Lin Yansheng still remembered the very first time he saw Qin Shun.
He had been utterly taken aback.
At that time, he had just started seeing Qin Shun’s mother, Shizhen. The way they came together was hardly romantic; it was, in truth, more a matter of practicality.
The mother and son lived in hardship, their circumstances nearly desperate.
She worked tirelessly yet what she earned was never enough. Her meager salary could barely cover the endless bills that piled up one after another.
So when someone introduced her to a blind date, she relented and agreed.
Her requirements were simple: an honest and considerate man with some savings, someone who could provide a roof over their heads and Lin Yansheng also knew that she had once met the wrong man and had a son of eleven or twelve.
He did not mind. Instead, he felt sympathy.
In fact, this match was something he had sought out himself. One glance at the newly hired waitress in the tea restaurant had been enough, her delicate features, her quiet gentleness, everything about her matched the wife he had always dreamed of. So he asked someone to act as a go between.
After only two dates, the relationship was settled.
Shizhen said, “I have to bring A’Shun with me.” Lin Yansheng had no objections.
“Next time, bring him along. Shall we go to the zoo or the amusement park?” Lin Yansheng immediately thought of buying a gift and asked, “What’s his shoe size…?”
Shizhen said six but buying size seven would be better. How much? Seven? Lin Yansheng laughed. “This kid’s got flippers for feet. He’ll definitely grow tall and strong in the future.” He had already unconsciously placed himself in the role of a father.
They had not even met yet.
But he already felt boundless pity for his future stepson.
He had heard that little A’Shun had once taken the initiative to say he would stop studying after elementary school and go out to work, wanting to ease his mother’s financial burden. Such filial devotion was nothing short of heaven moving.
In his imagination, the boy should have been small and skinny, with big eyes and a tiny face just like Shizhen’s, like a frail little kitten that might not survive without care. He imagined himself guiding the child’s hand as he taught him calligraphy, stroke by stroke.
And then Shizhen brought her son to meet him.
At that time, Qin Shun was still young, not yet fully grown but his build was already tall and sturdy, far surpassing others his age, he was as tall as Lin Yansheng himself. Lin Yansheng: “…..?”
So he was not a little kitten after all but a tiger cub.
What had he been eating to grow like this?
Lin Yansheng found himself marveling.
Most importantly, it was the first time in his life that Lin Yansheng had seen such a handsome boy, handsome in a way that felt almost aggressive. Thick brows, long lashes, sharply sculpted features, a steady composure, a calmness that seemed beyond his years. Both his appearance and demeanor were prematurely mature, nothing like a child’s.
Later, Lin Yansheng would think that if this boy were not properly guided, he would undoubtedly grow into a playboy, a scourge wherever he went.
Lin Yansheng: “You’re A’Shun?”
Qin Shun gave a slight bow. “Hello, Uncle.”
At last, there was a trace of childishness about him.
He was in the middle of his voice change, his throat hoarse, a faintly deep timbre already emerging beneath the rasp.
Before long, the mother and son moved together into Lin Yansheng’s residence in Kowloon Walled City.
He gave up the bedroom to his girlfriend.
As for himself, he squeezed into the living room with the half grown Qin Shun, the two of them sharing the cramped space to sleep.
He was deeply grateful that Shizhen never uttered a single complaint. More than that, she and her son worked together to keep the small home tidy inside and out, everything arranged in perfect order.
They were beginning to resemble a real family.
Those were good days.
At least, that was what he thought.
Even within such confined, limited space, a place could still feel warm, like home.
When Qin Shun entered secondary school, Lin Yansheng went with him as his guardian to complete the enrollment.
The teacher first read through the grades listed on the documents and smiled with satisfaction. Only afterward did she look at the address, pausing slightly before asking, “You live in Kowloon Walled City?”
Lin Yansheng replied as a matter of course, “Yes.” His tone carried the unspoken question: Is there a problem?
The other person fell silent.
Such prejudice was something he had long grown accustomed to since childhood.
Outsiders often regarded them as barbarians.
The Lin family, since his ancestors’ generation, had fled to Rong City to escape hardship. Through sheer diligence and perseverance, they had managed to build a modest livelihood for themselves.
The Walled City had originally been a government yamen left over from the late Qing dynasty.
Later, during times of war, refugees took shelter there, erecting makeshift modern dwellings. Layer upon layer of unauthorized structures were built, day after day, year after year, until today it had grown into a massive, towering mound like a gigantic termite nest.
His grandfather had been a schoolteacher. Before passing away, he would often hold the young, tiny Lin Yansheng on his knee.
He once said, “Yansheng, the feng shui of the Walled City is excellent. It sits at the foot of a small hill, facing south toward the sea. The two large wells are just like the twin eyes of one of the nine dragons.”
The outside world always viewed this place as a den of crime but he never thought there was anything particularly wrong with it.
By the time they returned home, night had already fallen.
Looking up, the buildings were scattered with countless lights, clusters upon clusters, as if endless, winding upward along narrow paths all the way to heaven.
Lin Yansheng said to the son he had gained almost by chance, “Your teacher isn’t entirely wrong. The Walled City is indeed a complicated place, a microcosm of society from top to bottom. You must learn to distinguish for yourself. As Confucius said, wealth and honor are what people desire; if they cannot be obtained by the proper way, one should not dwell in them. Poverty and lowliness are what people dislike; if they cannot be avoided by the proper way, one should not reject them.”
This was how his grandfather had taught his father and how his father had taught him.
And so, he taught his stepson in the same way.
