Actually, before Bai Yang arrived, Bai Liu hadn’t been sleeping very peacefully.
Years of business entertaining and drinking had made her less sensitive to anesthesia. The post-surgical anesthetic effects wore off quickly, forcing her to rely on painkillers to suppress the pain. Combined with her fever, even though Bai Liu had dozed off lightly a few times, her dreams were filled with things she didn’t particularly want to remember.
Bai Liu dreamed of her brother’s birth.
Ever since Bai Liu could remember, she knew that sooner or later her parents would have another child.
The reason was simple—Bai Liu knew her father didn’t particularly like her. At the dinner table he never served her food, never asked about anything that happened at kindergarten. This was already the most obvious answer possible.
When Bai Yang was born, Bai Liu had just turned seven. She had already made up her mind that she would never give this brother who was about to steal everything from her any extra affection. However, when that baby boy in her mother’s arms gently grasped her finger, and she couldn’t help but squeeze back, Bai Liu realized she could no longer keep her vow to herself.
Since she couldn’t help but love this brother, then she might as well bully him a little.
Thinking this way, Bai Liu drew little turtles on one-year-old Bai Yang’s face, tricked five-year-old Bai Yang into entering a haunted house, ate mixed rice that he couldn’t eat right in front of him, and then secretly soaked spicy strips in his milk.
It could be said that every time, Bai Yang would end up wailing loudly because of her pranks, and every time, Bai Liu could easily coax him back with lollipops and cookies.
This teasing continued until Bai Yang was in third grade. That year, in order to “train” Bai Yang’s ability to eat spicy food, Bai Liu tricked him into a spicy skewer restaurant. That very night after eating, Bai Yang developed a fever of 39.5°C, followed by acute gastroenteritis requiring IV drips for a week, and then lying at home for a full half month.
As could be expected, this incident was different.
Bai Liu was scolded bloody by her father who rushed to the hospital—even with her mother protecting her, the furious Bai Yiming still gave her a hard slap. Sixteen-year-old Bai Liu felt her brain buzz, then immediately ran straight out of the hospital.
That night Bai Liu didn’t go home. She sent her mother a text to report her safety, wandered around in circles, but ultimately returned to the hospital, sitting in the courtyard staring blankly at the emergency room lights.
At two in the morning, Bai Yang’s fever broke, and Bai Liu received a text from her mother: “Sister, Mom said you ran away. It’s cold and dangerous outside, will you come back?”
The midnight wind chilled Bai Liu to the bone, but her brother’s texts kept coming non-stop.
“Sister, I have cookies here, will you come back and eat them? I’ll give you all of mine.”
“Sister, where are you sleeping? Do you have money to eat?”
“Sister…”
Perhaps not wanting to wake their mother who was keeping bedside vigil, even though there were many characters he couldn’t write yet, Bai Yang kept tirelessly sending texts to his sister. As the messages accumulated more and more in Bai Liu’s inbox, gradually everything before her eyes changed from clear to blurry.
Before having a brother, there were three people in the family, and only one person loved her.
After having a brother, there were four people in the family, but two people loved her.
No matter what, having this should be enough for her… She didn’t need to expect those who didn’t love her to begin with to give her anything more.
Those things she could never have anyway, she didn’t need… and she didn’t want them anymore.
Finally, sixteen-year-old Bai Liu gently sniffed, and the confusion in her eyes disappeared along with those tears.
In the night wind, she stood up from the bench and slowly walked toward the brightly lit emergency hall.
The first dream ended abruptly here. Bai Liu briefly woke up for a few seconds, hearing the caregiver talking with Bai Yang at the door. Then her consciousness became muddled again, and closing her eyes, the second dream followed immediately.
It was about her divorce.
Compared to Bai Yang, Bai Liu’s romantic luck actually wasn’t much better.
Even since college, Bai Liu was very clear that even if she didn’t look for someone, Bai Yiming would find someone for her sooner or later. Bai Liu never liked putting choices in other people’s hands, so before finally getting married, Bai Liu had changed boyfriends more than ten times. Almost every year when Bai Yang returned to the country, the person sitting beside her was different. This went on until she was thirty, and finally, after Bai Yang’s third investment failure, the person beside Bai Liu became a newly arrived company executive.
