Wen Li almost wondered if his romantic threads had been plucked out entirely—how could anyone be so utterly oblivious to charm?
So what if he was handsome? He was the textbook definition of someone destined to die alone.
She grumbled inwardly, then dawdled as she opened her umbrella, sneaking a glance in his direction under the pretense of casualness, hoping to see if he was also heading back to school. That way, she could naturally say, "What a coincidence—let's walk together."
But he stood there, completely motionless.
Speechless. What was so interesting about this rain anyway? Did it look better than her?
Wen Li huffily opened her umbrella and walked back a few steps, then felt that leaving like this was simply too much of a loss. After a moment's thought, she turned back, unwilling to give up.
The rain was falling thicker now, and his shoulders were already soaked through, dark patches of water seeping into his coat. From this angle, he really did look like a little dog caught in the rain.
Just as she was sneaking a peek, the object of her gaze suddenly turned his head. Wen Li hastily looked away. "Wow, the rain seems to be getting heavier."
She started making idle chatter, but he didn't respond.
"I saw on the weather forecast that there might be thunder later. You should have learned this in elementary school, right? You're not supposed to stand under trees during thunder?"
"…" Still no response.
Five awkward minutes passed like this, so awkward that even Wen Li, a social butterfly, began to feel uncomfortable all over. "Well then, I'm really leaving now?"
Xiao Jinyu finally showed some reaction. He didn't look at her, his gaze fixed somewhere unknown, but let out a faint "Mm" from his nose.
Truly impervious to all persuasion.
Fine, just stand there and get soaked. Hopefully you catch a cold.
Wen Li gave up completely. She had only taken two steps when she noticed the shrubbery by her feet rustle, followed by a faint "Meow~"
"A cat?" Wen Li bent down to find the source of the sound.
It was a white Persian cat, huddled under the holly bush, completely drenched and shivering violently. Hearing the rustle of leaves being parted, it meowed again—a thin, soft sound quickly swallowed by the rain.
"There's a little kitten here!" Wen Li exclaimed, delighted and surprised. She reached out her hand, but just as she was about to touch it, Xiao Jinyu warned, "Be careful. It bites."
Along with his words, Wen Li's hand froze mid-air. The kitten let out a "meow" but showed no resistance to the suddenly approaching hand. Instead, it docilely rubbed its head against her palm.
Wen Li turned back with a smile. "Not at all! See, it's super well-behaved."
Xiao Jinyu: "…"
It wasn't like this before.
"Kitty, are you hungry?" As a Chinese person, her first instinct upon finding a living creature was to feed it. Wen Li fished a ham sausage out of her bag, crouched down, and with one hand struggling to hold the umbrella and the other peeling off the casing, offered it to the kitten's mouth.
The umbrella was too big, its canopy tilted precariously on top of her head, rainwater streaming down the edges and threatening to pour right down her neck.
Xiao Jinyu reached out and took the umbrella from her. Wen Li froze, turning around to find the handle already in his hand. He held it far more steadily than she had, the canopy perfectly centered, sheltering both her and the cat beneath it.
Wen Li suddenly felt a bit flattered. "Thanks."
With one hand freed, she could finally pet the kitten to her heart's content. Before long, she had coaxed and lured the little cat out from under the bush.
At that moment, a realization struck Wen Li—so he had been standing there all along, not to watch the rain, but to look at this cat?
Could it be that he liked cats?
Wen Li held the cat up to him. "Do you want to pet it?"
Xiao Jinyu declined. "No."
Wen Li said, "It just looks aloof. If you insist on petting it, it won't bite you. Just like you. Go ahead, don't be afraid."
Xiao Jinyu: "…"
How are those the same?
"Really not going to pet it?" Wen Li tilted her head. Seeing no response from him, she grinned even wider instead. "Then I'll pet it for you."
Wen Li didn't hold back. Her mischievous hand reached out and gave the cat a thorough petting all over. When she got to its belly, she noticed it was larger than a normal cat's, soft, with what seemed to be liquid shifting inside.
