Zhu Wenxing dragged his exhausted, aching body back to the wreck of a "home." Two days without food, he swayed as he poured himself a glass of water and washed the pills down his throat. Bitter.
He wouldn't be back tonight.
Zhu Wenxing did as he always did: shower, lie in bed, stare at the ceiling.
Ten years. He'd been kept so thoroughly caged that even ordinary small talk had become a lost skill.
"How did I get this stupid."
If he just kept turning a blind eye like always, everything would blow over, as it always had.
He gave a cold laugh, raised his left hand to cover his face, and the water slipped down between his fingers, dripping into his ear.
When he opened his eyes again, the phone at his side had buzzed several times.
He picked up—and got a tongue-lashing before he could speak.
"What are you doing? Why did it take you so long to answer?"
"I was asleep."
Wen Tingxuan cut him off: "Deliver a suit to the address I'm sending."
"Hurry up about it."
Zhu Wenxing said only, flatly, that he'd be right there, and the line went dead at once.
That speed—like someone fleeing the plague.
Outside the International Hotel.
Wen Tingxuan, face black as thunder, tore into Zhu Wenxing.
"What are you even good for?!"
"So slow!"
People kept passing by, throwing them odd looks.
Zhu Wenxing didn't argue. Only the wound under the bandage throbbed dully.
Shfk—
Wen Tingxuan yanked the garment bag away, and stabbed Zhu Wenxing with a vicious glare.
"All you do is cause me trouble. One thing after another. Now you've gone and hurt your hand—who's going to run the household?"
Zhu Wenxing clenched his jaw. Anger had taken over every nerve in his brain; he genuinely wanted to scream at Wen Tingxuan, right there, in public.
But...
He drew a deep breath. "I've hired a housekeeper."
Wen Tingxuan was winding up to explode when voices rose behind them—colleagues, chatting and laughing.
"And who might that be..."
Zhu Wenxing balled his fists, arranged his face into breezy ease, and smiled wide: "I'm Wen Tingxuan's wife. Zhu Wenxing."
The scattered group closed in at once. "Well, well, Xuan-ge, keeping up with the times! Sis-in-law's a real looker."
"Should we call you Mrs. Wen, or Brother Zhu?"
Zhu Wenxing flashed a mouthful of white teeth. "Either's fine."
Forced into accepting the introduction, Wen Tingxuan could only rest a hand on Zhu Wenxing's slim waist, a thread of falseness pasted on his face. "All right, all right, my wife needs to go home and rest. Shall we head to the next venue?"
The crowd chorused along at once: "Even better! Come on, Xuan-ge."
"Uh—sis-in-law, careful with that hand. Go home and get some rest."
Zhu Wenxing pulled his oversized coat tighter around himself, doing his best to hide a face raw and aching from the wind.
The wind was picking up. These days the rain came whenever it pleased.
Wen Tingxuan's figure slowly blurred into the distance. The rain in Zhu Wenxing's eyes fell faster and harder than the rain from the sky.
He opened the car door, sat quietly in the driver's seat, and let the "rainwater" drip down and soak his sleeve.
In the rearview mirror he studied himself: bruise-dark circles under his eyes. The face Wen Tingxuan had once praised as beautiful no longer looked the part—only those eyes remained, still as clear and naive as a fool's from years ago.
A ringtone sliced through the silence. Zhu Wenxing wiped the tears off his cheek, sniffed, and answered.
"Hello? Who's this?"
The person on the other end gave a contemptuous little laugh first. "Been crying?"
It was just a string of digits—unfamiliar.
"Who is this?"
"You can guess." The voice was scornful, with a strand of self-mockery in it. "Why didn't you come in for your follow-up today?"
Confusion first—then Zhu Wenxing calmly swallowed the tightness in his throat and steadied his voice. "Doctors as responsible as you are a rare breed these days. I have things to do today; I'll skip it. Thank you, Dr. Li."
"Oh? Ears work better than eyes, I see."
At that moment Li Feiyang was sitting in his sedan, watching Zhu Wenxing's car in his rearview mirror, parked right behind him.
He watched Zhu Wenxing wipe his face clean with his hand, heard the embarrassment and anger in his voice over the line: "Was there something you needed, sir?"
Li Feiyang smiled coldly and said, softly: "Don't you want to know what your husband has been doing behind your back?"
The topic struck straight at the heart. Every word a body blow.
"You know him?!"
"Who the hell are you?!"
Zhu Wenxing's hands clenched the steering wheel involuntarily, poised to drive off.
Knock knock.
A figure was pressed against the gray car window. The rain was getting heavier; the man's black jacket was soaked halfway through.
Click.
Zhu Wenxing tossed the phone aside and opened the door. Li Feiyang dropped into the passenger seat like he owned the place, all swagger.
In an instant Zhu Wenxing had both hands fisted in Li Feiyang's soaked black jacket, his bloodshot eyes locked on: "The person who sent me that video—was it you?!"
As he spoke, the pristine white bandage on his right hand slowly bloomed red.
Pain no longer mattered. He only wanted the truth.
Ten years—neither long nor short, depending on how you counted.
Endurable, and unendurable, both at once. All the fault seemed to be his, and yet none of it was.
But when a person is pushed past their breaking point, they always want to turn hysterical.
He wasn't a woman. He couldn't shriek or curse the heavens.
Seeing this, Li Feiyang seized his bleeding right hand and pulled the man toward him. "Are you trying to die?"
"He's a cheating man—is he worth this?!"
Zhu Wenxing: "Who do you think you are? You knew you could have left it buried. Why did you make me see it!"
"Why?!"
If he didn't know, then the days after would go on just like before—muddling, numb, settling back into stillness.
Li Feiyang peeled the hands off his collar. Blood dripped onto his jacket; he wiped at it, and the harder he wiped, the more it spread, bright red.
He frowned, irritation rising. "There aren't that many whys in this world."
Zhu Wenxing said nothing, only hung his head, blood still seeping from the wound.
"Your husband is seducing my fiancée."
Li Feiyang said it very quietly. Too quietly, almost—not like something he would say.
"We're getting married in three months."
He finished, then sneered, as if searching for a reasonable explanation: "Honestly, I don't love her all that much. Parents' orders. Matchmakers' arrangement."
"They were engaged to each other as babies."
Zhu Wenxing heard it and laughed along. Outside the window the rain came down like a overflowing river, the wind whipping so hard it looked ready to tear the warning sign beside the car right out of the ground.
"What good does telling me this do you now?"
"What you should be doing is keeping an eye on your own woman."
"You say your fiancée was seduced by my husband? More like they took one look at each other and matched—two of a kind."
The water in his eyes had filled to the brim, about to breach.
Back in the ER.
The nurse teased: "Dr. Li, back at work already? Weren't you going to your girlfriend's company party today?"
Li Feiyang shrugged off the black leather jacket and changed into his white coat, a gold-rimmed pair of glasses perched on his nose. At a glance it aged him several years—and lent him a certain steadiness.
"Nosy. Can't a man earn a little extra money?"