“Starting today, you, my brother, and I…”
Silence had grown thicker and thicker.
The silence in the hospital room was so intense that it seemed as though someone had activated the pause button.
Qin Lezhou didn’t dare breathe normally until he shifted his gaze away from Lu Sihuai and landed on Ye Ning lying in the hospital bed.
Qin Lezhou seemed to wake up all of a sudden. He jogged a step forward and blocked the space between Ye Ning and Lu Sihuai.
“Ge, did Luo Guang and Haonan-ge tell you or not? Luo Guang hurt his leg by falling on his own—it had nothing to do with Ye Ning. Yesterday I fell, Ye Ning saved me, and then…”
Lu Sihuai didn’t say a word; he just looked at him.
Qin Lezhou paused awkwardly, scratched his chin, and said, “Then I ended up making him fall too.”
“From yesterday until now, the two of us have both been in the hospital.”
The room fell silent again.
“You both have been in the hospital.” Lu Sihuai suddenly spoke, his tone surprisingly gentle.
Qin Lezhou replied with two ‘mhm-mhm’ sounds.
Lu Sihuai said, “You’re pretty capable.”
Qin Lezhou: “……”
Feeling a bit guilty, Qin Lezhou hunched his shoulders.
Lu Sihuai unexpectedly glanced at Ye Ning.
Caught off guard and feeling uneasy, Ye Ning also hunched his shoulders without thinking. “……”
A sudden beep of a vibrating phone saved them both from the awkward moment.
Qin Lezhou craned his neck to look at Lu Sihuai’s lit-up phone screen. “It’s Uncle. It must be something important. Ge, hurry and answer!”
This time, Lu Sihuai didn’t say much. He only glanced at Ye Ning in the bed and turned to walk out.
Qin Lezhou hovered by the door for a while, staring until he saw Lu Sihuai take the elevator down. Only then did he exhale and return to Ye Ning’s bedside.
“My brother probably has something going on. He’s gone.”
Ye Ning, whose nerves had been taut all morning, finally relaxed and leaned back.
Finally.
When Qin Lezhou looked up, he saw Ye Ning’s eyes, dead as ashes, the whole person trapped under a shadow of utter exhaustion, like a collapsing ruin.
Only then did Qin Lezhou realize that his brother’s departure was good for him but for Ye Ning…
“You…” Qin Lezhou couldn’t find any words.
Raised with everyone doting on him, Qin Lezhou hardly knew how to comfort anyone. At that moment, he felt completely at a loss for words.
“It’s my uncle’s call. He’s a bit special—he’s a monk. He hardly ever calls, so it has to be something urgent.”
Ye Ning absorbed this vagueness while half-listening.
Oh.
But why was he telling him that?
Qin Lezhou awkwardly reached out a hand. “You… don’t be sad.”
Ye Ning: “…?”
“Ye Ning,” Qin Lezhou said after thinking for a long moment, blurting out a string of numbers, “This is my phone number. My WeChat is the same. You…”
He looked at Ye Ning’s bandaged hand, then at his ashen face and refusal to communicate, and sighed.
Sigh, right now, besides his brother, Ye Ning probably didn’t want to talk to anyone.
What was his fault? He had only fallen for someone who was impossible.
“Forget it,” Qin Lezhou said. He propped himself up on the hospital bed rail, took Ye Ning’s phone from the bedside table, aimed it at Ye Ning’s ‘heartbroken’ face, opened WeChat, added himself as a friend, went into contacts, added the contact, and then shoved the phone back into Ye Ning’s palm.
“This is my contact information. Keep it.”
“I’m not someone who forgets kindness. You saved me yesterday, and I will repay that favor.”
Ye Ning, who had his phone unlocked in a blur, had nothing to say. “……”
Outside every VIP room on the 21st floor was a nameplate. Qin Lezhou’s room was two doors down from Ye Ning’s. On his way to the rooftop, Ye Ning had glanced at the nameplate and memorized his name.
“Qin Lezhou.” Ye Ning suddenly called out.
