usatvline 0005 Acquaintance
0005 Acquaintance
Since the accident occurred in the early morning, there was not much traffic on the road at around 7 a.m.
The traffic policeman surnamed Huang took less than half an hour to get Zhu Shiting to the emergency department of the county's People's Hospital.
Seeing that the boy was lively and energetic after the check-up, and the doctor said it was all just superficial injuries, the traffic policeman instructed, "Your car insurance has already called a crane and tow truck to take it up the mountain. It will be sent to the designated repair shop later."
"There are still two traffic violations on the list. Remember to handle them on the traffic management hotline 12123 after you are discharged from the hospital."
"You're a grown man. After an accident while driving a delivery truck, who would try to save money by not calling an ambulance? You must be more careful when driving in the future!"
The traffic policeman was a kind-hearted man who comforted and reassured the frightened Zhu Shiting along the way.
After arriving at the hospital, she even helped Zhu Shiting run around to various examinations.
"Okay, thank you for your help, Officer Huang!"
After being criticized and lectured by Uncle Huang, Zhu Shiting humbly accepted the criticism and quickly expressed his gratitude as the man was about to leave.
"The morning rush hour is about to start, and I still have to go on patrol duty."
"If you have any questions later, Xiao Wu will contact you via WeChat."
After saying that, the traffic policeman surnamed Huang hurriedly left.
Zhu Shiting was left lying on the hospital bed, letting the big-eyed nurse wearing a mask apply medicine and give him injections, and hang several bottles of anti-inflammatory and healing IV drips.
……
Half an hour later, I got really bored waiting for the IV drip.
Having survived the ordeal, Zhu Shiting opened the small black bag he had brought with one hand and took out the jade hairpin he had exchanged with Sun Lu, examining it carefully in his hand.
This jade hairpin is slender like a fountain pen, white all over, with an oily sheen. One end is carved with a mushroom head, and the hairpin is covered with shallow cloud patterns.
Upon closer inspection, there are two seals under the mushroom-shaped head: one reads "[Made by Zigang]" and the other is Sun Lu's maiden name, "[Presented to Yingning]".
"This thing should be worth some money, right?"
"Otherwise, taking this early train would be a huge loss!"
Zhu Shiting looked at the jade hairpin and muttered to himself.
Although there is insurance to cover car repairs and compensation for goods, he will have to pay at least several thousand yuan out of pocket after this accident.
If the hairpin he brought back from the late Ming Dynasty can't fetch a good price, then it would be too foolish of him to risk teleporting back.
Just as I was pondering this, a female doctor who looked somewhat familiar approached the bedside.
The other person first glanced at the patient's name on the bed, then stared at Zhu Shiting for a moment, before tentatively asking, "Brother Pig?"
Upon hearing this nickname—a nickname given to him during his school days because of a hit song—Zhu Shiting's face darkened. He quickly stuffed the jade hairpin back into his black bag and asked, "Beautiful lady, who are you?"
The female doctor smiled and removed her mask, revealing a pretty face with prominent canine teeth and a sweet, adorable appearance: "Old classmate, it's me! Wang Yingying!"
"Holy crap, it's the class representative for Chinese!"
Zhu Shiting vaguely recognized the girl's appearance; she was his classmate in high school.
However, it has been almost 10 years since I graduated from high school. The class representative who used to wear glasses all the time and had dark skin has grown into a graceful and beautiful young woman.
She looks almost like a completely different person before and after, truly proving the saying that a girl changes drastically as she grows up.
"How did you know I was here?" Zhu Shiting asked curiously.
Wang Yingying explained, "I was on duty in the emergency room. I saw a patient's name on the computer that sounded a lot like yours, Brother Pig, so I came to check it out. I didn't expect it to really be you!"
Rui County is a tiny place with a population of around one million, and there's only one People's Hospital on Wansong Road.
If you encounter someone in the emergency room with a minor headache, fever, or some kind of minor injury, there's a high chance they'll come across this person.
Of course, the two old classmates met unexpectedly, exchanged a few warm and subtle words, and then started catching up on each other's recent situations.
Upon learning that this class representative for Chinese language had started working at the People's Hospital right after graduating from university, saving lives and earning a government salary, Zhu Shiting remarked with considerable emotion, "You academic high-achievers still have it easy."
"It's alright! I see that many of the male classmates in our class are living pretty comfortable lives, and most of them are married and have kids." Wang Yingying smiled.
Zhu Shiting came from a rural background and failed the college entrance examination, only getting into a vocational college. A few years after graduation, he encountered the special period of the pandemic, and the company he worked for laid off a large number of employees, leaving him unemployed at home.
After the pandemic restrictions were lifted, I still couldn't find a job. With nothing to do, I bought a used pickup truck and started driving for Lalamove. I drove every day, rain or shine, working myself to the bone, and only earned two or three hundred yuan.
Unlike Wang Yingying, who got into a top medical university, completed her internship and residency training, became a physician, and earned hundreds of thousands of yuan every year without fail.
