Chapter 114 - Sick
Yu Tang felt the head pressed against his neck burn hotter, and he strode towards the elevator with Song Xiao in his arms. “Call a doctor.”
Popping out from the back of the car, Dugu An made a sound of a.s.sent and instantly disappeared.
Upon returning to their little nest, Yu Tang half-held the person in his embrace as he opened the door, then picked him back up and gently placed him in bed, covering him with the blankets.
Muzzy, Song Xiao was placed in bed, and the slightly cool pillow soothed him for a moment. He murmured and opened his eyes, his gaze a little fuzzy. He blinked a couple of times before his sight cleared up.
Yu Tang frowned and brought a medkit over, and stuck a cooling strip on Song Xiao’s forehead. He rummaged around for a thermometer to take Song Xiao’s temperature, and it was actually over 38 degrees Celsius. “Does it hurt?”
“I want to drink water.” Song Xiao felt that his eyes were hot and uncomfortable, and he had to squint. When he spoke, he sounded nasally and a little hoa.r.s.e.
Yu Tang felt like his heart was being teased, and he swallowed his saliva. Was his empress acting spoiled? This realisation immediately excited His Majesty the emperor, and he cheerfully poured a gla.s.s of lemonade. After thinking about it, he added warm water and tasted it first with a sip; the temperature was just right.
Helping the weak empress sit up and lean into his embrace, Yu Tang fed him the water, and watched as he obediently finished it like a small animal. Yu Tang couldn’t help kissing his cheek.
Song Xiao finished his drink and tilted his head to look at him, and received a soft kiss.
“Why didn’t you say anything about feeling unwell in the morning? I shouldn’t have let you go to work.” Yu Tang was a little annoyed and reached out to take off Song Xiao’s shirt and change him into soft pajamas.
“En…” Song Xiao’s mind was spinning dizzily, and he didn’t want to speak. He pulled back into the blankets and closed his eyes with slightly knitted eyebrows.
Yu Tang saw his discomfort and went to get a cold towel to wipe Song Xiao’s palms. The cooling patch was useless and was thus thrown away, and he wiped Song Xiao’s face with the towel.
The cool towel alleviated his dizziness, and Song Xiao sighed in relief. He reached out and grasped Yu Tang’s hand, stopping him from moving. People were always a little frail when they were sick, and Song Xiao was no exception.
Dugu An very quickly brought back the community doctor he had captured. Carrying a medical case, the doctor was very unhappy. “How many times do I have to say it? The community hospital is right downstairs; can’t you guys just walk over?”
Yu Tang was immersed in his empress’s rare dependence on him. Hearing this sentence, his face immediately turned cold as he gave the noisy doctor a glare. “500 for your house call.”
The community doctor instantly shut his mouth and walked over with the medical case, indicating for Yu Tang to move away from his seat. Young and rich married couples were always like this, making a fuss over nothing. Once the wife was a little unwell, the husband would waste money to have a doctor come pay a home visit.
Yu Tang shifted to the side a little, but kept his hold on Song Xiao’s hand.
Song Xiao felt that it was awkward to keep holding hands, and let go of Yu Tang’s hand.
The doctor put on his stethoscope and moved closer to check, and couldn’t help staring blankly. He had thought that this was a married couple, but unexpectedly, it was a boy! Lips twitching, he looked at Yu Tang, but thinking about the 500 house call fee, he ended up saying nothing and sincerely examined Song Xiao.
“His tonsils are inflamed and he has a bit of a cold. He’ll be fine with some medicine.” The doctor gave Yu Tang a box of antipyretics, a box of anti-inflammatory medicine, and some medical prescriptions. “His fever should go down at night after eating this. Call me if you have any questions.”
The doctor left his business card, accepted the money, and left.
“You didn’t drink water yesterday?” After getting Dugu An to order takeout, Yu Tang didn’t immediately give Song Xiao the medicine. He fed him a cup of water and planned to have him eat something first before taking the medicine.
“En.” After dealing with matters in A City yesterday, Song Xiao had rushed to catch a plane back, and didn’t think about having any water. Song Xiao drank half the cup and didn’t want any more, biting on the rim before pushing it away.
Feverish people couldn’t eat greasy food, so Yu Tang gave Song Xiao a bowl of plain congee to eat, then the antipyretics. He took off his own clothes and slid under the covers to hold Song Xiao as the latter slept.
“I have a cold, I don’t want to infect you.” Song Xiao sniffled and pushed Yu Tang, who had moved closer to fight over the pillow, to one side.
“It’ll be great if you infect me, then I don’t have to go to work.” Yu Tang didn’t care and tugged him into his embrace. The warm empress was a little hotter than usual, and was real comfy to hug.
Song Xiao was unable to persuade him, and simply wiped his snot on Yu Tang’s silk pajamas.
When Yu Tang discovered his sneaky action, he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, and reached out to smack Song Xiao’s b.u.t.t.
“My dad said to bring you home with me for New Year.” Song Xiao pressed his nose against Yu Tang and spoke in a m.u.f.fled voice. He was sweating and his dizziness was fading. He felt better, and mustered up energy to speak.
“You came back for this?” Yu Tang paused, then tugged the person in his embrace up to use his arm as a pillow.
“En.” Song Xiao looked at Yu Tang with curved eyes. “I wanted to wait for you yesterday to tell you…” In the end, he didn’t manage to wait up, and had even caught a cold.
Yu Tang’s heart ached, and he leaned down to kiss Song Xiao’s eyebrow. “This won’t do; it’s still better for Cao Xing to come over.”
