Chapter 17 (2/2)

My G.o.d. I called Binbin. The call went through but no one picked up. Was he in the bathhouse already?

Dad! I was shaking. I was afraid. I mean, you can’t be alive and not fear anything. After that, no one picked up when I called back. No one picked up when I called Binbin, either. By the time I got back at ten thirty, Binbin called, telling me to go to No. 2 Hospital.

My pa had diabetes for more than ten years and recently, he began eating off-limit foods, the result being fainting from high blood sugar. Thankfully, there were no complications. He was out of critical condition after getting some insulin.

The point is that after this incident, my mom began to think of Binbin as her real son.

According to Lin Dongfu, the little brat went out of the baths in a towel and heard his phone ringing. How strange, right? He didn’t hear it when I called but he did when my mom called.

Not even bothering with clothes, he dashed out with only the bathhouse’s slippers and a bath robe. Luckily, my parent’s house wasn’t far. He threw my dad onto his back once he got there and left like the wind. The house was an old, non-licensed building and the alleyways were complex like a maze. No wonder the ambulance couldn’t find it despite it being no more than one kilometer from the main road. He couldn’t hail a taxi either when he got to the road, so the brat just hauled my dad to the hospital.

And I’d have you know, my dad was ninety kilos, exactly, on the dot. If it were me, I would have outright collapsed.

My mom had already gone soft in the knees at home. By the time she made it to the hospital, my old man was already in the emergency room. They said if he got there any later, there would have been more complications.

The brat told me that my mom grabbed his hands and kept saying: Aunty’s sorry. Aunty’s really sorry. My dear, I’m so sorry.

The brat thought my mom was still in shock. Why are you sorry, Aunty? He asked.

I knew why.

My mom really thought of him as her son after that.

Then, the next day, she wanted Binbin to be her G.o.dson and call her mom. After my pa left the hospital, we even had a banquet in his honour and my mom announced in front of seventy-eighty people of the Qian family, “From now on, Ding Hongmei’s son, Shen Bin, will be one of us. I will be his mother, my old man here will be his father and Jiying will be his brother.”

By then, familial love seemed to overpower our love.

I wondered if the little brat would listen to my ma if she didn’t let him be with me

I asked him when we went home. He just wouldn’t answer me. Only after a long time did he burst out laughing.

“C’mon, Qian Jiying. Are you jealous of your mom here? Or are you jealous of me?”

Probably both. I was feeling like an outsider already.

“But, I don’t want you to feel guilty.”

“That’s why I’m extra good to them! I can’t leave your side. Without you, I’m nothing.”

Maybe I was thinking into it too much, but hearing him say that he can’t leave me, I felt warm and rea.s.sured inside.

I can’t leave his side either.

Let’s just keep the elderly happy for now.

Every gay person has to face this obstacle. We didn’t even have Shen Bin’s side to worry about. We were fortunate enough.

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