Chapter 62: I Can’t Do It

The engagement banquet three days later, Lu Zhiyan struggled and hesitated, paced back and forth in indecision for a long time, but ultimately still didn’t go.

He sat alone on the balcony at home, gazing at the brilliantly flickering lights in the snowy night of Beicheng in the distance, clutching a cup of long-since-cold warm water in his hand, sitting quietly from dusk till dawn.

The snow outside the window fell heavier and heavier, wrapping the entire city in a patch of pure white, so clean that it was actually somewhat glaring.

The horizon gradually showed the white of a fish’s belly. When the first ray of morning light pierced through the wind and snow and spilled down, Lu Zhiyan gazed at that patch of light, tears once again sliding down silently, crashing onto the ice-cold iron railing, blurring out a small wet mark.

Waiting until the alarm rang and the daylight outside the window was thoroughly bright, he finally dragged his weak and soft body slowly toward the bathroom.

While washing up, Lu Zhiyan looked at himself in the mirror. The dark circles under his eyes were heavy, and the corners of his eyes still carried an undispersed redness. Last night’s sleeplessness seemed to have drained more than half his strength, leaving his entire body with only numb exhaustion.

Three surgeries were scheduled for today. He forced himself to go downstairs and properly finish breakfast, drank a large cup of mocha, and only then went to the hospital carrying a heavy heart.

Entering the operating room at nine in the morning, when he came out again it was already dusk. His white coat still carried the cold aura of disinfectant, his back had long since been soaked by cold sweat, tired to the point that even lifting his foot felt strenuous.

Returning home, too lazy to even turn on the entryway light, his entire person slumped onto the sofa. His stomach was completely empty, yet he didn’t have the slightest appetite.

His mobile phone lay quietly on the coffee table, the screen pitch black. He didn’t even have the courage to touch it.

Afraid of swiping to photos of the engagement banquet in his Moments, afraid of Shen Yu being mentioned in the messages sent by his parents, and even more afraid of directly facing that long-settled conclusion.

But the more he wanted to hide, the more what should come could not be avoided.

The phone suddenly exploded with sound, the word “Mom” jumping on the screen. The sharp ringtone was like a fine needle, ruthlessly piercing into his eardrums.

Lu Zhiyan stared dead at the screen, both hands tightly clenched into fists, his knuckles turning white. Only when the ringtone died away on its own did he let out a sigh of relief as if relieved of a heavy burden, a thin layer of sweat having long since seeped out on his back.

But not even half a minute passed before the ringtone exploded again, so stubborn it refused to give up.

He closed his eyes, ultimately still picking up the phone with a trembling hand, his fingertips ridiculously ice-cold. Pressing the answer button, his voice was so hoarse it was almost out of tune:

“Hello, Mom.”

“Yanyan, why is your voice so hoarse? Are you sick?”

Li Mei on the other end of the phone immediately heard something was wrong, her tone full of worry.

“I’m fine.”

Lu Zhiyan forced down the astringency in his throat, softly brushing it off, “Just a bit tired.”

“Oh, then pay more attention to resting, go to sleep earlier in a while.”

“Mhm, okay. Mom, if there’s nothing else I’ll hang up first.”

“Wait, son…”

Li Mei paused, her tone lightening, carrying a bit of regret, and hiding an imperceptible blame, “Little Yu got engaged last night, why didn’t you come?”

Lu Zhiyan’s heart violently shrank.

Ultimately, he still couldn’t hide from it.

Li Mei sighed gently: “That child asked me over and over again yesterday whether you would come, hoping for you the entire night. No matter how busy you are, squeezing out an hour or two, you should always be able to, right?”

Lu Zhiyan gripped his phone dead-tight, his finger pads turning white, his fingertips cold as ice. He lowered his eyes, concealing the churning astringency at the bottom of his eyes, his voice so light it drifted: “The hospital was too busy, several surgeries running continuously, I really couldn’t get away.”

“So it was like that.”

Li Mei didn’t doubt much, gently sighing, then her tone shifted, lowering her voice, carrying a bit of lingering fear and sighing, “But… speaking of which, it truly is… sigh… son, a major incident happened at the engagement banquet yesterday…”

Lu Zhiyan’s heart violently sank, as if ruthlessly gripped tight by an ice-cold hand. An ominous premonition instantly swept through his entire body. His breathing hitched, his voice uncontrollably tightening:

“…What happened?”

