Wild Creatures

Chapter 126

"Thanks for messaging last night that you wouldn't be home," MingJue says, upon seeing him.

Huaisang nodded and sat down heavily on the cream sofa, suddenly feeling exhausted. He sank deeper into the plush softness, closing his eyes and throwing his arm across them for good measure, wanting to shut out the outside world.

No one says anything at first, but then after a few minutes, Huaisang feels the space next to him dip. Before he can open his eyes, he feels the warmth of his softest blanket wrap around him, and he smells the hot chocolate before seeing the steaming mug in front of him.

He looks up to see his older brother standing behind him, ready to knead his shoulders because, a) he can and b) he's the best at shoulder massages.

XiChen is sitting next to him looking worried, and he presses buttons on a remote. Soothing classical music turns on, relaxing Huaisang further.

"Are you hungry, A-Sang?" XiChen asks him.

It's such a simple question, and since Huaisang has already eaten, the answer is no. But it's the care with which those words are spoken, it's not just lip service; these people know and can see how stressed he is, and they're doing their best to make it go away.

He doesn't even know he's crying until Da-Ge comes to sit on his other side and wipes under his eyes with the rough pad of his large thumbs.

"Shall we watch a movie?" XiChen asks him, when Huaisang finds it hard to speak.

He nods, wanting some kind of background noise to fill the emptiness in his chest. To chase away the static in his head.

The Matrix movie is already on and is about halfway through, on one of the channels.

It feels as if the Universe is trying to tell him something.

Huaisang loves this movie; it's on his top ten can-watch-it-anytime-over-and-over list.

It's when the main character, Neo, is asked to make a jump between two skyscrapers, and he's told all he has to do is believe he can do it, that Huaisang sees a parallel between what's going on in the movie, and his life.

More specifically, his immediate situation and that of the main character.

"How do you know what the right thing to do is?" He suddenly asks them. Huaisang gestures towards the screen. "How did he know what to do?"

Da-Ge speaks first. He and XiChen are the bread to his filling right now, sitting on either side of him and comforting Huaisang just by their close proximity.

"You don't know," he says with a sureness. "No one knows what the right thing to do is, most of the time."

"But I," Huaisang pauses to really think about what he wants to say, "I can't not do anything."

"Two negatives don't make a right," XiChen smiles kindly at him. He gestures towards the television screen. "Morpheus was convinced that Neo was the 'one', right? And the only way Neo could move forward was by removing that pressure from himself, and he did that by denial. It freed him to do whatever he needed to do, and the label became a moot point."

"Are you making that about me?" Huaisang glances at both of them.

XiChen grins while shaking his head. "No...are you?"

"The point is, it sometimes helps to step away from the problem because we're too close to it, can't see the wood for the trees, so to speak." Da-Ge tells him.

Huaisang nods, reaching for the remote control himself.

"I've spent all this time, three years to be specific, researching all those missing people, putting the clues together and working it out. I'm ready to go public right now." He looks miserable.