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"Baatar, have you seen my mascara?" Kuvira called out to her husband, who happened to be downstairs sneaking a piece of the sweet egg custard tart they had consumed for dessert the night before.
"No dear." He replies, grabbing a fork before diving into the pie. Annoyed, Kuvira continues her search for her makeup accessory, digging through every draw in both her bedroom and bathroom. Even after twenty minutes of searching, she still couldn't seem to find what she was looking for. When she felt almost on the verge of giving up, that's when the light bulb in her head flickered on: Yusheng.
In a steaming fury at this point, Kuvira decided to march on over to the thirteen year-old's room for interrogation. Upon entering, bursting the door open, she caught Yusheng sitting on her bed doodling in her calligraphy notebook. She turned her attention to her mother immediately, almost practically speechless. "Where's my mascara? No one else seems to know where it is and I don't lose things that easily - so if you know where it is, then tell me! I know you've must've seen it! You're always walking into my bedroom uninvited!" Kuvira barked. As soon as she said this, her eyes somehow drifted over to Yusheng's dresser, spotting the mascara in question sitting stately on its surface. Yusheng looked over in the same direction as well, and watched in the mirror as her mother's facial expression changed within a matter of seconds.
Completely at the tip of her rage, and without warning, Kuvira grabbed Yusheng by the arm and dragged her off of the bed, causing Yusheng's pencil and notebook to drop onto the floor at her feet. Her daughter looked up at her with horror. "What did I say about touching my things?! How many times do I have to keep repeating myself?! What are you doing with my mascara anyways?!"
Yusheng trembled in fear as she tried to find the words to say. "I...I...I just wanted to try it. I was borrowing it....I was gonna give it back. I....I just wanna be pretty like you..."
Kuvira shoved Yusheng's body against the back wall, and slapped her in the face with the back of her hand. Her wedding ring left a slice on Yusheng's cheek. "What are you trying to get all pretty for?! What man do you think will ever want you?! Stop trying to be like me! Stop trying to take my things! You'll never be worth more than the dirt on the ground, so stop trying to pretend you're me! And the next time I catch you waltzing into my bedroom unannounced or find out that you're going in there regardless, I'm going to break your goddamn legs! Stay out of my way and away from my things - you stupid fuck!" With that, Kuvira grabbed her mascara off of the dresser and stormed out of the bedroom, leaving her daughter in tears.
That same night, when Kuvira returned back home from a party out in town, celebrating the bank's success with her employees and managers, she stumbles through the front door of her house, completely intoxicated. Baatar was already in bed upstairs, fast asleep, as was the rest of the household. He knew his wife was going out that night; she had already informed him upon leaving their residence during dinner time. Making her way up the stairs and almost tripping on her own two feet, she soon finds her way into Yusheng's room, quietly bolting the door behind her.
Staring down at her firstborn with eyes full of malice, Kuvira grabs the bedsheet covering Yusheng and drags it off if her, causing her daughter to shiver instantly. Kuvira then removes her belt from around her waist and places it around Yusheng's neck, almost like a leash. When she was done fastening it together, she then yanks the tail-end of it, dragging Yusheng right out of the bed and across the floor onto the balcony. Yusheng's eyes pop right open as she gasps for air upon feeling the sensation of being treated like a dog. Her hands clung to the belt wrapped around her neck, trying to keep it from choking her to death.
As soon as they got to the balcony, Kuvira ties the belt to one of the wooden posts and leaves Yusheng there to retrieve a bottle of bourbon from her office. She returns soon enough, chugging some liquor from the bottle in her drunken stupor. Yusheng whimpers, trying to loosen the leather belt from her throat. "Momma...please....let me go. I'm tired, and I wanna sleep..." she begs, almost on the verge of tears. Kuvira responds to her pitiful noise by spitting out a mouthful of bourbon into her daughter's face.
