Bloom of Youth - - - Chapter 88

Chapter 88

His back kinda hurt. His arm too.

Kou Chen could feel it even as he was dazed with sleepiness.

He was pretty scared of pain, so he was pretty scared of his dad. Even just thinking about getting made into a sausage or whatever hurts. But the pain right now was less than that. It wasn’t too bad, and any other person would probably be fine with it.

Like Huo Ran.

It was pretty painful when he dislocated his finger, and Huo Ran still teased him for screaming like that even now, over half a year later. Tsk.

The mahogany chair was sturdy, and even though his dad didn’t use much force, it was still a solid wooden chair after all.

“Ah…” He flipped over, groaning with his brows furrowed.

It was pretty bright, probably already morning. He kept the curtains open, so the sunlight swept through the room, bringing with it the crisp and clean air of the early morning.

Kou Chen tugged the blankets up and felt around for his phone.

This was probably the third morning he spent here, so it should be a Wednesday.

No, Tuesday.

Or Wednesday?

What day was it?

He grabbed his phone, but the screen didn’t light up like usual.

“It’s off?” Kou Chen frowned as he pressed the power button.

The symbol on the screen showed: ‘can’t you see that I’m out of goddamn battery?’

“Fuck.” Kou Chen threw the phone back down by the pillow. It’s been a long time since he’d done nothing but sleep, wake up, and go back to sleep. His head was a little fuzzy.

His phone was already nearly dead the day he ran away, and he was afraid to call Huo Ran in case it died before they got to talk much.

But Huo Ran’s call the next day pretty much killed his phone, and when he forced it on again to see Huo Ran’s text about trading him with a little secret, his phone died completely before he could think about what to reply, and what that little secret was.

His phone was suffering even more than him.

He sat up on the bed with difficulty. The spot where the chair hit him was throbbing, and he was also sore from sleeping for too long.

And he was hungry.

He’d eaten a total of two meals since he arrived at the hotel, that being two out of the three cups of instant noodles in the room.

He sat on the edge of the bed for a while, and then he grabbed his backpack from the floor.

He unzipped it, then remembered that he didn’t have a charger.

He had a power bank, but Wei Chaoren borrowed the cable.

Why the fuck would you borrow a charging cable for no reason?

They sell them at the convenience store, just go buy one yourself!

Dejected, Kou Chen stood up and headed into the bathroom dejectedly. He looked into the mirror as he passed it, and was shocked at how handsome he was.

Who knew that he could still maintain his handsomeness even in such conditions.

He washed up, planning to go down to the front desk to borrow a charger, or else he wouldn’t even be able to pay for the room anymore.

As he bent over the sink to wash his face, it felt like the muscles in his back were being torn apart. It really hurt.

That didn’t feel right. It wasn’t like he’d never been hit before, he’d also received a few punches here and there during fights, but none of them had hurt as much as this.

He frowned and took his shirt off, turning to the mirror to check out his back.

His back was smooth and firm, complete with the perfect lines of his muscles.

It wasn’t bruised and swollen at all like he thought, only the spot where the chair hit was slightly darker.

It didn’t look like it should hurt as much as it did.

…Did it break a bone?

A broken bone?

The ribs… That’s where the rib cage is, right? The ones at the front are ribs, so the ones in the back are ribs too, or back ribs…

Fuck! He had a broken rib?

To Kou Chen, it was fine if you hit him. Even if he was scared of pain, he could bear it, but a broken bone was a completely different story.

With that thought, he could barely even stand. He leaned against the wall with his hands on the sink.

But he immediately jerked away, what if he put his weight on the broken bone…?

He threw his clothes on and grabbed his phone and power bank before rushing to the front desk.

“Miss, can I borrow a charging cable for half an hour? I’ll give it back,” Kou Chen leaned onto the desk and waved his phone, “My phone’s dead.”

The receptionist glanced at him, and then handed him a cable: “Here.”

“Thank you,” Kou Chen took the cable and plugged it in, then he ran out of the hotel.

He remembered there was a community clinic on the street behind the hotel.

The building quickly came into sight. His memory was pretty good.

“I might have broken a bone.” He said to one of the nurse looking ladies.

“A broken bone?” The lady looked up and quickly came over to support him. “Where?”

“Back of the rib cage,” Kou Chen said.

“Your back?” The lady asked.

“Yes,” Kou Chen nodded.

The lady helped him into a room: “The doctor will come to take a look. If it’s really broken, then you have to go to the hospital for x-rays, we don’t have the equipment here.”

“Just take a look first,” Kou Chen said.

An older doctor came in, and talked to the lady before gently pressing down on his back: “Where is it?”

“Here,” Kou Chen pointed at the left side of his back.

“Does it hurt when you move your arm?” The doctor asked.

