Chapter 72: Confession
“A friend’s house.”
“What friend?” Chen Yin pressed step by step.
Ye Qizhen felt vaguely uneasy. She explained to Chen Yin last night, and Chen Yin didn’t say anything. Why this attitude now… She answered fairly naturally, “Wen Yu, you’ve met her, at the hospital during the summer.”
Chen Yin remembered that quite beautiful girl; she recognized her at first glance upon seeing the photo.
“What’s wrong?” Ye Qizhen intuitively felt that Chen Yin urging her to come home was related to this.
Chen Yin frowned, her tone almost interrogating: “Tell me honestly, what is your relationship with her?”
Ye Qizhen was stunned, her nerves instantly tightening. When she saw Chen Yin turn around, pick up a photo album, and throw it on the dining table in front of her, she realized what had happened.
This photo album—on a whim that day, she printed out all her favorite photos, wanting to organize them together and give them to Wen Yu along with the New Year gift.
She had always been careful, but yesterday afternoon Tang Tang dragged her out in a hurry, so she didn’t have time to lock it up properly.
Chen Yin propped one hand on the edge of the table. Although her temples were throbbing right now, she still calmed herself down, trying her best to show the composure a parent should have when facing a problem.
She found the album while tidying the room in the morning. She thought they were just photos documenting life, but the more she looked, the more wrong it felt. Hugging, even kissing—obviously more than just ordinary friends. These happened between two girls, and one of them was her own daughter. She admitted that when she saw these photos, she broke down.
The atmosphere froze to freezing point. A moment of silence could be as long as a century.
Ye Qizhen had thought about how her family would react after learning about this, but it came too unexpectedly right now.
“I’m asking you what your relationship with her is?!” Chen Yin couldn’t hold it back, knowing asking was futile. “Are you together with her?”
“Yes.” Ye Qizhen gritted her teeth and answered, “We like each other, so we’re together.”
Confessed, more crisply than imagined.
Perhaps the moment one faces it is when one has the most courage. Just like how it’s easy to be nervous before every speech, but once actually standing on stage, it’s not that hard; instead, there are no distractions.
Chen Yin’s lips trembled, still digesting this sudden revelation. She stared at Ye Qizhen, her voice raising a lot when she spoke again, even somewhat incoherent. “Do you think copying others being homosexual is fresh and exciting?! Or are you deliberately trying to anger us, doing whatever we don’t let you do?”
“Not for freshness, I just like her.” Ye Qizhen also retorted loudly.
Chen Yin slumped into the chair, rubbing her forehead with her palm, closing her eyes and sighing deeply. No matter how calm she usually was, she couldn’t control her emotions right now.
She encountered all kinds of people in the hospital every day, including homosexuals. She didn’t understand why such a small probability event would happen to her, to her own daughter.
Ye Qizhen’s eyes were red. She had never seen Chen Yin in such a wretched and composed state, but it was also expected. She took a step forward. “Mom, I know you can’t accept it all at once, but we are serious about being together, and we have considered the future.”
Chen Yin looked up, red blood vessels in her eyes. “You have nothing now, how can you consider the future? Think about it yourself, can your dad accept this? No one in the family can accept it…”
Just as they were deadlocked, the doorbell rang.
Chen Yin quieted down, exhaled heavily, and forced herself to cheer up. With guests visiting, she always cared about saving face, trying to make the emotions just now invisible.
Ye Qizhen returned to her bedroom. Leaning against the door, she wiped her tears with the back of her hand, a bit dazed. The phone clutched in her hand vibrated; Wen Yu sent her a WeChat message: What’s so urgent?
A hot tear fell on the screen. Ye Qizhen sniffled and wiped it indiscriminately. Staring at the screen, she hesitated for a long time, deciding not to tell Wen Yu for the time being.
Outside the door, she could hear Chen Yin chatting with others. She just typed a reply: Guests came to the house.
Guests at home during the day gave Ye Qizhen a chance to breathe. But by evening, after the guests dispersed, the air was oppressive to the extreme.
