Contract Marriage: The Replacement Groom

67 Opening up

"Jeslyn, you. are. my, father's. wife!" He spelled it out for her. "You are almost like those girls running after my father and we both know the reason." He smirked, hoping to see her raging like usual. 1 However, Jeslyn smiled bitterly and brushed his hair with her fingers, careful enough not to ruin it. "Your father and I are in this marriage for a reason and..." she thought against telling him. "I don't necessarily have to be your blood sister for you to see me as one. Besides, how many stepmothers do you see running around the house with their stepson? How many stepmothers and stepsons can you point out do what we both do?"

She watched as his brows furrowed. "None," she answered herself.

"That's because I don't see you as a stepson. You are like a little brother I don't have..."

The thought of Christine swept through her mind. How they used to play when they were kids, how she protected Christine like a mother hen when they grew up, how she went out of her way to make Christine feel among, and also the times she spoke to her grandfather to try harder than he already was, to make his heart accept Christine.

The memories were too deep that a tear leaked from her left eye. (1)

Jeslyn smiled embarrassingly at Valen and slowly wiped her tear with the back of her index finger. "You see, that's the difference between you and me. You don't shed your tears, but I do and that's why I can be whatever character I want to be in public without anyone knowing that I'm hurt.

But in your case, you are not your father who can conceal his pain extremely well. Putting your personality together, I can say that you hide your pain by hurting others.

Valen... that's wrong..." she pulled his left hand and placed it on her palm.

"You are still very young. What character do you want your mother to see when she returns?... I heard she's not dea-"

"She left me!" Valen screamed in his cute childish voice.

Valen's outburst startled Jeslyn. She never thought the child would open up to her. The pain he was hiding in his eyes was slowly starting to show.

"She left me! What kind of a child would she expect to see." Valen bit his lower lip harshly after saying

that.

He didn't understand why he was being vulnerable in front of Jeslyn and also didn't understand why he felt her pain, but the boy tried to fight against himself. He tried all he could to not open up but failed. "Something inust have happened, she might have been in a very compromising situation-" Jeslyn tried to reason with him but Valen was too bitter to hear anything.

"Nothing happened to her! My father is the greatest man in the Country. What could she possibly be scared of? My father can protect her, but she-"

Valen frowned when he felt a wet liquid running down his cheek. He raised his left hand to touch it.

but Jeslyn grabbed the hand and shook her head.

"Let them flow, it would help lighten your heart.”

"I hate you..." his voice broke."I hate you more than I hate that woman!!"

Valen's willpower broke and the tears he had been holding back for so long gushed out like a

fountain.

"Oh, child,"

Jeslyn pulled him forward and hugged him, allowing him to cry without resolve. Hearing the child's crying voice made Jeslyn's eyes tear up, but it wasn't right for her to also be crying when the child was, so she composed herself.

"Valen, you cannot hate your mother, she carried you through 9 months of hardship, and on the day she gave birth to you, she saw hell. I believe she took care of you for a while before she left.

No woman would willingly let their infants go. Even demons feel an attachment to their little ones. Your mother is just like the strong-willed women fighting for survival in their own way.

Their actions might have been wrong in our eyes, that's why they have something called 'conscience'. It follows the bad people and haunts them for the rest of their lives.

It might also seem like a lot of people don't have a conscience, but I tell you, child, they do. Just that they choose to not be bothered by it. And when it gets too much, they choose other means to vent their frustration while some show remorse.

Child, your mother can't be one of those without a conscience. She'll return to you and explain everything."

The more Jeslyn talked, the louder Valen cried.

"She hates me... She left because she doesn't want me," Valen mumbled amidst weeping.

"No mother hates their child, dear, she must also be suffering right now," Jeslyn said while stroking his

back. 3

That was what she wanted. She needed the child to cry out all his sorrow so his heart could be free.

Like Valen said, his mother had no good reason for leaving, but Jeslyn couldn't bring herself to say something so horrible to a child. She knew it would poison his mind against love and humanity. Well, Mulan did. Everything Valen knew and what he grew up to be was all thanks to Mulan.

After a long while of crying, Valen sat on the bed, looking tired while hiccuping. His face was red and Jeslyn wanted him to sleep it off after eating and getting a massage and cold patch. She didn't want him to get a severe headache.

"Valen, I should get your pajamas instead. You should rather sleep it off after eating or else, you'd get a

headache."

Valen only nodded and didn't say a thing. He also didn't want anyone to see him looking like a weakling.c

Jeslyn returned the black shorts and shirt to the wardrobe and brought out black pajamas. She sighed while looking at it before she took it to Valen and helped him get into it. oking at it before she

The child didn't shy away from her, probably because his emotions was over the place.

After he has gotten into his pajamas, Jeslyn made him sit on his bed and arranged the cake and pastry

in front of him

"It seems you can't eat everything at the moment. I should take the cake away while you eat the pastry?" She said.