HOW YOU LIKE THAT | JENLISA

Chapter 65

A FEW HOURS EARLIER

Jennie

I opened the journal again to read it. Lisa was still in bed, and I was taking a bubble bath in the tub. No one was going to disturb me right now, and the door was locked. Lisa wouldn't wake up for another hour and I needed to do a pep talk before this evening. I had to convince Lisa to go on the yacht with me. I picked up reading the journal, where I left off. The next dog-eared page was four years later.

Grace Manoban

January 10th
Lalisa is such a lovely child. My dearest baby has dark hair and golden-brown eyes that look like glimmering imperial topaz. She's a gem indeed, my Lisa. She's such a smart kid, even at four, I know my Lisa is special.

I named her Lalisa because it suits her. Everyone in the household adores her. Dad is always buying her gifts and taking her out for walks. She is completely spoilt. I mean, who has a room filled with toys? She merely points at something and she gets it.

I think it's safe to say that things have changed for the better.

The madness has finally ended.

Dad has changed too. He's not doing those crazy rituals in the house anymore , and I'm sure about this because I don't see random dead bodies in the house and that gives me hope.

I think meeting his first grandchild has made him undergo a change of heart.

While I was curious to read the rest of the pages, I noticed a thick amount of omitted pages in between. Whatever happened after these chapters had to be the turning point. I skipped directly to the next marked page by Bambam.

Grace Manoban

October 17th

I feel bad for these kids. They aren't any older than Lisa. While my Lisa is twelve, Nichkhun and Sorn are ten. I think the poor kids have an abusive alcoholic father, and the mother Lorna works in the mansion gardens to support the family. She's a sweet woman, and since the kids are young, I let them play with Lisa.

You can tell by the way that the kids eat hungrily at the table that they don't get enough food. Nichkhun eats with both hands. Nichkhun doesn't look ten either, more like six years old. The girl is healthier than the boy and it makes me sad for the children.

The kids don't go to school, so I have taken upon myself to put them in schools. I don't want them to grow up without proper education and I know for a fact that their mom can't afford it. It gives me immense pleasure to do good after all the bad that has followed my family. After all the blood that's on our hands, with the fucked up ancestral traditions.

I will not let history repeat itself. It's time to change things around here.

Chris is a loving husband, and it's wonderful to see how our child is growing up to look like him.

I sat there dumbfounded by the revelation in the journal. Nichkhun and Sorn were not related to the Manoban family by blood. They weren't even Lisa's real siblings. I wanted to solve this mystery desperately, so I leafed through the pages to get to the other marked passages. I noticed how there was a time-skip now. Grace didn't write the journal daily. It was an occasional occurrence when she thought some moments were important enough to pen down.

Grace Manoban

August 13th

Dad gave Lisa a Lamborghini on her sixteenth birthday. I told daddy that it was a little too much and that Lisa shouldn't be so spoilt because it would make her think that she was invincible.

When kids were younger, it was so much easier to forgive them for the mistakes they used to make. But now that she's old enough to understand everything and I'm not sure it's even easier to try and correct their behaviour if it goes haywire.

Nichkhun and Sorn keeps complaining that Lisa bullies them at school, that she shows them she is superior. Personally, I don't believe them. Lisa has never been a vile child. She's everything that a future Manoban heir would be, which is kind, understanding, thoughtful, and smart.

She's my child, and she is growing into a person that I know I will be very proud of.

I think Lisa didn't want me and her dad to adopt Nichkhun and Sorn into the family. She's still a kid, and although the kids have played since childhood and I'd never differentiated between them, she knows and understands that they are kids of Lorna, the servant.

I also think after Bambam's birth, there's been tension between the children. Bambam is a baby, and he has taken a liking to Sorn. I think Lisa doesn't like that and I often see them arguing for the baby's attention.

I'm not sure how Chris and I are going to make this work, but we promised their mother that they were our responsibility. Dad doesn't approve of it, but I know that I have done the right thing by adopting these kids.

Yet, I'm under this constant fear that I might not be doing a good job of raising them all. But I don't regret it. I have accepted Nichkhun and Sorn into our family. They are Manobans now, and Lisa will understand that as time goes by. 

I see a beautiful dream where all the siblings sit together at the table and laugh and bicker the way that real siblings would. I want this dream to become a reality.