Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Shi Qingxuan let out a long, melodramatic sigh full of discontent as she asked her brother one last time, “Why do I have to go with you again?”

“I already told you at least seven times already, Qingxuan. Quit whining and get your things. We’re supposed to be in the air in two hours,” her brother replied coldly.

“I’m not whining, I’m complaining! If you want to hear me whine—”

“No. I don’t want to hear any of your nonsense– whining, complaining, grouching, bitching, moaning, none of it. Get your things and let’s go. I don’t want to be late to the airport because of you. We are not going to miss this flight.”

Shi Wudu was waiting impatiently in the kitchen next to his suitcase and duffle bag. He was leaning on the counter, scrolling on his phone.

“But why did you have to pick somewhere so dreadful?! You know I hate the water, ge! And we’re gonna be surrounded by it!” she complained further, crossing her arms childishly. “So just one more time, tell me why I have to go to that stupid, boring, old town and get on that stupid, boring, old boat everyday with your stupid, boring, dumb friends?” 

Well, maybe Ling Wen didn’t really count as stupid, but she was definitely boring.

Shi Wudu didn’t even look up from his phone or acknowledge her in any way.

She continued, “It’s my vacation, too, you know! You’re dragging me along with you to your dream summer trip and said no to mine? Tell me how that’s fair?! I’m just gonna complain the entire time if you make me go. You might even hear me whine! So indulge me, ge.”

She pawed the phone away from his face when he made no moves and he scowled up at her.

“Make it make sense, ‘cuz so far, I’m only seeing more reasons to complain. You really should just let me stay here,” she insisted. “I will make this trip a waking nightmare for you if you make me go.”

Shi Wudu sighed just as dramatically and started massaging his temples with his free hand.

“Like I said the first time, it’s so I can keep an eye on you. For all I know, you’d drink yourself into a coma if I let you stay here or, god forbid, go to the capital alone,” he explained for the nth time. “I don’t trust you enough to go anywhere by yourself.”

“I’m not a child anymore, ge. You don’t have to—”

“Oh, I don’t have to take care of you anymore, do I? News to me!” he interrupted. “If you’re so independent, then why don’t you move out, hand over your credit cards that I pay for every month, and go get a real job?”

She rolled her eyes. Ouch. That one hurt.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he grumbled, going back to staring at his screen. “If you’re still freeloading, you’re still my little sibling and I am still in charge of you. Until you actually make something of your life, we’ll do things my way, since I’m the only responsible adult here. So we’re going on vacation where I want to go and you’re going to have a great time spending some quality time with gege and his friends, alright? You’re gonna be nice and smile and nod and not be a pain in gege’s ass, yes?”

“You’re the worst.”

He slammed his phone down on the thigh of his designer sweatpants.

“Qingxuan, do you think I want to be taking you with me?” he spat back at her petty remark. “Believe me, this isn’t my ideal scenario, either. If you showed me I could actually trust you, maybe I’d let you go where you want, but until then, we’re both stuck with each other for the entire summer. So please. For my sanity, just go get your things and let’s get this flight over with. I already requested our taxi.”

“I’d rather drink myself into a coma than listen to Pei Ming and Xuan Ji make out the entire summer on some stupid boat…” she muttered.

“Ling Wen will be there, so I doubt she’ll tolerate their PDA for very long,” he replied, going back to his phone again. “And Pei Xiu is coming with us, so maybe you can get to know him better. He’s a nice kid. You might hit it off, who knows? Maybe it won’t be as bad as you think.”

Her eyes narrowed dangerously and she could feel a bit of bile rise up in the back of her throat she had to swallow down. “If you’re trying to set me up with Pei Xiu, please know that I’d rather drown again than date anyone remotely related to that absolute scoundrel you call your best friend.”

“Stop being so dramatic, my friends aren’t that bad.”

“Your friends are the worst, ge. You have that in common, it seems.”

He just pointed to her bedroom, not looking up from his smartphone with the flight itinerary pulled up.

“Whatever,” she resigned in defeat, finally giving in and going to grab her suitcase. “Maybe there’ll be a super hot, tall and muscular, sexy lifeguard or a member of the coast guard to save me from drowning instead of a sea monster!”

“You’re not gonna drown. That was so long ago. Get over it,” he sneered. “And there was never any sea monster. How are you still on about that? Grow up.”

She started feigning some strained gurgling sounds, screaming melodramatically, “Save me! Save me!” 

As she thrashed wildly in the hallway, she almost knocked over an old family photo on the wall. One of the only ones with all four of them in it before their parents died. She rescued the picture at the last second before it could crash to the hardwood floors, and held it to her chest melodramatically. Shi Wudu only looked up when he heard the collision.

“Hey, watch it. Be careful with that.”

“Oh, thank you so much for saving me, Mr. Sexy Lifeguard. Oh my, did you give me mouth to mouth? That was my first kiss, how could you! Oh no! My bikini top came undone! Oh, Mr. Sexy Lifeguard, we can’t do this here! Someone will see!” 

She threw the picture back on the hallway table, not bothering to hang it back up, and started moaning loudly as she walked into her bedroom just to piss off her brother. She pulled up the suitcase handle with a quick pop and dragged it over the hardwood floors as loudly as possible into the kitchen, next to his.

Shi Wudu was trying desperately not to have an aneurysm at her infernal screeching. He tried to ignore her stupid antics and focused instead on reading the terms and conditions of the taxi app he downloaded in his desperation.

Shi Qingxuan gave him an overly fake smile and cried, “You know, maybe I will have some fun, after all!”

“This is going to be a long trip…” Shi Wudu muttered under his breath, head in his hands.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Get over it, he said, she grumbled to herself whilst leaning against the airplane window, looking out to watch the clouds. Yeah right. You can’t just erase trauma like that in the blink of an eye. 

Shi Wudu didn’t know what it was like, almost drowning. He’d always loved swimming since he was a kid, and he was on the swim team in high school. Had a personal best of 29.41 seconds for the 50 meter butterfly and bragged about it nonstop. 

How could he know what it was like? It was like he was made to be around the water. 

Every summer when their parents were still alive, he’d beg them to take him out on the boat in that same stupid coastal town, despite her harrowing trist on said boat. They hadn’t been back to Fu Gu since the accident. Their parents never gave into Shi Wudu’s demands, and after they died, there wasn’t much point going on family vacations. (Until now, it seemed.)

Shi Qingxuan, however, never shared her older brother’s hydrophilic tendencies. No, she always preferred the company of the sand, shore, shells, and seagulls, as well as that amazing ocean breeze, rather than the murky depths of the fathomless ocean. She shivered just thinking about it.

She’d been afraid of the water even before her accident. Not that her brother seemed to care. He was currently leaning back in his first class seat with a satin eye mask over his face, resting peacefully as she recounted her painful memories. 

Shi Qingxuan silently vowed to be eternally pissy and awful the whole summer for sweet vengeance sake.

She hated that town, and rightfully so. But another, maybe more masochistic, part of herself wanted to uncover the truth about what really happened that day she almost drowned. Maybe finally coming back would give her some much needed closure about the whole ordeal and she would be able to move past it. Maybe she could even learn to not hate the ocean, who knows!

There was one thing that wasn’t so horrible about that vacation, though… She’d briefly met a weird boy with the same name as her and his little sister on the beach all those years ago. She could never put on a finger on why they’d made such a strong impression on her, but she found herself thinking about them from time to time.

She wondered if they ever thought about her, too.

Doubt it… she thought, dismissing the crazy notion.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Fu Gu was a perfectly picturesque little seaside town. In the past, it was a bustling fishing hamlet no one ever bothered to visit, but slowly people started flocking to the town because of the historical lighthouse, pristine beaches, and charming atmosphere. Popular tourist activities included flying kites on the beach, renting sailboats or other vessels, climbing up the stairs of the lighthouse, and sampling the local seafood.

Back during the summer of the accident, their mother and father had rented a bungalow and boat for the summer in the supposedly quaint coastal town of Fu Gu. The Shi family had some business ties with Fu Gu due to the oil pipes running along the ocean floor that lead to a rig many kilometers out past the coastline, so they got a good deal on the trip.

Little A-Xuan had kicked and screamed the whole way, not wanting to go, despite gege ’s and her parents insisting they would all have a great time by the ocean. She was incredibly insistent, though. Wailing and crying all the way to the docks, little A-Xuan vehemently refused to get on the boat that first day. Her mother ended up having to stay on the shore while her husband and son got to enjoy the boat for the first time.

Even on the beach, A-Xuan was causing quite the commotion. Her terribly embarrassed mother was trying to dip her little toes into the incredibly safe shallows to show her that it wouldn’t hurt, but A-Xuan just kept screaming bloody murder every time the foamy tide came running up towards her. 

It was only until some little boy about her age ran over and invited her to play in the sand that she stopped her tantrum. The little boy led her over to his little sister who was dutifully helping her big bro build an elaborate sandcastle. 

Finally able to relax, her mother sprawled out in a lounge chair under a big umbrella a little ways away with some alcoholic drink that wasn’t nearly strong enough for her ruined outing. She watched the three kids play while she waited for her husband and son to come back from the probably much more invigorating boating trip along the coast.

“The water isn’t scary,” the little boy said late into the construction of their joint sandcastle, taking a big scoop of sand into a colorful plastic pale. “It’s nice.”

“It’s scary,” A-Xuan insisted, a deep frown on her face. She had found several little cowrie shells along the beach and was sticking them into the outer walls of their compound.

“No, it’s not,” he said with a severe brow for someone so young.

“Yes, it is!” She put her hands on her hips to punctuate her sentence.

He gazed out to the horizon, his gaze softening instantly. “The ocean will be nice to you if you’re nice to it, right meimei?”

“Mn!” the little toddler sounded, nodding vigorously.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” A-Xuan pouted. “The ocean isn’t a person. It doesn’t have feelings.”

“If you keep saying that, it’ll get mad at you,” he warned, furrowing his brows with an intense golden gaze.

“That’s silly.”

“I’m serious,” he insisted, pouring out the pale to make a new section of the increasingly elaborate sandcastle. “Can you swim?” he asked, changing topics.

“No! And I don’t want to know!”

“No wonder it’s scary. Even meimei can swim. And she’s three.”

“Can Daiyu-er go swimming with gege?” she asked, tugging on the side of his swim shirt. 

He shook his head. “Not right now. We have to finish the fortress together.”

“No, it’s scary because it’s scary. Not because I can’t swim. I don’t want to swim because it's scary,” A-Xuan continued.

“That doesn’t make sense,” he countered. “Scary things are scary because they make you afraid, not because they’re scary. Scary things are different from person to person.”

“Nuh-uh! Everyone’s scared of sharks. Sharks are scary.”

“I’m not afraid of sharks. They’re cool.”

“Cool?! They eat people!”

“They don’t want to hurt people. They mistake the people for food and then the humans make movies about sharks and start killing them ‘cuz they’re afraid. It’s not fair to the sharks. They just made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes.”

The two stared at each other for a long moment before A-Xuan finally deduced, “You’re weird.”

“You’re weird,” he retorted back immediately.

“Gege’s weird!” Daiyu-er echoed happily.

The boy was about to argue with his little sister before A-Xuan stood up and dusted the sand off her legs.

“I’m gonna go get some more shells,” she said. “Does your sister wanna come with me?”

“No, we’ll keep working on the foundations of the fortress.”

“Oh yeah, her name is Daiyu-er, right? So what’s your name, weirdo? I’m–”

“A-Xuan!” called out her mother from under the shady umbrella.

Both older kids’ attention snapped over to see who was calling their name. Daiyu-er kept slapping her chubby little fingers against the sides of the outer walls, making sure they wouldn’t fall.

“YES?” they called out in unison.

Bright emerald green eyes locked onto stern golden brown ones.

“I’m A-Xuan,” they both said at the same time.

“Wait, what? No, you’re not. I’m A-Xuan,” A-Xuan insisted, pointing to herself. She was in a cute little green and white sailor outfit with her chestnut colored hair in tiny, curly pigtails.

“No, I’m A-Xuan,” the second A-Xuan said, in black swim trunks with a big shark mouth on one leg and a matching swim shirt. His inky black hair gently jostled about in the ocean breeze. He hadn’t gone back in the ocean for a while, but he was still dripping wet. Daiyu-er, too.

“A-Xuan?” her mother called out again.

“COMING!” they both yelled.

“Hey! Stop! That’s my name! You’re copying me!” she demanded, pushing him in the arm.

“No, it’s my name. Stop it!”

They started batting at each other like cats until A-Xuan’s mom finally came over to break them up. Daiyu-er was clapping happily, in a fit of giggles over their bickering.

“A-Xuan, stop that!” she called, horrified her child was hitting another kid.

“He started it!” “She started it!” they called out in unison, pointing accusatory fingers at the other.

“Mama, he says his name is A-Xuan, but that’s my name! Make him stop!”

“My name is A-Xuan! He Xuan!”

“A-Xuan gege!” Daiyu-er confirmed, pointing at her brother. “And A-Xuan jiejie!” She pointed to the other A-Xuan.

Her mom started laughing and said, “Oh, I see. There are two A-Xuan! Qingxuan, isn’t that something?”

“Two A-Xuan?” she asked, looking wildly affronted by the boy who dared to share her name. Thick tears started welling up in her eyes and she began absolutely wailing, screaming how she wanted to be the only A-Xuan.

“Fine, then I’ll be Xuan-er,” the boy finally huffed. “Xuan-er and Daiyu-er.”

“No, you don’t have to—” her mother tried to interject.

“Okay,” A-Xuan sniffed, instantly shutting off the tears. “A-Xuan and Xuan-er.”

“Xuan-er gege!” Daiyu-er accepted easily.

Her mother slapped a hand to her slightly red forehead. What am I gonna do with this stubborn, spoiled child? She should be an actress at this rate…

(She was so stubborn, in fact, that one day a couple of years before this vacation-turned-nightmare, A-Xuan had insisted that she was a little girl instead of a boy and there was nothing any of her family could do except just accept that A-Xuan was their daughter now. 

They took her to a pediatrician and a child behavioral therapist, both of which couldn’t find anything clinically wrong, other than gender dysphoria. When she got older, they’d have to make some tough decisions, but before puberty, the best prescription was really just going along with it. Her family thought it wouldn’t be too long before she got bored of being a girl, but it had been nearly two years at this point and she showed zero signs of stopping anytime soon.)

“Anyways, A-Xuan, Baba and Gege are back from the boat! Let’s go meet them on the docks.”

Little A-Xuan looked back at the boy and said, “We didn’t finish the palace. Mama, can I come back to play with Xuan-er and Daiyu-er again tomorrow?”

“We’ll be here tomorrow if you wanna keep building the Nether Water Manor,” confirmed Xuan-er with a slight smirk.

“That’s not its name! It’s called the Palace of Wind and Water, not the stupid ‘Nether Water Manor’!”

Her mother cut in before her daughter could start another fight with the boy. “We promised your brother we’d try going back on the boat tomorrow, remember?” (A-Xuan definitely never made any such promises.)

She looked her mother dead in the eyes and stated plainly, “I'm not getting on that boat, Mama. I’ll scream the whole time if you make me. The ocean is mean and scary and there are sharks. I wanna finish building the sandcastle with Xuan-er.”

After a long moment, her mother just sighed and said, “I’ll think about it. We came all this way to enjoy the ocean, A-Xuan. Mama wants to be with Baba and Gege on the boat. Don’t you wanna be with Gege and have fun together?”

She shook her head violently back and forth and crossed her arms, puffing her cheeks out a bit. Xuan-er started snickering lightly at her. She stuck her tongue out at him.

“Maybe you’ll change your mind when you hear how fun it was,” her mother said, hoping and praying for her stubborn child to change her mind, knowing deep down that it was useless.

“Bye bye! I’ll see ya tomorrow, Xuan-er! See you Daiyu-er!”

“See you tomorrow.”

“Bye bye, A-Xuan jiejie!” Daiyu-er called back, waving excitedly.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

A-Xuan never showed up to build sandcastles the next day.

“YOU CAN’T MAKE ME!” she shrieked, flailing and struggling out of her father’s strong grip. “I WON’T GO! YOU CAN’T MAKE ME!”

“If you keep struggling and I drop you, you could fall in,” Baba said, the picture of calm, as he tried to wrangle her onto the anchored boat, still docked at the pier.

She gulped audibly, eyes going wide and she instantly went rigid like a piece of driftwood in his arms. Tears started welling up in her eyes as Baba set her down on the seating area of the speedboat.

“See, it’s not so scary!” Shi Wudu said, rushing to her side.

Except, it was very scary. She stared out into the endless horizon and all she could see was blue. Horrifying, dreadful, unknown ocean, as far as her eyes could see. She wanted to dash off the boat, run as far away as her legs could take her, and go back to the safety of the beach. Xuan-er and Daiyu-er were waiting for her to finish the sandcastle! But she was too terrified to even move from the bench. Her fingers turned into claws as she tried to ground herself deeper into the plastic-feeling leather upholstery.

“I wanna go back!” she cried, bursting into sobs. 

Mama appeared at her side, holding two life jackets. She passed one over to Shi Wudu.

“Do I have to, Mama? I’m really good at swimming,” he protested.

“Yes, put it on,” she replied. “Just in case.”

Shi Wudu who buckled it around his torso reluctantly. He gave A-Xuan a quick but comforting pat on the shoulder and went to ask Baba if he needed any help with the boat.

A-Xuan kept crying and trying to fight Mama who was only trying to buckle the life jacket around her torso.

“I wanna go back! I wanna get off! I don’t wanna go on the boat!” she wailed, trying to swat Mama’s arms away.

“Do you want to fall in and drown?” Mama asked, already getting frustrated. A-Xuan stopped fighting her for a moment as that thought consumed her mind. She fervently shook her head. “Then let me put this on you.”

Mama huffed and sat down next to her once it was secured. A-Xuan clung to her mother’s arms, digging her tiny fingernails into her arm and continued weeping.

“It’s going to be fun! Look how Gege’s not afraid, yeah? Baba’s not afraid and neither am I,” she tried to soothe. “If there was really something scary out there, we would be scared, but we’re not. So it’s going to be fine!”

Mama made a fair point. Shi Wudu and Baba weren't scared of anything, but Mama was a scaredy cat like her. If everyone wasn’t scared, maybe this wasn’t going to be so bad…? 

Except, right as she had that thought, Baba started up the engine of the boat. With a wicked lurch, they started a rather bumpy journey taxiing out into the open ocean.

A-Xuan practically jumped into Mama’s arms and hid her face into her armpit, screaming bloody murder from the sudden change in speed.

“I wanna go back! I don’t wanna go! Don’t take me out there!” Her sobs were muffled from the motor and by shouting directly into Mama’s arm.

“It’ll be alright, A-Xuan,” Mama said, tracing smooth circles on her arm since the life jacket covered up most of her back. “Come on, it’ll be okay. It’s really not so scary, I promise. The ocean is really pretty today. It’s nice and calm. The weather’s nice. We’re gonna have a lot of fun, yeah?”

“NO! I WANNA GO BACK! TAKE ME BACK!” She lifted her head and screamed directly into Mama’s face, her terror mingling with rage when they made no motions to turn around and take her back to shore.

And from such a wild motion of her head, combined with the jostling of the boat from the ocean waves, a wave of nausea picked up in her throat. It just made her cry even harder, scream even louder.

Mama was about to lose it. “A-Xuan! Stop screaming!”

“NO!”

Mama eventually pushed her out of her lap if she was just going to keep yelling directly into her ears. 

“Mama, wait! No! Don’t go! I—” she tried to say, but Mama wasn’t listening. Her pleas died in her throat as another lurch of the boat made her screech in terror.

With Mama as her anchor gone, this left poor A-Xuan clinging desperately to the bench below her for purchase with every toss and turn of the boat in the waves.

“Wudu, tell your sister to stop screaming,” Mama ordered her older, more sensible son. A-Xuan actually listened to him. Maybe he could calm her down. Or else, this was going to be a very long day.

Shi Wudu sighed and did his best to try and comfort her, but at this point, A-Xuan was so angry and so thoroughly upset and helpless to do anything, that she was content to just keep wailing and screaming at the top of her lungs.

Her family thought that if A-Xuan had been set loose in the Monster’s Inc. universe, she would’ve supplied enough scream power to last for decades. Centuries even.

Mama resorted to drinking, as she usually did, just to cope with the noise. Baba felt sorry for A-Xuan and wanted to go comfort her, but he was the only one who knew how to drive the boat. Shi Wudu was trying to avoid his little sister because he was also growing irritated from her astronomical tantrum. Thank god, it was a fairly sizable speed boat, comfortable for the family to spread out in while her father raced around, chasing the waves at the insistence of Shi Wudu who wanted to feel the boat jostle and shake, much to A-Xuan’s absolute horror.

“Baba…” she cried out (softer this time), holding her hands out for him. “I wanna go back. Can we go back now?” She sniffled and whimpered her big, teary, emerald eyes at him.

Fuck, her puppy dog eyes were really good. A lethal weapon. Baba stopped the boat for a moment and went to go grab her. He pulled her into his lap in the cabin with the steering wheel.

“We can’t go back yet, but if you’re really scared, you can stay here with Baba, okay?” he compromised. “I’ll keep you safe. It’s better here than outside, anyway.”

She bristled in his arms, not fully satisfied with this arrangement since they were still out on the ocean, but she eventually conceded. She was already exhausted from crying so much. Her face and throat ached. She curled up into his chest and wept silently for a while. Baba helped her unbuckle her life jacket so she could snuggle up closer and discarded it on the floor of the cabin.

A-Xuan yelped and cried out whenever a particularly big wave or hard turn jostled her a little more than expected, but she found it really wasn’t so bad in Baba’s lap. She didn’t have to see the outside and she couldn’t get flung off in here.

“Baba, my tummy feels weird,” she croaked out. “I don’t like it out here. Can we go back? Please?”

He gave her one of the nasty tasting anti-nausea and sea sickness tablets Mama had stocked up on, but made no mention of turning the boat around. 

That was the final straw. 

She wasn’t getting what she wanted, her stomach felt awful, they weren’t taking her back, and the pill tasted like ash as it dissolved on her tongue.

“I wanna go back!” she screamed, hitting Baba's chest with her fists. It didn’t really have any strength behind it. “Take me back! I hate it here! I hate you for taking me out here!” 

“If you’re gonna scream and hit me, I’m gonna have to kick you out, Princess,” Baba explained patiently. “I gotta keep driving the boat safely. I can’t do that with you hitting me.”

She screamed again and started flailing her limbs in his lap, even more enraged he wasn’t giving into her demands.

Mama had to come in and help wrangle her out of the cabin, kicking and screaming while Baba continued driving the boat. A-Xuan didn’t stop screaming for about two hours after that. Literal. Nonstop. Constant. Screaming. Her mother was already way past a tolerable amount of drunk just to cope. Shi Wudu was hanging onto the front railing of the boat with his bright orange life jacket tied loosely around his torso while Baba weaved and sped around trying to catch the biggest waves. They all tried to collectively ignore her, but wow, was she making it impossible.

“Stop that!” she demanded. “It’s too scary! I’ll fly out! Stop it and take me back! Right now!”

“Do it again, Baba!” Shi Wudu encouraged.

“NO!”

She hated seeing them ignore her and continue to have fun on the objectively horrible boating experience. It only encouraged her to scream and cry more.

With copious amounts of alcohol loosening her tongue, Mama finally lost her tempter.

“A-Xuan, shut up! Just shut up! Please, for the love of GOD, SHUT UP! Cry all you want as long as you do it quietly, I don’t care!” her Mama yelled, absolutely over it. “We’re not going anywhere! We’re staying here on the boat and you’re going to deal with it! We’re supposed to be having fun and you’re ruining it! This tantrum is not going to give you your way!”

In response, she just continued to scream and cry even louder and more desperate than before. But now instead of just her face and her throat, her little heart ached. Mama was always really mean when she drank.

Mama made her own loud, frustrated noise and stormed over to the cabin. She was already starting to feel sick from having a few too many drinks, and the rough ride coupled with her growing migraine from A-Xuan wasn’t exactly helping. She got up momentarily to go pop an extra anti-nausea and sea sickness pill in the interior cabin.

After a particularly nasty turn that only fed Shi Wudu’s adrenaline rush and left a huge spray of sea water in his face, he whipped his head around and started jumping up and down, begging his father to do it again. 

It was only then that the screaming finally stopped. 

Mama felt like it was music to her ears. She hoped that FINALLY A-Xuan and tired herself out and quit her infernal fussing.

She came tumbling out of the cabin interior, looking pale, “Do NOT do that again!”

“Come on, Mama! Just one more, please!”

“No, you’re gonna terrify your sister even more than she already is,” she said, not caring to mention that she was definitely going to hurl for sure if they kept this up.

“No, she loved it, didn’t you, meimei?” Shi Wudu called out to the back of the boat.

There was no response.

“Meimei, you loved it, right?” he asked again.

More blissful silence.

When no one replied, three heads immediately turned to look at the back of the boat. Much to everyone’s immediate horror, there was no little A-Xuan sitting on the bench. 

“A-Xuan!” her mother called out, suddenly very sober. “A-Xuan?!”

She ran into the cabin again, but A-Xuan was not there, only a discarded, orange life jacket. Six frantic eyes searched the horizon, searching for any sign of the little girl.

“There! Baba, she’s over there! She’s in the water! She fell in!” Shi Wudu called out, hand pointing out in the exact opposite direction the boat was currently speeding in. A tiny flailing figure was struggling in the water.

“Oh my god,” Mama said, putting a horrified hand over her mouth. “Turn around right now, turn around! She can’t swim! Oh my god!”

“I am!” Baba insisted, already spinning the wheel in a 180.

Mama ran over to the edge of the boat and gripped the tiny orange life jacket like it was her anchor as her eyes stayed locked on the form of her daughter splashing helplessly in the ocean. This was exactly why she was so scared to get on the boat in the first place!

“Did she jump? Did she fall off? I didn’t see what happened!” Mama asked frantically. “Oh my god…”

“I don’t know, Mama,” Shi Wudu admitted.

“Why weren’t you looking after her?!” she spat at her eldest son, despite the fact that it was definitely not his responsibility to do that. “You should always be looking after her! That’s your job as her older brother!”

Shi Wudu’s eyes widened and he swallowed uncomfortably. “I’m sorry—”

“It’s not his fault,” Baba piped up, racing the boat over to where they’d seen A-Xuan as quickly as possible. “I’m the one that let her take off the life jacket…”

Poor little A-Xuan, who was still screaming her head off several dozen meters away, had gotten flung off the boat before she could realize what had happened. She tried her darndest to keep her head above the water, but the water felt like it was trying to swallow her whole. She couldn’t seem to kick hard enough and her arms were too busy flailing around to help keep her afloat. She immediately regretted unbuckling the life jacket her mother had tried to put on her torso.

She kept kicking and kicking and screaming and screaming as she watched her family’s boat get further and further away. Hot, panicked tears raced down her cheeks as she watched her only lifeline speed away. 

Mama doesn’t wanna come back for me! was her first terrible thought. They hate me, they want me to drown! They took me out here to get rid of me!

It was too much work, all the screaming and splashing and kicking. The dark waters around her seem to grow rougher as waves began relentlessly pounding against her face, spilling salt water into her lungs. Every time she opened her mouth to gurgle and spit it out, another wave was there to flood her scratchy throat and aching lungs with more water. 

It hurts! It burns! Everything hurts! I can’t keep… I don’t wanna…

She tried to redouble her efforts to keep her head above the water, but her entire body felt like it was on fire from her valiant struggle. She just couldn’t figure out a harmonious rhythm to keep in time with the waltz of waves slowly trying to overtake her. 

One last hoarse scream ripped from her raw lungs as a particularly tall and powerful wave finally bullied her underneath the surface.

“Where did she go?” Mama searched frantically, running all over the boat, trying to see any shapes under the water. “She was around here somewhere! A-Xuan! A-Xuan!! Oh my god, I can’t see her! She’s wearing a green swimsuit! I can’t see her! Oh my god! A-Xuan!”

“I can go look for her, Mama!” Shi Wudu offered, already moving to jump off the edge of the boat.

Luckily Baba caught him by the scruff of his life jacket before he had the chance to do anything so foolish.

“No, stay here in case you see her,” he ordered, throwing his shirt on the deck. “I’ll find her.”

Mama caught hold of Shi Wudu, who was already going back to the edge of the boat to jump in after Baba, and hugged him tightly as they watched in bone-chilling suspense.

Baba didn’t resurface for a while, but when he did, he was empty handed. He immediately went back down after taking a gulp of fresh air to try and search a different direction.

The seconds of waiting turned into agonizing minutes. Still he couldn’t see her.

I have to find her. I have to find her. Where did she go? This is all my fault!

Mama was holding back sobs and Shi Wudu was practically vibrating in her arms, wanting to break free for the chance to search for his sister.

Flailing more than ever now that she was underwater, trying desperately to breach the surface again, A-Xuan undulated and squirmed all over and eventually lost her bearings. She couldn’t tell which way was the surface in her confusion. Her little lungs couldn’t hold much air to begin with, and with so much physical movement going into hopelessly trying not to drown, she had exhausted herself before a minute even passed.

I… I don’t want to die!

A-Xuan choked and sputtered, inhaling a huge mouthful of saltwater as her vision started darkening underneath the waves, trying desperately to scream for help. Water flooded her mouth and lungs, burning and choking her already shot throat and burning lungs. She looked up at the last rays of sunlight peeking through the waves as tears filled her eyes and washed away into the ocean current. Her body felt like the heaviest lead as she slowly sunk deeper and deeper into the darkness. Her ears felt like they were going to explode from the pressure.

Please… Someone! Baba, please! she begged, praying to anything. I don’t want to die!

She thought about how she had been so excited to go back to school after summer break and brag to classmates about where her family went for vacation. 

I still want to be a fashion designer…! I can’t… this can’t be it! Please, someone!

Mama was only just now teaching her how to hand sew bigger things. She had already sewn some buttons on her clothes all by herself. When she was older, Mama promised to teach her how to use the sewing machine. She scrawled into her sketchbook different designs for skirts and dresses and cute ruffled shirts she wanted to make.

A soundless scream bubbled out of her throat when she thought about her family. She still needed to make Shi Wudu proud of her. She wanted to impress him with her accomplishments so he could tell her that she did a good job. He was already so good at everything. She wanted to be just like him. 

She wanted to snuggle into Baba’s chest one last time and hear him read a story to her at night even though she was way too old for bedtime stories. She wanted to walk in on him in his study late at night and grab ice cream from the kitchen as he whispered, “Don’t tell Mama!”

Her eyes started stinging and going cloudy from the added darkness and pressure.

Please…! I just… I want to live!

She thought of that serious weirdo boy she met yesterday and his little sister. She promised them! She promised she’d come back and finish the Palace of Wind and Water. She wanted to be his friend. There was something about him…

She wondered if they’d forget about her if she never showed up.

I’m sorry I hit you, Xuan-er…

There was no one. There was nothing she could see other than emptiness. She closed her eyes as a stray tear bled into the fathomless saltwater trying to devour her, helpless to stop it.

And then, a rush of cold water jostled her a little to the side. She startled, eyes shooting open in terror. A black shadow darted underneath her.

Oh god, please don’t be a shark!

Something lithe and slimy grabbed hold of her foot and began climbing up her body. She opened her mouth to scream, but that slimy something reached a large, bony, webbed hand up and covered her mouth.

Suddenly, A-Xuan was face to face with a creature darker than ink with eyes even more golden than the sun. Its bioluminescent eyes glowered fiercely at her through furrowed brows as it held onto her shoulder with one hand and covered her mouth with another. 

It was definitely not a shark, that was for certain. 

A-Xuan tried to thrash and fight to break away, but her rapidly fading consciousness didn’t make for much of a fight. She squirmed her mouth away from the creature and tried to scream again, but in her panic, she just ended up swallowing more sea water into her already burning lungs. And coughing was little salve to her oxygen-deprived lungs when submerged underwater. The creature tried again and firmly slapped its hand over her mouth. The texture alone of its skin was enough to make her want to throw up.

Much to her continued horror, the creature then opened its maw, revealing rows and rows of razor sharp teeth and forced her face closer to its own, despite her pitiful attempts at resisting.

This was even worse than drowning, she realized, too terrified and exhausted to fight back anymore as the edges of her vision began enveloping her in the calm darkness. But she was so, so scared and trying to cling to any shred of consciousness left, but she also didn’t want to be awake for her inevitable demise. A-Xuan scrunched her eyes shut, waiting to finally asphyxiate and drown or have her face ripped off by this monster. 

No, please! Not like this! I just wanted… to finish the sandcastle with Xuan-er…!

Except, the creature neither attacked, nor did she suffocate.

She couldn’t say what exactly that creature did, but it must’ve been something akin to mouth-to-mouth. Smooth, slimy lips attached to her mouth. It held her face close, webbed hand on either side for support. Saltwater streamed out of her mouth and lungs in swathes, and the creature just gulped it all down. Once all the saltwater was gone, it breathed in precious air, filling her aching lungs. 

A-Xuan opened her eyes only to behold these eerie but determined golden orbs with a slitted pupil beaming directly at her bright emerald eyes. They looked a bit like lightbulbs or like the dangly bit on an angler fish in the darkness. The creature had a vaguely humanoid face amidst the inky black scales dotting its face. 

This was nothing like the sea monsters from the movie Luca. Those were nice sea monsters with pretty colors and not terrifying teeth. This was something much more grotesque and horrifying, but also exceptionally beautiful.

Fully taking it all in, she determined it really was the most stunningly beautiful thing she’d ever seen. The scaly skin reflected off dancing and undulating rainbows like an oil spill, completely mesmerizing her by the way it dazzled underneath the waves. 

She blinked several times, brain trying to put a name to the creature, but it was nothing like she’d ever heard of or seen. And the creature blinked back at her, slits turning softer and rounder the longer they held her gaze.

Finally detaching from her lips after the last big breath of air that rattled around her lungs, the creature covered her mouth with its hand. Instinctively, she flinched away from the slimy touch, so instead the creature grabbed her own hand and placed it over her mouth. After a moment of staring at each other, the creature blinked at her with that same determined gaze and pointed a clawed finger up towards the surface. He gently wrapped an arm around her waist, and started escorting her up to the surface. 

A-Xuan couldn’t rip her eyes away from her strange savior. Its assemblage of fins, legs, and maybe even a few tentacles if her eyes were seeing correctly, glided effortlessly and gracefully through the water. She wanted desperately to open her mouth in shock, but she kept her mouth closed with her hand covering it for good measure.

Once they breached the surface, she immediately started coughing and taking in gulps of fresh air to her exhausted lungs. Her head whirled around trying to get her bearings in the unfamiliar ocean. A firm push to the small of her back had her floating over to a small boat bobbing in the water a couple meters away.

“Wait!” she called out, finding her voice hoarse and barely more than a whisper. She kept trying to swim back as its murky visage under the water disappeared. “THANK YOU!” she screamed out to it, feeling like her throat was going to tear open.

“A-Xuan!” Mama called, crying tears of relief. “A-Xuan!!”

Mama nearly jumped in after her when she spotted her, but luckily Baba swooped in immediately underneath and grabbed hold of her waist, clutching her tightly to his chest to keep her head above the water. But she struggled weakly in her Baba’s grip, straining her head to look underneath the waves to catch a glimpse of the creature that helped her.

“Did you see it, Baba? Where did it go?”

“See what?” he asked, breathless from all the tireless searching.

“The monster! With the eyes!” she said, like it was obvious. “It saved me!”

But Baba hadn’t seen anything. No one had. 

Maybe she hallucinated it after all…

Chapter Text

“There’s something in the water around here,” Pei Ming said with an uncharacteristically serious look on his face to his younger brother, Pei Xiu. “And it’s our job to catch it.”

Shi Qingxuan’s breath caught in her throat at the implications of what Pei Ming just said. She whipped her head in their direction to overhear more of their conversation, interest piqued. It was the first time she’d looked up from the trashy gossip magazine she was using to fan herself from the summer heat all morning. 

That first day out on the water, she had spent most of her time sunbathing in the tiniest white denim shorts she had packed, an off-white crocheted crop top that covered up the ruffled pink bikini underneath, and a light and flowy, sheer, white cover up. She lounged next to Xuan Ji, who was only in the raciest, red, strappy one piece suit (that had more straps than actual fabric) and a huge, black sun hat that left a permanent, shadowy veil across her face. 

“What do you mean… there’s something in the water …?” Shi Qingxuan questioned hesitantly, eyes narrowing.

Xuan Ji gasped dramatically and slapped her even trashier magazine down on her thighs. She cried, “Omigod, like a shark?! Where?!”

Pei Ming gave them both a strange glance and said, “No. I’m talking about fish, duh… We’re going fishing. There’s gotta be some fish in the water in this area.”

“Then just say that! There’s no need to get all cryptic!” Shi Qingxuan scowled, folding her arms.

“Not funny, babe,” Xuan Ji chided, bristling in her lounge chair. She picked up the magazine and went back to her perusing.

Pei Ming wasn’t really listening and kept talking to his brother. “So where’s the best spot to cast do you think?”

“Probably off the back, I guess,” Pei Xiu replied half-heartedly. “I don’t really know a lot about this stuff…”

“Are you even allowed to fish in the water here?” Shi Qingxuan sneered. “Don’t you need, like, a license or something?”

“I dunno, probably. This whole place is a fishing town so I’d assume so,” Pei Ming asked. “Why? Are you gonna rat on us?”

“No,” she said quickly, looking back at her magazine. “I don’t care if you get sent to fish jail.”

“Why would you even wanna fish anyway? It's boring and gross,” Xuan Ji complained. “Don’t you wanna play with me, Mingming?” 

“I’m gonna catch us some tuna for tonight’s dinner! We’re gonna have a fish fry!” he replied, full of bravado, taking off for the back of the boat with two fishing poles in hand.

“We are?” Shi Wudu, who was in charge of the schedule, asked. “News to me.”

“Yeah! I thought we could make a lil’ campfire on the beach, chop up the tuna and fry it over the fire, old school-style!”

“Tuna are deep sea, open ocean kind of fish; you’re not going to catch a tuna barely three kilometers from the coast,” Ling Wen supplied doubtfully. “Not to mention the size. There's no way you’ll catch anything with a flimsy line like that.”

“Not with that attitude!” he called back, already casting a line off the edge of the anchored yacht. Pei Xiu woefully followed after his older brother.

“Okay, well I guess good luck catching something for dinner,” Shi Wudu replied, shaking his head. He put a hand on Ling Wen’s shoulder from behind before she could retort back and whispered, “Just let him have his fun, jiejie.” 

Ling Wen rolled her eyes and focused her attention back on annotating a large poli-sci textbook she brought for some ‘light summer reading’ while on the boat. It was only to be expected of someone like Ling Wen, especially now that she was in her first year of doctoral studies for her PhD. 

But all Shi Qingxuan could think was, Boooooring! Bringing homework on vacation? What kind of freak does that?

Shi Wudu walked over to the edge of her lounge chair and asked, “Having fun yet, Qingxuan?”

She looked up from her magazine and gave him a curious look over. He was wearing a lame bucket hat, a pastel blue Vineyard Vines button up shirt with a tacky whale pattern, paired with khaki shorts and some brown leather boat loafers.

“You look like a cry for help from boating dad’s anonymous,” she observed, going back to fanning herself with the magazine.

“And you’re gonna look like a lobster by tomorrow,” he countered, throwing a tube of sunscreen at her. “Use sunscreen. Skin cancer kills.”

She made an ugly, affronted noise as the tube slapped against her arm and clattered on the deck of the yacht. She rolled her eyes and pretended to read the magazine, turning the page as loudly as possible. 

“First of all,” she started, voice dripping with sass, “I put on sunscreen before we left. SPF is essential to any skincare routine, especially out on the open ocean with no shade. I’m offended you’d even think I’d skip such a crucial step. Who do you think I am?

“Second of all: the next time you throw something at me, I’ll shove it so far up your asshole, your dentist will be picking it out of your teeth. And third of all: This is ridiculous! We’re not even doing anything together. Like, what is there to even do all the way out here?”

“Swim, relax, drink, fish… apparently work on homework…” he supplied, motioning vaguely around. “I don’t know, get creative; you’re good at that, aren’t you, little miss beauty-school-dropout?”

That one hit a little too close to home. Her lip twinged a bit at the corners and she narrowed her eyes.

“You know I was a fashion design major, not in cosmetology school,” she corrected him. But something else he said was far more pressing than her intrinsic need to correct her brother. “Wait, did you say something about drinking?” she inquired instead, looking up from her magazine, peeking over the top of her chunky tortoiseshell Armani sunglasses.

Shi Wudu sighed. “Why am I not surprised? Whatever, you would’ve found it eventually… There’s beer back in the cooler. Save some for the rest of us.”

She smirked, rubbing her greedy hands together like a mischievous fly, throwing aside the magazine she wasn’t really reading in the first place. Shi Qingxuan floated to her feet, as if carried by the ocean breeze over to the cooler.

“I mean it, Qingxuan. Pace yourself. Or you’re buying the alcohol for the rest of the summer.”

“Anyone else want a beer?” she called out to the rest of them, decidedly ignoring her brother.

“Yeah, I’ll take one,” yelled Pei Ming over at the back of the boat.

“Make that two,” Pei Xiu called.

“Ling Wen? Xuan Ji? Any takers?”

“No, thank you,” Ling Wen replied robotically, not having looked up from her textbook.

“If there’s any white claws, I’ll take one, but I’m not really a beer drinker.”

“Gotcha, and Moby Dick?” she asked, looking pointedly at her brother in the stupid whale button up as she over-emphasized the last word. 

Shi Wudu rolled his eyes, thoroughly unimpressed. “Ha ha. Very funny. But it’s only noon. It’s too early for beer. Besides, I’m the only one that can drive this thing, and I’m not about to get my boating license taken on the first day.”

“No one’s gonna take away your precious boating license for drinking one beer, Captain Ahab. And you coulda just said no,” she snapped, already walking towards the cooler. “And Xuan Ji wants white claws. Add it to the shopping list.”

“Roger that,” he said before feeling the need to add, “Also, your Moby Dick references feel forced and uninspired. If you’re going to use allusion to insult me, at least make it somewhat insightful.”

Shi Qingxuan groaned, “You’re so lame, ge.”

“Seems you have a habit of starting things you can’t finish. Unless, of course, it’s alcohol,” he sneered. “Like the bachelor’s degree I was paying for.”

Her eyes narrowed dangerously at him and she said stiffly, “You know that was different.”

“I’m just trying to be insightful.”

“Yeah, well you and your insight can fuck off.”

Shi Wudu knew when not to press further or else she’d really throw a fit. He knew for certain that if he really pissed her off whilst stuck out in the middle of the ocean in a small space within forced proximity on the boat was not exactly going to be pleasant for anyone. Compounded with the fact that she was already in a bad mood being on the boat to begin with, it didn’t seem worth it to really piss her off. Teasing her was fun, but not worth ruining the first day out on the ocean together. So, he relented for now. Maybe he could get her to loosen up a little later. She clearly wasn’t in the mood.

Shi Qingxuan pried open the cooler lid and fished around the slosh of ice and water to grab three cold beers for her brother's friends and herself. She walked them over, cradled in her elbow, to the pair of brothers fishing off the side of the yacht. 

“As promised, two beers,” she announced, holding them out with one hand.

Pei Xiu grabbed them and muttered a quick thanks.

They opened up the cans, each with a satisfying crack and a resounding, “Cheers.”

Shi Qingxuan didn’t really have anything better to do so she just hunkered down next to them and watched them occasionally adjust their fishing lines when it had been a while with no activity. Sipping intermittently on her beer can and making some light small talk with them was nice… for a little while. Pei Xiu wasn’t really much of a talker and Pei Ming was only really concerned with himself and the phantom fish he kept feeling on the other end of his line.

She slapped her thighs, decidedly concluding, “Well, this is boring.” 

“The anticipation is what makes it interesting,” Pei Ming assured her with a big smile. “Right, Xiu-er?”

“Yeah. Sure,” he said unenthusiastically.

“Okay, you two have fun, I guess,” she said, motioning to get up. “I’m gonna go grab another—”

Suddenly, a loafer kicked out into her back and Shi Qingxuan’s entire world shifted as she was sent splashing a couple meters away from the anchored boat. 

Sputtering and thrashing wildly as she tried to keep her head above the water, cold terror clouded her mind. She inhaled what felt like an entire tidal wave in her panic, forced to cough and sputter while trying her best to tread water somewhat successfully.

No! No, no, no, no, no , nooo! Please, not again! How does this keep happening to me?! This town is cursed!! 

She was too busy coughing to try and scream for help this time.

“Cannonball!” Shi Wudu yelled, jumping in after her.

In the initial commotion, Shi Wudu had ripped off his outer layer of clothes so that he was now in just his swim trunks. He kicked off his shoes last and came crashing down into the ocean next to her. A huge spray of ocean water assaulted her face not far from where she was trying desperately to stay afloat.

“Hey! You’re scaring the fish!” Pei Ming cried out in protest.

“Are we getting in the water, Mingming?” Xuan Ji asked, lowering her magazine curiously.

Rage. Seething, boiling, unbridled, all-consuming rage flooded her senses and she immediately tackled Shi Wudu in the water next to her. Desperate and wild arms kept trying to drown him and push his head under the water, but Shi Wudu was a much stronger swimmer than his sister. Her antics only seemed to amuse him. 

“DON’T YOU EVER DO THAT AGAIN!” she screamed at him, resorting to just hitting and kicking him if she couldn’t drown him while simultaneously clinging to him for dear life. It was the only thing he was good for. “I thought I was going to die! I thought I was gonna drown! How could you do that to me?!”

And he laughed at her— unabashed, tears prickling in his eyes, with his full chest— laughed at her. Then, he proceeded to haul her over his head, fireman style, and plopped her sopping wet form back on the boat next to Pei Xiu, who scurried out of the way to make room.

Shi Wudu called out triumphantly, “Wudu saves the day! See? I’d never let you drown, meimei. No sea monster’s gonna get you on my watch.”

“You’re the one that tried to drown me in the first place! The sea monster was the one that saved me! I’ll take the sea monster any day over a brother like you!” She punctuated her thought with an angry splash of her foot to spray water in his face. “Ugh, I’m wearing white today! You’re such an asshole!”

“Lighten up, Qingxuan!” he dismissed, wiping the front of his face. “If you’re gonna make a big deal out of a little fun—”

“Shi Wudu, do NOT tell me to ‘lighten up’ right now! You know I can’t swim well! You know I think the ocean is scary! And you know I almost drowned after getting thrown off a boat! How the fuck could you think this would be a fun little prank?! How is that helping me?! Attempted murder isn’t a prank!”

There was no way she was going to accept the Until Dawn defense. “It's just a prank, Han!”  Like hell it was just a prank!

Shi Wudu continued to laugh at her, still treading water like it was the easiest thing in the world, and said, “Attempted murder is ridiculous. Swimming is supposed to be fun! And you’ve never been safer. The boat is anchored. I was a lifeguard for years. Everyone else here can swim pretty well. And you’re fine! Just a little wet. I thought it would help break the ice between you and the ocean, haha.”

Shi Qingxuan shook her head, groaning in frustration. Wet curls slapped against her face and shoulders, as she huffed and puffed at the audacity of her terrible older brother. 

Pei Xiu swallowed uncomfortably and said, “Let me go get you a towel or something.”

Xuan Ji helped Shi Qingxuan up from the edge of the boat and brought her over to the sun lounger she was sitting on before. Stripping down to just her bikini, she peeled the sheer white cover up off her dripping form and threw it on the lounge chair to hopefully air dry in the summer heat along with her poor drenched crochet top and soaked white shorts.

“Your brother’s an asshole,” Xuan Ji supplied, giving him the side eye. “That was fucked up.”

“Yeah, tell me about it,” she grumbled. “Ugh. I hope this crop top isn’t ruined! It was handmade by my best friend!”

Xie Lian had painstakingly crocheted that top for her a little over a year ago specifically for her surgery and it was one of her most treasured articles of clothing. It was perfect for wearing on the beach. It accented the girls without being too vavavoom and was classy enough that she could dress up if needed. Except now, it was a heap of tangled wet thread. If her unanticipated trist with salt water ruined it, she’d never forgive her brother. (Not that Xie Lian would mind, he’d probably just promise to make her another one.) 

But honestly, she had an even bigger concern at the moment.

Her lightly tanned, freckled skin slowly shifted to a shade of pink and not from the sun’s powerful rays. Shame and embarrassment, anger and fear, all swirling around in her stomach was not a healthy mixture. Most of her body was exposed to everyone on the boat for the first time and not of her own volition. She still wasn’t completely comfortable with her body even after getting aforementioned (modest) breast augmentations a year ago, so having to strip down to her bikini was her other worst nightmare (besides drowning, of course). Luckily, the bikini bottoms had a built in little skirt to cover up the front. 

Xuan Ji abandoned Shi Qingxuan not long after Pei Xiu showed up with a towel to hang off Pei Ming and pester him into going swimming with her. Ling Wen hadn’t so much as glanced up from her textbook in hours. So she was stuck with Pei Xiu who was awkwardly trying not to look at her as she tried to dry off the rest of her body with his supplied towel. Mortifying!

As she was scrunching up her drenched, curly locks with the towel to try and keep some semblance of volume, she realized the Armani sunglasses that had been resting on her head were nowhere to be found. A frustrated scream ripped out of her lungs. Pei Xiu’s eyes widened and he scampered away to the other side of the boat lest he provoke her wrath further. 

Shi Qingxuan swiped Shi Wudu’s discarded Vineyard Vines button up from the deck to use in the meantime as a cover up. She stormed over to the edge of the boat to catch a glimpse of Xuan Ji and Pei Ming already getting handsy in the water while her brother scowled at them a little ways away.

“Shi Wudu!” she screamed. “You owe me a new pair of sunglasses, you bastard! Those were my favorite!”

“What’s with all this full name ‘Shi Wudu’ nonsense, haha? You’re scaring me, meimei,” he said, not even acknowledging her main grievance. “Hey, is that my shirt?”

“I’m going to rip your head off!” she promised, eyes bloodshot with murderous intent, looking even more wild with her half-dry hair sticking up in crazy directions.

