WHF Ch 75 – “You’re awake.” 

When Yu Tianbai opened his eyes again, it was three days later—of course, this was just an exaggeration.

But Yu Tianbai had indeed just opened his eyes, and it was indeed three days later. He was lying in his long-unseen home in Jiamusi, but the only difference from usual was that he was in the guest room, on the right side of a 1.8-meter-wide bed, with another person squeezed in.

And predictably, at this very moment, that person was sound asleep.

The story began three days ago, on a dark and stormy night on the outskirts of Songyuan. Something happened in the Wuling Hongguang van. End of story.

Yu Tianbai was deeply dissatisfied with his own thought process. He turned over, trying to think a little deeper.

When he followed the young master back to Songyuan, he encountered the instigator of all this trouble—Yan Guoxian. But why he did it and how he did it, nobody knew.

The battle at the KTV in the early morning felt like a grand dream. Yu Tianbai’s heart, which had been in his throat, only settled down when he saw Xiu Ma again. But then it immediately started racing again, for no other reason than an old house catching fire.

It turns out that if a person goes too long without enjoying a climax, they burn too brightly when rekindled, and then feel deeply that their performance was subpar.

Of course, the choice of venue was also very poor—this was the conclusion Yu Tianbai reached while borrowing a hose from the service station’s repair bay to scrub the car seats in the still-chilly March wind.

But fortunately, Xiu Ma wasn’t idle either. He helped carry the buckets of water back and forth. Even with one arm in a sling, he could still help with the work. A good employee.

Back to their van. They made do in the car for one night, and couldn’t sleep past six the next morning. They got out and found a random breakfast stall. The dark circles under their eyes were so pronounced that the owner of the stall didn’t dare ask any questions. After a hasty breakfast, before they hit the road, Xiu Ma went to see his mother again.

Only then did Yu Tianbai realize that Xiu Ma had truly come home for his incomplete home and his not-quite-complete family.

Yu Tianbai reined in his meddlesome heart and leaned against the car to wait for the young master. When Xiu Ma came out of the hospital again, even his eyes were shining as he looked at him. It was a happy thing to have someone waiting for you in the direction you came from. Yu Tianbai understood, because he was in a pretty good mood when he saw the young master again too.

Once inside the car with the doors closed, they suddenly received a bombshell of news.

The police cars that had roared past last night were due to an anonymous tip-off, reporting the manager of a certain glass factory in Mudanjiang for group debauchery, premeditated murder, and illegal detention, and incidentally, for illegal business operations.

If nothing unexpected happened, the informant was likely Tu Laowu, who had escaped earlier.

The car radio host connected to the KTV manager who was on duty that day. As the manager described the scene, the two people in the car each looked away, lost in their own thoughts.

In the end, the news report concluded only by saying that the police were investigating the matter and would continue to follow up.

Yu Tianbai immediately tuned to several other local channels, but as noon approached, the local news stations were all showing either skits or recipes. No one mentioned the whereabouts of the anonymous informant again.

The news channel on the Wuling Hongguang’s radio was on until evening, a rare occurrence. They never got another update about the glass factory. It was also possible that since the car had already reached Jiamusi, such local news wouldn’t be followed by anyone outside of Songyuan.

Yu Tianbai turned off the engine and glanced at the young master in the passenger seat. He was already asleep.

The medicine had probably worn off. Xiu Ma was sleeping restlessly, curled up in his seat. When Yu Tianbai woke him, his brow was still furrowed, his face blank.

“Are we here?” he asked.

That was one good thing about the young master: no morning grumpiness.

“Go on up and sleep,” Yu Tianbai gathered his luggage and urged him out of the car.

They were a sorry sight, like defeated soldiers. Xiu Ma even paused on the first step, looking unusually like a patient.

Back home, after taking off their clothes and a quick wash-up, Xiu Ma was asleep before Yu Tianbai could even put the chicken soup and rice he had bought on the table.

In his twenty-nine years of life, Yu Tianbai had never taken care of a sick person. He even searched online for “is it normal for injured people to sleep a lot.” After getting the unique online diagnosis of “prepare for the funeral,” he turned off his phone and chose to trust in the kid’s powers of recovery.

On the first day, Xiu Ma woke up very early. He heated up the chicken soup and drank it by himself before Yu Tianbai had even gotten up. He even washed the bowl and chopsticks clean. But he must have been delirious while putting them away: the bowl was stuck in the chopstick holder, and the chopsticks were in the dish rack.

When Yu Tianbai woke up and saw the reversed bowl and chopsticks, he stared blankly, then realized the young master had been awake.

He couldn’t cook and didn’t know when Xiu Ma would wake up, but he couldn’t bear to let him go hungry. So he went downstairs again and bought some braised pork bones with pickled cabbage. The smell of the pork bones must have been enticing, because as Yu Tianbai was debating whether to leave it on the table or put it in the kitchen first, the young master woke up. He stood silently at the bedroom door, hair askew, wiping his sleep-shiny face.

