Three days passed before Jax finally came to find Zora.
Zora had been struggling—sleepless, heart racing, legs weak, her face pale. She couldn't bear the thought of hiding the dagger in her dorm room, so she kept it on her, tied to her body. She told the teacher she was just stomach pain—after all, girls in puberty often complain of such things. It was a convenient excuse. The class teacher instructed Zora to stay in her dorm and rest. Her roommates brought her food and water, and Zora stayed motionless, curled up like a quail for days.
One evening, as she walked back to the dorm alone, Jax caught her eye and signaled with a glance. Zora understood, following him at a safe distance. They walked to the field, where there was a patch of land left unused, overgrown with weeds—a perfect hiding spot.
Jax had been standing in the principal's office for days, being interrogated. He played the innocent role, but the school authorities couldn't pin anything on him. Half-suspicious, they finally let him go, and he swaggered back to class, playing the good student and sitting through lessons.
Zora stopped behind a patch of weeds, which concealed a small clearing, perfect for hiding. Jax pressed his finger to her forehead, pushing her down to crouch. He then circled around, returned, and crouched in front of her. Their faces were barely visible in the dim light.
"Where is it?"
The dagger was tied to her waist, hidden under the loose school uniform. Her hands trembled as she pulled it out, presenting it to him, her fragile wrist appearing almost ghostly in the dim glow. Jax took it from her, the warmth of her touch still lingering on the blade. It felt snug and comforting, carrying the scent of a young girl's purity. Jax weighed it in his hand, his black brows curving into a mischievous smile.
"Thanks."
Zora bit her pale lips, not speaking. She looked exhausted, her features devoid of any spark, clearly terrified.
After a pause, Jax reached into his back pocket and pulled out two bills, holding them out in front of her. "Take it. Buy something to eat. If it's not enough, ask me for more."
Zora didn't take the money. Her face remained blank, her lips quivering. "A-are you going to fight?"
"Why do you care so much?" Jax smirked, tilting his chin arrogantly. "Mind your own business."
She wasn't trying to pry, just wanting to leave. Zora stood up slowly, clutching her knee for support, and turned to walk away.
"Don't want the money?"
"No," she muttered, shaking her head. She hunched over, brushing past the weeds, eager to leave this desolate, secretive place. Jax folded the knife into his coat and stood up, coldly sneering. "Fine, don't take it then."
They walked in silence, with the faint glow from the field lights illuminating their path. Zora stumbled, unable to see clearly, taking each step cautiously. Jax brushed past her, clearing the path ahead, his broad shoulders shielding her from view.
After a few steps, he crushed a weed underfoot, sneering. "This thing's imported. If I sold it, it'd be worth a lot... Why'd you bring me the money? Looking for trouble?"
Zora blinked in surprise.
He kept walking, his steps swift and determined. In the blink of an eye, he was out of sight. Zora stood at the edge of the field, scratching her neck, feeling the itch from the grass seeds stuck to her face. With a sigh, she turned, walking slowly back to the dorm, her pace deliberate and tired. When she got to her bed, she collapsed onto it, blinking her eyes a few times before slowly exhaling. She curled up and fell asleep.
For a long time after that, there was no further interaction between her and Jax. But on the day of a routine dorm inspection, Jax loudly called her his "little sister" in front of all the boys. The rumor quickly spread. Some asked if she was Jax's cousin or adopted sister, and older girls came to her asking for favors—delivering love letters or helping with connections. Zora couldn't bear it and pretended to be mute, shaking her head. Once, when a few girls from the third year cornered her with questions, Jax spotted them. He walked over with a cold expression, glared at them fiercely, and then grabbed Zora by the shoulder, roughly pulling her back to the classroom.
Later, Jax announced to the whole school that he had several "little sisters," and soon, he became surrounded by girls who called him "brother." Zora's newfound status as his "sister" faded just as quickly as it had appeared.
In the sweltering weeks leading up to the June entrance exams, Jax found himself trapped under Mr. Li's hawk-eyed surveillance — no more skipped classes, mandatory evening study sessions. Their paths sometimes crossed on campus, where Jax would stride past Zora with his gang in tow, shoulders broad and legs long, cutting through the corridor like a summer storm. She'd instinctively shrink toward the lockers, dark lashes sweeping downward in practiced submission, yet whispers still trailed her like shadows.
"Hey, doesn't that freshman look familiar?"
"That's Jax's sister, dumbass. Keep your eyes to yourself."
Jax spun and delivered a sharp kick to the speaker's shin. "Got a death wish? Eyes. Front. Now."
"Yo, Jax… What's with this 'sister'?" another voice drawled, all mock innocence. "How many 'sisters' you got stashed around here anyway?"
"None of your damn business."
When exam results arrived, Jax's scores scraped him into a district-level key school — not the prestigious municipal elite high school, but enough to make Mr. Li feel a weight lift from his shoulders. The teacher cornered him by the basketball courts, voice cracking with something between relief and desperation. "This is your lifeline, understand? No more shortcuts. No more games. You've got decades ahead — decades — to choose what kind of man you'll become. Don't…" He swallowed hard, adjusting his glasses to hide the sheen in his eyes. "Don't throw it away before you've even started."
