[Synopsis]
Xu Zhaoran has two secrets.
The first is that he doesn't think he's Xu Yichuan's biological son.
The second is that he seems to have developed feelings for this man he calls his father, feelings he shouldn't have.
Once the seed was buried in the soil and showed the tiniest, most pathetic sprout, it took root and grew, sweeping through his entire adolescent heart almost in the blink of an eye. Yet he didn't dare cross the line.
Because he knew Xu Yichuan had a terrible temper.
"Get out."
Xu Zhaoran had been drinking, and his eyes were red. For the first time, he exposed his shameful feelings to Xu Yichuan, though he himself had been wholly unprepared for it.
At that very moment, Xu Yichuan's hands and feet were trembling. Looking at the child he had raised with his own hands, he felt regret for the first time in his life.
For an instant, it was as if he had returned to that time, to the hospital.
The paternity test in his hand was soaked through with sweat. His eyes burned red with rage, and the hand holding the paper was shaking uncontrollably.
"Why the hell did I go to all that trouble raising someone else's kid?!"
"What the hell is all this?!"
Back then, Xu Yichuan swore the first thing he would do when he got home was throw the little brat out, bag and all.
But in the end, he tossed the paternity test he hadn't even looked at into the trash.
"Xu Zhaoran is my son, Xu Yichuan's son. I said so," Xu Yichuan told everyone calmly. "He was my son then, he is my son now, and he'll be my son in the future."
Everyone who knew the truth warned him at the time, "Chuan, you'll regret this."
Xu Yichuan said he wouldn't.
And in all those years, Xu Yichuan truly never regretted it. He'd brought the boy home, and he'd raised him. He said the boy was his son, so his son he would be for life.
But now...
"Get out." Xu Yichuan irritably flicked his lighter and lit the cigarette between his lips. "After doing something this damn awful, don't expect anything from me.
"From now on, I'll act like I don't have a son."
In the firelight, Xu Zhaoran's face looked even paler, and his lips trembled uncontrollably.
He left that ordinary night without taking anything with him.
For years afterward, whenever Xu Yichuan woke in the middle of the night, he would feel dazed, as if everything that happened that night had been a dream, and yet somehow it hadn't.
Thinking of it, he seemed to smoke even more heavily.
He told Xu Zhaoran to leave, and Xu Zhaoran really did. All these years, he hadn't said a word or left behind a single message.
Six years after he left, Xu Yichuan's company faced an unprecedented crisis.
Every investor had run off. Just as he was beginning to think he was doomed, he received an invitation to work with a company he'd never even heard of before.
He glanced at his watch, lowered his eyelids, and sighed impatiently.
But before he could breathe out, he froze.
"Hello, Mr. Xu. I'm Shen Xu."
"Sorry to keep you waiting."
Xu Yichuan jerked his head up, only to see the face he hadn't seen in six years.
Sharp-tongued but softhearted, bad-tempered daddy bottom x younger, gloomy male ghost top, hard in every way except his mouth
[Reading Guide and Content Warnings]
1. Not biologically father and son. The child was born to the father's fiancee, but isn't biologically his. They are not related by blood and are not registered in the same household.
2. Younger top, 16-year age gap, neither is sexually inexperienced. The mother is six years older than the father. The parents' story takes place earlier, in a rural setting in the 1980s and 1990s. Back then, they were too young to register their marriage, but they got engaged early.
3. Some business-related content is purely there to move the plot along. I'm not a professional, so please bear with me.
4. The characters' values are not the author's values! No one is perfect! If you like it, that's our good fortune. If you want to drop it, there's no need to tell me.
Theme: Life is a process.
