After Amnesia, I Learn I'm a Scumbag Top?! - Chapter 72

Chapter 72

The late autumn, early winter wind carried a sharp chill. Pei Ji, hurrying out in his thin blue and white striped hospital gown, had no time to worry about the cold. His only thought was to catch up with Chu Tinghan quickly and clear things up.

Unfortunately, fate seemed determined to thwart him. The hospital elevators were already busy, and one had broken down, leaving only three operational out of four.

Pei Ji’s floor was high up, and he waited endlessly at the elevator doors without success. To make matters worse, a patrolling nurse spotted him standing in the drafty corridor, dressed only in his patient gown. Frowning, she marched over and forcibly dragged him back to his room.

As soon as the door slammed shut, Pei Ji, afraid of being caught again, could only anxiously wait for the nurse outside to leave.

Time ticked by, each second feeling like an hour. Terrified that Chu Tinghan might overthink things and lose heart, Pei Ji, in a moment of desperation, threw open the window and leaned out to look down.

Below, the street teemed with traffic and pedestrians. Amidst the dense crowd, Pei Ji spotted a familiar figure moving through the throng.

Though the distant figure was blurred and indistinct, Pei Ji recognized Chu Tinghan instantly amidst the crowd with a single glance.

Chu Tinghan had already left the hospital building. A car was parked directly in front of him, apparently about to drive away.

Pei Ji quickly calculated the time. It was too late to chase him down. With no other option, he flung the window open as wide as it would go, leaned out almost halfway, cupped his hands around his mouth like a megaphone, and shouted at the top of his lungs, “Chu Tinghan!”

But the distance was too great. His voice faded in the wind, gradually dissipating into nothing.

Calling out to stop him was impossible. After a moment’s thought, Pei Ji suddenly remembered something obvious: in this modern age of advanced technology, he could simply call Chu Tinghan!

How could I forget something so basic in my panic? Pei Ji berated himself, feeling his IQ had plummeted due to his anxiety. He pulled out his phone and immediately dialed Chu Tinghan’s number.

But just seconds after the call went through, another phone began to vibrate in the silent hospital room.

Downstairs, Chu Tinghan hadn’t paused either.

Pei Ji frowned. Could Chu Tinghan have forgotten his phone?

He glanced back, searching the room for the source of the vibration. His gaze swept across the room, finally settling on the chair beside the bed.

A deep beige wool coat was draped over the chair’s back. The coat’s style looked familiar; he seemed to recall seeing it in Chu Tinghan’s closet. The vibration was coming from the coat’s pocket.

Pei Ji froze for a moment, then hung up the phone and walked over to the chair. He picked up the wool coat and found Chu Tinghan’s forgotten phone in its pocket.

His hand tightened slowly around the phone, his heart plummeting.

How utterly desolate and hopeless Chu Tinghan must have felt when he left—not only forgetting his phone, but even forgetting to put on his coat in this freezing weather.

Pei Ji’s heart clenched at the thought, his anxiety surging, along with a wave of self-reproach.

I knew he was prone to overthinking. I knew how terrified he was of me leaving, so terrified he couldn’t even bear to hear the word “divorce.” Why did I have to ask such a loaded question?

He should have just said, “I’ll never leave you again. We’re not getting divorced,” instead of asking if Chu Tinghan still had the divorce papers.

…Seriously, why bring up the one thing that’s guaranteed to make things worse?

Pei Ji grabbed a jacket to cover his conspicuous hospital gown, picked up Chu Tinghan’s coat, and tucked it under his arm before rushing out to find him again.

The elevator was still taking forever, and Pei Ji refused to waste another second. Each moment Chu Tinghan remained out of sight felt like torture.

He decisively chose the stairs, sprinting down all fourteen floors as fast as he could.

Fortunately, just as he exited the hospital building, an empty taxi pulled up outside. Without a second thought, he yanked open the door and hopped in.

The driver asked for his destination. Pei Ji instinctively wanted to give the address of Chu Tinghan’s usual villa, but the words caught in his throat. After a moment’s thought, he abruptly changed his mind. “Take me to that old residential area near Communication University,” he said.

