A Certain Someone ( The On1y One ) Chapter 074 – Numb Legs

“Ge, What Are We Now?”

As a patient, Jiang Tian had approximately zero self-awareness.

Sheng Wang managed to locate the sickbay, refilled the hot water dispenser and plugged it in—he did not want to come back to only cold water for Jiang Tian to drink after he goes to buy the medicine—but the moment he turned around, Jiang Tian already got up from the bed.
His school bag was upended on his bed, the zip wide open. Inside it was the script that Sheng Wang had seized for himself for the entire night. His hand grabbed a bag strap, and he sat on the bed with his head lowered, trying to wait for the dizziness to pass.

He probably heard Sheng Wang’s footsteps. He croaked, “Give me five minutes.”
“What five minutes?” Sheng Wang stilled, “Why are you up?”
Jiang Tian said, “I’m going to class.”
Sheng Wang: “???”

“I’ve already asked the teacher to excuse you from class, what do you mean by going to class. Stay lying down.” Sheng Wang strided over, wanting to take his bag away. Jiang Tian dodged him.
He opened his eyes, “It’s not that bad.”
“You’re in my hands, whether it’s that bad is entirely up to me,” Sheng Wang returned what Jiang Tian said before, word for word. He gripped the other end of the bag, and stared at him with a dangerous gleam in his eyes, “Are you lying down or not? If you aren’t, I’m taking off your jacket.”

Jiang Tian looked at Sheng Wang, a little speechless, his gaze passing through the messy fringe on his forehead. Perhaps it was from his pale complexion, his eyes were darker than usual, a few traces of sickness lingered.
A while later, he finally felt that standing off like this was simply foolish. He looked away and let go of the bag.
Sheng Wang immediately stuffed his bag in the upper bunk.

“Lie down for a bit first, the hot water is cooking, it will probably take a few minutes—” Sheng Wang wore a jacket, took out a small sports bag from the closet and slung it behind his back.
He wasn’t done briefing Jiang Tian, but Jiang Tian cut him off, “You’re going to class?”
“Huh?” Sheng Wang paused. “No, I asked for leave too.”
“Then where are you going?”
Sheng Wang waved the campus guide in his hand. “Taking medicine for you from the sickbay.”

Jiang Tian withdrew his gaze. He coughed to the side before he said, “No need for medicine, some hot water will do.”
“I’m boiling hot water, not Miracle Healing Water.” Sheng Wang flipped the collars up to cover the lower half of his face, “If you insist on being like this, I’ll find a way to get infected. Then the two of us can both drink hot water, and see who can triumph over the illness with willpower alone first.”
Jiang Tian: “…”

Seeing that he finally went back to lying down on his bed with no further protests, Sheng Wang left the dorm in satisfaction. The school’s sickbay was next to the students’ dormitory, it was a little far away from the teachers’ condos in front of the hill. He jogged all the way there.

There weren’t that many complicated procedures to acquire medicine, it was okay to take on the behalf of other people too. There were two teachers on duty, and one of them asked him, “What’s the situation, how did he get the fever?”
“He probably showered with cold water.”
“Cold water? In this weather?”
Sheng Wang stared at the ground and was silent for a few seconds before nodding. “Mn.”

It was the teacher on duty who was at the opposite table who said instead, “Hey, you’ll never know. This is the third person claiming medicine today. Wasn’t there a water outage in the teachers’ condo last night? There were some who legit showered with cold water. However, those two didn’t have a fever—they just got a sore throat.”
“Oh, I see. I thought it’s some other student who couldn’t take it anymore and is trying to score a sick leave.” The teacher smiled at Sheng Wang apologetically, and said, “I’m going to grab medicine for you now, hold on, okay?”

The school hospital was probably afraid that the students would eat indiscriminately, so the school didn’t give that much in quantity. However, they did give him an additional thermometer. Sheng Wang kept the medicine, and just as the teacher was about to remind “feel free to come for IV drip for a faster recovery”, Sheng Wang had already went down the stairs three steps at a time with his bag over his shoulder, and then disappearing around the corner in a couple of steps as he ran.

Sheng Wang sprinted back to the dorm, and the moment he opened the door, a certain person who wasn’t obediently lying down was caught in the act. Jiang Tian stood by the basin; he probably just finished washing up, there was still a towel in his hand, he still clearly smelled like mint.
“Ha, caught red handed; do you have anything in your defense?” Sheng Wang was a little warm from running. He settled the medicine and porridge on the table, rolled his sleeves up and turned to capture someone.
Jiang Tian had nothing to say. He silently left the basin. He stood before the table, took out two containers of porridge from the plastic bag, and pushed one over to Sheng Wang.

