The door was pushed open from the outside. At once, Matthias noticed the dark circles around Leon’s eyes as it was rare to see him in such a worn-out state.
At this moment, the two men stared at each other, trying to guess the situation of their respective opponents. It seemed that both of them had already sensed that they were hiding secrets from each other. The thing was, those secrets were all related to Heather. Because of her, both Matthias and Leon weren’t themselves anymore. Wasn’t it weird that she had such a powerful effect?
At times, Leon would wonder whether she was the woman of his dreams or a witch. Having thought about it for some time, all he could come up with was that he didn’t dare to imagine a life without her.
“You’re here early today,” Leon said casually with a cheeky smile on his face.
Matthias offered him a smile in response too, but his mood was hard to read. “I’ve been here all night.” It was like a declaration of ownership rights just for Leon to hear.
With a nod, Leon said nothing further. After all, Heather and Matthias were originally a pair already. With that thought, Leon felt like there was nothing for him to say as he didn’t have anything to win Matthias with. Besides that, he couldn’t possibly take Heather’s words from yesterday seriously.
Lying on the bed, Heather didn’t dare to wake up as she heard the awkward conversation between the two men. However, she saw that the sun would be fully up soon, so there was no logic for her to continue sleeping. Moreover, the doctors would start checking up on patients in no time, so escaping wasn’t the best option now. Therefore, she tried to plan a time to wake up.
As she lay on the bed, she could feel time passing as she was contemplating when to get up. She then thought of how to wake up more naturally, but she couldn’t really recall how she’d wake up every morning. It was just not natural when one wanted to do something very natural on purpose.
At this moment, her eyelashes fluttered before she slowly opened her eyes. How could nobody notice that she was up? Thus, she contemplated whether she should make a sound. However, it must seem a little odd if she did that.
“Heather, you’re finally awake.” Matthias had sharp eyes. He was the one who noticed that she woke up despite the fact that she didn’t make a sound.
Looking toward Matthias, Heather saw Leon standing next to him. She noticed that Leon seemed to have something to say, yet he kept it to himself. It made her feel bad for him. In TV series or novels, love triangles had always appeared numerous times. At this moment, she realized that she had also become a part of the said triangle. She didn’t know what to say all of a sudden.
“Is the doctor here?” She suddenly had the urge to ask that out loud, so she simply blurted without thinking much.
“No,” Matthias replied blandly, knowing her intentions very well.
Meanwhile, Leon seemed to be very stumped by her sudden question. He was even impressed that Matthias answered it as if it wasn’t a little out of the blue.
“What time is it now?” This was a question she wanted to ask for a very long time.
Since the situation was so awkward, she didn’t really know what to say, so she resorted to asking random questions. At least she was able to take control of the situation for the time being as she feared that either Matthias or Leon would say something that would lead to an argument, and she was not in a state that was capable of handling that. She was afraid of unforeseen circumstances.
This time, Leon was quick to answer. “A quarter past seven.” As he answered, he was also surprised that it was so early. Usually, he’d still be in his bed at this hour.
“That early?” At first, she thought that it was already eight in the morning. If that was the case, the doctor should be on his way to check up on her.
“Are you still sleepy?” Matthias was concerned. He thought that she might not have had a good sleep.
“No, I’m not.” How could she be in the mood to sleep now? Plus, lately, she had been quite the short sleeper.
At this moment, the atmosphere in the ward was becoming more awkward. Even Matthias, who was usually good at talking, didn’t know what topic he should continue with Heather because she appeared uninterested in talking with him.
As for Leon, he seemed to be an outsider as he watched Matthias and Heather chat awkwardly. Leon couldn’t find an appropriate time to join the conversation either. It looked as though the three of them were talking to themselves, and if this continued, all would fall silent soon.
“Heather, you must be hungry. I’ll go out to buy you some food.” Leon got himself an excuse to head out.
The situation that the three people were in was far too awkward, and Leon didn’t like it. At the time that he wanted to fight for her the most, she didn’t seem to be giving him a chance. Now that she was presenting herself to him on a silver plate, it was hard for him to accept.
After Leon walked out, Heather and Matthias remained quiet. The both of them were either looking outside the window or at the surroundings; they were unable to look at each other as none dared to take the initiative to speak up first.
Who would’ve expected that there’d be a day where they’d look at each other for so long and still be speechless? He had thought of numerous adjectives, but none seemed to describe the current situation he was in.
On the other hand, Heather felt that her body had become one with the bed after lying on it for so long. She suddenly felt admiration toward people who could sleep in or laze around in bed and not feel tired.
After too much sleep, the body might not be in the best state. At this moment, she felt that her whole body was sore and in pain. She would definitely be up for a full-body spa after getting discharged. She then started to move her body slightly as staying in the same position was more tiring than she anticipated.
“I’ve already asked the doctor to come over when he’s on duty,” said Matthias awkwardly. Even the way he spoke to her sounded unnatural now.
