Strange Life of a Cat

“Eh, have you heard, that guy from the old alley was screwed over!”

“I heard that he was messed up pretty badly, when they found him he was already crazy.”

“Wasn’t it said that he was wasted when he got pranked? Probably hasn’t recovered from that yet!”

“I even heard that when his friends asked him who did it, he kept on saying “cat” and “monster” and some other stuff. He was most likely scared to death.”

“Didn’t he kill kittens recently? I said a few words on that matter and he even kicked me, it still hurts. If you asked me, I’d say that this is karma… Hey boss, another Chinese donut over here!”

…

Early in the morning, in some shops near the old building area that sold breakfast, people ate their breakfast while gossiping about the incident with the tattooed man.

The tattooed man was found at midnight. His mates working at the club saw that he wasn’t there, so they had two people that didn’t have much work at hand to find him. It turned out that there was no one in his house, and they only found him in a dead-end alleyway.

When they found him, he was frozen in a single posture: rolled up on the floor, his entire body trembling, mouth murmuring something that nobody could understand clearly. The tattooed man’s surroundings were covered in glass fragments, and there were many cuts made by exploding splinters on his body and clothing. His face, hands, and the exposed part of his calf had cuts all over them, and so did the new pants which had a strong odor of urine.

Someone that had gotten off their night-shift at midnight passed by at the time. They pointed over there with their torchlight and took a look . Afterward, rumors began to spread.

No one reported it to the police, and even if they had called the police, the police wouldn’t have wanted to have a hand in it. All of these people had criminal records so the police couldn’t be bothered to pay any heed to their personal affairs. Besides, that man was only a little hooligan, there was no need to waste time and energy to investigate his case.

Despite the tattooed man’s condition, and the discussions of the residents around the old building’s area alley, over at the eastern courtyard, Zheng Tan got out of bed relaxed and at ease. He squatted on the chair that was exclusively for him and ate breakfast.

When he returned last time, even with washed paws and having been in the wind, the smell of alcohol on him hadn’t dispersed. He was caught by Papa Jiao as soon as he went home.

Papa Jiao suspected that Zheng Tan had went to that restaurant to sneakily eat or drink alcohol, but he saw that Zheng Tan was quite sober, his pace was steady, he was in good spirits, and his fur was clean, so he didn’t delve any further. However, he still instructed Zheng Tan not to go near places like restaurants or diners, to be careful not to end up as a stewed dish.

Zheng Tan scratched his ears. The matter was taken care of so there won’t any need for him to wander there for a long time at nights anymore.

Having lifted the weight off his mind, Zheng Tan had some quality sleep last night. He ate a large bowl of three delicacy rice vermicelli made by Mama Jiao, then went out with the four members of the Jiao family.

When they went downstairs, Papa Jiao rode to the biology building on his little electric motorcycle while Mama Jiao carried the shopping basket and walked the two kids to school with Zheng Tan. Afterwards, Zheng Tan went for his stroll and Mama Jiao went grocery shopping.

The weather began to warm up, and the sun now felt comfortable on the skin.

Birds on the campus began to clamor, and tree leaves began to sprout. It wouldn’t be long before “Road of Shitlestrial Beings” began to rain bird poop again. Anyhow, Zheng Tan stopped walking on those roads now. The environmental greening on campus being good was one thing, but with more birds came more crap. Walking through there, Zheng Tan could smell bird droppings from miles away.

He walked through the green belts of the campus. They didn’t permit trampling on grass, but obviously that was targeted at humans. It didn’t apply to cats, so it didn’t matter, and Zheng Tan often trampled on it anyways.

There were some blooming flowers over there. Zheng Tan had seen them when it was snowing, but he hadn’t taken a closer look. He approached and took a glance. The leaves looked like Camille’s that Lan talked about, but he didn’t know what specific specie it was, though it was quite pretty.

Zheng Tan inched in and sniffed—they didn’t have much of a smell.

While he was watching the flowers, Zheng Tan heard a girl’s voice not too far away, probably talking to her boyfriend on the phone.

“You’ve been on the Mingzhu city assistant program for over three months. You said that you’ll be back in three months… Delay? How much longer… Alright, I hope I get to see you next month. By the way, what do you think about the specimen I sent you?”

The girl spoke on the phone and the high heel on her foot kicked a little pebble on the road.

“Excuse me?!” The girl’s voice suddenly elevated in volume. “That was the specimen I made myself from the leaves of the Japanese maple in front of the dorm! How could it be a rip off sold on the streets… Of course you can’t differentiate! Do you know the difference between oriental poppies and opium poppies? Do you know the difference between cherry blossoms and peach blossoms? You don’t know, you can’t even see the difference between a Siberian Husky and an Alaskan malamute!”

Zheng Tan listened in by the side. “…” ‘The pal at Mingzhu city, thank you for all the trouble you’ve taken!’

Soon, the girl hung up, stamped with her heels, and trotted away.