“Little Yu suddenly backed out!”

Li Mei’s voice was urgent and chaotic, “In front of so many relatives and friends, he directly said he wasn’t getting engaged anymore, turned around and left, making a complete mess of the scene on the spot. The Chu family’s complexions were terribly ugly, the adults of both families couldn’t step down from the stage…”

Lu Zhiyan’s entire body jolted, his blood seemingly solidifying in an instant, even his voice changing tune:

“What?”

“Little Yu called off the engagement.”

Li Mei sighed heavily, “A perfectly good marriage turned into this, who knows what that child is thinking… Yanyan, how about you help go persuade him? This isn’t child’s play after all…”

Lu Zhiyan could no longer clearly hear the words that followed.

His brain was buzzing, leaving only the two words “called off” repeatedly echoing. Shock and a wild joy that shouldn’t have existed crashed fiercely together, crashing until his heart ached, even his breathing carrying a tremble.

Just at this moment, the doorbell suddenly rang, urgent and persistent.

Lu Zhiyan violently regained his senses, hurriedly said “I have something to do, hanging up first” to his mother, then hung up the phone, stumbling to the door.

Looking through the peephole, unexpectedly standing outside the door was Chu Xiyao. Dressed in a plain beige coat, her eye sockets were slightly red, her expression unspeakably haggard.

His heart tightened. [Read on RanaTranslations🌸] Hesitating for a moment, he ultimately took a deep breath, and only after turning on the lights in the room did he gently pull the door open.

“Zhiyan.”

Chu Xiyao’s voice carried noticeable choking, yet she still maintained her dignity, “Sorry to intrude. I got your address through A’Yu’s parents. They originally wanted to come find you for help, but I really couldn’t hold back, so I came over first.”

Lu Zhiyan turned sideways to let her in. Closing the door, a silence so awkward it was suffocating permeated the air.

After Chu Xiyao sat down, her hands tightly gripping her bag strap, as if having made a heaven-shaking resolution, she looked up at Lu Zhiyan, her eyes full of pleading:

“Zhiyan, A’Yu isn’t answering his phone right now, refusing to see anyone. I know you are his best friend, perhaps… only you can persuade him.”

Seeing Lu Zhiyan’s face reveal embarrassment, she hurriedly spoke again, her voice slightly trembling:

“Zhiyan… I know you are in a difficult position. But… I truly don’t know who else I can go find. The reason this matter turned into this today, I think, must be because I pushed too hard. Actually, I always knew A’Yu didn’t want to get engaged so quickly; yet it was because the parents on both sides and I rushed too anxiously, putting so much pressure on him.”

“But I truly love him very much… I can feel that it’s not that he doesn’t love me, just that he hasn’t prepared himself yet. I can wait slowly, wait until he thinks it through, wait until he is willing, and we can get engaged again. I am not anxious at all, I only beg him not to do things so resolutely…”

Lu Zhiyan listened silently, his heart a jumble of mixed feelings.

Chu Xiyao’s gentle consideration and reasonable understanding only made his cautious, unspeakable guarding look even more like a massive joke.

He shouldn’t have come back from the very beginning.

If that had truly been the case, perhaps all of this wouldn’t have happened.

In the end, it was ultimately all his fault…

He looked at this woman before his eyes who deeply loved Shen Yu, looking at the surging urgency and shattered hurt in the depths of her eyes. His heart was blocked and stuffy by heavy guilt and complex emotions. Ultimately, under her nearly begging, earnest gaze, he slowly nodded.

After work the next day, Lu Zhiyan stood downstairs at the hospital, hesitating for a long time at his phone screen. His fingertip hovered over Shen Yu’s number repeatedly, before he finally mustered the courage and pressed the dial button.

The long dial tone in the handset, beep after beep, was like knocking on his taut heartstrings.

With every extra ring, his heartbeat grew a fraction more chaotic, both afraid that person wouldn’t pick up, and afraid he would pick up. He even bred a bit of absurd retreat. Maybe I should hang up, just pretend I never called.

But his finger froze over the hang-up button, delaying and not daring to fall.

Only until the ringtone sounded over and over again, nearly at the second before automatically hanging up, did the other side finally pick up.

“…Hello.”

Shen Yu’s voice was very low, carrying hoarseness and exhaustion so thick it couldn’t melt.