“The teacher said take two pills for this medicine.” Sheng Wang was opening up the box, and suddenly turned to his Ge in suspicion. “Did you use cold water or hot water when you washed your face?”
Jiang Tian’s hands—in the midst of dividing the chopsticks—paused. He plainly said, “Hot.”
Sheng Wang reached over to touch his face—it was cold to the touch.
Jiang Tian: “…”
Sheng Wang: “You think I’m stupid?”

Jiang Tian did not even look up. He stuffed a spoon in his hand, saying, “Focus on your food.”
The hell with the food, how incredible you are with changing the topic. Sheng Wang thought. However, as long as he heard Jiang Tian’s husky and tired voice, he couldn’t make himself stern with him at all.

Young master Sheng was rather particular when it came to being ill himself, but it was the first time he had to take care of someone else like this. The person who fell sick was Jiang Tian, so he wanted to use all and any method to reduce fevers possible, and thus he couldn’t help but to be a little worked up.
He stared at Jiang Tian, making sure he ate the porridge and the medicine, ensuring he went to obediently lie down on the bed for the second time, then he sat by the bed to change into his shoes.

He just stood up when someone grabbed his wrist.
“Where are you going again?” Jiang Tian asked.
“Heading downstairs to buy some stuff,” Sheng Wang said.
Jiang Tian’s boiling hot fingers loosened a little, and slid down along his wrist. He lifted his quilt, saying, “I’m going down with you.”
“Why are you going down?” Sheng Wang acutely pressed the side of the blanket down. “I’m just buying some cotton swabs and chips. I saw some alcohol on the shelf next to the basin earlier on, you can bring your fever down by smearing some on yourself.”

Jiang Tian frowned. “No need for the trouble, the medicine is enough.”
“Auntie Sun used to smear some on my forehead and arms,” Sheng Wang said.
“I don’t need that.”
“Do you dissipate heat at a particularly fast rate or?”
“Yes.”
“……”

Afterwards, whenever Sheng Wang wanted to go do something he would always end up getting vetoed by Jiang Tian’s singular vote. All he would say was “No need” “Don’t want” “Don’t go”. This person was already cold and stubborn on a normal basis, now that he’s ill he only became worse.
Initially, Sheng Wang thought he was just being stubborn, he wanted his face and was refusing to admit that he’s sick, or that he wanted to prove that his body was especially healthy even when he’s ill, he’ll recover with some water etc.

Later, he leaned against the glass counter as he waited for a new pot of water to boil, as well as searching for shops that provided food suitable for a patient to eat. Without knowing it, he stayed a little too long in the kitchen. Within that time period, Jiang Tian left the bed twice: once with a cup in his hands, wanting to get some water, the other being that he accidentally got some dust on his hands from the inner side of the bed railing, so he’s there to wash his hands.

Sheng Wang was baffled for quite a while and still could not figure out how exactly the dust managed to get on his hands. So, he simply brought the newly boiled water back to the bedside, continuing to keep his eyes on him. This time, he remained seated, and Jiang Tian did not ask for any more water, neither did he leave the bed.

Only until a certain someone gave in to the effects of the medicine and finally fell into deep sleep once more, then Sheng Wang realised in a certain moment—it’s possible that it wasn’t that his Ge wanted to cling on to his pride, but that he was just a little clingy when he’s ill.

To be fair, he couldn’t be blamed for realising too late. It was more like nobody would associate the term “clingy” with Jiang Tian at all. But now that the connection was made, it was like something magical occurred.
Sheng Wang left his chair and silently leaned inwards as he propped himself against the bed—Jiang Tian was sleeping on his side, facing the wall. His lips pursed into a straight line, like he reverted back to his usual “strangers beware” state.

Sheng Wang silently eliminated in his mind: it had to be either Old Man Ding of Jiang Ou who ever got the chance to take care of Jiang Tian when he’s sick, right? He wondered if Jiang Tian would be like this towards them too.
Intuition told him he wouldn’t, but he thought his intuition wasn’t humble enough.
Be more modest—he could be within the top three.
The young master was instantly thrilled, his long legs caused the chair to rock back and forth. Still, his happiness did not last for too long as someone wasn’t quite obedient even when he’s asleep.The feverish person would experience sudden chills, or suddenly feel hot. It’s too easy to feel stuffy in the process of recovering from a fever. When Sheng Wang was asleep while he’s sick, he would wrap himself tighter than a burrito. Jiang Tian was his antonym.

As this person slept, his blanket would retreat from his jaw to his chest. Sometimes, when he was so warm that his brows furrowed tightly, he would directly flip the upper half of the blanket down, squashing it beneath his arms.