Zheng Tan recalled again the times when he was in the university chasing after girls, resorting to everything during that time to please those ice beauties and cold belles. He looked down and stared at his furry paws, then threw back his head and exclaimed – ‘life is full of uncertainties!’

Zheng Tan made a face of contemplation at the sky when a voice suddenly drifted over from behind him.

“Charcoal, are you bird-watching?”

Zheng Tan wiggled his ears upon the sound, then turned and looked over. The next moment, a pile of bird dropping rained down from above, landing right on Zheng Tan’s ear.

“…”

‘F*ck, that’s why I said I hate this bunch of birds that sh*t everywhere! They have no sense of shame!’

The culprit had already flown away, chirping before flying off to declare it’s presence.

There were some temperature to the poo when it landed on the ear, but it quickly became cold, and the smell of it made Zheng Tan want to grab that b*tch of a bird and cut it to pieces!

“Don’t shake your ears, it will fall on your body,” Zhuo said, her words carrying a trace of a smile.

Listening to Zhuo’s words, Zheng Tan immediately stopped moving and rigidly stood there.

Zhuo took a pack of tissues from her bag and slowly lowered her body.

Zheng Tan’s heart stopped a beat when he saw her actions. Was it okay to squat with that big of a tummy?

Zhuo wiped off the bird poo from Zheng Tan’s ear, then gently poked his head before slowly rising up again. “This luck of yours!”

Zheng Tan tugged at his ear. ‘This luck sucks!’

Zhuo walked over to the trash bin and threw away the tissue, then said to Zheng Tan, “Come, let’s go to my place, I will wash your ears.”

Zheng Tan kept feeling like there was something wrong with that ear. He still had a subconscious feeling that there was a pile of bird poo in his ear; he could smell it. His heart would only rest assured after washing his ear clean, otherwise he’ll continue feeling repulsed by it.

As they headed for the western yard, the smile on Zhuo’s face never ceased. She even told Zheng Tan, ” I heard that most bird species don’t have a bladder. Their rectums are extremely short, so they relieve their bladder and bowels at the same time. Humans and felines can hold it in when they want to do that, excreting when they get to the bathroom. Birds can’t, they excrete wherever and whenever they want, even during flight. ”

So this bunch of bladder-less birds were the real shameless kind that defecate indiscriminately!

Zheng Tan silently cursed those despicable birds in his heart as he walked., “General”, who hadn’t appeared for a while, was not spared in his scolding.

Arriving for the second time at the western courtyard that Zhuo lived in, Zheng Tan saw cats walking about, and some that sunbathed on their balconies as they swayed their tail.

The number of cats in the western yard had gradually increased. Zheng Tan had visited this courtyard when he first came to this time period, and there were not many cats back then while some were just kittens that still had their fetal hair. In the blink of an eye, the kittens had all grown up to maturity.

Will there be a battle between the western and eastern courtyard cats in the near future? Sheriff would definitely be overjoyed.

Gang fight, even the thought of such a scene sounded epic to Zheng Tan. He had never seen cats engage in gang brawls before.

By the time Zheng Tan came out from his thoughts, they were already at Zhuo’s place. The housemaid was watching television. Her face filled with loving care at the sight of Zhuo returning, but that smile soon shattered when she saw Zheng Tan beside Zhuo’s feet.

Zheng Tan didn’t care about what the housemaid was thinking, all he wanted to do now was to quickly clean his ear. The smell of bird poo made him want to puke.

Zhuo dabbed some warm water and chose a gentle shower gel to rub gently on Zheng Tan’s ear as she didn’t have anything that was intended for pets.

Zheng Tan hopped onto a tall stool to make it convenient for Zhuo. This way she didn’t need to squat uncomfortably and could sit on a chair as she cleaned him.

It was a fast process since only the ear had bird poo. After being wiped dry with a towel, Zheng Tan still had the perfume of shower gel on him.

He felt his mood lighten and his tail began to unconsciously move from side to side.

Just like last time, Zhuo lied down on the lounge and Zheng Tan huddled in the moon chair beside her. What was different was that Zhuo wasn’t reading a book this time, but flipping through a photo album.

There was a plant specimen stuck in between the pages of the album.

Zheng Tan extended his neck and took a look. It was a four-leaf clover that was extremely difficult to find. He had wanted to find one in the school when he had tried to please a girl he was chasing, but in the end he spent money and bought it off someone.

Zhuo saw Zheng Tan staring and said, “This is a four-leaf clover, a mutated species from the three-leaf clover, apparently it symbolizes luck. This specimen was gifted to me by a junior in the physics school. There, that’s her.”

Zheng Tan looked towards the girl that Zhuo was pointing to in the group photo. Wasn’t that the intrepid girl he’d seen earlier today talking on the phone?

“But now she’s not in the physics school anymore, she is doing her master’s degree as a transdisciplinary in Botany. She was always quite interested in plants,” Zhuo said. “This four-leaf clover is from her, and according to her, this is a four-leaved clover of a Trifolieae. It’s common for Trifolieae to experience four-leaf mutations, so there is a higher chance of finding one. She had initially intended to find a four-leaf clover of creeping wood sorrel, only the leaves of a three-leaf clover from the wood sorrel class is heart shaped and unfortunately she never found it.”

