Chapter 247: [My Mother] Three Hours
Mother Han regretted giving the money to Bai Cha almost immediately.
With such a large sum of cash, it wasn’t that she worried Bai Cha would spend it recklessly—she was terrified someone might see the money in Bai Cha’s hands and swindle her.
Yet right now, she truly couldn’t bring herself to go to Bai Cha and demand the money back.
She could only keep reassuring herself over and over that she would test the waters just this once, and if it failed, she would simply chalk it up to buying a lesson.
Even so, she couldn’t suppress a growing surge of anxiety.
Seeing her daughter packing her things to head to school, she finally lost her composure.
“Are you planning to take all that money to school with you?!”
Mother Han’s tone sounded somewhat sharp, her voice carrying a loud edge.
The moment the words left her mouth, she felt a wave of regret herself.
Crouching halfway down, she spoke in a soft, gentle voice: “Mom didn’t mean anything bad. I just wanted to tell you that if you’re carrying the money on you, you must be careful of bad people, alright? Never tell anyone that you have money.”
“Rest assured, Mom, I won’t tell a single soul!” Bai Cha offered a brilliant smile.
Her face was currently ghastly pale to a frightening degree; a smile this radiant left Mother Han momentarily dazed and lost in thought.
“Do you really want to go to school? In your current condition, you’re in no shape to attend class. Wait until you’re better before going out to play with the other children, alright?”
“I have something I need to talk to my teacher about. Mom, just wait for me at home.”
Mother Han couldn’t resist pressing: “Is there anything you can’t tell Mom first? Mom can help you beforehand.”
Bai Cha looked at Mother Han, speaking only after a long pause: “I’ve told Mom about this matter many times before, but Mom is simply incapable of doing it.”
Mother Han froze.
“What matter? When did you mention it?”
Bai Cha offered her no answer, merely giving her another gentle, brief embrace and patting her back softly.
“Mom, remember what you promised me. Right now, you have to listen to me and stay at home. It won’t be long—just three hours. I will definitely return in three hours. If I haven’t returned, then I’ll listen to you from then on, alright?”
Bai Cha held up three fingers, gesturing before her.
Mother Han hesitated, unwilling to nod her head, yet incapable of uttering words of refusal as well.
Seizing the window, Bai Cha carried her small backpack and dashed toward the main door.
“Ying-ying!” Mother Han called out to her instinctively.
Opening the front door, Bai Cha turned her head to look back at her, flashing a brilliant smile.
“Mom, wait for me at home!”
Watching her silhouette vanish from sight, the terror and unease within Mother Han’s heart expanded at lightning speed.
That sensation of losing control over something made her stand up almost instantaneously, rushing straight to the doorway.
Standing at the entrance, however, she hesitated for a moment.
Mother Han kept her hand resting on the door handle for a long time, locked in a continuous struggle inside her mind.
Regarding her daughter’s condition, she simply couldn’t set her mind at ease to let her leave alone for three hours.
Although she had been deceiving herself into ignoring the abnormalities on Bai Cha’s body all along, the unease spawned by those anomalies couldn’t possibly vanish.
She felt frantic, anxious, and deeply tormented.
She didn’t want to disappoint her child; she wanted to be a parent capable of communicating with her child, acting like a friend to her as well.
Yet she simply couldn’t pull it off!
Breaking down completely, Mother Han fell to her knees on the floor.
She truly couldn’t pull it off.
This was her first time acting as a mother as well; no one had ever taught her how to be a good mother.
Her own mother had treated her poorly due to the family favoring boys over girls, forcing her into domestic labor from a young age.
From five years old onward, doing the laundry and cooking meals for the household fell entirely on her shoulders.
Her younger brother needed only to focus on studying.
Later on, after getting married, the person doing the laundry and cooking meals remained her.
She had vowed to herself that she would never let her own daughter live a life like hers in the future.
She would ensure her daughter lived a good life.
Yet her husband abandoned her, her maiden family abandoned her, and now was her daughter going to leave her as well?
She had worked so hard.
