Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

  As Zhang Zian called Richard by name, Lauren and Tim also looked at the second floor curiously. A grey shadow, accompanied by quacking sounds, flew downstairs and landed on Zhang Zian’s shoulder. When they looked closer, they found that it was a very smart-looking African grey parrot.

  Richard closed its wings to its body, turned its black pupils and said, “What do you want from me?”


  Zhang Zian looked at the two foreigners in front of him and said, “Tell me what they are talking about.”


  Tim and Lauren were stunned. Although they didn’t understand what this grey parrot had just said, apparently it was having a full conversation in Chinese with this young pet shop owner. They operated a cattery and had no knowledge of raising parrots, but this scene still astonished them.

  Richard looked at them and said, “Quack! Two foreigners! No wonder you are asking for my help! What language are they speaking?”


  “English.” Zhang Zian defended himself, “Actually I can understand, but they were speaking too fast.”


  Richard stared at him disdainfully, “Stop finding excuse for your ignorance! Ask them to repeat what they said before.”


  Zhang Zian smiled at them apologetically and said in English, “Excuse me, can you say that again?”


  “Well…” Lauren came back to herself from the astonishment and repeated what she had said before. This time, she slowed down a little bit, so Zhang Zian could capture more information even without Richard’s help. He went forward and shook hands with them respectively.

  When he approached them, he found that Lauren wasn’t short at all. She was actually much taller than most Chinese women — she just seemed petite when standing beside her husband. As for the big guy Tim… Zhang Zian felt more and more intimidated as he walked closer, and he retreated to a safe distance after shaking hands with him.

  “They’ve watched the dancing kittens’ videos, so they are here to visit your pet shop.” Richard summed up briefly.

  Visiting my pet shop… Zhang Zian glanced at their luggages. If they were just paying a visit, why were they bringing so many things with them?

  He was no fool. He knew that they were just being polite—they came all the way from Los Angeles, so they must have something to ask of him instead of simply paying a visit.

  When Zhang Zian was thinking of how to reply to them, Richard had spoken up in English, “Quack! Quack! My name is Richard Jefferson, and this is Jeff Richardson, nice to meet you!”


  “What the f**k!” Zhang Zian was about to flick it with his fingers angrily. “Don’t change my last name!”


  Richard dodged his attack quickly, “(in Chinese) All right, all right. You are really hopeless. (in English) Sorry, that was a slip of the tongue! Let me reintroduce ourselves! My name is Richard Jefferson, and this is Jeff Zhang, nice to meet you! You can call me Richard, and call him Jeff!”


  He was fine being called Jeff Zhang… So, Zhang Zian let go of the issue of how he was being addressed.

  Tim and Lauren’s jaws were dropping. This parrot was speaking standard English, like the anchors from BBC, with accurate and elegant pronunciations. If they were not looking at it, they would never have thought these words came from a parrot! To their great astonishment, this parrot could speak Chinese and English! How marvelous was that!

  Seeing their expressions, Zhang Zian sighed. He should have kept it low-profile. He said to them in English, “Excuse me,” and went to the second floor with Richard.

  “What? I was going to show them my English!” complained Richard.

  “Right, but when you finish showing off, you’ll be taken away to be dissected in labs.” Zhang Zian stared at it, “What if they are spies from CIA, FBI, KGB or SCP?”


  Richard said, “…I’m not sure if they are from the first three organizations, but the last one is impossible!”


  “Anyway, we must keep a low profile!” said Zhang Zian decisively.

  “You just want to show off your English and keep me out of the spotlight, right?” Richard had read his mind.

  Zhang Zian threatened it by making a gesture pretending to beat it up, “Damn you! You promised me to find me a girlfriend, so where is she?! Stop arguing with me!”


  “Yes, it was my bad to undertake such a difficult task. I shall help you show off today.” Richard said reluctantly, “What should we do?”


  Zhang Zian had made his decision. “You go into the invisible state and stand on my shoulder. When you are about to talk, pinch my shoulder with your claws, and I will synchronize my lips with your words, as if I’m the one talking.”


  Richard gave it a thought, “I think it might work, but what am I going to say?”


  “You need to improvise. Just ask them why they’re here and what they want, and strive for the best interests for us.”


  “…All right, but what accent should I use?” asked Richard.

  “What accent?” asked Zhang Zian perplexedly.

  “There are different accents in English, which accent do you want me to use?”


  Zhang Zian hadn’t thought about this. “Anything is fine… What are theirs?”


  Tim and Lauren were walking around on the first floor of the pet shop, their eyes stopping on Fina frequently. They whispered in English from time to time, discussing the breed of this golden cat.

  Richard listened to them carefully for a while, “Though they are speaking American English, the woman has some sort of rustic Australian accent, while the man has a Texas dialect from time to time.”


  “I don’t understand what you’re talking about. Just do as you see fit.” Zhang Zian waved at Richard, leaving it in charge of this matter. He then read the demand from the game, “Dr. Irene Pepperberg’s lovebird, invisible!”


  Richard entered the invisible state and was brought downstairs by Zhang Zian.

  “Sorry for keeping you waiting for so long, I needed to handle some urgent issues.” Richard clenched Zhang Zian’s shoulder with its claws and imitated his tone.

  Zhang Zian felt pain from its clenching! Damn it! I didn’t ask you to pinch me so hard! This is absolutely retaliation! I will punish you when I have time!

  Cursing Richard in his heart, he opened his mouth to synchronize with Richard’s speaking.

  Tim and Lauren looked at each other in confusion. They didn’t notice before that this pet shop owner was speaking English in a native London accent.

  Richard chose the British accent for Zhang Zian because it knew that many Americans were fond of, and some were even obsessed with, the London accent. Some Americans even mocked that their accent was lame. Using the British accent catered to Zhang Zian’s pretentious personality.

  “It’s us who need to apologize for taking up your time without making an appointment,” Lauren said apologetically. “We’ve watched videos on YouTube showing the kittens in your shop dancing. We got so excited, but we couldn’t find a contact number for you, so we had to pay a visit based on the address we got. Before we came here, we worried that we wouldn’t be able to communicate well because of different languages, but your English is well beyond our imagination…”


  Richard pinched Zhang Zian’s shoulder with its claws and talked recklessly, “Quack…well, in fact, I lived abroad in England for many years. During that period, I was granted a doctorate degree in English and Applied Linguistics from the University of Cambridge.”


  “…A PhD from the University of Cambridge is running a pet shop? How fierce is the competition in the pet industry in China?”


  Zhang Zian’s cheeks ached from the lip synchronization and smiling. Although he was poor in speaking, he could understand parts of the conversation in English. He knew that Richard was playing pranks on him. This lie had gone too far!

  “It’s my honor to host guests from so far away. Please, sit down to talk.” Richard pinched at Zhang Zian again.

  Hearing the word “sit”, Zhang Zian raised his arm to point at the chairs for customers in his pet shop. These were the bar stools brought by Guo Dongyue during renovation, and previously, there was only one broken four-legged steel chair in the shop.

  He looked at Tim’s butt nervously, praying to God that the new chair wouldn’t collapse.

  Luckily, the chair just made a creaking sound. It survived the weight.

  Richard seemed to have misunderstood his gazing, and uttered some low-pitched secret laughter.