Cheng Boyan had said before that he didn’t dare casually say anything heavier than that.

Xiang Xi knew what he meant, and he also knew why he didn’t dare say it casually.

So now, when he suddenly heard Cheng Boyan whisper those words into his ear, he clutched his bag and felt his whole mind go blank.

The elevator doors opened. An auntie returning from grocery shopping stepped out and greeted Cheng Boyan. Cheng Boyan walked into the elevator, but Xiang Xi was still standing frozen at the doorway.

“We’re going to be late,” Cheng Boyan said, reaching out to pull him into the elevator. “What are you thinking about?”

“What did you just say?” Xiang Xi turned to stare at him. “What did you say?”

“You can’t seriously not have heard me, right?” Cheng Boyan looked back at him. “I struggled internally all night before managing to say something that cheesy…”

“Say it again,” Xiang Xi said softly.

Cheng Boyan smiled. After a moment of silence, he leaned close to Xiang Xi’s ear again. “Xiang Xi, I love you.”

Xiang Xi didn’t speak. He stared fixedly at him, and after a few seconds suddenly crouched down, burying his face in his arms.

“What’s wrong?” Cheng Boyan froze. Just as he bent down to pull him up, he heard Xiang Xi crying. Alarmed, he hurriedly crouched beside him and touched his hair. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Xiang Xi was crying hard—really hard. Hugging his head with both arms, he cried until his voice went hoarse, as though he were venting something buried deep inside him.

Even after the elevator descended one floor and the doors opened, he showed no sign of stopping.

At this hour, it happened to be the time when all the elderly uncles and aunties in the building came back from morning exercise carrying breakfast. The elevator doors opened to reveal two aunties and an old man, all of whom froze at the sight before them.

“Get up first,” Cheng Boyan tugged at Xiang Xi’s sleeve. “People are going to think I beat you into tears.”

“Who wo—” Xiang Xi lifted his head while wiping his eyes, only to see the concerned faces of the elderly people outside the door. He immediately froze too, then sprang up and bolted out with his head lowered.

“Sorry about that,” Cheng Boyan said with a smile as he followed him out. “Breakfast didn’t suit his taste and he got upset enough to cry.”

Xiang Xi ran so fast Cheng Boyan lost sight of him the whole way. Only when he reached the car did he see Xiang Xi already leaning against the door waiting for him.

“You okay? Why were you crying?” Cheng Boyan walked over.

“It was nothing. I just suddenly got emotional.” Xiang Xi had already wiped away his tears. His eyes and nose were still a little red, but his voice no longer sounded like he’d been crying.

Cheng Boyan smiled and touched his face. “Don’t lean against the car door. It’s dirty. Get in.”

Xiang Xi rubbed his nose and opened the car door. “You’re kind of hopeless.”

“Hm?” Cheng Boyan got into the car too and looked at him.

“At a moment like that, you’re still thinking about whether the car’s dirty,” Xiang Xi glanced at him. “Hopeless.”

“Yeah, hopeless.” Cheng Boyan thought for a moment. “I probably should’ve cried together with you. Want to do it over again together?”

Xiang Xi laughed. After laughing for a while, he turned to look out the window again. Only after the car reached the street did he quietly say, “I thought you’d never say those words.”

“I won’t say them all the time, but I still had to say them at least once,” Cheng Boyan said with a smile. “It means something different.”

“I…” Xiang Xi turned back around, his voice tiny. “I also… I also… I…”

He stammered “I” for ages without managing to get the words out properly. Finally he slapped his thigh. “Fuck, I’m too embarrassed to say it.”

Cheng Boyan turned to look at him.

“Hey, I’ll watch it next time. I was too nervous to notice what I was saying.” Xiang Xi scratched his head. “Focus on driving.”

Cheng Boyan didn’t say anything else and kept driving.

“I love you too,” Xiang Xi suddenly murmured very softly from beside him.

Cheng Boyan didn’t visibly react, but the car abruptly sped up, then after several meters he slammed on the brakes.

“Hey! What the hell?!” Xiang Xi shouted in fright.

“I got a little… emotional.” Cheng Boyan pulled the car over to the roadside and grabbed a carton of milk, gulping down several mouthfuls.

“You scared me!” Xiang Xi said, then laughed after thinking about it. “You get emotional that easily?”

“Not really. Let me tell you, you haven’t seen someone who really gets emotional,” Cheng Boyan said seriously while drinking milk and turning to look at him. “Just now I saw someone get so emotional he crouched down in an elevator and burst into tears.”

