“…I like men.”
“...Okay. It’s okay.”
I’m so lucky.
Li Ying hadn’t thought his foster father would be so readily accepting. Not that Li Ying thought he would be outright homophobic or anything, Qian Hong was a very good-natured man, having fostered his ex’s son and everything, but Li Ying had thought…
I don’t know what I thought he would say.
“As long as you’re happy.”
“I think I will be.”
That answer told Qian Hong a lot: Li Ying must have had someone in Shanghai, someone he couldn’t tell them about.
Could it really be him?Qian Hong had a hard time believing it, but his wife was perceptive, and now he too had a feeling.
“Is it Wu Hanjun?”
Qian Hong felt Li Ying freeze in his arms.
Li Ying pulled out of the hug, laughing nervously:
“No! No, Hanjun is… a friend.” Li Ying didn’t know whether his act was believable at all. He sounded fake even in his own ears. “Thank you, Uncle. For everything. I should go now.”
“...Alright. Good night.”
“Good night!” Li Ying left the car and started walking slowly towards the dormitory building, waiting for Uncle Qian to be out of sight before heading to the subway station.
—
“What is this about Li Ying moving to Shanghai?” Mrs. Qian asked her husband first thing when he came back.
She had been in the bedroom, changing into her sleepwear, when Qian Hong had come in. Amy had told her mother about Li Ying’s plans after Li Ying had gone.
“Why am I not told anything in this house? As if I wasn’t sitting at the same table with the rest of you just now!”
“I’m sorry for us having excluded you, Jenn.”
“Did you think I would try to stop him? Why would I? Let him go, see how easy it is to immigrate. I bet he’ll be back at our door by next year.”
“Perhaps, but he should be able to try his wings.”
“Why is he really going? To be Wu Hanjun’s boy toy?”
“Li Ying said he has nobody and that Wu Hanjun is just a friend. I asked.”
Qian Hong would not tell his wife that he was, in fact, quite sure his foster son was dating the Wu heir, or at least had his eye on him. He knew she would have nothing nice to sayabout it.
Chapter 34: A Final Test
As soon as the month turned to June, Li Ying flew back to Shanghai with Anne, on a jet sent by the Wus, of course.
This time he had packed everything he owned; he was moving to Shanghai permanently.
Li Ying had kept himself together until now, more or less, but after the jet had taken off it was all starting to become too real, and he was freaking out.
He was taking turns bounding along the jet in joy and sitting in a foetal position, biting his knee and fretting over every possible thing.