Chapter 2

Li Xuan finished the exam and peeled off his gloves.

Su Xingchuan hurried to fix his clothes. Whatever had just happened behind that screen — he'd deal with that later. Right now he cared about his diagnosis. He followed Li Xuan out and asked, 'Is the stone serious?'

'Serious.'

'Huh?' Su Xingchuan's face fell — but then he frowned. His habits were fine. Sure, he'd been going out more lately with the promotion on the line, and the work stress was real, but he still hit the gym. He showered every day, even in winter. Overall he was healthy.

Serious seemed like a stretch.

He studied Li Xuan's face, dragged a chair over, and sat down beside him. Li Xuan typed another line on the screen.

Su Xingchuan couldn't read it. 'How serious are we talking?'

'Serious.'

'What kind of answer is that,' Su Xingchuan muttered, exasperated. 'Can you be specific? It's not — it's not cancerous, is it?'

Li Xuan's expression went grave.

Su Xingchuan's stomach dropped. 'It's not actually cancerous, right?'

'Any plans to get married soon?'

'What? Me — married? Are you serious right now? I got together with you at twenty. What do you mean, get married?'

Su Xingchuan caught it — Li Xuan's lashes flickered. Twice.

He clearly did not appreciate the phrase 'got together.'

'Not necessarily.' Li Xuan's voice was flat.

'I wouldn't do that to someone,' Su Xingchuan said, irritated. 'You think I'm as irresponsible as you?'

Li Xuan's expression didn't shift, but his back straightened slightly. 'And kids — you're not thinking about those either?'

What did kids have to do with anything?

Never mind the fact that Su Xingchuan was gay and had long since thrown the whole wife-kids-carry-on-the-family-line script in the trash — just hearing the word 'kids' was enough to make his blood pressure climb.

Back then he'd treated Li Xuan like something precious — fussing over him, spoiling him rotten, no limits. And what did he get for it?

Ungrateful little bastard.

A man had to love himself first. That was the lesson, Su Xingchuan decided.

Li Xuan said, perfectly calm: 'Not wanting it now doesn't mean you won't later. Keep putting it off and eventually the window closes.'

That sent a spike of cold through Su Xingchuan's chest. It wasn't actually cancer, was it? Bladder cancer, prostate cancer, vas deferens cancer —

He ran through every male cancer he could think of, and by the end he'd even worked himself up to kidney cancer. The color drained from his face. He touched Li Xuan's hand. 'What's actually wrong?'

'Nothing. Just asking.'

'………'

Su Xingchuan was speechless.

Li Xuan gave him the diagnosis: 'Stones caused by inflammation. You can have surgery soon.'

'What caused it?'

'Could be a lot of things — irregular sex life, poor diet, work stress, or congenital underdevelopment. Any of those.'

Su Xingchuan had a pretty good idea which one it was.

Had to be work stress.

He just wondered which charge Li Xuan had already decided to pin on him.

Li Xuan turned and asked: 'Do you want the surgery?'

'Will you be the one doing it?'

'Normally it'd be the attending physician, but not necessarily — there might be a last-minute switch.'

'Is it complicated?'

'No. Minimally invasive.'

Su Xingchuan thought about it. 'Okay, let's do it.'

Li Xuan wrote out the orders. The printer ground to life, and he told him, 'Come back the day after tomorrow for the surgery.'

'Oh,' Su Xingchuan said, watching Li Xuan's cool, sharp profile. He thought about what had just happened between them — and felt a little devil stir. He couldn't help asking: 'Are you single right now, Dr. Li?'

'How is that any of your business?'

'Of course it's my business. The surgeon is my ex-boyfriend — and it wasn't exactly an amicable split either. How scary is that? I'm going to be lying on that table, completely out under anesthesia. What if you decide to settle old scores? Who's going to protect my happiness for the rest of my life? Who's going to answer for that?'

'That won't happen. Doctors have professional ethics.'

Su Xingchuan suddenly smiled. 'You finally admitted it.'

Li Xuan paused. 'Admitted what?'

'That you're my ex-boyfriend,' Su Xingchuan said, leaning back in the chair. 'You've been so cold I was starting to think you'd forgotten me entirely. That's harsh.'

Li Xuan had no interest in going down that road. He checked over the paperwork, signed it, and said, 'Go pay. Get the admission process started.'

Su Xingchuan picked up the form and looked at it.

