After Transmigrating Back, I Became My Own Stand-in - Chapter 9

Tan Tan stood there, paralyzed, not knowing what to say. Shen Tianqing continued to stare at her, her eyes looking strikingly unfamiliar—exactly like those of her stepfather.

Time had passed too quickly; Tan Tan could barely remember what kind of personality Shen Tianqing had as a child.

She was actually a little afraid of her now.

Their mother snapped back to reality and reached out to swat Shen Tianqing. “How can you talk to your sister like that?”

Just then, the little niece handed over the remote. Shen Tianqing pressed a button and changed the channel. The child puffed out her cheeks in annoyance and got her face pinched by Shen Tianqing in return.

Tan Tan’s expression remained grim; the atmosphere between the two sisters was so awkward that even the children could sense it.

Since it was getting late, the nanny came to take the children to bed. Chen Geni switched the television back.

“What is this girl’s name?” she asked.

“Meng Heng,” Shen Tianqing replied.

Chen Geni knew exactly what kind of people her daughters were. Her eldest, Tan Tan, was the child of her first husband. She had a flamboyant personality and had dated countless people—both men and women—since her teens, though she kept it hidden at first. In the world of adults, some are conservative regarding emotions, while others have seen it all; it wasn’t particularly shocking.

Chen Geni felt that Tan Tan was simply playful and would eventually settle down. She hadn’t expected her eldest daughter to be so fickle in her relationships. Whatever her mindset was, it had caused a perfectly good partner to end up in such a tragic state.

The family could have handled a bit of drama, but once Shen Tianqing got involved, everything turned into a mess.

Chen Geni had met Shi Xu twice. At first, she thought she was just Tan Tan’s friend, only to realize they were “that kind” of friends. When Tan Tan cheated on Shi Xu, the subsequent fallout catalyzed the future tragedy. Shi Xu had a hardened personality; she executed the “never speak again” rule perfectly and disdained any compensation from the family.

But Chen Geni never expected her younger daughter to be a textbook lesbian who was in love with her sister’s ex. After Shi Xu died, Shen Tianqing’s personality underwent a radical transformation.

Tan Tan looked up at the TV. On screen, Meng Heng looked tender enough to drip water, her youth lingering between her brows. When she laughed, she was boisterous; one could find a resemblance to her in her features, but no matter how one looked at it, she could never replace Shi Xu.

Shi Xu had been dead for twelve years. Tan Tan thought she had moved on, but she found that no matter how recklessly she threw herself into new relationships, she could never recapture the feeling of being with Shi Xu. When she chose to return to the country, she had anticipated a conflict with her “little sister” Shen Tianqing, but after a long period of uneasy peace, she hadn’t expected the explosion to happen tonight.

“She doesn’t look like her.”

As soon as Tan Tan spoke, Chen Geni pinched her hand.

Tan Tan frowned. In Shen Tianqing’s eyes, this face was older than before—or rather, more mature. The fatigue brought on by marriage lingered there; she was no longer the Tan Tan of the past who would animatedly describe how her love was a match made in heaven.

We have all changed.

Only the dead remain the same.

Tan Tan had long eyes and single eyelids—a very classical look, much like Chen Geni’s. Shi Xu used to say that at first sight, Tan Tan looked like a lady walking out of a painting by Mr. Lin Fengmian.

Tan Tan was an artist herself; while her mother did art management, she specialized in ceramics. Pots, pans, and little trinkets were her passion.

Shen Tianqing remembered every word of praise Shi Xu had for Tan Tan. When the three of them went out, or while Tan Tan was off buying something, Shi Xu would sit on a bench with her eating ice cream and say, “Your sister is so cute. I really love the clay dog she sculpted.”

Shi Xu was charming to others, but in private, she loved to show off. She even showed off to Shen Tianqing, who was then just a middle schooler, dangling her keychain in front of her.

Back then, Shen Tianqing hadn’t developed her poisonous tongue yet. She just took a look and said, “It’s very cute. Like you.”

Shi Xu had ruffled her hair and laughed. “Little sister, are you insulting me?”

“No,” Shen Tianqing had muttered.

They didn’t spend much time together; people in a passionate relationship don’t usually like carrying a “little lightbulb” around. Occasionally, Tan Tan would bring her along to divert suspicion from their mother. Once Chen Geni found out, Tan Tan stopped being so deliberate.