"I didn't ask you to talk...*hiccup*...." Her mother then says before taking another swig. "You think men want a girl with a dick? You think anyone will ever love you?! *hiccup* You wanna look pretty, huh? You wanna know what else looks pretty Yusheng? Seeing your blood splattered all over the floor!" With that, Kuvira throws the glass bottle at the young girl and proceeds to remove the belt from the wooden post. She then picks up Yusheng with her two hands and holds her body up in the air, just about ready to cast her daughter down to the foyer below. Yusheng wails and screams the whole while, still not fully understanding what she's done to deserve such a punishment.
She assumed that Raava must've heard her cries, because the next thing she knew, her father had showed up and pulled her mother back away from the edge of the balcony, seconds before she was about to be sent to her death. Both Yusheng and Kuvira fell backwards onto the floor, with Baatar continuing to hold his wife down and away from their daughter. He tried calming her down, hoping that he'd be able to knock some sense into her before things got any worse.
Yusheng gazed down at the glass cut marks that lined her arms and legs. The bottom of her left foot also had a glass splinter that made its way through her skin. Some blood gushed out, but it wasn't too bad; this could easily be removed. A simple task her father could take into his own hands.
She looks up again, tears still falling down her soft cheeks, and makes eye contact with her little brother, who was standing by the doorway of his bedroom all shocked and confused. She suspected her screaming had woken him up out of his sleep as well. Why didn't she drag him out of bed too? Yusheng thinks to herself out of jealousy and anger. Why is Mom always coming after me? She never puts a finger on Lu. It's not fair....
Likewise, Lu never had a clue as to why Kuvira treated Yusheng the way she did, beating up on her for even the most simple and harmless of mistakes, like forgetting to cover her nose and mouth when she sneezed, or forgetting to greet her mother upon returning home from school in the afternoons. It seemed kind of ridiculous - all of it; but that's how things were, and it was improbable that it could be changed. On the contrary, Kuvira was always smiling at him, being a darling angel to him and whatnot, sending kisses his way even if he did nothing to deserve them. All Yusheng ever got, as she recalled, was the cold shoulder.
Her mother was a strong woman, and Yusheng wanted to be just like her. In her mind, this was probably the only way she could gain Kuvira's approval. Instead, all she got was denial and reprimands from trying to steal her mother's belongings and experimenting with some of her clothing items as well as other things of personal value.
Kuvira's vinyl records and mascara were just the beginning. What would come next was her perfumes, her cigarettes, her lingerie, her hair products, and her jewelry. With each act of thievery, each punishment became more severe than the last. The second time that Kuvira caught Yusheng masturbating, she didn't hesitate to hold her daughter down and threaten to castrate her with a pocket knife. Baatar had to come to the rescue once again.
"Stop protecting her! She should know better than to whip out her penis for anything other than taking a piss in the bathroom!" Kuvira shouted to her husband.
Baatar only frowned in disapproval. "Kuvira, she's a teenager now! This kind of thing is normal for them! Don't act like you weren't her age once! Now I'm for sure she's traumatized! You tried to cut off her genital area!"
"So what?! She should know better! Next thing you know she'll start whoring around and asking for sex from all types of people! What man would want to screw her anyway?! It's disgusting!"
"Stop it! You shouldn't be judging her based off of her gender and sexual orientation! She's intersex - I get that - but she's also allowed to have any partner and live any lifestyle she chooses! She's a human too!"
"She may be human, but she's no daughter of mine. If she has no respect for my things, then she has no respect for me!"
Baatar shook his head and says gravely, "Has it ever occurred to you that she just wants your love? She looks up to you Kuvira. Maybe you should acknowledge that for once."
"What more do you people want from me?! She's just lucky that I have the slightest bit of mercy on her, being that I haven't put her in the ground yet!" She says in distaste before brushing past his shoulder with much vexation and heading back upstairs to her bedroom.
"Daddy, do you think Mommy will like me better if I got her some flowers for Mother's Day?" Yusheng asks after breakfast one morning, just before Baatar was about to head straight out the door and to the University. He knew he was running a tad bit late, but still ponders for a moment as he retrieves his briefcase by the front door where he always placed it after work, watching his daughter scratch the back of her leg with her foot in nervousness.
