Chapter 1782: Summer in Fool

In front of the window of the three-dimensional residential apartment at 23 Camphor Street in the current Living Hell, Selina sat on the bay window, fiddling with a pile of small things like bead strings, and turned to look at the courtyard in the center of the building.

Maggie opposite her wasn't in a wheelchair, but leaned against the side of the bed. There were two boxes on the bedside table, and three bags at her feet, all filled with some shiny little things.

Maggie held a thin nylon rope in her hand, carefully threading the small parts she had picked out from the box onto the rope, knitting a pattern every certain distance. Between her dancing fingers, a delicate bracelet with Cat Getan style was completed.

The reason why it was said that this bracelet had Cat Getan style was that the decorations used on it weren't exquisite gems or round beads, but brownish-red nuts, chain buckles, bullet casings printed with the names of popular rappers, and even a metal tag in the middle printed with a bat pattern.

The one Selina was knitting was about the same, with more metal parts, and some resin-simulated hearts and brains, accessories with a slightly Gothic dark style.

Bruce had been very busy lately, and Selina hadn't been idle either. Since she became a little popular in Hollywood last time, many directors had taken a fancy to her face and figure, wanting her to play some vase roles in movies.

Selina acting was just for freshness. She wouldn't take scripts she didn't like. After being idle for a while, she returned to Cat Getan. At this time, her good friend Maggie found a new way to make a living, which was setting up a stall.

Because Maggie was in poor health and couldn't do heavy work, she had been helping at the church before, helping the old priest count donations, write purchase lists, etc. Although this job was leisurely, there was almost no income, and Maggie had always wanted to save money to buy sperm at a sperm bank to have a child of her own, so she had been looking for a job with higher income.

At that time, Cat Getan's tourism industry was just starting to rise. Maggie found that the style of the gang-related surroundings was really too rough. Basically, whatever the factory produced, they put it up for sale. The badges didn't even have a pin, let alone some small accessories with high practical value.

Maggie keenly grasped the business opportunity. She found a black mother who managed the food in the gang she knew before, bought a small bag of mini badges through her, and bought ropes and second-hand accessory parts at the second-hand market, made a few bracelets at home, and took them to sell near the beach.

Because she didn't set up a stall and didn't occupy a position, she just hung them on a cloth draped over her wheelchair and sold them in the crowd. The gangs were too lazy to bother with her.

Or out of sympathy, or because Cat Getan really lacked such small accessories, Maggie's business was quite good. The dozen or so bracelets she made were sold out in less than two hours, in exchange for a huge sum of nearly thirty dollars.

For a woman in poor health, this was indeed an extremely substantial income, because there was almost no cost. Buying factory-produced metal parts with Cat Getan elements from the gangs used up most of Maggie's savings, but it was only seven or eight dollars. The remaining ropes and accessories added together were less than three dollars, but she earned twice the profit, which was quite amazing.

It wasn't that there were no jobs that made more money in Cat Getan, but Maggie was in poor health and almost relied on a wheelchair to go out. Helping at the church only earned her thirty cents a day, barely enough to make ends meet, and saving money only saved a few dollars. But she earned it in a day of knitting and selling, which gave her a deposit that was quite amazing relative to the bottom-level people in Cat Getan.

Before Selina came back, Maggie had been doing this job. After Selina came back, she saw a bigger business opportunity. Although Catwoman wasn't interested in doing business, she could make a name for herself in Cat Getan, which proved that her brain was very sharp.

She found the gang managing the nearby streets and showed them the results of Maggie's handicrafts. At first, the gang was dismissive of this, so Selina set up a stall at the gang's door.

It was impossible for the gang to let her be arrogant, but in the ten or so minutes it took them to gather people and prepare to go out, the small accessories on Selina's stall were swept away by a group of graffiti enthusiasts passing by.

They hung the chains all over their bodies, wore the pendants with buckles directly on their ears, and asked Selina to set up a stall again the next day, because they thought it was really cool and wanted to send it to their friends.

The gang felt that this was very profitable, so they cooperated with Selina, organized the manpower in the gang who had no combat ability and were not convenient to go out and socialize, used the design drawings provided by Selina, made the metal parts produced by the factory into small accessories, and set up stalls to sell them.

Due to their special living environment, Gothamites' aesthetics were somewhat different from mainstream aesthetics. The design drawings Selina gave them were just hanging some metal badges with ropes, or making some exaggeratedly shaped small ornaments into earrings and pendants.

But Gothamites' whimsical ideas took a big step forward in terms of unique style. People who had worked in the gangs for a long time chose accessories to match according to their own understanding, so a large pile of pure prison-style bracelets, earrings, and pendants appeared.

Selina was very helpless about this, but unexpectedly, outsiders were very interested in this style of accessories, especially those industrial-style accessories made of bullet casings, bolts, metal bearings, etc., which would almost be snatched up as soon as they were put out.

