Six years ago, in the cold and quiet He residence, there was no
laughter and no companionship.
Although the household staff had prepared a cake for him on He Jiwei and Lü Zhishu's orders, He Yu didn't eat it. It was his birthday, yet his parents weren't present and were instead in Yanzhou with his little brother. They'd said they had to meet with an important client that day and would have to wait until after the discussions ended to see whether they could fly back in time. He Yu didn't have many friends either, since he was mostly cordial and distant with his classmates. It would have been awkward to invite any of them to his birthday party.
That day, Xie Qingcheng wasn't in Huzhou either; he was on a work trip as Xie Xue's message had stated, attending a conference.
Not even the heavens were cooperating that day; the rain poured down as the wind blew wildly. He Yu stood in the living room watching the floor-to-ceiling European-style windows become an eerily fluctuating ink painting, framing the torrential deluge outside.
A bell tolled once—twice—three times—
The large clock in the residence sounded every hour, accurately announcing the time on its clock face.
From afternoon, to evening, to nightfall.
"Young Master…don't wait any longer. Executive He and Executive Lü said they won't be able to get back today…" Unable to bear it any longer, the housekeeper cautiously stepped forward and draped a jacket over He Yu's shoulders. "You should go to bed."
"It's okay. It's not like today's a formal holiday or anything." When He Yu turned his head, he was unexpectedly still smiling. "Go do what you have to do. I'm going to watch the rain for a while longer, but I'll rest soon."
The housekeeper sighed softly and left.
Was it really okay? Did it really not matter?
Of course not. He was just waiting.
He thought that there must at least be one person in the world who would remember him, who would miss him, who would brave the wind and rain to keep him company in the dark. He wasn't such a bad person that he deserved to be punished with loneliness like this, right?
He waited.
And waited…
"He Yu! He Yu!"
After an indeterminate length of time—it seemed like it was right before the clock bell struck midnight—he heard someone knocking on the door, and a girl's faint voice that sounded so indistinctly through the wind and rain that it seemed like an illusion.
He Yu's eyes widened slightly, and he hastily rushed over to open the door.
Standing outside, panting slightly, was Xie Xue—the only girl he was close to. The only playmate who had stayed with him for so many years. She was wearing a raincoat, and her rain-drenched face looked ice-cold. But when she looked up at him, her gaze was warm.
Sniffling slightly, she took off her raincoat with a smile, revealing the birthday cake that she had carefully hidden underneath.
"I made it in time, right?"
"Why did you come…"
"I didn't want you to spend your birthday alone. How sad would that be?" Xie Xue wiped away the water that was dripping from her hair and said, "I made your favorite chocolate cake for you. Gosh, I nearly drowned out there. It's such a big storm, what the hell…"
In that moment, He Yu's resentment seemed to dissipate as the void in his heart was filled. He grabbed Xie Xue's freezing hand and pulled her inside. He felt like his voice was a little raspy as he said, "I also didn't think I should be alone…"
"How's that possible? How could you be alone? You still have me. I'll always stay with you."
He Yu said nothing.
"Happy thirteenth birthday, He Yu." The girl smiled brightly, becoming the most brilliant ray of sunshine in the shadowy home.
It was so long ago, He Yu couldn't quite remember what had happened afterward. He only remembered that when he went to the refrigerator, looking for a piece of that unfinished chocolate cake, it was already gone.
Of course, the untouched desserts that the nanny baked for him had disappeared along with that piece of cake.
Seeing his dejected face, the nanny quickly explained before he could get mad, "Those things aren't fresh anymore—it's not good for you to eat them, so they were tossed… If you want, we can make them again tonight."
But even if they were to make it again, it still wouldn't be the cake that Xie Xue had brought for him on that rainy night.
He Yu had said, "It's fine, forget it."
Now, He Yu looked at the projection before him, his spirits plummeting into a pool of ice. He clearly remembered Xie Xue coming to his house on that day.
That day he'd…he'd…had someone with him; someone had remembered him…
But the contents in the projected images in front of him couldn't possibly be fake. He had gathered the information himself from the backups on cloud storage.
