默读/Silent Reading by Priest - Book 4 Translated by E. Danglars at edanglarstranslations.com. For comments, questions, and corrections, e-mail [email protected]. 1 CHAPTER 90 - Reading Aloud (3) Since Fei Du had started to be able to eat some ordinary food, his troublesome nature had immediately been revealed beyond doubt. He’d turned up his nose at the hospital’s tasteless, watery fare. In fact, President Fei’s original idea had been to move to a private hospital with fine scenery and hire a cook, bringing his crowd of beautiful assistants over to chat and making them run any necessary errands as he recovered. At any rate, it didn’t matter to him whether he would be reimbursed for medical expenses. Unfortunately, Fei Du’s energy reserves had been void at the time, and it had been hard to speak. Before he’d finished stating this perfect plan, Luo Wenzhou had already decided on an idea for him. Luo Wenzhou said, “You don’t like eating this? All right, I’ll cook for you and bring it over.—So many problems. How come you’re so hard to support?” Fei Du could only tactfully express that shixiong was wounded himself; he didn’t want to trouble an injured person. Having heard this, Luo Wenzhou nodded, then rejected his objection, having the final word: “No need for you to worry. It’s settled.” While Luo Wenzhou’s handiwork was admittedly pretty good, it certainly didn’t rise to the level of being able to go on the “Celebrity Cook-off” program. He could only make plain home cooking. But somehow, for the sake of these plain home-cooked meals, Fei Du obediently held his nose and stayed at the public hospital; when he thought of it afterwards, he couldn’t understand it himself. He could only ascribe it to the fact that he’d never eaten a “free lunch” in his life. 2 For the Criminal Investigation Team, the Zhou Clan case had temporarily come to a close, but the economic investigation was far from reaching a conclusion, and the follow-up work was very complicated. Luo Wenzhou had been very busy ever since returning to the City Bureau, and today he had one meeting after another and really couldn’t get away. He could only delegate Madam Mu Xiaoqing to go to his house to watch the stewpot and Luo Yiguo, and trouble her to go to the hospital. Before leaving, Luo Wenzhou had directed Tao Ran to tell Fei Du about it. He hadn’t expected that as soon as Tao Ran called, Fei Du would greet him with the sentence, “Ge, you’re on speaker, President Zhou is here, and he wants to hear something of what’s going on from you.” Tao Ran, with his compass needle-like attention, had heard this and immediately changed direction, entering work mode and casting all matters about moms and delivering food far, far away. When he’d hung up the phone, there had been some doubt in Tao Ran’s mind; he’d thought he’d forgotten something. He’d turned it over in his mind, determined that he’d said everything he ought to have said, hadn’t said anything he oughtn’t to have said, and thereupon had relaxed and concentrated his attention on writing a report. This had produced the current calamity— Looking at the living Fei Du in front of her, there were a few seconds where Mu Xiaoqing really did think she’d gone to the wrong room. The last time she’d seen Fei Du, he’d just been brought out of the ICU. He’d been unconscious at the time, his face entirely bloodless, his IV- bearing arm so thin you could see the bones; there’d been hardly any skin showing not covered in bandages. He’d looked like a piece of porcelain that would shatter at a touch. Despite being out cold, his brow had been furrowed, as if he’d been enduring some agony that 3 couldn’t be covered up even by deep sleep. He’d looked as pitiful as could be. Mu Xiaoqing had later heard that he could have ducked behind his car and made it out with a scratch at most and had only been injured like this for the sake of protecting her unfortunate son, and had thereupon, in connection with Fei Du’s delicate-featured face, imagined a story of an infatuated youth being carried off by a rotten scoundrel; every time she’d come by his hospital room, her maternal love had nearly overflown. So afterwards, when Fei Du had woken up and Luo Wenzhou had kept his parents from coming to visit with lies like, “I still haven’t talked to him about going public, and we haven’t gotten to the point of meeting the parents, so if