That word—"Mom"—coming from the mouth of a boy about fifteen or sixteen, froze Su Rui on the spot.
She couldn't accept it. Not at all.
Even in TV dramas, the oldest "son" she had ever played was barely three years old.
And now—she had suddenly become the mother of a teenager? How was she supposed to play that role?
Her mind flashed back to that moment on the minibus earlier, when Xiu Hui had given her a knowing look and said,
"You're really something… want me to teach you the secret to carrying on the family line?"
She hadn't understood it at the time, still preoccupied with the shocking news that Lin Yueying had a daughter.
And now? Not just a daughter—there was a son too?
Su Rui looked at the tall, fine-featured boy in front of her and couldn't help thinking,
"Over forty and still having kids? Lin Yueying, you're incredible… I guess times really have changed."
This time, she decided she couldn't keep pretending. She came right out with it:
"I'm not your mom!"
The boy froze, a flicker of suspicion in his eyes, but he didn't argue.
Instead, he studied her for a few seconds before speaking calmly,
"You may look like her, but you're not my mom."
"…" Su Rui was the one caught off guard now.
"My mother, Lin Yueying, wouldn't talk like you do," the boy continued,
"She wouldn't use those expressions, or stand the way you stand. You're nothing like her."
He frowned. "Why are you pretending to be my mother?"
The question left Su Rui momentarily speechless.
She had thought it would take ages to convince him, but the boy had accepted it almost instantly.
She couldn't help asking, "You really believe I'm not your mother, Lin Yueying?"
"Of course," he replied without hesitation. "So who are you?"
Su Rui opened her mouth, but not a single word came out.
Under the boy's steady gaze, she felt a strange pressure settle over her.
And then—
A rush of unfamiliar yet strangely intimate images burst into her mind,
as if someone had suddenly opened a long-sealed cabinet.
Memories of "this boy" came to her in perfect clarity, as though they'd happened only yesterday—
When he first learned to walk and scraped his knee, crying in hiccupping sobs as he threw himself into her arms;
His first day of school, carrying a backpack taller than he was, turning around with a smile as bright as the sun;
And—
The small red birthmark on his backside, shaped exactly like a pistachio.
Without even thinking, she spoke in a tone that wasn't her own at all,
a tone that was entirely Lin Yueying's:
"You're my son. Your name is Li Kai, and your nickname is Pistachio—because you have a red birthmark shaped like a pistachio on your butt."
The air went still for two seconds.
The boy's pupils tightened.
And in that instant, Su Rui realized—
She really did feel as if Lin Yueying had taken over her body.