Chapter 32

All this while, I had always had a clear goal and would never detour for anyone.

Even if that person was Yan Yang.

It was the first time in my life that Yan Yang had hung up on me. I sat in the departure hall, my hand gripping the phone. If I turned, my eyes would be pierced by the sun.

I thought given Yan Yang's personality, he would definitely message me, but even after arriving in London, I received not a single word from him.

I settled all the paperwork to check into the apartment, then sat in this unfamiliar room, a small window in front of me. Through the window, I could see a few lush trees outside.

Like that, I sat there quietly. My phone never rang.

By the next day, Yan Yang still had not contacted me. That was when I finally realised – he was really upset this time.

I should go coax and cheer him up, and find a way to make a trip to the US before school starts?

Not quite possible.

But I should at least take the initiative to call him and apologise.

I really should have apologised. Whether from an emotional or logical standpoint, I should have apologised.

But at the time, we had just frozen. I didn't know what was up with me either.

In London, I made new friends. People who lived in the apartment, and people from all over the world.

There were men and women, people much younger than me, people much older than me, and of course, people my age too.

There were heterosexual people, and homosexual people. People who were single, and people in relationships. There were even married people.

Just like how I had been in school before, I was very welcomed. I quickly became decent friends with everyone. They all invited me to participate in all sorts of activities and social events, introducing me to their friends and teachers.

My life was very lively.

My life was also very lonely.

For one month, Yan Yang didn't contact me.

No messages, no calls.

A big part of my world had collapsed.

I had always been unwilling to admit that Yan Yang was important to me, not to mention that he had already become so much more important than I could ever have expected.

During the one month he didn’t contact me, I became severely insomniac. Even after trying all kinds of remedies, I still couldn’t have a night of complete, solid sleep. In the end, I had no choice but to see a doctor.

During this period of time, I relied on sleeping pills to fall asleep. My quality of sleep was so bad that a part of me wanted to just jump off a building and be done with it all.

Yan Yang’s dad or mum would occasionally call me to check on me about my studies and whether I had been adapting well to life here. My answers were short and simple. I was not keen to chit chat with them.

At the start, I never brought up Yan Yang in conversations with them, as though this person had already been erased in my world. But eventually, I became seriously worried and couldn’t help it, unable to hold myself back anymore. When Yan Yang’s mother called me, I asked, “How has Yan Yang been? Has he called home?”

The response I got was that Yan Yang was very well. He had just been on a video call with her. Later at night, Yan Yang was going to attend a classmate’s birthday celebration. He looked very happy.

Was he happy?

I thought of how Yan Yang had sounded that day, before he hung up. I felt half my heart frosting over.

Sometimes, people just liked to make things hard for themselves. Yan Yang and I could clearly be happy, but I simply wanted to torment him, and myself as well.

Knowing that Yan Yang was ‘happy’, the discomfort in my heart grew.

That day in the apartment, I masturbated, thinking of Yan Yang. I ended up ripping the bed sheets.

I took the sheets as him and was resentfully cruel to it, tearing it up and destroying it, before ultimately collapsing there, weakly mumbling apologies.

During that period of time, my whole being lived twistedly. In front of others, I forced myself to be enthusiastic and inviting, while alone, I wanted so badly to simply destroy everything, including myself.

The week before I restored contact with Yan Yang, I even began to have self-harming tendencies. I would always purposely inflict pain on myself. The more pain I felt, the more satisfied I would be.

I had originally really looked forward to going to London, filled with anticipation for how my life and studies would be like after coming here. However, after I had actually arrived here, it turned out that every day passed like a living hell. I couldn’t feel a single ounce of happiness.

The beautiful world I had imagined, didn’t come true at all.

There had been one day after class when I didn’t want to return to the apartment, because I knew that once I went there, my thoughts would begin to run wild again and I would end up breaking something.

I would break everything in the apartment, including myself.

So I walked around aimlessly, and ended up stumbling upon a tattoo parlour.

I thought of Yan Yang’s tattoo. You're the only one who can spread my two legs.

Now, was I still the only one?

I entered and stood inside the shop.

The place wasn’t big. The owner was a buff man who had a sleeve tattoo.

He asked me what tattoo I wanted, and where.

I didn’t have a clue.

Before coming here, I had never thought about getting a tattoo. After coming in, I didn't think of what tattoo I wanted either.

But when he asked me that, without a second thought, I answered, “‘Yan Yang’, on my chest.”