The wall clock in the living room ticked out its steady rhythm, stretching the sticky, awkward silence in the air longer and longer.
Theresa pressed her knees tightly together, her whole body stiffly glued to the very edge of the sofa.
The flush brought on by her extreme social death had already burned its way up from her neck to the tips of her ears, until even those two white twin tails seemed to be steaming.
She buried her face deep in her hands, wishing she could claw a hole in the composite wood flooring right then and there and bury herself in it.
Bronie was sunk into the single-seater sofa beside her, one leg slung carelessly over the armrest.
Watching the older sister across from her, who was about ready to spontaneously combust on the spot, the curve at the corner of her mouth grew wider and wider, an extremely wicked low chuckle suppressed in her throat.
Kiana came out of the kitchen carrying two cups of freshly poured ice water.
Looking at Theresa in this state — red-faced and not even daring to lift her head — the originally taut muscles of her own face began to twitch uncontrollably.
She had to clench her back molars hard just to barely choke back that wildly rising urge to laugh.
"Alright." Bronie spat out the now-flavorless gum in her mouth, fished a lollipop from her pocket, and tore off the wrapper. "Watch any longer and this Kaslana family's factory-original brain capacity is probably going to overload and short-circuit right here on the spot."
She popped the lollipop into her mouth and used the little plastic stick to point at Theresa, who was still playing ostrich.
After all that venting, Theresa seemed to realize that her earlier behavior — mentally drafting a ten-thousand-word smutty little story — really did violate every norm of propriety. If the other party truly were that bastard Siegfried's illegitimate daughter, then hadn't she just spun an entire year's top "Aunt-and-Niece Tragic Forbidden Romance" melodrama in her head?
The ancestors would take one look and punch Theresa flat into a stubby winter melon.
How could Bronie not know what was packed inside the head of this Sister Theresa of hers? That tragic-romance act just now — if she hadn't known Kiana's situation, she really would have thought this was some kind of large-scale Kaslana family reunion scene.
"Listen up, Miss Theresa."
"This idiot in front of you named Kiana — although she really is an idiot who solves everything with her fists — is absolutely not some illegitimate daughter Siegfried fathered out in the world."
"You can put away that prime-time high-society tearjerker routine of yours now."
Kiana set the ice water down on the coffee table, the bottom of the glass knocking against the surface with a dull thud.
"Siegfried?" She instinctively picked up the thread, her brows knitting slightly. "Don't tell me — this world also has a Siegfried and a... Cecilia?"
The moment the words left her mouth, Kiana's breath abruptly hitched.
She clamped her mouth shut at once, realizing that in this peaceful world that didn't belong to her, she'd nearly let slip a name she shouldn't have asked about.
Bronie crunched the hard candy in her mouth and sized Kiana up and down with a look reserved for idiots.
"Obviously, of course it does. Don't you know Kevin Kaslana, that guy who keeps a stern face on all day? There are only those few people on their family's Household Registration, so of course his parents are named exactly that."
Kiana's brain jammed.
Kevin Kaslana.
That deadpan man she'd spent several months calling "Ancestor Kevin."
Su Yu's good buddy, the studio's CEO, the poor sap who'd quit his former company and come running to work for Su Yu.
Kevin was her own Counterpart.
Which meant Kevin's parents... were Siegfried and Cecilia.
This extraordinarily simple equation thunderously established itself in her mind.
That door she had deliberately sealed shut, used to wall off the pain of the past, was suddenly split open by a blinding sliver of sunlight.
She clenched the hands hanging at her sides hard.
The Mama Cecilia she had never met, who existed only in illusory dreams and cold data — in this world, she was a real, breathing person.
Kiana's throat bobbed.
She wanted to see her.
The thought surfaced so fast that even she herself didn't have time to react to it.
But right after, a second thought pinned the first one down.
How would she even bring it up?
She could hardly message Kevin saying, "Kevin, Kevin, can I meet your mom and dad, because I think they look like my mom and dad."
Though, given Kevin's personality, he probably wouldn't refuse.
But saying it out loud always felt strange somehow — the excuse sounded exactly like some new kind of telecom scam.
And besides.
Kiana's gaze flicked toward the window.
That guy, Su Yu.
He'd known Kevin for so long.
There was no way Su Yu didn't know what Kevin's parents were named.
But he hadn't told her.
Kiana bit the soft flesh on the inside of her lip.
She knew it wasn't a deliberate concealment.
That guy always had his own sense of measure in how he did things.
He hadn't said anything because he knew what those four characters — "Cecilia" — meant to her.
He was afraid she'd be sad.
Afraid she'd be reminded again of all those things she could never get back.
Kiana's fingertips curled against the seam of her pants.
Still.
Since she'd been the one to discover it on her own, the one to bring it up on her own.
That guy probably had no more reason to keep hiding it.
Mm.
She'd talk to Su Yu about it tonight when he got back.
If it was Su Yu, he'd surely think of a way to let her meet Mama Cecilia.
Kiana was still turning the matter over and over in her head when Theresa's voice came from the sofa.
"Impossible!"
Theresa snapped her head up, a sharp, raised cry forcibly cutting off Kiana's train of thought.
Bearing that still-bright-red face, she slapped both hands down hard on her knees, in a stubborn pose that showed she hadn't taken in a single word of Bronie's clarification just now.