“You—” Xiang Xi started, then suddenly realized what he meant and burst out laughing. “You’re just mocking me!”

Cheng Boyan was about to say something else when a police siren sounded outside. A police car pulled up beside them.

“The police!” Xiang Xi shouted in a low voice, immediately panicking and reaching for the door handle as if preparing to jump out of the car. “Why are the police here?! What happened?!”

“Traffic police! It’s traffic police! You’re not allowed to park here.” Cheng Boyan quickly grabbed him, rolled down the window, and drove forward slowly while smiling apologetically at the officer. “Sorry, the kid got carsick so I stopped for a second. We’re leaving now!”

“That scared me to death.” Xiang Xi collapsed back into the seat. “I’ve been getting startled non-stop all morning!”

“You…” Cheng Boyan reached over and ruffled his hair. “When are you going to get over this fear of police?”

“I’m not usually that scared,” Xiang Xi sighed. “But Uncle Ping and the others still haven’t been caught. I’m afraid the police are looking for me and will arrest me too.”

“Even if they really did look for you, it’d just be to ask about the situation. You’d only need to tell them what you know,” Cheng Boyan said. “Who’d arrest you for no reason? Police stations are just as short on bed space as hospitals.”

“Mm.” Xiang Xi smiled faintly.

When they reached the hospital, the timing was pretty good, but several rows of chairs outside the consultation rooms were already full of people.

“Play by yourself. Don’t wander around. If anything happens, come tell me. We’ll eat outside at noon,” Cheng Boyan instructed him before hurrying into the consultation room.

Xiang Xi looked around the chairs and deliberately chose one where he could see Cheng Boyan perfectly.

When he sat down, his butt felt a little… uncomfortable, though still tolerable.

People were sitting on both sides of the seat, and both looked displeased that Xiang Xi had squeezed himself between them despite there being empty seats elsewhere. The middle-aged man on his left even muttered irritably, “Got a fever or something? Looking for body heat?”

Xiang Xi ignored him and pretended not to hear. Lowering his head, he slowly took out the milk and bread from his bag and started eating.

Actually, he was already very familiar with Cheng Boyan’s work mode. After all, he’d spent so long hospitalized and often wandered around outside the consultation rooms. But this was the first time he’d watched him continuously from the start of the workday like this.

Watching Cheng Boyan—who had only just put on his white coat and hadn’t even finished buttoning it before already starting to talk to patients—gave him a fresh feeling, along with a strange sense of pride.

Look! That doctor over there—the really handsome one, the one who speaks calmly and smiles so politely—he’s mine! My boyfriend!

And this morning he just told me he loves me!

Xiang Xi bit into his bread and smiled at the milk carton.

By the time he finished the bread and milk, Cheng Boyan had already seen two patients. As the third patient went in, Cheng Boyan glanced outside. Xiang Xi immediately grinned at him.

Though Cheng Boyan was wearing a mask and his face couldn’t be seen clearly, Xiang Xi could still tell he was smiling too—his eyes curved slightly.

The third patient was being helped inside, hopping on one leg. Cheng Boyan immediately stood up to pull out a chair for him, then crouched down and began examining his leg while asking questions.

Xiang Xi stared absentmindedly at Cheng Boyan’s profile, suddenly recalling the very first time he himself had entered that consultation room with a fracture.

“Not out hustling today?”

That had been the very first thing Cheng Boyan said to him in the consultation room. Even now, remembering it still made Xiang Xi want to laugh.

And he also remembered the first thing Cheng Boyan ever said to him outside the consultation room: “What’d you crash into?”

And even before that, he remembered their first encounter on the street—Cheng Boyan dressed stylishly and flamboyantly walking out of the supermarket…

Holding the empty bread bag and milk carton in his hands, Xiang Xi spent an entire hour slowly replaying every little moment between himself and Cheng Boyan.

Thinking about it, it really was incredible.

Escaping  Zhaojiayao alive without dying at Uncle Ping’s hands—that kind of thing had still fallen within the limits of what he could imagine.

But ending up with Cheng Boyan like this, reaching the point they had now—that was something he had never once imagined, something he couldn’t even have conceived of imagining.

To Xiang Xi, Cheng Boyan had always been a kind of warm light he longed for.

And before truly embracing that beam of light, he had never believed he could get this close to it.

When he finally snapped out of his memories, he realized all the chairs around him were already full, and people were still continuously arriving.

