"What are you looking at?" Xie Qingcheng finished washing his hands, wiped them dry with a couple of tissues, and glanced mildly at He Yu.
The young He Yu asked, "Doctor Xie, on your wrist…"
Xie Qingcheng's eyes darkened. He looked down to see that his sleeves were rolled up high enough to reveal the skin above his wrist and immediately went to pull them back down. But it was too late. He Yu was already asking, "What does it say?"
Xie Qingcheng didn't answer for a few seconds, his motions stiff as he unbuttoned his cuffs and smoothed them back out. Then he said with an indifferent expression, "Here lies one whose name was writ in water."
He Yu recognized the quote: it was the same one carved into the grave of the English poet John Keats. "Why did you get that tattooed? You like tombstones?"
Xie Qingcheng rolled his eyes, lifting his wrist to refasten the button of his sleeve properly. "I like Keats."
In those days, He Yu usually didn't talk back to Xie Qingcheng. Even though he was thinking, "Just because you like Keats doesn't mean you have to tattoo his epitaph on your arm," he didn't ask any more questions. It was clear from Xie Qingcheng's unhappy expression that he didn't feel like wasting his breath on him.
He figured, though, that Xie Xue probably liked her brother's weird taste, so she must approve of him inking an epitaph onto his own body. With that thought in mind, he went to a tattoo parlor near his school that very same night.
The owner welcomed him with a broad smile and handed him several thick volumes of reference images. He Yu lowered his head and looked through those pages full of flying gods and supernatural creatures for a while as the owner gave a steady stream of recommendations.
"The most popular one is this flying dragon tattoo. Look at these claws, it—"
"Are there any epitaphs?" He Yu interrupted.
"Huh? Epitaphs?" the owner repeated, confused.
Of course, the tattoo parlor didn't have any samples of something so bizarre, but the owner had seen shady characters from many walks of life come through his shop with all sorts of peculiar requests. As a result, after a beat of surprise, he continued his enthusiastic recommendations. "I don't have epitaphs, but if you want some cooler words, young man, 'om mani padme hum' is very popular right now."
He Yu smiled courteously. "In that case, I'll decide on one myself."
In the end, he gave three lines to the parlor owner.
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change,
Into something rich and strange.
"This is quite long," said the owner, "so it will hurt for quite a while. Plus, it has to be broken into several lines. Would you like to find something shorter?"
He Yu said, "It's fine, I want this one."
There were, in fact, shorter Latin epitaphs on the graves of other poets, but He Yu wanted something exactly like Xie Qingcheng's—a long line of text wrapping around his wrist like a bracelet—so he chose this poem that had been engraved onto a tombstone.
When the owner rolled up He Yu's sleeve, he received a great shock. "Aiya, you have so many scars here! What happened here? Are people bullying you in school—a good-looking kid like you? And they all look like knife wounds?"
He Yu frowned. "Can't you tattoo over scars?"
"I can. Of course I can. I can put it here, over this really obvious one, to cover it up…"
"There's no need to cover it up. I want the tattoo slightly above my wrist." He Yu gestured at the spot, "Right here. Thank you for your trouble."
Thus, the verses were inked, burning like a brand on the youth's wrist. The flesh reddened where it had been pierced as the slanting letters of specially formulated ink sank into his skin. He Yu looked at the tattoo, feeling deeply satisfied, and left the little tattoo parlor after paying the bill.
But he hadn't anticipated that he would be allergic to the tattoo ink.
He woke up the next day feeling dizzy. Not only was the writing on his wrist so inflamed it was unreadable, but his head ached and burned from the allergic reaction.
Unfortunately, that hapless little brother of his was having a celebration later that day for starting school. He Jiwei and Lü Zhishu were both with their younger son in Yanzhou—which was all fine, except that Lü Zhishu called He Yu seven or eight times to remind him to join the video call with his brother on his computer.
"As his elder brother, and as an example to everyone, don't you think you ought to wish your little brother smooth sailing in his studies?" Lü Zhishu had nagged.
On top of having a distant relationship with his parents, He Yu was proud and withdrawn, so he wasn't willing to say anything that made him look soft or weak in front of them. Naturally, he couldn't tell Lü Zhishu that he was sick. So he pulled himself upright, grabbed his laptop, and curled up on the sofa. When the time for the video call came, he opened the webcam and put on his flawless mask of perfection, sending his congratulations to the people on the other end of the call in a manner perfectly befitting the occasion.
