Little Great-Aunt didn’t answer Chu Xiaoxiao’s questions, but she successfully persuaded the little child to brush her teeth and wash up for bed, rescuing Great-Uncle from his impossible predicament.
Before going to sleep, Chu Xiaoxiao conducted a private investigation and discovered that only she and Mom had never been hit!
In the bedroom, Chu Xiaoxiao wrapped herself up in her blanket and looked at Xiao Bi, who had come to turn off the light for her. Unable to hold back, she asked,
“Mom, is it really okay for adults to hit children?”
Chu Xiaoxiao’s worldview had been greatly shaken. She truly couldn’t understand why the family members had all been hit when they were young, yet all considered it no big deal.
After pondering for a few seconds, Xiao Bi walked back to her daughter’s bedside and softly asked,
“Do you think there’s a problem with it, Xiaoxiao?”
Chu Xiaoxiao muttered, “Of course there’s a problem.”
Xiao Bi calmly replied, “Then when you have children in the future, you can choose not to hit them and follow your own beliefs.”
Seeing that her mother hadn’t directly answered the question, Chu Xiaoxiao hesitated for a moment before asking,
“…Then should Dad have hit Brother?”
Xiao Bi fell silent for a moment. Then she smiled helplessly and answered,
“Xiaoxiao, whether something should or shouldn’t have happened isn’t for outsiders to judge. It should be judged by the people who experienced it.”
“Some people may be able to accept it, while others may never let it go. No matter which outcome it is, other people can’t decide for them what’s right or wrong.”
After hearing that, Chu Xiaoxiao felt somewhat better.
It was similar to how Great-Uncle felt that being hit was no big deal, while imagining herself in his place made her feel terrible. People simply thought differently.
There was no point in her racking her brains over the matter. What mattered was what her bargain-bin brother thought.
Reassured, Chu Xiaoxiao closed her eyes and went to sleep, while Xiao Bi closed the door behind her.
Standing in the living room, Xiao Bi suddenly remembered many things from the past—the old frictions, arguments, and conflicts, as well as the endless family wars in the old house that had once left her exhausted.
After Chu Xiaoxiao was born, she had grown up around Yurong Terrace.
But Chu Xiaoyi’s childhood had been spent in the old house in the old city district, which was now where Great-Uncle and the others lived.
When Chu Xiaoyi moved away from Yurong Terrace, he had taken most of his belongings from there. However, all the things from his past remained sealed away in the old house, together with yellowing memories.
The next day, Chu Xiaoxiao hid in a corner and secretly observed Chu Xiaoyi, unable to find a suitable opportunity to speak.
Noticing her sneaky little glances, Chu Xiaoyi couldn’t help teasing,
“What are you up to now?”
Chu Xiaoyi: A couple of days ago you wouldn’t even give me the time of day, and now you’re acting like a suspicious stalker fan?
After being discovered, Chu Xiaoxiao stopped trying to hide it and quietly asked,
“Is your relationship with Dad bad because he hit you before?”
Chu Xiaoyi froze.
He hadn’t expected the little thing to have heard his slip of the tongue yesterday after all. No wonder she had been acting so cautiously.
Casually, he replied,
“No. It’s not like I’m that childish. I’m not a three-and-a-half-year-old kid.”
The conflict between him and his father was nowhere near that simple.
Sometimes even he couldn’t clearly explain it himself.
Seeing him use her own words against her, Chu Xiaoxiao immediately became a little annoyed.
Then she muttered,
“So you’re fine with it?”
“Of course.”
Chu Xiaoyi answered readily.
Then, suddenly thinking of something, he said enthusiastically,
“Speaking of which, as the eldest brother, I’m basically like a father. If you don’t behave in the future, I can spank you too.”
Chu Xiaoxiao’s eyes instantly widened.
“How can you be like that!?”
She had been worrying about her bargain-bin brother’s feelings, yet he wanted to spank her?
Chu Xiaoyi replied, “Then just behave yourself. Besides, I got hit before too.”
Chu Xiaoxiao declared,
“If you dare spank me, then when you’re old and forgetful, I’ll spank you every day too!”
If Chu Xiaoyi dared hit her now, then when he became as senile as Grandma in old age, she wouldn’t show him any understanding either. She’d spank him every day.
Chu Xiaoyi: “…”
Should I be grateful you’re not planning to pull the plug on me in the hospital?
Because the siblings had recently been playing basketball with Chu Jiadong so often, the relationship between father and son had improved slightly and was no longer as tense as before.
The Spring Festival holiday wasn’t very long. Chu Xiaoyi only had two days left before returning to work, and Great-Uncle and the others had already been sent back to the old city district ahead of time.
Grandma now suffered from dementia and had difficulty moving around, so someone needed to look after her.
Unfortunately, the rest of the family couldn’t watch her constantly.
Chu Jiadong had specifically invited Great-Uncle and Little Great-Aunt to live in Beijing. The three elderly relatives normally lived in the old city district near a well-known hospital.
Chu Jiadong regularly provided them with living expenses and visited them from time to time.
