Finn had a bit more patience compared to Hamish. He didn’t get angry just because Aoife didn’t directly answer his question.
He reached out to touch Aoife and repeated his question: “Tell me, what are you afraid of?”
The person in his arms was as stiff as a pole, and this made Finn realize that something was not right. He touched Aoife’s calloused fingertips, “Is it because of practicing the piano?”
Aoife shook her head, unable to move as Finn held her, and after choking back sobs for a while, she said hoarsely, “You want me to practice the piano because of her? You wanted me to change my name to Elisa not to help me forget the past and start anew, but to use me as a substitute?”
Her words were difficult to make out, and they were laced with a nasal twang, but Finn just laughed.
“Why pretend you don’t know? Isn’t it better to feign ignorance? Are you asking for trouble?” Finn’s voice remained soft and pleasant.
Aoife was just a girl from a small village, without power or influence. She foolishly signed with an economic company, becoming a pawn in the game of capitalism.
Lan Tingchen had always looked down on her. If it weren’t for her useful face, he wouldn’t even spare her a glance.
Naturally inferior, without even the qualifications to talk about self-respect, Aoife hadn’t expected Finn to acknowledge it so directly.
She stared blankly at Finn, tears streaming down her face.
Finn pinched her cheek, “Don’t cry. When you cry, you don’t look like her. You need to smile more.” With that, he used his hand to lift the corners of her lips, “You need to smile more. When you smile, you look like her. Enough crying, go play the piano. I want to see how well you’ve been learning lately.”
Choking, Aoife said, “I don’t want to practice the piano.” What she really meant was that she didn’t want to be a substitute.
Lan Tingchen and Hamish were of the same blood, their characters not exactly alike, but generally similar. After all, they had both held high positions, with people around them revolving around their every thought, hardly anyone daring to oppose them.
He grabbed Aoife’s hand, “Since you don’t want to practice the piano, then there’s no need for these hands either. Why not do as the person in the video did and insert 28 steel needles into your fingernails?”
Aoife’s legs went weak. It was at this moment that she truly understood Finn. He was a demon, and it was ridiculous that she had once thought of him as the heavenly being that saved her from hell.
Finn ran his fingers over her hand gently, almost tenderly, and Aoife spoke, almost in despair, “I’ll practice. I’ll play for you right now.”
“That’s a good girl,” Finn patted her head, as if rewarding an obedient little dog.
He led Aoife to the music room. Helpless, Aoife couldn’t resist even if she wanted to. She was like a puppet being led into the room, then held the violin against her shoulder.
Fear had a great impact on her. Her playing was sporadic, tears falling onto the strings.
After a grating screech, Aoife put down the violin.
She wasn’t Elisa, no matter how well she practiced.
Finn frowned, “That sounded terrible.”
From then on, they went on as if nothing had happened, continuing as they did in the past.
Aoife continued to serve Finn as if she were a maid, much like a servant girl from ancient times. The only difference was that Finn didn’t need her to serve him, he never even touched her. The closest contact was the last time, when he had embraced her on the sofa, pinching the corners of her mouth to teach her how to smile like Elisa.
From the moment she changed her name, she gave up the life of “Aoife.”
Aoife began to study Elisa’s every glance and smile, striving to be a qualified substitute.
When Finn saw that she had almost mastered it, he arranged for her to spend time with Hamish.
He had chosen Aoife to be Elisa’s substitute not for himself, but to use this substitute to control Hamish.
For three years, Hamish had been half-dead due to Elisa’s death. Perhaps, by giving him a substitute, he would be grateful to himself.
In his eyes, Aoife had always been obedient. Even though she knew she was a substitute, she obediently played along, accepting the arrangement without making a fuss. Letting her go to accompany another man, she probably wouldn’t refuse.
Indeed, Aoife did not refuse. She only said hoarsely, “Things sent out willnot return.”
At some point, she had stopped seeing herself as a person, but as an object, something that Finn could use and manipulate at will, something that could be given away at a whim.
At that time, Finn had sneered in disdain. Did Aoife really think she was such an important plaything? Dispensable. From the beginning, he had never cared for her.
“If I leave, I won’t come back,” Aoife spoke again, like a soulless doll, her eyes wide open, mechanically moving her lips.
“Fine, as long as you obediently go to Hamish’s room tonight, whether you come back or not is up to you. But if you choose not to return, don’t regret it,” Finn said.
What he didn’t know was that the thing Aoife would regret most in her life was meeting him and willingly becoming a substitute for a whole year.
In the end, Aoife truly did as she said. She left and never came back, blocking all of his contact information.
It took Finn quite a while to adjust to the days without Aoife.