Of course, this memory could bring her neither love nor hate—it only ever brought her guilt, so she wouldn’t casually indulge in recalling it.
Because guilt doesn’t feel good.
Rather than getting trapped in that vortex of sadness over and over, Su Xiaoyan might as well continue focusing on her dear brother.
With that thought, she pulled out her phone, planning to look through Su Ziyan’s photos and experiences from a long time ago again.
The recent ones, from after he went blind, were just too depressing.
Now she had neither the reason nor the excuse to meet him, nor the resolve to see him and lay everything out.
So all she could do was hide in the dark corners and peep into Su Ziyan’s life again and again.
As a spectator, a fan, she preferred his former sunny, cheerful self over his current gloomy state of hiding at home and refusing to go out.
That was why she was flipping through old materials again.
She had repeated this act not just for one day, not just once.
Like a fan who loves watching matches, after their favorite team loses every game and gets eliminated in the top 16, they would feel sad at night and then revisit the team’s glorious history.
Even though the analogy was a bit off, that was indeed how Su Xiaoyan felt now.
She also often wondered if she would ever have another chance to intervene in Su Ziyan’s life, imagining herself making a heroic entrance after he encountered a huge problem and joining his life.
Those imagined plots were as classic as some female-lead web novel, and as frequent as high school students fantasizing about saving the world one day.
But in the end, it was just imagination.
If asked whether she actually wanted such a thing to happen, her answer would definitely be no.
Just like how a high school student would only need to save the world when the apocalypse comes.
If Su Ziyan needed her and contacted her, it must mean he was in some big trouble.
She didn’t want that; she only wanted Su Ziyan to be happy every day.
Although she didn’t know how long he would take to emerge from the shadow of losing his sight, Su Xiaoyan believed he could do it.
After all, he had Xu Duyan by his side.
Compared to herself, his younger sister, Xu Duyan was such a wonderful and competent elder sister.
With his sister’s company, Su Ziyan would surely walk out of that shadow one day, right?
She would just be a spectator like before.
It was best to be a spectator for life.
Su Xiaoyan comforted herself as she buried her face in the quilt, placing her phone weakly to the side.
The screen showed a group photo.
A photo of her, her father, Mother Su, and Su Ziyan.
That was the photo from the birthday banquet.
Her smile was fake, Su Ziyan’s smile was forced.
It was the first family photo they had ever taken together, and also the last.
Tired.
Time to sleep.
When after involuntarily thinking about that time again, Su Xiaoyan felt an uncontrollable mental exhaustion, so she decided to turn off the lights and sleep.
It had never been like this before.
She didn’t know what was wrong with her today.
It felt like an ominous premonition before something big happens…
“If I could redo the mistakes I made, if I could avoid them all, maybe there’s still time to repent. If I hadn’t said everything out loud, that small storm could have been laughed off…”
Suddenly, her phone rang.
Maybe because she was thinking about that ominous premonition, even though it was her favorite song, it startled Su Xiaoyan.
‘Really, who is calling at this hour?’
‘Scared me! How annoying!’
Su Xiaoyan picked up her phone with some irritation, but froze when she saw the caller.
It was Xu Duyan—the person she had thought might never contact her in her lifetime.
The two of them had very little interaction, but Su Xiaoyan had imagined more than once that Xu Duyan must be a very strong, independent, and reassuring person, right?
Otherwise, how could she make her brother love her so desperately?
“If I had known your spontaneous self earlier, or met you later, after I became mature…”
Even though Su Xiaoyan only thought for a moment, the ringtone had already played for a long time.
She snapped out of it and quickly answered the call.
After all, she and Xu Duyan had almost no contact, so since the other party was calling at such a late hour, something big must have happened.
“Hey…”
“Su Ziyan might be in trouble!”
The voice on the other end didn’t sound like the Xu Duyan Su Xiaoyan had imagined.
She could clearly feel that the woman on the phone seemed to be falling apart.
***
“Ahhh!”
Su Ziyan let out a strange sound as he stretched, greeting his first morning in the “prison.”
Whether it was because the bed in the young lady’s house was a high-end product or because he had enjoyed a very satisfying midnight snack, he actually felt he had slept quite well.
Obviously, he didn’t know that while he had slept well, many others had passed a sleepless night because of him.
“Ah…”
After stretching, Su Ziyan intended to sit up and do something, but remembering his situation, he deflated and lay back on the bed listlessly.
After getting enough sleep, his first feeling was…
“Bored…”
No phone, no internet, and he didn’t know his way around.
Going out for a walk was also impossible.
At this moment, he simply had no idea what he could do.
He couldn’t go bother Shi Lingge, could he?
Although he could contact her, he didn’t know if she was awake yet, so…
“Bored?”
Shi Lingge’s pleasant voice immediately responded.
“Want some breakfast, or should I take you out for a walk?”
“Wha-!”
The voice from beside the bed startled Su Ziyan, making him bounce on the bed like a worm.
Then he warily looked in the direction of the voice.
“Shi Lingge?”
Su Ziyan’s voice carried a hint of doubt.
“When did you get here?”
“I just arrived a short while ago. Two minutes ago I was still hesitating whether to wake you up,” Shi Lingge’s voice remained calm, completely unaffected by Su Ziyan’s confusion.
“But as it turned out, you woke up on your own before I could call you.”
“Huh? But that’s really scary.”
Su Ziyan felt a bit slow to react and blurted out, “As a maid, shouldn’t you be waking up your young la-”
Before he could finish, a fragrant breeze swept past his nose, and her slender fingers gently patted his face.
Just like a lover’s caress.