Four-leaf clover was already a mutation by itself, comparatively speaking, the chances of a wood sorrel undergoing mutation was even more unlikely. It was extremely difficult to find a heart-shaped four-leaf clover, only a handful of plants would grow a fourth leaf under the condition of genetic mutation.

There was a difference?

Zheng Tan carefully examined it. He didn’t know how this specimen had been made, still able to retain it’s green colour. In the center of each leaf was a “V” shaped white halo. Was this the four-leaf Trifolieae that Zhuo was talking about?

Zheng Tan tried to recall the clovers he had found when he was trying to impress the girls. The ones that he found were the kind with heart-shaped leaves, no white “V”, but the ones that he bought had it, just like the specimen tucked in Zhuo’s album.

Wood sorrel four-leaf clover?

Pretty high difficulty rating.

“Ah!” Zhuo gave a little exclamation.

Zheng Tan’s nerves immediately tightened and he looked over. Was she about to give birth?!

Zhuo casually placed the album down and laughed. “It moved.”

What moved? Zheng Tan was puzzled.

Then, Zheng Tan followed Zhuo’s line of sight to her bulging stomach.

Zhuo took her coat off when they came home and the woollen jumper exposed the protruding curve.

Zheng Tan stilled as he looked at Zhuo’s big belly with confusion. Just as he was about to turn away, he realised that it had suddenly moved.

“Charcoal, the little brother is saying hi to you,” Zhuo said to Zheng Tan. “Hurry over here.”

To do what?

Zheng Tan jumped hesitantly over to the lounge from the moon chair, intentionally leaving a distance between Zhuo’s belly and himself; it felt quite horrifying.

However, Zhuo didn’t plan to let Zheng Tan get away. Grasping one of his arms, she pulled him over. The next second Zheng Tan was about touch the big belly.

He pulled his paws away. These paws of his had thrown beer bottles, drugged, and messed with someone just yesterday, so he felt that it wasn’t right to touch her.

Zhuo was about to open her mouth and say something when she saw Zheng Tan pull away, but the stomach moved again.

Zheng Tan saw it move.

It’s really greeting me?

Zheng Tan slowly moved over after thinking about it. He didn’t raise his paws, instead he pressed his forehead against the place that had just moved. A moment later, something gently touched his forehead.

Perhaps…

This was what new life feels like?

“This little guy will call you brother Charcoal, yes, brother coal,” Zhuo said.

Zheng Tan moved back to the moon chair, an image emerging in his mind of a little human child following behind the ass of a black cat, calling “brother Coal” after him. He shivered. Zheng Tan didn’t want to consider such a thing happening.

Sh*t, would it pull my tail then? If he does, I’ll whip him with no exception.

Zheng Tan didn’t stay for lunch at Zhuo’s place. The housemaid was looking at him as if she was looking at the god of plagues, always maintaining a two meter distance from him.

After he finished lunch back at the Jiaos, Zheng Tan rolled around on the couch. Unable to sleep, he ran out again and wobbled to Lan’s parterre. He remembered at once that he had seen the wood sorrels that Zhuo was talking about in Lan’s greenhouse.

Wasn’t there always “treasure” in Lan’s parterre?

Zheng Tan planned to try his luck.

Other than the few sheds with special signs hanging on the door, the rest of the sheds were not locked up. Lan was busily working in one of the sheds when Zheng Tan entered the parterre.

Hearing the rattle in the shed, Lan only threw a side glance at Zheng Tan before getting back to his work.

Some of the doors to the sheds were open, so Zheng Tan took a look in each one of them before finally catching sight of wood sorrels in a shed near the end.

This shed had nothing specific planted in it. Everything that was planted before got relocated and nothing was planted afterwards.

When Zheng Tan visited this shed before, it still had the warning signs and the door was constantly locked. It was open today, so Lan was probably taking samples again. This was where Lan conducted mutagenesis experiments, but Zheng Tan had no idea what new species he had created since he couldn’t recognize any either way, though Lan and other old men treasured it.

Zheng Tan walked in and stopped beside a wood sorrel bush, scanning over it. He found that the leaves were indeed heart-shaped.

This type of plant was really common, so common that Zheng Tan didn’t bother to pay any attention to it when he was taking his daily stroll. Nevertheless, he now held a just-try-it mentality to see if there was any special mutated species in here.

Three-leaf… Three-leaf… Four-leaf!

Seeing that there was a four-leaved one, Zheng Tan was thrilled—he’d heard that it represented luck!

But he wasn’t happy for long for he realized that there were many four-leaved ones beside his one. Three-leaf clover had, on the other hand, become a rare occurrence here.

What the f*ck is happening?!

Didn’t they say that four-leaf mutations are rare?

Back then I had sore backs just trying to find a single four-leaf clover to get the girls, and now there is a bush with over seventy percent of the four-leaved ones right in front of me!