“Not really,” Kou Chen said.

“It’s not broken,” The doctor lifted his shirt, and pressed down again. “Not broken.”

“Wait, take a proper look, it’s broken, it hurts.” Kou Chen leaned forward on the table.

“When did it happen?” The doctor asked.

“The day before yesterday? Or before that?” Kou Chen wasn’t really sure.

“It’s not broken,” The doctor assured him. “Did you bump into something? If you really did break a bone, you wouldn’t be able to move now. You can get an x-ray done if you really want to.”

“Then why does it hurt so much?” Kou Chen suddenly felt a little distressed.

“Of course it would hurt, how could it not?” The doctor said. “Especially the first few days after the injury. You haven’t moved around much these days either, right? I see the indents from your shirt all over your back. Have you been lying down the whole time?”

“Ah,” Kou Chen tugged his shirt back down a little embarrassingly.

“Moving around some more will make it feel better, and put a warm compress on it.” The doctor said. “It’ll be fine in a couple of days. You’re young and healthy.”

“How do I do a warm compress?” Kou Chen asked.

“Put a warm towel or a hand warmer over it,” The doctor smiled.

“Thank you.” Kou Chen glanced at his phone, it had charged enough to turn on. “Hold on, I’ll pay you.”

“There’s no need for that, it’s not like we did anything.” The doctor said. “What payment?”

“…Oh,” Kou Chen paused. “Thank you.”

As he headed out, the doctor said something else behind him, but he didn’t hear it.

Right as his phone turned on, it was like it got possessed by Kou Xiao’s vibrating face massager. It buzzed with notification after notification, not stopping even when the screen froze.

At that moment, Kou Chen was suddenly snapped back to reality.

He lived in a daze the past few days, having spent most of his time asleep, and even then he was always dreaming, but he couldn’t remember what any of the dreams were about. It felt like he crawled out of a basement when he left the hotel too.

And now, he finally snapped out of it.

He ran away from home because he argued with his dad. His dad hit him and then told him to get out. His dad told him to get out because he said something impolite and wouldn’t go abroad no matter what, and he wouldn’t go abroad because of…

Huo Ran.

He found a couple of steps by the road to sit down on, holding his phone that was still vibrating even with the screen frozen, and staring down at the ground.

He remembered that he had actually been thinking a lot these couple of days.

But he couldn’t remember what he was thinking about.

Even though he couldn’t remember, he knew it all as he sat there.

His phone vibrated until it shut off again.

He leaned down and blew on his phone. When he was little, his grandma told him a breath of magical air would fix it.

It did work, the magical breath woke his phone up again.

There were over three hundred missed calls, from his dad, mom, Kou Xiao, Old Yang, and his friends. Each of them called him multiple times as well as texted him, both on WeChat and SMS.

He even saw a QQ email from Xu Chuan.

Suddenly, he kinda wanted to cry.

There were a lot of notifications from Huo Ran, message after message.

-what’s wrong

-you don’t wanna hear the little secret?

-where did you run off to kou chen!

-kou chenchen

-charge your phone!!!

-chenchen…

-the snakes are coming! quick hide behind gege!

-your phone is still off?

-turn your phone on did you fucking break your arm?!

—————

-fuck you kou chen!

-it’s just going abroad, if you don’t wanna go then don’t, take it up with your parents what are you doing disappearing on your friends?!

-fuck off!

-don’t expect me to tell you anything from now on, I won’t fucking tell you!

-my ass!

-go eat shit why don’t you

—————

-look at shuaishuai

-I went to your place, I wasn’t gonna use your family against you, but our friendship isn’t working so, your mom is crying, and kou xiao cursed you out for twenty minutes straight

-your dad isn’t saying anything, I think he’s really worried about you

—————

-morning, kou chenchen

-fuck you is your phone still not on

-I’ll take your last name if I send you another message! stupid fucking thing

—————

-old yuan asked us about what happened —kou ran

—————

-kou chen you’re done for, just disappear for good why don’t you?! If I ever see you again I’ll stab you to death

-make you into a sausage

-feed you to shuaishuai! and sell the rest!

-I’ll split the money between the six of us

—————

-is your phone on yet

-.

-?

-123

-please allow the professional Jiang Lei to sing you an old song

Followed by a voice message.

The first thing Kou Chen heard was Huo Ran whispering: “Sing, stay on key.”

And then Jiang Lei started belting out so loud the audio crackled: “Come home! Oh come home! The Chenchen who wandered to the end of the world…”

Kou Chen rubbed his eyes, and he was about to replay the message to listen to Huo Ran’s voice again when his phone buzzed and another text from Huo Ran came in.

-test

-hey, are you there chenchen

At that moment, tears burst out from Kou Chen’s eyes without warning. His nose didn’t even get to tingle much, nor did the corners of his eyes get heat up.

