Chapter 12: Has Yu An Really Turned Over a New Leaf?

Yu An went stiff as a board—which, to Liu Huaixu, only proved how far gone she was in her own performance.

So far gone she’d forgotten she was supposed to hate eggs. Liu Huaixu’s face cooled on the spot.

Yu An hadn’t the faintest idea what was churning through Liu Huaixu’s head. She was too busy game-planning.

It wasn’t as if she’d never thought about this.

She and the original owner were, at bottom, two different people. Same face, near-identical memories—but two souls. From the smallest habits to the way they spoke and handled the world, everything was bound to diverge.

Yu An looked down at the plate of scrambled eggs, hunting for whatever had given her away.

She stared a long while. They were just… scrambled eggs. What possible excuse could exist for a lifelong egg-hater to suddenly love them?

She had nothing.

While she was still racking her brain, Liu Huaixu finished serving her rice and began eating her own.

She had no appetite for excuses. She’d said her piece; she wasn’t waiting for an answer.

Yu An, meanwhile, was quietly crushed—she’d agonized all that time, and Liu Huaixu hadn’t cared a whit.

She plowed through her second bowl anyway, then said, “I’m just so tired today. Everything tastes incredible.” And to prove it, she held the empty bowl up for inspection.

“See? Clean as a whistle. Two bowls!”

The look on her face—half pride, half showing off—left Liu Huaixu faintly stunned. How childish. Like when she was small, forever parading how clean she’d licked her bowl.

Watching her now, Liu Huaixu conceded the logic.

Perhaps she really had been that hungry. Hunger does make everything taste of glory.

She gave a small nod to say noted.

Yu An found this crushingly perfunctory, scooped another half bowl, sat, and announced, “I could still eat more, you know.”

An hour ago she’d been terrified the food wouldn’t stretch. And now…

Well. The words were out. The glutton persona was hers to carry now.

The second half-bowl landed, and this time Yu An was honestly, truly stuffed.

When she rose, her belly pressed faintly out against her clothes. One hand braced at the small of her back, she toddled toward her room, pausing at the door to tell Liu Huaixu, “I’m a bit sleepy… going to nap. Wake me later, all right?”

Sleepy was a lie. Stuffed past the point of standing was the truth.

Sleepy or stuffed, the answer was written across her belly for anyone to read. Liu Huaixu answered with a soft “Mm”—and once Yu An had waddled inside, a thread of a smile escaped her.

It had been far, far too long since she’d seen this Yu An. Caught off guard, she even found her a little cute.

Then she caught herself, clipped the smile, and reminded herself: no dropping your guard.

She had lain down meaning only to let her stomach settle. Instead, Yu An dropped straight into a deep, dragging sleep—and woke to find the sun already sinking.

The rice! Still out in the fields!

She jackknifed upright on the kang, jammed her feet into her shoes, and bolted for the door.

In the courtyard, Liu Huaixu was sorting rice for milling. Her eyes tracked Yu An’s headlong exit.

Curiosity itched—what on earth was she doing now?—but she said nothing. Only watched, coldly.

“Aiya, it’s so late already! Why didn’t you wake me?”

“I was going to get every last bundle hauled home today!”

Yu An was really just muttering to herself, expecting no answer; she finished and made for the gate, cart in hand.

Passing Liu Huaixu, she called back cheerfully, “Off I go!”

Liu Huaixu’s brow knotted. Should she tell her to stop—it was nearly dark? But when had the girl’s hands gotten this quick? Before the thought could settle, Yu An was already through the gate.

Even granting that Yu An wanted to work, Liu Huaixu had never imagined this kind of diligence—so she hadn’t taken the wake-me request to heart at all. And now this headlong scurry had her off balance all over again.

If it were theater, the days in the fields would have been enough. Now she was volunteering to haul rice by dusk. No angle of it looked like acting.

Not that Liu Huaixu needed the labor. All she needed was for Yu An to stay out of trouble.

“Sister Huaixu—!”

