Chapter 7
At some point, we all had to return to reality.
He looked at me for a moment, then seemed to come back to himself. Whatever emotion had flickered across his face quickly disappeared.
As we walked inside, he asked gently. “Do you want the fish braised or boiled?”
“Boiled,” I said. “Something lighter.”
Given his condition, I figured heavy seasoning probably wasn’t a good idea.
We washed the vegetables, cooked, and sat down to eat.
The whole meal passed in near silence.
Halfway through, Nolan suddenly looked over and said. “Actually I need to tell you–about us.”
It was clear he didn’t want to keep lying. He searched for the right words.
But I pretended not to hear him.
Instead. I ladled some fish soup into a bowl and said, “Tastes a little spicy. Maybe next time we cut back on the chilies?”
His eyes flickered with hesitation, some inner struggle.
After a moment, he nodded. “Okay.
Then he pushed a glass of water toward me. “Here, have some water… Erma.”
After dinner, he cleaned up the guest room for me, then went back to his own.
That night, I couldn’t sleep. Sometime after midnight, I got up to get a glass of water.
But the moment I stepped into the hallway. I heard it–deep, violent coughing coming from the room next door.
There was something else too–retching. The kind of dry heaving that made your stomach twist just hearing it.
It didn’t stop. It kept going, one wave after another.
The sound made my chest tighten.
I walked over and knocked. No answer–just more coughing and choking.
I tried the handle. It wasn’t locked.
The door opened easily, and in the faint glow of moonlight, I saw him–curled up on the sofa.
The air was thick with the acrid smell of alcohol and smoke. His back was hunched, body leaning forward over a trash can.
One hand gripped the arm of the couch, shaking violently.
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Chapter 7
I didn’t turn on the lights. Just walked in quietly.
Moonlight spilled dimly across the carpet, just enough to reveal the blood at his feet.
Late–stage heart failure could cause that–coughing up blood.
And with how much he smoked and drank, it was like he’d given up completely.
Several white bottles of sleeping pills lay scattered across the floor, tangled with cigarette packs and empty bottles.
One bottle had popped open, the pills spilled across the coffee table.
Maybe he’d tried to take one but dropped them.
He must’ve heard my footsteps, because he looked up.
Then–frantic–he opened a drawer and shoved everything in: the bottles, the pills, the evidence.
He even tried to hide the alcohol and cigarettes, though it was obvious I’d already seen everything.
There was still blood at the corner of his mouth. His eyes were glassy, his face twisted in pain.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “I shouldn’t… be like this.”
I sat down next to him and said quietly, “Do you really want to die?”
For a moment, I couldn’t tell if I was asking him… or asking myself–the version of me that had thought about dying so many times.
Do I really want to die?
Or is there still a chance–to try living again?
Nolan looked at me, lost.
After a long pause, he finally said, almost to himself, “I’m just like this because I’m sick.”
I looked at him under the pale moonlight.
“And if they found you a matching heart?” I asked. “If your heart failure could actually be treated–what then?”
Nolan’s expression trembled, but he didn’t respond.
After a long silence, I said quietly, “Hey… what if we tried living instead?”
Just the two of us, in a world where no one really seems to care if we exist.
Rather than slipping away unnoticed… what if we tried to hold on?
At the very least, the people who left this world because of us–surely, they hoped we would live well.
Nolan’s face trembled even more.
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Chapter 7
He raised his hands and buried his face in them.
His voice came out choked and raw. “I lost the right to keep living a long time ago.
That year…. she ended her life during her illness, just so I wouldn’t have to pay her medical bills.
“That’s why I worked like hell for years–trying to earn as much money as I could.
“But… it doesn’t matter anymore. None of it matters.”
His voice cracked in the darkness, slowly unraveling into quiet sobs.
I said softly, “Dying now… that would be the real betrayal.”
I was saying it to him–but I was also saying it to myself.
The clock crept past midnight. Outside, the sky was beginning to pale with the first hint of dawn.
After a long while, Nolan finally lowered his hands and looked at me, grief etched deep into his face. “You really did know,” he said.
He didn’t finish the thought, but I understood.
He knew I’d been pretending–that I had recognized him from the start and deliberately acted like I hadn’t.
There was no need for me to explain.
I just looked him in the eye and said, “Why don’t we try finding you a matching heart?”
He looked at me, confused and hurting. “Why would you help me?”
“Because,” I said quietly, “if you can hang on…
“then maybe I can too.”
Maybe I could try living again.
Just like my parents had hoped for–something they fought for with their lives.
We sat there in silence, the kind that stretches long in the quiet of night.
As the sky gradually brightened, Nolan finally gave a slow nod.
“Alright,” he said. “But… I’ll probably let you down.”
I smiled. “Don’t be so sure. Who knows–maybe we’ll get lucky.”
I’d spent the last seven years like a ghost, numb and aimless. But now, for the first time, I had something to do.
Nolan’s health was deteriorating fast.
It was getting harder and harder for him to even make it to the office, so the plan to sell the company was quietly shelved.
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He wasn’t physically capable of chasing down hospitals or transplant programs anymore.
Fortunately, aside from my occasional psychological episodes, I was still in decent health.
So I took on the task of finding him a donor.
Almost every day, I was out early and back late, contacting top hospitals both in and outside of the country.
To make sure we were taken seriously, I even made a few donations to the hospitals.
Life wasn’t easy for either of us, but thankfully, we weren’t short on money.
ト
Before my parents passed away, they left a will–an inheritance of 30 million dollars and 30% of the company shares.
On the day before Christmas, I was in the kitchen with Nolan, helping prepare dinner.
Then, out of nowhere, I got a phone call. It was from Vlaufield.
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