Chapter 45: The Mom and Dad You’re Talking About… Are They the Same Ones as Mine?
The morning sunlight fell on Li Mu’s face. In the golden light, tiny bits of dust floated up and down.
The warmth of the sun slowly woke him up.
Lately, his sleep had been getting a little better.
He pushed himself up with his arms and looked down between his legs.
Hmm... still no improvement.
Sitting cross-legged on the bed, he placed his hands on both sides of his chest.
It felt like there was a core inside, and a needle-like stinging sensation transmitted from the core to the surface of his body, making him tremble slightly.
Did it… get bigger?
He wasn’t sure if it was just his imagination, but when he looked down at his chest, he felt like the curve was becoming more obvious.
Sighing softly, he opened the drawer of the bedside table, pulled out two band-aids, and stuck them over the center of his chest.
Zhang Hui hadn’t come back all night.
After returning home from dinner at the neighbor's last night, Li Mu noticed Zhang Hui had disappeared, even the front door was left wide open.
He had waited until 11 p.m. before going to bed, but Zhang Hui didn’t listen to his advice. Who knows where he went messing around in the middle of the night?
Then he raised his head, brought the little mirror that was facing away from him in front of him, and asked, “You want to see your mom and dad?”
“Yeah!” The image in the mirror immediately became lively and full of spirit.
Li Mu froze. He brought the mirror even closer, almost pressing it to his face.
He clearly felt something had changed, but just couldn’t tell what.
How much longer would it take for his body to fully change?
If he ended up becoming a “woman with a big d*ck,” maybe he could still accept it... but sadly, he couldn’t even get hard anymore.
His feelings were mixed, but he didn’t want anyone to notice, so he rubbed his face, smoothed out his gloomy expression, and went back to his usual cold look.
He got up, stretched, and walked out of the room toward the bathroom. While washing up, he looked into the mirror and asked, “So, where did your parents go?”
To lure out the ghost who killed Lin Xi, he needed another ghost. But the only one he could sort of control was the mirror ghost. Problem was, she just wanted to find her parents… Oh, and she also said she wanted to sing on stage.
Every year, the school held a singing contest in the second semester, but bringing a mirror on stage wouldn’t really work.
If he could actually see what the mirror ghost looked like, maybe he could make a missing-person post online or something. He could even make up some touching story to get people emotional. But sadly, the ghost looked exactly the same as the person in front of the mirror.
“I don’t know!” Xiao Jing said while brushing her teeth, her voice unclear because of the foam.
Who knows why a ghost still kept the habit of brushing her teeth?
“What do your parents look like?”
“I don’t know!”
If you don’t know anything, then just shut up already!
Are you messing with me?
Li Mu pressed his lips together and was about to ask more questions when Xiao Jing suddenly tilted her head and said, “They look a lot like you.”
Huh?
That’s when Li Mu suddenly remembered what Xiao Jing had said yesterday.
After she became a ghost, her parents had placed her inside the mirror and left on a trip for some reason, and still hadn’t returned.
That little spark of inspiration from last night came back to him again.
He spat out the foam from his mouth. “The mom and dad you're talking about… don’t tell me they’re the same as my mom and dad?”
Xiao Jing tilted her head and looked at him in confusion.
“Maybe you were already inside the mirror before the house got renovated, and then my parents bought it and brought you home,” Li Mu muttered to himself, then shook his head. “But a few years ago, when my parents were still here, the lights didn’t flicker like that, and the temperature in the house seemed normal.”
Back then in summer, his little sister couldn’t handle the heat and cried, begging for a standing air conditioner to be put in the living room.
Li Mu thought for a moment, rinsed his mouth, wiped his face, and then walked into another bedroom.
It was the master bedroom, where his parents used to stay. It hadn’t been opened in years.
Even during big clean-ups, Li Mu would always “accidentally” skip this room.
Inside, everything was covered in dust. The room looked like it was painted in grey. It was messy, the bedsheets were piled up, and there were still some old amusement park flyers in the trash can. Time seemed frozen in there, like it hadn’t moved since three years ago.
Li Mu paused for a second, then walked straight to the bedside table and picked up a framed family photo.
Seeing his family again made him feel down, but he still took the photo back to the bathroom and held it up to the mirror.
“Are these your parents?” He asked while wiping the dusty photo with a tissue.
In the photo, a family of four was posing for a studio picture.
Xiao Jing leaned in with curiosity, blinked her big eyes, looked up, and asked, “Why are you in it too?”
“......”
Li Mu’s sadness turned into something much more complicated. His throat moved, and his lips trembled a little, but he didn’t know what to say.
Even though he had vaguely guessed this before, hearing it confirmed still made it hard to accept.
After a long pause, he dropped his arms and lowered his head, standing there without moving.
“What’s wrong?” Xiao Jing’s voice, usually cheerful and sweet, now had a bit of concern in it.
The bathroom light started flickering again. She kept pressing the switch, trying to get Li Mu’s attention. “Hey! What’s wrong with you?!”
Li Mu took a deep breath and wiped his face. “It’s nothing.”
He placed the photo on the sink, turned around, and said, “I’m going to do deliveries now.”
“Then put me in front of the TV, I want to watch something!”
“Okay.” His voice suddenly softened a little.
He placed the mirror on the table and turned on the TV for her. Then he put on his delivery uniform, opened the door, and left.
But just as he opened the door, he saw Zhang Hui outside in the hallway, pacing nervously with dark circles under his eyes.
“Where were you last night?” Li Mu asked. “What time did you get back?”
“I just got back… I was at the internet café.” Zhang Hui trembled, stepped closer to Li Mu, and nervously pointed into the apartment. “Hey, is your place… haunted?”
“Haunted? No.”
“Then why did the light keep flickering last night after you left for dinner? And the ghost in the mirror told me to get out…”
The big guy looked scared, like a frightened little girl.
Li Mu kept a straight face and patiently said, “There’s no such thing as ghosts. How could there be ghosts? You probably saw a cockroach and scared yourself into imagining things.”
But with that completely blank face, Li Mu didn’t sound convincing at all. If anything, it made Zhang Hui’s spine go cold.
He heard the TV changing channels inside the room and peeked past Li Mu’s shoulder into the living room.
No one was there.
“Wait… are you a ghost too?” Zhang Hui suddenly took two steps back.
Li Mu pretty much understood what was going on, so he didn’t answer. Just stared directly at Zhang Hui.
Then his lips curved slightly.
That expressionless face pulling out a creepy little smile made Zhang Hui’s heart freeze in fear.
Ghost?!
Hair standing on end, he turned and ran down the stairs without looking back.
Only after the sound of his footsteps faded into the distance did Li Mu turn and walk into the elevator, quietly muttering to himself, “Hope I didn’t scare him to death.”
Well, he did sense a bit of hostility from the guy…
It was obvious Zhang Hui disliked how he was starting to look more and more feminine.
He’s living in my house, and he dares to hate me?