Chapter 4

The next day was Saturday. Li Lehe was lured awake by the delicious smell of breakfast. Rubbing her eyes as she came downstairs, she immediately noticed that the atmosphere in the dining room was a little strange. Li Caiwen sat at the head of the dining table. The bowl of porridge in front of him was untouched, and two unmistakable dark circles hung beneath his eyes. Zhou Wan moved back and forth between the kitchen and dining room, carrying dishes and setting out bowls and chopsticks. Her movements were as efficient as ever, but she said nothing. The smile tugging at the corners of her lips looked as though it had been glued on. Li Yu'an sat in her usual seat, quietly drinking her porridge. Her expression was as still and emotionless as a stagnant pool. “Morning!” Li Lehe yawned as she pulled out a chair and sat down. “Morning.” Zhou Wan placed a bowl of porridge in front of her and gently touched her hair. “Sleep well?” “Yep!” Li Lehe scooped up a spoonful of porridge and blew on it. “I had such a long dream. I dreamed I was eating at a buffet, and there was anything and everything I wanted. But just when I was about to grab a piece of cake, I woke up.” The corner of Li Caiwen’s mouth twitched, as if he wanted to smile, but he couldn’t quite manage it. Li Yu'an picked up a fried egg and placed it beside Li Lehe’s bowl. “Eat more. Make up in real life for everything you didn’t get to eat in your dream.” “You’re the best, Sis!” Li Lehe beamed at her before lowering her head and digging into her breakfast. She ate with complete abandon, utterly oblivious to the undercurrents swirling among the other three people at the table. Zhou Wan glanced at Li Caiwen, who gave a slight shake of his head. They had talked until three in the morning the night before, yet they still hadn’t come up with a solution. They couldn’t hit her, they couldn’t bring themselves to scold her, and even if they tried reasoning with Li Yu'an, she wouldn’t listen. The only thing they had agreed on was this: they absolutely could not expose the matter in front of Lele. Lele was only thirteen. She shouldn’t have to bear any of this. As for Li Yu'an, they had planned to have another serious talk with her today. This time, they wouldn’t talk about feelings. They would talk about consequences, about reality, about the things a seventeen-year-old girl ought to understand. However, Li Yu'an didn’t give them the chance. When breakfast was nearly over, Li Lehe put down her chopsticks and contentedly rubbed her stomach. “I’m full! Su Niannian asked me to go to the bookstore with her today. I’m going upstairs to change!” She hopped and skipped upstairs, her ponytail swinging from side to side behind her. After the sound of her footsteps disappeared at the top of the stairs, the dining room fell silent for several seconds. Then Li Yu'an put down her chopsticks. “Dad, Mom, let’s talk,” she said. Her tone was calm, but it wasn’t the calmness of someone being obedient. It was the unwavering certainty of someone who had something to say. Li Caiwen and Zhou Wan exchanged a glance. “Okay.” Li Caiwen stood up. “Let’s go to the study.” The study was at the end of the second-floor hallway. It was where Li Caiwen usually handled his work. The room wasn’t large: a desk, two chairs, and a wall lined with bookshelves. The window faced south, filling the room with plenty of light. Li Caiwen sat in the swivel chair behind the desk, while Zhou Wan sat on the small sofa beside it. Li Yu'an didn’t sit down. She stood in front of the desk, her back perfectly straight, much like the way she used to stand at a podium and give speeches back when she was a student. The window was open, and from downstairs came the sound of Li Lehe humming. She was waiting in the garden for Su Niannian to come pick her up, her voice bright and clear, like a happy little bird. Li Yu'an’s gaze drifted toward the window for a moment before quickly returning. “Go ahead,” Li Caiwen said, leaning back in his chair, his hands clasped over his stomach. “What do you want to talk about?” “About me and Lele.” Zhou Wan’s fingers twisted together, her knuckles turning white. Li Yu'an spoke. Her voice was quiet, but every word landed with unmistakable weight. “Dad, Mom, I know this is hard for you to accept. I thought about it for a long time last night, trying to figure out how I could tell you without making you hurt so much. But eventually, I realized that no matter how I put it, you’re going to be hurt. Because you never expected it, and you never wanted to imagine that I could have those kinds of feelings for Lele.” “But I still need to make this clear today.” She took a deep breath. “I like Lele. Not in the way an older sister likes her younger sister. It’s not something temporary, something that will pass after a while. I like her in the way that makes me want to marry her, in the way that makes me want to spend the rest of my life with her.” Zhou Wan abruptly closed her eyes. Hearing those words come out of a diary was different from seeing them on a page. They had gone from written words to a voice, spoken by a living person right in front of her. The impact was entirely different. “Lele isn’t my biological sister,” Li Yu'an continued. “She doesn’t share any blood relation