Shen Tianqing’s blueprint for “romance” was largely formed during that period as a third wheel. Years later, when that relationship lay in pieces and Shi Xu had cut ties with Tan Tan only to die shortly after, Shen Tianqing couldn’t even find her in her dreams. She only occasionally thought of the past and shamefully imagined herself as the one being pinned in an alleyway for an ice-cream-flavored kiss.

But it wouldn’t happen. It couldn’t happen. Not in this lifetime.

“How is she not like her? Elaborate,” Shen Tianqing challenged.

The nanny brought out a pot of floral tea. The borosilicate glass teapot was beautiful, with flowers blooming inside the water—but they were dead, too.

Chen Geni closed her eyes and rubbed her temples, feeling for the 108th time that she had made a wrong decision. She was deeply worried; the relationship between her two daughters was so tense over a dead person that the loss outweighed any gain.

One had a disastrous marriage—an “incorrect option” chosen to escape reality.

The other was trapped in an old dream, living every day as if she were barely hanging on.

Was it worth it?

She could say to Tan Tan, “If you knew this would happen, why did you do it?” but she didn’t know what to say to Shen Tianqing. Because the timing was never right—even if Tan Tan and Shi Xu had lived happily ever after, Shen Tianqing would have only ever been a “little sister.”

“She’s not like her in any way,” Tan Tan said, taking a sip of tea. Her makeup made her look healthy, but it couldn’t hide her exhaustion. The eyes Shi Xu had once praised had lost their spirit; they were filled only with the drudgery of a life she was barely enduring. “Little sister, I know you hate me, but it’s useless.”

The issues they had avoided for years were finally laid bare. Actually, they had been laid bare once before—on the day of Shi Xu’s funeral.

That year, Tan Tan and Shi Xu had been broken up for three years. Tan Tan had married a British professor and was arguing at home with Shen Tianqing, who had returned from the funeral with a bruise on her face. It wasn’t exactly an argument, because Shen Tianqing was already crying. She had been slapped by one of Shi Xu’s friends.

Shi Xu’s father had jumped off a building after going bankrupt, and her mother, who had been in the ICU for years, had passed away shortly before Shi Xu’s own accident. The only relative who came from their hometown was a maternal aunt who was too busy to take full charge.

Shen Tianqing was in a terrible state. She grabbed Tan Tan’s hand and asked, “Did I do something wrong?”

At the time, Tan Tan only knew that Shen Tianqing liked Shi Xu, but she didn’t realize it was that kind of love. She shook her head. “It was my fault.”

“Yes, it was you!”

“I only realized I loved her after she died.”

Shen Tianqing wasn’t even twenty yet. Her face didn’t hold the “stories” it would years later; all her heartaches were visible on the surface, but her words pierced Tan Tan’s soul. Tan Tan thought she had gone mad.

“You… love Shi Xu?” she asked, crouching down and holding Shen Tianqing’s hand.

Tan Tan hadn’t seen Shi Xu in three years. Their meeting had been a romantic misunderstanding—a red string tied by fiery roses. Their love was no different from a fire.

Shi Xu grew up in a home filled with love. She was excellent at creating romance and expressing her heart; her love was an endless cycle of giving without requiring anything in return, because giving was her joy.

Everything was beautiful at first, but Tan Tan was different. Chen Geni’s first husband was a painter with violent tendencies and mental health issues. Every romance starts beautifully, but the results are often disappointing. Her parents’ relationship caused Tan Tan infinite pain; she believed that to gain something was to lose something, and that everything had a price. Her mother married for her father’s art, and to gain status and fame—much like the union between her mother and her stepfather was based on her mother’s net worth and ability.

Tan Tan craved an eternal love. She found it in Shi Xu, but it felt like she was losing something else. She feared being “domesticated,” feared loving Shi Xu to the point of madness. So, she chose to betray her.

At a party that was vital to Shi Xu’s career, Tan Tan slept with the investor of the movie Shi Xu was set to star in.

The news spread everywhere. The pairing of a bisexual and a “pure” lesbian became a joke. Shi Xu had a good personality, but she wasn’t a saint. She had a temper; as a teacher at the Kun Opera Society, she was strict yet caring. Because of her high talent and achievements, she always carried a bit of pride. Above all else, she feared insult.

