Chapter 55: Inevitable

After he separated from Nan Jia, Yue Zhishi completely forgot to eat dinner, muddling his way back to his dorm in a blur.

It just happened to be dinner time, so there was no one in the dorm. Yue Zhishi’s eyes really hurt, and he had no energy at all — he felt dizzy and utterly weak, and he planned to sleep after taking a hot shower. But his luck and his physical condition seemed to line up: he’d only finished showered halfway when the dorm’s hot water heater suddenly broke, only ice-cold water coming out no matter how he tried to adjust the gauge. With no other choice, Yue Zhishi could only rush through the rest of his shower, drying off and putting on his clothes before going out.

Song Yu sent Yue Zhishi two messages in the meantime. The first one was to tell him he’d been called away to do a surface survey and wouldn’t be able to train with Yue Zhishi after dinner; the second one asked where he was.

Yue Zhishi’s teeth were chattering from the cold by the time he wrapped himself into his blanket. He typed out ‘sleeping in the dorm’ with shaking hands and then turned on his phone’s do not disturb mode.

He didn’t know how long he actually slept. His dreams were extraordinarily fragile, and he’d wake as soon as he moved. He passed back out very quickly after waking up, so his dreams were broken bits and pieces, all of them memories from his childhood and every single one of them related to Song Yu. Whether he was in his dreams or in reality, he was still the one chasing — chasing until he fell down. But every time, Song Yu would turn around and wait for him. Except for the last time.

Song Yu walked away without looking back, his shadows of his receding figure disappearing rapidly. His surroundings melted and trickled down, the scene monstrous and bizarre, and everything was dyed red, turning into boiling, viscous lava that wrapped around Yue Zhishi. He couldn’t breathe and had nowhere to escape.

When he was about to suffocate, Yue Zhishi woke up as if in self-protection. It felt like there was someone calling his name from below his bed, but he couldn’t lift up his eyelids at all — he could only feel his swollen and painful eyes and the extreme aching in his bones. He used some effort to turn over, mumbling out a response from inside his blanket.

He seemed to hear Jiang Yufan and Shen Mi’s voices. Jiang Yufan said he needed to go out and asked Shen Mi for help, but these sounds seemed to reach Yue Zhishi through a wall and didn’t seem real at all. Yue Zhishi didn’t feel anything concrete until Shen Mi and Jiang Yufan pooled their strength together and brought him down from his bed.

Pain — it was everywhere.

Jiang Yufan pulled a long woollen knit over Yue Zhishi. Thinking Yue Zhishi’s legs might be too weak, he asked, “Le Le, do you think you can walk?”

Yue Zhishi heard him clearly and nodded, his voice feeble. “Yes, I’m fine.”

“Don’t talk anymore. How can you be fine when you’re burning up so badly?” The sound of Shen Mi’s voice was a bit high, and Yue Zhishi’s heart shook as he listened. He didn’t say anything to contradict him, but he very stubbornly insisted on walking by himself. The other two people had no choice but to hold him up and support him down the building. By the time they were walking on the stairs, Jiang Yufan clearly felt Yue Zhishi drifting back into unconsciousness.

So when they came out of the building, Jiang Yufan immediately called a taxi — but his teacher called him, asking where he was, and he had to leave. “Shen Mi, I really have to go. Are you going to be okay by yourself?”

“Yeah. You should go, I’ll call you later.”

“Okay, I’ll go look for you guys at the hospital once I’m done.”

At the end, only two of them remained, and the wind under the dormitory building seemed to blow Yue Zhishi a bit more awake. He mumbled that he didn’t want to go to the hospital, that he didn’t like the hospital, and Shen Mi patiently tried to persuade him before he finally pulled Yue Zhishi’s arm over, wanting to carry him on his back. But Yue Zhishi wasn’t willing to get on; he knew Shen Mi was going to take him to the hospital.

