Tang Ke seriously suspected that if he posted the ten words “Jiang Xu is pregnant with Shen Fangyu’s child” in their eight-year clinical program group chat, he would be bombarded with countless question marks and inquiries about his mental state. The psychiatrists in their class might even show up in the middle of the night to drag him away.
Supporting his sore back, he slowly stood up and looked at Jiang Xu with a head full of disbelief. “You’re not messing with me, are you?” he asked, slapping his own mouth. “What I just said about the third-ranked guy, that was just a joke. Don’t take it seriously.”
Jiang Xu set down the documents, folded his arms, and tilted his head slightly, looking at Tang Ke who was leaning on the table with both hands. “If I told you that the two of us only ended up in bed because we were drunk, would you believe it?”
“I would,” Tang Ke said firmly. “Otherwise, I can’t think of any other reason why you two would sleep together.”
Jiang Xu took a deep breath. “Come on, I promised to buy you dinner.”
Even after they sat down in the restaurant, Tang Ke still hadn’t recovered from the shock. Hiding behind the menu, he sized up Jiang Xu from head to toe. Jiang Xu endured his gaze in silence for a while before finally lifting his eyelids and cutting him off: “Stop staring. I’m not crazy.”
“So what are you going to do then?” Tang Ke asked, sounding like a worried old mother. “Shen Fangyu doesn’t even look like he’s gay,” he added irritably. “Damn it, we should’ve crippled him back then—would’ve saved the world a lot of trouble.”
Although Jiang Xu really wanted to agree with Tang Ke, the tiny sliver of conscience he still had as a doctor stopped him from saying it out loud.
“Are you going to tell him?” Tang Ke asked.
Jiang Xu didn’t answer directly.
He lowered his gaze, slowly running his fingers along the edge of the white porcelain plate. Clearly, he hadn’t figured out what to do yet. That was precisely why he’d told Tang Ke about the child’s origin in the first place.
Tang Ke was like a brother to him; he didn’t need to keep up appearances in front of him.
Now that he was in the eye of the storm, Jiang Xu felt he couldn’t be objective or rational enough to deal with it on his own. That’s why he wanted to hear Tang Ke’s opinion.
Unfortunately, the man he was counting on was currently lost in a fantasy of melodramatic TV dramas and novels about wealthy CEOs and secret pregnancies. “If you can’t find anyone to do the abortion for you, you’re not planning to sneak off to the US and give birth in secret, are you?”
His imagination was like a runaway horse, galloping further and further, “And then ten years later, when you two are competing for the department head position, you drop the bomb on Shen Fangyu that he’s the kid’s father and use it to force him into submission!”
Jiang Xu, “…”
“With an imagination like that, being a doctor is really wasting your talent.”
“To be honest,” Tang Ke laughed, “Lu Xun, who quit medicine to become a writer, is my life idol.”
Jiang Xu rolled his eyes, but Tang Ke suddenly grew serious. “I think you need to tell him.”
He went on, “If you’re going to have the surgery, you’ll need to take extended leave. I’ve worked at Jihua Hospital too; I know exactly how hard it is to get time off at a public hospital. I also know how heavy your workload is, not to mention your… special situation.”
As long as Jiang Xu wanted to keep working at the hospital and avoid social suicide, he couldn’t exactly list “abortion” as the reason for his leave request.
But if he wanted to keep his condition a secret from the rest of the department, getting leave would only become even harder.
If he couldn’t get leave, he’d have no choice but to resign. And if he really resigned, Shen Fangyu would probably set off firecrackers around his family’s ancestral grave for three days and three nights, convinced that Jiang Xu had finally admitted defeat.
Just picturing Shen Fangyu’s smug face made Jiang Xu’s expression grow even darker.
“When it comes to dealing with the higher-ups and office politics, Shen Fangyu’s way smoother than you. If you let him figure something out, maybe he’ll actually find a way that works for both of you,” Tang Ke said. “Besides, this isn’t just your responsibility. Shen Fangyu’s involved too. You don’t have to carry this burden alone.”
If there weren’t a metaphorical knife at his throat, Jiang Xu really didn’t want to tell Shen Fangyu this absurd, unbelievable truth.
There’s a reason “secret pregnancy” novels exist. Avoidance might be cowardly, but it’s effective.