Suddenly, a slender hand reached past him from behind and unequivocally slammed the laptop on his knees shut, ending the video transmission. He Yu twisted around in astonishment to see Xie Qingcheng standing behind the sofa.
Xie Qingcheng, with his broad shoulders and long legs and poker face, lowered his peach-blossom eyes to look down at He Yu from above. "You should rest properly if you're sick."
"I wasn't done talking to them yet," He Yu protested.
Xie Qingcheng reached out a hand to feel He Yu's forehead. His hand was slightly cool and felt indescribably refreshing on He Yu's burning skin. Instinctively, He Yu let out a sigh, his eyes falling half-closed as he subconsciously leaned forward and pressed his head gently into Xie Qingcheng's hand. It felt so wonderful that, for a moment, he couldn't even finish the rest of what he was going to say.
"Little devil, you have a fever." Xie Qingcheng leaned over He Yu where he was sitting cross-legged on the sofa and took the thin laptop from his lap.
He Yu snapped out of his daze and stopped in the middle of rubbing his head against Xie Qingcheng's hand. "My computer…"
Xie Qingcheng had no plan to return the computer to him. "It's just a first-day-of-school celebration. You've come down with an extremely high fever. Why didn't you say anything to anyone?"
"It's fine. You don't need to worry so much about such a small thing." He Yu tried once again to reach for the laptop in Xie Qingcheng's hand.
Xie Qingcheng held up the laptop even higher. "You're my patient. If I don't worry about you, then who will?"
He Yu didn't reply to that, but he reached over the back of the sofa to grab Xie Qingcheng's arm. He glared at Xie Qingcheng and opened his mouth a few times to refute him, but he couldn't find the right words to say.
The two of them remained in their respective positions—one sitting and reaching out to grab the other's arm, and the other standing while looking back at him. An evening breeze swept over the pure-white sofa as rich light trickled in through the slightly open window, giving the scene the appearance of an oil painting.
Perhaps in that moment, this sick, lonely boy was so pathetic that he falsely perceived a hint of softness in Xie Qingcheng's ever chilly and emotionless eyes.
"He Yu," he said. "You're much too tense. There's no way you can do everything perfectly."
"Doctor Xie, you're only a doctor," He Yu argued. "You don't have to consider these sorts of things for me. Give me back my laptop. I need to finish what I was doing."
The two of them stared each other down. In the end, Xie Qingcheng lifted the laptop and tapped it gently against He Yu's forehead. "Doctor's orders."
Then Xie Qingcheng's gaze dropped downward, inadvertently sweeping over the sliver of skin peeking out from under He Yu's sleeve.
He frowned. "What's wrong with your hand?"
As if electrocuted, He Yu immediately withdrew his hand and tried to tug his sleeve back into place. But Xie Qingcheng was already a step ahead of him. He reached out to grab He Yu's arm at once and pushed his long sleeve up…
…For a moment, neither of them spoke.
At last, Xie Qingcheng asked, "You got a tattoo?"
"No."
"So that isn't tattoo ink on your wrist?" When He Yu didn't reply, Xie Qingcheng continued, "Are you looking for trouble? How old are you again? Does your school even allow this?"
He Yu didn't say a word, but his invisible dragon's tail began to thump against the ground in restless irritation.
Xie Qingcheng's gaze traveled back and forth between He Yu's wrist and his face. After a while, something seemed to occur to him. "He Yu, are you…copying me?"
This time, he had truly stomped on the little dragon's tail. A stricken expression overtook the boy's face, but he couldn't manage a single word in self-defense. He could only glare daggers at Xie Qingcheng, his face twisting up as though he'd eaten some fatally poisonous mushroom.
"Are you copying me?" Xie Qingcheng pressed.
He Yu leapt up from the sofa in an attempt to flee. "The tattoo artist designed it. Who's copying you? You're not handsome at all, you're not good-looking, and I don't like your taste either…"
But he had overestimated his physical condition. He hadn't taken more than a couple of steps before his legs went weak underneath him. It felt like he was walking on cotton. Then the world suddenly spun around him, and by the time he got his bearings, Xie Qingcheng had already picked him up around the waist just like when He Yu was little and hoisted him over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
The problem was that back then, He Yu had only reached Xie Qingcheng's knees. But now…
He whipped his head around, furiously flustered as he stopped feigning docility. Pinching the back of Xie Qingcheng's neck, he yelled, "Put me down! This is too embarrassing…"
"If you don't want me to suplex you, get your pointy little claws off my neck."
