Chapter 636
Pain
"Han Zhou, doesn't your heart hurt?"
"It doesn't hurt."
"Does it hurt here?"
"It doesn't hurt."
"And here, does it hurt?"
"It doesn't hurt."
"here……"
In the hospital corridor, Han Zhou looked at Gu Zheng, who was half a head shorter than him, and said helplessly, "Gu Zheng, if you ask me if my conscience hurts, it does hurt a lot, but my heart really doesn't hurt. Can you please stop pressing on it randomly?"
He never expected that the "liar" Gu Zheng was referring to wasn't the cat-ear pajamas he saw in his new home, but rather the medical record he found in his hometown.
The medical record that diagnosed late-stage dilated cardiomyopathy.
This is an organic lesion characterized by ventricular enlargement and systolic dysfunction, with widespread degeneration and necrosis of myocardial cells and interstitial fibrosis, causing the heart to function like a paralyzed pump with an ejection fraction of less than 30%. It is a recognized irreversible change and can lead to sudden death at any time due to malignant arrhythmias or pump failure.
That's right, it was because of this medical record that Gu Zheng was angry all day. She was angry that he didn't tell her, and even angrier that he refused to get proper treatment.
Han Zhou kept the medical record simply to have a shield when facing those debt collectors, so he casually stuffed it into the drawer. However, he did not expect that Gu Zheng not only got the key to his new house from Yi Xia, but also the key to his old house. This morning, she even went to his old house to find the medical record.
Ever since she took him to the hospital by bike, Gu Zheng had been in a domineering mode. From registration to electrocardiogram to blood tests, if he dared to say a word more, he would be met with Gu Zheng's cold stare. It wasn't until the doctor said "the problem should not be serious" that her tense nerves relaxed a little. But a moment later, her hand restlessly pressed against his chest again.
You should know that she wasn't massaging through your clothes. In this cold weather, even if that hand was small and soft, it still felt chilling to the bone when it touched your body.
"I'll press it, so what?"
Gu Zheng retorted stubbornly, "Who told you to lie to me so much? What if you and the doctor conspired to lie to me?"
Han Zhou was both amused and exasperated: "How could I be so powerful?"
"That doctor was clearly taken aback when he saw the medical record, and then looked at you for a while before saying it was a misdiagnosis. Don't think I didn't see you giving him the eye the whole time. How do you explain that?"
How else can it be explained? This doctor was my attending physician at the time, the one who personally told me I wouldn't survive that winter. Now, seeing me still lively and energetic, how could he not be stunned...?
Han Zhou felt helpless because he had been diagnosed with a terminal illness at this hospital and had been trying his best to avoid coming there ever since.
Gu Zheng and Lin Anyu both knew about this, but after his explanations, they only thought that the hospital was corrupt. Because of this, when they were sick, they would go to another hospital for treatment.
Now that things have come to this, Gu Zheng naturally noticed something was amiss. She not only dragged him into the hospital but also found the attending physician at the time and interrogated him about the authenticity of the medical record in an almost threatening tone.
Han Zhou strongly suspected that the doctor was intimidated by Gu Zheng's aggressive demeanor, which was why he was hesitant to confirm the authenticity of the medical record he had once issued.
He said softly, "Take a close look at the date on your medical record. That was a diagnosis from two years ago. If it hadn't been a misdiagnosis, would I still be alive today?"
"Then why are you keeping it?"
"Have you forgotten? My dad has a huge group of creditors. They can't find my dad, so they can only come to my house to look for me. Someone like me who can't even kill a chicken can't fight back, and calling the police won't help either, so this is the only way to get them to have some compassion."
"Why didn't you tell me these things sooner?" Guzheng asked.
“Those people are like leeches, even the police can’t do anything with them, let alone you.”
"Why don't you just come and stay at my place?"
Han Zhou was taken aback: "I remember that your relatives came to visit around that time..."
"Auntie is auntie, what does it have to do with being related to me? And what does it have to do with you staying at my house?"
Han Zhou was silent for a moment: "No... I'm talking about a real relative. She's staying in that guest room in your house."
Gu Zheng was silent for a while before saying, "Then why don't you sleep in my room?"
"Huh?" Han Zhou wondered if he had misheard.
Gu Zheng said matter-of-factly, "My bed is big enough for two people. We can each use a blanket."
