MFW 21

Chapter 21

In the end, Li Fei couldn’t bring himself to hit him. Sighing, he gently wiped the tears from his lover’s face with warm fingertips. As night deepened outside the window, Li Fei began speaking slowly, enunciating each word: “Fu Xiaoting, I know you’re intelligent.The truth is exactly as I said. But I can give you some time to sort through the logic yourself. I believe you’ll eventually reach the same conclusion as me.”

“Go ahead. Sort it out right here.”

“I won’t let you go until you’ve sorted it out. You can take your time thinking it through here.”

He reached out, offering his chest.

Supporting the silent youth with his embrace, he gently stroked the back of his neck…. That night, the starry sky light in the bedroom cast rippling patterns. Within the small space shared under the same blanket, Li Fei finally heard Fu Siting speak for the first time about those stories from his youth, the “not-so-good” times, the “things that are over,” the “nothing worth mentioning.”

“When I was born, my leg joints were malformed. The doctor said treatment was possible, but no guarantee of success. My father cared only about appearances and shirked responsibility. Unable to bear others mocking him for having a disabled son, he stopped coming home from that day on.”

“He’d run a small business, but lost it. He spent his days carousing and causing trouble, until gambling debts led creditors to our door.”

“My foolish mother still believed he’d change his ways. She gave him everything we owned to pay off his debts.”

“She even sold off her job at the Highway Bureau, a position my grandmother had secured for her by exhausting her lifetime of connections. She scraped together every last penny and handed it all to that good-for-nothing man.”

“But he ran off with the money. She lost her only stable job. Times were tough back then, and she had no marketable skills. She still had to raise me and care for Grandma…”

“So she decided to go out and find a new provider.”

“But her luck in that regard was terrible. The first man she found tricked her into working as a hostess in a nightclub, then committed a crime that nearly got her arrested too. The second man swindled her money under the guise of investments and beat her. The third, Mr. Cao, was the only decent one, a truck driver who treated her well and paid for my education. But less than a year after we married, he and his truck plunged off a cliff, and he died.”

“Then came the fourth one, I still don’t know what she saw in him. He was a deadbeat, ugly as sin, and skilled at everything from prostitution and gambling to drinking, scamming, and violence. Yet she refused to leave him.”

“…”

“Actually, the year Mr. Cao died, my mother received over 300,000 yuan in accident insurance as his widow.”

“If that money hadn’t been swindled away by the fourth husband, it should have sustained our family until I graduated from college. We wouldn’t have been left destitute. Once I found a job, I could have supported her instead.”

“But after the money was gone, even reporting it to the police couldn’t get it back. We did file charges, and he was convicted and is still in prison. But he’d already blown through every penny, he couldn’t pay a cent in compensation.”

“That year, I was in ninth grade.”

“We sold everything we could. My mom and I sat facing bare walls, sometimes going days without food. I tried odd jobs, but shops wouldn’t hire me because I was too young, or only as cheap labor. Mom took a job at a snack shop, but after a week, she collapsed in the kitchen. The hospital diagnosed her with uremia. She needed dialysis and was waiting for a kidney transplant.”

“Later, I chose No. 3 High School for its proximity to home. They offered me a scholarship.”

“No. 3 High’s admission standards weren’t high, I ranked among the top entrants. But the scholarship gradually fell short of covering my mother’s medical bills. Throughout high school, I juggled studying with daily part-time work.”

“Then I was diagnosed with my own illness… Ha…”

Fu Siting still withheld certain details from Li Fei.

For instance, after his mother was hospitalized, the family savings steadily dwindled despite his part-time wages and scholarship supplements. By the time he was diagnosed with cancer, the household account held barely over 1,300 yuan. So when he learned he had stomach cancer, his immediate fear wasn’t whether he could afford surgery or survive. His greater dread was losing his ability to find new work, what then?

1,300 yuan, without any new income, it would last them only a few days. After that, even putting food on the table for him and his mother would become impossible. Where they would live next month would be a question. In the harsh reality of life, the greatest source of fear and dread wasn’t the sudden onset of illness. It was the constant, vulture-like presence of scarcity and hopelessness hovering overhead. The constant threat of going hungry, the constant fear of losing their home, the perpetual absence of even the slightest sense of security.

But Fu Siting didn’t want Li Fei to know these excruciatingly embarrassing details. He still clung to some shred of pride, unwilling to let him see his most humiliating side. Fu Siting had assumed he’d shared at least some of his past with Li Fei. But it seemed the twenty-eight-year-old had buried everything.

Why?

In the darkness, Li Fei fell silent. He too wanted to know why. The bedroom was quiet, illuminated only by the flowing starlight lamp. After a long moment, a small voice came from his embrace: “I’m sorry.”

