He Lives In You (COMP.)

27th CHAPTER: CAVE IN

XIAO ZHAN POV

"What if?"

These two words, these simple words that stab my heart deeper than I could imagine, keep on bugging me, day and night for the last 3 months. Ever since that day, when we went to Yibo's Uncle's house and he told me the story about Yuta and him, he had been behaving strangely. Not distant, but somewhat, constrained.

2 weeks after that visit, I finally moved in with him and I felt happy, except for those nights that he spends alone in Yuta's room, wasting his health drinking liquor. Why? I ask myself too, whenever I'm in the shower or eating breakfast alone or when I'm at work. And, whenever my mind is not occupied with something else, crazy thoughts sabotage its peace. What in the world did I get myself into? I often wonder but, when you love someone to the extent that you feel like you're going to go crazy without them, other alternatives will automatically go down straight to the drain.

Other times, what if it's just my guilt forcing me to stay with Yibo? Probably not, if so, I would've never wasted my time convincing my self that nothing is my fault, that I didn't choose it to be that way, that Yuta willingly gave me his heart and have already spit out to him the truth but no, I selected to stay.

I wanted to because I love him. Simple as that. And, not telling him saves me from the possibility of losing him.

On a gladder side though, Zhou Cheng and Haikuan finally announced their relationship, proudly. Haikuan admitting to everybody, especially to his Uncle about his sexuality somehow lifted the dark clouds above everybody's heads that day, particularly the two brothers, giving way for them to start exchanging smiles again. Yibo felt proud of his older brother for coming out and accepting Zhou Cheng as his partner, even though he had known for a long time. People like us knows which is which when we see one, I suppose.

That awkward atmosphere between the brothers, Yibo and me at that time, inside that considerably huge dining area, disappeared. At least, for a little while.

Everybody beamed when Zhou Cheng and their uncle exchanged a hug, including Yibo who I noticed was blushing. And at that moment, Yuta's face came into my mind. Questions and doubts started piling up in my already uptight psyche, again. Did he do that? Did he do this? Maybe that, maybe this. The what-ifs and what-not. Although I never felt that I was being left out, given that the old man already gave me a piece of that embrace, that peculiar feeling that I don't belong there, wavered. More so, it intentionally followed me home and never left since then.

The entire meal, I sat there looking at the newly blessed lovers settling across the table, lovingly staring at each other as if no one else is present except them, while the person sitting next to me, did nothing but stare blankly at the single pea on his plate, chasing and forcefully trying to poke it with his fork.

He was too occupied hunting the thing that he was beginning to ignore the other stuff still present on that ceramic platter.

I'm not unhappy, but, I can't say that I'm okay either and my emotions are falling into a deeper hole whenever I try and peek at his expressionless nature. We don't argue, at least not yet, and we don't talk about anything except work, sex, more sex and in between those conversations, he always finds a way to incorporate Yuta. What he liked and doesn't, how he did things, how he was so good at everything, this and that but, none about us. None about me.

Sometimes, I would find it strange how much time we spend talking about a dead person as if he's only away on a business trip or something but, oddly enough, I find it satisfying too. Fulfilling in a way that I get to see Yibo's eyes light up every time we talk about him and his naturally perfect smile because of it, even though I know that his smile is not for me, at least, he is smiling with me.