"Little Wan, if I hid something really important from you before, would you hate me?"
Wan Jia did not know what to say. What was Sis Lihua talking about? Did she hide something important from her?
"Sis Lihua, what are you talking about?"
"You can't just answer me?" Lin Lihua looked very frightened. It was as though she was awaiting a death verdict.
"What level of importance is it?"
"The most important thing."
Wan Jia tried to guess what Lin Lihua could be talking about but no matter how hard she thought about it, she could not guess it. "If it's something you should have told me before, I may be upset."
Lin Lihua had expected such an answer. "Let's go in."
Xia Rou had prepared many dishes with the help of the maids. It could be easily mistaken for a feast.
"Little Wan, you're here. Come in." Xia Rou welcomed her with loving eyes. As usual, those loving eyes were the only exposed part of her body.
Lin Lihua led Wan Jia to the dining table. If Wan Jia was not busy trying to decipher the meaning of Lin Lihua's words, she would have noticed that Xia Rou was even more scared.
Soon, Lin Zhou joined them too.
"Aunty Lin, you're not eating?" Each of the three times Wan Jia visited Lin Lihua's parents, Xia Rou would make excuses to not eat with them. Those who knew the truth, Lin Zhou and Lin Lihua, knew that it was because she did not want to take off her scarf.
"I'm not hungry. You guys just eat, I'll grab a fruit later." After saying that, she scooped dishes for Wan Jia and Lin Lihua and, perhaps Lin Lihua had told her about Wan Jia's preferences because she got them all right.
Lin Lihua only took a few bites in the name of watching her weight.
After the meal, they sat in the living room to chat a little. Lin Lihua's heart was constantly on the verge of dropping to the pits of her stomach.
After a while, Xia Rou stood up and said to them, "You guys can continue chatting, I have something to do and will be back before you know it."
How could Lin Lihua not know that her mother was too afraid? She followed her out. "Mom, you have already gone this far."
After convincing her for a while, the two of them finally came back and there was something different about Xia Rou- She had taken off her scarf.
Wan Jia looked at her and had several facial reactions within just a few seconds. If Xia Rou was not wearing the same clothes, she would have thought that Lin Lihua was bringing in a guest.
"Aunty Lin...?" She asked in uncertainty.
Xia Rou nodded.
Wan Jia smiled. We look alike. What a coincidence. All this while, she had thought that Lin Lihua's mother was..ahem...disfigured, and did not want people to see her face. what was the meaning of this...
Xia Rou sat down and did not know how exactly to say it so she asked Lin Lihua to bring her the DNA report, which she gave to Wan Jia.
Wan Jia was shocked witless when she read the content. Her mother had been found?! The probability of their parent-child relationship was 99.99%?!
Then she asked the first question that popped into her mind. "Who is Xia Rou?"
When she saw the looks on Lin Zhou's, Lin Lihua's and Mrs. Lin's faces, her heart raced.
She turned to the woman beside Lin Lihua. "Wait, you are not going to say that you are Xia Rou, right?"
Xia Rou nodded. "I am. I am also your mother. Little Wan, I'm sorry that I couldn't tell you earlier."
Wan Jia's first reaction was; "I can't believe it! I looked North and South for my mother but she was right under my nose all this while?"
As the seconds passed, the meaning of this finally found its way into her brain. She looked at Lin Lihua, who got so scared of her curious look that her palms became sweaty. "Sis Lihua, the important thing that you talked about, the one you said you were hiding from me, was this?"
"Yes."
"When did you find out?"
"On the day we recieved the report."
Wan Jia looked at the report in her hands again. "It's dated five months ago."
Xia Rou and her husband let the girls solve their misunderstanding first. It was not the biggest one after all.
Lin Lihua explained, "Actually Little Wan, I found out long ago. The DNA test only confirmed what I already knew. I'm sorry for not telling you, everything was so complicated and..." Lin Lihua's voice trailed off.
Wan Jia did not know what to feel. Happy that she finally knew her family? Confused? Where did this Xia Rou pop up from anyway? Or should she feel disappointed because they had known this for such a long time and never told her?
For a second, Wan Jia was afraid that she was being lied to. After all, with cosmetic surgery quite common, anyone could pretend to be another person. She and Yun Xuan were the perfect example. She went beside Xia Rou and wordlessly pushed her hair back.
When she saw the faded scar, she covered her mouth in shock.
Xia Rou and Lin Lihua exchanged wide-eyed looks. Did she know about the scar?!
Xia Rou mumbled, "Lu Aotian...is quite something."