She had treated her family with such dedicated effort, yet they had never been willing to grant her even a single shred of love or care.
Her parents’ eyes held nothing but her younger brother forever.
She worked diligently and conscientiously; upon returning home, she cleaned the rooms, did the laundry, cooked the meals, and catered to her parents-in-law, managing her husband’s life impeccably so he held zero worries outside of work.
Yet he still didn’t want her.
That woman had declared that no one would ever like a housewife.
She claimed the outside world was filled with outstanding, independent women nowadays, and a housewife like her ought to have been phased out long ago.
Housewives deserved to be looked down upon.
She said that looking the way she did, even her daughter wouldn’t respect her in the future.
Because no one would ever want to become a mother like this, nor would anyone want a mother like this.
And her Ying-ying right now truly seemed to loathe her deeply.
She no longer treated her as her primary confidante, keeping secrets of her own and turning willful.
Was she truly such an utter failure?
Yet clearly, she had been working hard to earn money all along as well…
Mother Han knelt flat on the floor, curling up into a tight ball.
Only after a long while elapsed did she barely manage to calm herself down, mainly because she abruptly realized Bai Cha had been gone for quite some time, and she still couldn’t set her mind at ease.
“No, I still have to go out and check. I can’t let Ying-ying go out all by herself.”
Muttering to herself, Mother Han stepped out the door.
Bai Cha had already arrived at the school, locating her homeroom teacher.
The homeroom teacher was thoroughly startled by her deathly pale complexion.
“Han Yingying, what happened to you?!”
“Don’t worry, Teacher. I have a favor I’d like to ask of you.”
Bai Cha flashed a brilliant smile toward her, pulling her over to step to the side.
“Teacher, I am about to die.”
The homeroom teacher froze.
“What… what are you talking about?”
“Teacher, I don’t have time to explain everything to you. My mom can’t accept this outcome… I don’t want her to suffer so terribly after I’m gone. During this period, I want to spend time with her, and I have some gifts I want to give her. But she always trails behind me, and she’ll definitely come to the school looking for me in a bit.”
Bai Cha held the homeroom teacher’s hand, saying, “So I want to ask you a favor, Teacher. If you see my mom in a little while, please calm her down and chat with her about anything you like—you just need to stall her for three hours!”
The homeroom teacher felt a pang of sorrow while simultaneously finding the request absurd.
Sorrow, because judging by Bai Cha’s complexion, she likely wasn’t lying; absurdity, because she didn’t know what kind of scheme Bai Cha was trying to pull off.
“What do you need these three hours for?”
“I want to give her a gift, but I don’t want her to know about it. If she knows, she’ll definitely just say things like, ‘Why are you spending money recklessly? I don’t need any of this, as long as you’re doing well’ and so on.”
The homeroom teacher fell silent.
She had instinctively wanted to utter those exact words herself just moments ago.
“But Teacher, it’s impossible for me to get better.” Bai Cha’s eyes rimmed slightly red, and she raised her sleeve to wipe away a tear.
“My mom’s health is terrible too, and she’s had such a hard life already. I don’t want her to go crazy or pass away after losing me. She loves me, and I love her too.”
The homeroom teacher felt a sting in her nose.
She let out a deep, heavy sigh.
“Alright, I promise you. Will three hours be enough?”
“Yes! Three hours will be plenty! You can talk to her about my matters—she should be willing to listen. But if possible, I hope you won’t call her ‘Ying-ying’s mom’ or ‘Mother Han,’ Teacher.”
“Why?” The homeroom teacher paused, stunned.
“Because she is Han Hongmei first, and only then my mom. She has her own name.”
Bai Cha looked at the homeroom teacher with solemn intensity.
The homeroom teacher froze on the spot as though struck by a bolt of thunder.
Her lips twitched gently.
She recalled in a daze that after she got married, many people would refer to her as Old Li’s wife or Old Li’s spouse. Later, after giving birth, she became Li Chao’s mother or the kid’s mom.
Only when she was at work, at moments requiring a signature, would she write down her own name.
