***

Ever since Ren Xinxin was discharged, rain or s.h.i.+ne, Yu Dong would send over some soup and visit Little Bell. As for how Xinxin's daughter ended up being called this, Xiaoyue would hold a variety of toys out to play with the little child, and the baby would always have the biggest response towards the toy bell. Hence, Little Bell was named.

(T/N Pinyin for Little Bell is Ling Dang, just in case it ever comes up.)

Seeing Yu Dong play with Bell, Ren Xinxin smiled: "Since you like children so much you should consider making one."

"If it happens, let it happen." Yu Dong laughed sweetly.

"Oh? You're already trying?" Ren Xinxin was a little surprised.

"Yeah." Yu Dong admitted readily.

"That's great." Ren Xinxin was somewhat surprised at first, but she seemed to think of something as she asked: "But I heard a while ago that Xia Feng's ex-girlfriend was back in town?"

"She's an ex-girlfriend; what can Xia Feng still have to do with her?" Yu Dong shrugged.

"You must not be careless." Ren Xinxin saw Yu Dong's smug smile and couldn't help but remind her.

"Don't worry, I've been vigilant." Yu Dong winked.

Ren Xinxin shook her head with a smile. Glancing at the time, she said, "Didn't you say you were going to talk about a contract with the crew? you should hurry and go."

"Oh!" Looking at her watch, Yu Dong found that she really couldn't stay.

........

City Hospital, Surgical Office.

An anxious nurse was running through the ward, pus.h.i.+ng the door of the office: "Dr. Shao hurry, Dr. Xia is getting beaten by a family."

"What?" Shao Yifan, who had been slurping noodles, almost did a spit-take.

"A patient didn't make it off the operating table this morning, so they surrounded Dr. Xia." The little nurse explained.

Shao Yifan dropped the chopsticks in his hand and ran with the little nurse all the way to the operating room. When he neared, he saw five or six people surrounding Xia Feng, pus.h.i.+ng him around. Xia Feng looked tired as he stayed silent, letting them push him around. Several nurses were trying to stop this in vain.

"What are you doing?" Shao Yifan ran over and squeezed his body through to block a fierce middle-aged man.

"What am I doing? This quack killed my old man, I want him to pay with his life." The middle-aged man was the eldest son of Xia Feng's patient. He was pointing towards Xia Feng with heated eyes.

"It was a very risky operation, we've talked about it before the surgery," Shao Yifan said, "Your family members signed the waiver."

"We didn't know." A middle-aged woman cried out, "I asked about dad's complicated lung surgery and asked that your surgical director, Dr.Zhong, to do it. But why is this young doctor here, he doesn't have the ability at all, why did he operate on my father? isn't he to blame?"

"Yes, we put out trust in the hospital, yet you treat human lives like gra.s.s." Several people joined in.

(T/N Human lives like gra.s.s is an idiom meaning that someone easily disregards human beings/easily ending lives like cutting gra.s.s)

"It was the patient himself who asked Dr. Xia to operate on him." The head nurse couldn't stand these accusations and loudly interjected on the side.

"He was fooled." The second daughter of the deceased pointed towards Xia Feng and said, "I know that younger doctors with little qualifications don't have many chances to do major surgery, so seeing that my dad is old and confused, he must have cheated and coerced him to sign."

"You're talking nonsense!" The head nurse angrily retorted, "The patient had too many tumors, and his lungs have become completely necrotic. Coupled with the ma.s.sive bleeding during the operation, Dr. Xia couldn't have saved him no matter what he did."

"My dad was still alive and well before the operation, how could he be dead just like that?"

"Right, something must have happened during the operation."

"I'm reporting you."

