During this period, Gu Yan saved money and bought a cookbook, and learned various recipes from the cookbook to make a variety of things for Shen Jiayu to eat.
As the days passed, Gu Yan's cooking skills were also improving, visible to the naked eye.
Until one day later, Gu Yan happily opened the door with the newly developed mashed potatoes.
She just happened to look at the woman standing at her door about to knock.
The boy behind the yellow-faced woman was still sitting on the stairs outside. The porcelain white face was a little red and swollen, as if he had been beaten by someone.
The woman glanced up and down at Gu Yan, then frowned and asked, "Have you been giving my son something to eat?"
Gu Yan's hand holding the plate tightened slightly, and she nodded, "It's me."
The woman snorted coldly, "Don't send any more. I will take care of my son, and you don't need to meddle in our business."
She then said, "Who knows if there is something wrong with what you’re sending?"
Gu Yan had roughly guessed the identity of this woman.
This woman was Shen Jiayu's adoptive mother when he was a child, named Chen Lanyu.
Gu Yan was silent for a moment.
Then, she spoke softly, "Will you care? The child wears such thin clothes in winter and eats a meal as if it was the last and it’s unknown when he will get the next meal. Is this your attitude as a mother?"
Chen Lanyu didn't expect that Gu Yan, this seemingly fragile girl, would have such poisonous words just as soon as she spoke. Her face turned red, and she turned her head to find no one around. Then she said confidently, "How do you talk to the elders? This is how your family teaches you, ah?"
After saying that, she viciously glared at Gu Yan, pulled up Shen Jiayu from the top of the stairs, and entered the apartment next door. While walking, she cursed at Shen Jiayu, "You broom star, look at the trouble you've caused me!"
Shen Jiayu’s face remained indifferent while facing Chen Lanyu's curses as if he hadn’t even heard them.
Just before entering the door, he turned his head and glanced at Gu Yan with an unclear emotion visible in his eyes.
Under the sunlight, his pupils were a little cold and amber. The expression in his eyes was the same as cold as the snow outside. There was no temperature, but it seemed that it was about to melt.
However, just because of this glance, Gu Yan suddenly sobered up from the anger she had been feeling.
The heavy sound of closing the door came from next door, knocking on Gu Yan's heart like a drumbeat sound.
Then, she bit her lip, and feelings of self-blame came to her heart little by little.
She could argue with Chen Lanyu, but if Chen Lanyu were to be angered, wasn't it still Shen Jiayu who would suffer in the end?
Thinking of how Shen Jiayu was raised in the book, Gu Yan sighed at the abuse and contempt of his adoptive father and mother.
In her last life, she complained that her parents were mediocre and couldn't give her a better living.
But what she didn't know was that someone else had it a thousand times worse than her.
This man was struggling in the dark corners of anguish. Even if his original parents recognized him later, he would still have to live through the long night.
You are deceiving him, and stabbing in the back at both ends.
Out of the endless nights, it would no longer be this fragile boy.
Instead, it would be cruel and ruthless Shen Jiayu.
*
Later, Gu Yan never saw Shen Jiayu in the corridor.
Occasionally, she met him when she was out shopping. Gu Yan didn't say hello to him because of the strange feeling of guilt.
It wasn’t until the night when Shen Jiayu's adoptive father came back.
Shen Jiayu's adoptive father, Wei Zhengkun, was an inveterate gambler.
He would take the money from home to gamble and drink all day long. He seldom talks if it wasn’t related to money and rarely came back.
Once he came back, it would be bad news for Chen Lanyu and Shen Jiayu.
When Gu Yan was ready to go to sleep at night, the sound of smashing things came from next door. It was like some glass products broken on the ground, breaking the silence of the night.
In the silent night, the woman's cry, the man's curses filled the atmosphere, were extremely harsh to the ears.
Gu Yan's sleepiness disappeared.
She immediately rushed and opened her door.
The cold wind whistling in the corridor made Gu Yan take a breath of cold air. At the same time, Gu Yan's hand holding the door handle turned slightly rigid.
The door of the next unit was wide open, and the cold light came from it.
Gu Yan saw Shen Jiayu.
To be precise, she locked eyes with him.
Then she bit her lip with a little trembling.
Shen Jiayu leaned against the wall, and the pale light and shadow fell on his face, reflecting a distorted shadow on the floor of the corridor.
Half of his face was covered in blood.
The bright red blood flowed down his delicate cheek like the roses blooming in spring.
He looked at Gu Yan, his eyes were empty, but his mouth slowly raised a scornful arc.
That was the first time Gu Yan heard him speak.
Gu Yan heard him say in a clear and pleasant voice, "Are you afraid?"
Gu Yan clenched her fist and saw her pale face in his lucid and beautiful eyes.
Shen Jiayu said lightly, "It's too late to regret now."
Now regret, pretending not to know him, close the door, do not meddle and forget all the so-called care and pampering that was shown previously out of pity, as if nothing happened.
