1
He likes listening to music, especially pure music.
The first time I met him was in a supermarket outside the city's People's Hospital. At that time, I was accompanying my friend to the hospital for a health checkup. My friend was misdiagnosed with bone cancer by another hospital, so she came to the city hospital for a follow-up, and while waiting for the final diagnosis, she wanted to eat canned food, so I ran to the supermarket to buy her her favorite canned orange.
When I carried two cans and was ready to go to the checkout, I saw him wandering around the cigarette counter. He was tall, very fair-skinned, handsome, and had a very nice hand for holding cigarettes. In short, he was the kind of boy you couldn't help but look at.
It's a pity that such a handsome boy actually smokes.
While I was checking out, he also picked out a box of cigarettes, not a very expensive brand, the kind that costs more than ten dollars a box, and a box of gum.
We were out the door almost at the same time, and there was a very pretty girl standing in the doorway, looking at him with a look of impatience.
"Why are you so slow...... didn't I tell you to buy some toiletries? Why are you buying cigarettes again, does the hospital let you smoke?"
He smiled, especially gently, "Then I'll come out and smoke."
Her girlfriend rolled her eyes in anger and took the lead. I witnessed the whole thing and thought the boy was just capricious as hell.
Later it turned out that we were almost on the same path: one after the other, one elevator, one floor. I was a little surprised, such a young boy, no way ......
The doctor by this time had arranged a ward for my friend, saying that there was a strong possibility of misdiagnosis, but that it would be prudent to be admitted for a few days for observation.
Coincidentally, I ran into him again, in the same room. He had changed into a hospital gown and was standing by the window, wearing headphones.
When we came in, he glanced at me and smiled politely.
My friend became a nymphomaniac and tugged at me to sneak in, "So handsome, so handsome!" I laughed at her heartlessness; I was more nervous than she herself actually was about the lack of a final diagnosis.
Then his girlfriend came in, dragged him outside and talked for a long time, and when she came in, he was left alone.
My friend urged me to strike up a conversation, and while I chided her for not knowing better and smelling the hospital disinfectant, I still obliged her capricious request.
"It's noon, do you want to eat? I'll bring one for you." I asked him.
He froze for a moment, took off his headphones and looked at me seriously, I knew he hadn't heard me just then, so I asked again.
"That would be a pleasure, thank you." He smiled again.
I didn't react for a moment, was he so ...... nonchalant?
Because I thought the hospital food was bad, I went all the way to get my friend's favorite crab meat casserole and shrimp dumplings. It was only when I went back to hand him the other one that I remembered to ask if he could eat seafood.
"It's fine, thank you, let's add a wechat later and I'll transfer it to you." He had already copied his chopsticks.
I cried and laughed a little.
After serving them dinner, he also opened his box and kept talking to me, spouting about the hospital food and the carelessness of the nurses.
No wonder his girlfriend was angry, she did act like a little kid.
"Ugh, why does your voice sound so familiar to me?" He asked suddenly.
Before I had a chance to speak, my friend exclaimed, "Like ballads? Know Xu Sansheng?"
He was busy nodding like a rabbit.
My friend pointed at me smugly, "Xu San Cheng himself."
He looked shocked and stared at me for a long time without uttering a word.
I smiled helplessly, I didn't realize that wards could run into fans who liked my music.
2
"Just play one song, big guy, I managed to sneak in my guitar." He pestered me.
I smiled helplessly, "No noise in the wards."
He followed me, "We're the only three people in the ward, the soundproofing is so good, the doctors and nurses just finished checking in, they won't be coming."
Me: "No noise is allowed in hospitals."
He leaned back against the window in frustration and went off to look sadly up at the sky with his guitar at a forty-five degree angle.
My friend couldn't bear it, "Just play one song, don't you usually keep your guitar with you? Too cruel."
My friend is alive and kicking these days, it's been a while since the misdiagnosis, and she knows for sure that she doesn't have the disease at all, but she's happy to play dumb when the doctor won't hospitalize her in order to look at the handsome man.
