Pimploy smiled without feeling bothered. "Sorry, I’ve been working a lot lately. Are you guys here to sign up for internships?" The young woman asked to continue the conversation out of courtesy.

"Yeah, we bring Pichart over to sign up. It has been so long, yet he hasn’t signed up yet. People already filled up the space. So slow.” Saiparn said, walking closer in her four-inch heels.

"Who are you calling Pichart? My name is Peachy!!" Pichart quickly corrected her before turning to Pimploy. "By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask for so long—are you taking a babysitting job, Pim? The other day, I saw you carrying a baby under the dorm. I was going to come over and say hi."

She heard her friend’s question, yet the young woman had no intention of answering. Pimploy stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for the first floor. Just as the doors were closing, she gave four of them a smile.

"Was the baby cute?"

What does it mean when a person answers to a question with another question? It means the person doesn’t want to answer.

Before she could get an answer, the elevator doors slowly slid shut, concealing the young woman’s smile until it vanished completely. A dead silence settled in the elevator hall for several seconds until Saiparn turned to her friend.

"Whyyyyy did you even ask her? Everyone already knows that’s her kid. You’re such a bad kathoey. Go, go write your name on the board." Saiparn shook her head and shooed her friend away. 

People gossiped about this matter everywhere.

Most people in the department knew that Pimploy had a baby while still in school. The university didn’t have any rules about it—if you could study, you studied; if you couldn’t, you took a break. Saiparn herself had known for a long time, but that didn’t mean she needed to go announcing it to make herself look like someone who lacked humanity.

If you’re beautiful, you have to have a good personality too. That’s the right thing to do.

Thinking this, she used her index finger to fix the curls in her hair a little.

"Yeah, you’re so evil, Peachy. The two of us are the best ones."

The two other gorgeous kathoeys shook their heads at Pichart before bumping their shoulders against him and following Saiparn.

"Do you remember that a senior told us that there was one company you should not apply to for internships? It’s some big-name magazine company. They’ve had a record of failing their interns three years in a row. No one’s applied there for years. What was the name? Do you remember it? It’s something ‘ca-ca.’ I surely won’t apply for it." Pichart asked his friends while scanning the empty slots where he could write his name down.

His two gay friends looked at the board and said: "I think it was called Velonica or something like that."

"Oh, thanks a lot."

"But someone already signed up for that company." Both of Pichart’s gay friends turned to him and made a weird expression. So, Pichart moved to take a look.

Velonica Publishing Co., Ltd.

Miss Pimploy Kamonanan, 592036657

"Oh God. Oh no. It’s Pimploy’s name. What if she doesn’t pass the internship? She won’t be able to graduate, right? And she won’t have a job. Then she won’t have money to raise her kid. And then she’ll have to abandon her baby, and the child will end up homeless. Aah. I pity the child. This is your fault!!! Why didn’t you two warn our friend? You’re so evil, so so so much more evil than me.” Pichart pointed a finger at his friends, cursing them. They blamed each other for evilness for several words until Saiparn was annoyed by the sound. 

"Why are you all arguing? Just call her and tell her to change it." Saiparn told her friends. "But I don’t have her number. Do you?"

"I don’t." / "I don’t." / "I don’t either." All three kathoeys spoke in unison. Saiparn, the only real woman among them, could only make a weary expression. She rolled her eyes up and let out a sigh. Today was the last day to sign up.

…Nothing could be done. They probably would just have to let fate take its course.

The development of Little Pailin had reached the stage where she could walk or crawl all over the room. However, Aunt Im kept putting her in the crib. This was why Pailin was extremely bored. After planning for many days, the little girl who had once defied the world of death—what else could she possibly fear?

Today, she had to revolutionize Aunt Im’s method of child-rearing!!

With that thought, Pailin threw her nearly empty milk bottle onto the floor. Then, she climbed up with all her strength and plunged herself down beside the crib.

Thud!!

The sound of her landing was firm, fully following the laws of physics. With an award-winning acting skill, Pailin let out a cry that echoed throughout the room. However, the pain was real, so tears streamed down her face without any need for forcing them.

‘Huuuuu... That hurtsss.’

Aunt Im abandoned the iron and quickly rushed over. She flipped the little one over—her small face was scrunched up, and a bump had already swollen on her head, as large as a lime. Pailin added a scream to make this convincing. After falling like this, if Aunt Im still put her back in there, she would climb out and fall again. Let’s see if Aunt Im would risk putting her back in it. However, her landing was a bit off today—next time, she needed to be more careful. Otherwise, her brain might suffer a concussion.