Of course, one arm was not enough for the young master to gnaw on pork bones, so Yu Tianbai sat to his left the whole time, wearing plastic gloves and pulling the meat off for him.

He fed him a bite, the young master ate a mouthful of rice. He fed him another bite, the young master ate a mouthful of pickled cabbage.

How does a man with no children, unmarried, and gay, raise a child? Yu Tianbai felt like he was raising a child right now.

But the young master was ultimately more sensible than a child. He was quite well-behaved when taking the meat from his hand. After the meal, the table was clean. After helping Yu Tianbai take the dishes to the sink, he silently rinsed his mouth and said thank you.

Yu Tianbai was surprised that after knowing each other for so long, Xiu Ma was still so formal with him. But then he realized that the young master had gone back to sleep.

It was five o’clock in the evening. On his first day back, the young master had slept for a total of sixteen hours.

On the second day, Xiu Ma got up at the same time as Yu Tianbai. He suggested making noodles for breakfast, but Yu Tianbai, seeing the inconvenience of his sling, proposed making a budget-friendly alternative—instant cup noodles.

The two of them sat side by side, slurping down two cups of chicken and mushroom noodles. The young master still ate cleanly and quickly. After drinking even the soup base, he went back to his room.

But today, Yu Tianbai was not going to let him lie in bed all day. When Xiu Ma groggily got up to use the bathroom, Yu Tianbai went in as well.

“I’ll give you a bath,” Yu Tianbai’s suggestion was concise.

“Huh?” Xiu Ma’s question was equally clear.

“You’ve been lying in bed for two days. I used to run a bathhouse, it’ll be quick to help you wash up.” Seeing a hint of resistance slowly appear on Xiu Ma’s still-drowsy face, Yu Tianbai suggested again, “Or I can take you to the public bathhouse downstairs.”

Xiu Ma chose the former.

Although it wasn’t the first time they had been naked together, the awkwardness was still there. Xiu Ma sat on a plastic stool that Yu Tianbai had prepared, hugging his knees, watching Yu Tianbai pile bubbles on his head.

That’s right, he could see in the mirror that Yu Tianbai wasn’t taking his job seriously at all. But Xiu Ma didn’t interrupt him; he was waiting for the right moment. As the last dollop of foam was lifted and floated onto the top of his head, Xiu Ma immediately started shaking his head.

The result was that after pushing Xiu Ma out, Yu Tianbai had to take another shower himself.

The weather was warm today. Xiu Ma stood by the door, drying his hair and listening to Yu Tianbai’s curses. The window was open, and he could hear the distant chirping of birds. It wasn’t even cold wearing just shorts. So he knocked on the door again and asked Yu Tianbai to throw out his other clothes, which earned him another round of curses.

In the brilliant spring sunshine, Xiu Ma cursed back, “You have such a bad temper,” and then ran off.

Yu Tianbai had thought that if he had the energy to cause trouble, the young master must be mostly recovered. He didn’t expect that after his shower, the young master would go to bed early again, sleeping all the way through to the third day.

The third day, which was now. They were lying in the same bed.

The specific reason was not that the young master had switched rooms in the middle of the night, but Yu Tianbai himself. When he woke up at six in the morning, he went straight to the guest room door. The young master was sleeping peacefully. He walked to the bedside and looked down at the young master. The young master was still sleeping peacefully. He simply got into bed and lay down with Xiu Ma. The young master continued to sleep peacefully.

Then Yu Tianbai fell asleep too.

An hour into his nap, Yu Tianbai woke with a start. He turned over to look at the young master again, and even struck a pose, hoping to give him a surprise when he woke up.

But after lying on his side with his head propped on one hand for fifteen minutes, Yu Tianbai confirmed that Xiu Ma was not pretending to be asleep; he was really asleep.

In his free and unrestrained dream, Xiu Ma was running on a beach, as free as the newly born stone monkey. Until a palm came down, slapping the world with a thunderous clap. In the confusion, Xiu Ma managed to force his eyes open and found that he had been slapped on the chest. The person who had struck such a heavy blow was none other than Yu Tianbai.

Watching the young master’s expression go from dazed to bewildered, Yu Tianbai’s lips curved into a smile. He said happily, “You’re awake.”

Xiu Ma’s expression went from bewildered to suspicious. He asked, “What are you doing in my bed?”

Yu Tianbai was still shameless. 

“It’s not like we haven’t rolled around in the same bed before.”

The implications of this sentence were rich, but the first thing Xiu Ma thought of was what had happened in the van three days ago. He blinked, thinking for a moment, then continued to lie flat on his back, staring at Yu Tianbai:

“Are you uncomfortable anywhere?”

Now Yu Tianbai was getting confused too. After a moment, he understood the young master’s roundabout way of thinking. After a long sigh, he rolled over onto his stomach to look at Xiu Ma and replied:

“I have a medical report, do you want to see it?”