"Are you pregnant?" She lifted the kitten up, only to discover it was male—so not pregnant. "Then why is your belly so big? Are you sick?"
The kitten could only respond with "meow, meow," its voice soft and pitiful.
Wen Li cradled the kitten in her arms and turned to Xiao Jinyu. "It seems sick. I need to take it to the vet."
"Let me see," Xiao Jinyu said.
"Okay." Wen Li raised her arm. The moment Xiao Jinyu's hand reached out and touched its belly, the kitten began struggling in a panic.
Wen Li soothed the kitten while holding down its paws. "It's okay, it's okay. It'll be fine in a moment."
Xiao Jinyu withdrew his hand, his expression unchanged. "It's nothing serious. Just bloating from improper diet."
Wen Li was surprised. "You med students can treat not just people but cats too?"
"The basic physiological structures are similar."
"So how do you treat it?"
"Just go to the pharmacy and buy a box of probiotics."
Wen Li looked at the trembling kitten in her arms, a hint of uncertainty in her voice. "That simple?"
"Mm."
There was a pharmacy across the street. Wen Li rushed in, holding the cat, while Xiao Jinyu followed behind, folding his umbrella.
Inside the store, Wen Li borrowed a cup of warm water, mixed in the powdered medicine, and fed it to the kitten bit by bit.
By the time they finished and stepped back outside, the rain had stopped. The streetlights flickered on, illuminating the rain-soaked asphalt with a glossy sheen.
The kitten had fallen asleep in Wen Li's arms, occasionally stirring to nuzzle its tiny head against her arm.
Looking at the fluffy little ball, Wen Li's heart nearly melted.
She loved animals, but she'd never been able to keep anything alive since she was a child. Even the money tree by her front door had met its demise because she "checked on it a little too often." So her parents had issued a strict order: no more pets.
"It's so well-behaved," she said softly. "Do you think it was abandoned by its owner?"
Xiao Jinyu didn't say anything, walking quietly beside her.
Wen Li didn't expect an answer anyway, continuing on her own: "It must be. Such a good kitten… How about I adopt it? Otherwise, it'll have to keep wandering."
"…"
"But the dorm doesn't allow cats," Wen Li sighed. "And my parents won't let me keep one either."
"…"
"In a few months, it'll be winter. Look at its constitution—it got sick just from the rain. By then, it probably won't even find food. If it doesn't starve, it'll freeze to death."
She imagined the kitten's fate: curled up in some cold corner, hungry, shivering, crying out to heaven and earth with no one to answer.
Wen Li was sinking into melancholy, lost in her autumnal sorrow, when a voice suddenly cut through from beside her: "Give it to me."
"Huh?" Wen Li didn't process it at first. "What?"
"The cat." Xiao Jinyu repeated, his tone calm. "I'll keep it."
"You keep cats?" Wen Li looked at him incredulously. How strange—was he really the type to care for stray animals?
"Yeah." Xiao Jinyu responded again, not sounding like he was joking.
"Where would you keep it?"
"Home."
Wen Li's eyes lit up. "So you're from Haishi too? Which high school did you go to? How come I've never seen you before? And if you keep a cat, won't your parents have objections? Have you ever had a cat before?"
She fired off a barrage of questions, and he didn't know which to answer first. In the end, he simply said: "It's fine to keep."
"That's just wonderful!" Wen Li's voice rose a full octave in excitement as she thrust the cat toward him. "Kitty, you have a daddy now! You won't have to wander anymore!"
Xiao Jinyu: "…"
What a strange way to put it.
Because she'd gotten soaked in the rain, the first thing Wen Li did when she got back to the dorm was take a shower.
The old campus had limited facilities—no private bathrooms in the dorms, so showers meant a trip to the public bathhouse.
After washing up, she couldn't be bothered to change into proper clothes. Wearing a loose nightgown, she carried her toiletry basket in one hand and used the other to towel-dry the water droplets from her neck as she ambled slowly back toward the dorm building.
Just as she entered the lobby, the dorm matron called out: "Hey, you there!"
Wen Li stopped and turned around, confused.
