T/N: Today is double update again! If you haven’t read the previous chapter, please do so first. Thank you!
Perhaps sensing his son’s return, on the night Bian Cheng came back to the country, Bian Huaiyuan regained consciousness.
His eyelids felt heavy as lead, flickering open and closed several times. Slowly, his consciousness slowly floated to the surface in his blurred vision. The hospital room was dimly lit, and each breath came with a heavy, obstructed sensation. The steady ticking of medical equipment echoed in his ears, connecting him to the world, its rhythmic sound telling him that he was still alive.
The pain from the surgery felt like a hidden undercurrent deep beneath the sea—he could feel its presence, but now the warmth of the sedatives was masking it.
The doctor came over quickly to check his vital signs, confirming the stability of his heart rate and blood pressure, as well as the ability to move his limbs.
As his consciousness became clearer, Bian Huaiyuan tried to move his fingers to regain control of his body.
The doctor asked him if he understood what was happening and if there was any numbness or tingling in his limbs.
Bian Huaiyuan shook his head, his gaze drifting behind the doctor—Bian Cheng was there.
The doctor noted his response and turned to Bian Cheng, saying: “He is out of danger now, but we will need to continue monitoring him for 12 more hours.”
Bian Cheng nodded in thanks and moved a chair to sit beside the bed, asking his father if he wanted some water.
Bian Huaiyuan shook his head, silently watching him: “I dreamed about something that happened a long time ago.”
His hand hovered above the water cup.
“Do you remember when you were eleven?” Bian Huaiyuan asked. “You were training in Nanjing for the IMO finals, and you were only this big at that time.” His muscles were still too numb to gesture, so he could only use expressions to show his memories of the past.
Bian Cheng naturally remembered. He had a clear recollection of everything.
“Two years before that the national team won gold medals, and the coach wanted to keep the championship for three consecutive years. You were under too much pressure and couldn’t sleep all night,” Bian Huaiyuan said. “Every time I visited you, your face was stone cold, no smiles at all. I thought, ‘You love math so much. How can you let something you love become so painful?’ So I smuggled you back home in a car.”
“But then the coach called and scolded me, so I had to go back.”
“Yes,” Bian Huaiyuan said, “but at least you got to spend a day at Xuanwu Lake.”
Speaking of good memories, there were still a lot left.
“After that, I stopped doing those things,” Bian Huaiyuan said. “I tried to find other ways to make you happy. Our family doesn’t have much of a sense of humor, so I started searching for jokes online and told them to you when I visited. Unfortunately, you, this kid, were too hard to please. You never laughed even once.”
“Those jokes were really boring.”
Bian Huaiyuan sighed and stared at the ceiling. “Then I woke up, and it felt like that dream was from a past life.”
Bian Cheng silently withdrew his hand, resting it on the edge of the bed, just an inch away from the soft tube connected to his father’s hand.
Bian Huaiyuan slightly turned his head to look at him, his hair rubbing against the pillow and making a rustling sound: “How did we become like this?”
This was the sword of Damocles, and it was only a matter of time before it fell. Now, the patient on the bed had actively severed the cord.
“I met her only after your mother passed away,” Bian Huaiyuan said. “I don’t understand how you could think that about me. I went to college with your mother, we shared over twenty years of relationship. Do you really think it was all fake?”
Bian Cheng looked at the electrocardiogram monitor beside the bed, and saw a green arc slowly drawing: “I was very angry at that time, I didn’t think before I spoke. Don’t take it to heart, dad.”
“Have I not been good to your mother? Have I not been good to your grandfather?” Bian Huaiyuan’s breathing quickened, his fingers bending and trembling, “Can a person act for over twenty years? What were you thinking?”
Bian Cheng instinctively grasped his hand. No matter what, this was his father. Despite the broken ten years in between, the lies, the doubts, and the grudges, but the hands that built Lego together in childhood, the voice reading by the bed, the soccer rolling on the lawn—those were all real.
For him, most of the time, his father truly had been a good one.
“Dad, don’t get agitated. You’ve just recovered, and the doctor said you need to rest,” Bian Cheng spoke more slowly, his tone softening with reassurance. “I told you, it was just something I said in anger.”
“Dad is just an ordinary man,” Bian Huaiyuan said, his voice fragile. “When a young, beautiful girl comes close, it’s inevitable to be moved.. I don’t expect you to understand, but… you can’t… just treat me like a sinner, you can’t deny me…” He paused for a moment. “When I heard what you said, it was like being stabbed in the heart, I couldn’t even breathe. When I collapsed, I thought, maybe you’d only forgive me if I died.”