With just this one word, Lu Zhiyan’s heart violently clenched, and a dense, dull pain instantly spread throughout his entire body. Hearing it, he knew immediately that that person’s state had already deteriorated to the extreme.

His Adam’s apple bobbed fiercely, doing his utmost to suppress the trembling in his voice, speaking hoarsely:

“It’s me, Lu Zhiyan.”

The other end of the phone fell into a patch of silence.

He repeatedly struggled at the bottom of his heart for a long time, before finally asking with difficulty that sentence he had repeatedly tangled over countless times in his heart:

“Can we… meet up?”

It was another burst of long silence before a response came from the other end, so light it was almost inaudible:

“Okay.”

For the convenience of talking, Lu Zhiyan specifically booked a private room in a high-end Western restaurant, with good soundproofing and strong privacy, able to completely isolate the clamor of the outside world.

He arrived early, his fingertips repeatedly caressing the ice-cold glass rim, his heart an entangled mess.

When the private room door was pushed open, he violently looked up.

The moment he saw clearly the person who had arrived, Lu Zhiyan’s pupils abruptly constricted.

Shen Yu wore a gray sweater, covered with a black long down jacket on the outside. His complexion was frighteningly pale. An impressive, clear fist print was stamped on his left cheek, and there was still un-faded bruising at the corner of his mouth. He looked so wretched that it made one’s heart ache.

“Who hit you?”

Lu Zhiyan instantly stood up and rushed over quickly. Unsuppressible anger churned in the depths of his eyes, even his voice trembling.

That undisguised concern and anger caused a faint, weak light to suddenly show through Shen Yu’s originally dead-silent eyes, like a spark inadvertently ignited in the cold night.

This subconscious action completely bypassed his brain. Lu Zhiyan violently froze, realizing it was inappropriate. He hurriedly and forcefully suppressed the heartache in his heart, looked away, and made his tone deliberately harder by a few fractions:

“Sit down.”

The two sat facing each other. The private room was so quiet that they could hear each other’s breathing.

Lu Zhiyan took the lead in breaking the silence, his voice dry and astringent:

“Why did you suddenly back out of the marriage? Chu Xiyao is quite good, and suitable for you too.”

Shen Yu raised his eyes to look at him, the depths of his eyes carrying a bit of probing, his voice hoarse:

“Did my parents ask you to come persuade me?”

“No.”

Lu Zhiyan shook his head, avoiding his gaze, “I wanted to come persuade you myself.”

Seeing Shen Yu lower his head in silence, Lu Zhiyan steeled his heart and added another sentence:

“If you feel this one is unsuitable, don’t like her, then change to another. You can always change to a suitable one.”

The moment these words came out, the air in the private room completely solidified.

Shen Yu slowly raised his eyes, staring scorchingly at him. That gaze was too hot, carrying grievance, incomprehension, and a trace of stubbornness he couldn’t read, making Lu Zhiyan feel flustered and chaotic, subconsciously shifting his line of sight away.

“A’Yan…”

A low, deep voice carrying a tremble, gently calling out these two words.

Like a feather gently tickling the heart, and also like fine needles ruthlessly stabbing in. Lu Zhiyan’s heart violently shrank. His eye sockets instantly turned hot, and wetness surged up uncontrollably.

He hurriedly turned his face away, desperately suppressing the complex emotions churning at the bottom of his heart, dead-tight holding up that thick, ice-cold layer of camouflage.

But in the next second, Shen Yu spoke softly again. [Read on RanaTranslations🌸] With just one sentence, all the defensive lines he had desperately built up instantly collapsed.

“In the future… you are not allowed to go to places like bars and nightclubs, got it?”

Shen Yu’s voice was very light, yet like a clap of thunder, it explosively crashed beside Lu Zhiyan’s ear.

His entire body violently jolted, even his breathing abruptly stalling, his whole person freezing in place.

This sentence was what he had specifically instructed Shen Yu during the summer vacation when he was twenty. Back then, because of jealousy, he seriously admonished Shen Yu not to go to those places mixed with dragons and fishes.

To him, everything seemed like yesterday, but to the Shen Yu of today, it was already an old matter from fifteen years ago.

He thought Shen Yu should have forgotten long ago.

Yet that person spoke word by word, incomparably clear.

