Chapter 13
I had guessed she would ask this, so within a few seconds I gave her the answer: I met a tabby cat, and it couldn't bring your cat back, so it asked me to send it back.
The girl was stunned. Just when I thought she couldn't understand my sign language and was about to explain it again, she suddenly raised her hand and gestured to me: Thank you so much for helping Lihua!
This time it was my turn to be surprised: You actually know sign language?
The girl smiled and said: My mother is deaf and dumb, and I majored in special education in college, so I understand.
Then, the girl asked me again: "When you were holding Huang Huang and approaching me, I didn't see the tabby cat. Didn't it lead you here? Or did it come and leave?"
It seemed like I was on the verge of being exposed, but I didn't panic. Instead, I was very calm: it seemed to have some mission, and after sending me to the intersection, it turned and left.
The girl understood and nodded slightly. Then, she suddenly realized my problem and pointed to her ears: You are not deaf and dumb, can you hear with your ears?
I nodded: I just can't speak.
She told me that, in a way, although I can't speak, I am undoubtedly a lucky person.
This statement is true, and I also feel lucky.
The girl subconsciously wanted to communicate with me using sign language, but then she realized I could hear her, so she simply kept it simple and spoke directly to me, "Thank you for bringing Huang Huang from Lihua to me. As a token of gratitude, I'll treat you to a meal! I don't know what you like or what your appetite is, but once you've chosen, I'll pick up the bill."
As a cat used to living in its original form, I am not used to eating human food in human form, especially when facing unfamiliar people, so I rejected the girl's idea on the spot.
It was at that moment that I suddenly thought of a better way to thank her, so I told the girl my unreasonable request.
I took a smartphone from the girl.
Since I couldn't beg for treats in cat form, I, as a human, was thinking about how to choose the best thing for myself to maximize the results of my efforts. Almost instantly, I thought of the phone.
Of course, I knew cell phones weren't something you could buy for a few bucks, and I wasn't so shameless as to ask a young girl for a new one. I remembered the restaurant owner's recommendation that Li Ying'an buy a used phone, so looking at the delicate girl before me, I wondered if she might have one.
For the same reason I told Li Ying'an before, I used my miserable life experience to arouse her sympathy, and then added fuel to the fire to create a more miserable image for myself.
But before making up a lie, I asked her if she had a second-hand phone, so as not to make a false appearance. When I found out that she did, I told her my miserable life story without hesitation, and finally asked her carefully about the phone.
"Oh my God, I didn't expect you to be around my age. I thought you were underage." Her watery eyes softened instantly, and when she looked at me, she was filled with deep pity, as if she was about to become a mother. "I sympathize with you and feel sorry for you, but stealing is definitely not a good thing to do. So if you need a phone, I will definitely help you."
I followed her back to her place.
She lived in the apartment rented by Li Ying'an, but they were not on the same floor. The girl's home was two floors higher.
We stopped in front of her house, but I didn't see her take the key from her bag to open the door, so I guessed there was someone else at home.
Sure enough, as soon as we opened the door, we ran into a woman head-on.
At first glance, I knew it was probably the girl's mother.
She has the same mold as the girl, a standard Western woman's appearance, but the mother's face looks deeper.
The woman in the house didn't expect her daughter to come home with a child who looked malnourished. She stood at the door for a while, and then she came to her senses and asked: Who is this child?
The girl replied with a smile: It’s the brother I just met. He helped me find the lost Huang Huang. I treated him to some water.
When she heard that Huang Huang had been found, the woman's smile deepened. She quickly invited us both into the house while she went to the kitchen to cut fruit.
Watching her mother's busy back, the girl turned around and finished what she had just said: "My name is Li Lan, I'm two years older than you. From now on, you can call me Sister Lan. What's your name?"
Li Ying'an named me Li Youzhi, but I was a cat at that time. In order to avoid trouble in the future, I racked my brains to think about it, and finally made up a name: Li Feng.
Who made me have a maple leaf on my back?
"What a coincidence, we both have the surname Li, so we are a family."
I didn't expect the girl's surname was Li.
My first day on earth after returning from Heaven was at the western tip of my homeland. Without a clear destination, I could only wander aimlessly. Although the Goddess Wuqing deprived me of the right to speak, she granted me the ability to understand human speech.
In my impression, Western people's names are very long, like a wide map.
So Li Lan's name broke my cognition.
“That’s because I’m not a minority.”
While we were talking, Li Lan's mother had already cut the fruit and placed it on the table. Then she sat on the sofa with a smile on her face, her eyes moving back and forth between Li Lan and me.
The approach of strangers always makes me alert, especially when their gaze is fixed on me. I will subconsciously look back and ignore Li Lan's attention to me.
Perhaps noticing my discomfort, Li Lan turned around, handed me the peeled apple, and urged: Don’t wait for Huang Huang to come home, she lives in the yard, you should go back to your room and rest first.