In a single hour, he lifted the blanket six times, and Sheng Wang covered the blanket back on him six times too. While doing so, he even nearly woke him up.
In the end, Sheng Wang stood by the bed with a headache, and said in a low voice, “You forced my hand.”

He went to the closet to take out yet another blanket, adding another layer to seal the person within his quilt, covering him up nice and tight……and then he climbed on top of him.

He grabbed a pillow from the upper bunk as his backrest, and sat horizontally across the bed with his back against the wall. He kept his legs straight, pressing them down against Jiang Tian’s lower leg with the quilt between them, pretending that he was a weight weighing him down.
From then onwards, Jiang Tian was abnormally well behaved in his sleep; he did not even turn around.

He picked a particularly good spot; the sun happened to shine upon this area, his bones lazily melted away from the glow. He was dozing off from reading the lecture notes, so he took the photo album from the upper bunk and flipped through it.
There were only less than 20 photos no matter how many times he flipped, yet he could still keep flipping through. He managed to continue until Jiang Tian got enough sleep and woke up, and then he went to sit next to him.

“Are you still feeling terrible?” Sheng Wang’s palm covered his forehead, and passed the digital thermometer to him. “You don’t seem as feverish as in the morning.”
Jiang Tian sat next to him, shoulder to shoulder; the warmth of human skin diffused to him across fabrics. He held the thermometer near his ears for a while, and said, “Much better now.”

The thermometer beeped. He looked at the temperature with his eyes lowered, and showed the indication to Sheng Wang. It was below 38 degrees, much better than the one taken in the morning.
“Hungry?” Sheng Wang asked.
Jiang Tian shook his head.
Sheng Wang said, “Then I’m going to pour some water for you.”
Jiang Tian held him back just as he was about to stand up. He said, “I don’t want it.”

With the new found knowledge of “clingy” he acquired, Sheng Wang automatically translated this into “Sit next to me for a while”. Therefore, he was obedient and did not hurry off the bed.
Jiang Tian looked at the photo album—now flipped open—with lowered lids. He asked, “Why do you keep looking at this page?”
Sheng Wang pointed at the last photo with his silhouette, saying, “Feels like it’s missing a photo.”

Jiang Tian stilled. “Which one’s missing?”
Sheng Wang raised his phone next to him, and captured the instant Jiang Tian looked towards the camera.

In the photo, two boys sat shoulders to shoulders. The bright and genial morning sun of the beginning of winter shone upon them, gently covering up those few traces of sickness. Sheng Wang’s eyes were crescent in a smile, effervescent. Jiang Tian just happened to look up, his thin eyelids nearly translucent under the sunlight; quiet, and alive.

“Okay.” Sheng Wang tapped on the photo, and waved at Jiang Tian, “It’s complete now.”

“Just nice, there is still a slot for another photo below this one, we can find a shop at night to print it out.” As he spoke, he folded his legs, wanting to change his sitting position. However, the moment he curled a leg, his expression immediately turned complicated.

“What the, hisssss—”
Jiang Tian shot a glance at him. “What?”
“Numb.”

Jiang Tian looked at the way Sheng Wang didn’t know if he should laugh or cry, and asked, “Which leg is numb?”
“Two legs.” Sheng Wang’s head rested against that bent leg. “Both of them are numb.”

Jiang Tian, dumbfounded, shook his head. He reached out to squeeze the muscle on the other leg. “How long have you been sitting?”
“More than two hours,” Sheng Wang said, muffled.
“You don’t know how to change your position?”
“Forgot.”
……

Sheng Wang’s head rested on his knee, and let Jiang Tian massage the stretched out leg as he liked. Quite a while later, he suddenly bent his knee, and stopped Jiang Tian’s wrist with his hand. “Don’t squeeze anymore.”

Jiang Tian paused, and turned to him. “You’re fine now?”
“No.”

Sheng Wang answered with a word, and no longer spoke. He only looked up again after quite a few seconds later. He let go, and the warmth that came from Jiang Tian lingered on his thigh. It gradually faded away.

In a long period of time after that, nobody spoke at all.
Sheng Wang bent his legs, propping his elbows on his knees. He lowered his eyes in his hammering heartbeat, pounding like a drum, waiting for the tension and restlessness in the air to slowly dissipate.

In a certain moment, he vaguely realised that he and Jiang Tian were actually in a pretty odd state—they both knew each other’s feelings damn well, but they still seemed to be somewhat neither here nor there. As such, he kept feeling like that layer of intimacy had always been hovering in thin air, never did it once truly settle on the ground.

He was quiet for quite a while with his head lowered, and suddenly played with Jiang Tian’s finger. “Ge, what are we now?”

TO BE CONTINUED.