The early bird catches the worm, and a beautiful morning naturally begins with... an embarrassingly intimate sibling ritual.

Next door, elementary students chanted familiar ancient poems. Qi Ran, cheeks flushed after washing up, defiantly grabbed Qi Yan’s English textbook. She flipped to the vocabulary list at the back—notes still scribbled in the margins.

Qi Yan never sold, tossed, or tore up old textbooks. He kept every single one from childhood. Now, they all belonged to Qi Ran.

To her, without her brother, there would be no her—past, present, or future.

One memory stood out vividly: seventh grade. A printing delay meant textbooks wouldn’t arrive for over two weeks. Classes couldn’t wait, so everyone borrowed books from seniors.

Watching classmates around her receive books one by one, Qi Ran felt a trace of panic. It wasn’t that she *needed* the textbook—she could copy every word from the board and keep up just fine. Still, a hint of envy lingered.

She struggled with relationships, especially after transferring to the provincial capital’s elementary school. Used to rural simplicity, she felt utterly out of place. Values, spending habits, interests—nothing matched.

While other girls had close friends, Qi Ran had none. Her relationship with her desk-mate stayed lukewarm. During breaks, classmates huddled in buzzing circles, chattering about fashion magazines, celebrity gossip, and TV shows.

Qi Ran, naturally quiet and preferring to pour her heart into diaries, could never join those noisy groups. Her aloof expression kept others at bay. An unapproachable beauty with top grades, she was quietly excluded.

Borrowing a textbook? Her first thought was her brother—two years older, her obvious lifeline. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to climb to the ninth-grade floor. What if he’d already lent his book away? The thought left her cringing.

Unlike her, Qi Yan wasn’t lonely. An art club member, he had friends.

At dinner, under their family’s strict "no talking during meals" rule, Qi Ran kept stealing glances at him. Since moving to the city and entering middle school, the two-year gap between them had widened into a chasm.

He’d grown distant. His drawings now won awards and hung in hallways; her diaries and essays remained messy scribbles. A flicker of insecurity choked her words whenever she tried to talk to him.

So she barged into his room unannounced. *Too much politeness only pushes us further apart*, she told herself, acting deliberately unreasonable around him.

Qi Yan sat focused at his desk, sketching. Instant regret washed over Qi Ran—she’d interrupted him. He turned, pencil pausing. "Xiao Ran? What’s up?"

Hands clasped behind her back, she stammered, "Brother, I..."

As if reading her mind, he pulled out a textbook. "Ah! Everyone’s borrowing books, right? I saved mine for you. A junior asked, but I refused. Figured you’d struggle—you don’t have many friends..."

True as it was, Qi Ran hated hearing it. She snatched the book, shouting, "You’re the one with no friends!" before storming out.

In the end, she never even said thank you.

Now, voiceless, thousands of unspoken thanks piled heavy in her chest—but they’d never reach his ears. A written "thank you" felt too flimsy to carry the weight of what he meant to her life.

If Qi Ran had one small goal? To call him "Big Brother" again—just like before.