Removing his glasses from the bridge of his nose to wipe them in his shirt, he then replies hesitantly, "Well, it's definitely a start. I can't guarantee anything, but it's definitely worth the shot." After returning his glasses to their proper place, a quick glance at his watch gave him his cue to leave. "We'll talk later Yusheng. I have to get to work now. I love you - bye!"
"But Daddy-" It was too late. He was already out the front door. She wanted to beg him for money again, especially since she didn't get an allowance from her parents like any other normal kid her age would. Kuvira forbid it, simply stating that "she didn't need money if she was already being provided for." Still though, it would've been nice to have a little bit of spare change. The only time I ever really get money is on New Year's or my birthday. But even then, it's only ever enough to buy an ice cream cone, Yusheng thinks to herself as she ascends the staircase to grab her satchel before she left for school.
Just when she least expected it, her mother called out to her. "Yusheng! Come here!" She hurriedly made her way over to Kuvira's office, wondering what she's gotten herself into now. Once she entered the room, she found her mother brushing Lu's hair behind the desk, looking slightly annoyed in the face.
"Yes Mother? You called for me?" Yusheng says nervously.
Kuvira doesn't look in her direction, continuing her activity. "Of course I called for you! Who else in this house has the same name as you?!" She then places the brush down on her desk top and double-taps Lu on the back, signaling him to leave the room. Looking her daughter in the face now, she states, "Don't forget to drop your brother off to his class like usual. And don't leave him in front of the schoolyard like you did last time. If he comes home today and tells me you did that again, it's not going to end well for you-"
"But momma, he's almost nine years old-"
"Don't talk over me! Do you want me to bust your lip like I did in the past?! Then shut up and listen!" Yusheng nodded in agreement, shuddering at her mother's voice. Letting out a sigh to try and regain some form of contentment, Kuvira then says, "Did your father give you money today?"
She stuttered her words a little before responding. "Um...n-no Mother. He didn't. Was Daddy supposed to give me money?" Kuvira puts a hand to her forehead and groans.
"I knew he'd forget! He was supposed to give you some lunch money today for school because there wasn't any food in the house to pack you two anything and I don't have any cash on me at the moment! I gave what I had to Lu."
"So then, momma...what am I gonna eat?"
Kuvira sighed again. "I don't know Yusheng. We didn't go grocery shopping yesterday because we were busy with other things. Go and dig out of a garbage can or something. I can't help you right now." Yusheng’s eyes began to get watery at the thought of getting beat up at school by her bullies if she somehow didn't hand up some collateral to save her from a black eye.
"Momma....they're gonna beat me up again if I don't give them something, like money or food. What am I gonna do? Don't you have at least one gold piece?"
Kuvira got infuriated by such a display of begging. "What did I just say?! Don't patronize me! That's a personal problem of yours - not mine! Stop being such a pussy and stand your goddamn ground! What do you think they're gonna do?! Rape you?! Don't be ridiculous! It's a bunch of thirteen and fourteen year-olds you're dealing with, for Raava's sake!"
Yusheng really wished that her mother was telling the truth. Alas, life played unfair. Once lunchtime rolled around, Yusheng had no choice but to get dragged out of the cafeteria and into the school hallway by a group of boys who were about a year older than she was. They spotted her sitting by herself at one of the lunch tables, doodling in her class workbook, trying to take her mind off of food, and took the opportunity to bully her once more.
She tried to fight them off - but it was five to one, unfortunately for her. "Leave me alone! What do you want from me?! I don't have anything! My mom didn't give me money or food today! Can't you see that?!" Yusheng shouted at the posse before their leader decided to punch Yusheng in the stomach.
"That sounds like a personal problem, Yusheng. You still owe us something!" He sneered.
"But I already told you - I don't have anything!" She cried in retaliation. They had her surrounded, and held her by the arms with her back pinned against the wall. Sweat lined her forehead, as she tried to conjure up a method to get out of this situation. She personally didn't know martial arts or any self-defense techniques either way, so she was just about ready to give up and give in. That's when her captors started having their own brilliant ideas.
"Quick! Pull her pants down!" One said.
"Yeah, I wanna see her dick too!" Another interjected.
