No patience, no talent

Due to some incidents in the past, Xiao Qian had an inexplicable of love-hate feeling towards piano. However, looking at his little sister who misunderstood his expression and might only had a good intention to him, he forced a smile on his lip, pushed aside his childishness for wanting to avoid from facing the one thing that ruined the ones he love, and let his sister request for another play from Chen Ziyi.

Chen Ziyi caught the 'nice-guy' expression on his face but she did not assume anything. Her attention was more on the little girl and the little boy. The little boy asked her to play a duet performance with him instead, saying if she was embarrassed to go again alone, he can go with her. Looking at the two small ball face looking at her with their anticipating eyes, as if they are begging her to agree, her eyes fleeted away towards her mother, as if she was asking her mother's help to deal with the kids.

Looking at the silent anticipating eyes that appear with the usual stoic look from her daughter, Chen Rumin with a smile, spoke to the kids, "Can both of you go choose a song first and wait at the piano? Let this sister finish her meal, she will come to you later."

"Really?? Reaaaallyyyy?!! Yeayyyy.!" The little girl shrieked in excitement, for the first time they heard her voice, as it was the little boy the one who spoke to them from the beginning they met.

"Xinxin, manners!" Their brother scolded.

The little girl brushed pass the reprimand and turned her head to the same size boy as her, while shook his arm, as if signaling him to respond on her behalf. The older man only sighed while shook his head at her.

"Thank you, aunty, sister. We will wait for sister over there." The little guy said, before pulling his sister to the piano.

Once Chen Ziyi finished her meal, she took a last sip of drink before stepped away to the piano.

This time however, Chen Rumin had her attention fixed on her daughter's figure and movement, from the moment her daughter moved from their table to the piano seat, to when her daughter took a seat beside the little boy, to how her usually-cold-type daughter seemed very patient in discussing about something with the kids. She had her elbow on the table, propping up her chin while she enjoy the unusual sight.

When she agreed to the request on behalf o her daughter, she was glad yet surprised that her daughter seemed fine and did not show any discontent or disagreement on her face. She did not consider the possibility of her daughter would publicly express her disagreement as one small part of her heart believe that her daughter would not do anything that would make her lose face in front of the others, and mainly her friends.

Chen Rumin had a vision on her mind of her daughter's least response towards her action, whereby her daughter at least would give a sharp gaze at her, as if asking her 'what are you doing, mom? You should know me better than this.' She was prepared to sweet talk to her daughter in case if such situation happen, but surprisingly her daughter show an opposite reaction.

Chen Rumin could not help but feel good with the change.

She was worried if her daughter would make the little girl cry by rejecting the request, but now, - it turned out her worries was not needed. There was this surprisingly good feeling that she felt. Her daughter asked her help in dealing with the kids and she did not show any discontent with the arrangement. AND she did not even need her to remind her to go to the kids once she had finished her meal. She went there by herself as soon as she ate her steak.

The song that the little boy chose was a simple song yet has an attractive melody. Felt the choice was quite good and fit with the place's ambiance, Chen Ziyi agreed to play it. She even told the boy to not be surprised and to just keep playing even if he felt the tune change a little bit. The boy wanted to ask why, but he held his urge to ask, and turned his head facing the piano key.

There, again, the room was filled with beautiful melody, and it soothed their listeners' hearts. The song's beat was a bit more cheerful compared to the previous performance, as if it was trying cheer them up a bit after a quite melancholic song. When they saw how Chen Ziyi skillfully play the piano, they could not help but be impressed with her, and assumed that Chen Ziyi must had won a lot of awards if she had such talent at that age.

Xiao Qian could not help but clenched his fist, fighting his urge to enjoy the performance. The song was for him. He knew his little brother purposely picked the song for him. However, he could not help but to feel sorry for any good intention his siblings had for him.

As towards to the end of the song, he was torn in between wanting to acknowledge the talent before his eyes, or blocked his ears from listen properly to the performance, and forget everything.

A sound of applause was heard, and it woke him. He released a deep breathe of relief, as if he finally able to escape himself from some tortured situation. Yet, at the same time, he felt a loss.

The three siblings did not forget to thank Chen Ziyi before they separate their ways.

####

As Chen Rumin and the entourage went to the restaurant straight from their new house using only one car, Chen Rumin had to drop by at Fei Xingru's office.

As they had a small chat on their way back to the office , Lin Cheung who could not forget Chen Ziyi's beautiful performance, made a comment to Chen Rumin, saying he could not help but want to try to listen to Chen Ziyi's violin performance one day.

At this time, Chen Ziyi had wear her headphone gazing out of the window car, so she didn't know they were conversing about her.