“A’Yan, these years, I haven’t entered a bar, nor have I gone to a nightclub.”

“You said, we would go study abroad together, immigrate together in the future, and we could even get a marriage certificate and get married over there.”

“You said, as long as you were with me, you weren’t afraid of anything. We needed to be promising, needed to make money to provide for our parents’ old age, and we also needed to come out to them, let them see that we are doing very well, and never need to worry about us again for the rest of their lives.”

Lu Zhiyan violently turned his head, crashing into Shen Yu’s reddened eye sockets.

Surging emotions churned inside them, like a flood backlogged for fifteen years, finally breaking its dam.

“You said, just wait, one day, we will be able to openly and legitimately hold hands and walk on the street, and no one will ever be able to hurt us again.”

Word by word, it was entirely the words he had said to Shen Yu back then.

Experiencing fifteen long years of time, that person actually could still remember so clearly, even the tone being extremely like him back then.

Lu Zhiyan’s heart was hugely shocked. His eye sockets turned thoroughly red, scalding tears swirling in his eyes, almost about to fall.

He opened his mouth, yet couldn’t emit a single sound. His throat felt as if it were blocked by something, both sour and astringent.

“A’Yan… you said if you treated me badly, I should forget you, find someone who loves me, treats me well, live a good life, and never think of you again…”

Shen Yu spoke incomparably clearly, carrying heavy choking.

“I’m sorry, A’Yan… I can’t do it.”

His voice trembled terribly. [Read on RanaTranslations🌸] Tears finally slid down, crashing onto the ice-cold tabletop, “Things I promised you, I have always put in all my strength to achieve, but this one, I truly cannot do… I really… really have already tried my best.”

He lowered his eyes, his hands clenched dead-tight into fists under the table. Every single word was as if forcefully gouged out from his heart, carrying grievances and despair suppressed for many years.

“For so many years, I have always been desperately enduring, not disturbing you, not pestering you, and trying hard to accept others… but as long as I see you, I can’t do anything anymore…”

“A’Yan…”

Why…

To this day, Shen Yu still didn’t understand why Lu Zhiyan would suddenly collapse that summer night when they were twenty.

After waking up, he became so cold and distant. Past promises were all tossed to the back of his mind, the doting in the depths of his eyes disappeared, and he was still surrounded by countless, constantly changing people…

He remembered those heart-tearing days and nights. He cautiously guarded the agreement between the two, desperately following that person’s footsteps, taking exams, going abroad, and in countless late nights in California, foolishly waiting for a person who seemed to never look back.

He tried hard, gritting his teeth and enduring; not disturbing, not interfering, at his beck and call. He endured until his tears ran dry, his heartache having long since turned numb, yet he still dead-tightly clung to the promises that person made to him, guarding from afar, watching, enduring, waiting for him to turn back.

But even so, it still made Lu Zhiyan feel that his existence was too much of an eyesore, too burdensome. He was even less spared from quarreling and making scenes with him over this.

Seeing that person’s unbearably pained appearance, he ultimately compromised. He followed his wishes and returned to the country, and then with a heart like dead ashes, let his gray-templed parents arrange for him to meet with all sorts of prospective dates.

He knew clearly that Lu Zhiyan had always regretted and blamed himself for dragging him into this abyss.

But what that person didn’t know was that the one who was the first to be moved, the first to fall, had always been him, Shen Yu, himself.

He loved him, having long been carved into his bones and marrow, becoming an inescapable fate.

It had nothing to do with gender, nothing to do with the secular world, only because that person was Lu Zhiyan.

No matter what appearance he turned into, or how cruel he was to him, this love could not be suppressed. Only waiting until the final moment when life burned out would it be possible to stop.

He gritted his teeth, trying hard to abide by the promise made to Lu Zhiyan back then; if the other party no longer needed him, he had to find someone to live a good life with.

For no other reason, only seeking to make that person feel slightly better in his heart.

It was holding onto this thought that he forced himself to try to accept Chu Xiyao, drawing near bit by bit, compromising step by step, ultimately walking to the point of setting a marriage contract.

As to why it was Chu Xiyao, he never told the truth to anyone, and even he himself deliberately didn’t think about it deeply.

The reason he was able to selectively pick Chu Xiyao among all sorts of prospective dates was never because of some matching social status or compatible temperaments.

