Song Qi finished explaining things to the floor’s special care nurse, turned around, and walked into Ruan Luo’s ward.
As soon as he entered, Song Qi stared at the ceiling with a frown: “Did you turn off the big white light on the ceiling?”
He pointed to a strip of dim, yellow light on the wall that was working hard to emit light: “Turning on a firefly light instead. Being so sensitive to the dark, don’t tell me you’re a vampire.”
After asking, he noticed Fu Yu was on the phone, so he shut his mouth.
He walked to the bedside and looked down at Ruan Luo. When his gaze swept over Ruan Luo’s eyes, his heart suddenly skipped a beat.
A thought that challenged his cognition exploded in his mind,
Holy crap! Is this guy actually trying to protect Ruan Luo’s eyes?!
Ruan Luo had stayed in a dim environment for three years and indeed could not adapt quickly to normal light intensity. If not protected properly, it would cause a certain degree of damage to his eyes.
Song Qi was a doctor, yet he hadn’t even considered protecting the patient in the first instance.
On the contrary, it was Fu Yu who considered things so thoroughly for his victim, which was completely unlike him…
Song Qi paced back and forth in the room for a minute, scrutinizing Fu Yu from various angles.
He felt that this weasel visiting the chicken for the New Year didn’t seem to be faking his concern for Ruan Luo.
Yet he still didn’t believe it.
Just as he turned to leave, he heard Fu Yu hang up the phone and say to him, “I want to do a full-body physical checkup for Ruan Luo. When can it be done?”
Song Qi pushed up his gold-rimmed glasses: “As soon as he wakes up. However, his situation is special, so I need to draft a few plans for you to look at first.”
His voice carried no lack of playful mockery: “Although you never held a wedding for him, nor took him out to meet anyone, you did register the marriage after all, so you are ultimately his responsible party. The chosen plan will require your signature.”
After Song Qi left, the floor nurse who was there earlier knocked on the door and pushed a cart inside. She took out five thick and long syringes from the cart: “Mr. Fu, these are the Alpha special-grade suppressants Dr. Song asked me to bring to you. He said seeing you suppress it yourself looked too exhausting, so he allocated stock from the inventory for you to use first. The customized ones can only be provided a day later. There are five injections here. You are a top-tier Alpha, so the efficacy of the medicine will be greatly reduced. If you inject one a day, it can suppress it for one day. Or if you inject five at once, it can suppress it for a week. How would you like to choose? Do you need me to help you administer them?”
“No need.”
The special nurse smiled, pushed the cart, and left.
Fu Yu gave himself five consecutive injections and felt somewhat fatigued. He suspected Song Qi was setting a trap for him, but he didn’t care.
After completing the injections, he reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes.
He was not addicted to smoking; smoking simply helped him calm down.
When he went out, he took Ruan Luo’s diary, which he had placed in his coat pocket.
He sat on the sofa and lit a cigarette.
Taking a puff, he exhaled a cloud of turbid smoke. Sparks of light flickered between his fingers as he opened Ruan Luo’s diary.
The first page: “Endure a little longer.”
The handwriting was delicate and neat, written with a light stroke. However, there were scratch marks from fingers on the paper, looking as if Ruan Luo had written it while in agony.
The second page: “Endure a little longer.”
The third page: “Endure just a little longer.”
Fu Yu patiently turned the pages one by one. After turning through about a third of the book, it was all “Endure a little longer” or “Endure just a little longer.”
It was different from what Fu Yu had thought. Before opening it, Fu Yu assumed the diary would be filled with the pain and suffering he had endured. Yet regarding the pain and that sadist, Ruan Luo did not mention a single word in his diary.
He mentioned no hatred, no hardship. He only wrote, “Endure.”
Having “endured” through a third of the book, on the first page at around the two-thirds thickness mark, Fu Yu saw different content.
This page read: “I had a fever today, and I was very cold. But I saw Grandpa. I know it’s a hallucination. If hallucinations allow me to see Grandpa, please let me have a fever a bit longer.”