Eyes turning into sarcastic crescents, Shi Wudu called up with a smile full of teeth, “I’ll be looking forward to it!” 

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Pei Ming and Pei Xiu ended up catching a handful of smaller fish towards the evening, much to Xuan Ji’s immediate horror. She kicked up a whole hissy fit, squirming and whining, while they tried to gut it. Shi Wudu had to stop them from doing it on the deck of the yacht and told them to wait until back on the beach.

“You’ll stain the lacquer!” he had fussed. 

So, as per Pei Ming’s plan, they made a little campfire out on the beach in the back of the villa they would be renting for the summer. Shi Wudu and Ling Wen pushed over some outdoor seating from the patio of the villa to be closer to the fire. Finally, the two Pei brothers could get to gutting their fishing haul for the barbeque.

Shi Qingxuan’s clothes had dried eventually, but she still refused to give Shi Wudu back his shirt. However, he didn’t seem to mind going shirtless for the rest of the day, much to her dismay. The crop top looked to be salvageable at least. She sent Xie Lian a picture and he promised he could fix it whenever she got back.

Once they had skewered all of the fish and were waiting for them to cook, Shi Qingxuan noticed Pei Xiu had been eyeing her suspiciously for a while. She made eye contact with him a couple times, catching him in the act. He just kept looking away and trying to pretend like he wasn’t staring.

She had a pretty good idea of what was probably going through his head. She’d seen the way his eyes had grown wider than saucers as he stared at her body when she was drying off. If he was going to be weird about her situation, she didn’t want to be the one to bring it up first. She rolled her eyes internally and tried to ignore him.

Xuan Ji was sitting in Pei Ming’s lap, much to everyone’s discomfort, and kept trying to feed him different sliced fruits while he kept an eye on the fish cooking over the fire. Shi Wudu was chatting absentmindedly with Ling Wen and Shi Qingxuan just sat a little off to the side, feeling somewhat alienated from the rest. She figured something like this was going to happen eventually, and it was part of the reason she didn't want to come in the first place. Feeling lonely on vacation felt entirely pathetic, like a jellyfish sting to her heart at being the proverbial third wheel— or in this case, the fifth wheel? Sixth wheel? It was a little unclear.

Suddenly, Pei Xiu appeared in front of her holding out a tiny fish on a stick.

“This one’s ready, if you want it,” he said. 

She blinked up at him, snapped out of her melancholy and said, “Thanks.” Taking it in her hands, she began twirling it around and watching the steam wisp off of the fish in the dim glow from the fire. 

Pei Xiu was still standing in front of her awkwardly.

“I… I have a question,” he parsed out hesitantly. “You’re… You?” He struggled to find the right words. “You’re a girl, right?” he eventually settled on.

“Here we go…” Shi Wudu muttered, noticing what was happening. 

Shi Qingxuan sighed. Well, at least he isn’t being outright transphobic… She’d had much worse opening questions, if she was honest. This one wasn’t bad. It sounded like he was trying to get it right.

“I’m a trans woman, yes,” Shi Qingxuan eyed him hesitantly, still a little nervous about what his response would be.

“Oh,” he said in a small voice. “That’s pretty cool.”

Her eyes glimmered in the firelight, preening from the positive reaction. Thank god, he’s not going to be weird about it!

“Wait, OMG, for real? Mingming, you didn’t tell me!” Xuan Ji cried, hitting Pei Ming in the chest. “I would’ve never guessed you’re a trans!”

“Ahaha, thanks, I guess…” she said hollowly. And that’s not exactly the compliment you think it is…  

“Trans is an adjective not a noun,” Shi Wudu said stiffly. “She’s a trans woman. Not ‘a trans’.”

“Oh, sorry,” Xuan Ji said quickly, shifting in Pei Ming’s lap, so that she was facing Shi Qingxuan’s direction. “You know, my cousin’s really good friends with this transgender girl who’s a boy now,” she continued from across the campfire. “Do you know her? Her boy name—”

“That’s not how it works,” Shi Wudu hissed, clenching his fist on his knee.

“Ge , it’s fine,” Shi Qingxuan said, trying to calm him down. “It’s a learning opportunity.” She looked over at Xuan Ji and said calmly, “So if he’s a trans man, he’s not a woman. He never was. Maybe he was assigned female at birth, but he’s a man, so when referring to him, try to use he/him pronouns and other typically masculine-leaning words.”

“Ohhh, okay. Ugh, it's sooo confusing, like, the whole using different pronouns and nouns or adjectives or whatever type-thing,” Xuan Ji said, sighing dramatically. “So, like, I should keep using girl words for you, yeah? You’re a girl now?”

She nodded, smiling without her eyes. “I’m a woman, yeah. And I know it can take some time getting used to, but it’s fine to make mistakes every now and then as long as you’re making a good-faith effort to try and get it right,” Shi Qingxuan explained patiently.

“And I always get them confused, which one’s which? Like, so, a trans man is a former girl? But someone like you, you identify as a girl, yeah? So that means you used to be a boy. Wow! I literally wouldn’t have ever guessed you used to be a guy! Oh my god, I bet you were so handsome, if you’re this pretty as a girl! I could’ve sworn you were a real girl! You look really good for a—”

This… she lamented, this is what I wanted to avoid…

“Meimei is a real girl, end of story. If you think otherwise, we’re gonna have a problem,” Shi Wudu announced loudly. 

“Hey,” Pei Ming jumped in with a noticeably deeper voice, trying to defend his girlfriend. The two supposed friends made tense eye contact and everyone could feel the atmosphere shift dramatically.

“Okay, let’s move on!” said Shi Qingxuan, trying to steer the group in a less hostile direction. “The fish! Are they done yet?”

“I wasn’t, I wasn’t trying to offend you or anything,” Pei Xiu mumbled anxiously. “I’m sorry, I just… I’ve never—”

“It’s fine. You didn’t offend me,” Shi Qingxuan said honestly. She couldn’t say the same for Xuan Ji, though. But she also knew that Xuan Ji probably wasn’t trying to be offensive, she was just ignorant. “I don’t mind talking about it or explaining anything, but it’s just not the most interesting thing about me, that’s all. And it can get a little… People can be mean.”

“Mn, I bet.”

Shi Wudu was always there to defend her whenever people were nasty about her identity. Shi Qingxuan was always grateful for it, but sometimes he didn’t know the difference between standing up for her and conflict resolution. It was best if he didn’t fight with his best friend or his best friend’s girlfriend, especially when they were all trapped on vacation together for the whole summer. Especially not on the first day.

The group ate the sad excuse for a fish fry in awkward silence for a couple minutes. Xuan Ji eventually slipped out of Pei Ming’s lap and over next to Shi Qingxuan. She placed a cold hand on Shi Qingxuan’s thigh in a friendly gesture.

“We’re still cool, though, right?” Xuan Ji asked sincerely. “I didn’t mean to say anything wrong. I was trying to give you a compliment. You’re seriously so beautiful, Shi Qingxuan. Like, soo beautiful.”

“Ahaha, thanks. That means a lot,” she assured her, still a little uncomfortable. “We’re okay. I understand that it’s a lot to learn about for the first time. Exposure and practice are key.”

Xuan Ji wrapped her in a side hug and said, “Ah, you’re the best! Let’s be friends, m’kay? You can teach me all the right things to say so I can give you more compliments!”

Oh, yippee… she thought unenthusiastically. A whole summer of this to look forward to…

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Finally, it was time to retire into the villa for bed. The room assignments were supposed to be Pei Ming and Pei Xiu sharing a room, Shi Qingxuan and Shi Wudu in another, and Xuan Ji and Ling Wen sharing the last. But, Xuan Ji snuck into the Pei brothers’ room not long into the night and poor Pei Xiu got kicked out. 

He ended up knocking on the Shi sibling’s bedroom door for help. Shi Qingxuan was forced to vacate, a little pissed she wouldn’t get the chance to strangle her brother in his sleep. She ended up spending the night in Ling Wen’s room.

Thus, the impromptu, musical-chairs-style room assignments were settled late into the evening. 

After a late start to everyone’s (especially a certain couple’s) morning and a leisurely half-breakfast— mostly just some coffee, leftover fruit from last night, and the remaining plane snacks— Shi Wudu made the executive decision to go out into the town for some brunch and to buy some more supplies for the rest of their stay. They needed to stalk up on groceries, drinks, and the like. 

Shi Qingxuan also wanted to buy some new interim sunglasses to temporarily replace the ones she lost ever-so elegantly into the fathomless blue yesterday thanks to her amazing and not-at-all insufferable brother, Shi Wudu. Some cheap sunglasses from a gift shop would do in a pinch, at least until she forced her brother to replace her favorite Armani ones. 

Ironically, she also wanted to take a page out of Ling Wen’s book, (not literally of course) and find something to read while she was forced to spend time on the boat. Probably not a poli-sci textbook or that vapid gossip magazine she’d borrowed from Xuan Ji. Shi Qingxuan felt in the mood for some raunchy romance novel set in a cute coastal town that had lots of passionate sex on the beach. Her goal was to try to live vicariously through the protagonist for the summer. Maybe she could meet her fated true love while horse riding on the beach or have a ripped hunk confess his undying love to her in a thunderstorm. Anything to distract herself from her (amazing and not-at-all-insufferable) brother and his (amazing and not-at-all terrible) friends. She was desperate. The plot didn’t matter as long as there was lots of flowery, gratuitous porn.

The self-appointed vacation czar, Shi Wudu, delegated the researching of potential brunch spots to the obvious choice, Ling Wen, and the café she chose for lunch was a local hotspot with a couple signature seafood dishes that looked especially delicious. 

Once they had all sat down in the quaint little café and began perusing the menu, Shi Wudu rudely snatched the drink menu away from Shi Qingxuan fingers when he noticed her eyeing it up. 

She blinked at him and asked, “What was that for?” 

“You have a two drink limit for today. Use it wisely.”

She laughed straight to his face. “You can’t just impose your will on me like that, even if you think you’re in charge. I’m an adult. This isn’t a singles mixer or a work outing. We’re on vacation. I can drink what I want when I want.”

“Not if I’m paying for you and you don’t know what they have,” he smiled, full of teeth. He taunted her further by holding the menu out of her reach and waving it around.

“You’re being ridiculous,” she huffed at him. 

It was only eleven. How was he already getting under her last nerve?

However, Shi Qingxuan wasn’t above sinking down to his childish antics. She stuck her tongue out, and resolved to not talk for the rest of the meal. 

Or at least, she tried not to. She wasn’t particularly good at keeping her mouth shut.

In her fleeting self-imposed vow of silence, she happened to notice the decor on the walls of the pale blue, nautical-themed café were littered with tiny frames of photos and newspaper clippings about the town’s history and other memorable residents. 

Her eyes traveled along the walls, gazing vaguely at the black and white pictures of people who were probably long dead. There was a collection of articles about old ship wrecks. Another detailed the history of the lighthouse and the different lighthouse keepers throughout the years. What looked to be a fairly recent addition was about an oil spill and the three activists who committed suicide in protest of the offshore oil rig.

And then, her eyes fell upon a really blurry picture with a big, bold headline “ Something Dark Lurks Beneath Fu Gu’s Waters ”. 

Shi Qingxuan’s eyes widened as she comprehended the words on the wall and tried to make out the shape of something incredibly big in what she realized was the ocean and a dark shape beneath the waves of the photograph.

“Holy shit,” she muttered.

Now, normally, if she went to a strange town and saw something like this on a café wall, she wouldn’t be so readily convinced. She’d chalk it up to a local legend hyped up to make tourists visit or maybe some natural explanation like a whale or something. 

But this was different. 

She’d experienced an other-worldly creature in the waters here. If there were other people that have had similar encounters, maybe she could finally prove she wasn’t crazy and really had seen a sea monster all those years ago. She was living proof that it existed. If it hadn’t saved her, she surely would’ve drowned that day.

A surge of energy instantly lifted her spirits and she momentarily forgot why her mood had spoiled so much to begin with. This was something else she could focus on during her forced vacation in this stupid town, besides just escapist romantic literature. She could try to find out more about the monster from the locals, or at least try to catch another glimpse of it for herself.

“What’s got you all smiley?” Shi Wudu asked, elbowing her in the side.

“Nothing you need to concern yourself with,” she replied breezily, still a little giddy inside from the realization. “I just thought of a good idea to keep preoccupied, that’s all.”

“Something other than drinking, I hope?” he sneered.

She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, making a noise of exasperation. “Stop treating me like a child, ge. It’s getting old. Why are you being so weird about me drinking lately?”

“It’s still early, Qingxuan,” he scolded. 

“Yeah, so? Isn’t it a normal thing for adults to do when they’re having brunch with friends? Have a drink with said brunch? You got on my ass yesterday for this, too, on the boat.”

“You have to learn to pace yourself.” 

The same line from yesterday.

She scoffed an ugly sound at him. “I know my limits. I didn’t get drunk yesterday, did I? We were trying to have fun on the boat. You suggested drinking and you’re the one that brought beer in the first place,” she defended. “It's crazy that you don’t even trust me enough to have a drink at brunch without making it a whole thing.” She gazed out to the rest of the table and asked, “Is anyone else going to have a drink?”

“I was gonna get a Bloody Mary,” Xuan Ji supplied.

“See! She’s an adult deciding to drink a brunch cocktail with her friends,” Shi Qingxuan pointed out. “You aren’t getting on her ass, huh?”

“I’m not in charge of Xuan Ji.”

“And you’re not in charge of me either!”

“It’s my responsibility to look after you, Qingxuan,” he said seriously, brows furrowing in his mounting frustration. “You’re my little sister.”

Shi Qingxuan groaned even louder, face flushing pink.  They really were doing this in front of his terrible friends! He was making her out to have some sort of drinking problem! 

She hated when he did this. He was trying to be both her parent and her brother at the same time. He still couldn’t help but try to parent her even though it was largely unnecessary. Why was he still treating her like a child he had to take care of, even now! It was infuriating! 

She was about to bite his head off there in the café, but their waitress came over before Shi Qingxuan could open her mouth to rip him a new one. She quickly snuffed out the fire in her stomach and smiled brightly up at the cute waitress whose name tag read Banyue. She looked to be a couple years younger than her, with violet eyes and a somber expression. Shi Qingxuan noticed Pei Xiu not-so-secretly gawking at her and smirked knowingly at him.

Banyue went around the table and took everyone’s order. Xuan Ji, as promised, ordered a Bloody Mary, and Ling Wen ordered a glass of some local wine called Paradise Dreams. So of course when it was Shi Qingxuan’s turn to order her food, she added, “And a Strawberry Sunrise Mimosa, please.”

“Qingxuan!” cried Shi Wudu, as if she had just committed some heinous crime.

“What?!” she snapped back at him. 

The poor waitress looked a little confused and then proceeded to ask for Shi Qingxuan’s ID, fearing she was too young or something and that’s why her brother was pitching a fit. 

Shi Qingxuan, absolutely mortified, fished out her ID while babbling some nonsense about, “Oh, do I really look that young? Ahahaha, thanks…”

When Banyue deemed her ID real, she confirmed the order and sped away before anything else awkward could happen.

Shi Qingxuan’s furious eyes locked onto Shi Wudu, foam practically dripping from her trembling lips.

“What the fuck was that, ge?”

“I’m not paying for that,” was all he said, not daring to look at her.

The others at the table were looking back and forth in between the Shi siblings in horribly awkward silence.

“What is this really about, ge?” she demanded. “Do you really think I drink too much? Are you trying to stage an intervention or something?! Well, you’re doing a shit job of it! You forgot to bring a big white banner—”

“We’re not talking about this here.”

“Apparently we are because you keep making a big deal out of it!”

“I’m just worried about you.”

“It’s not like I have a problem—”

“You drink a lot, Qingxuan,” he interrupted, finally finding the courage to actually look her in the eyes. “It’s not good for you, or healthy, for that matter. You have to be careful.”

She sputtered for a few seconds, baffled by him actually admitting it.

“I drink because it’s fun! But I've never gotten, like, blackout! I just like drinking with friends. There’s nothing wrong with that!”

Okay, so maybe the blackout part was a bit of a lie. It had only happened once or twice when she was still at university, but she quickly realized that she hated the feeling of waking up not knowing what she’d done the previous night. And it had been years since her wild party girl era. Nowadays when she drank, it was mostly just to get a little of that warm, buzzy feeling. 

“It’s a slippery slope,” he countered seriously. “Alcoholism is genetic. At this rate, you’ll end up l-like Mother…” His voice broke in his throat (a sound that she’d never heard before) and he trailed off, unable to look her in the eyes.

Her mouth stood wide open from the accumulating shock. Shi Qingxuan’s lips slowly folded in on themself and she bit down harshly, trying to swallow any sound forming in the back of her throat.

The entire café went dead silent.

“You think I’m turning out like her?” she whispered, not even recognizing the hollow sound of her own voice. “You’re being serious right now?”

Shi Wudu’s eyes betrayed the panic he felt deep in his gut and was trying his best to smother. He knew he just stepped on a land mine and he wished he hadn’t.

“Qingxuan, I didn’t—”

“How dare you.”

“Wait, I didn’t mean it like—”

“How. Dare. You.” Tears bubbled up in her eyes and her throat warbled with every word, tightening painfully.

“I’m just scared of losing—”

She stood up in her chair and started grabbing her things in a frenzy.

“I’m not an alcoholic and I’d sooner drown myself than turn out like her. And fuck you for even thinking I would,” she spat.

Hot tears streamed out of her eyes and a sob crept up her throat at the scalding betrayal boiling the aching heart in her chest. She stormed out of the restaurant, biting back more choked out sobs. Shi Wudu called out for her, but she didn’t even bother acknowledging him. She didn’t even have a destination in mind, just nowhere near him.

Her feet wandered around the cute little downtown, while her mind reacquainted itself with a bitter grief that usually only gnawed on her heart, but now it was biting down like a vice. 

She didn’t even care that she was still visibly crying as she toured around the shopping streets. People stared at her, but she pretended not to notice. Feeling self-conscious and craving invisibility, she caved and bought a cheap pair of mirrored aviators from a stand outside a souvenir store just to hide her puffy eyes from public view.

Shi Qingxuan just walked around for what felt like hours. Her throat felt scratchy and dry from the salty sea air. When she looked up from her daze, her feet had carried her to the edge of a deserted white beach. A few sail boats and other vessels dotted the blue horizon, but there weren’t any people around this part of the beach for whatever reason. She shrugged off her sandals and dipped her feet into the warm, grainy sand. Wiggling her toes around to relish in the softness, she started walking along the edge of where the tide met the sand, staying just shy of where it became damp.

A horrible dizziness washed over her with the rushing tide in her ears and she decided to sit down in the sand. She spread out her white cover up, which she was using as a billowing shawl today, for a makeshift beach towel.

The horizon was stark and rigid in the distance. It felt like it was taunting her, calling out to her, daring her to try and swim and try to grasp it in her fingertips. But she had no plans on getting wet this afternoon.

Except, of course, her face still hadn’t dried fully from the tears before a sob shivered out of her lungs and was swallowed instantly by the roar of the ocean.

She wished she’d never let her brother take her on this stupid trip in the first place! She wished she was halfway through a bottle of fruit wine from the liquor store… but that was sort of the root of the problem, wasn’t it?

Shi Qingxuan realized that maybe her brother had a point. After she had quit university, drinking had sort of become her main hobby. She felt disgusted by the idea of using her mother’s old sewing machine. It had become synonymous with the memories of her mother and with her time at university studying design. And she hated thinking about both of those things.

When she didn’t know what to do, she drank. When she hung out with her friends, she drank. When she felt exceptionally lonely and useless, she drank. Never too absurd amounts of drunk, but just enough to take the edge off.

“Fuck…” she realized. “Maybe I really am turning out like Mama…”

She quickly unthought that thought. No. She was vastly different from that awful woman. 

The more Shi Qingxuan thought about it, the more she realized she was different from her mother. Mama had been an alcoholic because it was easier than dealing with her unhappiness. She had almost achieved a near constant state of drunkenness towards the end. And she was a mean drunk, too. 

To this day, Shi Qingxuan never really understood what Mama was trying to numb. Baba was the sweetest man in the universe and he definitely didn’t deserve a wife like her. They had money, lots of money, really. Two beautiful children. So many friends. But it was never enough for her, it seemed. Whatever it was that she was trying to run away from, it caught up to her in the end.

Shi Qingxuan, while not necessarily an alcoholic, at least knew what she was trying to numb.

Grief. Insurmountable, all-encompassing grief and loneliness. 

Life hadn’t been kind to her, despite what most people saw projected on the outside. She had her brother of course, after their parents had passed, but he quickly stepped into the role of parental figure in their absence. And she was eternally grateful for it, but it was a difficult relationship to navigate, especially when they were so young. And she thought she had lots of friends at university, but quickly found out just how fast fair-weather friends can turn on a dime. 

Xie Lian was the only friend from university that continued to stand beside her. But he had a boyfriend now and had less and less time to spend with her. Shi Wudu was busy running the company their father had left him and had his own friends. 

And it left her all alone.

She covered her loneliness up with her happy-go-lucky mask, bright smile, and bubbles of laughter. It was an easy persona to project, but it was rather taxing to keep up the facade for so long. 

But underneath it all, she felt cursed.

And it just so happened that Shi Qingxuan was a happy drunk. It was easier to retreat into that happy buzzing feeling in her head, instead of the black hole she carried with her at all times she constantly tried to swallow down, like a bitter medicine that stubbornly tried to come back up again and again.

And so sitting there on the beach, deafened by the waves, she finally allowed herself to grieve. She pushed her new sunglasses up on top of her head so they wouldn’t get in the way and she let the feeling swallow her down, not even knowing if she’d be able to crawl back out. 

Shi Qingxuan wailed into the breeze that stole her screams into the limitless horizon, a secret just between her and the wind and the gathering clouds. 

She grieved firstly for her father, who hadn’t deserved to die so soon. She grieved for the thought that he’d never walk her down the aisle or get to meet his grandchildren. She grieved for the fatherhood unfairly stolen from him and burdened onto his eldest son. She grieved for Shi Wudu’s childhood that ended too early. She grieved for herself and her all the years she’d asked why it had to happen. She grieved for the degree she’d been forced to abandon. 

And lastly, she spared the tiniest whisper of grief for her mother, who didn’t deserve it.

Shi Qingxuan grieved until her throat was raw and her lungs burned from screaming. She found that maybe grief wasn’t so different from drowning. But at least she didn’t need a sea monster to save her from this.

In her crying, she hadn’t realized a figure slowly approaching from the right.

“You’re hot,” a monotone, dry voice spoke up behind her.

Shi Qingxuan blinked several times. There was no way some random stranger really just said that to her while she was currently bawling her eyes out.

“What…?” she choked out, trying to clarify if she had really heard that right.

“You’re hot,” the voice repeated.

She turned around to glare at the man that was…? Cat-calling her? She’d never been complimented so bluntly before… and she definitely wasn’t in the mood to flirt with strangers.

“Excuse me?” she asked, completely baffled by his double-down.

The pale young man stood behind her like a shadow, stretched long and thin in the afternoon light. He was decked out in an entirely black ensemble, complete with a black hoodie, even though he was on the beach in the middle of June. He looked about the same age as her. His long, silky black hair was tied up in a high ponytail and the loose tufts of his bangs whipped in the ocean breeze. It looked like he had some eyeliner on, even in the distance. Or maybe it was dark circles?

But his words suddenly made sense when she realized he had a blue popsicle in his hands. He had broken it in half and was offering the other half to her.

“You’re hot,” he repeated again, gesturing for her to take it. “Take it. It’ll cool you off.”

“Oh,” she realized awkwardly.

So he wasn’t actually cat-calling her after all… He was just being nice?

Wait a second… Considering he was wearing all black, long sleeves and pants in the summer at the beach, he had absolutely no right to be telling her to cool off!

She wiped away some stray snot leaking from her nose (very attractive) and asked, “Aren’t you hot?” 

He made a small affirming “Mn,” and motioned again to the proffered popsicle impatiently.

She finally reached out and tried to grab the popsicle half from him. Their fingers touched in the passing since the stick was pretty short. She felt her heart race from embarrassment as she briefly touched his surprisingly cool skin. Her gaze dropped to where they had touched and noticed his fingernails were painted black, as well.

And yep, the eyeliner she had sense from afar was in fact eyeliner AND dark circles. 

That meme of ‘goths in un-gothy places’ came to her mind seeing him for all his dark glory on such a pristine, picturesque beach.

“Thanks,” she said, trying to put on a smile, still not completely ready to socialize just yet. Shi Qingxuan quickly wiped away the stray tears from her face as surreptitiously as possible (also probably super attractive).

He either didn’t notice she had just been crying or pretended not to notice. Either way, she was grateful he didn’t say anything about it. The strange figure plopped down next to her on the sand, a jarring dark blot of ink against the white sand. He sat a comfortable enough distance away, a sentiment she was also grateful for. 

The strange figure then proceeded to take a huge bite, teeth first, into the popsicle. Shi Qingxuan watched in amazement and fear at such a bold move.

“Aren’t your teeth going to hurt?” she cried out, before he could take another bite.

“It’s fine,” he said nonchalantly. He ripped into the popsicle, yet again, teeth first. A little bit of blue juice dripped from the corner of his mouth and he wiped it up with the sleeve of his hoodie. (How was it cooler when he did it?)

Shi Qingxuan couldn’t tear her hungry eyes away from such a strange person. If she blinked, she felt like she’d miss something.

What is happening to me right now? Am I dreaming? What on earth… Is this a prank…? Am I being punked?

He glanced coldly over to her and said, “It’ll melt.” 

Shi Qingxuan stared at him, completely baffled by this whole situation. But he was right, she admitted. And he had given it to her out of the kindness of his heart. She didn’t want it to go to waste. It did look refreshing.

She started with a cautious lick, not daring to bite into it like he had, and revelled in the cooling, sugary, blue raspberry flavor dancing on her taste buds.

“Thanks,” she said again, covering her mouth for some semblance of table manners even on the beach. “It’s good.”

“Mn.” 

He was either not super talkative, or he was too busy devouring the popsicle. Maybe both. (Probably both.)

That’s alright, she thought. I can talk enough for both of us.

“So… Are you from around here or visiting?” she started, trying not to look too inappropriate while licking and sucking on the popsicle. 

The popsicle was unfortunately a little too phallus-adjacent for it to look completely G-rated to any onlookers, but she tried to cover her mouth with her other hand to block the lewd sight of her practically giving head to the innocent popsicle. (She was really good at it, but he didn’t need to know that yet, they’d only just met!)

Out of the corner of her eye, Shi Qingxuan watched his pronounced, pale Adam’s apple bob, swallowing the next hefty chunk of blue raspberry popsicle. She found herself swallowing along with him. Her face flushed again, but she was trying to deny the reason why. Suddenly self-conscious, she hoped it wasn’t completely obvious from her red eyes that she had just been scream-crying into the wind. 

Hey, maybe she was in the mood to flirt with strangers after all. Maybe even nice, hot, goth strangers… 

“From around here,” he replied. 

When he opened his mouth, she caught a glimpse of his tongue already turning blue. She smiled and held back laughter.

“Oh, really? A real local in the flesh!” she remarked, impressed. “I’m just visiting here for the summer.”

“First time?” he asked casually, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye.

She felt invigorated for some reason. He had asked a question back! 

Was he interested? Or was he just being nice? Ah, she was getting ahead of herself… They’d only just met.

“Second, actually!” she corrected, a bright smile on her face. “I came here a long time ago with my family. Maybe twelve years or so?” 

The young man nodded and chomped the last dangling bit of the popsicle, licking up all the juices on the stick before pocketing the stick in the hoodie pocket.

He was absolutely not like the guys she’d normally go for, but there was something about him that felt captivating. She realized she’d been staring at him a little too long.

She mentally slapped herself. Get a grip, Qingxuan! This isn’t a romcom!

“You here with family again?” he asked in the silence.

Her smile dropped in an instant. “My brother and his friends,” she said perhaps a little too bitterly for casual small talk.

He looked at her with his stoic face somewhat expectantly, as if asking her to explain.

“It’s whatever,” she said quickly, waving her hand dismissively. “Just wanted to get away from everyone for some fresh air. They’re not my preferred choice of company at the moment.”

“...You were crying,” he said, eyes narrowing suspiciously.

She laughed awkwardly and itched her nose. “Haha, so you did see that, then…?”

“Mn.”

Fuck. I must look so pathetic to him.

“Food always makes me feel better,” he continued, nodding to her still unfinished popsicle.

Her eyebrows shot up in surprise at the realization that he had done this to cheer her up. Her heart felt like it was being squeezed from how sweet it was that this stranger cared enough to share a popsicle with her.

“Well, I’m not crying anymore, so I’d say it worked,” she said with a warm smile. “But, you know, when you first approached me, I thought you were cat-calling me or something,” she admitted with a sly smile, elbowing in his direction. “You might wanna think of a better opener than, ‘you’re hot’ next time you approach a girl crying. It’s giving dacryphilia.”

Wild golden-brown eyes bulged horrifically into hers and his pale face flushed a splotchy red. He looked a little like a pufferfish that had expanded in fright.

“T-That’s not what I—”

“I promise, it’s alright! I know you didn’t mean it like that, haha,” she laughed breezily. “It just caught me off guard.”

“Sorry,” he muttered, facepalming in agony.

“It’s fine!” she assured him, touching his shoulder lightly. “Honestly, I’m just embarrassed you saw me crying, haha. Crying on the beach while on vacation in such a beautiful place? So pathetic, ha!”

He lifted his head and stared so fiercely at her, she almost jolted back in fright. “It’s not pathetic,” he grumbled in his deep monotone she was coming to enjoy the sound of.

Those eyes and that determined gaze… Now that she was thinking back, it really reminded her of someone, but she couldn’t quite put a finger on who.

“Sorry, this is gonna sound weird, but have… Have I met you before?” she asked suddenly, cocking her head to the side. 

He glanced over at her with a strange expression and she instantly regretted saying anything.

“No, wait, don’t answer that. Sorry! Haha! I’m bad with faces. I thought you looked like someone I met a long…” Her voice trailed off and they locked eyes for a long moment. She actually wasn’t bad with faces or names, or people in general, but she didn’t want to embarrass herself further.

His eyes filled with realization, but the lower half of his face remained in a cold line.

“...A-Xuan?” he asked hesitantly. “Is your name A-Xuan?”

“Wait… No way! Is that really you, Xuan-er? From the beach all those years ago?!” she realized, eyes glimmering brightly. “Oh my god. What a small world! There’s no way this is happening right now! It must be destiny!”

Suddenly, he furrowed his brows and frowned deeply. She feared she said something weird again.

“You’re late,” he grumbled.

She blinked at him, really not understanding what he meant by that and asked, “What?”

“You’re late,” he repeated coolly. “You owe me a sandcastle.”

Shi Qingxuan sat speechless next to him for a few moments before she broke down in strings of laughter. She held onto his shoulders for dear life, so she didn’t collapse into the sand. 

His face betrayed the surprise he felt, eyes going wide and face still faintly blushing. She quickly realized her error and removed her hands from his shoulders, apologizing quickly. Settling back into her own personal space a comfortable distance away in the sand. The neglected popsicle had slowly melted down the stick and crashed down to the base of her thumb.

“Ahaha, I thought you would have forgotten about me since I never showed up!” she managed to say in between heaving for air and trying to save the rest of the popsicle from falling into the sand. “I felt so bad I never showed up that day. It’s been eating away at me for years! I’m really sorry if I kept you waiting. Oh shit–”

She probably looked like an idiot, sticking her tongue out to catch the rapidly melting popsicle to catch it from falling, but he didn’t seem to care. She quickly swallowed up the last half of the popsicle in embarrassment to occupy her mouth.

“What happened?” he asked. “You didn’t show up. I always wondered what happened.”

She cleared her throat and looked out into the ocean with an uncharacteristic serious expression. Her fingers twirled around and fiddled with the sticky popsicle stick.

“Well, it was kind of a nightmare after I met you on the beach, haha… Long story short, I almost drowned,” she stated as lightly as possible. Pushing the stick into the sand, she began drawing different shapes absentmindedly. “I had to go to the hospital for a week. Ruined the whole vacation.”

“Yeah, that would do it,” he gruffed in reply, staring out into the sea with her.

She laughed awkwardly. “Not the glamorous explanation you were expecting, huh?”

He shrugged. “Accidents happen.”

“Yep,” she said, popping the p, heart stinging a little.

They sat in companionable silence for a little, just staring out into the horizon together.

“Why’d you come back?” he asked suddenly. His eyes felt like they were burning into her skin, hotter than the oppressive UV rays of the sun. “If you have bad memories here… Why bother coming back?”

“Trust me, it wasn’t my idea…” she said bitterly, averting his intense gaze. “My brother wanted to come back. He dragged me along with him.”

“Mn.” He nodded vaguely, shifting position in the sand.

“Wait, what about your sister? Is she here too? How’s she doing?”

He stopped moving, and for a moment, it felt like the whole ocean stopped moving with him. Only when he finally sucked in a harsh breath did the tide dare to move again. 

Shi Qingxuan could recognize grief anywhere.

“Daiyu’s gone,” he said stiffly.

“What?” she gasped, covering her mouth. “Oh my god. I’m so sorry.”

He didn’t reply, but she watched him shrink into himself a little bit.

“I know a little about how you feel. I lost my parents about seven years ago,” she said a small voice. “Drunk driving. Killed my dad instantly. My mom survived only to kill herself after. She’d had too much after a party they had attended together and still insisted on driving back home.”

“She was the drunk driver?” he asked. Shi Qingxuan nodded. “Shit.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay…” she tried to say, but her voice broke and she felt tears start to prickle in the corners of her eyes again. She tried desperately to fight them. She didn’t want to cry again, especially not in front of him! “It’s actually what I was crying about earlier, ahaha. Sorry! I’ll shut up now!”

“I didn’t have anyone to talk to after Daiyu died… So… you can talk to me. If you want,” he offered hesitantly. He seemed unsure if he was pushing some boundary or taboo, and waited for imminent rejection.

“Are you sure? It’s a lot to put on someone I’ve only just met, ahaha… or I guess re-met? Reconnected? Whatever. Trauma dumping, and all that… Not exactly a good conversation topic.”

He looked at her expectantly and shifted positions so that his body was fully facing her direction.

And with that simple movement, suddenly, she was telling him her whole life story, like they’d been friends for centuries. Secrets spilling out of her mouth like cheap wine. Things she’d never even told her best friend, Xie Lian.

She talked about how much she hated her mother for taking her father away from them. And how she hated her even more for killing herself and leaving them alone.

“We just came home from school one day,” she explained. “And we kept calling out for her, but she wasn’t answering. We tried calling her phone, but it was on the kitchen counter. We were looking around the house. Then, my brother went into the bathroom and I heard him scream. He shoved me out of there before I could really see anything too horrible. But I remember seeing a shattered wine bottle on the floor. And the bathtub was red. Like. Really red. And her hand was almost as white as the porcelain tub dangling over the edge.”

And he kept listening to all she had to say attentively. It felt nice to have an objective outsider to share everything with, even if he didnt know the full context. And he was a good listener, all with those intense brown eyes and his stoic expression. He made little noises here and there to encourage her to keep going.

“And at brunch today, ge had the audacity to say I was turning out just like her all because he thinks I drink too much! So I just ran away… and here I am. I guess you know the rest, haha,” she said at last, concluding her long monologue. 

He didn’t say anything. Instead, he rolled up the sleeves of his hoodie and started gathering up swathes of sand in his arms. She watched him start excavating out a large area with his black fingernails until he reached the wet sand underneath the dry powdery top layer. 

He took a deep breath and began his story, “There was an oil spill a couple of years ago out here. Meimei tried to start a protest against the company that owns the rig. I told her it was stupid, that there was no way she’d be able to convince the town to rally against them, since they sorta own the town. But it was a pretty popular movement and gained a lot of traction, especially since the spill impacted tourism in the area. She staged a bunch of boycotts and organized volunteers to help with cleaning up the beaches.”

He formed two small mounds of sand and began evening them out into finer shapes until it resembled the start of a sandcastle.

“Meimei was in over her head, running a movement like that. But I didn’t know what she got herself mixed up in until it was too late. They called her and the other leaders of the group over to the rig in what was supposed to be a gesture of good faith, that they were willing to come to an agreement to help the environment and assist with clean up efforts.”

His fists dug into the sand aggressively and stopped building. He took a deep breath.

“She was so excited. She thought she was actually making progress,” he scoffed, shaking his head. “And she never came back. ‘Environmental activists commit suicide in protest’ was what they told everyone. But that's frankly bullshit. Meimei wouldn’t hurt a fly. She wouldn’t do that. They were all peaceful protesters. And they killed them just to stop the movement. And the sick part is that it worked. Fizzled out after she was gone. Everyone was too scared to go against them after a move like that.”

He squished the perfectly smooth mounds between his fists, destroying all he had created.

“I should’ve gone with her. I should’ve told her it was a bad idea. I should’ve–”

He was shocked out of his head when two warm hands covered his own.

“It’s not your fault,” she said softly. “You couldn’t have known.”

He shook his head, but didn’t say anything more.

“It’s not your fault,” she repeated. 

She dug her hands into the sand, uncaring if her manicured fingernails got kernels of sand stuck underneath. Despite not being so adept at sandcastle building, she tried her best to help rebuild the two shapes he’d made from before. Without proper tools for sandcastle construction, she made use of the popsicle stick to create crisp edges. And for decoration, she dug around in the warm sand for some intact sea shells to press into the walls. 

Eventually, he joined her in building a sandcastle in complete silence. Neither of them needed to speak to divvy out directions, it was almost instinctual. He began by digging out a moat around the perimeter and Shi Qingxuan started piling wet sand for the second layer. They worked in tandem, pushing and pulling like the tides. This construction project was offered up in memoriam to all they had lost.

She didn’t realize how much she needed the silence. For someone so used to filling silences by babbling nonsense, she felt content for once to not say anything. There wasn’t anything that needed to be said among the two. 

And once they felt the sandcastle was complete, Shi Qingxuan used the prettiest shells she could find hidden in the sand to decorate the memorial. A mosaic of purple, pink, white, and beige covered the sandy walls, pieced together into a swirling pattern.

She nodded after placing the last shell, finishing the design.

“It just needs one last thing,” she said. “Where’s your popsicle stick?”

He looked at her, eyes twitching at the corners in momentary confusion. He fished it out of his pocket and handed it to her without question, but she didn’t take it.

She gently poked her stick into the top of the sandcastle and whispered, “For Baba and Mama.” Clasping her hands together in prayer, she sent up a quick prayer on their behalf to the heavens.

He didn’t miss a beat. “For Meimei,” he said, placing the stick on top next to hers.

They prayed together for a moment before the solemn atmosphere finally washed away with the tides.

She wiped away a stray tear that had fallen and looked over at the goth boy with a brilliant smile. “What should we call it?” she asked, placing her hand on her hips.

He tilted his head slightly, mulling it over with a ridiculously serious expression for something so trivial as naming a sandcastle.

“The Palace of Wind and Water.” 

Her eyes lit up, remembering the name she had offered all those years ago. “You sure? I feel like the Nether Water Manor may be more appropriate here,” she teased.

The edge of his lip curled up into a slight smirk, “Are you going to cry this time if I don’t agree?”

“Shut up! I did not cry about that!” she feigned offense, pushing him lightly in the shoulder.

He rolled his eyes and let the smirk turn into a real smile. “Whatever you say,” he conceded.

“You know,” she said, turning to him on a more serious note. “I really needed that. Thank you for listening. And thank you for trusting me enough to talk about your sister. And for making the sandcastle together. It was nice. I had fun.”

He opened his mouth to reply, but someone else’s voice called out from beyond the sandy shores, pulling them out of the moment in a shock that other people existed.

“Qingxuan!” Shi Wudu yelled. “There you are! Fucking hell, I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”

She sighed and glanced back over at her brother who was running up towards them. His timing was uncanny. He really knew how to ruin everything, didn’t he? He grabbed her arms like he was terrified she’d just fly away in the harsh breeze if he didn’t keep ahold of her.

“What have you been doing all day? Why did you turn your phone off? I couldn’t track your location!” he said frantically. “I was worried sick!”

“It must’ve died, I didn’t turn it off…” she muttered, shrugging off his bruising grip. She reached into her pocket, and sure enough, her phone wouldn’t turn on. “I was just sitting here on the beach. And I ran into an old friend. We built a sandcastle together.”

It was only then that Shi Wudu acknowledged the tall goth next to his sister, and the look he spared him was not a friendly one in the slightest. The stranger, in turn, didn’t look too eager to meet her brother either, especially considering her remarks about him earlier.

Shi Wudu’s eyes narrowed, as if repulsed just by the sight of him. “Well, come on. Let’s go back. We’ve all been looking for you. Have you even eaten anything today?” 

He grabbed her arm again, but she resisted for a moment.

“Ge, wait just a second,” she cried, turning back to her old friend. “Do you have a phone?” He nodded. She held out her hand, gesturing for him to give it to her. “Let me put in my number. We should meet up again for lunch or something! We’ll be here the whole summer.” 

Maybe it was a little forward of her, but she'd always been the type to live shamelessly and chase after what she wanted. Even if it meant she kept getting her heart broken.

He blinked at her, trying to process her words before inevitably complying. He opened up his phone’s contacts and she rapidly typed her number under the contact name Qingxuan 💚. 

Shi Wudu was not happy at this development and started forcibly dragging her away.

“Text me later, okay?” she called back, scrambling to pick up her sandals and the white cover up she had discarded on the beach earlier. “See you!”

He waved back at her with the phone still in his hand in response. Her smile glimmered in the early evening light, brighter than any star, moon, or sun as she waved back at him. And he smiled back at her.

Chapter Text

The storm clouds that had been gathering on the beach finally let loose in a downpour late into the afternoon. Luckily, the group had been able to retire back to the villa with everyone accounted for before it got too bad. 

Shi Wudu did not apologize for the root of the issue that caused her to run away. Instead, he interrogated and lectured at her for the better part of an hour, all while she sort of half-listened and gave vague answers. If he wasn’t going to admit he was wrong, she wasn’t going to take him seriously. So Shi Qingxuan sat there in a blissful state with a stupidly big smile on her face. She was practically floating away in her seat on the sofa in merriment.

I can’t believe I really met Xuan-er again! After all these years! And he remembered me! she chanted this over and over in her head like a mantra. He remembered me! He was waiting for me!

Her heart soared, flying through the breeze and high above the clouds like paper lanterns during a festival. 

“Hello?” Shi Wudu called, waving a hand in front of her glassy eyes. “Are you even listening to me?”

“Hmm?” she called, snapping back to reality like an apple had fallen on her head. “Oh, was it something about how it was irresponsible of me to wander off and let my phone die?”

Shi Wudu narrowed his eyes and shook his head, incredibly disappointed and frustrated. “That was about fifteen minutes ago,” he sighed heavily. “Did you seriously not hear anything I just said?”

“Do enlighten me, great master Wudu, with your boundless wisdom,” she replied, dripping with false sincerity. “This humble one is but a vessel for you to impart knowledge in.”

“This is serious, Qingxuan,” snarled Shi Wudu. “You can’t just go giving your number out to random strangers you meet on the beach.”

“Okay, I hear you,” she said, sensing he was actually a little pissed off. “But he wasn’t some random stranger. It was the boy I told you about all those years ago, that I met on the beach when you and Baba were on the boat. I made a sandcastle with him and his sister. I told him that I’d come back to finish it, but then I almost drowned and… yeah. Whatever. It wasn’t some random stranger, it was that boy that had the same name as me! We’re old friends!”

Shi Wudu did not look impressed or convinced. “You met him exactly once when you were children and now suddenly you’re old friends?”

“He remembered me!” she said dreamily. “He said he was waiting for me to come back that day even though I never showed up. And he kept wondering about what happened and why I never came back the next day! And we have the same name! Destiny wanted us to meet again!”

Her brother rolled his eyes and said, “Qingxuan, you know nothing about him. Is this seriously a real conversation I need to have with you? What, are you some Disney princess about to marry a man you just met once? You know what happened with Anna and Hans.”

Shi Qingxuan gasped.

“Don’t you dare bring he-who-must-not-be-named into this. I told you to never bring that despicable bastard up again. It’s too painful…” she feigned holding back tears. “If anything, Xuan-er’s like Kristoff. He’s nothing like that traitor. And don’t compare yourself to Elsa! You’re closer to the reindeer or like one of those weird rock trolls or even that annoying weasley Duke. But it’s not like I’m in love with him or anything. Why are you making romantic comparisons? It’s not that deep. We’re old friends.”

“This situation is exactly like that, Qingxuan! You gave him your number and asked him to lunch!” Shi Wudu cried. “How is that not coming on to him?”

She scowled, but couldn’t think of an excuse around it. “Okay, fine. I think he’s cute. What’s wrong with that? Doesn’t have to mean anything. I just wanna catch up!”

“I think you’re not realizing how weird it was that he’s, what?, been obsessed with you for however many years, waiting for you to come back? Isn’t that a little creepy? Get a grip on reality.”

“He hasn’t been waiting for me all this time,” she corrected, dismissing such a silly notion. But somewhere in her heart, she thought maybe that wasn’t so creepy after all. It would be kind of romantic, actually. But it didn’t matter, since that was not the case. “He said he was waiting that day and since I didn’t show up, he had been wondering what happened ever since. Don’t make him out to be some sort of stalker. He was just curious. I was curious! I thought about him from time to time. That’s not weird and I’m not some stalker.”

“Either way, I don’t think it was wise to give him your number.”

“It’s fine. You’re just paranoid. I just want to catch up over lunch or something!” she said. “We won’t be strangers for long. In fact, I think we’re already friends! He gave me a popsicle and we bonded over building a sandcastle together.”

“He gave you a popsicle? And you just took it?” Shi Wudu asked slowly, putting his head in his hands, thoroughly defeated. “Qingxuan, have you ever once thought about your actions before doing them? What if he had done something to it?”

“A popsicle?” asked Shi Qingxuan, doubtfully. “Be so fucking for real right now. Have you ever heard about someone roofie-ing a popsicle? You’re crazy.”

“I’m sure it’s happened before.”

“Yeah, sure. Maybe on Mars,” she laughed. “Besides, even if he tried something, I’d probably give him a big shock down there and he’d run away, haha!”

“Don’t even joke about that.”

“Whatever. It was a nice gesture! He thought I looked hot and offered me half of his popsicle and I ate it and nothing bad happened,” she said quickly. 

She remembered him absolutely tearing into that thing with his teeth and shivered a little at the thought. How had his teeth not been burning from sensitivity?! That was the only thing she could consider ‘weird’ about him.

“He said you looked hot?” growled Shi Wudu, barely concealing his rage. 

Of course that’s what Shi Wudu latched onto out of everything she just said.

“No, not like that!” she cried. “Well, haha, actually, I thought he meant the same thing at first. No, like, temperature hot. I was sweating and he thought I should cool off so he gave me half of his popsicle. But of course, I am hot hot! But that’s not what he meant, though.” 

She was simultaneously hoping he thought she looked hot and also terribly embarrassed because her eyes had been so red and puffy and there was probably snot dripping from her nose. She didn’t want him to have any opinion about her appearance just yet. When they meet for lunch, she’ll be sure to look drop-dead gorgeous to really make up for it.

“But who knows? Maybe he’s not interested in a fixer-upper like you and I’m worried for nothing,” teased Shi Wudu.

“How dare you use Frozen against me in this way!” Shi Qingxuan feigned offense by slapping a hand to her chest and gasping dramatically. 

Shi Wudu crossed his arms defensively and muttered, “You said I was nothing like Elsa.” 

“Because you’re objectively not a girlboss!” 

“I can be whatever I want to be. Maybe I want to be Elsa.”

Shi Qingxuan shook her head and sighed. “What is the world going to think of our parents if both of us turn out to be girls? You’ll be dragging down the family name. You have to think of the company, not just yourself,” she lamented, full of sarcasm. She’d heard similar nonsense all her life from her parent’s friends and the company’s shareholders.

“Okay, fine. Not Elsa. What about Jack Frost?”

She scowled and thoroughly scrutinized him. “I could see it… Okay, sure. I mean, it’s Dreamworks, not Disney. But you can be Jack Frost.”

“No badass song, though…” he pouted.

“Yeah, there is that to consider.”

Shi Qingxuan smiled and they both burst into a fit of giggles. 

This was the side of her brother she rarely got to see: a Shi Wudu that was actually kind of funny. When he was working, he was always so serious— almost like he had to remove his funny bone as a requirement for his job. And ‘working Shi Wudu’ meant that he was overworking and stressing himself out. He’d pick on her just to take the edge off, but it was rarely to both of their delight like this. Times like this, it really proved he did have a sense of humor somewhere buried underneath all that paperwork and stress. 

Maybe she could convince the vacation czar to watch a Disney movie with her at some point like they used to when they were kids. Maybe this ‘vacation Shi Wudu’ would be better than regular Shi Wudu.

She tried not to get her hopes too high, considering all that happened earlier. 

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Ling Wen wanted to go to bed early, so they shut the lights off while Shi Qingxuan waited patiently for her phone to charge, eager to see if she had received any messages from a certain handsome goth friend she met earlier that day. But, much to her dismay, once it had sprang to life, there were no new messages.

Shi Qingxuan sighed to herself and rolled over after placing her phone face down on the nightstand. She closed her eyes to go to sleep. 

Maybe tomorrow, she resigned.

Her dreams that night were strange, disconnected, and full of mini-nightmares she kept startling awake from. It felt like someone was banging on the walls of her skull and she kept hearing someone scream. In her delirium, she couldn’t make out whether it was in reality or in her dreams.

Her parent’s car accident haunted some of her nightmares. Others were about a particularly traumatizing ex from university, and all of the rest were about drowning in as many different and horrifying ways as possible.

Getting flung off the boat when she was a child, and drowning. Shi Wudu kicking her into the sea, and drowning. A nameless villain holding her head under the water, and drowning. Jumping into the deep end of the pool, and drowning. Running out of oxygen while scuba diving, and drowning. Getting trapped in a locked car that fell into the ocean, and drowning. 

