In the long, unending darkness, Pei Zhen had a dream.
In the dream, Yi Changqing came looking for trouble with him.
The scene was still that same night—the revolving restaurant with floor-to-ceiling glass and a sky full of starlight. The man wore his perfectly tailored suit, his amber eyes carrying a chill of indifference and resentment.
“…Why did you say things like that? What gave you the right to say that to Changkong?!”
The main reason Yi Changqing had been able to endure staying by his side for so many years was largely so he could find a way to pay for his precious younger brother’s schooling.
Every time he called his brother, he only talked about happy things, sharing good news and hiding the bad.
And then, in just a few careless words, the image of the perfect, self-reliant older brother he’d built up over so many years was shattered.
When his little white rabbit of a brother came crying to him face-to-face, who else could he hold a grudge against?
……
Pei Zhen wasn’t afraid in the slightest.
After his emotions had spiraled out of control and he’d lashed out at that innocent little white rabbit, a sense of relief mixed with a sliver of guilt and a thorough, unrestrained exhilaration washed over him. It gave Pei Zhen a sudden, brand-new epiphany about life—
All these years, why had he suppressed his true nature?
For as much as he had loved back then, that was exactly how much he hated now.
That was normal, wasn’t it? Why force himself to control countless negative emotions, desperately pretending he’d weathered the storm, all calm and indifferent?
He might as well just openly and honestly let his true feelings show. If everyone was a winner in life, then everyone could be a winner. But if it was going to be bad, then no one should have it easy!
“…I’ll say whatever I want. What are you going to do about it?”
“If you’ve got the skills, then cover up your little white rabbit’s ears, take him back to your hometown and hide him away. Don’t let him hear or see a single thing.”
“Or, figure out a way to make me shut up for good?!”
“…” A trace of bafflement flickered in Yi Changqing’s eyes.
Pei Zhen just found it amusing on his own.
Even as a gold-medal perfumer for Belle, no matter how high your standing in the industry, you still can’t control the owner of a cheap knock-off fragrance OEM factory from making his own money, raising his own dog, and spewing his own nonsense.
……
Back then, he had truly liked and treasured him.
He’d rather shoulder all the blame alone than let him suffer the slightest grievance.
But things had changed now. Time had passed, circumstances were different.
If Yi Changqing was smart enough, he should silently swallow this hidden loss and not come provoking him.
After all, in this whole world, the person who holds the most of his darkest secrets was none other than his former sugar daddy.
And that sugar daddy now had a new dog.
He should know by now that he would never again protect and indulge him the way he used to.
……
……
Pei Zhen woke up lying in a hospital bed.
Beside him was the little wolfdog with the teardrop mole by his eye. He was holding one of Pei Zhen’s hands against his cheek, his hair a little messy, the corners of his eyes slightly red. He looked utterly haggard.
“Zhenzhen, you slept for a day and a half. You’re finally awake.”
“…” In just an instant, the murky chaos of the dream vanished like smoke.
A faint sense of security, a faint heartache.
As expected of a healing-type little wolfdog.
Han Fu’s voice was still a little hoarse. It was so soft it made Pei Zhen suddenly think of that day when Han Fu had held him from behind and whimpered softly, “I’m so poor, don’t be angry, don’t stop taking care of me.”
“What are you so worked up for?” He turned his head, his heart instantly a mess. “I’m practically made of paper that falls apart every other day, it’s not like you didn’t know.”
Han Fu gave a soft “Mm” and said, “You must be hungry. Have some congee, I just finished cooking it.”
He wasn’t actually hungry, but he still ate several big mouthfuls for the sake of face.
“Zhenzhen, next time you’re feeling unwell anywhere, you have to tell me. Don’t ever scare me out of nowhere like this again, okay?”
The tearful, heartbroken sadness made Pei Zhen’s heart sink. “What did the doctor say?”
“Cardiac hypoxia led to fainting. It shouldn’t be anything serious, but he needs to stay in the hospital for observation for a day.”
Pei Zhen: “…”
Nothing serious? Then why do your eyes look so tragic, like I’ve got some incurable disease!