Xia Feng raised his head, his eyes blank as he looked at family members, all giving him vicious stares. He walked past Shao Yifan and calmly said: "Mr. Li Min was in the later stages of lung cancer. After I opened his chest cavity, it was discovered that his tumor has spread to other internal organs and couldn't be removed anymore. Considering that the patient was old, surgery wasn't recommended, and I started to close the chest. But the patient's heart suddenly tremored, and the blood vessels ruptured, inducing hemorrhage. Any attempts of rescue were ineffective and the patient died."

"Whatever excuses you have doesn't change the fact that you killed him. You must give us a proper account of why the blood vessels burst for no reason." The middle-aged man yelled as he stepped forward again.

Shao Yifan quickly went past to protect Xia Feng again. At this time, An An arrived with the security guard, eventually controlling the situation and herding them towards the Medical Department office.

Then the surgical director who came to see Xia Feng sighed and said, "Xia Feng, you go back and rest first, I'll deal with the rest."

"No, I'm alright, I can handle it." Xia Feng shook his head.

"The patient's family members are emotional right now; you should avoid them for now." The director advised, "I knew about the patient's condition and the patient did ask for you to operate. This shouldn't be a big problem, you should go back first."

Xia Feng nodded and went to the locker room in a trance.

Shao Yifan was just about to follow him, but a nurse called him to prepare for an upcoming surgery. So in the end, Shao Yifan could only glance towards Xia Feng's back before turning around and leaving.

"Dr. Xia is really unfortunate. It was clearly the patient you asked Dr. Xia to operate on him."

"Yeah, yeah, those children, when the old man was bedridden no one was around but the moment something happened they suddenly became filial."

"That's right. And besides, it was our director said that Dr. Xia's skills aren't inferior to his."

"...."

As the nurses talked, An An listened in for a while before following Xia Feng to the locker rooms, worried.

Xia Feng was inside, leaning against his locker. His face was blank and his mind was replaying the operation. The open chest with tumors spread in a large area. If he had found out earlier, he would have never advised the old man to do the surgery. Then perhaps, he would have lived a little longer instead of dying on the operating table.

Xia Feng first slammed against a locker.

An An was outside the door when she heard a loud bang. Concerned, she almost rushed inside, but in the end, she let go of the doork.n.o.b.

Xia Feng was a proud man, and he wouldn't want anyone seeing him when he's feeling this low.

After a long time, when the air wasn't so tense, Xia Feng managed to calm down. He turned and opened his locker. He looked at the black phone inside, before slowly reaching out to turn it on. His fingers pressed a few b.u.t.tons and Yu Dong's name flashed on the screen.

Yu Dong was waiting for the director to finish filming when her phone rang. Looking at the screen, she saw that it was Xia Feng calling. With a smile, she answered: "Xia Feng."

"Where are you?"

"I'm about to talk to a director regarding a contract." Yu Dong readily replied.

"Can...can you possible come back?"

"Xia Feng? What happened?" Yu Dong could clearly tell that Xia Feng's voice didn't sound right.

"I want to see you."

"I'm coming back now." Yu Dong profusely apologized to the director who had alreay suspended filming and directly ran out, regardless of their startled eyes.

An An, who had been hiding on the other side of the locker door, heard Xia Feng's phone call. She suddenly realized that in fact, Xia Feng really didn't need her anymore.

With a bitter smile, An An turned and finally left.

It took an hour and a half to drive back home from the set, but Yu Dong managed to shorten the travel time by 20 minutes.

Yu Dong had been uneasy the entire drive home and only calmed when she opened the door and found Xia Feng sitting quietly in the living room.

"Xia Feng." Not bothering to change out of her high heels, Yu Dong eagerly walked over and crouched in front of Xia Feng, "What happened?"

Xia Feng carefully observed the Yu Dong in front of him. She was wearing a suit, her makeup delicate, and her face full of concern. She was dressed a little more extravagantly than usual, but it was still her.

Xia Feng slowly raised a hand and without any warning, suddenly turned and pressed Yu Dong on the sofa, kissing her hard.

