Toward such a spoiled child, he felt more disdain than jealousy and envy. So what if she was loved now? Back then, wasnāt he cherished like a precious gem by the Xiu Family? But when they had their own child, didnāt he still become insignificant?
At the time, as an observer, he stood aside watching Jiaojiao being lifted up by the Ruan Family brothers. A few teenage boys surrounded her, using all their skills to amuse her. He thought someone so pampered should be very delicate and would cry if she fell into a mud pit.
But what he didnāt expect was that not only did she not cry, but after being picked up by Ruan Jie, she wiped her little face with her small hand, spat out the muddy water from her mouth, and said with a smile, "So rainwater is bitter, huh? It tastes terrible."
It was May, and there had been thunderstorms for several days, leaving everything wet.
Yet, her smile when she said that rainwater was bitter etched a deep impression in his memory, so much so that it never faded over the following decades.
He met her for the second time on his seventh birthday.
That day, as usual, he finished his farm chores and came back exhausted and starving. Searching through the entire house, he couldnāt find anything to eat. He lay under the shade of a tree, clutching the pigweed heād just cut, utterly spent. Idly, he plucked a few wild grasses and chewed on the roots. The roots were a little sour and fishy, but he was used to it and didnāt find it too bad.
It was only that day coincidentally was his birthday. When he first started to have memories, the Xiu couple valued him greatly. Although the family wasnāt well-off, they would still cook him two red eggs and offer half a pound of pork on his birthday.
But by then, he had a two-year-old brother, and he could no longer enjoy such treatment.
Just as he was feeling dizzy with hunger, he saw her stepping into the light toward him, and she handed him a dark green bun, saying sweetly, "My grandma made these for me; she made a lot. Iām giving you one, brother, please eat."
He doesnāt remember what he replied, only that it was the best thing heād ever eaten in his life.
As he devoured it greedily, he saw her leading a little girl somewhere else, say something to the girl, and then the girl walked away with a mugwort rice cake...
Such beautiful memories in his mind had never dimmed with the passage of time; instead, they became ever more vivid.
Looking at Ruan Jiaojiao before him, he couldnāt hold back any longer and asked the question that had troubled him for ten years, "Jiaojiao, if back then I wanted to replace Duan Xi and get adopted by your family, would you have agreed? I would have treated you well and protected you like Duan Xi. Would you have agreed?"
Jiang Xun had kept this question hidden in his heart for ten years, and now he finally voiced it, bringing along with it his anxiety.
He looked forward to her answer, yet also feared it.
He believed that before the Ruan Family adopted Duan Xi, Duan Xi wasnāt as outstanding as he was.
It was the Ruan Family that provided Duan Xi the conditions allowing him to excel. He believed that if he could have been Duan Xi and been adopted by the Ruan Family, he would have done even better, become even more exceptional.
What sort of question is that?
Ruan Jiaojiao looked at him speechless.
Such a possibility simply didnāt exist, did it?
Without Duan Xi, there would be no her, and subsequently no story of Duan Xi being adopted by their family. These things are intertwined, fundamentally without a second possibility.