There’s a psycho who has a crush on me

Chapter 66

“Ah Pei…” Luo Changzhou raised his hand and gently placed it on Yu Pei’s shoulder. He wanted to comfort Yu Pei, but didn’t know how to begin.

Even if it was true what Yu Pei had said about him being able to say many sweet words, in front of Yu Pei, he was always clumsy.

When Yu Pei smiled, he would follow with a slight curve of his lips. When Yu Pei frowned in sadness, he would also feel restless and troubled. Yu Pei’s every move could easily stir all his emotions, yet he was helpless against it, as if every slight tremor in Yu Pei’s world was to him like an earth-shattering collapse that couldn’t be ignored.

But after taking two deep breaths, Yu Pei stopped crying. He and Luo Changzhou climbed out of the pool and sat on the long wooden bench beside the swimming pool.

A cool breeze swept by, rustling the leaves. Several orange-red leaves fell from the sugar maple tree behind the bench, swirling twice in the air before landing at Yu Pei’s feet. Yu Pei lowered his head and nudged the leaf with his toes. After a few seconds of silence, he said to Luo Changzhou, “I was sick once.”

Hearing this, Luo Changzhou looked up at Yu Pei. He said nothing, only reached out to hold Yu Pei’s hand, gathering all his fingers into his palm and gripping them tightly.

The warmth from Luo Changzhou’s body transmitted through their clasped hands. Perhaps this strength gave Yu Pei some sense of security, because he lifted his head and looked at a distant maple tree, saying, “That illness was called Cotard syndrome. It’s a type of schizophrenia, I suppose. And the reason I got this disease was because of my mother.”

But Yu Pei didn’t elaborate on all the things his mother had done to him, didn’t describe them in detail to Luo Changzhou, because the source of all this tragedy was that Ning Jinglan was ill.

But who could be blamed for that?

Some mental illnesses were hereditary, and both Ning Jinglan and he were simply the unfortunate ones who inherited it. If they could choose to live healthy lives, who would willingly choose to be sick?

He simply used a few understated words to explain his and Ning Jinglan’s mother-son relationship: “She was sick too, much worse than me, so she didn’t recognize me, didn’t think I was her child.”

Just a few short sentences, a mere dozen or so words, but the bitterness, heartache, and painful memories they contained could only be understood by those who had experienced it.

Although Luo Changzhou hadn’t been part of Yu Pei’s first seventeen years of life and knew nothing of his past, he did know that Yu Pei had once taken half a year off from school for hospital treatment before returning to continue his classes.

Some things didn’t need to be fully explained. Just a few clues were enough to roughly guess and understand.

And Yu Pei’s mother’s influence on him was so great that just seeing her once could make him melancholy for an entire day, showing how deep the wounds she had inflicted on him.

But these wounds often didn’t scab over and appear on the flesh. Instead, they lurked like abscesses in one’s bones and blood, invisible and difficult to heal.

“Actually, I don’t really have any feelings toward her anymore.” Yu Pei blinked, his tone light as he said this, though it was unclear whether he had truly let go or was just trying to convince himself. “I’m just thinking… will I become like her someday…”

Both hateful and pitiful.

Some doctors believed that mental illness could never be completely cured because damaged nerves in humans couldn’t be repaired. Once someone had mental problems, it proved their nerves were damaged, and that damage could never be fixed. That was why psychiatric diseases were so difficult to cure, because even if temporarily healed, there was always a high risk of relapse.

After Yu Pei’s mother became ill, hadn’t she received treatment? She surely had, and had struggled, but couldn’t be cured.

Yu Pei was too happy now. He had a big brother who loved him, friends who accompanied him, and every day and night spent with Luo Changzhou. He was someone who naturally lacked security, so even after doctors declared him cured and discharged from the hospital, Yu Pei still worried about whether he might relapse someday. His mother’s appearance had completely drawn out the anxiety buried in his heart.

Because he had gained so much, he was even more afraid of losing the happiness he now possessed.

The greatest fear Ning Jinglan brought him was the fact that illness could make even one’s beloved child become a stranger. If blood relatives could be like this, what about others without blood ties?

“Mental illness is hereditary… I’ve already been sick once. What if I get sick again in the future?” Yu Pei said somewhat dazedly, as if talking to himself.

He had never told Luo Changzhou about these things before, but sooner or later they had to be said. How many schizophrenia patients became unrecognizable to their own families, killing their relatives and friends during episodes? Such cases weren’t rare.

Before a girl married, her parents would always remind her to know the man’s family medical history. Those with hereditary diseases or mental illness absolutely couldn’t be married. The same applied to men.

