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Tang Yi had never once questioned his natural luck.
He was very well and fully aware that it was complete and absolute shit.
First, to be given up by his mother. Tang Yi grew up knowing a figment of a person. No photos or stories of his mother were ever found by him at home. Tang Yi was acknowledged only by a puzzle box with nothing inside and a birthday cake once a year. Even the birthday cakes eventually stopped. No matter how Tang Yi wished or weeped or wailed, the box held no answers and his mother maintained her distance.
Second, to have such a terrible adoptive father. The sting of slaps upon his cheek, the pangs of hunger when he had no allowance for food and his father clearly only cooked for himself, the feeling of isolation inside his own home, all these had left scars on Tang Yi’s heart. Tang Yi could not change the fact that he wasn’t born of his adoptive father’s blood.
It wasn’t his choice to be adopted. But the man had only known cruelty and disdain, disappointed that his own family line could not be extended through his own biology. Tang Yi was glad he’d taken the chance to run away. Although living on the streets was tough, it was easier than to constantly look over your shoulder in fear of someone who should have loved you.
It was mercy enough that Tang Yi had never tried to find his adoptive father to take vengeance on him for his mistreatment. Or at least, Tang Guo Dong had not allowed Tang Yi to grab his gang brothers and cause trouble for such a thing.
Third, to find a home, only to have it all taken away from him in one terrible swoop. Tang Guo Dong’s blood was still warm on his fingertips when Tang Yi was shot himself. As he lay there bleeding, Tang Yi’s eyes were stuck on the man he called father with all the love his heart could muster up again. Tang Guo Dong was the cornerstone of Tang Yi’s new family, and to see him die in front of him was a greater pain than the bullet wound in his chest. It was as if every part of him that had found hope after the abandonment by his mother and cruelty of his adoptive father was torn away.
As the world darkened around him, Tang Yi found himself lying next to a woman he didn’t know. Her blood stained his jacket all the same. He cursed her as well as the shooter, for bringing Tang Guo Dong to this place. He cursed them both with all the scorn and pain he could muster.
But most of all, Tang Yi cursed himself for allowing himself to love again, for not going with Tang Guo Dong and taking the first bullet for him.
And now, here in a hospital bed, fighting for his life, Tang Yi mourned the fourth occurrence that confirmed his poor luck. Nearly dying. To live without Tang Guo Dong would be like living without a heart. Although Tang Yi wished for vengeance, it was hard to say that being the one to live and move on was a blessing.
It was one of these brief moments of consciousness, with Zuo Hong Ye having just left, that Tang Yi found a fifth reason to curse his luck. After a ruckus outside his private hospital room, there was a bang of his door being thrown open and a police officer stormed in.
“Tang Yi! Tang Yi! What happened that day?! How did Li Zhen-Jie die?! Who else was there?!”
“Officer Meng!” Li Zhi De stormed in and pulled the police officer to the side, but not very successfully. “You can clearly see our boss is still recovering! He’s already done what he can to give a police statement! We don’t owe you anything else!” He pointed at the door. “Now leave!”
“Absolutely not!” Officer Meng crossed his arms. “There are clearly more details than he’s let on! Given the placement of his body and the others, where he was shot, the entry of the bullet-”
“Get… this idiot out…” Tang Yi groaned.
“Yes, Boss!” Li Zhi De rounded upon Officer Meng with renewed strength. “You heard him! Leave!”
It took another minute, but at last, Officer Meng had been chased off, although not without promising to resume pressing the issue. Tang Yi only allowed himself to drift off again, hoping the sleep would ease the sudden headache that had been awakened from the rude interruption.
------
The remaining time for Tang Yi’s hospital stay was blissfully quiet. The calamity known as Officer Meng had not visited again.
Little did Tang Yi know that calling Officer Meng a natural disaster was a rather apt comparison.
As soon as Tang Yi had set one foot outside of the hospital door, yelling could be heard from the side.
“Tang Yi! Tang Yi! Stop right there!”
Tang Yi spared one glance to confirm it was Officer Meng before ignoring him to continue walking the few steps to the car waiting for him. But even a few steps was too far as Officer Meng nearly charged into Tang Yi’s side. A flurry of activity and the clicking of several concealed pistols later, Officer Meng and Tang Yi were encircled by Tang Yi’s protective entourage. Officer Meng didn’t waver in the slightest.
“You’re fully recovered, now you have no place to run! I won’t stop until I get the answers I want!”
“I am not obligated to comply.” Tang Yi slipped on a pair of sunglasses handed to him by one of his guards. “I have already given everything I can remember in my police statement.”
