Chapter 11 – Meow Meow Meow Meow

Chu Yin trembled as he pointed at Wei Lai, panting heavily, looking as if he wanted to beat Wei Lai up.

Wei Lai quickly covered his face and said, “Calm down!”

Chu Yin thought about how good Wei Lai had been to him and that he hadn’t intentionally thrown the furball away. He couldn’t bring himself to hit him, torn between love and hate, grief and pain. Covering his face, he let out a whimper and ran out of Wei Lai’s bedroom.

Wei Lai followed closely behind, only to see Chu Yin burrow completely under the blanket, curled up into a large lump on the bed, crying so hard he was shaking.

Wei Lai glanced at the camera, lifted a corner of the blanket, and said, “Chu Yin, the camera’s rolling.”

Chu Yin was crying so hard he could barely catch his breath. A muffled voice came from under the blanket, “I need… tissues, tissues.”

Wei Lai hurriedly placed the tissues near the edge of the blanket. Chu Yin extended half an arm from under the covers and pulled them in.

Wei Lai couldn’t help but laugh unkindly. It inexplicably reminded him of the cat-shaped coin bank he’d bought before, where a little paw would reach out to steal coins—just like Chu Yin right now.

Chu Yin angrily threw a crumpled tissue out from under the blanket and roared, “You’re still laughing?! Get lost!”

Wei Lai patted the blanket gently. “I was wrong, don’t cry. Get some sleep first. When it’s light out, you can beat me up.”

Chu Yin sniffled. “Can’t sleep. Madam Wei, you don’t understand shit. I… I’ll never… be able to… sleep… sleep well again. Waaah!”

Wei Lai: “…Huh?”

Chu Yin must have felt stifled because he finally threw the blanket off, tears streaming down his face as he glared at Wei Lai. But when he saw that his crying had attracted the cameraman, he immediately wrapped himself up again, head to toe.

In front of outsiders, Chu Yin stubbornly clung to his aloof, cool-guy persona, refusing to let out a single sob. Wrapped in the gray blanket, he hunched on the bed like a stone. But to Wei Lai, Chu Yin had simply shut down.

After much coaxing, Wei Lai finally learned that the gray, bedraggled furball was no ordinary furball—it had a history older than Chen Meixian’s!

Back then, the furball wasn’t as bald as it was now. About the size of an adult’s palm, snow-white, fluffy, and soft, it was the kind of cheap trinket you could pick up in a dollar store back in the day. But for Chu Yin, it was the first toy he’d ever fished out of a trash can. He treasured it like gold, burying his little face next to it every night when he slept. Though his baby face eventually grew into a sharply defined, masculine one, the habit remained—every night, the first thing he did after climbing into bed was press his face against the furball and nuzzle it. Without it, he’d have nightmares.

Wei Lai, who’d grown up in a happy home with countless toys, couldn’t understand Chu Yin’s attachment to the furball. He found it odd. “Stop crying. I’ll buy you a new one—as many as you want.”

Chu Yin was furious. He lifted a leg to kick Wei Lai off the bed and roared, “It’s not the same! The furball is the furball. No matter how many you buy, none of them will be my furball!!!”

Wei Lai sighed helplessly. Seeing Chu Yin cry like this made him feel terribly guilty. “Want me to dig through the trash downstairs? What if it’s dirty—would you still want it?”

Chu Yin sat up abruptly, sniffling. “…Yeah.”

The two of them headed downstairs, one after the other. Chu Yin strode ahead on his own, the atmosphere between them tense.

Wei Lai caught up to him. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have thrown your stuff away. It’s just… your room was full of junk, and the furball looked like trash too.”

Chu Yin pursed his lips. “Don’t insult the furball.”

Wei Lai: “…”

They stopped in front of the trash bins, staring blankly at the three empty containers.

Chu Yin: “…Was the furball dry waste or wet waste?”

Wei Lai glanced at him. “…Doesn’t matter. Whether it was dry or wet, it’s already been hauled away by the garbage truck.”

Chu Yin hummed and turned to leave. “Where’s the dump?”

Wei Lai grabbed his arm in horror. “You’re not serious?! That place is hundreds of square meters, with piles seven or eight meters high! How long do you expect me to dig through that?!”

Chu Yin: “I have to look. Even if I don’t find it. If the furball knows I didn’t even try, it’ll be sad.”

Wei Lai was even more horrified. “It’s a ball of fur! Are you… maybe…” mentally unwell?

Chu Yin lowered his head, utterly heartbroken, his voice trembling. “…It’s been with me for so many years. You probably think I’m crazy. The furball was my only friend.”

Wei Lai’s heart ached violently. He pulled Chu Yin into a hug and rubbed his back. “I was wrong, I was really wrong. Go back and rest. I’ll dig through the trash—no matter how much there is, I’ll find your furball for you!”

“Meow…”

Wei Lai kept rubbing. “Stop mewling, okay? Be good, I’ll head to the dump now.”

Chu Yin lifted his head and looked toward the trash bins. “That wasn’t me. There’s a cat.”

The two of them craned their necks and, after a lot of effort, fished a kitten out of the wet waste bin.

A tiny orange kitten, likely just abandoned, its warm little body trembling in Chu Yin’s hands as it let out fragile, high-pitched meows.

Chu Yin cradled it carefully, tear stains still on his face, and glanced at Wei Lai.

Wei Lai said, “It’s 5 AM now. Take it home first, and we’ll send it to the vet later.”

Chu Yin asked, “What about you?”

Wei Lai rolled up his sleeves. “I’ll go to the dump to look for the furball.”

Chu Yin pursed his lips. “Come home with me first. I can’t handle this alone. You help block the wind for the cat.”

With four hands between them, one holding the kitten and the other shielding it from the wind, they carried the little orange furball home like royalty.

Wei Lai remarked, “Once this episode airs, people are definitely going to say it’s scripted.”

Chu Yin said, “Who cares? They don’t have a cat. They’re just jealous.”

Wei Lai asked, “You’re keeping it?”

Chu Yin liked cats, but Chen Meixian didn’t, so he’d never gotten one. Now that he was free of Chen Meixian, raising a cat as the start of his new life didn’t sound bad.

Chu Yin nodded. “I want to keep it.”

Wei Lai used a scarf and a cardboard box to make a nest for the kitten. “Now I have two cats.”

It took Chu Yin a long moment to realize who Wei Lai meant by the other cat.