And every time, without fail, the moment she was sure she would suffocate and die, the creature would show up. After a moment of relief, thinking she was about to be saved, its glowing yellow eyes were smiling and round with a sinister kind of affection. The creature latched a bruising grip onto her wrists and dragged her down further into whatever water source she’d wound up in this time, and she’d wake up coughing and frazzled.

When she finally woke up in the morning, her eyes were crusty and gooped together, and her body felt sluggish and heavy, thoroughly exhausted from tossing and turning all night. Dark circles and bloodshot eyes stared back at her in the bathroom mirror. It sort of felt like she had a hangover, too, except she hadn’t even drank yesterday. Like, at all. So that was kind of weird.

Looking out the window, it was cloudy again today, but still bright enough to make the looming headache flare up with a vengeance. She hissed and shut the curtains again. Luckily, Ling Wen was always prepared and offered up some pain killers.

As the last one to trudge into the kitchen for breakfast, Shi Qingxuan was unceremoniously greeted by her delightful brother.

“Whoa, you look like shit,” he announced in front of all his friends.

She rolled her eyes at him. “Gee, thanks.”

As his friends acknowledged her with a chorus of polite greetings, Shi Wudu thought it the opportune moment to toss her a banana she was thoroughly unprepared to catch. Shi Qingxuan’s body felt like it could only process everything in slow motion. And just like the tube of sunscreen from the first day on the boat, she made an affronted noise as it slapped against her arm and clattered to the floor.

Shi Qingxuan just stared languidly down at the fallen banana and sighed dramatically.

“I thought I told you that the next time you threw something at me, I’d shove it up your ass?” she grumbled, reaching down to pick up the probably bruised banana. “Alright, bend over and drop your pants. You asked for it.”

She moved to tackle him and they wrestled for a moment until Shi Wudu caught her in a headlock and she cried uncle. She slapped around desperately, trying to break free, to no avail.

“Okay, okay, okay! I surrender! White flag!” she pleaded. “Just! Stop throwing things at me, alright?! You’re very big and strong, okay? You’re a great older brother! Is that what you want me to say? Please don’t break my beautiful neck!”

Shi Wudu laughed, grip still steady, and said through a shit eating grin, “By all means, continue, meimei! What else can you say about me?”

“You’re… Uh, you definitely don’t have terrible taste in fashion! And, uh, you’re really… funny or uh, smart…?” She was quickly running out of good things to say. “You know what, I take it back! Fuck you! Snap my neck for all I care! You’re the worst brother ever—”

Shi Wudu finally let go, laughing his ass off. His sister was usually such a morning person. He wondered why that had changed suddenly this morning. 

“Wake up on the wrong side of the bed, huh?” 

“Yeah… Couldn't sleep very well,” she said, rubbing her neck. She was stringing together a long string of curses against him in her brain. What would Xuan-er think if she ended up with a bruise on her neck!

“Join the club,” was all Ling Wen said, giving the nastiest side-eye to a certain couple.

Several eyes also fell upon Pei Ming and Xuan Ji and for a moment, no one spoke a word.

“Fine, I’ll say it if no one else is,” Ling Wen said, slamming her coffee cup on the bar table. “This is not going to work all summer. You two need to fuck quieter. And for shorter periods of time late into the night. Some of us actually need to sleep without it sounding like a stupid porno being filmed in the room next door.”

Pei Xiu instantly covered his face in his hands, wishing to become invisible. Shi Wudu’s face turned several different colors, absolutely horrified at Ling Wen’s audacity.

Shi Qingxuan covered her mouth to suppress the gasp of surprise and subsequent laughter that was threatening to eek out. Oh, so maybe that’s why she kept having nightmares and waking up intermittently from the noise of screaming and, for lack of a better word, banging…

Xuan Ji’s eyes and her entire face turned red with rage. She started several sentences, but couldn’t finish any of them in her shock. She whipped her head around to look at Pei Ming who was trying to hold back laughter.

“MingMing, this is not funny!” she cried, pushing him in the shoulder.

“You do kind of sound like a bad porn star…” was all Pei Ming responded with. And he let slip a half-suppressed, choked-out laugh.

Her mouth gaped open as a huge, melodramatic gasp ripped from her lungs. She twirled around on her feet and sped out of the kitchen and slammed the door leading into their shared room.

Pei Ming hadn’t originally intended to follow her, but with four pairs of eyes on him shooting accusatory looks, he shifted his weight awkwardly.

“Sorry about that, jiejie,” he said on a more serious note. “And anyone else we kept up… I’ll just… go… fix that.”

He scurried after her, more excited to be out of their judging gazes than to actually repair his relationship.

“Breakfast and a show,” Shi Qingxuan said, filling the uncomfortable silence that followed. She began peeling open the banana and began nibbling away at it. “I didn’t know that was included in the rental price.”

Shi Wudu shot her a quick look of disapproval, but didn’t say anything. No one really knew what to say. 

Pei Xiu was still trying to turn invisible. Or perhaps he was trying to acquire the ability to camouflage so he could blend into the kitchen cabinets. Or maybe he was thinking that if he was still enough, no one would be able to notice him. 

Ling Wen calmly sipped her coffee while Shi Wudu stared daggers into the back of her head.

“Jiejie, was that entirely necessary? First thing in the morning?” he hissed.

“Yes, it was,” she replied flatly. “You can’t tell me you didn’t hear it all night.”

Shi Wudu sighed and rubbed his face. “I did, but there are more delicate ways to bring something like that up without causing a whole scene. We haven’t even been here seventy two hours and there’s already drama.”

“You know, he didn’t even want to invite her on this vacation…” Pei Xiu blurted out suddenly. “He was trying to break up with her before the trip, but she insisted on coming. Wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

Shi Wudu’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope,” he said. “But… You can’t tell her I said that…” Even quieter, “She’ll kill me…”

Ling Wen smirked devilishly and continued sipping her coffee, eyeing Shi Wudu strangely. He smacked her in the shoulder and looked away, hiding his face from view.

“Who needs K-Dramas when you can live it?” Shi Qingxuan chimed happily, about halfway done with her banana. “Who bets they break up right now? Or is this just the start of a bunch of awkward encounters that’ll eventually lead to a huge blow up like a week from now?”

“We’re not placing bets on our friend’s relationship,” Shi Wudu announced. 

“I bet the latter,” replied Ling Wen immediately. “Knowing good ol’ Pei, he’ll try to keep a bad thing going for as long as possible to avoid conflict. But it usually just blows up in his face.”

Shi Wudu massaged his temples in frustration and let out an exasperated sigh. “This is exactly why I didn’t want him to invite her in the first place. I knew it would turn into some big dramatic thing. He never listens, does he? He can only think with the head of his–” He stopped himself from finishing that sentence and cleared his throat. “Well, in any case, what should we do today?”

“I think the forecast says there’s going to be rain later,” Ling Wen said.

“Probably not the best day for the boat…” he said. 

“Okay, so what about a chill beach day?” chirped Shi Qingxuan happily. Yay, no boat!

No one said anything in protest, but instead, Ling Wen said, “And when it rains, we can just stay inside.”

“Yeah, that’s probably for the best,” Shi Wudu agreed. “Shark movie marathon later?”

Pei Xiu murmured an agreement and Shi Qingxuan stayed silent. 

That sounded painfully traumatizing. Nothing like getting over your fear of the ocean by watching campy shark movies! 

The czar clapped his hands and decreed everyone start getting ready for the beach. Shi Qingxuan started for the bedroom, but she felt her cell phone buzz in her pocket and stopped in the middle of the hall. Her heart leapt up into her throat and she fished it out quickly, desperate to check the new notification.

An unknown number had left a message. She nearly jumped into the air and floated away at how giddy she felt upon reading:

Lunch today?

It’s Xuan-er, he added quickly.

She couldn’t help the half-squeal, half-giggle that slipped past her lips at the confirmation.

Shi Wudu threw an arm over her shoulder, shocking her out of her bliss. She tried to dodge, but he was too quick. His eyes narrowed when he gazed over the messages on her phone. Shi Qingxuan, perturbed he was being nosy, quickly hid the screen into her chest.

“Get off. You already tried to kill me less than ten minutes ago,” she grumbled.

“Who was that?” he asked, despite knowing the answer. “On your phone?”

“Just making lunch plans,” she said, shrugging and ducking out from under his arm.

“You’re seriously going to lunch with him? Alone?”

“Well, you’re not invited, if that’s what you’re asking,” she sneered.

“Please, Qingxuan,” he said, taking all the teasing out of his voice. “You shouldn’t go out with this guy. You don’t know anything about him.”

“Welcome to the modern dating world,” she cried. “That’s all anyone ever does! Besides, I know how to handle myself. I’ve gone on plenty of bad first dates.”

Shi Wudu narrowed his eyes. You couldn’t even break out of my headlock… he thought.

“I mean! It's not really a date!” she added quickly. “I mean, it could be, but we’re just going to catch up! Don’t be so worried.”

She quickly escaped his incredulous and unimpressed gaze and shut the door to start getting ready for the beach.

But, more importantly, she opened the new message and typed an enthusiastic reply:

Goooood Morning!! ☀️

Yes!! I’d love to meet up for lunch!! 😄

What time works for you? 🧐

I’m free all day~~ 😉

As she pressed send, a queasy, fluttery feeling swelled in her stomach.

A knock sounded on the door and Shi Wudu stepped inside. She groaned upon seeing his form, thinking it was going to be Ling Wen coming to get ready.

“I don’t want you seeing this guy alone,” he said with a stern look on his face. This was as close to worried or anxious as she’d ever seen him. 

Shi Qingxuan rolled her eyes. “Why are you being weird about this? It’s just lunch.”

“You don’t know him.”

“So? Neither do you,” she pointed out. Shi Wudu’s eye twitched. “Ugh! You’re acting like he’s a serial killer or something!”

“We’re in an unfamiliar place. What if something happens and no one is around. If I’m not around. I’m trying to keep you safe.”

“What would you have me do, ge? Invite you along so you can intimidate or interrogate him or something? Or worse— invite everyone else to lunch with us?” she asked seriously. “That’s like baptism by fire or throwing him into the deep end of the pool.”

“He’s… I get a bad vibe from that guy. He seems fishy.”

“He does look a bit like an eel, haha…” she admitted.

He rolled his eyes, not amused. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

She sighed and realized he wasn’t going to back down. Negotiating with him would be better than arguing with him.

“Look, I’ll take my phone and make sure it's charged and on and notifications aren’t silenced. I’ll share my location with you and check in when I can,” she began. “But if you’re going to stop me from going or demand to come with me, that’s crossing a line, ge. I know you care and are just worried about me, but I’m not as fragile and naïve as you think. Like I said, I’ve gone on so many first dates with guys I know even less about. It’ll be fine. I know how to deal with weirdos, if needed.”

Shi Wudu frowned, scowled even. But he didn’t immediately shut down the idea. 

After a moment, considering her words, he said, “If you promise to check in… I suppose… Maybe I won’t follow you and sit a couple tables away to observe…”

Shi Qingxuan grimaced. She pictured him sitting in the corner of a restaurant with a trench coat and those costume glasses with the built in mustache trying to blend in surreptitiously.

“Ge, that’s so embarrassing.” She lamented in her palms at the thought.

“You text me if anything happens or he says something weird or tries anything, alright?” he insisted. “If you need me, I’m there. I’m just trying to keep you safe, meimei.”

“I know. I know.”

“Fifteen minute check-in texts.”

“Thirty.”

Shi Wudu narrowed his eyes and said, “If you forget, I’m—”

“You’re gonna come in, guns blazing. I know. I won’t forget,” she promised. “And if it’s an emergency or something, I can send you an emoji or a code word or something and you can call to give me an excuse to leave suddenly. Xie Lian and I used to do that. I used to send him the leaves blowing emoji if I ever—”

“Sure, whatever, that’s fine. I can probably make up some random emergency, if needed,” he said. 

“So, thirty minute check-ins and you won’t be a weird stalker?” she confirmed. 

Somehow, he made his face contort further into an even deeper scowl. “Fine,” he grumbled.

“I’m gonna need you to shake on it,” she proposed.

She held out her hand and he shook it hesitantly.

“I give you my word,” he promised. He held onto her hand tightly for a moment and added, “Only if you give me your word.”

“Yes, yes, I promise!” she cried happily.

A huge smile lit up on her face and after he let go, she jumped and wrapped her arms around him, thanking him profusely. Then, she promptly shooed him out of the room so she could get ready and, more importantly, reply to the message she’d missed during their heated negotiations.

Noon ok?

She wrote back, Yes! ☺️ Where should I meet you?

Idk what food do you like

Seafood!! 🦐🦞🦀🐟🍤🍣🦪🥰🤤😩

They went back and forth for a moment before she ended up recommending the place they had tried to grab brunch yesterday. Even though he was a local, he didn’t really seem too ‘in the know’ about popular restaurants in the area. 

When she questioned him about this, all he said in response was, I usually cook at home i guess

She prayed this not-date went well so she could convince him to cook for her, but she was getting ahead of herself. She was definitely going to count it as a date… but he didn’t need to know that.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Xuan-er was surprised to find he could spot her from all the way across the end of the main street. A-Xuan was a head taller than most of the locals and she liked wearing white, he was coming to notice. Most everyone from around here stuck to blues and greys since the weather could get unpredictable in the summer. 

He had originally tried to arrive earlier than her to grab a table for them, but it seems that would not be happening.

Most noticeably, she looked much happier than yesterday, something he was especially grateful to see. 

Shi Qingxuan showed up outside the café at 11:45AM despite agreeing to meet at noon. She’d been too antsy on the beach that morning and decided to go back and get ready earlier than originally intended. 

Half of her hair was braided and tied up in a bun set in the back with a chunky, ornamental barrette. The rest was long and flowing down her back in loose waves. She was wearing a white linen sundress and the pair of sandals she’d brought. A light concealer had been enough to salvage her tired complexion and she put on a pink tinted lip gloss and some brown mascara. Nothing too extravagant, but natural enough for that “no-makeup” look most boys couldn’t see through. She deemed herself much more put together and acceptable looking than this morning, and especially yesterday.

Shi Qingxuan texted her brother a quick message signaling her arrival and that she was waiting for him. Her phone was charged up all the way and notifications were turned on just in case. Her location was already shared with her brother, so she didn’t need to deal with that.

“You’re early,” he stated plainly in lieu of a greeting.

Shi Qingxuan gave him a cute little wave and momentarily pondered if she should go in for a hug or if that would be too familiar. She settled for a slight bow of her head instead. She also noticed that he was wearing the exact same thing as yesterday. She almost laughed, but held it back.

“Yeah! Is that alright?” she replied. Why was her heart fluttering already? He’d said barely two words. “I wasn’t waiting long, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

He opened up the door to the café and said, “Let’s sit down.”

He let her walk through first while he held the door. 

Alright, that’s a good sign. He opens doors! How thoughtful. Wait… He doesn’t know this is supposed to be a date. What am I even thinking about? 

She blinked the strange thoughts out of her mind and put on a smile.

The café was just as crowded. Out of the corner of her eyes, she noticed that the same waitress from yesterday was buzzing around and tending to several tables at once.

The hostess gave her a polite greeting which Shi Qingxuan returned. When she asked for a table for two, glancing back at her not-date who was standing behind her like a looming shadow, the hostess made a strange and incomprehensible expression. Without really giving it more thought, she followed the hostess over to a two-top table-booth combination in the far corner of the restaurant.

Xuan-er stopped walking suddenly and asked, “Are there any other tables?”

The hostess blinked up in surprise and put on a fakey customer service smile and said, “We’re pretty full considering the lunch rush.”

Shi Qingxuan looked around and spotted several other two-tops on the other side of the restaurant.

“What about those over there?” she asked innocently, not trying to be rude.

“That section’s server is a little busy at the moment,” the hostess said, a strange twinge in her smile that didn’t look natural at all. “If you’d like to be seated now, this is the only table available.”

“Oh, okay… Uh, is this one alright?” she asked Xuan-er, who originally expressed the sentiment. “We could wait, I don’t mind. It’s up to you.”

“Whatever, it’s fine,” he grumbled, yanking out the chair and sitting down.

The hostess bid them to enjoy their meal, leaving in a hurry.

Shi Qingxuan sat down across from him, a little uncomfortable from how this not-date was starting off. She tried to examine the table, but truly nothing seemed wrong with the table. Why had he acted so strangely? She was not deterred, though. She could spin anything around.

“So how’s your day going so far?” she asked with a charming smile.

“Fine,” he muttered, staring down at the table.

“That’s good to hear,” she said. 

She waited a moment for him to say more. He did not. 

“Well, my day started out kinda rough, but now it’s going well!”

He didn’t reply.

Tough crowd! Okay, so small talk isn’t his thing. That’s alright. He likes food. I like food. You can do this, Qingxuan!

She passed him over a menu and started talking about how some of the different seafood dishes looked delicious. He scowled intently at the menu, thoroughly scrutinizing it with a grave seriousness that didn’t seem natural at all.

“What kinda food do you like?” she asked, trying to get him more engaged. “Or I guess what do you normally cook at home?”

“Anything. I’m not picky.”

Come on! Give me something to work with here!

“What’re you thinking about getting? I can’t choose,” she tried again. 

And just when he opened his mouth to reply, Banyue, the same sever walked up to their table. She noticed Shi Qingxuan first and looked a little relieved to see her back and not crying.

“It’s nice to see you again,” she greeted with a smile under those eternally sad looking eyes. “What drinks can I get you started off with?”

Banyue turned to acknowledge Xuan-er and she did a huge double take and let slip a small gasp of surprise.

“Oh, hey. I… I didn't see you there,” she said in a small voice. “H-how are you doing?”

Shi Qingxuan watched both of them shrink away from the other and tried to understand what the relationship between them could be.

“You’re the server for this section?” he asked harshly, biting his words. Fists clenched tightly at his sides.

“Y-yeah,” she said, looking reluctant and concerned. “I’m s-sorry, I didn’t know or I wouldn’t have…” She swallowed uncomfortably. “We can try to get you seated in a different section, if you’d like.”

“Oh, but the hostess said there weren’t any other tables available,” Shi Qingxuan supplied, trying to be helpful.

Banyue’s brows scrunched up in confusion and she looked around. “What? She said that? There should be—”

A set up… he thought bitterly. Fuckin’ figures.

Xuan-er stood up, mumbling an apology to both of them, and stormed out of the restaurant.

Shi Qingxuan was left sitting at the table with a baffled expression on her face and looked over at the poor waitress, who looked like she was about to burst into tears.

“What?” Shi Qingxuan managed to say. “What just happened?”

“Why would she seat him here…?” Banyue whispered, putting her head in her hands. “Of all places?”

“What do you mean?” Shi Qingxuan asked, looking around and trying to deduce anything she could from her surroundings. It all seemed perfectly normal to her!

That is, until she looked behind.

On the wall, right behind her head, the article about the environmental activists who killed themselves as part of a protest was hung proudly. Pictures of each of the activists were in black and white, staring back with intense eye contact. 

Shi Qingxuan could only gasp. She stared back at an incredibly young face that looked so much like Xuan-er, but with softer more feminine features. She couldn’t have been older than nineteen or twenty. This was his sister, she realized. Out of the three protesters, Daiyu-er’s picture was the only one that was smiling; a beautiful, wide grin that was just a little crooked in a charming way. Her eyes still sparkled full of life, even for a black and white picture. 

How could she have forgotten about this stupid article?! And she’d recommended they come to this café!

“What the fuck?!” she cried. “Oh my god, I’m so stupid…”

She raced out of the table and went to chase after him, but right as she almost exited the door, she heard giggling coming from the host stand.

“Have a nice day!” the host called, laughing with a wicked smile.

Shi Qingxuan had seen this particular brand of wickedness before. The one where people laughed in the face of other’s pain and misery. A shiver ran down her spine and she burst through the doors and into the street, trying to catch a glimpse of where he went.

It was easy enough to spot him, she realized. He was several heads taller than most of the locals and the only one wearing all black.

She called out to him, stopping just short of calling him Xuan-er. Somehow the nickname felt too familiar now that they were both adults. (She could work up to it). Thankfully, he stopped upon hearing her. She caught up to him, placing a hand on his shoulder and panted from the effort of running.

His face looked incredibly sad, almost despairing, in that stoic way he always held his face, tight lips and intense eyes and furrowed brows. Except now, his eyes were filled with a special kind of rage and sadness she wished to never witness again.

“I’m sorry,” she pleaded. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea. I didn’t mean—”

“Are you still hungry?” he interrupted suddenly, looking away from her face.

She could hear a tinge of something like hurt in his voice, but she pretended she didn’t notice it.

“Oh, um, yeah,” she admitted, a little confused.

He started walking again and she stumbled after to follow him.

“W-where are we going?” 

“Somewhere better than that shithole.”

Well, at least he still wanted to continue the not-date despite the circumstances. Right…? 

Shi Qingxuan was wracking her brain with how to salvage this absolute fiasco.

They walked in silence down the unfamiliar streets he’d probably walked his whole life. People parted ways for them in the busy streets when they saw him coming. What the fuck was in the air in this town? Just being seen with him, the stares she was getting from the locals were ruthless and absolutely nasty. 

He led her over to a small stall with a couple picnic tables out front close to the beach. It looked to be a little meat bun stall from the distance. The old man working at the shop smiled widely upon seeing customers coming towards him. This old man was the only one that seemed to not regard Xuan-er with contempt.

“Ah! Always nice to see my favorite customer!” he called over with a jolly laugh. “And is that a lady-friend with you, He- yufu? Well, now that’s something! I never thought I’d see the day!”

Is that his surname? she wondered. He Xuan?

“Two of the usual,” he answered back flatly to the worker. He turned to glance back at Shi Qingxuan and asked, “What do you want?”

“Oh, um,” she hesitated, looking at the menu for the first time. “Oh, the shrimp buns look good!”

“Best in town,” the shop owner, she presumed, replied proudly. “How many would you like?”

“You got two, right?” she asked, tugging his sweatshirt. “Then I’ll do two, too!”

The worker laughed and said, “Two? Buns or two sets?”

Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Wait, which did you get?”

“Two sets.”

Her face betrayed the suprise she felt. “Oh. Well… How many are in the set?”

“Six.” 

She did the math in her head and nearly choked. “Holy shit. You can eat all of that?!”

“Sometimes more,” he admitted nonchalantly.

“It’s both beautiful and terrifying,” the shop owner said, about to tear up. “There’s a reason He- yufu is my favorite.”

“Uh, okay, I’ll just do two of the shrimp buns,” she clarified.

Shi Qingxuan moved to grab her wallet out of her crossbody purse, but Xuan-er had already put money in the tray.

“Wait!” she cried. “At least let me pay for mine!”

“Isn’t this a date?” he asked, looking at her with a confused face. “Doesn’t the guy usually pay on dates?”

Wait, what? He wasn’t supposed to know this was a date!

Her mind went completely blank upon hearing that he had her figured out.

“Let the nice man pay for you,” the shop owner hissed, snatching up the money so she didn’t have a chance to protest. “This new wave of youngsters paying half-and-half on a date is just ridiculous. The man is supposed to pay, end of story.”

Xuan-er stared at her for a long moment before he parsed out, “Was… was it not a date?”

Suddenly, her brain started working again and she spit out rapid-fire, trying to save the interaction.

“No, no! It’s just..! I, ahaha, I thought that… I didn’t know you were interested like that!” she explained intelligently. 

“So, it’s not a date…?” he tried to clarify, grimacing at the potential mistake.

“No, no!” she babbled quickly. “Wait, no, I mean, yes it is! It can be! If you want it to be, ahahaha!”

Fuck, I look like an idiot! Oh my god, and I picked that stupid café for a date?! I’m SUCH an idiot!

“Let’s just start over,” she proposed. “This is a date. We didn’t go anywhere before. This is the start of the date, okay?”

He nodded and motioned her over to sit at one of the tables in front of the stall.

“My name is Shi Qingxuan, by the way,” she said sheepishly. “I think I heard him say your name was—”

“He Xuan,” he answered, with a little nod of his head. 

“It’s nice to meet you for real, ahaha. I was still calling you Xuan-er in my head. I can’t believe I hadn’t asked for your full name! That’s so embarrassing.”

He let out a little chuckle and a half-smile. “It’s fine. I didn’t ask yours either.”

He Xuan looked to be in much better spirits than before, and for that, she was incredibly grateful. 

This time, when she struck up some small talk or other topic of conversation, he actually responded. Well, he was still not much of a talker and fairly clipped in speech, but it was more natural and not as forced as before.

The shop owner dropped off their order on the table and gave He Xuan a knowing smile and even winked at him. He Xuan didn’t react at all, pretending not to notice.

Shi Qingxuan was too busy gawking at the sheer amount of food on the table in front of them to catch the tiny interaction.

She had a small plate with two fairly large shrimp buns and he had two full plates of six buns each in front of him, twelve in total. Each plate was supposedly a different flavor, beef and pork. 

How on earth was someone as slim as him supposed to eat all of this in one sitting?! This amount would take a normal person at least two days to eat!

“You’re crazy,” she breathed, taking it all in. “If you can eat all of that without throwing up, I don't know if you can be considered human.”

He Xuan smirked and licked his lips before picking up a meat bun. “Watch me.”

The steam wafted in his face and he blew on it briefly before going in for a bite.

She didn’t want to doubt him, especially when he was so confident. She stole a glance over to the stall owner who nodded supportively.

“It’s terrifying,” he said. “I’ve never seen anything like it. He- yufu is one of a kind, that's for sure.” This time, he sent her a playful wink, like he was trying to set them up even though they were already on a date.

She laughed nervously and looked away. By the time her eyes fell back on He Xuan, he’d already finished the first meat bun and was starting on another.

Well, she’d get two meals with a show today, it seemed! 

Shi Qingxuan giggled a little bit and took up her own shrimp bun and bit into it. A burst of shrimpy-goodness exploded on her tongue and she groaned in delight, ready to tear into it even more.

“Wow, that’s amazing,” she exclaimed after swallowing. “The shrimp is so fresh! And the bun is steamed so perfectly.”

“Best in town!” repeated the shop owner. “I told you so.”

“Try the pork ones,” He Xuan encouraged, pushing a plate over her way.

“If I’m still wanting more after these two, I’ll definitely take you up on that,” she said, smiling in excitement.

Both of them readily got lost in the assortment of buns and forgot about speaking for the longest time. It left Shi Qingxuan cringing about just how much better this was going than that stupid café.

She bit her lip, thinking about how awful that must’ve felt, seeing that news article on the wall. And that evil hostess had done it on purpose? She wanted to go back there and give her a stern talking to. 

But something was eating away at the back of her mind. Just what was the relationship between him and the waitress, Banyue? 

“I’m sorry,” she said out of the blue. “I know I was the one who said to forget about what happened at that stupid café, but I just want you to know, I really didn’t see the article behind the table. I’m sorry. I would’ve insisted we leave or–”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

”Your sister…” she started hesitantly, unsure if she should really be talking about it. “Uhm… I just wanted to say… She was really pretty.”

He Xuan closed his eyes for a moment and nodded. “She was.”

“And that server…” she asked. “You knew her?”

“Daiyu-er’s best friend,” he explained, looking down with a guilty expression. “I didn’t know she worked there. I haven’t seen her since the funeral.”

“Shit,” she cursed at herself. Oh my god, was I really starting to get jealous over nothing? What the fuck is wrong with me?

“I don’t really go to the touristy places,” he admitted, picking up another meat bun. “They’re always crowded and expensive and the food isn’t even that good. And I didn’t know they had that stupid article…” He balled his other fist on the table and scowled.

“I’m really sorry,” she said sincerely. “I wouldn’t have suggested it if I’d realized.”

He shook his head and said firmly, “It wasn’t your fault.”

She was intelligent enough to know that was the end of that conversation topic. If he didn’t blame her, that’s all she could ask for and move on to spare him the pain.

“So, you come to this place a lot?” she asked, motioning to the meat bun stall.

“Mn,” he nodded. “Often enough. When I don’t have time to cook.”

“Oh, yeah!” she cried, thinking of an obvious question she hadn’t asked yet. “What do you do for work? Did I hear the owner call you… yufu?”

“Yeah. I’m a fisherman,” he said plainly. She made a face with a big, impressed smile and he scowled. “Don’t look at me like that. It’s not nearly as interesting as you’re thinking.”

She laughed and said, “It’s much more interesting than most of the people I’m around. Corporate drones in suits. Blegh, so boring! But fishing! Now that’s, like, a real job! Important!”

He shook his head, trying to dismiss her grand fantasies about his terribly unsexy work. “What about you?”

“Hmm, well, about that, ahaha,” she replied, nervously twisting around a strand of her hair. “I dropped out of university a while ago and I’m still trying to figure out what I want to do.”

“What were you studying?”

“Fashion,” she said stiffly. It didn’t bring back many good memories. “Did you ever go to university or trade school?”

“Couldn’t afford it even though I got offered a good scholarship. I was trying to save up for my sister in case she wanted to go.”

“Oh, I see.”

It suddenly occurred to her that she’d never thought about the cost associated with going to university. With the trust fund from her parents, the oil company Shi Wudu had inherited from Baba, and their house already being paid off, it was never even a question of whether or not she could afford to go university. 

“Well, if you could go, what do you think you’d study?”

He considered her words for a moment before saying, “Philosophy or law.”

“Really?!” she gawked, absolutely not expecting that answer. “Oh my gosh, that’s so cool. Better than fashion, that’s for sure.”

Suddenly the phone in her purse started buzzing.

“Oh shit!” she cried, panicking. “Sorry, one sec!”

She’d completely forgotten about texting her brother! She picked up the phone and could already hear him screaming before she could even put it to her ear.

“—told you that you’d forget! I fucking knew it! And I go to the café and you’re not there?! I’m on the way to your location right now! I swear to god, if something happened to you, I’m going to—”

“Calm down,” she interrupted, rolling her eyes. “We didn’t wanna go eat there after all. Nothing’s wrong. We just changed to a different venue. I’m sorry, I forgot to text you.”

Shi Wudu went quiet for a long moment. 

“Hello?” she asked, looking to see if the line disconnected. “Hello, ge? You there?”

“Nothing happened?” he asked, a little confused.

“No,” she lied. “Why do you sound so surprised that everything's fine? Did you really think he was gonna kill me or something? We’re having a lovely time eating meat buns. You’re still not invited, by the way.”

He Xuan snorted a laugh.

“Final strike, Qingxuan. Don’t forget to text me again or else,” he said quickly before hanging up the phone.

She sighed dramatically and shook her head, trying to ease the anxiety.

“Ahaha, sorry about that…” she said, awkwardly putting her phone back. “My brother’s a little crazy sometimes.”

“Mn,” he sounded, scowling for a moment.

“He just cares about me a lot,” she defended. “He’s not so bad, I promise.”

He Xuan didn’t look so convinced as he took a ferocious bite into another meat bun.

Sure enough, He Xuan was making incredible progress on the meat buns. There were only three buns left and he didn’t show any signs of stopping now.

“Oh, yeah! If you’re a fisherman, surely you have some crazy stories!”

This was perfect. She could get to know He Xuan and get to know the stories about the sea monster.

“What do you mean?”

“Like the coolest fish you’ve ever caught or something. Aren’t fishermen supposed to have good stories about ghost ships or strange creatures they’ve seen swimming underneath the waves? Tell me a tall tale, Mr. Sailor!”

He Xuan opened his mouth to answer, but the shop owner decided to butt in before he could.

“You ever heard the stories about the sea monster of Fu Gu?” he started, just like any good story. “Some people ‘round here got stories about it.”

“Oh yeah?” she asked, feeling a flutter of anxiety in her stomach. 

“They say it's even bigger than a cruise ship and darker than the night!” the shop owner continued, putting big gestures to his words to exaggerate. “It’ll swallow you whole so that not even your bones remain!”

Bigger than a cruise ship? she wondered. The one I saw wasn’t so big…

“They say it lurks underneath the waters near the oil rig. Some people swear it’s the reason the dredgers couldn’t find the bodies of those–”

He Xuan shot the owner a deadly glare that shut him up instantly. 

Shi Qingxuan’s heart burned for him. Oh my god, he didn’t even have a body to bury… That’s awful. I can’t even imagine. 

The owner cleared his throat awkwardly. “Sorry. I forgot, He- yufu. But anyway, we haven’t had any credible sightings of the thing in more than twenty years. Some people think that the oil rig caused it to move away. Maybe it’s off terrorizing some other part of the ocean.”

“Have you ever seen it?” she asked.

“Oh, sure, a long time ago,” he said easily. “Nearly capsized my old man’s sail boat while we were on the water!”

“What did it look like?”

He thought for a moment, finger on his whiskery chin, and said, “Only caught a glimpse of the back swimming away. But it was huge! Couldn’t have been a whale. I’ve seen whales before and they don’t look like that. Didn’t even see it coming till it was underneath us, it was so fast. Thought for sure we were gonna get gobbled up, but here I am!”

Suddenly the man’s wife came out of the back of the stall, threatening to swat him with a ladle.

“You quit that!” she cried. “Let our Xiao -He enjoy his date without scaring the nice young lady off with your stupid stories about something that’s not even real!”

“Hey!” he called, offended. “It’s real! I’ve seen it!”

The woman ignored him and shot an endearing smile at Shi Qingxuan and said, “Please forgive my silly husband. Don’t listen to him. He’s got a wild imagination.”

“The only wild thing I got is a wife like you!”

His wife raised up the ladle again and gave him proper whack upside the head.

Shi Qingxuan giggled a little awkwardly as they started bickering back and forth in the back of the stall. By the time Shi Qingxuan looked back, He Xuan had finished all of the meat buns and began stacking up the plates one after the other.

“Holy shit, you actually did it?”

“I told you I would.”

“How are you not exploding right now? Where does it all go?!”

“In my stomach,” he replied simply.

“Surely your stomach has, like, a pocket dimension in it or something ‘cuz there’s no way any normal person could eat that much in under an hour!”

He Xuan just shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal.

“Well, is there something else you wanted to do after lunch?” she asked, changing the subject.

He Xuan shrugged for a second time. “Is there something you wanted to do?”

She faked a scowl and said, “I asked first.”

“Yeah, well, I live here. You’re the visitor. You choose.”

He made a fair point. 

“Well, I wanted to see the lighthouse or maybe fly a kite, but the weather’s not gonna hold up for much longer,” she said, looking at the looming cloud cover. “There’s not a lot to do if it’s going to rain. Should I just go back…?”

Ugh, but I don’t wanna leave!

He Xuan frowned, but didn’t protest. “I’ll walk you back.”

Shi Qingxuan felt a little sad. The stupid weather was throwing a wrench into her grand plans. Standing up from the picnic bench, she thanked the shop owner for the lovely food and promised to come back. She also remembered to text her brother one last time and give a little update that she was already coming back.

The two of them took off back onto the main streets. Most of the people in the crowded street had started packing up their stalls and closing the perpetually open shop doors to brace for the incoming showers.

Shi Qingxuan was feeling especially bold and a little guilty for having to end the date after only some lunch, so she hesitantly clutched onto his upper arm and waited for a reaction.

He Xuan stopped walking for a brief moment and whipped his head around to stare at her.

Fuck, was that too forward of me?

“Oh, did I make you uncomfortable? Sorry, should I stop?” she asked, cringing inside. 

“No.” He continued walking, looking straight ahead.

She blinked in confusion but he didn’t specify which question he was answering. Maybe both? Either way, he didn’t shake her off, so that was a win!

“Where are you staying?” he asked eventually, coming to a stop in the street.

Oh yeah. She was following him. He didn’t even know where the villa was. 

“Duh,” she realized, face-palming into her free hand. She explained the general area where they were staying, but she couldn’t remember the name off the top of her head. “I know how to get back! But I’m not really sure the exact street address, ahaha,” she clarified.

“Lead the way,” he said, gesturing for her to start walking.

It started sprinkling not long after they started walking in the right direction. He Xuan was about to offer her his sweatshirt when Shi Qingxuan pulled out a mini foldable umbrella out of her crossbody purse.

“I always come prepared!” she demonstrated, opening it up.

It was a pastel green umbrella with a golden handle and some lacey edges. He placed his hand on the handle, briefly brushing against her hands, and took it from her.

Such a gentleman! she cried, screaming and kicking her feet inside her head.

Her cheeks flushed even from that brief, exceptionally chaste physical contact, and she couldn’t help but smile ear-to-ear all the way back to the villa.

The rain started to pick up by the time they reached the door.

“Oh… Well, I guess this is me,” she said, unlatching her arm from around his bicep. “But you’ll get soaked if you go out without an umbrella!”

“I’ll be fine,” he assured her, handing back the umbrella.

“No, no, no,” she said resolutely, pushing it back into his hand. “Take it. You need it more than I do right now.”

He blinked at her, unsure of what to say in response. “Uh… Thanks.”

“You’ll just have to give it back to me on our second date, yeah?” she added, sending a flirtatious wink his way.

Right as she said these words, Shi Wudu swung open the doors to the villa with an incredible scowl on his face.

“Meimei, get inside before you catch a cold,” he grumbled, staring her way coldly.

God, he really did have the worst timing. Still, it was no matter. Pretending like he wasn’t there, Shi Qingxuan pranced right up to He Xuan, who was already turning to leave, and pecked him on the cheek. She had to stand on her toes to reach.

Both her brother and He Xuan stared at her with eyes wider than the moon. She glanced back at Shi Wudu with an innocent smile on her face. He looked absolutely furious.

“Call me or text me about that second date, okay?” she added before he could go. “We’ll do something even more fun when the weather’s better!”

“Qingxuan, Ling Wen had something she wanted to ask you when you got back,” Shi Wudu said visciously.

She wasn’t stupid, there was no way Ling Wen had anything to say to her, but she could play along.

“Oh, really? I’ll go ask jiejie what’s up,” she said, stopping at the threshold of the door to wave goodbye to He Xuan. “See you~!”

Shi Wudu closed the door behind her and was left out on the threshold staring daggers at He Xuan.

“How was your… date …with my sister?” he sneered. He could barely even say the word without almost throwing up.

“Fine,” He Xuan replied dryly, turning to leave.

“You have her umbrella.”

“She’s letting me borrow it.”

Shi Wudu scoffed and rolled his eyes, dropping all pretenses. “So, you know who I am, then? Is that what this is about? Pretending to date my sister?”

He Xuan watched him pick up his head and put his shoulders back like he was trying to seem like a bigger man. He barely contained an eyeroll. What a poser.

“Yeah, I know who you are,” He Xuan said, trying to play it off. “You’re the older brother I’ve heard so much about.”

Shi Wudu scoffed again. “That’s not what I meant. I know exactly who you are, He Xuan, but do you know who I am?” 

“Yeah, I know,” he confirmed. “Shi Wudu, of Shi Offshore Energy.”

Shi Wudu shifted uncomfortably and asked stiffly, “Does she know?”

“No. Not all of it.”

“What did you tell her?”

He Xuan choked out a laugh. “I told her the truth. That my sister didn’t kill herself.”

“A court of law couldn't prove that.”

“I’m not here to argue with you about my sister’s death,” he growled. He’d barely managed to salvage this day, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to let his sister’s murderer ruin it. He didn’t deserve to have that power. “Your sister doesn’t know it was your company, anyway. But you’ll have to tell her soon. Or I will.”

Shi Wudu crossed his arms. “So what’s your angle here? She’s clearly interested in you. You’re not stupid, you can see it. Are you trying to turn her against me? Or are you just playing with Qingxuan to get back at me for your sister’s death?”

Turning around, intending to start leaving, he called back nonchalantly, “Not that it’s any of your business, but there’s no angle. I liked her before I figured out who she’s related to.”

Shi Wudu laughed darkly. “Yeah, right,” he said. “Why would I assume you’d tell me? Either way, stay away from my sister. This is your first and final warning. If anything happens to her, there will be hell to pay.”

He Xuan stopped and whipped his head back. “Oh, I see. So you get to defend your sister, but when I try to do it, it’s not allowed? Is that right? At least you still have a sister left to protect. You took mine away from me,” he spat back, full of teeth. Rage broiled his very blood just being in proximity with this evil man. “You really have some nerve… coming back here on vacation… When she doesn’t get to breathe? You’re lucky I don’t strangle you where you stand.”

Shi Wudu just laughed and repeated, “Stay away from my sister.”

“You don’t scare me.”

“Oh, I don’t scare you? Maybe you are stupid after all…” 

Shi Wudu turned on his heels and walked inside, slamming the door in his wake.

Chapter Text

Shi Qingxuan was surprised to find that Ling Wen did, in fact, have something to ask her about. Apparently, while Shi Qingxuan was out on her date, Xuan Ji and Pei Ming broke up. That meant Xuan Ji was going back to rooming with Ling Wen, as was the original plan. So, Shi Qingxuan, once again, needed to vacate and move back in with her brother.

Shi Qingxuan was more surprised that they actually broke it off than she was angry about having to move again.

“Wait, really? You’re serious?” she asked. “What the heck happened while I was away…?”

Ling Wen’s cold expression said it all, she neither knew nor cared. “I didn’t think it would happen this soon, either. I’m just the messenger.”

“Wait, so who broke up with who?”

“Well, I couldn’t really catch the whole argument from all the crying and screaming, but I’m betting it was him that called it off, based on her reaction.”

Yikes. That didn’t sound good.

“What do you mean, ‘her reaction’?”

“You’ll see.”

That also didn’t sound very good.

“Just give her a while to cool off before you get your stuff in there,” she advised. “It’s like the aftermath of a nuclear war in there right now. She nearly killed me just for smiling earlier.”

Shi Qingxuan promptly sat down next to Ling Wen on the couch, not wanting to deal with whatever nonsense awaited in that room. Looking around the room, Pei Xiu was typing away on his phone with a goofy little smile on his face. His older brother was also suspiciously absent from the living room.

“Where’d Pei Ming go?” she asked. “Did he leave?”

She shrugged in response with a look of cold indifference. “Yep. Good Ol’ Pei up and left after everything,” she said. “He’ll be back eventually. That’ll be fun to deal with, I’m sure.”

Shi Qingxuan nodded vaguely and turned to look over at the TV that no one was really watching and instantly realized why. Just as she looked at the screen, a gigantic shark burst out of the water and chomped limbs off of several people at once, leaving a sea of blood and screams in its wake.

She almost lost hold of her lunch being digested from the sight and passed out from the shock. Shrimpy bile started rising up in her throat, thoroughly unused to seeing such violence and gore. It wasn’t even very realistic, the shark was an obvious puppet-CGI-animatronic abomination and the blood was way too orangey for it to actually look believable. But it was enough to make anyone with a weak stomach nauseous from the sheer amount of it all.

“Can we turn that off? she complained, shielding her eyes from the prolonged gory sequence.

“Be my guest,” Ling Wen offered, handing her the remote from the coffee table. “It’s logged into your brother’s account.”

Easy peasy, she figured. She switched off profiles over to her own since they shared the account (read: she mooched off of her brother in most aspects, this was no exception.) Also, this was a more recent development, but Pei Ming also had a profile on their account for whatever reason. 

“Anyone going to veto an animated movie?” she asked her captive audience. “No one? Good!”

“Hey, I was watching that!” Shi Wudu called out with a frown, finally walking into the living room.

“No one else was,” Ling Wen replied, giving him a snarky look. 

Shi Wudu slumped down next to his sister and tried to snatch away the remote from her hand. They proceeded to play a surprise round of keep-away on the couch, much to Ling Wen’s annoyance.

“See, look! You’re making jiejie mad!” Shi Wudu protested, trying to guilt Shi Qingxuan into giving him the remote. “Let’s just finish the movie and then you can pick the next one.”

“The only one making me mad is you, Wudu,” Ling Wen snapped, unusually icy towards him. “She only just got here and she was trying to switch off that god-awful shark nonsense. I’m on her side.”

Shi Wudu feigned innocence and put his hands up in the air. They started bickering back and forth while Shi Qingxuan absentmindedly half-listened to their roundabout conversation. It was like they were trying desperately not to mention something crucial that only they knew about. Whatever it was, she couldn’t deduce the source of their argument without previous context.

“Yeesh, what did I miss?” she asked, finally choosing a suitable movie. “I leave for a little bit, and now you two are fighting and Pei Ming and Xuan Ji broke up? What happened to you, Pei Xiu? Anything new to share?”

Pei Xiu looked up suddenly, hearing his name called and said, “Oh, uh. I’m just texting that server from yesterday.”

“Great, so Pei Xiu’s got a girlfriend, his brother broke up with Xuan Ji, I just went on a date, and now you’re fighting. The world is turning upside down!” she cried out melodramatically.

“S-she’s not my girlfriend!” Pei Xiu cried. Yet… he thought secretly.

“It’s not that big of a deal,” Ling Wen interrupted, completely ignoring Pei Xiu. “Your brother, like always, is just being as stubborn as a mule and acting like an idiot.”

“Yeah, well, you have been no help at all, jiejie,” Shi Wudu groaned.

“Just talk to him!”

“It’s not that simple and you know that. It’s too soon, anyway!”

“That’s never stopped him before.”

Shi Qingxuan shrunk back into the back seat of the couch, trapped in between the two of them arguing. “Wait, who are we talking about here?” she interjected, trying to defuse the situation or at least get it going in a more productive direction. 

“Your brother needs to get his head out of his ass and talk to Pei,” Ling Wen snapped. “It really is that simple. Then you don’t have to talk to me about your problems anymore. Everyone wins.”

“Is it about what happened with Xuan Ji? Was it really that bad?” she asked.

Ling Wen rolled her eyes, but didn’t elaborate further.

“It’s nothing you need to worry about, meimei, because I’m NOT going to talk to him.”

Jeez, I leave for less than two hours and his friend group is in utter shambles… Shi Qingxuan thought.

“Talk to him or don’t. I don’t care, personally. Just whatever you decide, stop talking to me about it. I’m sick of hearing you whining about him constantly.”

“Wait, are you breaking up with Pei Ming?” Shi Qingxuan guessed, laughing. “Is this the best day ever? A world where you two aren’t friends? Did Christmas come early?!”

Shi Wudu scowled ferociously at the two of them. 

Ling Wen barked a laugh. “I’d hardly call it a breakup if this coward can’t even muster up the courage to ask him out,” she said offhandedly.

Shi Qingxuan laughed again, grimacing at the horrible thought, and said, “Omigod, don’t even joke about that! Can you imagine? Ge definitely doesn’t need another stick up his ass, especially not Mr. Playboy’s iron rod… Wait, is Pei Ming even, like, gay? Maybe he’d swing both ways just to stick his dick in something breathing, ahahaha!”

Ling Wen stared at her for a long moment, biting her lip. Shi Wudu’s face was slowly turning even redder. He was staring daggers at Ling Wen, trying to explode her with his mind.

“Wait, what?” Shi Qingxuan asked, utterly confused when Ling Wen did not laugh along with her. “You’re joking, right? My brother’s not even gay, so there’s no way—”

Shi Wudu opened and closed his mouth. He looked down at the floor, too embarrassed to speak.

Ling Wen exploded in rage, making a strangling motion with her hands at him. “How could you have told me and not your goddamn sister?! Are you kidding me right now? Aiyah! You’re such an idiot!” 

Shi Wudu couldn’t muster any words to deny anything.

“Wait, no… What? Woah, woah, woah,” Shi Qingxuan said, waving her hands. “Back up a second! There’s no way. You’re…? You’re gay?! You’re SERIOUSLY telling me that you’re gay right now?!”

Ling Wen shook her head and muttered, “I’m sorry. I thought she knew. I wouldn’t have…”

“Please tell me you’re joking…” Shi Qingxuan begged, suddenly dizzy and breathless. “This isn’t real. What is happening right now? You’re serious? And you seriously like HIM? Pei Ming?!” She felt like she was going to throw up from the shock.

Shi Wudu stormed off the couch with thunderous rage and embarrassment swirling around his eyes. Ling Wen put her head in her hands, wishing she was dead. 

Shi Qingxuan took off after her brother, who slammed the door to his room immediately. A sinking gut twisting feeling, and she knew that she seriously messed up. She needed to make it right. She swung it open without a second thought, but he was there at the threshold, pushing her out.

“Get out,” he demanded, face still even redder than she’d ever seen before. “Get out, Qingxuan.”

“No, no, I’m sorry!” she pleaded, struggling against him. “Please, can I talk to you about this?”

He held her at arms distance away and refused to let her draw closer. “No.”

“Ge, please! It’s me, ge! I know what you’re going through—”

“You’re going to make fun of me.”

“No, I’m not! Ge, I promise I didn’t mean to make fun of you,” she explained, dripping with sincerity. “Please. That wasn’t fair of me. I really thought it was a joke and we were all joking. I’m so sorry if I hurt your feelings. I’m just really shocked right now, but I want to talk about it. Please. It’s me, ge. I know what you’re going through, more than anyone else.”

Shi Wudu finally stopped fighting and stilled himself. He looked her in the eyes, still visibly angry, but he moved out of the way. He closed the door behind them and they sat down on the bed next to each other.

She took a deep breath before beginning. How do you even begin something like this? She didn’t even remember coming out to her family. She just sorta realized one day that she was a girl and that was it…

“Okay. So. You’re… gay?”

“Yeah.”

“Like gay-MLM-gay, or like bi or pan or something?”

“Gay.”

She nodded, taking a moment to digest all this new information. “How long have you known?”

“Since high school.”

Her eyes widened. “What?!” He shrugged. “And you never told me?” 

Somehow, she felt a little hurt that he didn’t trust her enough to come out before now. And it took Ling Wen, of all people, to finally get them to have this conversation! 

Shi Qingxuan supposed this unexpected development sort of made sense, thinking back. Shi Wudu had never dated anyone as far as she knew, and never showed any interest in dating anyone either. In the back of her mind, she sort of guessed he was on the aromantic spectrum or maybe he was too narcissistic to actually love anyone else that wasn’t his immediate family. This suddenly put so many missing puzzle pieces together in her mind, connecting a bunch of dots in her brain. No wonder he always seemed so pent up. He just needed to get laid!

“I never told anyone,” he shrugged. “I just didn’t see the point of the whole ‘coming out’ thing, especially if I never dated. I never liked anyone, either. It doesn’t really matter. Superfluous information. Nonessential details.”

“You told Ling Wen,” she countered, pouting childishly. “And not me.”

