Guo Wenli interrupted what Xie Wanwan was about to say and gently wiped away her tears. “Wanwan, listen to Mom first.”
“These things were originally supposed to be given to you when you came of age, but I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting lately.”
“I’ve been asking myself whether everything I did under the guise of ‘doing what was best for you’ was truly the right thing.”
“When I watched you grow throughout the show, I finally found the answer. I realized how terribly wrong I had been.”
“I’m sorry. I’ve been a failure as a mother.”
As Xie Wanwan pulled out a tissue to wipe her tears, she caught sight of the documents out of the corner of her eye. In an instant, she understood how significant they were.
Then she met her mother’s guilt-ridden, anguished gaze, and it seemed as though she suddenly understood so many things.
Unable to hold herself back, she threw her arms around her mother. Her voice was choked with tears, yet firm as she said, “Mom, you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“You’re Mom, but before that, you’re also your own person.”
“You haven’t wronged anyone. Being a mother shouldn’t become your shackles.”
“So, Mom… don’t doubt yourself. You’ve already done a wonderful job!”
Guo Wenli gently stroked her daughter’s back, but the tears in her eyes could no longer be held back.
She slowly pulled the sobbing, breathless Xie Wanwan away and told her to take a proper look at the documents.
Xie Wanwan spoke in a muffled voice. “Mom, I don’t want these.”
“You should keep them for yourself. After the divorce, you’ll finally be free of that swamp. You should keep these as your starting capital!”
The thick stack in her hands included properties, shops, company shares, and savings. Judging from the dates on the documents, her mother had prepared them for her a long time ago.
And every one of them was registered under the name Xie Wanwan.
Guo Wenli shook her head. “These things were meant for you in the first place. Your brother received shares in the company, so you should have your share too.”
“I used to think that, in families like ours, most people don’t get to decide their own futures.”
“As long as the family or the company needed something, they could be sacrificed without hesitation—for example, through an arranged marriage.”
“I didn’t want your future to be like mine, with you being sacrificed for a marriage alliance.”
“So, after you became old enough to understand things, I began deliberately ignoring you. I refused to give you even the slightest expectation.”
“I thought that way, you would eventually grow disillusioned with this family. Then, when you grew up, you could leave without the slightest reluctance or attachment and live the life you wanted.”
“But I forgot that deprivation in the spiritual world could drive a person insane!”
Back then, she had always thought that as long as she gave Xie Wanwan nothing to miss, Wanwan would go to a university far away once she grew up and never return.
She would never come back to this so-called wealthy household. Before that happened, Guo Wenli would prepare enough for her to leave with confidence and security.
That was why she had never raised Xie Wanwan to be a socialite. She had sent her to a full-time boarding school at an early age, hoping she would develop an independent mind.
She had even considered raising Xie Wanwan to be spoiled and hot-tempered. At the very least, if Wanwan truly couldn’t escape her fate, those traits might reduce the risk of her being used in a marriage alliance.
But after Xie Wanwan joined the variety show, Guo Wenli watched every episode. That was when she saw the inferiority hidden deep inside her daughter.
Wanwan yearned for other people’s attention. She longed for their approval.
Whether it came from her parents, her friends, or complete strangers.
Because she had never received enough love, her inner world had been barren, and she had desperately tried to seize even the slightest drop of rain.
Jealousy, resentment, awkwardness, even cruel words—all of them had been methods she used to gain attention from the outside world.
But later, she met a group of friends who understood love and were generous with it.
That insecure, prickly child began learning to let go—to let go of the attention and recognition she had once fought so hard to obtain.
She also began learning how to love herself.
It was then that Guo Wenli finally realized that the path she had painstakingly laid out for her daughter was not necessarily the right one for Xie Wanwan.
Nor was it necessarily the life Xie Wanwan wanted.
Xie Wanwan’s throat was painfully tight, and she couldn’t force out a single word.
She knew that her mother had never been valued in the Guo family and had received very little of what could be called love. The first half of her life had been spent under the Guo family’s constant emotional manipulation.
Burdened by such heavy shackles, she had only been able to use the methods she could think of to prevent her daughter from repeating her own tragedy.
Tears streamed down Xie Wanwan’s face. She had no idea how long it had taken her mother to accumulate such a thick stack of documents and assets.
“Mom… I…”
Guo Wenli wiped away her tears bit by bit, only to find that the more she wiped, the more tears came.
“Mom knows that Wanwan has always been a wonderful child, and that you’ve grown up so well even in all the places Mom couldn’t see!”
“Xie Wanwan is wonderful just as she is. The one who wasn’t good enough was Mom!”
Xie Wanwan cried as she struggled to speak. “No, Mom, you’re wonderful!”
“You’re the best mother in the whole world!”
The young girl was nearly overwhelmed with tears. After struggling for so many years to earn a single word of approval, she had finally received it today.
But why did it make her feel so terribly wronged?
Guo Wenli was having just as hard a time holding herself together. After wiping away Xie Wanwan’s tears, she wiped her own.
“Wanwan, thank you!”
Thank you for going through so much injustice without ever resenting me, your inadequate mother.
This time, it was Xie Wanwan’s turn to wipe away Guo Wenli’s tears. The mother and daughter took turns wiping each other’s faces, creating a scene that was both heartbreaking and faintly amusing.
“Mom, I recently learned something: before you can love someone else, you have to learn to love yourself!”
“Mom, you don’t have to apologize to me, and you don’t have to thank me either. You’ve already done a wonderful job!”
“You don’t owe anyone anything.”
She wasn’t saying it merely to comfort her mother. She truly believed it.
Her mother had saved up all these assets for her without Xie Zhenxing knowing.
Given Xie Zhenxing’s personality, if he had found out, there was no way any of these things would have ended up in her hands.
The reason Guo Wenli had waited until Wanwan came of age to give them to her was also because she was afraid that, if Xie Zhenxing found out too soon, Wanwan wouldn’t be able to protect them.
Guo Wenli’s eyes were still red from crying, and she seemed unsure of what to say. In the end, she merely raised a hand and lightly tapped Xie Wanwan on the forehead.
“Mom understands now, so stop crying, Wanwan!”
“If you keep crying, your eyes will be swollen tomorrow. If you show up to play with your cousins looking like you have two walnuts for eyes, they’ll probably laugh at you for three whole months.”
Xie Wanwan instinctively muttered, “Three months? Those heartless monsters would laugh at me for at least half a year!”
By then, Xie Shen had already brought out two bowls of noodles. His eyes were red too, and it was obvious he had been secretly shedding tears himself.
The apartment he had bought wasn’t very large, and the distance from the living room to the kitchen was only a few steps. There wasn’t much soundproofing either.
He had naturally heard the entire conversation between mother and daughter.
Seeing that the two of them had finally untied the knots in their hearts and cried tears of joy, he hadn’t been able to stop himself from shedding a few tears as well.
Xie Wanwan spotted something was off with him at a glance and immediately burst out laughing. “Big brother, were you secretly crying?”
“How old are you, and you’re still hiding in the kitchen to cry? What a loser!”
“If word got out that the dignified CEO of a company had hidden in the kitchen and shed a few little tears because his mother was divorcing a scumbag, wouldn’t people laugh at you for three whole years?”