“The doctor also said that after you’re discharged, you need to eat more corn, buckwheat, sweet potato, and onion. Take more warm baths and exercise an hour every day. I wrote it all down in my little notebook. I’ll properly supervise you when we get home.”
Pei Zhen: “What corn? I’m not eating corn!”
Corn was the food he dreaded most, and sweet potatoes and onions were also high on his list of picky-eating foods.
“Zhenzhen, you have to listen. No more being picky about food.” Han Fu helped him sit up, wrapping him in his arms, and stuffed a soft cushion behind his back. “You can’t scare me like that again. If you do it again, I-I’ll…”
There was another slight pang in his chest, but it only lasted for a moment.
He tugged at the little wolfdog, forcing him to look him in the eye.
Look carefully! Your esteemed sugar daddy right now clearly has clear vision, a clear mind, is fully refreshed, and feels perfectly fine! Not weak at all!
……
But just a short while later, he wasn’t so “fine” anymore.
Actually, by Pei Zhen’s own estimation, he was clearly even better than before. Not just especially energetic, but inexplicably full of cheer.
The little aloe vera by the window looked utterly delicate and lovely. Looking at Han Xiaohua, he was even more dazzlingly handsome. Even the crosstalk show on the hospital TV was really so hilarious, hahaha, he couldn’t stop laughing.
Han Fu: “Doctor, what did you give him? Why’s he suddenly acting drunk?”
That was putting it mildly.
To put it properly, it was like he’d taken some kind of drug!
Doctor: “Nitroglycerin tablet. Contains no alcohol, not addictive. Ahem, but individual constitution does vary, after all…”
Han Fu: “…”
Terrified that Pei Zhen would laugh so hard he’d run out of breath again, he hastily changed the channel. Pei Zhen didn’t complain, just continued staring at the screen.
The new channel was playing some melodramatic soap opera about wealthy families, terminal illnesses, and backstabbing. Just a few scenes of exaggerated acting, and Pei Zhen’s eyes were silently red with emotion.
“…”
Han Fu got goosebumps and quickly turned off the TV.
Just as he turned it off, his phone rang.
The caller was his good buddy from school, Yu Wenzhe.
“Han Fu, you didn’t come to audit class with us today? I even saved you a seat.”
Han Fu: “Sorry, forgot to tell you. I couldn’t make it to school today.”
After hanging up the phone, he turned around and jumped in shock.
Pei Zhen was quietly craning his neck, staring at him intently exactly like a cat.
Seriously… just like a cat.
Pei Zhen didn’t usually give off a “cat” vibe, but today, probably because of the “fake drug” he’d just taken, his pupils seemed brighter and darker than usual, which made him… kind of cat-like.
The colors of his two eyes were even different. Like a real Persian cat.
“You don’t need to be here taking care of me,” he just stared like that, his whole person a bit neurotic. He pushed Han Fu, both normal and abnormal at once. “Quick, go to class.”
Han Fu: You’ve drugged yourself into this state, and I’m supposed to go to class?!
“I’m not going to die. Hurry up, you go.”
Han Fu was speechless. He pressed the man down by the shoulders onto the bed and tucked him into the blanket. “Lie still. Be good~”
“Han Xiaohua.” Pei Zhen clutched the edge of the blanket, still like a cat, his big eyes wide open. “Which is more important, me or the competition?”
“Of course, you’re more important!”
However, this didn’t seem to be the answer Pei Zhen was hoping for. In a second, he wilted like an eggplant hit by frost. “How could I be more important?”
Han Fu: “What else would it be?”
“You’re studying perfumery for me?”
“Isn’t that exactly who I’m studying it for!”
Pei Zhen: “!”
He just froze for a long moment, his eye sockets reddening again. His lips trembled, and he seemed to mutter sadly to himself: “That won’t do… how can you say it’s for me? Without passion, without love, like you, no matter how high your talent is, it won’t work. You don’t really, truly love fragrance blending. You can’t find happiness in forcing it.”
“Don’t do it anymore. I won’t rely on you. I’ll… think of another way myself.”
Saying this, he dizzily tried to get up. Han Fu pushed him back down in one motion, both amused and exasperated. “Enough. Stop thinking nonsense and sleep properly!”