“…”

Fu Siting’s head rested against his chest, his voice hoarse: “I’m sorry. I don’t know why he… chose to hide it from you. I’m sorry.”

“I apologize for him. Please don’t be angry with him, okay?” Another moment of silence passed. Countless complex emotions tangled within Li Fei’s heart. In his youth, he had always been a cold, hard man. It had to be said that Fu Siting’s appearance had taught him this soft yet helpless feeling. “It’s not your fault,” he murmured. “You’re the best, baby.”

“It’s my fault.”

“It’s my fault for pressuring you to tell me all this. I’m sorry.”

The person in his arms stiffened, looking lost and helpless. Li Fei held him tighter, slowly warming his cold hands and feet. “Fu Siting, I admit I was a bit impatient before. But thinking about it now, if you didn’t want to tell me these things at twenty-eight, there must have been a reason.”

“Whatever the reason, if you were hiding something, I should have been more patient. Waited longer…until the day you were ready to fully trust me and lean on me.”

“Instead of taking advantage of your vulnerability, exploiting your amnesia that turned you into a child, tricking you into revealing things you never meant for me to know.”

“Like this,” he smiled softly, eyes lowered, “once you recover, you might despise my cunning.”

He was genuinely reflecting. He hadn’t expected Fu Siting’s reaction in the darkness to be so intense.

“I won’t!”

“…”

“I won’t! No matter what happens, I won’t hate you. I won’t!!!”

Li Fei: “…”

Little darling, for a moment, he genuinely wanted to call Fu Siting that.

Though it wasn’t a term he’d normally use in his ordinary life, these past few years with Fu Siting had already forced him to employ so many words he’d never said before, do so many things he’d thought he’d never do, and experience so many emotions he’d believed he’d never feel.

The little darling was calling him so loudly, was he going to cry again? He had just managed to coax him so hard. Damn it.

This time, he hadn’t meant to deliberately upset him!

…

The older Fu Siting grew, the clearer it became that vulnerability solved nothing. He’d long since learned to grit his teeth and fight back no matter what hardship came his way. He’d forgotten how long it had been since he’d last cried properly.

He had cried before, actually. This momentary loss of control stemmed solely from his inability to bear Li Fei using such a heavy word as “disgust” to describe their relationship. What right did Fu Siting have to feel disgust toward Li Fei? It was absurd. Things he dared not even imagine, why would Li Fei…

Why would he say such a thing?

Could it be that the twenty-eight-year-old Fu Siting truly hadn’t treated him well enough? Thinking this, suddenly everything seemed to make sense. Overwhelmed by emotion, he bit his lim, “The twenty-eight-year-old Fu Siting… is a bastard!”

Only a bastard would buy so many random Legos and figurines without restraint.

Only a bastard would keep everything from Li Fei, making him worry so much.

Only a bastard would… be so ungrateful as to argue with Li Fei!

He truly couldn’t understand how his twenty-eight-year-old self could bear to fight with Li Fei.

Li Fei was perfect in every way, he couldn’t even love him enough. What possible reason could there be for an argument? It must all be his fault. What could Li Fei possibly have done wrong? Had Li Fei not been tolerant enough?

Fu Siting genuinely believed Li Fei was the embodiment of tolerance incarnate in this world, most people would struggle to forgive a boyfriend who kept secrets. Yet Li Fei actually made excuses for him? This was extraordinary behavior. Combined with Li Fei’s background, it was almost unimaginable. After all, Li Fei wasn’t some ordinary kid. He’d been the pampered darling of countless adoring eyes since childhood!

Fu Siting hadn’t encountered many wealthy young masters, but he’d certainly seen plenty of ordinary rich kids. Just look at those at his school, with only a little money, they could be so arrogant, so full of superiority! He’d seen it all!

If they also possessed good looks and a modicum of talent alongside their wealth, it was even worse. He knew all too well how devoid of sympathy and empathy such people could be, how cold, cruel, and incapable of seeing others as human beings.

Because they were born with so much. And adored and idolized by so many. Those raised in such adulation often weren’t inherently evil, yet cruelty became their natural state. After all, the goodwill and adoring gazes surrounding them grant them the tangible privilege to hurt and exploit others at will.

Many such people never learn to cherish. Because the doors of opportunity remain perpetually open for them, and those foolishly devoted, smilingly indulging their whims, come in endless waves, one after another. Likewise, many such people never learn to be tolerant.

They have no need to learn, for countless souls are willing to bear their burdens. They can spend their days as pampered princes and princesses in tranquil peace, leaving all storms for others to weather.