“Yeah, well, I just needed to get it off my chest about a year ago when I started, you know… acquiring feelings… for, erm, you know… him. And you hate him. I couldn’t just… Ling Wen knows him.” 

This did not sound at all like her brother. How could someone serious and proper like him fall for such a lecherous playboy like Pei Ming, of all people?!

“I’m not going to do anything about it,” he decided. His stormy blue eyes burned with determination as he spoke. “If the shareholders still give me shit about you and you’re not even directly affiliated with company affairs, how the fuck am I supposed to navigate dating a man and being in a homosexual relationship and be taken seriously in my own damn company? I’d lose all face if they found out. Everyone would see me differently and lose confidence in my ability to lead. It just wouldn’t work. I’m not going to do anything about it.”

“But do you like him?” she asked gently, covering his hand with her own. She loved a good forbidden romance. And she was nothing if not an enabler.

“No, don’t ask me that, meimei. I can’t afford to entertain that.”

“Do you like him, ge? Really?”

An exasperated sigh. “I’ve never liked anyone... but I do like him… AND I KNOW he’s an idiot, and a player. Probably not even gay.” Another annoyed groan. “This is all just so fucking stupid, Qingxuan, I’d rather slit my own throat than tell him how I feel. It’s been over a year, please just forget about this.”

Shi Qingxuan slapped her brother on the back and said, “Welcome to the queer world, ge. Happens to us all. It’s like our initiation ceremony. We all fall in love with our friends and the ones we like are never gay and the ones that are gay are either toxic, or never like us back.”

That didn’t help him feel better. 

“So, what I’m hearing is that you like him, but you’re more worried about your reputation or ruining your friendship if you act on these feelings?”

He nodded, adding, “And, like, a thousand other things, but those are the main ones, yeah.”

“Well, maybe you could start by, like, sneakily asking his sexuality or something? Oh, or I could do it! You know, be your wingman or something!” she offered. “Ask Xie Lian! I’m really good at it—”

He shot her a deadly glare and said, “I do not need you meddling in this. It’s my own business and I’ve already decided I’m not going to pursue anything. I just keep thinking, if he wanted to break up with Xuan Ji before… that maybe things could’ve been different here in Fu Gu. Maybe I could’ve… I don’t know… It’s stupid.

“But now everything’s so fucked and everyone’s walking on eggshells. It’s just not worth starting even more drama. Do not involve yourself. Just leave it.”

Shi Qingxuan lamented a sigh. “Okay, but if you ever change your mind or anything, you can always come to me about it. About anything. You know that, right? I want to know these things about you. We’re the only family we have left.”

He gave a sort of weak, half-smile and nodded. And then his expression abruptly changed into a serious scowl. “Oh, by the way, meimei,” he started, completely changing the subject. “Your ‘not-date’ with that guy. You’re saying everything was fine? He didn’t do anything weird?”

“What? No. He was normal. Everything was fine. Amazing, even!” she chirped, thinking back to He Xuan’s handsome face. “The only thing weird was how much he ate. Seriously, it’s insane. But he’s really sweet! He even paid for me! And it did turn out to be a date!”

Shi Wudu scoffed. Muttering, “Yeah, I could tell.” The cheek-kiss in front of him wasn’t exactly subtle.

“Oh. My. God. Wait. Can you imagine! You and Pei Ming, me and He Xuan? Double dates on vacation?! Like a beach episode of a romance anime!”

Shi Wudu shook his head and said flatly, “Over my dead body.”

“What?! Why not!! It would be so fun and romantic!”

“Not gonna happen. You know, I had a little chat with him after you went inside—”

“Oh my god, what did you say to him?!” She shook him by the shoulders, cringing and furious.

Shi Wudu narrowed his eyes, but refused to elaborate more than, “...You deserve someone better than him. He’s not a good person.”

She groaned at him and crossed her arms. “You don’t know anything about him. You’re just a judgemental asshole. Also, you have no room to talk, given your taste in men!”

Shi Wudu’s eyes narrowed at her and said, “I’m serious, Qingxuan. I know he’s not good for you.”

Shi Qingxuan stood up from the bed, becoming increasingly frustrated, and said plainly, “We’re not having this conversation again. You don’t get to decide what’s good for me anymore.”

She started walking out the door, but Shi Wudu caught her hand before she could leave. 

“He’s dangerous, Qingxuan. You shouldn’t trust him,” Shi Wudu pleaded. “Did you even know he has a criminal record? I’m trying to keep you safe.”

She stopped and looked back at her brother, surmounting fury boiling in her stomach. “How the fuck do you know that?! Did you do a fucking background check on him?! How’d you even find out his name?! I never even told you before now! I didn’t even know his full name until a couple hours ago!”

Shi Wudu shook his head and said, “Why aren’t you listening to me? He has a criminal record! And you’re still defending him? Did he even tell you?”

Red in the face, she pointedly looked away from him and huffed. “That’s not… Of course he didn’t! But, like, that’s not something you can just casually drop on the first date, anyway!”

“So are you still going to see him?”

“Well, I let him borrow my umbrella—”

Shi Wudu massaged his temples, frustration dripping from his voice, “You’re seriously still going to see him?”

“He’s a good person,” she said firmly. “I can feel it. Why can’t you just trust my judgement for once?”

“Your judgement has led you wrong many times before. And I’m always the one that has to pick up the pieces and fix the messes you get yourself into. You never listen to me.”

Huffing and puffing, she snapped, “Whatever! Since you know so much about him, huh? What did he do? Was it even something so dangerous?”

“Disorderly conduct and trespassing.”

Shi Qingxuan laughed in his face. “Yeah, for sure. He’s dangerous alright. Practically a serial killer! You know Pei Ming has a DUI and you’re not worried about that. What about your precious reputation? What would the shareholders think?”

“That was a long time ago, and he doesn’t drink like that anymore—”

That was the final straw.

“You’re a fucking hypocrite,” she yelled, yanking her hand out of his grip. “You get on me for drinking and compare me to Mama and now you’re defending Pei Ming’s DUI?! All while you’re telling me not to go for this guy I like that has a criminal background when you like someone with one?! You’re SUCH a hypocrite! You and ‘MingMing’ are fucking perfect for each other!”

She paused again at the door, not done berating him, and continued, “You know, sometimes I can see these, like, glimmers of a real person inside you. But if anyone’s turning out like Mama between the two of us, it’s not me and my non-existent drinking problem, you asshole. Unhappy and controlling and toxic—”

“Meimei—”

“Don’t fucking ‘meimei’ me right now!” She stormed out of the door and called back, waving her hands in the air, “Congratulations on coming out! I hope you get railed, ‘cuz you certainly need it! Maybe it’ll actually get something other than your head out stuck up your ass!”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Shi Qingxuan refused to move into her brother’s room and refused to talk to him for three full days. She slept on the couch in the living room instead. 

Pei Ming eventually came back later that night, like nothing had happened. 

The tension in the rented bungalow was at an all time high and they hadn’t even been on vacation for more than a week. It was only day six. Xuan Ji had been avoiding Pei Ming as much as possible. Whenever they were in the same room, the atmosphere felt charged with static electricity. Same with the Shi siblings.

To make things worse, it had continued to rain for the next few days, so everyone was hopelessly cooped up inside to let tensions broil even higher.

Xuan Ji was also prone to weeping and wailing at random, deep in the throes of grief over their break up, much to everyone’s discomfort. She kept clinging onto poor Ling Wen for support. Ling Wen wanted absolutely nothing to do with her and pushed her off to Shi Qingxuan, who also didn’t know what to do with her. Pei Ming, on the other hand, was trying his best to pretend nothing was wrong. He was sticking close to Shi Wudu, who was trying his best to keep it together and not think about his massive crush.

Around day three post breakup, Xuan Ji suddenly turned a new leaf and turned bright and cheery again, still a little too clingy to Ling Wen and Shi Qingxuan. She now insisted they had been best friends all along and refused to separate from their side. Wherever Shi Qingxuan went in the house, there was Xuan Ji following after her. Whenever Ling Wen went to study at the dining table, there was Xuan Ji looking over her shoulder. Whenever everyone else had gone back to their rooms and Shi Qingxuan was pulling out the blankets for the couch to go to sleep, Xuan Ji thought it the opportune moment to start venting about something.

Ling Wen and Shi Qingxuan were well past their limit. Ling Wen ordered Shi Wudu to make her leave.

Originally, Pei Ming had been decent enough to offer to pay for her flight back home if she wanted to leave, but Xuan Ji was determined to stay. It was unclear if she was staying to win him back or cause even more drama, but either way, they were all stuck with her for the time being despite no one wanting to be around her. Shi Wudu wasn’t about to kick her out, as much as he wanted to.

Shi Qingxuan hadn’t really had any time to text He Xuan lately because of all the drama in the house. According to the weather forecast, they were supposed to be due for sunshine later in the day, much to everyone’s relief.

Shi Qingxuan decided to send He Xuan a text, but she spent a few minutes mulling over the contents in her mind. How many emojis was too many? What if she sounded too eager or too desperate? What if he was just using her for an easy umbrella?!

She shook her worries and realized at least that last thought wasn’t true. He Xuan was nice. There was nothing to worry about. He wasn’t like the other douchebags she dated previously. She knew she could be herself around him. Hell, he’d seen her post-breakdown with snot running down her nose and still was interested in her. Why was she worrying so much?

She pressed send on a whim, psyching herself up to do it, and sighed in relief after it was finished. The little “schwoop” of the message being sent was music to her ears.

Hey! The weather’s supposed to be getting better soon! ☀️🌈

Would you be interested in hanging out again soon? 😉 

You owe me an umbrella! ☂️

Even though it was still cloudy outside, the forecast said clear skies were on the horizon for later in the afternoon. The group decided to go back out on the boat for the day. Shi Qingxuan still wasn’t talking to Shi Wudu, but not for his lack of trying. He was being even more frustrating than usual, if that was even possible.

Shi Wudu did his best to talk to her about anything (except of course their underlying issues). She only rewarded him with scowls, the cold shoulder, and prolonged silences. Xuan Ji also stole Ling Wen and Shi Qingxuan from Shi Wudu, so now he had no choice but to talk to Pei Ming in the interim (except of course about their underlying issues). Pei Xiu was on his phone more often than usual— busy talking up Banyue, the cute server. 

On a boat in the middle of the ocean, Shi Qingxuan was going to be Shi Wudu’s captive audience. Maybe he could try smoothing things over in the middle of the ocean. Or rile her up into talking to him. Whichever was easier!

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

He Xuan had just finished docking at the pier when his phone finally connected back to cellular data. Out on the ocean, he didn’t get any service. That wasn’t unusual. What was unusual was the notification that buzzed in his pants. No one important ever texted him anymore. He didn’t think anything of it at the time and kept working.

He’d been fishing since about two o’clock in the morning and was beat. His prominent eye bags were even bigger than usual, and he longed for the sweet embrace of cold cotton sheets. But he still had to sell his haul to the local fishmongers in town. 

By the time he finished docking and getting ready to load up the fish and the crabs, it was nearly eleven AM. The other fishermen in town were never as late in selling their catch of the day (usually they were finished around six). He Xuan never liked seeing the others, so it was better that he was always “late.” The fishmongers never complained either. In fact, they usually praised his hauls as being bigger than the other local fisherman. 

He was dumping out a big crab pot into some coolers in his truck he’d parked next to his boat when he heard someone walk up behind him. Thinking it was a dock worker sent to harass him, he turned around with a dark scowl on his face. His high ponytail whipped him a bit in the eye from how quick he turned.

“He Xuan!” chirped a person he was not expecting to see here on the dock. 

His face twisted in confusion instead of anger. “What are you doing here?” 

“Good morning to you, too, haha!” Shi Qingxuan said, brushing some hair behind her ears. “I didn’t realize you would be working here at the pier, what a surprise! Well, we’re about to go out on the yacht and I thought I saw you from afar, so I came over to say hi!”

He blinked at her and put down the large crab pot. “Hello.”

“Okay, great, well, it looks like you’re busy working, so sorry if I disturbed you,” she said quickly. “But we should figure out a time for that second date now the weather’s better! I sent you a text, did you get it?”

He patted his pants vaguely. The notification! “Yeah. I was working— still am working… I’ll check it later and we can set something up.”

“Yeah, yeah! No rush, Mr. Sailor!” she chirped happily. “I’ll see you soon!”

“See you.”

He watched her skip away down the dock in her open-toed sandals that were definitely not safe for the rickety wooden pier. He shook his head in disapproval. She momentarily paused to look back and wave again with a huge smile on her face. He sent her back a one handed wave and a half smile. Turning back, she moved to step onto a yacht not too far away with several other people watching him intently.

He Xuan was used to being a spectacle. But he was not in the mood to entertain that sort of company. He dropped his expression upon seeing them. Rolling his eyes and turning around, his attention focused back on the many crab pots he still needed to transfer into his truck. 

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

That was such a terrible idea!! Shi Qingxuan was cringing to herself just thinking about it. I’m so stupid! How could I think that was a good idea?! He was obviously busy!! He probably thinks I’m stalking him or something…

But the fashion design major in her still couldn’t get over what he was wearing. How was he still wearing that god-awful black sweatshirt? Did he even own other clothes? She had to find out for her own sake more than his. Maybe even take him shopping or something. It was getting a bit ridiculous.

“Oh my god, your old friend’s kinda cute!” Xuan Ji said, hitting Shi Qingxuan in the shoulder as she hid her face into her palms. “But in, like, a rugged, working-man kinda way!”

She looked up, a little offended. “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

“He looks poor,” translated Ling Wen, already nose-deep into her textbooks again.

“Wen-jie! You’re horrible! That is not what I meant!” Xuan Ji whined. “No, like, he’s… Ugh! What’s the word…?”

“Lower-class?” Shi Wudu quipped.

“Okay, let’s move on. The elitism on this yacht is showing,” Shi Qingxuan mumbled. “I don’t care what his socio-economic status is, and neither should any of you.”

“You obviously don’t care about his criminal record, either,” added Shi Wudu. “Practically a saint.”

Pei Ming burst out laughing, but Shi Qingxuan nearly tackled Shi Wudu overboard. The only thing that stopped her was her vow of silence. That also included any interactions, including but not limited to attacking, biting, drowning, slapping, throwing overboard, and so on… She resorted to just cursing him out in her head as usual.

“Ooooh~!” sing-songed Xuan Ji, elbowing Shi Qingxuan in the side repeatedly. “A-Xuan likes bad boys!”

Oh, so they were nickname-level besties in Xuan Ji’s head. A shiver ran down her spine at the unrequited familiarity. “Please, don’t call me that.”

“Yeah, meimei doesn’t like nicknames,” Shi Wudu butted in yet again.

Who doesn’t like nicknames?!?! Now that was a bold-face lie and he knew it, too! The audacity, really! She loved giving others nicknames and having secret little inside jokes between her friends! Now, he had gone too far!

“I do like nicknames, actually. Just not that one,” she clarified to Xuan Ji, eyebrows twitching from trying to hold back her rage.

Her parents used to call her A-Xuan. It just felt weird when other people called her that. Except He Xuan on the beach for some reason… She kinda liked how it sounded out of his mouth. Nostalgia, maybe?

“Oh, okay,” Xuan Ji said. “What about Xuan-er?”

“That’s her criminal boyfriend’s nickname,” Shi Wudu supplied helpfully.

And sure enough, that pushed her over the edge.

“Don’t you have a yacht to drive?!” she yelled, finally losing her cool and speaking to her brother for the first time in days.

Shi Wudu smiled at her triumphantly. “Speaking to me again, are we?”

“Fuck you.” She flipped him off for good measure, just in case her vitriol was unclear.

“You know what, meimei’s right,” Shi Wudu said, sounding faux-serious. “We shouldn’t care about his criminal record or how much money he has. At least he has a job.”

“Oh, burn,” said Pei Ming intelligently.

Shi Qingxuan almost risked it and jumped off the yacht right then and there, but ultimately decided against it. It was a tempting dive though. Perhaps she’d get to meet that sea monster again, who knows? That would be preferable than spending time with her dear brother.

She stormed off to the other side of the boat towards the coolers and fished out a White Claw for herself, mumbling bitterly. She threw herself on the nearest lounge chair and popped the top of the can expertly without hurting her long acrylic nails. Even if he was going to get on her ass about drinking in the morning, there was no way she wanted to raw-dog this day sober and trapped on a boat with the most insufferable people known to man.

About halfway into chugging the strawberry White Claw, she noticed out of the corner of her eyes something on the little glass side table that looked exceptionally familiar. Big, chunky, tortoiseshell Armani sunglasses! She nearly choked when she noticed them! There was no way! She looked around, almost like she was in a hidden camera show, ready for someone to pop out and surprise her, but no one did.

She picked up the glasses on the table and set aside her drink. Inspecting the pair all over, she searched for any new or old scuffs or scratches or water damage. But they really did look like her original pair, not a replica or fake. The same glob of black nail polish on the left arm that covered up part of a faded gold logo from when she forgot to set her gel polish under a UV light on accident. (That day, she also ruined a white blouse. Sob sob sob!)

Thinking back to that first day, she really thought she had lost them. They were not on her head or anywhere on the boat when they docked; she had made extra sure to check the whole boat looking for them. And now here they were, like they were just waiting for her here after all this time! Like a miracle!

Her first thought was that her brother had found them and placed them for her to find, but that wasn’t his usual M.O. If he had somehow found them in the ocean, she had no doubt that he would make a whole dog-and-pony show about it. How he had labored and searched painstakingly long hours to find them for his precious sister, who should never be deprived of such luxuries! In other words, he would make sure she knew it was him that found them and hold them over her head like a bully until she thanked him a satisfactory amount.

Not to mention, they hadn’t been back on the yacht since that first day. It had been almost a week and she’d been with him all of those days, except when she was on her date with He Xuan. But she was only gone for less than two hours! That was definitely not enough time to find sunglasses at the bottom of the ocean! And it definitely couldn't be anyone else for the same reasons. The only one she hadn’t seen for a prolonged period of time was Pei Ming when he ran off for several hours after breaking up with Xuan Ji, but he didn’t know how to drive a yacht. Or any kind of boat, for that matter.

So who the fuck could it have been?! Or maybe she really did just miss them in the most obvious place ever? No! She had looked for them meticulously! She couldn’t have missed such an obvious place, right?!

Shi Qingxuan supposed that perhaps she shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Especially since they were her favorite sunglasses. Shouldn’t she feel grateful? Thank whatever heavenly deity that decided to return her precious sunglasses back into her possession?

The afternoon came and she was quite enjoying the company of her sunglasses in the summer breeze. Everyone except Shi Qingxuan and Ling Wen jumped into the water once they had anchored out in the middle of the ocean to go swimming. Shi Qingxuan remembered to leave her sunglasses over on the longue chair in case she got pushed in again. 

Xuan Ji was treading water and babbling at Shi Qingxuan, who was dangling her feet in the water. Pei Ming, Shi Wudu, and Pei Xiu were off swimming on the other side of the boat when they called over Xuan Ji to have a game of chicken, leaving Shi Qingxuan alone. Meanwhile Ling Wen had hauled up in the interior to work on her reading where it wasn’t so hot.

The ocean. Shi Qingxuan’s stomach tightened looking out into the horizon. There was no telling how far away from land they were. She could come to terms with the distance and the depth and the boat more so than she could when she was little. But the thought of willingly swimming in the ocean when there were countless dangers? It was just not something she could picture herself doing. At least at this depth. Maybe in the shallows. She would be more willing to swim in the shallows with her feet close to the bottom, but never like this. Out in the open ocean.

With a loud THUNK and the yacht jostling to the side, Shi Qingxuan’s knuckles went white as she gripped onto the boat. A large, dark shadow darted swiftly underneath around the boat and swam further away. 

“Holy shit,” she muttered, scrambling to her feet. She raced over to the side of the boat and screamed at her brother and his friends to get back on the boat. 

“There’s something in the water! I think it’s a shark! It rammed into the yacht!” she screamed when no one was listening to her. “You have to get back in!”

Xuan Ji immediately started panicking and screaming. Even though she was currently on top of Pei Xiu from their game of chicken, she tumbled into the water, splashing everywhere, and tried desperately to race back to the back deck where the ladder was.

Shi Wudu, who was happily sitting on top of Pei Ming’s shoulders just a moment ago, also panicked because of Xuan Ji panicking. If there was a shark, then it would be drawn towards the splashing and commotion! Stupid girl!

“It’s fine!” he yelled. “It’s fine, just don’t make any big movements and you’ll be fine!” 

Xuan Ji was not listening— or more accurately, she couldn’t hear anything over her own shrieking and splashing.

Pei Ming let Shi Wudu down carefully and the three of them started swimming quietly and calmly towards the ladder on the back deck. They could also see the silhouette of something dark underneath the waves. There had never been any recorded incidents of shark attacks in this area, Shi Wudu had checked!

“Ah, fuck!” cried out Shi Wudu suddenly. He clutched onto Pei Ming for support. Wisps of red started blooming in the water around them. 

Pei Ming’s eyes went wide with horror. “What?! What happened, are you okay?” 

“I don’t know, I don’t know! It felt like I scraped my leg on something? Fucking shit!” 

They double-timed it back to the deck, heaving from how hard they swam.

Shi Qingxuan went back to the edge of the boat to help pull everyone up and out. Xuan Ji was a blubbering mess and kept slipping on the ladder so she just yanked her up. Pei Xiu went next and Shi Qingxuan was there to help pull him the rest of the way. Pei Ming insisted Shi Wudu go before him and kept ducking below the water, looking for culprit or any sharp rocks.

Shi Wudu was hurt, and it looked like a bloody mess once he was safely up on the yacht. He collapsed to his knees when he tried to put weight on his leg. His face was paler than she’d ever seen before. Shi Qingxuan was already running into the cabin to get the first aid kit by the wheel when the boat gave another huge lurch. Xuan Ji screamed again and clung on to the furniture for dear life.

“What the fuck is happening?” Pei Ming asked, kneeling down next to Shi Wudu. He put pressure on the wound with his hands.

“It’s probably just a curious shark,” Shi Wudu said, wincing. “It’ll go away. Just, stay on the boat. We’ll be fine. Did you see it?”

“No, I couldn't see anything under the water,” Pei Ming said.

Shi Qingxuan came back with the first aid kit and took one look at Shi Wudu’s leg and she had to look away. WOW! That was a lot of blood! Even from a cursory glance, it didn’t look like a bite or anything, she could tell that at least. 

“I… I can’t deal with all that,” Shi Qingxuan said, starting to feel nauseous from the amount of blood dripping out of the fresh wound. 

Pei Ming took over immediately, snatching the kit out of her hands. He had been a lifeguard with Shi Wudu before, a long time ago. He knew some of the basics of first aid, but nowhere near as much as Shi Wudu. They sort of fumbled their way through applying a tourniquet with Shi Wudu’s directions and Pei Ming’s trembling hands. There wasn’t enough gauze in the kit to wrap around his leg down the whole length of the cut. Pei Ming improvised by taking off strips of his T-Shirt and wrapping the rest of the wound.

As Pei Ming started cleaning up the wound on Shi Wudu’s calf, it became increasingly clear to everyone that it wasn’t a scrape, either. It looked like three big, deep claw marks.

“What the fuck has claws like that…?” Pei Ming muttered. “That wasn’t a shark. I would’ve seen it in the water.”

“A seal?” Shi Wudu guessed. “They’re fast and they can hide.”

“There’s no way a seal just knocked that hard into this big fucking thing,” Pei Ming said, rolling his eyes.

“Wudu, you need the hospital. This looks like it’s gonna need stitches,” Ling Wen said. “Ol’ Pei can only do so much out here.”

Except Shi Wudu was the only one that knew how to drive the boat.

“Fuck…” Shi Wudu mumbled. “Help me over to the wheel.”

“No, you can’t drive—”

“Just do it!” he hissed. “We don’t have time to wait for the coast guard. I’ll be fine. Adrenaline’s a hell of a drug.”

Shi Wudu went full captain-mode. Pei Ming helped walk him over to the cabin while Shi Wudu started handing out orders to everyone. It wasn’t anything hard, just stuff he would normally do himself if he wasn’t injured.

”Qingxuan, can you raise the anchor?” he asked finally.

“I don’t know where it is—”

“It’s just at the stern.”

“Where the fuck is the stern—”

“Jesus! It’s the back of the ship! The stern is the back. Remember where you were sitting at the back? There’s two big buttons next to a winch. Just push up and wait for the anchor to come up. You don’t have to do anything, just push the button,” he explained. “Oh, and make sure the chain doesn’t get tangled on the winch, but it should probably be fine.”

She mumbled a confirmation and went to the back of the boat. Or should she say stern? Sure enough, right next to where she was sitting earlier, there was the winch. She smacked her palm into the green up button and the winch squeaked to life. The chain reeled in slowly, pulling up the anchor along with it. Shi Qingxuan grimaced. She didn’t want to stand here and babysit a chain that was definitely not going to get tangled at this speed. She stayed for a minute or too, just to be sure, but it really was just reeling in slowly. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Right as she turned on her heels to report the anchor was in progress, the winch screeched to a stop, fighting against something underneath the water. The whole boat lurched again, tugging against something at the end of the chain.

Shi Qingxuan yelped as she lost her balance. She nearly took an unplanned dip in the ocean, but she caught herself just on the edge of the ladder. Her nose was inches away from the water.

And that’s when she saw it. A shiny, undulating oil spill moving like a snake in the water, blacker than night. Even from here, she could see it was holding the anchor and trying to swim away. It was too big to be a seal and too small to be a shark. And sharks didn't have hands to hold an anchor, either.

“It’s real…” she whispered. “It’s you. I know it’s you.”

Immediately, a pair of blindingly bright golden eyes locked onto hers beneath the surface, as if it heard her call out. The creature stopped tugging on the anchor and turned towards the boat.

Instantly hypnotized by those intense eyes, her heart jumped in her chest, aching to reach out for the creature. The creature— maybe it was reading her mind— held out a long and bony claw towards her, drawing her closer to the edge.

It felt right. Like they were meant to meet again. Like she needed to take the creature’s hand and jump in after it. 

Those golden eyes were getting swallowed by it’s pupils rounding again, the way they had when it had saved her the first time. 

It was so close, she could almost feel the texture of it’s slimy, scaley skin on her fingertips again.

“Qingxuan, what are you doing?!” Shi Wudu screamed, seeing her practically dangling off the edge of the stern.

Her breath caught in her throat and she scrambled to her feet to get away from the edge, breaking the spell that had ensnared her.

The creature’s head broke the surface first and remained laser focused onto Shi Qingxuan. It’s pupils had instantly turned into slits and it hissed ferociously, showing off the many rows of its ferocious maw. It jumped out of the water in a beautiful arch, splashing water in her face, and kicked the anchor directly into the side of the boat before darting back underneath the waves.

The whole yacht felt the impact of the anchor and the winch screamed in protest for a moment before settling into a normal rhythm again and pulling it up the rest of the way.

“What the fuck was that?!” Shi Wudu yelled from the cabin. “Qingxuan?! Are you okay?!”

Shi Qingxuan wiped the saltwater out of her eyes, absolutely baffled at what she had just witnessed. Blinking, she stared out into the waves, trying to see where it had swam off to.

“It’s real. It’s real and it tried to get me to jump in after it!” she cried out, turning to look at the group staring at her on the boat. “Did you see it?! Someone please tell me you saw that! It’s real! The sea monster that saved me! It’s fucking real!” 

Chapter Text

“Did you hit your head?” Pei Ming asked, reaching out a hand to check for injuries. “Are you feeling dizzy? That looked like a nasty fall.”

She dodged out of the way of his hand, shaking her head vehemently. “No, I didn’t hit my head,” she scoffed. 

Pei Ming, however, insisted. He searched for any bumps or bruises all over her head, but he couldn’t find any blood like he was expecting. Incredibly patronizing, the way he was treating her. 

She huffed dramatically and shook him off, crying, “I’m fine! I didn’t hit my head. It was real! I saw the creature! It was the same one that saved me from drowning! It was h-here! It wanted me to… to j-jump in the water!” 

Ling Wen and Pei Ming locked eyes for a moment. Ling Wen glanced back with a gaze laced with pity, “Maybe you should sit down. I think you’re going into shock.”

Shi Qingxuan’s voice broke, “You don’t believe me? I saw it. I swear it was—”

“I believe you think you saw something,” Ling Wen offered, taking her by the shoulders and sitting her down on the lounge chair, far away from the edge. “It was a stressful situation. You fell down, maybe you saw what you wanted to see?”

She swatted away Ling Wen’s hands, frowning. “You don’t believe me.”

Pei Ming rushed to grab a spare towel and draped it over Shi Qingxuan’s arms. “Jiejie, stay with her, I’m gonna check on Wudu’s leg.”

“Mn.”

Now that the anchor was up, Shi Wudu drove like a bat out of hell back to the pier. Partially because of adrenaline, partially because he was scared shitless that his sister had nearly been fish food. 

Poor Shi Qingxuan was shaking so much, her teeth were chattering from how rattled she was from seeing the creature again. “But I saw it…” Shi Qingxuan whispered, thick tears threatening to spill from her eyes. “It tried to… It wanted me to—”

“You’re fine, you’re safe,” Ling Wen assured her. She patted Shi Qingxuan’s back awkwardly in a stiff show of comfort or affection. “Sea monsters aren’t real. You don’t have to worry about it. Whatever it was, it’s not here anymore.”

Shi Qingxuan was so frustrated and shaken that she couldn’t hold back tears anymore. Ling Wen interpreted this as tears of shock and relief. She just stroked Shi Qingxuan’s back in soothing circles, trying to comfort her with the same infuriating lines that didn’t even remotely make her feel better.

Xuan Ji eventually calmed down enough and went over to Shi Qingxuan to comfort her as well. She sat down way too close to Shi Qingxuan and threw her arms around her neck. Shi Qingxuan was effectively sandwiched between Ling Wen and Xuan Ji on the lounge chair. Xuan Ji started whining something in her ear, practically leaning all her weight on Shi Qingxuan’s shoulders.

No one else had seen it. No one else believed her. It was alienating. Like they thought she was crazy. The condescending glances and babying. The lack of personal space, the gaslighting, the betrayal. 

Shi Qingxuan snapped.

She threw herself off the lounge chair, suffocating under Xuan Ji’s arms. It was hard to breathe! Why did it feel like she was choking? And she felt so cold! Why was it cold in the summer? Not only that, but her legs wobbled with every step. The towel dropped to the floor, she couldn’t keep her shaky grip on it. 

Shi Qingxuan turned around and started scream-crying at Ling Wen and Xuan Ji to get away, but her face felt strange, like it was full of pins and needles. And her voice sounded far away. Blackness started clouding up her vision. It felt like the boat had lurched again under her feet and she hit the floor, already unconscious before her head made contact with the deck.

Diva down!

Shi Wudu almost had a heart attack watching her pass out in real time from inside the cabin. But he couldn’t abandon the wheel, let alone even walk in his current state. 

“Qingxuan?! Qingxuan!”

Her limp body was surrounded instantly by the rest of the group, save for her brother. Pei Ming was lightly tapping her face, trying to get her to wake up.

Once they had docked as quickly as they could manage together as a group with Shi Wudu’s instructions, they sent Pei Xiu down the pier to call for help. Shi Qingxuan was only just opening her eyes by the time he came back.

“I got someone to call an ambulance,” Pei Xiu said, jogging back to the boat. 

Pei Ming tried to say, “Wudu, let’s get you—”

“Q-Qingxuan,” Shi Wudu interrupted, panting and desperate. Sweat was dripping down his brow. His face was flushed with pain, but he could only think about her. “Take me to Qingxuan. How is she? What happened?”

Shi Wudu didn’t even wait for a response, he stumbled up and held onto Pei Ming for dear life. Pei Ming didn’t think he should be moving too much, but there was no use trying to talk him out of it. They hobbled over to her like they were in a three-legged race for the sports festival.

Ling Wen was pushing Shi Qingxuan down, trying not to let her move until the paramedics came. 

“Meimei!” Shi Wudu cried, collapsing next to her. “Meimei, talk to me. Tell me what happened. What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

Shi Qingxuan was still pretty out of it, eyes unfocused and searching for the source of the voices around her. It really sounded like she was underwater. Was she drowning again?

“Give her some space, Wudu,” warned Ling Wen. “Let her breathe.”

“Why did she faint? I don’t understand.”

She’d only ever fainted once before. But that was when they were told that Baba died…

“I don’t know,” Ling Wen said. “Maybe she hit her head? Or the low blood pressure from shock?”

“She’s not good with blood, either,” Pei Ming said. “I think she hit her head, too. Maybe it was, like, everything combined or something?”

And with a blaring siren, a paramedic rushed onto the boat and looked around, taking stock of the scene on the yacht: a bleeding young man draped over an unconscious girl, trying to shake her back to her senses.

“Okay, you, leave her on the ground. Is it just these two that are injured?” the paramedic asked. “Is anyone else hurt?”

Shi Wudu tried to insist she look at Shi Qingxuan first, but he was almost about to pass out from losing a lot of blood, so the first paramedic started with him. The paramedic applauded the foresight to use a tourniquet and attempt to bandage it with what little they had aboard. Another paramedic came aboard to take a look at a less disoriented Shi Qingxuan. She was fairly alert by the time someone started shining a flashlight in her eyes.

“How’d it happen?” the first paramedic asked, lifting up the bandage on Shi Wudu’s leg to assess the damage. “Oh, these are pretty deep.”

“We’re not really sure,” Pei Ming admitted. “We were swimming together and something started attacking our boat. It got Wudu pretty good. I think it was like a seal or some kinda animal, but we didn’t get a good look at it.”

“I saw it. It wasn’t a normal animal,” Shi Qingxuan said, swatting away the flashlight the paramedic was flashing in her eyes. “It was the sea monster of Fu Gu.”

Pei Ming and Ling Wen slapped their palms to their forehead at the same time. The paramedics both looked at each other and burst out laughing.

“I’ve never heard that one before!” the second said. “Did you say she hit her head?”

“Yeah, she hit the deck pretty bad when the boat shook,” Pei Ming said, grimacing. “Almost fell in.”

“I didn’t almost fall in! It tried to lure me into the water! I’m telling the truth! It was the sea monster!” she insisted. “I know, it sounds crazy, but I’m being completely serious. I’ve seen it before, when I was here when we were kids. It wasn’t a seal and it wasn’t a shark or something. It was a sea monster. It had these big yellow eyes and—”

She moved to sit up again, but the paramedic pushed her back down and started inspecting her head for injuries.

“Don’t move,” she instructed. “If you hit your head, you could have a concussion.” The paramedic turned to Ling Wen. “About how long did she lose consciousness?”

“Maybe a minute or two,” Ling Wen supplied. “I think she was in shock or something. Shaking and all that and then down she went. But maybe it was from when she fell the first time? I didn’t really see it.”

The paramedic nodded and started taking some vitals on Shi Qingxuan. “Okay, are you feeling any pain or dizziness?”

“I mean, a little in my head but I’m fine—”

“Do you remember your name and birthday?”

“Yes, Shi Qingxuan. January 24th. I’m an Aquarius. ENFP. My blood type is B.”

She took down some notes on a clipboard, nodding vaguely. “Oh, wow. Okay. Do you know where you are?”

“I’m on vacation in this hellhole with my brother and his terrible friends. Do you want their names, too?”

The paramedic laughed and said, “No, that’s alright. How about any neck pain?”

“No, and I don’t have a concussion. This is stupid. I didn’t hit my head. Well, I mean, maybe when I fainted, but I’m fine—”

“Fainting can be a serious thing, especially if you hit your head before,” the paramedic scowled at her. 

“I’m telling you I didn’t hit my head before I fainted. It was after—”

She wasn’t listening. The paramedic just looked up at Ling Wen and said, “She seems pretty aware and alert… But I’m still concerned about a potential brain injury causing the fainting. But we won’t rule out anything just yet. I think it’s best to take her to the hospital to check for brain trauma since she’s exhibiting some confusion, memory loss, and hallucinations. Are you her family?”

“What?! I don’t have memory loss! And I didn’t hallucinate—”

“I’m her brother,” Shi Wudu interrupted loudly.

Shi Wudu was already being strapped into a stretcher. He was going to need several stitches from the looks of it. Because the identity of the animal was unknown, they were also worried about potential infection, so he was definitely going to the hospital to get it properly cleaned out and bandaged. 

Shi Qingxuan, however, did not expect to be taken along with him.

The paramedics called for another ambulance to transport Shi Qingxuan. They put a brace around her neck and the group stood around her with a worried expression.

She tried to deny treatment, but because the paramedics believed she was confused and disoriented, she was deemed unfit to refuse. 

“This is so humiliating! You guys are overreacting! And you’re not even listening to me!” she cried while being strapped into the stretcher. “I’m fine! You’re making this into a big deal for nothing!”

“Brain injuries are no laughing matter,” Ling Wen said, brows furrowed.

Because of the situation, only one guest was allowed in each ambulance. Usually, it was only family allowed, but the only family that the Shi siblings had were each other and they were going in separate ambulances. Pei Ming offered to go with Shi Wudu and Ling Wen volunteered to go with Shi Qingxuan to help her answer questions since she was “in a state.” It was also an ingenious ploy to get away from Xuan Ji! 

Pei Xiu and Xuan Ji were told to go back to the bungalow and wait. It was no use following them to the hospital. They’d have to wait either way. 

Almost every single question about Shi Qingxuan was asked directly to Ling Wen and not Shi Qingxuan, which only added to her surmounting fury and frustration. It was a good thing that Ling Wen had near encyclopedic knowledge of her life because of her friendship with Shi Wudu, so she actually did a fairly good job answering questions. Finally, Shi Qingxuan just gave up. She just went quiet, silently seething with rage.

Several hours and one very underwhelming CT scan later, Shi Qingxuan was cleared to go. They determined the first fall where she hit her head (that didn’t happen!) didn’t cause any brain trauma, and neither did the fall where she went unconscious. The disorientation and confusion was chalked up to an acute stress reaction. The doctors assumed that her body went into a state of vasovagal syncope due to the stressful situation, her blood pressure lowered, and she fainted. Not brain trauma related at all. Which she tried to tell them!! Several times!! The whole thing was such a waste of time!!

Shi Wudu, however, had to get seven stitches. Pei Ming offered out his hand for Shi Wudu to squeeze while the doctor stitched him up. The whole time, Shi Wudu was asking if there was any news on his sister’s condition, he barely even reacted to the stitches. (He didn’t even have enough brain space to realize that he was holding Pei Ming’s hand, he was so worried.) After it was finished, the doctor bandaged him up again, gave him an extra roll of sterile wrap, and a prescription for antibiotics. 

He was only able to fully relax when his sister walked in with Ling Wen at her side.

Heaving a sigh of relief, “Qingxuan, are you okay?”

She just rolled her eyes and scoffed. “I’m fine.”

“How’re you doing, Wudu?” Ling Wen asked pointedly, elbowing Shi Qingxuan in the side. 

“They’re letting me go soon, too,” he answered. 

“He was a champ for the stitches,” said Pei Ming, slapping Shi Wudu on the back. “Barely even flinched!”

“You sure you’re okay, Qingxuan?” Shi Wudu asked. “Like mentally?” He wasn’t trying to be rude, he was wondering if she was having a meltdown. Shi Qingxuan never handled stressful situations very well.

“No, I’m fucking pissed,” she admitted, crossing her arms. “Why is no one listening to me? The doctors just proved I don’t have a concussion and still no one believes me about—”

“Look, you have to get over this,” Shi Wudu groaned, not wanting to entertain the idea. He was sort of relieved that she wasn’t spiraling. Only the same old nonsense from before. “Sea monsters aren’t real. They weren’t real back when you almost drowned, they aren’t real today. End of story.”

“Then how did I survive that first time?! That thing carried me back up to the surface! I would have died if it didn’t give me air—”

“Baba saved you. I saw it. Mama saw it. You’re being ridiculous, pushing this sea monster narrative—”

“That’s not what happened! I was sinking. I was drowning, ge! Baba said he couldn’t find me! And then, poof, suddenly there I was on the surface! How did I make it back up to the surface for Baba to find? I couldn’t swim! I’m telling you—” 

“Qingxuan! Just drop it! You’re acting like a child! If I knew your PTSD was going to get triggered coming back here and you’d start spouting the same nonsense as when you were a kid, I never would’ve let you come—”

“My what?!” she choked, baffled by his audacity. “I don’t have fucking PTSD! That’s not even how PTSD works! Why are you inventing all these problems? First, I have a drinking problem, and now I have PTSD! What’s next? Am I gonna have a stroke?”

Shi Wudu scoffed, “Well, there’s something fundamentally wrong with your brain if you really, truly believe in sea monsters.”

Shi Qingxuan was seething. “I hope it takes more than just a chunk out of your leg next time—”

“You two need to calm down,” Ling Wen snapped, tired of their bickering. She would’ve smacked both of them upside the head or held them by the ears if they weren’t currently in a hospital. “Look, it’s been a weird day. Let’s just go back to the rental and relax. Wudu needs to get off that leg. Maybe we can order a pizza or something. But fighting is not going to make today any better.”

Ling Wen continued, turning directly to each of them in turn, “Wudu, stop antagonizing your sister. Let’s just agree to disagree about the whole thing. And Qingxuan, you shouldn’t be wishing ill on your brother. You guys are family. You shouldn’t be at each other’s throats over something stupid. Just drop it. Both of you.”

“Jiejie’s right,” agreed Pei Ming. But he also didn’t want to add anymore unnecessary emotional crap, so he pivoted. “I’ll request us a taxi and text Xiu-er an update.”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

“A-Lian!! You have to come save me from this dreadful place!” Shi Qingxuan whined into her phone. 

It was later that night, when everyone had gone to get ready for bed. Once again, the sleeping arrangements changed. Shi Wudu offered to sleep on the couch since he shouldn’t be doing much walking on his leg. Shi Qingxuan was more than happy to be sleeping in a real bed for the first time in a couple of days. 

She’d been talking to Xie Lian for a couple of minutes alone in the room, detailing the many miseries of the trip. 

“Please, I’m begging! Ge is only getting worse and there’s so much drama in the house and it’s just miserable!”

Xie Lian didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry, hearing her complaints. He knew Shi Qingxuan had a tendency to be more than a little melodramatic, so he tried to take everything she said with a grain of salt. 

“Is it really all so bad?” Xie Lian asked. “Surely, there’s something positive about your trip!”

She tilted her head to the side, thinking of He Xuan. A smile crept up the corners of her mouth. “Well, I suppose there IS one thing that’s worth staying…”

“Hmm?”

“So there’s this guy…”

Xie Lian let out a surprised gasp. “You met someone?!” She hadn’t mentioned seeing anyone romantic since things ended with her terrible ex in university!

“I reconnected with him,” she clarified. “I met him a long time ago, the first time we came here. He was that weirdo-kid I told you about that I made a sandcastle with. Who woulda predicted I would meet him again?”

Xie Lian was kicking his feet in his bed with glee. “I need to know everything.”

“Ugh! I wish you could just, like, teleport to me or something! Or what if I summon you as a spirit in my own body just so I can share everything in perfect detail!

“Anyways! So yeah! His name is He Xuan, and he’s a local here. Oh my god, A-Lian, you should’ve seen him eat all these meat buns. Twelve! In under an hour! It was ridiculous! But yeah, uh, he’s really cute. Tall. Super pale. Wears eyeliner. Doesn’t talk much. I think he’s goth or something, ‘cuz he only wears black and this one god-awful sweatshirt. Seriously, I don’t think he’s ever taken it off. Oh, he’s a fisherman, by the way! And you know how much I love seafood! Hmm… I don’t know why, but I feel like your boyfriend would get along with him.”

Xie Lian took a moment to process all this information. “I don’t know if you’ve ever gone for a goth or alt-fashion person before, so this is new,” he said, encouraged. “I’m happy for you! Do you think it’ll amount to anything?”

“Well, if nothing, just a fun summer fling,” she said, twirling the edges of her hair with a big smile on her face. “I mean, we’ve only had, like, one date… But can I be totally honest, A-Lian?”

“You know you can tell me anything.”

“I can totally see it turning into something more,” she whispered into the phone. A squeak and she hid her face in the pillows, embarrassed. “Ahh!!! We have another date in two days. He’s gonna take me to the lighthouse here and then, wind-permitting, we’re gonna fly kites on the beach.”

“That’s so cute! I’m so happy for you, Qingxuan!” Xie Lian beamed. 

“But, seriously, A-Lian. Like. He’s… He’s just! Ah! I don’t even know how to describe it. I’ve never met anyone like him. You know how you always talk about how you met Hua Cheng and you just kinda knew something was different about him? That’s how it feels. Like a magnet or something. It really does. And I know, I know , I’m getting my hopes up and it’s probably not gonna be anything serious and we’ve only known each other for a short time, but, A-Lian, it really feels right. And we don’t even know each other that well! But it feels… Yeah. Ah! Sorry, I’m gushing again. Talking in circles. You have to tell me to shut up if I’m talking too much, hahaha!”

Xie Lian’s stomach flushed with pride as she spoke. He was over the moon that she was feeling so happy. It was such a stark difference from the way she normally spoke about her love life.

“No, no,” Xie Lian insisted, smiling with his voice. “Please, go on. I wanna hear all about it!”

“It’s just like, not even that he’s super cute and he’s a gentleman, it’s like, he actually listens to me, you know?” she said. “And he can relate to me.”

She told Xie Lian the story of when they met. The popsicle he shared because she was crying. How he listened to her rant and then they built the sandcastle together. About his sister and how she died. How she almost royally screwed up their first date, but he still was interested. The impressive meat bun eating. Him holding the umbrella for her!

Xie Lian listened intently and was vaguely impressed by this guy. He really did seem like a good guy, from what she was telling him. 

“But, you know how my brother is…” Shi Qingxuan said bitterly. “He’s somehow got it in his head that He Xuan is dangerous. He even did some sort of background check on him, I don’t even know how. And he got all weird and defensive about him having a tiny criminal record. But I swear it was nothing major!”

Xie Lian frowned for the first time since they started the call. “You know, arrest records have nothing to do with a person’s character. My San Lang has some history and he’s the most sincere person I’ve ever met.”

“Exactly!! You try telling my brother that!” she cried. “ Ge just can’t understand that there’s so much more to a person than their past.”

“Have… Have you told him yet?” Xie Lian asked delicately. “About… you know…?”

Shi Qingxuan’s lips folded into her mouth instantly. “No.” A sinking feeling settled into her stomach. Fuck. I have to tell him about that.

Xie Lian didn’t really want to press her to do it since last time she told someone about her identity, a horrible domino effect happened that changed the entire course of her life. It would be a daunting task for anyone normally. Especially Shi Qingxuan.

“He’ll understand,” she said, trying to sound confident, but Xie Lian could hear her voice breaking. “He’ll definitely understand.”

“Yeah. If he’s as great as you say, he’ll understand,” Xie Lian encouraged, trying to keep her spirits up. “Anyone worth your attention will understand.”

“Mhm,” she agreed weakly. “If he’s an asshole about it, it just wasn’t meant to be.” 

She secretly hoped it was meant to be, though— however silly that sounded.

“Exactly.”

It was silent on both ends of the phone for a moment.

Shi Qingxuan took a deep breath. “Can I tell you something else really weird that I need you to actually hear me out for? No one is listening to me here and I just feel like I’m going crazy.”

“Of course.”

“I… I saw that thing again,” she said. “The creature that saved me from drowning? I saw it again today. It was the thing that attacked the boat.”

Xie Lian was not expecting her to say that. His face contorted into a mixture of confusion, pity, and disbelief, but he didn’t say anything.

“It scratched Wudu. And it was trying to lure me into the ocean. It made me think I wanted to go with it, but I snapped out of it at the last second…” she said in a low voice, so the other people in the house couldn’t overhear. “No one believes me. Ge literally has seven stitches from it and no one believes me. They think it was a seal or something. But I saw it, I really did. It was that thing. 

“Ugh, I don’t really know what to call it. I hate the phrase ‘sea monster,’ it just sounds so unserious. But whatever it was, I feel like… it wants… me? I don’t know how or why or anything… Ah! I know I sound insane right now! But I swear to you, I’m telling the truth. Please, A-Lian. You believe me, right?”

Xie Lian didn’t know if he actually believed her or not, but he knew what she needed to hear. “If you say you saw it, then you did,” he answered evenly. “I know you, Qingxuan. You’re not crazy. You don’t make stuff like this up.”

She could’ve cried from relief. “Thanks, A-Lian.”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

And two days later, she was getting ready for a date. This time, Shi Qingxuan didn’t put in as much effort into her appearance for the second date. She wanted to look nice, don’t misunderstand, but it was going to be outside and climbing up a bunch of stairs to the top of the lighthouse. She didn’t want to sweat through nice clothes or have makeup smear down her face in the summer heat. 

So, she did a lighter no-makeup look again, but this time with a tinted chapstick. Perfect for potentially kissing a hot, goth boy. It also accentuated her eyes. 

And because of the physical activities and the wind, she thought it best to steer clear of skirts or dresses. Instead, she opted for a pair of white shorts to show off her gorgeous long legs and a pale blue top. She also threw her signature white cover up on for added layers and drama. 

She deftly twisted her hair into a long french braid at the back of her head to keep it out of her face. Sunglasses on top of her head, sandals tied, and purse thrown over her shoulder, she was ready!

Shi Wudu was moping on the couch, in pain, and furious she was going on another date. He reminded her to check in every thirty minutes again, but she just rolled her eyes and didn’t even acknowledge him. They hadn’t spoken much the past two days after the hospital incident. Shi Wudu was about to make a fuss, but there was a knock on the door, and she rushed out to greet her date.

Sure enough, there was He Xuan with his pale, stoic face standing outside. His inky black hair was long and loose today, instead of the high ponytail she’d seen him in previously. And he was wearing the exact. Same. Sweatshirt. Except this time, he had some sneakers and black cargo shorts instead of long pants. His legs were somehow even paler than she could’ve imagined. And covered in tattoos.

“Hey,” he said. “You ready?”

“Hi!” she chirped back, a bright smile beaming up at him. “Yes, I’m all set!”

He nodded and motioned over to his truck parked on the street. “The lighthouse’s a little far for a walk,” he explained. “I thought I’d drive us.”