When it's gone, it's all in time.
As soon as Shen Jiayu's voice dropped, the heavy footsteps came from the next room, and it was getting closer with the disgusting smell of wine.
The man's grumpy and rough voice yelled, "You bastard, think it's fine to hide outside?"
With the drunken man staggering with a beer bottle approaching, Shen Jiayu did not have the slightest look of panic, but stared at Gu Yan in silence.
When the man saw his indifferent appearance, he cursed fiercely, "Bastard, I'm talking to you!"
At the moment when the man waved his hand with the beer bottle, Gu Yan, who had been stiff in place, moved.
She rushed forward without hesitation.
Then, she firmly protected Shen Jiayu in her arms.
Shen Jiayu's eyelashes trembled slightly.
Girl had a pleasant smell of clean soap.
It surrounded him at that moment.
At the same time, he watched as the full beer bottle heavily landed on Gu Yan's back.
The sound of shattering of the bottle accompanied by Chen Lanyu's scream filled the narrow corridor at that moment.
Cold wine mixed with warm blood flowed down.
Shen Jiayu’s pupils constricted, hearing Gu Yan whispering in his ear, "I don't regret it."
I said I will protect you. We should do what we say.
Because of this sudden change, the drunken man suddenly sobered up a lot. He looks at the injuries on Gu Yan’s back and the mess on the ground like a dream. He looked frightened and even took a few steps back, "You, you... "
Gu Yan frowned and turned her head slowly. Looking at the shocked Wei Zhengkun, Gu Yan said while bearing the pain, "This gentleman, If you don't want me to call the police, for you should not want to pay for the fine, and also bear the legal responsibility of intentionally injuring people... "
She looked at him and said, "Just do what I say."
The corridor was strangely silent.
Everyone was silent.
The girl in the white dress, splashed with red blood debris, had a clean warm embrace.
Shen Jiayu did not expect that this picture in the future would once become a nightmare tormenting him.
Let him think about it day and night.
*
When Gu Yan came back from the hospital, Shen Jiayu was sitting on the sofa.
That’s right.
Gu Yan did not call the police on the condition that Shen Jiayu would live at her home for three months.
Although Chen Lanyu was reluctant, yes, but thanks to Wei Zhengkun's pressure, she still agreed.
Gu Yan knew from the beginning that despite his excellent ability to beat his wife and children at home, Wei Zhengkun was a man who was extremely afraid of trouble. If she called the police, he would die of hypocrisy.
Three months was a short period of time, but it was enough.
As far as Gu Yan knows, soon after, Shen Jiayu's biological father would send someone to take him back.
Shen Jiayu's father, Shen Cheng, was a well-known entrepreneur in the capital city. Not only did he have a prominent family background, but his wife, the current Mrs. Shen, was also one with a rich family background.
Shen Jiayu was the child of a woman who was raised outside in his early years.
That was a nominal illegitimate son.
*
Although the days now weren’t much better, at least he would not starve or t be beaten and scolded every day anymore.
Gu Yan thought, while finishing the prescribed medicine, the wound on her back was still not good. When the action range was large, it would affect the wound behind.
In fact, Gu Yan's courage was relatively small, and she was particularly afraid of pain.
Even she was shocked at herself at the time when she rushed to protect Shen Jiayu.
She couldn’t even tell whether the decision to be so decisive was because she suddenly had the chance to be reborn, or because of her sympathy for Shen Jiayu.
Gu Yan asked Shen Jiayu as she tidied up, "What do you want to eat today?"
He had been keeping quiet ever since Gu Yan took him over. Gu Yan didn't care. She just said to him, "I'll try to make a cake."
Because she had to pay for medical expenses, Gu Yan's savings had already bottomed out.
So she went to a nearby dessert store and got a job as a front desk cashier, and with the consent of her boss, she could learn how to make sweets from the shop’s chef in her spare time.
Just as Gu Yan opened her notes and looked through the steps of making a cake, Shen Jiayu suddenly said, "If you’re doing this just because you pity me, it's useless."
Gu Yan paused slightly as she held the paper in her hand.
Shen Jiayu said indifferently, "I don't need it, and I won't repay you."
Gu Yan turned her head and looked at him for a while, then smiled.
She approached and asked, "Is the wound on your head better now?"
With that, she lifted his soft bangs, looked at the gauze on his forehead, and whispered, "The doctor said that these days the wound cannot touch water, you should pay attention to that, got it?
“Oh."
Her fingers, with warm temperature, fell on his cold forehead.
It made Shen Jiayu's body slightly stiff, but he did not escape as usual and even did not say what he wanted to say.
Because he suddenly found out.
He was even more greedy for this temperature and warmth than he had imagined.
He slowly raised his eyes, the ink-like eyes staring at Gu Yan, who was examining the wound for him. Some emotions gradually grew and settled in the fundus of his eyes.