Even though he and Luo Changzhou didn’t need to worry about descendants, his illness was still like a time bomb, ready to explode at any moment.

Back then, Yu Pei’s father had married Ning Jinglan for a family alliance despite knowing the Ning family had a history of hereditary mental illness. And he himself, with his asthma, wasn’t much better, so together with Ning Jinglan, they had produced Yu Pei, a child who seemed to have inherited all their worst traits: asthma and mental illness.

Sometimes Yu Pei couldn’t help but secretly think that if he hadn’t met Luo Changzhou, his life would probably have been destined to be a tragedy from birth. But after meeting Luo Changzhou, what if he relapsed and became like Ning Jinglan?

Luo Changzhou quietly listened to Yu Pei speak the words he had kept bottled up in his heart. Only after Yu Pei fell silent and lowered his lashes again did he gently speak: “I’ve been very happy since childhood. Wealthy family circumstances, a gentle older sister, loving parents. Even though I was a poor student, I could live without material worries. But actually, I wasn’t really happy.”

After saying this, Luo Changzhou smiled slightly, as if he thought his words sounded somewhat boastful.

But the truth was indeed like this. Sometimes an overly perfect life could make one lose fighting spirit and goals, living mediocrely, and most importantly, not knowing what one wanted.

Just as Yu Pei had been unhappy before, so he knew what he wanted. He wanted his family’s love, wanted someone who loved him.

However, anything needed contrast to understand its value. If a person hadn’t experienced hardship, they wouldn’t know how precious what they possessed was. Without pain as a backdrop, how could one understand the goodness of happiness?

And Luo Changzhou had been too happy, so when he wanted something different, it was easy for others to misunderstand it as ingratitude. He had too many halos around him, so naturally he couldn’t tell whether people approached him for those halos or for him as a person.

So he was lonely, because no one could understand him.

Otherwise, why would so many apparent winners in life constantly cry out about how unhappy they were? Because they couldn’t find what they most wanted, so the more dispensable things they had, the more it highlighted how pathetic they were.

“Many times, I felt like I was a lonely star in the vast universe. There were countless stars casting brilliant light toward me, attracting me to chase after them, but the distance between us was so vast that I could spend my entire life and never get close to another star.” As Luo Changzhou spoke, he reached up to gently touch Yu Pei’s hair, softly pressing his head against his shoulder. “Until I met Ah Pei.”

The things Yu Pei worried about weren’t just Yu Pei’s concerns alone. They were also things Luo Changzhou should worry about, because he liked Yu Pei, so he was destined to worry and be happy together with him.

But it was also because of this affection that these worries felt necessary, and nothing was worth resenting.

“I used to live so well, but because I hadn’t met you, I always felt my life was missing a part, that it was incomplete.” Luo Changzhou held Yu Pei close. “Only when I’m with you do I feel the emptiness in my soul has been filled, even though many worrying things come along with it.”

“Because I’ve always believed that everything that happens in this world must have its meaning. If it’s good, it’s excellence; if it’s bad, it’s on the road toward excellence. So even if that meaning can’t be found in the short term, it definitely exists.”

Luo Changzhou pressed Yu Pei’s shoulder, looked into his eyes, and said slowly in a low voice: “You’ve encountered too many bad things because your road toward excellence is a bit long, but you’re destined to become an excellent person.”

“And you’ll have an excellent partner.”

Luo Changzhou’s lips curved slightly, his thumb gently brushing under Yu Pei’s eyes, where tears had once been but now was completely smooth with nothing there. He leaned down and lightly kissed the corner of Yu Pei’s lips.

A brief touch that separated immediately, without going deeper.

But in that moment of contact, their hearts and souls were incredibly close.

Yu Pei kept gazing at Luo Changzhou, watching his eyes. He saw the blue in Luo Changzhou’s eyes magnify before him, then gradually move away. For an instant, it was as if he was approaching death again. He had no breath, his heart stopped, all thought ceased and remained frozen one second before.

But in the next second, his heart welcomed a strong beat and dull pain like being shocked by a pacemaker, and his mind was like the brilliant explosion at the birth of the universe, projecting dazzling light that almost drowned him.

Yu Pei blinked and smiled slightly, saying in a hoarse voice: “Changzhou, I feel like I’m starting to not like you anymore.”

“Are you starting to fall in love with me?” Luo Changzhou also smiled, his lips touching his forehead as he spoke softly.

Yu Pei didn’t speak, only nodded.

Some people never understood what love really was, and that was because they hadn’t encountered love yet. Before it arrived, one could and would never know.

And when it came, one would understand that love was the force that drove and compelled a person to willingly shoulder heavy burdens and strive to become excellent, to overturn wrong for right. It was roughly like this.