“Oh, yeah! That’s fine with me!”

Behind him, parked on the curb, was an old, white pickup truck. It was the same one she had seen him loading up crabs in the other day. And it absolutely REEKED of fish. Her eyes were almost watering from how strong it was. He Xuan had to have been nose-blind to the smell at this point because he made absolutely no mention of it at all. But, he did open the passenger door for her, so that was a plus.

Lying in wait on the passenger seat was a folded up green umbrella. 

“Ah, you remembered!” she said, picking it up and putting it in her purse before she sat down on the weathered leather seats. “Thanks for returning it.”

“Thanks for letting me borrow it.”

It was about a ten minute drive to the lighthouse and she made some casual small talk over the music on the radio. It was some gloomy, eerie English music she couldn’t really understand, but it felt oddly apt.

“So you have tattoos! How many do you have?”

“I don’t know. Too many to count.”

“That many?” He nodded. “Oh, which one is your favorite?”

He thought for a moment and said, “On my chest, I have a dragonfly. My sister designed it.”

“Oh, that’s nice. I don’t have any, but sometimes I like to do those long-lasting temporary tattoos just to get a feel for if I’d actually like something permanently on my body. But I think I’m too indecisive to settle on, like, one design forever, you know? Plus, doesn’t it hurt a lot? Well, I guess you’d be used to it if you have so many…”

“Some places hurt more than others,” he explained. “Like the ribs. I have a big piece there and that was a bitch to sit through for six hours.”

“Oh shit? Six hours of pain?” She couldn’t fathom torturing her body like that. “My brother has one on his ribs, too. I went with him for moral support, but I’m so bad with needles and blood… I had to look away, like, the whole time, ahaha! And he was a complete baby about it!” 

She was about to ask to see some of his other tattoos, but decided maybe that would be a little forward. And considering he was practically a Victorian woman showing his ankles for the first time, she thought perhaps he might be shy about showing his skin.

“Okay, I’m dying to know,” she started again with a new subject, “And I say this as a former fashion design major: Do you own anything other than that sweatshirt? You’ve worn it, like, every time we’ve met. And I’m not judging! I’m just curious.”

Okay, maybe she was judging just a little bit.

His face scrunched up in confusion, and said, “This isn’t the same one.”

She didn’t believe him. “What? There’s no way. Just a plain black hooded sweatshirt, right? You’ve worn it every time I’ve seen you!”

“It’s not the same one.”

“Do you just have, like, multiples of the same sweatshirt or something?”

He didn’t respond for a moment. “…It’s comfortable.”

Shi Qingxuan didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. “You’re kidding. You have got to be kidding me right now!”

“What? I don’t really care about style or anything like that. If I find something comfortable, I buy it. And this was really comfortable, so I went back for more. Is that so weird?”

She put her face in her hands. “No, no. It’s fine. If that’s what makes you comfortable.”

“…Do you want me to wear something else?”

“No, no! I promise it’s fine. I love the whole black, alt, gothic vibe! Honestly, I’m just glad that you have multiple and that they’re all getting washed, ahaha! You should wear clothes for you, not for anyone else,” she said, trying to save the interaction. “And if anyone tells you to wear something else to make them happy, you should not listen to them. That gets toxic really fast, let me tell you.”

“Alright.”

She couldn’t let it go.

“But doesn’t it get hot?” she asked after a moment of silence. “I mean, I asked you that on the first day we met. Like, especially in the summer? Doesn’t it get super hot?”

He glanced briefly at her a moment and then back to the road in front of them. She couldn’t decipher his expression, but she feared she’d offended him or something.

“Sorry, I’m not trying to be mean or anything, I swear. You said it’s comfortable, but I thought maybe being hot in the summer would be super uncomfortable. I’m just trying to figure you out. You’re very mysterious, haha!”

“Mysterious…?” That wasn’t the word he would use.

“Tall, handsome, brooding, loner fisherman, listening to depressing English music, smudgy eyeliner, withholding and doesn’t talk a lot, eats like an insatiable vacuum, only wears all black? Yeah, I’d say it’s pretty much an objective fact of the universe that you’re mysterious. And that’s putting it lightly.” 

He Xuan smirked and pulled over in the street, decidedly not answering her questions. “We’re here.”

“See! You barely ever talk about yourself! Mystery Man!” she cried.

“And you only talk,” he countered. “Very unmysterious. Keep people guessing.”

She shook her head, holding back a laugh. “You got me there.”

However, comparatively, she already knew more about him than most other people he’d known for longer. And she was probably about to learn a whole lot more considering where they were headed.

He opened up the door and walked around to her side to open up the door for her. Shi Qingxuan smiled warmly at him and jumped out of the fishy car, breathing in some salty sea air. She took hold of his upper arm as they walked down the sidewalk. This time, he didn’t flinch away. 

The charming lighthouse was just up the road in the distance.

“Have you ever been here before?” Shi Qingxuan asked. “I know you said you don’t do much of the touristy stuff…”

“Yeah, a lot when I was a kid,” he replied. “My aunt would take us. But I’ve only climbed up all the way once. When I was… I don’t know… twelve?”

She tried to picture little Xuan-er from her memories trying to run up the stairs and losing steam really quickly. His determined little gaze must’ve been so precious! She smiled impossibly wide just thinking about it.

“Oh, so it’s gonna be pretty new to you, too!” she said. “Is it really all stairs? No elevator or anything?” He nodded. “Are they steep?”

“Yeah, it's a really small, metal spiral staircase going all the way up. Pretty steep, I guess, but there’s a handrail. It gets progressively tighter as it gets to the top,” he explained. “There’s a look-out at the top with some binoculars. Oh, there’s also a separate house you can go into where the old lighthouse keepers used to live. They have the real logbooks and all that.”

“Sweet! That’s so cool! I’m excited.”

“Don’t be. It’s a lot of stairs. Like two-hundred-something…”

She laughed, but secretly thought that if the strong, handsome fisherman was complaining about the stairs, then she had absolutely no chance of surviving. 

The lighthouse was a lonely figure on the horizon, located on a drafty, rocky shore overlooking the northeast side of Fu Gu, far away from the recreational sandy beaches. The red and white stripes were especially cute to Shi Qingxuan, as well as the tiny windows dotted in gradual, ascending intervals around the circumference. There was a metal balcony up near the top and she could see a couple of people waving down at them. Of course, she waved back! And lastly, at the very top, was the gigantic lens that was not currently active. It was exactly what one would think of when you mentioned the word “lighthouse.”

And next to the lighthouse was a small wooden house painted in a weathered wash of white. There was a little gravely stone path that led to the house from the lighthouse. This was presumably where the lighthouse keepers and their families stayed.

Shi Qingxuan took out her phone and snapped a couple of pictures on the sidewalk to get a good landscape of it from far away. 

“Okay, Mysterious Fisherman,” Shi Qingxuan said seriously, putting her phone away and on silent. “Can I pay for the tickets today since you got lunch last time? To make it even?”

He Xuan laughed, a scoffing sort of half-chuckle noise, and said with a devious smirk, “I called ahead.”

“You what?!” she cried, feigning offense. “Oh, you’re evil. Wow. Okay. I’ve been bested. Outsmarted, even! Then I call dibs on paying for lunch or whatever else we do today.”

“We’ll see.”

He Xuan waltzed them up to the ticket booth service counter, slid his ID under the glass and waited. The ticket agent typed his name into the computer. Her eyes went wide and she stared at He Xuan with fear in her eyes.

“He Xuan. I called earlier,” he explained. “The guy I spoke to earlier said he’d set aside some tickets for me to pick up at the window.”

“One second, sir. Let me just get my manager to confirm…” she mumbled, turning around in her chair quicker than lighting and speeding off into the back.

He Xuan rolled his eyes and muttered under his breath.

“What?” Shi Qingxuan asked, looking at him quizzically. “Is there a problem?”

“No. The manager will figure it out,” he said through gritted teeth.

“Figure out what?”

He didn’t reply, just rolled his eyes impatiently. The same girl reappeared with an older woman trailing behind her with eyes like a hawk, graying hair, and harsh eyebrows. She took one look at He Xuan and her expression betrayed the surprise she felt and then softened slightly. 

Her name tag read: He Haitang. 

His family? Or a coincidence? Shi Qingxuan thought.

“Ayi,” He Xuan addressed the woman. 

Ah! His mother’s sister? He’s never mentioned his mother before… She wondered if perhaps there was some family drama that she was not privy to. He only ever really mentioned his sister, but never his parents. And just today was the first time he ever mentioned this aunt.

“Waisheng,” she answered with a cold smile. “My, how you’ve grown. Are you eating well? You look so skinny.”

Shi Qingxuan nearly burst out laughing at that comment, remembering how he practically inhaled twelve meat buns, but she kept her mouth shut and stood quietly behind He Xuan.

“I’m well,” he said stiffly. “Is there a problem? I called ahead. They said they’d set aside two tickets for me.”

“No, not at all,” she said, smiling without her eyes. “You know you’re always welcome here. Why didn’t you ask to talk to me directly?”

“Figured you’d be busy.”

“Never busy enough for family,” she assured him.

Yeah, right, he thought, not believing a word that was coming out of her mouth. She didn’t even go to her own niece’s funeral. So much for family.

His aunt turned to the ticket agent and started barking at her for not printing out the tickets in advance. 

“Don’t worry. It’ll be just a moment. One ticket, you said?” Her eyes flitted for the briefest moment over to Shi Qingxuan.

“Two,” he clarified. 

He Haitang finally acknowledged Shi Qingxuan directly, harsh and critical stare, piercing and unwelcoming. Though Shi Qingxuan couldn’t see much of a familial resemblance between the two, their facial expressions were eerily similar. 

His aunt offered Shi Qingxuan a fake smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Waisheng, who’s your friend? I haven’t seen her around town.”

Shi Qingxuan put on the most charming smile she could muster and bowed her head respectfully. “Hello, it’s nice to meet you. I’m—”

“A friend,” He Xuan interrupted, giving her a side glance. Shi Qingxuan shut her mouth.

The older woman narrowed her eyes in suspicious crescents, but gave Shi Qingxuan a slight nod back to at least seem polite. “Pleasure.”

“Yeah, so those tickets?” he asked, frowning impatiently.

“Here you are, He -gongzi,” the ticket again said, sweating from the growing tension in the room. She passed back his ID and two tickets for the lighthouse. “I apologize for the inconvenience, He -gongzi. Please, enjoy your visit to the Watcher of the Deep Lighthouse.”

Gongzi?? Shi Qingxuan thought, looking up again at He Xuan, thoroughly confused.

He Xuan snatched up the tickets and his ID immediately, and started dragging Shi Qingxuan away from the counter.

“If you need anything else, let me know,” called back his aunt.

He only grunted in response. 

Now several meters away and out of earshot of the ticket booth, He Xuan was aggressively putting his ID away with a huge scowl on his face, mumbling incoherently again.

This was only adding the mystery surrounding her date.

“He -gongzi,” she repeated, finding it funny on her tongue. “What was that all about?” 

He Xuan let out a defeated sigh. The jig was up. She’d find out sooner or later, anyway. There was a little stand with some pamphlets about the lighthouse not too far away. He shoved one in Shi Qingxuan’s hands, trying not to make eye contact with her. 

Shi Qingxuan read:

Watcher of the Deep Lighthouse (深渊守望)

Constructed in 1840 along the jagged cliffside of Fu Gu, the Watcher of the Deep Lighthouse played an integral role in guiding merchant and naval vessels through the fog and safely along the rocky cliffs. Operated continuously for 144 years by the He family, the lighthouse still stands as a symbol of dedication, precision, and maritime safety throughout the late Qing Dynasty, the Republic era, and into modern China.

Though decommissioned in 1984, the lighthouse remains a monument to the town’s rich history. Now maintained by the Fu Gu Historical Society, founded by He Haitang, the great-great-great-granddaughter of the original keeper, the site is open to anyone willing to climb the long and grueling staircase to the top of the lighthouse. For our less-adventurous visitors, the restored keeper’s quarters, original logbooks and journals, and maritime exhibits chronicling over a century of oceanic trade and navigation are open for exploration.

A beacon once lit for safety, the Watcher of the Deep Lighthouse now shines as a testament to heritage, perseverance, and the family who quietly served the town from generation to generation.

“It’s been in my family for a long time,” he mumbled, a little embarrassed when Shi Qingxuan finished reading. “I never knew him, but I was named after my grandfather who was the last lighthouse keeper. They stopped needing it around the 1980s, and the historical society kinda took over the lighthouse sometime after that. My mother and aunt sorta co-founded the society, but my aunt runs the place now.”

“What?! That’s so cool!” she exclaimed. “Oh my gosh, I had no idea!”

“So you don’t have to worry about paying for the tickets.”

“You can just go here for free?!” He nodded. “So that was really your aunt?”

“Yeah… We’re not close.” He looked disgusted to even bring her up.

“I see.”

She was trying to decide if it would be inappropriate to pry for more information, but figured it was probably a bad idea considering it was the woman’s place of work. She didn't want to ruffle any feathers in case someone overheard something. But she couldn’t deny her surmounting curiosity. She wanted to know all of the family drama! Spill the tea!

“Ready to climb?” he asked, silently grateful she didn’t keep asking about it. He hated talking about his family, save for his sister. But that was a painful subject nowadays.

Shi Qingxuan took one look at the tall, erect structure before them and gulped audibly. This was going to be a lot of stairs. 

“How many stairs is it?” she asked.

He Xuan opened up the pamphlet again, fumbling to the second page, and read out, “257.”

“Shit.”

To get her thighs warmed up to the idea, she started doing some stretches and a couple of lunges in place. He Xuan watched her with a curious gaze, but didn’t say anything.

“Okay! I’m ready!” she said, jumping back to her feet. He just stared at her. “What? I don’t want to pull anything and be sore tomorrow!”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Yeah, but you were thinking it!”

“Not true.”

She laughed breezily and started marching up towards the entrance of the lighthouse. There was a little roped off queue at the front, but it was practically empty save for a family of four ahead of them. 

“Looks like we came at a good time,” Shi Qingxuan observed. 

It was a weekday at mid-morning, but she expected a little more people here, especially because of the good weather.

He Xuan shrugged.

Because of the limited space on the staircase, only about ten people could be allowed in at a time, which was actually kind of perfect, Shi Qingxuan thought. They only had to wait a couple of minutes before several other tourists exited and the family of four in front of them were let in. And another five minutes, they were allowed to ascend the steps.

Shi Qingxuan had her phone and started taking a bunch of artsy pictures of the inside, trying to get a good angle of the center of the spiral staircase as it swirled up and up and up, almost like a long strand of DNA. It was only when she looked with her eyes after putting away her phone that realized just how high 257 steps was.

“Oh, we’re so screwed,” she whispered, looking up. She almost felt dizzy just looking up the center.

“There’s a break every fifty-or-so stairs,” he said. “It’ll be fine. Probably.”

The staircase had metal railings on either side. It was only wide enough for a person and a half, so they had to climb up one after the other. He Xuan offered to go first, but Shi Qingxuan didn’t think that was a good idea.

“Maybe I should set the pace,” she said. “Or I have a feeling you’ll leave me in the dust.”

He neither confirmed nor denied, just motioning for her to go ahead of him. 

The first twenty-or-so stairs weren’t bad at all. Out-of-sync footsteps echoed up and down the barrel of the lighthouse. Shi Qingxuan held loosely onto the railings. Sure, it was a little steep and cramped, but it really wasn’t that bad! And He Xuan hadn’t so much as made a peep. 

It was around stair number thirty that she could start to feel the burn in her thighs and her breath catching. 

“How ya doing?” she called back, feeling a little winded.

“Mn,” he grumbled.

“I’m starting to feel it.”

“Mhm.”

And it was about stair forty that she really felt it in her thighs. What a difference ten stairs can make! 

“Oh, I’m failing fast!” she cried out, already in agony. “How can there be so much more to go?!”

“Do you want to go back down…?” 

“No! I’m not a quitter! Stairs will not best the boundlessly talented, funny and carefree, kind and righteous, Shi Qingxuan!”

He Xuan gave a loud snort at that, but said nothing more. 

He Xuan was having a hard time concentrating on the steps. Originally, he was happy to let her keep the pace, but he didn’t realize the harrowing consequences of his chivalry— his face directly behind her ass for about 90% of the climb. He was trying and failing to look anywhere else. Shi Qingxuan had not seemed to notice this issue yet. While he wouldn’t necessarily classify this situation as particularly unpleasant, it was incredibly awkward.

They finally made it to the first rest area, which was a hollowed-out, brick alcove in the recess of the tiny window. There was an old, bronze plaque on the wall detailing some history of the first lighthouse keeper. Above it, a black and white photo of a man in white with a strip of white silk covering his eyes. They took some time to lean on the walls and read over the plaque.

He Xingchen (贺星尘, 1813–1884)

Once a promising junior officer in the imperial customs patrol, He Xingchen’s life took an unexpected turn when he was accused of killing a fellow officer, rumored to be his closest friend. He was ultimately exiled in 1840 to the remote coast of Fu Gu to the newly constructed Watcher of the Deep Lighthouse as punishment. Left alone to ruminate over his actions, He Xingchen was consumed by either guilt or despair. He gouged out his own eyes, blinding himself shortly after arriving at his post. However, He Xingchen defied all expectations, and learned to navigate the tower by touch and sound. Later, his youngest son apprenticed under him for many years and began record keeping for the lighthouse. For more than thirty years, the blind keeper maintained the flame, becoming something of a legend among sailors, traders, and the local townspeople. They spoke of a kindly man who had lost his sight but never his vigilance, carrying the weight of a story he refused to speak about.

“Holy shit, that’s incredible,” Shi Qingxuan remarked. “Can you imagine going up all these stairs everyday blind?! That guy’s insane!”

He Xuan refused to look her in the eyes and only gave a little gruff in response.

They rested for a couple more seconds, catching their breath. Shi Qingxuan started to go first, but He Xuan caught her by the hand.

“Let me go first.” It wasn’t a suggestion. He didn’t want to be forced to stare at her ass for the remainder of the climb. 

Shi Qingxuan looked confused, but before she could protest, he had pushed ahead of her and started climbing up again. She followed after him, trying to keep up with his pace, but it wasn’t as hard as she originally thought. 

However, she tried to hang a couple of steps back because of a different problem. His ass was directly in her face. And no matter how many steps she lagged behind without it seeming strange, it was all she could see ahead of her. And she wasn’t complaining about it! But it was kind of awkward… She focused instead on the tattoos on his legs. But every so often, she found herself staring at it…

It consumed her thoughts so much, she barely even noticed the growing burn in her thighs.

She tried to snap herself out of it, slapping her cheeks quietly. Indecent! Shameless! You’re ogling! Objectifying! Do not give into base desires! You’re better than this!

Finally, they reached the second little alcove with another bronze plaque. The photograph above was of a young, squirrelly-looking man with thick spectacles.

He Qinghua (贺清华, 1852–1912)

He Xingchen’s youngest son brought literacy and the start of modern practices to the lighthouse while still apprenticing under his father. He Qinghua began keeping incredibly detailed logs in both Chinese and occasionally English as foreign ships became more common along China’s coast. Following his father’s retirement, He Qinghua, then just twenty-two years old, assumed the role of keeper in 1874. He was rumored to be somewhat of a hermit, writing constantly. Anything from weather logs, tidal charts, ship sightings, maintenance notes, even personal reflections. He filled notebooks faster than the sea changed tides. One stormy night in 1889, He Qinghua recorded seeing “a vast shadow, longer than any vessel, moving beneath the surface with purpose.” Whether a trick of moonlight or a glimpse of something older than the lighthouse itself, he never spoke of it again in his writings, but he never missed a night gazing out into the sea afterward. His daughter, He Mingyan, later wrote in her journals that he “lived like the sea was watching, like he couldn’t afford to blink.”

Shi Qingxuan’s blood ran cold. Nearly fainted again, after reading the plaque. This keeper had seen the monster! And he had written about it! From what it sounded like, he’d seen something similar to the meat bun shop owner, something incredibly big and black in the water. So why was the creature she kept seeing closer to human-sized? It didn’t add up in her head.

“What do you think?” she tried to pose casually. “Do you think there’s a sea monster in the water around here? I mean, with fishing and all, have you ever seen anything weird?”

He finally made eye contact with her. It was like his eyes sparkled when he did, but his face remained the same as always, flat and unaffected.

“I’ve seen some weird things at night, sure, but nothing like a monster,” he said, crossing his arms. 

Shi Qingxuan looked dejected and was about to drop it, but he continued.

“But that doesn’t mean there isn’t one out there.”

Her heart fluttered. “You really think so?”

He nodded and moved to start climbing the stairs once more. “My mom saw it.”

“What!” she cried out, echoing strangely into the stairwell. “Wait a minute! You can’t just say that and then start walking up the stairs like it was nothing!”

“Watch me,” he called back, taunting her.

And watch she did (his ass), chasing after him (his ass), pestering him (his ass) to give her more information. But she was also losing her breath much faster than before and using her legs was starting to feel like an impossible task the longer they climbed up. He Xuan was also noticeably slowing down, too.

Absolutely winded and legs burning with pain, she was starting to feel more like a quitter by the time they reached the next alcove. There were two photographs this time, portraits of a teenage boy around eighteen, and a young woman in her thirties with kind eyes and a veil covering the lower half of her face.

He Qingge (贺清歌, 1875-1895) and He Mingyan (贺溟烟, 1880–1938)

Originally, He Qinghua’s son, He Qingge, was set to inherit the mantle of lighthouse keeper. He apprenticed under his father for many years and his penmanship can be seen alongside his father’s in some of the logbooks. However, He Qingge was eventually drafted during the First Sino-Japanese War in 1894, leaving his younger sister, He Mingyan, to take over the family lighthouse when he died a year later in an ambush. A romantic at heart and inspired by her father’s passion for writing, in her youth, He Mingyan dreamed of becoming a novelist. She returned home when her brother passed, forced to learn the care and keeping of the family’s legacy. He Mingyan became the lighthouse’s first and only female keeper in 1910 after her father’s health declined so that he could no longer climb the steps. Though she kept the beacon burning through the darkest years, her true refuge was writing by candlelight in the keeper’s quarters, penning forbidden love stories set in ancient times far away from the sea. Her unpublished manuscripts, still preserved in the lighthouse archive, speak of yearning, love and loss, perseverance, obsession, and the quiet ache of dreams unfulfilled.

“Oh my gosh! Girl power!” Shi Qingxuan cheered. “Hell yeah! I bet she had thighs of steel!”

“I’m sure it comes with the territory.”

They had to wait a lot longer at this alcove than the previous ones. Shi Qingxuan felt like her legs were about to fall off and they were only a little more than halfway.

He Xuan, however, looked practically unbothered in the face. But he was sweating a bit and breathing a little more labored than normal. Although, nowhere near as exhausted as Shi Qingxuan felt. She sort of figured this would happen, though. As a fisherman, surely he had a much more active and physically demanding lifestyle than her own. She needed to get back to the gym! She had been neglecting the StairMaster!

“Wait, wait,” she said, when He Xuan made a move to start climbing again. Please no more ass in my face! “Please, let me go first. I’m going to collapse. I really think I should set the pace.”

“Am I going too fast?” He thought he’d been keeping a good pace for them both…

“Okay, fine, it’s not only that,” she admitted. “Also, it’s… How do I say this delicately…? Uhm… Your rear end… is kinda in my face the whole time…”

He swallowed uncomfortably and said, “I know.”

“Wait, what?” 

And suddenly it hit her that he had probably experienced the same thing on that first leg of the stairs. And then he offered to go in front… 

OH MY GOSH WAS HE STARING AT MY ASS THE WHOLE TIME??? JUST LIKE I’VE BEEN???

Shi Qingxuan’s face turned bright red. Neither of them could look at the other in the eyes. She was thankful that she was at least wearing her long white cover up so that he hadn’t seen anything TOO uncouth. Her shorts were very short today, after all…

“Okay. Yeah. Maybe you should continue to go first,” she parsed out. “That’s… probably for the best. I’ll just… It’s fine.”

They climbed the next leg in tense silence. Shi Qingxuan tried her best to keep staring at the tattoos on his legs, but wow, he really had a nice ass. And it was right there! Swaying! Practically begging for her to stare!

Please! Let’s get this over with already! she thought.

And her legs! Perilous and heavy and painful, every step filled her with dread that there was practically no end to these accursed metal stairs! She was practically dragging herself up by the handrails. And now her arms were aching because of it! How did the keepers do this everyday at least twice a day?! It was unfathomable! She couldn’t imagine climbing up all the stairs and then realizing she forgot something vital back in the house and having to do it all over again!

Shi Qingxuan slumped down on the cool brick of the next alcove, panting, and sweating like a dog. It took her several minutes to be able to breathe normally and look up to read the next plaque.

“Don’t worry, this is the last set,” He Xuan assured her, breath catching in his throat. “Next is the lookout.”

“Thank god.”

She tried to use the wall to get up, but she fell back down. Her legs were shaking! He Xuan resisted the urge to laugh, and held out a hand to help heave her up from the floor. He was incredibly strong, picking her up like she weighed nothing! What sort of muscles was he hiding under that sweatshirt?! She was dying to find out!

Finally, once pulled to her feet, she read the next plaque. The photograph this time was of a very stern looking man with angular features and a ridiculous mustache.

He Mingjue (贺明玦, 1912–1958)

He Mingjue had long dreamed of joining the military, envisioning a life of service as a career naval officer. He passed his entrance exams with distinction, but shortly after enlisting, at only twenty-four years old, he was diagnosed with a degenerative brain tumor that caused disorientation, muscle spasms, memory lapses, and volatile behavior, and eventually cut short his military aspirations. Forced to return home in 1938 following his mother’s death, he reluctantly took over the family lighthouse with a fierce, stubborn determination, refusing to surrender to his fate even as his condition worsened. His logs, once precise and clean, grew increasingly erratic. His handwriting turned sharp, missing strokes, smudged, and inconsistent, betraying his frustration and fading strength. In the final years, later entries suggest his son quietly stepped in to keep the records and the light burning until his death in 1958. He Mingjue’s struggle is etched in those logbook pages, an angry acceptance of a life reshaped by illness; gone, but never extinguished.

Shi Qingxuan covered her mouth and tried to hold back tears prickling in the corners of her eyes. 

“That’s so sad,” she said, voice warbling with emotion.

“It gets worse.”

“What do you mean by that?! How could it get worse?!”

He Xuan shook his head and pointed up. “Find out for yourself.”

She looked up the last set of stairs and shook her head. Her thighs were going to revolt. Crying, weeping, begging her not to do it! A mutiny surely awaited if she dared climb another step. Perhaps they would walk off without her in the middle of the night for torturing them so!

But, still, she endured. It was a long, grueling journey. And this one was just a bit longer, too. 57 steps instead of just 50. The extra seven steps were even narrower than the rest of the staircase and led to a little landing and with a door to an interior room.

“I’m dying!” she groaned, collapsing in the middle of the staircase about halfway up. “I’ll die! I’m dying! I’m dead! Currently dying!”

He Xuan chuckled, winded and feeling the burn, too. “Just a little more.”

“I can’t! I’m going to die!”

“Die after we get to the top.”

“Be nicer to me! I’m dying!!”

“I’ll be nice if you make it to the top.”

“You’re horrible!”

“Come on.” 

“You want me to die!”

Shi Qingxuan ended up bear-crawling up the last couple of steps. When she picked herself up to finally enter into the too-small watertight door hatch that led into the watch room, she tripped and stumbled over the high threshold. He Xuan, who had been waiting for a minute, reacted instantly. He caught her by the arm so she didn’t fall, and accidentally pulled her into his tight embrace because of the momentum.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

Shi Qingxuan could almost hear the shoujo-anime music in the background and see the wall of pink sparkles and hearts surrounding them as he held her close to his chest. Honestly, the texture of his sweatshirt was really soft, so she finally understood his obsession with it. It was a nice fabric, she had to admit it. 

She looked up at him, blushing furiously under her suddenly even shakier legs. “Y-yeah.”

He Xuan’s golden brown eyes were hypnotizing, and his pupils had blown wide upon looking at her so close. She was so beautiful, even sweaty and exhausted, he thought. 

His lips were so close! If she wasn’t so sweaty, and panting like mad, it might’ve been the perfect opportunity to kiss him! And boy, did she want to kiss him!

Shi Qingxuan swallowed audibly before slowly pressing lightly against his chest, pushing herself out of the embrace. Suddenly, he let go, realizing he was holding her a little familiarly.

“Sorry—”

“No, no, it’s fine,” she promised him. “Thanks for catching me.”

“Maybe you should sit,” he offered. 

Luckily, there were a couple of benches in the tiny room. It was half decorated in a roped off section like how the lighthouse keepers would’ve had it. And the other half was two metal benches for people to sit after climbing up all those steps. Shi Qingxuan was eternally grateful! Collapsing into the nearest bench, she pulled He Xuan down with her so that they were sitting hip-to-hip.

“Remind me never to climb 257 steps again without training for months before,” she said, leaning her head on his shoulder. “I think my legs are going to take off without me in protest.”

He Xuan huffed some semblance of a laugh and agreed with her. Maybe he wasn’t being as dramatic as Shi Qingxuan, but that climb had taken a lot out of him, too.

“But we did it!” she cheered, half-heartedly. She threw her hands up in the air with a weak “hurrah” and slumped them back down into her lap.

He Xuan felt bold. And she was leaning on his arm. So in his mind, they were one step away from cuddling. But he was terrible at transitioning things.

“Can I tell you a joke? It’s about pirates,” he said with a serious monotone that didn’t at all match what he was asking.

Shi Qingxuan perked up at hearing this. He’d never even given a slight interest into making jokes before, at least not one without being laced with sarcasm-overdose.

“Uh, yeah, sure!” she chimed back at him. “I’d love to hear a joke about pirates. Joke away, good sir!”

“If you were a pirate,” he began, “would you put your parrot on this shoulder,” He touched his hand to the shoulder currently leaning up against him a little awkwardly and continued, “or this shoulder?” And he put his arm around her opposite shoulder, effectively making a move.

Shi Qingxuan almost didn’t understand what was happening for a moment because of his exceedingly deadpan delivery.

“I can’t tell if you’re serious right now or if you’re making a move, ahaha,” she admitted, laughing nervously. “Like, is this another ‘you’re hot’ situation or are you…”

“I am putting my arm around you.”

“Okay, yeah, I get that. But like in a romantic way? You said this was a joke?”

He Xuan looked visibly flustered. “In a romantic way…” Was I not clear enough…?

Shi Qingxuan breathed a sigh of relief and started laughing at the absurdity of this interaction. He Xuan flinched, the hot sting of embarrassment and perhaps unrequited feelings. He tried to pull his arm back, but she trapped his hand and nuzzled closer into his side. 

“I didn’t say you should stop! Okay, ahahaha! Oh my gosh, I thought you were being serious for a moment!” she said, almost crying from laughing so hard. “Well, I can confidently say that I’ve never had anyone make a move like that before! We can work on your delivery of romantic lines later,” she teased. “But that was absolutely iconic. Please, never change.”

“So… it’s fine? Like this?”

“More than fine,” she assured him, running her cheek along the soft fabric of his sweatshirt that smelled like driftwood and sea water, and just a hint of fish. “Also, you were so right. This sweatshirt is so soft. I may have to steal one.”

“Dream on,” he said with a smirk. 

She snuggled contentedly into his side for a while, trying to give her legs time to relax and recover from the long climb. 

The stained wood paneled walls of the watch room had no windows, save for the hatch that led to the viewing deck. Warm light spilled into the room from the roof windows surrounding the big lens. A large, oxidized metallic cylindrical structure that held all of the mechanics and formed the base of the lens housed above in the center of the room. Decorating the walls were many shelves and other posters about fresnel lenses and other blueprints explaining the different parts of the lighthouse and the science behind it. 

In the roped-off part of the watch room, there was an old wooden desk with several books and papers scattered about. A small, brass handheld telescope sat folded up on the desk next to a magnifying glass. There were several decorative paperweights in the shapes of various sea creatures holding down the papers and to keep the books open, the most beautiful being a delicately sculpted violet octopus. 

Shi Qingxuan’s eyes traveled around the walls, searching for the next plaque and photograph. It was next to the entrance, easy to miss. Feeling like she could probably stand without falling over, she hesitantly wiggled her way out of He Xuan’s side embrace and walked over to it. He followed after her, side now cold without her warmth snuggled up close.

The photograph, still black-and-white, depicted a family, standing in front of the keeper’s quarters on a sunny afternoon. The father looked world-weary, with an unspeakable sadness in his eyes. His wife was holding a young girl in her arms and an older girl with a fierce brow stood in front of her father, his hand resting on her shoulder.

This was He Xuan’s grandfather. And the little girl in front of him was obviously his aunt. Shi Qingxuan’s eyes drifted over to the young girl being held: his mother. Her face looked round and soft, but her face was turned slightly to the left of the camera, facing away to gaze out in the direction of the ocean. They didn’t really look much alike from what she could tell, but the photo was taken when his mother was a child so it was hard to make an accurate comparison.

This plaque was longer than the others.

He Xuanyu (贺玄羽, 1939–1984)

He Xuanyu was the last official keeper of the Watcher of the Deep Lighthouse. It’s slightly unclear when he officially took over the position, but it’s estimated that he began taking on most of the responsibilities by the time he was sixteen. Haunted by his father’s slow unraveling and the creeping obsolescence of lighthouses, in his time as the keeper, He Xuanyu struggled to find purpose in a world that no longer needed the light he was bound by duty to tend. By the 1960s, with more and more lighthouses in the country becoming automated and the inventions of satellite navigation and coastal radar had rendered most lighthouses obsolete, He Xuanyu still continued to keep the grounds immaculate and the lens polished until it’s formal decommission on August 23rd, 1984. When the light was extinguished for the final time, He Xuanyu reportedly stood watch until dawn, marking the end of 144 years of unbroken service by the He family. When the sun rose, He Xuanyu walked out along the cliffs beyond the keeper’s path and leapt into the waves below. In the final logbook entry, written in a shaky hand, he had left only one line: 

“No one left to watch the deep.”

Today, his eldest daughter, He Haitang (贺海棠, 1972–current), carries the torch in a new way. A historian and preservationist, she founded the Fu Gu Historical Society, which works to primarily protect the lighthouse archive, family records, and other local history, and educate the public about maritime history on China’s eastern coast. Through guided tours, exhibitions, and oral history projects, He Haitang ensures that the story of the lighthouse, and the generations who kept its flame alive, continues to shine.

He Xuan didn’t have any emotion (as usual) on his face as he read over the history of the grandfather that he never knew. Inside, he was scoffing at his aunt for being so egotistical that she actually put her own name on the plaque here without even mentioning his mother and her contributions to the historical society.

What a disgusting woman, he thought vaguely, looking away.

He stared at the photograph for a while, focusing on the figure of his mother, before finally turning to look at Shi Qingxuan. He was surprised to find a silent tear streaming down her face and her mouth covered up in horror.

“You were right. It did get worse.”

She looked up at him with glistening eyes, a cute frown, and a pathetic expression. 

“What’s that face for?”

“I’m so sorry about your grandfather.”

“It’s whatever. I didn’t know him.” 

“Yeah, well, it’s still sad!”

“I guess. I mean, I didn’t really know any of these people,” he said, shrugging, looking around vaguely. “I never lived here. I have no emotional connection to them or this place. And all of this information is available to the public, so it doesn’t really feel personal. It’s just part of my name.”

“I guess that makes sense.” She felt the same way about her family’s oil company. She wanted absolutely nothing to do with it, or the Shi name in general. Pondering all this, she found herself quoting, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.” However, given his line of work, she added while elbowing him lightly in the side, “Or smell as fishy.”

He Xuan rolled his eyes at her poor attempt at humor. A fitting reference, though she would never understand why, in He Xuan’s mind at least. 

Why do you have to be related to him…? Why did it have to be his sister?

“Wanna take a look at the view outside next?” she asked, smiling up at him.

“Mn.”

Chapter Text

By the time He Xuan and Shi Qingxuan started walking towards the bulkhead door that led to the observation deck outside, two children whirled past them, almost knocking Shi Qingxuan on her ass. The younger sister, maybe six or seven, was pouting and asking her older brother to slow down, crying that she didn’t want to race down the stairs. But the older brother kept taunting and teasing his sister, trying to goad her into racing.

Presumably their mother burst through the doors not long after in a panic, trying to corral her children, and stop them from sprinting down 257 metal stairs. 

The dad finally appeared seconds later, following after them all casually and laughing.

“Sorry about the commotion,” the dad said, bowing slightly to them and continued leisurely down the steps. “Kids, right?”

Shi Qingxuan and He Xuan made eye contact, an undercurrent of disgust in their eyes.

“Is he really not gonna help her at all?” Shi Qingxuan whispered once the family was out of earshot. “What a loser.”

He Xuan crossed his arms. “Barely a step up from a deadbeat.”

“Also, how the heck do those kids have that much energy after climbing up all those steps?” 

“Kids, right?” He Xuan echoed. 

“We’re so old…”

They stepped out onto the viewing deck and Shi Qingxuan’s mouth fell open at the beautiful view, eyes sparkling in the sunlight of the early afternoon. The whole ocean stretched out below them like an oil painting. She laughed, still gaping at the view.

“Ahaha! Wow. Okay. So this was totally worth it. Legs be damned!”

Up here, the wind was jostling her long braid, and his loose hair was whipping wildly. He Xuan eventually gave up from keeping his hair down. He took off the hair elastic from his wrist, and began pulling it up into a ponytail to keep it out of his eyes.

Shi Qingxuan leaned out on the railing before remembering her phone and dug around in her bag for a moment to take some photos. He came up next to her, about an arm’s length away. 

He Xuan watched her squinting behind the screen, trying to get the perfect angle, snapping over a dozen different photos. The beginning of a smile tugged at the corner of his lips.

She moved closer to him, putting her phone away. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” 

“Yeah.” He wasn’t talking about the view.

Because of the strong sunlight, they shifted a little to be more in the shade.

“Oh, there! Did you see that?!”

“See what?”

“A fish! It jumped out of the water!” 

He let out a breathy, weak scoff. “Fish jump all the time.”

“Yeah, but I’ve never seen one do that!”

“You get used to it.”

“Hmm… I guess if it was your job, yeah,” she said, a little defeated. And then, she remembered something he never responded to. “Wait, so you said your mom saw that sea monster, right? Now that I’ve got you trapped up here, you have to tell me the whole story!”

“No.”

She pretended not to hear him. “Was it more like a sea serpent? A giant squid? A giant eel? A dragon? Or like a really big whale?”

He stared at her, vaguely offended.

“A kraken?”

“The kraken isn’t real.”

“So then tell me! What was it, really?”

He Xuan stared out into the water. The wind rustled between them in the silence.

“When she was a kid, she said that she looked out over the edge of the cliff down there by the keeper’s quarters,” he explained, pointing down to the house below them. “She said the water didn’t look right. It was too dark. Flat. Like the night sky had fallen into the ocean.”

“Oh shit, that’s creepy.”

“She said she saw it move under the surface, huge and slow, like the whole ocean shifted. She said it was big,” he continued, “so big that it didn’t have a shape. And it had too many eyes that kept opening and closing.”

Shi Qingxuan shuddered, trying to imagine it. 

“And when it finally noticed she was looking at it, all of its eyes opened and zero-ed in on her.”

Her heart stopped. “Oh my god.”

“It smiled at her, but she couldn’t describe how. It didn’t even have a mouth, but she said it smiled.”

“What the fuck.”

“And she said it looked lonely.”

Shi Qingxuan considered this. “Well… I guess if I was that big, and presumably the only one like me, I’d be lonely, too.”

He Xuan glanced at her out of the corner of his eyes with an indecipherable expression. 

“What happened after it looked at her?”

“It left,” he whispered.

Shi Qingxuan stared out into the water in silence. This sea monster or whatever it was, didn’t sound anything like the thing she saw the other day. It had a definite shape and was smaller. Much smaller. Perhaps a little bigger than a human now. And it only had two eyes.

Maybe they really weren’t connected at all?

“Well, thank you for telling me,” she said, sounding a little disappointed. She was no closer to finding out anything about the monster than she was when she was drowning.

He could sense her disappointment, but chose not to inquire further.

She perked up quickly enough, “Oh, can we… take a picture too? Is that okay? For proof of survival! Our triumph!”

Also, so I can text it to Xie Lian later… she thought secretly.

He didn’t look too into the idea. In fact, he couldn’t even remember the last time someone ever took a picture of him. Probably his sister? Even then, he didn’t like getting his picture taken so she didn’t usually press him.

She dug out her phone again hesitantly, waiting for his approval.

“Is it okay?” she asked again.

Well, who was he to say no to her?

“I… I don’t normally look good in photos,” he admitted. “But sure.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” she said. “I’m really good at taking pictures. And right here is peak romance movie lighting.”

His heart fluttered a bit and he nodded.

She pulled out her phone, and set it into selfie mode. He was still standing pretty far away for a picture, so she dragged him over so that their shoulders were pressing up against each other.

He just stood there looking at the camera blankly, while she was smiling brightly, holding up a cute peace sign.

“Aren’t you going to smile?”

“No.”

She laughed and said, “Alright, then. On three, okay?”

As she counted down, He Xuan looked a little worried on the screen next to her. She clicked the shutter anyway, figuring it was just his nerves. 

The screen immediately got stuck in the middle of taking the photo. The colors looked wrong and staticky. The sky looked a putrid greenish-yellow, and her mouth stretched way too far. 

Shi Qingxuan’s smile faded as she stared at her phone.

“What the…?”

When she tried tapping the shutter again, then the whole screen went black and shut off.

Completely baffled, she looked over at He Xuan. “It’s never done that before. Maybe I ran out of space or something?”

It took a moment to bring her phone back to life, and she immediately looked at the photos app to check whether it had been saved at all.

The last picture in her phone looked almost completely black. Like a pixelated, negative version of the photo she was trying to take. And as she looked at the two faces in the photo, it was obvious that something had glitched and made them look insanely creepy. Mouths wider than normal, eyes gigantic and glowing, especially He Xuan.

And just when she opened it, her phone shut off again.

“No, seriously, this is starting to freak me out…”

She kept tapping her phone screen until minutes later, it finally sprung back to life.

“Maybe it’s the service out here…?” she posited, still trying to figure out what was wrong. “Did you see what it did to that picture? That didn’t look like us…”

He Xuan shrugged. “Phones are weird sometimes, I guess.”

By the time her phone turned back on, the photo had been erased completely. No trace of it ever having been taken. 

Shi Qingxuan shook her head at her phone and just decided to put it away into her purse. Turning back towards the ocean, a creeping feeling started crawling up her spine. Like she was being watched by the deep.

The silence between them was palpable and awkward.

“I kinda wanna get down now. This place is kinda creeping me out…” she admitted.

“Okay,” he said, motioning her to go first.

Luckily, descending 257 steps was much easier than climbing up. It didn’t take as long either. Shi Qingxuan’s mind was elsewhere, but she tried to focus on not tripping down the stairs. 

He Xuan suggested they go into the lighthouse keeper’s quarters, so she followed in after him. 

It was a tiny little cottage, only three small rooms with a small lofted attic space. It was decorated half like a real cottage, beyond the roped off section, and half like a museum. There were original logbooks on display behind glass of some of the more interesting entries. 

Displayed prominently was the very last entry from He Xuanyu along with a newspaper clipping of his obituary in the local newspaper. 

A collection of He Mingyan’s unpublished writings were in a smaller section, next to entries showing He Mingjue’s original handwriting, samples of writing close to his death, and some of young He Xuanyu’s handwriting when he took over for his father when the script became illegible.

Finally, along the back wall, Shi Qingxuan nearly froze to the spot when she found what she’d been looking for. He Qinghua’s entry about the monster. It was highlighted in the display case, the specific passage. Except the plaque at the lighthouse failed to mention that he had also scribbled a little charcoal drawing next to the entry in the logbook.

It wasn’t like one of those old blurry photos of the loch ness monster, with a little serpent-y head and a shadow in the water. It was exactly like what He Xuan’s mother had described.

A large, solid black amorphous blob in the water, like a living oil spill. Dotted all over the creature's surface were eyes of different shapes and sizes, some open, some closed, all looking in different directions.

She stumbled back, but her eyes were glued to that drawing.

A voice sounded behind her, “Unsettling, isn’t it?” 

Shi Qingxuan nearly screamed, coming out of her skin. She whirled around, slapping a hand to her chest.

“Sorry, did I frighten you?” The narrowed eyes, sly smile of He Xuan’s aunt greeted her.

“Um, no, it’s fine,” she babbled, trying to get her heart rate under control. “I scare easily, it’s really not a big deal—”

“So, how do you know my nephew?”

“Oh,” she said, paused out of her daze. “Well, you could say we met a long time ago, but we recently reconnected.”

He Haitang didn’t look impressed. “Is that so? Well, you seem like a nice young woman. A warning for you, keep your distance from my nephew. He’s nothing but bad luck.”

“What?”

“What did you say your name was?”

He Xuan came jogging over, noticing his aunt from afar. “Ayi, stop bothering her,” he hissed, pulling Shi Qingxuan away. “Come on, let’s go.”

Shi Qingxuan blinked and they had already exited the cottage. Once they had gotten far enough away, He Xuan let go of her hand.

“What did she say to you?” he asked, jaw clenched.

“She… She just said to stay away from you… That you’re bad luck.”

He Xuan looked slightly relieved. 

“Is there… a problem between you two?” she asked. “Sorry, it’s none of my business—”

He looked away and after a moment, “She blames me.”

“For what…?”

“For their deaths.”

“Your sister?”

“And my mother. All because I look like him.”

Shi Qingxuan didn’t really understand, but she was trying to. Did he mean his father? Or perhaps his grandfather? 

But it didn’t matter the specifics, really. She knew what it felt like to blame herself for something that wasn’t her fault. Maybe if she begged her parents hard enough, they would’ve never gone to that party. Maybe if she was a better child, her mom wouldn’t have… 

She put a hand on his shoulder and said, “It wasn’t your fault.” She’d told him the same thing on the beach the day they built a sandcastle together.

He didn’t reply, a storm brewing behind his eyes.

“Hey, look at me?”

He slowly, almost begrudgingly, locked eyes with her. 

“It’s not your fault. Say it with me, ‘it’s not my fault,’” she demanded.

He hesitated, “It’s… not my fault.”

A bright smile spread across her lips, “That’s a good start. Now you just have to keep saying it enough until you start to believe it.”

He Xuan grumbled in response, obviously not believing it yet.

“You know, our dates have a funny way of going not the way either of us planned, ahaha,” she admitted. 

He’s nothing but bad luck, his aunt’s words rang around her mind.

He’s dangerous, Qingxuan. You shouldn’t trust him, her brother said.

Her eyes flashed up at him, but she couldn’t feel anything other than blooming affection for him. Why was everyone acting like he was the antichrist or something? He just seemed kinda sad and lonely…

“Let’s blow this place,” Shi Qingxuan offered. “Are you still up for kite flying?”

“Yeah. Let’s get out of here.”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

They decided to go for the “paint your own kite” kite flying package. The store front had been explicit in explaining that the painting option kites were cheaper quality than the rental kites, only really good for a couple of flights. It was perfect because it wasn’t like either of them wanted to be avid kite-flyers, especially not Shi Qingxuan who wouldn’t be able to bring it back in her suitcase.

The shop offered a couple of different kite bases and an array of paints to choose from. From fish, to birds, to even dragons! 

Shi Qingxuan went for the smallest kite, the fish. He Xuan followed suit. 

Shi Qingxuan practically pushed He Xuan out of the way when it came time to purchase them, smirking triumphantly back at him. He just sighed and shook his head. It wasn’t worth fighting over. If she really wanted to pay, he wasn’t going to stop her.

Once handed their kites, they went over to the workshop space in the back. There was another couple sitting at a different table working on a pair of birds and laughing together. Shi Qingxuan smiled at them. 

He Xuan sat opposite of her at the table before they began gathering up all the colors and brushes necessary for their art project.

“Neon…?” He Xuan asked, an eyebrow raised at her color selection.

“Yes,” she answered brightly, without any shame.

“And glitter?”

“Also yes.”

“It’s a kite,” he said flatly. “Are you trying to blind some poor bird?”

“First of all, rude. Second of all, kites are supposed to be pretty! They go in the sky!” she said as she dipped a paint brush in some water, and then into the neon orange. “Mine’s gonna be a koi fish. Very classic. Very graceful. She’s gonna shimmer.”

“She?”

“Well, obviously, we have to name them after.”

He Xuan sighed, reaching straight for the black paint. 

“Are you really using only black…?” she asked, now her turn to raise an eyebrow at his color choices.

“Black, white, grey,” he explained. “Maybe some red or gold for the eyes.”

He started drawing the outline of bones and filling in the negative space with a small brush.

“Oh, are you drawing a skeletal fish?” she said, realizing what he was going for. “That’s such a good idea. How very you.”

He didn’t look up. 

They painted for a while, Shi Qingxuan making some small talk with minimal reaction from He Xuan— who was concentrating intently on the design of his bone fish, trying to make it as anatomically accurate as possible on a traditional kite.

“It’s looking really good,” she encouraged, almost done painting different blobs of orange and gold scales on the back of her kite.

“It’s not finished,” he said.

“Well, yeah, I can see that. But it’s still really impressive. Like it’s about to start chanting in tongues or something.”

That got a small chuckle out of him. 

“Mine looks like she’s going to grant three wishes!”

“I don’t know…” He Xuan said, looking up. “The eyes look like they’re crying.”

“She has eye shines so she doesn’t look dead,” Shi Qingxuan explained. Except the more she looked at it… “Oh god, it kinda does look like she’s crying… Maybe I should add more glitter?”

By the time they finished, Shi Qingxuan’s koi fish shimmered with overlapping neon orange and gold scales, big round sparkly eyes, and far too much glitter— so much that it shed glitter whenever it was handled. He Xuan’s bone-fish was an elegant monstrous thing with painted teeth and blood-red eyes, fins looking like torn dragon wings. 

Shi Qingxuan looked at both of them and nodded, completely satisfied. “They’re totally awesome.”

“Yours looks really… you,” he offered.