The aunt, the laundry shop owner, cradled Pailin, pacing back and forth while soothing the little one, saying it didn’t hurt and that she was alright. Who would have thought that Pailin would fall from the crib? Since raising her, normally, this child had never been naughty or mischievous. She ate and slept, slept and ate. She was such a well-behaved girl. Aunt Im was nervous, not knowing how she would explain this to Pimploy.

She held the child for a long time, but the crying didn’t stop. Aunt Im gently laid Pailin down on the sofa. Instantly, the little kid stopped crying, as if someone had pressed an off button. Aunt Im made a puzzled face. She walked to the fridge to find a cold gel she had frozen. She wrapped it in several layers of cloth and placed it against the swollen head. Seeing that Pailin had calmed down, Aunt Im prepared to pick her up and put her back in the crib. But the moment her bottom lifted off the ground, Pailin loudly cried again. The little one twisted left and right, trying to escape from the grasp. Thus, Aunt Im placed her back down... and Pailin stopped crying once more…

Lifting her up... She cried again... Placing her back down on the sofa... She stopped crying...

“…”

It seemed that Aunt Im had understood a certain sign. Because of this, from that day on, the soft blue sofa by the entrance of the laundry shop became Little Pailin’s territory.

Pimploy returned from work and went straight to pick up Pailin. Upon seeing that her daughter had a swollen bump on her head, she cried out in shock. Aunt Im apologized profusely, but Pailin wasn’t seriously hurt. The young woman could only say it was all right. For the first time, she started to realize that she could no longer raise Pailin by just feeding and letting her sleep. Every child needed to have their own development. Apart from seeing when her daughter needed vaccinations or doctor visits, she had never paid attention to how each stage of her child’s age should develop. Because Pailin was an easy child to raise, Pimploy had overlooked so many things. She felt like she was a very bad mother.

Lifting her daughter close to her chest, Pailin saw her mother become still. She wrapped her small arms around her mother’s neck, resting her tiny head against that delicate shoulder.

The mother and daughter’s dormitory was a women-only dormitory with no elevator. Pimploy held her daughter, climbing the stairs up to their room on the 4th floor.

The dorm had clean hallways, with no history of crime, making it relatively trustworthy. Once inside, the mother and daughter went about their daily routines before Pimploy left the little one in her playpen. Tonight, the young woman would skip studying for her exams to do something else.

Pimploy crawled over to the corner of the room and pulled out a plastic crate. Inside were several small books, nearly all of them about motherhood and childcare.

She flipped through them briefly and picked one to read. Right now, she was thinking about how to raise her child in a way that wasn’t just feeding and sleeping. She needed to find something to enhance her child’s development.

Pailin clung to the playpen, motionless. She watched her mother bury herself next to the table and read something with seriousness, so much so that it was unusual. Normally, if her mother wasn’t studying for exams, she would be watching Korean dramas, ones that made her pinch her pillow out of satisfaction. She did not really make productive use of her time.

Pailin had never heard her mother talk about her grandparents. She assumed that if they weren’t dead, then they probably had never existed in the first place. Mother was a person without any family.

Perhaps the only lucky thing about her mother... was being born with a good-looking face...

No, another lucky thing was having a smart and adorable child.

Actually, the previous statement should have been said by someone else, but she had to compliment herself a little. How many parents could have a daughter born with a college-level education and memories?

Pailin didn’t often see herself in the mirror, but she knew that her skin was like her mother’s—fair, clear, and radiant. Her mother had brown eyes and long black hair, but she had dark gray eyes tinged with brown, or Gray Eyes Brown Spot, a rare genetic trait where two eye colors did not overpower the other. It was an eye color that many international celebrities dreamed of having and was also a color for popular contact lenses’ patterns. Pailin’s hair was in dark shade, but it was not black like ink. Her nose bridge was quite high; it must have been something good she had inherited from her father.

However, even when the little child inherited only her mother’s complexion while the rest of her facial features clearly came from someone else, it didn’t spark any memory in her mother’s mind about her father at all. At this point, Pailin had to use the phrase utterly ridiculous once again.

The mother and daughter imagined about different things. The mother wasn’t sure how to raise her child, while the child wasn’t sure how much development was appropriate for a kid of each age.