Just looking at all those people made Xiang Xi feel waves of irritation. He honestly couldn’t imagine how only a few doctors inside could handle so many patients every single day.

It really wasn’t easy for Cheng Boyan to stay this busy every day and still go home afterward to shower, clean the house, and read books.

The guy was basically a machine.

Xiang Xi glanced at the empty bag and milk carton in his hands. The trash can was only a few meters away, but he didn’t dare get up to throw them out—because the second he stood up, someone would immediately take his seat.

Every time Cheng Boyan finished seeing a patient, he would glance outside once, and Xiang Xi didn’t want to leave either—he was afraid Cheng Boyan would look up and not see him.

So he kept sitting there clutching the bag and carton until noon. There were slightly fewer people now, but it was already past lunch time, and there were still patients inside Cheng Boyan’s consultation room. The doctors in the neighbouring rooms hadn’t come out either.

Xiang Xi’s stomach growled. He rummaged through his bag but couldn’t find anything to eat.

Cheng Boyan was holding up an X-ray film and talking to a patient. All morning, Xiang Xi hadn’t once seen him drink water. He didn’t know whether Cheng Boyan simply had no time to drink, or whether he avoided drinking because he wouldn’t have time to go to the bathroom.

Xiang Xi himself really needed to use the bathroom by now. He’d been holding it for almost twenty minutes. Seeing that Cheng Boyan probably wouldn’t be done anytime soon, he finally stood up and ran to the restroom.

When he came out, Cheng Boyan had finally left the consultation room. He beckoned to him. “Come through the back door.”

“Man, you finally get a break?” Xiang Xi hurried over and followed him down the corridor. “Why were there so many people today?”

“It’s not too bad,” Cheng Boyan smiled. “None of the cases were especially difficult to handle today, so that already counts as pretty good. What do you want to eat?”

“Noodles are fine. You probably don’t even have time for a big meal anyway.”

“After we eat, why don’t you head home?” Cheng Boyan looked at him. “Sitting there all morning… doesn’t your butt hurt?”

“I…” Xiang Xi glanced at him. “It’s not so bad I can’t sit down… Besides, my attention wasn’t on my butt the whole morning. I was watching you the entire time.”

“Alright then. After we eat, go take a walk in the little garden by the inpatient building, okay? Move around a bit. Keeping pressure on it all the time probably isn’t great.”

“…Got it.”

Xiang Xi felt that Cheng Boyan must have been a doctor for too long already—he could talk about this kind of thing so naturally.

Xiang Xi had eaten at the noodle shop outside the hospital before. It tasted pretty good, but they were ridiculously stingy with the beef. After only a few bites, it basically turned into plain noodles.

“There’s way too little meat,” Xiang Xi clicked his tongue.

“I already paid for an extra serving of meat in your bowl,” Cheng Boyan said, transferring two slices of beef from his own bowl into Xiang Xi’s. “Or should I take you out for meat tonight? Have we been eating too lightly these past couple of days? You’re craving meat this badly.”

“You eat it. You still have to work this afternoon.” Xiang Xi tried to put the beef back into Cheng Boyan’s bowl.

But the moment he picked it up, Cheng Boyan immediately stopped his hand. “Don’t give it back to me!”

“Hey,” Xiang Xi laughed. “Alright, alright, I won’t. It’s not like I licked it or anything…”

“If I give it to you, then eat it.”

“I’m eating it.” Xiang Xi stuffed all the meat into his mouth.

After lunch, Cheng Boyan bought him a yogurt and accompanied him for a lap around the little garden before heading back to work.

Xiang Xi wandered around the garden while drinking the yogurt. His butt was still okay—it hadn’t become any more uncomfortable. Just… forget it, better not think about it.

There weren’t many people in the garden. The weather was starting to cool down, but the sun was still pretty strong right now, so most people preferred staying indoors.

After walking a few laps, Xiang Xi started sweating a little, so he sat down in a shaded pavilion. A woman with a splint wrapped around her leg sat in a wheelchair nearby, and beside her was a little girl around five or six years old—probably her daughter—singing to her.

“Will it get better tomorrow?” the little girl stopped singing and looked at her mother’s leg.

“Maybe the day after tomorrow,” the woman said with a smile.

“Then I’ll sing a few more songs,” the little girl cleared her throat. “Doctor Cheng said listening to singing makes you heal faster.”

