Chapter 13: If it is bitter it is medicine, if it is sweet it is poison

Mo Zhan and Lu Zhi did not let Li BaoGui waste any more time and returned him home.

Li Yan stood at the gates of the Li residence, undecided whether he should enter or not. To his luck, Hua Zhang came out with a basket at that very moment, Li BaoGui stopped her.

"Third Young Master Li." She greeted.

"Hua Zhang, do you know if my husband is at home?

"Master Su came out, he said..." Hua Zhang hesitated with flushed cheeks. "He said he would buy a couple of cucumbers."

Li BaoGui's face suddenly caught fire.

"C-cucumber?!"

"Please, Third Young Master, don't make me repeat it."

Hua Zhang had long served the family, and always saw Li BaoGui as a pure white lotus. Why should she find out the way Su WuLi would taint him, he was a beast?!

Li Yan was on the verge of fainting; did he really need cucumbers? He had nothing against the idea and it was not new to him, but, it was his first time with Su Jian; his dignity would not stand for Su Jian to see him with something like that inside him.

Madam Mo walked through the door with Li XuDan, both of them laughing together and greeting Li BaoGui. He and Hua Zhang struggled to disguise the color in their faces.

"Gui'er, we're going for a walk." informed Madam Mo. "Your father and uncles have taken Li Huan with them to ZunYi, they'll be back early in the morning."

"Shushu, do you want me to keep you company later? You promised to teach me how to embroider peonies." said Li XuDan.

She always seemed to have a radar for making interruptions, so Li Yan had to refuse.

"Today is not a good day. En, I'm tired, I'll go prepare my medicine." Li BaoGui escaped as fast as he could, and his face reddened again once he was on his way to his courtyard.

The first thing he did was to take a bath, following the instructions of his cheap friends. Then he put on warm robes to go to the kitchen, where he set about preparing his medicine before Su WuLi returned with the cucumbers.

His belly grew warm with undue thoughts, but he couldn't help it.

He walked over to the cupboard containing the ingredients for his medicine, took the necessary ones and noticed that there was one packet left over. He took the ingredients to the table and then returned to examine it.

The packet had been opened and used, and was definitely not part of his recipe. From the smell and color, Li Yan could recognize it and doubt was planted in his heart. Why didn't he see it before? Su Jian had hidden it, why didn't he tell him, why would he use it?

He took a deep breath and calmed himself. If he continued he was going to cause himself great anxiety. Su Jian could have used it individually... Su Jian couldn't hate him that much.

Determined, he turned off the water he had put on to boil, and headed for the HuiChun clinic.

A sichen and a half later, Su WuLi finally returned to the Li residence.

BaiBai was sleeping in his small home, and Li BaoGui did not seem to be in the kitchen. Su Jian felt uneasy, had Li Yan still not returned?

He decided to go look for him in his bedroom, and right there he could find him. Li BaoGui was sitting on the edge of the bed, with his hair loose and a single layer of outer and thin inner robes protecting him from the slight cold.

Su Jian found him as beautiful as ever, but sensed some concern in his gaze. He walked towards him, forgetting what it was he was holding in his hand.

Li BaoGui heard the footsteps and looked up, and the first thing he saw was the cucumbers in Su WuLi's hand. He actually dared to pick them out of large size, Li Yan did not feel able to swallow it all.

"Those cucumbers..." Li BaoGui said in a low voice.

Su WuLi looked at the vegetables and then looked at his husband-enemy.

"I'll put them inside later."

A poor choice of words. Su Jian should have explained where he was going to put them.

Li Yan nearly died from embarrassment, still, he fought to stay focused.

"B-before you put them inside. We should talk."

"I'm listening."

Li BaoGui sorted his thoughts and asked a question:

"Do you remember why there was an extra ingredient left over in my medicine?"

Su Jian understood that he was referring to the memories of the original Su WuLi.