“I understand, Uncle,” Qin Shun said. “I’ll listen to you.”
It sounded obedient enough at first glance yet every time Lin Yansheng looked into his eyes, his heart would tremble with unease.
They were like dark, submerged reefs beneath the sea, distant, cold and shadowed with quiet gloom.
Perhaps it was simply because they had not spent enough time together yet.
He comforted himself with that thought.
On the eve of the wedding he had planned with Shizhen, a medical examination revealed that a tumor was growing inside her body.
Lin Yansheng closed the door and asked the doctor, “Can it be treated?”
“Hard to say. It’s already in the late stage and very difficult to eradicate,” the doctor replied. “An X ray can only show a rough picture. What it’s really like will only be known once we open her up. It’s not that no one has ever been cured. You know, sometimes miracles do happen in this world.” Then he asked, “What is your relationship to her?”
Lin Yansheng said they were engaged.
The doctor changed his tone. “The surgery will require a considerable amount of money and success cannot be guaranteed.”
“Thank you, thank you,” Lin Yansheng said, his palms damp with cold sweat. “Please do your best. The rest is up to fate.”
The savings his parents had left him were entirely poured into the surgery. After that, Shizhen lived for another year.
At first, he could still push her out for short walks. Later, she could only move about in a wheelchair.
With each passing day, the illness worsened.
By the time she passed away, she was as thin as a paper effigy. Leaning against him, she felt light, weightless, as if she might drift away.
During that time, Shizhen said “I’m sorry” to him countless times every day.
Lin Yansheng never accepted those apologies.
He was the one who should have been sorry. He had asked an old classmate studying medicine abroad whether treatment might be possible in the United States or Germany but he simply did not have enough money.
In the end, they turned to traditional Chinese medicine, collecting herbal prescriptions from an old practitioner and relying on conservative treatment.
Caring for a patient was no easy task.
Fortunately, A’Shun was a filial child. Every day after school, the first thing he did was come home to help take care of his mother. At night, he slept by the doorway, springing up at the slightest sound and rushing to his mother’s bedside.
One day, he was washing the basin that held his mother’s vomit, bright orange residue clinging to the green plastic surface.
Water gushed loudly from the tap. The narrow washroom felt even more cramped with two grown males standing side by side.
Lin Yansheng forced a casual smile and said, “Your mom said again today that she wants to eat carrots. It’s like she’s turning into a little rabbit.”
Qin Shun did not look up, continuing to work with his hands. “Uncle, if there’s something you want to say, just say it.”
It felt unbearably cruel to speak such words to a child who loved his mother so deeply. Lin Yansheng hesitated, his heart aching. “I think… we should start preparing for your mother’s funeral arrangements…”
“Mm ”
Qin Shun twisted the faucet tighter and tighter, until it would not move another inch. The veins on the back of his hand bulged sharply before he finally stopped.
“Thank you, Uncle,” he said, head lowered.
On the day of the funeral, Lin Yansheng borrowed a black suit for A’Shun. Wearing it, the boy looked even more like an adult.
The cremation chamber was in operation, pale bluish white smoke billowing out in thick waves.
Dressed in black, Qin Shun stood beneath the corridor, holding his mother’s photograph, his posture straight and unmoving.
Above his head, the gray stone eaves sliced the azure sky into a narrow strip of drifting light, like the edge of a white wave poised to spill over at any moment.
When he borrowed the suit, a friend had asked, “What about that burden of a kid? What do you plan to do with him? He’s not related to you by blood. He’s got hands and feet, he should find his own way.”
Whenever Lin Yansheng closed his eyes, he would remember Shizhen’s final appearance. She had grown so frail, curled upon the bed.
A’Shun did not dare use any force even when wiping her arms. Her bones were like dry twigs beneath a layer of skin as thin and fragile as rotten paper, as if it might tear at the slightest touch. The sight filled him with sorrow.
Shizhen had been such a kind woman.
Even at the very end, when illness left her drifting in and out of unconsciousness, she would murmur softly, “A’Shun, A’Shun… what will you do?”
She felt embarrassed to trouble him any further.
In private, she told him that perhaps they could arrange for A’Shun to take up an apprenticeship, one that would provide food and lodging. In the future, at least he would have a skill to rely on.
If A’Shun had disliked studying, that would have been one thing but A’Shun was both diligent and intelligent.
In Rong City, Shizhen’s only family had been the two of them.
If he did not take responsibility, then who would?
So, the matter was, in truth, very simple.
Lin Yansheng walked over, stopped in front of him and said:
“A’Shun, no matter what happens from now on, I will treat you as my own child. Just keep living with me. If you want to study, then study. As long as I am here for even a single day, you will have that same day with me.”
✦ ✧ ✦
Fleurveil
[Translator]
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Next →
ChaptersChapter 1 · UncleChapter 2 · Ran AwayChapter 3 · TimidChapter 4 · DeceasedChapter 5 · Grow upChapter 6 · CharmChapter 7 · EndureChapter 8 · Biological FatherChapter 9 · ContestChapter 10 · MisunderstoodChapter 11 · BreakChapter 12 · ReunionChapter 13 · MeetChapter 14 · To clearChapter 15 · InstructionsChapter 16 · RegretChapter 17 · SecretChapter 18 · Subtle SophistryChapter 19 · GuestChapter 20 · KissingChapter 21 · Extra 1Chapter 22 · Extra 2Chapter 23 · Extra 3Chapter 24 · Extra 4Chapter 25 · Extra 5Chapter 26 · Extra 6Chapter 27 · Extra 7Chapter 28 · Extra 8