An Adoptive Older Sister Cannot Become a Wife - Chapter 14

Having promised Qi Shu that, she would go to bed early, so she could actually crawl out of bed to go running with her the next morning, Qi Nianshu quickly tidied up and tucked herself into bed.

The soft silk sheets carried a faint, lingering warmth from the sun, making her want to squint with comfort. However, her long-standing habit of staying up late kept her tossing and turning. She hugged her pillow, then threw it aside, then pulled it back again, but sleep remained elusive.

“Sigh”

Nianshu let out a heavy breath and sat up, crossing her legs against the headboard.

The room was deathly quiet, making her single bed feel increasingly vast. It felt as though her mind was packed with too many things a tangled mess of yarn that she couldn’t unravel, yet couldn’t share with anyone else.

In the past, whenever she had something on her mind, whether happy or sad, she would always run to Qi Shu and chatter away without stopping. But now, Qi Shu had become the very center of her worries. This made her even less brave and even less able to speak to her.

Since sleep wasn’t coming, Nianshu rolled over and grabbed her phone to play a game. Her parents didn’t place many restrictions on phone usage, knowing the two girls wouldn’t get addicted. But Qi Shu didn’t allow her to play “messy” games, so after some sorting, only a dress-up game remained.

Following her routine, she logged in and dressed the pink-haired girl on the main screen in a new set she’d just pulled from a “ten-roll” gacha. The large skirt was encrusted with tiny simulated diamonds that shimmered and sparkled on the screen. The bow on the back was fluffy and cute; on the character, it looked like a pampered princess.

She piled on various accessories and even changed the character into matching leather shoes, even though they were hidden by the long train of the dress and couldn’t be seen. Only when the girl on the screen looked like a delicate porcelain doll from a fairy tale did Nianshu stop, satisfied.

As she was admiring her handiwork, she noticed the game had updated with a new feature. Curiosity piqued, she clicked it and found that she could now have real-time chats with the game character.

Nianshu thought: If there’s no one in real life I can talk to, then… a game character should be fine, right?

After a moment’s hesitation, her fingers tapped out a line in the chat box: “Do you know what it’s like for a girl to date another girl?”

After typing for a while, she realized the words “date” and “relationship” wouldn’t go through. The screen repeatedly displayed: “Input contains invalid content.”

Nianshu stared at the screen, stunned. She figured the game company had set up filters to protect the characters, but this left her with nowhere to pour out the restless thoughts in her heart.

Pouting, she poked the pink-haired girl’s face on the screen. The character, wearing the outfit Nianshu had meticulously chosen, acted cute and said, “I love your style, that’s why I’m wearing this!”

There it was again. That word.

Love. Like.

Lately, the frequency of that word appearing around her was becoming far too high. It was high enough to make her instinctively sensitive. Two simple characters, yet they held so many different meanings.

The “like” on the Confession Wall was the joy of shipping; the “like” Lao Chen asked about was a consideration for the future; the “like” the game character just said was a pre-programmed line…

Then, what about the “like” Qi Shu spoke of?

“If you like each other, there’s no reason you can’t.”

That “like” definitely wasn’t any of the other answers. It had to be the kind of “like” meant for a relationship.

And what about her feelings for Qi Shu?

Without a doubt, she liked Qi Shu. But what kind of “like” was it?

She liked her parents because they were her parents, because they were family. But as for Qi Shu…

Nianshu spread her arms and fell back onto the bed, resting her forearm over her forehead as she stared blankly at the ceiling. She vaguely felt that her “like” for Qi Shu was different.

She liked following Qi Shu, liked holding her hand, liked the comforting scent that clung to her. She liked squeezing into one bed to sleep with her, liked looking at her, and even liked the way she occasionally looked cold while lecturing her.

These feelings seemed fundamentally different from the love she had for her parents. But where, exactly, was the difference?

Nianshu reached out, trying to touch the swaying glow of the chandelier on the ceiling. But her palm hung in mid-air, touching nothing, just like the answer that was on the tip of her tongue, yet one she didn’t dare investigate.

She hadn’t dared to tell Qi Shu that earlier, while she was distracted by the color of Qi Shu’s lips, she had been wondering: It’s a shame for such beautiful lips to only be used for explaining math problems.

She felt they should be used for something else. Like a touch or if they were to kiss, it would surely feel wonderful.

The moment that thought surfaced, Nianshu’s heart hammered against her ribs as if it were trying to break free. Uncontrollably, Qi Shu’s face flashed in her mind—her calm features under the light, her slightly lowered lashes, and those thin lips she had just been fantasizing about.