“Okay,” she replied faintly. The two were acting so distant that it was almost scary.
As if on cue, the door of the ward was pushed open promptly after the exchange of words. Following that, an old doctor came in with several younger doctors around him.
Taking a glance at the time on her phone, she figured that the doctors must’ve not had the time to get breakfast since they came so early. Her gaze then swept past Matthias, thinking that he must have pressured the doctors. She had already heard of his reputation as someone with drastic yet effective measures when dealing with business.
The way Matthias instructed the doctors was more like a threat instead of a simple command. At this moment, she couldn’t help but smile a little thinking of his actions. It made her happy. She liked seeing how cruel he was toward others, yet acted affectionately and caring when it came to her. The stark contrast made his feelings toward her seem extra prominent. He was really able to fulfill her fairytale fantasy that had always been buried deep down.
At this moment, the older doctor stood by Heather’s bedside to take a good look at her. She seemed to be more energetic today. “Miss Langston, do you feel better today?” the old doctor asked in a friendly tone.
In response, she nodded. She seemed to be speaking less these days. Meanwhile, Matthias was just awkwardly standing by the side. He recalled how Leon had gone to get breakfast, thinking how smart he was to escape the awkward situation quickly.
“Can I get discharged today?” Heather asked. She didn’t like the everlasting smell of disinfectant in the hospital. Hence, she didn’t want to stay here any longer.
Pushing the pair of glasses resting on his nose bridge, the old doctor said, “We’ll have to wait until the test results are out.” Obviously, the doctor had to make judgments not only based on her complexion but also from the tests run data.
At this moment, she furrowed her brows. She didn’t like the idea of tests, nor did she like the idea of being in the hospital in the first place. That was why she wished that she could leave as soon as possible.
Matthias knew that she must be displeased, knowing her temper. In fact, he had already noticed how she didn’t cope very well in the hospital. At times, her thoughts were all written on her face. She could be simple or complex, depending on the situation.
While the old doctor asked a few more basic questions on how she felt and so on, the younger doctors surrounding the older doctor would take a peek at Heather from time to time. Though her complexion was not the best, she still looked so beautiful that one would be shy to keep their eyes on her. Matthias liked how she looked simple and clean now. Her baby-like flawless skin was so alluring.
After the doctors left, the ward had fallen back into silence. There were several instances where he wanted to start a conversation with her, but he had yet to succeed.
The silence was a little unbearable for Heather. The more cautious he was, the more guilty she felt. She wanted to talk to him too, but she just didn’t know how. As such, she felt like a failure once again
At this moment, she was beginning to feel hungry. Nibbling on her lower lip, she wondered where Leon went to buy breakfast as it was taking too long. Besides that, she was in a dilemma as she wasn’t keen on asking Matthias to get her breakfast as well. All she wished for at the moment was for Leon to be back soon.
The atmosphere was too awkward, so Matthias figured he could turn on his phone that had been off since last night. He figured there must have been many people looking for him. Not long after the phone was turned on, the notification pings started ringing nonstop. Even Lara, who was always calm and composed, had bombarded his phone with a string of text messages.
He felt his head ache as he looked at the messages on his phone, reckoning that they were from the company. As he wasn’t going to leave the hospital just yet, he simply deleted them all without even reading. At times like these, he didn’t want to be affected by any other factors. He wanted to make sure that he got to see her recover until she was discharged with his own eyes. Therefore, he was not planning to go anywhere now.
On the other hand, Heather watched him as he focused on swiping on his phone. She wondered if there was an emergency that he had to tend to. With that thought, she spoke up. “Is there something urgent back at the company that you have to deal with?” She hoped that he would depart as soon as possible to not extend the state of suffering that both of them were in right now.
“No,” he answered concisely, fully grasping the meaning behind her words.
It seemed that he really wasn’t going to leave. Since that was the case, she went back to remaining silent as her gaze was trained on the ceiling. She just couldn’t find any topic to talk to him about.
“Leon went out for quite some time. I think he might be lost.” Matthias suddenly brought Leon up. He was actually looking for an excuse to get some fresh air. Besides, there was an important call he had to make.
“He shouldn’t be. I reckon he might be stuck somewhere seeing some pretty nurses,” Heather said in a teasing tone.
As she spoke of the devil, the devil appeared. At this moment, Leon pushed the door of the ward and came in. In his hand was a bag. He seemed to have brought a cartful of breakfast back. Alerted, Matthias stepped forward and took over the food from Leon.
He might have overbought a little too much. The portion was sufficient for a group of 30 people, not to mention there were only three of them.
“Why did you buy so much?” Matthias asked as he was confused. No wonder he had taken such a long time.
“I didn’t know what she feels like eating today, so I bought everything that she likes,” Leon told Matthias. Truth was, Leon had actually been taking his time outside.
