“Recently, a major fire broke out at the Jing’an Sanatorium in the western suburbs of our city. Upon receiving the alarm, relevant local departments rushed to the scene immediately to carry out rescue operations. At present, the open flames have been successfully extinguished.
According to preliminary verification, the fire resulted in one casualty. There are currently no other injuries reported at the scene. It is understood that relevant departments have intervened to conduct follow-up investigation work…”
The calm, steady voice of the news anchor emanated from the television. The person lying in the hospital bed attempted to open his eyes, and the first thing that met his vision was a stark white ceiling. Li You had a splitting headache. He managed to prop up his upper body and looked around, everything here was white, monotonous, cold, and empty.
Outside the window, it was a bright and beautiful day with singing birds and fragrant flowers. The azure sky was dotted with large fluffy clouds, and the treetops were touched with a hint of yellowish tint, though most still retained the lush green of high summer. A gentle breeze swept past, rustling the white gauze curtain by the window. No matter how one looked at it, it was a bright, peaceful, and lovely scene.
“You’re awake?”
Lin Xun leaned partially against the doorframe and tapped on the doorboard a few times. Drawn by the sound, Li You looked over, and his eyes invisibly met and collided with those of the visitor in mid-air.
Li You watched as the man walked over step by step, casually pulled up a chair by the bed, sat down, and folded his arms while staring at him.
The Alpha’s tone of inquiry was very familiar, which instead left Li You feeling flustered and at a loss.
A few minutes later.
“Who are you?” Li You licked his dry lips, scrutinizing the Alpha before him with the same searching gaze. “Do we… know each other? Why am I here?”
Lin Xun’s motion of pouring water paused.
He set down the glass, rested his chin on one hand with his knee propped against the edge of the bed, and imitated Li You’s tone to ask him back: “Then who are you?”
Li You let out a blank “Ah?”, saying in confusion: “I am Li You. I am sixteen years old this year.”
Hiss, is that so…
Lin Xun let out a long breath and leaned back slightly. With a troubled expression, he stated the objective fact quite calmly nonetheless: “You are my boyfriend.”
“!” Li You looked at him wide-eyed and dumbfounded, stammering incoherently, “Ah…? I… How could I…”
“How could I be in a puppy love…” When the Beta said this, he hung his head in extreme embarrassment. As if unable to believe it, he sneaked a quick, guilt-ridden glance at the Alpha, speaking in a muffled voice: “Besides, you… look so much older than me…”
He, he looked to be at least thirty, didn’t he?
“I, I’m still a student,” Li You stumbled over his words. “Puppy love… puppy love is wrong.”
His head had probably been knocked silly.
Lin Xun pulled the person up and carried him to the mirror in the bathroom. “You’re actually six years older than me.”
Is having amnesia that remarkable?
Can having amnesia allow him to openly disdain him for being old?
It was simply atrocious.
“Let’s do a simple test like this. If you feel uncomfortable at any point during the process, you can request to stop.”
Li You subconsciously looked toward Lin Xun. Only when the Alpha nodded did he obediently sink into the sofa and say, “Okay.”
Zhou Jing showed a difficult expression. “Mr. Lin, would you… like to step outside first?”
Lin Xun responded and rose to leave. Almost the exact second he stood up, the person beside him shot up with a “swoosh.” Li You still had an injury on his head; because he moved too quickly, his blood pressure couldn’t catch up, causing his vision to double.
“You can’t go!”
In his panic, Li You clutched the Alpha’s sleeve and wouldn’t let go, requesting softly once more: “You can’t, no, you are not allowed to leave.”
“…” Zhou Jing fell back into his chair. “I respect the patient’s wishes.”
Lin Xun lowered his eyes, thought for a few seconds, and wrapped his arm around the person to sit back down. Li You had more than half of his body encircled in his embrace, feeling slightly uneasy all over. Lin Xun, on the other hand, was entirely relaxed, tilting his head back to lean back while idly scratching Li You’s chin with a few fingers. He slightly crossed his long legs, which had nowhere else to go, and nodded to Zhou Jing: “Begin.”
That posture looked remarkably like a fatuous emperor holding his beloved concubine in his arms to flirt, completely uninterested in mundane matters other than flirting, his face practically written with: Permission granted, hurry up and get out after reporting.
“Alright, Mr. Li, please sit upright.”
Li You secretly gave Lin Xun a few pushes and sat up straight with reddened earlobes, he had never been criticized by a teacher for his sitting posture before. As of now, this was the sole exception.
Zhou Jing: “In your memory, you are sixteen years old this year, right?”
“Yes.”
“Regarding your sixteen-year-old self or earlier, what events do you remember that you consider relatively important?”
Li You thought for a moment and spoke slowly: “Mom, moving homes, medical treatment… and, picking up a kid…”
Hearing those final words, Lin Xun’s expression, which had always been unbothered and detached, finally experienced a subtle shift.
“But in fact, you are already thirty-two years old. So regarding memories after age sixteen, you have no impression at all, correct?”
When the consultation ended, Li You was sitting on a garden bench out of sheer boredom, kicking at the fallen leaves on the ground.
“It is just as you saw. He currently only possesses memories prior to the age of sixteen,” Zhou Jing said. “Ruling out objective organic brain lesions, a preliminary diagnosis points to dissociative amnesia, what we commonly call post-traumatic episodic memory loss.”
Lin Xun’s face instantly became somewhat delicate, though not necessarily unpleasant. “So, he is a sixteen-year-old kid right now?”
