Chapter 101 - After all, you can’t let children suffer.
Chapter 101 - After all, you can’t let children suffer.
Edited by Noks
By the time they got into bed, Yu Yan almost fell asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow.
Yi Chen wasn’t sleepy at all. He held the other man in his arms and loosely touched his hair.
Afraid of waking him up, he kissed him especially lightly, his kisses scattering across Yu Yan’s eyelids, the tip of his nose, and finally his lips.
Yu Yan was so sleepy that he didn’t open his eyes even upon feeling these kisses. He just asked him vaguely, “…aren’t you going to sleep?”
“Will sleep,” Yi Chen said, “Good night.”
Only after the breaths of the person next to him grew steady did Yi Chen start to move.
He raised the quilt, got out of bed, tucked in every corner of the quilt securely again, casually put on a pair of pajamas, picked up his cellphone, and went to the balcony.
It was very cold outside. He closed the door firmly, confirmed the current time, and then dialed a number.
The phone rang twice before it was soon picked up.
The person on the other end seemed to be in a state of disbelief. It took a long time before they said, “Xiao Chen?”
Mother Yi glanced at the time and said in a tone filled with complete surprise, “It’s two o’clock in the middle of the night in China ba. At this time… Why are you still calling? You’re not sleeping?”
As soon as those words were uttered, Mother Yi paused.
What she said wasn’t quite right. Even if it was morning, noon, or evening in China, she pretty much would never really get a call from Yi Chen.
Yi Chen let out an “en” and asked, “Did you have lunch?”
“Yes.” Mother Yi stopped what she was doing. She thought of something and spoke with some guilt and great care mixed into her tone, “Xiao Chen… Is your injury better?”
Since the accident, Mother Yi could clearly feel that the estrangement between her and her son was growing deeper and deeper.
That car accident had been caused by Mother Yi’s relatives. After the accident, she had lost count of the number of times those people had come to her to beg her for help. She had never relented even once, nor had she mentioned a word about it in front of Yi Chen.
If she had known earlier that indulging them would endanger Yi Chen’s life, she wouldn’t have ever started helping them with anything.
However, there was no such thing as clairvoyance in this world, and the injury had already been caused, she just didn’t know how to make up for it.
“It’s all better.”
After Yi Chen finished saying that, he fell silent.
He had originally thought that question would have been followed by a plea. He had even already decided the way he would reject it, but who knew that this unmentioned “topic” would just pass by like that.
“That’s good. You should remember what the doctor said. Go back for a check-up once a month, and don’t miss it because of work…”
Speaking to here, Mother Yi fell silent.
She knew that Yi Chen didn’t like it when she started to talk about this kind of thing.
The time they could use to converse was passing by silently, but neither of them spoke any further.
A cool breeze blew by again, and Yi Chen suddenly kind of missed the warmth that came from being under the quilt, just now.
He took the lead in breaking this silence and finally got to the reason for this call.
“The adoption matter, do you need me to help with it?” He inquired.
Mother Yi was shocked, and asked as if she hadn’t heard clearly, “….What?”
“The requirement for domestic adoption is that the parents have to be childless, so you guys shouldn’t be able to meet that requirement.” Yi Chen’s voice was very light, and his tone was extremely calm as he continued speaking, “If you want to adopt from abroad, the requirements there are also not any less stringent, and you even may have to go through and successfully pass a family investigation…”
“No, hold on.”
Mother Yi stood up unconsciously. Father Yi looked up from the easel he was working on, looked at her doubtfully, and mouthed a question, asking her what was wrong.
Mother Yi couldn’t attend to her husband right now and asked again in surprise, “Adoption? Who’s going to adopt?”
Yi Chen paused and then replied, “Aren’t you guys planning on adopting a child?”
“……” Mother Yi took a deep breath. “Where did you hear that nonsense? I can’t even manage to worry over one of you enough, how could we adopt another child?”
Yi Chen held his cellphone and subconsciously raised an eyebrow.
Mother Yi firmly asked again, “Where did you hear that?”
Yi Chen curled his lips and in that moment, couldn’t figure out exactly what emotions he was experiencing. “Last time you guys came back to China, you visited a welfare home.”
Mother Yi instantly understood.
The only people who knew that she had gone to the welfare home were her relatives, the ones who subsidized the welfare home.
“Did your uncle go look for you?” She said, “What else does he want from you? For you to let his son go again? I already clearly warned him to not harass you any more…”
The woman’s voice was angry and urgent, and Yi Chen listened to it while somewhat lost in his thoughts.
