Psycho Chapter 14

I'm going to bed right now but let me first apologize for the poor English in this chapter. Please don't burn my house thanks.

Chapter 14, Gloom

Ye Zi sat on the bed inside the completely dark room. Hare was cleaning up the scene outside and would occasionally make a rattling or banging noise every so often. Ye Zi had no idea what he had done, and in fact, he wasn't interested.

There was already a new message there in his inbox, received yesterday. In it was information on an old woman. Just like with Jiang Wei last time, the information was extremely detailed. Ye Zi would turn on the screen sometimes, and turn it off a short while later, causing the lights to come and go in the room.

Finally, he tossed the phone aside and slouched over, digging his fingers deep into his hair.

God. What the hell happened?

What happened?

It would be nice if everything was just a dream.

But what was he going to do now?

What can he do?

He had no idea how long had passed but he suddenly heard a knock on his door. Then, the door was opened. A yellow glow entered the room, gradually expanding in an arc.

Hare who didn't appear to have a single trace of blood left on him walked towards Ye Zi. His hair was still wet with water droplets dripping down at their ends, dripping onto the ground. Drop after drop, exuding the faint aroma of his shampoo.

“Ah Zi, are you okay?” he asked with worry.

Ye Zi still hung his head with his hands in his hair, his voice hoarse. “it's over.”

“What's over?”

“It's all over. We'll get caught.”

“That won't…”

Before Hare could finish, he was interrupted by Ye Zi. Ye Zi's voice gradually grew louder and his body trembled along. “The camera footage is surefire evidence. She came to my house but she never left. The guard at the door can testify as well. Maybe she might've met someone she knew along the way, or maybe someone in the market would recognize her, maybe the neighbors saw her. If they have evidence, the police can conduct a search. The floors and the sofa…There'll definitely be traces of blood…”

Hare crouched down in front of Ye Zi and raised his head up to look at him, reassuring him softly, “That won't happen. I've already checked. The cameras on your side of the apartment have already broken down for months and nobody came to fix it. The guard today is new, and he was playing on his phone while he was guarding the entrance. He might not remember your girlfriend. What's more, she came early when barely anyone was around, so I don't think the neighbors would've seen her either.”

“Phone! Her phone! Where's her phone?! She sent me a message and they'll definitely be able to locate her if they find her phone…” Ye Zi's eyes widened and his body began to shake terribly. “There's no way the cameras on the streets would be broken…right? She might have told her family or friends about where she went…Also…we didn't do any preparations this time…”

Hare grabbed Ye Zi's arms and raised his voice. “Calm down, Ah Zi! You're not the one who killed her. I did! Even if we get caught, I'll be the one in trouble. It has nothing to do with you.”

“How could it have nothing to do with me…”

“You have to trust me!” Hare looked into his eyes and said softly to him, “No matter what, I'll never let anything happen to you. I told you that I'd protect you, so trust me, Ah Zi. You don't have to worry about anything. Don't be scared.”

…

Nie Haixia's disappearance caused a great stir on campus, and Nie Haixia's parents came to the school several times to kick up a fuss about it. After all, their daughter had disappeared during a school day.

Ye Zi continued to take his exams at school and pretended to be calm. But in reality, he began to fear the police. As soon as he saw one, he would instantly think that they were there to capture him. Every single night, he would have the same recurring nightmare.

Everything was pure white inside of that dream. He couldn't feel his own existence as if everything had just disappeared. Then, globs of large black figures would enter from the doors and the windows, surrounding him, chattering around him as if they were discussing amongst each other. Rubbing his eyes and taking a closer look, he realized that they were all rabbits. There was a big rabbit, a small one, a smiling one, a crying one, and even a bleeding rabbit.

Ye Zi's body thinned at a visible rate. One day, when he looked in the mirror of the school's restroom one day, he realized that his skin had become morbidly pale with a dense bruise under his eyes. His hair was in a mess and a fine stubble had grown out on his jaw. He was a completely pitiful sight, just like a terminally ill patient.

