You Won’t Understand Me - Chapter 84

By the time they were done, it was already night. They weren’t allowed to visit Yul till tomorrow morning.

“Are you feeling well?” Zeng asked Mrs Wang.

“I am all well. Don’t worry.” She smiled. “It’s all thanks to you, Zeng. You are the one who urged me to eat those haemoglobin increasing iron tablets. I am happy that I could be of some use. I was feeling so helpless and useless earlier when they were operating on my Yul. I am glad everything turned out well.”

Zeng smiled, “Thanks a lot.” Behind his smile, he felt sad as he realised,

‘I am the useless one here.’

“Come on, let’s get you some sleep,” Zeng said as he walked slowly along with her, Mr. Wang supported her from the other side.

“But my Yul…” She protested but Zeng cut her off,

“Yul is not going anywhere, mom. You can’t meet him till the morning anyways. So please rest till then.” Zeng tried convincing her but she didn’t agree. Finally, Mr Wang meddled in the duo’s arguments, “My dear, Yul is okay now. You don’t need to worry. We will see him in the morning, okay?”

Mrs Wang finally gave in to her husband’s words. After having dinner at the canteen, they decided to call it a day. Mrs Wang didn’t say anything but Zeng concluded that she was feeling weak and dizzy as most people feel after donating blood. Zeng took her to his on-call room in the doctor’s residency. He initially wanted them to stay in a nearby hotel as his room was too small and congested. However, given Mrs Wang’s condition, he decided that hospital was the safest place in case something happened and they needed to report. They comfortably laid her onto the bed and themselves took chairs for sleeping.

Dr Fanxing was on his night shift so if anything were to happen, he would let them know immediately. Zeng had already asked him to do the same.

Mr and Mrs Wang slept soon due to the exhaustion that they experienced for the entire day. However, sleep didn’t touch Zeng’s eyes. Now that Yul was safe, the worry exited his mind and it began filling with other sorts of mixed feelings.

He felt detached, relieved, sad and useless and much more, all at the same time. He glanced at the sleeping couple. Mr Wang had placed his chair close to the bed in case his wife needed anything and Mrs Wang had her hand on his knee to make sure he was there for her.

‘They have each other,’ Zeng gave a faint smile as he looked at the older Wang couple. At some time in life, he too had wished for this kind of relationship with Yul when they both grew old together. However, this fortune was never his.

He couldn’t sleep. His insomnia was kicking in once again. He guessed that after whatever happened, he would be needing another couple of months of medicines. This was what Wang Yul did to him. Even without interacting directly, he would still take his sleep away and make him restless.

Laying back on the chair, his sleepless eyes brimmed with tears. Understanding everything, the entire situation was such an emotional ordeal for him.

Sometimes, he wished he wasn’t like this; an insecure, overthinking, closeted homosexual. The other times, he wished he was a girl. Things would have been much less complicated if that was the case. At times, he blamed society and at times, himself.

Often he would demean his mindset for constantly fearing Yul’s death. He also thought, if he hadn’t met Yul in the first place, none of this might have happened. He would have met other potential people. He might be happy. He would still be Dean Jiang’s beloved pupil, he would still be Fanxing’s supervisor, still on his duty in the Emergency Ward, not suspended and being a pathetic mess like his current self. Yes, that would have been better.

Reflecting back on life, he didn’t gain much. He got his medical degree, had a job and was devoted to it. Honours and certificates, he received them too, but they were nothing more than chunks of metals and printed papers. In all the years of his life till now, Yul had been the highlight. He was the most beautiful chapter of his life; something he never asked for or deserved but still got.

He tried ending it but couldn’t, even after all these months. He couldn’t get over him. He was still stuck in time. Even now, he referred Yul’s parents as mom and dad. He was starting to go back to the same time when their relationship was intact.

But didn’t they already break up? He was the one who separated Yul from himself. So why… ?

Why was this so difficult? If it had been some medical procedure, he would have easily grasped it however things like relationships and love were not like the medical assignments. Those things were always out of your comfort zone. Zeng wasn’t good at dealing with them. He had his own set of rules for a relationship and he followed them. The rules were simple and easy, something on the lines of – Like it, hold it dearly. Don’t like it, leave it.

However, with Yul, he couldn’t do both of them. All his principles failed before that man.

When with him, some unpredictable things tend to happen, something that Zeng didn’t know the answer for, something that would make him restless enough to have insomnia. He couldn’t understand why it would happen. He couldn’t understand what he should do, other than himself from everything? When all the emotions corner him to a place, he would run away because that was the easiest way. But he came back to where he ran from in the first place.

Maybe this was a mistake.

‘I don’t understand this at all!’ He breathed out heavily, closing his eyes, letting the tears fall off.

‘What should I do now?’ he mumbled to himself.

He looked out of the window to see the dark night sky. He stared at it blankly as if it would give him answers. But it didn’t.

Over the period of six months or should he say five years, things changed. He changed.. Yul must have changed too.