I knew she was sympathizing with him, living here at such a young age, and even though her friend had been misdiagnosed, once upon a time, she'd experienced that desperation.
"Just play one." I sigh.
The two of them cheer, and he sits on his hospital bed, legs crossed and cheeks resting, looking at me intently, as if there are stars in his eyes.
I purposely chose a ballad with a more upbeat melody to try and break the cold silence inherent in the hospital room, I wanted to break the haze in his mind that hadn't shown up in front of people, I knew that it was cancer and that no one had it and still looked unconcerned.
His heart, in fact, broken into several petals?
At the end of the song, my friends applauded, but he was silent, after a while, he called me: "Big Brother, do you know which of your songs is my favorite?"
I froze.
He handed me the headphones and played an as-yet-untitled tune. The melody played, a brief twenty seconds, a blend of guitar and piano riffs, no vocals, but as if I could see the soft but resilient gesture of a newborn force as it broke through the ground.
This is a demo I didn't finish, but uploaded it to my homepage before it became famous. It's amazing how time has changed, and I've been reunited in this way.
"You know what? I've had it on a single loop forever, I wouldn't have come to the hospital without it." He grunted.
It was as if something hit me in the heart, "Why?"
"My dream is to travel to the limit, I'm not afraid to die, but when I got checked out for this shit, I realized that I'm not afraid, I'm not willing."
He wore the somewhat ill-fitting hospital gown that very day, as easily as talking about not eating at lunch.
"I want to live, I'm only twenty-four, I haven't gotten to know everyone around me, I haven't had a good relationship, I haven't graduated from college, and I haven't even started a life. Not even out of breath and no sound ...... how TM suffocating ah."
He laughed bitterly, his eyes slightly red.
3
My friend is fine and discharged from the hospital, but I still run to the hospital every day, because I promised, to write him a song.
He had already started the first stage of chemotherapy, the whole person often confused, I came to catch up with his spirit sometimes very good, he would ask me if the song was written.
"Almost." I said.
It's really close, I've got almost all my friends who play music together, making a big deal out of it, grinding it out over and over and over again, just to make a song, a pure song based on that unfinished demo.
Really soon.
"Ugh, you know what, I broke up with my girlfriend." He sat there sighing.
I laughed and said, "Sad?"
"It's okay, since I got this disease, I see a lot of things clearly, breaking up is good for everyone, my life is almost over, I can't just consume someone else's girl's youth!?"
I said, "Bone cancer can be cured, there are precedents."
He didn't laugh, "That's someone else's ah, I know better than anyone in my own heart. Now I don't think like that, I just think that one more day of life is one more day of profit."
Then he added, "I had a dream yesterday that I was misdiagnosed, just like your friend, and then I was so excited that I ran out of this damn hospital without even taking off my gown!"
My eyes glazed over, "What ghost hospital? This is the best hospital in the city."
He suddenly fell silent, then said, "Well, it really can't be a misdiagnosis."
I didn't mean it that way, but I didn't know how to explain it, and for a moment, I was a little speechless.
He smiled "heh heh", looked sideways out the window, and then turned back, his eyes watery. "Do you think it's extraordinarily unproductive that I'm a big man who's become rambling since I got sick?"
I didn't know what to say, and with the excuse that I had to get back to my music, I hurried out the door.
I was crying on the way, I could feel his fear of death, and the happier he laughed, the less he knew.
At night he sent me a weibo message: big brother, I want to eat crab meat casserole tomorrow, trouble you, quill!
His WeChat avatar was a full-body photo of himself, dressed in a cool hip-hop outfit, framed in a dance move.
The older boy in the photo was smiling uncontrollably, all light in his eyes, not swallowed up by a bit of gloom.
This was when he wasn't sick.
The more I looked at it, the more heartbreaking it became, but I still sent him back a crying emoji: Roger that.
When I entered the hospital room the next day, I was shocked to see him sitting on the hospital bed with ghostly eyes and a white sheet over his head, styled like a nun.
