In front of the window of the three-dimensional residential apartment at No. 23 Xiangzhang Street, Selena sat on the bay window of the window, fiddling with a bunch of bead-like gadgets with both hands, and turned her head to look at the courtyard in the center of the building.

Across from her, Maggie was not in a wheelchair, but leaned on the edge of the bed, with two boxes on the bedside table and three bags at her feet, all full of shiny knick-knacks.

Maggie holds a thin nylon rope in her hand, carefully threads the small parts selected in the box onto the rope, weaves a fancy pattern at intervals, and between the fingers fly, a delicate Gotham-style bracelet is completed.

The Gotham style of the bracelet is due to the fact that instead of the usual delicate gemstones or rounded beads, the bracelet is adorned with brown-red nuts, chain clasps, bullet casings with the popular rapper's name on them, and a metal tag with a bat motif on it.

The string Selena is knitting in her hand is similar, with more metal parts, and resin replicas of hearts and brains, which are slightly Gothic dark style accessories.

Bruce has been very busy during this time, and Selena has not been idle, since the last time she was a small hit in Hollywood, many directors have taken a fancy to her face and figure, and want her to play some vase roles in the movie.

Selena's acting was originally fresh, and she would rather not accept the script that she couldn't like, and returned to Gotham after being idle for a while, and at this time her good friend Maggie found a new livelihood, so she set up a stall.

Maggie can't do heavy work because of poor health, she has been helping in the church before, helping the old priest count donations, writing purchase orders or something, although this job is idle, but there is almost no income, Maggie has been trying to save money to go to the sperm bank to buy sperm to have a child of her own, so she has been looking for a higher-paying job.

At that time, Gotham tourism was just emerging, and Maggie found that the style around the gangs was a bit too rough, basically what the factory produced, they put on it and sold it, and the badge didn't even bring a single pin, let alone some small accessories with high practical value.

Maggie keenly seized the business opportunity, she found a black mother she knew before who was in charge of food in the gang, bought a small pack of mini badges through her, went to the second-hand market to buy rope and second-hand accessories parts, and made a few bracelets at home and sold them near the beach.

Because she doesn't set up a stall, she doesn't occupy a place, she just hangs these things on a piece of cloth on top of her wheelchair and goes into the crowd to sell them, and the gangsters don't bother to care about her.

Either out of sympathy, or Gotham did lack such trinkets, Maggie's business was quite good, and 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 is indeed an extremely large amount of income, because there is almost no cost, buying factory-produced accessories with Gotham elements from the gang, it costs Maggie more than half of her savings, but it is only seven or eight dollars, and the remaining rope and accessories add up to less than three dollars and make twice as much profit, which is quite amazing.

It's not that Gotham doesn't have a more lucrative job, but Maggie is not in good health, she almost has to rely on a wheelchair to go out, and she can only earn thirty cents a day as a church helper, which is barely enough to make ends meet, but she can only save a few dollars if she saves money, but she only sells it for a day, but it gives her a very surprising amount of savings compared to the people at the bottom of Gotham.

Maggie had been doing this work before Selena returned, but after Selena returned, she saw a bigger business opportunity, although Catwoman was not interested in business, but her ability to get ahead in Gotham proved that she was very smart.

She approached the gang who ran the neighborhood and showed them the fruits of Maggie's craft, which at first dismissed the gang, and Selena set up a stall in front of the gang.

The gang couldn't let it run wild, but in the ten minutes it took them to gather their men and prepare to go out, the trinkets on Selena's stall were swept away by a group of spray painting enthusiasts passing by.

They hung the chains all over their bodies, put the locks on their ears, and asked Selena to come back the next day to set up the stall because they thought it was really cool and sent it to a friend.

The gang felt that this was very profitable, so they cooperated with Selena to organize the people in the gang who had little combat ability and were not convenient to go out to socialize, and used the blueprints provided by Selena to make trinkets from the metal parts produced in the factory and set up stalls for sale.

Due to their special living environment, the Gotham people's aesthetic is somewhat different from the mainstream aesthetic, and Selena's design drawings for them are just some metal badges hung with ropes, or some exaggerated knick-knacks made into earrings and pendants.

But the whimsy of the Gotham people allowed them to take a big step forward in terms of style, and those who had worked in the gang for a long time chose accessories to match according to their own understanding, and a whole bunch of pure hell-style bracelets, earrings and charms appeared.

Selena was helpless about this, but unexpectedly, outsiders were very interested in this style of jewelry, especially those with industrial style made of bullet shells, bolts, metal bearings, etc., which were almost snatched up as soon as they were put out.

Selena had no choice but to adjust the blueprints, and the gangsters saw that there was money to be made in this style, so they went to ask the factory to produce more parts of a similar style, and it didn't take long for almost the entire Gotham stall accessories to be in this style.

