Chapter 47: The Open Auditions

Tang Songyuan pulled back the foot he had stretched toward the floor, glanced at the back of Tao Fei, who was turned away, and pressed the answer button.

A hurried, shrill woman's voice came through the phone.

"Mom, it's my fault. Go ahead and scold me."

Tang Songyuan's voice was unusually calm.

"&*^%$#……"

The person on the other end really started yelling and scolding. Tao Fei pricked up her ears to listen out of sheer curiosity. Making a phone call in the middle of the night definitely meant something had happened at the older man's home, so it was normal for his mother to call and berate him.

"Yeah, alright, okay, get some rest early."

Tang Songyuan hung up the phone and cast another glance at Tao Fei. Tao Fei remained completely motionless, not even the sound of her breathing audible. This was identical to the situation over the past few days, always making Tang Songyuan half-wonder if Tao Fei was already dead, prompting him to instinctively reach out and check her nasal breathing.

Dead people do not lie on their sides. Tang Songyuan gave a self-deprecating stroke to his cheek. Having stayed in the hospital to accompany her for three consecutive days, a dense stubble of beard had sprouted like bamboo shoots after a spring rain along his jawline and chin.

"Tao Fei."

Tang Songyuan tentatively called out in a soft voice, and Tao Fei continued to feign sleep. The rustling noise turned into soft snoring, and Tao Fei finally relaxed and lay flat on her back.

Leaving the hospital the day after tomorrow was out of the question! Until the time portal back to her own era opened, she absolutely could not leave Anhe Hospital.

Tao Fei reached out to stroke the body of a forty-year-old woman. What kind of body was this?

Ice-cold and slender, without a shred of excess flesh. A waist so thin a pair of hands could span it, looking as though it had been bound in a whalebone corset. If not for the heartbeat thumping within her chest, she would have truly suspected this was a human mannequin.

A faint, hazy glow filtered through the bathroom. Unable to suppress her curiosity, Tao Fei padded barefoot to the bathroom mirror and looked left and right. Although the mirror was only sixty by eighty centimeters and the lighting was far from bright, it was more than enough for Tao Fei to take in the full view of her body.

This was the look of an aloof, ascetic woman! She actually matched the tough older man quite well. Tao Fei rubbed her cheeks, only now beginning to slightly accept her post-transmigration appearance.

That night, Tao Fei was plagued by endless nightmares, struggling relentlessly within the confines of a forty-year-old woman's body, unable to break free.

"Family member of the patient, why are you sleeping in the hospital bed!"

The sharp reprimand of the cleaning auntie woke Tang Songyuan and also startled Tao Fei awake.

"I saw no one was staying here, so I lay down for a moment."

"How could no one be staying here! The double rooms in our hospital are the most sought after; patients will be moving in shortly. Honestly..."

The cleaning lady twisted around, pushing past Tang Songyuan, who was flusteredly tidying up the bedding. Tang Songyuan smiled and turned back to look at Tao Fei. Tao Fei had just wiped the cold sweat from her forehead and was also looking right back at Tang Songyuan. Seeing the older man, Tang Songyuan, in the morning gave a completely different feeling from the previous night. There were already a few strands of white hair at his temples, and his beard had a grayish-white tint. Set against his dark suit and light-colored shirt with an open collar, he possessed a certain mature masculine charm.

Tao Fei was momentarily dazed, and seeing Tang Songyuan ask her what she would like to eat, she simply shook her head.

"You have to eat something; staying entirely on intravenous drips won't do."

"I have no appetite."

"Even if you have no appetite, you still have to eat."

Tang Songyuan pulled open the cabinet door, took out a square glass lunch box, and waved it at Tao Fei.

"I'll go buy a bowl of wontons and be right back."

Tao Fei was noncommittal, somewhat startled by the sound of her own voice. For a forty-year-old woman, the voice turned out to be almost identical in pitch to her twenty-year-old self, completely devoid of any sense of discordance.

The attending doctor was in his thirties, wearing silver-rimmed glasses. He extended a pair of fair-skinned fingers to flip through Tao Fei's medical chart while asking Tang Songyuan about the patient's condition during the previous night.