Yusheng shook her head wildly and started crying. "No! Stop it! Leave me alone!"
"No - wait! I gotta better idea! Let's stick her into the janitors closet and stuff our dicks in her mouth!" Their leader chimed in. She was beginning to hyperventilate now.
"Or we could hang her from the flag pole?!"
"Hey - what about my idea?!"
"Your idea sucks! How about we just throw her into the dumpsters, like the piece of trash she is?!"
"We'd probably get more fun out of screwing her! That's what my brother does to his girlfriend when she comes over sometimes!"
"It's not like she has a pussy, stupid head! She's not a real girl! She's just a weirdo!"
All of the back-and-forth, about how to go about violating her this way and that, almost sent her on a one-way trip to Hell. "How about it Yusheng," the leader smirks in a sultry manner, "You like guys, don't you?" The response he wanted never came. Yusheng just stood there, sweating profusely, and too shaken up to say anything back. Impatient and annoyed, the gang leader decided to take a swing at her to the jaw. His posse soon followed, sending punches her way all over her upper body.
Yusheng tried crying and screaming loudly for help all the while, but none ever came. After about five minutes of giving her a beating, her bullies then decided to bring her outside to the flag pole in front of the school building. They unraveled the rope from the post and brought it down the pole, removing the Earth Federation flag and creating a noose, hoping to hang Yusheng from the top with it.
As soon as they placed the noose and tightened it around Yusheng's neck, just seconds before they hoisted her up the pole, the school's headmaster had called out to them, making his way over to the scene in haste. "Hey, you boys there - what do you think you're doing?!" He scolded, which somehow signaled the group of boys to begin scattering from the evidence, as fast as their legs could carry them. One of the boys, however, seeing the job as incomplete, attempted to try and finish carrying out the mission by pulling down on the rope, which sent Yusheng up the flag pole immediately, and then proceeded to tie the knot around the halyard. During those few moments that she was hanging in the air with a rope tied around her neck, her legs wriggled wildly about, gasping for breath to keep herself from suffocating as she did so. Her cheeks were flowing with watery tears, bawling out and crying horrendously at the thought of never seeing the light of day again.
Once more, the Spirits were in her favor, because the next thing she knew, the tightness of the rope had loosened and she was slowly descending from thirty feet in the air. Upon landing on the ground on her two feet and collapsing to her knees, the headmaster had rushed over to her, asking Yusheng if she was alright as he removed the noose from its place. She coughed and coughed, trying to get air back into her throat before she could answer him.
With one look at him in sheer anger, she replies to his question by saying, "How could you let people here get away with stuff like that?! They always try to beat me up! It's not fair!" The headmaster could say nothing more besides bringing Yusheng into the front office to get her looked at by a nurse while he contacted her parents about the incident.
"What's the problem this time?" Kuvira asked in annoyance once she entered the headmaster's office with Baatar and Lu by her side. She then eyed Yusheng sitting in the chair in front of the desk, and abruptly grabbed her daughter by the shoulder, yanking her up out of the seat in order to make eye contact with her. "What did you do this time?!" Yusheng gulped; her cheeks were still wet with the tears she shed from earlier. Kuvira took one hard look at the bruises and the black eye her daughter bore on her face and couldn't help but further question the situation. She gazes up at the headmaster with a confused expression and then says, "What happened to her? Why is her face like this?"
With a grim tone in his voice, the older man sighed and said, "She was assaulted and hung up the school's flag pole today by a group of boys in the higher-level grade. According to Yusheng, they wanted to take her lunch money. But since she didn't have any money or food to give them, they beat her up in retaliation. One of the boys that was an accomplice to all of this is sitting out there in front of the door. You passed him before you came in. His name is Wang Lei.”
Baatar furrowed his eyebrows. "So what are you planning to do about this, Sir? Should we press charges? This boy should be punished for hurting our daughter the way he did.”
"Unfortunately, I can’t really do much of anything about punishing Wang Lei. His parents are huge donors to this school and the police station. If they see their son expelled or suspended, or possibly even thrown in jail, we'd lose their support. His family has a lot of influence in Ba Sing Se. A lot of money was thrown on the table to ensure their son’s protection from criminal indictment."
