Chapter 30: The Wish is to Pick Me Up After School
The silence of the night enveloped the entire Xu Mansion.
Xu Si had urged Pei Zhen to rest early before returning to his room, where he stared at an economics book beside him, his gaze unfocused, half his thoughts still immersed in what Pei Zhen had just recounted.
Not able to perceive the pain of a relative’s passing.
She didn’t know if that was a good thing, but it was certainly an indelible shadow in a person’s life.
Pei Zhen was currently unwilling to undergo psychological therapy, and she wouldn’t force him. She knew that although Pei Zhen was young, had never been exposed to society, and was attending school for the first time, he possessed a very independent personality, mature thoughts, and had never even displayed childish behavior.
Physiological age doesn’t determine psychological maturity.
Xu Si believed that Pei Zhen’s current state meant he was already fully capable of making his own decisions.
During their usual discussions of concepts, she would seize opportunities to subtly teach him what was right and what was wrong in the world. For instance, if he were bullied. While the law might forbid retaliation, she told him he must remember to fight back—though not too aggressively. Her intention was simply to help him grasp societal rules so he could interact more comfortably with people at school.
Pei Zhen absorbed these lessons very well. He mulled over almost everything she said just once, making further examples unnecessary.
「Winter passed and spring arrived.」
December went by, and it was now the spring of 1986.