Zhou Jing refuted: “There is nothing wrong with his intelligence or daily living abilities; his memories are simply stuck at sixteen. I still suggest you do not treat him as a child.”
“This situation isn’t considered tricky either. With active treatment, recovering his memory in three to six months will be no problem at all.”
Lin Xun stared at that slender figure in the garden and remained silent for a long time.
Seeing Lin Xun come out, Li You hurriedly stood up and patted the dirt off his clothes. With his arms hanging down naturally and his index fingers hooked together, he asked him in a low voice: “Can we go home now? I don’t like staying in the hospital.”
He hated smelling the hospital disinfectant; it always carried a heavy, sharp bitterness. During the last two years of Li Qingyun’s life, he could smell this scent almost every single day.
Unexpectedly, Lin Xun put on a completely unconcerned posture. “How should I know where your home is?”
Li You instantly rang alarm bells internally: “But you said you were my boyfriend! Why don’t you know?”
Lin Xun let out a scoffing laugh, raised his hand to pinch Li You’s cheek, and said testily: “You dumped me to elope with an old man, why don’t you go ask him?”
“Impossible!” Li You refuted, so anxious that he scratched his head and ears. “This kind of… this kind of immoral behavior…” He climbed onto the Alpha’s arm, “In short, it’s impossible for me to elope with someone else, and why would I not want you?!”
The Alpha slapped away the hand resting on his arm and said coldly: “Because I can’t be presented in public, are you happy now?”
Lin Xun pretended to leave. Li You hesitated, wanting to say something, but he really didn’t know what to say. He caught sight of a faint ring mark left at the base of his left ring finger. To look at it more closely, he leaned in even nearer.
“Actually, you aren’t my boyfriend, right?” Li You asked weakly while staring at Lin Xun’s retreating back. “I have a mark left from wearing a ring for a long time on my hand, but you don’t have one on yours. You aren’t my boyfriend at all.”
As soon as his voice fell, a strange expression suddenly surfaced on Lin Xun’s face, he seemed a bit angry, yet also a bit amused.
“Did I ever say I was your boyfriend?”
Li You’s head let out a “boom”, this man had only said he was his boyfriend, purely one-sided.
The Beta stood frozen on the spot, utterly stunned.
“Then, then you are my…?”
Lin Xun dropped a bone-chilling sentence: “I am the male side-chick you keep in secret.”
“Are you satisfied now?”
Under Lin Xun’s deadly glare, Li You shook his head tremblingly and replied stutteringly: “N-Not satisfied…”
He raised his head to look at Lin Xun, saying with a look of deathly resignation: “For the sake of me picking you up when we were little, can you… temporarily take me in for a few months?”
Lin Xun finally stopped in his tracks, turned around, and stared at him indifferently.
“You remembered?” Lin Xun raised an eyebrow, smiling inexplicably while keeping his vocal pitch pressed very low, sounding eerie and strange. He yanked Li You up by the back of his collar and threw him into the car. “Li You, you are even more despicable now.”
Inside the car, Li You drooped his head dejectedly. Lin Xun only drove in silence. Aside from the sound of car horns on the road, the enclosed space was almost a suffocating, dead silence.
“I’m sorry.”
Li You didn’t dare to look at the Alpha, nervously picking at his fingers, and added another sentence: “Thank you.”
Lin Xun tapped his fingers rhythmically against the steering wheel, concise and to the point: “The reason.”
Li You said: “Even though I don’t remember what happened in the past, there must definitely be a misunderstanding between us. I wouldn’t abandon you to elope with an old, with someone else.”
“Thank you also for being willing to take me in. Once my injuries get a little better, I’ll go out to work and earn money to pay you rent.”
Lin Xun rubbed his face forcefully, gritting his teeth as he ordered: “Just shut up, Li You.”
Li You opened his mouth to speak, but Lin Xun stopped him a step ahead, threatening: “If you dare say one more word, I’ll throw you out.”
The early autumn weather was not as sweltering as high summer. The sunlight was no longer scorching, and the breeze blowing past carried a faint, refreshing comfort that felt exceptionally pleasant when hitting the face.
Li You had medicine applied to the backs of his hands and arms, wrapped up in gauze, which felt largely painless. He wanted to try unwrapping it to look at the wounds, but as soon as he touched the gauze, his hand was lightly slapped away by the person beside him.
Lin Xun chided him with a stern face, yet his voice wasn’t that severe, scattering as soon as the wind blew past.
Li You heard him scolding him: “Behave yourself.”
Li You blinked his eyes rapidly twice, then nodded, leaving it at that.
Dinner was still personally cooked by Lin Xun. Li You felt embarrassed and tried several times to go help out, only to be scolded back by the Alpha every time.
It wasn’t that Lin Xun was truly cursing at him; rather, he seemed to be deliberately keeping his distance, not bothering to have any interaction with him. From beginning to end, he carried a faint air of detachment on his body.
Ever since Li You stepped into this house, his heart was constantly filled with an awkward discomfort.
He was familiar with the layout of the rooms, proving that he had once been here, or even lived here. Yet being physically present inside it, his whole body felt uneasy, and even a surge of empty panic welled up within him.
Perhaps what Lin Xun said was true, and they really had dated in the past.
Li You firmly believed he couldn’t possibly do something as absurd as cheating or betraying his lover, yet he genuinely couldn’t remember a single thing. If he tried to think just a bit deeper, his temples would throb with needle-like pain.
“Which room do I sleep in?” Li You asked after setting down his bowl and chopsticks. Lin Xun casually pointed to a guest room to send him off, then cleaned up the leftovers by himself, leaving no further sound in the living room.