“I don’t want to go, I hate going to the hospital.” Yue Zhishi spoke with great difficulty, and he kept repeating it over and over, his words disjointed and muddled.

Shen Mi stopped caring that he refused to go and directly pulled him over to forcefully get him on his back.

But very soon, blinding high beams stopped his movements. Shen Mi looked over, frowning, and realised a black car was coming closer. He could guess who the person in the car was, and it was exactly who he expected.

Song Yu came out of the car, his steps very swift. Shen Mi’s actions stiffened, and he placed down Yue Zhishi, keeping hold of his wrist. Yue Zhishi looked completely unwilling — unwilling to go to the hospital — but in Song Yu’s eyes, the reason for his unwillingness turned into something else.

“What are you doing?”

Even though Shen Mi gripped onto Yue Zhishi very tightly, Song Yu was still able to bring Yue Zhishi over in one motion.

Yue Zhishi had clearly been so insistent just then, but it was like he gave up the moment he heard Song Yu’s voice. He leaned against Song Yu’s body.

As their skin came into contact with each other, Song Yu only then realised something was wrong with Yue Zhishi. He lifted a hand to touch Yue Zhishi’s forehead and then looked at Shen Mi.

Shen Mi’s face was steady and calm. “He’s sick. I was going to take him to the hospital. It’s that simple.”

Song Yu stared at him and said thank you after a few seconds. “He has a terrible temper when he’s sick. You won’t be able to handle it. I’ll drive him over.” He lifted up the half conscious Yue Zhishi horizontally, carrying him into the car, and closed the passenger seat’s door.

He turned around and saw Shen Mi who’d subconsciously followed over. He felt apologetic for misunderstanding him, and Song Yu’s voice gentled slightly. “You should head back to your dorm, I’ll contact you on WeChat if anything happens.”

But for some reason — maybe because of that sentence, or maybe because of the sentence before — Shen Mi was unexpectedly infuriated. The hands he’d left next to his body tightened into fists, and he glared at Song Yu from half a metre away. He said, using a moderately loud voice, “I’ll tell you directly. I like Yue Zhishi.”

Song Yu wasn’t surprised. He turned his head over to double check if Yue Zhishi was still sleeping, and then he twisted back around to continue confronting Shen Mi.

“I really liked him from the first time I saw him on the bus. That’s why I ran after him in the rain to return his phone, and that’s why I actively requested to transfer classes. Yue Zhishi looks like he’s really easy to get close to, but he actually doesn’t open his heart very easily. So I’ve been working hard, hoping to get a bit more space in his heart. Do you understand how that feels?”

Song Yu listened to Shen Mi speak very solemnly. He thought if Yue Zhishi heard these words, he might’ve been very touched — but unfortunately, he was Song Yu.

“What’s the point in you telling me all this?”

Shen Mi laughed, as if he was extremely unsatisfied with Song Yu’s attitude of ignoring everything he said. “You can continue pretending. To be honest, I’ve felt like you and I were the same since the first time I saw you. We’re both people with ulterior motives, so why don’t we reveal our cards and fight fairly. There’s no need for you to act like you have a higher identity than me — it’s not like your feelings are more important than mine.”

“What’s your identity, a friend? A classmate?” Song Yu looked at him indifferently, and then bluntly lay bare Shen Mi’s thoughts. “You’re just using that as a pretence to continue getting closer to the person you want to approach.”

Shen Mi bitterly smiled. “Then what about you?”

Song Yu stared at his eyes.

Shen Mi dropped his gaze briefly and then fearlessly looked at him again. “By relying on your identity as his older brother, by relying on the emotional foundation you’ve accumulated over so many years, you do so many ambiguous, boundary-crossing things to Yue Zhishi. You enjoy how he worships you and how he’s unwilling to leave you, and yet you’re not willing to break through the layer between the two of you with your own hands. Song Yu, have you seen it when Yue Zhishi’s unhappy? Have you seen how your actions have affected him? Do you know about the distress and pain he feels because of you? Or are you pretending to not know?”

