Chapter 209: Sincerity is Scarce in the Adult World
"What else could it be! She hit me," Mrs. Sheng said indignantly, pointing at Mrs. Gu across from her.
Mr. Sheng: ...
He shouldn’t have asked. One was his wife, the other was Jiaojiao’s biological mother. How was he supposed to handle this perfectly?
"Mom, why is your face so swollen?" Gu Jiaojiao only noticed her mother’s swollen face when she heard Mr. Sheng ask.
A large crowd of onlookers had gathered, so Su Shuochi couldn’t get his wheelchair through. The backpack, meanwhile, was with him.
Gu Jiaojiao had no choice but to help her mother walk away from the crowd. "Mom, let’s go put some medicine on that."
"Jiaojiao, I’m fine. It doesn’t hurt at all," Mrs. Gu said, seeing the worried look on her daughter’s face.
"It’s so swollen, how could it not hurt? Let’s go get it treated first."
Gu Jiaojiao didn’t know why her mother would come to the Sheng Family’s courtyard to pick a fight.
The onlookers didn’t know the specific reason either. They had only heard Mrs. Gu call someone an "ungrateful wretch," and then Mrs. Sheng came out to meet the challenge.
Mr. Sheng, however, knew exactly what was going on, which was why he never asked for the reason. He was too ashamed to face Gu Jiaojiao.
The four people who had been fighting were all a disheveled mess, so Mr. Sheng just wanted both sides to call a truce and leave.
Actually, Gu Jiaojiao felt the same way. After all, all four of them had swollen faces, with Sheng Yueyue’s being the worst of the lot.
But Sheng Yueyue had always been a fool. When she heard Gu Jiaojiao offer to put medicine on her mother’s face, she roared with uncontrollable anger.
"Gu Jiaojiao, you stop right there! She spent years feeding pigs on a farm. Her skin is thick and tough, what medicine does she need?"
"Sheng Yueyue, are you saying I should be putting medicine on you instead?" Gu Jiaojiao replied, looking back at Sheng Yueyue.
Her eyes, like icy pools, seemed to be veiled in a thin, cold mist.
It hid her true emotions, but her voice was as cold as ever. "And why would I do that?"
Sheng Yueyue looked at Mr. Sheng with a wronged expression and said, "Dad, look at her! She has no gratitude for the years you spent raising her."
Mr. Sheng wanted to slap this daughter of his silly. ’Have *you* shown any gratitude for being raised?!’
"Well, listen to you! Sheng Yueyue, where do you get the nerve to say that? You maliciously tried to frame Jiaojiao, and now you want her to treat your wounds? Dream on!"
Ren Xiaofang said sarcastically. It was all Sheng Yueyue’s fault. If she hadn’t come out to attack her just now, she wouldn’t have gotten the worst of it.
So, she added loudly, "You all still don’t know why Jiaojiao’s mother came looking for a fight with Yueyue’s mother, do you!"
"Didn’t Jiaojiao’s mother call Sheng Yueyue an ungrateful wretch? It’s obvious she’s blaming Sheng Yueyue for not acknowledging her."
"That’s not it at all! Who cares if she acknowledges us?" Mrs. Gu stopped and said loudly.
"Then what’s the reason? I think I heard Jiaojiao’s mother say something about Sheng Yueyue trying to frame Gu Jiaojiao."
"Grandma Dong, hurry up and tell us! What happened?" an impatient woman urged.
Gu Jiaojiao also wanted to know what could have driven her usually gentle mother to start a fight on someone else’s doorstep.
But her mother’s face was too swollen. Treating it was the priority. So she pulled Mrs. Gu, who still wanted to say something, toward where Su Shuochi was.
Mr. Sheng grabbed one in each hand and started pulling them toward the house. He was too ashamed to face the crowd.
Mrs. Sheng also felt disgraced, so she followed her husband back inside.
Sheng Yueyue also regretted yelling at that bitch Gu Jiaojiao just now. She glared fiercely at Ren Xiaofang, hoping she would keep her mouth shut.