First, Mother Yi thoroughly lambasted their relatives, and after her anger had been vented a bit, she said, “Yes, your dad and I have been to the welfare home… But we went there to gather artistic inspiration, not to adopt.”
“Your dad was seized by a sudden impulse and co-organized a painting exhibition with his friends. It was in April, and it was called ‘Eyes’. He wanted to draw a pair of children’s eyes.”
“We not only went to the welfare home, but also to the mountains a few months ago and saw a lot of left-behind children. Those children…they’re too pitiful.” Speaking of this, Mother Yi got angry again. “Your uncle can’t even be called a human being. Only after your dad and I went there personally did we find out that although on the surface he seems to be a great philanthropist who supports the welfare home, in reality, while saying it was all a donation, he embezzled a lot of the profits. All the children there have to eat are just dry noodles without any nutritional value; they are as thin as a stick of firewood!”
Yi Chen’s throat moved slightly: “…”
When he had heard his uncle talk about this matter before, he had actually never suspected the truth behind the matter.
Taking ten thousand steps back, even if he had doubted the truth behind the matter, he still wouldn’t have checked with his parents.
“Xiao Chen, what exactly are you thinking?” Mother Yi’s eyebrows twisted. “And you even said just now you wanted to help? How could you help, use money to get it done? That’s against the law, you know?”
Yi Chen leaned against the railing on the balcony. Through the window, he saw that the person lying in bed in the room suddenly turned over.
He bowed his head, unable to describe exactly what was going on inside him.
He had originally thought that he didn’t care at all, especially at the moment from before when Yu Yan had held him tightly. At that time, he had suddenly felt that this adoption matter actually wasn’t that important.
But now that he knew that this matter was all just a misunderstanding, he had to admit that… he felt happy.
Mother Yi rubbed her eyebrows. She felt that maybe her tone was a little heavy, so she relaxed her voice a little.
“Your father and I have never thought about adoption.”
Father Yi finally understood their conversation. He was shocked, and his brush nearly made a mistake as he exclaimed, “Adoption? Nonsense, what adoption?!”
“You be quiet, just draw.” Mother Yi stopped her husband’s words, took a deep breath, and then went on to say, “Xiao Chen, I feel like the problems between us have grown rather large, and they’ve already reached the point that we have to talk them through. I’ve booked the flight with your dad. When we get home, let’s have a good talk ba.”
Yi Chen’s throat suddenly felt a little dry, but it didn’t feel uncomfortable.
After a while, he let out a soft “en” and said, “Okay.”
Although he only replied with one word, Mother Yi still managed to catch the fact that he had relaxed a bit, and she immediately struck while the iron was hot, asking “Right… I asked your aunt to make reservations for a New Year’s Eve dinner. You will come there then ba?”
Yi Chen raised his eyes and looked at the person in the bed.
“I’ve already made plans with someone, I can’t go.”
Who would make plans with a friend on New Year’s Eve?
Mother Yi asked, “It couldn’t be that it’s…”
“En.” Yi Chen replied very generously. There was nothing to hide about this matter; they would know about it sooner or later.
This unexpected call contained too much information in it. Mother Yi was holding her cellphone tightly, unable to cover up her excitement.
This son of hers had always been far more solitary than ordinary people, and it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that she had even worried that he would spend his whole lifetime alone.
After her emotions had tumbled around for a long time, Mother Yi nodded and said, “Then that’s just perfect, bring them over to have a New Year’s Eve dinner with us ba? Whatever the circumstances, it’s only good for you to let your family members meet them.”
She didn’t ask about this person’s family background or about their appearance. As long as Yi Chen liked them, those things were all secondary.
Yi Chen replied, “Not possible.”
Mother Yi had thought that they hadn’t reached that point in their relationship yet, and she was just about to say that there was no hurry, when she heard Yi Chen continue—
“It’s too soon, they’ll get nervous.”
——
The next day was the weekend. As soon as Yu Yan woke up, Yi Chen told him about the phone call he had had last night.
Of course, he only talked about the misunderstanding part, and said nothing about the rest of the conversation.
Previously, he had told Yu Yan about this matter because he had thought that if a Didi or Meimei suddenly appeared in his life, then he wouldn’t need to explain any further at that time.
…… Now he had to explain why a Didi or Meimei wouldn’t be appearing at all.
Yu Yan had originally still been a little drowsy, but after hearing what Yi Chen had to say, his eyes cleared up of all signs of sleepiness.
“That’s great.” Yu Yan rubbed his eyes and laughed. “I was still worried…”
“Worried about me?”
Yu Yan nodded very sincerely.
