The Stepmother's Daughter -Preview-

Chapter 1: Seventeen again

She was breathing. She was alive... Yaling had personally jumped in that high traffic yet here she was... here was her mother... still living and younger than in her memories... healthier too as though that aura of death that hung over her head never existed in the first place... everything seemed normal... almost as though time really did rewind itself.

It took time for that reality to sink in. Days... weeks even... And in the end, convinced that she was wide awake, not delirious –or if she lost her mind and was in a psychiatric hospital, let her never be cured- Yaling wondered now what happened?

At night, when she closed her eyes to sleep she would wake up in cold sweat and screaming, seeing that past or maybe future that haunted her and deeply scared her; but once awake she would be in her mother's embrace. Warmth contact, light perfume and soft words whispering to her that it was but just a nightmare. Eyes closed, she could still feel the impact of the car that had run over her, the cold metal that flung her to the windshield and could still feel the crack of her bones as she was slammed on the floor after; eyes closed, she could still see her mother's lifeless body, blue face and eyes almost popping out of their sockets; eyes closed she could still see the rejection in her father's eyes as well as the eyes of her grandparents; eyes closed her worst nightmares came alive in the most terrifying forms.

But opening them... the reality was so different... or maybe it just hadn't caught up yet? Or did she dream it all? Were they really just dreams –highly imaginative nightmares actually- or maybe like her mother had said back then in that other-reality did her soul really went back in time? She couldn't believe it! Hadn't even believed it when her mother had said that and was quite angry at the woman for wasting her medical fees on such things... but now, now... maybe she could start believing because it really matched.

Everything happening from the moment she woke up with tears on her face until now... it matched with the faint memories she had from the year she was seventeen. She had missed two weeks of classes now but from the messages, she was getting nothing changed. Be it the homeworks that were passed via mails or the lessons' contains. Yaling was really back to being seventeen with memories up to when she would be twenty-eight.

Her mother had been right.

Her dear mother had been right.

Oh God, her mother had been right!

Tears welled again in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. She couldn't help herself but cry. At the time, she had been so angry and had quarreled with her begetter so much. Instead of using the money for her operation, Mei Ping went ahead and consulted someone dealing with black magic. She was so happy about it too, no remorseful at all over the fact. They were in dire need of money yet she went ahead and gave almost all of it into something like this. Yaling had been so mad that she said many horrible things and didn't return home that day... and when she finally did... she found that her depressed mother... had hung herself... The ready apologizes she had rehearsed couldn't be said anymore... no matter how much she wanted... she couldn't apologize anymore... she had regretted it so much... so bitterly... painfully...

So every night that she saw her mother's body hanging on that rope behind closed eyelids she would scream like she did that day; pleading for reality to be different and would be so appeased then to open her eyes again to see the woman holding her in her arms. She would apologize then, fiercely hugging the warm and living person, she kept on begging forgiveness... constantly... full of tears and remorse... and Mei Ping wouldn't understand but would still try to calm her down.

"Should I call your father?"

Mei Ping started to really worry about this but Yaling always declined to go to the hospital and refused for someone to come and check on her so the mother really didn't know what to do.

At this mention, Yaling froze before shaking her head. She didn't want to see him... not now... not yet... In the end, after two weeks, it got better. She was having nightmares still but she wasn't screaming anymore so her mother thought they stopped and she didn't disillusion her.

Yaling had holed herself up in her bedroom for two weeks refusing to come out, not even responding to her friends' calls. However, she finally decided that it was enough. Hearing that word 'father' brought her back to reality. Ready or not, she must face it.

There was no need for tears. No time for tears. She had cried enough already.

It had scared her mother out of her wits, when, the next day of the first time her daughter started screaming in her sleep, she had then cried profusely when looking at the breakfast she was served.

Yaling couldn't help herself at that moment. How could she not cry? Near the end of their lives, they had almost nothing to eat, their conditions not better than the beggars in the street. At that time, Tu Yinjun was using his influence so that Yaling wouldn't find work anywhere in the city. Not talking about the accumulating bills, the landlord was always breathing down their necks, threatening to expulse them. If it weren't for Tu Hong, they would never have collected enough for her mother's operation... yet instead of using that money... she had gone and... it didn't matter anymore.

Now, Yaling really did go back to being a seventeen years old teenager, her last year of high school had just started. That sister had yet to appear, she herself had yet to be disinherited. She could do this. She could give her mother a better life... she could give herself a better future...

N/A: Kidding! I'm not fixed on a story. But I was asked if I had other villainess kinds of story. This one fit the description I think. It is set in a modern time too. I'm not saying it's ongoing though.

For now, I'll be writing sparsely depending on my mood. You know, there are days when you're in the mood for magic or romance or cultivation. I mostly don't set myself for one story for now because it will then occupy my mind more than sparsely writing which wouldn't be good for me for the time being.