Second Male Lead to One, Male Lead to Another (Part 2)

392 No Time to Sleep

Mo Fang continued to sit on the bench with Madam Zuo for a little longer. He even offered to accompany her home but she just waved, telling him it wasn't necessary. Mo Fang watched her leave with a smile. Well, in a sense, he had exactly accomplished what he had wanted to do: He had escaped the empty apartment for a while even if it had happened in a completely different way from what he had expected.

He picked up his bag with groceries and carried it home, storing everything away before sitting down at the table. By now, it was already the middle of the afternoon. He didn't mind that he had missed lunch but since he had nothing better to do anyway, he still fetched himself a salad before returning to the living room and continuing with his research.

Originally, he had searched very broadly. The result wasn't what he had been looking for at all but it at least gave him a better idea of where he stood and how to continue.

What he was looking for wasn't a missing person so he needed to be more specific. He leaned back and thought for a while before exchanging 'person' for 'relative'. This might still not yield the right information but it might get him closer to his goal and right now, he felt like it would be best to go through this step by step. With each website he read, he would find out something more. Surely, as long as he continued with this, he would find out what he wanted in the end.

Mo Fang got busy again. This time, the search results were a little better. At the very least, they weren't all about people who had suddenly gone missing. This also meant that there were results that didn't require him to know a bunch of information ahead of his search.

Time flew by and soon enough, it was evening again. In fact, he had almost missed the time for dinner as well. Mo Fang sighed, raked a hand through his hair, and returned to the kitchen to make a meal for himself. Since he had already left out lunch, he shouldn't skimp on dinner. Afterward, he directly got back to his search though, slowly reading through the websites he had found before.

Unfortunately, this kind of matter indeed couldn't be finished in just a few hours. After a while, he stopped to save the websites he hadn't looked at yet and then turned off his laptop before going to sleep.

Lying in bed, he pulled the blanket up to his chin, staring up at the ceiling that couldn't be seen in the dark. So far, he hadn't found anything in detail but he was indeed much closer now. At the very least, he knew how to go about this in theory.

Over the next few days, he'd try everything and see where it led. If it didn't work ... He rubbed his forehead, not sure what to think. He didn't want to give up. But then, he didn't have a reason to worry yet. So far, weren't things going well? Some setbacks were normal but it wasn't like he didn't still have ideas on how to continue.

He closed his eyes and tried not to think about the matter any further. Unfortunately, despite that, he couldn't fall asleep. After a moment, he opened his eyes again, staring into the darkness again.

This ... really wasn't a new problem anymore. It sure hadn't gotten better after he came back either. Throughout the day when he kept busy, the apartment already seemed exceptionally empty. Now, at night, with everything being quiet, that was even more so the case.

He turned to the side and tried again but the result was still the same. Turning back around, he reached out and grabbed his phone from the nightstand. Opening up Baidu, he looked around for a while until he found a video with relaxing sounds. He wasn't sure if it would help but then, it wasn't like he'd be able to fall asleep without either.

Putting the phone down on the nightstand, he pulled the blanket back up and once again tried to close his eyes. The light from the phone soon vanished when the screen switched off and the room became dark again. This time though, it at least wasn't completely silent.

Mo Fang listened to the sound coming from the phone. He didn't really feel tired if he was honest and he also didn't feel like it was helping much. Maybe he should get a pet.

The thought struck him suddenly and he couldn't help but dwell on it. Having a pet might help with the loneliness but then, a pet was also a long-time commitment. Right now, he wasn't working so it wouldn't matter much. But in the future, if he went back to modeling or found something else he wanted to do, then what?

He couldn't just abandon a pet for hours on time or could he? How did pet owners usually go about this? Surely, with everyone working, they had to have some plan in place. Well, this should also depend on the pet. So if he were to get one, what type of pet would he choose?

Mo Fang tried to imagine himself getting a cat or a dog but he really wasn't sure whether he liked the image in his mind. Somehow, he didn't think he'd be a good pet owner. Well, it didn't matter anyway. It wasn't like he really wanted to get a pet.

He turned to the other side, pulling the blanket up higher while feeling frustrated with himself. If he didn't fall asleep soon, he was afraid he'd be up half the night again. He really should stop thinking about useless stuff like this.

Unfortunately, no matter how he reminded himself, he still couldn't fall asleep. He turned off the phone after about an hour, feeling that it wasn't helping at all. Then, he continued to turn from one side to the other without success. Only by the time the sky was starting to brighten again did he finally manage to drift off.