A sliver of moonlight filtered through the window, suddenly landing on Nianshu’s raised fingertip, as if illuminating a hidden secret.

“Qi Shu”

Looking at the pale moonlight on her finger, Nianshu suddenly whispered the name aloud.

“I like Qi Shu.”

The voice was as light as a feather touching water, unable to stir a single ripple; it was barely audible in the silent room. Even Nianshu herself was stunned the moment the words left her mouth.

Her hand, still hanging in the air, jerked back as if she’d been burned, as if she had touched something she shouldn’t have. She could feel the temperature of her fingertips rising bit by bit, along with her cheeks and ears—it was a staggering heat.

She wanted to kiss Qi Shu. She liked Qi Shu.

It was different from a younger sister’s dependence on an older one, and it wasn’t the usual closeness between family members. It was the kind—the kind where you instinctively look for someone the moment you hear their name, the kind where you want to be with them forever, the kind where you feel panicked at the thought of them leaving.

It was the kind of “like” Qi Shu had described: the kind where you want to be in a relationship.

Standing at the tail end of her seventeenth year, Qi Nianshu suddenly understood her extraordinary feelings for Qi Shu. She just liked her. All the contradictions and entanglements of the past two days found their answer in this moment.

Qi Shu was so good to her. There was no one in the world who would treat her better than Qi Shu did. So, falling for Qi Shu didn’t seem like such an incomprehensible thing after all.

But Qi Shu was her sister. The sister she had lived with for nearly a decade. The person who treated her best in the world.

Realizing this, the heart that had just calmed down with the answer began to race again. Nianshu rolled over and buried her face in her soft pillow.

How could I have such thoughts about my own sister? What if Qi Shu finds out?

The thought was like a massive boulder crashing down on Nianshu’s heart, making it hard to breathe. Would she find it weird? Would she even find it disgusting that her own sister harbored such feelings?

No. Nianshu shook her head repeatedly. Qi Shu was so good to her; she would never treat her that way.

But Qi Shu was so rational. If she knew about her sister’s feelings, she would surely distance herself.

No. Absolutely not.

Nianshu sat up abruptly. The night outside was deep; the moonlight that had just touched her finger had been hidden by clouds. Nianshu’s chest heaved.

She couldn’t lose Qi Shu. Therefore, Qi Shu could never know.

She took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down. It’s okay. I’m Qi Shu’s sister. We’ll just keep interacting like we always have. Qi Shu hadn’t noticed anything yet, right?

Nianshu threw back the covers and went to the sink to splash her face with cold water. The icy water helped dissipate some of the heat in her heart. She looked at herself in the mirror, chanting over and over in her head:

Qi Nianshu, it’s okay. Just be a sister. Don’t be greedy.

Only when she felt her heartbeat stabilize did she turn to go back to her room. Yet, as if possessed, she found herself standing in front of Qi Shu’s door.

It was late; Qi Shu should be asleep. Nianshu leaned her forehead against the door in a state of despair, her mind a chaotic mess.

However, a second later, her downcast eyes saw the doorknob turn.

Everything happened too fast. Before Nianshu could react, the door was pulled open. She fell forward, straight into a warm embrace.

Her nose brushed against the slightly open collar of Qi Shu’s pajamas, and she could clearly smell the faint scent of body wash. She froze, forgetting to breathe. Her cheeks felt like they were on fire, and her heart was drumming so loudly her ears rang. She didn’t even dare look up.

Inside the room, Qi Shu clearly hadn’t expected someone to be standing there. Unprepared, she instinctively reached out to steady the body in her arms. Her palm pressed firmly against Nianshu’s lower back. Her voice was full of confusion: “Why are you?”

Qi Shu’s body temperature was high, the hand on her back felt like a branding iron. Nianshu recoiled instinctively, but somehow her coordination failed her. Her ankle buckled, and she began to fall backward.

In that moment of falling, a sense of desolation washed over Nianshu: Is this the price for liking my sister?

But the expected pain didn’t come. Instead, she fell into an even tighter embrace. Qi Shu had instinctively grabbed her waist and pulled her back, causing Nianshu to crash into her chest. Her nose throbbed with a dull pain from the impact.

Once she was steady, Qi Shu released her waist and began smoothing out Nianshu’s rumpled clothes. She asked in a low voice, “Did you hit yourself anywhere?”

She didn’t ask why Nianshu was standing at her door in the middle of the night, nor did she scold her for being careless. Her first instinct was still to care for her.

That one sentence was like a switch, instantly shattering all of Nianshu’s defenses. The panic and helplessness she had been suppressing all night surged up at once.

Tears fell uncontrollably. Nianshu wiped them away as she whispered, “Sister, I twisted my ankle.”

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