Charles Gray hesitated for a moment, unsure whether he could share the task assigned to him by his superior with others. He was indecisive, so he lowered his head to observe Darrin Grant's expression. But Darrin Grant was just a long-haired cat, its face covered in sleek, shiny black fur, and Charles Gray couldn't find a single stray color in it.

Darrin Grant silently covered its face with its front paw—broad daylight, and instead of speaking properly, did he really need to consult a cat?

It felt that the conclusion their wise and heroic leader had drawn about this peculiar intern was absolutely correct and hit the nail on the head.

Fortunately, William Sherman was tactful. Seeing his discomfort, he immediately said, “You know, I didn’t really think before I spoke just now. I just blurted it out, sorry, I wasn’t actually trying to pry.”

Charles Gray lowered his head in shame... though he couldn’t quite figure out why he should feel ashamed.

“Have you eaten? I bought quite a lot. If you don’t mind, would you like to come in and have some?” William Sherman offered.

Charles Gray was about to refuse, but his stomach growled—actually, he hadn’t eaten or drunk anything since the previous night, almost a whole day.

While he was still hesitating and struggling with his decision, William Sherman had already successfully summoned Darrin Grant: “Come here, kitty, I bought some milk. The doctor on duty has probably gone to eat too. Let’s be quiet and not let anyone see us.”

Watching his pillar of support—the fat cat Darrin Grant—succumb to temptation and abandon him without a second thought, Charles Gray was left with no choice but to muddle along after them.

William Sherman, perhaps worried he’d feel awkward, tried to make small talk: “Officer Xiao Guo, you look quite young, about the same age as my students. You haven’t been working long, have you?”

Charles Gray answered honestly, “It’s my second day today…”

William Sherman smiled. “How does it feel to enter the workforce?”

Not great at all… but Charles Gray still chose his words carefully: “It’s okay, I guess.”

William Sherman led the man and the cat down the narrow corridor of the campus hospital, his gaze flickering behind his glasses before he casually asked, “Are your colleagues and… your boss treating you well?”

“Director Zhao is nice to me—oh, that’s the person from this morning. As for my colleagues…” Charles Gray’s expression twisted subtly as he recalled Old Wu’s paper-thin face and Wang Zheng’s head that looked stitched back on after being chopped off. He finally said, with a bit of a toothache, “They’re… they’re pretty good too.”

“Director Zhao.” William Sherman repeated softly, then asked, “Is your Director Zhao usually busy?”

Charles Gray scratched his head. “Probably… probably busy, I guess? It’s my first day, so I really don’t know.”

William Sherman asked again, “What do you think of him as a person?”

Charles Gray: “He’s pretty good.”

William Sherman looked at him. “Why do you seem a little afraid of him?”

Charles Gray jumped: “He’s the boss, after all…”

William Sherman couldn’t help but laugh, realizing he wouldn’t get much more out of him, so he stopped pressing. The two of them arrived at Quinn Barnes’s hospital room.

William Sherman seemed used to taking care of others. He quickly set out the food, distributed the utensils, found a microwave to heat up a few bags of milk, and finally tore the lid off a disposable meal box, poured in the hot milk, and pushed it in front of Darrin Grant: “Let’s eat, don’t just stand there.”

Charles Gray was already so hungry his chest was sticking to his back, but his appetite was still weak. Back in school, he rarely ate in the cafeteria—not because the food was bad, but because when there were too many people, someone would come to share his table, and he’d feel so uncomfortable his appetite would vanish. Let alone now, eating with two strangers in a hospital room.

Quinn Barnes was even more out of sorts, barely able to eat. Whether in speech or behavior, she seemed extremely disoriented. If the campus doctor hadn’t said she was fine, William Sherman would have suspected she was on drugs.

Professor Sherman noticed that whenever he fell silent, the only sound left in the room was the black cat Darrin Grant lapping up milk. So he tried to make conversation with Quinn Barnes: “You said you’re a local. Is your home far from here? If not, maybe you should go home and rest for a few days. If you need, I can talk to your advisor for you.”

Quinn Barnes’s chopsticks paused almost imperceptibly. After a moment’s hesitation, she said softly, “At home… there’s a funeral going on. We have a lot of relatives visiting these days, and there’s no room.”

William Sherman was taken aback.

