Elly Campbell saw that Adam Jones was left speechless by her question and continued eating her breakfast with satisfaction, paying him no attention.
Adam watched the hint of pride that inadvertently showed in Elly’s eyes and couldn’t help but laugh.
He lifted his hand to pinch her cheek, "Naughty."
Could he not talk to her with the tone one uses to coax a child?
She was his wife, not his daughter!
The next second, Elly realized that her subconscious had already accepted the identity of being Adam Jones’s wife, and her expression immediately darkened, feeling rather annoyed!
Pah! Who is his wife!
Her mood became subtly complex because of these strong subconscious thoughts, and her ears began to heat up involuntarily.
Just at that moment, a low sobbing could be heard from upstairs, and the expressions of both husband and wife changed instantly. They exchanged glances and quickly got up to run upstairs.
Pushing open the door of the master bedroom, they saw William Campbell sitting on the bed with tears streaking down his face, sobbing softly. The moment he saw his parents at the door, his crying paused, and a gleam of light flickered in his tear-blurred eyes.
He abruptly stood up from the bed and rushed straight towards Adam Jones.
Adam hurriedly stepped forward to catch him, patted him gently on the bottom, suppressing the heartache that rose when he saw his son’s tear-stained face, and said:
"Why are you crying? A man shouldn’t cry at the drop of a hat."
William, held by Adam, clung tightly to his neck and buried his face in his shoulder, whispering:
"Just now I didn’t see Daddy, and I thought Daddy had left secretly again."
The words of William instantly tightened the hearts of Adam and Elly Campbell.
"William, don’t worry, Daddy won’t leave, never ever again," Adam reassured him.
He pushed William away from his shoulder and held out his pinky finger, saying:
"If you don’t believe it, let’s make a pinky promise."
William quickly extended his finger and hooked it tightly around Adam’s pinky finger, "A liar has to turn into a long-nosed one."
"Hmm, Daddy is so handsome; he definitely doesn’t want to turn into an ugly long-nosed person, so William, don’t worry, Daddy won’t leave you," Adam solemnly comforted his uneasy son.
Adam had thought that his talk from the previous day had been enough to calm his son, but he hadn’t expected that the child’s little heart could harbor such insecurity.
Elly felt even more guilty, realizing that despite having spent more than three years with her son, she had never considered how fragile his heart might be.
If it wasn’t for this recent fight with a classmate, she might have never known what her child had endured in his heart as he grew up.
Her heart felt heavy, as if it was being pressed down, making it difficult to breathe.
Seeing her standing off to the side, silent and not making a sound, Adam knew she was upset. He felt a bitter taste in his own heart.
Turning to William, he said, "Come on, Daddy will help you get dressed. We need to head out to the kindergarten for the sports meet."
"Daddy doesn’t need to; I can dress myself."
William was easy to console. He had been crying with tears and snot just a moment ago, but now, with tears still on his face, he scurried off the bed to dress himself.
Adam didn’t insist and turned to look at Elly, who was silent. He extended his hand to pull her into his embrace and once again whispered an apology, "I’m sorry, it’s all my fault."
This time, Elly unusually did not push Adam away but quietly let him hold her, as she began to ponder whether her decisions back then were right or wrong.