Chapter 3

Chapter 3

The girl from upstairs had rushed down as soon as she heard me getting into a confrontation with the neighbor across the hall.

She ran so fast that she’d lost a shoe along the way.

She was even brandishing a badminton racket.

I couldn’t help but chuckle at the sight. “Are you for real?”

That thing was way too flimsy. It wouldn’t last more than a few hits before snapping.

The girl brandished the racket with a wary, superstitious air as she walked down. She shot a glance at the neighbor’s locked door before stepping over to my side. “Are you okay?”

I didn’t have anything better to do anyway.

“Want to come in for a bit?”

The girl’s name was Jiang Ning. She was a homeowner in this complex and had lived here for three years.

She looked at me with a grimace. “You should really move out as soon as possible. Don’t worry about the security deposit or the rent. I’m the one who’s stuck here-my apartment and my shop are both in this neighborhood.”

I started asking her what kind of psycho lived across from me.

Just as we were talking, a series of high-pitched moans and groans erupted from across the hall again.

She spat out a mouthful of water and scratched her head in awkward frustration.

I was stunned. “Has it even been ten minutes since they went inside?”

Didn’t he just slap that woman…?

And the kid must still be awake!

Jiang Ning sighed. “There’s no helping it. She’s a total ‘love-brain.'”

I was even more horrified.

Has the pathology of the “love-brain” virus progressed to this level already?

Jiang Ning told me the neighbor had been like this since she moved in three years ago.

They fought every single day, crying and screaming.

And as soon as the fighting stopped, the “noises” began.

When Jiang Ning first moved in, she was young and hot-headed enough to try and reason with them. Other neighbors had gone along with her back then, too.

In the end, the woman pointed her finger at Jiang Ning specifically and started screaming.

“Just because you don’t have a man, you can’t show some consideration for others? If you can’t stand it, go find your own man and live your own noisy life!”

“I think you’re just jealous of how deeply in love we are!”

Jiang Ning could still recite those words verbatim. Her expression looked like she’d been struck by lightning.

“And their kid… he was only in first grade three years ago, and he was already commuting to school by himself.”

I was shocked. “He’s only in third grade now?”

Jiang Ning corrected me. “Fourth grade. But he’s so thin and small that he’s nothing but a pair of sticks holding up a giant head.”

“His mom doesn’t work. She spends all day fighting with the dad, and then she spends the rest of the day lying in bed being ‘heartbroken.’ She gets so ‘heartbroken’ she won’t even drink a sip of water. You really think she’s going to get up and cook for the kid?”

Apparently, lying in bed all day wasn’t enough to process her emotions; she had to go to battle again at night.

I let out a dry laugh. “Well, that’s certainly an eye-opener.”

Jiang Ning said that wasn’t even the half of it.

At first, the neighbors were kind-hearted. The boy would eat a meal at one house, then another, just to get by.

But the woman-likely feeling that people were gossiping about her behind her back-got upset. She specifically picked out an older lady upstairs whose house the boy often ate at and beat the child within an inch of his life right in front of her.

Afterward, she even filmed a video and posted it in the building’s group chat, saying: “Sorry, I haven’t disciplined my child well. I’ve caused everyone a lot of trouble.”

Jiang Ning said, “Wasn’t that just to spite the lady? The auntie was so furious she started arguing with her. As a result, the woman blocked her door and cursed her out for over an hour.”

Hearing this, I remembered how the man had been beating the child tonight while the woman filmed it.

Jiang Ning said that even when the police came, it didn’t help. The auntie’s husband almost had a heart attack from the stress.

She warned me: “I know that kid is pitiful, but whatever you do, do not feed him.”

But after everything she had just said…

“Didn’t you feed him today?”

Jiang Ning looked embarrassed. “Well… that’s why I’m telling you. Don’t repeat my mistakes.”

I thought about it for a moment. “How about you add me to the homeowners’ group chat?”

Jiang Ning said it was an eyesore and asked why I’d want to join.

But I insisted, so she added me.