This time, Bai Liu didn’t change again.
At thirty-one, Bai Liu officially married with her father and brother as witnesses. For her, marriage wouldn’t affect work, so even after marriage, Bai Liu continued working overtime and attending meetings as usual. Even though Bai Yiming often hinted intentionally or unintentionally that he wanted to hold grandchildren, Bai Liu would usually just smile and deflect.
These were just excuses anyway.
Bai Liu was very clear in her heart that if she retreated at this time, not only would her previous efforts be wasted, even Bai Yang might be forced to give up his dessert business.
You can never have both fish and bear’s paw.
To appease her husband, Bai Liu bought him a new car. She and her husband agreed they would have a child before she turned thirty-five. But before she even reached her thirty-second birthday, the dash cam footage synced to her phone showed other people sitting in the new car she had given her husband.
Things became awkward soon after.
Bai Liu’s divorce was an exhausting tug-of-war, with her and Bai Yang on one side, and everyone else except them on the other.
For five whole months, Bai Liu confronted countless people, including her husband, her husband’s family, her husband’s pregnant mistress, and finally, unsurprisingly, her own biological father.
It took a long time afterward for Bai Liu to discover that Bai Yiming had been in contact with her husband very early on, even asking him to switch her medication, just to use pregnancy to tie her down and make her give up control of the company.
Bai Liu ultimately didn’t bring this matter out in the open. She wanted to leave everyone some dignity, but she didn’t expect that at the very end of this tug-of-war, it would be her husband himself who tore this last bit of dignity to shreds.
At that time, the man who realized he had to sign the papers suddenly let out a cold laugh before putting pen to paper and said: “Do you know? I actually already switched those medicines, but even after switching them you still couldn’t get pregnant… Bai Liu, do you really think you can still have children in the future?”
In an instant, Bai Liu felt her brain go completely blank, while Bai Yang had already rushed up in fury: “If you dare slander my sister again, I’ll make you pay right now!”
The other party didn’t say anything more, just contemptuously left the divorce agreement on the table. After they went to the civil affairs bureau, as soon as they stepped out the door, Bai Yang punched his former brother-in-law down onto the curb.
To clean up the mess for her brother, Bai Liu spent the first week after her divorce running between the company and the police station. By the time it was all over, Bai Liu had lost a full fifteen pounds. For the first time ever, she took leave from the company and quietly went to the hospital.
And that day, she finally learned what was wrong with her body.
It turned out… she still had some things very much like her mother.
Accompanied by a dull ache from her lower abdomen, Bai Liu frowned and slowly awakened from her dream.
In the pitch darkness, there was no father, no ex-husband, none of the things from her nightmares—just Bai Yang struggling to open a lunch box lid with one hand. His face was scrunched up, and from Bai Liu’s understanding of him since childhood, this expression meant he had either just finished crying or was about to cry.
“Liar… if I believe you again, my brain must be made of mousse.”
Bai Liu heard Bai Yang softly sniffling.
That damn kid, she told him not to come, and now that he’s crying doesn’t she have to comfort him?
Bai Liu sighed inwardly, but caught sight of her hand being held by Bai Yang—just like when she first held her brother’s hand outside the delivery room as a child, Bai Yang wasn’t actually using any strength at all, being as careful as if she were a fragile cream cake.
It seemed that just as she couldn’t help but love that child back then, that child would always stand by her side too.
A long-absent thought inappropriately surfaced. Bai Liu gently moved her finger, and Bai Yang immediately noticed, looking over with both eyes red like a rabbit’s.
“Sister…”
Bai Yang asked pitifully: “How do you feel? Does anything else hurt?”
Really, it wasn’t her fault, Bai Liu thought. This kid really did look too easy to bully.
Outside had completely darkened. There were no lights in the hospital room. The siblings gazed at each other in the darkness for a while, and finally, Bai Liu opened her mouth softly and weakly.
“Little brat.”
She decided to mischievously lie once more: “You’re pressing on my pain pump.”