Bian Cheng’s hand, hanging at his side, suddenly trembled.
He looked at his father, who had just returned from the brink of death, and suddenly realized that he might never be able to speak of his marriage.
“Forgiveness isn’t the issue,” he said quietly. “We both have our own lives. I wish you had told me earlier.”
“I pushed you toward blind dates because I want you to be happy,” Bian Huaiyuan said. “With this body of mine, who knows how many more years I have left. Before I die, if I could see you get married and have children…”
“Don’t say such unlucky things,” Bian Cheng interrupted him. “The doctor said the surgery was very successful. As long as you rest properly, there won’t be any problems.”
Bian Huaiyuan sighed, “I know; I’m not going to force you to marry anyone. Can’t you just be with someone you like? There are so many excellent girls; don’t you like any of them?”
Bian Cheng decided not to argue about his orientation anymore.
“Dad,” Bian Cheng said, “let’s make a gentleman’s agreement.”
Bian Huaiyuan looked at him. “What agreement?”
“I won’t publicly disclose my orientation, and I’ll make sure no one in the circle will know your son is gay,” Bian Cheng said. “And you also can’t try to get me to marry.”
Bian Huaiyuan looked at his son. The other person met his gaze, unwavering.
He looked down; the hand that could once be held in one palm was now easily grasped by him.
“Alright,” he said. “Alright.”
A temporary truce.
Bian Huaiyuan turned his head and saw the water cup beside the bed. Bian Cheng picked it up and brought the straw to his lips. The water flowed slowly through the tube, and Bian Huaiyuan tried to lift his hand to hold the cup, but his hand rose halfway and then fell dejectedly. In that instant, the person in the bed suddenly seemed much older. This sense of fragility made Bian Cheng realize that he had already lost.
He was weak, and after chatting for a while, Bian Huaiyuan fell into a deep sleep again. Bian Cheng walked out of the ward and sat down on the bench where his brother had sat earlier, thinking about his new husband.
He left without a word, traveling across the ocean, and didn’t leave any contact information. When that person wakes up in the hotel, finding the space beside him empty, with his husband having vanished into thin air, what would that feeling be like?
Bian Cheng ran a hand through his hair in frustration, burying his face in his hands. He had to find this person, but he knew nothing about him except that his name was Wen Di and he had a very common English name.
He recalled the youthful face of that young man, the messy hair while he slept, the loud curses in the empty alley, the warm kiss in the casino. These memories were too vivid, like fireworks flashing across a desolate wasteland.
What were these memories to that person? Perhaps they were a misfortune that fell from the sky.
In a way, this understanding was not wrong. After waking up, Wen Di indeed wailed for a full twenty minutes.
“He robbed me of my body, but why did he take my money too?” Wen Di cried bitterly, holding his clothes. “My rent, my food money…”
Jiang Nanze, watching coldly, felt his legs ache and reached out to lift him, dragging him out of the hotel and tossing him into a taxi: “Alright, alright, even though he cheated you of money and sex, at least he left you all your organs intact.”
Wen Di looked at him sadly, not feeling comforted at all: “He even took my phone! What was the point of taking that broken thing? It had so much of my balance left…”
Jiang Nanze sighed and pulled out his phone: “Here, you can use mine for now.”
Wen Di stared at the phone, ready to make a move, but hesitant out of politeness: “You’re really giving it to me?”
“I wanted to get a new one anyway; it’s a waste to just throw it away.” Jiang Nanze tossed the phone into his arms. “I was the one who asked you to flirt with that man. I am half responsible for this. Consider it my compensation for your loss.”
Wen Di sniffled, hesitated for a moment, and still took the phone. He really needed it right now.
“If your living expenses aren’t enough, I can lend you some,” Jiang Nanze added.
Wen Di thought for a moment and then said without hesitation: “I’ll pay you back as soon as possible.”
One night of spring is temporary, but the pain stretches endlessly. In the following two months, he found a part-time job as an online tutor, filling his study abroad life with crazy classes. All travel plans were canceled, and the food expenses were cut again and again.
While calculating the tuition fees deducted by the institution, he cursed that unknown man furiously in his heart.
He finally understood that all men were fucking bad. From now on, if he fell for another man, may a swift lightning strike blind his eyes—this unrepentant, hopeless romantic brain of his!
The author has something to say:
Finally Finally Finally …… back to the present
T/N: yeayy we’re back to present in the next chapter! As usual, new chapter on every weekdays so there’s an update tomorrow too!
