Wen Yanyu lowered his eyes and opened his phone's contacts. There were only a handful of people listed, and Fu Hanchuan's name occupied the very first spot.
Duan Mufeng uncrossed his legs and turned to look at him.
Wen Yanyu stayed silent for a long while, lowering his eyes to hide the emotions in them. His voice was a little dry. "I'll drink."
A staff member brought three glasses of alcohol over to him.
Looking at the three glasses filled with beer, he already felt a faint ache in his stomach.
He had promised him. He couldn't drag him into another public controversy.
Wen Yanyu lowered his eyes and, deciding to get it over with, lifted a glass to his lips.
[Lmao, Wen Yanyu wouldn't dare call either.]
[After that huge mess last time, another round might get him blacklisted.]
[Okay, but hahaha, why is Fu Hanchuan first in his contacts? Does Wen Yanyu not have friends? Why are there so few people in there?]
[With that bizarre personality of his, it'd be weird if he had friends.]
[His personality seems fine, though...]
[Baby said he wouldn't have anything to do with Fu anymore. If he called, you'd curse him out, and now he isn't calling, you're making snide comments anyway. You're sick. Taking our bunny baby away.]
Just then.
His phone rang.
Fu Hanchuan's name lit up the screen.
Wen Yanyu froze, failing to react even after the phone had rung for over ten seconds.
The host came over and pressed answer and speakerphone for him.
"Go on, say something."
The host gave him a meaningful look.
Wen Yanyu pressed his lips together, the palm holding his phone sweating slightly. "Fu... Hanchuan?"
There was a stretch of silence on the other end.
"Who else would it be?"
A deep, languid voice came through the phone, though there was no uncertainty in the question.
Wen Yanyu drew a deep breath and tentatively asked in a quiet voice, "It's so late. Did you need something?"
"You left your medicine at my place last time," the man replied casually.
Wen Yanyu sat dazed for a long moment before stammering, "My, the medicine, you can just throw it away. I don't want it anymore."
The man spoke again. "I checked. It's prescription medication, and it's hard to get. Find some time to come pick it up yourself."
The phone was so close that he could clearly hear the man breathing. Wen Yanyu lowered his head, his fingers clenching tightly, his thoughts in chaos.
"Can I have a friend pick it up from your place?"
"A friend? That Sister Lan?"
"Yes."
A stretch of silence.
The sound of a lighter clicking.
"I'm abroad for a conference."
Wen Yanyu tightened his grip on his phone, his peach-blossom eyes slowly lowering. He said softly, "Then I'll wait until you're back."
"Mm." The man gave a flat acknowledgment, then continued, "The doctor said your stomach and esophagus are almost completely ruined. Go to the hospital and stay put for treatment. I don't want to have to collect your corpse."
"Don't make me keep an eye on you every day. If you run off early again, I don't mind coming to catch you myself." His voice remained calm.
Wen Yanyu rubbed his fingertips together and said listlessly, "I know my own body. You don't need to worry about me. We're not..."
He hadn't finished the rest of his sentence.
"Wen Yanyu, shut your mouth."
The voice on the other end abruptly grew stern.
Wen Yanyu trembled, instantly too afraid to speak. But once he recovered, he still couldn't help asking, "I, I promised. I did what you said. Didn't you say we wouldn't, contact each other? Why are you doing this again?"
Hadn't we agreed not to contact each other?
"Why do you... always snap at me?" His voice trembled with hurt he couldn't suppress.
Why are you still calling me? We aren't friends anymore. I can't make up for what I owe you.
You hate me so much, so why... don't you take your anger out on me like those people do?
Why are you still calling me?
Why do you still care about me?
Wen Yanyu raised a hand to rub his stinging eyes, unable to tell where the ache and hurt in his heart had come from.
The person on the other end was clearly taken aback.
"I wasn't snapping at you."
Wen Yanyu gripped his phone tightly and took several deep breaths, barely managing to steady his voice. "What I promised you last time, I haven't broken it. You, you don't need to worry about me. I know to see a doctor."
We aren't friends anymore.
A deathly silence settled, as though even the air had frozen.
Only heavy breathing came through the receiver.
A long while passed.
The deep, hoarse voice sounded again, carrying a bone-deep chill, without a trace of discernible emotion.