"This……"
"I can stay at your place."
Gu Zheng tried hard to stay calm, but looking at Han Zhou's slightly pale face, she became more and more agitated as she spoke, wishing she could bite him. "We clearly agreed that as long as I'm here, no one can bully you. Can you please stop ignoring what I say?"
As soon as she said those words, she could clearly feel Han Zhou's heart rate quicken. She was momentarily stunned, then subtly tightened her grip.
"Have you been secretly working out behind my back?" she asked casually.
The sudden turn of events startled Han Zhou, who nodded blankly.
My heart rate has calmed down.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Guzheng asked again.
Which matter are you referring to?
My heart started racing again.
"all."
"...I was afraid you'd worry."
"Oh."
Gu Zheng nodded first, then looked over expressionlessly, pinching the soft flesh of his chest with her index finger and thumb. "Didn't you say it was a misdiagnosis?"
"hiss--"
Han Zhou gasped in pain, grimacing as he said, "I didn't know it was a misdiagnosis at first."
"So that means you were deliberately hiding it from me back then." Gu Zheng tightened her grip on the zither.
"I already told you I was afraid you'd worry... Ouch—"
"I'm sorry, I was wrong! I'll never do it again!"
Gu Zheng only let go of Han Zhou when he raised his hands in surrender, but her palm was still pressed against his warm chest. She turned her head slightly and said in a muffled voice, "Don't hide it from me next time."
"……it is good."
Looking at the girl's dejected profile, Han Zhou hesitated for a moment, then said softly, "I was just afraid you'd be like this, that's why..."
"So that's why you kept it from me?" Guzheng continued his question.
"Ah."
Han Zhou gave a wry smile and frankly expressed his thoughts at the time: "I have left nothing in this world. If all I can leave behind is regret, wouldn't that be too tragic?"
"Regret? What regret?"
Guzheng turned her head and looked at him, giving him a disapproving glare. "You didn't expect me to cry, did you?"
Seeing the girl's reddened eyes, Han Zhou wisely refrained from pointing it out. He simply smiled and said, "It would be even better if she didn't cry."
The air suddenly became quiet.
In the distance, the faint sound of stretcher wheels rolling could be heard, mixed with hurried footsteps and cries. Inside this building, some people were signing critical condition notices, some had just lost loved ones, and they were simply sitting side by side, waiting for a report that everything was normal.
In this place filled with birth, aging, sickness, and death, it's already incredibly lucky that it was just a "false alarm." Gu Zheng looked away and sniffed.
“Coward,” she said suddenly.
"I'm sorry," Han Zhou replied softly.
I'm talking about myself.
Gu Zheng glanced at him, "But you're not much better off."
Han Zhou nodded: "I don't deny that."
"So, are you planning to change this bad habit?"
Gu Zheng turned her head slightly and said in a casual tone, "Anyway, I've already decided to change it."
"That's rare." Han Zhou didn't answer directly, but joked, "I thought you would never change."
"Didn't you say you would support all my decisions? Are you lying to me about this too?" Gu Zheng immediately became unhappy.
"This is absolutely true."
Han Zhou smiled and said, "No matter how you change, I'll still like you."
Gu Zheng froze, a blush instantly spreading across her cheeks. She hurriedly covered her face, unsure where to look, and after a long pause, stammered, "No, you can't say anymore, or what will I say next..."
Her voice grew softer and softer, even softer than a bell, so that even with Han Zhou's amazing hearing, he couldn't make out what she was saying.
Most importantly, at the end, Guzheng pressed her hand back onto his chest.
Han Zhou's lips twitched.
As two nurses walked down the corridor, Gu Zheng's hand was still pressed against his chest. Even with his thick skin, he felt a little embarrassed and said in a low voice, "The lesion of dilated cardiomyopathy is in the myocardium itself. Pressing on the chest should not hurt. Even if you press on me until I scream, it will not prove that this is dilated cardiomyopathy."
"I don't care."
Gu Zheng's face was still red, but her tone was quite domineering, "I won't believe a single word you say now."
Han Zhou felt a headache coming on: "But this is a hospital, it's not appropriate for you to keep pressing like this, is it?"
"What would be considered proper? Go to the toilet to press it?"
Han Zhou never imagined that one day he would hear such lewd words from Gu Zheng.