There was no way, Selina could only adjust the design drawings. Seeing that this style made money, the gangs went to ask the factory to produce more similar parts. Not long after, the accessories on almost all the stalls in Cat Getan became this style.

This solved the employment problem of a large part of Cat Getan's old, weak, sick, and disabled. As long as their hands could move, sitting there was knitting. It also gave many children who were recruited into schools extracurricular activities. Often, children in a class worked together, some responsible for purchasing, some responsible for manufacturing, some responsible for occupying positions, and some responsible for selling.

In a short time, Cat Getan had another kind of vendor, that is, children covered in necklaces, bracelets, pendants, and earrings, walking through the streets and alleys to sell the small accessories they made to tourists.

Maggie had also wanted to participate, but she found that she really didn't have the head for business. She wasn't as shrewish as Selina, and she was a bit out of breath after talking too much. She had lived to this day purely because of good luck and couldn't do the work of negotiating with gangs or grabbing stalls at all.

So Selina and the gang she initially cooperated with reached a deal. They got the right to use a stall for three days a week. Maggie led five or six children upstairs and downstairs to make products, and when the time came, they went to the stall to sell.

Although the products were already somewhat saturated, their manufacturing speed couldn't keep up with those gangs with sufficient labor, but they could earn dozens of dollars a week, and Maggie was almost saving enough money.

It was time to set up the stall again tomorrow, but three children in Maggie's small team had heatstroke and couldn't work at all. They couldn't even gather enough products for a table now. Too sparse stall layout would greatly reduce the desire of passersby to buy, so Selina came to help Maggie catch up with the work.

Maggie was knitting the bracelet in her hand while looking up at Selina and asking: "Have you read the recent newspapers?"

Selina nodded and said: "Of course, the recent headlines are really lively."

Maggie sighed bitterly and said: "You are too optimistic. Do you know that those reporters are looking for you everywhere, wanting to get evidence of Bruce Wayne's mental abuse from your mouth?"

Selina curled her lips and said: "I only believe one thing. If Bruce really wanted to sleep with that woman named Talia, he wouldn't need to drug her at all. He wouldn't even need to be rich. That face is the best weapon."

"And I am more certain that if he really drugged Talia, then Talia couldn't have tested for drug residue in any hospital in Cat Getan, or any hospital in the world."

Maggie covered her face with her hands and said: "I simply don't know how you two get along daily. I am very sure that you two together would go to a mental hospital, and you wouldn't even need an extra nursing assistant."

"That's just how it is." Selina waved her hand and said.

"But I am indeed still a bit worried, Selina. Of course, I don't mean that he is really mentally controlling you or anything. You would scratch his face full of flowers." Maggie shrugged and said: "However, you have complained to me several times about the restrictions of the upper class. If you two really get married, there will definitely be more trouble. Can you adapt to it?"

"Don't mention it, I get a headache just thinking about it." Selina dropped the things in her hand, walked to Maggie's side and sat down, then lay back, looking at the ceiling and saying: "Honestly, we have discussed marriage before. Just imagining this process has already exhausted me."

"Do you know? He probably intends to invite all humans to watch the ceremony, and then show them that I am going to wear a wedding dress that might have been prepared by Jesus for his mother to get married, and a necklace made of gems dug from the crowns of twenty-six British queens, walking over a carpet that humans have been knitting since they jumped down from the trees, and kissing him with lips painted with lipstick made of seventy-two of the most poisonous mushrooms in the world that are completely non-toxic but can change into I don't know how many colors."

Maggie laughed in a low voice and said: "Shouldn't you feel that he values you?"

"Oh, 'values', that's the word." Selina stretched out two fingers from each hand and hooked them, saying: "Just to tell everyone that even if I marry a girl from the slums, I can dress her up like Queen Mary, like a competition of 'you absolutely can't see a bit of her rustic smell'."

"Selina, don't say that." Maggie reached out and touched Selina's head and said: "This isn't a lucky metaphor."

"But I just looked at the Italian designer's eyes, and I knew he intended to take a collar weighing about ten kilograms to break my neck."

"I don't know why it has to be like this." Selina sighed and said: "I always feel that he seems to have misunderstood something. Perhaps I should find a time to talk to him."

"Talking is always good." Maggie encouraged: "Perhaps you can tell him that this makes you uncomfortable."

"Then he will reveal a very sad expression, as if it is completely my fault that I don't play those 'how many things can be hung on a doll' small games with him, that I have failed his love, so he intends to die for me to see right now. Do you know how much lethality this expression has when combined with his face and those eyes?"

"Wait." Maggie suddenly looked at Selina vigilantly and said: "I take back what I said before. Are you sure you haven't been mentally manipulated by him?"

"Damn it, of course I have—just like you would be mentally manipulated by every stray dog you see soaked in a cardboard box on a street corner on a rainy night." ===== CHAPTER 1783 =====