Xie Xue: Gege, Auntie Li's sick. I've gone with her to get an IV. When will you be back from your work trip? These hospital procedures are so confusing, my head hurts, I wish you were here…
How could this be?
How could this be?!
He pulled out his computer and his fingers flew over the keyboard, his expression twisted and his eyes nearly insane, as if he was about to dig up a grave of information, pry open the coffin, and exhume the corpse, seeking a truth that had been buried for ages.
He rapidly retrieved the messages from those dates.
Xie Xue's, Xie Qingcheng's, He Jiwei's, Lü Zhishu's.
The truth was like an incorruptible corpse, and from within the cloud's database, it gave him a coldly eerie sneer.
Lies…
Lies…
Lies!
Because too much time had passed, most of the chat logs could no longer be retrieved, but the messages that he successfully restored were enough to prove that, on that night, on the night when he had needed Xie Xue the most, she…hadn't come at all.
He Yu even saw the message she had sent to Xie Qingcheng the next day.
Xie Xue: Ge, He Yu asked me if I could go to his house to play and spend his birthday with him, but Auntie Li was so sick yesterday and I was so busy that I forgot to respond to him. I feel so embarrassed. Can you apologize to him for me? I don't have the guts to explain it to him…
Xie Qingcheng: There's no need for you to get so close to him.
He Yu kept searching.
The timeline inched forward…
And became even more shocking.
He found a certain chat log.
It was a conversation between Xie Qingcheng and He Jiwei.
He Jiwei: He Yu seems to create a sort of delusion when he's at his most helpless, and the object of his delusion is your little sister. I've recently discovered by accident that some of the things he told me didn't happen at all. Doctor Xie, this kind of situation…
Xie Qingcheng: It's very normal for him. I've known about this behavior of his since the beginning.
He Jiwei: How could this be…
Xie Qingcheng: He Yu needs a friend who's around his age, but he isn't willing to open his heart to any of his peers. His way of thinking is unique and precocious, so most children his age don't quite understand him. Because of his long-term isolation, he needs an outlet to vent his emotions, and at such a time, his closest peer can very easily become his own reflection.
He Jiwei: His own reflection?
Xie Qingcheng: Yes. Some children with autism or other psychological conditions will imagine a friend as they're growing up, and with that friend, they can hand over their heart without reservation. That friend may not exist at all, or they might only exist in part. The patients make them up to fulfill the intense longing in their own hearts.
Xie Qingcheng sent another explanatory message to He Jiwei.
Xie Qingcheng: Actually, it's not just children with mental illnesses. Normal children will also develop some delusions when they're lonely. For example, if they're an outcast in class and have no friends, they'll make up a friend for themself and believe that they're the only person who can see and communicate with that friend. This is a child's instinctual psychological defense mechanism.
Xie Qingcheng: But people who aren't mentally ill are able to distinguish imagination from reality and realize that these are illusions. They know that they're born from the comfort they so desire. But for a child like He Yu, it's hard for him to recognize this—especially because his delusion is only partially imagined.
He Jiwei: By only partially imagined, you mean…?
Xie Qingcheng: Xie Xue does exist—she's my sister, and she's his closest friend who is indeed very nice to him. But I know my sister very well. She's always very enthusiastic around people, and although He Yu is a good friend of hers, they aren't particularly close yet. There are certain things that she wouldn't do for him.
Xie Qingcheng: However, with respect to He Yu, his mind needs to be supported. The things that he hoped Xie Xue would do but she didn't were filled in by his imagination. He only has one friend, and he doesn't want to be disappointed by his only friend. And so, his subconscious mind will try to convince him repeatedly that such things really did happen in the past, that Xie Xue really did do all of those things.
He Jiwei: But this is so mystifying that it's hard for me to believe.
Xie Qingcheng: It's not mystifying at all. The human brain is a very complex, precise instrument; such a phenomenon can occur if there's an error in a person's memory and the error is continuously reiterated.
Xie Qingcheng: It's just like how some people confuse dreams with reality, or the so-called Mandela effect.
He Jiwei: The Mandela effect?