Great-Uncle was Grandma’s youngest brother, with a large age gap between them. Even now, he remained energetic and physically strong. Rumor had it that before moving to Beijing, he often worked on construction sites to earn money, doing heavy manual labor every day.
Back when he lived in the village, Chu Jiadong had received care and support from his uncle Chu Qingfeng. Believing him to be honest, kindhearted, and close to his mother, he had invited him to live in the capital.
Great-Uncle had essentially been raised by Grandma, so now that he was taking care of his older sister, he did so without any complaints.
It was a solution that benefited everyone.
Grandma had family members helping care for her, and family naturally paid more attention than outsiders. Meanwhile, Great-Uncle no longer had to earn money outside to support the household or endure discrimination on construction sites because of his age.
Originally, Chu Jiadong had even suggested hiring a nanny for the three elders.
Little Great-Aunt politely refused.
The elderly didn’t like having outsiders in their home, and their health was still good enough that they didn’t require someone to care for them.
After the three elders left Yurong Terrace, the spacious new house suddenly felt much emptier.
The festive atmosphere of the Spring Festival gradually faded away as well.
Xiao Bi stayed in the study preparing lesson plans for the upcoming school term.
The remaining three occupied the living room, watching television, using an iPad, or scrolling through their phones.
Wearing headphones, Chu Xiaoxiao was curled up on the sofa watching a foreign-language video when she suddenly caught a strange smell.
“Dad,” she asked, “are you burning something?”
Chu Jiadong had originally been scrolling through his phone. The moment he heard that, he jumped to his feet and cried out in panic,
“It’s over, it’s over! The stove’s still on! Don’t tell your mother!”
He rushed frantically toward the kitchen, hoping to destroy the evidence before Xiao Bi discovered it. In his haste, he even knocked his phone onto the floor.
Seeing the phone crash down miserably, Chu Xiaoyi couldn’t help feeling speechless as he bent down to pick it up.
“You’re really something…”
He intended to put the phone back on the table, but unexpectedly noticed that the screen was still lit. Apparently, in his panic, his father had forgotten to lock it.
Chu Xiaoyi had no intention of snooping through his father’s information.
Unfortunately, the content displayed on Weibo was impossible to ignore.
It was all news about Chu Xiaoyi.
If Chu Jiadong had merely been browsing ordinary information, Chu Xiaoyi wouldn’t have been so shocked.
But his father was specifically reading the vicious insinuations and attacks posted by anti-fans.
As one of the hottest young idols, Chu Xiaoyi’s anti-fans possessed astonishing combat power and extremely foul mouths. Insulting family members was practically routine for them. On top of that, he had recently been receiving good resources compared to his peers, making him the target of coordinated attacks from multiple groups.
Even Chu Xiaoyi himself sometimes couldn’t bear to read the hate comments. He couldn’t understand why people on the other side of a screen harbored such enormous malice toward him, as though they were lunatics who desperately wanted him dead.
Stunned, Chu Xiaoyi scrolled through the Weibo posts on the phone.
The more he read, the more horrifying they seemed.
Then he came across one particular post, and a sharp pain pierced his heart, bringing with it an indescribable feeling.
TodayHasTheBestActorFloppedYet:
Hope cxy’s entire family reincarnates soon. Hurry up and make room for other handsome guys [smile]
“Best Actor” was one of the mocking nicknames used by Chu Xiaoyi’s anti-fans, originating from their ridicule after he won a Best Actor award.
If Chu Xiaoyi had seen that post on his own phone, he could have forced himself to stay calm and simply scroll past it.
But he was holding his father’s phone.
The thing he least wanted was for his father to witness him at his most humiliating.
He still remembered the scene on the Hengdian set.
During an action sequence, the wire rig had malfunctioned, leaving him injured and disheveled. When he turned around, he saw the panic and heartache in Chu Jiadong’s eyes.
He wanted his father to see only the best side of him.
Only the shining brilliance under the spotlight.
He didn’t want his father involved in anything that happened behind the scenes.
Back then, he had angrily shouted for his father to leave and told him never to visit the set again.
If concern had come from anyone else, it wouldn’t have affected him.
But when it came from his father, he was easily shaken and made to feel vulnerable.
No one else could move him.
Only family had that power.
Chu Xiaoyi had desperately tried to hide all the hardship he experienced outside.
Yet Chu Jiadong had already known everything in private and had even been dragged into it himself.
Not wanting to disturb the little sister sitting nearby, Chu Xiaoyi silently turned off the screen and gently placed the phone back on the table.
A short while later, Chu Jiadong finished cleaning up the crime scene and hurried back into the living room.
The moment he returned, he repeatedly reminded them,
“Don’t tell your mother.”
Chu Xiaoxiao lazily glanced at him.
She seemed thoroughly accustomed to her father’s clumsiness and didn’t say a word.
Meanwhile, Chu Xiaoyi had something weighing on his mind. Seeing that the little thing was wearing headphones and probably wasn’t paying attention to the sounds around her, he pondered for a few seconds before finally asking,
“Why do you read those things?”
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