CH 58

Dr. Tang couldn’t treat the brain; he couldn’t even treat Tao Xiaodong’s chronic untidiness. The patient himself wasn’t willing to receive treatment in any case, and it was an interesting dynamic for one to leave stuff around and have the other pick up after him.

The next morning, Tang Suoyan went to the balcony to retrieve the elevator card from the coat on the balcony. Tao Xiaodong smiled at once, saying, “I didn’t lose it then, I’d find it again when I wear it next week.”

“You’ll be away next week, what if I kept your clothes for you, then?” Tang Suoyan slipped on his shoes and went out of the door with him.

Tao Xiaodong lost the previous three elevator cards in that fashion, forgetting where he left those slim items. The rest were probably somewhere in the pockets of his various articles of clothing.

Tao Xiaodong didn’t immediately leave after sending Tang Suoyan but followed him to the inpatient wing. While Tang Suoyan went to the office, he went to the obstetrics department.

Tian Yi’s wife, Song Zhu, was due to give birth to twins yesterday. To reduce the risk of unforeseen complications, she was admitted the day before, but there were no new developments when Tao Xiaodong dropped a call yesterday.

When he went over, Song Zhu was meandering down the walkway, supporting her belly. The tissue ball clutched in her hand fell to the ground and she bent down to pick it up. Tao Xiaodong happened to see this as he came and he said, “Let me pick it up, you should avoid moving.”

“Yo.” Hearing his voice, Song Zhu looked up at him, smiling. “You came?”

They were far too familiar with each other. They had met when young; she knew Tian Yi for as many years as she knew Tao Xiaodong. There was no need for pleasantries between them.

The VIP maternity wards were much more peaceful than the regular maternity wards. Tao Xiaodong picked up the tissue ball and gave her a hand. “Is there no one around now?”

“Mom went to find the doctor. She’s anxious, her questions never end.” The mother she was speaking of was her mother-in-law. Her birth mother passed away a few years ago. She had a good relationship with her in-laws. Tian Yi’s mother was very understanding, so there was no conflict between them.

The belly when pregnant with twins was frighteningly huge. Furthermore, Song Zhu was one of those with more severe symptoms of pregnancy, and the first few months really took a toll on her; she lost ten kilograms. Tian Yi was so distressed for his wife that he had even cried. Out the door, he was an old soul who could weather any storm—but this, he couldn’t. It was completely nerve-wracking. Song Zhu was a few years younger than Tian Yi but even then she was still two years into her thirties. Their relationship had been relatively smooth sailing, but the past year had been one adversity after the next.

Tao Xiaodong, accompanying her for a while, asked if she felt nervous.

Song Zhu waved dismissively. “Right now aside from wanting to hurry up and expel them, I don’t care for anything else. It’s awfully exhausting.”

Tao Xiaodong sat in the walkway for the whole afternoon but there was no movement, and eventually, Song Zhu chased him away. Before leaving, he dropped by Tian Yi’s office for a while. He’d been wearing himself thin with worry during this period.

“I’ll let you know when she’s given birth, don’t keep running over here, go do your own thing,” Tian Yi told him.

“I don’t have much on this couple of days, it’s fine,” said Tao Xiaodong.

Tian Yi had seven days of paternity leave which he hoped to save for after the kids were born, but he hadn’t applied for them yet as it was hard to predict when that would be, exactly. On this side, there was only Song Zhu and Tian Yi’s mother, so Tao Xiaodong would often head over when he didn’t have anything on to take a look these days, afraid that they would be alone if anything unexpected came up.

In spite of his godfather status to the two boys and his close relationship with Song Zhu, at the end of the day, he wasn’t the children’s actual father. It wasn’t quite appropriate for him to keep hovering around the maternity wards.

In the subsequent days, after dropping by the maternity wards, he would linger at the Ophthalmology Department, ready to be called on if need be. He didn’t even visit Tang Suoyan while at the Ophthalmology Department; he simply sat in the waiting area. To be honest, it didn’t matter where he sat, only that this section was more familiar to him and closer to his heart.

