AMTBYIGA Chapter 98

Chapter 98: I Don’t Like You

Gu Nian froze, taking several seconds to register what Lin Sui had said. He looked at Lin Sui in disbelief, his voice hoarse, “Do you know what you’re saying?”

Lin Sui pursed his lips, turning his head to avoid his gaze, “Yeah.”

“…”

Gu Nian suddenly stepped forward, raising his hand to grip Lin Sui’s chin, preventing him from dodging. He repeated each word carefully, “You’re saying, even if we have to separate, you don’t care?”

Lin Sui lowered his eyes, remaining silent.

A suffocating silence spread between them. After an unknown amount of time, Lin Sui suddenly felt something warm and wet falling onto his hand. He looked up in shock to find that Gu Nian was crying.

“You, you, don’t cry.” The sadness that had been accumulating in Lin Sui’s heart shattered because of these unexpected tears, and he didn’t know what to do, completely flustered.

This was the first time he had seen Gu Nian cry like this. Unlike others, Gu Nian wasn’t being dramatic; he was simply letting tears roll down his face silently. Even his expression wasn’t that different from usual. His eyes were fixed on him, slightly red, making him look exceptionally vulnerable.

Lin Sui hesitated whether to wipe away the tears for Gu Nian. Although he was unwilling to admit it, even at this moment, he still felt heartache for Gu Nian. But thinking of Duan Miao, he silently lowered the arm he had raised.

“Lin Sui, I’m begging you.” Gu Nian grabbed Lin Sui’s shoulders, his voice trembling with a crying tone, pleadingly murmuring, “Even if you’re angry, hit me, scold me, or if you want to think about it yourself, please don’t say that. I really, really love you. I can explain everything that happened. Please don’t say you don’t care.”

“The reason I didn’t tell you my legs were better was because I was afraid Gu Zhi would find out I cared about you and do something to you. I was also afraid that if something changed in our lives, you wouldn’t be used to it, that you wouldn’t like me as much. I was really too scared, so I didn’t tell you, but I really didn’t want to hide it from you forever. I just wanted to give you a surprise when you were angry.”

“I’m sorry, my insecurity made me make such a selfish decision. I know I was wrong. Please don’t divorce me, okay?”

Listening to Gu Nian’s sincere confession, Lin Sui felt like a soaked wood ear mushroom, softening bit by bit. However, what bothered him the most was—

“Why would Duan Miao know that your legs are better?”

Lin Sui uncontrollably used a questioning tone, with a sharpness in his voice that he himself didn’t realize. Then he watched Gu Nian’s eyes freeze, and a corner of the world that had just been rebuilt instantly collapsed.

“I…” Gu Nian was speechless, because he himself found this matter strange. Besides Doctor Chen and Jiang Sheng, no one else should have known about this.

Yet, Duan Miao knew, and even showed it directly in front of Lin Sui.

Gu Nian understood that if something like this couldn’t be explained clearly at the first moment, any explanation afterwards would be discounted. He watched Lin Sui’s eyes slowly fill with disappointment, and frantically opened his mouth, “I, I really don’t know. I’ll investigate it clearly, you wait for me…”

“Gu Nian.”

Lin Sui interrupted him, his tone calm without a trace of fluctuation. Gu Nian’s heart thumped violently, as if suddenly anticipating something. He frantically wanted to cover Lin Sui’s mouth.

“Let’s break up.”

After saying these words, Lin Sui felt lighter, a sense of finality.

If this was a destined fate, then he would rather live with the still-beautiful memories than end up fighting with Gu Nian until they were both ruined.

So, let it end here.

It was enough.

“…”

Just as Lin Sui was about to push him out, Gu Nian, who had been unresponsive, suddenly pressed him onto the bed behind him. Lin Sui only felt a dizzying spin, and then he was forced to lie on the bed, both wrists grabbed and pinned above his head. This position also made him unable to move.

“What are you doing, let me go.” Lin Sui shouted in a weak but stern voice, a hint of nervousness surfacing in his eyes.

Seeing this trace of fear, Gu Nian’s eyes instantly turned bloodshot, but the words he spoke were more humble than anyone else, “You like me too, don’t you? I can really explain it clearly, please wait for me, you, you like me so, so much, you definitely don’t want to leave like this, right?”

“…” Lin Sui bit his teeth and couldn’t speak. After a long time, he squeezed out a voice almost from between his teeth.

“I don’t like you.”

These short five words made Lin Sui feel like he had run eight thousand meters, all the strength in his body drained.

“You don’t like me, you say you don’t like me?” Gu Nian’s voice was hoarse. “Then why are you so good to me? You said you liked me, you said you would stay with me, you said you would go to the grasslands with me, watch the sunrise with me. If you don’t like me, why did you let me kiss you, do everything intimate with you?”

Gu Nian didn’t believe Lin Sui’s words at all, but even though he knew they were just words of anger, he couldn’t help but retort.

