8 Chapter 8
Li Junfeng was at the hotel balcony. It was half past three in the morning and the lights were already off in the bedroom where Li Shaoze was sleeping. He worked with his laptop until just one hour ago and due to Li Junfeng's piercing glare, he finally decided to sleep.
Li Junfeng recalled two tablets of sleeping pills that his brother casually took out from the bottle on the bedroom drawer before he went to bed. After swallowing them, Li Shaoze then bade him goodnight as if it was nothing.
As a wandering soul on earth, Li Junfeng of course couldn't sleep. His range of activity was actually just being there- wandering. So to pass the time, he went to the balcony and was thinking about his lover again.
Li Junfeng decided not to go visit the Pei residence because he was still unreconciled about Pei Qian. These past few days, he had seen her crying non-stop under the quilt. He just met her in the day during the funeral so he thought it should be fine.
His heart hurt just thinking about it.
"I wonder if she's still crying under the duvet," he sighed with a sad smile. He had reminded her through Li Shaoze not to do so, so she must have gone to sleep peacefully tonight.
Li Junfeng stayed for the sake of fulfilling his regrets but he wasn't quite sure how to do it. He was afraid that his brother would be alone for the rest of his life. He was also afraid that Pei Qian wouldn't move on.
Li Junfeng pursed his lips and he turned around to see his sleeping brother behind the sliding door. The balcony was adjacent to the master bedroom where Li Shaoze was so he could see him.
Li Junfeng had been thinking ever since he found out he was dead. He had been thinking hard and seeing Li Shaoze standing in front of Pei Qian under the green lush tree was enough to calm his restless heart and make up his mind.
He made a decision to pair his brother up with his lover. He was going to matchmake them and be a cupid.
For some reason, he felt Li Shaoze was the man who could accompany Pei Qian in her life and Pei Qian should be the one to heal his brother and support him. He thought they would be perfect together.
Li Junfeng knew other men would fall short to deserve Pei Qian. She was a lovely woman and the one he treasured the most. He didn't believe in the others but if it was his brother, he thought it would be wonderful.
Li Shaoze had had many things going on in his life and he was an awkward individual. Li Junfeng worried that Li Shaoze couldn't extricate himself from his shell he built so why not let Pei Qian be closer to him so that they could become each other's support?
Li Junfeng wasn't thinking arbitrarily but he somehow had a feeling that the two would be able to be together. Maybe the reason he died was so that they could become a couple.
"....."
He didn't know whether to curse on fate or something.
The cold breeze swept on slowly but he didn't feel anything. The city was still bustling at this time in the night but Li Junfeng felt alone. He looked down from the 50th floor of the hotel as he swore to himself that he would make it work.
He wouldn't be able to get past that huge golden door if it was otherwise.
***
Pei Qian opened her eyes as she jolted awake in the middle of the night. She brushed her hair aside as it fell down her shoulder and to her chest. She heaved up a sigh and recalled the funeral today.
Ever since Li Junfeng passed away, she had been unable to have a good night's sleep. She often woke up in the wee hour of the night and cried alone. Today should be the same too.
But she was able to hold back because she remembered what Li Shaoze had said. She was somewhat hopeful that what he said was really what Li Junfeng wanted to deliver to her.
Pei Qian wanted to do what he told her to even though it sounded absurd. She was still reluctant to believe Li Shaoze but she wanted to know more. She was curious about his claim to be able to see souls.
Once she made up her mind, Pei Qian got up to go to the bathroom and once she was done, she heard a knock on the door.
"Qian'er, you there?" it was her brother Pei Zeyan.
The two of them decided to have a walk on the backyard where their mother grew flowers to design her garden.
It was cold at night and Pei Zeyan made his sister wear his woolen coat. He glanced at her and saw her tired face. He knew she must have woken up due to stress again.
He was worried as he asked, "Why aren't you sleeping at this hour?"
Pei Qian smiled in order to make him less worried as she said, "Then why aren't you sleeping too?"
"I'm different. I have a lot of work to deal with nowadays," he replied with a grin.
Pei Qian nodded absentmindedly. She knew the reason he was busy recently was because of her. He had made sure to take some of his annual vacation days just to be with her in this difficult time. He wanted to be with her to make sure she wasn't depressed or overly saddened.
Pei Qian felt guilty but at the same time she was glad that he was by her side. Her family all supported her after Li Junfeng's passing and although she was reluctant in her heart, she felt that she had to carry on for her family's sake.
"I'm alright now, brother. I'll feel sad if you worry like this," she said as she felt the warmth from the bottom of her heart. Apart from her dead lover, her family was the most important to her.
"Then promise me that you'll change back to the usual you. I want you to smile everyday like you always do," Pei Zeyan said slowly.
He knew he was asking for too much since there was no way his sister would return to who she was before without Li Junfeng. He knew it was hard work but he still couldn't bear to see her in constant sadness.
Pei Zeyan had never fallen in love like his sister did so he couldn't relate to her loss. But he knew that if he had a woman in his heart and he lost her, he would feel devastated. So he tried his best to understand Pei Qian's situation.
"By the way... I saw you talking with a man at the funeral but I didn't recognize him," Pei Zeyan said as he looked at Pei Qian. He almost forgot to mention it but now that he remembered, he asked immediately.
Pei Qian still had a good impression of Li Shaoze because of Li Junfeng so she didn't hide anything, "That was Li Junfeng's older brother, Li Shaoze. He came for the funeral,"
Pei Zeyan was surprised. Pei Qian was the same age as Li Junfeng which meant they were both 27. But he was older by three years and was 30 this year. He remembered Li Shaoze because they were of the same age. Obviously they were the same grade in school.
He had a bit of impression about Li Shaoze during school because he was a very mediocre student. He didn't stand out and was mostly alone by himself due to the Li's obvious disdain against him and it made others look at him as someone to avoid.
But what made Pei Zeyan remember Li Shaoze was because of a certain day when he was in charge of helping as a teacher's assistant during exam. As a student council president, Pei Zeyan had to look over the invigilation process and he once saw a record about a student with very ordinary but eye-catching grades.
That student was Li Shaoze. He read the whole record and saw that for every subject Li Shaoze took, he would often fall short of above average marks. But there were no failed marks on any subjects either. If there were 100 people in a grade, then his name would always steer around the 50s for the whole semester.
Pei Zeyan thought Li Shaoze should just try to put in some effort for a bit more to get the above average results but later when he continued to observe the next term, he found out that Li Shaoze stayed constant even until their last year of high school. The consistency was rather obvious as he looked further into it.
He didn't want to think too much but Pei Zeyan had a feeling that Li Shaoze had deliberately controlled his own grades so as to appear mediocre. After that when they were about to graduate, he as the student council president had to give an official speech. He saw Li Shaoze under the stage for the first time and realized that his conjecture might have been true.
Li Shaoze at the time was just like any other youth about to graduate, but his eyes and his temperament showed a very different resonance. His black eyes were darker than anyone's, making people think that he was gloomy and cold. But underneath that, his attitude was also calm like the sea.
Pei Zeyan had always had an eye for people and that was why he had supported Li Junfeng as his sister's boyfriend. The same also applied to when he saw Li Shaoze. He felt that Li Shaoze was a person with a story and was hard to read. However, he also appeared very weak-minded as if he didn't care about anything at all.
