"Have you thought about your future?" To avoid answering the question, John shifted the topic to Henry and Adrian.
The attempt at evasion was so obvious that anybody with half a brain could see it. Adrian went along with it and answered, "It's going quite well for us, actually. Right?"
He elbowed Henry's arm and cast him a sideways glance.
"Yes, we are doing quite well." Henry concurred with Adrian's statement. "My mom already knows."
"What?" Adrian sat up straight. "When did our mom find out? When did you tell her?"
"You're calling her your mom now. Of course, she should know why she has acquired another son." Henry wanted to laugh at the look of apprehension on Adrian's face. "While we were on a video call one time, she asked me if I liked someone. I told her the truth. Why are you so agitated?'
"Agitated? Who, me?" Adrian's heart was pounding in his throat. He rubbed his sweaty palms against his thighs.
After a moment's pause, he asked, "Did your mom come out of the screen to beat you up? Did she point at your nose and curse at you for being an unfilial son?"
If Adrian's parents found out about them, the Song family would be in an uproar.
"So she's 'my mom' now?" A dangerous glint flashed in Henry's eyes, and Adrian chuckled at how inflammable he was. "Oops. Our mom. Did she warn you or something?"
"Well, she ignored me for a month. I called my stepfather so that he could put in a good word for me, but to no avail." Henry didn't really intend to hide these things from Adrian.
As he listened to Henry recount the unpleasantness of the time, Adrian's heart ached. He didn't realize that Henry and his mother hadn't talked to each other for an entire month.
Worry and guilt warred inside him.
"It's really impossible to make others accept us." Adrian hung his head in resignation.
How long could they go on like this?
What if their families forced them to marry?
It wasn't that Adrian had never considered it before, but he only thought that it was too soon to think about the topic. But Henry had told his family, so they had to get ready to face what the world would think of them.
A small smile lingering on his lips, John shook his head slightly. "Henry hasn't finished his story yet. Let him finish first."
"Huh?" Adrian's head snapped up.
Henry smiled. "After a month, my mother gave me two choices."
"Two choices?" Adrian swallowed nervously. He dreaded the choices that Henry's mother offered. His own mother threatened him from time to time, and he felt helpless.
"Either we adopt a child, or she will give me a brother or sister whom we could raise as our own kid."
After scooting closer to the other man, Adrian asked, "What does that mean?"
With a gentle smile on his face, Henry placed a hand on Adrian's palm and stroked it gently.
John slapped a palm on his forehead, speechless.
How could Henry stand being with such a dense person? John could feel the second-hand embarrassment keenly.
"She agrees." John breathes out a sigh of relief. Really, he couldn't bear North Yard's air to be polluted by Adrian's obtuseness any longer.
"She agrees?" Adrian voice was an octave higher, and his eyes were round with shock. He hurriedly grabbed Henry's shoulders. "Really? Our mom is really okay with us? Does she really agree?"
In Adrian's excitement, his mouth sprayed Henry's face with spit as he spoke.
"Wait, wait, calm down! Your spit is all over my face." Henry reached out for some tissue to wipe his face, but Adrian beat him to it, raising a sleeve to casually wipe Henry's face like he was wiping a table.
Henry wanted to hit him, but he couldn't.
The way Adrian wiped his saliva from Henry's face seemed familiar to John. He was reminded of the time when Nina blew a snot bubble.
John once made her laugh so hard, and that happened.
He also used his sleeve to wipe her face, which turned redder the more he cleaned up her face.
That time, his little girl's face turned red with embarrassment. In Henry's case right now, his face was quickly turning red from how hard Adrian was scrubbing it with his sleeve.
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