It was a very beautiful gift box.
Perhaps because he was too nervous, Lin Zhenmo held it a little too high, nearly above Qu Tantan’s head.
But precisely because of this angle, it was easy to see his hand trembling slightly, clutching the gift box so tightly that his fingers nearly sank into it.
Qu Tantan was briefly stunned. Her bright eyes curved into a crescent moon as she asked, “This… is for me?”
The hallway wasn’t well soundproofed, and just as Lin Zhenmo was about to say something, he heard the sound of Father Qu walking outside. He immediately grew alert and pulled her into the room. After shutting the door, he pursed his lips, then cleared his throat unnaturally, trying to cover up his shyness. “Didn’t you say no friend had ever given you a gift before, and you were really envious?”
…Actually, that had just been something she said to fool him, to give him an excuse to look for the gift.
When she said that to Lin Zhenmo, Qu Tantan had already made up her mind on how to deliver the gift to Lin Wan, so that the mother and son could clear up the misunderstanding.
Whether or not the hair clip could be repaired, it had been Lin Zhenmo’s most sincere gesture.
Qu Tantan felt that as a mother, Lin Wan deserved to know about it.
So what Qu Tantan said the day before was just her going with the flow. Then, she was too happy that their misunderstanding had been cleared up and they were on good terms again, and never thought to dwell on anything else.
But what she hadn’t expected was that Lin Zhenmo, who seemed indifferent, had quietly taken that offhand comment of hers to heart.
Qu Tantan couldn’t help feeling moved.
Still unaware of what she was thinking, Lin Zhenmo casually emphasized again, “I picked this out myself too. It’s about the same as the other one.”
Since she liked that hair clip so much, she should like this one too, right?
After all, she had said he had good taste.
That’s what Lin Zhenmo thought.
When he silently agreed to let Qu Tantan give the hair clip to his mother, along with the guilt he felt, he had already decided to buy a new, even better one for her the next day.
Qu Tantan had clearly liked that hair clip a lot, and said it was a token of his feelings that she would treasure. He had also promised to give it to her and even agreed that when they grew up and started working, they would take it out and look back on the memory together.
But in the end, because of that tiny hope, he had given tacit consent for her to give the clip to his mother.
Qu Tantan didn’t get mad about it at all. On the contrary, she had cared so much about his relationship with his mother and had genuinely been happy that they reconciled.
To Lin Zhenmo, Qu Tantan was like a cheerful little sunflower from a picture book—bright and warm when she smiled like sunlight itself, yet always staying by his side. She wasn’t scared off by his bad temper and even acknowledged him as a friend.
So he thought, since this little sunflower said no friend had ever given her a gift, then he absolutely had to give her one—even prettier than the hair clip—as a token from a friend, from him.
So the next day, he took the leftover money from buying the previous gift and rushed to the mall after school. He went into an accessories shop and seriously picked out what he thought was the prettiest one. He declined help from the store clerk and clumsily tied the bow on the gift box himself.
He even specially chose a pink ribbon, which was her favorite.
On the way back, he kept thinking about how to casually hand her the gift in a way that wouldn’t be too awkward. But before he could figure it out, he unexpectedly ran into Qu Tantan, already on her way back.
Luckily, she hadn’t noticed the little secret he was hiding the whole way.
The only thing that troubled him was that, listening to her talk about her best friend cutting her hair short, it seemed she genuinely thought that hairstyle was nice. He clumsily imagined what she would look like with a spiky ‘hedgehog’ haircut while wearing a hair clip.
…It seemed kind of odd.
If she really was tempted and ran off to cut a hedgehog hairstyle, she definitely wouldn’t need a hair clip. So should he give the gift or not?
Lin Zhenmo seriously fretted about it all the way home.
Even though Qu Tantan had promised not to, he was still a little anxious. But thankfully, Father Qu’s sudden appearance distracted him. And now, he suddenly felt this was the perfect time to give her the gift.
As for Qu Tantan’s apology, he hadn’t really minded. Although her questions that morning did make him a bit uncomfortable, he knew she was just worried about him. Because her sincerity was so obvious, he had even secretly been a little happy despite the awkwardness.
He had once watched others have caring friendships and pretended not to care, but deep down, he had been a little envious. And now, he had a friend who cared about him too. Just thinking about it made him feel lighthearted. Even when he explained things to the teacher and apologized earlier, his mood had been uncharacteristically calm.
But those little secrets, he would keep to himself. He wouldn’t tell anyone.
Thinking about how she’d said he looked good when he smiled, Lin Zhenmo resisted the urge to touch the corners of his mouth. Only then did he realize—it seemed that for the past couple of days, every time he saw Qu Tantan, he couldn’t help but smile.
It was like after their little scuffle last night, all the unhappiness had been shaken off. Even the thought of going home today didn’t feel so heavy anymore.
Imagining the little sunflower wearing the hair clip he picked with her eyes sparkling, Lin Zhenmo couldn’t help but feel a bit happy. He didn’t want her to notice though, so he deliberately acted casual as he handed her the gift.
Sure enough, Qu Tantan didn’t pick up on the awkward emotions of her little neighbor. She just solemnly untied the crooked pink bow and opened the box.
It was also a delicate and beautiful pearl hairclip, just a different style from the one given to Lin Wan.
On either side of the hairclip were realistic sunflower hair ties, with little orange-yellow beads dangling from them, making them look especially cute.
In fact, with her ahead-of-the-times sense of aesthetics, the pearl hairclip wasn’t particularly special. It was the sunflower hair ties that seemed more interesting.