The hospital waiting area was where one could observe the spectrum of the human psyche. There were differences between every patient and family that came in. The lucky ones could leave in relief after seeing the doctor, but the unlucky ones were alone in their misfortunes.

Pain, horror, desolation. One would witness much on a daily basis here.

On this day, Tao Xiaodong even saw a young hotshot actor with crew members and his agent clustered around him, making a beeline for Tang Suoyan’s consultation room.

The patients in the waiting area who recognised him watched the fuss and whipped out their phones to snap pictures. Those in their later years were considerably less entertained; the jerk was jumping the queue, after all.

The office Tang Suoyan was in today wasn’t for emergency cases. There were no exceptions made, no matter their reputation or the urgency of their conditions.

Tao Xiaodong watched them barge straight into Tang Suoyan’s office, only to be driven out barely any time later.

The agent looked in a foul mood, cursing non-stop. The actor had gauze covering his eyes the whole time, maybe an injury that he sustained on set. The entourage looked slightly befuddled, but the actor silently took a seat in the waiting area and told them to quiet down, while another young man took something and ran off, probably to grab a queue number.

Tao Xiaodong reclined in his seat watching them but shut his eyes after a while.

What a joke.

It was an affront to San Hospital’s Ophthalmology Department, where some people would queue for a week and still be waiting for an appointment. It was unclear if these jokers had gone to the wrong place or had spoken to upper management.

After about forty minutes, the young man who had run off earlier likely called over. The agent started to spew invectives again, calling the hospital unreasonable, all the while taking photos of the actor from every angle.

The actor appeared collected throughout. The wound probably wasn’t severe; if it really was that critical, it was unlikely Tang Suoyan would have summarily dismissed him.

After, the entourage departed noisily. Huddled in his coat, Tao Xiaodong watched them, guessing by today’s crowd in the waiting room that Tang Suoyan wouldn’t be able to catch a proper break again. Tao Xiaodong went down to get take-out and soup for him, using the short half-hour break during lunch hour to send it to him.

There were all sorts in the hospital, and too many would charge straight for the consultation room. Some would even force their way in because they couldn’t register for a queue number and block the doorway after being turned away by the doctors, refusing to let anyone else be seen if they themselves couldn’t be seen.

It was a sight that every doctor had come across too many times.

When Tang Suoyan got off work in the evening, Tao Xiaodong said, “I’d thought that the celebrity from the morning would have called your bosses.”

“Maybe he did, I wouldn’t know, he wasn’t mine to handle.” Tang Suoyan said, “Such cases are usually assigned to the new doctors.”

“I was afraid that they’d raise a storm, I’d have gone over if they did,” Tao Xiaodong

“They couldn’t, public figures have to maintain their image.” Tang Suoyan took a sip of water. He was a little thirsty after a day of consultations; he hadn’t gotten to drink much.

“How did you get them to leave?” Tao Xiaodong asked.

“I told them to get out.” Tang Suoyan stoically reenacted the scene for him.

“Just like that?” Tao Xiaodong burst out laughing.

“Or what?” Tang Suoyan chuckled as well. “This happens almost every day, we don’t have the time to waste our breaths.”

Like Chi Cheng’s situation before, the actor had just suffered a blow to the eyes; there was slight haemorrhage, easily fixed with some anti-inflammatory medicine. His fan club was all for allowing him to skip the registration and queue process and get all the ophthalmologists in the department to see to him. Doctors found people like that most unpleasant.

This type of minor incidents happened far too frequently for it to even count as an episode in the hospital, but this mess still ended up trending on social media that very night.

The young actor from the morning posted on Weibo, using indirect words to aggrievedly complain about the hospital’s treatment of him, what with how the staff spoke to him coldly and disregarded him. After airing his woes in the first half, he went on to engage in a high-sounding social commentary on the current state of doctor-patient relationships.

It was a sensitive subject that easily rallied others to his side. There were many others who felt that the hospital had done them a bad turn, each jumping on the bandwagon to share their miserable experiences. The hospital cheated them of their money, forcing patients to take random tests and slapping on additional fees. Any diagnosis a doctor made would never be minor, talking up a normal cold into a grave illness.

