MOKA stared intensely at her cell phone screen.
Because the money had been sent via a WeChat transfer, she was not sure if Su Li had actually received it.
Theoretically, Su Li should have replied to her message the moment she received the money.
MOKA felt a bit of regret.
If only she hadn’t worried about the transaction being a loss or entertained the thought of skipping out on the bill.
However, she had paid a heavy price for that mistake, and fortunately, she could now afford to bear it.
As long as Su Li did not end their transaction, she was willing to do anything.
She did not want to be phased out.
When no reply came from Su Li after a long time, MOKA picked up a bottle and began chugging the alcohol.
In the past, drinking might have sparked some interest or provided some inspiration.
But now, after gulping down the wine, her head felt heavy and dizzy.
MOKA sprawled on the sofa at home, her thumb rapidly scrolling through the soaring playback volume curve.
The blue light from the screen made her pupils tremble. The corners of her mouth started to turn up into a smile, only to flatten into a straight line again.
The data charts were like fireworks—the more brilliant the explosion, the faster they faded.
But even if it was as brief as a firework, the excitement it brought her was real.
No one could keep themselves going forever, even if she believed she was a genius.
The pressures from reality and various other levels were so heavy that she could hardly breathe.
She couldn’t even find the energy to focus on songwriting.
She was no longer the innocent little girl who only thought about creating.
Her nails unconsciously scratched the edge of her cell phone case as the words of praise in the comment section exploded before her eyes one after another.
She suddenly buried her face in her knees, her body rising and falling slightly with her breath.
The charging cable was twisted like a pretzel, and the plug scratched long, thin marks on the wooden floor.
In the past, seeing such appreciative comments would have excited her, but not anymore.
At the thought that her songwriting would be like constipation once Su Li was gone, MOKA did not dare to imagine what the comment section would look like then.
‘Su Li…’
She looked at the cell phone screen; Su Li still had not replied to her message.
MOKA’s fingertips hovered over the keyboard, trembling.
The “Are you there?” that she typed and then deleted felt like a coin stuck in the cracks of piano keys.
She never expected that she would become this kind of desperate simp.
The light from the neon lights outside moved across the ceiling. She stared at the last message she had sent—the invitation for dinner.
the chat message sat lonely in the chat interface like a piece of glowing coal, burning so hot that she suddenly pressed the phone against her chest.
The charging port dug into MOKA’s collarbone, making it ache. Her heavy breathing drowned out the hum of the air conditioner.
‘What is Su Li doing right now?’
MOKA wondered. She had never really thought about Su Li’s life before.
In the past, she had never considered such questions.
In her heart, the old Su Li was just a replaceable tool, a means for her to make money. It wouldn’t have mattered if that person wasn’t Su Li.
But now, MOKA realized it had to be Su Li.
She looked at the chat interface between the two of them and felt her heart pounding.
Finally, she made up her mind and sent a message to Su Li.
[ Are you there? ]
…
Su Li heard the sound of the phone vibrating but did not pay it any mind.
She was currently sitting beside Cat, correcting the issues the Little Kitten encountered while writing.
After all, Cat had never gone to school, so she had never undergone any systematic learning.
Although there were many more opportunities and ways to learn now, the content on websites was of varying quality, making it difficult to discern what was correct.
Especially for Lielie, Cat did not yet possess the ability to distinguish between them; she might just click on a video because the cover looked good.
Once the foundation was crooked, it would be very difficult to correct it later.
“Lielie’s posture for holding the pen is wrong.”
As Su Li spoke, she took a gel pen out of the pencil case and demonstrated the correct way to hold a pen in front of Cat.
Cat’s watery eyes looked at her, and she tried hard to mimic the posture. Finally, under Su Li’s correction, Cat successfully mastered the grip.
The tip of the pen bled a small ink dot onto the Tianzige grid. With her nose nearly touching the paper, she traced the radical for the character “cat” stroke by stroke.
Su Li soon patted Cat’s back, telling her to sit up straight.
It wasn’t that she was being overly strict with Lielie; she just wanted Lielie to form a habit.
If she maintained a proper sitting posture while writing now, it would eventually become a subconscious action.
“The vertical stroke should be as straight as a flagpole,” Su Li said softly.
Looking at the vertical lines Cat wrote, which looked like twitching cat tails, Su Li even felt that Cat’s font could be its own category, called the Maomao Style.
Su Li traced a line in the air with her index finger, and Cat’s eyes followed her finger slowly.
Finally, Su Li’s wrist gently pressed down on the back of Cat’s trembling hand.
The pencil tip suddenly slid in a curve, poking a small hole in the paper.
Cat hurriedly used an eraser to rub it away, the crumbs sticking to her trembling eyelashes.
Su Li picked up the eraser and helped blow them off, then held her hand to write again.
“Look, Cat. When you lift the pen, it’s like a kitten stretching. The stroke flickers up lightly from the bottom right to the left.”
She tried her best to explain it in a way Cat could understand.
Moonlight sliced through the blinds, casting golden stripes on the paper.
Cat suddenly let go of the draft pencil and held the paper covered in crooked handwriting above her head.
The scent of ink mixed with the strawberry scent from her hair drifted into Su Li’s nose.
Those horizontal and vertical strokes were like kittens that had just learned to walk—though they were wobbly, every stroke showed her earnestness.
Cat suddenly remembered when her pooper-scooper used to patiently teach her how to walk.
Now, Su Li teaching her to write was filled with the same patience.
Back then, Cat could not understand what her pooper-scooper was saying, but by observing her, she could still communicate with a certain tacit understanding.
Perhaps because Cat had just bathed with the household shower gel, Su Li felt that the scent on Cat was identical to her own.
It was only with Cat that Su Li felt an unprecedented sense of peace.
And it was only regarding things related to Cat that Su Li did not care about money or the transaction.
Watching Cat’s busy appearance, Su Li suddenly reached out and rubbed that fluffy pink head.
The strands of hair felt warm as they slipped through her fingers.
Cat shrunk her neck and nuzzled into Su Li’s palm, but the pen tip stopped steadily on the final horizontal stroke.
Su Li’s thumb unconsciously circled the crown of Cat’s head. On the tea table, a corner of the open notebook was blown up by the wind.
The four characters “Su Li” and “Maomao” just written looked like little kittens crouching on the paper.
Although they were crooked, every stroke had its ears perked up, trying hard to stand straight.
Cat did not know why Su Li liked to pet her little head, but she felt that Su Li’s palm was just as warm as her pooper-scooper’s.
She liked being petted by Su Li.