She laughed at him and said, “Right back at ya! It’s giving ‘gloomy monster with too many dark secrets.’”

He Xuan frowned.

“Well, they look good together, don’t you think?” she said, holding hers up next to his.

“Not really.”

She glanced up at his eyes with a charming smile. “Opposites attract.” 

“You said yours grants wishes… mine only devours things.”

“Well, how about we try ‘em out— OH WAIT! Name! You have to think of a name first!”

He Xuan groaned and rolled his eyes. “A name, really?”

“You poured your heart and soul into painting him so detailed, of course you have to give him the dignity of a name!”

“So it’s a he now, is it?”

“I don’t know, I just get a vibe.”

“Well, what’s your koi’s name?”

She held it up and thought for a moment, “Well, there’s this web novel series I’ve been keeping up with and it’s sorta about a koi fish. How about Xiaoyu?”

He Xuan didn’t give any reaction to her obviously brilliant name and continued staring at his kite. 

“Dian Dian,”^[1] he said with a straight face.

Shi Qingxuan burst out laughing. “If that’s what you want, ahahaha! Okay, let’s go!”

The beach outside the shop was one of the more popular in town, and there were a couple others flying kites nearby. There was even a big dog on a long lead playing fetch with its owner and chasing some waves further down. She could see a couple of sailboats in the distant horizon, as well as some windsurfers.

The sky was perfect for flying. Bright blue streaked with wispy clouds. The sun was a little bright, but there was not really anything to be done about it.

Shi Qingxuan ran ahead, feet kicking up the warm sand into her sandals, clutching her kite that left a trail of glitter wherever she went. She threw the koi-shaped kite in one hand and held on to the string with the other, laughing joyously as she did so. As she let go, the wind caught it, and she watched it soar upwards in a glorious swoop of orange and gold shimmers. She let out a bit of string so it could go even higher.

He Xuan trailed behind her at a much slower pace, looking very out of place in his entirely black attire and grim-looking kite. His kite was held limply in his off hand, like he couldn’t even be bothered to try. 

He glanced up at the sky and then back at her. “How do you get it in the air?”

“You’ve never done this before?”

He shook his head. The locals of Fu Gu didn’t do much kite flying, really. There was a kite festival later in the summer with some fireworks and a contest for the best homemade kite, but that was always a chaotic mess of tangled wires He Xuan had never bothered to attend.

“Well, you hold it up, start running, and then you throw it into the air! It’s easier to go into a breeze, so just wait for one to pick up and then you can throw it.”

He Xuan scowled. “I have to run?”

“Just a little, ahaha,” she chirped. “It’s not that hard. If you need me to do it, I can get it going for you. Call me the Wind Master!”

“No.”

He Xuan pushed up the sleeves of his sweatshirt, leaving pale forearms and the tail end of a couple tattoos peaking out. He looked like he was preparing for war, with such a serious look on his face. And he started jogging forward.

Shi Qingxuan noticed just a second too late, “Just don’t throw it too close—”

The bone fish swam through the air clumsily, bouncing once, twice, and then caught on the glimmering koi fish.

In an instant, the two kites were tangled together, wrapping around each other in mid-air, like birds repeatedly pecking into each other, trying to kiss and failing spectacularly. They plummeted from the sky and hit the sand with a comical flop.

Shi Qingxuan burst out laughing, but He Xuan was not as amused.

They approached the wreckage together.

“Aw, they’re entwined. How romantic!”

He glared at her, deadpan, “They’re strangling each other.”

“I mean, maybe some kites are into that.”

He Xuan’s eyes grew wide, giving her a wild look, as the tips of his ears turned pink. 

“I’m just joking, ahahaha!” she added quickly. WHY DID I SAY THAT?! Shi Qingxuan cleared her throat awkwardly. “Well, ahem, they don’t look too damaged… I think they should still fly if we can figure out how to untangle them…”

“Let me do it,” He Xuan insisted. “I’m good at untangling stuff.”

He had to do it all the time with his fishing lines or the different trawl nets on his boat. He was practically an expert.

Shi Qingxuan crouched down next to him in the sand and tried to help. Their hands kept brushing up against each other, fingertips bumping. He was quiet and methodical, but she tugged a little too hard and almost snapped a string. 

“Am I even helping?” she asked nervously.

He gave her a look. She withdrew her hands and let him take over.

By the time the strings were separated and the kites were ready to fly again, his fingers and his kite had gotten a nice showering of golden glitter. 

“This shit is everywhere,” he said, shaking off his hands to try and rid himself of the glitter. It didn’t even budge.

“Do you think I used too much?”

He shot her another look.

“Okay, noted. Less glitter next time.”

“Next time?”

“You know, they looked pretty together up in the air,” she said, meeting his gaze. “Even for a brief moment.”

“Falling out of the sky?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Let’s try it again!” she said, jumping to her feet. “Just don’t get so close this time. I should’ve warned you earlier, ahaha! Unless you want them to get tangled again on purpose!”

“Definitely not.”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

He Xuan drove her home not long after and she had to hold her breath most of the way home because the smell of HOT FISH in the truck that had been left out in the sun was overwhelming. 

They said their goodbyes, promising to meet up again soon, and He Xuan waited until she was inside before driving away.

Shi Qingxuan had barely taken her shoes off before Shi Wudu was already up her ass.

“Where the hell have you been?” he asked, limping over, voice cracking like a whip. His jaw was already tense, eyes burning.

“Out. Look, can we not do this right now?”

“You didn’t answer any of my messages. Didn’t pick up your phone. Disappeared for hours. And I’m just supposed to guess you’re not dead?”

She tossed her phone into his chest and said, voice flat, “My phone was acting up. Can you look at it? It was doing something weird.”

He barely caught it time. “Oh, that’s even more reassuring,” he snapped. “Your phone, that I bought by the way, is conveniently acting up when you’re out with… you were with him, yeah? Didn’t I tell you he’s dangerous, meimei?”

“It was fine! We had a nice time! If he wanted to kill me or whatever, no one would have put up with me this long! He could’ve pushed me down the stairs of the fucking lighthouse or someting, but he didn’t. And he drove me back here, didn’t he? He’s a good guy!”

Shi Wudu didn’t say anything for a moment, but the glowering look on his face was enough to unsettle her stomach.

“What…?”

“You’re… grounded.”

She laughed in his face. “You can’t ground me. You’re not Baba.”

“I know. Baba would never have grounded you.”

Shi Qingxuan narrowed her eyes. “You can’t be serious.”

“I’m completely serious. Vacation over. You’re not leaving this house unless I’m with you.”

“Right. Of course! Because if you don’t micromanage me every second of my life, I’ll go off and have a nice time with a guy I like, and we can’t have that, can we?”

“I’m trying to keep you safe, Qingxuan. I am not the bad guy, here, he is,” Shi Wudu scowled. “Thanks for your phone, by the way. You’re not getting it back until I say so.”

“What the fuck?! You can’t ground me! I’m not fucking twelve!”

“Well, too bad, because you’re grounded. Go to your room.”

“For what?! For having a fun day without you?! God forbid, I have a life outside of my brother!”

“Hate me if you want, but I know what’s best for you. Go to your room.”

She stormed off back into her room, slamming the door shut behind, groaning in frustration.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

A knock on her door, hours later, well into the evening. The orange sunset sprinkling in through the windows and making the shadows long. Shi Qingxuan had been sulking all afternoon and dozed off. She opened the door just a crack. And there he was.

Shi Wudu.

She almost shut it on his injured leg, which he’d already wedged through the gap, but he held something out to her like a peace offering.

Her phone.

“I… I took a look at it,” he began, hesitant. “It’s working fine. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

This was as close to an apology as she would ever get. An admittance of guilt with no admission.

“Oh, so I’m allowed my phone back?” She snatched it, slipping it into her pocket before he could change his mind. “Am I supposed to thank you or something? For your generosity?”

He didn’t answer. Just stood there, hovering like a stormcloud caught in the doorframe.

“Sure you don’t want to take anything else while you’re here? I’ve got a couple of credit cards you could snap.”

He exhaled sharply, frustration cracking through his teeth. “I’m not gonna do that without a reason, Qingxuan. I’m not the bad guy here.”

“Yeah? Well, from where I’m standing, you kinda are.”

“If you knew…” he muttered, shaking his head. A soft, half-hearted chuckle. “I’m just trying to keep you safe.”

“Yeah, you keep saying that.” She crossed her arms. “But I am not in any danger with him. I keep telling you that.”

“Meimei, I can’t lose you too.”

“You keeping me on a tight leash is exactly what’s going to make me leave. I love you, but this—” She gestured between them, trembling with emotion. “This is not love. It’s control. And I’m at my limit tolerating this type of behaviour. I’m so done fighting with you constantly. If… If you keep this up, then after we get back… I’ll—I’ll move out.”

He scoffed, unbelieving.

“I will! I’ll find a job, get a place, crash on Xie Lian’s couch or whatever if I have to. I don’t care. I’ll cut you out of my life,” she insisted, trying not to start crying. “Is that what you want? Because you’re sure as hell pushing me in that direction.”

“That’s the last thing I want.”

Shi Wudu didn’t really believe her. His sister would never be able to stand on her own without him and his support. She had a nasty tendency to get over ambitious, make all these crazy plans, and then fall flat on her ass. Only to come crawling back to him and his money. 

“I don’t want that either!” her voice cracked. “But I can’t breathe like this anymore. You’re being… You’re suffocating me, ge!”

Silence, palpable and heavy.

Finally, trying to meet him halfway, she said, “I was pissed at you earlier. I’m sorry I made you worry. But I’m just so tired of fighting. I miss how it used to be… Before everything got so complicated between us. I miss you, ge. Not the version of you who tries to be my parent. The version who used to laugh with me. My older brother. I miss him. Bring him back.”

“I’m right here.”

“But you’re not.” She reached out, taking his hands. “I know you don’t trust him. But can you at least trust me?”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying… if I promise to keep you updated, text you, check in, whatever you want me to do, will you try not to freak out every time I see him?”

Something snapped in his eyes.

“No,” he growled, yanking harshly out of her grip. “You’re not seeing him again. I won’t let this… thing go any further. I told you before he’s dangerous! He’s lying to you. He’s just using you. You think I don’t know what kind of man he is? What he wants to do to you?!”

His voice rose, thunder crackling in his stormy eyes now.

“You’re so goddamn naïve sometimes, Qingxuan! It’s exhausting! You always think just because someone’s nice to you, they care? That they could love you?”

Shi Qingxuan gasped, sucking in a harsh breath. And just when she didn’t think he could sink any lower…

“Have you even told him yet? Do you really think this time will be any different? He’s never going to love you, you know that right? Who else but your family could ever understand? They don’t see you like I do. My precious, innocent little sister…” He scoffed the word, like it was a slur. “She doesn’t know about the big scary world out there waiting for her. Couldn’t fathom it, even if she tried…” He shook his head and laughed, a shrill, wicked thing at the next thought. “If he doesn’t try to kill you before you tell him, believe me, when he finds out you’re trans, he’ll try after. People these days hate people like you. Like really hate. Do you know how fucking terrified I was every day when you went off to university? That you’d just disappear one day if someone outed you? Or that you’d just be another fucking statistic and kill yourself?”

Shi Qingxuan whimpered, cupping a hand over her mouth. Her knees knocked together.

“Do you know why I’m like this? Why I’m keeping you from things? Because you have no self-preservation instinct. Zero. You have no pattern recognition skills either, apparently. I’m saving you from yourself, can’t you see that? Because I love you. Because I’m supposed to look after you. Because you’re my sister and you’re the only family I have left. But who knows? Maybe I am wrong about him. I know I’m not. You don’t even know… God! If you’d just fucking listen to me! Or maybe you really are just too fucking stupid to realize he’ll be just like the rest of those other cretins you tried to date, and you’ll come crawling back to me, your dear older brother. Don’t you get it, Qingxuan?” 

He grabbed her shoulders. She trembled like a leaf in his grip, weeping silently at his onslaught.

“No one else will ever love and accept you like I do. I’m the only one who actually gives a shit about your life! Why can’t you just—”

“Wudu.”

A voice behind him. Calm. Cutting.

Ling Wen.

Her hand landed on his shoulder, fingers light, grip like iron. The silence that followed her voice was glacial.

Shi Wudu froze, releasing Shi Qingxuan from his hold. She staggered back, gasping for air.

“Wudu, you’re out of line.”

He turned sharply, his face changed color, flushing red, then white. “What are you—”

“Qingxuan,” Ling Wen said, ignoring him, voice gentler now. “Are you okay?”

Shi Qingxuan wiped her eyes quickly and looked away, biting back tears.

“Why the fuck are you taking her side?” Shi Wudu snapped. “You know why he’s interested in her! You know what he’s capable of! Why are you—”

“I know exactly what I’m doing,” Ling Wen said coolly. “And right now, I’m telling you to back off.”

“You don’t understand—”

“Wudu.” Her voice dropped to sub-zero. “This is not helping. You’re hurting your sister. Get out.”

He was seething now, teeth clenched so tightly, they creaked.

“Take a walk,” she demanded.

“But my leg—”

“Take. A. Walk.”

It was not a suggestion.

Behind her, Pei Ming stepped up with a disarming smile, holding out a hand as if offering peace, but his eyes were sharp, watchful. “Come on. I’ll help you walk it off before you say something else you’ll regret. Cool your jets with some nice salty ocean air.”

Shi Wudu hesitated, breathing hard, nostrils flared, like a man on the verge of sinking his own ship just to stop it from leaving the harbor.

And he looked back at his poor sister… and he melted. 

Shi Qingxuan was crying. She looked scared and hurt. Because of him. The realization hit him. What he said… Only then did he finally step back, relenting.

Ling Wen stayed in the doorway for a beat, watching him retreat, before turning gently back to Shi Qingxuan.

“You didn’t deserve that,” she said. 

Shi Qingxuan knew, deep in her heart, that her brother really meant the best for her. But she couldn’t be controlled and belittled any longer. This build up of toxic waste accumulating between them just went nuclear. 

She just wished she could go home already. She’d never witnessed him be that toxic and manipulative and that awful before… What had gotten into him?

The thing about Shi Wudu is that he loves really hard. And feels things really deeply. Deeper than the ocean floor, where light doesn’t reach and monstrous secrets stay buried forever. Not that anyone would know it, of course. He keeps it hidden beneath an aloof surface, as if nothing ever stirred his waters. All his love, locked tight in the hull of a ship no one else can board.

His way of showing love was building a vessel around those he cherished, sealed and seaworthy. Unsinkable, if he could help it. He built a great ship for his sister. Strong, vast, and watertight. He would sail it through any storm, steer it through any wreckage, so long as it kept Shi Qingxuan inside, safe and untouched by the waves of the world.

He would do anything to protect the ones he loved from drowning. Truly, anything. He already had. So many unforgivable things done to keep Shi Qingxuan alive and afloat. Things she could never, ever know.

But at some point, he hadn’t noticed that he started losing her anyway, right there on the deck of the ship he built for her. For them.

Shi Qingxuan was a bird with salt on her wings, fluttering against the masts, desperate for the sky.

And Shi Wudu kept her aboard, firmly, even when she screamed and cried and fought back. Because open water was no place for something so radiant, so soft. Because it was better, he told himself, to keep her seasick and furious than to let her sail off alone into the maw of the sea. He didn’t mind shooting down this albatross. 

Because nothing, nothing, was worse than the thought of her vanishing beneath the waves. Like Baba and Mama.

Shi Qingxuan almost died once, when he wasn’t at the helm. He let their parents step off the pier and onto that doomed voyage to the party. And even if Mama survived, she never really came back to shore. He learned his lesson that night. He would never again let someone drift off without him.

If it meant chaining her to the mast, he would. If it meant keeping her locked in the captain’s quarters, far from the sirens and the storms and the jagged rocks of the world, he would.

Because the world has a hunger for beautiful, good things. And she is the best thing in his life. He’d do anything to keep her from being swallowed whole. She was worth it.

The door shut behind Ling Wen. The tension in the room finally released like a held breath.

Shi Qingxuan, still visibly shaken, repeatedly wiped her face with the sleeve of her white shawl, then sat heavily on the edge of her bed. 

“Thanks,” she mumbled, swallowing. “For that. I mean… for stepping in.”

Ling Wen walked over and sat beside her. “He’s been out of line ever since he made that comment about drinking too much. I didn’t think it was my place to say anything, but… That was awful.”

Shi Qingxuan let out a weak laugh. “You could say that again.”

They sat in silence for a moment. The muffled sound of waves drifted in through the half-open window. 

Shi Qingxuan peeked at Ling Wen from the corner of her eye. “He’s not usually like that. Or, well. Not this bad. When we’re at home. Just the two of us.”

Ling Wen raised a skeptical brow, but didn’t say anything.

Shi Qingxuan kicked her feet a little, fidgeting with her hands. “He means well. He just… Ever since I moved back in after I dropped out, he doesn’t know what to do with me now that I’m not constantly relying on him like after they died.”

Ling Wen hummed in agreement. “He’s trying to hold onto this version of you in the past or something. Like he can’t see you without him being by your side, protecting you.”

“Yeah, but I’m in my twenties now. It’s stupid. He needs to get with the program already.” Shi Qingxuan leaned back on her palms with a sigh. “I just… I wanna go home…”

More silence.

Then Ling Wen said, drier than the desert sand, “He needs to get laid.”

Shi Qingxuan nearly choked. “Jiejie!”

“I’m serious.” Ling Wen glanced at her, completely unbothered. “You’ve seen how tense he’s been lately. I think it would fix him just a little bit.”

“I am not going to tell him to get laid after that.”

“You won’t have to.”

Shi Qingxuan blinked. “What do you mean?”

Ling Wen’s expression turned just a little too thoughtful. “What if we provided him with a distraction? We both know someone who could untangle that tension in a more productive, adult fashion.”

Shi Qingxuan looked horrified. “You’re not seriously considering telling Pei Ming to fuck my brother?! Ge would have a conniption if you told him.”

“No, of course not. I'm not going to out him. We make them think it was their idea all along.”

“Oh my god.”

“It’s not such a terrible idea. Pei Ming likes a challenge, and Wudu is good at pretending he’s not interested.”

“You are evil.”

“I’m pragmatic,” she countered. “Besides, good Ol’ Pei has been looking for another fling when he tried to break up with Xuan Ji before the whole trip. And your brother could use someone who isn’t afraid of him.”

“Does Pei Ming even swing that way…?”

“I’m certain he’ll take the bait.”

Shi Qingxuan put her head in her hands, then peeked through her fingers. “Do you really think it’ll work?”

“Only one way to find out. And I’m never wrong, so.”

They both broke into quiet laughter.

A warm breeze fluttered the curtains. The moment felt lighter now. Softer. Like a knot in Shi Qingxuan’s chest had finally started to loosen.

“So what’s the plan, evil mastermind?” she asked, nudging Ling Wen with her elbow.

Ling Wen smiled. A twisted, glimmer of pearly teeth.

“We let nature take its course. With a few gentle nudges. A group campfire, lots of alcohol, some strategically placed seating arrangements, drinking games. Maybe one or two dares to take off their shirts… The rest is up to them.”

Shi Qingxuan grinned. “Wow. You’re really good at this.”

“I’m terrifyingly efficient when I want to be.”

“Ge has no idea what’s about to hit him.”

Ling Wen stood and brushed a wrinkle out from her shirt. “No. But with any luck, it’ll be Pei Ming’s, how did you describe it? Mr. Playboy’s iron rod?”

“Jiejie, you’re disgusting!”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

Their plan was watertight.

That night, Ling Wen gathered everyone up on the beach outside for a bonfire. After sharing some laughs and too many drinks, Shi Qingxuan, feeling emboldened by the alcohol coursing through her system, proposed a game. A drinking game.

“Never have I ever,” she said, giggling mischievously. “Everyone knows how to play, right? I mean, who hasn’t played ‘never have I ever’… So! Who’s in?”

Shi Wudu shook his head. “Bad idea.”

Shi Qingxuan frowned at him, looking down at her feet. They hadn’t really spoken since the blow up earlier, and this is what he says to her? And she was trying to help him blow off a little steam, too!

“I think it sounds fun,” Pei Ming said, smirking.

“Yeah, I’m down,” said Xuan Ji.

“Sure,” Pei Xiu said.

“Whatever,” Ling Wen said, rolling her eyes, feigning indifference. “If everyone’s playing, why not?” She locked eyes with Shi Qingxuan for a moment, nodding almost imperceptibly.

Shi Wudu rolled his eyes and begrudgingly mumbled a confirmation.

Everyone perked up around the campfire, sitting a little straighter in their seats.

“Okay, okay! Let’s go in age order,” Shi Qingxuan said. “Who’s the oldest?”

“Me,” Ling Wen called. “Then it’s Ol’ Pei, Wudu, Xuan Ji, Little Pei, and then you, right?”

Pei Xiu and Shi Qingxuan looked at each other, the same question in their minds.

“How old are—”

Shi Qingxuan laughed as they said it at the exact same time. 

“I’m twenty two,” she said. 

“Twenty three.”

Crossing her arms childishly. “Damn, okay, fine, I’ll go last,” she pouted.

“I feel like Pei Xiu’s gonna be the dark horse, here,” Shi Wudu said, eyeing him. No one really knew much about him other than he was Ol’ Pei’s little brother.

“Nah, it’s gonna be jiejie for sure,” Pei Ming said. “I still don’t know shit about her and we’ve known for, what?, since university? She never talks about herself.”

Ling Wen smirked, but didn’t deny it.

“Okay, by all means, jiejie,” Shi Wudu said, motioning for her to start. “Whenever you’re ready.”

Everyone held up ten fingers, ready to count down. Shi Qingxuan tapped her feet in excitement, ready for the first statement.

“Never have I ever gotten a tattoo,” Ling Wen said.

“Good start, good start,” Pei Ming praised, trying to hype everyone up.

Both Pei Ming and Shi Wudu both drank from their cups and put a finger down.

“Oooh, ooh! You have to show everyone!” Shi Qingxuan cried. “Ge’s is really cool.”

This was all part of the plan! Get them showing a little skin. Create some tension between them! Shi Wudu’s tattoo was on his ribs which meant that if he showed everyone, Pei Ming would get to see his torso in the sexy bonfire light. 

Pei Ming rolled up his sleeve to show off a small string of numbers. “It’s just something from my time in the military,” he admitted. 

“I didn’t know you were in the military…” Shi Qingxuan muttered.

“I also have one on my ass. But that one’s… let’s just say it’s not safe for work,” he said, smirking proudly.

Shi Qingxuan gagged and rolled her eyes. However insufferable, she needed this to work.

Shi Wudu hiked up his shirt to show off the piece on his ribs. It was a large clipper ship with three rows of white sails. Shi Qingxuan sometimes forgot he even had a tattoo. He dragged her to that stupid shop and she didn’t even want to go, but she did remember he sat like an ABSOLUTE baby for it. She laughed, thinking back to his groans and grunts of pain in the chair.

Pei Ming’s eyes lingered a little longer than everyone else’s. Shi Qingxuan and Ling Wen locked eyes. 

Finally Pei Ming peeled away and said, “Okay, my turn, right? Never have I ever… Hmm… Never have I ever stolen anything.”

Shi Qingxuan, Xuan Ji, and Ling Wen drank, putting a finger down.

Shi Wudu looked horrified at his sister, but before he could say anything, she beat him to it.

“Look! It was a one-time-thing, okay?! Don’t be weird about it! I was still at university and I was in the self check-out in the grocery store and I couldn’t find the stupid strawberries on the produce menu scanning thing. So I just rang them up as raspberries and left. I haven’t been back since.”

“That’s not stealing, you’re just stupid,” Shi Wudu grumbled, feeling a little relieved that his sister wasn’t some notorious shoplifter. “But wait, what did you steal, jiejie?”

“Textbooks. Among other unmentionables.”

That didn’t sound suspicious at all.

“My turn, then,” Shi Wudu said, not wanting to question her further. “Okay… How about… Never have I ever dated anyone.”

Everyone else took a drink and put another finger down. 

Pei Ming glanced strangely over at Shi Wudu, but decided against saying something. Shi Qingxuan, noticing their microinteractions, thought that the plan was working! He even said that, completely unprompted!

“Never have I ever dated someone younger than me,” Xuan Ji said, eyes flashing bitterly towards Pei Ming.

Pei Ming, Pei Xiu, and Ling Wen all took a drink and put a finger down.

“Never have I ever used a bad pick-up line seriously,” Pei Xiu said, looking pointed at his older brother.

“Hey, you guys are targeting me.” Still, Pei Ming reluctantly took a sip.

“Okay! My turn!” Shi Qingxuan chirped. “Never have I ever had sex before.”

“What are we counting as sex?” asked Pei Ming. “Like going all the way or does foreplay count?”

“Why are you asking, Lover Boy?” Ling Wen snapped, narrowing her eyes. “Just take a drink already.”

“I’m just making sure everyone’s on the same page,” he hissed, taking a drink anyway.

“Foreplay doesn’t count,” Shi Qingxuan clarified. “I’ve done some stuff, but I’m talking about all the way.”

Shi Wudu grimaced. He did not want to hear about his sister’s sex life. Especially not when her current fancy was… him… He felt a little nauseous at the thought.

Pei Ming, Ling Wen, Xuan Ji all took a drink and put another finger down. Pei Ming was in the lead, with five fingers down.

Pei Ming looked curiously at Shi Wudu and asked, “Really, Wudu, not ever?”

Shi Wudu shook his head and said, “Never.”

“Foreplay?”

He shrugged. “Never even kissed someone.”

Pei Ming nodded vaguely. He was trying to determine if Shi Wudu was somewhere on the aro/ace spectrum or if he just never found the “right” person.

Ling Wen’s turn was next, “Never have I ever cheated on someone.”

“Okay, now this is really getting targeted…” Pei Ming muttered, taking another sip. Now with six fingers down.

Xuan Ji also took a sip. Everyone stared at her. 

“I didn’t cheat on you,” she clarified through narrowed eyes. “It was stupid. I made out with my boyfriend’s best friend when I was in high school. It wasn’t a big deal.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I never cheated on you, either,” he offered vaguely. “Okay, well. Never have I ever… Oh, I don’t know… Seen a ghost? Whatever. I can’t think of anything.”

Xuan Ji and Pei Xiu took a sip.

“Okay, well, you HAVE to tell us what happened,” Shi Qingxuan ordered.

“That’s not part of the game,” Shi Wudu pointed out dismissively. “They don’t have to explain. No one does.”

The tension in the air suddenly rose tenfold. Shi Qingxuan bit her tongue to try and keep her from retaliating. This was for everyone’s sake. Her brother must get railed. For the sake of the entire vacation. (Was he a bottom? She had no idea. He probably didn’t either.) If she needed to stiffen her upper lip and take some of his passive aggressive quips, then so be it.

“Is there a problem…?” Pei Ming asked, despite definitely knowing what the problem between them was.

Shi Wudu ignored him. “My turn! Never have I ever been arrested.”

Pei Ming narrowed his eyes and put another finger down. “You guys suck.” He took another drink. At this rate, he was going to run out of beer and fingers.

Xuan Ji’s turn next. “Never have I ever… Hmm… Oh! Never have I ever been skinny dipping!”

Everyone looked around, but no one took a sip.

“Oh really?” Xuan Ji asked, surprised. “No one?” 

“Not even you, Pei?” Ling Wen asked.

Pei Ming shook his head. “You’d think so, right? But I’ve never actually done it.”

There was some awkward silence. Shi Qingxuan looked at Pei Xiu expectantly. 

“Oh? Is it me?” he asked. “Um… Never have I ever… broken a bone?”

Pei Ming, Shi Qingxuan, Shi Wudu, and Xuan Ji all took a sip. Pei Ming only had two fingers left.

Shi Qingxuan locked eyes with her brother and flashed a shit eating grin his way. 

“Never have I ever taken it up the ass,” she said, boldly. “And no, ge, the stick perpetually stuck up your ass doesn’t count.” It probably wasn’t the right thing to say given their current situation, but she wasn’t thinking too clearly. 

“Isn’t that the same question as before?” Pei Xiu asked. 

“No, anal is different,” Pei Ming said, defending her question. “Hole different ball game, if you know what I mean, hoho!”

Pei Ming, Xuan Ji, and Ling Wen all took a sip. Pei Ming was down to one finger!

Shi Wudu’s mouth went dry and his heart raced when he realized what that implied, but he didn’t know if he should laugh or cry. Was Pei Ming just kinky and got pegged one time by a girl? Was he some sort of bisexual and taken it from a guy before?! Shi Wudu was dying to know!

“Wait, jiejie?!” Pei Ming asked, noticing she had taken a sip. “You’ve…?”

“My fiancé likes it,” she shrugged. “I usually don’t let him touch me. But if he’s obedient, sometimes I let him fuck my ass as a reward.”

Everyone’s mouth dropped. Ling Wen?? A stone top?? With what sounded like a sub fiancé?! What the fuck!! This was news to everyone.

“YOU HAVE A FIANCÉ?” Pei Ming screamed. “Wait, hold on! How come you never told us?!”

Ling Wen looked confused. “What do you mean? I told you at that party six months ago when you got drunk and tried to kiss me.”

Xuan Ji looked between them, fury burning in her stomach at the thought.

“I thought you were kidding! I thought that was a stupid excuse!” Pei Ming cried.

Ling Wen scoffed. “Why would I lie about a fiancé when there are so many other reasons why I wouldn’t kiss a degenerate like you?” 

“Have we ever met him?” Shi Wudu asked, also flabbergasted. “Wait, why didn’t you invite him here with us?”

She shook her head. “I didn’t want to bring him. You guys would be weird about it. And now I’m glad I didn’t, ‘cuz of all the bullshit that’s happened…”

“What’s his name? Do we know him?” Pei Ming asked.

“Bai Jin.”

Shi Wudu’s jaw dropped, somehow even further than before.

“YOU AND—?” Pei Ming started and then stopped himself. “You know what, congratulations, jiejie.”

“Yeah,” Shi Wudu echoed, picking his jaw up from the sand. “Congrats, jiejie. We’re happy for you. We’re getting invited to the wedding, right?”

She narrowed her eyes and said, “I’ll think about it.”

“I’ve never seen you wear a ring!” Xuan Ji lamented. “Is it a big rock?”

“It’s just a simple gold band, but I didn’t bring it on vacation.”

“Wait, when’s the wedding?” Shi Qingxuan asked. “I love weddings!”

“You only like open bars at weddings…” Shi Wudu snapped.

Shi Qingxuan almost snapped back, but Ling Wen spoke up before she had the chance. “See, this is why I didn’t want to make a big deal about it,” Ling Wen groaned. “Everyone gets so nosy when you get engaged.”

“Okay, okay,” Shi Wudu said. “Let’s let jiejie keep her secrets. But it’s your question next.”

“Ready to lose, Pei?” she said, smirking. Pei Ming shook his head, annoyed and muttered something under his breath. “Never have I ever gotten a DUI.”

“Fuck you for that. It was one time! Why do you guys keep bringing it up?”

Pei Ming chugged the last remaining bit of his drink. He crumbled up his plastic cup and threw it in the sand, cursing. 

“I believe that’s the game,” Shi Wudu said. “Are we doing, like, a punishment or something?”

“It’s not my fault you guys are pussys and haven’t ever done anything cool,” he snapped. “You guys are all so fuckin’ weird. And you targeted me! This is entirely unfair. And? Three?? Of you are virgins?? Like, what?!”

“Not for lack of trying…” Shi Qingxuan mumbled. 

Shi Wudu pretended he didn’t hear that, and put his head in his hands.

“We should punish him,” Ling Wen said, grinning a little too wide.

“Take off your shirt and pants for the rest of the night!” blurted out Shi Qingxuan. 

Shi Wudu’s head snapped up. He locked eyes with his sister. She couldn’t decipher if he was angry or grateful. 

Pei Ming laughed and threw his shirt off in a second. “I’d hardly call that a punishment. If anything, that’s a reward for everyone here, hoho! Like what you see?” He started unbuttoning his shorts.

Shi Qingxuan was trying her best not to vomit. “Ew, gross. I take it back. Put it back on—”

Shi Wudu was trying his best not to stare too noticeably.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

It was morning the next day. Most everyone was still nursing a nasty hangover. Shi Qingxuan and Ling Wen had seen Pei Ming and Shi Wudu talking until late into the night, but they were too drunk to really remember if they had made any progress in their master plan.

Shi Qingxuan, on the other hand, had already made new plans with He Xuan for the day. Secret, escaping plans. She popped a pain killer and downed three glasses of water to try and recover quickly.

He Xuan wouldn’t tell her what they were going to be doing today, having planned the whole thing when she told him her brother was being weird and keeping her locked up. The only thing he did say was to ‘dress appropriately for a boat’ and to ‘wear slip-resistant shoes’.

Except, she didn’t pack any shoes like that for the trip. And what the heck was the attire for a boat? Swimsuit and shorts? Like a leisure boat or a fishing boat? He didn’t even read her messages asking follow-up questions… She was going to assume a fishing boat…

And he was already on his way to pick her up.

Shi Qingxuan was ass-up, bent over, digging around through various suitcases in the other girls’ room, looking for something when Ling Wen walked in.

“What are you doing?”

Shi Qingxuan startled upon hearing her voice, and whirled around. She breathed a sigh of relief, realizing it was only Ling Wen, and asked, “Do you have any sneakers or, like, close-toed shoes I could borrow?”

Ling Wen narrowed her eyes. “Yes, why? You didn’t bring any?”

“No, I only brought some Birkenstocks for casual stuff and my sandals for cute stuff. I just wanna go… for a run! Yeah, a run!”

Ling Wen continued to look at her suspiciously.

“Look, I promise I’m not gonna do anything dangerous. But I’m not going to be kept in a cage while on vacation. He can’t ground me. I’m an adult.”

Ling Wen crossed her arms, shaking her head slightly. She sighed after a long moment and said, “Fine.”

Shi Qingxuan’s heart soared, moving to embrace Ling Wen. “Ah, thank you, jiejie—!”

“No,” she said, holding up a hand for her to stop. “Don’t thank me. He’s going to kill you if you do this.”

“He’s not gonna—”

“He’s going to find out,” Ling Wen said, as-a-matter-of-factly. “You’re not very good at being sneaky.”

Shi Qingxuan swallowed uncomfortably. The pillows she’s laid in her bed and covered up with the blanket would only work for so long…

“When will you be back?”

She thought for a moment, hesitating. It was kinda impossible to tell. “Late? I don’t really know. Maybe sometime tonight? If I’m not back by midnight, I’ll call.”

“Don’t call me.”

“I meant I’ll call my brother, jiejie.”

“Good. Leave me out of this.”

Ling Wen pushed her way over to her suitcase and retrieved a pair of grey and blue sneakers. 

“I never gave you these, got it? And I never said that leaving from the back door would be better than the front because your brother’s in the living room.”

Shi Qingxuan snickered quietly, giving her a brief hug for a moment, before sneaking out the back door.

“Midnight,” Ling Wen reminded her quietly. “He’ll flip out if you don’t call before then, but I can keep him from doing anything too drastic until midnight, okay? And I’ll try to speed things along so he gets… distracted.”

“I got it, jiejie. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. He’s going to kill you.”

“I know, I know.”

Shi Qingxuan waved back before scurrying out the back door of the rental, slipping Ling Wen’s sneakers on, and running off before Shi Wudu could figure out she was missing.

And there was that white truck parked a little ways down the road, waiting for her. The window was rolled down and He Xuan had his elbow propped up on the edge, sending a small wave in her direction.

A huge smile split her face in two. Why did He Xuan feel more like home than her own brother?

Chapter Text

When He Xuan heard about Shi Qingxuan’s unjust seclusion, rage surged in his chest and threatened to boil over. No matter what Shi Wudu thought of him, He Xuan thought a hundred million times worse of Shi Wudu. And now the bastard had locked Shi Qingxuan away… just to keep her from him?

Absolutely not. Shi Wudu had already taken one person from He Xuan. He’d be damned if he let the bastard take another.

It wasn’t the most glamorous plan, and it definitely wasn’t going to be any fun. But at least Shi Qingxuan would be free of her brother’s constant control. The stream of drunk, whiny, ranting texts and rambling voice messages she sent yesterday made it clear, he wasn’t just annoying. He was unbearable.

She still looked radiant, even in captivity. As she approached the truck parked a distance away from the bungalow-prison, she wrinkled her nose, catching the lingering funky fish smell He Xuan had long gone nose-blind to, and climbed into the passenger seat anyway, smiling like the sun.

“Hey!” she said cheerily. 

At least she was in good spirits, he marked.

“Thanks for coming to my rescue. I really appreciate it.” She reached out and put a hand on his thigh for a moment and then retracted it. “So! What are we doing today? Why the dress code?”

He Xuan, reeling from the touch to his thigh, snapped out of it and finally looked to see if she had complied with his vague instructions.

He said flatly, “You’re wearing shorts.” And she had a cute purse.

She looked down, confirming it. “Yeah, you didn’t say anything about shorts… You just said ‘boat attire’ and I didn’t know what kind of boat you meant. Also, I didn’t bring any long pants. But I did borrow some sneakers!”

He Xuan pinched the bridge of his nose. “Whatever. You’ll have to borrow something of mine.” Mumbling, “I think I have an extra pair…”

“What are we doing?”

“I have to work,” he explained. “I’m taking you out on the boat with me. It’s nothing exciting. But maybe it’s better than being stuck in there with him.”

Shi Qingxuan processed this news, a little unsure of how she felt about it. 

More boats. More chances to see that creature… 

She stifled a shiver creeping up her spine.

Shi Qingxuan put a big smile on her face despite her mixed feelings.

“Alright, then. Let’s get to it!”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

The boat was rocking gently in the water by the time they walked out onto the dock. The white mid-morning sun shimmered across the water, making everything look a little too peaceful and serene. She was starting to feel a little uneasy about this whole thing, but tried to keep it together. It was worth it if she got to spend some time with He Xuan. She tried to block out her brother’s words echoing in the back of her mind…

“If he doesn’t try to kill you before you tell him, believe me, when he finds out you’re trans, he’ll try after.”

A morbid, anxious cloud of worries sent flutters to her stomach.

I have to tell him… she thought.

She followed behind him trying to think of how to broach something like this naturally. Her ruffled white crop top caught the breeze. He Xuan thought she looked so clearly out of place among the rusted metal and tangles of rope. He held out a hand to steady her as she climbed aboard.

She took it, grinning. “So this is the famous boat?”

“I don’t know about famous.”

She stepped onto the deck and looked around vaguely.

“It’s smaller than I thought. Smells like fish.” But nowhere NEARLY as bad as his truck.

He rolled his eyes and turned toward the cabin with the wheelhouse. “Better get used to it.”

“No, no, don’t get me wrong! I love seafood!”

Her gaze landed on the name stenciled across the bow in faded blue paint. She blinked once, then turned slowly back to him, smile stretching.

“Wait… No way, hahahaha! The Dream Boat?” she asked, gleeful. “There’s no way you named it The Dream Boat!!”

He closed his eyes, embarrassment rising up into his ears. “Shut up.”

“Please tell me it’s ironic, ahahaha!” She was already in stitches, hunched over, clutching her stomach from laughing so hard. He Xuan just stared at her, not making eye contact. “Wait! It’s not ironic, is it? You really meant it?!”

“Daiyu’s idea… She thought it was funny.”

Shi Qingxuan’s face dropped, stomach feeling like she just ate a dozen rocks.

“Oh, I’m sorry—”

He muttered something inaudible and stalked toward a lone banged up locker in the cabin. “Here. You’re gonna ruin those fancy clothes. Put these on.”

She took the bundle he handed her and unfolded it. A pair of rubber boots about two sizes too big, a large black T-shirt with some death metal band logo on it she couldn’t read, and a pair of faded green waterproof overalls that looked like they’d survived a war.

“These are… hideous,” she said, delighted.

“They’re practical. You want to be cute or do you want to not smell like a rotting fish?”

She wiggled up an eyebrow. “What if I want both?”

He gave her an unimpressed glare.

“Fine, fine,” she laughed, kicking off her borrowed sneakers and held out the floppy boots that would surely look like clown shoes on her feet. “No peeking while I change.”

He was already averting his eyes. “There’s a bathroom in the cabin. Go.”

By the time she put on the shirt, zipped into the overalls, and adjusted the boots for the fifth time, he was already at the bow, coiling rope with practiced ease.

“You’re sure about this, huh?” she said, stepping carefully toward him. “I’m really gonna be shadowing you at work? I don’t really know anything about boats or fishing…”

“I don’t bring civilians onboard lightly,” he said. “It’ll be fine.” 

Shi Qingxuan bristled, shifting her weight between her feet anxiously, “Do you have any life jackets or something? Just in case?”

“No, but there’s a life preserver over there,” he said, barely offering a glance up.

“Will you save me if I go overboard?” She was imagining a terribly romantic scenario in her head of him, dripping wet, holding her in his arms and coming out of the sea, like some romance movie.

He thought about it for a moment. “Probably.”

Dream shattered!

“Probably?!”

He smirked and continued coiling up the rope. “Just do what I say and nothing bad will happen.”

She saluted him, lips twitching in barely held back laughter. “Aye, aye, captain.”

He faltered just slightly, the rope slipping between his fingers. A new pinkish color dusting his ears. “Don’t call me captain,” he mumbled.

She smirked mischievously and giggled.

They set out onto open water, waves lapping gently against the hull as he showed her how to check the bait bins, prep the lines, and toss out the crab pots. 

Shi Qingxuan had never even seen a crab pot before, this big circular wire trap attached to thick ropes and buoys. 

“This is how you catch those things?!” Shi Qingxuan marveled. “I would’ve never guessed! I’ve only ever seen crabs and lobsters and stuff in those creepy fish tanks in the supermarket or in those weird restaurants where you can, like, play the claw game to pick which one you want.”

“Those are incredibly cruel.”

Shi Qingxuan tried to pick up a crab pot to help He Xuan toss them overboard once they’d reached some specific point. She struggled with the weight of one (they were incredibly heavy and bulky for something mostly made out of wire). He Xuan had to step in behind her, his hands bracketing hers as he helped guide it overboard.

“Let go on three,” he said, his low monotone right behind her ear. “One… two—”

Her breath hitched, hearing him so close, and she let go early. The crab pot nearly caught the edge.

He pulled her back quickly with a hand at her waist, steadying her.

“I said on three.”

“I panicked,” she said breathlessly.

His hand lingered. “Yeah, I noticed.”

Their eyes met for a fraction too long. Shi Qingxuan smelled like coconut sunscreen and warm vanilla. He Xuan had to clear his throat and avert eye contact, racing away from the unintentionally intimate position.

“Wait, so why do the crab pots go here, but we haven’t started, like, actually fishing yet?”

“Because of the spill a couple years ago, there’s been some regulations on the locations where we can fish, where we can put down the pots,” he explained, walking over to the next task on the other side of the boat. “Lots of the local marine life were affected by the spill and either died or migrated to another area. And even though the spill was cleaned up years ago and sea life is coming back, we can’t risk overfishing and ruining the growing populations.”

“Ahh, that makes sense.”

“Come over here. We’re going to start prepping the lines next.”

She squatted beside the bait cooler and wrinkled her nose at the fish guts. Three fishing rods were attached to the side of the boat. She’d never seen anything like it, but instead of a straight rod, they were all bent at ninety degree angles.

“So what happens if you accidentally drop one of these over the side of the boat?”

“I make you swim down and get it.”

“Hey! I’d pull you in after me!” 

“I’d like to see you try.”

“With my boat luck, I’ll get pulled under by some mythical sea monster and drown by noon.” She sighed dramatically. “What can I say? I’ve got a penchant for mysterious, emotionally unavailable sea monsters.

He didn’t smile, but the edge of his mouth twitched. “Sure you do.”

“Especially ones who name their boats The Dream Boat.”

“Are you insinuating that I’m a sea monster?” he stared up at her, skeptically.

“You never know with these things. People can identify as all kinds of different stuff. We’re dealing with a broad spectrum these days, you know.” 

She was sort of soft launching the idea of coming out to him, trying to gauge his reaction. 

He shook his head at such a ridiculous notion. “People are people. Monsters are monsters,” he said, dismissing the topic. “Why would a sea monster need a boat, anyway?”

Well, that wasn’t exactly a telling answer, so she decided to play it off and keep it light.

“I don’t know. Why do humans need cars if they have feet? It’s the same thing. What is a car but a land boat?”

He narrowed his eyes. “Just help me with the bait.”

“Okay, captain,” she said, tossing a fish head at him. “Ahaha, ‘Oh captain, my captain’!”

He caught it midair, tossed it into the bait bin, and gave her a look. “I’m not your captain.”

She smiled. 

But you could be… she thought secretly.

As Shi Qingxuan was reeling up the hook of the rod in the middle— well, she couldn’t really say what happened, to be honest— but the line caught on something and snapped back into her face.

“Shit!” she screamed, hearing the horrible pop.

And before she knew what happened, she was flat on her ass.

“Are you alright?” He Xuan asked, racing over and offering a hand out to pull her up.

“Yeah… Oh god. Sorry. I don’t know… That was so weird. It just snapped! I’m sorry—”

“I don’t care about the line, are you okay? It didn’t hit you or anything?”

“Yeah, popped me in the cheek, but I’m fine.”

There was a little red line on her face from where it had got her, but it wasn’t bleeding or anything. 

“Are you really gonna make me go in the water and get it…?”

“What? No.”

Shi Qingxuan breathed in relief.

He Xuan took a look at the damage. The end of the line with the hook and lure was already probably at the bottom of the ocean by now. He sighed. It wasn’t her fault, that rod had been giving him trouble recently. Maybe a faulty spool or something. He’d have to take a closer look at it some other time.

After attaching the bait to the rest of the hooks and releasing them into the water, Shi Qingxuan was already feeling exhausted. She hadn’t worked this much in a while. The sun was climbing high by the time they paused for a drink, both leaning back against the railing, wind in their hair and the sea glittering around them.

She nudged his shoulder lightly with hers.

“You know, this is nice. I thought it was going to be super boring and hard and gross,” she said. “But it’s not as bad as I expected. And you didn’t have to bring me.”

He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “Yeah. I did.”

She felt a little embarrassed. Embarrassed that her brother was turning out to be such a monster, embarrassed that this guy she was sort-of seeing had to rescue her from her fucked up family on his fishing boat of all places. 

“Thank you. For real, He Xuan. You’re a lifesaver.”

And for a second, everything was quiet. Her smile faded into something softer, more vulnerable.

He leaned in just slightly, testing the waters.

Shi Qingxuan suddenly panicked and turned her head away, swallowing uncomfortably.

Neither of them said anything for a moment, before he began working like nothing had almost happened.

Shi Qingxuan was cursing herself out in her mind for chickening out.

I have to tell him before… 

It would be a disservice to him and herself if both of them weren’t on the same page about who she really was. He had to know before they did anything.

They worked side by side for most of the morning, settling into a rhythm that surprised them both.

He was all sharp, efficient movements, tossing ropes, checking knots, adjusting the crab pot buoys with steady, capable hands. She was less efficient, more curious and hesitant, always asking questions. So many questions. Always watching him like she was trying to memorize every frown and furrow on his face.

He Xuan crouched by a crate, sorting through a mess of extra fishing lines since that one had snapped earlier. Fishing would probably be a bust today. With only two lines up and working, he doubted he’d make any substantial catches. Maybe he could let out the trawl net for a change, just for something to sell in the morning.

She was supposed to be wiping down some gear, but she kept stealing glances at him instead. When he caught her staring, she gave him a big, cheesy smile, and went back to cleaning. He squinted back at her. 

Next, he started explaining how to sort the morning’s catch. When they had hauled up the crab pots that had been soaking for several hours with the winch (that Shi Qingxuan was not allowed to operate), they opened the pots up to begin sorting into different tanks. Dumping them out, the crabs clattered onto a large table, legs tapping wildly as they tried to crawl away.

“Careful,” he warned, reaching out just in time as she jerked her hand back. “They’ll pinch you.”

“They’re kinda cute! But… I don't know… Do you ever feel guilty?” she asked, holding her wrist to keep herself from petting them. “Do they even know they’re going to be eaten? Isn’t that kinda sad? Ripping them from their homes only to—”

He raised a brow. “I thought you liked seafood?”

“I do, but… I don’t know… Whatever, it’s stupid…”

“You’ll get used to it.”

She glanced at him. “You say that about everything.”

“Because it’s true.”

She tilted her head, watching as he gently righted a flipped crab with his long fingers. His touch was careful, almost respectful, despite the fact he’d be selling them to the fishmonger by morning. Measuring each against a wooden ruler and tossing it into a different tank depending on the size. He worked impossibly quick, tossing and measuring and tossing and measuring with incredible accuracy and efficiency. She just gawked at him.

“You’re really good at this,” she said, softer now. “Like, holy shit.”

He gave her a long-suffering look. “Are you going to help?”

She raised both hands. “I feel like I’d just slow you down or mess up or something…”

“Probably. But… you can try anyway.”

She gasped, scandalized.

He smiled the tiniest bit. She caught it before he hid it again.

He Xuan quickly moved onto their next task, untangling a trawl net. If the fishing lines were a bust, then the least he could do was let down the trawl to try and catch something as they taxied around. She sat cross-legged on the deck, helping him. It reminded her of the kites from the day before. She let him do most of the work, remembering how horribly that had gone.

“You don’t mind the quiet?” she asked after a while. “Don’t you get into your head with no one else to talk to? I’d definitely go crazy out here all alone with no music or someone to talk to.”

He shrugged. “I mean, sometimes I get in my head, but usually it’s… fine. Peaceful. Always something else to do with the job. No one out here but me and the sea.”

“And now me,” she said, smiling.

He didn’t look at her, but his voice was quieter. “Yeah. And now you.”

He Xuan suggested they have lunch next, since it was getting later into the afternoon. They sat down on a bolted down cot pressed up against the wall of the tiny interior cabin structure. There was a mini fridge to the right of the steering wheel where he’d procured two sandwiches, two apples, and two small bottles of water, and handed her one of each. To the right, a door to the tiny bathroom that she’d used to change.

“This is a cool little place! It’s got a bed, a fridge, and a bathroom! Do you ever stay here overnight or something? You could totally camp out here! Or have sleepovers!”

