Meet you at nightfall

Chapter 2

That day, Anna returned to her apartment, kicked off her high heels, walked barefoot to the place where her mother kept her money, and reached out to touch it, but she found nothing.

She blinked blankly, and touched it several times, but still found nothing. It was impossible for her house to be robbed, because she lived in a den of thieves, and no one knew how to prevent thieves better than her since she was a child.

So, there was only one possibility.

She spent all her money.

Where did she spend it?

I don't know.

She really didn't know.

Anna tried hard to recall what she had bought in the past few days, but found that she didn't seem to have bought anything. No, at first, she bought some small things, such as earrings, hairpins, false eyelashes... These small things only cost a dozen cents, and she felt that she could afford them, so she bought a lot of them at once.

Later, she passed by a magazine stand. The magazine at the front had a female model wearing a white bikini, with a blurred look in her eyes, and her bright pink lips slightly opened, revealing neat pearly teeth. Many men lingered in front of this magazine. She spit on the lustful looks of these men, but she couldn't help but walk into the department store and bought a metal tube lipstick.

The moment she got the lipstick, she felt a flash of regret in her heart, but it was soon filled with a swollen sense of satisfaction.

In this way, she unknowingly bought a lot of unnecessary cosmetics. Because she didn't spend all the money at once, she didn't even feel guilty about spending money, nor did she feel that she was spending money recklessly. It wasn't until she got home that she realized that she had spent all the money!

Although she had found a job, it would take some time before she got paid, and this restaurant would not provide food and drink for employees like other restaurants. After the money was gone, she even had a problem eating.

Thinking of this, cold sweat crawled down her back, and she realized for the first time how terrible it was that her mother had left.

She no longer had relatives, nor a safe haven, and she had to face everything alone.

Anna stood up and walked to the bathroom in a daze, wanting to wash her face and calm down. However, when she turned on the faucet and looked at the clear water flowing down, her first reaction was, will she have to pay the water bill in the future...?

How to pay?

Where to pay?

How much to pay?

It was not until this moment that she realized how her mother treated her. In order to protect her, her mother wrapped her in a warm and safe cocoon, isolating the darkness and filth. Her mother never told her how hard she worked, nor did she express her love to her, but only gave her nutrients to survive. She did survive, but she knew nothing about how to survive. The person responsible for providing nutrients left, and she got out of the cocoon in a daze, and then stepped into the swamp-like darkness.

Calmly turning off the faucet, Anna wiped her wet cheeks with a towel, leaned in front of the mirror, and looked carefully at this beautiful face.

After washing off the eyebrows, mascara and lipstick, this face became even more beautiful. The skin was as sweet as honey, with a healthy pink. Even without lipstick, the lips were bright rose. However, this made Anna very unhappy, because bright pink and light pink were popular now, and she looked particularly ridiculous when she put them on her lips.

Her hair and eyebrows were very thick. She had to trim her eyebrows almost every two days, otherwise they would spread to her hairline like crazy weeds. Her overly thick hair made her proud, but also gave her a headache. Her hair was very hard, and each hair was full of vitality. She had to spend at least ten minutes combing her hair every day, so she always missed the bus.

Such a beautiful face would soon be eclipsed if it lost the irrigation of money.

She thought of her mother's friend, a call girl who was less than 20 years old. Her mother told her that the girl had gone down this road of no return because of an unexpected pregnancy: "Anna, girls nowadays are doomed. They are still in high school and get pregnant! I heard from the girl that in their school, there are even girls who go back to school after giving birth - there is such a terrible thing! You must not learn from her, you will go to college in the future!"

After that, her mother put out the cigarette butt, opened the door, and took the girl in. That was the first time Anna saw an unpresentable call girl - before that, she thought that all call girls were like her mother, living a romantic life of eloping with customers from time to time. The girl was pale, with yellow-brown freckles on her cheeks, and a piece of dead skin on her lower lip. It seemed that she had not dressed herself up for a long time.

Anna did not sympathize with the girl's experience - she did not understand what it meant for a girl to have a child before the age of 20, but she sympathized with the girl for not being able to dress herself up. If one day she became so embarrassed, so swollen, and so ugly, she would rather die.

Thinking of this, Anna raised her head, looked at her youthful and beautiful self in the mirror, and made a decision.

——

The next day, Anna found Charlotte and asked directly: "How did you find a rich man?"

Hearing this, Charlotte's cheeks were red and almost dripping blood. She thought Anna was going to humiliate her, and she stammered and couldn't speak. Unexpectedly, Anna's next sentence was: "Can you introduce me to one?"

Charlotte: "..."

Charlotte blushed, looking at Anna's pure and beautiful face, she actually wanted to persuade her not to go down this road of no return, but her thinking was simple, her lips and tongue were stupid, and she couldn't think of words of persuasion. In addition, every fallen person hopes that others will fall together. She hesitated for a moment and agreed to Anna's request.

This time, it was Charlotte who took Anna to Mrs. Mason's apartment. When Anna walked in, she thought she had walked into the heart of a giant in a horror movie. The walls of the house were gray-pink, the carpet was dark red, and the air was filled with a strong smell of perfumed powder. Because the smell was so strong, it reminded people of the fermented garbage dump at the end of the alley in summer.

A woman came down from the second floor, looked at her indifferently, walked to the sofa and sat down, lowered her head and began to apply nail polish. She was wearing a suspender dress, her shoulders were round, her upper body was plump like a flower that was about to bear fruit, and she exuded the smell of wine and sweat. She didn't seem to smell her own body odor, but just focused on applying nail polish.