Quinn Barnes poked at her rice with her chopsticks. “My grandmother… passed away a couple of days ago.”

William Sherman immediately apologized, “I’m sorry, I didn’t know. My condolences.”

Quinn Barnes kept her head down and didn’t respond, swallowing mouthfuls of plain rice.

William Sherman picked up an extra pair of chopsticks, used them as serving chopsticks to put some food in her bowl: “I just bought a few things at random, not sure if you’ll like them, but try to eat a little.”

Charles Gray, who had been pretending he didn’t exist, suddenly blurted out, “I was raised by my grandmother too. She passed away when I was sixteen, and because of that, I took half a year off from school.”

William Sherman and Quinn Barnes both looked at him.

Charles Gray was silent for a while, then said gloomily, “I was never very promising as a kid. When other kids bullied me, I didn’t dare fight back or cry. If she found out, she’d take me all the way to school to confront them, then scold me at home… She’d take me out to buy yogurt, chocolate, candy, vegetarian buns from Qingfeng. She never ate any herself, gave them all to me. Even when I tried to feed her, she’d just take a small bite… When I was little, I always thought that when I grew up and made money, I’d be filial to her, buy her yogurt, chocolate, little buns too. But… she didn’t live to see it.”

Something in Quinn Barnes seemed to be touched, and her eyes began to fill with tears. Charles Gray was oblivious, speaking more to himself than to anyone else: “She passed away in her sleep at night. No one knew. The next morning, when she didn’t get up, we went to call her and found out… For years, I kept dreaming about her. When I was on leave from school, I’d dream every day that she was pushing me, telling me, ‘Go study, study hard.’ Later, when I went back to school, sometimes when my grades were good, she’d smile at me in my dreams. When my grades dropped, she’d look at me and sigh. This went on until I got into college.”

Charles Gray looked like a wilted eggplant. William Sherman couldn’t help but pat his head.

Charles Gray gave him a shy smile, which quickly faded: “I got my admission letter later than everyone else… third batch, it was already September. That night, the last time I saw her, she told me, ‘You’ve grown up, Grandma can rest easy now, so I’m leaving.’ I asked her where she was going, but she just shook her head and said she was going where the dead go, and the living shouldn’t ask. After that, I never dreamed of her again, not even once. My uncle said she was reincarnated.”

Quinn Barnes’s tears fell silently, like a string of broken pearls.

“What I mean is…” Charles Gray awkwardly scratched his head. For once, because he could relate, he’d managed to say so much that he almost admired himself. “Hey, classmate, don’t cry. When my grandma just passed, I felt like the sky was falling too, like I’d never be able to be filial to her again, so what was the point of studying or working hard? I would have traded my life for hers back then, but… sigh, I’m still not good with words. What I mean is, don’t be sad. Our loved ones who’ve passed are all watching over us.”

He might have been better off not saying anything, because as soon as he finished, Quinn Barnes began to tremble all over and burst into uncontrollable sobs. She cried so hard she lost all awareness, her limbs twitching involuntarily.

William Sherman hurried out to call the campus doctor. Charles Gray had never seen anyone so overcome with grief, and stood helplessly to the side.

The campus doctor was only used to prescribing cold medicine or anti-diarrheals, not giving sedatives. Seeing this, he immediately waved his hand: “Transfer her to the Second Hospital!”

Charles Gray had no choice but to help William Sherman take Quinn Barnes out of the campus hospital and send her to the hospital. Sitting in William Sherman’s car, holding down a barely conscious stranger, Charles Gray looked out the window at the receding Longcheng University and felt more than ever that work was truly awful.

William Sherman was neither Quinn Barnes’s advisor nor her counselor, nor even her political instructor. As a teacher of an elective course, he was already being as responsible and caring as anyone could be. At least, Charles Gray had never seen such a good professor at his own shabby school.

Registration and paying the deposit were all handled by him. After getting her into the ER, Charles Gray saw William Sherman in the hallway, calling colleagues to ask about Quinn Barnes’s situation and her family’s contact information.

Even though William Sherman’s tone was always calm and polite, Charles Gray could still sense something was wrong. When William Sherman spoke to Quinn Barnes’s father on the phone, he kept getting cut off mid-sentence, as if the other party kept interrupting him. After a while, William Sherman put down the phone with a hint of resignation, pinched the bridge of his nose, and made another call.

It was the same with several calls in a row.