Fu Yu’s finger trembled, and the cigarette ash between his fingers fluttered down, falling into the shadows of the sofa and disappearing without a trace.
Fu Yu continued to turn the pages. “Endure a little longer” was still scattered among the sheets, but the handwriting was no longer neat, and the strokes were heavier than before.
Words like “Was my birth a mistake?” began to appear.
Flipping further, Fu Yu saw a page that read: “I can’t tell whether I’m alive or not. I saw Grandpa again. I also saw the garden, flying birds, and the sun. I haven’t basked in the sun for a long time. I used to look forward to hallucinations, hoping to see something familiar. But now, even hallucinations cannot make me feel happy.”
Fu Yu’s fingertips lingered on this page for a long time. He forgot to smoke.
There were not many pages left. After staring blankly, he began flipping again, but after turning only four or five pages, his finger stopped once more.
That page contained only eight words: “Want to die. But what about Grandpa?”
Time seemed to stand still.
Outside the window came the sound of wind and bird calls, and sunlight streamed through the windowpanes, falling right onto Ruan Luo’s diary.
Those words remained silent in the sunlight.
Yet Fu Yu could only hear the howling wind, rain, and snow echoing within the diary.
There was nothing after that; a few blank pages remained unwritten.
Fu Yu fell into silence.
It was not until the cigarette burned down to the butt and scalded his finger that he lowered his head and cast a faint glance at the reddened gap between his fingers.
Returning to the ward, Fu Yu warmed a towel in the bathroom inside the suite, brought out a basin of hot water, and carefully wiped Ruan Luo’s face and body.
After tucking Ruan Luo in under the blanket, he pinched the bridge of his nose, leaned back against the nurse’s chair by Ruan Luo’s bedside, and closed his eyes. It was unclear whether he was contemplating or resting.
Ruan Luo, who had been comforted with gentle pats when Fu Yu was on the phone earlier, had only been quiet for a short while before he began muttering anxiously again.
Fu Yu leaned forward, propping his elbow beside Ruan Luo’s pillow to support his head, while wrapping one arm loosely around Ruan Luo over the quilt. His hand patted Ruan Luo rhythmically, offering a somewhat clumsy comfort. He whispered, “Ruan Luo, do you like little sheep? I’ll count sheep for you. One little goat, two little goats, three little goats…”
The curtains in the ward had been drawn shut by Fu Yu when Ruan Luo first moved in, leaving only a thin layer of sheer gauze to let in a tiny bit of faint sunlight, bringing a touch of life to the room.
The entire environment was extremely dim.
When Song Qi entered with a stack of printed PPT plans while breaking into a sweat, the scene he witnessed made his jaw drop,
A man standing 1.9 meters tall with broad shoulders and long legs was awkwardly crammed into a far-from-spacious nurse’s chair, counting sheep in a deep voice: “Three hundred twenty-one little goats, three hundred twenty-two little goats, three hundred thirty-three little sheep…”
The impact it delivered to Song Qi was equivalent to seeing the legendary Godfather Vito Corleone sitting atop a wobbly rocking horse, singing to him: “What is daddy’s daddy called? Daddy’s daddy is called grandpa…”
Song Qi’s scalp felt numb, but he didn’t forget to correct him: “According to patterns, I judge that the three hundred thirty-third should also be a little goat.”
Fu Yu opened his eyes and slowly looked toward Song Qi.
The gaze sent a shudder through Song Qi right where he stood.
Song Qi feared Fu Yu looking at him like this the most. Just as he wanted to laugh it off, leave the plans, and temporarily flee, a very subtle movement drew Fu Yu’s attention away.
Following the sound, Song Qi looked at Ruan Luo, who opened his eyes in Fu Yu’s arms and coughed weakly. Feeling as if he had received a grand reprieve, Song Qi let out a breath of relief and stepped forward, saying, “Finally awake.”