Jax rarely returned home during the summer. It had been months since he last saw Leo. This time, there were no punches or kicks. Over the years, Jax had grown so tall that he was almost on par with Leo. The two sat at the dinner table, eating in silence as usual, each in their own world.
When the conversation turned to this year's entrance exam and high school plans, Leo poured himself a glass of wine. He thought for a moment, then slowly spoke.
"What high school? How much more will the school fees be? You've been causing trouble your whole life—who doesn't say you're a bad influence? The people you know all talk about how much trouble you cause. Once you get into school, there are only serious students there. What will happen when you start fighting and corrupting them? How many people will you ruin? And then, I'll have to pay for it. Can I afford that?"
Leo emptied the glass, his pale face flushing slightly. "You'll go to vocational school. I've already enrolled you. They have a machinery and electronics program there. You'll finish in a few years, and I'll get you a job as an electrician. You need to learn what you're afraid of so you can avoid causing trouble."
Jax was afraid of electricity.
He froze, his jaw tightening like a stretched bowstring, his whole body radiating coldness and hostility. Zora and Megan sat on the other side of the table, not daring to make a sound. Zora was too scared to lift her head, but when her gaze accidentally met Jax's, his dark eyes shot a piercing, cold glare at her. Suddenly, he stood up and flipped the table—plates, bowls, and chopsticks crashed to the ground. He grabbed a chair and hurled it at Leo. Leo, pale with fury, barely managed to dodge, causing his body to crash into Megan's shoulder. She and her mother screamed, watching helplessly as father and son wrestled violently.
"You son of a bitch! You killed my mom, and it's still not enough?! You're a piece of shit, a madman..." Jax's eyes were bloodshot as he swung his fists mercilessly. "I'll kill you one day..."
"You little bastard... dog shit, wild animal... I raised you, and you're nothing but garbage..." Leo yelled back, his voice full of venom. "You take my last name, but you'll never get my money. I'm only raising dogs and cats, not you."
The fight ended with neighbors gathering to watch and people knocking on the door to intervene. The father and son became sworn enemies, and for a long time, their feud became the talk of the neighborhood.
Jax left the house, covered in bruises and wounds. He slammed the door behind him and never came back.
Zora entered eighth grade that summer, her quiet brilliance and solitary habits deepening like shadows under old oaks. She spent sweltering afternoons burrowed in books, flinching at every creak of the house. Leo's transformation haunted her—the man who once exuded professorial calm now hunched over his computer with liquor bottles, his complexion growing paler and his demeanor unnervingly refined with each sip.
Megan sensed her daughter's unease. "Come help at the teahouse," she'd say, dragging Zora to her two-story sanctuary near the pedestrian mall—a place where jasmine tea aromas clashed with mahjong tiles clattering upstairs. Zora arranged fruit platters for tips, her knife slicing melons into geometric perfection while watching her mother's secret unfold: a silver-haired businessman slipping in weekly, Megan's laughter a shade too bright as they vanished into back alleys.
"He's my lover," Megan confessed one afternoon, cigarette ash fluttering onto Zora's homework. "Keep quiet, yeah?"
Zora nodded, her childhood numbness calcifying into something colder. She'd long stopped expecting maternal warmth from this woman who wore leopard-print tops too tight for her thirty-six years.
"What if someone finds out?"
Megan snorted. "Who'll care? Even Leo's too drunk to notice."
Their fractured domesticity held a perverse equilibrium. Leo funded Zora's school fees; Megan played mistress to a middle-aged accountant with a paunch and promises.
"Once you're in college," Megan mused, painting her nails blood-red, "we'll ditch this dump. Get our own place."
Zora said nothing. She'd begun avoiding the Thorn household, stretching weekend visits from weekly to monthly. Let Leo drink himself into oblivion while Megan poured his refills—liquor as both weapon and currency in their silent war.
Autumn brought whispers about Jax dropping into vocational school limbo. Zora barely remembered her stepbrother's face until September 14th, when an English class interruption thrust her into hospital fluorescence.
ICU lights hummed like trapped insects. Megan's tear-streaked face glowed with performative grief. "He fell down the stairs," she hiccuped, though Zora noted how her mother's grip on Leo's wallet never loosened. "Fetching more liquor, the fool."
Jax arrived as shadows lengthened—taller, harder, reeking of clove cigarettes and rebellion. His once-familiar features now hid behind a buzzcut dyed gunmetal gray, silver chains glinting against a graphic tee.
"What's the deal?" He loomed over Zora, eyes glinting like broken glass.
Megan launched into theatrical sobs. "We need to save him, Jax! You're family—"
"Since when?" Jax's laugh scraped raw. He was sixteen, legally powerless, yet Megan shoved responsibility like a burning coal.
Zora watched their dance from the periphery—Megan's calculated tears, Jax's simmering rage. In ICU's antiseptic glare, she memorized vocabulary lists while Jax smashed mobile game levels, their silence thicker than the ventilator's wheeze.
Seven days later, they signed the DNR forms.