Su Na was not feeling good at all. The sweet ice cream that was in her mouth didn't taste creamy any longer. When Su asked her friend if she had heard what Du had said, her voice had come out roughly. It sounded so cracked as if it wasn't hers. Su's voice sounded like she had a bad cough, but it was the fear... the perturbation she felt that affected the sound of her voice.
Apparently, Xue hadn't heard her because she didn't even reply.
How would Xue have heard her friend? When Su couldn't and didn't even repeat the question.
It appeared to Su like Xue Jing wasn't taking her seriously.
Su shut her eyes and shook her head. She dropped the cup of the ice cream which she had been holding while feeding Du, stood up, and walked slowly back to where she had been sitting. It was just beside Xue Jing.
"Oh? What is the matter? Doesn't she want some anymore?", Xue Jing asked her friend.
Su was so engrossed in her thoughts. What she had heard Du say, how she had heard the girl talk...
"Su?", Xue called out. She noticed that her friend was behaving strangely.
Su had just gone to feed Du her ice cream, and now she had abandoned it and had come back to where she was sitting... looking like she had seen a ghost.
"Are you hearing me at all?", Xue called again.
Meanwhile, it was as if Su Na was in her own world. It was as if no one was there with her as she walked through the dark, endless space in her mind.
Su moved like a zombie till she got to her chair.
[Is it poisoned?], Su thought as the words that had come out of Du's mouth played over and over in her mind.
Xue Jing had had enough of the situation because the whole thing was beginning to make her feel weird. Xue got up from her chair and walked towards her friend till she was directly in front of her.
"Are you okay?", Xue asked as she shook Su's arm.
Su jerked out of her reverie with her eyes wide open.
She looked up at Xue and bent sideways to glance at Du who was sitting innocently in her chair.
Du was even sucking on her thumb... that enhanced how angelic and babyish she looked, sitting pretty.
In a short moment, Su wondered if she should tell her friend that Du had asked if the ice cream was poisoned.
Su let out a little burst of laughter.
Xue was taken back by the act. She had been standing directly in front of Su, waiting for n answer or maybe an explanation as to why she had a dampening aura around her. But what did Su do? She laughed at nothing...
Xue looked at the television thinking that maybe... just maybe it was something that was being aired that made her friend laugh.
"Your daughter says things that a child her age shouldn't say", Su finally said. She had seen the look on her friend's face, especially when that laugh that she couldn't control had come out of her mouth.
Xue rolled her eyes and went back to her chair. "What did she say, Su?"
Su could tell that Xue did not believe her.
"Children can say anything. You have to know that. They learn things from the television, from their friends and even us, while we talk in their presence. Why are you acting up?", Xue said.
She was getting tired of Su's behavior around her daughter.
Xue's mind went to the first time that her friend had seen her daughter. Su had been downcast just because Du cried in front of her as if babies do not cry normally. Because of that, Su had stayed away for a very long time. And now, she was back and was still putting up this behavior.
Xue didn't even wait for Su to respond. Xue let out a deep sigh, got up, and gathered the cups that they had used for the ice cream. She looked into Su's cup and discovered that she didn't even have up to half of the cream.
[I do not have the strength for this tonight], Xue thought.
There was silence in the room.
Then Su spoke. "I am not acting up. Maybe I heard wrongly. Maybe I am just tired from some stress somehow. I do not know, Xue. I am confused"
Xue Jing thought about this.
"Okay, Su darling. I have set up the guest room for you. Maybe you should have some rest", Xue said.
Su nodded as she got up and walked towards the guest room.
Where she was supposed to pass to leave the living room was beside where Du Jing's chair was.
As Su Na was about to walk past, Du grabbed her hand with a strength that even a 27-year-old man wouldn't have.
Su screamed.
In seconds, Ren was out of his room and frantically looking around the sitting room to see what had happened to warrant such a sound.
Xue just stood, frozen to her spot because of the confusion she felt.
"What the hell is going on here, Xue?", Ren yelled. He faced his wife because she was the one he expected to tell him why she would allow such to be happening.
"The noise is too much... it is just too loud", Ren said as he walked further into the living room.
Su's head was down as she cradled her wrist. It was already red.
Su winced in pain. She was oblivious to Ren's presence as she wondered how... how Du's hand caused so much ache.
Su looked at her hand and looked at the little hand that grabbed her.
Tears gathered in her eyes. She wasn't crying because of the pain that she felt, but because of the thought that maybe... just maybe she was beginning to lose her sanity.