The moment Xiang Xi heard the words “Doctor Cheng,” he immediately turned his head.

The woman smiled at him. “The doctor said she talks too much, so he got her to sing instead.”

“Doctor Cheng Boyan?” Xiang Xi laughed. That method really did sound like Cheng Boyan’s style.

“Yep,” the woman nodded. “Are you his patient too?”

“…I used to be,” Xiang Xi said. “I’m better now. I came for a follow-up today.”

“Oh, I just got admitted. I’ll probably have to stay for a while.”

“Doctor Cheng’s a really nice person,” Xiang Xi suddenly blurted out.

The moment he said it, he felt it might have been a bit abrupt—there wasn’t even any lead-in.

“Yeah, he’s really great,” the little girl immediately jumped into the conversation. “He even gave me candy! Lollipops, milk candies… but he didn’t come by today…”

“Oh,” Xiang Xi responded.

He didn’t really like kids that much, and he never knew how to talk to them.

The little girl didn’t mind his simple response at all and kept chattering away on her own.

“I even went to his office once. He said children aren’t allowed inside, so he took me back to my hospital room. But he gave me a candy afterward. It was kind of sour—a preserved plum candy…”

Xiang Xi could only smile awkwardly at her. He had absolutely no idea how to continue the conversation. All he could think was that Cheng Boyan really had a lot of patience with such a chatterbox little girl.

The little girl kept rambling on and on. Even when Xiang Xi wanted to head back toward the consultation rooms, she was still talking. He tried several times to interrupt her, but failed every time.

In the end, her mother finally said: “Weren’t you supposed to sing songs so my leg would heal faster?”

Only then did the little girl stop talking. She turned and started singing to her mother’s leg instead, and Xiang Xi hurriedly stood up and escaped from the little garden.

The afternoon passed much more slowly than the morning.

Well, afternoon clinic hours were longer to begin with, and there were even more patients in the afternoon. The whole hospital was noisy and chaotic.

All the seats where he could see Cheng Boyan were already occupied, so Xiang Xi could only pace around nearby. After finally waiting for an empty seat, he still had to lean his head back to see into the room.

So he spent the time leaning back to watch for a while, then lowering his head to play with his phone, then leaning back again and lowering it again. By the time Cheng Boyan finally finished work—almost an hour after his official shift ended—and walked out of the consultation room, Xiang Xi felt like his neck was about to break.

“My neck’s about to snap!” Xiang Xi complained while rubbing it.

“I wanted to ask what you were doing an hour ago already,” Cheng Boyan said. “Wasn’t there an empty seat in the row behind you?”

Xiang Xi froze. Then he suddenly bent over with a depressed sigh.

“I forgot… I completely forgot that after people left, I could just move over there…”

“Guess I’m just too handsome,” Cheng Boyan said with a grin. He pulled out his phone and checked it. “I should make a call. My mom sent me a text earlier and I still haven’t replied.”

“Oh!” Xiang Xi immediately straightened up and asked nervously, “What did she say? Did she… mention me?”

“No, don’t panic,” Cheng Boyan patted his back. “She just said to stop by and pick up some sausages later… although I guess she did technically mention you.”

“She mentioned me? What do I have to do with sausages?” Xiang Xi quickly asked.

“She said Grandma made the sausages herself, and she was worried you might not be used to eating the food I cook, so she wanted us to take some back for you to eat,” Cheng Boyan said with a smile. Then he imitated his grandmother’s tone and added, “I know Boyan doesn’t like eating this kind of thing, so give it to Wangxi instead… Grandma definitely said it like that.”

Xiang Xi burst out laughing, his eyes narrowing into crescents. “Grandma’s so nice.”

Cheng Boyan called his mother, who told him to take a detour home and pick them up directly.

“Can I come tomorrow instead? Xiang Xi’s with me right now,” Cheng Boyan said. “We’re about to go eat dinner, and carrying around a pile of sausages…”

“It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine!” Xiang Xi waved frantically beside him and whispered anxiously, “Just take them! Don’t let Director Xu think I’m troublesome!”

“Then we’ll come get them now,” Cheng Boyan said into the phone.

“Okay. If you two are going to eat, then don’t come inside. Wait at the entrance and I’ll bring them out to you,” his mother said. “If you’re coming to the house, come at a time when your father’s home too. It’s more respectful to Xiang Xi that way.”

“Mm.” Cheng Boyan smiled.

“Should I wait here, or…” Xiang Xi hesitated.

