The Fake Son Wants to Live [BL]

Chapter 244: Chapter 244 - Hand that protected me

Li Wang’s shoulders trembled as he knelt there, forehead nearly pressed to the floor, the weight of his guilt leaving him breathless. Jian sat still, eyes fixed on him in silence, then slowly shifted his gaze to the ground between them.

"What good is it if you leave?" Jian said at last, his voice quiet but cold. "Tell me, Li Wang... do you truly not intend to hurt my kind?"

Li Wang flinched at the words but looked up slowly, his face streaked with tears. His lips parted, trembling.

"I... I don’t. I swear I don’t."

Jian’s expression didn’t change. His hands gently wrapped around his mother’s cold fingers, brushing them softly against his cheek.

"Initially..." Li Wang continued, his voice hoarse, "I was given an order to bring you back. I... I was planning to follow through."

Jian raised an eyebrow slightly, but kept rubbing his face against his mother’s unmoving hand, the warmth of his skin a stark contrast to hers.

"And why is that?" Jian whispered. "Were you scared of the Farians? Or were you also thinking like Wang Bushen—how to exploit us? Cut us open? Sell us to the highest bidder? Make a name for yourself off our suffering?"

Li Wang didn’t answer immediately. His breathing grew unsteady again. He wiped his face roughly with his sleeve, then steadied himself and looked Jian straight in the eye.

"No," he said quietly. "What I felt wasn’t fear. And it wasn’t hunger for power."

He pressed his palm to the floor to ground himself, forcing the words out.

"I... I sensed something. A kinship. When I spent time with you, when I saw how your kind lived, how you treated others, the strength and kindness you showed—I started to feel ashamed of everything I believed before."

He swallowed hard.

"I came here thinking I knew what you were. Aliens. Weapons. Biological assets. But you’re not. You’re people. You’re... you’re just people."

He lowered his head again, his voice breaking.

"After spending time with you, Jian... I came to like you. Genuinely. I couldn’t hand you over. I couldn’t betray you like that. I couldn’t live with myself knowing what they’d do to you."

He let out a soft sob against the floor.

Jian watched him quietly, his expression unreadable. After a long silence, he finally looked away, his jaw tense.

"Get up, Li Wang," Jian said, voice tired but calm. "Go."

Li Wang blinked, lifting his tear-stained face. "Jian, I—"

"Go sleep," Jian cut him off gently, not unkindly, just firmly. "It’s been a long day for all of us."

Li Wang sat there frozen for a second, then slowly nodded. He wiped his face again, eyes red and swollen, and shakily got to his feet. With one last glance at Jian and the unconscious woman on the bed, he turned and walked toward the small room where he had been staying.

The door clicked softly behind him.

Jian remained at his mother’s side, her hand still in his. He didn’t cry anymore. Just sat there quietly, eyes on her face, gently rubbing circles into the back of her hand with his thumb.

Xing Yu gently gave Jian’s shoulder a squeeze, his hand warm and grounding. "You should go sleep as well," he said quietly. "I’ll keep watch here."

But Jian shook his head, still holding his mother’s hand in both of his. "I’ve missed out on spending time with her..." His voice was soft but sure. "I just want to talk to her a little more."

He glanced up, smiling faintly, a small curve of warmth despite the exhaustion on his face. "You should go sleep now. I’ll be fine. Besides..." He lifted his free hand and pinched at his own cheek, puffing it up playfully. "See? Even my face is all puffed up. That’s how much I’ve slept."

Xing Yu looked down at him with a mix of fondness and restraint. Slowly, he crouched to Jian’s level and reached out, gently cupping his face. His thumb brushed under Jian’s eye where it was still slightly swollen from earlier crying.

"Okay," he said quietly, almost like a sigh. He stood, giving the boy one last look before turning to leave.

He had just reached the doorway when Jian’s voice stopped him.

"Mister Yu... wait," Jian called softly.

