55 Memories (I)

"Xiao er, welcome to Tu Island!" Fu Yixiao glanced at the woman that self-claimed as her grandmother. She recalled the name the woman introduced herself with; Yun Xi. A beautiful name compared to hers. She always hated her name because every time her mother called her 'Fu Yixiao' she could almost feel the pain that would be inflicted on her body.

She ignored the excited smile on the woman's face and stared outside. She could feel the unstable piloting of the young captain maneuvering the helicopter. Sometimes, a dangerous thought popped in her mind, such as the malfunction in the system which led to an emergency landing that caused the eruption of death. She wished such things could occur. Besides, she always hated this world that filled with hypocrite people. Yun Xi; her so-called savior was also in pretense. She knew sooner or later, her real face would be revealed.

"Do you like what you see? This is the outskirt of the island. Soon, we will reach the inner part of the island. Grandma's place will be new heaven for both of us. You'll learn how to be strong and you'll meet good people there. This is an alienated world free from the people that want to harm you,"

Fu Yixiao closed her eyes, irritated that her ears were force to listen to the non-stop chatters from Yun Xi. She hated people who spoke too much and that formed a habit of her yawning to free herself from the need to reply. However, even with all the facade she did, Yun Xi seemed to be oblivious of them all and continued to talk about the island.

In the end, she found herself listening to every word she spoke. Gradually, she fell asleep after tirelessly decoding and filtering the countless information she heard from her grandmother. She woke up only at the cold sensation she felt on her forehead.

"Thank god, you're finally awake!" She saw a round, chubby face was looking at her. It was a girl with a ponytail. Her right hand was holding a wet towel. That should be the coldness she felt on her forehead.

Then, she watched the girl ran to the other room parallel to the room she was in with screams of excitement scattered from her tiny lips.

"Grandma! She's awake! Xiao meimei is awake! Come and see her!" The girl kept screaming until she reached the other room. Soon, Fu Yixiao saw Yun Xi who was holding the girl's tiny left hand walked toward her.

"Xiao er, sorry, grandma failed to notice your fever. Don't worry, Tu island had the best doctor in the world. Grandma had asked them to check on you," Fu Yixiao saw the warm in Yun Xi's eyes. She ignored the nagging feeling of questioning the two people and instead shifted her thought on her whereabouts. Judging from what Yun Xi had told her, it seemed that she had arrived at Tu island.

Fu Yixiao's eyes scanned the room and saw a row of shelves with incomprehensible bottles and flask. She looked and saw many never-be-seen before types of equipment. She assumed that it was equipment used in medical practices for some of them, she had already seen on television while living with her parent at the Fu residence.

"Xiao meimei, you must be hungry. I can share my two buns with you," The little girl with ponytail nervously shoved the two buns on top of her stomach. She stared at the girl who was staring at her with a nervous smile on her face.

"Who are you?" She asked after a while. Her eyes examined the two buns; strawberry and chocolate flavors. Then, she focused her eyes on the little girl's face.

"My name is Lu Xinya. I'm a year older than you. That's why I call you meimei,"

"Ermm, I'm happy that you came to this island. I am always alone,"

"Hehe, thanks to granda, Xinya now has a friend," Lu Xinya, the girl seemed to be a chatterbox similar to Yun Xi.

'So, she wasn't nervous,' Fu Yixiao thought after listening to the smooth way Lu Xinya was using to introduced herself. At the same time, she could feel the loneliness in her voice.

"Nice to meet you. My name is Fu Yixiao," she introduced herself with a smile that she felt was blandly formed on her face. At least, she tried. She never knew the proper way of smiling not when her previous everyday life was filled with the constant fear of her mother abuses.

And her father, he seemed to hate it when she complained about her mother. He used to be very protective of her but then one day, he changed. He ceased all contacts with her and whenever she tried to speak with him, all she received was his cold glares.

Once, she had run to his working room and showed him the red and almost bleeding bruised from the hot iron planted by her mother on her back but all he heard was him saying that he hated the whinings coming from her. She remembered him advising her to toughen up for if she did so, he would love her. Since then, she never showed any emotions whenever her father was present. Yet, the loved he promised was never given to her. Eventually, she naturally became someone who never expressed her emotion in front of others.

That's why, receiving the warm welcomed from Lu Xinya made her felt guilty for she had forgotten exactly how it was to give gratitude to others.

"Thank you," she uttered those two words with no attachment of feelings, but, seeing the gleeful smile from Lu Xinya as well as the warm, loving pat on her head from Yun Xi made her chest heavy with a bizarre feeling.

For the first time ever, she looked forward to the new life she would face in the island.

Little did she knew that she just sold herself to the devil. Three years later, after being showered with passionates cares and loved from Yun Xi, she found out about the truth hidden in the facade of kindness.

One night, she woke up in a thick dense jungle with only a backpack. Surrounding her was an endless darkness and one couldn't tell whether it was day or night.

A realization came to her that she just knocked on the door of hell. The jungle she was in wasn't an ordinary one. It was a survival land where dangers lurked everywhere.