Xie Qingcheng: It's not a strictly academic concept, but it's useful as an explanation. Executive He, you can understand it as when entire communities of people share discrepancies in their memories. If you search the internet, you can find many examples of it. For example, does Mickey Mouse wear overalls?
This time, it took He Jiwei some time to respond, as if he had been shocked stupid by Xie Qingcheng asking such a cute question during such a serious conversation.
He Jiwei: I think so.
Xie Qingcheng: He doesn't. But many people believe that he's always worn overalls—this is the Mandela effect. It's an erroneous memory that has been repeatedly affirmed by the human brain, resulting in this kind of impression.
Xie Qingcheng: Executive He, you can think of Mickey Mouse as being equivalent to my sister—she exists, but she's actually never worn overalls. However, He Yu used his own imagination to fill in the two nonexistent overall straps, resolutely believing this to be the truest reality of the matter.
He Jiwei: Then, is this considered a delusional disorder?
Xie Qingcheng: It can't be called that. To He Yu, this is a way for him to protect, comfort, and redeem himself.
A long time passed between this message and his next.
Xie Qingcheng: Executive He, with all due respect, you and Executive Lü don't spend enough time with him. Even children with healthy mindsets can hardly endure such neglect, never mind the fact that he's mentally ill.
Xie Qingcheng: He can't get any care and love, but he's stubborn about showing vulnerability. Perhaps stubborn isn't the right word, but he knows that it's useless to cry or beg because nothing will give him the reaction that he wants, so he's already used to internalizing everything and defending himself. The Xie Xue he imagined was actually his own reflection the entire time; it was his own heart that comforted him, borrowing Xie Xue's image to tell him what he wanted to hear.
Reading these old messages, He Yu thought about the wishes that were buried deep within his heart…
For example, I'll always stay with you.
For example, the words that he never got to hear face-to-face: "Happy Birthday."
Didn't he long for someone to gift those words to him?
But he never got to hear them…
Xie Qingcheng: Since nobody told him, and since he's someone with a strong sense of self-respect, he would never say such things to himself. Therefore, his brain relied partially on his imagination to fulfill his wish while maintaining his dignity at the same time. This is a kind of psychological self-defense mechanism that people have, so there's no need for you to worry too much.
He Jiwei: You've known about this all along?
Xie Qingcheng: I've observed it for a while now. I can't tell him about this, since the shock would be too much. But I always tell Xie Xue to stay a bit further away from him. Xie Xue shouldn't be the person on whom he develops an emotional dependence. Neither of us should be, Executive He. Sooner or later, we'll have to leave.
Xie Qingcheng: I'm a doctor, not He Yu's relative. I can't possibly waste an entire lifetime on a single medical case, and Xie Xue even less. I can only give him guidance, not the type of love he lacks and wants to have. My sister is the same.
He Yu didn't continue reading the following messages; they were no longer important. Knowing this was already enough.
More than enough.
Xie Qingcheng had been deceiving him all along, and Xie Xue wasn't real either. Of the two of them, one was the person who'd once given him the strongest encouragement with his articles of faith, allowing him to believe that there would come a day when he could return to regular society, while the other was the person who'd given him the warmest companionship, who would always rush to his side in the nick of time when he was at his most hopelessly desperate.
Just like how on the night of that torrential downpour, she'd knocked on his door while shouting his name, taken off her raincoat, and presented him with the chocolate cake that he wanted.
He never could have imagined that perhaps that the cake, and that Xie Xue…never existed at all.
Meanwhile, Xie Qingcheng had witnessed his pitiful, lowly self-comfort; the man had seen it all and knew it very well.
No one had ever loved him.
It was his own idiocy! He was too foolish, too stupid, too desperate in his yearning to walk amongst the warmth of the crowd. In order to become a normal person, in order to tuck his hideously ghoulish face away, he'd forged a faintly glimmering glow from within his own bloody skull.
Xie Qingcheng had seen it, but he had said, "I can't possibly waste an entire lifetime on a single medical case, and Xie Xue even less. I can only give him guidance, and not the type of love he lacks and wants to have. My sister is the same."
But if someone possessed love in the first place, why would he lie even to himself? What kind of liar would trick the entire world yet end up deceiving himself the most? Only the poorest, most destitute of liars.