"No, I can't remember."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't think it was necessary. I thought it would be enough to put it aside." Realizing his mistake, Su Jian thought again his brain must have been kicked by a donkey. "I'm sorry."

"I spoke to Master Qu. The original Li BaoGui had gotten sick, it wasn't serious, but Su WuLi paid extra for Master Qu to give him a way to kill Li BaoGui." explained Li Yan. "That extra ingredient does no harm if it acts alone, however, when mixed with the other ingredients it creates long-term damage. The reason why Li BaoGui was getting worse as time passed was that, Su WuLi poisoned him slowly to avoid suspicion."

Su Jian came closer. His mouth moved a couple of times, but he was unable to say anything.

"Don't feel guilty, it wasn't something you did... Right?"

"Definitely not!" Su Jian immediately denied. "I tried to find out for myself what that was, so I boiled it and drank it."

Now that he was saying it out loud he felt even more stupid. Su Jian thought, [I'm sorry, grandfather, this grandson of yours is very stupid and has lived by luck.]

"By itself, the ingredient is good for treating muscle pains. However, don't drink unknown stuff anymore."

"I won't do it anymore... What about Li BaoGui's body, can you recover?"

"Master Qu said that once you cut off the consumption, you can get better quickly superficially. He said it was better if I drank the medicine until next year, that would help the inside of this body recover completely."

Su Jian really hated the original Su WuLi. Too mean to be just a damn illiterate peasant. He forgot values and violated justice, he was so ungrateful as to try to murder someone who actually loved him.

[What a piece of shit!]

"Besides..." Li Yan continued speaking in the face of Su Jian's silence. "Can we talk... About the past?"

"The past?"

Li BaoGui motioned Su WuLi for him to come closer, then Su WuLi sat next to him on the bed with cucumbers in hand. Li BaoGui made up his mind to ask:

"We... Why did everyone thought we hate each other?"

"To tell you the truth, I don't remember."

"I know we were first separated when we were children. I never knew why you were mad at me."

"When we were children." Su Jian struggled to remember, then admitted with embarrassment. "About that... The teacher asked who your best friend was, and you chose Che XuDan."

Su Jian really was jealous, so much so that he got angry and put Li Yan aside to show that he had other friends.

Li BaoGui laughed once he was able to remember it too, and that increased Su Jian's embarrassment.

"It's not funny, it was serious to me."

"Sorry, sorry." Li Yan took a deep breath to stop laughing. "I didn't choose you for a good reason."

"What's that good reason?"

"...I didn't think of Su-ge as a friend."

Su Jian's heart broke, [Not even as a friend?!] His expression froze, but he said nothing. Li Yan continued:

"I never thought of Su-ge as a friend... Still, I was too cowardly to ask in the past." Li BaoGui suddenly had a sad expression. "...Su Jian, when we became friends again in high school, why didn't you do anything when I confessed my feelings to you?"

Su Jian froze for a moment, then asked:

"Did you confess your feelings to me? I sent you a love letter, the reply was an insult. And, the next day, everyone in the class knew I was gay!"

"Are you gay?" Li Yan was shocked.

If Li Yan didn't know, then there was a misunderstanding.

They looked at each other in silence for a few seconds.

"I received your letter, and I made a reply. I replied that dating you was my dream since we were kids, I thought we would be a couple, but you... You were so cold all of a sudden." Li Yan still remembered the tears shed in his teenage years. "And you went away from me again."

"The letter I got back had a lot of silly scribbles and insults. I thought you didn't like men and I said 'okay,' then people at school started picking on me." Su Jian recalled the hitting, fighting and insults. "I always thought you told everyone."

"But how? The only people who touched the letters... You gave the letter to Che XuDan, and she handed it to me without any harm."

Su Jian was silent as his face darkened.

"And I gave the letter to..." Li Yan understood everything and said no more.

Su WuLi got up from the bed and shouted:

"Wang Lu, you piece of shit! I curse the eighteen generations of family!" Su Jian wanted to go back in time and kill him with his own hands. "You, you dirty wretch, you dragged me with you until the end! I hope that in your next life your penis rots, that you reborn like a cockroach!"