with the Li family. Legally, we aren’t related at all. She came into this family when she was seven. I was eleven that year. From the very first day she arrived, I felt that there was something different about her. Back then, I didn’t understand what that feeling was. I only knew that I wanted to protect her, treat her well, and give her everything good.” “Later, as I grew older, I gradually understood. What I felt wasn’t the kind of affection an older sister has for her younger sister. It was something else. I never deliberately tried to nurture those feelings. They simply grew on their own, like a tree. Starting from a seed, it grew little by little until it became a towering tree. By the time I realized what was happening, its roots had already grown too deep to pull out.” Li Caiwen’s fingers tapped lightly against his stomach, once, then again, without any particular rhythm. “You were eleven,” he said. “What could an eleven-year-old child possibly understand?” “I didn’t understand,” Li Yu'an admitted. “But I’m seventeen now. It’s been six years. Dad, six years is long enough for me to figure out a lot of things. I’ve figured out exactly what I feel for Lele. I’ve thought about how difficult this road will be. I’ve thought about how you’ll oppose us, how outsiders will gossip, and how society may never accept it. I’ve thought about all of that.” “Have you thought about how Lele feels?” Zhou Wan opened her eyes and looked at her, her eyes red once again. “You’ve thought about everything, but have you thought about Lele? She’s only thirteen. She sees you as her real sister. She trusts you and depends on you with all her heart. If she finds out about those… those feelings you have for her, what do you think she’ll think? She’ll feel betrayed. She’ll feel that the sister she trusted most has always been looking at her in a way that wasn’t pure. Yu'an, can you really bear to make her go through that?” Li Yu'an’s jaw tightened. “That’s why I haven’t told her,” she said. “I originally planned to wait until she was older, until she was an adult, until she was mature enough to understand and accept these things. Then I would tell her little by little. Until then, I’ll control myself. I won’t do anything that makes her uncomfortable.” “You think you can control yourself?” Li Caiwen’s voice carried unmistakable doubt. Li Yu'an was silent for two seconds. “You saw it yourselves last night,” she finally said. “You caught me, but Lele knows nothing. That proves I was able to control myself.” “That was just luck!” Li Caiwen’s voice rose slightly. “What if one day you can’t control yourself? What if you do something you shouldn’t while she’s awake? Have you ever thought about the consequences?” “I won’t.” “You say you won’t, so that means you won’t?” “I said I won’t, so I won’t.” There wasn’t the slightest hint of retreat in Li Yu'an’s tone. “Dad, I have more self-control than you think. I’ve been controlling myself every single day for the past six years.” The study fell silent. The singing downstairs had already disappeared. Li Lehe had probably gotten into Su Niannian’s car by now, leaving only the rustling of leaves as the wind passed through the trees in the garden. Li Caiwen let out a long sigh. He stood up and walked to the window, turning his back to Li Yu'an as he looked down at the empty garden. “Yu'an, Dad isn’t trying to make things difficult for you.” His voice softened. It no longer carried the explosive anger from moments ago, but instead held a weary tenderness and heartache. “You’re my daughter, and Lele is my daughter too. I don’t want to hurt either of you. But think about it. If you two really end up together, how are you going to walk this road in the future? What will our relatives and friends think? Outsiders will call you perverts. They’ll say the Li family failed to raise their daughters properly. Lele is so innocent. Can she really withstand all those rumors and cruel words?” “I’ll protect her,” Li Yu'an said. “What are you going to use to protect her?” Li Caiwen turned around. “You’re still a student. You have no financial independence, no social standing. What are you going to use to protect her from other people’s judgment and gossip?” “I’ll work hard. Once I graduate, once I get a job, once I have the ability…” “Those are all things in the future!” Li Caiwen interrupted her. “What if the future doesn’t turn out the way you imagine? What if, no matter how hard you try, you still can’t do it? What if Lele gets hurt because of you by then? Have you thought about any of that?” Li Yu'an fell silent. She hadn’t been stumped by his questions. She was seriously thinking them through. Zhou Wan watched the thoughtful expression on her daughter’s face, her heart filled with conflicting emotions. How she wished she could see hesitation on Li Yu'an’s face, uncertainty, a retreating thought of Maybe I really can’t do this. But written plainly across that young face, every stroke and every line, was a single message: I’ll find a way. “Dad, Mom.” Li Yu'an finally spoke again. “I’ve thought about everything you said. I admit that right now, I can’t give Lele anything. I’m just a broke student with no income. I’d have to save my allowance for several months just to buy her a stuffed bear. I