RES Chapter 75

T/W: Mention of abuse, implied depression, attempted suicide

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In the office, Lu Fengshen was so angry that he raised his hand again.

But facing his own nephew, his heart softened and the second slap never fell.

He was clear that if a slap could not wake up Lu Ming, then more slaps would be futile. Lu Ming was a patient, and there was little point in taking a patient seriously.

Lu Fengshen understood, but didn’t want to admit it.

With red eyes, he tried his best to stabilize his emotions, putting away his hands: “Now that there is such a good opportunity, you should help Chi Qiu. You are in this situation, helping him is also helping yourself. Besides, he is full of you, can’t you see that?”

Lu Ming could not answer this question, he simply chose to remain silent.

“Lu Ming, answer me.” Lu Fengshen’s palm was still tingling. He hit Lu Ming for the first time and like being on a suspension bridge, his heart was throbbing.

Looking at the unusually cold Lu Ming, Lu Fengshen simply could not believe it. He waited for a long time, but still could not wait for Lu Ming to open his mouth and answer.

In the silence, Lu Fengshen was the first to admit defeat: “You have become so inhumane. In fact, all of us have a responsibility. But your grandma and I have told you before that the person who needs to take this responsibility can be anyone but it shouldn’t be Chi Qiu.”

He wanted to stop Lu Ming’s wrong behavior and wanted to correct Lu Ming’s distorted heart in time. Unfortunately, no matter how much effort, in Lu Ming’s absurd revenge plan, it was all to no avail.

Right now, Lu Fengshen had said all the good and bad things, so he could only painfully rebuke him, eager to awaken a trace of his conscience: “You use Chi Qiu, but you can’t love him, you can’t even sincerely think about him and make the right choice for him for once. Lu Ming, what kind of person do you think you are? You once hated Lu Rongtian for forcing your mother to die, but now, what’s the difference between you and Lu Rongtian?”

“……”

“Just like when he used your mother, you are doing the same thing.”

Lu Ming slowly lifted his head, the slap marks on his face obvious. He stood motionlessly in front of Lu Fengshen without a bit of extra expression. Now, even a piece of trash like Lu Rongtian couldn’t stir Lu Ming’s emotions.

Silence was the sharp dagger that had been sheathed.

Seeing this, Lu Fengshen finally shook his head and gave a cold laugh as he said with disappointment: “I thought you would change for the better, but you actually didn’t, did you?”

Lu Ming wanted to say: No.

If it was before, he really wouldn’t want to treat Chi Qiu’s eyes. However, now, if Chi Qiu was really blind, he would take Chi Qiu to foreign countries for medical treatment. Even if he needed to accept Xia Zhiyan’s goodwill, he would not give up this opportunity.

Lu Ming had indeed changed, but this change was from the inside and it was very small. Even Lu Ming couldn’t see his heart, how could others know?

At this moment, Lu Ming only knew that he couldn’t open his mouth and the more he said, the more mistakes he would make. His silence had become the greatest protection of a secret.

He didn’t feel wronged at all. After all, he was the one who did the wrong thing.

Lu Ming didn’t remember Chi Qiu from the beginning. He decided to pursue Chi Qiu and marry Chi Qiu for the property of the Lu family and to get revenge on those who had hurt Lu You.

This point, Lu Ming undoubtedly deceived Chi Qiu.

Even if he was 100% loyal to the marriage, it couldn’t erase the fact that he lied. What’s more, he knew that Chi Qiu loved him, but he couldn’t return the feelings.

Therefore, Lu Fengshen’s slap was for Chi Qiu’s sake and it was rightfully so. Looking at Lu Fengshen who was so angry and disheartened, he safely covered all his irrationality with ‘selfishness’.

Lu Fengshen, who had gradually calmed down after slapping Lu Ming, ssqueezed his hand and regretted it very much.

In fact, Lu Fengshen was more heartbroken than anyone else, and more than anyone else, he hoped that Lu Ming could return to normal.

From the age of seventeen, Lu Ming went to live with him abroad. Lu Fengshen was the one who witnessed Lu Ming’s most difficult time. He could never forget shortly after the death of Lu You, Lu Ming did not eat or drink, locking himself in the attic without light for two full days.

If he hadn’t pried open the door, gone in and carried the unconscious Lu Ming out, Lu Ming might have died.

Lu Ming once lost his desire to live.