Baatar clenches his fist, hot-headed with a fury. "So what can you do to this kid?! We can't just let him walk free?!"
The headmaster sighed again. "I'll inform his parents about the matter, if that would make you feel at ease, Sir. I'll ask and see what they want to do about this."
Before Baatar could say anything else back, Kuvira held up a hand. “It’s fine Baatar. I don’t see any reason to push this issue any further. Let’s get out of here.” With that, she takes Yusheng by the arm and storms out of the office.
“Don’t even think about calling yourself a woman until you’ve learned to stand up for yourself without having a man by your side to do it for you,” Kuvira scolds as she tends to her daughter’s bloody nose, cleaning it up with cotton balls. Yusheng didn’t want to say anything back. All she wanted to do, at this point, was crawl into her bed and cry. “Stop your sniffling. You’re making the blood go back up your insides.”
“I want an allowance,” Yusheng says nonchalantly.
“Don’t ask me for money. I didn’t raise you to be spoiled.”
"But it's not fair -"
"Shut up. I'm not telling you again. Don't ask me for money. I mean it."
"How come other kids get money and allowances from their parents and I don't?" Annoyed, Kuvira took Yusheng by the chin and stared straight into her eyes, striking fear into her heart.
"Did you not hear me the first time?! Apparently you're going deaf too! No is no! And if you ask me - you don't deserve to have an allowance if you're being such a slacker all the time! You can't even do what you're told to when you're at home, and you're too stupid for school! Your brother performs better than you do and he's the younger one! It's pathetic!" Kuvira immediately shoves Yusheng aside once she said her piece and proceeds to throw away the bloody cotton balls. "Get out. I don't want to see your face for the rest of the evening."
"But momma..."
Kuvira flashes her eyes at her. "Get out! You're an embarrassment to me and the entire Beifong family! Leave, if you know what's good for you!" Yusheng couldn't contain the tears this time; in fact, she never could. She always tried playing the stronger woman by taking her mother's beatings and displays of verbal abuse with a grain of salt by holding back her emotions and the desire to shed her inner pain, but that never worked. Yusheng couldn’t contain herself, unable to bear the dreaded feeling of torment her mother afflicted upon her. None of it was fair; but it was the life she had to live with at the moment.
As she ran out of her parent's bedroom in tears, her father walked right past her, and soon stopped in place, looking back at her with much confusion. He then strolled on over to his wife in the bathroom and questioned, "Kuvira, what did you do to her?!"
She didn't give him her attention, keeping her gaze fixated towards her reflection in the mirror. "I didn't do anything," she replies.
"Then what did you say to her?!" He sounded much more angry now, almost as if he was about to blow his top off.
"All I said were some words of discipline, Baatar. Nothing too out of the ordinary."
"I'm starting to question your version of ordinary. What you claim is ordinary, I call abuse," Kuvira instantly shot a look at him from where she stood. "Yusheng doesn't deserve to be treated this way, Kuvira. She's just a little girl."
"She's going through puberty Baatar. She's not little anymore. Stop using that as an excuse for her actions and idiocy. Instead of being a role model to Lu, she's a perfect example of a complete failure."
Baatar shook his head, sighing heavily. "Kuvira, she's thirteen years old! She hasn't even reached adulthood yet! How about you just give her some time and patience?!" She strides her way past him in anger and over to her vanity mirror to remove her bracelet and earrings.
"Patience and nonsense is exactly what I don't have time for Baatar. Time is what we don't have in general. Life is too short and I feel like I'm getting older by the second. I'm already thirty-eight years old. Anything's bound to happen at this point. Raava-forbid I drop dead tomorrow and leave our kids motherless. What'll become of them?!"
"So then why do you insist on treating Yusheng like shit?! What's the matter with you?!" There was a few moments of silence between them that began at that very instant. Neither words nor the smallest pin drop was heard; a hushed whisper couldn't even manage to escape either one of their lips.
