My Chongxi Husband Is Faking His Coma novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: Bad Luck on Camera

"It's a security upgrade," said Pei Wen the next morning, and wrung his hands.

"Who ordered it?" asked Lin Zhi.

"Mr. Xie Guangping. For the patient's safety. It sends video to the security office, and to, I think, a phone."

"Whose phone?"

"I don't know! I swear I don't know. I'm only the assistant," said Pei Wen.

Lin Zhi looked at the little red light in the vent.

He had spent half the night working out the angle.

The walk had happened at the window side of the bed, out of the cone.

The carry and the kiss on the forehead had happened inside it.

He was, as far as he could tell, on film kissing a sleeping man.

"Fine," he said. "Then it has to go."

The family dined together that evening in the private room with the round table.

This time, Lin Zhi took the chair beside Madam Xie.

He did not sit by the kitchen door.

Nobody told him to move.

"Grandmother," he said, when the soup had been served. "May I ask you something about the fortune-teller?"

The old woman lifted an eyebrow.

"He told us to cover the mirror in my husband's room, because a mirror frightens the groom's soul."

"He did," said Madam Xie.

"Last night somebody put a lens in the ceiling vent. A lens is a kind of mirror. It looks back at you."

"It's a security camera, Xiao Lin," said the Second Uncle, patiently. "For his protection."

"Who is watching it?"

"The security office. And a phone."

There was the smallest pause.

"Mine," said Xie Guangping. "I check it every hour or so, to be sure he's well."

"Every hour," said Lin Zhi. "At night too?"

"If I wake."

The Second Aunt put down her spoon.

In Lin Zhi's pocket, his phone kept recording.

"It's very kind of you," he said. "But I'm there all night, you see."

"I wash him in the morning, and I turn him, and I rub the cream into his heels."

"I don't need a nurse. I wash my husband myself, everywhere."

Somebody's teacup rattled.

"Everywhere," Lin Zhi repeated pleasantly. "I don't need a camera to tell me how well he is. I know exactly how well he is."

The Second Aunt turned an extraordinary color.

At the end of the table, two young cousins stared fixedly at their plates.

Pei Wen, in the corner, was holding his napkin over his mouth.

Madam Xie set down her cane.

"The fortune-teller told us the room was to be private to the bride," she said. "I had forgotten. It was my mistake."

"Mother," said Xie Guangping.

"The lens comes out tonight. Safety is the bride, Guangping. I did not marry him off for a ceiling."

The Second Aunt's head came up.

"Daughter-in-law," said Madam Xie. "The household keys."

"Mother, I have run this house for twenty years."

"Yesterday you poured boiling tea for a sick man's mouth. A woman who does that does not carry my keys."

Slowly, with her bandaged fingers, the Second Aunt unhooked a ring of old brass keys from her belt and laid it by her plate.

"Pei Wen will hold them until I decide," said Madam Xie.

"Yes, Madam," squeaked Pei Wen, and took them in both hands.

Down the table, the Second Uncle was smiling at Lin Zhi.

For the first time, it did not reach even the corners of his face.

The technician came and went before the lamps were lit, and the vent in the ceiling was bare.

Lin Zhi stood in the middle of the ward and looked up at it.

Then he turned the lock on the inner door and put his back against it.

The room was dim and warm and quiet.

He had a speech prepared about physiotherapy and the importance of rest.

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