At that time, Lu Ming’s memory was not yet completely lost. From time to time, he was in a trance, shouting into the air, “Mom.”

From time to time, he would also get lost in a nightmare, crying for mercy and apologizing, and no one could wake him up. He was trapped by Lu You in a dream full of blood and was strangled by Lu You with a rope tightly around his neck, unable to escape.

Seeing that he was suffering all day, Lu Fengshen tried to persuade Lu Ming: “No mother would not love her child, so you have to come out on your own.”

But as soon as he finished speaking, Lu Fengshen knew he was wrong.

Lu Ming suddenly bawled like a child, grabbing his hair and pressing his head against the wall as he breathed painfully: “Mom, mom I’m not going back to him, I’m really not going back to him! Don’t die, don’t die. We have decided to live again…I was wrong, Mom I was wrong, I’m not looking for him, I should not have said I’d go to him…”

Who this ‘he’ was, Lu Fengshen didn’t know.

He asked Lu Ming several times when he was awake, but Lu Ming kept silent.

In order to stop him from abusing himself, Lu Fengshen held Lu Ming’s shoulder, but Lu Ming pushed him away in extreme panic. Lu Ming’s overreaction was undoubtedly telling everyone that things were far from simple as they thought.

Looking at Lu Ming, who was wearing long sleeves even in the summer, Lu Fengshen felt more and more that something was wrong. He took off Lu Ming’s shirt while he was sleeping at night and only then did he find that Lu Ming’s body was covered with bruises and scars, large and small, all of which had not yet faded and healed.

Liu Fengshen’s action was deadlocked in half, and the picture in front of him seemed like a cognitive catastrophe. He didn’t have to think about it to know that these scars were all left by Lu You.

This child must have been tortured long ago. Lu You’s death was the last straw that broke the camel’s back.

 

This situation of Lu Ming had had a significant impact on his grandparents. The daughter passed away, the only grandson also suffered from mental problems due to years of abuse.

For this reason, the old couple spent the whole day in tears and sadness.

As the only normal young man in the family, Lu Fengshen took on the responsibility of accompanying Lu Ming to seek medical treatment. He suspended Lu Ming from school for a year, then he took Lu Ming to many hospitals, changed many doctors, as well as taking a lot of medicine.

Lu Ming was like a puppet without a soul, and Lu Fengshen led him to the east and west.

Occasionally, when Lu Ming saw a small roadside garden, he would give up the ‘puppet’ identity. He would walk into the garden and find a bench to sit down. In a moment of tranquility, he liked to look up at the mottled shadows of the leaves, tracing the trail of sunlight when it fell.

Behaving this way, Lu Ming seemed like he was carefully thinking of someone.

As a result, he was usually very quiet, so quiet that he did not seem to breathe, as if he was afraid of disturbing someone.

And Lu Ming was always so moody.

Sometimes he was silent, and sometimes he begged Lu You’s illusion with a piercing heart.

Lu Ming blamed himself for Lu You’s death. His insomnia was very serious. After careful calculation, he had not been able to sleep properly for a long time.

Today, he sat on a park bench, as if he had a brief moment of relaxation, and he said to himself, or confessed to Lu Fengshen: “Mom said that she wanted to live with me again. It was me who abandoned her. I told her I must return to China, I must go to him…”

Lu Fengshen asked again: “Who the hell is he?”

“I want to abandon her as much as they do.” Lu Ming’s gaze was listless and did not answer Lu Fengshen, “Mom didn’t do anything wrong, but she was always being thrown away. In the end, even I want to abandon her.”

Lu Fengshen reached out his hand, wanting to touch his head, but he was afraid of scaring Lu Ming, so he withdrew his hand in distress.

Lu Ming’s eyes fell to the ground, landing on an ant, and said softly: “That’s why she punished me.”

It was his determination to go find Chi Qiu that completely killed Lu You. Obviously everything was already going in a good direction, why, why would it still be like this?

He was so miserable, so miserable that he both missed Chi Qiu and resented himself.

He could always recall the scene of Lu You being cut open and hanging on the wall in blood. The whole wall was covered in blood; it was scarlet and they kept appearing in his dreams.

The killer who committed the murder was soon arrested; a pervert who had not long been released from prison. He said that it was Lu You who took the initiative to open the door and it was Lu You who said she wanted to die.

