Chapter 14

A father who never came home. A mother who had been tamed into a canary with beautiful plumage, who knew no meaning in life beyond men, who believed she had finally found the life she dreamed of after marriage, only to be driven half-mad by cold cruelty.

The villa was freezing cold. Just maintaining that glittering façade burned through piles of money.

“Perhaps… Madam could move to a smaller house,” Zhong Yourou had once suggested to Tan Yan. “That way, the child support Mr. Zhou sends each month wouldn’t all go up in smoke on the villa’s heating and upkeep, and life for you and Miss Zhou could be a little more…”

“Get out!”

Tan Yan snatched up the bottles and jars from the table and hurled them at Zhong Yourou’s face, sharp shards of glass cutting into her skin. “My family’s affairs are none of your business!”

Tan Yan was a ticking bomb, unpredictable, ready to blow at any moment. One moment she smiled like a spring breeze, the next she flew into a rage and swept everything in front of her onto the floor.

Zhou Siyou hated her. Cursed at her.

Hid from her.

Back then, Zhong Qing and Zhong Yourou were the only people Zhou Siyou could rarely lean on.

And so, a few days after Tan Yan beat the kitten to death, Zhou Siyou followed the two of them and, under cover of night, secretly moved back into Zhong Yourou’s old home.

Compared to the villa, Zhong Yourou’s home was terribly cramped.

But rather than complaints or grumbling, what Zhou Siyou felt back then was the joy of a survivor, of being one step closer to freedom.

In that small home, there was no Tan Yan, none of Tan Yan’s string of lovers, tall and short, fat and thin.

Only her, Zhong Qing, and Zhong Yourou.

For the first few days, Zhou Siyou couldn’t feel the difference in living conditions at all.

She and Zhong Qing squeezed under the same blanket, sharing a pair of earbuds, listening to the foreign songs Zhong Qing loved, eyes bright as they gazed at the stars outside the window.

She found it all so novel.

But in that shabby apartment, the damp, moldy peeling walls, the living room where the power kept cutting out, the hallway light that wouldn’t respond, the hair dryer that reeked of burning plastic whenever it was turned on, the renovation noise that shattered any hope of sleep…

Over time, they became impossible to ignore.

And it was in the middle of that hardest stretch that Tan Yan, dressed to the nines, went to the school to find Zhou Siyou.

In the dean’s office, several teachers stood awkwardly in a row.

Tan Yan sat in her seat and curved her lips into a smile at the belated Zhou Siyou.

“Jianian, there you are.”

Tan Yan’s brows and eyes curved gently, her gaze shimmering, and even Zhou Siyou felt herself momentarily dazed.

There was no denying that Tan Yan was truly, strikingly beautiful.

Exquisite features and bone structure, skin pale as porcelain, and in her eyes just the right hint of allure. Jasmine perfume sprayed on her wrists, and every gesture, every movement, bewitched the heart.

Beauty was Tan Yan’s proudest capital. The only career she had ever bothered to cultivate.

That was, frankly, foolish. But then again, the education she’d received from childhood had guided her toward exactly that: to be a beautiful second sex.

Perhaps the teenage Tan Yan had once had dreams of her own. But under that tidal wave of taming that caught her unprepared, she remembered nothing anymore.

“Little Nian,” she said to Zhou Siyou with a beaming smile, “your grades have improved lately. The teachers have all been praising you.”

The teachers nudged Zhou Siyou forward, watched her take a seat beside Tan Yan, gave Tan Yan a small nod, and filed out of the office in unison.

“Zhou Jianian,” Tan Yan said. “I know exactly where you’ve been living these past few months. Your mother is very curious. That little place of Auntie Yourou’s, can you really get used to living there? If her home were truly comfortable, why would she have moved into ours in the first place?…”

“Little Nian, come back and live with me, okay? Mommy promises I won’t lose my temper anymore. I won’t bring any men home either. If the villa feels too big, if you’re bored, Little Qing can come back and keep you company. Her grades are good, aren’t they? Cooped up in that cramped little apartment, with no proper environment to rest, her studies are bound to slip, right? Yours too. Mommy wants you both to study hard and keep improving.”