“I don’t buy it!” Officer Meng stomped his foot and Tang Yi wanted to point out his childishness. “There’s no way that’s all the details! There must be more! You have to be hiding something!”
“Can you prove it?” And here, Tang Yi was curious. Of course he was hiding something. But that was for him to know and the police to never find out. If the police did know just how much Tang Yi had truly seen, just how much Tang Yi truly knew, then there would have to be some damage control. And just maybe, Officer Meng might have to be dissuaded from pursuing the issue any further. “Do you have any evidence to lay such a charge?”
“Well…” Officer Meng bit his lip and Tang Yi smirked. “No, not yet. But my gut tells me there’s more!”
“Well, Officer Meng, I’m not a lawyer or a police officer, but something tells me that gut feelings are not admissible in court.” Tang Yi straightened out his suit, taking note of the bobbing of Officer Meng’s Adam’s apple as he did so. “And even if you badger me every day for a month, you won’t hear anything different from me. So please excuse me.”
Tang Yi walked and the wall of people parted around him as he entered his car. The car had only started pulling away from the curb before Officer Meng shouted, “THEN I’LL BADGER YOU EVERY DAY FOR TWO MONTHS! I’LL GET THE TRUTH!”
“Idiot,” Tang Yi muttered as he started to get caught up on the goings on of the gang and Shi Hai on his tablet. But there was still a ghost of a smile on the corner of his lips.
------
Tang Yi stepped into his suit store and frowned.
It was only his first day back after leaving the hospital and it appeared he had gained a new shadow. The same car that had followed him from home to the sports club, to the office, and now to the suit shop.
Tang Yi gracefully took his usual seat on the couch as his assistants brought him the weekly reports. Whoever it was following him had great courage. And also greater idiocy. Tang Yi looked to the side to glance out the window. A far too familiar curl of hair peeked out from behind a pole outside the store.
Cataclysm Meng had come to follow him.
“Sir… Do you want us to invite the gentleman in,” Tang Yi’s assistant asked.
“No, let him be. It’s not so cold out. Besides, he wants company secrets.”
The assistant bowed and shuffled away. Tang Yi continued to flip through reports, casually taking peeks outside. Officer Meng appeared determined to badger him and find something.
“Let him come,” Tang Yi muttered. “He won’t find anything anyway.”
After reviewing everything and issuing directions, Tang Yi left the suit shop to find Officer Meng leaning against the pole he’d been hiding behind for so long, dozing off. Tang Yi smiled and flicked one of his large ears. Officer Meng jolted and fell to the sidewalk.
“Th-T-That’s assaulting an officer!”
“Now now, Officer Meng. Surely calling that assault would be an abuse of power.” Tang Yi cocked his head. “After all, haven’t you been stalking me all day?”
Officer Meng’s eyes began to shift around him. “No I haven’t.”
“Isn’t that your car? That old and tacky thing over there?”
“Of course not!”
“Oh, police officers must make much more than I expected.” Tang Yi waited, but Officer Meng did not rise to the bait. “Well, if there’s nothing else, I should be going then.”
“Wait! I have questions!”
“Do you have a warrant?”
“I-”
“If you do not have legal documentation that says you have the right to follow and question me, then you had best be on your way, Officer Meng.” Tang Yi leveled his best glare and was impressed to find that Officer Meng matched him. “I will press charges if required. I’m entitled to my personal freedoms after all.”
“I will get the truth out of you! Even if I do have to hound you every day!”
Tang Yi left Officer Meng sputtering on the ground. However, Tang Yi’s intimidation had made no difference. Officer Meng still followed him to his next stop. And he followed him every day through all his stops. Even the most adamant of bodyguards had not been enough to dissuade him.
Truly, he deserved to be called Cataclysm Meng instead of Officer Meng.
------
“Officer Meng, did you, upon my client’s release from the hospital, run up to him to question him?”
“...Yes I did.”
“At that time, did my client remind you that he has already provided a witnessed police statement?”
“...Yes he did.”
“Did you then, continue to press that you did not believe my client’s statement?”
“I… I said I did not believe he had told all the details he was aware of...”
“When my client said, ‘And even if you badger me every day for a month, you won’t hear anything different from me,’ did you take him literally?”
“No.”
“Did you perceive this as an invitation?”
“I-” Officer Meng’s mouth snapped shut and he made a face. “No.”
Tang Yi stopped glaring down the police attorney to glare down Officer Meng. Apparently he was taking the lawsuit seriously, dressed in his police uniform. A surprisingly good fit, in Tang Yi’s opinion. Good shoulders, not a bad color on Officer Meng’s skin. Shame about the low quality fabric though.
