"Mom, stop!" How Erica wished she could cover her mother's mouth so that she wouldn't keep gossiping about her. It was embarrassing the first time around. And to have someone recount the stories just rubbed salt in the wound.
"Why?" Blair didn't think it was such a big deal. She continued to fill Matthew in on Erica's past, heedless of her daughter's protests.
Back when Erica was filling out the application forms for the college entrance exam, father and daughter discussed her plans together. They were upstairs in the study for much of the evening.
Wesley respected her and asked her to choose a major she was interested in. He would give her the best advice he had.
Hearing that she had the freedom to choose her major by herself, Erica was shocked. "I must be hearing things. You said you'll respect my choices?"
Seeing the calculating glint in his daughter's eyes, Wesley regretted what he said, so he answered decisively, "No."
"I knew it!" She pouted her lips.
Wesley suggested, "You can learn from your mom. Go to a foreign language school." Blair was a talented translator and was well-paid for her trouble.
Erica rolled her eyes and disagreed more decisively, "No way! Could you think of anything more boring?"
Wesley knew she wouldn't agree. His face darkened at her answer, but before he could straighten her out, the girl who was reclining on the couch sat up straightaway and said, "It's okay if you want me to learn different languages. Because I'll make friends with a lot of foreigners. Probably even fall in love with one. If that happens, I may not come back and you won't have to see me anymore…"
"Enough!" Wesley was pissed off.
Since she had already had her digs in, Erica obediently shut up and did not say one more word.
Wesley kept telling himself to calm down because Erica was his biological daughter. He tried to hold back his anger and soften his voice. "Then tell me, what do you want as a major?"
Erica cupped her chin and thought for a moment. "Medicine! Wearing a white gown and holding a scalpel, doctors are real hotties!" In her mind, the young men in clean white doctor's coats were especially attractive.
"You? A doctor?" Wesley regained control and said in a serious tone, "I'm pretty sure that's the impossible dream, as far as you're concerned. I'm afraid your mom and I have to handle the medical negligence disputes for you every day."
That was no exaggeration. Erica was a careless girl. She always acted rashly and was accident prone. He was afraid she would put the patients' lives at risk if she were to become a doctor.
'Humph! Some father you are!' Erica was not convinced. "Mr. Li, you are not helping!"
Wesley snorted, "Mr. Li, is it? So you're saying I'm not your real dad? Aren't you the one always saying you're a fairy? Look, I'm just an ordinary man. How could you be my daughter? You sat on a meteorite that fell to earth. You came from the sky."
'From the sky? Oh, right!' Erica clapped her hands and said seriously, "Dad! How about I take flying lessons, learn to be a pilot? I want to fly planes for a living!"
Wesley looked at her with a smile, which made the girl's hair stand on end. "With your sense of direction? I'm afraid you'd fly your plane into outer space and get abducted by aliens. They'd take you away and stick things in you. Your mom would be sad."
The last sentence was the key point. The girl pulled a long face.
"Dad! You say no to every profession I want. What do you want me to learn then?"
"I think you're quite eloquent. Why not be a lawyer? If you know the laws better, maybe you'll spend less time breaking them!"
'A lawyer who has to memorize laws, corollaries, addenda, as well as facts and circumstances surrounding whatever case I take on?' Erica said desperately, "Probably not the best thing for me, Dad!" She had a headache at the sight of all those long words. To read and recite those articles of law could cause her head to explode.
Wesley completely lost his patience. "Just choose what you want! I don't care!"
"Okay, Dad!" She was waiting for these words. She had him exactly where she wanted him. "Then I'll choose..."
Staring at his daughter sullenly, Wesley warned, "Think it over before you say anything."
She tilted her head and said, "Painting with light."
"Painting with what? What's that?"
She cleared her throat and answered him syllable by syllable, "Photography! And I know just where I'm going, too. The A Country Film Academy. I've thought about this for awhile! Surprised?"
It was more than a shock to Wesley. He was going to read the riot act to his youngest daughter. "How many times have you touched a camera? Photography? What makes you think you can do that? What a waste of time!"
Erica thought for a while, then she looked at her fingers and began to count. "I've touched my mom's camera once...maybe twice...no, I'm pretty sure it was three times... Ah! Nine! It was nine times! Dad, I will work hard to freeze moments both ordinary and beautiful in my pictures. I really want this."
Seeing the smile and longing look on his daughter's face, Wesley bit back his retort.
In the end, Erica enrolled in A Country Film Academy and studied photography. She made quite a few enemies there, but also many friends. Some of her friends went to the same school as her, like Rhea and Hyatt.
However, to everyone's surprise, she dropped out in her sophomore year and just vanished.
After she came back with Feb Wu (a.k.a. Ethan Li), Wesley had planned to help her get back into college. But before he could go through the formalities, they had decided to marry her off to Matthew. So Wesley stopped helping her here, and let her apply for a university in Y City.
Sitting there, Matthew quietly listened to Blair. Erica had already gone upstairs with Ethan in her arms, her face red with embarrassment. Only Wesley, Blair and Matthew were in the living room now.
Wesley turned to the silent man and asked, "Matthew, what do you think?"
The young man answered, "I'd like to have Erica resume her studies. Ethan will go to Y City with us. I'll hire a professional nanny to take care of the baby."
The couple looked at each other. At last, Blair shook her head. "We are relieved to see that you are so nice to Rika. But I don't want you to be bothered by the baby. You are always busy with your work and Rika will go to school. Just leave the baby here for the time being. We'll take care of him. When Rika's missing the baby, I can take him to see her or she can come back here to stay for a while."
"Okay," Matthew answered curtly.
Half an hour later, Wesley and Matthew went upstairs. Blair went to the kitchen to prepare formula for Ethan.
In the hallway, Wesley patted his son-in-law on the shoulder, and after hesitating for a while, he finally opened his mouth. "I know you don't like the girl, and it's unfair of us to make you marry her. Rika does what she wants, and it's not always what you want. But she's a nice girl. Promise me, if she does anything wrong, send her back to me and I'll discipline her myself. Don't hurt her if she ever pisses you off." It wasn't that he didn't trust Matthew. But Erica was his daughter. He knew very well how much she could irritate other people. He didn't really know how much one man could take, and didn't want his daughter to pay the price if she annoyed him too much.
However, since she had Ethan, Wesley could feel that Erica had changed a lot. She was much quieter than before, probably because she felt guilty. Wesley didn't feel happy about the change. On the contrary, he felt sorry for his daughter.
Deep in his heart, he hoped that Erica would find happiness again. Although she always made trouble, at least she was happy.
Matthew nodded, "Don't worry, Dad. I got this."