"Wen Yanyu, in your dreams."
The call ended.
The screen went dark.
Wen Yanyu stared blankly at the black screen. Only after a long while did he speak hoarsely. "That counts as... completing the challenge, right...?"
The host came back to his senses, his expression complicated. "Ah, of course, of course. That counts, that counts."
The live comments fell silent.
[...Unless my memory's wrong, Wen Yanyu was the one clinging relentlessly to Fu Hanchuan, right? And Fu Hanchuan absolutely loathed him, right?]
[Yep, you remember correctly.]
[Why do these two seem so much like a couple sulking after a fight?]
[Is he... worried about our baby? Ah, I'm losing it.]
[Stop making your fave look good. Fu Hanchuan is clearly annoyed with him, okay?]
[So annoyed that he threatened to personally catch him if he didn't get treatment? "I wasn't snapping at you~"]
[These two are killing me. Wen looking all timid and hurt, and Fu saying "catch"-it's like he's scolding a little bunny, help ahhhh. What a bizarre ship.]
[I just remembered that when Wen Yanyu went to the hospital and got cornered by reporters, Fu was the one who picked him up.]
["You left your medicine at my place"? Wait, what? If he's calling now, it probably wasn't long ago. Wasn't Fu Hanchuan supposed to have hated Wen Yanyu since six months ago? What's going on? Wait, what? What's happening? Guys, I'm confused.]
[Didn't someone previously reveal that Fu and Wen were friends and often went out to eat together? There were even photos at the time, but it was a tiny hole-in-the-wall restaurant, Fu looked a little blurry and was dressed really casually, and the two seemed to have absolutely no connection, so nobody believed it. Now I'm starting to think it might be real.]
[Yes, I remember. And Fu had this ridiculously goofy smile in the photos, picking up leaves under a tree with Wen. Fu was a total big puppy, even tugging at the hem of Wen's clothes. It got buried pretty quickly, but because of those photos, when Wen did all that stuff later, I always thought they'd broken up and Wen couldn't accept it.]
[Are they acting out some melodramatic, tortured romance, and we're actually part of their play?]
Round after round of inconsequential challenges continued.
Wen Yanyu hung his head. As the night breeze blew, his body shivered a few times, and he breathed into his icy palms.
So cold.
It hurt so much.
When would it end?
Duan Mufeng hesitated for a moment, then reached for the jacket lying on his lap and draped it over the young man's shoulders.
Wen Yanyu paused, looking at Duan Mufeng.
"Thank you."
Duan Mufeng didn't dare look at him.
Wen Yanyu wrapped the jacket tightly around himself and gently rubbed his hands together.
The host was still joking around. "Young people these days all love staying up late."
Jiang Wanrou laughed a few times. "My son's a doctor. He's still on the night shift at this hour. He probably only answered because he wasn't busy just then."
Wen Yanyu froze and looked up at the woman.
"My Xiao Shen only came back from abroad recently." Jiang Wanrou smiled gently, her eyes full of pride. "He works at the city hospital now. He's usually quite busy, but he often makes time to spend with my husband and me."
They chatted happily.
[Aunt Jiang has a child?!]
[Why do I remember Aunt Jiang only sponsoring children, not having any herself?]
[He's adopted, the child of her husband's teammate. He even kept his original surname, Ji. He's a very accomplished doctor. Aunt Jiang's husband posted about him on Weibo.]
[His name's Ji Shenhuai. He was the doctor who operated on my older sister when she went to the hospital! He's really young but really skilled! And incredibly responsible! Such a good person!]
It was nighttime.
Fu Hanchuan leaned against his desk, a cigarette between his fingers, his chiseled features shrouded in smoke.
The audio on his computer was turned back on.
Elsewhere.
The host tapped the screen.
"For the final round, the guest selected is Wen Yanyu."
Wen Yanyu raised his head.
He heard the host continue, "Throughout history, many people have devoted considerable study to the subject of death. Please describe your own feelings about death. Imagine that one day you faced death yourself. How would you react?"
The host finished speaking.
The others present all began to frown.
Jiang Wanrou, who had been laughing just a moment ago, also lost her smile.
Twice now.
It wasn't as though they didn't go online.
Before you continue