Qu Tantan instantly fell in love with the two little sunflowers.
She happily wore the hair ties around her wrist, lifted her arm up high to show Lin Zhenmo, and beamed. “Lin Zhenmo, don’t they look nice?”
Lin Zhenmo hadn’t expected her to like the sunflowers more. She’d seemed particularly fond of the pearl hairclip just yesterday—but he was delighted.
The moment he saw those sunflower hair ties, he had thought of Qu Tantan. Acting on a bit of selfishness, he hadn’t been able to resist buying them.
But at the time, he had simply hoped she would accept them, not expecting her to truly like them. So when he realized she had chosen the hair ties over the pearl clip without hesitation, Lin Zhenmo’s heart skipped a beat, and the corners of his lips involuntarily curved upward.
The little sunflower had chosen the little sunflower hair ties.
Imagining how she would look tying up her hair with them, Lin Zhenmo nodded seriously and gave her a firm response. “They look great.”
Then, Qu Tan’tan gave him a hug.
Catching him completely off guard, Lin Zhenmo stood frozen, unsure how to respond, when Qu Tan’tan had already stepped back two paces, her face radiant with joy. Her clear black-and-white eyes sparkled brightly. “Thank you, Lin Zhenmo. I really, really like them!”
“This is the first gift I’ve ever received from a friend, and I’ll take good care of them,” she said, holding out her pinky finger with a cheerful grin. “From now on, we have to protect each other’s gifts, so that when we grow up, we can take them out and treasure the memories. Let’s pinky swear on it!”
Was she implying that she would give him a gift in the future, too?
Lin Zhenmo pressed his lips together, but couldn’t hold back the smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. He completely forgot how he used to find pinky swears childish, and extended his own pinky in return.
As if sensing the weight of that promise, their expressions grew unusually solemn. From a distance, it looked as though they were holding some kind of mysterious ceremony.
To adults, the scene might have seemed a little silly—but it radiated a kind of childish innocence and sweetness.
Lin Wan, who had stepped outside upon hearing the commotion, didn’t dare interrupt them. She simply leaned against the doorframe and watched from afar, her face breaking into a smile along with the two children.
How long had it been since she’d seen Xiao Mo act like such a child?
Lin Wan could no longer remember.
Her memories of him seemed stuck at the moment of his birth—when no one had been around to help, and she’d flusteredly fumbled to figure out how to hold a crying baby.
He had been so tiny, his body so soft, that she’d been terrified of dropping him.
She vaguely remembered how he once smiled so innocently, his little hands clutching at her with complete trust. It had been unbearably adorable.
Lin Wan had once sworn to give him the best life possible. But she hadn’t known how to do anything. Finding work outside had been full of setbacks and rejections—no one wanted to hire a single mother with a newborn child.
The cold looks, the gossip, the way people pointed fingers at her, the employers who didn’t believe in her capabilities and scoffed during interviews… After facing one failure after another, Lin Wan finally realized how hard life outside really was.
But she gritted her teeth and endured. She would rather suffer than go back.
With help from a kind stranger, she barely managed to find a job that could support both her and the child. Life seemed to gradually get better.
But due to the stress and exhaustion from work, she started to neglect Xiao Mo’s growth.
It was as if time had been stolen. In the blink of an eye, he’d grown up. She had no idea what had happened to him, or what he had gone through. By the time she noticed, he had already become who he was now.
Like a hedgehog bristling with spikes, impossible to approach.
She didn’t understand why Xiao Mo kept getting into fights, why he always lashed out whenever he saw her with someone else, driving others away with those sharp barbs.
At first, she thought he was afraid she’d remarry. She’d explained to him that she wouldn’t, that those people were just other parents or friends.
But he still acted like a defensive hedgehog, targeting everyone who came near them.
Lin Wan had no experience with parent-child relationships, and no one to turn to for advice. So when her son reacted so strongly, she simply began avoiding those people, thinking that would reassure him. She had no idea that doing so only made their relationship more strained—and made his personality increasingly extreme and withdrawn.
She tried to fix things, but always made it worse. Her clumsy concern was often misunderstood, and their conversations would end in disaster. Apologies only earned her impatient glares.
They just couldn’t understand each other.
Lin Wan had always been timid, prone to avoiding problems. She had no idea what to do. All she could do was cry quietly at night.
Eventually, she began to doubt herself—wondering if it was because she was too incompetent, too clumsy, too embarrassing, and that’s why he had grown to resent and distance himself from her.
She didn’t dare ask Xiao Mo, afraid that if he said yes, it would be the final blow—the last straw that would break what little bond they had left.
She had wanted to change. But every attempt ended in awkward failure. To this day, her cooking was still terrible. Aside from a little bit of handicraft, she was good at nothing. The housework was always a mess. Sometimes, it was even Xiao Mo who had to take care of her.
As Lin Zhenmo’s features gradually came to resemble that man’s, especially when he looked at her coldly with those upturned phoenix eyes, Lin Wan couldn’t help but feel a flicker of fear every time they met eyes. In those moments of dazed confusion, Lin Zhenmo would misunderstand, thinking she didn’t care, so the mother and son gradually stopped talking altogether.
And at some point, their interactions became what they were now.
He strongly resisted her coming to school. Refused her rides. Insisted on being alone. Lin Wan felt guilty, believing it was her neglect that caused this, and so she dared not interfere further, only nodding and agreeing timidly.
The atmosphere at home had become increasingly cold and heavy. Lin Wan would occasionally even find herself dreading the thought of returning there.