If your career goes smoothly in the future, and you have mentors to guide and support you, you can easily climb the ranks to become a chief physician and earn an annual salary of one million.
If she finds a husband of equal social standing at the right age, she can definitely squeeze into the upper class of a small county town.
Of course, Zhu Shiting wasn't foolish enough to ask the other person if they were dating or married.
Men shouldn't ask about income, and women shouldn't ask about marriage; these are basic common sense principles for navigating society.
After learning that Zhu Shiting was currently delivering goods and had been involved in a serious car accident, Wang Yingying looked at her old classmate's attire and his unfortunate situation, and said nothing more than a forced smile.
She gently advised him to drive carefully on the road, and even took a few glances at the diagnosis on the bedside medical record: "It's nothing serious, just superficial injuries. Go back, apply some medicine, and let it rest for a few days."
"I'll head back to my shift now, Brother Pig, you get some rest!"
After chatting for a while about gossip from her high school teachers and classmates, Wang Yingying left the noisy hospital area with light steps, without adding Zhu Shiting on WeChat.
Seeing this, Zhu Shiting wisely refrained from exchanging contact information.
If you're all in the same classmate group and have a good relationship and frequent contact with each other in private, you would have been WeChat friends long ago.
The gap between people widens infinitely as soon as they step into society.
"Why force yourself to fit into different circles?"
"Fortunately, with this jade pendant, I have a chance to defy fate and turn my life around!"
Zhu Shiting touched the slightly warm ancestral jade pendant on his chest, and in an instant, the gloom and dejection in his heart were swept away.
……
After receiving an IV drip until midday, Zhu Shiting, carrying a plastic bag and a small black purse, finally stepped out of the People's Hospital gate, full of energy.
After a morning of running around, he was feeling quite hungry and turned into the commercial street next to the hospital.
The hawking of vendors along the way, and the aroma of fried rice and noodles, whetted his appetite.
Thinking about his near-death experience this morning, Zhu Shiting realized he had wronged himself in the past and decided not to eat those cheap roast pork trotter rice dishes that cost only a dozen yuan to fill his stomach.
Instead, they went to a Wenzhou food stall that served home-style dishes and ordered sweet and sour pork ribs, steamed blue crab, crispy ribbonfish, and tomato egg soup to treat themselves.
Looking at the ¥135 printed on the receipt, Zhu Shiting, who had been sitting down and boasting about his meal, felt a surge of emotion: "This meal cost me most of my driving income for half a day. I'm really living a good life."
After eating and drinking his fill, Zhu Shiting, whose stomach was still bloated and had left a lot of food on the table, looked out through the floor-to-ceiling windows at the bustling street. With a toothpick in his mouth, he began to try to recall where in the county town there were shops that bought antiques and jade.
Ruixian County is a place with high housing prices, high cost of living, and low income. Most of the people living here are shrewd and pragmatic ordinary citizens.
In an environment where everyone is a business savvy, cost-effectiveness has become the sole standard for measuring the value of an item.
Therefore, even as he sat digesting his food and racking his brains, Zhu Shiting couldn't recall where he had seen a similar antique shop when he was out delivering goods.
After all, business people and big bosses in the Vancouver area rarely collect antiques and collectibles. In their eyes, antiques are not cost-effective!
Prices fluctuate greatly, and there's a risk of being stuck with counterfeit goods, making it very inconvenient to sell them for cash.
Even if there are collectors in Vancouver, it's a very niche circle that ordinary people have no access to.
"Never mind, I'll go ask at a jade shop."
"This jade hairpin is, after all, a piece of jade; someone should be willing to buy it."
Zhu Shiting pondered for a moment, bit off the toothpick, went out, hailed a taxi, gave the driver the address, and soon arrived at an old shop called "Yu Shang Mei Yu" on Zhongrong Road.
Over the years, Zhu Shiting has frequently passed through this place and has a deep impression of this jade shop.
The shop has three doors and is decorated in a very grand style. It seems that there is another floor upstairs that belongs to them. They are definitely the most powerful jade shop in the county.
It was afternoon, and several female sales clerks were chatting and scrolling through their phones on the first floor.
Seeing that Zhu Shiting had gauze and bandages on his face, and that he was dressed slovenly and carrying a bag, he didn't look like a rich person.
Because wealthy people in the Vancouver area pay great attention to their appearance, they are always impeccably dressed when they go out shopping, unlike him who looks disheveled.
Fortunately, one of the female sales clerks, upholding professional ethics, casually asked as a customer entered, "Handsome, are you buying jade?"
"Just came in to take a look."
Zhu Shiting smiled and pretended to walk around the store.
When he saw the jade jewelry in the display case, each priced at tens or hundreds of thousands of yuan, his heart skipped a beat.
Seeing that he was like a silent gourd, keeping his head down and staring at the exhibits in the counter the whole time, the female sales clerks didn't ask him any questions and let the young man wander around the store.
After looking around for a few minutes, Zhu Shiting looked up and asked, "Do you buy jade here?"