you guys go over in too much ceremony I’m worried he’ll be stressed,” Mu Xiaoqing had actually believed it! Seeing him in the flesh now, she finally realized that her imagination had run too far off course. Being half-incapacitated didn’t hold up Fei Du’s ability to flirt. He had a dark gray jacket on over his hospital gown, his hair was perfectly styled, and he was wearing a pair of rimless glasses. Before he’d spoken, there was already part of a smile in his peach blossom eyes, reflecting from his cold glasses with a powerful and mysterious aura. He was simply rather demonic—simply a different person from the “poor child” in the hospital bed. How come this wasn’t at all like what Luo Wenzhou had said? “Oh, thank you, the inpatient department is a little confusing.” Mu Xiaoqing looked him up and down, looked up at the number plate at the hospital room’s door, verified it was the right one three times over, then asked, “Do you know a Luo Wenzhou?” 4 Fei Du’s originally unassailable smile froze as he dimly sensed that something was off. Then he answered very cautiously, “Oh? He’s my colleague—excuse me, you are…” Mu Xiaoqing took the words “he’s my colleague” and chewed them over in her mind. According to her seasoned sense of taste, she couldn’t sense any other meaning behind these words. Were all young people so calm and unblushing about their romances now? Mu Xiaoqing gave an “oh” and nodded understandingly, thinking that it was no wonder that that brat Luo Wenzhou, for once sending her to bring food today, had first exhorted her, telling her not to say this and not to say that, as if Fei Du had been of an uncommon easily embarrassed breed in the present age. After all this fuss, what Luo Wenzhou had said outside of the ICU that day had been entirely unilateral bluster! Mu Xiaoqing realized what was happening and was immediately overjoyed, knowing she had Luo Wenzhou by the pigtails. She familiarly handed over the food and the flowers, sitting in the chair in front of the hospital bed, very warmly saying to Fei Du, “Me? I’m his neighbor. He said he had something to do today that he couldn’t get out of, and my husband just happens to be in the hospital for a few days, so he entrusted me with bringing you food while I was here— your colleague brings you food every day? He’s very good to you!” Fei Du was extremely sensitive to others’ expressions. More and more, he thought there was something off about this middle-aged “beauty,” so he avoided the serious question and simply agreed, endorsing the fact that Luo Wenzhou was very good to him, then changing the subject. “Thank you, but are you really already married?” 5 Mu Xiaoqing knew perfectly well that this was wholly insincere flattery, but looking at Fei Du’s face, the flattery still put her entirely at her ease. Beaming, she said, “You’re a very well-spoken child. My son is already as tall as an electricity pole!” Fei Du: “…” That description…really sounded very robust. Madam Mu Xiaoqing’s heart was as big the Pacific Ocean, able to swallow Asia in one go. While she’d been temporarily astonished by the great change in Fei Du, she recovered very quickly, hastily pulling back her imagination, which had wandered out of the solar system, adjusting to reality at the speed of light—after all, removing everything else, Fei Du truly had saved her son under those circumstances, and Luo Wenzhou’s fluctuating emotions outside the ICU had been real. So she very happily started asking after Fei Du’s family. Fei Du didn’t know whether today’s “good Chinese neighbors” were all so immediately familiar. While he wasn’t unable to hold his own, he was still entirely unprepared to meet this mother-in-law-style cross-examination. He hadn’t had a chance to rest his body and mind after his contest of wits with Zhou Huaijin, and now he was meeting with these “heavy losses.” And most importantly, he felt he’d just made a blunder— Finally getting Mu Xiaoqing to get up and bid him farewell, Fei Du hurriedly sent a message to Luo Wenzhou while her back was turned: “Who came to deliver food?” Then, as if nothing were the matter, he maintained his smile and went over in his wheelchair to open the door for Mu Xiaoqing. “Where is your family member’s hospital room? I’ll take you to the nearest door.” 6 Mu Xiaoqing was happy after their chat and had already forgotten her initial nonsense.