Chapter 1
Siping County, overcast.
The sky was a dingy white-gray, and the whole street ahead of them was blurred by the haze. A white sedan rolled slowly into the residential compound and stopped in front of a detached villa.
In the back seat, Yu Min wore headphones and lowered her head to read in silence.
The faint rustling sounded especially sharp in the cramped, enclosed space; rustle—rustle rustle—
She couldn’t hear anything outside, and she deliberately didn’t try. As if she had sealed herself off from everything around her, Yu Min held perfectly still, never once lifting her head, immersed in her own world from start to finish.
Yu Shengyu, in the driver’s seat, said something. When no reply came from the back, he twisted halfway around to look at her; his usually stern face grew even more rigid.
Yu Min kept her eyelids half-lowered; her thick lashes trembled.
She was indifferent, obedient, and well-behaved.
The blaring music was obnoxious, completely drowning out what her father said. She still hadn’t caught a single word, dull and wooden as a mannequin, not at all quick on the uptake.
The book was an English study guide she had just bought yesterday. This time, when she moved out of the house, she hadn’t had time to bring anything else; she only had a schoolbag and whatever was still in it.
Yu Shengyu and Zheng Qing were in the middle of a divorce. Outwardly, they had been an affectionate couple, but once they fought, the damage was devastating; the house inside and out had been smashed to pieces, as if even the roof might be torn open. With nowhere else to live, Yu Min had been sent to stay temporarily at her aunt’s place.
As for when she could go back, there was no certainty. Neither of them had brought it up; they were too busy tearing into each other. Who had time to care about their daughter?
No one asked for Yu Min’s opinion, and even less did anyone care what she thought.
The feelings of a middle school student didn’t matter. Her main task right now was studying; nothing else should distract her. That was the adults’ problem. She couldn’t decide it, and she couldn’t influence it in the slightest.
“Can’t you stop being so willful and save me some trouble, for once?”
Yu Shengyu’s patience was limited. When she still didn’t answer, he reached over and roughly yanked off her headphones.
The cord was looped around her neck, and the hard tug hurt. The middle-aged man had a lot of strength; with that sudden jerk, he nearly snapped the wire in two on the spot.
Only then did the page-turning stop. Yu Min pressed her lips together, pausing for a moment as the sudden pain slowly, clearly spread.
He had just argued with Zheng Qing before coming out, and he was in a foul mood. With no time to care what she was thinking, he gave her an ultimatum: “If you don’t want to stay here, then go live in Jincheng for two months. Once school starts, apply for boarding. You choose.”
Jincheng was the provincial capital; Yu Min’s grandparents lived there in retirement. The two places weren’t far apart; it took just over an hour to drive.
Yu Min was even less willing to go there, but in truth, she had no choice.
The detached villa belonged to her aunt. Her aunt was a returnee from overseas and a divorcee. She had originally married a Chinese-American man in the United States and had one son. The boy was the same age as Yu Min, and they were both studying at No. 1 High School now.
In the past couple of years, her aunt had found another partner; he was a university lecturer at Jincheng University of Science and Technology, a handsome and talented man. Though he was technically family, Yu Min had barely met this new uncle. The last time she saw him was around the New Year, and the memory had already faded. She only remembered that his red-envelope gift had been quite large; it had been a thick stack of bills.
Father and daughter were deadlocked when the aunt’s family arrived, breaking the stalemate at just the right time.
They had called last night, so they knew they were coming. Her aunt came out first to meet them; the boy Zhou Jin followed behind to help Yu Min with her schoolbag, then sweetly called out to Yu Shengyu, “Uncle.”
Yu Shengyu’s expression eased a little; it no longer looked quite so bad.
Then, when he greeted Yu Min, Zhou Jin was very tactful. After all, the two of them were childhood friends and classmates, and he knew enough about the Yu family’s current situation. He called Yu Min “sister” and quietly comforted her.
“It’s fine; don’t feel pressured. Stay as long as you need. We’ve already prepared a room upstairs, and it’s been cleaned for ages.”
Yu Min was taciturn and followed behind her aunt without much response.
Divorce wasn’t one person’s business; it involved two families, especially since Yu Shengyu and Zheng Qing were husband and wife who ran a furniture factory together, with their interests deeply tied together. The consequences of a divorce would very likely hurt both sides. That wasn’t rational.