Naturally, his classmates noticed the changes in him as well. They all believed that it was due to him taking the disappearance of his girlfriend too hard. Many people tried to comfort him and told him that his girlfriend would come back. People would sometimes flee from the real world so they could head out to a distant place for a break when they grew into adulthood, and they all told him that Nie Haixia would return.

A dozen days later, the police began their investigations at the campus. Of course, Ye Zi was a prime suspect of the case. They interrogated a total of three times, and there was even a police officer who visited his apartment.

By the third interrogation, Ye Zi really wanted to give up on saying all the things Hare taught him. He wanted to just come clean.

Because he really was in the wrong.

He and Hare took a total of three lives.

What would be the meaning of them robbing those people of their lives? What was the meaning of living such a depressing life?

But his phone suddenly rang.

His mother called.

Receiving a nod from the officer in front of him, Ye Zi took the call.

On the other hand of the phone, his mother's voice that came over the receiver was gentle. “Ah Zi, why haven't you come to my place to eat? We brought back so many regional specialties for you to try. Do you have classes this afternoon?”

“No.”

“What's wrong? Your voice is hoarse. Did you catch a cold?”

“No…”

“I bought stir-fried beef with bamboo shoots and bone broth with kelp. They're all your favorites. Why don't you come eat? Me and your uncle…Ah no. Dad has some good news to tell you.”

“Mm…”

This call saved Ye Zi. He nearly came out with the truth, but he swallowed his words back down again.

Finally, he was let go by the officer, and finally, he stepped into his mom and uncle's house. He saw the wind chimes hanging in the doorway and smelled the tempting aroma. Then, he watched his mother come toward him cheerfully with an apron around her waist, offering him a pair of slippers. He watched his uncle put down his newspapers and nodding towards him before asking enthusiastically about his studies and his health. Many times, Ye Zi felt like he was going to cry.

At this moment, he really wished he could go back to the times when he was young.

Whenever he got in trouble at school, he would be scolded by his dad when he came back and got a spanking on his butt, but he would quickly be forgiven as soon as he apologized. If he ever wanted to cry, he could just do it with abandon. He was the only child at home. He was their precious son. They would all get anxious when he cried and tried to comfort him. His dad would fill up his bowl with food and say, “It's alright. Just don't do it again next time.” Then, his mom would serve up his favorite ice cream after dinner, and bring him out in the evenings so they could talk while walking together…

How nice would it be if he was the biological son of his parents?

If he was their real child, then he would never be replaced.

If he were their real child, he wouldn't have to leave that home with his mother.

If he were their real child, then mom wouldn't meet that bastard, and he would never have killed him. He never would have killed another unrelated person. He would never want to kill. Never doing wrong after wrong after wrong…

“What are you thinking about?” his uncle asked.

Ye Zi smiled. “It's nothing. The stuff you guys brought back is nice is all.”

“That one's ginger candy. Your mom said you liked sweets so I bought more of them. If you ever want to go on a trip in the future, you should just come with us. Then we'll be able to buy you anything you liked.”

“Okay, Dad.”

The man was surprised when he heard the word “dad”. Then, a happy smile emerged on his face.

His mom brought a plate of fruit and said, “Why are you so thin? You don't look so good either. Is the food at school no good? Or have you been staying up too late? If the food is the problem, you can just eat at our place next time. Your dad rarely eats at home so it's no fun for me to eat alone anyway.”

“Mm…” Ye Zi dropped his head and took a deep breath.

God knows how hard he had to try to prevent his tears from falling.

God knows how much he wished he could turn back into a child, crying out as he clutched onto his mother's clothes.

But he couldn't. He was grown now and he didn't want them to worry.

After a while, Ye Zi raised his head and his face had turned calm again. Softly, he said, “Oh yeah, Mom. You said you've got good news for me. What is it?”

His mother's cheeks turned red. “Ah Zi, you're going to have a little sister soon.”

Ye Zi was surprised. “You're pregnant? For how long?”

“Four months!”

“That's wonderful…Congratulations.”

