CHAPTER 179: CHAPTER 179: HOLLY AND YARROW HAVE NO SECRETS

Boundless blackness seemed to sink into a bottomless deep sea.

Holly felt as light as a feather, her body seemed to have lost its weight, drifting in the chaos.

Suddenly, an invisible force pulled her toward a bright exit.

The air was filled with the familiar sweet scent of Myrica fruit.

Under the tree, a little girl with pigtails was tiptoeing, climbing up the Myrica tree.

At the top, the large, red Myrica fruit hung on the branches, enticing her to lean forward.

Suddenly, her foot slipped, and the girl fell with a gasp, but instead of the expected pain, she fell into an embrace smelling faintly of medicine.

She looked up and met a pair of amber eyes, like stars over Port Kallow at night.

Below her was a boy sitting in a wheelchair, pale and with delicate features.

The girl was stunned, forgetting to be scared, blinking her big eyes, "You’re really good-looking."

That was her, at five years old, the first time she met Blake Sinclair.

Blake Sinclair, who was raised in the ancestral hall from a young age, always following the 321 rules of the Sinclair Group, had never been praised so straightforwardly.

His ears quietly turned red, he averted his face a little awkwardly, his tone stiff, "..Be careful."

From that day on, the fearless pigtail girl from Port Kallow had a little tag along her side.

Young Holly lugged a half-filled basket of Myrica fruits, huffing and puffing, running to Blake Sinclair’s house.

She pushed open the always closed courtyard door, the bamboo basket squeezing her arms red, but her smile was still bright and crescent-shaped.

Young Holly stuffed the biggest, reddest Myrica fruit into the boy’s mouth: "Barefoot Uncle just picked it for me, sweet! Try it, it’s not sour!"

At first, Blake Sinclair always frowned and avoided her.

He was used to being guarded and distant, not used to this overly enthusiastic girl, bright like a little sun, "I don’t eat it, take it away."

But she was never discouraged, one attempt failing, she would try twice, always persistent.

And every time, he would ultimately give in, reluctantly opening his mouth, letting the sweet and sour taste spread in his mouth, but as if the bitterness in his heart was indeed a bit diluted.

Later, Young Holly would often push his wheelchair to accompany him to play in the alley, saying she was pushing, but in fact, it was always Blake Sinclair himself maneuvering the wheelchair.

She would chatter on beside him, and when tired of playing, she would unceremoniously lay on his lap to sleep.

The warm sun cast its rays on her face, Blake Sinclair looking at the person on his lap, too stiff to move.

Once, she fell asleep on his desk, waking up to see him doing homework, she couldn’t understand those complicated characters, only thinking the notebook looked empty.

"Yarrow, your notebook is so white, it would look nice with some drawings on it!"

Young Holly awkwardly picked up a pen and drew a yarrow on it.

Blake Sinclair helplessly grabbed her mischievous hand, wiping the ink stains from her hands, "Stop fooling around."

At the entrance of Port Kallow, a few mischievous boys always laughed at Young Holly, calling her "a wild child living with her grandparents, without parents", even snatching her Myrica basket and tossing it on the ground.

She squatted on the ground crying, and the boy who was always sitting in a wheelchair suddenly stood up.

His movements were somewhat stiff, but he stood firmly in front of her.

The kids ran off scared, Young Holly tugged at his clothes with tearful eyes: "Yarrow, you can walk?"

Blake Sinclair froze for a moment, silently sitting back in the wheelchair.

He turned his head, his face flustered and stubborn, "You can’t tell anyone, it’s my secret."

Young Holly got up, walked to the front of the wheelchair, "What do you mean by secret?"

Blake Sinclair looked at her pure eyes, found an explanation she could understand, "A secret is like having a particularly big, sweet Myrica fruit, but you don’t want to share it with others and can only hide it yourself."

"I get it!"

Her eyes lit up, she held his cool fingers, saying earnestly, "Holly has no secrets with Yarrow, Holly will give you the biggest, sweetest Myrica fruits to eat."

A strange emotion filled his chest, sour yet warm.

Blake Sinclair stubbornly said, "I don’t want to eat it. You shouldn’t pick Myrica fruits anymore. When I leave, if you get bullied, who will help you?"

She got anxious, shaking his hand: "Then don’t leave, okay? Let’s pick Myrica fruits together."

"I have to leave."

"Wah!" Her little face crumpled, crying even louder than before.

"Alright, alright, don’t cry, I’ll go pick Myrica fruits with you, okay?"

The childish words in the alley gradually drifted away.

The sunset stretched their shadows long.

Later, she heard he was leaving.

Young Holly pestered her grandfather, wanting to make a ceramic yarrow for him.

Aiden, from next door, came to help voluntarily, and the two of them labored in the kiln for several days, ruining several bases before finally producing a small yarrow before he left.

They said goodbye by the Nymphaea Pond.

The wind was gentle that day, a few late-blooming lotus flowers swaying in the breeze.

Young Holly handed him the ceramic yarrow: "Yarrow, this is for you. The clay is from the Barefoot Uncle on the mountain, he asked the Bodhisattva, and it can help take away your sickness, so you won’t need a wheelchair anymore!"

The boy looked at the little yarrow, slowly reached out to take it.

He looked down at the little girl in front of him with tears in her eyes, his heart felt tightly wrapped, sour and swollen.

He took off the Mutton Fat Jade Pendant from his neck, gently hanging it around hers, its warm surface touching her skin.

"My mom gave this to me, with it on, it’s like I’m with you. I’ll come back before school starts and teach you how to write my name, alright?"

The boy’s voice was a bit hoarse.

She always called him Yarrow, and back then, he also felt "Blake Sinclair" was difficult to write, so he couldn’t bear to let her learn it.

"Really? Pinky swear!"

"Pinky swear, a hundred years without change."

Two small pinky fingers hooked together.

Blake Sinclair left, taking the ceramic yarrow with him.

The Myrica season was also over, and the fruits on the branches had fallen all over the ground.

Soon primary school enrollment was starting, she was about to leave Port Kallow.

In those days, she ran to the old locust tree at the village entrance to wait every day, clutching the notebook he gave her, each page filled with drawings of yarrow.

She waited day after day, but the boy who promised to return and teach her to write his name never appeared.

Until that day, when a strange man came over, saying "Your brother asked me to pick you up," she naively followed him, forcibly pulled into a van.

There were other children in the van, and cries filled the air.

She was terrified.

"Grandpa! Grandma! Mom! Dad! Yarrow!"

She cried and shouted in the van, pounding on the windows.

The van drove faster and faster, the scenery outside became more and more unfamiliar, until a loud crash, the van was struck by a car and flipped into the river.

The river water engulfed her, she struggled desperately, choking, suffocated by despair and suffocation.

Darkness swallowed her.