Ren Xiaofang had originally considered sparing Mr. Sheng’s feelings by staying quiet, but Sheng Yueyue’s glare infuriated her.
"Sheng Yueyue didn’t study properly and scored a zero on her exam, so she wrote Gu Jiaojiao’s name on her test paper."
"What? Sheng Yueyue is that vicious?"
"I never would have guessed. Sheng Yueyue is the type to get a zero!"
"Then what will happen to Gu Jiaojiao? I heard that if there are two exam papers with the same name, even if the person did really well, their score will be voided, and they’ll have to retake it next year."
"For real?"
"It must be true! Why else would Sheng Yueyue write Gu Jiaojiao’s name?"
The crowd chattered away, making Sheng Yueyue so angry she stomped her feet all the way home.
"What are you stomping for? What right do you have to throw a tantrum? If you hadn’t yelled at Gu Jiaojiao just now, who would have brought this up?"
Mrs. Sheng scolded her, full of disappointment. Hearing the crowd’s gossip, she just wanted to find a hole to crawl into and hide.
"Mom, I was just trying to stick up for you! The first thing Gu Jiaojiao did was help her own mother with medicine. She didn’t even ask about you."
Sheng Yueyue was trying her best to stir up trouble. She didn’t actually care that much about her mother; she just wanted the whole world to hate Gu Jiaojiao.
"Yueyue, what nonsense are you spouting now! I was blocking your mother, so Jiaojiao didn’t see her face."
Mr. Sheng lied with a straight face. He just didn’t want his wife to feel bad.
In truth, they had already severed ties. It was perfectly normal for Jiaojiao not to be concerned about his wife.
"Yueyue, from now on, you need to think before you act and speak."
As Gu Jiaojiao applied medicine to her mother’s face, she asked in a low voice, "Mom, is what Ren Xiaofang said true?"
"It’s true. I went to see your grandfather today and overheard Sheng Yueyue’s mother scolding her. That ungrateful wretch is just too vicious."
"Jiaojiao, don’t worry. I heard Sheng Yueyue blubbering that you scored first in the entire city."
"Jiaojiao, someone must be helping you behind the scenes. I’ll find out who it is."
Su Shuochi said calmly, though in reality, he was already burning with rage.
’That Sheng Yueyue is becoming more and more deranged, to think she’d use such a method to frame my girl.’
"Sheng Yueyue was always putting on a mask, playing a part. I guess she finally got tired of it, because the mask is off now!"
Gu Jiaojiao rarely spoke ill of people behind their backs, but this time she was truly furious.
"That’s a perfect way to put it, Jiaojiao. Sheng Yueyue loves to put on an act. It used to be so hard to make her cry; she rarely did."
Although Mrs. Gu didn’t fully grasp the metaphor, it didn’t stop her from admiring her daughter.
"That’s because my grandfather and parents raised her well. After she returned to the Sheng Family, her biological mother and second brother spoiled her, and she developed this entitled attitude."
Of course, Gu Jiaojiao couldn’t tell her mother that Sheng Yueyue had already lived one life and knew exactly how to act to win people’s favor.
"You’re so right, Jiaojiao. She really wasn’t so arrogant and vicious before," Mrs. Gu lamented.
"Back then, Sheng Yueyue was young and didn’t understand the outside world. After returning to the Sheng Family, she saw more of the world, and she changed.
Actually, everyone is innocent when they’re young. Just like childhood friends, a single eraser or a pencil could be enough to seal a lifelong friendship.
It’s only after growing up that you realize those innocent childhood relationships were just an idealized fantasy.
The older people get, the more their understanding of the word ’relationship’ changes.
Before you experience it yourself, you always think the old saying ’the human heart is treacherous’ is just an exaggerated, negative warning.
Only after living through it do you learn that in the adult world, sincerity is scarce and true affection is hard to come by. Behind all the apparent beauty and harmony are actions that go against our very nature."
"That’s still no reason for her to frame you! She’s just a bad person," Mrs. Gu said bitterly.