It felt like a lifetime ago.

Li Xuan's handwriting was so much more mature than it used to be.

He'd finally started writing his own name properly.

Li Xuan had always hated the character in his name — xuān. He thought it didn't fit him at all: warm, bright, sunny. That was nothing like him. So when he signed things, he'd deliberately flatten the radical into a single vertical stroke. Su Xingchuan had corrected him on it countless times, laid out every reason why he shouldn't, and Li Xuan never listened. He'd just curl up in Su Xingchuan's arms and fix those lake-green eyes on him, calm and unhurried, until Su Xingchuan ran out of things to say — and tipped his head down and kissed him instead, hopelessly soft, murmuring, 'Fine. Write it however you want.'

'Li Xuan.' Su Xingchuan said his name out of nowhere. Li Xuan's hands stilled over whatever he was putting away.

'Long time no see.'

Li Xuan's response was as cool as ever.

'Yeah.' He gave a small nod.

Su Xingchuan got the outpatient and surgery fees paid before the clinic closed, and came back out clutching a thick stack of receipts.

He glanced back down the clinic corridor.

Just a handful of patients scattered around, and the door to Consulting Room 3 was shut.

He'd forgotten to ask for Li Xuan's contact. Su Xingchuan felt a little annoyed at himself.

Not that he'd ever really forgotten it — he'd held onto it the whole time. He'd made himself delete everything back then, a moment of cold resolve, but drunk and coming back to his senses he could still recite it without thinking.

Knowing it by heart wasn't the same as being able to just reach out whenever he felt like it.

A nurse looked up at him. 'Anything else I can help you with?'

Su Xingchuan smiled. 'No, that's everything.'

When he stepped outside, the days of grey drizzle had broken without warning — sunlight poured across the pavement and scrubbed the hospital's chill clean away.

Surgery was scheduled for the afternoon two days from now. He'd check in tomorrow.

He headed down to the parking lot to get his car. Xie Liang called. 'Drinks tonight?'

Xie Liang was a colleague — they both worked at the same investment firm, had been partners on deals, and had clicked over shared interests. They'd stayed close.

Su Xingchuan tugged his seatbelt across. 'Drinks? I'm checking into the hospital tomorrow.'

'What?' Xie Liang thought he'd misheard. 'Checking in for what? What happened to you?'

Su Xingchuan had been a little reluctant to say it out loud, but then again, it wasn't like he'd gotten this from anything embarrassing — it was pure work stress. So he came clean: 'Kidney stone. Nothing serious. It's just that the negotiations with Zhongjin Group have been dragging on forever, pulling all-nighters every day. Wore myself down.'

'Where's the stone? Your kidney?'

'...' Su Xingchuan said nothing.

'Gallbladder? Oral?'

Something in Su Xingchuan's prolonged silence clicked for Xie Liang. 'Wait — don't tell me it's your... buddy?'

'Go to hell.'

Xie Liang burst out laughing loud enough to fill the car. Su Xingchuan pressed a hand to his forehead and pulled out of the parking lot.

Xie Liang was absolutely delighted. 'Boss Su, I've been telling you — you gotta take the little guy out for some fresh air once in a while. Leave it idle too long and things go sideways. But no, you had to go on about how abstinence is freedom. Look at you now. Abstained your way right into a medical situation.'

'Shut up.'

'Which hospital? Want me to come with you tomorrow?'

'No need.'

'Your parents aren't here and you don't have a partner, so at least give me a heads-up before the surgery. I'll be there. It's minor, yeah, but someone should be waiting outside.'

Su Xingchuan was about to say no, then thought — actually, fair point.

What if his ex did something funny to him on the operating table?

The thought of Li Xuan made him let out a soft, quiet laugh.

Xie Liang startled on the other end of the line. 'What are you laughing at? Run into a cute nurse? Wait — do they have male nurses?'

'No male nurses. There is one male doctor, though.'

Bro, your taste really went somewhere. One checkup and you're into bald specialists now? Didn't you say your first love looked like a porcelain doll?'

Su Xingchuan caught Li Xuan's reflection in the rearview mirror.

Li Xuan had swapped the white coat for a short padded jacket, a black backpack slung over one shoulder, walking out of the hospital alone. At the rack of shared bikes by the entrance he picked one, scanned it, and rode off.

He looked a little solitary. Also kind of sweet.

