Chapter 5

As soon as they arrived home, Si Chun took the young Ling Yan by the hand and led her to the guest room.

Ever since she was very little, she had been accustomed to gripping her mother’s hand tightly whenever she felt afraid. It always made her feel extremely safe.

Since the young Ling Yan did not resist physical contact, Si Chun hoped to offer the girl a little comfort this way and let her know early on that there would always be a place for her in this home.

“You can stay here from now on. If you need anything, just tell me.” As Si Chun spoke, she carried the pieces of a four-piece bedding set out of the wardrobe one by one.

After all, she was also a child now and could not effortlessly carry everything at once as an adult could. Before she had even taken out two pieces, a slender, fair arm reached toward her and took the duvet cover from her hands.

—“Let me. I’m stronger than you.”

The woman’s cool, calm voice suddenly echoed through her mind. Si Chun’s movements paused, and by the time she came back to her senses, the young Ling Yan had already begun making the bed.

She seemed very familiar with such work. She swiftly spread out the bedsheet and slipped the duvet into its cover, ​unauthorized copy​completing the entire process without any need for Si Chun’s help.

The sight filled Si Chun with both heartache and sorrow, and she hurried forward to help.

“The desk is over here. If you think it’s too small, you can also use the study. Mom is usually the only one who uses it.” After saying that, she went to the study and carried over a spare chair, then wiped down the seat and backrest with a damp cloth. “You can make do with this for now. We’ll choose a new one over the weekend. Um…I also have a spare winter seat cushion. I don’t know whether you’ll like it, but there’s no hurry. We can talk about it when the time comes!”

When the girl lowered her deep blue eyes and softly murmured, “Okay,” Si Chun tried to restrain herself but ultimately reached out and ruffled her hair.

The young Ling Yan did not dodge. She merely lowered her head and allowed Si Chun to stroke it.

So obedient.

After settling the young Ling Yan in and leaving some snacks in her room, Si Chun finally left. She straightened her back and sat solemnly before her mother.

Si Jiao closed the door and told her to sit on the bay window farthest from it, then regarded her with helpless affection. “Tell me. When did you meet this ‘online friend’?”

She knew Si Chun’s real-life circle of friends very well, but she had never monitored [bailiantales.com]what her daughter did while using her phone or computer. As for this unfamiliar mixed-race girl, Si Jiao had realized from the moment she saw the way Si Chun treated her that the girl meant something extraordinary to her daughter.

Naturally, she had to investigate the background of an online friend Si Chun was so close to.

Si Chun blinked and lied without batting an eye. “We met three years ago. I never expected us to actually become classmates.”

They really had been dating for three years. Their third anniversary was approaching, and Si Chun had even secretly prepared a gift for Ling Yan.

“Do you know what her family situation is like?” Si Jiao continued asking.

“Things were actually quite good when her parents were alive. I’m not too sure about the situation now, but it looks like she’s having a terrible time.” Si Chun cleverly glossed over the parts of Ling Yan’s past that she did not understand either. “Originally, I only wanted to let her stay with us for one night so she could calm down. But if she continues living in that environment, she’ll fall ill sooner or later.”

The Ling Yan of the future rarely spoke to her about her condition. It was a kind of closed-off state that Si Chun found difficult to truly empathize with.

Ling Yan had said that whenever she entered that state, unbearable, cutting words would surround her completely, while an invisible hand twisted every sound from the outside world. Whether those words were kindly or maliciously intended, once they entered her mind, they all became sharp spikes that pierced her until she was covered in wounds.

“So I want to help her and let her stay with us temporarily,” Si Chun said seriously. “I can stop taking an allowance from bailiantales.comnow on, and after I start working, I’ll hand over my entire salary right away—”

“You child!” Si Jiao interrupted her, caught between laughter and exasperation, then said solemnly, “To tell you the truth, Mom was thinking the same thing. I’ll take responsibility for this myself. You can simply focus on studying with the friend you care about.”

Si Chun froze upon hearing this and asked in disbelief, “Really? You want to help Ling Yan too?!”

“Would Mom lie to you?” Si Jiao gave a soft huff before returning to their earlier topic. “If you asked her now, would she willingly explain her family situation clearly to you?”

Si Chun did not answer immediately.

If this were the future, she would never ask unless Ling Yan brought it up herself. She would be afraid of accidentally touching one of Ling Yan’s scars and cutting an irreparable rift between them.

But now that she had returned to the beginning of everything, after nearly a month without seeing Ling Yan and then happening to encounter the young Ling Yan at her purest and most unguarded, Si Chun thought back to all the conflicts and cold wars they had experienced before she traveled through time. She felt that she truly needed to seize this opportunity to ask for a clear explanation.

What if…she could still travel back?

She wanted to spend the rest of her life with Ling Yan, which meant they unauthorized copy needed to properly resolve the various problems between them.

–

Ling Yan curled up on the bed and buried her face in the covers.

Everything here was familiar to her.

She and Si Chun had even been intimate here before. Si Chun liked curling up in her arms and gently taking the back of Ling Yan’s hand between her lips, using that to tell her whether she felt good.

On several occasions, Ms. Si Jiao had still been preparing lessons in the neighboring study late at night, so they had deliberately kept their voices very low or hidden inside the wardrobe as though they were having an illicit affair—even though they had already openly told her mother about their relationship.

Si Chun’s scent enveloped her. Ling Yan breathed it in greedily and wantonly, feeling her tense nerves gradually begin to relax.

But she soon pulled herself out of that comfortable, relaxed state and began considering how she could bring her parents’ inheritance out with her as well, or perhaps…transfer it into accounts belonging to Si Chun and her mother.

After all, she was still legally related by blood to that stolen content family. Moreover, whenever a minor wanted to accomplish anything, obstacles stood in the way at every turn.