The mother was anxious: Why is Huang Huang in the hospital?
Li Lan said helplessly: I was given anesthesia, it's okay.
Holding the fruit, my mother nodded uneasily, but still pretended to be in a good mood and let Li Lan treat me well.
The door to the room gently opened and closed, and Li Lan's gaze shifted. She lowered her eyes and looked back, forcing a tired smile at me, followed by a sigh.
Her expression seemed to tell me that she had a story.
I also happen to be curious as to why her mother followed her here.
"Because my father died when I was very young."
Li Lan's father died when she was ten years old. It was a serious car accident. Her father was knocked off a cliff by a truck and died on the spot.
After hearing the news, my mother became almost a different person. She was not good at speaking and became even more depressed. The root of her physical illness also lay at that time.
As an only child, Li Lan supported the family when she was still a minor. She had to go to school and do odd jobs. It was she who accompanied her mother to slowly walk out of the shadow of the past, and it was she who tried every means to help her mother put aside the pain she had suffered.
She once had a plain white cat, and it was that cat that helped her mother to struggle out of her past misery.
But the cat was killed by someone.
Li Lan still remembers that she was studying in another city at the time. She had just finished class when she received a call from her mother, who was sobbing and saying that their white cat had been poisoned to death by a neighbor.
Li Lan still remembers a neighbor couple who came to her house the year her father died. Their intention wasn't to offer comfort, but to persuade her mother to remarry. Their plan was brilliant: they profited from the marriage and sought a good reputation and favors, but were ultimately rejected.
Li Lan's mother did not want to remarry. She would rather raise her daughter alone, no matter how poor and unhappy her life was.
The couple who were not treated well held a grudge against each other.
People around her didn't care much about Li Lan's mother. They thought she was deaf-mute and unsociable, so she was inferior. Whenever there were any gatherings, they would just drag her in to make up the number. She was just an insignificant character.
But this was only the beginning. The real conflict arose when the couple's son fell in love with the white cat Li Lan brought home and cried out for it. The couple, who had spoiled their child, pretended to be kind and approached Li Lan's mother again, but was rejected again. Furious, they encouraged their son to poison the white cat, which held such profound significance.
In the surveillance video, the couple did not care and let their child hit the cat, and then fed the white cat poison when it was dying.
The surveillance camera was bought by Li Lan when he was in college. It was installed in an inconspicuous location just to ensure his mother's safety.
Now this became evidence in the mother's hands. After failing to get an explanation from the couple, she took the video to the police. However, the police were overwhelmed with their daily workload. For them, the death of a cat was not the death of a person, so they couldn't afford to waste their resources on such a matter. They could only mediate a few words and ask the couple to pay some compensation for emotional distress, or perhaps a cat as compensation.
To Li Lan's mother, nothing held more meaning than the white cat. Its passing was like siphoning away half of her soul. For a long time afterwards, she was in a daze, even maliciously labeled a psychopath, even though she had done nothing wrong.
So, Li Lan, who couldn't bear it, resolutely took her mother from her hometown to live with her during her internship in her senior year. With her tenacious perseverance, she broke through the pressure of life and study, worked to rent a house, took care of her deaf and mute mother, and adopted a stray cat from the neighborhood again. The cat is now Huang Huang.
"With Huang Huang's company, Mom's mental state is getting better and better. I don't want this peace of mind to be disrupted, so I was very anxious when Huang Huang went missing today." Li Lan thanked me again, "Huang Huang is no longer just a cat, she is a member of our family. Thank you very much for helping me bring Huang Huang back. I'll go buy you a new phone!"
His words suddenly changed from expressing his feelings to wanting to buy me a new phone. I was so surprised that I quickly refused.
Of course I know that new things are better than old things, but I want to give this phone to Li Ying'an.
If I bring back an old cell phone, Li Ying'an might praise me for my ability, and even if he suspects me, he won't punish me; on the contrary, if I give him a new cell phone, he will definitely suspect that I stole it and will definitely beat me up!
I shook my head, rejecting Li Lan's offer: "Just give me one you've used. I don't even know how to use a smartphone."
I must ask Li Lan to teach me how to use it. When Li Ying'an gets it to study, I will show him my skills.
After several refusals, Li Lan finally compromised with me.
She spent half an hour teaching me some basic mobile phone operations. I couldn't help but secretly praise myself for having a good brain, and thanked the Goddess Wuqing for giving me human intelligence. Otherwise, if I turned into a human form, I would have no face to live in this world.
As expected of a college student, Li Lan’s ability to explain is outstanding, and even I, who have poor comprehension skills, can understand him in a short time.
Before Li Lan's mother went out to keep me for dinner, I had already run to the bottom of the community, hid in the corner and turned back into a cat.
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