"If I could run and jump, I'd definitely chop up that old man."
I was baffled, "What's going on?"
He took the sheet off, revealing a bare head, "He damn shaved my hair, what's my face?"
I looked at the rounded brain and forced myself not to laugh, "Well ...... it's not ugly."
"And handsome?"
"Uh-huh."
"Still graceful?"
"Uh ...... hmm."
"You're not lying to me, are you?"
I couldn't help myself, "Hahaha, wait for me to laugh ...... not lying to you really, haha."
He threw a pillow over and wailed, "Get out get out get out, I can't see anyone!"
4
Then it took a lot of coaxing before he finally stopped gambling.
"Where are your parents?" I asked him.
"My mom works in a foreign province, I didn't tell him that I was sick, the surgery was signed by my girlfriend at the time. As for my dad ...... he died when I was in middle school."
I was dumbfounded.
"Biggie, I've been hurting all over for the past few days, in fact, the last time I asked you to help me bring food was because I suddenly had too much pain in my legs to stand it, otherwise I wouldn't have let a girl run errands for me."
I was a little worried, "So that's it, so where do you hurt now? I'll call the doctor."
He stopped me, "Don't don't don't, I'm just having a hard time, so handsome I am, usually those girls run after me, to nowadays just because of a meal I leaked my micro-signal, ugh."
I rolled my eyes, "You have a big face."
"Ugh, get me the cigarettes I have hidden in the drawer." He pointed to the drawer.
"Why? You're like this and you're still smoking?" I was like an enemy.
"What are you thinking? What do I smoke ...... you bring it over." He shook his hand.
I watched him light the cigarette in his hand after I half-heartedly found it and handed it to him.
Get out of bed, put on his shoes, straighten his back, walk, raise his hand ......Every action, he did it unusually difficult, his temples sweating like rain, his lips white, but he grunted did not grunt.
"Today is the anniversary of my father's death, can not get out of the hospital this year, just worship here, secretly, you are not allowed to tell the nurse." He grinned at me.
"This was my dad's favorite cigarette."
The next second, he suddenly went limp on top of me.
"It hurts ...... big guy, I hurt all over, can you help me to bed." He had a sobbing voice and his breathing became very heavy.
I panicked and helped him to lie down on the bed and rushed to the doctor.
Suddenly an emergency surgery, it turned out that before, the hospital for him to organize a network fund-raising, he was in the operating room, I urgently advanced the remaining 40,000.
That day I kept running between floors, I don't know why I ran so fast, I just felt that if I slowed down a bit, I wouldn't be able to see him.
The doctor notified his family anyway, and I stood in front of the hospital until late afternoon, when I saw a short, vicissitudinous, short-haired woman rush in.
I didn't know what else to do and stayed with my aunt until the lights went out in the operating room.
His eyes were closed and he was very weak, in a completely different state from the day. His mom instantly fell to her knees and started bawling when she saw what her son had become.
I followed the doctor to his office and he said, "The surgery was unsuccessful, it was very rushed and not all of the cancer cells were removed, the only thing that can be done at this point is to have chemotherapy over and over again, which will provide some relief."
I have cold hands and feet.
5
In the past few days, he has been in a coma, and I have been visiting him in the hospital often. his mother is very nice, and told me not to delay my own work, and that I would be contacted when he woke up.
She thought that I was his son's girlfriend, and I didn't explain.
The song was ready, I sent it to the musician's personal homepage and told the story behind the song. In just one day, the number of plays exceeded hundreds of thousands.
Some people were asking for ways to donate in private messages, others were praying for him.
I didn't reject these people's good intentions and provided his Alipay account. He was still young and I didn't want his life to come to an abrupt end.
Almost a week later, his mom called and said he had woken up, I rushed to the hospital room. When I pushed open the door, his mom wasn't there, so he was sitting on the hospital bed, hunched over, wearing headphones and weeping.
When I first met him, the tall and handsome boy was now huddled there with a pale face, looking very thin.