Li BaoGui just looked at him, allowing him to vent all his anger. Li Yan was not angry, just sad.

Once Su WuLi stopped shouting, he turned to look at Li BaoGui. His expression was full of doubt and regret.

"Li Yan, why didn't you ask me? We wasted so much time. I said horrible things to you."

Li BaoGui lowered his head, keeping silent as his eyes watered. Su WuLi crouched down beside him, seeking to see his face.

"Why?" repeated Su Jian.

"I never had the chance to tell you, and I never told anyone else either. I was adopted. I never knew my birth parents." Li BaoGui wiped his tears with his sleeves, but they continued to flow. "When Madam Li adopted me with her husband, I was a baby and they didn't know I would have problems. I guess they didn't have the heart to return me to the orphanage, so they stayed with me even though my heart was weak."

Seeing him cry, Su Jian felt guilty. If he had taken a moment to ask, if he had been braver, he might have noticed that pain.

"You asked if it didn't hurt to leave anything behind, and the truth is, it doesn't hurt too much. I spent my whole life waiting for that moment. I never expected to live long, so I thought..." His voice cracked and he had to pause for breath. "I thought it was okay if Su-ge didn't want my feelings. I thought Su-ge had regretted it, because he knew I would die easily."

"I would never..."

"Su Jian, you've lost so many important people in your life, in that life. Do you think I could bear to become another suffering for you? Tell me, do you think I could bear to leave you alone?"

Su WuLi did not answer. Unbeknownst to him, tears were welling up and sliding down his cheeks.

"To tell you the truth, it's my fault too. I didn't ask you about it either." Pretending to be strong, Su Jian wiped away his tears and rubbed his reddened eyes. "Because after thinking about it, I knew I had nothing to offer you. I've always been a lonely orphan. I barely had money to study and live on, what could I have given you? I didn't even have a family to take care of my funeral, my death meant nothing..."

Su WuLi was interrupted by a soft knock on his head. Li BaoGui, sobbing and gasping for breath, had hit him.

"How can you say that, no one cared?" Li Yan was angry.

Su Jian thought he was referring to Qu Yuan, however, there was a deeper thought that made his eyes go wide.

"When I died... Your heart...?"

"My condition was not improving, you know? Although I seemed fine on the outside, sometimes it was hard to run for more than a minute. When I knew that my Su-ge had died... It hurt so much that I couldn't breathe."

However, Li Yan had arrived a day later, Su Jian knew he shouldn't have died from it instantly.

"I spent my last hours in the hospital. I could have survived, but the nurse taking care of me chose the wrong medicine." Li Yan smiled as if he was going to laugh, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. "I had seen her. And I didn't tell her."

"You let her kill you!"

"The medicine was expensive and I wasn't getting better. Madam Li and her husband had financial problems because of that, they tried to hide it and then... After many years of trying, Madam Li managed to get pregnant."

"... Li Yan..." Su WuLi couldn't find something to say.

"I didn't want to be a burden, I didn't want to live thinking I was going to die at any moment... I couldn't even afford to be with the person I liked, so I agreed to die." Li BaoGui raised his hands, touching his face red and wet with tears. "Now I am Li BaoGui, and I decided that, if this body could recover, I wanted to marry Su-ge and stay with him for a lifetime."

Su WuLi stood in front of Li BaoGui, and smiled as he sighed.

"Interestingly, my plan was to act obvious so that Li Yan would fall in love with me, and decide to be my husband for a lifetime."

Li BaoGui wiped the tears from his own face, and smiled back at Su Jian.

"Then, can I stay with my Su-ge all this life?"

Su WuLi bent down to take Li BaoGui's face in his hands, and kissed his lips once more.

"To be worthy of my Li Yan's love in this reincarnation, I suppose I was a Buddha in past lives."

[Grandpa, Mom, Dad, you really saved all your blessings for me.]