His voice was a little hoarse, as if he was suppressing something strongly. Qin Lezhou felt uneasy. He looked at Ye Ning, wounded in body and heart, and finally hardened his resolve.
Qin Lezhou took out his phone, opened WeChat, found a familiar profile picture, tapped on it, and shared the contact.
The phone in Ye Ning’s hand buzzed.
He instinctively looked down.
A WeChat message notification popped up on the screen.
Before he could tap it, Qin Lezhou had already spoken, “Some things you have to solve yourselves. Outsiders like us can’t help.”
“This is my brother’s WeChat,” Qin Lezhou said, pausing. “I can only help this much.”
Ye Ning stared at the contact profile quietly resting in his phone. “….…”
Finally.
This world had turned into something he no longer recognized.
“Qin Lezhou.” Ye Ning lifted his head and looked at the person standing by his bed.
“Do you treat everyone who likes your brother this way?” Ye Ning asked genuinely.
Qin Lezhou looked as if he’d been stumped. After a moment’s thought, he said, “No, no.”
Ye Ning: “Then why are you treating me like this?”
One should not repay kindness with betrayal.
“Just because I saved you?” Ye Ning pressed on.
“Well… not exactly.” Qin Lezhou didn’t know how to answer either. “Mainly, I think you… are a really good person.”
Ye Ning: “……”
Thank you very much.
Ye Ning held the phone with Lu Sihuai’s number as if he were cradling a bomb.
Ye Ning thought to himself that he couldn’t have any unnecessary contact with the male lead or anyone around him anymore.
He had turned love into hatred. With such a twisted mind, anything he did or said was not surprising.
Ye Ning made up his mind.
“‘Really good?” Ye Ning said, raising his head and staring at Qin Lezhou for two or three seconds. Then he let out a short, ironic laugh. “Just because I saved you?”
There was a hint of sarcasm in that laugh.
Then, right in front of Qin Lezhou, Ye Ning picked up his phone, opened WeChat, selected the contact profile quietly sitting in the message list, and deleted it.
He looked at Qin Lezhou without a hint of doubt. “You’re Lu Sihuai’s little brother, and yet you’re so naive.”
A prompt popped up on the phone screen.
[Do you want to delete this message?]
Ye Ning’s finger pressed down on the bright red ‘Confirm.’
The bomb had been defused successfully.
The scorching hot contact profile vanished completely.
“Didn’t you think for a second that if it weren’t for your brother, I wouldn’t have saved you at all? I would have just walked by and pretended not to see you, no matter how long you lay on those steps or how long the rain drenched you. I wouldn’t have even called for help.”
“You!” Qin Lezhou watched in disbelief as Ye Ning wiped his sent contact card clean.
But Ye Ning’s fingers didn’t stop. This time, he tapped on Qin Lezhou’s avatar.
Avatar… upper right corner… Profile settings… the very last option.
Ye Ning tapped each option in sequence, his pale finger finally stopping on the red ‘Delete Contact’ button.
Ye Ning wasn’t only going to delete his brother; he was deleting him too.
Qin Lezhou’s eyes widened in disbelief.
When he woke up in the hospital this morning and found out it was Ye Ning who had saved him, Qin Lezhou had suspected that Ye Ning did it to get close to his brother, and he had accepted that fact. However, when he walked into the room and actually met Ye Ning, it felt different from what he had imagined.
Yet, now Ye Ning had admitted that he had saved him merely to get close to his brother and even said something like, “I wouldn’t have even called for help.”
What was that about?
Qin Lezhou exploded in anger. “Ye Ning, I was trying to be nice…”
“Enough!”
A voice suddenly came from the door.
Ye Ning’s hand trembled as it tapped the screen, and the phone fell onto the blanket.
Both of them looked over to see Zhao Haonan walking in with a complex expression, as if he had been listening at the door for a long time.
Qin Lezhou clenched his teeth. “Haonan-ge, you heard it all, Ye Ning—”
“Lezhou.” Zhao Haonan’s voice was low as he cut Qin Lezhou off.