He saw me and smiled, "Thanks, big guy."
I didn't control my tears either and walked over to crouch in front of the hospital bed. "See those comments? A lot of people are rooting for you, no matter how hard it is, no matter how much it hurts, just hang in there, okay?"
He rubbed his phone, "It really hurts and it's exhausting."
"I'm with you, so many people are with you, you can't give up, when you're better, I'll write you another song."
He stared at the screen of his cell phone, smiled suddenly, and nodded.
Afterward, I had lost track of time, a month, two months? One of the always had time, and I went to the hospital to see him, to talk to him, to talk to him.
Some people ask if we are in love, this question I have no way to answer, because during this time, my whole person is derailed from the original established life, I am running for a person who knows no more than a few months.
I didn't have the heart to think about anything else, I just hoped, he would pull through.
During this period, he had countless chemotherapy treatments, large and small. Countless courses of treatment, countless liquids and oral medications, ascending white injection ...... every time a shot, he would vomit, faint, red face.
"It sucks, I don't want to hold out, I'm sorry ah sorry ......" Every time he was in a daze, he held my hand or the doctor's hand and rambled. A few of the little nurses also wiped tears.
Although he said so, but every time once awake, for the non-treatment, he shut his mouth.
I was heartbroken, really.
But I still want him to hang in there.
6
The day he left, it was terribly overcast.
"Biggie, I want to get some sun." He said as he lay in bed.
I plugged my headphones into his ears, "Be good, listen to this song and I'll take you out."
He was quiet for a while and started moaning again, "I hurt."
"Where does it hurt?"
"It hurts all over ...... You talk to me, I can't sleep." He muttered.
I softened my tone, "What do you want to hear me say?"
"Biggie, is there anything ...... you want to do right?"
"Yes, I want to sing for the rest of my life."
He grinned, "That's great, when I get out of the hospital, can I sit on stage with you and sing?"
I rubbed my eyes, "You sing too hard!"
"Huh? It's okay. The doctor won't let me do extreme sports, so I'll just follow you to a national concert, where you sit on stage and sing, and I'll sit next to you ......"
"Why are you sitting next to me?"
He laughed, his voice muffled, "I'm responsible for looking beautiful, you are responsible for earning money to support the family."
"Yeah."
I couldn't wipe away my tears, one by one, they all dripped on his hands, his mom just came in, saw him like this, covered her mouth and kept sobbing.
He seemed to hear his mom's voice and yelled in a whisper, "Mom come here."
His mom walked over and grabbed his hand tightly.
"Mom don't cry, the more you cry the more it hurts on me, rub it for me will you?"
I turned my back, listening to the murmur of their mother and son, looking at the crashing rain outside, and for the first time, I immensely hated the weather.
"Biggie."
I turned back.
"Thanks for the song, you're a good looking guy." He closed his eyes and let out a laugh, "But I'm sorry ah, I'm really sorry ......"
He was suddenly silent.
I froze for a long time, his mother kept rubbing his face, crying while softly calling his name, trying to wake him up ...... But he just lay there peacefully and quietly, since the beginning, ignoring the noise of the outside world.
I finally collapsed to the floor, breaking down and crying.
7
It was May, the grass was long and the weather was warm.
It's been two months since he left, and I finally came to terms with the fact and posted on Twitter that he had passed away. The comments section was full of words of condolence and regret.
Sometimes, I really blame God, why do you treat a big boy who loves life so much? Even though our lives did not intersect, hearing that such a vibrant life was lost because of an illness is a depressing experience that can't be released from the mouth of the heart.
But the dead are gone, and the living can't bring them back to life, even if they're not happy about it.
I am glad that I left a piece of music in the rest of his life, and he will live in more people's hearts because of this music.
And he, in turn, left me with what must be the most genuine and kindest smile of this life.
May he be well in heaven, and I will spend the rest of my life cherishing every day, every minute, every second for him.
Only sigh: I heard the flowers have bloomed, the gentleman Hu did not return?