“Worried about me, and yet you managed to sleep so well last night?” Yi Chen chuckled and bit the tip of his ear.
“That was because I was too tired.” Yu Yan also laughed and blushed as he replied, “You even have the nerve to say that.”
It was still early, and it was the weekend, so Yi Chen didn’t need to go to the company.
The two of them rested and recuperated for a bit, before Yu Yan suddenly thought of something. “By the way, auntie said on the phone that the children in the welfare home have no food to eat… Is that true?”
Yi Chen’s eyebrows also twisted together as he answered, “It should be.”
Yu Yan hesitated. “Can you ask auntie what the name of that welfare home is?”
“You want to donate to them?”
“En.” Yu Yan was a little embarrassed. “But I don’t have much money on hand now, so I can’t donate much. I can only donate small amounts slowly, but a little help is still help, and I should do what I can ba. They have had no parents since they were little, and they’re very pitiful.”
By the time he reached the end of his sentence, his voice had gotten a lot quieter.
Yi Chen hugged him a bit tighter and said, “Okay.”
Yu Yan nodded and said, “Although I don’t have much money, I want to go there myself. Your uncle… I’m not quite at ease.”
“I know.” Upon the mention of this relative, Yi Chen’s voice grew a few degrees colder. “You can donate your money at ease. He won’t have the chance to do those dirty things again.”
Yi Ran had already gone home, and Saturday was the housekeeping auntie’s day off. It would only be the two of them at home for the entire day today.
Yi Chen took action himself, frying up poached eggs and warming a few slices of ham for breakfast.
Throughout the morning, they sat on the sofa in the living room while watching a movie, chatting about the plot from time to time and kissing each other, and it felt wonderful.
Only when it reached his livestreaming time did Yu Yan reluctantly stand up. “Then I’ll go livestream.”
“I’ll keep you company.”
Yu Yan froze and asked, “You’re not working today?”
Yi Chen turned off the TV as he replied, “Everything’s been pretty much handled.”
Yu Yan wasn’t quite willing to let him sit around and just wait for an entire afternoon. Just as he was about to say something though, Yi Chen stepped into the computer room.
All Yu Yan could do was follow him.
It turned out that, as soon as he entered, he saw another computer on the right in the computer room. Looking at it carefully, he realized that aside from having a video camera, this computer was almost identical to the one he used.
He was shocked. “When was this installed…”
“Yesterday, when we went to dinner.” Yi Chen said, “I asked Yi Ran to arrange it before he went back.”
As the start time of the livestream neared, many people could be seen waiting in the stream. Yu Yan started the livestream before slowly logging into the game.
“I’m in a good mood today, so I’m going to draw for stream followers for squad matches. There will be two open positions…”
Yu Yan spoke until here before suddenly pausing.
He saw that, in the game interface, his character was now wearing a small gray skirt, red Hi-Top Sneakers and a maple-red scarf, making his entire person seem like he reeked of money.
He paused, then logged off, murmuring, “System bug.”
When he logged in again, he saw that it was still the same outfit.
Yu Yan doubtfully opened up his own apparel inventory, and after taking a look at it, he was startled—not only was he wearing this expensive outfit, but his wardrobe was also stuffed full of clothes.
“…… I seem to have been hacked?”
[What hacker would buy you clothes?? You go make him hack me.]
Yu Yan was just about to go find customer support when he heard the person next to him say, “I bought it.”
It was only then that he remembered that his Steam account had been directly saved on this computer.
He didn’t pay any attention to the barrage, and just turned his head to say in surprise, “Why all of a sudden….These clothes are too expensive.”
The clothes in this game were more expensive than those found in games whose entire selling point was to change outfits!
In fact, it wasn’t all of a sudden. Yi Chen had wanted to buy these for him since a long time ago. Not because of any specific reason, but just that he wanted to offer up everything that Yu Yan could use and deliver it right into his hands. Whether he liked it or not and whether he wore it or not, was all up to him. However, Steam’s remote login protection had been the long-standing hindrance to him in this, and only today had he managed to lift the restrictions on him buying things for Yu Yan.
[Today, I finally saw what they call the world of rich people. I’m so jealous.]
[Is it the first day for the one before in this livestream? I’m already numb to it.]
[Expensive? Sorry, there’s no such word in Boss 1’s dictionary.]
“It’s alright.” Yi Chen laughed and said, “Expensive is also fine… After all, no matter what hardships you suffer through, you can’t let children suffer through them.”
—
Juurensha: Yesssss, it was all a misunderstanding! And Mother Yi seems really excited to meet her son’s partner! And it’s really sweet that Yanyan wants to help out at the welfare home.
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