Zhang Lanhua was overjoyed, talking nonstop the whole time.
She praised the wedding dress in her hands to the heavens, saying how much effort she had spent and how many favors she had called in just to buy it all for Su Mo.
For Su Mo’s own good.
Those four words “for your own good” pressed on Su Mo’s heart like a thousand-pound stone, lingering without fading.
Zhang Lanhua tried to suppress her excitement, almost wishing she herself were the bride wearing the dress.
Noticing Su Mo sitting silently to the side, Zhang Lanhua kept smiling, though the smile made Su Mo feel uncomfortable.
“Momo, what’s wrong?”
“Are you not satisfied with something?”
Not satisfied?
Su Mo hadn’t been satisfied from the very beginning.
“Momo, why don’t you try it on and see if the size fits? If it doesn’t, I’ll have someone alter it.”
Without giving her a chance to refuse, Zhang Lanhua placed the cheap, pungent-smelling dress into Su Mo’s arms.
Su Mo held back her anger. She said nothing, only wanting to see how Lin Yuyi would explain things when he returned.
Extremely unwilling, she put the dress on. The stiff tulle scratched painfully against her skin.
When she stepped out of the room, Zhang Lanhua stared in amazement.
She rushed forward, grabbed Su Mo’s hand, her eyes seeming to hold unspoken words.
“Momo, come here. You look so beautiful in this your photos will definitely look wonderful too!”
After talking for so long, Zhang Lanhua clearly had another plan.
In Su Mo’s eyes, all the romance tied to ceremony had become, in Zhang Lanhua’s eyes, mere wasteful extravagance.
“Didn’t you say you wanted wedding photos?”
“I think we might as well take them right here in the village. What do you all say?”
Standing in the middle of the room, Su Mo looked around at all of Lin Yuyi’s relatives before her.
She had been trapped in Zhang Lanhua’s scheme.
“I’ve already invited the photographer. I’ll have someone call my youngest son over now, and we’ll take the wedding photos right away.”
Su Mo stayed silent.
Her upbringing and manners would not allow her to lose her temper in front of so many elders.
Besides, she was the only outsider here the only one surnamed Su.
Everyone else belonged to the Lin family, a family she could never truly fit into.
She sat quietly on a stool.
There wasn’t a trace of a smile on her delicate face.
Her long curved lashes drooped, and disappointment filled her dark eyes until Lin Yuyi appeared in her sight.
“Wife, I’m sorry you’ve been wronged.”
Such a simple sentence almost made Su Mo’s tears burst forth.
In front of Zhang Lanhua she had managed to preserve the last shred of composure, yet Lin Yuyi’s gentle words made her feel unbearably aggrieved.
She thought he would take her away from this predicament.
He did pull her into his arms but only to persuade her.
“Wife, can you endure this just a little? My mom has only this one wish.”
“She raised me all by herself. It hasn’t been easy. She truly wants my father to see that I’m married to see that I married such a good girl as you.”
“I promise, once we go back, I’ll make up the wedding photos, the ceremony, the honeymoon everything.”
“Just treat this as helping me fulfill the last bit of filial duty to my father, okay? After we return, everything will be as you wish.”
Su Mo bit her lip, trying not to cry aloud, letting him wipe away her tears.
Suddenly, she began to hate Lin Yuyi.
At the very first conflict between wife and mother, he had chosen Zhang Lanhua.
When they came out into the courtyard, Zhang Lanhua had already changed into clean clothes and neatly combed her hair.
The three of them stood in the middle of the yard.
A photographer no one knew where he had been hired from held an old-style camera and began shooting.
“Bride, smile.”
“Lean a little toward the groom.”
“Good now the bride hold her mother-in-law’s arm, look filial.”
Throughout it all, Su Mo’s smile looked worse than crying.
She didn’t even know how she endured it.
The courtyard was surrounded by people she didn’t recognize, and she could barely understand their pointing and whispering.
Only scattered fragments reached her ears:
“The old Lin family must have smoke rising from their ancestral graves they married such a delicate city girl.”
“The key is, this girl obeys Zhang Lanhua in everything.
Who knows what ability Zhang Lanhua has living in such fortune.”
“It’s not Zhang Lanhua’s ability.
I’d say it’s her son’s skill he’s got the girl completely wrapped around his finger.”
“If my son married a girl like this,
I’d never let her marry into our family so hastily and simply.”
“Shh, don’t let Zhang Lanhua hear you…”
When Su Mo returned to the room and changed out of the dress, the skin that had touched the fabric broke out in dense red rashes.
She looked extremely unwell.
Yet from beginning to end, she hadn’t said a single word.
Even feeling this miserable, she still said nothing.
Lin Yuyi, worried, followed her in, eyes full of concern as he approached.
“Momo, what’s wrong?”
“Come, I’ll take you to the clinic.”
Su Mo pulled her hand free from his grasp, prying open his fingers one by one, looking at him with deep grievance and disappointment.
That cold, distant attitude made Lin Yuyi panic.
“No need.”
“That won’t do. This looks like an allergic reaction. Momo, this isn’t the time to throw a tantrum.”
Su Mo let out a faint laugh.
At a moment like this, he still thought she was just being temperamental.
Wasn’t he afraid an allergy might kill her?
But in her anger, Su Mo didn’t want to say a single word.
She thought Lin Yuyi should understand.
She turned and walked toward the bed.
She only wanted to sleep these past few days Zhang Lanhua had exhausted her completely.
Since childhood, she had never suffered such grievance.
The clothes Qin Hui bought her were always of the softest, most skin-friendly fabric, precisely because her body was delicate and couldn’t tolerate rough material.
In the quiet room, Su Mo seemed to hear Lin Yuyi’s sigh.
He crouched beside the bed, covering her small hand with his, gripping it tightly.
“Momo, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have raised my voice just now.”
“I was too anxious. I only wanted you to be happy, and I accidentally made everything worse.”
“I’m actually in a difficult position too, Momo. Can you understand me?”
Su Mo lay with her back to him, unwilling to turn around.
Her tears fell silently onto the pillow, soaking a large patch, soft sobs escaping.
The moment she cried, Lin Yuyi panicked even more.
He pulled her tightly into his arms and said firmly in her ear:
“Then we won’t do it we won’t do any of it. I’ll take you back right now, okay?
Don’t cry. When you cry, my heart falls into chaos.”
“Momo, let me take you to the clinic first, alright?”