These were perpetual points made in any discourse surrounding doctor-patient relationships.

When Huan Ge forwarded him the post, Tao Xiaodong was lying on his belly, showing Tang Suoyan a few of his newer creations.

This was a small routine they had, that Tao Xiaodong would occasionally chat with Tang Suoyan about stuff that happened at work and show him some images. While they weren’t in similar fields of work, it was impractical for them to avoid the topic completely; they’d soon run out of mutual topics to discuss otherwise.

Tao Xiaodong clicked on the Weibo link from Huan Ge, his brows furrowing deeper the further he read.

Huan Ge asked: Ge, this looks like Dr. Tang.

The photo was taken in the waiting area, with a mosaic over the doctor’s face.

Seeing that he was distracted firing off messages, Tang Suoyan got up to shower. Tao Xiaodong sat up as well, roughly glancing through the actor’s post. When he finished reading it, his lips were tightly pursed. What a load of bullshit.

Who the hell do you think you’re photographing? Are you crazy? That’s my doctor, okay?

Tao Xiaodong didn’t even have Weibo downloaded on his phone. He didn’t understand the appeal or have any interest in checking it out.

Although Huan Ge was in the dark about what was going on, it annoyed him to see someone dissing San Hospital’s Ophthalmology Department.

There were some in the comments who called the celebrity out on his entitlement, but Tao Xiaodong ignored those. The post that Huan Ge forwarded had even tagged the hospital, riling him up the more he looked at it. What right do you have to scold doctors? Work is already so gruelling on them every single fucking day!

Tao Xiaodong wouldn’t stand for it. He got Huan Ge to write a post in his place under the parlour’s official account and directly tag the celebrity.

—Jumping the line and barging straight into the doctor’s office, do you have any grounds to talk?

Tao Xiaodong wasn’t familiar with the platform; he never touched it much and the account was handled entirely by Huan Ge. Thus, posting this didn’t assuage his anger, but neither did it aggravate him any worse.

After the open challenge, he went to stand at the bathroom door, ranting angrily about this incident.

Tang Suoyan didn’t take it to heart. After coming out of the shower and seeing how worked up Tao Xiaodong was, he even took time to placate him. “Let it go.”

Tao Xiaodong wouldn’t stand for it even if the doctor in question today wasn’t Tang Suoyan but a stranger, and it being directed to his own partner only made it worse.

“If I’d known this would happen I would’ve snapped a couple of pictures in the morning myself.” Tao Xiaodong leaned against the wall, bristling with anger at this pig-headed celebrity.

At his temper, Tang Suoyan stroked the nape of his neck, smiling amusedly at him. “What are you so angry about? I don’t believe it will affect me, the hospital won’t seek me out because of this.”

“It’s preposterous.” Tao Xiaodong was dying of irritation over this.

It was the crux of the matter. Tao Xiaodong couldn’t care less about people who constantly railed at him for being an evil heartless scrooge, but when it was Tang Suoyan being derided by the masses on the internet, that seriously touched a raw nerve.

He seldom got so incensed, which thereby amused Tang Suoyan to no end. This behaviour rather reminded him of a child throwing a tantrum.

“How are you still smiling?” Tao Xiaodong, sprawled out next to him, questioned.

“Don’t be upset,” Tang Suoyan turned onto his side, placating him. “You’ll be away on business the following day, it’ll have blown over by the time you’re back, they just need to get it out of their system.”

Tao Xiaodong was aware of this as well, but it still triggered him when he saw that the target was Tang Suoyan.

Tang Suoyan wrapped an arm around his waist, saying, “Don’t lie on your belly, go to sleep.”

Tao Xiaodong fumbled around for the remote and turned off the lights. He leaned into Tang Suoyan’s embrace, hooking his chin on the other’s shoulder.

Tang Suoyan reached up to stroke his back, amused by the events that night. Love made one young in spirit; even a guy as unflappable as his partner could throw a childish tantrum over such a minor little thing.