Chapter 158: Words that are hard to say

Xie Qingcheng doesn't know how he slept through it.

If it were before, with his mind in such turmoil, and the things he had experienced in such a mess, he would not have been able to sleep in any way.

But his body is deteriorating, and just did a thousand times more painful than chemotherapy RN-13 treatment, is really very weak, in the couch to calm down for a while, also really well up tiredness.

He didn't want to go to sleep, he felt he needed to calm down and think about what was the reason for the inner fluttering that was becoming more and more obvious when he was facing He Yu.

He looked at He Yu's closed door.

He was outside the door, He Yu was inside, and the door never opened again ......

The more Xie Qingcheng thought about it, the more he couldn't understand, he thought about what had just happened, especially the sound of He Yu's choking sobs at the end, he felt more and more uncomfortable in his heart.

Finally, he cursed himself and fell back onto the couch, his eyes drifting to the blank ceiling.

Tired and in pain, Xie Qingcheng finally fell asleep and had a dream.

He dreams he's trapped in a raggedy Muppet Bear, standing in front of a Ferris wheel at an amusement park, as if he's waiting for someone.

He didn't know who he was waiting for, and he just stood there, awkward and broken, with a handful of amusement park hydrogen balloons in his hand.

The Ferris wheel spun slowly, the neon lights changed, and the tourists who had finished their rides walked down, laughing and talking, without anyone paying attention to the corner where he stood.

Tourists come in groups.

They laughed so happily, so contentedly, that Raggedy Bear and his toy balloons were superfluous to them. So they couldn't see him.

After a while, Xie Qingcheng realized that he seemed to be waiting for someone who needed him and wanted to take the balloon away from him.

But it was as if he was under some kind of magic, he couldn't speak or show his true face, he could only stand like this, waiting ah ...... waiting ah ......

Amidst the music of the dream-like amusement park, a couple came down, and Xie Qingcheng realized with a jolt that it was his own parents, and he tried to move his body to walk over to them.

But his father beckoned and fetched down a white-horse carriage from Paradise, and Zhou Muying went with him, and the two were gradually carried out of sight by the white horse.

Xie Qingcheng stopped blankly.

He knew that they were gone and there was no turning back.

The second person to step off the Ferris wheel is Qin Ciyan.

Old Qin was alone, wearing the white coat he had worn all his life, smiling and looking to the right and left. Xie Qingcheng tried to get him to stop, but suddenly a child came running in the distance - a six- or seven-year-old boy holding a cone - and tilted his head up to yell something to Old Qin that Xie Qingcheng couldn't hear. Qingcheng couldn't hear him.

But he already knew who the kid was.

Old Qin reaches out and takes the little boy's palm, and the man and the boy fade away in the colorful lights of Paradise, and they look happy.

It's a happiness not found in life.

Only Xie Qingcheng stayed put.

It was already dark.

The third person who came down was Xie Xue, Xie Xue jumped up and down, and her figure changed from that of a little girl of five or six years old to her present form as she ran closer and closer from a distance.

Xie Xue froze as she passed him, staring at the rag doll as if she thought he looked familiar. After a few seconds, she walked up to him and smiled, just about to speak-

In the distance, however, a man suddenly called her name.

Xie Qingcheng couldn't see the person's face, but he knew it was a man, the person Xie Xue would eventually spend the rest of his life with.

Xie Xue turned her head when she heard the man's voice and thought about the fact that she wasn't a child after all, and that the toy dolls or the colorful balloons should no longer belong to her.

She then smiled at him one last time, waved with her favorite childhood bear Muppet toy, and stepped on her little white heels to walk briskly into her brightly lit future.

It was, well, completely dark.

On the Ferris wheel, one after another, many more people came down.

Colorful balloons.

The amusement park was about to close and the crowd dispersed.

He stood alone in the midst of his mirth, blinking slowly in his bear puppets, and gradually he was going to close his eyes, gradually he was going to let go of his hands and let the balloons, which could no longer cheer anyone, flutter and return to the sky ......

However--

"Thanks Dr."

"Thanks Dr."

He heard someone calling him.

He blurred his eyes open and there was no one in his field of vision.

"Look at me, I'm here."