She was midway through her work when the call came from the gate. Wu Qiuqiu. Liu Huaixu rose to meet her, voice warming. “Qiuqiu? What brings you here?”

Wu Qiuqiu didn’t answer at once. Her eyes went darting—courtyard, house. Liu Huaixu knew exactly what she was looking for. “Yu An isn’t home.”

Caught red-handed, Wu Qiuqiu went pink, stuck out her tongue, and tugged at Liu Huaixu’s sleeve, all sugar: “Sister Huaixu~ You know how I am about Sister Yu An. She’s been home every day lately—I haven’t dared come see you!”

That’s right. Back when Yu An had been perpetually out, Wu Qiuqiu had come by nearly every day to keep her company, sometimes to embroider together.

Recently, with Yu An home, she hadn’t come once.

Liu Huaixu found the cooing rather pleasant, all things considered. She tapped the girl’s forehead, fondness leaking into her voice. “Little scaredy-cat. Is she really so terrifying?”

Wu Qiuqiu nodded like a pecking hen, utterly certain. “She is! Sister Huaixu, you’ve no idea—when she came to borrow our handcart today, I was scared half to death!”

The handcart. Right—that was why Yu An had gone to the Wu house today.

Liu Huaixu asked, “What did she say, when she came?”

“Mm… I didn’t hear much. I hid inside the house—Big Brother spoke with her. But… Big Brother says Sister Yu An was acting strange.”

“Strange? Strange how?”

“Big Brother says the very fact of her coming to borrow the cart was strange.” Recalling his words, Wu Qiuqiu’s face turned oddly evasive, her words sticking.

That baffled Liu Huaixu. Wu Qiuqiu was blunt to a fault. She was never like this.

“Qiuqiu. Did Yu An say something she shouldn’t have?”

“No, no—I barely heard anything, and Big Brother hardly said a word either.” A certain guilt threaded through the denial. In truth, it was Big Brother who had said the thing that shouldn’t be said.

At the time, she’d been eating with Wu Da and their mother. Yu An had only called out from the gate; Wu Da had bolted out the moment he heard her voice. From inside, Wu Qiuqiu had caught fragments—something about borrowing—nothing concrete. And when her brother came back, his brows were dug in deep.

She’d asked, “Big Brother, did Sister Yu An come to borrow money?”

Wu Da had shaken his head. “No. The handcart.”

Wu Qiuqiu had blinked at that. “A cart is nothing. Why the long face?”

“It’s not the cart, but—”

“But?”

Wu Qiuqiu’s eyes had spun, something clicking—though she’d privately thought her brother was losing his grip on reality…

“The fact that Yu An would come borrow a cart at all—that’s what’s strange.”

Wu Da had paused, then let the truth off its leash: “What if she’s actually reformed? What if Huaixu might change her heart?”

Wu Qiuqiu’s brother had adored Liu Huaixu for years, and Liu Huaixu was likely well aware of it—which meant words like his only ever produced awkwardness. Thinking exactly that, Wu Qiuqiu swerved: “Oh! Big Brother told me to ask—is Sister Yu An done with the cart today?”

“Today—”

Liu Huaixu had barely opened her mouth when a clatter sounded from the gate. Yu An, wheeling the cart in.

The moment Wu Qiuqiu saw her, her body locked. She shot Liu Huaixu a pleading look—let go of the sleeve she’d been clinging to, even—and watched Yu An with wide, nervous eyes.

But Yu An, busy maneuvering the cart through the gate, noticed none of it. She parked the cart in the courtyard, spotted Wu Qiuqiu, and assumed she’d come to reclaim it. She greeted her cheerfully: “Qiuqiu! I won’t be done with the cart till tomorrow—let your Big Brother know, would you?”

She waited a beat. Wu Qiuqiu only stared, glassy. Still holding a grudge against the original owner, huh? Too put out to talk?

Yu An smiled again and went back to shifting rice.

Wu Qiuqiu, gaping, looked from Yu An to Liu Huaixu and back. “Why is Sister Yu An being so weird?”