After all, Director Xu didn’t approve of him. He wasn’t sure whether showing up together would make her uncomfortable.

“We’re going together,” Cheng Boyan said as he headed outside. “I already told her we were going to eat together.”

“Do I look okay like this? Should I wash my face?” Xiang Xi tugged at him.

“You look great. Extremely great. Handsome and full of energy,” Cheng Boyan said. “No need to wash your face. If you wash it, you’ll look too good and steal my spotlight.”

Xiang Xi giggled happily.

Song Yi’s three bodyguards were standing beneath the trees across from the hospital. Xiang Xi wasn’t sure whether they’d been standing there the whole time or had only come out near the end of the workday, but he felt Song Yi should really give them some cold drinks or something—they worked too hard.

As Cheng Boyan and Xiang Xi walked toward the parking lot, the three men followed behind them.

When the car pulled out of the parking lot, Xiang Xi looked back and saw their car following too.

“They’re seriously dedicated,” he sighed.

“Once this whole thing is over, we really should treat Song Yi, Lin He, and these guys to a meal and thank them properly,” Cheng Boyan said, glancing at the rearview mirror.

Traffic was already getting jammed as soon as they left the hospital. It was rush hour, and they were taking the main roads. Even without any cars, the red lights alone were enough to leave people completely dazed and stuck.

After finally getting out of the section where they could only crawl along at five kilometers per hour, Cheng Boyan pressed the accelerator. Once the car hit thirty, he already felt like he could take off flying.

He let out a long breath. “Looks like from now on I really should start riding a bi…”

Before he could even finish speaking, a motorcycle suddenly shot out from the right side, cutting sharply in front of their car and braking almost right against the front bumper.

Cheng Boyan hadn’t even seen where the motorcycle had come from. He immediately slammed the brakes all the way down. To avoid hitting the bike, he also jerked the steering wheel toward the left-side divider. He would rather crash into the barrier than hit a person.

The car let out a sharp screech as it stopped right beside the divider. The bodyguard squad driving behind them also slammed on the brakes, nearly rear-ending them.

“Holy fuck, you asshole! Are your damn eyes attached to your ass or what?!” Xiang Xi was thrown violently forward by the inertia. If Cheng Boyan hadn’t insisted every single time that he buckle his seatbelt before the car moved, he probably would’ve smashed straight into the windshield by now.

But after he finished cursing and was just about to roll down the window to continue yelling, the motorcycle had already sped off.

“I—”

The anger in his chest suddenly felt completely jammed up inside him. After a long moment, he finally turned toward Cheng Boyan and squeezed out a sentence through clenched teeth: “If you still won’t let me swear after this, I’m literally gonna suffocate from holding this in!”

“Haven’t you already sworn?” Cheng Boyan steadied himself before starting the car again. “Good thing we didn’t hit him. Are you hurt?”

“No.” Xiang Xi sighed, then took several deep breaths. “Does having your lungs explode from anger count as being hurt? We should’ve chased that idiot down and rammed him once! I’m so pissed off! I’m so mad even my butt hurts!”

“You should just let people like that run off,” Cheng Boyan suddenly burst out laughing. “Guys like him only have a few minutes left to live anyway—they’re in a hurry. Why bother arguing with them?”

Xiang Xi glanced at him and laughed too. “You really don’t swear, but you’re savage enough anyway.”

“I had to help smooth out the anger stuck in your lungs somehow,” Cheng Boyan said with a smile.

When they were still around a hundred meters from the entrance to the residential complex, Cheng Boyan stopped the car. There weren’t any temporary parking spaces at the gate, so they could only park there.

“Let’s walk from here,” Cheng Boyan said as he opened the car door. “My mom should be at the entrance soon.”

“I’m kinda nervous.” Xiang Xi got out too and stretched his arms a little.

“We’re just picking up some sausages and leaving. What’s there to be nervous about?” Cheng Boyan smiled.

The two of them walked forward along the road. After only a few steps, the sound of a motorcycle engine came roaring from behind them.

The engine noise grew rapidly louder from far away to right behind them. Just hearing it, you could tell the bike was moving extremely fast—and it sounded like it was driving directly along the pedestrian walkway.

Cheng Boyan pushed Xiang Xi slightly inward, trying to move out of the way.

But Xiang Xi suddenly whipped his head around.

Having spent more than ten years living in Zhao Family Hollow, he had developed a sensitivity to danger completely different from ordinary people.

 

Translator : DarNan