Jiang Xu pushed his glasses up with his fingers. “I’ll think about it,” he said, glancing at his phone. Before coming to dinner, he’d emailed Dr. Kenn. There was still no reply.
Although Jiang Xu knew perfectly well that the time difference existed and that the other party was a highly renowned figure in the field who couldn’t possibly reply so quickly, he still couldn’t help feeling irritated.
Back when he was submitting papers, he hadn’t checked his messages this obsessively.
Seeing his behavior, Tang Ke hesitated before speaking. “If Dr. Kenn really is willing to share the surgical indication plan and the video with you, I can help arrange an operating room at our hospital. But as for the lead surgeon… who are you planning to ask?”
Jiang Xu flipped his phone face down and suddenly didn’t feel like talking to Tang Ke anymore.
Probably because every single thing Tang Ke said tonight hit the nail right on the head, all the toughest problems Jiang Xu was facing. It was hard not to want to cover his ears and escape.
This surgery would be the first of its kind in the country. Skilled surgeons in general surgery weren’t familiar enough with obstetrics and gynecology to dare take it on. As for OB-GYN itself, Jihua Hospital, the affiliated hospital of Medical University A, was already the best in the nation. Jiang Xu wouldn’t feel at ease having it done anywhere else.
But he couldn’t possibly ask someone from Jihua’s OB-GYN department either. They were all his colleagues, people he saw every single day. Not to mention how socially humiliating this would be, Jiang Xu knew his department’s capabilities well. There weren’t many who had the skills to take on such a challenging procedure, and even fewer who had the courage and determination to be the “first.”
It wasn’t anyone else’s fault. Even if a patient with a similar case came to him right now, Jiang Xu himself would have to seriously weigh whether to proceed.
To have both the ability he could trust and the courage to act, Jiang Xu could only think of one person—unfortunately, that was the last person he wanted to mention.
“You’ll still have to go to Shen Fangyu,” Tang Ke bluntly named the person on his mind.
Jiang Xu pinched the bridge of his nose.
“He might look unreliable, but he’s capable. At this point, hiding it from him will only do you more harm than good. You two already slept together, letting him do an abortion for you is nothing compared to that. If he refuses, just report him to the disciplinary committee for being a heartless bastard who takes advantage of people.”
Jiang Xu, “…”
If he didn’t end up dying from Shen Fangyu’s antics one day, it would definitely be from Tang Ke’s words.
Sometimes Jiang Xu wondered if his own taciturn nature was the reason why everyone around him spoke so brutally.
As the dishes were served one after another, Jiang Xu picked up the biggest chicken drumstick from the pot and dropped it into Tang Ke’s bowl. When Tang Ke opened his mouth to say more, Jiang Xu raised a hand to his lips and said, “Shh. Eat.”
However, after only a few bites, Jiang Xu set down his chopsticks. The nausea and fatigue of pregnancy never struck at the right time. Staring at the colorful feast in front of him, he couldn’t muster even the slightest appetite.
Pregnancy was exhausting.
Since he was old enough to remember, Jiang Xu had never had any serious illnesses. He rarely even caught colds or fevers. His body had always been full of energy, enough to sustain his relentless cycle of work and study.
But now, he felt his strength constantly being drained away. The discomfort in his body was like a phone’s forced shutdown system, leaving him helpless over and over again.
Even if he wanted to bury his head in the sand like an ostrich, he couldn’t avoid thinking about what Tang Ke had said.
He was too deep in the puzzle, unable to see things clearly through all the emotions and biases. Tang Ke, on the other hand, was standing outside of it, able to view everything with far greater clarity.
Jiang Xu stayed silent for a while. He wasn’t sure what would happen if he told Shen Fangyu, or how he would even face him afterward. But Tang Ke was right about one thing: whether he chose an abortion or decided to have the child, if he insisted on carrying this burden alone, it would only make things worse.
Jiang Xu was someone who demanded a lot of himself. He could barely tolerate his own drop in productivity. This unexpected child, whether he wanted it or not, was already consuming far too much of his energy.
If this continued, the consequences wouldn’t just be about embarrassment or social death.
Forget it, Jiang Xu thought. Soldiers block the attack, water covers the flood. As long as I don’t feel awkward, it’s everyone else who will.
Taking a deep breath, he opened Shen Fangyu’s chat window and typed:
“9 p.m. tonight. I’ll be waiting for you in my office. /smile.jpg.”