Busarewski

From the next chapter of Sanatorium, which I just finished -- will review tomorrow, and then post. But until then, have a snippet of the next weird lady coming to call.

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Fang Duobing and A-Fei weren't home yet when Li Lianhua got to the old pump house; the cats were sleeping, and mosquitoes were dancing in the evening air between the lake and his kitchen courtyard.

He set out the strawberries in a bowl, and then went to the fridge and poured himself a Berliner Weisse with woodruff syrup. He didn't often drink the local beer, but he found it quite refreshing on hot summer evenings like today.

"Oh," said a female voice with a strong local accent. "Strawberries!"

Li Lianhua was half expecting Carmen, but it wasn't her. Instead, it was a spectacular young blonde with a messy mane of hair in a very messy bun, wearing some vintage apron dress and wooden clogs on her feet. She looked like an escapee from a cottage core romantasy novel; Li Lianhua wouldn't have been astonished if she'd commanded an army of cheerful gnomes.

"I didn't know you lived here," she went on, as if picking up on a conversation they had had before. Or had they? Patients came and went, and while everybody remembered Li Lianhua, he could not return the favour.

"sir. that is a wooden pole", you jest. the scene hits like one million bricks

Pride Comes to the Cat Café

Pride month is not important if all you care about is cats and knitting, so Li Lianhua thought. However, if your café contains a gaggle of girls lusting at Jiao-jie's Louboutins, the cat guy from Barrowdowns meets his male crush, and people are coming out to each other there, you actually are a safe space and should put a sticker in the window.