Mrs. Mason's room was at the end of the apartment. When Anna was about to enter that room, she suddenly had a strong desire to escape.

She finally realized that she was heading towards a road of no return. Thinking that she might never turn back, her hairs exploded one by one, her calves were trembling, and her back was full of sticky hot sweat.

At this time, all her senses became sharp. Like an antelope that strayed into a beast's lair, she smelled the decaying smell of the graveyard of this apartment. She saw the blue circles under the eyes and the tired look of every woman living here. She gradually realized that selling herself was not the solution to the problem - but what other solution was there besides selling herself?

She couldn't think of it.

Perhaps it was because her head was too small and too delicate. This was a head suitable for appearing under the spotlight and on the cover of magazines, not a head for thinking.

So, she couldn't think of it.

Finally, Anna walked into Mrs. Mason's room.

What relieved her was that Mrs. Mason didn't look fierce, and even looked kind. She had curly hair, thick eyeliner, thick lips, and every move revealed her desire for money. It seemed that with her, the only topics to talk about were body and money.

Mrs. Mason glanced at Anna, a little surprised: "Mary?"

In front of Mrs. Mason, Anna's sharpness was dulled a lot: "Mary is my mother."

"That's it." Mrs. Mason responded, took off the cigarette in her mouth with her thumb and index finger, and blew out a choking smoke ring, "So, little girl, why are you looking for me? I haven't bothered your mother recently."

"My mother ran away." Anna wanted to describe herself as miserable, but her writing skills were limited. In addition, she spent money lavishly during this period, and she could be said to be living a carefree life. Yao Zizai really didn't know how to describe it more miserably, so she just said plainly, "I have no money. Can you introduce me to a rich man?"

"Yes." Mrs. Mason agreed readily, "but I want to charge an introduction fee."

"How much?"

"Not much, $165, the price of a breast augmentation surgery."

Anna asked, "Can I give it to you later? I have no money now."

Mrs. Mason squinted her eyes and looked at her for a moment, then nodded slowly, "Yes, but you have to sign a contract with me."

"Okay."

The deal was done. Mrs. Mason put the cigarette on the edge of the ashtray, licked her thumb with her tongue, took out a piece of white paper from the drawer, and wrote two lines of English. Her handwriting was very sloppy, but you could probably make out the words "$165" and so on. Anna took the paper, pretended to study it for a while, and signed her name: Anna Brown.

After doing all this, Mrs. Mason put the paper in the drawer, as if she didn't care about the $165 at all. She took out a hardcover photo album and threw it in front of Anna: "These are all my regular customers. Pick two that you like." As she said that, she picked up a cigarette, took two puffs, and laughed hoarsely like a witch in a musical, "Young people nowadays are always clamoring for fairness. Is this fair? Give you - what's the word, oh, the right to vote." Anna opened the photo album, which was full of middle-aged men of all kinds, each of them looked weird, and each of them was as fat as a pregnant woman in her eighth month. She wrinkled her nose and flipped through it for a long time, and finally found a middle-aged man who looked decent. She pushed the album back: "Let's go with him."

Mrs. Mason didn't move her head, but rolled her eyes downwards to see the man's appearance clearly: "Oh, him, he likes female students - not the female students who drink and fight and worship hippies, but the young and lovely female students. I will arrange a meeting for you tomorrow. Remember not to wear makeup and dress more pure."

In this way, Anna successfully sold herself and owed a debt of $165.

The next day, she followed Mrs. Mason's instructions, hailed a taxi, and went to the opera house in the city center. She rarely came here because it was too prosperous and every woman passing by was dazzling. She knew she was beautiful, but she also knew that she was not beautiful enough to look down on all American women, so she only acted as a beauty in her own neighborhood and rarely set foot in the city center.

After getting off the taxi, she passed by a candy store and saw her appearance in the window glass.

The white dress, the hem just covered the knees, was the length that middle-aged men liked. Her thick hair was scattered, covering a thin clavicle. Without the smoky makeup, her beautiful eyebrows and eyes were full of childishness, looking like a real schoolgirl, not a fallen girl who was about to sell herself out.

Anna was an optimistic girl, and the element of optimism was never to think too much. So, she stopped at that point, did not continue to watch, and turned to the opera house.

The white theater was magnificent and solemn, the Roman columns were ancient and luxurious, and the Stars and Stripes fluttered in the wind. Anna waited for more than ten minutes, a little bored, and stuffed a stick of gum into her mouth.

At this time, two men came out of the theater.

The first middle-aged man who came out had a Mediterranean hairstyle, a round face, and was a little fat, but because of his straight nose and full forehead, he was not particularly ugly, just within her acceptable range, and was a rich man she was going to get together with.

As for the other man...

Anna blinked, forgot to chew gum, and stood there stupidly.

For a moment, her heartbeat stopped for two seconds, but then it was filled with a louder and more rapid heartbeat.

Looking at the man's profile, her ears felt a piercing pain. After a long while, she realized that it was a feeling of congestion and fever.

... Her heartbeat was so painful and hot in her ears because of the profile of a strange man.

But the man was so handsome.

He was holding a cane, wearing a dark gray long coat, a black satin shirt underneath, the hem of his coat hanging to his knees, and shiny leather shoes. He was very tall, almost a head taller than the middle-aged man next to him, and he seemed to have to lower his head slightly to hear the middle-aged man's voice. While listening to the middle-aged man talking, he slightly curled the corners of his lips, revealing a polite but careless smile.

This smile directly paralyzed half of her heart.

It was clearly not spring, and there were no flowers blooming around, but looking at the man's face, she heard the sound of bright spring flowers blooming.