Chapter 2

I’d known since childhood that something was wrong with me.

There was more malice in my heart than it could hold.

I hated rich people from the bottom of my heart. I hated people whose lives were easy.

More than that, I hated the classmates who smiled and waved goodbye as their parents picked them up.

On the surface, though, I hid it well. People liked me.

I knew that if I let even a glimpse of my real self show,

anyone would abandon me in disgust and run as far away as they could.

The only person in the world who accepted all of me was my older brother.

When I stole the neighbour’s child’s toy train, my parents grew so sick of me

that they wanted to send me away to another family. My brother held me and refused to let go.

When our parents argued, spotted the trains I’d scribbled on the wall, and took their anger out on me,

he slipped into my room in the middle of the night and put medicine on my injuries.

“When I earn my own money, I’ll come and get you. We’ll ride a real train somewhere far, far away.”

My brother had promised.

He had such a lovely smile, his eyes curving with it.

“I’ll never leave you behind.”

But later, at twenty-four, he jumped from a rooftop.

His note contained only one sentence:

I love you so much, little sister. I’m sorry.

From that day on,

twenty-four became a terminal station I could never reach.

I also understood, with perfect clarity, that people only came close so they could leave.

So when Jiang Ye gave me a love letter,

I looked at the boy who’d just transferred from a private secondary school.

He was so clean and unspoiled, as though someone had shaped his bones out of moonlight and wrapped them in fresh snow.

Then I looked at the sprawling line on his “love letter”:

Hello! I think you’re great. Wishing you good mental health and a very long life.

At the bottom, he’d drawn a huge heart and a thumbs-up.

I turned around and told the teacher.

But Jiang Ye hadn’t transferred here to study.

He was always hovering somewhere near me, watching out for me.

Even in the final push before the exams, my parents wouldn’t spend money on extra practice papers.

So Jiang Ye bought a mountain of the best revision materials and stuffed them all into my desk.

When he saw me saving money in the canteen by eating nothing but watery vegetable dishes,

he stole my meal card and topped it up with ten thousand yuan.

Later, I was moved to the advanced class. Jiang Ye, who was bottom of the year, simply had his family pull strings to get him into the same class.

After that, we saw each other constantly. In class or out of it, I could always catch him looking at me from the corner of his eye.

I even wondered whether Jiang Ye had some sort of system bound to him.

One that would kill him unless he won me over.

I tried asking him outright why he cared about me so much.

He looked startled for a moment, then broke into a grin as bright as the sun.

“No reason.”

“I just want to be good to you. I like seeing you happy. Is that not allowed?”

For the first time, my heart gave a flutter I couldn’t control.

I began to believe

that perhaps, after my brother, Jiang Ye could be the second person in the world who accepted me.

So much so that I was the one who made the first move.

After school one day, a few thugs cornered me, laughing as they tugged at my uniform.

I ran for my life and happened to find Jiang Ye. I flung myself at him and clung to his arm.

I shouted back at the men behind me,

“This is my boyfriend! His family owns a huge company! Bother me again and you’re finished!”

Jiang Ye went rigid for a second.

Then he immediately bundled me into the back seat, told the driver to go, and took me home.

When the car door opened, his little sister was standing on the porch. She was still at the age when she idolised her brothers.

She looked at me, clutching his arm and sobbing my heart out.

Then at Jiang Ye, stiff as a board, his ears bright red.

From that moment on, Jiang Tian openly disliked me.

She decided I was a scheming, unscrupulous woman.

And I was.

I wanted that affection too badly.

I wanted to grip it tight, cut open my heart, and sew it inside.

So that it could never, ever drain away.

And so I hid my true self more carefully than ever.

I made myself seem cheerful and outgoing, without a shadow in sight.

I tended that false skin with care. One day. One week. One year.

The first time the mask slipped was after the university entrance exams.

It was also the third day we’d officially been together.

Because of my separation anxiety, I wanted to install a couples’ app on Jiang Ye’s phone.

It offered live location tracking, app-usage monitoring, screen sharing…

Jiang Ye frowned as soon as he saw it.

“Hang on. Are we dating, or am I going to prison? This is seriously unhealthy…Gu Di, why would you even think of this?”

My heart began to race. I immediately changed my story and said I was only copying some online joke.

He stared at me for a long time before letting out a relieved breath.

“You scared me. I thought you’d gone off the rails.”

He ruffled my hair. “If you want to know where I am, just call and ask. Anytime. Okay?”

But after that, I only wore myself down more.

I could always tell, so easily, when someone didn’t like me quite enough.

The way my mother instinctively criticised every item of clothing I tried on.

The way I came home from school every day and called “Dad” to my father watching television on the sofa.

He would keep drinking his beer without looking up, too lazy even to grunt an answer.

Jiang Ye was good to me.

But he never reached for my hand or kissed me first.

So I couldn’t help it. While he was in the bathroom, I went through his phone.

While I’d been ordering our food, he’d been chatting with someone else.

I’d always known he had a childhood sweetheart.

Their families were old friends, but he rarely mentioned her in front of me.

So I’d never known they talked about me, too.

Tang Chengqin: Ah Ye, when exactly are you going to break up with Gu Di?

My finger stopped on the screen.

I scrolled further back.

Only then did I learn

why Jiang Ye had transferred to our school.

It was because of his eldest brother.

Jiang Ye had worshipped him ever since he was small.

So when he happened to hear that a new employee at his brother’s company had jumped to his death on his second day,

and that all the rumours pointed to his brother, Jiang Ye’s first reaction was fury.

He started investigating without hesitation, determined to find evidence to refute them.

Instead, he discovered that the new employee wasn’t merely the same age as his brother. They had been classmates.

And his gentle, cultured brother had been a bully.

That new employee had worked his way into a good university, then fought and clawed his way into a major company everyone envied.

He’d thought he was finally free of the old trauma, out from under the shadow of his schooldays.

Then he’d looked up and discovered

that his direct superior was the bully from his nightmares.

The new employee had left a suicide note.

And a younger sister.

A girl the same age as Jiang Ye.

But that was all your brother’s fault! It had nothing to do with you!

Ah Ye, you said you didn’t like her. You’re only doing this out of guilt, to make it up to her.

Stop dragging it out. The longer it goes on, the harder it’ll be to get rid of her. You’ll never get rid of her.

I put the phone away.