Xing Yu froze mid-step, one hand on the doorframe. He glanced over his shoulder, his sharp gray eyes catching the dim light.

"Yes?" he asked.

Jian sat there beside the bed, his fingers still lightly wrapped around his mother’s. He smiled—not with amusement this time, but with something gentler. Curious. Longing.

"Her name," he said. "What is my mother’s name?"

Xing Yu turned back toward him, the doorway casting a shadow over half his face. The silence lingered a moment before he spoke, his voice low and filled with something ancient, reverent.

"Her name is Saeleah," he said softly. "It means ’gentle starlight’ in Old Gia tongue."

Jian repeated it under his breath, testing the syllables on his tongue like a prayer. "Saeleah..."

Xing Yu’s expression softened. "She always liked the stars. Said she’d name her child after the brightest constellation in the sky... but when you were born, she said you were too radiant to be named after anything else. So she named you Jian, and said the stars could follow your light instead."

Jian’s lips parted slightly, stunned, as he looked back at his mother’s peaceful face. Something ached deep inside him—grief, joy, love—all tangled and too much.

He nodded slowly. "Thank you," he whispered.

Xing Yu smiled faintly, a rare tenderness flickering through his usually unreadable features. "If she wakes up and hears your voice... she’ll be happy."

He stepped away quietly, letting the door close behind him without a sound.

Jian turned back to the sleeping woman, still holding her hand. He leaned closer, brushing a few golden strands of hair from her forehead.

"Saeleah," he whispered, his voice trembling. "My mother..."

Jian shifted slightly, adjusting his posture on the floor beside the bed. His legs had gone numb, but he didn’t care. He leaned forward and brought his mother’s hand close, brushing his lips gently over her cold palm—riddled with thin, faded needle marks from whatever treatments had kept her alive. He closed his eyes at the contact.

"Mom..." he began, voice low and warm, "do you want to hear about my childhood?"

The room was quiet except for the soft hum of the machines and the night wind whispering through the crack of the window. Jian placed her hand gently against his cheek and smiled faintly, as if she had answered.

"I lived in a very small house," he said, his eyes distant now, remembering. "It was old... just three rooms, and the walls were cracked in places, but there was a river not far from it. A clear stream where dragonflies danced over the water and loaches hid beneath the rocks. Sometimes when Grandma was angry and didn’t want to feed me, I’d sneak off, roll up my pants, and wade in."

He let out a soft chuckle, voice thick with nostalgia. "I’d catch two or three slippery little loaches with my bare hands and roast them over fire behind the woodshed. They were chewy and bland, but I thought they tasted better than anything in the world."

His gaze fell gently on her face.

"And there was an orchard nearby," he went on. "I stole a lot of peaches from there... flat peaches, you know, the sweet kind. Sometimes the orchard guard chased me with a stick. Once he caught me and pinched my ears so hard I cried."

He paused, a sheepish smile on his lips.

"I didn’t have much, but I had trees, and the river, and the wind in summer. And I thought I had a family too." His voice dropped lower. "So when I found out I was an alien baby... sent to a fake family..."

His throat tightened. He looked at her fingers resting limp in his hand.

"I was just disappointed," he whispered. "Not angry... not really. Just... disappointed. I kept thinking: why would my real mother send me there? Why did she choose them?"

He shook his head, a single tear falling and landing on her wrist.

"But now I know," he breathed. "You wanted to protect me from Wang Bushen. You disguised me as his son hoping he wouldn’t hurt me. You did everything you could, everything in your power... You gave up your freedom. Your life. Maybe even your name..."

His voice cracked.

"I’m thankful, Mom," he whispered. "I understand now. And I’m so—so thankful."

He pressed his forehead gently against the back of her hand, letting his tears fall freely.

"Thank you so much," he said again, barely more than breath.

From somewhere deep in the house, a wind chime rang faintly, stirred by the night breeze. Jian didn’t move. He stayed right there, nestled close to the woman who had never stopped protecting him, even in sleep.

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