Tang Yi’s lawyer continued to press for answers during the deposition. “Why then, did you persist in following my client every day for two months?”
“I did it to find out the truth.”
“Do you understand that your constant stalking and harassment has infringed upon my client’s rights to personal freedom?”
The court stenographer taking the deposition typed furiously on her tablet as Officer Meng’s jaw muscles jumped and jerked as if he was grinding his teeth to keep quiet. Officer Meng’s lawyer keep shooting him glances out of the corner of her eye, as if expecting him to jump up and object.
“I was only interested in finding the truth. No harassment was intended,” Officer Meng said at last.
“Did you have evidence of probable cause when you decided to pursue questioning my client?”
“I did not.”
“What was the reason you believed my client had withheld information?”
Tang Yi raised an eyebrow and waited.
“After a careful rereading of the statement and analysis of the evidence found at the scene, my intuition told me that there might be details missing. I wanted to interview Mr. Tang only in this capacity.” The lines were careful and practiced. It was just a shame that Officer Meng appeared to be a terrible liar.
Tang Yi nudged his lawyer. His lawyer nodded.
“Might I direct you to this transcript of security camera footage from Mr. Tang’s suit shop, taken a few months ago.” Tang Yi’s lawyer produced a set of pages stapled together. “Here you said, ‘I’m sure you had something to do with the death of Li Zhen-Jie. I’ll find it and arrest you for sure.’” Officer Meng’s jaw muscles started moving again. “This statement does not sound like you had no other motive than to find missing details.”
“Objection. Don’t say anything.” Officer Meng’s lawyer at last had to restrain Officer Meng from jumping out of his seat. “Line from the transcript is presented out of context for this question.”
The questioning continued and Tang Yi found himself impressed by how cool Officer Meng had managed to stay under pressure.
“At last, some professionalism,” Tang Yi teased after everything was wrapped up. “Keep it up. I hope you won’t cause a scene in court.”
Officer Meng snarled just a bit, but Tang Yi was already walking away, hoping that with this measure, Officer Meng would be dissuaded for good.
How was Tang Yi to know that several more lawsuits later, Officer Meng would continue to breathe down his neck like a dog, determined to be the one to latch on to Tang Yi’s neck and drag him down?
------
After seeing only Officer Meng, Cataclysm Meng, Stalker Meng, and even Martial Artist Meng, it was still a surprise to Tang Yi to see Meng Shao Fei. Even more so that when the most useful person to have in his corner would have been Officer Meng as they were taken up the mountain to meet with a mysterious boss, it was Shao Fei that Tang Yi had to contend with.
It was Shao Fei that had his back in the parking lot, knowing with a glance what to do.
It was Shao Fei that understood his looks and nudges to distract the men in the van.
It was Shao Fei that bodily blocked the knife for Tang Yi.
Shao Fei showed concern when Tang Yi dislocated his thumb, wanted chicken to roast over their meager fire, and most importantly, Shao Fei had listened. Listened when no one else could or would.
No matter what Tang Yi told himself, no matter how many times Tang Yi tried to remember all the anger and problems Officer Meng had created for him, his heart began to make room for one more piece. Meng Shao Fei was so different and yet the same as Officer Meng. Shao Fei saw the truth behind Tang Yi, knew him best despite all of Tang Yi’s efforts, and accepted it all.
“If you say that you are trying to reform Xing Tian Meng, I will believe you. And one day, I’ll hear the truth from you. I know it,” Shao Fei had said.
So when Shao Fei had gone to sleep on the old wooden pallet with only a few smoldering branches to help keep him warm, Tang Yi had covered him with his jacket. When Shao Fei would not wake, Tang Yi felt his forehead and felt the pangs of concern over Shao Fei’s fever.
Tang Yi chose that moment to trust once more. Chose to listen to his heart, despite all things telling him that a relationship between a police officer and a gangster would never work. Chose to defy his unlucky fate and make his own fortune.
And Tang Yi hoped he had chosen right.
In the rush down the mountain on a stolen motorcycle and in the flurry of treating Shao Fei’s infection, Tang Yi did not have time to see if he had chosen correctly. In the days after, Tang Yi had also begun investigating who had attempted the kidnapping. Proof would have to wait.
Proof came just as Shao Fei had been released from the hospital and just as Tang Yi had tired of waiting.
From only a disgruntled conversation, Shao Fei had known the lighter was of greater importance than anything else Tang Yi had on him. And despite their animosity, Shao Fei had returned it.
So Tang Yi had decided to see where his feelings went, how they grew, if they would bloom beautifully or become something thorny and toxic.
He realized, as they ate lunch together, that he’d have to survive Shao Fei’s disastrous eating habits first.