“I stay here most nights.”

“Really? Why?”

He hesitated before speaking, clearing his throat. “Night fishing,” was the safe answer. He decided to give the real answer after a moment, “And… It’s… It’s better than being at home.”

He Xuan hadn’t the heart or the nerve to step into Daiyu’s old room in years. It was better just to keep it shut.

I know what that feels like, she thought. Being in the house after her father died, it just never felt the same.

Shi Qingxuan changed the subject.

“Do you ever sneak beers or other fun stuff in the mini fridge?”

“That would be illegal.”

Not that it stopped about 75% of the other local fishermen…

“Oh yeah. Duh. Laws.”

She took up the sandwich first, unwrapping it from the plastic. Ham, cheese, and mayonnaise. Not her preferred choice, but it would do in a pinch. By the time she looked back at him, he’d already inhaled his own sandwich and started working on his apple.

“You know,” she said, covering her mouth between bites, “you’re not nearly as scary as you pretend to be.”

He raised an eyebrow, swallowing a chunk of apple. “I’m not pretending. Just born this way.”

“No, no. I’ve figured you out, He Xuan. You’re totally pretending!” she insisted. “Sure, you’ve got that whole ‘mysterious man of the sea, tragic backstory’ thing going, but then you do stuff like make sure I have proper footwear on and pack me an apple. That’s not mysterious. That’s soft.”

He gave her a hard look. “I’ll make you walk the plank and we’ll see who’s soft.”

Shi Qingxuan grinned, swatting him lightly with a free hand. “Oh, would it kill you to admit it? You like having me here.”

He rolled his eyes. But he didn’t deny it, either.

They finished their lunch as the afternoon wore on, golden and lazy. They worked slower now, moving like people who didn’t want the day to end. 

She was crouched beside the tanks, sorting the last of the crabs under his half-watching eye. Every so often, he’d come up behind her and nudge a wayward one back into place. She kept getting distracted by how sharp his profile looked in the afternoon light, how the wind whipped his bangs around, how serious his mouth always seemed when he was focused.

He caught her in the act and raised an eyebrow.

“You keep staring at me. What?”

“Nothing.” She looked down, cheeks warm. 

He rolled his eyes and turned back toward the rope bin. “Don’t get distracted.”

They finished the last bit of clean-up in near silence, the good kind, comfortable, slightly awkward, full of glances that both of them pretended not to notice.

Later, she sat on the deck while he started up the boat again in the wheelhouse.

“You ready to go back?” he asked. “I’m finished for the day. Gonna sell in the morning.”

The crab haul was larger than normal, but he barely caught anything substantial, fish-wise. With the wire snapping and the trawl net only out for half of the day, it hadn’t been a good catch. 

And… He was also a little distracted, to be honest. 

She shook her head, heart seizing at the thought of leaving his side, of going back to see her brother, who was probably already freaking out. 

“I… I don’t want to go back yet.”

He looked at her, and nodded like he understood.

“Well, we can grab something to eat for dinner and figure out what to do from there.”

“Yeah, sounds good.”

The motor was off now, and the boat swayed quietly near the dock, already moored. The sun hung low in the sky, painting the water in streaks of gold, just the color of those beautiful little specks in his brown eyes.

The last tasks of the day wrapped up around them. Shi Qingxuan scooted next to him and leaned on the railing. She had already changed back into her normal clothes, hair windswept and soft around her face. 

He Xuan bristled next to her, feigning annoyance. He’d also changed back into normal sneakers, jeans, and that same black sweatshirt. 

She’d meant to ask something, anything, maybe about the crabs… but the words had never left her mouth.

Instead, her eyes fell to his lips.

The golden light caught the edge of his cheekbone. His mouth was so close. Just right there. Soft. Serious.

She was leaning in before she realized it. His face so close now, it made her heart skip. He wasn’t pulling away! He wasn’t smiling either… Just looking at her, steady and unreadable.

And then, just before she could close the gap, her thoughts made her freeze.

How could you kiss him when he doesn’t even know what you are? You disgusting creep…

She snapped her head away.

“…Sorry,” she said softly, her voice almost lost to the waves. “I didn’t mean… I mean…”

She didn’t know how to finish that even if she tried.

“Don’t,” he said, swallowing hard.

He didn’t move. Just sat there, still as stone, turned towards the ocean. Overthinking everything he’d done all day. Was it something he’d done? Or didn't do? 

Shi Qingxuan bit her lip and forced a smile. She looked out toward the horizon like nothing had happened.

He Xuan stole a glance for a moment, then looked away, jaw tight.

The boat rocked gently beneath them, quiet and slow, until the silence was just too full, too heavy.

Shi Qingxuan stood perfectly still, heart hammering against her ribs.

Fuck. I wanna kiss him so bad, she thought, staring at his lips. He’ll kill me…  

A snort of laughter escaped from He Xuan’s mouth and he smirked, “Yeah, right…”

“Wait, what?”

“I’m not going to kill you if you try to kiss me. That’s ridiculous.”

She was still very confused. “…Are you reading my mind or did I say that out loud?”

“You said it.”

“I definitely did not just say that out loud, right to your face…” she lamented, covering her face in shame. “Oh my god, that’s so embarrassing. I know you’re not gonna kill me, ahahahaha…”

A storm of emotions and thoughts churned and clouded over her head. She wanted to kiss him. She wanted to do more than kiss him, if she was honest. But her crippling fear of rejection left her stalwart, hesitant, and very unsure of how to proceed.

He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know about me. What I am…

What if he hates me? What if ge was right? What if he runs, or worse…?

What if everything changes the moment he finds out and he—?

No. No, he wouldn’t hurt me. That’s stupid. That’s just paranoia talking.

But still… I have to tell him. He deserves to know. He deserves the choice, before this turns into something more than I can take back.

I just… I don’t want to ruin it.

I don’t want him to look at me like I’m someone else.

Please, please don’t look at me differently.

She hadn’t felt this strongly about someone in possibly forever. If this went badly, she didn’t know if her heart would ever recover.

He Xuan knew something was the matter. Anxieties he could never even hope to understand were painted clear as day over her beautiful face. She didn’t deserve to have so many unhappy thoughts when thinking about kissing him. He reached towards her and poked her forehead with his black fingernail.

He ordered, voice serious and harsh, “Stop thinking so hard.”

Shi Qingxuan looked up at him, the corners of her eyes already prickling with tears. But it shocked her out of a flurry of worry clouding her thoughts.

She took a deep breath and tried to begin. “I… You should… I think… Do you know—” 

Several sentences died in her throat. She got frustrated and made a little whimper before giving up, shoulders slumping in defeat. 

It was like her mind stopped working for a moment.

His thumb wiped away a tear threatening to fall as he cupped her cheek.

“What is it?” he asked more gently than he intended. 

Heartbreak from someone that was not He Xuan reflected in her eyes, but it was still raw.

“It’s just… I do want to kiss you,” she admitted through tears.

His face betrayed a semblance of emotion on his normally stoic face. “How is that a bad thing?”

“I like you,” she said gravely, like it was the answer to his question. 

Like it wasn’t just a confession.

Like it was a warning.

“I really like you.”

He didn’t answer at first, he just looked at her, trying to understand. Trying to scry something she hadn’t said yet just from the pain in her glassy eyes.

But isn’t that a good thing? he thought, thoroughly confused. “I don’t understand.”

“You should know something about me before whatever this is goes any further,” she said, and her voice turned rehearsed. Too calm. Like she was reading from a card she’d memorized a hundred times over. “I’m a trans woman.” 

He Xuan blinked once. Twice. Not sure what the dramatic build-up was for.

She studied him carefully. There was no visible reaction. No recoil, no shift in his expression. Just that unreadable stillness.

“Do you know what that means?”  she asked. 

He shook his head.

Of course he didn’t.

He had grown up in a lonely little town by the sea. He kept to himself. He didn’t spend time with people unless he had to. He didn’t talk much, and they didn’t talk to him much either.

It was understandable that he hadn’t really heard about it before. But she also knew that people from small towns could be weird about anything that was different… But from the way the locals treated him, she had a little spark of hope that maybe he’d be able to understand and empathize.

Please, just don’t try to kill me…

She took a breath. A deep, careful one.

And then she began to explain.

She walked him through it gently. She’d gotten good at this, starting from the beginning, softening herself for other people’s comfort. Making herself and circumstance digestible for others.

He didn’t interrupt. Didn’t look away. Didn’t ask questions. He just listened, quiet and focused, his face unreadable as ever, but something churned behind his honey-brown eyes. Something she couldn’t read.

When she finished, she twiddled her fingers nervously and braced herself.

His expression still hadn’t changed.

And she dreaded the words that were surely about to come out of his mouth.

“What does that have to do with wanting to kiss me?” he asked. “Is that really a big deal?” 

A joyless noise spilled from her lips. 

“Heh, you’d be surprised. A lot of people think it’s disgusting to kiss someone like me,” she said in a small voice. “But whatever you feel about it is fine. I just wanted to let you know before anything happens. Haha! Um. Not that I’m implying that anything’s gonna happen! But, yeah, just so you would have a chance to, I don’t know… bail, jump ship, or run away or something.”

A formerly motionless eyebrow shot up. “You think I’m going to run away?”

She couldn’t help the nervous laughter and admitted, “I don’t know what you’re going to do.”

Just please don’t be mean… she prayed. Please, please, please, don’t be mean.

“You’re still you, right?” he asked, brows furrowing. “I guess I don’t really care… I’d still want you to kiss me regardless.”

She almost let herself feel happy at his answer. Almost.

A ghost of a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth, and a hollow laugh escaped her. She’d heard things like this many times before.

All her past relationships followed the same cruel pattern. She’d come out to someone, and at first, they’d act cool about it. Maybe they’d even kiss her once or twice, just enough to make her hope. But when things started moving toward something more intimate, that’s when the distance would start. That’s when her heart would break.

Sometimes she wondered if they were just afraid of looking like bigots. Afraid of being “cancelled” if they rejected a trans woman outright. So instead, they waited. Waited a few weeks, maybe a month. Then let her down gently, respectably.

That was, until her last ex.

She really thought it was different with him. A little less than a year, they were together. She thought maybe, maybe, this one wouldn’t run. But in the end, he was just like the rest.

He bolted. Right in the middle of her taking off her clothes.

Humiliating. Heartbreaking. Traumatizing.

And that wasn’t even the worst part.

She shook her head, not wanting to think about it. No. She was getting too caught up in the past again.

“You know, you don’t have to be nice and tell me what you think I want to hear. Especially not if you’re just going to let me down easy in the future. You can tell me if it’s a dealbreaker for you. I can handle it. It’s better now rather than later.”

Please don’t drag it out. Just give it to me straight if you think I’m an abomination or whatever, she thought.

He continued to stare at her with that same, blank expression. She was getting frustrated with his lack of emotion to her big lore drop! But for He Xuan, the gears were cranking so loudly in his mind for any possible words to respond that he couldn’t even make room for his brain to put effort into his face.

Am I not being clear enough…? he thought.

In turn, she misunderstood his staggering silence as rejection. A hard lump caught in her throat and she bit her lips, trying to hold back a whimper. She couldn’t even look at him.

“Yeah, no, it’s fine! It happens all the time, no biggie! You don’t have to worry about it. Sorry if I led you on, or whatever, hahaha.”

She turned around to go collect her things to leave, but he caught her hand in a panic.

“I said I’d still want you to kiss me regardless,” he said with a pinched brow that didn’t at all match the sentiment behind his words.

His expression hardened, sharp, unwavering, almost fierce, and for a moment, she nearly shrank back from the intensity of his glare. That look didn’t scream reassurance. It screamed challenge. It only cemented her suspicion— he was just saying what he thought she wanted to hear. Playing along. Biding time.

He continued dangerously, “If you want to kiss me, then do it.”

He’d been waiting all damn day for this. Since yesterday, even. At the lighthouse and flying kites on the beach. He’d held back, trying to be respectful, trying to let her make the first move. He thought she’d been sending signals, but then she’d keep pulling away… and now he was spiraling. He couldn’t screw this up. Not now. Not when it felt like everything was riding on this moment. Come on face, work with him!

Shi Qingxuan couldn’t form coherent thoughts, let alone words. Did he really mean that? She stood frozen still, like a deer caught in the headlights, staring at him like he had a third eye.

He made a small tsk of annoyance and yanked her forward, closing the distance between their lips by himself.

Well…

It was definitely not an ordinary kiss. But it wasn’t some grand romantic gesture like in a romance novel or a period drama, either. His technique was crude, stiff, and harsh, and it sort of felt like he was trying to chew her lips instead of actually kissing her. 

He Xuan mashed his mouth around, trying to bite her through his lips or something? It was entirely unclear what he was trying to do and it was also entirely awful.

This is definitely his first kiss, she realized immediately. Oh my god, does that mean he’s also a virgin like me? 

That sorta made sense in her mind given his previous attempts at courting her in a normal way. She doubted that he ever had a girlfriend before…

Shi Qingxuan was the first to break away from the well-intentioned gesture, not because she needed to breathe from the intensity of the kiss, but more because it kind of hurt? And not in a fun way.

“Do you believe me now?” he asked, trying to sound cool.

His pale face had gone entirely red and his eyes were burning bright gold, staring hungrily into her thoroughly embarrassed face. 

Shi Qingxuan couldn’t help it. Bubbles of laughter caught at the back of her throat and she burst out laughing. She slapped a hand over her mouth, instantly trying to silence herself, but she was in stitches over the absurdity of his atrocious technique. 

He Xuan’s confident smirk dropped into a deep scowl. Somehow his face turned even more red as he looked away from her. He definitely thought about running now. Or jumping overboard.

“I’m so sorry, ahaha!” she breathed in between peels of laughter, placing a hand on his chest for support. “Oh my god, hahaha, I’m so sorry! I’m not laughing at you, I promise! Hahaha! I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Hahahahaha!” 

She was definitely laughing at him.

When the laughter finally faded from her throat and she managed to catch her breath, Shi Qingxuan reached up and cupped his flushed, burning cheeks in her hands. Her touch was steady, reverent, almost trembling with purpose. Then, without another word, she pulled him into a kiss, this time, a real one.

He Xuan made a tiny, startled sound that she immediately swallowed into her mouth. But the surprise lasted only a second. The moment their lips met, he melted against her like wax beneath flame. All the tension in his shoulders, the stiffness in his posture, gone in an instant. She kissed him with quiet confidence, guiding him through the rhythm of it, and he followed as if he’d always known how.

Now this was the kind of kiss she’d dreamed about. The kind that belonged in movie climaxes, in storybook endings. (Well, second kiss technically. But who was counting?)

And He Xuan, for all his uncertainty and fumbling, proved to be a devastatingly quick study. Soon, he matched her pace, mirroring her movements with growing assurance. His hands slid to her hips, fingers curling in with need, and he tugged her closer like he couldn’t bear another inch between them. She rewarded him with a soft, playful bite to his lower lip.

Her mouth curved into a smile against his. A breathless giggle bubbled out of her, giddy and involuntary, carried on the heat of the kiss. He answered with a low hum in his chest, like the sound of thunder building under calm skies.

When they finally broke apart, neither went very far. Their foreheads pressed together, hot breaths accumulating in the space between their mouths. 

Her emerald eyes searched his, still shining with hope and disbelief. And his eyes were dark with awe, blown wide with desire. The golden flecks in his irises were nearly lost in the sea of expanding pupils, hungry and impossibly soft all at once.

“Yeah, I believe you now,” she whispered, pushing his long bangs behind his ear.

Finding this answer acceptable, he attacked her lips as a carnivore would, but this time with technique and the precision of a deadly predator instead of a stumbling fawn. She thought he was determined to devour her for real. Sharp teeth bit painfully down into her bottom lip, and his tongue lapped over it in a soothing gesture. He swallowed down her gasp of pain and used the opportunity to slip his tongue into her mouth.

Strong hands tangled painfully into the back of her hair, and yanked her even closer until her warmth was pressed fully up against his rock solid torso. She couldn’t help the moan that shivered out of her mouth at such delicious rough treatment. For (presumably) a virgin that only just had his (abysmal) first kiss, he was turning out to be quite the natural. 

Her mind started to get a little carried away at how this might translate into kinkier tendencies in the bedroom and she was NOT mad about it. 

A pleasurable heat began pooling in her abdomen as the want and need to be even closer to him grew with every passing second.

Their tongues danced into knots around each other, but in the end he overpowered her. It was her own lungs fault— she kept running out of breath much too quickly for how much she wanted to continue. It was like he didn’t even need to breathe.

Patting his shoulder to signal her surrender, she started to break away to breathe, but he tried to follow her, a low growl forming in his mouth at the thought of not being connected to her.

She took a deep breath and exhaled a low laugh, “We still need to breathe, ahaha. Or at least I do.”

He narrowed his eyes and mumbled something she couldn’t really understand until he spoke clearly, “What now?”

She chuckled and said, “What do you mean, ‘what now’?”

“I don’t know…” he said, face flushing again. “What now?”

“Well, we could stop kissing and talk about our feelings because I know how much you love talking about yourself,” she said, playfully tapping his nose. “Or we could find someplace to sit and make out some more. Your choice, Captain Dream Boat.”

It was hardly a choice at all.

He dragged her down to the cot bolted into the corner of the interior cabin. 

Her free arm slapped against her chest, scandalized. “How forward!” she cried melodramatically. “We’ve only just shared our first kiss, mister! And now want to take me to bed?!”

He Xuan, shocked out of his daze, suddenly realized the implications of dragging her over to a bed, and froze, practically trembling.

“Aahahaha! I was only kidding!” she laughed through tears. “You’re easy to tease, you know that?”

“Don’t… don’t do that. Not about that.”

I need to know if you want the same thing I do… he thought.

His face was set into an embarrassed scowl, shaking his head. He mumbled something incoherent, looking down at the floor.

“Forgive me?” she smiled sweetly up at him before giving him a little peck on the cheek, standing up on her tippy toes to reach. “I’m sorry.”

His gaze softened the tiniest fraction. Taking that as confirmation enough, she walked backwards and led him to sit next to her on the cot that was smaller than a single sized mattress. Even if he had wanted to do something more than just kissing, there was hardly any room for it.

The back of her knees hit the side of the cot unexpectedly. She almost fell backwards, but he caught hold of her arm to keep her steady. 

Sitting down a respectable distance away from her, He Xuan found himself too unsure of how to properly initiate something like this while sitting. Maybe they should’ve remained standing so that they could face each other? 

The feeling of her hips crashing into his side immediately knocked him loose from his tangle of thoughts. 

“What’re ya thinking so hard for?” she asked, smoothing out the wrinkle that had formed in between his brows. “Come here.”

She cupped the side of his face, shifting her legs so that she folded one knee up on the cot to fully face him, and brought their lips back together. 

Well, that did solve his first problem, at least. He almost thanked her for her insufferably impatient personality. She never had to wait too long before she got what she wanted. And he didn’t feel particularly inclined to change that right now.

And just as soon as they settled into a comfortable rhythm, she gasped and pulled her mouth away.

“What?” he practically snarled, momentarily infuriated at the loss of contact.

She chuckled slightly and shook her head, thoroughly endeared. “I just had an idea!” she said. “Have you ever gotten a hickey before?”

His eyes widened into huge pools of uncertainty. “No…?” he admitted. “You’re the only person I’ve ever kissed.”

I could definitely tell, she thought. “Well, I’m glad today could be your first!”

He opened his mouth as if to contradict something, but instantly reneged and bid her continue silently.

“So can I do it?” she asked, practically vibrating with excitement. “Can I give you a hickey?”

How was he supposed to tell her no when she looked so eager? And so of course, a mumbled noise of confirmation sipped out of his mouth before he could really understand what he was getting himself into.

“You can tell me if you don’t like it,” she warned. “But I think they’re super fun and sexy!”

He nodded, highly doubtful she could ever do anything he wouldn’t like.

Practically squealing in excitement, she promised he’d enjoy it even if she had absolutely no evidence to support that bold claim. She didn’t want to tell him that she’d never done it to someone else before, but she’d had it done plenty of times on her own skin. She at least knew what she liked done to her. How hard could it be?

Scooting impossibly closer to him, she slowly craned her neck upwards to get purchase of his long and slender pale neck. This close, she could make out the edges of some of what looked to be the start of his tattoos peaking through the collar of his sweatshirt. His familiar scent comforted her nerves. The smell of driftwood and sea water, and just the slightest hint of fish. 

It was a good thing she loved eating seafood.

Without further ado, she summoned forth all the courage and boldness in her veins. She could start off easy and familiar. She kissed his lips first, easy and naturally. Dipping her tongue inside his mouth for a moment before she began kissing down his chin and onto his neck to build up confidence. She hesitantly licked a small stripe on his neck. Goosebumps shivered out of his skin as he let out a long held breath and relaxed his shoulders.

Shi Qingxuan teased and tapped her tongue languidly along the cool, pale skin. Once she found a suitable spot, she marked it out with a little X with her tongue. 

X marks the spot, she repeated that children’s rhyme in her head, with a dot and a dot.

A whisper touch of her lips kissed into the area right above his collar bone. And thus she began her quest for the treasure locked away underneath his skin. Feeling another surge of adrenaline spur her on, she transitioned into a bolder, wetter kiss. Opening up her mouth, her teeth grazed against the surface of his neck, testing the waters.

He Xuan shuddered at the cool sensation of her saliva against his neck but elsewhere, his entire body was being slowly brought up to a low simmer. He closed his eyes, and got lost in the new and delicious sensations.

Shi Qingxuan bit down lightly with her front teeth, and smoothed over it with a firm press of her tongue. His only reaction was a barely audible exhale. So she’d have to dig in deeper to really find what she was searching for. She bullied her tongue further into his neck, and tried again with her teeth, just incrementally harder this time. She held onto the skin a little longer and grinded it softly between her teeth, trying to leave a visible mark, an amethyst or ruby just for her to admire. 

He let out another shaky breath and growled, “You don’t have to be so gentle…”

A ping of lightning shot straight to her core hearing his voice sound so affected by her ministrations. Smirking against his skin to catch her breath for a moment, she put her hands around his shoulders and squeezed briefly.

“You got it, captain,” she whispered into his ear, leaning in close.

He snorted a laugh and rolled his eyes. It seemed the nickname was sticking, much to his chagrin.

She wanted to check her progress. Leaning away from him, she tried to get a better look at the jewels she was trying to encrust into his skin. 

“What the heck?” she pouted. “It’s barely even red.”

“What?”

“I thought it would’ve looked darker, I guess…” she said, puzzled. Especially with his pale skin…

“Harder, then.”

Another strike of lightning into her core. She swallowed hard and tried to even her breathing. God! Did he even realize what he was saying?! She didn’t want to get so worked up over just a little makeout session.

Regardless, she didn’t need to be told twice.

Shi Qingxuan dove back into his skin, teeth first. She almost chuckled thinking back how he’d done something similar on that beach to that popsicle. 

She was determined to make him bruise, even if it took all night. And she was even more determined to hear his normally stoic countenance moan. She’d give anything to hear him debauched and losing his composure because of her actions. It would be her own personal victory, and she was not going to accept defeat.

Her hands held on for dear life onto his shoulders to steady herself. She bit down, much harder this time, wondering vaguely in the back of her mind if maybe it was too intense. A shiver snaked down He Xuan’s body and he sucked in a harsh breath, holding it tight in his lungs. As quickly as she caught hold of his skin, she let it go and smoothed over the area with her tongue. Next, she tried to suck a small circle in the same location. He gasped, but she still couldn’t hear anything close to debauchery. That is, until…

“Do that again,” he choked out.

Yes, this is exactly what she wanted! She needed more. She needed to hear him losing control.

“I love it when you tell me what you like,” she encouraged in a low whisper, hovering just up above his skin. 

Her hot breath was like a cool breeze against the wet area she was sucking on his neck. It sent more shivers wracking through his body.

“Can I…?” she asked, pulling away suddenly. She swung her leg over his lap, straddling him. “Is this okay? It’s kinda hurting my neck the other way, ahaha…”

She could literally hear how hard he dry swallowed as she watched his Adam's apple bob up and down.

“Uhh,” he mumbled intelligently. “Mn.”

It’s not like he was gonna stop her! No one in their right mind would ever not give her anything she asked for! He decided that anyone she’d dated previously was an idiot and a fool for letting her go. But still, he felt powerful, the pride going to his head, knowing that he was getting to experience this all for himself and that they weren’t. Take that, ungrateful losers! 

How could someone ever let her go? Now that he’d had just a taste, he couldn’t imagine ever letting her out of his sight, let alone leaving her side.

Shi Qingxuan purposefully wasn’t sitting directly on his lap because she knew things would probably go a little too far if she did that. So she stayed sitting up on her knees for a better angle to kiss him and his neck, rather than craning her head awkwardly to the side.

The mark on his neck was only just now starting to turn pink, she realized. Wow, he had some tough skin. Or was this normal? She felt like she definitely had bruised much easier from far less when receiving a hickey… Whatever. Everyone’s different.

She didn’t go back to his neck immediately. She missed the taste of his lips and his tongue. He didn’t seem to mind and made a little hum of approval when she crashed against his lips. She answered him with her own sound of surprise when she felt his fingers firmly grip her hips.

They got lost in each other’s mouths for far longer than she had intended. It was only supposed to be a brief detour. She was getting off course from her main mission! In the back of her mind, she thought his pale skin would look especially striking with a necklace full of purple and red bruises dotted around his neck— but based on her current progress on the first hickey, that might take all night. One day, Shi Qingxuan silently vowed, she would make it a reality.

He let out a breathy almost-snarl when she pulled her tongue out of his mouth. She licked a stripe along his lips, and started mapping out a dotted path back to the X on his neck with tiny kisses where her destination was clearly marked. 

She sucked and chewed and licked and dug deeper even than all her previous attempts. His fingers, in turn, pressed further into her hips. She wished he’d leave bruises on her as well…

Occasionally, she’d tread back up that dotted path back to his lips whenever she missed his warmth. Each time, she caught a small glimpse out of the corner of her eyes at the color and how it was still slowly showing signs of getting worse.

Maybe it’ll look better in the morning? she conceded.

He Xuan had the cutest stifled breathing noises, especially when she sucked particularly hard, but he still hadn’t so much as let out a whine or a moan yet. 

This needed to change, she realized. 

I can tease him just a little bit… she conceded.

She slowly slid down until she was fully resting on his lap. She paused for the briefest moment when she felt immediately that she was sitting directly on something incredibly stiff. Licking her kiss-swollen lips, she leaned into his mouth and started wandering her hands around the front of his torso.

He Xuan went incredibly rigid underneath her, unable to form any coherent thoughts. His fingers dug even harder into her hips, almost painfully so.

Feeling the change in his body language, she stopped the movements of her arms and pulled away from his lips.

“Are you alright?” she asked. “Do you want me to stop?”

He still couldn’t form sounds, but he managed to shake his head.

“Use your words,” she said, just to be extra careful. They still hadn’t discussed boundaries or anything like that. She didn’t want to push him too far too quickly. 

“D-don’t stop,” he breathed, closing his eyes. 

He Xuan shifted slightly underneath her in a bid to create some space between their crotches, but even the momentary friction felt like lighting a sparkler at a summer festival in his stomach. He sucked in a harsh breath and mumbled a curse.

“Fuck, don’t stop,” he repeated.

“Tell me if it’s ever too much,” she reminded him softly, feeling drunk with power.

He nodded, still reeling from the pleasure of that tiny movement.

Shi Qingxuan started snaking gentle fingers in swirling random patterns along his arms and torso. She was trying to get a vague grasp for his body from underneath that infernal, plain black sweatshirt he refused to take off. 

Well, perhaps if things went further, maybe she could convince him to take it off tonight. But for now, she was content with just some light teasing and making out.

Finally, she found the courage to rub her hips languidly over the hardened bulge in his pants, separated only by a few layers of clothes. And He Xuan bit his lips hard enough, she was concerned he was going to puncture through and start bleeding. His eyes were still shut tight and every muscle in his was wound up like a jack in the box just about to spring out.

“Relax,” she cooed, softly grinding against him. “Does it feel nice?”

Her hands changed course from exploring to massaging his shoulders gently to try and loosen him up. He only hummed in response, but didn’t make any progress on actually relaxing.

She laughed lightly against his lips and gave him a quick but loudly exaggerated smooch. The noise she made and the lack of prolonged contact startled him out of his head for a moment enough to relax his shoulders and open his eyes.

Upon making eye contact with her, something snapped inside He Xuan, hungry and desperate. He moved to shift positions. He had intended to pin her down underneath him, but in his pleasure-filled daze, he forgot just how small the cot was, and ended up knocking her head against the interior cabin wall in the process.

A hard bonk rattled her skull and sent the bad kind of shivers flooding her nervous system. A pitiful yelp ripped from her mouth. 

“Shit! I’m s-sorry–” he sputtered, nearly speechless and horrified at what he’d just done so stupidly. He instantly moved off from on top of her. 

She sat up slowly, trying to make sure she didn’t feel dizzy. It didn’t feel that bad, but it had definitely given her a big shock.

He Xuan was cursing himself out under his breath and in his mind, absolutely infuriated he’d hurt her, even just a little bit.

“Are you okay?” he asked, kneeling down next to her. His hand was hovering around her head, looking like he desperately wanted to caress it. “I didn’t mean to.”

“I know, I know,” she replied lightly. “I’m fine. Just a little bump! Truly. Nothing serious, I promise. Haha!”

He didn’t look so easily convinced. Instead of touching her head, he cupped her cheek with a worried expression.

“I’m A-Okay!” she assured him again, a brilliant smile blinding him momentarily. “Really, it barely even hurts.”

He studied her face, thoroughly scrutinizing her every microexpression to determine whether or not she was telling the truth. Finally, his gaze softened and he placed a kiss on her forehead, mumbling another apology.

Both of them didn’t really know what to do next. He Xuan was not feeling as motivated to take things further as he was before. He hated the awkwardness that had ruined the perfectly crafted mood, cringing and cursing at himself in the silence.

Her eyes drifted vaguely around and saw a clock over near the steering wheel and realized just how late it was.

Oh shit. He’s going to kill me… She’d turned off all notifications and location services on her phone before they set sail so Shi Wudu wouldn’t be able to spoil their fun— not that anyone got much cell service in the middle of the ocean— but she had forgotten to turn it back on when they docked. It was quickly nearing midnight. They haven’t even eaten dinner!

Were we really making out that long…?

“Shit, it’s really late…”

“Oh,” He Xuan mumbled, gazing at the clock. “Do you need to leave?”

“Yeah, I think so… I told Ling Wen I’d be back by midnight, but I don’t really want to leave.”

“Then don’t.”

She laughed lightly and said, “My brother’s gonna kill me if I’m already this late and didn’t text him…”

“So what?” he scoffed. “Your brother doesn’t get to tell you what to do.”

“It’ll be easier for all of us if we try to stay in his semi-good graces,” she explained. “He’s already being an insufferable asshole and me sneaking out isn’t gonna do us any favors. And he seems to hate you for whatever reason.”

“Yeah, well, the feeling’s mutual…” mumbled He Xuan bitterly.

She’d already given up hope on salvaging their relationship, but it did sting her heart to know her brother didn’t approve of him. And it didn’t help that he could never articulate why! He Xuan’s criminal record was hardly suspect and she doubted that was really the reason behind her brother's mistrust. Not that her brother had ever really approved of anyone he’d known her to be dating (and he probably wouldn’t have approved of the ones he didn’t know about), but at least he’d given her proper reasons for the others!

Now that she thought about it, the only one he’d ever seemingly encouraged her to pursue was Pei Xiu. And hell would sooner freeze over than that match ever working out. She still found herself wanting her big brother to be proud of her… But it seemed all she could do was fall short of his impossible expectations. 

“I’ll drive you back,” He Xuan decided, standing up. “It’s late.”

She sighed deeply as she stood up. She instantly wrapped her arms around him, not wanting to leave his side even for a moment.

“I don’t wanna go,” she whined into his chest, nuzzling her face around childishly into the soft fabric.

“Then don’t.”

“But I have to.”

“Then go.”

“But I don’t wanna!”

He made an exasperated noise and cried, “You’re impossible.”

“What if I could be convinced to stay?” she propositioned mischievously, pulling her face out of his torso. “If he’s already going to commit double murder-suicide, why not go out with a bang? Add to our list of iniquities to repent for!”

He Xuan raised an eyebrow. 

“Come on!” she goaded. “Let’s do something or go somewhere! I don’t know… take me on a night fish or we could just look at the stars! I don’t care. Anything is fine!” 

I just wanna be with you, she almost added but decided against it at the last second. 

Maybe that was too forward after only having just kissed for the first time, but she secretly hoped he felt the same way. Now that she had tasted him, she didn’t know how she was supposed to go through life normally again without dreaming of his lips. How had he ruined her so thoroughly and so quickly? She had no idea. 

Shi Qingxuan was already beginning to dread the end of summer. How could she just leave him here? Go back to her old life? Could she convince him to come with her? Or perhaps visit often? Long distance would be so hard, but worth it for someone like him.

He Xuan considered her words, and despite how bad of an idea it was, he did think of something.

“We could go night swimming? The moon’s full and clear tonight,” he suggested hesitantly. “But I don’t know if you’d be down for that…”

“Night swimming, huh? Is it… safe?”

He smirked, practically reading her mind, “You’re scared of a sea monster?”

“No!” she cried a little too quickly for it to be believable. “Well, I mean, yeah, but, like! There’s also other dangerous stuff in the ocean at night! Not just sea monsters! I’m hardly being unreasonable here!” She huffed and crossed her arms.

He rolled his eyes, not buying her defensive attitude. “If you don’t go very deep, it’s not dangerous,” he said evenly. “We don’t have to go further than you can stand. Unless you have a better idea.”

A better idea…? Everything sounded like a better idea. Watching paint dry sounded like a better idea. 

Night swimming in the ocean was not something she’d ever consider normally. Especially not in a town with sea monsters! And sea monsters that tried to lure her into the ocean, for that matter! But something in the back of her mind was daring her to agree, if only to spend more time with him. Her fear of the ocean could be bottled up and put on an out-of-reach shelf in her heart for tonight. Spending as much time as possible before the end of summer with He Xuan should take priority. And that included showing interest in things he liked doing. Not everything could be about her, as much as she’d like it to be.

“Sure,” she agreed with a hitch of anxiety in her voice. “What’s the worst that could happen with a big, strong, fisherman like you around?” He could eat that creature for breakfast!

He Xuan smirked. “A sea monster swallows us whole and we’re never seen or heard of again.”

She punched him in the arm and cried, “That was rhetorical, you weirdo! Don’t put that out into the world! You’re gonna manifest it!”

He stifled a snort of laughter and said, “Nothing’s going to happen.”

Her lips curled into a smile and she gave him a quick peck on the cheek. “You’d better fight off a sea monster for me.”

After a moment’s hesitation, he pulled her closer and wrapped his arms around her. “I’d never let anything take you from me,” he whispered, crooking his head into her shoulder so he was speaking directly into her ear.

Shi Qingxuan shivered under the rumble of his low baritone and hot breath on her neck, absolutely melting like putty into his chest. 

She was so fucked, she realized. And from the sound of it, he was too.

No one had ever treated her with this much care and affection before, especially not after she had come out to them. Part of her couldn’t believe something like this was even possible for her. After such a bad experience in university with her dating life, part of her had given up hope on romance, thinking no one could ever really fall in love with someone like her. But with He Xuan, everything felt so easy and natural. She hadn’t known anything like it before. And she certainly didn’t want it to end along with the summer season. She had tried and failed to temper her expectations for this summer tryst, but it was hard to keep things pleasantly casual when he kept saying things that made her heart flutter and her breath catch.

“Keep this up, and you’re going to ruin me, I just know it,” she whispered back.

Shi Qingxuan wrapped her arms around his neck and lifted up on her toes to reach his lips. 

“Good.” He met her half way, ready and eager. I want to ruin you… You’re mine. Only mine…

She could feel the smirk on his face through their kiss and she couldn’t help the bubbles of laughter that followed.

After a couple of minutes getting lost in each other’s eyes and then promptly going back to making out, Shi Qingxuan finally broke away through peels of elated giggles, crying that if they were going to go night swimming, they better get a move on or else it’d turn into morning swimming. He Xuan didn’t think that sounded so bad.

Ling Wen was already going to be pissed at her for not giving updates and being late and probably several other things that were somehow her fault. And her brother was probably going to be bouncing off the walls, spitting fire— if he wasn’t already storming the streets of Fu Gu with a torch and pitchfork. Why not add to her list of sins to repent for later during the inevitable lecture and subsequent execution that undoubtedly awaited her back at the villa? There was no way she was going back now.

Shi Qingxuan realized only after He Xuan had grabbed a rumbled pair of swim trunks that had been drying on the back of the bathroom door that she didn’t have a swimsuit with her. And thus, a diabolical plan entered her mind: skinny dipping!

He Xuan helped her off the boat and back onto the pier. A sly grin full of teeth appeared on her face unbeknownst to He Xuan, who was leading the way to his favorite night swimming spot.

Chapter Text

The spot in question was that secluded beach she had unknowingly happened upon the day He Xuan spotted her crying and offered her a popsicle. Realizing it was the same beach, she smiled fondly at the memory. The remnants of their sandcastle were still there on the shore looking a little wind-worn. 

What a stroke of luck they happened to reconnect that day.

“Not many people come here,” he explained. “It’s quiet and clean. And the view isn’t bad.”

“Yeah, it’s nice,” she agreed, taking his hand in hers. She stroked her thumb along the backside of his hand absentmindedly.

“I used to go swimming with meimei here all the time when we were kids… But I stopped for a while after she… She would’ve wanted me to share it with you.”

Shi Qingxuan didn’t say anything, but she squeezed his hand briefly and pulled him into another embrace. 

The view of the moon rippling in the waves of the black water was like something out of an oil painting, so picturesque and perfect. It really was like a serene paradise.

“Wow,” she breathed, gazing out into the fathomless black. 

She wasn’t sure if it was beautiful or horrible. A sinking dread she couldn’t quite shake crept into her throat and she felt the urge to run away in terror at the thought of actually going swimming in it.

He sensed her hesitation almost immediately and said, “I’ve done this a million times and in worse conditions, too. Nothing’s going to happen, I won’t let it. But… if you don’t want to—”

She pulled her eyes away from the hypnotizing horizon that beckoned her to try and catch it and said, “It’s fine. I want to do this. Prove I’m not a scaredy-cat.”

“It’s fun,” he encouraged flatly.

Somehow she couldn’t imagine him actually doing things “for fun.” 

“Yeah,” she agreed, nonetheless, smiling warmly up at him. 

His pale face was ghostly white in the moonlight. He looked a bit like a walking corpse or like a drowned spirit, but she found it endearing.

Shi Qingxuan swallowed down any semblance of fear she felt in order to make room for adrenaline and shamelessness. 

He Xuan had already started taking off his sweatshirt and T-shirt underneath in one motion. He tossed both aside to the sand below. His pale and lean torso, glowing white in the moonlight, revealed a litany of dark ink tattoos that she couldn’t make out in the dim light. 

Trying to keep her gawking to a minimum, she made a mental note to bring it up later. Now was time for her plan to spring into action.

In a flash of courage, she stripped down quick as lightning and tossed all her clothes to the sand in a daze.

“What are you—” 

But it was too late. He watched her bare ass rush into the water.

“Skinny dip with me!” she cried, dashing below the black waves before he could see anything too revealing.

He Xuan looked somewhere in between flustered, angry, embarrassed, and shocked. It was like watching a machine buffering as he stood there in the sand, trying to compute his next action.

She laughed brightly at him and kept goading him on while sending splashes of water his way.

Her silhouette against the white of the moon reflecting in the water behind her made her look like some kind of immortal, ethereal beauty trying to lure him to his death. 

A siren, he thought. She’s a siren.

And like the foolish fishermen from mythology, he couldn’t help but be lured in. He Xuan kicked off his shoes and socks in a hurry, and slipped out of his pants so fast, he nearly tripped and fell from his uneven footing. No longer did he think about how terrible and risky an idea such as this was, his mind had been flooding with wanting to appease her, with wanting to hear the melodic sound of her infectious laugh. 

Perhaps she really had enchanted him with some kind of magic.

Shi Qingxuan, still hiding her body beneath the waves, was a little surprised he didn’t put up a bigger fight. She’d been anticipating the playful banter and the back-and-forth, even coming up with several good reasons to defend herself, but found none of them were needed to convince him.

Wading into water up to his knees to meet her, he moved a self-conscious hand to cover up most of his modesty. When he deemed the water deep enough, he dove in and raced over into his siren’s embrace.

She was giggling excitedly, adrenaline and the tiniest bit of fear pumping through her veins.

“I can’t believe you actually did it, ahaha!” she laughed, crouching below the waves to hide her body from his eyes. She was practically crawling on her knees in the water.

He snorted in response, shaking his head disapprovingly. “If we get arrested, I’m blaming you.”

“You said so yourself, no one ever comes here!” she cried, sending a splash his way.

He Xuan sighed, wiping the saltwater from his eyes, but didn’t say anything. He held out a hand on the surface and she took it instantly. He led her out into the deeper water slowly, making sure she looked comfortable. They stopped when she was standing upright with the water at her shoulders, which for him meant the water was at his chest. 

Shi Qingxuan’s heart raced and the back of her neck was damp from nervous sweat. This was probably the deepest water in the ocean she’d ever willingly subjected herself to. 

And it wasn’t as bad as she thought it was going to be… yet. 

She could still stand and keep her head above the water. She kept having to do tiny little hops off the ocean floor to keep her balance and jump above an incoming wave, but it was nothing as oppressive and bullying as she’d experienced before.

Hoping to distract herself from the unseen horrors lurking potentially right next to her, she tried to memorize and catalogue every bit of exposed skin in case it was the only time she’d be able to see him without that godforsaken sweatshirt. 

She could see a faint mark on his neck where she’d attempted to give him a hickey and frowned. Lowering her gaze to his chest, she could tell there was a tattoo there, but she still couldn’t decipher the dark splotches of ink while he was cast in shadows in the moonlight.

“Is this depth okay?” He Xuan asked. She nodded stiffly. “Do you want to swim around or just stay here?” 

She involuntarily swallowed at the thought, but instead used it to try to push down the lump of fear in her throat. 

“Uh. I’m not a very good swimmer. But yeah, we can swim around, I guess, ahaha.”

He gave her an incredulous look, but, again, didn’t say anything. 

Instead, he picked his feet up from the sandy ocean floor and shifted into swimming. Still holding onto her hand, he waited for her to do the same. It took her a moment before finding a comfortable rhythm, but with the shallow depth of the water, she didn’t find it very hard to keep her head above the water. If needed, she could just kick off the floor. It felt the slightest bit more safe than she initially imagined, especially with such a handsome guide holding her hand through it all.

He swam around backwards, like it was the easiest thing in the world, slowly pulling her along at a leisurely pace until she got a little more comfortable with the motions and let go of his hand.

“I’m fine with putting my head under, but don’t feel like you have to,” he said, about to dip his head beneath the black waves.

“Don’t!” she cried, voice shrill with anxiety. She instantly clung onto his arm with a trembling grip. “Please, don’t go where I can’t see you! It’s too scary! Maybe in the daytime, it's fine, but not when I can't see!”

He looked a little annoyed, but didn’t make any motions to dive beneath the water.

“Fine,” he compromised. “I’m just going to get my hair wet, then.”

He slowly swayed back, watching for any protest to this action, and dipped his inky black hair into the water. 

That didn’t seem so bad, she thought. She dipped her hair under the water, mimicking his movements. 

When she came back up, he moved a hand to brush over her cheek and tuck a stray wet lock behind her ear tenderly. She smiled up at him, her teeth glowing bright from the reflected moonlight, beaming into him with rays of affection. 

He looked away and began swimming again, faster than before. 

“Hey, wait!” she called, jumping after him, heart racing for a moment, thinking he was going to go underneath the waves.

And he was swimming around her, circling like a predator stalking his prey. His pale, stoic face was the only thing visible above the surface, like an ominous shark fin out of the movies. She stood in the water and watched him swim around her, mystified by how swift and soundless he could swim. Finally, she grabbed him underneath the water, guessing where his limbs would be, and snatched an arm.

“You’re really good at swimming,” she remarked. “I can barely keep my head up and doggy paddle. You’re like an eel or something, gliding through the water all sneaky-like.”

He smirked as he was pulled over and stood in front of her. She moved her hand from his arm, slowly snaking her way down to his hand, tracing the droplets of saltwater as they fell from his arm, until she clasped her hand in his.

“I’ve been swimming since I was born, so I’d hope so,” he said nonchalantly. 

“Pfft, yeah right.”

He let go of her hand, and she almost protested, but before she knew what was happening, he turned around and lowered himself into the water a little bit.

“Get on my back,” he said. “I’ll carry you around.”

Her eyes widened and she swallowed involuntarily. “O-okay…” she said stupidly, mind going absolutely blank. “Are you sure? I mean… We’re…” 

Naked… she couldn’t finish.

It was like that only just now dawned on him. He started to turn back around, but instead, she did the exact opposite of what her mind was telling her to do. Following her heart and body. Her mind screamed that it was far too intimate an act when she had only known him for so long, but her body craved the coolness of his skin, and wanted to inspect his tattoos even closer under the moonlight.

She hopped up on his back before he could fully turn around, and wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist.

Now it was He Xuan’s turn to swallow.

“Is this okay?” she asked, noticing him short-circuit underneath her touch.

Fuck, had she really ruined everything already?

He Xuan could feel the warm, plush press of her breasts against his shoulder blades and something else at the small of his back. His mind went blank as he started feeling an unfamiliar warmth settle into the base of his stomach.

“It’s fine,” he managed to say after a long moment. 

She couldn’t help but notice the hitch in his voice. Fearing the worst, she moved to unlatch her legs from his waist, but a gentle hand moved to hold it in place.

“I said it’s fine.” More than fine, really.

“If it’s ever not,” she reminded him quietly, “you can tell me.”

She didn’t want him to freak out and run away after everything…

He didn’t respond to that, but instead kicked off the ocean floor and started swimming with a human-shaped backpack attached to him. He made extra sure that said human backpack’s head was kept unquestionably above the surface. He didn’t want her to feel scared or inhale water at all, if he could help it. 

Shi Qingxuan, on the other hand, was trying to keep it together. She was trying to be very normal and not move so much and throw off his swimming rhythm. However, unfortunately, the friction of her bare skin against his was sorta feeling good. But she didn’t want it to feel good! Well, she did, but now was not the time! She kept squirming a little, trying to hold herself at a respectable distance away so nothing uncouth would happen.

To distract herself, Shi Qingxuan tried to make sense of the ink on his skin that appeared and reappeared above the surface while he bobbed up and down in the water. She could make out a couple shapes that looked like some kind of boney spinal column that belonged to an animal that wrapped all the way down his arm.

With her head so close to the back of his, breathing in his scent from so close almost felt like she was inhaling laughing gas. It was talking all of her willpower and self-control not to open her stupid mouth and say something embarrassing like how much she wanted him to fuck her on the beach—

She shook her head violently, shaking that thought out before it even had a chance to form. 

He Xuan stopped swimming instantly and looked back slightly. He didn’t say anything, but she could feel him burning a question into the silence. 

Why did it feel like he could read her thoughts?! The horror! 

Shi Qingxuan immediately let go of him and raced a respectable enough distance away. The front half of her body felt cold from the absence of his comforting body heat. Unconsciously, she took a small hop forward towards him again, seeking it out.

“Let’s just stay here for a little!” she said quickly. “My arms are tired from hanging on.”

They both knew that was a lie, but neither one acknowledged it.

He Xuan leaned back and let the surface catch him so that he was floating on his back. She followed after him and back-floated next to him. Her eyes obviously drifted up to look at the blanket of stars in the sky, trying to make out the different constellations she could see.

“You know otters fall asleep holding hands in the water so they don’t float away,” she said suddenly.

“What?” he asked, pulling his head out of the water. With his head partially in the water, all he heard was garbled sounds. He had to stop floating and stand back up in the water to hear her clearly. “Water in my ears.”

She stood up to mirror him in the shallow water and blinked a couple of times, a blush painting across her freckled cheeks in the moonlight. “Uhh, all I was saying was that otters sometimes hold hands when they fall asleep so they don’t float away…” she muttered. “It wasn’t that important… Just that, so we don’t float away from each other, we could… you know…”

His eyes lit up in amusement, a large smirk forming on his lips. “You just want an excuse to hold my hand, don't you?”

“Shut up! Maybe! So what?! Sue me!” 

She grabbed his hand and flopped on her back with a pouty frown, her brilliant scheme foiled so quickly.

He Xuan snorted a laugh and flopped down next to her, now holding hands so they didn’t drift away from each other amidst the bobbing of the waves.

Shi Qingxuan quickly forgot about being angry and just relished the feeling of his hand in hers as she looked up at the stars above. Her soul felt so light and airy that it could take off like a rocket ship and disappear into the universe from just how happy and giddy this person holding her hand made her feel. 

Like they were made for each other.

She finally caught sight of the constellation she was searching for. She pulled his hand over to her and stood up in the water and he followed suit, a silent question in his eyes.

“You’re a fisherman, yeah? You know stuff about the stars, right?”

“Not really.”

She looked baffled, absolutely scandalized. “What? Can you even find Orion’s Belt? It’s, like, the easiest one!”

“I don’t know what that is.”

“You’re so weird! Shouldn’t you be some rugged sailor who uses the North Star to guide yourself back to shore?!” she cried. 

“I’m a fisherman, not a pirate in an adventure movie.”

“Maybe you should be a pirate,” she laughed. “It’s more romantic.”

He scoffed. “Pirates are a real and dangerous reality for people on the seas. It’s not some romantic thing—”

But she wasn’t listening. It took her all of three seconds to find Orion in the night sky. 

“You see those three stars all in a row, with the one in the middle being the biggest?”

He squinted up in the sky. “Yeah, I guess.”

“That’s his belt. Orion was a beast hunter.”

“Okay?” he asked, clearly not super impressed. What use is it to know where to find stars nowadays?

“You see that one over there?” she asked, pointing up into the sky. “That’s my star sign!”