Ye Zi was happy for his mother. Finally, her new family was complete. She has a new husband, and she'll have a new daughter in the future. How wonderful.

At the same time, however, he also felt a strange sense of sorrow.

Finally, he, the adopted child, will be replaced once more by the real one.

What use did he have left?

Sure enough, nobody wanted to choose him. Isn't that right?

The instant these gloomy feelings rose up, Ye Zi forced them away.

He really is selfish.

But that's good. Very good.

In the future, even if he does get caught and received the death sentence, at least someone would take care of his mother.

Ye Zi felt a strong need to just head out and relax.

He ignored the messages on his phone and got on a bus one weekend, riding it to the final stop, going to the place he always liked going as a child. But what once was a forest had now been reduced to nothing. The small hills had mostly been dug up and trash was piled up on one of the foothills. The farms were barren just like a fish with most of its scales plucked off, pitifully slumped on the ground.

Ye Zi walked along the mountain path that was covered in brown dirt and would occasionally see a few peach trees. There were pedestrians gathered around to take pictures, happily ripping off their branches and posing charmingly in front of their cameras before tossing the flowers away to the curb.

Clearly, this place had been so filled with trees in his memories.

There were tall elm trees, soap pod trees, blackboard trees, and laurels. He liked to climb up the tree trunks and searched the bird nests, and he liked to pull off the leaves from the bamboo tree and his nanny told him that they could make a drink that could help clear the heat[1] by boiling them. He liked collecting cicada shells and catching all sorts of bugs and tiny creatures like crickets, butterflies, beetles, and snails. There were also plenty of wild strawberries and mulberries along the way, and his tongue would turn purple when he ate them, which looked really weird and scary…

Finally, Ye Zi arrived at a single plot of land that had not been destroyed.

It was beautiful and looked the same as when he was just a kid.

Large expanses of nature was blooming with all sorts of flowers that he couldn't name. There were red ones, orange ones, and yellow ones. By the pond were thing blades of grass reaching up to his knees that bore purple wildflowers that exuded a wonderful fragrance. The trees were tall and there were tiny shrubs around the area with large stones that reflected his figure under the pond. As long as you looked closely, you would be able to find green aquatic plants growing densely at the bottom with tiny swimming fishes that were blowing up their bubbles.

Ye Zi sat on the grass which fluttered along with the wind. When he put his hand down on them, he could feel that it was cool.

He couldn't resist the urge to lie down and cover his eyes with the back of his hands.

After adjusting his eyes for a moment, he opened them slowly and gazed up at the sky.

The sky was an azure blue and the clouds looked like they were creating patterns atop blue drawing paper. Every time the wet paintbrush landed down, the white paint would blossom on top of the paper, forming flower after milky white flower. With a gentle blow of the wet paint on the canvas, fibrous traces would emerge like thin thread forming from spun cotton.

A light breeze blew by, causing the hundreds of leaves around him to sway and rustle.

Ye Zi took a deep breath and muttered, “Come out. Aren't you tired standing there for so long?”

Hare who had been secretly watching him from beside the tall trees walked out in surprise and crouched down by Ye Zi's side. He was somewhat tongue-tied and was trying his best to find a way he could comfort Ye Zi without making him unhappy.

But Ye Zi turned his body over slightly and said only two words before closing his eyes. “Don't speak.”

Hare quickly swallowed down the words he wanted to say and just stared at Ye Zi's profile, his slightly messy black hair, and his cutely shaped ears in the breeze. No matter how many times he looked at him, he would never get sick of it.

Sleep well, Ah Zi.

Whether you sleep until dusk, till night came, or even till tomorrow, it'll be fine.

I'll always be here with you.

Notes:
[1]In Chinese medicine, we need to balance out the yin and yang in our bodies with the food we eat. Eating too much heaty foods like fried foods or meat will make us feel uncomfortable or sick, so we balance it out with a cooling drink or food like fruits(not lychee that stuff is infamous for being HEATY AF apparently. As the saying goes 1 lychee = 🔥🔥🔥).

Chapter end