Hard work after winning the lottery

"Yunyun, are you asleep?"

It was my mother's voice.

Hua Yun's tense nerves relaxed, but a more complex emotion welled up in her heart.

She walked over and opened the door.

Outside the door, under the dim light, Mom and Grandma stood side by side, their faces bearing the same unspoken worry.

In that instant, Hua Yun's heart felt as if it were being tightly gripped by an invisible hand.

She got it.

"Mom, Grandma, it's so late, aren't you asleep yet?"

She turned to the side, her voice slightly hoarse without her even realizing it, and let them in.

Grandma didn't sit on the stool, but went straight to the bedside and sat down next to Huayun.

Her hands, etched with the wrinkles of time, covered Hua Yun's hands, patting them gently and rhythmically.

That familiar temperature and force, like a warm current, instantly rushed into Hua Yun's limbs and bones, causing a crack to appear in the hard shell she had been holding up.

"Yun'er..."

Grandma's voice, aged yet gentle, carried a calming power.

She looked into Hua Yun's eyes, those cloudy yet still wise eyes reflecting her granddaughter's haggard face.

"Tell Grandma the truth."

"That Mr. Zhou..."

Grandma paused, each word seeming to have been carefully considered.

"You and him, did you... know each other before?"

One sentence, like a precise key, instantly pried open the tightly locked door to Hua Yun's heart.

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She shuddered, and her fingertips curled up uncontrollably.

Before she could answer, Li Guifen sat down beside her and took Hua Yun's other hand, the calluses on her palm rubbing against her daughter's cold skin.

Her voice carried the unique, undisguised anxiety and heartache of a mother.

"Yes, Yunyun!"

"Mom has noticed you've been quite distracted these past few days, and you've lost a lot of weight!"

Li Guifen's eyes immediately reddened.

She stared intently at her daughter's face, as if trying to find evidence that she had been bullied.

"Tell Mom, was it him... was it him who bullied you?"

The word "bully" was like a red-hot iron needle, piercing deeply into Hua Yun's heart.

Her mother's concern and her grandmother's worry were like two gentle yet irresistible forces, enveloping her tightly from both sides.

The grievances, fears, resentment, and helplessness that she had been suppressing deep in her heart surged forth like a flood bursting its banks, overwhelming the gates of reason.

Her lips began to tremble uncontrollably.

My vision was blurred by scalding tears in an instant.

The mother and grandmother in front of me turned into two swaying, blurry shadows.

She opened her mouth, wanting to say "no," wanting to say "don't worry."

But in my throat, it felt like there was a big wad of water-soaked cotton stuck in it, heavy and sore, and I couldn't make a sound.

In the end, she simply lowered her head and buried her face deeply in her palms.

A scalding tear slipped through her fingers and landed on the back of her hand.

Then came the second drop, the third drop...

A silent, suppressed cry, more heartbreaking than any loud wail, instantly engulfed the entire room.

It felt as if a piece of Li Guifen's and Grandma Hua's hearts had been brutally ripped out.

They didn't ask any more questions.

He simply stretched out his arms, one around her shoulder, the other gently stroking her back, and held his daughter (granddaughter) who had single-handedly shouldered the entire world in his arms tightly, very tightly.

Hua Yun knows.

this matter.

Can't hide it.

I don't want to hide it anymore... any longer.

The crying gradually subsided.

A silence, more suffocating than weeping, fell over the room.

The dim yellow light, like a warm wad of cotton, enveloped the three people who were tightly embracing, but it could not dispel the six-year-old regret that had been weighing on Hua Yun's heart.

Li Guifen and Grandma Hua did not urge them; instead, they gently soothed the trembling body in their arms with their calloused hands, warmed by the passage of time.

They are waiting.

When she is willing, she will pull out the thorn that is stuck deep in her heart.

Silence fermented slowly in the confined space.

So long that even the chirping of insects outside the window seemed to be silenced by the heavy atmosphere.

Li Guifen thought that her daughter would not speak again tonight.

It was at this moment that Huayun made its move.

She slowly straightened up from her mother's and grandmother's embrace.

Her eyes, washed by tears, were swollen and red like two ripe peaches, but deep within them shone an unprecedented clarity.

A decisive and resolute clarity, like burning one's boats.

She raised her hand and roughly wiped away the tears on her face with the back of her hand, the movement even a little rough, as if she was erasing the last trace of weakness.

Her gaze swept over her mother's anxious face and her grandmother's distressed eyes.

Then, she took a deep breath, the breath carrying the coolness of an autumn night in a mountain village and the saltiness of her tears, filling her lungs together.

"mom."

"grandmother."

Her voice was terribly hoarse, as if it had been sanded, and every word was uttered with extraordinary difficulty, yet with remarkable clarity.

"Zhou Yanjin..."

When she uttered the name, her jaw clenched unconsciously, as if the name itself carried immense weight, making it hard for her to breathe.

She paused for a moment, as if gathering all her strength to say the next word.

"He is..."

The air seemed to freeze completely at that moment.

Both Li Guifen and Grandma Hua were on tenterhooks over the unfinished words.

Hua Yun's lips moved, and finally, in a voice that was almost a whisper, yet as powerful as thunder, she uttered the secret that was enough to overturn their entire world.

"Si'an, Si'le, Si'tao's..."

"...biological father."

"boom--!"

These words, like a thunderclap in a dry season, exploded in the minds of Li Guifen and Grandma Hua without warning!

Time seemed to have been paused at that moment.

Grandma Hua gasped sharply, her aged hands instinctively covering her mouth, and a storm of emotions surged in her cloudy eyes.

She stared intently at her granddaughter's face, as if trying to confirm whether she was hallucinating due to old age.

Li Guifen, on the other hand, froze completely.

Her eyes widened to their maximum size in an instant, her pupils contracting violently from extreme shock.

incredible.

absurd.

And a kind of bewilderment after being struck by a huge secret.

That...that Mr. Zhou who has been so polite and kind to them these past few days, and gentle and patient with the children?

That extraordinary young man, who clearly came from a wealthy and noble family?

He's...he's the biological father of her three grandsons?!

"Wh...what?!"

The silence was shattered by Li Guifen's sharp scream.

She suddenly grabbed Hua Yun's arm, her voice rising almost distorted with shock, but then, realizing the children were fast asleep next door, she slammed it down, turning it into a hissing interrogation.