Lin Sui nervously swallowed, then he took a deep breath and lowered his head, “I said I liked you at the beginning because I pitied you. I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to recover in this lifetime. Those things, those things were because I was afraid you would be sad. I thought it was a pity for you to be so listless, so I, so I said those things to you. I, I don’t like you.”

“I know you’ll be angry when you hear me say this. I won’t pester you about the divorce. In the future, let’s, let’s never meet again.”

Lin Sui endured the dull pain in his heart and said the last sentence: “I’m sorry.”

Gu Nian didn’t pay attention to what Lin Sui said at first, but the more he heard, the uglier his expression became.

Not because he really believed that Lin Sui didn’t like him, but because Lin Sui’s attempt to sever all ties with him by using all kinds of clumsy excuses made him so uncomfortable.

He could accept Lin Sui being angry and ignoring him, but he couldn’t accept Lin Sui completely denying all the beautiful memories between them.

Those were treasures that he would record in his diary word by word, things that would make him smile uncontrollably when he looked at them.

How could he hurt his heart so much?

In the end, Gu Nian left the hotel alone. When going down the stairs, he accidentally tripped and fell heavily down the stairs. Fortunately, it was only two or three steps and just broke the skin. Someone next to him exclaimed and came over to help, but was rejected. Gu Nian climbed up alone, limping towards the car parked outside.

Lin Sui stayed alone in the frighteningly quiet room for a while, and finally couldn’t help but go to the window. Hiding behind the curtains, he watched Gu Nian get safely into the car before returning to the bed and curling up into a ball.

He slept soundly and darkly before remembering to charge his phone. The moment the screen lit up, Lin Sui saw 99+ messages in WeChat.

Because he hadn’t eaten for too long, Lin Sui’s stomach ached from hunger, but he really didn’t have an appetite. He slowly reported his safety to Shi Qingzhou and Sui Congzhi, then his finger stopped on the contact of the only person pinned to the top, not clicking in for a long time.

In the upper left corner was a bright red 99+, and the last chat time was at four o’clock this morning.

Lin Sui thought of the tiredness on Gu Nian’s face and the stubble on his chin, and belatedly realized that he hadn’t slept all night.

Finally, he made up his mind and clicked on the chat record. A large string of anxious inquiries and apologies flooded into his eyes, as well as countless missed calls. The most recent one was even half an hour ago.

Intense pain swept through Lin Sui. The endless unread messages were telling him word by word that he had hurt the person he loved the most, and used the sharpest knife to stab that person’s heart.

Lin Sui cried until he couldn’t breathe. He turned off the phone, but the excruciating pain still haunted him. The injured expression Gu Nian had before leaving was deeply engraved in his mind, replaying clearly again and again as soon as he closed his eyes.

What was he thinking at that time?

Regret, sadness, wanting to grab Gu Nian’s hand and say that those weren’t his true feelings, that he actually liked him to death, liked him so much that he wanted to hide the other person, not letting anyone see him.

Lin Sui loathed his own reaction. He had obviously been deceived once, he had obviously learned a hard lesson, he had obviously vowed never to care about a person so unreservedly again.

But in the end, he repeated the same mistake.

Lin Sui asked himself harshly, wasn’t he deceived enough in his previous life?

The person who said he would love him forever gave birth to a new child in the second year of his disability, and then, the little love he had was taken back, all placed on that child who was healthier and more outstanding than him.

The hospital was really scary, everywhere was white without a trace of life, and no matter when, the only things that answered him were the doctor’s cold instructions and the machine’s rigid voice.

He struggled hard, lying on the operating table again and again, but what he got in return was a more broken body.

He lay exhausted on the bed after rehabilitation, with no family to rely on, because they were busy nurturing his younger brother.

Lin Sui had once naively thought that even if he could never stand up again, at least he still had a family who loved him. He told himself that his parents loved him, so he worked hard to rehabilitate, tried to get close to his younger brother, and wanted to integrate into this family.

But some things can’t be done by trying hard.

He was really, really happy when he received his first birthday present from his younger brother. At that time, the only eight-year-old Lin Sui sat in a wheelchair and introduced his birthday present to everyone in the hospital, hugging it in his arms even when he slept.

Then the next year, he received the exact same Lego.

Lin Sui told himself that it was because his younger brother liked Lego very much, so he sent him something he liked.

The third year, it was still the exact same Lego.

Little Lin Sui was silent for a long time looking at the gift box, and then, as before, carefully assembled the Lego and placed it in the most conspicuous position in the ward.

The fourth year, the fifth year, the sixth year, until Lin Sui’s eighteenth birthday.

There were already ten identical Legos in the ward. He finally couldn’t maintain the facade and collapsed, smashing all the Legos into pieces.

That day, Lin Sui hid in the sunless ward, crying, finally facing the cruel reality.

He had been abandoned.

Ten years ago.