Chapter 3 Deserved to be Beaten to Death

• Seeing it happening, my heart trembled. My father came to me before I could ask what was going on, and slapped my face. He used so much strength that I couldn't stand still and hit the wall behind me. Before I could gather my thoughts, I heard him yelling and cursing: "Qin Ziqi, we have raised you for three years. And is this how you pay us back?"
• I scented blood permeating in my mouth and I could only see blurry things. I tried hard to stand up straight, looked at my father, and asked: "Why..."
• "How dare you to ask why! You think you are getting way with what you did. You set up a trap for your sister, fed her sleeping pills, and replaced her at the wedding! If we didn't find out and take Qinqin to the hospital to get gastric lavage, she could have been dead by now!"
• After father finished, he raised his hand and gave me another slap in my face.
• This time, he used more strength. I fell to the ground in trance.
• Although I couldn't see clearly, my mind was extra sober.
• A few days ago, my parents told me that Qin Ziqin was in love with Fang Liwen from their company, so I had to fill in for her at the wedding.
• The day before yesterday, I sent my older sister to the airport in person, and I watched them passing through the security checkpoint. In the end, how had I become the one who set Qin Ziqin up?
• My mind was in chaos. Some truths were hitting the surface, but I refused to believe them.
• Father seemed to be still infuriated, he took a stool and hit it towards my head!
• I was startled and dodged, yet I still got hit on the spine!
• The pain!
• The pain was killing me, but I managed to suck it up, and not screaming nor dropping tears. This was a habit from my time in the orphanage. During that time, even when I was sick and miserable, I had no accompany. There was nobody for me, my crying and howling would have been in vain. Over time, I learnt to not express my pain, no matter how unbearable it was.
• My silence didn't ease father's fury. He hit me hard a few times more. I bit my lips to restrain any sound from coming out of my throat.
• Finally, mother couldn't stand to see the sight of it anymore, she grabbed onto the stool and stopped father, and said: "That's enough. You are going to beat her to death if you go on."
• "She deserved to be beaten to death!" Father threw away the stool, and said in anger.
• I heard the sound of the stool touching the ground, then, I dared to stay where I was. I looked up and saw Ji Zeyan holding Qin Ziqin in his arms. Qin Zi Qin looked at me and said: "Zeyan, you see, my parents already punished her and beat her up. Can you let go of this matter? After all, she grew up in an orphanage, it was unavoidable that she picked up some bad habits along the way."
• I saw clearly that her expression was shrewd speculation instead of sympathy, even though she said in such sympathetic tone of voice. Her reaction further proved my conjecture.
• I lied in the corner, and kept silence, because my spine was in unbearable pain. I was afraid that if father went on hitting me, my spine would break.
• Ji Zeyan took a look at me, oddly, there was a flash of complicated emotion in his black eyes. He waited for a while and said: "We'll talk about it later."
• After that, they all sat in the living room.
• My father saw me, and cursed at me: "Get the hell upstairs. I will beat you to death if you kept wandering around here."
• I watched Qin Ziqin sitting next to Ji Zeyan, her arms wrapped around intimately, and their hands held on with fingers.
• That looked like a married couple.
• I endured the pain, and arched my back. The dozen steps in front of me were like the high ladders. Every step, the parts of me that got beaten were making me sweat.
• But, compared with the pain on my body, the pain on my heart hurt more!
• Although I had no idea how it all happened to this stage, I understood clearly that I was set up.
• Behind me, there were Qin Ziqin coquetry, Ji Zeyan's boiling behavior, and my parents' loving words.
• I knew, that was their world, and I was just a clown that was never part of it.