know I’m not good enough.” “But I’ll make myself good enough.” “I’ll study hard and get into a good university. I’ll find a good job. I’ll make lots of money and give Lele the best life possible. I won’t let anyone hurt her with cruel words. If someone dares to say anything, I’ll stand in front of her and shield her from it.” “I know you think I’m young, immature, and acting on a momentary impulse. But time will prove everything. One year, two years, five years, ten years. If by then you still think I’m not good enough, I’ll keep working until I am.” She looked at her parents, the rims of her eyes slightly red, but her gaze remained unwavering. “Lele deserves the best. I want to become the best for her.” Zhou Wan could no longer hold back her tears. Large drops rolled down her cheeks one after another. She didn’t know what to say. She didn’t know whether she should scold her daughter for dreaming of something impossible, or simply ache for the fact that her daughter had fallen so deeply in love that it hurt. Li Caiwen wasn’t doing any better. Standing by the window, he gripped the edge of the windowsill so tightly that his knuckles turned white. “You…” he began, his voice so hoarse it barely sounded like his own. “What do you expect your mother and me to do? Just stand by and watch you walk down this road?” “You don’t have to watch,” Li Yu'an said. “I can go somewhere farther away. I won’t interfere with your lives. If having me at home makes you uncomfortable, I can live at school. Or I can go somewhere else to study…” “That’s not what I mean!” Li Caiwen’s voice suddenly rose. “I mean, I don’t want you to take this road! This road is too difficult. I don’t want you to suffer! Do you understand?” Li Yu'an froze. She looked at her father’s flushed face, his reddened eyes, and the cheeks puffed up as he struggled to hold back his tears. And suddenly, she understood something. Behind her father’s anger was something called heartache. It wasn’t because he didn’t love her. It was because he loved her too much to let her walk down a path destined to be difficult. Li Yu'an’s nose suddenly stung. She drew a deep breath and forced down the ache in her chest. “Dad, I know you’re doing this for my own good.” Her voice softened. “But I’m already walking this road. From the day I realized I liked Lele, I’ve been on this path. Whether you agree or not, no matter what people outside say, I’m going to keep going.” “You—!” Li Caiwen pointed at her, his finger trembling for a long moment before finally dropping helplessly to his side. Zhou Wan stood up and walked over to Li Yu'an, reaching out to cup her daughter’s face in her hands. That face looked so much like her own, the eyes and brows, the lips, too. But the gaze was different. Zhou Wan herself was a gentle woman. When faced with difficulties, she was prone to tears and quick to compromise. And in Li Yu'an’s eyes was something Zhou Wan had never possessed herself—a kind of almost obsessive stubbornness, the kind that refused to turn back even after hitting a wall, let alone before reaching one. “Yu'an,” Zhou Wan said softly, her voice gentle and tender. “Mom only has one question for you.” “Go ahead, Mom.” “Are you serious?” Zhou Wan looked into her eyes. “Is this not a momentary impulse, not teenage rebellion, not something you’re doing out of spite toward someone? Have you truly thought about all the difficulties that lie ahead and still decided, wholeheartedly, that you want to take this road?” Li Yu'an looked into her mother’s eyes. Reflected in those eyes were her own face, the window behind her, the osmanthus tree outside, and the leaf trembling in the wind. “I’m serious,” she said. “More serious than I’ve ever been about anything.” Zhou Wan closed her eyes, and two streams of tears slipped down her cheeks. She released her hands, turned around, and walked two steps before gripping the armrest of the sofa. Slowly, she sat down. The study remained silent for a long time. So long that Li Yu'an thought they might not speak again. Then Li Caiwen finally spoke, his voice dry and rough, like sandpaper scraping across wood. “Yu'an, I’m giving you two choices.” Li Yu'an looked at him. “First, you tell me that you’re willing to try to let go of this idea. You don’t have to let go of it immediately. Take it slowly. See a therapist, perhaps, or find something else to occupy your mind and shift your attention.” “If one day you realize that what you feel for Lele really is nothing more than the affection an older sister has for her younger sister, or perhaps just a period of confusion, then we’ll pretend this never happened. Everything can go back to the way it was.” “And the second choice?” Li Yu'an asked. Li Caiwen looked at her. His lips moved, but it took him a long while to get the words out. “Second, if you insist on holding on to these feelings, then you’ll have to leave this family. I’m not kicking you out. It’s just… you should go study somewhere else for now. Change your environment. Keep some distance from Lele. Wait until you’ve truly grown up, until you have enough ability to take responsibility for your own choices. When that time comes, if you still want to come back, if you still have feelings for Lele, then we… we’ll talk again.” Li Yu'an heard