He wasn't riding fast — almost geriatric, honestly — but his back was perfectly straight as he coasted steady and unhurried down the slope.

Su Xingchuan kept watching. His tongue drifted across his back teeth, and something stirred quietly in his chest — the beginning of an idea.

'You'll see when the time comes.'

*

The following afternoon, Su Xingchuan packed a few changes of clothes and some toiletries and drove to the hospital.

It was a minimally invasive procedure — three days, start to finish, if that.

Su Xingchuan hadn't made much of it — didn't even tell his parents.

His mom had called the night before, asking how he was doing. He just said fine, fine, fine, just a little busy with work.

She'd scolded him fondly: 'Don't work yourself to death. The money'll always be there.'

Su Xingchuan had grown up comfortable. Both parents worked steady jobs, the family did well enough. He was two when they moved into their first apartment building, ten when they sold it and upgraded to an elevator unit near a good school district. One home, one car — and after his parents retired, their days were mostly mah-jong with the neighbors. A quiet, easy life.

Growing up, money had never felt like something that mattered much to Su Xingchuan.

That changed when he met Li Xuan.

Li Xuan's family had real money. Everything he wore, everything he used — name brands, all of it. Not that Li Xuan was flashy about it; he didn't chase luxury or make a thing of his tastes. But Su Xingchuan had one thought that stuck: Xiaoxuan deserves better than what I can give him.

The drive to save, to earn — that started in university. He'd ground away at it for years and built up a decent amount. But just like Xie Liang said: the more you tell yourself deprivation means freedom, the more you're heading for a breakdown.

Money can buy happiness. But when you've lost the person you wanted to share it with, all you're left with is running — just keep moving, keep going. It gets exhausting.

And on top of all that, he still had something stuck in his chest. Couldn't shake it loose.

Su Xingchuan walked into the inpatient ward. A nurse showed him to his room.

Lucky — it was a two-bed.

The nurse pointed to the bed on the left: 'Get yourself settled. Dr. Li will be in shortly.'

The right-hand bed was already claimed — things on the mattress, but no sign of whoever it belonged to.

'Thanks.' Su Xingchuan texted Xie Liang the room number.

Su Xingchuan set his things down without unpacking and immediately got a call from a client — the guy was still going around in circles about the management fee. Su Xingchuan kept his tone light, a tired smile in his voice: 'Director Xu, cut us a little slack here. If we drop the management fee to 0.5%, we'll be eating out of a trash can…'

He hung up and turned around — and nearly jumped out of his skin. Li Xuan was standing right there by the bed, white coat and everything, quiet as a wall.

'Could you maybe make some noise?'

Li Xuan opened the chart and walked Su Xingchuan through the procedure: 'Surgery's scheduled for ten-thirty tomorrow morning. Eight hours fasting beforehand — nothing to eat, nothing to drink.'

'Got it.'

The nurse brought over the hospital gown.

Su Xingchuan felt the fabric — a little rough — and said out of nowhere: 'You could never wear one of these. You'd hate how stiff it is.'

Li Xuan looked at him, the corners of his mouth dipping just slightly.

Su Xingchuan couldn't tell if that expression was annoyance or something closer to hurt.

When Li Xuan moved to leave, Su Xingchuan reached out without thinking — grasping for anything: 'Doctor, are there any side effects with this surgery?'

'Side effects?'

'Like, after the surgery,' Su Xingchuan glanced downward, 'will it still work? Will things... decline?'

Li Xuan glanced in the same direction. 'No.'

Su Xingchuan let the mischief back in, deliberately: 'And if it doesn't? Does the doctor offer after-sales service? Can I use the doctor to test it out?'

He sat on the edge of the bed, watching Li Xuan with easy, unhurried eyes.

It was the same as seven years ago — he used to love winding Li Xuan up exactly like this.

Li Xuan parted his lips slightly, like he was about to say something.

Then someone knocked, and Xie Liang walked in mid-sentence: 'I was driving past anyway, figured I'd come scope the place out — room's pretty decent actually, quiet too, not bad at all. Oh, but that fruit stand downstairs is an absolute rip-off. Nine eighty for a single apple. I bought you some anyway.'

Li Xuan looked at Xie Liang. Then at Su Xingchuan.

Su Xingchuan went quiet.

His 'and if it doesn't?' was still hanging in the air.

Something shifted in Li Xuan's eyes, going dark. He said: 'If it doesn't work, just be a bottom.'

'………'