He lowered his head and saw a neatly groomed and beautiful little child, seven or eight years old, looking up at him.

That was the first time he saw He Yu ......

"Dr. Shea, why don't you go home?"

"......" he couldn't answer, he was in a mannequin, in magic.

And even if he could answer, what would he say?

He doesn't have a home anymore.

"By the way, Dr. Xie ......" He Yu Jr. held out his hand as he held up a small face in the shape of a dragon, "This is something I made today at the playground... ...for you ......"

He stuck the Little dragon face in the pocket of his Xie Qingcheng doll suit.

The little kid smiled, "Can you brag about me?"

"Can you give me a hug?"

"......"

Can you give me a hug ......

That seemed to be, what he had heard He Yu say countless times.

Sad, impulsive, petulant, earnest, pleading, desperate--

He Yu's voice.

Over and over again, it spoke to him.

It was a lonely child, stubbornly begging for a little response from him.

Can you give me a hug? Xie Qingcheng?

Just like when I held you.

The child has been waiting and waiting ......

But Xie Qingcheng can't move, Xie Qingcheng is in the bear puppet, neither can he speak nor bend down to give him any reaction.

He Yu looked into his eyes, slowly, from anticipation, to bewilderment, from bewilderment, to confusion, from confusion, to disappointment ......

He just looked at Xie Qingcheng silently, lost.

And then - his body gradually became transparent - and he was going to - he was going to disappear too.

He's going away too ......

Xie Qingcheng's heart suddenly felt very bad, in the dream, he tried his best to break away from the magic, he wanted to give him the colorful ball in his hand, he wanted to ask him, can you see me? Do you know I'm in there? He wanted to reach out--

Suddenly.

The surroundings seemed to turn white all of a sudden, the colored lights, the Ferris wheel, the brick and stone streets where the floats paraded, everything faded into a scene like in a colored pencil painting.

Xie Qingcheng Open your eyes.

There was a man hugging him from behind.

He didn't look back, but his heart had gone from calm, to gradually speeding up and catching up with his body's response, and there was a great tremor within his chest, and he could feel the familiar body heat and smell ......

The He Yu of his childhood disappeared before his eyes, and the He Yu of his adulthood embraced him behind him.

Xie Qingcheng could feel his hot tears flowing down and falling on his shoulder ...... The tattered Muppet bear was tightly embraced by the tall and handsome young man, and He Yu fell into tears and said softly, "I know that you are inside. You don t go."

"I also need a Muppet Bear."

"I also want the colored ball in your hand ......"

"Xie Qingcheng, give me all your balloons and dolls. OK?"

"You ...... you turn around and give me a hug, okay ......"

That moment.

It was at that moment that Xie Qingcheng's heart felt like it had received the heaviest and deepest impact, an impact that destroyed the magic binding him and broke the shackles that prevented him from moving himself.

The broken bear-puppet turned awkwardly, and his chocolate-bean eyes looked at him wordlessly for a long time--

Then it stretched out its worn and tattered arms that no one needed to rely on any longer, and slowly ...... slowly lifted ...... eventually it embraced the youth who stood before him wiping away his tears ......

"Don't cry."

The raspy voice was finally able to unseal itself from the muppets, with difficulty, and flow out of the voice he had not been able to vocalize for so long.

"Don't cry, He Yu ......"

"No More Crying ......"

Withered lips murmured, eyelids rolled-- Xie Qingcheng suddenly awoke from his dream.

His eyes were still lax, the remnants of the dream lingering.

He raised his hand, trembling, and gently touched it to his eyelids.

This is him ......

What's the dream?

The earthquake of the heart continued, rippling through the limbs, unable to calm even the fingertips.

He wiped his eyes incredulously-wet and hot.

It's true that there have been tears.

"......" Xie Qingcheng woodenly lay on the sofa, his chest rose and fell more sharply than usual, he still had those neon lights in his eyes, and it seemed as if there were still the ethereal songs of the playground in his ears.

He didn't want to believe what he dreamed, didn't want to believe the response and vulnerability of his dream.

He preferred not to believe the feelings he was showing in that moment ......

He responded to He Yu, literally.