“As for the kitten… Mommy was wrong. Mommy was truly wrong… Little Nian, forgive Mommy. Please?”

Tan Yan had never spoken to Zhou Siyou so earnestly, so gently, for so long.

Her tone, her expression, the light in her eyes were all so warm and kind that it made the heart tremble.

Under that tender gaze, anyone who had scarcely known a mother’s love would easily fall into the trap.

The young Zhou Siyou, or rather Zhou Jianian, returned to her cage.

Waking in the early morning, Zhou Siyou was still disoriented, staring at the unfamiliar ceiling, unable to tell whether what lay before her was dream or reality.

Morning light slipped into the room through the gap in the curtains.

The heating hadn’t been on last night, and the whole room was eerily cold.

She picked up her phone to check the time. WeChat notifications crowded the screen; the work groups had erupted into chaos again.

Zhou Siyou frowned and ignored them all, simply rummaging in the nightstand for a charger, giving her dying phone a lifeline.

Then she tied up her hair and shuffled to the bathroom in her slippers.

The light was a harsh white, and the glass mirror reflected a pale face.

In the instant of eye contact between mirror and reflection, that face tugged at its corners, brows and eyes bending unnaturally to assemble a listless smile.

…No. Wrong.

As if remembering something, Zhou Siyou let her lips and the curve of her eyes fall flat.

Gazing at herself in the mirror once more, she ground her teeth lightly and began gathering her emotions in the depths of her eyes again.

A few seconds later.

Those dark, lucid eyes brimmed with light. With a slight press of her lips, an impeccable smile blossomed across her face.

Yes, that’s it. Just keep smiling like this, she thought.

She was Zhou Siyou.

Not Zhou Jianian.

By the time Zhou Siyou arrived at the outdoor set, there was still half an hour before the appointed time.

But outside the church, Zhong Qing was already seated among the camera crew, waiting.

At the sound of footsteps, her eyes flicked outward, a hint of something unspoken in them. “Yesterday, you…”

Right at that moment.

Over the snow-white dome of the church, a white bird swept past.

The sleek bird cut across the blue sky like a sharp arrow, graceful and clean, then flew into the barren hills and vanished.

Zhong Qing froze for an instant.

But she recovered quickly.

Turning back, she looked at Zhou Siyou and, without pressing further, spoke in a strictly businesslike tone. “Zhou Siyou, the shooting order was updated in the group chat and you didn’t reply. Did you open it yesterday?”

Zhou Siyou’s face stiffened, and her hand instinctively went to her pocket.

Zhong Qing understood.

She sighed. “The updated file isn’t all that different from before, just some changes based on the weather. I’ll go over it with you again.”

“We’re shooting the school and family segments first. If the schedule stays tight, we can wrap these two stages before the end of the month. Barring surprises, there’ll be a blizzard early next month. We’ll take advantage of the snow to shoot some exteriors and the Sunday service scenes at the church. After that comes the interrogation segments, mostly soundstage work, so we won’t need to worry about the weather.”

Watching Zhou Siyou sit down beside her, Zhong Qing tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, her expression cool and unreadable when she raised her eyes. “The shooting order doesn’t match the film’s timeline, which demands even more layered, cumulative performance from the actors. Especially from you, our female lead. Have I made myself clear?”

Have I made myself clear?

Those six words swept Zhou Siyou straight back into the past.

Rather than “Do you understand?”, Zhong Qing had always preferred “Have I made myself clear?”, especially in the din of a crowded classroom, patiently and carefully walking Zhou Siyou through the electromagnetic diagrams she had scribbled all over in pencil.

Zhou Siyou’s nose suddenly stung.

But she was, after all, a seasoned actress, and disguise was her greatest talent. So now she simply said, “Mm. Very clear. I understand.”

