Chapter 6 What is Real?
It took about ten minutes to walk to the low-rise building where my family lived. Although it wasn't one of those tall and crowded tenement buildings, the small pile of houses in front of me wasn't much better.
Seeing the struggle and disgust in his daughter's eyes, Lin's father sighed inwardly.
The family is heavily in debt and can only afford to live in this kind of cramped place. Their daughter is a pampered girl from the Shen family; she definitely won't be able to stand it here. What can they do? It's all their fault as incompetent parents…
"Mu Yan, our house is a bit small, it's definitely not as big as the Shen family's. If you really want to..."
Lin Jianbin wanted to say that if she really couldn't get used to living there, he would rent her a decent place in the city, but before he could finish speaking, Lin Muyan lifted her leg and walked into the stairwell.
"Let's go, we're already here."
Lin Muyan hadn't figured out how to interact with her family of origin yet. Seeing such a terrible environment, she couldn't be happy at all, and suppressed all her emotions with a blank expression.
In Lin Jianbin's eyes, however, it took on a completely different appearance.
Sure enough, Mu Yan definitely looked down on them.
It makes sense. How could a pampered young lady, who was living a wonderful life and was pampered by everyone, be happy to have to adopt poor people like them as her parents?
Lin Jianbin didn't know how to comfort his daughter, nor did he have the confidence to tell her that he would give her the life she wanted. He could only keep his head down and silently follow along.
After passing through a narrow, dimly lit stairwell and around a small pile of garbage, a low door appeared before Lin Muyan.
The door wasn't closed, and it was pitch black inside; you couldn't see anything.
Lin Jianbin quickly stepped forward to lead the way, turning back as he went to whisper a reminder: "Mu Yan, be careful. The small door to the entrance is a bit low. You're tall, so you'll have to bend over a little."
After passing through the three-meter-deep entrance corridor, the view suddenly opens up.
It's a small courtyard. Although it looks old, like a Tujia courtyard from the 80s or 90s, it's clearly well-maintained and very clean compared to the dirty and messy places outside.
There were also some cheap wildflowers for decoration, and all three doors were covered with clean curtains, so the environment wasn't bad.
This was beyond Lin Muyan's expectations.
The comments section was filled with exclamations of surprise, with most saying that they didn't expect the Lin family to be so nice. The house had a courtyard with three rooms arranged in a square shape, forming a self-contained household that was quite cozy.
"Mu Yan, this is our home. It's a little small, but your mother keeps it clean."
Lin Muyan was slightly surprised. The wicked mother would clean the house? It was different from what the comments said.
What? You're just bragging. Your tigress wife can't possibly help you with housework?
[He's being stubborn, but I think he's head over heels for that wicked woman. He's definitely in love with her.]
"Jianbin, is Muyan back?"
Suddenly, a voice came from the side room. It was very gentle and even more pleasant than Mrs. Shen's voice.
Lin Muyan suddenly held her breath and nervously looked in the direction from which the sound came.
The door opened from the inside, the curtain was lifted, and a woman who still possessed a captivating charm stepped out.
With an expectant look on her face, she opened the door quickly and immediately met Lin Muyan's eyes.
At that moment, Lin Muyan felt as if the dark sky had brightened, and the lady in front of her was like the sun, making her feel warm.
Lin Muyan recognized her almost instantly, because they looked so alike!
Lin Muyan had always known that she didn't resemble Mrs. Shen or Chairman Shen, nor any of the Shen family's relatives. She had never cared, and no one in the Shen family had ever mentioned it.
Because she was very beautiful, in a striking way, such beauty was definitely a powerful asset in a wealthy family. The Shen family often praised her for being more beautiful than anyone else in the family.
Now Lin Muyan finally understands that she looks like her biological mother, at least seven-tenths like her.
But that's strange. The "wicked mother" used to work as a nanny in the Shen family. This fake heiress looks more and more like the family's former nanny. Didn't they ever have any suspicions?
However, it's also possible that they genuinely didn't notice. The Shen family had many servants, each with their own duties. Only two or three of them were truly allowed to linger in front of the master's household. The rest of the servants who did the work had no right to be present in the master's household's activities.
Perhaps she herself was just an insignificant nanny in the Shen family before, and no one noticed her.
Wang Yanqin stared intently at Lin Muyan, lost in thought, as if trying to etch her image into her mind forever. It was only when Lin Jianbin reminded her that she snapped out of her reverie.
"Xiaoqin, stop staring at our daughter, talk to her."
Lin Jianbin grinned foolishly, and Wang Yanqin quickly chimed in, "Yes, yes, look at me, I'm so excited to finally meet my second daughter."
Wang Yanqin's eyes reddened. She wiped her eyes with her sleeve and pulled Lin Muyan closer, wanting to get to know her better.
Lin Muyan instinctively took a step back, and her mother's hand missed its mark, leaving her embarrassed and at a loss.
"Um, hello everyone..." Lin Muyan greeted them with her head down, her mind a jumble of thoughts.
Was it really her mother who used the trick of switching babies for her own selfish desires back then?
Such gentle eyes cannot be faked; how could such a person do such a despicable thing?
Many people in the live chat shared the same thoughts as Lin Muyan, while others remained steadfast in their beliefs.
[Mother Lin doesn't seem like a bad woman, so what's going on?]
[Family members, this might be the granddaddy of all green tea bitches and white lotuses; they've reached a level of indistinguishable from the real thing!]
[Without a doubt, this is a high-level woman. The "green tea girl" is nothing but a chick in front of her mother. Just wait and see, this woman will eventually show her true colors.]
Lin Muyan looked at the comments on the screen, then at her mother who was radiating maternal warmth, and a flood of doubts arose in her mind.
Wang Yanqin knew her daughter was probably not used to being back, so she didn't force her to immediately acknowledge them. Instead, she said:
"Mu Yan, this is the room Mom prepared for you. You'll live here from now on."
As she spoke, she deftly lifted the curtain on the right-hand side of the room.
“Xiao Nuan used to live here alone. Now that you’re back, I’ve divided the room in two. You’ll have more space inside. She’s still young and goes to school during the day, only sleeping at night. You can decide how you want to arrange the room.”
Lin Muyan was once again plunged into deep thought by her mother's words.
She silently walked into the room, which was divided in the middle by wooden boards. The space inside was obviously larger than the space outside. There was only a small bed outside, which Lin's mother had left for her youngest daughter, Lin Xiaonuan.
As for Lin Muyan, they actually arranged for her to have a larger space, with a ventilation window on her side, and a door with a lock on the wooden board in the middle.
The couple stood awkwardly at the door, and Lin's mother rubbed her hands together as she explained:
“Your dad is a construction worker, and he also does carpentry. He installed these wooden boards. Go and take a look. If you need anything else, your parents will buy it for you in a little while.”
Lin Muyan's feelings were extremely complicated, and she even felt like crying.
Because of the comments on the screen, because the Shen family told her that her birth mother was wicked and used the method of switching babies to achieve twenty years of wealth and honor, and because of Shen Jiaojiao's reminder before she left, she had no illusions about her original family at all. She even felt that this family was a den of dragons and tigers, and that she would definitely suffer a lot when she came back, and even be skinned alive.
But none of these things appeared. All that was there was her simple yet cozy little home, her father who tried his best to please her, and her mother who would tear up whenever she looked at her and speak in a gentle, tender voice.
Can anyone tell her what is real?
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