Tan Tan had insulted her and their relationship. That day was the first time Tan Tan saw Shi Xu truly angry. Shi Xu had only agreed to act as a favor to a friend and had no intention of entering the industry permanently. The investor was a large man, but Shi Xu gained the upper hand in their confrontation, which only made it more of a laughingstock.

In the end, everything was ruined. They broke up. Shi Xu went back to being a Wudan, but the trouble didn’t stop. Her father’s business failed, the capital chain snapped, he was buried in debt, and he committed suicide. Her mother fell ill from grief, was ridiculed at the theater, and finally died in a car accident on her way to work.

The family was gone. Shi Xu was saddled with massive loans, a fact Tan Tan never knew because she had rejected the investor’s proposal and fled abroad for graduate school and a relationship with a professor.

Shen Tianqing was still young then and had limited contact with the situation. By the time she understood the sequence of events, Shi Xu had resigned from the theater and become an actress—the kind who worked solely for money.

Some people are vindictive and used past insults as a tool for revenge, so Shi Xu’s career wasn’t very smooth. But she didn’t care. Those who study opera grow up suffering; she was clear-headed and resilient. Yet, some things cannot be hidden—like her talent. Once she had filmed a certain number of projects, many people recognized her face.

Still, Shi Xu had no money. Everything that could be sold at home had been sold. Teachers and friends helped, but it was just a drop in the bucket. When Xin Xiaoxuan cursed Tan Tan, Shi Xu just laughed and didn’t comment on her “poor judgment in people.”

Xin Xiaoxuan would point at her nose and call her too weak, saying scumbags come in all genders.

Shen Tianqing only realized her “brother-in-law” had become an actress when her classmates started talking about her. She didn’t know the reason for the breakup, only lamenting how such a good couple could separate. Tan Tan didn’t talk, and Shen Tianqing didn’t ask; she just missed the happy times she spent eating with them.

But she hadn’t expected the truth behind the torn-open adult relationship to be so ugly. The more she learned, the more her heart ached. Later, she stubbornly insisted on becoming an actress herself, even going on a hunger strike when her parents refused. She naively thought she could help.

But she forgot that for help to work, the other person has to accept it.

So she filmed one movie with Shi Xu—the only one in her life—the martial arts film Legacy of Xichuan. Shi Xu was cold to her, lacking the old intimacy of ruffling her hair. The closest they got was a scene where Shi Xu carried her on her back. The mountain road was rugged, but Shi Xu’s back was steady. When she set her down, she finally said, “You’re too thin.”

Shen Tianqing had opened her mouth, hesitated, and finally leaned her head against Shi Xu’s shoulder as tears fell. She didn’t know why she wanted to cry. Recalling it later, she felt that humans have a premonition of the future; back then, she felt deep down that her fate with Shi Xu was something she was trying to force.

“Twisted melons aren’t sweet” is a proverb and a truth. So she would suffer for a lifetime, hoping for sweetness in the next.

“I love her. I love her much more than you ever did,” the young Shen Tianqing had said through tear-filled eyes, looking at her sister. “Sister, if you really loved her, how could you bear to make her suffer?”

Tan Tan was speechless, her hands cold. She hadn’t expected things to turn out this way, nor had she expected the future Shen Tianqing to go so mad. She truly had no right to say she loved Shi Xu. At this moment, she couldn’t even say, “Shi Xu wouldn’t be happy if she knew you were like this,” because she had lost the right to speak for Shi Xu.

Yet she felt a sense of sorrow. What is this? If Shen Tianqing finds someone who looks like Shi Xu, can she love them the same way?

“I know it’s useless, so I don’t talk about it much,” Shen Tianqing said, closing her eyes. Her pearlescent eyeshadow shimmered under the light but offered no warmth. “I’m just finding something to do.”

“I hope Meng Heng won’t disappoint me. It’s hard to find another who even looks one-percent like her.”

Meanwhile, Shi Xu—now as Meng Heng—was posing in her livestream, trying out various ridiculous filters and answering fan questions.

— “Xiao Heng, are you going back to work immediately now that you’re better?”

Shi Xu hummed in response, looking uncomfortably at her own image in the screen wearing a digital headgear filter.

— “Does Xiao Heng have an ideal type? You didn’t finish answering in the last interview!”

Shi Xu let out an “Ah” and said flatly, “I do. The kind who won’t cheat on me.”