Her aunt opposed the divorce. Not only her; the whole family had jumped out to stop it.
The moment they entered the house, her aunt started arguing with Yu Shengyu, not caring that Yu Min was still there.
Zheng Qing had real authority. If they really divorced, Yu Shengyu would be crippled even if he didn’t die. Back when the factory was first set up, her aunt and the others had also invested a lot of money in it, and they all had a right to dividends. The factory had been running for more than ten years, and after finally reaching its current scale, it had also caught the tail end of the booming real-estate industry. It was making money hand over fist. If the couple fought like this, it would be no different from shaking the foundation of the furniture factory; in effect, they would be cutting off their own source of income.
Her aunt scolded Yu Shengyu, saying that in the end this was all his fault. He couldn’t keep it in his pants; once he had money, he started getting arrogant, finding women outside without even bothering to hide it properly, forcing Zheng Qing to catch him red-handed.
Of course, Zheng Qing was no less guilty. She had been keeping a pretty boy on the side for a long time.
No one knew whether that had started only after she discovered Yu Shengyu’s rotten business, or whether it had been there before.
The couple’s messy accounts couldn’t be untangled. Her aunt didn’t care that much; no matter what Yu Shengyu tried to do, that was his problem. In short, he was not allowed to divorce.
At the very least, not until the factory was completely stable.
Whenever adults’ conflicts came to a head, they always ended up landing on the child. Yu Min became the excuse used to persuade Yu Shengyu.
“For the sake of your daughter” was truly a universal argument that occupied the moral high ground.
Yu Min would be entering her third year of middle school next semester; the little girl wasn’t even fifteen yet, and next year she would be moving on to high school. Right now, her studies were at a critical point. How could her parents possibly divorce at a time like this?
Even if they were enemies, they should at least keep up appearances until their daughter got to college.
Her aunt was furious that iron wouldn’t become steel. She didn’t say anything even harsher out loud, only glancing toward Yu Min on the sofa before slapping Yu Shengyu on the back of the head and shouting, “What kind of father are you?”
Ignoring this superficial farce, Yu Min never said a word to the very end; she treated the whole thing like transparent air.
Yu Shengyu shouldn’t have dragged Zheng Qing into founding the factory back then. That had been like inviting the wolf into the house. At the time, Yu Shengyu had been blinded by love; Zheng Qing had contributed only labor and not money, and had entered the Yu family so easily. Now that half the property had to be split away, that was the price Yu Shengyu had to pay.
Yu Min was not stupid. She understood the subtext in the adults’ words.
The adult world didn’t talk about feelings. Once it fell apart, only hard benefits remained.
Even if Yu Shengyu had been at fault first, even if he was an irresponsible husband and father, when it came to money, everyone had their own position.
Yu Min was sensible. She stood up without a word and went upstairs.
She wouldn’t join their argument; she consciously stepped aside.
She was an outsider and shouldn’t have come here.
Unfortunately, Zheng Qing didn’t want her either. She truly had no choice, nowhere to go.
The room her aunt arranged for her was on the third floor, near the stairwell; it was the smallest one.
Originally, they had planned to let Yu Min stay on the first floor, but the only room there was the maid’s room. That would have been hard to justify on the surface, so in the end they still arranged for her to stay on the third floor.
There were only two rooms on the third floor. In addition, there was a suite that integrated a studio, study, bathroom, and other spaces, and that was the private territory shared only by her aunt and uncle. The little room Yu Min was given was less a guest room than a storage room; it had originally been used to pile up all kinds of miscellaneous clutter.
Since she hadn’t brought luggage and nothing had been prepared on this side either, the tiny room was painfully empty. After staying in it for a while, Yu Min actually felt it was quite spacious. It wasn’t even half the size of her room at home, but at least there was a desk and chair for homework and reading; it wasn’t just an empty bed frame.
One had to know contentment.
She wasn’t even their biological child; having this treatment was already generous enough, wasn’t it?
The argument downstairs was fairly loud and drifted up intermittently to the third floor.
Yu Min took out her headphones and put them on again.
She tried to shut out the disturbance that was bothering her peace of mind, but it was unlucky; one of the headphones had been damaged when it was yanked off earlier and no longer worked.
