A Gilded Cage of Love - Chapter 19

Niannian played all day and went to bed early tonight.

Jiang Qin booked the room, a business suite.

Just two bedrooms-one for Niannian, the little man.

Niannian seemed to become independent early; at four years old, he was already telling his kindergarten friends that he no longer slept with his mom.

I still remember the day he first slept in a separate bed from me. Suddenly, I felt the loss of a mother who was no longer needed.

I stared at the big bed in the master bedroom.

“You did this on purpose.”

“Mm, I did.”

“I’m going to find Nian…”

Jiang Qin grabbed my hand, his phoenix eyes full of tenderness: “Someone needs you more than Niannian.”

Jing City was sunny.

That night, the moon was round and bright.

The atmosphere was just right, and somehow, things got out of hand.

…

Afterwards, we lay in bed.

“What I wrote was about us.”

Jiang Qin paused while wiping my fingers.

“I grew up in a family that favored boys over girls.

“My parents both liked my younger brother, even though he played video games all day, grew to 200 pounds, couldn’t get into college, took out online loans, got into fights-they still liked him. I was only responsible for cleaning up his messes.”

I closed my eyes and spoke softly: “I was the nourishment for my brother’s growth.”

Jiang Qin paused, then denied it: “You’re not. You’re my beloved.”

“Your mother came to see me.”

“I know.”

Jiang Qin put the towel back and lay down beside me.

“Our family doesn’t have the worries of ordinary families who can’t afford to eat, but we also don’t have the happiness of ordinary families. In this family, everyone spends their whole life fighting.

“They’re all used to playing games of strategy. What’s the essence of that? It’s making the other side lose, making them do what you want. My mom is the same.

“My dad plays games with her, but she can’t beat him.

“Then she plays games with those women, and she wins.

“Then she wants to defeat their sons, and even marriage is a loaded weapon she prepared for me.

“In the end, I won without using what she prepared. With no one left to play against, she wants to play against me again.

“She doesn’t love me that much, and she doesn’t care that much.”

Jiang Qin paused.

“But the child is mine.

“I just don’t want to be like my father. I have only you.”

I turned my head to look at him: “Then can you…”

Only ever have me.

I didn’t say the second half, but Jiang Qin understood.

“I can. I will.”