Pailin’s tongue was already strong enough to form full sentences, but it was her who wasn’t sure how long she should talk. If she blurted out long sentences, people might think she was a child possessed by a ghost. Thus, during this time, Pailin was living life using very few words.

Hearing the sound of Pimploy closing her book, Pailin lifted her head to look. She saw the young woman walking toward her, so she raised both hands. Pimploy scooped her up under her arms. The mother and daughter had their usual seat—a large beanbag chair. Whenever they sat down, both Pimploy and Pailin would sink into it.

The little kid sat on her mother’s lap. Pailin wiggled her feet to create a jingle from the tiny bells. The laptop on the Japanese table was turned on. Pailin peeked as her mother browsed an online shopping site, typing in the search box for non-toxic stationery for children. Then, she selected the most popular item for express delivery.

The little girl lifted her hand to scratch her neck, wishing for a growth-enhancing potion or a magic spell that could skip this stage where she was unable to do things on her own.

‘How about swapping that stationery for a tablet instead? I promise I’ll be a good kid.’

She blinked rapidly. She probably could only send this wish through telepathy.

Three months passed. Pimploy discovered that her daughter had an extraordinary talent for drawing. At first, when she bought colored pencils for her, she only intended to use them as a tool to enhance child development. Who would have thought that this little girl could create several books of works?

The story started on that day... The day a university student, who lived in the dorm, left their rabbit at the front of the laundry shop. Aunt Im said that Pailin had sat hugging her knees, watching it for a long time. By evening, the first sheet of drawing paper had a rabbit drawn in crayon. From that moment on, Pailin would stand and stare at certain objects to use as references for her drawings. Her art desk was the sofa in the shop, the one she liked. Of course, it wasn’t a fun way to pass the time, but there was no way this effort would go to waste.

These sketchbooks... Aunt Im had asked to see them many times, but Pailin was very possessive. She wouldn’t even let the paper corners get creased. She needed them. In another year and a half, Pailin would have to enter kindergarten, but the place she wanted to go—Pimploy, in her current state, couldn’t get her in there. Thus, the little girl had to do something on her own.

Today, the sun outside was scorching. The air conditioner in the shop could barely fight it. Moreover, there were flashing waves of heat from the iron. Pailin sacrificed her midday nap to sit striking a pose at the front of the shop. Today, her mother woke up late, so she didn’t tie her hair. That was why her dark, slightly wavy strands spread across her back. Nowadays, Pailin had bangs, making her look even more adorable and pinch-worthy. Some regular customers who came to the shop would occasionally ask to take pictures of her. The girl never refused.

But today, she was waiting for someone. And now it was time for that person to arrive.

Creeeak.

The glass door was opened.

A man stepped into the shop.

“Auntie, is my shirt ready yet?” The speaker was a tall, thin man with a large backpack slung over his shoulder, stuffed of who-knew-what.

Aunt Im lifted her head to look at him and let out a soft ‘Oh.’

“It’s you. Come, come. I hung it right at the front. I cut the line for you,”

“Whoa, thanks a ton. If it weren’t for your shop, I’d be screwed. I have a job interview tomorrow, and my room doesn’t have an iron, haha.” He walked to the clothing rack, reaching for the shirt bag. However, the young man felt a tug on his shirt. He looked left, looked right—there was no one there. So, he glanced down at the floor. The sight made the young man’s hands go weak, as if a hammer had slammed into his heart.

An extremely adorable girl with gray eyes was holding out a handcrafted rose to him. A perfectly balanced smile. Eyes full of attitude. That rare eye color!!!

“Whose kid is this, Auntie?”

Late at night, Pimploy checked her daughter’s sketchbook. She saw that another drawing had been added. It was a picture of the street in front of their dormitory. It seemed that the little kid hadn’t taken a nap today. When she got home, she had dragged her stuffed rabbit by the ear across the floor before falling asleep on her mother’s lap.

Buzz.

A flash of light appeared on her phone screen. A message had come in on Facebook Messenger. It was from the same photographer who had previously sent her pictures of herself with the rose.

"Big Sister, do you have any free days next month?"

"Why? Are you hiring me as a model? Next month, I’ll be starting my internship, so I’ll only be free on Sundays, probably." Pimploy typed back.

"Nope, I’m not hiring you."

"Oh. Then why are you asking?" She added a sticker of a confused face along with it.

"I’m hiring your daughter."

!!