This is a good solution to the employment problem of a large part of the old, weak, sick and disabled in Gotham, as long as the hands can still move, to sit there is to make up, and it also allows many children who are incorporated into the school to have extracurricular activities, often a class of children division of labor, some are responsible for procurement, some are responsible for manufacturing, some are responsible for occupying positions, and some are responsible for peddling.

All of a sudden, Gotham had another kind of vendor, that is, children with necklaces, bracelets, pendants, and earrings, who walked the streets selling small accessories they made to tourists.

Maggie also wanted to get involved, but she found that she really didn't have the business mind, she wasn't as spicy as Selena, and she was a little out of breath when she said two more words, and it was pure luck to be alive today, and she couldn't negotiate with the gangsters or grab the stall at all.

So Selena made a deal with the gang they had originally worked with, and they got the right to use a stall three days a week, and Maggie took five or six children upstairs and downstairs to make products, and when the time came, they went to the stall to sell them.

Although the products are already somewhat saturated, and they can't make them as fast as the gangsters with ample labor, they can make dozens of dollars a week, and Maggie is almost enough to save up.

Tomorrow will be set up again, but three of the children in the small team led by Maggie have suffered from heat stroke and can't work at all, and they can't even get together a table of products now, and too sparse booth layout will greatly reduce the desire of passers-by to buy, so Selena came over to help Maggie catch up with the work.

Maggie knitted the bracelet in her hand as she looked up at Selena and asked, "Have you read the nearest newspaper?" ”

Selena nodded and said, "Of course, the headlines on the front page have been really lively lately." ”

Maggie smiled wryly and sighed and said, "You're too optimistic, do you know that those reporters are looking for you everywhere, trying to get evidence of Bruce Wayne's mental abuse from your mouth." ”

Selena pursed her lips and said, "I'm only sure of one thing, if Bruce really wants to sleep with that woman named Talia, he doesn't need to be drugged at all, he doesn't even need to have money, that face is the best weapon." ”

"And I'm even more convinced that if he did drug Talia, then Talia wouldn't have tested for drug residues in any hospital in Gotham, or any hospital in the world."

Maggie covered her face with her hands and said, "I don't know how you two get along on a daily basis, I'm pretty sure that you two go to a mental hospital together, and you don't even need an extra nurse." ”

"That's it." Selena said with a wave of her hand.

"But I'm still a little worried, Selena, of course I'm not saying that he really has mind control over you or something, you're going to scratch his face." Maggie shrugged her shoulders and said, "But you've complained to me several times about the restrictions of high society, if you two really get married, there will be more trouble, can you adapt to it?" ”

"Don't mention it, I have a headache when I think about it." Selena dropped what she was holding, covered her head and sat down next to Maggie, then leaned back, looked at the ceiling and said, "To be honest, we talked about getting married before, and just thinking about the process was exhausting. ”

"You know what? He was probably going to invite humans from all over the world to come and watch the ceremony, and then show them that I was going to wear a wedding dress that Jesus had prepared for his mother's marriage, and a necklace made of precious stones cut from the crowns of twenty-six English queens, and walk through the carpet that humans had been weaving since they jumped from the trees, and kiss him with lips made of seventy-two of the most poisonous mushrooms of the most poisonous species of man, but completely non-poisonous and able to change into an unknown number of colors of lipstick. ”

Maggie chuckled under her breath and said, "Shouldn't you feel like he values you?" ”

"Oh, 'value,' that's the word." Selena stretched out two fingers with each of her two hands and hooked them, and said, "Just to show everyone that even if I marry a girl from the slums, I can dress her up like Queen Mary, like a 'you will never see a little rusty taste of her'." ”

"Selena, don't say that." Maggie reached out and touched Selena's head and said, "This is not an auspicious metaphor. ”

"But just by looking at the Italian designer's eyes, I knew he was going to cut my neck with a collar that weighed about 10 kilograms."

"I don't know why this is happening." Selena sighed and said, "I always feel like he's misunderstood something, maybe I should find a time to talk to him." ”

"It's always good to talk." Maggie encouraged, "Maybe you can tell him that it's making you uncomfortable." ”

"And then he would show a very sad face, as if it was entirely my fault that I didn't play those little games of 'how many things can be hung on a doll' with him, and I had failed his love, so he was going to die for me now, do you know how lethal that expression is with his face and those eyes?"

"Wait." Maggie suddenly looked at Selena vigilantly and said, "I take back my words before, are you sure that you are not mentally manipulated by him?" ”

"Hell, of course I have—like you're going to be mentally manipulated by every soaked-wet, pathetic puppy you see in a cardboard box on a street corner on a rainy night."