PPS Chapter 137

by Volare

Chapter 137: Even Hallucinations Are Stingy

Xie Tingyun was stunned for a moment. Zhang Anru didn’t have time to pay attention to her husband. She grasped Chu Zhaoyi’s hand, and this time he didn’t shake it off.

“A-Yi, what’s wrong? Are you feeling unwell anywhere? I’ll call a doctor for you.”

Chu Zhaoyi shook his head, his voice a little weak: “It’s nothing…just a little short of breath.”

His gaze fell on the empty space at the bottom of the stairs. In a daze, he seemed to see Gu Yusen standing there waiting for him. But he knew it was an illusion, causing a pang of bitterness in his heart. He closed his eyes, trying to calm his breathing, but that feeling of suffocation grew stronger and stronger.

“Can you…help me bring the food upstairs? I don’t really want to go downstairs.” Chu Zhaoyi said softly, his voice trembling uncontrollably.

Zhang Anru looked at his pale face, her heart aching. She nodded quickly: “Okay, you go back to your room to rest, and I’ll bring the food up right away.”

Chu Zhaoyi nodded, turned around, and slowly walked back to his room. Every step felt like he was stepping on cotton, light and floaty, yet so heavy that he could barely lift his feet.

He sat on the edge of the bed, his fingertips digging deeply into his palm, his knuckles turning pale.

His back was hunched, his chest rising and falling violently, like a fish washed ashore flapping its gills uselessly, only able to inhale air that burned his lungs.

In a daze, he saw the entrance to Gu Yusen’s mushroom house again, the rain soaking his whole body. But the red rose protected inside his white short-sleeved shirt was still vibrant. It was the light he had stolen and hidden in his drawing paper, the only oxygen pump he could hold on his tongue in his dark, sunless prison.

Zhang Anru quickly brought the food up and gently placed it on the table in front of him. She looked at Chu Zhaoyi’s lowered head and couldn’t help reaching out to touch his shoulder, her voice gentle: “A-Yi, you…”

“It’s okay.” Chu Zhaoyi had calmed down a lot. Looking at Zhang Anru’s frightened appearance, he subconsciously reassured her.

“Please go out first, I’ll be fine soon.”

Zhang Anru left, turning back every few steps. Although she was very worried about Chu Zhaoyi being alone, it was obvious that he didn’t want her there.

The room was eerily quiet. Chu Zhaoyi looked at the food on the table, but he had no appetite at all.

He raised his hand to cover his chest, the pain coming from there making it almost impossible for him to breathe. He closed his eyes, and the days in the Chu family flashed through his mind. Countless times he had fantasized about Gu Yusen’s appearance, but it always ended in nothing.

Why could he recognize Gu Yusen the instant he saw his photo? They had only met when they were little, and his appearance should have changed a lot.

When he was locked in his room by the Chu family under the pretext of protection, he fantasized again and again, wondering what Gu Yusen would look like when he grew up, carefully sketching him on the drawing paper over and over again.

The room didn’t have Gu Yusen’s familiar scent, reminding him of those days. That kind of empty, void feeling made it a little hard for him to breathe.

Perhaps his mental illness had never been cured.

He had never told anyone that when his condition was at its worst, he had already seen the figure of Gu Yusen as a child, fantasizing about the figure who had given him warmth and brief shelter when he was young.

The congealed cold fat was gradually forming on the corner of the table. In the reflection, the spilled decoction from when he was twelve years old flickered. At that time, he clutched the sketch book filled with Gu Yusen and refused to take the medicine, until Li Yurong pinched his chin and poured the bitter juice down his throat.

Now he finally understood that the bitter medicine had crushed more than just the phantoms.

Even hallucinations are stingy with charity.

“Brother Sanmu,” he murmured softly, his voice almost inaudible.