Yu Dong didn't know what was going on and was stunned by Xia Feng's abrupt movements. His lips felt different from his past gentle kisses, and his fierce actions held a slightly salty taste.

Xia Feng rudely took off Yu Dong's winter coat, dropping it on the ground. He then opened her s.h.i.+rt, revealing the white underwear inside.

Yu Dong felt a little pain from being bitten, but she didn't hide. Instead, she went along with Xia Feng's movements, letting him do as he pleases.

Xia Feng's hands came down to the b.u.t.tons of Yu Dong's trousers, but he suddenly stopped just before the b.u.t.tons became undone.

Noticing Xia Feng stop, Yu Dong slowly opened her eyes. Wrapping her arms around Xia Feng's still form, she asked softly: "Why aren't you continuing?"

Xia Feng raised his head from Yu Dong's chest and looked down at the red and swollen lips of his wife. He reached out and gently helped Yu Dong sit up, straightening her s.h.i.+rt.

"I'm sorry!" Xia Feng looked towards Yu Dong, his eyes full of guilt.

"Can you tell me what happened?" Yu Dong gently caressed Xia Feng's face, her eyes full of heartache and patience.

Xia Feng smiled bitterly and then slowly recounted everything that happened in the hospital today.

"Mr. Li trusted me, but I didn't fully understand his condition."

"You didn't know that his tumors had spread." Yu Dong comforted.

"But if I didn't do his surgery, his blood vessels wouldn't have ruptured..." Xia Feng closed his eyes in pain.

"It was an accident. Changing doctors wouldn't have changed the results."

"Maybe his daughter was right, that I pushed to do this operation. If I had waited two days when the director was free..." Xia Feng thought that maybe Li's illness would've been more obvious, and they would have noticed the spread of the tumor.

"You did the operation because you knew that nothing would've changed if you had waited for the director." Yu Dong shook her head, "Even if the operation was delayed, the results wouldn't have changed."

"I'm a doctor. This isn't the first time I've seen someone die on the operating table, but this is the first time I've done an operation that was completely unnecessary." Xia Feng said painfully.

"It was an accident, he won't blame you." Yu Dong was distressed as she comforted him.

"Really?"

"Really! ”

Xia Feng bent down and rested his head on Yu Dong's thighs as he hugged her waist. His face was buried against her abdomen, like a helpless child.

Yu Dong gently ran her fingers through Xia Feng's black hair, her eyes full of heartache: "Xia Feng, I've seen you work so hard for your research. I believe that you'll succeed and eventually, you'll save countless people like Mr. Li. So don't feel guilty anymore, you have to look forward."

"You really think I'll succeed?" Xia Feng had long doubted himself and his research.

"Will you be with me the whole time?"

"Yes, I'll be with you no matter how long it takes!"

With this, Xia Feng finally felt at ease, falling asleep with his arms still wrapped around Yu Dong's waist.

Sitting on the sofa, Yu Dong watched the sunset and the moonrise. She didn't move, afraid that she would end up waking Xia Feng. After a while, she couldn't hold on and she fell the side to sleep on the sofa.

So the two snuggled, so close together that earth could end and they would never part.

When Xia Feng woke up, he saw Yu Dong's uncomfortable posture on the sofa. Looking at the clock, he saw that unexpectedly, eight hours had pa.s.sed. His heart aching, he gently picked Yu Dong up and placed her on their bed.

"Xia Feng." As Xia Feng tucked her in, Yu Dong suddenly woke and pulled at his clothes.

"You've woken up?" Xia Feng crouched down by the bed.

"It's already spring, when are we going to buy flowers?" Yu Dong saw that Xia Feng looked a lot better, so her heart settled down and she smiled as she asked.

"We can go tomorrow."

I promised to plant a balcony full of flowers for you.

The author has something to say: I don't know if the illness and events that I wrote were accurate. Li's condition was difficult to detect, so Xia Feng did the operation.

***

I feel bad for Xia Feng. Thank you Yu Dong for being there for him