<19 Days Oneshots>

<1> You Know What I am

"If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more. But you know what I am."

— Unknown

—

He Tian disappeared soon after they all got to the hospital.

Mo Guanshan never wanted to admit the emotion twisting and clawing around his ribs as he sat, shitty plastic chair digging into his spine. It was the overpowering smell of antiseptic mixed with the harsh white lights of the hospital corridor, Mo Guanshan would swear up and down to anyone who listened, that's why his eyes looked wet. No one knew him well enough to question his frown and furrowed brows. Yet, on the other hand, that late, the hospital reminded him more of a morgue or a haunted house then a place of healing — and him and Zhan Zheng Xi were the only ones who seemed to be haunting its halls.

Although, given the thousand-mile-stare clouding the blond's eyes, he wouldn't notice.

It was passed 1am by the time a nurse finally forced the two to go home and if Zhan Zheng Xi wasn't as drained as he was, he would have dug his nails even tighter into the chair and it would have been later. The other looked as fragile as thin glass and Mo Guanshan felt that if he so much as spoke too loudly, the other would shatter. Zhan Zheng Xi was far from weak, but when it came to that idiot, Mo Guanshan knew the male was was on his knees for Jian Yi — he'd follow the dumbass off a cliff if the other whined loud enough. In ways he didn't think he could admit, he was jealous of the two (although he didn't really know what those two had going on, nor did he think he wanted to know, he still admired it). Mo Guanshan had never been one to make those kinds of bond with people — he often wondered if that was in the cards for him — and if it wasn't, would he really mind? This was something he didn't know the answer to.

So even if he did care about the other (although he could never admit that), they weren't all that close if he were honest. Zhan Zheng Xi was really a man of few words (with everyone but that brain-dead Jian Yi), and this time was no different. Mo Guanshan simply watched, blank stare hiding his feeling of helplessness, as the other dragged himself off down the street, wordlessly, looking like he had one foot in the grave and Death was about to serenade his slumber.

And something in him flipped. That idiot Jian Yi.

Mo Guanshan stood there, angrier than he thought he could get in his sleepless state. It wasn't that red hot kind of anger that burned all that was around in a vibrant and elaborate imitation of the sun, but rather that cold anger that could freeze the celestial object over and fold steel with a simple glance. It was somehow worse. He didn't really know where it came from, nor who it was really aimed at. Anger was such a familiar state of being that it took a second for him to even realise that was what he was feeling. Yet this kind of anger wasn't so ordinary for him and although it wasn't like he had never met it before; in this empty street, at this late hour, with no one around to even provoke him: Mo Guanshan was confused. Why was he so fucking angry? But it was Mo Guanshan after all and anger was more familiar than any place he'd ever called home, so he left it.

(Maybe it simply was home.)

Mo Guanshans legs started moving before his mind had a chance to catch up and for half an hour he walked the lifeless streets in a mindless stupor. His fogging breath was the only company he had, not another soul marked his sight. He wouldn't even have known how much time had passed had he not checked his phone to pull up a map of the area, he didn't often come to this part of town and for that he was grateful. He didn't wish to visit hospitals any more than the next person. And he didn't wish for any more of his confusingly acquired friends to do anything so stupid again.