The matron pointed at a boy standing by the entrance: "That young man at the door—he says he's here to drop something off for Cheng Xiling in your dorm. He's been standing there all evening. Since you're heading up anyway, take it up for him."
Wen Li followed her gaze. A tall, thin boy stood outside the access gate, holding a plastic bag. When his eyes met hers, he looked a little nervous.
Wen Li recognized him—it was the boy with the hearing impairment.
"Oh, okay." Wen Li walked over. The boy quickly handed her the bag, mumbling an accented "thank you." Inside was a box of strawberries—bright red and plump.
Wen Li recalled the bag of apples that had been thrown into the trash. She hesitated, unsure whether she should take it up for him. What if Cheng Xiling didn't want it and blamed her for meddling?
The boy made a few gestures at her, but Wen Li couldn't understand. She ventured cautiously: "She's probably at the library. Maybe you could wait a bit longer and give it to her yourself?"
The boy couldn't understand her either, looking at her with confusion.
The atmosphere turned awkward. She hadn't brought her phone to the bathhouse, so she couldn't type out a message to show him.
Wen Li cleared her throat, slowed her speech, and combined gestures with exaggerated mouthing: "You—wait—a little longer. She—will—be back—soon."
The boy understood this time. He smiled, said thank you, and continued standing by the roadside to wait.
Wen Li carried her basket upstairs. The moment she walked in, she was stunned to find Cheng Xiling actually in the dorm, sitting at her desk in pajamas reading a book. She'd clearly been there for a while.
Wen Li was baffled: "You've been in the dorm this whole time?"
Cheng Xiling looked up: "Yeah, why?"
Wen Li opened her mouth, about to say someone's waiting for you downstairs, but the words caught in her throat. She changed her approach: "Just that the dorm matron said there's something for you downstairs. She asked you to go down and pick it up."
Cheng Xiling's movements paused briefly. After a moment of silence, she closed her book, stood up, and pushed the door open to leave.
Wen Li flopped into her chair and started drying her hair.
So what exactly was the deal between those two? Was the deaf-mute boy pursuing Cheng Xiling, and she wasn't interested? But if she wasn't interested, why would she let him hold her hand?
This drama was way too complicated.
Wen Li shook her head, deciding not to worry about other people's business for now. She pulled out her phone and opened her chat with Xiao Jinyu.
Revolutionary friendship needed to be struck while the iron was hot—she had to use the cat-raising topic as an excuse to keep boosting her presence.
So she opened Xiaohongshu and started searching: 【Beginner Cat Owner Precautions】
Then she forwarded them to him one by one.
Big Pear: 【Things You Should Never Do When Raising a Cat】
Big Pear: 【Signs That a Cat Is Sick】
Big Pear: 【How to Choose Cat Food】
She forwarded over a dozen posts in one go. Even though she knew he probably wouldn't look at them, she still had to keep building her presence. After forwarding, Wen Li put down her phone and was about to continue drying her hair when the screen suddenly lit up.
A green chat bubble popped up with a single word.
Little Goldfish: 【Mm】
Wen Li stared at that word for a full five seconds.
What the hell—Xiao Jinyu actually replied.
Before this, he'd never responded to any of her carefully crafted messages. She'd already given up in defeat, and yet a few casual forwarded posts got him to reply. Though the word "mm" was a bit too cold—at least when she replied to others, she always said "mm-hmm."
She thought for a moment, then typed away furiously: 【Can't you reply with a few more words? Like "Okay, I see, thank you." One word makes you seem really unfriendly】
Sent.
Waited a moment.
Little Goldfish: 【Okay, I see, thank you】
Wen Li stared at that word-for-word exact reply and laughed even harder. For some inexplicable reason, she found him kind of adorable.
Then a question suddenly occurred to her—what if he'd always been reluctant to reply not because he didn't want to, but because he didn't know how?
An image formed in her mind. A boy frowning hard at her messages, typing then deleting, deleting then typing, and finally giving up altogether.
She'd figured it out—aloofness was just your disguise, Little Goldfish.