Cao Xing was Cao Gonggong’s present name. To Yu Tang, all this was the result of Cao Gonggong not being by their side.
“This house is so small, where can he stay?” Song Xiao yawned. While the size of this apartment wasn’t considered small, it only had one bedroom. Cao Gonggong would have nowhere to stay if he came over.
“Then let’s quickly get married and live at the Yu residence.” As Yu Tang spoke, he started plotting to buy a large house in the outskirts of the capital and move the entire family over.
While they were talking, Yu Tang’s phone rang. It was Mother Yu. “Tangtang, why aren’t you home yet?”
“Xiaoxiao has a fever.” Yu Tang didn’t avoid the subject at all, and in his embrace, Song Xiao’s eyes widened.
On the other end, Mother Yu fell silent for a moment, then sighed as she said, “How do you plan to deal with the ball in two days?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Yu Tang nonchalantly said. “Whatever grandpa says, just pretend to be confused.”
After hanging up, Yu Tang threw the phone aside and tucked the blankets back around them.
“Empress dowager… did she already know…” Song Xiao somewhat nervously grasped Yu Tang’s pajamas. When she gave him the woolen slippers last time, he had already felt that something was amiss.
“No one knows their son better than a mother.” Yu Tang rubbed his face against Song Xiao’s. He had already started to subtly influence his mother long ago. Mother Yu had always worried that her son might still have autism, and it hadn’t been easy for him to find someone he liked, gender be d.a.m.ned. The empress dowager a thousand years ago had been able to accept Song Xiao, so there was no reason why the modern Mother Yu couldn’t.
Yu Tang didn’t go to work the next day, but stayed at home to accompany Song Xiao while the latter recuperated. The two of them thus idly played games in bed for an entire day, and in pa.s.sing, finished watching the last few episodes of ‘Golden Age of Jinghong’.
The drama had reached the reign of Emperor Hongyuan. The young little monarch had lost his brother and sister-in-law, but fortunately still had a group of capable officials and strong generals. After stabilising the imperial court, he began to do his best to govern the country and complete the work which his brother had failed to finish.
The magnificent view of peace throughout Great Yu in fact was only truly achieved during Emperor Hongyuan’s rule. During Emperor Jingyuan’s previous reign, foreign lands had only come to offer tribute out of fear. It was only in Emperor Hongyuan’s time when they did commercial trade for real.
There were three actors for Emperor Hongyuan: for his childhood, teen years, and his later years. The actor who played his middle age was a veteran who portrayed Emperor Hongyuan’s seemingly carefree but actually shrewd and capable nature very well.
Song Xiao couldn’t help calling little Yu Lin to ask him what he thought after watching the show.
“That actor is too ugly!” Yu Lin angrily said, “He doesn’t have any of my elegance from back then at all.”
Song Xiao couldn’t help laughing and falling against Yu Tang. Yu Tang took the phone. “That is something you should ask your son, why your portrait is so ugly.”
Yu Lin became even angrier when this was mentioned. The portrait of Emperor Hongyuan left behind in history was truly so ugly it couldn’t be seen. Crown prince, that unfilial son – once he was born in this life, Yu Lin had to instill the major principle that ‘Father Emperor is the most handsome’ in him from a young age.
“Where’s Yu Tang?” Yu Taixian, who was in a good mood, went to Yinyu Building today to inspect the situation in their China HQ, but discovered that Yu Tang hadn’t come to work.
“The chairman didn’t come today,” Secretary Jin replied without a change in her expression.
“What happened?” Yu Taixian frowned. Last night, his daughter-in-law said that Yu Tang went out to play with friends. Could it be that he had played the whole night?
The bodyguard responsible for monitoring Yu Tang’s whereabouts said expressionlessly, “Tang shaoye slept in the city apartment last night, and didn’t leave the house at all today.”
That was the truth, but the bodyguard just didn’t say which apartment he slept in and who he slept with.
Yu laoyezi nodded, and a.s.sumed that Yu Tang had played too much yesterday and was catching up on his sleep today. “This child is too outrageous.” Even though he said this, it wasn’t a rebuke. His grandson was already very capable, so it was understandable if he played around on occasion. Besides, Yu Taixian had just forced him to break up, so it was very normal for him to drink a bit of alcohol while he was feeling low.
“The Yu family will be having a ball tomorrow night; all of you come too ba; you can bring your family,” Yu laoyezi said to a few Dayu executives.
The executives smiled and agreed, but exchanged looks when Yu Taixian turned around. As higher-ups, they knew some of the Yu family’s affairs; telling them to bring their family was in fact telling them to bring their daughters to meet Yu Tang – the implication could not be any more obvious.
Word of the Yu family ball had long spread in the upper cla.s.s circle. Families with daughters of suitable age were all enthusiastic about going, and the Cheng family was no exception.
“Miaomiao, is this pretty?” Being from an aristocratic family that had a good relationship with the Yu family, Cheng Xinran could go to the Yu residence before the ball started and change there.
Yu Miao glanced at the evening dress embedded with small diamonds and smiled politely as she said, “Pretty.”
“Then, will your ge like it?” When Cheng Xinran said this, her face was a little red.
Yu Miao curled her lip. “That’s hard to say.” Obviously he won’t like it…
Little Theater
‘Who Is The Prince’s True Love?’
Fish Tang: The ball is about to end, I think I found my true love.
Grandpa: Is it the one who left the gla.s.s slipper?
Fish Tang: No, it’s the one who left traces on my suit
Xiaoxiao: (Blows nose) My bad, I haven’t recovered from my cold
Grandpa: …