"I know every single Kaslana! Since you're called Kiana Kaslana, then this is absolutely that old bastard's doing! You child, you're just too considerate — still covering for that scumbag who abandoned his wife and kid!"
Bronie and Kiana both froze at the same time.
The two of them exchanged a glance.
Bronie's eyes said: She didn't take it in.
Kiana's eyes said: Not a single word got through?
Bronie's eyes said again: Clearly, not a single one.
Theresa's brain had already spun out a complete plotline all on its own:
Kiana was Siegfried's illegitimate daughter.
When Bronie had just said "she's not Siegfried's daughter," she was obviously doing it at Kiana's request, helping cover it up.
This child was just too considerate.
Clearly bearing the Kaslana surname, clearly possessing the same white hair as Siegfried, and yet still helping that bastard protect his reputation!
Pitiful.
So very pitiful!!
Theresa added one more item to Siegfried's list of crimes in her heart: making his own flesh-and-blood daughter deny their father-daughter relationship in front of outsiders.
Truly lower than a beast!!
Bronie and Kiana fell into a silence that lasted a full five seconds at the same time.
This Auntie's train of thought had been thoroughly welded shut inside the script of a tragic romance.
Theresa completely ignored the bizarre looks from the two of them. She took a deep breath, and in her eyes a raging fire named "the sense of responsibility of an elder" reignited.
"Don't worry, little Kiana. No matter whether that old bastard acknowledges it or not, you are the niece of me, Theresa. If he won't dote on you, then Auntie will spoil you rotten!"
As she spoke, she was frantically rehearsing in her head exactly what pose to use, the next time she saw Siegfried, to splash an entire plate of bitter melon juice across that hypocritical face of his.
To cover up her earlier embarrassment, Theresa cleared her throat and forcibly hauled the topic back on track.
"By the way, you said just now — that Senior Brother who lives with you now, what's his name?"
"Su Yu," Kiana answered honestly.
Theresa's eyes went round in an instant.
This was a name she couldn't possibly be more familiar with.
A few days ago, in that hidden bar of Cioara's, it was this very man who'd been holed up in a corner having a secret rendezvous with that megastar Eden, the celebrity who was all the rage these days.
Not only that — he'd also casually smoothed over that mother-daughter conflict between Cioara and Bronie that had looked about to escalate into an all-out brawl, and even, with a flip of his hand, recruited a thorn like Bronie into his own studio.
Just how small was this Arc City? How was it that this man's shadow turned up everywhere?
"He..."
Theresa opened her mouth, about to pour out all the gossip she knew about Su Yu, and to thoroughly interrogate just what designs this dangerous man had on her pure, pitiful niece while she was at it.
But at that very moment, a cold syringe pressed against the small of her back without any warning.
Every hair on Theresa's body stood on end in an instant.
At some unknown point, Bronie had already circled silently around to the back of the sofa.
She bent down slightly and brought her lips close to Theresa's ear.
"The dose in this anesthetic is enough to knock down a full-grown elephant."
Bronie's wrist moved slightly, the needle tip lightly prodding Theresa's skin through the thin fabric of her clothes.
"If you don't want to be knocked out on the spot and then dragged all the way back to the safehouse like a sack, then you can go ahead and keep asking those boring questions in your head right now."
Theresa shuddered violently and swallowed the words already at the tip of her tongue right back down into her stomach.
She was utterly certain that Bronie was entirely capable of doing something this deranged.
After a round of suffocating pleasantries.
Bronie put the syringe away and dragged the still somewhat shaken Theresa toward the entryway.
At the moment she pushed open the security door, Bronie glanced back at Kiana, those gray eyes transmitting an extremely clear signal.
Leave it to me.
Kiana gave an almost imperceptible nod.
"Bang."
The security door closed again.
Two sets of footsteps came from the stairwell, one light and one heavy, gradually fading into the distance.
Only Kiana and Chongchong were left in the apartment.
The electric fan spun in the bedroom, its humming sound leaking out through the gap in the door.
Cicadas cried outside the window.
The July sunlight squeezed in through the crack of the sliding window, drawing a narrow band of light across the floor.
Kiana stood where she was, both hands still stuck in her pockets.
She looked down at Chongchong by her feet.
Chongchong was tilting its head up to look at her, the sky-blue eye on the left side bright and translucent in the light.
Kiana crouched down.
She reached out and stroked Chongchong's head.
Chongchong narrowed its eyes, a purring rumble rising from its throat.
Kiana's fingers ran through Chongchong's white fur, the pads of her fingers feeling the cat's body warmth.
"Chongchong."
Her voice was very soft.
"This world really does have Mama Cecilia."
Chongchong tilted its head and batted at Kiana's finger with a paw.
Kiana didn't say anything more.
She just crouched there, stroking Chongchong's back, one stroke after another.
The cicadas outside the window were noisy, but the apartment was very empty.
The electric fan turned round and round, the sound of its blades cutting through the air filling every gap.
Chongchong rolled over, turning its belly up, its four paws curled in, lazily waiting for Kiana to scratch it.
The corner of Kiana's mouth moved.
She lowered her head and buried her face in Chongchong's fluffy belly.
The cat fur brushed against the tip of her nose and her cheeks, carrying the warm, sun-baked smell of having been out in the sunshine.
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