“Don’t say anything. I heard it all.”
Ye Ning was stunned for a moment but quickly snapped back to reality.
Right now, the ‘main group’ connected to him, apart from Qin Lezhou, was Zhao Haonan and the others. Since the root of the matter also lay with Zhao Haonan and his group, and Zhao Haonan had heard it and recognized his real intention, everything naturally should return to the right track.
Good—no one left out.
“Didn’t you realize he was doing it on purpose?” Zhao Haonan said.
Ye Ning: “…?”
Zhao Haonan looked at Ye Ning’s pale face and couldn’t bear to meet his eyes. He grabbed Qin Lezhou, who was turning to leave. His voice was choked.
The hospital room instantly went silent.
Not only Qin Lezhou —even Ye Ning froze.
Qin Lezhou: “On purpose… what?”
Zhao Haonan wiped his face and said, “If he really saved you merely to use you and get close to your brother, then he should have gone ahead and added your contact information, added Huai-ge’s contact information, and then used every possible method to get close to you.”
Zhao Haonan choked up, his voice even hoarser. “Not like this—deleting everything clean.”
Breathing monitor.
Ye Ning felt he really needed a breathing monitor right now. His heart was going to explode.
Zhao Haonan was such a good liar. He wondered why he hadn’t become a screenwriter.
Ye Ning clenched the blanket so hard he almost lunged to grab Zhao Haonan’s collar.
Qin Lezhou was completely stunned. He turned his head very slowly to look at Ye Ning, who sat on the bed in silence.
Ye Ning’s shoulders were shaking, his fingers trembling, as he lowered his head. His face was still pale and frail, as if he were in unbearable pain.
Zhao Haonan: “He didn’t want to give you a psychological burden, that’s all. You…”
“Zhao Haonan,” Something caught in Ye Ning’s throat as he warned, “Stop talking.”
He’d call the police if this person said another word.
Qin Lezhou watched Ye Ning’s pained expression and felt that strong emotion become tangible, pressing down on Ye Ning like a weight.
Even though Ye Ning wasn’t crying, he looked as if he had already cried all his tears dry!
Qin Lezhou didn’t say another word. He grabbed Ye Ning’s phone from the blanket, performed a few taps, and firmly placed it back into Ye Ning’s hand.
Qin Lezhou: “This is my brother’s WeChat contact card and phone number.”
Ye Ning felt dead inside.
Not only had the bomb not been thrown away, but now there was another one.
Qin Lezhou: “It’s different from the one I gave you before. This one is personal.”
Ye Ning: “……”
Qin Lezhou: “Only family and friends have it.”
Ye Ning: “……”
“Don’t worry, even if someone gets beaten up, it’ll be me. I’m used to it, so don’t feel guilty,” Qin Lezhou continued. “And also… you don’t need to deliberately say those self-punishing[mfn][T/N: “心理負擔” literally means “mental burden” or “psychological burden,” referring to feeling guilty or worried.][/mfn] things anymore, I know that’s not what you really mean.”
Ye Ning felt drained of all energy and had no will left to argue back.
Seeing that Ye Ning finally stopped tormenting himself, Qin Lezhou also let out a sigh of relief.
He took a step forward and reached out his hand to Ye Ning.
Qin Lezhou patted Ye Ning’s shoulder, which looked gaunt under his loose hospital gown, and spoke word by word, “Ye Ning, you saved me. No matter where you and my brother end up, it won’t affect our relationship.”
“From today on, I, Qin Lezhou, accept you as a brother.”
Zhao Haonan also stepped forward.
“Young Master Ye, you also know. I’m not educated, and I can’t say any fancy words.”
“We used to have some harmless misunderstandings, but ever since you decided to take responsibility for Luo Guang’s leg, I’ve respected you as someone with guts! On top of that, you saved Lezhou, so we also accept you as a brother!”
Ye Ning’s fingers stiffened around his phone. Listening to Qin Lezhou and Zhao Haonan’s voices, he closed his eyes.
He was utterly exhausted.
