Chapter 3

I blocked Mom.

But she kicked my bedroom door open, stormed in, and slapped me again and again. “Zhao Zixuan! How did I give birth to such a selfish little monster? He’s your own uncle! If his big sister won’t help him, who in this world will care about him?”

In the past, I had never thought there was anything wrong with that.

I’d even believed that girls were supposed to be softhearted and kind, because she told me self-sacrifice was what made a girl good.

Now I understood.

Love had to go both ways. Ruining her own family to support her brother wasn’t love. It was an obsession with catering to him.

Grandma had shackled Mom with the idea that she owed her brother everything. Now Mom was trying to fasten those same shackles on me.

I tried as hard as I could to reason with her. “Mom, Uncle has a family now. Supporting his wife and child is his responsibility. However much you care about him as his sister, you have to make sure our own family can get by first. Don’t you?”

I brought my sister, thin as a skeleton, in front of her. “Look at her. If Uncle were a good person, could he bear to spend the money meant for her school meal card on his own food and drink?”

For a long time, Mom couldn’t find a word to say.

Then her embarrassment turned to anger. “You’re a girl. Why is food all you ever think about? Besides, just let your sister use your meal card! Don’t you understand that an eldest sister is like a mother? Would it kill you to eat a few mouthfuls less and leave them for her? I’ve been far too good to you. When I was your age, I’d already left school to work for my family!”

I was so angry I almost laughed.

“Listen to yourself, Mom. You’d think there was money on my card! You don’t even care whether she eats. Why would you remember whether I’m alive?”

All my resentment came pouring out. “While we’re gulping cold water at school just to fill our stomachs, Uncle is spending our living money on trips and food, showing it all off on WeChat. What gives him the right? Just being our uncle?”

Smack! She slapped me again. “Zhao Zixuan, what’s gotten into you?”

She screamed at me hysterically, her voice dripping with venom. “I should have found a pond and drowned you when you were born!”

When she said that,

I searched her eyes for the slightest hint that she was joking, or only saying it in anger.

There was none.

She truly regretted not drowning me.

And she regretted even more that her first child had been me instead of Zhao Zixing.

Just then, Zhao Zixing’s wheedling voice came from the doorway. He was deliberately making sure I could hear. “Mommy, I woke up as soon as you left. I’m so hungry. I want something to eat.”

He particularly liked appearing whenever Mom was slapping me.

He came over and rolled his eyes at me. “All she does is tell on you to Dad. I’m not like her. I’ll always take your side, Mommy!”

For my sister and me, Mom always had the same cold, disgusted expression.

At the sight of Zhao Zixing, she instantly became a loving mother. “Come here, let Mommy hold you. What would you like to eat? I’ll make it right now! What’s that? Chicken wings? All right, I’ll go out and buy some!”

It was very late.

Outside, frost and heavy dew chilled the night.

Mom kicked me out. “Go to the late-night food stall and get your brother some barbecue. Now!”

She threw twenty yuan at me. “Don’t buy anything else. Just his favorite wings. He likes them crispy, so tell the owner to fry them longer.”

I took the money, wrapped my thin school uniform around me, and hurried into the biting, subzero wind.

It wasn’t that I was willing to do this.

If I refused, she would send my sister instead.