Tao Fei stared at Qin Kai's employee badge: Chief Physician, Qin Kai. Qin Kai's speech and demeanor were identical to those of the young professors at medical school, and this sense of familiarity made Tao Fei feel a special warmth.

"Let me check the wound healing progress."

The pretty nurse from last night, Li Yamaha, hurriedly lifted Tao Fei's clothes. Tao Fei instinctively resisted being touched by a stranger and raised her hand to push the pretty nurse away.

"Why aren't you cooperating with the treatment?"

Before Li Yamaha could speak, Qin Kai looked at Tao Fei with a smile. Tao Fei's tense muscles relaxed. As a medical student, she naturally understood that the doctor was the closest ally a patient had.

"Don't worry, our Chief Qin's examinations don't hurt at all."

Bearing no grudge, Li Yamaha once again lifted Tao Fei's upper garment. At that moment, Qin Kai's cell phone rang. Looking extremely apologetic, Qin Kai fished out his phone, pressed the mute button, gave Tao Fei a polite smile, and signaled that he had to take the call.

With half of her abdomen exposed by Li Yamaha, Tao Fei felt somewhat displeased, pulled her clothes down, and covered herself up.

"... Chao Sheng is coming back?"

At the ward door, Qin Kai raised his voice in surprise, but realizing he was in a hospital room, he hurriedly covered his mouth and stepped out into the hallway.

"Sorry for delaying your time."

When Qin Kai came back in, his expression carried a trace of helplessness. After finishing the routine examination of Tao Fei's condition, he scribbled rapidly on the chart, crossed out a few lines, and raised a hand to adjust his silver-rimmed glasses.

"Chief Qin, are you alright?"

Li Yamaha looked at Qin Kai with concern; not even the most imperceptible expression of Qin Kai could escape her eyes.

"I'm fine."

Qin Kai strode out quickly, and Li Yamaha hurriedly chased after him.

"Nurse Li—"

"That Nurse Li definitely has feelings for that Chief Qin..."

Tang Songyuan stared at the nursing sign hanging at the foot of the bed, rubbed his cheek, and let out a wry chuckle.

Even the older man loved gossip!

Tao Fei had never been interested in gossip; all she wanted to do was stall for time and delay her discharge.

Seeing Tao Fei gaze apathetically out the window, Tang Songyuan assumed that his unconscious gossip had angered Tao Fei. However, words spoken were like water poured out—they could never be taken back.

Just as Tang Songyuan was pondering how to salvage his ruined image, the cell phone in his pocket buzzed.

"Songyuan, come downstairs right now. The hospital security won't let me up to see Tao Fei; you'll have to come down and switch places with me."

Zhou Meixiang's shrill voice made Tang Songyuan's eardrums ache.

"Fine, okay, I'm coming down right now."

Looking immensely relieved, Tang Songyuan hung up the phone and smiled at Tao Fei.

"Your mom is here. I'm going downstairs to swap with her. Hospital rules don't permit family visits during doctor rounds, so we have to take turns."

Watching Tang Songyuan's hurried retreating figure, Tao Fei suddenly grew anxious about her current predicament. Having an older husband was distressing enough, and now a shrill-voiced, hot-tempered mother had shown up! Would some son or daughter pop up to visit her later on?

There was simply no living like this!

Tao Fei forced herself to calm down. Right now, her only option was to let water be met with earth and soldiers with shields, maintaining a steadfast calmness in the face of all changes.

Barely two minutes after Tao Fei was hooked up to her IV drip, an elderly woman in her sixties appeared at the doorway of wards 515 and 516.

Seeing her daughter Tao Fei half-reclining on the elevated hospital bed, Zhou Meixiang hurried forward in a few quick steps and threw herself over the bedside.

"Tao Fei, how did you get sick without even letting me know? If I hadn't gone to your place last night and found you gone, and then called Songyuan to find out you'd undergone major surgery, when did you ever start treating your maternal home like strangers!"

As Zhou Meixiang spoke, she grasped Tao Fei's hand, her eye sockets suddenly turning red.