“Good.” Zhong Qing rose and addressed the surrounding crew. “Once everyone’s here at a quarter past ten, we can start rolling. But settling into the scene takes time, so go hurry them along.”

“…”

While Zhong Qing spoke with the others, Zhou Siyou stayed where she was, opened her phone, and went straight to the work group.

Like a bad student frantically scrambling to finish homework before the teacher noticed.

The first shooting task of the day was a long take, sweeping in everyone involved in the church ceremony, all of the film’s main cast.

But the true spotlight fell on the female lead, Jiang Jin.

The script contained a line, spoken almost like background narration: He is my redeemer, and I love Him so much as I love a God.

This line carried three layers of meaning. The first was the faith of believers toward their God within the church. The second was Jiang Jin’s worship of the male lead. By the logic of the ordinary world, a fragile, bullied student and the “savior” teacher who reached out a helping hand, the former was bound to convince herself she had truly fallen in “love” with the latter. A hidden “romance.”

The third layer, and the universally acknowledged difficulty of this performance, was Jiang Jin’s hidden world.

No matter how weak and self-deceiving she appeared in the early stages, once the truth came to light, even the same look in her eyes carried an entirely different meaning.

Jiang Jin had been lucid from beginning to end.

Love?

Nothing more than a violation that took advantage of an opening.

She would not deceive her own heart, would not confuse her own emotions, and above all would not mistake hate for love.

“I’m a liar, but I don’t lie to myself. I will live on, but never for anyone else. I will kill you, but revenge will not be the whole of my life.”

Beneath the church’s stained-glass windows, the Virgin Mary kept her eyes closed.

Outside the church, Zhou Siyou looked up from the script and murmured, “…So hard.”

In other words, a single look had to feel believable, at the same time, to audiences who knew the truth and audiences who didn’t.

Zhou Siyou paged through the script again and again, rubbed her eyes, and sighed once more. “So hard.”

“What’s wrong?”

As if the words had summoned her soul back, Zhou Siyou turned around. “Zhong Qing?”

Then, realizing how many people were around, her voice softened, and she added two deferential words: “…Director Zhong.”

Zhong Qing answered and asked, “What’s giving you trouble?”

“The eyes.” Zhou Siyou held up the script, asking openly for guidance. “I don’t understand this part about the eyes.”

Zhong Qing leaned in close, resting a hand lightly on Zhou Siyou’s right shoulder. “Here…?” As she murmured, her gaze swept over the script without any particular reaction, but then, without warning, she raised her other hand and covered Zhou Siyou’s eyes.

“…Zhong Qing?”

As expected, Zhou Siyou panicked.

Fortunately, she had acting skills to fall back on, so the panic carried nothing but shock, with no other emotion mixed in.

People came and went around them. Only the two of them knew that beneath that cool, soft palm, a pair of long, butterfly-wing lashes were struggling, helpless and fluttering.

By her ear, Zhong Qing asked softly, “What do you see?”

“I see…” Zhou Siyou answered honestly. “Darkness.”

“…”

Zhong Qing paused. “What I mean is, where you were standing before, facing the church. Close your eyes now, and reach back toward the direction of the church. What do you see?”

Zhou Siyou: “…”

She winced inwardly. How embarrassing! What a way to humiliate myself!

See what? Close your eyes, look toward the church. What could I possibly see? Her thoughts scrambled in circles, and she couldn’t work it out at all.

Seeing Zhou Siyou still silent after so long, Zhong Qing let out a breath.

She offered a hint: “A church in a sea of fire.”

A sea of fire… a church…

A moment later, Zhong Qing realized that beneath her palm, those fluttering eyes had gone still. The lashes had quieted, as if gazing blankly at something far ahead.

Zhong Qing steadied her breath, then slowly lowered her hand.

Zhou Siyou held that still, quiet pose.

But beneath the surface of her eyes, hidden currents were unmistakably surging.

No, “currents” wasn’t the right word. What flickered in her eyes were leaping flames.

As if she truly saw, burning right in front of her, a wall of fire.

A burning church.