"Put me down first! I'm already twelve!"
"I'm still older than you, even if you reverse the digits. No matter how tall you get, you're just a little devil who's still in junior high."
"Xie Qingcheng!"
Xie Qingcheng paused for a beat. When he continued speaking, his words were as indifferent as ever, but his voice seemed to carry the faintest hint of a smile indicating that their strict doctor-patient relationship had crossed some boundary. "He Yu, I didn't know you admired me so much."
"Who are you saying admires you?!"
"You like Shelley?"
"No way! I like tombstones!"
The racket had lasted all the way to He Yu's bedroom.
Even now, as an adult, He Yu had no idea whether that faint smile in Xie Qingcheng's voice had just been his own fevered imagination, especially when so much time had passed and he could no longer remember many of the details all that well. But the one thing he could still clearly remember from that night was that after Xie Qingcheng had carried him back to his bedroom and given him a shot of antihistamine, he had gone out to the bedroom's balcony and made a very long call to Lü Zhishu.
He Yu was lying on the bed, and he couldn't hear what Xie Qingcheng was saying through the floor-to-ceiling glass doors. But he could see Xie Qingcheng lift a hand to rub repeatedly at his brow, like he was suppressing certain emotions as he spoke. By the end, Xie Qingcheng was clearly angry, hurling harsh reproaches at Lü Zhishu with a furious expression on his face.
To be honest, there's really no need for this, He Yu thought, nestled in his blankets as he watched Xie Qingcheng struggle to communicate with his mother. There's really no need. What meaning was there in care that was received by asking, in pity that was given by begging?
Later on, when Xie Qingcheng pushed the balcony door open and walked back into the room, He Yu hastily flipped over on his belly and closed his eyes, pretending he was asleep to prevent himself from getting even more annoyed. He could smell that faint icy scent of disinfectant on Xie Qingcheng's body, but for some reason, perhaps because he was also wrapped in the chilly moonlight of a bright evening, it didn't smell as bad as it once did.
Xie Qingcheng thought that He Yu was already asleep, so he kept his voice quiet when he said, "Forget it."
The moonlight was clear and cold as it spilled onto He Yu's bed. But, for some reason, those words revealed a bit of unprecedented warmth.
He Yu could tell that Xie Qingcheng's voice was a bit hoarse from spending so long fruitlessly arguing with Lü Zhishu.
"Little devil… Get some rest. I'm not busy these next few days, so I can keep you company."
Right in that moment, He Yu felt as if his heart was suddenly seized with an indescribable pain. It was a sensation he'd never felt so clearly before. It was like there was a rusty knife within his chest that had grown together with his flesh, and it had been abruptly awoken by those words and started to twist inside him, struggling to be drawn out.
It hurt so much he couldn't breathe, but he had to stay quiet so that Xie Qingcheng wouldn't realize that he was still awake.
He knew Xie Qingcheng had failed to negotiate anything from his mother. He wasn't at all surprised by this result, but he suddenly realized that before Xie Qingcheng, there had never been even a single person who had strived so hard to make sure that he wouldn't be lonely.
There had never been a single person who chose him over He Li, who stood on his side and asked his parents, who were practically strangers to him, Why?
He Yu tilted his face into the shadows, his thick eyelashes quietly lowered. There, tucked away where Xie Qingcheng couldn't see, a tear slowly welled out and slid down his cheek, landing silently in the goose down bedding. Amidst this unfamiliar burst of pain, He Yu kept quiet, kept pretending, until finally falsehood became truth, and he gradually fell asleep for real.
The next morning, He Yu's fever broke and he woke up very early.
The sun shone in through the gauze curtains, which swayed slightly in the wind as birds chirped outside the window. His head felt so clear, as though it'd been freshly washed.
Blinking, he collected himself and flipped over to get up. That was when he saw Xie Qingcheng beside the bed, asleep with his head on his arm and several strands of hair tumbling over his brow.