“Song Yu, just exactly how are you better than me?”

Seeing Song Yu not say a single word, Shen Mi thought this was useless. There was no point in a one-sided provocation, and there was also no point in exposing the truth like this. He went around Song Yu’s shoulder to glance at Yue Zhishi; his head curved onto the car window, his face unclear.

He pushed down his emotions, finally saying to Song Yu, “I don’t know what you’re thinking, and I’m not bothered enough to care. Song Yu, you can either sincerely be a good older brother with clear boundaries, or you can just give up your lofty, respectable identity. I can’t see you being able to continue with it anyway.”

Up until Shen Mi left and entered into another dormitory building, Song Yu didn’t speak. He felt extremely unwell — he’d been bound with this ‘older brother’ identity since he was six years old, and it didn’t matter if he wanted it or not. The identity had already become a layer of his skin attached onto his body.

Shen Mi’s words were like a knife, sharply cutting off this fake layer of skin. Song Yu had no choice but to face the bloody and mutilated truth.

He truly did want to continue drifting along, leaving things alone.

By the time he returned back to his car, Song Yu was still unable to calm down his emotions. He drove towards the hospital, the car moving very quickly, and he distantly had a very scary thought. He might actually be willing for another car to suddenly appear and crash into him — after all, Yue Zhishi was here.

But this thought lasted for only a second. He rapidly lowered the car’s speed and forced himself to continue driving calmly, arriving safely at the hospital. He once again carried Yue Zhishi up, and he realised he was lighter than he’d imagined. There were many people in the emergency room, and Yue Zhishi rested against Song Yu as he sat in the seats in the corridor. He’d occasionally open his eyes to look around before he closed them again in pain.

When it came time for Yue Zhishi’s turn, he suddenly recovered a bit of energy. He’d clearly not been willing to come, and yet he cooperated with the doctor very well as he faced him.

“The fever’s at 39.4 degrees.” The doctor spoke flatly, telling them they should’ve come earlier. Song Yu was even more remorseful; he didn’t even know Yue Zhishi had a cold.

Yue Zhishi had changed — Song Yu was just afraid of admitting it. Past Yue Zhishi would’ve told him everything, offered every little bit of information to Song Yu like a treasure, but now, he no longer did.

“Allergic to any medication?”

Song Yu said yes and listed out every drug Yue Zhishi was allergic to.

“Who are you to the patient?” the doctor asked.

Song Yu paused for two seconds, struggling, and then replied, “Older brother.”

“The fever’s not too serious. He doesn’t need to stay in the hospital, and we don’t have space right now anyway. But I see he has a history of allergic asthma. Asthma can be easily triggered by a cold and a cough, so I’ve prescribed a cough medicine. You need to watch over and take care of him the next few days. Go pay around the corner on the right and then take him to get an IV drip.”

Song Yu sat next to Yue Zhishi during the transfusion, telling him to rest on his shoulder. There was nothing he could do, and there was nothing he wanted to do, so he quietly stared at a stained patch on the hospital’s white walls. Yue Zhishi seemed to hazily recover some consciousness, opening his mouth to say he wanted some water, and Song Yu pulled out the bottle of mineral water he’d prepared earlier. After twisting open the cap, he placed the bottle next to his mouth, slanting it to pour in some water.

But Yue Zhishi struggled to swallow, and even though Song Yu raised the bottle very slowly, a lot of water still trickled from Yue Zhishi’s mouth. He grabbed a tissue and wiped Yue Zhishi dry.

He heard Yue Zhishi painfully call him gege. For no reason at all, Song Yu suddenly felt angry. “Why didn’t you say you were sick?”

Yue Zhishi’s reactions were delayed due to his illness. His face was flushed red from his fever, unable to take in enough air when he spoke, and yet he still reached out to touch Song Yu’s arm without realising it. He didn’t speak, only using this method to admit his mistake and ask for forgiveness.