Her best option was probably to find an excuse to board with Si Chun’s family, patiently wait until she reached adulthood, and then reclaim everything completely without leaving those awful people a single cent.

As she planned her future, Ling Yan slowly closed her eyes.

But she soon jolted awake from her sleep.

—“What about me?”

In her dream, the future Si Chun embraced her from behind and whispered beside her ear, “Are you going to throw me away?”

No matter how Ling Yan struggled, she could not escape.

She clenched her teeth and refused to say anything, so Si Chun kissed her hard, trying to pry open her lips with something soft. Ling Yan simply opened her mouth and allowed Si Chun to seal away both her words and her breath, closing her eyes because she did not dare look at her.

Ling Yan opened her eyes, [bailiantales.com]drenched in sweat. Before she could recover, she heard a knock on the bedroom door.

“Ling Yan? May I come in?”

Like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, Ling Yan’s heart gave a violent leap. Several seconds passed before she hurried out of bed to open the door.

Si Chun came in carrying a plate of fruit. She closed the door and set the plate beside Ling Yan.

“Mom agreed, but we don’t know much about you, and you don’t know much about us either. So for now, we can only let you stay with us. We can’t completely pull you out of that awful home yet,” Si Chun explained earnestly. “As you can see, I’ve always lived alone with Mom, and there are only two people in our family, so there are limits to what we can provide.”

“That’s all right. I’m accustomed to taking care of myself.” Ling Yan shook her head.

Although Si Chun had expected that answer, she still paused. “But if you need to use or buy anything, you only have to tell us. Keep saving your own allowance. Having money gives you security, doesn’t it?”

Ling Yan was the one who had taught her that.

Ms. Si Jiao had spoiled her too well. It was only after she went far away for university that she realized she needed to plan how she spent her [stolen content]money. After she began dating Ling Yan, she finally started saving each payment she received and building her own private nest egg.

—“Money gives you security. When you want to make a choice, you won’t have to worry so much about other people’s reactions.”

Ling Yan’s tone had been exceptionally calm when she said it, but her expression had been frighteningly dark.

“Your family…” Remembering this, Si Chun could not stop herself from asking, choosing her words as tactfully as possible. “Have they been withholding your money…and using it for their own child?”

She saw Ling Yan lower her eyes, a small gesture that meant she did not want to continue the subject.

“They’re not my family,” Ling Yan answered anyway. “They never have been. They adopted me only because they wanted the inheritance my deceased parents left behind—the house, the car, and the money in their bank accounts. As for whom they intended to spend it on, I don’t know.”

She was willing to open her heart to the young Si Chun in her dream and pry apart every one of her scars for her to see.

This had to be a companion she had imagined for her younger self. In actual reality, she and Si Chun had never crossed paths at this age. Si Chun could not possibly have called out her name the first time they met, much less decided to overcome every obstacle and bring her home after hearing only a few tearful complaints.

It was not that the real Si Chun would never do such a thing. On the contrary, precisely because Ling Yan knew that Si read the original at bailiantales.comChun certainly would, she had been able to imagine a companion who stood wholeheartedly on her side.

She merely…suspected that she would probably never return to the future. Even if she was fortunate enough to survive the car accident, her body, weakened by years of illness, and her fragile mind, already on the verge of collapse, would inevitably become a burden to Si Chun.

But before she died completely, she still longed to have a dream in which Si Chun saved her.

As she thought this, Ling Yan suddenly felt a weight on her head. Si Chun was stroking her hair.

She bit her lip and continued, “I want a family. They’re greedy and insatiable. They don’t deserve to be my family.”

Before she had completely lost hope in them, she had rarely used such harsh words to describe that family. For many years, she had been more accustomed to tolerating, yielding, and speaking indirectly.

It was only after she had been wounded all over and repeatedly hurt that, during one episode, the emotions she had suppressed for more than a decade finally spiraled out of control. After raging at those awful people for the first time, she finally realized that a sharp tongue could instead become a sturdy barrier with which to protect herself.

“Mm, I understand.” Si Chun lowered her hand and gently patted Ling Yan’s back, secretly breathing a sigh of relief.

The fog that had always shrouded Ling Yan’s back, preventing Si Chun from seeing what lay behind it, had finally dispersed a little.

Children at this age were pure and had not yet been stained by society’s complicated dye vat. They dared to speak and act freely. Thanks to returning to this period, Si Chun could finally hear the thoughts Ling Yan had carefully hidden away.

“Then do you need me to accompany you home tomorrow?” Si Chun took the opportunity to ask.

“No.” Ling Yan answered without hesitation. “I can manage by myself…”

Whether now or in the future, the one thing she never wanted was for Si Chun to be scrutinized by those awful people’s filthy gazes.

Si Chun blinked, finding the reaction incredibly familiar. She had not expected Ling Yan to already behave this way at such a young age.

She respected the older Ling Yan’s decisions because the future Ling Yan was capable enough to handle things alone. But when the young Ling Yan said the same thing, Si Chun could only feel that she was trying to act strong.

“But you said you hate them, didn’t you? Don’t they also say many things that hurt you?” Si Chun reminded her. “Wouldn’t it be better to have someone there to endure it with you and shield you from some of the harm?”

She tested the waters very carefully while closely observing the young Ling Yan’s reaction.

However, the girl lowered her head deeply, clearly reluctant to accept Si Chun’s help.

After thinking for a moment, Si Chun offered a compromise. “Or…I could pick you up nearby? At the entrance to your residential complex, for example?”

She deliberately said “pick you up” rather than “wait for you.”

The girl’s long, beautiful eyelashes fluttered twice, followed by an extremely soft sigh.

“Okay.”