“…”

If Li Fei wanted to be that kind of person, he could become one anytime.

That’s why Fu Siting couldn’t understand: Why didn’t Li Fei kick him out the first time he went on a shopping spree?

Why didn’t he throw him out the moment he dared to argue back?

He believed that the second Li Fei ended things, a line of suitors—more handsome, more beautiful, younger, richer—would instantly form outside that red-brick villa, stretching all the way to France.

So why…

Why could Li Fei, who seemed born above the clouds and rainbows, perpetually tiptoeing to pluck dazzling stars from the sky, end up living with such grounded sincerity, loving someone so genuinely? Even managing to catch his occasionally unhinged lover amidst the mundane grind of daily life.

No one in this world should be this perfect. And even if they exist, they shouldn’t be favored. How could anyone continue to favor him after arguing with him time and again?

Li Fei sighed helplessly: “Fu Xiaoting, even with amnesia, your head is still full of nonsense.”

“So what if we argue? No couple living together long-term can avoid friction in their daily lives.”

“In an equal relationship, disagreements are inevitable. We communicate, persuade each other, sometimes even forcefully. Arguments are unavoidable.”

“It’s not just lovers. Even family members raised in identical environments, with fused genes, still argue, right?”

“Fighting doesn’t mean we don’t love each other.” Li Fei said this matter-of-factly.

Yet the look on Fu Siting’s face at that moment was pure thunderstruck disbelief.

“…”

So Fu Siting had genuinely believed that lovers never argued? Li Fei suddenly found it rather endearing.

“Actually, it’s lovely that you think that way,” he said. “It shows our Xiaoting is pure and adorable, with a heart as clear as crystal.”

Li Fei held him tightly on the bed, gently nuzzling him, and suddenly recalled their first argument after moving in together. He couldn’t even remember the reason, some trivial, insignificant thing. So Li Fei had forgotten about it after the fight. But that night when he came home from work, he found Fu Siting curled up quietly in the corner of the living room sofa, sad and alone in the cold, dark, unlit room.

He looked miserable, like an abandoned puppy. When Li Fei gently embraced him, his body felt icy cold, as if his body heat and pulse were fading away. In that moment, Li Fei truly felt… something he’d never experienced before. His head ached.

Life truly defies reason at times. He’d always prided himself on his rationality, feeling out of place since childhood. He’d long accepted the possibility of growing old alone. Before this, he’d briefly imagined what his future partner might be like. What kind of person would that be? Li Fei had always assumed it would be someone much like himself—emotionally stable, efficient, and pragmatic. They’d respect each other’s boundaries, understanding and considerate.

The key was to avoid overstepping boundaries and causing each other trouble. It wasn’t that Li Fei feared inconvenience; he simply believed that strict self-discipline and meticulous organization were essential virtues for an adult. Those who let emotions cloud their judgment and repeatedly made foolish mistakes irritated him. He genuinely didn’t want such people in his life, especially not by his side.

Li Fei had once coldly resolved that if he ever chose to be with someone, the slightest hint of irrationality would prompt an immediate, decisive breakup. But when it actually happened, he realized those rigid rules were hollow and laughable. The truth was, he loved Fu Siting’s blazing intensity. And Fu Siting’s occasional loss of control only made him more certain, more convinced, that this man was alive and vibrant.

It turned out he didn’t dislike people who could go wild and crazy. It turned out his heart could be made tender and swollen, filled to the brim by someone. It turned out he could find someone so foolish and yet adorable at the same time. It turned out he too could become a little out of control, losing his usual self. It turned out he too could spoil someone without reason, wanting only to hold them every day and coax them with the world’s finest things.

Only then did he belatedly realize that those romantic scripts he’d dismissed as ridiculous, dumbed-down, and lacking character consistence, the ones he’d refused to act in, were often perfectly fine. Sometimes it’s precisely the seemingly illogical parts that make a love story’s logic feel real and reliable. He just hadn’t loved before, so he couldn’t understand.

Once you truly fall in love, many things simply defy logic. Even someone who values absolute logic will come to appreciate the absurdity and novelty of inconsistent logic. Then he recalled an old director he’d worked with before, a veteran of arthouse films who, nearing fifty, suddenly began directing saccharine romantic comedies.

Li Fei couldn’t understand it. The old director downed his drink: “Romantic comedies actually contain a lot of depth. They’re really hard to make. One day, you’ll understand.”

Li Fei didn’t believe him, thinking the old director had simply bowed to capital. Turns out he hadn’t. Turns out one day, he really would understand.

***

Author’s Note: Old Wang Director: Actually, I really did bow to capital =w=… Sorry.