I never thought I would love anyone, let alone fall in love with a woman.
But until I met her, Sheng Wu, the only person who made my heart beat faster in this life.
At first, my impression of this stepmother was just "extremely beautiful", and I didn't have any emotions towards her. After all, my father didn't care much about us. She was like a stranger, and no one had ever mentioned our mother.
When I heard that my father was going to marry someone else, I didn't feel any emotion. I was just curious. Could my father, who seemed gentle but was extremely cold-hearted, really love someone?
After all, he never really cared much about the three of us siblings. I even thought at one point that he was not our father, even though we looked so much like him.
It wasn't until I heard that my father was going to marry a 19-year-old actress that I became angry. But I wasn't angry that he was going to marry such a young girl. I was angry that he, a 44-year-old middle-aged man, was going to marry a girl 25 years younger than him!
I don't think he could really like a girl who was one year younger than his daughter. I just felt disgusted and thought it was another feudal concubine's trick of persecuting women, so Shen Zheliu and I never went back to live there.
I tried to persuade my father, but he remained silent and just told me to focus on my studies. Obviously, he didn't listen at all.
Later, my father repeatedly sent people to call us back for dinner, saying that we should meet our stepmother.
We knew that resistance was futile, so we finally went back and met the stepmother. She was different from what I expected. She was very delicate and beautiful, like a peony grown in a greenhouse, who needed careful care.
I found that this stepmother was not that scheming and charming. She was even a silly beauty with a charming face.
When I saw her again later, she sang a beautiful song for me. No wonder my father and older brother always loved going to the theater. I felt an inexplicable closeness to her at the time. When I learned that she and my father had married after only knowing each other for a few days, I felt even more convinced that my father had married her for some purpose. I felt a pity for her illiterate and uneducated situation, so I invited her to visit our school.
Later, she came to school and even resorted to using her beauty to help us. I was a little angry, but not because I thought she was seductive, but because she seemed to be used to this way of survival. I took her back to the dormitory and made her a cup of coffee.
She clearly didn't like the drink, but she still frowned and said it was delicious. She said, "I don't want to see disappointment on your face. You made this specially for me." I thought to myself that she was quite understanding. After all, I had only met her a few times, and she didn't need to please me because she was loved by her father.
I was afraid that she would suffer too much with her personality. As a woman, I guided her and told her that if she didn't like something, she should express it instead of blindly enduring it and agreeing with others.
Later, I added sugar to her coffee, and this time she smiled, a smile that made my face flush. I looked away as if nothing had happened. During our conversation, I discovered she wasn't the type to simply accept everything and please everyone. She had her own thoughts and boundaries, but she was used to hiding them.
That time, she accidentally dropped a fan after singing, and I repaired it. Unexpectedly, it brought up the fact that my father had liked someone else. And many traces showed that Awu was almost exactly the same as the person that my father and eldest brother liked at the same time eight years ago.
At that moment, I was horrified. Could it be that my father married her at 19 just to use her as a substitute for a 27-year-old? I was dissatisfied with my father's arrangement, but out of respect for him, I didn't take much action.
But as we got along later, I felt more and more sympathetic towards this stepmother. She was so delicate yet strong-willed that she shouldn't be trapped in the backyard her whole life. I wanted to send her away from the Shen residence, but she said she didn't want to. I didn't know why at that time.
Until she was kidnapped by Zhang Feng, I had to go to rescue her alone. When Zhang Feng drugged her and held her hostage, I agreed to kneel down for him because he knew that I was very proud and had a strong sense of self-esteem, and this was the best way to humiliate me.
Seeing Awu crying for me, I still knelt down. Fortunately, I only knelt on my left leg, so it didn’t really count as a kneeling. I just regarded it as a tribute to the dead Zhang Feng.
I saved my stepmother, but by mistake, she kissed me and called my father's name. I thought she recognized me as her father, but I heard her say to me.
"Qinghuan, I like you so much."
"In this family, you're the only one who's truly good to me. They can all use me as a substitute. Why, since Gui Wu and Shen Junsheng both covet me, then why... can't it be you!"
At that moment, I panicked.
When she kissed me the second time, I seemed to lose my mind and kissed her back.
Later I realized that this was not a solution. She had been fed drugs, and I was afraid that her reputation would be damaged if she went back like this, so I held her and soaked in the lake for an hour.
He didn't wait until the scorching temperature on her body subsided before carrying her back to the Shen residence.
That was the first time I felt resistance and rebellion towards my father who reached out to take Shengwu.
They clearly didn't cherish her, so why did he send her back to the Shen residence, this cage?
But I still had to let go.
Later I tried to persuade Awu to leave again, but this time she no longer hid her thoughts. Just as I taught her, she told me passionately and bluntly that she didn't leave the Chen residence because she didn't want to leave me.
I was stunned. Since I broke through this layer of paper, I responded to her for the first time and hugged her and kissed her in my room.
Even my father was right outside the door.
Awu and I officially confirmed our relationship, a forbidden relationship that was destined not to be made public.
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