His hand was very pale, his veins visible, and a thin, short needle was inserted into the back of his hand. Song Yu thought, there was going to be a very obvious bruise there tomorrow.

Yue Zhishi was someone easily injured.

As he thought of this, the pain and worry he felt for Yue Zhishi once again defeated his anger, and so he stroked Yue Zhishi’s wrist, treating it as a silent comfort.

“Next time you’re sick, you need to tell me immediately.”

He didn’t know if Yue Zhishi heard his words or not, because Yue Zhishi didn’t do anything at all. He seemed to have closed his eyes once again due to his lack of energy. Song Yu flipped open Yue Zhishi’s medical record he held in his hand, saw the word ‘allergy’, and his mind started to wander.

He became aware that he himself seemed to often suffer from an allergy. It would flare up whenever he broke a taboo, and he would only wake up after it attacked. Except the more he wasn’t allowed to touch something, the more he wanted to touch it — the taboo was meant to restrain desire, but instead, it gave birth to an even greater desire that was about to consume him.

Yue Zhishi was Song Yu’s one and only allergen.

The night sky outside the window darkened as they sat there, and yet the hospital corridor was still so noisy. After finishing two bags of infusions, Song Yu brought Yue Zhishi and left the hospital.

Yue Zhishi’s impression of hospitals was always very terrible. He always went in when he was feeling most unwell, and he was forced to let other people give him all sorts of tests. He used to always cry when he was a child because he’d thought it would be useful to do so, but reality proved otherwise. No matter how hard he cried or how loudly he screamed, illnesses that needed to be checked still needed to be checked.

From falling asleep after his shower, to spending time in the hospital, to waking up in the middle of the night in a foreign place — Yue Zhishi was delirious for all the time in between. He was like a piece of self-igniting wood with no awareness, lifeless yet dangerous. This time, he woke again and realised everything around him was unfamiliar. The cream-coloured ceiling was very low, like a thick layer of clouds pressing down on him, and the blanket and bedding on his body were in the same dark colours Song Yu liked using. But they were all new without a single hint of Song Yu’s smell on them at all.

A faint light came from the bedside table. Yue Zhishi pushed himself up and borrowed the light to look around — the room wasn’t large, and even though he hadn’t come here before, it was decorated a bit like Song Yu’s room.

He touched his own forehead, thinking the fever was pretty much gone, but he was still weak. He wanted to get off the bed, but he could only move slowly.

The door opened, and Yue Zhishi met Song Yu’s eyes just as he was pulling away the blanket. Song Yu was bringing in some porridge. It was a bit awkward; Yue Zhishi froze, not knowing if he should continue getting off the bed, or if he should get back underneath the blanket.

“Lie back down. Do you want to get a fever again?” Song Yu placed the porridge onto the bedside table, forcefully pulling the blanket back over Yue Zhishi’s body.

Yue Zhishi didn’t say anything, seeming to lean back against the headboard obediently, and watched as Song Yu stood there above him. Song Yu lightly stirred the plain porridge in the bowl with a stainless steel spoon.

He’d never used stainless steel cutlery before, and even the bowl looked like it came from somewhere random.

Everything looked very hastily prepared.

“You’ll need to take some more medicine after food, you should feel better after sleeping. The doctor said it’s not very serious.” He sat onto the bed and stretched out a hand, looking as if he was going to feed him.

But Yue Zhishi didn’t obediently shift closer automatically like he used to do. He simply didn’t want to eat. His stomach really hurt, but it didn’t feel like a stomachache — it was a dull, deep gnawing, as if something was being torn apart inside.

Song Yu could see his resistance. “At least have a few bites.”

“All right.” Yue Zhishi’s voice was very soft. He reached out a hand, wanting to take the bowl from Song Yu, but Song Yu put the bowl back down. He could see Yue Zhishi didn’t want him to feed him.