the concession hidden in her father’s words. It wasn’t If you leave, don’t bother coming back. It was Go somewhere else for now. We’ll talk about the rest later. For someone with Li Caiwen’s temperament, that was already an enormous concession. “Let me think about it,” Li Yu'an said. Li Caiwen nodded. Sitting on the sofa, Zhou Wan covered her mouth with a handkerchief and wept silently. Li Yu'an glanced at her mother, then turned and walked out of the study. She walked down the hallway and passed Li Lehe’s room. The door was open. The room was a complete mess. The bed hadn’t been made, a stuffed bear lay sprawled beside the pillow, her pajamas had been tossed onto a chair, and unfinished summer homework was still spread across the desk. Li Yu'an walked inside. She folded the pajamas and put them back in the wardrobe, shook out the blanket and neatly folded it, then straightened the stuffed bear and propped it against the headboard. Then she sat down on Li Lehe’s bed and looked around the room. The walls were covered with stickers and photographs. There were pictures of her with Su Niannian, commemorative photos from school sports day, and a family portrait. It had been taken when Li Lehe was ten. She stood in the very center, smiling so brightly that the gap where one of her front teeth had fallen out was visible. Li Yu'an stood to her left, her head tilted slightly as she looked at her younger sister, a faint smile on her lips. Li Yu'an stared at that photograph for a long time. Then she stood up and walked out of the room. Li Yu'an didn’t return to her own room immediately. Instead, she went to the storage room. At the very back of the storage room, she found an old trunk. Inside were things she had kept since she was rummaged through it, finding things she had kept from childhood to the present. At the very bottom, she found a picture frame. Inside was an old photograph. In the picture, an eleven-year-old girl was crouching on the ground, holding a seven-year-old girl in her arms. The seven-year-old was wearing a pink dress, her hair tied into two little pigtails. Her large, round eyes looked timidly at the camera. The eleven-year-old had one arm around her shoulders, her chin resting on top of the younger girl’s head. She was smiling brightly, her face full of youthful vitality. That was the first day Li Lehe came to this family. Li Yu'an remembered that day. She remembered the scent of laundry detergent lingering on Lele, the softness of her little hand wrapped around her finger, and the faint childish lilt in her voice when she timidly called her, “Big Sis.” From that day on, her life had been different. Clutching the picture frame to her chest, she leaned against the wall of the storage room and slowly slid down until she was sitting on the floor. There were no windows in the storage room. With the door closed, it was very dark. Dark enough that she no longer needed to pretend to be strong. She buried her face in her knees, her shoulders trembling lightly a few times. There was no sound. Li Yu'an had never made a sound when she cried. About ten minutes later, she emerged from the storage room. There was no trace of tears on her face. She returned to her bedroom, took the dark-blue diary from beneath her pillow, and flipped to the final page. Then she picked up her pen. She wrote: “Today I told Mom and Dad everything. They’re very upset. Dad made me choose: either let go or leave. I won’t let go, but I don’t want to make them sad either.” “Lele wore a white T-shirt today, with her hair tied in a ponytail. When she smiles, her eyes curve like crescents. While she was waiting in the garden for Su Niannian, she hummed some song I didn’t recognize. The melody was beautiful. I wanted to record it, but I never got the chance.” “No matter what happens in the future, no matter where I am, my heart will always belong to her.” “Lele, wait for me.” After finishing, she closed the diary and put it back beneath her pillow. Downstairs, Zhou Wan was washing dishes in the kitchen. She washed them very slowly, rinsing each bowl several times as water rushed continuously from the faucet. Li Caiwen walked into the kitchen and turned off the tap. He took the dishcloth from her hands. “Stop washing,” he said. “Your hands are all wrinkled.” Zhou Wan lowered her head and looked at her hands. Her fingers were indeed all pruney. She suddenly smiled, but the smile looked even more painful than crying. “When Yu'an was little, there was a time when she accidentally got hit by another child at kindergarten. She came home crying and told me, ‘Mom, I don’t want to go to school anymore.’ I comforted her for a long time. The next day, she happily put her backpack on and went back to school as usual.” Zhou Wan paused. “That was when I realized that this child never kept things bottled up inside.” “But now she has something this enormous weighing on her heart, and there’s nothing we can do.” Li Caiwen said nothing. He simply pulled his wife into his arms and gently patted her back. Outside the window, the sun had already climbed high into the sky. Sunlight streamed into the kitchen, casting a bright patch of light across the floor. A new day had begun. But for the Li family, this new day felt heavier than the night before.