It was the first time he had seen Xie Qingcheng sleeping. He was tranquil, calm, and as serene and translucent as a diaphanous spirit, like the first glow of dawn cast over the windowsill after the passing of night.
He Yu's gaze subconsciously shifted down to Xie Qingcheng's wrist. One of the buttons had loosened in his sleep, so his sleeve splayed open, exposing a section of slender wrist with clear skin and elegant bones. In the morning light, it was almost shockingly pale.
He Yu looked at the line of words on that pale wrist, which he had glimpsed but never examined closely before.
Here lies one whose name was writ in water.
He Yu left the nightclub with his emotions in a chaotic tangle. He wandered about without any set destination in mind, constantly thinking about such random things… But why did he remember those past events?
No matter what happened in the past, no matter what Xie Qingcheng had been feeling when he said, Little devil, it's all right. I can keep you company, it was all fake.
The extent to which Xie Qingcheng had moved him back then was equivalent to the depth of the ruthless wound he had stabbed into his heart when he left without the slightest hesitation.
To be honest, over the years, He Yu had often wondered in the middle of the night why Xie Qingcheng had to leave.
Was he not good enough?
Was it because he hadn't been able to become a normal person like Xie Qingcheng wanted?
That day when He Yu was still in ninth grade, when his fourteen-year-old self stood stiff as a pole before a departing Xie Qingcheng, he hadn't even had the courage to ask that man, Xie Qingcheng, tell me, those words that you said to me, the warmth you showed me—did I make it all up?
Was it my misunderstanding?
Was all that we shared just a pure, simple doctor-patient relationship?
It's been seven years.
Xie Qingcheng, even if you were just casually treating a stray dog, you have to get a bit attached in the process, right? So how could you break things off so cleanly? How could you leave just like that… How could you spout all those justifications, talking about working relationships, contracts, rules—as though you'd conveniently forgotten that you also occasionally showed me those bits of care and warmth that perhaps had no place in a doctor-patient relationship.
But having been abandoned like that, he felt too humiliated. His sense of self-respect had suffered a grievous injury, as though Xie Qingcheng had landed an excruciating, scorching slap across his face.
It hurt so much that He Yu was never willing to recall this moment later on.
And in the end, no matter how much he thought about it, it was all nothing more than his one-sided fixation. He had too little affection, so whatever he received from another, even if it was mere scraps, he treasured as his own and hoarded as if it was a priceless gem. It was laughable.
How humiliating.
He Yu's pride caused him to take all those tiny stirrings of emotion and suffocate them with his own hands, then ruthlessly slam the coffin shut and seal them away—until this very moment.
He Yu closed his eyes, the casket of memories opening as he recalled the scene when Xie Qingcheng stood on the balcony and argued with his mother without backing down, when Xie Qingcheng pushed open the door and walked inside with an air of fatigue, and when Xie Qingcheng's sigh landed next to his pillow.
Forget it.
Little devil… Get some rest. I'm not busy these next few days, so I can keep you company.
Xie Qingcheng had given him faith and companionship, but then he left so completely, so heartlessly. He could always remain calm and coolheaded, clearly weighing the pros and cons of the situation. He willingly studied psychology, yet he left the hospital because he didn't want to become the next Qin Ciyan. He made pleasant statements about how the mentally ill should be treated equally, yet he claimed that people's lives could be sorted according to their worth—that the lives of doctors were much more valuable than those of the mentally ill.
Xie Qingcheng was too complicated, too paradoxical.
Aside from the man who had truly been tormented to the point of helplessness beneath him last night, He Yu didn't think there was a single facet of Xie Qingcheng that was real.
Everything about him was fake.
That man was like a kaleidoscope, but He Yu was too young, so he couldn't make sense of him.
After walking for a long time without any particular destination, He Yu finally returned to his senses to realize that he had inadvertently walked to Xie Qingcheng's neighborhood.
The words that Xie Qingcheng had left behind after their fight echoed through his ears once more. "Something's happened at home, and I have to get back! Get the fuck off me right now!"
He Yu stood near the curb, his hands shoved in his pants pockets and a dazed expression on his face as he looked at the chaotic scene at the entrance of Moyu Alley in the distance. There were even a number of police officers gathered there.
He had a vague idea of what must have happened at Xie Qingcheng's house.