Pinned down and unable to move, Pei Zhen struggled a few times, then suddenly, like a child, covered himself with the blanket and started sobbing with a whimpering sound.
Han Fu was utterly heartbroken and helpless. He hugged the person tightly from outside the blanket, patting and coaxing him with a bitter smile. “It’s just ordinary medicine for heart disease. How come everyone else takes it without side effects, but you turn into this?”
“You don’t like it…” From under the blanket, the trembling continued, along with repetitive mumbling. “So, you don’t like it.”
“Right… what use is ‘liking’ something, anyway? The entire industry now is all capital and hype. People who truly love fragrance, who properly craft it—people like me, like Senior Chen She—we were probably done for a long time ago.”
“On the contrary, people like Lister… good-looking, just dabbling, casually making some sloppy thing can sell as Cranberry’s seasonal hit. Yi Changqing too… after getting to Belle, he’s just pandering to the market, hasn’t had his own creation at all. Even you… aren’t genuinely into it. From start to finish, it’s only me, only I alone…”
He cried for a little while, then forcefully held it back.
He wiped his face with the blanket, revealing his usual stubbornness.
Even high off his head, he probably still had that bottom line of reason, knowing that in the adult world, crying was useless. Crying didn’t solve problems.
……
“Doctor, you saw him. Laughing and crying just now, and now he’s fallen asleep and can’t be woken. Is he really okay?”
Doctor: “It’s nothing, don’t worry. He should be back to normal when he wakes up again.”
Just as the doctor turned to leave, he was stopped again.
“Doctor, I just heard the little nurse saying your professional skill is exceptionally strong, that you’re the youngest department head here, and your last paper, published just half a year ago, has been cited 17,000 times.”
Doctor: “…” What are you getting at?
“What I wanted to ask is, were you motivated to study medicine because you especially loved it and had the noble ideal of healing the world?”
The doctor gave the bed a suspicious look. “That medicine of his, you didn’t take some too, did you?”
Han Fu: “…”
The doctor gazed into the distance. “Actually, I originally studied medicine simply to go to the same school as my significant other. My motives were far from pure.”
Han Fu: “But you still ended up becoming a great doctor.”
The doctor smirked a wicked smirk. “Well, what else could I do? In case my darling ever got some little illness or ailment, I’d need to be able to take care of him!”
“…” Right.
That’s exactly the logic! Worthy of being a young, brilliant department head. See how much sense that makes!
After the doctor left, Han Fu sat by Pei Zhen’s bed and murmured, even though he knew he couldn’t be heard.
“Just because you don’t love fragrance as much as you do, you can’t be a good perfumer? But in this world, how many people are there who devote themselves single-mindedly to it like you…”
Really, the most naive, most pure-hearted lover of fragrance he had ever met in his life was probably this man.
Maybe he would indeed never be able to throw himself into it as deeply as Pei Zhen did, but Han Fu didn’t feel that would necessarily be a problem.
“Look, that doctor also became an industry elite because he ‘liked a certain someone.’ So no matter what the object is, as long as you have the passion to desperately ‘love’ something, that’s enough to be a driving force to move forward, isn’t it?”
His fingers gently brushed the sleeping man’s cheek, smoothing away a faint furrow between his brows.
Zhenzhen…
In this world, what I truly, wholeheartedly like and can’t give up on really isn’t fragrance.
But you have to believe that the feeling you said is needed in a creation, that kind of ‘love’ you unreservedly pour in…
I definitely have it too. And I won’t spare a single bit of it.
……
At dusk, there was a soft knock on the hospital room door.
The bun-faced Yu Wenzhe poked his head in and said in a tiny voice, “Han Fu, here are today’s class notes. I attended all five classes you’re auditing. Here!”
Han Fu paused, then took the notebook. Inside were page after page of Yu Wenzhe’s neat, orderly handwriting, with diagrams drawn and key points highlighted with colored ink pens. It was impossible to say he wasn’t moved.
“Sorry, my boyfriend’s still asleep, can’t make noise… I’ll definitely, definitely treat you to a meal later!”
