48. Thirty years ago

Lance dragged Paige to school while being an hour late, and she slept through the subjects, woke up, and wanted to sleep more, only to be dragged by Lance to the cafeteria.

Again, she was only living off products with hazelnuts, so he had to stuff normal food into her. The other students constantly glanced at the duo, but neither cared.

Lance was sitting across from her while munching on the cafeteria food, satisfied with it.

"When is the Nanny caretaker coming?"

"Dunno." Paige had a good appetite; she was just too lazy to make her food.

"Give me Mr. Donavan's number, and I'll call him on this."

Paige wanted to take her phone out of her skirt pocket, but it didn't have a pocket, so she said while chewing.

"It's in class."

"Don't talk while chewing," Lance said, looking at her in disgust.

"You did it too just now?!" Paige accusingly pointed at him.

A light cough interrupted them; they both looked to their left and saw Natasha and Pigtail standing there.

Natasha asked politely

"Can we sit with you two?" It was the first time she saw Paige eating here and with Lance together at that. 

Yesterday evening, Juno called her and told her that according to her friend both of them were blood related cousins! She was ecstatic.

"Yes." Lance did not want to but didn't want to embarrass her in front of all the peeking students around them.

Paige had long continued with eating.

Juno sat beside her and introduced her name to both of them as if knowing that they were clueless about it. Finally, Lance and Paige knew the actual name of Pigtail.

Natasha sat beside Lance, letting both of them sit beside their deskmate.

Natasha asked "We heard what you said, you're looking for a nanny?"

The system urged Paige to be mean, but she ignored it, responding,

[I'm eating, and you wanted me to decide on things myself. If I interrupt their talk,, they have one less chance of bonding.]

The system did not say more and let her be.

"Yes...Someone who cooks the meals at home..." He thought about how to explain suddenly living together with Paige and whether he should directly say that they are cousins if someone would even believe a cousin popping up after they introduced themselves on the first day.

"You even live together? You are cousins, right?" Natasha blurted out. First, Juno said Lance was an orphan, and later, she said Paige was his cousin. She believed her but had to clarify it nonetheless.

Lance was surprised that Natasha knew about their fake relationship already and suddenly didn't want to talk anymore but nodded. Looking at Paige....it seems she had no interest in anything around her.

"I... I'm... I can cook really well... Can I get the job?" Again, she was overly familiar.

Who would even do that?

She admonished herself for her hastiness, but she wanted to see him more. Thinking about it, she felt that this would be perfect. Being more away from home would lessen her time with Meier and his Mother.

Lance immediately felt averse. There was no way he would let this happen. He thought about how to decline appropriately, not saying something like, 'I don't want to have you in my home.' or ' I don't want to fake being nice at home, too.'

The system said [SAY YES.] to Paige.

Paige answered [That is not in the plot?]

******************************

Thirty years ago

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A girl walked down a street in the middle of the night.

She stopped before a house, she went to a window of the ground floor and tapped it twice, the window unlocked itself, she pushed it up and climbed in swiftly.

Looking around, she found shortly after the room of the young woman she was searching for.

The girl observed the sleeping woman. She combed with her fingers through her hair lovingly.

She bent down and whispered in her ear:

"What is it that you wish for?"

Her voice was beautiful, luring an answer from the sleeping woman.

"To marry.... to have a baby... with him." The woman answered.

"You love him, you love him so much. Your baby will be born soon. You want it to be born, do you?"

"Yes." the woman answered.

"You will get your baby. But you have to do something for your wish to come true."  The girl sat on the bed and spoke a little louder, as if humming, twirling a strand of the woman's hair.

"You have to help your man. Your man has problems with his work, you know that? He never talks about it, but he has problems. You want to help the man you love, right?"

"Yes." She answered.

"The child of the rivaling company is a thorn in your eyes; you want him to suffer. Just suffer because he is hindering your man, your future baby, your family."

The woman on the bed hissed. "I hate that child; it is his fault. His fault."

"Yes, good girl, you are right; that child has to suffer, but you would never let him be killed, right? Never would you do that."

"Yes, I just want him to suffer, I will just injure him, cripple him..."

The girl's face turned cold. She gripped the woman's hair and yanked the sleeping face closer to her own.

"You will never injure the child; you will have him kidnapped and live without his family finding him. When the child dies or is injured, your child will never be born."

The woman whimpered.

"I would never injure the child. I just want him to suffer, I will let him be kidnapped and let him suffer, his family will never find him."

The girl loosened her grip and arranged the sleeping woman's hair. She stood up and bent down again, tenderly holding the sleeping woman's cheeks in both of her hands.

"Yes, good girl, good girl. The name of the child you will kidnap, the child you hate but will never hurt, this child's name is Lance Walker, right?"

The sleeping woman spat in odium, "Lance Walker."