A second later, his tears dripped onto his wrist.

They were warm.

Kou Chen could feel how hot they were.

“Anything?” Xu Zhifan asked.

“No,” Huo Ran sighed, turning his phone around in his hands. “His dad’s coming over to school again this afternoon. Dunno if Old Yuan can come up with something.”

“Still not gonna call the police?” Xu Zhifan asked.

“Yeah,” Huo Ran nodded. “Kou Xiao told me yesterday. His dad doesn’t want to call the police, he has to come back on his own. Kou Chen might be embarrassed if he has to be dragged back by someone.”

Xu Zhifan was silent for a moment before saying quietly: “It feels like he understands Kou Chen, so why do can’t they get three sentences out before arguing?”

“The generation gap, I guess.” Huo Ran put his head on the desk. “I’m so tired.”

“You better not collapse or something if he doesn’t come back,” Xu Zhifan said. “You don’t need to worry, Kou Chen’s not stupid, and he can fight. Nothing’s gonna happen to him, he’s just stubborn.”

“I’m not really worried that something will happen,” Huo Ran closed his eyes. “I just want to know what happened… And he isn’t replying to my messages… It’s not like I told him to go abroad… So why is he ignoring me? Fuck.”

After third period, Huo Ran strolled over to the store, wanting to buy some ice cream to eat.

His phone buzzed.

He didn’t rush to look at it.

And then he froze.

He stared at his notification for five seconds before his heart started beating like it was tied down to a drop machine.

His phone was pretty busy these couple of days. Kou Xiao and Old Yang would contact him from time to time.

At first, he perked up every time there was a new notification, but after being disappointed for two or three days, he wasn’t expecting anything.

Seeing Kou Chen’s name now, he almost didn’t know how to react.

-come alone, don’t tell anyone yet

And then he sent a location.

Huo Ran looked around, not knowing if he should let someone know or not, but there wasn’t anyone he knew near him right now anyways.

In the end, he turned and ran towards the haunted building.

-be there in 30

There was no time to call a cab, nor was there time to flag one down on the road. Huo Ran decided to climb over the fence to the neighbourhood gates down the street where they had cabs waiting.

There was someone there when he climbed the fence, but he didn’t even glance at them. It was a quiet area, so sometimes the third years came to study.

“Huo…” That person started.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the person sitting there with a book was Lin Wuyu, but he was already over the wall so he didn’t have the chance to say hello before he was hopping down.

Lin Wuyu exclaimed from the other side: “Woah!”

His luck was pretty good. Huo Ran sprinted as fast as he could, and not even halfway there, he saw a cab driving over.

“Taxi—! Taxi!” He yelled as he rushed across the street, stopping the car. He pulled the door open and sat down, showing the driver his phone. “I need to go here, Mister! In half an hour!”

“No problem,” The driver said. “It’s not too far, it’ll only take twenty minutes.”

“Okay! Thank you!” Huo Ran yelled his reply, unable to control his voice.

The driver glanced at him, and he looked away a little embarrassingly and bucked his seatbelt.

The location Kou Chen sent was a hotel, and Huo Ran thought the name sounded a little familiar. When they arrived, he realized that it was the hotel Kou Xiao worked at!

Fuck!

Kou Chen was literally just hiding in there?

What kind of insane idea is that?!

Maybe he even used his sister’s discount card?

Maybe he even ate using an employee card…

With that thought, Huo Ran couldn’t help but laugh. He chuckled to himself as he stared out the window the rest of the way.

“Almost there,” The driver said.

“Okay,” Huo Ran reached out to open the car door.

“I need to stop first!” The driver quickly stopped him.

“Oh,” Huo Ran paused.

“Payment,” The driver remained him.

“Oh, oh, oh,” Huo Ran scanned the QR code.

The second the car stopped he jumped out and ran towards the hotel doors.

Nobody was there, and Huo Ran stopped to look around confusedly. He got his phone out and was about to call Kou Chen.

“Hey,” Someone said quietly behind him.

Huo Ran immediately recognized it as Kou Chen’s voice.

He hadn’t heard Kou Chen’s voice in three days.

He jerked around and saw Kou Chen walk out of the side door. He was smiling lightly as he walked to him.

“Fuck you,” Huo Ran exclaimed. “Are you fucking crazy?!”

“Where’s the little secret?” Kou Chen stopped in front of him and asked as he leaned in.

He was suddenly enveloped by Kou Chen’s scent, making him feel a little dazed. His voice was a little breathy as he replied: “What?”

“You said you’ll trade me with a little secret,” Kou Chen said. “Where is it?”

A little secret?

A little secret!

Fuck!

The little secret!

Huo Ran’s eyes went wide.