Father Ye’s face was very ugly, enough to be described as livid. Chen Yin called Ye Qifan over too. Several people sat around the sofa, practically a “three-hall joint trial.”
Ye Qizhen faced it directly, having guessed it would be like this. There was no expression on her face, appearing incredibly calm and composed. Probably because she knew what she wanted. Anyway, what must be faced must be faced sooner or later—
First, a burst of silence.
“Consider it not being sensible, a small fuss. This matter ends here.” Father Ye sighed, his voice deep.
Ye Qizhen was stubborn: “I am serious.”
Father Ye’s face darkened, almost unable to suppress his anger. “Ends here, do you hear me?”
Chen Yin tried to persuade her too: “You’re almost a senior, have to take the postgraduate entrance exam and prepare for the future. Now is a critical point in life. You are still young and immature. Talking about feelings at this time won’t have a result. You feel you like her to death right now, but in two years it will be nothing. Current studies and future development are more important. Don’t lose the big for the small, do you understand?”
Let them say what they wanted; Ye Qizhen’s eyes remained calm without a ripple. “No, we agreed to work hard together, and we will stay in the same city in the future.”
“Break up, no other choice.” Father Ye interrupted Ye Qizhen, his attitude tough. “I’ll say it clearly. I can’t accept my daughter being a homosexual. I can’t agree.”
“I am a homosexual, I just like girls, I just want to be with her.” Ye Qizhen raised her voice, trying hard not to sob, but tears couldn’t stop leaking from her eyes. “Whether you accept it or not is your business; who I like is my own business.”
No hysterical explanations, no bitter begging. She never thought her parents would agree, nor did she attempt to persuade them. She understood the family had long planned a path for her, just like arranging for her sister back then: after graduation, get a decent and stable job, find a well-matched boy, and get married at the right age. And now she jumped directly outside this framework; her parents would never support it.
But so what?
She was long tired of being like a puppet on strings.
Father Ye was thoroughly enraged. “Say that again!”
“Who I like is my own business!” Ye Qizhen repeated in a tougher voice. This sentence contained more, containing a side suppressed in her heart for so many years.
Ye Qizhen had always obediently pleased those around her, never “rebelled” so strongly. Even Ye Qifan was shocked watching.
A slap struck fiercely. Ye Qizhen only felt her cheek numb and stinging, her head buzzing and dizzy. One can imagine how strong an adult man’s strength is.
“Old Ye…” Chen Yin stepped forward to pull him back.
Ye Qifan also hurriedly pulled Ye Qizhen behind her. Ye Qizhen felt a wave of nausea, her head dizzy, unable to speak, unable to recover for a good while.
“She’s so big now. Since she has her own plans, even if you don’t support, respect her,” said the always reticent Ye Qifan.
Ye Qizhen’s heart warmed suddenly; at least she wasn’t isolated and helpless.
Chen Yin lowered her voice at this time, scolding Ye Qizhen, “Can’t you learn more from your sister? Be more sensible, let us worry less.”
A sentence of “not sensible enough” made Ye Qizhen’s tears fall like rain. Turns out no matter how hard she tried, they didn’t care; they only cared if the result was what they wanted.
“I am me, why must I be like my sister?” Ye Qizhen rebelled to the end tonight, crying as she spoke, “You don’t care about my thoughts at all. You only care about your face, only care about others praising your daughter for getting first place again.”
Ye Qifan’s heart was pricked. She lowered her head, a mess inside.
“What are you saying,” Chen Yin said, “Aren’t Mom and Dad thinking for you? We arrange for you with all our hearts, isn’t it for your better future? Would we harm you?”
“I know what I want better than you.”
“You know better than us? How do you know better than us?” Chen Yin continued, “Look at your sister, how many fewer detours she took than others.”
This familiar rhetoric again. Ye Qifan bit her lip. She looked up, her face equally expressionless, carrying numbness. “I got divorced.”
The air in the living room was dead silent.