Though he couldn’t articulate the exact reason, Pei Ji inexplicably felt that if Chu Tinghan were heartbroken by his departure, she would likely return to their old haunts, seeking solace in memories evoked by familiar objects.

As they drove, the first snowflakes of the year began to fall from the sky. Unlike the cold, desolate blizzards he remembered, these were small, delicate snowflakes drifting gently on the breeze like stardust.

The pure white snowflakes shimmered under the sunlight, appearing crystal-clear. They didn’t resemble cold ice and snow at all, but rather fragments of celestial light broken into star-like pieces as they descended.

In the past, Pei Ji might have found this scene quite romantic, evoking the winter ambiance of a love movie.

But now, he only felt that this snow was undesirable. He didn’t like it, because every time it snowed, a melancholy shadow always darkened Chu Tinghan’s eyes.

If he could, he wished that Chu Tinghan’s world would forever be bathed in bright, cheerful sunshine.

The drive from the hospital to the old university district wasn’t long. Pei Ji arrived at his destination in less than half an hour.

After getting out of the car, he noticed the snow wasn’t intensifying, but a thin layer of white frost had already blanketed the ground.

Pei Ji sprinted into the residential complex, shouting Chu Tinghan’s name as he ran. But each call was swallowed by the swirling snowflakes, eliciting no response.

He remembered the building, unit, and floor where Chu Tinghan’s apartment was located. But when he followed his memory and knocked on the door, there was still no answer; it seemed no one was home.

Couldn’t he hear me? Or is he too afraid to open the door?

Pei Ji raised his hand and knocked harder, continuing to call out his name.

The next moment, instead of Chu Tinghan’s door opening, the neighbor across the hall opened theirs.

The aunt across the hall told him the person inside had left downstairs just a few minutes earlier.

“Left?” Pei Ji paused his knocking. “Do you know where he went?”

“Not sure, but he only just left. If you hurry downstairs, you might catch him in the complex.”

Pei Ji rushed down the stairs, his heart pounding. As he emerged from the building, he finally spotted the figure that had been weighing on his heart not far away.

The figure was slender and thinly dressed, appearing even more frail and vulnerable against the backdrop of swirling snow. White flakes clung to his head and shoulders.

A sudden gust of icy wind swept through, scattering the snowflakes and shattering the romantic winter atmosphere, leaving only the desolate chill of the season.

The biting wind seeped through his collar, its icy touch penetrating his skin. Yet the man seemed impervious to the cold, standing motionless in the snowstorm without so much as a shiver, as if he had lost all sensation and become a living corpse without a heartbeat.

Despite the frigid temperature, he wore only a thin sweater.

Pei Ji felt a pang of heartache and tenderness. He rushed over in quick strides.

Chu Tinghan stood with his back to him beside a flower bed, gazing absently at the distant snow-covered landscape, so lost in thought that he didn’t even hear the hurried footsteps approaching from behind.

He held a slender cigarette in his right hand, shielding the flame from the wind with the divorce agreement as he lowered his head to light it.

But in the next instant, the cigarette was abruptly snatched from his hand by someone behind him.

He turned to see a pair of anxious, conflicted eyes staring back at him.

Pei Ji frowned, clutching the cigarette in his hand. Unable to resist, he gently rebuked him with a hint of helplessness in his voice, “Do you even know how to smoke? Don’t you care about your throat anymore?”

Chu Tinghan froze for a moment, a flicker of surprise crossing his eyes.

When Pei Ji asked him something, he didn’t respond, as if he’d lost his voice. He simply stared at Pei Ji with a hazy, unfocused gaze.

The snow continued to fall, and the wind howled relentlessly.

Pei Ji shook the snow off his wool coat and draped it over Chu Tinghan, whose thin clothes seemed utterly inadequate against the freezing wind.

He initially intended to help Chu Tinghan put it on properly, but Chu Tinghan remained motionless, rooted to the spot, staring up at Pei Ji’s face.

Left with no choice, Pei Ji simply wrapped the coat tighter around him, trying to keep the biting wind out.

Whether it was the coat’s oversized cut or because Chu Tinghan had grown even thinner, the coat seemed absurdly large on him, almost large enough to fit half another person inside.

