The next morning. Winter’s sun always rises late, but time waits for no one.
Ye Xingmian quietly opened her eyes. The curtains weren’t drawn, and the sky outside was already showing a fish-belly white. The howling wind beat against the window.
She frowned and looked down. She saw Lin Ziyan’s hands tightly wrapped around her own waist.
Even while sleeping, she refused to let go, which made it troublesome for Xingmian, who wanted to leave.
Winter mornings were always cold, and crawling out of a warm bed while still sleepy was always torturous. But even so, the cold couldn’t hinder her desire to leave.
Carefully, she pushed the arm off herself, then quietly got out of bed, minimizing all movements to avoid disturbing Lin Ziyan.
She found her clothes on the chair across from the bed, put them on, slipped into her shoes, and left the bedroom.
Her foster parents seemed to have already left. It had to be said that their work was actually very hard.
Many times they had to go to work at six in the morning, and aside from occasionally coming back at noon, most of the time they only returned home around six in the evening.
Of course, Ye Xingmian didn’t care about them. After all, they had never cared about her, had they?
After changing, Ye Xingmian silently glanced at Lin Ziyan, who was still fast asleep.
At this time in the past, she would have just come down from the attic, washed up, and prepared breakfast for herself and this nominal “younger sister.” But today was a bit special; she was still hesitating even now.
Even when she entered the bathroom to wash up, she was still hesitating.
‘I want to go to school earlier…’
Normal students usually avoided school as much as possible, not going if they could, delaying if they could. She wanted to go not because school was great, but because home was really terrible, and also…
There was also someone at school she wanted to see.
‘Is that the main reason? Because there’s someone I want to see, so I have hope for going somewhere.’
‘Now I regret choosing Lin Ziyan when we changed seats that day. If only I had chosen Liu Yinuo then… But there are no ifs.’
One’s thoughts are hard to change overnight. It was only after experiencing those things that she realized her own naivety and childishness. She stubbornly held on to some irrelevant things and missed what truly mattered.
‘So, what I need to think about now is…’
‘As expected, it’s the question of what to eat for breakfast, right?’
After washing up, she left the bathroom and entered the kitchen.
Actually, the question of what to eat was relatively easy to solve. Most of the time in the past, she would just reheat last night’s leftovers, and today was the same.
No need to wake Lin Ziyan; she would wake up on her own when she felt like it.
After reheating the dishes, she ate some herself, then picked up her schoolbag. Even as she was about to leave, she was still a bit hesitant.
Come to think of it, the injuries on her body seemed to no longer hurt.
The medicine Lin Ziyan bought seemed to be effective, or was it just a psychological effect? She pulled up her sleeve to look.
The bruises were still there, and they looked like they wouldn’t disappear for at least half a month. But purely from feeling, they indeed didn’t hurt much anymore. Thinking of this, she suddenly felt herself laughable.
‘Where did the resolve from last night go? Why am I starting to waver again? And even beginning to think of Lin Ziyan’s good points?’
‘Ye Xingmian, Ye Xingmian, have you forgotten how that Lin Ziyan treated you before?’
But just walking away like this, her conscience seemed unable to bear it.
After all, although her intentions seemed impure, Lin Ziyan’s change was visible to the naked eye. She seemed to really want to seek her forgiveness? Ye Xingmian couldn’t help but mock herself.
‘When will this inexplicable kindness, this irresolute mentality, ever end?’
‘I really am, full of flaws from head to toe.’
She went back to the dining room, covered the dishes on the table with plastic wrap, and only then felt at ease to go to school.
Regardless… at least when Lin Ziyan got up, the dishes could be eaten directly without needing to be reheated.
As for the rest, what she would think about Xingmian leaving on her own—that wasn’t her concern anymore.
Heh, was it thanks to Qin Haiyue’s four-day “imprisonment”? This week almost flew by. Yesterday was Thursday, and today, the second time she came to class this week, was already Friday.
Tomorrow was the weekend again. Who knew how difficult it would be to see Liu Yinuo again?
Lin Ziyan definitely wouldn’t be happy, and Qin Haiyue—would she come looking for trouble again?
After all, yesterday was already a “rest day,” and yesterday at noon she hid behind Liu Yinuo and refused her invitation to eat together. Would she hold a grudge?
A beating? Or being locked up again?
However, with Liu Yinuo protecting her, she was no longer the pitiful nobody no one cared about.
Fortunately, now she didn’t need to be afraid of those things so much. After all, now there was still someone who cared about whether she lived or died.
At least… if she suddenly disappeared, someone could call the police for her, right?
Things like what happened before had almost become her nightmare, lingering and impossible to shake off.
Even in her dreams, she often felt as if something was tightly constricting her neck, that suffocating sense of oppression truly unbearable.
Without realizing it, she had arrived at the school gate.
The sun had just risen. The temperature in the early morning was still very low, with sub-zero temperatures and a light wind making it hard to stand still. Looking at the gate, she couldn’t help but hesitate.
What was in the school? There was the person she feared most, and also the person she liked most. She couldn’t lift her head here, but she could also be with the only girl willing to treat her gently.
Pretty contradictory, wasn’t it? But she still had to go in; the cold wind outside was unbearable.
She went all the way to her school building, then to her classroom. There weren’t many students in the class, only a few who were very diligent in her memory, heads down writing.
Unfortunately, the class monitor didn’t seem to have arrived yet.
But that was normal; not everyone was willing to come so early. It was also not yet the time Liu Yinuo usually came.
She sat in her seat in a daze for a while, then pulled out a book from her schoolbag. She should have taken advantage of arriving early to review, but her mind was full of all sorts of random thoughts, unable to focus.
After waiting for a long time, most of the class had arrived, but Liu Yinuo still hadn’t come.
Occasionally, there were sounds of coughing, which was also normal since the weather often alternated between cold and hot, with large temperature fluctuations. If one didn’t take care to keep warm, catching a cold was only natural.