He slumped on the couch in a daze, with no strength at all, the knots in his throat rolling from time to time, his eyes wide and lifeless as he thought about it all.

I can't believe I'm still shaking inside when I think about that last hug in my dream.

It took Xie Qingcheng a long time to collect himself, he wiped away the thin wetness at the ends of his own eyes and raised his hand to look at his wristwatch-it was already past two in the morning, I wonder if He Yu had left?

He turned his head to the study door, which was still closed.

Xie Qingcheng calmed down again, rustled up, and just as he reached the door of the study to knock on the door, he heard the kitchen door open -- He Yu was in the kitchen.

"You woke up from your nap?" He Yu seemed to still be embarrassed by what happened between the two of them before going to bed, and for a moment he did not wish to meet Xie Qingcheng's direct gaze, but instead flexed his hand to cover up a cough and said in a small voice, "That, I've cooked a snack, you haven't eaten yet in the evening, have you? Originally, I wanted to wake you up later. It will be good soon ...... you wait for me for five more minutes."

Although He Yu didn't want Xie Qingcheng to go into the kitchen and wanted to bring the food out directly, Xie Qingcheng went in anyway.

A casserole stewed over a low flame on the stovetop, gurgling and steaming, and a smell, by no means unfamiliar to the old Huzhou people, wafted out of it.

Xie Qingcheng walked over and saw He Yu's cell phone still in front of the stove.

The young master wasn't much of a cook, and this was something he'd learned off-the-shelf from an online recipe. The screen also showed the title of the recipe, which was cheesy and straightforward-

Make a pot of soup for your baby.

Xie Qingcheng averted his eyes from that title, hiding from something.

He took the insulated wet towel and lifted the lid off the casserole, the heat from inside steaming out and blurring his rigidly lined face.

The stew in the pot was really pickled dukkah.

Xie Qingcheng loved this dish. Auntie Lai would make it, and so would he himself, but it was never as good as his mom's when she was alive.

Pickled Dukkah is a typical southern dish that calls for ingredients like tender bamboo shoots, ham hock and thousand knots, but there's one more unseen ingredient needed to cook this dish: patience.

The "duk" in "pickled duk fresh" is taken from the gurgling sound of the soup as it simmers slowly over a gentle fire. During the long and patient simmering process, the tenderness of the bamboo shoots, the saltiness of the ham, and the freshness and aroma of the pork ribs are all transformed into the essence of the pot, and boiled through to the thousand knots that contain all the flavors.

He Yu so thick skin, this moment also some can not hang, he wants to drive Xie Qingcheng out again: "You do not stand here, you stand here I can not play well, you, you first out."

"........."

--

"Don't stand in the kitchen and distract me, get out." Zhou Muying used to say the same thing to Xie Qingcheng.

He Yu is just like her in this respect.

Xie Qingcheng wanted to say something, but finally did not say, he went out.

As he sat in the living room waiting, he kept thinking about his dream, and all that had happened before.

He knew that He Yu was digging out a heart to give to himself.

He'd never seen such passionate love before, so at first he just dismissed it as a teenager's whimsical obsession. It wasn't real.

He was like the king who could not recognize the Heshi Bi, and He Yu was the Huai Bi man whom he had wronged. He Yu proves time and again that his heart is true. He says to Xie Qingcheng, "You are irreplaceable. If you think that I am wrong in loving you, I can be wrong for the rest of my life, and on the day of my death, I can prove that I am right.

He said, I'm with you every day I'm alive, every hour, every minute, every second. I'm loving you, I'm protecting you, I'm there for you.

Xie Qingcheng is not an iron heart, and it would be a lie to say that he was not touched. But what makes him unable to break free is actually He Yu's need for him.

Xie Qingcheng was always a macho man, and what he did most often, what he was most accustomed to doing, was to take care of others. As if that was the meaning of his existence.

Xie Qingcheng Think carefully, if one day, he is no longer there, then all the people around, how will they live on?

He knew that Auntie Lai, Chen Man, Xie Xue ...... they must be very sad, but at the same time he believed that they could support each other and slowly come out from that sadness.

They all have many bridges between them and society, and while losing one of their own certainly hurts, it won't be impossible to walk away from it.