When we live together again, Pei Ji thought, I’ll have to learn how to cook delicious, nutritious meals and help him get healthier. At the very least, he shouldn’t be so frail that a gust of wind could knock him over.

Chu Tinghan continued to stare intently at him, making Pei Ji feel slightly self-conscious. He cleared his throat and asked, “Where’s the divorce agreement?”

The immediate priority was to eliminate this source of Chu Tinghan’s anxiety.

Hearing these words, Chu Tinghan immediately snapped back to awareness, his eyes regaining their clarity.

He lowered his gaze, hesitating for a moment, before reluctantly raising his left hand.

Before he could react, Pei Ji snatched the divorce agreement from his grasp, pocketing the lighter in his palm as well. He held the document up before Chu Tinghan’s eyes.

Chu Tinghan assumed Pei Ji was here to take him to finalize the divorce and was about to numbly nod.

But in the next instant, a brilliant, dazzling flame erupted before his eyes.

Pei Ji had actually lit the divorce agreement with the lighter. The fire grew rapidly, spreading from the bottom corner upward as the burning paper crumbled into ash that fluttered to the ground.

Only when most of the document had been devoured by the flames did he release the charred remains, letting the worthless paper fall into the snow.

In this relationship, Chu Tinghan had already taken a thousand steps forward. How could he possibly retreat even one more?

It was time to move forward.

Under Chu Tinghan’s stunned gaze, Pei Ji abruptly pulled him, coat and all, into a tight embrace.

The man in his arms was stiff and cold, like a block of millennia-old ice. Pei Ji tightened his arms around Chu Tinghan’s waist, pressing him closer, determined to transfer every last ounce of warmth from his own body through the embrace.

Chu Tinghan didn’t dare move a muscle, his eyes widening abruptly as he remained still in Pei Ji’s embrace.

Pei Ji rested his chin on Chu Tinghan’s shoulder, each word pronounced with deliberate emphasis: “Tinghan, I’m not leaving anymore. I’ll stay by your side, now and forever.”

“A long time ago, you asked me if I would forgive you if you ever made a mistake. But what mistake did you make? If I hadn’t stubbornly insisted on leaving you back then, you wouldn’t have devised that scheme to keep me here.”

“You never cheated me out of my money or my affection. You did nothing wrong, and you don’t need my forgiveness. I’m the one who should be asking for yours.”

“I underestimated your love back then. I thought that one day the novelty would wear off and you’d grow tired of me. I was afraid of seeing regret in your eyes, and I feared that my troubles would drag you down.”

“I acted selfishly, without considering your feelings, causing you years of heartache.”

Hearing this, Chu Tinghan finally snapped out of his daze. He opened his mouth, murmuring weakly, “…But I deceived you.”

Hearing this, Pei Ji paused, sighed, and chuckled softly. “I lied to you too.”

Chu Tinghan, bewildered, asked, “What did you lie about?”

Pei Ji lifted his chin from Chu Tinghan’s shoulder and shifted his embrace to grip Chu Tinghan’s shoulders, forcing him to meet his gaze.

Those clear, cold, narrow eyes still held a trace of bewilderment.

After a moment, Pei Ji stared intently into Chu Tinghan’s eyes and said earnestly, “I lied when I said I didn’t like you. In truth, I like you even more than you can imagine—and I love you more than I ever thought possible.”

Pei Ji’s confession was so direct that Chu Tinghan didn’t immediately realize it was a declaration of love. Only after the words had circled through his mind did he grasp the full weight of Pei Ji’s like and love.

The two words—like and love—flooded Chu Tinghan’s consciousness. His body gradually warmed, and his heart began to race.

Pei Ji actually said he liked me?

Pei Ji actually said he loved me?

Is this a dream?

Or has my years of unrequited longing finally driven me to hallucinate?

Unaware of Chu Tinghan’s inner turmoil, Pei Ji held him close and continued earnestly, “Love shouldn’t begin with deceit. Let’s start over.”

Pei Ji gazed into those amber eyes, their tenderness magnified by the sunlight, and steeled his resolve. His voice resonated with the sincerity of a wedding vow as he declared, “This time, I’ll take the initiative. Let me pursue you. Will you let me?”