"You know my daughter can play violin?" Chen Rumin asked.

"Yes. When we were discussing on one part of the room, she had mentioned about playing violin."

"She can play violin too?~" Fei Xingru enviously asked.

Although her eyes was looking to the front, Chen Rumin could feel the envious stare that she received from her friend. She laughed softly before released a small smile.

"What? Your children can't? Didn't you send them to music class too?"

"I did send them to piano class. But, they had no patience at all learning them. So we stopped. My husband told me, I should just give up as it's not like both of us had talent for it either."

"Aren't your kids more to sportsmanship thing?"

"I guess."

"So, you're going to send them to any sports school or club? Or wait for them to complete high school, then you will let them pursue it?"

"At first, we had a plan to do so. My husband even had this friend to check on YangJia. But, I had this thought that maybe it's better for my kids to just stay where they are right now. I don't want to separate them from their friends."

"You're the one who doesn't want to separate with your son, right? But, YangJia?"

"I know, right? Well, YangJia is of course, will be our very first choice, regardless. But, it just a wish. Whether it will be realized or not, we are not sure. As XingHe is just a thirteen year old kid, I don't want to put pressure on him. He already feel pressure for being the eldest one among his cousins, and with his younger brother always look up to him."

"XingHan still follow him around?"

"En. That kid loves his brother too much."

"It's good that they have good relationship."

"Well, they are siblings. Your daughter- I'm sorry, Rumin"

"Hm."

"Well, my kids sometimes had a fight too. But they will be good to each other the next morning. I guess it was a thing from our family. When Xinghan wouldn't act coy like usual, Xinghe as the older one would apologize first, and when Xinghe wouldn't come and apologize first like usual, Xinghan would burst out crying, clinging on him and apologize with his runny nose." Fei Xingru gave a soft laugh, while her thoughts remember of the scene of her sons amending back their relationship every time after thay had a fight. She was actually wanted to cover back by what she slipped out by asking about her friend's daughter relationship with her supposed to be 'siblings', but she herself get entertained by her own kids antic.

"Wouldn't Xinghan be embarrassed by you telling us this? What is he? How old is he again? Was Xinghe fine with a crybaby brother?"

"Who's son you calling crybaby?" Fei XIngru retorted.

"You're the one who telling us this!"

"Well, I just want to tell you how cute my sons are."

"Yeah yeah. Just do a pray so that kid would not do that when he enter into high school age. People would make joke about him, you do aware of that, right?"

"Xinghan won't do that. He only do that when they were at home. He do know what would make his brother angry, so he would not do that at school."

"I guess so."

As the conversation happened go about their family situation, Lin Cheung felt that he was not supposed to listen to them, retreated. He turned his head to the girl who already closed her eyes while her head rested on the headrest, before turned to his right side, looking at the scenery out of the window.

Upon they arrived at Fei Xingru's office building, Lin Cheung left first after said goodbye to them and Chen Ziyi. Chen Ziyi thanked him before moved to the front seat after her mother and Fei Xingru went out of the car. It seemed to her that her mother might want to have a small chat with Fei Xingru, so she took her sweet time to find comfortable position to continue her sleep on the seat.

"Xingru, They.. just like usual.. I think."

"What?" Fei Xingru asked. It's clear to her from the tone and the words her friend used, that her friend was not sure about her own exclamation. But, as Chen Rumin suddenly made a statement after there was a gap of silence, so she could not catch up what Chen Rumin was talking about.

"Zheng Rong's children. I'm not sure. Ziyi not mentioning about them these days. It's been almost two month I think? It was as if she did not care at all, like those guys are nothing to her anymore." Chen Rumin casually said. Fei Xingru know that Chen Rumin did not like to mention Zheng Rong's name out of her lips and even if she did, there always hatred and disgust look on her face, but right now, for the first time, there was no hatred, but indifference and just pure worry. Worry for her beloved daughter, she thought.

"Maybe they have fights?" Chen Rumin want to laugh hearing the question, before she shook her head.

"No. It's different. If you have fights with someone that you have a relationship with , or someone that you used to care about, no matter how angry you are, you would still show a reaction that you still care about that person, and you would at least sometimes accidentally mention their name-"

"and we will at least want to cover back our mistakes, denying that we still care about them. And those thing would obviously appeared on our face. Yet, she didn't." Fei Xingru continued for Chen Rumin, who later nodded.

"Do you want to try bring her to Yihan?" Fei Xingru asked.

"Can you asked him to come along next time we meet?"

"You don't want to bring her meet him at a separate date?"

"I'd like her to be comfortable around him, first."

"Yeah, sure. I'll try to contact him and gave you an update."