“If you don’t want to eat now, you can wait until it’s cooled down a bit.”

Yue Zhishi dropped his eyes, sealing shut his lips. He fixed his eyes on the blanket covering his body and painfully managed to swallow back a cough. Song Yu touched his forehead again, briefly checking his temperature, and then took his hand back.

Song Yu’s heart eased — Yue Zhishi was no longer burning up. He pulled out all of the medicine Yue Zhishi needed to take and separated them out onto the table according to dosage. He’d just lifted his head when he heard Yue Zhishi ask: “What is this place?”

His face was very pale, but his voice sounded fairly relaxed — as if he was asking only a random question.

“An apartment I’m renting.” Song Yu counted the tablets again. There was one missing.

Yue Zhishi first very lightly released a hum, and then he took a deep breath; this time, he couldn’t hold back his coughing. He turned his face away when Song Yu turned to look at him. He didn’t know that Song Yu had said he had a terrible temper when he was sick. If he’d heard, he definitely would’ve hurriedly denied it. He was actually very obedient — he only made a fuss because he was scared.

Song Yu called out Yue Zhishi’s name, prepared to feed him the medicine, but the coughing eventually stopped by itself. Yue Zhishi turned his head over to look at Song Yu, his gaze a bit empty.

“Why’d you rent a place?”

He waited for a long while, and yet Song Yu didn’t give him a response. Yue Zhishi usually would only ask a question once in order to not annoy Song Yu, but this time, he asked very insensitively again, “Why are you moving out?” He lowered his head to look at the blanket after the question left his mouth.

A layer of sweat covered Song Yu’s palms. He didn’t look at Yue Zhishi and only gave him a brief reason. “It’s easier to live by myself.”

“I see.” Yue Zhishi was still smiling at the beginning, and then he continued asking, “Then who did you want to leave this bed to? Who did you want to go with to get all the cutlery you haven’t had time to buy? And then, in this apartment — who did you want to cook with, eat with and sleep together with?”

His questions were thrown out one after another. He grew agitated to the point he was about to break apart, his voice shaking. Song Yu didn’t expect and didn’t really understand why Yue Zhishi became angry at such a minor thing like renting a place; he had still been okay at the hospital. Song Yu was very distressed, so he reached out a hand, catching Yue Zhishi’s hand that was tightly clutching the blanket, trying to console him.

“Be good. Don’t be like this.”

“What am I like?” Yue Zhishi’s eyes were red, tears stubbornly gathering and yet not falling. “Am I not obedient enough?”

“I’ve asked you before if I was really strange like this. You said I wasn’t, you said I was only afraid of separating from you.” Yue Zhishi’s voice slightly trembled, so he took a small pause. “No matter what you said, I listened and followed along. Even if you treated me like a child, I still believed you.”

He couldn’t find anything he wanted to see in Song Yu’s face. He lowered his head and accidentally saw the red rash on the inside of his arm. He rubbed the rash with his fingers, his face blank — the rash turned angrier, and he muttered, “An allergic reaction again. I’m still so sensitive.”

Yue Zhishi broke down without warning — that mild allergic reaction became the final straw and overwhelmed him, and he cried bitterly like a child. “Why I am still reacting.. Weren’t you at the hospital? Didn’t you tell the doctor I was allergic? You keep things away from me so carefully, but did that help me at all?”

Nan Jia was right: he really was in uncontrollable pain. He convulsively sobbed, struggling to breathe, and yet he still raised his head to stare at Song Yu. The tears clouded his sight, so Yue Zhishi couldn’t see what look Song Yu had on his face. He actually really, really wanted to see clearly, and this made him even more angry. He didn’t want to look anymore.

Yue Zhishi felt very fragile, but he didn’t plead for Song Yu to hug him like he did in the past.

He curled up, hugging his knees and burying his head into the crook of his arms. “It was no use at all. I still ended up liking you.”