Then he thought of He Yu.

If he were gone, would He Yu still be in the kitchen making soup? Would he still cook a meal with a recipe and a fire?

If he were gone, would He Yu still seek to speak to someone, try to see a doctor, restrain himself as much as he could from being consumed by the demons of his mind, would he still follow another person around, talk to the other person about the trivialities of the day's events, and then seek a hug from that person?

Xie Qingcheng knows that it's hard.

He Yu is too stubborn.

He can have his head blown off, he can have his jade burned, he can fall into madness, but he doesn't know how to turn back.

Even if he knows a path is dead and black, as long as he steps on it, he's going to keep going.

Xie Qingcheng closed his eyes.

He did not expect that in the end, the remaining person who made him he could not predict the subsequent life, the person who made him feel most at ease, would be He Yu.

"It's cooked, try it!"

He Yu came out of the kitchen and brought a big steaming bowl to Xie Qingcheng.

"I'm smart, it should taste good."

Xie Qingcheng looks at it, and it's not a pickled dukkah.

It was a bowl of noodles, the soup was milky and rich, the noodles were smooth and delicate, on top of which there was a tender green sea green that had been boiled in scalding water, a golden loose-formed egg lying on top, and a stir-fried mushroom topping with fragrant meat foam on top of the soup, and then finally there were a couple of thousand knots that were cooked into the fresh flavor, sprinkled with a handful of white sesame seeds.

The essence of pickled dukkah lies in the broth and the thousand sheets of knots, as the freshness of the bamboo shoots, ham, and meat are already fully paid for in them.

Xie Qingcheng looked at this bowl of noodles made with pickled dashi broth, as if He Yu had exhausted all his eagerness, love, and kindness, and then eagerly held it in front of him. He knew that something in his heart had crumbled and collapsed.

"He Yu."

The teenager raised his almond eyes, "Hmm?"

"......"

Xie Qingcheng found himself wanting to apologize for being mean to him earlier.

He was so angry with him for no reason, and a few hours later he gave him back a warm pot of soup ......

Xie Qingcheng's heart was full of bad feelings, and he really wanted to reach out and give this lonely demonic dragon a hug.

Just like in the dream, He Yu hugged him, who was trapped deep inside the worn-out Muppet Bear.

But he ultimately held back the slight tremor in his fingertips and didn't do that.

If a bridge is eventually going to be torn down, it shouldn't be allowed to become the path that teenagers are used to walking on.

Xie Qingcheng was ultimately sensible and restrained enough to avert his gaze.

"Why don't you have some along with it."

"I'll just eat meat, I like meat."

"......" Who doesn't know that the meat of the marinade has long ago boiled all the essence with the soup, and nothing of the flavor is left?

But He Yu, a picky eater more than anything else, really went and scooped up some meat bones and sat down across from Xie Qingcheng to gnaw on them.

Dog-like.

Xie Qingcheng thought for a long time, finally made up his mind, and said, "...... He Yu. come to my place on the weekend, and I'll make you what you want to eat. Then ......"

He Yu's joy and frustration both spilled over in an instant before he could finish the words that followed, "The weekend? ...... I'm going to the sports meet on the weekend, the school signed me up for it."

Xie Qingcheng thought for a moment, "Have a good game then. Next time."

"So you'll come to my game?"

"......"

"Will?"

"I have weekend morning classes, I'll try."

Xie Qingcheng said, seemingly feeling that the teenager's gaze was too hot, so she lowered her eyes and ate her noodles.

The teenager was happy again.

And at that moment, Xie Qingcheng felt so much pain in the heart ......

He finally realizes that he cares about He Yu that much too, but what can be done about it?

He has a shallow lifespan, and if he can't let go of the warmth He Yu Yu has given him, if they keep going on like this, then in the end he will leave the world himself, and although he has enjoyed all of the teenager's love, he will only leave the teenager with a long period of sadness, and that would be too selfish and irresponsible.

Long pain is better than short pain, delayed for so long, it turned out to be all because he has him in his heart, have to be difficult to pull out ......

But it's time, too, for a complete heartbreak--

It's time for him to let go of the kid who wants to hug a bear puppet doll.