If Lu You’s life was a broken rose, she wanted to stay in the hearts of others forever in full bloom, never to be abandoned again.

So the killer helped her.

Lu You had also tenderly said to Lu Ming: “If you dare to go back and find him, I will die for you to see. Xiao Ming, if I die, you are the one who kills me.”

That day, the sunset came very early and Lu Ming never opened his mouth to say a word.

Seeing Lu Ming’s dejected appearance, Lu Fengshen had no way to comfort him. Lu Fengshen was not a doctor, he didn’t dare to say anything lest it stimulated Lu Ming.

Suddenly, an ice-cream truck drove by the road, playing music, and parked at the entrance of the garden. Many children gathered around joyfully, taking out their own banknotes to exchange for ice-cream. Their happy voices broke the dull bitterness.

Lu Ming’s gaze actually moved with it.

Lu Fengshen caught this and hurriedly asked him if he wanted to eat ice cream: “When you were a child, you loved to eat that sweet ice cream. I’ll buy it for you, okay?” Seeing a rare nod from Lu Ming, he hurriedly got up and urgently said, “Wait for me here, don’t go anywhere!”

Lu Fengshen trotted over.

In the end, he bought the ice cream in a hurry. When he turned around, Lu Ming had already climbed over the fence and jumped directly into the lake in the garden. The lake was very deep, and when he jumped in, it made a small splash.

Surrounded by people, the swans on the lake screamed and swam away.

Lu Ming closed his eyes and felt the cold lake water leap into his ears and nose, wrapping around him in a tangled way. In the pain of suffocation, he was silent.

The bottom of the lake was a deep color, like a silent purgatory. His heart was filled with fear, but he longed for relief.

But it was a failed suicide; Lu Ming was soon rescued by eager passersby.

When he spit out the first mouthful of water, the view of the earth was clear…He was actually still alive?

Lu Fengshen was angry and exasperated as he hit him: “What are you doing?!”

This roar was like a thunderclap, ripping Lu Ming’s consciousness awake a lot. Lu Ming began to shed tears, sobbing and shivering before vomiting out a second mouthful of water.

Soon, he passed out again, and when he woke up, he was in a hospital bed.

The surroundings were dull white light, floating in the sky like cotton wool, so clean that it did not stain with a trace of mundane filth, and even the dust fell to the ground and blossomed.

From this moment on, Lu Ming’s inner pain and suffering disappeared.

He died again and again, but this time, he was really ‘dead’. He closed his fear, self-blame, longing, and any deep emotions, all in the depths of memory, shutting the door and locking it.

He turned into another Lu Ming and got better in another sense.

 

Now, at twenty-seven years old, the only thing left in Lu Ming’s body was the tip of the knife precipitated by the years, stabbed in Lu Fengshen’s body.

It stabbed Chi Qiu’s heart even more.

Outside the door, Chi Qiu did not stand firmly and leaned against the wall.

In order not to disturb the two people in the office, he picked up his guide cane with a pale face and hurriedly went to the waiting lounge that was far away from the office. Here, the sound from Lu Ming’s office could not be heard and he would not be noticed by people passing by.

Chi Qiu clutched the insulation box in his hand, clenching his teeth as his legs softened. He slumped down and unconsciously lowered his head. He saw that one of his hands was trembling, and the insulation box fell uncontrollably to the ground, crashing with a dull sound.

‘Thud’——just like the sound of Chi Qiu’s heart tumbling to the ground, instantly covered with dust, no one wanted to pick it up.

He looked at the insulation box on the ground. His eyes were hot, tears had long since blurred his vision.

Every word that Lu Fengshen rebuked Lu Ming echoed clearly in his ears, and the lingering sound lingered for a long time. If possible, how Chi Qiu hoped that this was just an absurd nightmare: when he woke up, he complained about his grievances, and Lu Ming still loved him.

 

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T/N: Hi everyone, I’m sorry for being MIA for almost two months. Things have been exhausting in real life with my sister getting warded twice (and as someone who lives in the same apartment complex as her, my mom asked me to take care of her), me getting covid again hahah and also my new work place just literally shit, like no lie, i’m submitting my 30 days notice next week. it’s so fucking toxic that even my mom asked my to resign asap haha. Hopefully everything will be fine again soon haha

Anyway. if by december, I haven’t gotten a new job, you can expect a daily update from me (but please don’t hope for me to be jobless. i got bills to pay T_T)