Extra: Lu Family Brothers and Sisters’ Daily Life as Children (3)
The old house of the Lu family.
The solemn mourning hall was shrouded in a heavy white.
The air was filled with the faint smoke of burning incense and candles and a lingering sadness.
Lu Yannan was wearing a well-fitting black suit. His figure was taller than his peers, but he also exuded a fatigue that went beyond his age.
He, along with his younger brothers and sisters, bowed and expressed gratitude to the last group of guests who came to pay their respects.
The teenager tried hard to maintain composure on his face.
The guests dispersed.
Only the Lu siblings and their parents were left in the mourning hall.
Lu Yannan turned his gaze towards his father and mother who were standing aside, their faces showing no trace of sadness.
His eyes were calm, but a layer of icy frost condensed deep inside: "Mom and Dad, please bow to Grandpa."
Upon hearing this, Father Lu raised his lips in a sarcastic arc, his eyes piercing Lu Yannan sharply, his voice undisguisedly harsh and resentful: "You deserve to be filial. I left all the share funds to you."
Lu Yannan's body tensed for a moment.
He almost immediately stepped sideways to protect his younger brother and sister who were obviously hurt by their father's words.
He met Father Lu's malicious gaze and said in a low and clear voice, "This is Grandpa's decision."
Father Lu sneered, his eyes swept over Lu Yannan and his younger siblings whom he was protecting, and finally landed on the coffin covered with white cloth in the center of the mourning hall.
There was no trace of nostalgia or sadness on his face, only cold calculation and resentment for being deprived of benefits.
He turned abruptly, throwing down a curse: "Alright! I want to see if you can protect those things that don't belong to you."
After saying that, he strode away without looking back.
Lu's mother followed closely behind with an expressionless face.
In the huge mourning hall, only five brothers and sisters were left in an instant.
The air seemed to freeze, leaving only the subtle crackling of the burning candle.
The suppressed sadness and the cold feeling of being abandoned by loved ones weigh heavily on everyone's heart.
The four brothers knew that their parents did not love them, but their sister was the only one who still held on to a glimmer of hope.
Lu Shiman lowered her head, and her hands unconsciously hooked tightly around the fingers of her second brother beside her.
Lu Chixu's eyes were red. He held his sister's hand tightly, pursed his thin lips, and tried hard not to let the tears fall.
Lu Qiyun and Lu Jianheng also leaned against each other in silence, with confusion and anxiety on their faces.
Lu Yannan took a deep breath and forced himself to suppress the anger and sadness that was surging in his heart.
He turned around, his eyes sweeping over the pale faces of his younger brothers and sisters. His voice was unquestionably calm as he made arrangements: "Xiao Xu, you and I will guard the mourning hall. Xiao Heng, you take your younger brothers and sisters to bed."
"Brother..." Lu Shiman raised his tearful face and cried, "I don't want to sleep..."
Lu Qiyun also grabbed the corner of Lu Jianheng's clothes tightly and shook his head vigorously.
"Be obedient." Lu Yannan's voice became low and tired: "Go to sleep."
His eyes fell on Lu Jianheng, with a sense of entrustment.
Lu Jianheng nodded, took Lu Qiyun's hand with one hand, and put his arm around Lu Shiman's shoulder with the other: "Let's go to bed with Third Brother."
He tried to keep his voice calm.
After watching them leave the mourning hall, looking back every few steps, and their figures disappearing into the depths of the corridor, Lu Yannan slowly withdrew his gaze.
Only he and Lu Chixu were left in the mourning hall.
Lu Chixu walked to the brazier where paper money was burning and squatted down silently.
He picked up a stack of paper money and threw it into the fire one by one.
The dancing flames illuminated his sad profile.
The flames burned his eyes, causing bursts of stinging pain.
The tears that had been held back for a long time could no longer be controlled. Like beads that had broken off the string, they fell down in large drops, dripping onto the burning paper money with a slight "sizzling" sound.
Lu Yannan stood quietly behind his brother, looking at his slightly trembling shoulders.
His Adam's apple rolled silently and his chest felt congested.
He was also holding back.
At this moment, Lu Chixu's voice, with a heavy nasal tone, sounded low and broken: "Brother...will we no longer have an elder to love us in the future?"
These words were like an ice-hardened awl, piercing through Lu Yannan's forced calmness.
His tense nerves suddenly broke, and the tears that had been accumulating for a long time instantly broke through the dam of his eyes and surged down.
He raised his head suddenly, trying to stop the tears from falling, but the hot liquid still flowed silently along his cheeks.
He took a deep breath, trying to calm his choked throat, took a step forward, stretched out his hand, and pressed hard on Lu Chixu's slightly trembling shoulders.
"Brother, it hurts."
These three words, like a heavy promise, fell on the silent mourning hall.
When Lu Chixu heard this, his body trembled violently, and the suppressed crying could no longer be controlled. It burst out from the depths of his throat and turned into sobs and heart-wrenching pain.
He turned around and buried his face deeply in his eldest brother's waist and abdomen, his shoulders shaking violently.
Lu Yannan's hand was still firmly on his brother's shoulder, and his other hand was gently stroking his trembling back.
He tilted his head back and let the tears fall silently.
His eyes passed through the plain white curtains of the mourning hall and cast onto the dark night outside the window.
Their future is shrouded in fog.
From this moment on, Lu Yannan became the only support for his younger brothers and sisters.
......
Lu Jianheng's room.
The lights were turned off, and the room was dark, with only a faint light coming in from the window.
Lu Shiman and Lu Qiyun squeezed on Lu Jianheng's bed.
Lu Shiman curled up beside his third brother, his small body still trembling slightly.
She opened her eyes wide in the darkness, her voice hoarse from crying, "Third brother, from now on...will I never see Grandpa again?"
Lu Jianheng was lying in the middle, holding one of his younger brothers and sisters in each hand.
The sadness and fear in his heart were no less than theirs.
But at this moment, he is the older brother and he has to be strong.
Lu Jianheng tried to soothe them in a steady and gentle voice: "Manman, be good. You'll be able to see Grandpa in the future."
He repeated the words that adults use to comfort children.
Lu Shiman sniffed, his voice filled with sober sadness: "Third brother, I've grown up, I know... I know what death means."
Her voice trembled slightly in the darkness: "We... don't have a grandfather anymore?"
This sentence was like a key, instantly opening the valve of repression.
In the dark.
Lu Qiyun's soft sobs were the first to sound, and then Lu Shiman couldn't help sobbing as well.
The tears that Lu Jianheng had been holding back finally fell silently.
He stretched out his arms and hugged his brother and sister tighter.
Three small bodies huddled together in the darkness, sharing the pain of losing their loved ones.
In the room, the only sound left was suppressed, intermittent sobbing, which seemed particularly clear in the silent night.
Lu Chixu cried himself to sleep leaning against a chair. Lu Yannan was afraid that he was cold, so he went back to the room to get a blanket.
His footsteps stopped in front of Lu Jianheng's door.
Standing outside the door, listening to the faint sobs coming out from the crack, my chest felt like it was being tightly gripped by a hand.
The suppressed crying sounds were like cold needles piercing his heart.
In the end, he was unable to protect them from the storms of the world, and they had to swallow their sorrows alone.
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