The things he had were too few, and the tears he'd shed were too many. Even "Happy Birthday" was something he could only obtain through his own imagination. If he didn't lie to himself, what could he rely upon to continue living with a smile?
So, even in front of himself, he would wear a smiling mask tightly bolted to his face, which he was loath to take off. He would lie even to himself.
Xie Qingcheng was right. He did have self-respect. He didn't want to be seen as a patient, a madman. He knew that, given the He family's status, many people were waiting to see him come crashing down, to watch him make a fool of himself, to look at his corpse and rejoice in his blood. Thus, he strove even harder to prove himself; he didn't want to receive anyone's pity by showing them his scars.
He Yu stood in the empty living room for a very long time.
He stood there so long that time seemed to become slightly hazy. His gaze was light yet sharp, repeatedly sweeping over the ice-cold tide of messages before him. In the end, that sharp look seemed to have been eroded by the tide, becoming scattered and unfocused.
He slowly closed his eyes.
His mask had grown into his flesh, but Xie Qingcheng had cruelly torn it away. He reached up and touched his own face silently.
It hurt.
It hurt so much…
It hurt so badly it made his heart and entire body shudder.
It felt as though he'd lost everything overnight.
Xie Qingcheng's articles of faith were fake, Xie Xue's closeness was fake; the consolation he had given himself was fake, and in the end, even his self-respect, even the hard shell he used to protect himself, that mask, had been smashed to pieces. Only now did he suddenly realize that—as it turned out, his laughable, clownish face had already been exposed to Xie Qingcheng for many years.
So what exactly was he persevering for? And why did he have to be so stupid?! Risking his life to accompany that person for just a word of acknowledgment in return, or to repay the wisp of hope that Xie Qingcheng had once given him…
He'd disregarded his own life to gain favor with a liar for an all encompassing lie!
He Yu started to laugh softly. He doubled over and leaned against the wall, laughter growing louder and louder, madder and madder, like a vengeful ghost stirring in its grave. The wraiths of sickness in his heart glided out in their hooded cloaks; he put his hand to his forehead as his laughter turned deranged—it seemed furious and hateful, sorrowful yet crazed, as tears fell incessantly down his cheeks…
It really hurt too much.
He saw Xie Qingcheng reach out to him with an open hand, but what lay in his palm was an ice-cold scalpel. This was the actual truth.
He saw Xie Xue pass him a piece of chocolate with a smile, but he blinked his eyes, and she was only gazing at him from afar.
This was the actual truth…
And then he saw… He saw himself standing before the floor-to-ceiling window. A storm was raging outside. The antique grandfather clock in the old residence rang twelve times—it was midnight, and he was surrounded by endless darkness.
But no one knocked on the door.
No one had ever knocked on the door.
He waited from darkness until dawn. The storm had ceased, and the long night had brightened, but he never managed to get a single, sincere wish of "Happy Birthday."
This was the actual truth.
Then, he saw himself strapped to a bed, gagged, as needles pierced his skin. He struggled and wailed like a dying beast, but he couldn't call out anyone's name.
He was a solitary island.
There were no bridges.
This was the actual fucking truth! The truth!
A child who was denied love. In order to resist the demons in the depths of his mind, to keep striving to live on, he lied to anyone and everyone—even himself—for so many years…
He Yu leaned against the wall. He'd already vengefully ripped away the bandages from his shoulder, allowing his wound to tear open. His blood was everywhere. Only the scent of it could please him and ground him and make him feel that he was actually alive! He had a body. The blood he shed was warm. He was a living, breathing person. He was alive… He was alive…
He buried his hands in his hair, knuckles whitening, veins protruding. He was like a blinded dragon with its claws torn out. Having lost the treasures he cherished and the lair he relied on for refuge, he'd been forced out into the sunlight, beneath the clear sky, with each one of his ugly scabs on display for everyone to see and ridicule as they pleased.
He'd finally woken up from his dream.
He'd been struggling for almost twenty years, but he was still insane.
No one had ever loved him, no one had ever cared for him.
He had nothing but a clumsy lie.
He'd never actually managed to earn anything.