About a minute later, Kuvira decided to speak once again. "She's not the daughter I thought she would be....what I had hoped for. And I know for a fact that men will only judge her for what she's hiding beneath her clothes. She'll never get married and she'll never have children. Even now, I don't know what I did wrong in my pregnancy with her; I still blame myself for it all. Lu is our only hope at this point."
He furrows his eyebrows. "Our only hope of what?"
"Keeping our bloodline alive. Our legacy. Both yours and mine."
On Mother's Day morning, Yusheng followed her father to the flower boutique on the other side of the Middle Ring so he could help her pick out a nice set of flowers for Kuvira.
"Ah, yes," Baatar says to Yusheng as he picks up a flower pot filled with panda lillies and hands it to her, "These should do nicely. They're your mother's favorite flowers, you know."
His daughter raised an eyebrow at him. "How come?"
"Because they're so rare. Rare, yet beautiful. They grow at the tops of volcanoes. To find one out there in the wild is considered good luck."
Yusheng screwed up her face a little bit. "They look weird. I like moon flowers better. Those are my favorite. I think they're very pretty, Daddy. Don't you?"
He chuckles in response. "Yes, my little angel. They are very beautiful too." After a bit more browsing, they soon turned heel and headed to the cash register to make their purchase. Yusheng had brought the rest of her savings with her in order to buy the flowers for her mother.
On the train ride back home, Yusheng decided to ask her father a question that had been burning on her mind for hours. She was hesitant at the thought of doing so, not knowing how he'd take it. "Daddy..." she began.
"Yes Yusheng?" He said, staring back at her.
She glances down at her worn-down shoes and the flower pot, and then looks up at him. "Do you think I'll get married one day? Mommy is always telling me that I won't. She thinks that no one will love me because of my weenie. Is that true?” Baatar shakes his head in disappointment for Kuvira. Of course she would try to fill our daughter’s head with such nonsense. That’s just like her, he thinks to himself.
“Only insecure people would go out of their way to say such things to you, Yusheng. Your mother should know better. Don’t listen to any of the foolishness she tells you. It’s not right.” He said. Yusheng nods in acknowledgement.
"Here you go momma. I bought you some flowers. Daddy said these were your favorite: panda lillies," Yusheng announces in a semi-happy tone, trying to put on a pleasant face for her mother. Kuvira takes one glance up at the arrangement and then immediately returns her attention to the paperwork sitting on her desk that she was in the middle of signing before her daughter decided to interrupt her.
"Take them back. I don't want them," She says indifferently. Yusheng’s heart began to melt. Her arms suddenly drooped, pulling back the flower pot that she once held up to her mother so proud before hearing those words of disapproval.
"B-but...but...but momma...."
"Get out of my sight Yusheng. I'm busy. I don't want anything you have to offer me. I don't want anything from you."
"But...I can't give these back. It's Mother's Day."
"I could care less if it was my birthday - I don't want your fucking flowers!"
"I wanted to get something nice for you."
"Get out of my face Yusheng....."
"Why don't you like it? Did I do something wrong?"
Kuvira stands up suddenly from her chair behind the desk and shouts, "What part of 'get out' don't you fucking understand?!" before slapping Yusheng across the face with the back of her hand, causing her to drop the flower pot, which broke into pieces and spread dirt across the floor. Her daughter burst into tears and made her attempt to scramble her way to the door before her mother got to her; but it was too late. Kuvira metal-bended the bolt shut just as Yusheng grabbed hold of the handle. Yusheng tried to pry the door open and unlock the bolt, but it was no use. As soon as she turned her head around to face her mother, Kuvira was already standing right in front of her, all red in the face. She grabs Yusheng by the throat with one hand and threw her down to the floor, in which she then saw as another opportunity to give her daughter a beating she would never forget.
That was probably the last time Yusheng would ever try and attempt to please her mother. What she soon came to realize, was that there was no point in avoiding the beatings or the harsh reprimands anymore, because she'd get them anyway for even just breathing within two feet of Kuvira. It didn't matter if Yusheng already came home in tears from getting bullied at school; Kuvira failed to have any sympathy whatsoever. Even Lu tried to step up for Yusheng at one point and stop his mother from hitting his older sister, only to get shoved aside. It was practically routine: all the yelling and screaming and crying just next door to his own. Every afternoon it was almost the exact same thing, and Lu was starting to get tired of it.