It was only because… the curved arc of that person’s brows and eyes, the way the corners of her eyes gently lifted when she smiled, actually shared a bit of resemblance in spirit to Lu Zhiyan.

With just that one glance, he couldn’t help but redden his eye sockets.

But it was also precisely because of this bit of resemblance that he was even more unable to commit the slightest transgressive intimacy.

When holding hands, his fingertips were stiff. When Chu Xiyao slightly raised her head and drew near with anticipation, he would always calmly turn his head aside, or use the excuse of tidying his cuffs or checking the time to avoid that soon-to-fall kiss.

If even kissing was so forced, let alone a deeper, lingering integration. Just thinking about it, a burst of hard-to-hide resistance and guilt would surge up from the bottom of his heart first.

Whenever he met that bit of cautious anticipation in the depths of Chu Xiyao’s eyes, he would pretend not to understand and hide, not daring to respond, and not daring to burst the bubble.

All he could do was use double the consideration and thoroughness to make up for it. Remembering her preferences, taking care of her emotions, protecting her in front of others, and giving her enough dignity and stability that a fiancée should have.

But that gentleness and meticulousness was never from being moved by love, it was entirely a debt owed.

His heart had long since been lost in distant California, completely, entirely, and thoroughly locked onto that person’s body.

What he could give Chu Xiyao was never anything but a soulless empty shell, and a self-deceiving makeshift.

Returning to the country for two years, he had always tried his absolute best to bear it dead-on, enduring bone-corroding longing to not contact Lu Zhiyan, properly playing the roles of a good son and a good boyfriend.

But when he was downstairs at the company and saw Lu Zhiyan collapsed in a pool of blood, all the camouflage he had managed to build up over these two years collapsed with a crash, routed and dispersed.

He only felt a heart-piercing, bone-chilling pain in his chest, as if his entire person had been bloodily torn to shreds all over the ground from the deepest part of his soul.

Only at that moment did he truly understand that even if he tried his absolute best, he fundamentally could not fulfill his promise to that person.

In this lifetime, he had long been unable to fall in love with anyone else besides Lu Zhiyan ever again.

“A’Yan…”

“I know, you don’t love me anymore, you even feel that I am very annoying, very hateful.”

He sniffled, his eyes full of despairing self-mockery, “But I truly have no way… I can’t do it, and I even less want to delay other women. I don’t want to deceive someone into marriage, don’t want to be deeply in the closet. I beg you, don’t force me anymore. I have already made it clear to Mom and Dad, I only like…”

【I only like you.】

“I only like men.”

“On the Chu family’s side, I have also already personally visited to apologize, and have also spoken extremely clearly to Xiyao. Her and I, there is no longer any possibility. With other women, it’s the same. All these decisions were made by myself, and have nothing to do with anyone else.”

As he spoke, he stood up, his footsteps stumbling a bit, his voice as light as a sigh, “Don’t worry, in the future, I won’t come to annoy you anymore. If there’s nothing else… I’ll be leaving first.”

After speaking, he got up and walked toward the door, his back resolute and thin, as if he would be scattered by the wind at any time.

“Also… ”

Reaching the door, his footsteps suddenly paused. He didn’t turn his head back. His voice was very light, but his tone was exceptionally firm:

“It has always been me who fell in love with you first. All of this is my own business, it has nothing to do with you.”

The instant the private room door was gently closed, the world abruptly fell silent.

Lu Zhiyan froze in place, almost forgetting even how to breathe.

He originally thought that as long as he ruthlessly pushed him away, alienated him, and was cold to him, he could make Shen Yu completely let go and live the stable life of an ordinary person.

But it wasn’t until now that he understood that the thick, high wall he had personally built had never blocked Shen Yu, but rather himself.

Shen Yu loved openly, loved to the point of madness, loved to the point of being covered in cuts and bruises and still refused to turn back.

And he, Lu Zhiyan, from beginning to end, was that most cowardly, most foolish deserter who dared not face his true heart.

“A’Yu—!!”

A roar broke through his throat, so hoarse it was unrecognizable.

Lu Zhiyan violently sprang up, stumbling as he rushed toward the door.

He couldn’t care about anything else anymore. What fear, what not daring, what inability…

All of it, at this moment, crumbled completely clean.

Only one thought remained in his mind—

He cannot let Shen Yu leave.

This time, no matter what, he would never let go again.