She didn’t know how to fix headphones. After fiddling with them for two minutes, she still couldn’t get them working.
In the end, she had no choice but to make do and wear only one side.
The door to the little room wasn’t closed; it stood wide open.
There were other people on the third floor, but Yu Min didn’t know that and hadn’t noticed at all, until by chance she turned her head and suddenly caught sight of a figure in the corridor outside, only then realizing it belatedly.
This was her second time running into Lin Baixin.
The first had been at her aunt’s wedding, when she met Lin Baixin there; but they hadn’t had much interaction. Lin Baixin had shown up briefly and then left, so Yu Min had long since forgotten her and didn’t remember her at all.
She didn’t know when Lin Baixin had come upstairs; she had probably been there before her. Dressed casually, Lin Baixin wore a loose off-shoulder top with a beige skirt, cinched at the waist with a dark slim belt. Her black hair was tucked behind her left ear and tied off at an angle, with a few stray strands falling softly along the clean, beautiful line of her jaw. It looked half tied and half loose, languid and carefree to the extreme.
Lin Baixin was also reading, half-reclined in a rattan chair; she was far more calm and focused than Yu Min had been pretending to be in the car. Brilliant midsummer sunlight streamed in through the glass window, and the soft pale-gold light cast a blurred halo around her.
Yu Min didn’t remember her, but Lin Baixin recognized Yu Min.
Almost as if drawn in, Yu Min walked out and took two steps closer, making out clearly which book was in her hands.
Wang Zengqi’s Human World, Vegetation.
Yu Min had read this book before; it was one of the required reading titles recommended by her teacher. But after finishing it, she had felt nothing special; she didn’t like it very much.
Lin Baixin seemed to quite like it, turning the pages slowly and unhurriedly.
They weren’t familiar with each other; they were practically strangers.
Yu Min had no intention of starting a conversation. She was slow to warm up by nature and couldn’t work up any interest in people she didn’t know. After standing there for a while, she merely watched in silence.
Lin Baixin spoke first, asking in a low voice, “Why are you looking at me?”
Her voice was very pleasant, faint and gentle, carrying a softness that was hard to resist, just like her personality itself, soft as water.
Caught in the act, Yu Min couldn’t deny that she had been looking.
She struggled to part her lips, opening and closing them a few times; after hesitating for a long while, she still couldn’t get the words out.
“Looking outside...”
Yu Min’s voice was very soft. It took her a while to force the words out, so quiet that even Lin Baixin couldn’t hear them.
“Just got here?” Lin Baixin wasn’t bothered by her awkwardness; she was quite patient and asked again.
Yu Min didn’t answer. She wasn’t used to such a cramped, awkward situation; her chest felt tight. Pretending she hadn’t heard clearly, she turned her face away and looked out the window instead.
The dispute downstairs happened to flare up again at that moment, saving her and cutting them off.
Lin Baixin kept reading at an unhurried pace, as if she had noticed neither Yu Min’s unease nor her embarrassment.
After a long while, until the noise downstairs had grown quieter and was about to fade away completely, Lin Baixin finally said something indistinct:
“Don’t take it to heart.”
Yu Min didn’t understand whether that was an apology for her own abruptness or a word of comfort.
She couldn’t tell.
Lin Baixin was Zhou Jin’s older sister, though not by blood; she was Uncle Xiao’s adopted daughter. Yu Min wasn’t especially clear on the details, only had a rough idea of this much.
Zhou Jin came upstairs to take a look.
Taking advantage of the moment, Yu Min walked away and returned to her room. Zhou Jin was full of curiosity and had a lot to say; he asked in confusion, “What were you talking about with my sister?”
For some reason, Yu Min didn’t want anyone else to find out, so she lied to Zhou Jin and denied it.
She wasn’t good at lying. The moment she felt that gaze on her back, she tensed up; when she turned around and secretly looked again, Lin Baixin had already put her book away and gone downstairs.
Her peripheral vision followed after her unconsciously; only after Zhou Jin tapped her once did Yu Min come back to herself.
“What’s wrong with you?” Zhou Jin asked, puzzled.
Yu Min pulled herself together without showing it on her face. Calmly and perfunctorily, she said nothing was wrong; she was just thinking about something.