He sighed helplessly: "Can't you even consider taking your hands out of my clothes?"
"No."
"No room for negotiation?"
"There's no room for negotiation."
During the conversation, several more patients' family members, each with a little girl, walked past them with extremely strange expressions.
"Mommy, what's wrong with that boy?" the little girl asked in a low voice.
"I don't know, maybe it's breast cancer," the man explained with a forced smile.
"I heard from the doctor that my mother has breast cancer."
"You misheard me, Mom is fine."
“But Dad, you just said ‘also’…”
"Then the doctor made a mistake in the diagnosis. I'm going to see the doctor to confirm it now."
"really?"
"Of course it's true."
When Han Zhou heard the man say that he had breast cancer, his eyes twitched, but looking at the man's hurried and anxious appearance, he really couldn't bring himself to complain.
He could only pray that the man's hopes wouldn't be dashed, and that his wife's illness was indeed just a misdiagnosis.
Seeing that Guzheng still showed no sign of letting go, he had no choice but to resort to his ultimate move, leaning close to Guzheng's ear and saying, "If you keep pressing down like that, I'm going to press it back down when we get back this afternoon."
As expected, the moment she finished speaking, Gu Zheng's face flushed red. But instead of letting go as expected, she raised her head and gritted her teeth fiercely: "I'll press it then, who's afraid of who!"
Han Zhou noticed that her eyes were even redder. Clearly, she had heard what the man had just said. She was very worried that his illness might not have been misdiagnosed. Even if it had developed a few years later, it didn't necessarily mean that things were moving in a better direction.
"Are you serious?" he asked.
"If you're serious, then I'm serious!"
Seeing that this guy still had the mind to joke, Gu Zheng's eyes immediately reddened. She wiped her eyes hard and put her hand back inside his clothes, afraid that his strong heartbeat might become weak or disappear. Her voice was slightly choked.
"If the diagnosis is good, you can do whatever you want!"
"Really, whatever you do..."
Before he could finish speaking, Han Zhou suddenly froze.
The girl, who had been holding on all day, could no longer hold back her tears, which streamed down her face uncontrollably.
But she bit her lip tightly and refused to make a sound; only the hand pressed against his chest trembled slightly.
This was the first time Han Zhou had ever seen the guzheng so fragile in all the time they had known each other.
He didn't know what to say. As Gu Zheng had said, the other party wouldn't believe anything he said before the diagnosis was out, so he could only open his arms and try to pull the girl into his embrace.
But the next second, Guzheng pushed his face away, wiped her tears haphazardly, and choked out, "Turn your head away, don't look. I'm not crying, do you hear me?"
Han Zhou obediently turned his head away and listened silently to the guzheng's murmured chanting.
“Listen carefully, no matter if the diagnosis is good or bad, no matter if you die or not, and no matter if I will ever see you again, I will not cry, I will only laugh.”
“If we get sick, we’ll go to the best hospital and find the best doctors. It’s not like we don’t have money. My parents prepared a lot of dowry for me. If it’s not enough, I’ll ask them for more… Xiaoxiao can work part-time while studying, and so can I.”
"This disease seems to make people weak, but it doesn't matter. I'm so strong that even if you're bedridden and can't move, I can still carry you all over the world."
"If you had told me sooner, I would have chosen medical school when filling out my college application. I can be number one in everything, and maybe I could have found a treatment for this disease much sooner. You know that if I want to be number one, there's nothing I can't do..."
Han Zhou listened quietly, and then he realized that Gu Zheng had been silent all morning not because she was angry with him, but because she was thinking about these things.
She's not incapable of using the internet; how could she not know what late-stage dilated cardiomyopathy means? Yet she insists on acting as if nothing is wrong, as if she herself is the patient.
Finally, Gu Zheng stopped crying. She turned her head back to look at me, her face still streaked with tears, and said with a smug look, "I've said all this just to tell you one thing: you don't need to hide it from me out of fear that I'll worry, because I haven't worried at all. Do you understand?"
"Ah."
Han Zhou opened his mouth, but could only squeeze out this one word.
The next second, a warm body crashed into his arms.
Gu Zheng buried her face in his chest, her ear pressed against his heart, which had been sentenced to death, as if she wanted to personally confirm every beat.
"Stop lying to me," she said. (End of Chapter)