"Mom, why do you always hurt Yusheng? I'm trying to do my homework and I can't focus because she's crying all the time because you keep hitting her and yelling at her," he asked her once.
Kuvira gave him a straight face and replied, "Don't meddle in things that don't concern you, Lu."
"I'm just asking-" He continues.
"What did I just say?" Kuvira says through gritted teeth. Shivers went instantly down his spine. She never usually got angry or remotely upset at him, except if he somehow screwed up a lot during training. For her to have to talk to him in such a manner, especially when it concerned family, must've meant that the topic was either too serious or rather taboo to where it should be kept under the table.
--
"Baatar, honey....the kids should be asleep now...." Kuvira says, planting kisses along the back of his neck as she embraces him from behind. He was a bit more preoccupied with removing his expensive Future Industries wristwatch than acknowledging his wife's obvious compulsion to make love on a Wednesday night.
He takes a deep breath. "If you want me to get into bed with you, I need you to promise me something....."
"Yes dear. What is it?"
"I need you to stop beating up on Yusheng."
She pulled back rather quickly, raising an eyebrow. "What?"
"Every day I see her, she always looks so sad and depressed, like she had just gotten the life taken out of her. It's not good for a young teenager like herself to be experiencing such a lifestyle like this. One day she'll end up wanting to kill herself if this keeps up. Whatever you're doing to her before I come home from work, it needs to stop, now. She's already facing enough torture at school from getting bullied by her classmates. There's not much we can do about that, but the bottom line is: you don't need to be bullying her here too. I'm pretty sure she's already tired of getting such maltreatment-"
"I run this house when you're out at the university, Baatar. Let's get that straight. Whatever I say, goes."
"Kuvira, there are limits-"
"Fuck that! Yusheng should know who's boss when she walks in through that front door upon coming home from school! She should know when to greet her own mother and when to do her chores and all of the other simple things she acts like she can't do! I can't help but wonder why she's so stupid all the time! And then she even has the audacity to steal my things and leave her room a mess-"
"Kuvira! Please! Why is any of that so important?! She's your only daughter, for crying out loud! Yes, we should teach her to not take things from other people without permission - but you shouldn't have to be so hard on her all the time! She's got a life too! Let her be happy for a change! She's a teenager! It's okay to leave her room messy every once-in-a-while! Let her go out and make friends and have a good time with other people! I'm pretty sure she wants to have a social life instead of being stuck here doing chores and homework, and having to see your face every afternoon at 2 p.m.! Even if she just wants to go out alone for a little fresh air, you should let her!"
"And what will people think of us when they realize that she has a dick?! It'll put the entire Beifong family into shame! I probably won't get any business at the bank anymore because of it!"
"Kuvira, it's not like she's gonna be dropping her panties out in the street for anyone-"
"That's what you think! Like you said, she's a teenager! They all love to explore! And when the time comes for her to start having sexual thoughts, she'll want to screw everyone and anyone who crosses her path! And then the whole world will know!"
"Kuvira, she's not that kind of girl!"
"You're full of shit, Baatar! Do you hear the fuckery that's coming out of your mouth?! When was the last time you saw her naked Baatar?! Because the last time I checked - she's pretty hung down there and it shows through her clothing! So yes - it's kind of obvious that she has a cock!"
"Why would I want to look at my own daughter naked for?! What kind of father would I be?! She deserves her privacy Kuvira, and it sounds like you could give her some too!"
"For what?! She deserves to be humiliated for being so incompetent anyway! What man is going to want a woman with a body like hers?!"
He started to tear up a bit at his wife's cruel words. "How could you just go on with your life, torturing a little thirteen year-old girl like that?! You're making her feel worthless!"
"As she should be!"
It was at this moment that Baatar realized, that the woman standing in front of him wasn’t the same woman he married; and in such, he began to wonder, what he had gotten himself into.