Evidently, both of them had misunderstood the other’s meaning.

“No,” Xiu Ma denied first. He lifted his neck, trying to lie more naturally. 

“I don’t have any energy right now, and I didn’t perform very well last time.”

One sentence brought a shared silence upon them both. Yu Tianbai pondered for a moment and gave his evaluation: “Although that’s not what I meant, you actually did okay.”

A conversation that made a twenty-one-year-old college student sound like a limp, middle-aged man.

“Wait,” Yu Tianbai corrected the direction of the conversation himself. 

“I didn’t wake you up for this.”

He took a deep breath and sat up in bed. Xiu Ma’s gaze followed him suspiciously, a very bad feeling creeping over him. He didn’t expect what Yu Tianbai wanted to do to be so simple.

This twenty-nine-year-old man who had been wandering the world alone for a long time beamed with joy and announced loudly, “Let’s go have some corn grits congee!”

After sleeping in bed for three days, Xiu Ma finally recovered from his semi-hibernation state. He got dressed like a zombie and followed Yu Tianbai downstairs to the breakfast stall he had been thinking about.

At ten in the morning, the breakfast stall was about to close. They were the last customers. Looking at the salted duck eggs and corn grits congee brought to the table, Xiu Ma remembered that this was something he had casually ordered at some late-night stall.

“You actually remember?” Xiu Ma picked up his chopsticks and looked up at Yu Tianbai.

“I just happened to remember,” Yu Tianbai said casually. 

“Besides, you’ve been sleeping for three days. It’s good to eat something light.”

But what Yu Tianbai ordered wasn’t entirely light. Besides the salted duck eggs and congee that the young master had personally ordered, there was also the last serving of beef pie and beef buns from the stall. The owner recognized Yu Tianbai and added a plate of his own pickled eggplant.

Now, the spread on this table was practically a state banquet of Northeastern breakfast.

Xiu Ma’s arm was inconvenient, so Yu Tianbai made the first move as usual. He cracked open a salted duck egg, scooped out a perfect, sunset-like yolk, and placed it in the young master’s bowl.

This time, the young master didn’t say thank you. Yu Tianbai was very gratified.

But with such a perfect yolk in his bowl, Xiu Ma didn’t rush to eat it. He used his good right hand to pick up some pickled eggplant and put it on his own plate, seemingly still in a daze.

It wasn’t his fault. When Yu Tianbai was a soldier in his first year, he got a short leave to visit home. He slept for twenty-four hours straight in his old house without eating or washing his face. Although he didn’t break the young master’s three-day sleeping record, he didn’t look much better when he woke up—and back then, there was no one to scoop out salted duck egg yolks for him.

By the time Yu Tianbai himself had started eating his congee, Xiu Ma had finally picked up his spoon and taken a bite of the salted egg yolk.

It seemed the place Yu Tianbai himself had praised so highly was really good. The young master’s eyes lit up.

After a few mouthfuls of congee, the young master reached for a bun. But the bun couldn’t shut him up. At this moment, he suddenly wanted to talk.

“I’ve made a decision,” he said.

Yu Tianbai was currently focused on scooping out the next duck egg. He glanced up at Xiu Ma. This person rarely made a solemn announcement to him, so he was curious to hear what was so important.

Xiu Ma even put down his spoon. He took a breath and said, “I’m not going back to Songyuan.”

A tricycle creaked past the stall. Other than that, there was no sound. Yu Tianbai put the second duck egg yolk into the young master’s bowl.

“It’s not like you’ll run into danger every time you go to Songyuan,” Yu Tianbai rubbed his eyebrow with his thumb, picked up his chopsticks, and helped himself to a beef bun. 

“You can go back if you want to.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about my mom,” Xiu Ma said with great concentration. 

“I’ve left her to the doctors.”

Yu Tianbai finally looked up, his gaze sweeping over Xiu Ma’s face.

“Good. You’ve grown up,” Yu Tianbai even smiled.

As someone who wasn’t very emotional himself, leaving home was easy. But for the young master—the young master in his memory was always soft-hearted, the type who in a TV show would bring along a burden after setting sail, the type that would make the audience sigh in frustration.

At least now he had made a domineering decision that matched his young master persona, even if he might change his mind in the future.

But faced with the young master’s solemn promise, Yu Tianbai could hardly resist a sarcastic remark:

“But the decision you’re making now might change in the future. You’re still young, maybe it’ll change tomorrow.”

The effect was outstanding. Even the way Xiu Ma chewed his bun became indignant. Yu Tianbai laughed heartily, hiding his face.

After laughing for a while, Yu Tianbai looked up again. This time, it was his turn to level his tone:

“But speaking of Songyuan, there’s still something left to do.”

As noon approached, the stall owner had already cleared and stacked the tables and chairs around them. Yu Tianbai turned to look at the busy person behind him and lowered his voice, “Tu Laowu said that while Laoqi is not fully recovered, he wants me to help him with something.”

“It’s about Fang Hui.”