“Where?” He squinted up in the direction she pointed. Now that was a little more interesting than some random guy’s belt.

“There,” she said, taking the hand that she was holding and positioning it right on the tip of the constellation. “That’s Aquarius.”

She traced the constellation with their fingers together in the sky. 

“It’s supposed to be a maiden pouring water or something, but I don’t really see it,” she admitted. “And Aquarius is an air sign, too! It never really made sense to me.”

He nodded vaguely, not understanding it either.

“What’s your star sign? Maybe I can find it,” she asked, brightly. “I’m not an expert, but I know a little bit.”

“I don’t know what my star sign is,” he said plainly.

“Haha, okay, well, when’s your birthday?”

“January.”

She looked a little surprised, but didn’t comment on that. “Okay, what day? ‘Cuz it depends what day and some people can be a blend of two signs if they’re on the cusp. Oh, and there’s a BIG difference between January Capricorn versus the January Aquarius—”

“The 24th,” he interrupted what was undoubtedly going to be a long, babbling rant.

Her jaw dropped to the sea floor.

“No way. No way! You’re kidding, right?” 

“What?”

She pushed him in the chest and said with a huge smile on her face, “No, you’re lying! You’re kidding! You have to be! How did you know?”

“What?!” he demanded, swatting her arms away.

“That’s my birthday!”

He scrunched up his face, grimacing, and grumbled, “Are you going to make me change my birthday, too?”

“Oh, shut up!” she cried. “That’s insane! This is totally insane!!”

“What’s insane?” he asked, not giving her an appropriate reaction.

“Don’t you get it?! We have the same name and the same birthday!” She jumped up and down off of his shoulders, practically vibrating with excitement. “What year? I have to know who’s older.”

He said the exact same year she was born. Even he started to look a little freaked out at the coincidence. 

“Wait, so we’re the exact same age?!” she exclaimed.

Is that why…? The Pull…? he thought vaguely.

Soulmates!!! she thought, but was too embarrassed to say it out loud.

“I can’t believe this! It’s, like, almost a little scary,” she admitted. “You swear you’re not kidding?”

“Why would I lie about my birthday?” he asked, crossing his arms and furrowing his brow. He was not as amused at her over this new information. “And how would I have known your birthday beforehand to pull such a stupid prank?”

She was still absolutely baffled, not able to make a coherent sentence for a while beyond just gasps of surprise.

“We’re like twins! Oh my god! What if we’re separated at birth?” she said, in a frenzy. “Wait, that’s kinda problematic if we’re sorta together…”

“We are not twins.”

“How would you know? You weren’t conscious when you were born. Oh, wait, but ge was in the room… There’s pictures and all that in a scrapbook somewhere with my mom and dad—”

“Okay, that’s enough for tonight,” He Xuan announced, rolling his eyes. “Come on, let’s go back to the shore and get dressed before someone sees.”

She nodded vaguely, still not able to think about anything other than how perfectly they were made for each other.

Without even thinking or asking, he scooped her up in his arms. A hand under her knees and the other at her back and he glided them back to the shore with ease.

“What’re you—”

“You said your arms were tired,” he answered before she could even finish asking the question. She was about to protest, but he looked at her sharply and threatened, “I could drop you.”

“No, no! This is fine!” she said, becoming still and compliant.

She blinked cutely back up at him and then placed her arms against his chest. A faint blush heated up her cheeks at the thoughtful gesture from what was most certainly a lie.

It didn’t take very long to get to the shore, but they had drifted a little ways away from where their clothes were lying in the sand, so he had to swim more parallel with the shore than going towards it.

When it was finally shallow enough for him to start actually carrying her weight, she started moving to hop onto her feet, but he held her firmly in his arms. Her emerald eyes widened and she moved her hands to cover up her body.

“I won’t look if you don’t want me to,” he promised her, staring straight ahead.

“N-no, it’s fine!” she assured him weakly. “I mean, it was my idea in the first place, haha! It’s stupid to be self-conscious about—”

And suddenly they were at the pile of clothes on the deserted beach and he was letting her down. And true to his word, he looked away once he had set her on the sand and made sure she caught her balance. They both turned to face away from the other.

Shi Qingxuan didn’t know what to do first, turn back to stare at him or put on her clothes. He Xuan also didn’t really know how to proceed.

They both started a sentence at the same time and stopped to try and let the other one go first.

“Ahahaha, you first!”

“No, you.”

She blinked again and thought it was no use arguing. Her thoughts were fighting to get out of her throat, like a bad cough or the feeling when you really have to sneeze. 

“You can look at me!” she blurted out, too late to take it back now. “If you want…”

He Xuan bit his lip to keep himself from saying anything. He was frozen, still facing away from her. He was trying to determine if it was genuine or if that’s what she thought he wanted to hear. The only problem was he kinda needed to look at her to see that.

However, once again, she misinterpreted his silence for rejection. Regret, shame, and embarrassment stabbed into her stomach and she instantly reneged.

“I mean, you don’t have to, ahaha! It was just an idea! I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable or disgusted or whatever—”

He Xuan whipped his head around, his inky black locks flying behind him silhouetted against the moon. “Stop,” he said harshly, brows furrowed in anger.

Her voice died in her throat and she felt like her heart was going to burst from betrayal.

“You could never be disgusting.”

Wow. Okay. That wasn’t what she thought he was going to say. A breath caught in her throat and tears welled up in her eyes that she tried to power through. 

His fierce eyes were practically glowing in the moonlight. And then she watched his eyes slowly drift downward. 

She wanted that, right…? She asked him to do it… But it was too much, she realized. Too much too soon.

In the heat of the moment, she really thought that she did want this, but now faced with the reality that had spurned her more times than not, she wished she could take it back.

She didn’t move to cover herself, only squeezed her eyes shut and went rigid in the sand as she waited for the proverbial guillotine to drop. Silent tears blinked out of her eyelashes and into the wet sand below her feet.

He's going to run away. He's going to hate you. You're disgusting—

A surprised whimper crawled out of her throat when she felt a cool thumb brush away the streak of wetness left behind on her cheek. She locked eyes with his concerned brow and instantly melted, pulling him into a tight embrace, afraid he’d vanish in an instant. His own startled noise made her suddenly aware of what she’d done in a panic. 

She pushed him away immediately. 

“Ah, I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I’m so stupid! I didn’t mean to—”

“Don’t. You didn’t do anything wrong.” 

He did not make any motions to pull her back.

He Xuan didn’t want to touch her if she was feeling vulnerable and uncomfortable in her own skin. Hell, he didn’t even know if it was alright to look at her right now. But he didn’t know how to comfort her with words. He was never any good with words.

The bubble protecting her heart shattered. Her knees buckled underneath. She was going to collapse under the scrutiny. The weight of her sorrow felt so heavy and leaden, she sunk to her knees in the sand and sobbed.

He Xuan was incredibly confused. He had absolutely no idea what to do now that she was sobbing naked in the sand for some reason. Without any better ideas, he just sat down across from her on his knees and waited.

“I’m stupid, I’m so stupid…” she mumbled, covering up her breasts with her arms. “I should’ve known! Why would it be any different?”

“I don’t understand what’s happening,” he said quietly, unsure if he should move to comfort her. “Did I… do something wrong?” 

His heart felt like it was being squeezed tightly seeing her so broken and defeated. He had promised to protect her and all he’d done is make her cry. Somehow.

I don’t know what you need. I want to help. I don’t want you to cry. Please, tell me what’s wrong. What did I do? Can I fix it? he thought helplessly.

“You’ll change your mind!” she cried into her trembling palms. “You’ll look at me and change your mind! I know! I look like a girl everywhere except there! And you don’t want to be with—”

“What are you even talking about?” he demanded harshly. “When did I say that?”

“You didn’t need to say it.”

His eyes and brows softened a fraction. He grabbed her shoulders with a firm grip and wrapped his arms around her. 

“Don’t put words in my mouth,” he stated, tone much softer than before. “If you think I’d let you go ‘cuz of your body or whatever else, dream on.”

How could I ever think that? You’re everything to me, he thought, but did not voice.

Shi Qingxuan was dumbfounded for the umpteenth time that night. That was also not what she had expected. She looked at him helplessly, almost unbelieving his words.

“You really don’t think I’m…?”

Xie Lian’s wise words suddenly came to her mind, What matters is you, not the state of you.

“I’m not leaving,” he promised, sure and steady. Like the promise of the sun rising.

He Xuan was about to break away from the hug when she practically threw herself back into his lap, a grateful sob gutting its way out of her mouth. Shi Qingxuan squeezed her arms around him so tightly, still expecting him to vanish like a dream, but he’d never try to run away from her. Especially not with her crying like this. He squeezed back just as hard and ran a comforting and cold hand across her back in soothing circles.

And she thanked him profusely. Pathetically, really. How could he accept gratitude for something that he would freely give, even if she’d never asked to be accepted for being herself? 

If he didn’t really want to be with her, he wouldn’t continually put up with her spoiled, borderline-annoying personality. 

He Xuan did not suffer fools lightly, but Shi Qingxuan was no fool. She was a rare diamond amongst the regular rubbish humanity had to offer, a true pearl amongst ordinary stones. He wanted to keep her tucked away close to his chest like this forever, protecting her from getting damaged or chipped or tarnished or worn.

But the true tragedy was that he didn’t know how to properly convey all that he felt and more. It was not in his nature to speak his heart. His sister, He Daiyu, had been good at that, but he’d never been able to voice his deepest thoughts and secrets, even to her. Shi Qingxuan was similar to his sister in that way, fundamentally open and honest, even to an irritating degree. 

There was an invisible cage around He Xuan’s brain that prevented him from truly voicing his thoughts aloud. There was so much he couldn’t say but desperately wanted to. Just when it was on the tip of his tongue, a hand would crawl in his throat and steal the words away before they had a chance to make sound. He wished he could just transfer his heart and his thoughts directly into hers so she could glean even a little bit of the praise and affection he curated especially for her.

When she finally calmed down, the shame and embarrassment of sobbing into his naked body slowly crept up the back of her spine, but she was too comfortable in his embrace to move away. He Xuan twirled little stray locks of her hair that were already starting to dry as Shi Qingxuan giggled softly underneath.

That’s it, keep laughing, he thought fondly. Crying doesn’t suit you.

“Thank you,” she said seriously, looking deeply into his eyes.

“Stop thanking me,” he scowled.

She took it as acceptance enough and smiled up at him. 

He Xuan may be all harsh words, sly smirks, frowny faces, and pinched brows, but she was starting to be able to read his tiny microexpressions. There was a soft heart, just like hers, underneath that hard outer shell. She could see it sometimes, through the cracks in his cold, aloof mask. And he’d undoubtedly deny it if accused, so she didn’t press him further. Partly because she was a little exhausted from sobbing her eyes out.

“You’re not like anyone I’ve ever met before,” she said instead. “You always say exactly what you’re thinking.”

He made a face at her, thoroughly unconvinced. There’s so many more things that I’m thinking about than there are words enough to say to you, he thought.

“Wait, I meant: you always say exactly what you mean,” she continued, realizing a small error in her words. “You speak honestly and without flattery or hidden meanings. Like blunt, but in a good way. For the most part. It’s nice. Like, I know I can trust you’re not going to lie to me just to be nice. A definite change of pace to the people I’m usually around, that’s for sure.”

He Xuan scowled as she said all of this about him. He had done nothing to deserve her words or merit any praise at all. And he especially didn't think he deserved any awards for honesty, either. He shifted uncomfortably in the sand and couldn’t make eye contact with her for a moment.

“He Xuan,” she said, cupping the curvature of his rigid jawline, “I really like you.”

A little flutter ruffled his steady heart. His lips curled into something more than a smirk. 

But he didn’t respond with words, rather he pressed his lips to hers instead, letting his actions do the talking for him. She could feel the sheer amount of passion and emotion fueling him as he kissed her senseless. Holding on to her shoulders with that familiar bruising grip, it was like he wouldn’t be satisfied until he had absorbed her very essence into his with how tightly he held her against him.

She couldn’t help the tears of joy that fell from her eyes. He didn’t say anything, and maybe he would never be able to, but this was his way of telling her just how much he cared about her. She could feel it. Her heart swelled with pure joy; she thought it might burst.

He Xuan slowly trailed kisses around her mouth, up her cheek bone, and over to her ear. His teeth nibbled on her lobe for a moment, and a breathy sigh slipped out of her lungs. He then kissed and licked down her jawline, down her neck, until he found a spot that made her squirm and giggle underneath him. He licked his lips like a wolf about to devour a lamb and began in earnest.

He started out gently, only really teasing, just like she’d done to his neck. Shi Qingxuan made little pleased noises that rumbled against his lips from being so close to her throat. His teeth bit mercilessly into her neck and the mixture of pleasure and pain was too great, she let out a high pitched, drawn out whine. 

Yeah, that was definitely gonna leave a bruise.

How the fuck was he so good at this already? She hadn’t even gotten him to make any noises! It was entirely unfair! She’d been beaten in her own game that he wasn’t even originally a player in!

He Xuan’s tongue licked soft circles around the bite mark and he pushed in deeper to her skin. He kissed secrets and promises and confessions he couldn’t voice yet into the mark as penance for the pain.

A thrill of heat surging through his veins halted his movements. He wanted more. He didn’t even really know what “more” his body was craving, but it was instinctual. And he couldn’t be sure that’s what she even wanted in her vulnerable, post-cry state.

Shi Qingxuan sounded a confused hum as he pulled off her neck like a vampire after taking a deep drink.

“Are you alright?” she asked, peering up into his suddenly somber looking eyes.

He Xuan scoffed, thinking he should be asking her the same thing. He opened his mouth, starting to form words, but shut like a bear trap before he could get anything out. A rapidly stiffening cock between his legs betrayed his usual self-control and he shifted away.

“You can tell me,” she encouraged gently. She didn’t want to spook him, but there was something definitely on his mind. “But if it’s too hard to say, that’s alright.”

Instead of replying, he pushed her off of him and stood up, turning around quickly.

“What?” she asked, feeling like things were about to fall apart again. Did he really change his mind so fast? “What’s wrong? Please. Please, tell me what’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” he muttered over his shoulder. “We should get dressed.”

“Okay, that’s fine,” she said, forcing a smile on her face. “Did I make you uncomfortable?”

“No,” he said instantly. Not like that anyway… he thought, trying desperately to will his cock to turn softer. “I just… I… A c-crab or something… pinched me.”

Shocked out of her imminent spiraling, she leapt up with a yelp and jumped on him, crying, “Oh my god, where?!”

This was the exact OPPOSITE of what he wanted to happen.

He Xuan hissed and tried to shake her off, but she was scrambling around him, trying to evade the phantom crab. He grabbed her by the shoulders firmly and forced her to quit flailing and screaming.

“Stop!” he shouted. “I lied, okay?”

“What? But you said—”

And he quickly turned away from her again and slapped a hand over his little problem.

“Just get dressed. It’s late.”

Shi Qingxuan wasn’t a fool. In all her running around his legs, she’d vaguely noticed his erection but was preoccupied with not getting surprised by crabs. She hadn’t taken the time to properly take a look at it, but she put two-and-two together. 

Lying about a crab to cover for his erection? Super smooth…

“Oh,” she giggled, realizing why he suddenly pulled away. “Is that all that’s wrong? You know… I can help take care of that for you, if you’d like? I’m really good at it.”

His head whipped around with the widest eyes she’d ever seen him make. They were rivaling the moon itself in the sky. But now was not the time to laugh at him. She walked up behind him and placed her soft hands on his hips and massaged his hip bones.

“Would you like that?” she whispered sensually into his ear. 

“We c-can't!” he choked, sounding pathetic for the first time in his life. “N-not here…”

He was trying not to fixate on the image of her hands slipping lower and wrapping around his cock, but it just made his cock twitch painfully.

“Then on the boat?” she suggested.

He swallowed audibly and nodded in agreement. 

This was such a bad idea.

Chapter Text

They practically raced back into their clothes. Shi Qingxuan should have won, but He Xuan was surprisingly unhindered by his painfully hard cock and added layers, (that goddamn sweatshirt).

Chimes of giddy laughter rang out of her mouth as they ran hand in hand back to the docked boat.

They were already a tangle of lips and teeth when he punched on the light for the interior cabin and pinned her against the wall.

“Are you sure?” he panted in between messy kisses. “You don’t have to.”

“I want to hear you moan when I suck you off,” she answered back, equally breathless.

He paused for a moment as he shivered at her words, cocking straining against his clothes, practically weeping at the thought.

“Fuck…” he hissed.

Shi Qingxuan ran her hands down his sweatshirt until she reached the waistband of his pants.

“I’ve only done this a couple of times, but I’ve never had any complaints,” she smirked. 

“I’ve never…” he babbled, so close to losing his sanity at the mere thought of what was about to happen. “I’ve never done… N-Not with anyone. Only you. I’ve only ever wanted you.”

Her heart swelled again at his words. How could he be so poetic and so blunt at the same time?

“Lots of firsts tonight for you then, huh?” she teased, poking his nose playfully. “Shall I continue?”

He nodded and choked out a strained word of confirmation. She smiled mischievously at him, like she knew something he didn’t. 

Shi Qingxuan hooked her fingers around the belt loops of his jeans and pulled down, making intense and sensual eye contact with him as she did so. He hadn’t even bothered to fasten his belt in their haste. His well-worn black jeans caught briefly on the tip of his cock that was stiffer than either of them thought possible. And finally his pants tugged free, falling around his ankles. The metal part of his belt clattered to the floor.

Her eyes were met with a large tattoo on his right thigh and she paused for a moment to take a look at it. An ouroboros pretzeled around itself and of course, devoured the end of its tail. Each individual scale was shaded exquisitely and the linework looked crisp and immaculate.

He must have a really skilled artist.

But she was getting distracted. She trailed her hands up to the waistband of his boxer briefs with a little shark pattern running across the fabric. Her tongue swiped against her lips in anticipation when she saw a tiny wet spot forming at the tip of his cock through his underwear.

She kept that enthralling and eager eye contact with him as she slowly lowered to her knees. She dipped a finger under the elastic band and pulled down. 

If the anticipation didn’t kill him, he guessed his painful hard-on just might. 

A pale cock sprung forth from his boxer briefs, already leaking a bit of fluid. She thought it perfectly matched the rest of his body, all long and slender. His tip blushed that same pinkish color that his face turned when he was embarrassed.

She couldn’t help but smile and giggle a bit, but she swallowed down the lump of anxiety trying to crawl up her throat and looked up at him.

His face looked gravely serious and intense, but his eyes gave away how he really felt. His pupils had grown about twice their size, and were still wider than the moon.

She wanted to kiss him again, but instead she kept on her knees and said, “If it’s too much or you want me to stop, you gotta tell me.” 

He nodded frantically. “Yeah.”

“Oh, and it might be hard, but can you try not to fuck into my mouth? It might make me choke or gag or something.”

“I’d never hurt you,” he answered immediately.

She giggled sweetly up at him and said, “I know. Just in case.”

Secretly, she was hoping that he’d be willing to hurt her just a little once they’d established some clearer boundaries. He already liked biting her pretty hard, so she was sure he’d enjoy things like that.

But that could wait. Now, her only mission was to make him lose his mind.

Shi Qingxuan wet her lips again, readying herself to take this weeping cock into her mouth. 

The musky, saltwater scent of his cock wafted into her nose like an aphrodisiac. She began by licking a long strip up the underside and then swirled her tongue around the tip. Tasting him for the first time felt like quenching some long-forgotten thirst in her throat. She forgot how much she enjoyed making men lose their minds.

He Xuan bit down into a balled fist, trying to suppress the noise that had almost escaped his mouth. He struggled to figure out what to do with his free hand and placed it on the wall for support.

This was really happening. Shi Qingxuan was really going down on him. And she even offered to do it! He cursed himself for trying to run away from his erection on the beach. If he’d known she felt the same way, he wouldn’t have almost ruined everything with that stupid lie about a crab.

His eyelids fluttered closed and his teeth sunk deeper into his fist when he felt her mouth slowly envelope the tip of his cock.

She’d only given three other blow jobs before and two of them were on the same person, but from what they told her, it was the best they’d ever experienced. A natural, both had called her. It sorta made sense in the back of her mind, she’d always been called a big-mouth or a blabber-mouth. Why wouldn’t she also be skilled at putting to work her silver tongue?

Shi Qingxuan took him deeper, slowly swallowing her way down his length. He Xuan gasped and shuddered above her. She couldn't take it all the way down just yet and nearly gagged, but was able to suppress it.

Suddenly, she pulled off his cock and swallowed, smacking her lips like she’d just tasted something amazing. 

A big scowl awaited He Xuan when he finally opened his eyes to check why she’d stopped.

“I want to hear you,” she pouted. “Get your hand out of your mouth and let me hear you. It lets me know I’m doing a good job.”

He thrust his hands down at his sides and blinked at her, unsure if this was a joke or not.

“Good,” she said, a wicked smile appearing. “Now, let me hear you come undone because of me.”

She attacked his cock with her tongue and much to her delight, a punched-out groan spilled forth from his usually tight-lipped mouth. She rewarded him with her own moan. The vibrations tickled his cock in a way he’d never experienced before.

He Xuan saw stars. Yes, he could see the constellations all around him. His Orion’s Belt was on the floor; Aquarius had unbuckled it herself. He could see the water pouring from her eyes, tiny tears gathering at the corners when she took him all the way down to the base for the first time.

And finally, he let go, moaning, loud and breathy when she sucked around the tip.

“Fuck… Just like that.”

She hummed around him and sucked again, hollowing out her cheeks as much as she was able to. And for what felt like a painful eternity, she rotated in between swirling her tongue and sucking around his tip.

Pressure began building up as the heat in his belly felt like it was about to set him on fire.

But Shi Qingxuan was only getting started. She pulled back slightly and started swallowing down his length once more. His girth wasn’t unbearable in her mouth, so it was fairly easy to adjust to it, but his length was starting to test the limits of her unpracticed throat. Once she had taken him as far as she could, she did her best to ready her tongue into position at the base of his cock and started bobbing her head up and down.

“Shit!” he hissed, punching the wall at the new feeling.

She let out a breathy laugh through her nose and continued. Snaking a hand up his leg, she started fondling his balls with her idle hand.

“Fuck! I’m not… I’m not gonna last! If you— ah!” He Xuan sputtered desperately, legs trembling underneath the intense sensations.

His hands tangled in her still-damp chestnut waves as she kept bobbing her head up and down on his cock. It took every single ounce of self-restraint in his body not to move his hips and fuck deeper and harder. The warmth of her mouth was addicting. And when she rolled her pretty emerald eyes up to look at him, corners teary and wet from her ministrations, he felt his cock twitch violently at such a lewd sight. 

Fuck, she’s so pretty… Even like this, he thought vaguely, not knowing how he could be this lucky. 

“Seriously— Ha!— I’m gonna…!”

He watched her smile around his cock and she just redoubled her efforts, licking, sucking, bobbing, and torturing him in the most satisfying way possible. 

Panic suddenly settled in his foggy, pleasure filled mind at the real and immediate danger. Wait, shit, if I…!

“No, really! I’m gonna—” he choked out frantically. 

He tried to pull her head away from his groin, but she just moaned from having her hair yanked. Not realizing he was trying to push her off, her hands locked around the small of his back, holding herself place. 

It was too late.

His stomach fluttered in a horrible flash of pleasure and his dick twitched and sputtered. He let out a terrible growl into his sweatshirt sleeve, biting down fiercely to suppress the primal noise as he came directly into her mouth. The overhead light flickered in tandem with waves of pleasure of his orgasm. She probably could have kept going and sucked the soul out of him if she really wanted too.

Releasing him from her mouth with a wet pop of her kiss-swollen lips, she smiled up at him as her throat bobbed up and down, swallowing everything. 

FUCK!

“S-Spit it out!!” he demanded instantly, cupping her face in his trembling hands. “You can’t—!”

She lolled her tongue out, showing him that it was really too late. “Whoops!”

Panting, breathless. “You shouldn’t… have done that…” 

He sunk to the floor like an anchor, utterly defeated and spent. His legs wobbled like a newborn giraffe from how hard he came. Eyes wider than the moon stared at her, boring into her brilliant emerald eyes with worry coating his thick brows.

She wiped the corners of her mouth with the back of her hand, laughing breezily, “Relax, it’s not like I’ve never swallowed before. I enjoyed it!”

“That’s not—” He stopped himself prematurely and sighed deeply, putting his head in his hands. “Fuck…!”

“I gotta say though,” she said, smacking her lips a bit, tasting the remnants of his spend on her tongue. “Yours has the strangest flavor I’ve ever tasted… we should work on your diet, if you wanna keep this up.”

He lashed out in the next moment, desperate and clawing into her shoulders. “Go throw up,” he demanded, wild fear crackling in his golden brown eyes. “That stuff will—”

He was kinda freaking her out, but she didn’t understand what the big deal was?

She laughed nervously, brushing his hands off. “It wasn’t that bad, haha. Don’t worry about it.”

“But you could—”

“What? It’s not like anything’s going to happen, and especially not from swallowing, haha!”

He just looked at her with the same grave seriousness. “You shouldn’t have done that… You’ll… You could get sick.”

She smiled sweetly at him for being so concerned and said, “There’s no way this is gonna get me sick. I promise it’s fine. Just tasted a little funny.”

He shifted uncomfortably before her. She put a hand on his shoulder for comfort, realizing he might be self-conscious about the taste. 

“But your cock, wow! I’ll be dreaming about how perfect your cock tastes,” she admitted, swirling her tongue around again to taste his salty essence. “Honestly, swallowing it wasn’t bad! Just something different from what I was expecting! I promise, I’ve definitely had worse-tasting stuff in my mouth! You should see the stuff my friend Xie Lian cooks—”

Her voice stopped suddenly as her eyes traveled to her hand on his shoulder. There was a black smudge from where she had wiped the corners of her mouth. It looked like motor oil or even tar, but had the consistency of curdled milk. 

“What the…?” she said, completely baffled, bringing it closer to her eyes. “When did I touch something black…? Is there like oil or something around here?” Her head whipped around trying to find the source.

“It’s a boat. There’s lots of weird stuff to touch…” he said hurriedly, trying to stand up. “…get you a towel or something.”

He scrambled away from her as quickly as possible. 

Shi Qingxuan found herself staring at his pale ass cheeks jiggling and practically glowing in the moonlight as he trotted around the cabin, trying to find something.

“And some water, if you can,” she finally called out after realizing she was staring at his ass for too long. 

She bit her lip in excitement as a wave of want rushed through her veins, lighting a fire in her abdomen. Fuck. She really wanted to go all the way. She imagined the feeling of his perfect cock pressed up against her hole and bit her lip to try and contain herself from squealing in excitement.

He Xuan came back with a small hand towel from the bathroom and a bottle of water from the mini fridge. She thanked him and started wiping up the corners of her mouth and then her hand. He snatched it away from her as soon as she was finished. Shi Qingxuan just shrugged and started taking some slow sips of the water bottle.

He sat down next to her on the floor, side by side, backs against the wall.

“How was it?” she asked, elbowing him lightly in the side. He didn’t respond and looked up at her curiously. “Getting head for the first time? Anything you liked or didn’t like?”

He Xuan considered it for a moment. “I didn’t like finishing in your mouth,” he said seriously. “I’m not doing that ever again.”

Damn, I like swallowing… she thought, grieving momentarily.

“Okay, no swallowing next time,” she assured him. “That’s fine. What about things you liked?”

A red hue flushed across his cheeks and he found he couldn’t look her in the eyes anymore. “No notes…” he squeaked out.

“No notes?” she said, baffled. “What does that mean?”

“It was great,” he explained. “‘No notes.’ No feedback or criticism. …Whatever, it was something my sister used to say.”

“No, no, I like it! Maybe I’ll have to start saying it too!” Shi Qingxuan smiled full of admiration.

“Can I…?” he asked suddenly, gripping her thigh. “Can I do you next?”

Shi Qingxuan blinked at him for a moment, unsure of how to answer him. “You… w-want to…? On m-me?” 

He Xuan nodded.

So, she was learning that thinking about him fucking her and then the reality of him actually fucking her were two very different things indeed. She so desperately wanted to make it a reality but faced with the opportunity, she felt like a deer in the headlights again. 

This was thoroughly uncharted territory. A new frontier. Her hole, terribly unexplored by another. 

She’d given blowjobs before. That was familiar, that was easy. But going all the way? Could he really want to do that with her…? Her brain convinced her that he was going to run away despite having no credible evidence suggesting anything of the sort. In fact, wasn’t he the one offering?

Her face immediately turned beet red and she started babbling something incoherent and intermittently laughing, like she’d gone mad. All he could make out from her nonsense was, “Wait, like, just head or…”

He placed a hand on her thigh and gave it a quick squeeze, trying to shock her out of her rambling. “Anything. I want to make you feel good, too.”

She gulped. “W-What?” 

Am I not being clear…? he wondered in the back of his mind. 

“Let me fuck you next,” he said, incredibly serious. 

His eyes looked intense and hungry as he stared down at her, lust practically radiating off of him. His cock twitched as he spoke, trying to spring back to life.

Panic. All-consuming fear. Flashbacks to when he said the exact same thing… 

Shi Qingxuan’s face went absolutely pale and He Xuan could practically hear the dial-up internet sound leaking out of her brain.

Oh shit, was that too much? He added quickly, “Only if you want to—”

“I can’t do this—”

Suddenly, she scrambled up from off of her feet and tried to run away, but He Xuan grabbed her arm before she could escape and pulled her back down. 

“Hey, relax,” he said, poking a cool finger into her forehead. His eyes glimmered a flash of gold and the overhead lighting flickering a bit that she didn’t notice. “It’s me. Just relax. I’m not gonna do anything you don’t want. We don’t have to do anything more.”

She shut her mouth and stared straight ahead, too embarrassed to speak. But somehow, his words helped her feel a wash of peace over her rapidly spiraling thoughts. Her mind felt like jelly and all the muscles in her body loosened up and relaxed. She leaned over to prop herself up against his shoulder and closed her eyes, breathing evenly.

He Xuan stared at the chipped paint across from him, thoroughly confused at her wildly unexpected reaction. Where had he gone wrong? 

Neither of them spoke for a long time.

“Did I scare you?” he asked into the silence.

“What? No! No, you didn’t,” she cried, finally able to look him in the eyes again, like a spell was broken. “Well, I mean, you didn’t mean to. You couldn’t have known. But it’s fine! Ahaha, I just… I thought… Sorry, I freaked out, ahahaha. I’ve just…  My brain went into fight or flight.”

He Xuan stared at her, frowning with concern. She felt like she had to keep talking and explain herself.

“It’s just… The last time someone said that to me, he… It didn’t go well. When he saw me for the first time… you know, down there. He just… He…! Ugh, he freaked out and ran away. Said some really awful shit to me. And that was just the start of it all,” she said, hiding her face in her hands. “Sorry, this is just all really new for me, too. I’m trying to be here in the present and not focus on that. You wouldn’t do that to me, I know you wouldn’t.” 

Shi Qingxuan shook her head, trying to shake the bad thoughts out with it. She put a hand on his propped-up knee, squeezing it with affection.

“You mean, you haven’t… ever?” he asked.

“I’m a virgin,” she admitted with a frown.

“Does what we just did not count? Didn’t you say you’d done it before?”

“Well, some people have different ideas about it. I mean, you can count it if you want,” she said. “But virginity is usually reserved for, like, putting it in someone’s bits below. I’ve never done that before. Oral’s just considered foreplay. At least in my mind.”

He nodded, feigning understanding. “I would’ve thought… from how much you know about this stuff…”

He didn’t want to say anything that maybe she would find offensive. He wasn’t trying to imply she was a slut or anything, he just sort of assumed she’s had sex before since she’s so beautiful and the way she sounded like she knew what she was talking about.

“Yeah, you’d think that, hahaha,” she lamented sarcastically. “I’m sure you’ve guessed from my numerous freak-outs tonight, but my dating history hasn’t exactly been sunshine and rainbows.”

She took a deep breath and forced a smile to her quivering lips.

“But that doesn’t matter now. Because you’re not them. You’re not him. So I guess, if I didn’t completely ruin the mood, ahaha, do you still wanna… you know, go further? I’ll try not to freak out again.”

“I only want to do what you’re comfortable with.”

“I want this,” she assured him, nodding. “I’m nervous, but I know for certain that I want you.”

He Xuan, instead of responding, started looking around the boat. His eyes settled on the stupid cot in the corner.

“It’s… small. The bed, I mean. Well, cot,” he said, a flush of red coating his cheeks. “But I think the floor would be uncomfortable. We could go back to my house, but it’s kinda far… I’d have to drive us in the truck.”

Well, that was one way to agree.

She glanced over to that cot that was bolted down in the corner and thought about how she’d bonked her head on the wall earlier. One person could fit on it uncomfortably, so to fit two writhing bodies on it seemed like a stretch. However, she didn’t feel like making the way out to wherever his house was just yet.

It was a good thing she was flexible.

“I mean, we’ll have limited options, position-wise,” she calculated, “but I agree this is probably our best bet for now. I don’t really feel like getting in the Ford-F-1-Fish-ty this late, anyway. And it’s not like we have to do everything in one night, ahaha. We can save a real bed for later!”

“The… what?”

Shi Qingxuan blinked, not realizing she actually said that out loud.

“Ahahahaha, your truck? I don’t really feel like going in your truck! Yeah!”

He crossed his arms defensively. “What’s wrong with my truck?”

“Look, I don’t know how to tell you this delicately…” she took his hands in her own and stared at him with a very serious expression. “Your truck REEKS of fish. Like to the point, it could knock out someone with a weaker constitution. Like, I think Febreeze needs to confiscate your truck for scent testing, bad. Air fresheners exist for a reason!”

Rolling his eyes, “It can’t be that bad.” 

“He Xuan. I love seafood. And I almost threw up when you were driving me home from the lighthouse. Of course, The Dream Boat smells like fish, but that truck is in a whole different league of FOUL fishy smell. Like, it’s BAD.”

He Xuan struggled for a moment, words failing. “W-Why didn’t you say anything before?”

“It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter!” she assured him, persuading him with a big kiss. “Where were we? About to have sex right? That’s more important than your smelly truck!”

He scowled at her. “We’ll talk about this later.” But he ultimately conceded and kissed her back briefly.

She winced, definitely not looking forward to that conversation.

He Xuan stood up and hurried around to find a towel to lay on the cot just in case things got a little messy. He came back and started taking off his hoodie until he was standing there in front of her with only his T-Shirt, bottom half still completely bare.

When he looked down at her with a hand outstretched, she suddenly realized how clothed she was. A ripple of nervous laughter leaked out of her mouth as he pulled her up like she weighed nothing. Her hand hesitantly reached for the hem of her ruffled crop top, but he beat her to it.

Strong hands gripped her waist, pulling her closer to him and whispered, “Can I?”

Shi Qingxuan nodded, too excited and nervous to speak real words. He Xuan’s cold fingers snaked under the hem of her stretchy top and he pulled up. She lifted her arms and he almost slipped it off in one smooth motion if it weren’t for the straps. Once it was finally off, he discarded it next to his sweatshirt. He traced the edges of her strapless bra with his cold fingers, causing a ripple of goosebumps rising under her skin. He followed the garment behind and along the bra’s underwire until his hands came to a rest at the back. 

The look on his face changed when he failed to comprehend the clasping mechanism of the bra. She snickered lightly at him and asked if he needed any help. He scowled at her but didn’t respond and he finally unlocked it after struggling for a moment and threw it on top of her shirt.

He Xuan held his breath as he finally allowed himself to take a proper look at her bare chest. He couldn’t imagine someone having such silky smooth, perfect-looking skin, but here it was, right before his eyes. All for the taking.

“You can touch them, if you want,” she encouraged with a smile.

He did not need to be told twice. Taking one breast in each hand, he pressed into them eagerly. He didn’t really know what to do with them just yet, but he didn’t need to think about it too hard either. He gave each of them a curious squeeze and nearly gasped at how soft they felt. He rubbed his thumbs over the rapidly hardening nipples and played around with them for a while. Shi Qingxuan sucked in a breath when he gave her a little pinch. He did it again, looking up to see her reaction, but this time even harder.

“Mmm, that feels good,” she cooed, eyes closed and biting her lip.

He was getting distracted, he realized. As much as he wanted to keep playing with her breasts, he was still much more naked than she was at the moment. They’d have plenty of time to play later.

He Xuan shifted his hands down to her hips, intent on her shorts next. She kicked off her sneakers quickly and bit her lip in anticipation. His eyes were burning into her skin, intense and wanting to savor every single bit of her skin and commit it to memory.

Before he started again, he looked up at her, silently asking if it was alright to continue. She nodded back, just as eager. 

His fingers continued to leave goosebumps in their wake. He gently slid his hands over her navel and started unbuttoning her white denim shorts. Steady fingers pulled down the zipper, almost unbearably slow. Shi Qingxuan couldn’t tell if he was teasing her or if he was just as nervous as her. Either way, she was doing her best to calm her mind from past anxieties that didn’t belong in this precious moment.

He’s different, she coached herself, taking a deep breath. He’s already seen me. He’s not going to run away. He wants this. I want this. It’s completely different.

And just like that, her shorts and underwear were all on the floor, pooling around her ankles.

He Xuan didn’t linger, fearing he would make her uncomfortable. So instead, he went back up to her lips, reassuring her that he wasn’t going to go anywhere. He dominated her mouth with his tongue, not leaving her any room to think, only to feel his affections for her.

She really couldn’t have asked for anything better. Feeling like she could finally relax, like a huge weight was lifted off of her shoulders, like the clouds had parted from her occluded mind. This acceptance, his eagerness, while it didn’t immediately heal over all her trauma, she was beginning to realize that she really didn’t need to be so worried right now. Her mind could take a backseat and actually enjoy this.

Feeling instantly soothed, she kissed him back with enthusiasm and started pulling up the hem of his metal T-shirt so she wouldn’t be alone in her nakedness. They tried to keep their kiss connected for as long as possible, until he was forced to break away to remove the shirt over his head.

Seeing his bare torso in the water was nothing compared to seeing it for real. She had been dreaming about what he looked like in the light. She’d seen his body in the dim moonlight, but now she had him all to herself.

He Xuan had a thin, but lean and lanky build. Shi Qingxuan couldn’t understand how fit he was compared to his monstrous appetite. All of those toned muscles just visible under his pale skin covered in a wash of ink. She could’ve stared at his tattoos all night, if she really wanted too. There was not a shred of colored ink on his body. All of the tattoos were in black, white, and grey. She wouldn’t have expected any less, to be honest.

Her hands immediately stuck to his skin as she marveled and traced over the lines of his tattoos. The one in particular she was staring at was a solid, dark blue dragonfly on his chest. He mentioned it before, his sister designed this one. Its delicate wingspan stretched the length of his collar bones while the slender body was nestled perfectly centered on his sternum. 

“They’re all so beautiful…” she breathed, looking up at him with the warmest affection in her eyes. “You’re so beautiful.”

He Xuan’s eyes widened at the unexpected compliment, and looked away to hide the blush rising in his cheeks. She giggled softly at him and led his face back to her so she could kiss him again. Lips met and tongues intertwined in a passionate dance. She felt like if this was the last thing she ever did, she’d die happy just kissing him.

And then, he broke away to start kissing down her neck, biting intermittently. He bit her exactly like he had that stupid popsicle the day they reconnected, teeth first and without hesitation, with his full strength. She gasped in surprise at the momentary pain before he smoothed over the marks with his tongue, leaving a cooling sensation from his saliva.

“Mmmm,” she groaned.

He Xuan felt his dick twitch again when he heard this noise. Emboldened by her moans, he walked her back until her knees hit the edge of the cot, kissing and biting her neck along the way. She bit her lip in anticipation and she let him push her on the cot to lie down.

Now lying on it, she realized that wow, it really was a very small bed. Only slightly longer than the width of her shoulders, with a bit of wiggle room. But where there’s a will, there’s a way… 

Anything to not have to get in that goddamn truck…

He Xuan also seemed to realize the space problem as he hesitated, hovering just out of reach. The look on his face was priceless, it was like he was trying to calculate just the right angle or formulate a plan on where to put his legs and position himself so that this could work. Her amused giggles snapped him out of his head and she sat back up, reaching over to pull him down with her.

He made a surprised noise and then they both let out an “OOF” when he accidentally elbowed her in the ribs during the fall.

He tried to move off of her when he heard her wince in pain, mumbling, “Sorry—”

But she didn’t let him move, wrapping her arms around his neck and giving him a little peck on the cheek.

“It’s okay,” she promised. “You’ll just have to make it up to me, won’t you?”

“Make it up to you? It was your idea to drag me down—”

She silenced his ramblings by giving him a sloppy, open mouth kiss. He immediately melted into it and started repositioning his body to get more comfortable on top of her. Two elbows were propping him up in the crook of her armpits and his knees were on either side of her legs, caging them in between. He didn’t want to crush her, so he was holding himself up just a little bit off of her body. It also gave him a better angle to kiss down her neck.

He Xuan shifted his weight over to one elbow so he could caress her skin as he kissed closer and closer to her breasts, trailing bites and nibbles down her collarbone and finally onto the meat of her breast.

“Fuck, you’re so soft…” he breathed into her skin.

He was suddenly overcome with the desire to just consume her— every single part of her, he wanted to devour it until there was nothing left. Until they were one.

And so he began by attacking her breasts, one hand on her right and his mouth on her left. Shi Qingxuan shuddered under the assault. He licked and laved over her nipple, before taking it fully into his mouth. Her hands clenched around nothing until she caught a grip on his shoulders and dug in with her fingernails to ground herself from the onslaught of torturous pleasure.

While he sucked and played with her left tit, he squeezed, rolled, and pinched at the right, making sure they’d get equal treatment. It was only fair. The noises and yelps that fell from her mouth only spurred him on, and he redoubled his efforts. He may have gotten a little ahead of himself. 

After a particularly harsh bite, he pulled off, a little worried he’d gone too far.

Her eyes were squeezed shut and she was holding her breath. Shi Qingxuan slowly peaked through her long lashes when she noticed he’d stopped.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “Is it too much?”

She shook her head and said, “Go as hard as you want, I’ll tell you if it’s too much. Trust me.”

“Hard as I want…” he repeated, with a sly smirk. “I’ll make you eat your words, if you’re not careful.”

“Fuck…” she moaned, shivering in anticipation. “I want to see your marks still fading on my skin two weeks from now. Make me remember every detail of this moment.”

He Xuan growled a curse under his breath before going back in with more confidence. His dick was already painfully hard again, even though it hadn’t been that long. 

He picked a suitable spot out above her collarbone and he bit down around her skin, hard, seeing if she’d protest. Shi Qingxuan wriggled underneath him and winced, but she didn’t ask him to stop. He kept her skin in his jaws like a vice for several seconds until he let go and immediately kissed apologies around the mark.

Holy shit. Talk about an oral fixation… she thought vaguely. Other thoughts seemed so far away and unimportant now that she was writhing underneath his ministrations.

If it wasn’t already clear from how much he loved to have food in his mouth, he was practically insatiable at the sight of her endless smooth skin, all for the marking. And he seemed determined to not let a single spot go unmarred from his teeth and tongue.

Shi Qingxuan was practically dripping from how aroused she was. Her whole body felt hot and loose, and her heart fluttered in a strange mixture of anticipation and anxiety. Her spiraling thoughts were beginning to quiet down as she let go of all that baggage for now to make room for cataloging this experience. She wanted to let herself feel free and fully give in to pleasure. She trusted him.

As soon as he was finished marking up one side of her chest, He Xuan moved onto the other side, shifting his weight onto his other elbow. Shi Qingxuan dug her nails deeper into his shoulders as he started massaging over the bruised skin, hissing from the dull pain. A yelp tore from her lungs when he bit down particularly hard around her nipple.

“Yeah, l-like that,” she encouraged with a yelp.

He kept going until he was sure she’d be bruised for weeks, and then continued even more just to make extra sure. 

He Xuan, now having tasted his fill of her chest, started kissing and moving lower down her torso, down her silky soft skin, until he reached just below her belly. He made intense eye contact with her as he moved down, wanting to relish in all of her reactions. 

But he noticed her growing more apprehensive, a worried frown coating her fair features. He pulled up his head instantly and went back to comfort her, giving her tiny nips and kisses against her jawline.

“What’s wrong?” he whispered, circling a finger around her belly button. “I wanted to taste you next. I bet it tastes even better than your tits.”

She shook her head and said, “Not there, please. Anywhere but there. I just… It’s not–”

“Shh,” he cooed, giving her another kiss to calm her down. “You don’t have to explain. I won’t do anything you don’t want.”

Shi Qingxuan let go of a long held breath, feeling a little relieved. “Pretend it’s not even there. I’m sor–”

He Xuan interrupted by placing a gentle kiss on her lips, stopping the apology from her mouth. She kissed back eagerly, exceedingly grateful for his understanding. A little bit of moisture had collected in the corners of her eyes from just how sweet he was… and from how hard he had bitten her…

He Xuan pulled away first and caressed the side of her face, gazing dreamily at her. He brushed an errant curl from out of her face and asked lightly, “So, how do you want to go about… What would be best for you? How should I…?”

“Oh. Um… We can still keep going,” she said, feeling her face flush. “I mean, if you’re still hungry, you can eat me out if you want, hahaha.”

He blinked down at her. 

She blinked up at him.

“You know… Like, eat my ass?” she supplied. “A rim job?”

He Xuan’s eyes betrayed his confusion.

“Is… Wait. Do you know—?”

“I know how it usually works!” he interrupted, a flash of embarrassment, making him pull back and turn his head away. “But I didn’t really think about… I don’t… You…”

He let his voice drift off. He didn’t want to say anything stupid.

Shi Qingxuan tried her best to hold in her laughter. She wasn’t trying to make fun of him at all. Everyone had to learn from somewhere!

“Wait, can I ask you some questions?” she asked, pulling his head back. “I’m not judging you or gonna make fun of you, I promise. I just need to know what we’re working with so we can navigate this together, alright?”

He could barely keep eye contact with her, but he did his best to nod his head. She pushed him lightly in the chest so that they could sit up and have a little talk.

She already felt confident she knew what the answer to her first question would be, but she asked anyway, “Have you ever watched porn or anything like that?”

He grimaced and admitted, “Maybe once. But it never really interested me.”

“Okay, that’s totally fine. Porn isn’t a good representation of real sex, anyway. But you know how it normally works, yeah?” He nodded his head. “Usually heteronormative sex is like penis-in-vagina penetration, but since I’m a trans woman, it’ll be just a little different. Trans women need a little more prep since we can’t get wet down there like a cis woman can. After that, it’s mostly the same stuff, just in my ass.”

“So ‘down there’ for you… it’s your ass?” he asked in a tiny voice. 

She was his first kiss. He’d hardly ever watched porn. Not everyone grows up with good sex education, especially not LGBTQIA+ sex ed. She tried to remind herself of these things. She silently thanked him for just knowing what heteronormative sex was.

She nodded, giving him an endearing smile. “Yeah. We’re probably gonna need some lube if you wanna ‘go all the way,’ as they say. Spit doesn’t really cut it for anal. Especially not the first time. But there’s other stuff we can do that doesn’t require penetration since I don’t have any with me. Like when I said you could ‘eat me out,’ it just means using your tongue there. Figuratively ‘eating.’ And there are other options if you don’t like rimming. Frotting, 69, grinding—” 

He Xuan’s brain stopped listening when he realized just how out of his depth he was at that moment. How was there so much about sex he didn’t know? He thought it was pretty simple, just get in and start moving around, and now she was saying all these new words… and numbers? What’s that even about?

“I have lubricant,” he supplied, sounding confident. “Use it for greasing the fishing lines.”

“Skin safe lubricant?” she asked skeptically.

He opened his mouth and then closed it.

She gave a little chuckle and said, “Yeah. Unless you have, like, coconut oil or aloe or something we could use as lube, I doubt we can do much in the penetration department today. Or even yogurt. I’ve heard about some people using yogurt as lube before.”

“That’s disgusting,” he said, shaking his head. An insult to the yogurt, he thought. “Wait, did you say aloe? Like aloe vera?”

As soon as she nodded, he got up from the cot and ran into the bathroom to retrieve a small plastic jar. He Xuan shoved it in her hands.

“I use this for rope burns or little cuts here and there,” he explained. “Will it work?”

She looked at the jar, a little surprised, and turned it around to look at the ingredients. It was one of those all-natural aloe vera jars they sell at the drug stores with just aloe and water and some other skin-safe ingredients. She made sure to read a couple more times, checking to see if it had alcohol in it, but it didn’t as far as she could tell.

“It looks safe, yeah. It’s still not as good as, like, proper water-based lube, but it’ll do in a pinch. We can definitely use this if you still want to try. But like I said, we don’t have to do everything in one night.”

He stared at her, deadpan and earnest, “I want to fuck you.”

She laughed and gave him a little kiss on the cheek as she opened up the jar.

“Do you want me to show you how to stretch it?” she offered. “It’s not hard.”

“Stretch?”

“Yeah, for anal stuff you have to prepare it for penetration. Otherwise, it’s, like, super painful and I could end up bleeding or tearing.”

He Xuan looked absolutely unprepared for that answer. “Does it even feel good… in your ass…?” he asked, skeptically. “I don’t want to do it if it doesn’t feel good for you. And I’m not going to hurt you…”

She giggled and said, “Oh, it’ll feel really good, I promise. For you, for me. You don’t have to worry about that, I promise. You won’t hurt me if we do it right. It just takes a couple extra steps to make sure it feels good. For both of us.” 

He was nervous. Both of them were, really. But they knew that tackling this big step together was the only way forward. 

“Then…” he started, “I still want to do it.” 

She shivered under his words, biting her lip to suppress the smile that appeared from getting too wide. 

And suddenly, a thought came to her mind. 

“Oh, shit! Past-me is a genius!” she cheered, leaning over and kissing him on the cheek.

She hurried up out of the cot and quickly sorted through their pile of clothes looking for her bag. 

“Wait, where did I put it?”

“Put what?” 

“My purse!” 

“Oh, it’s on the chair,” he said, pointing over to the steering wheel.

She fiddled around in her purse for a long moment until she called out triumphantly, “AHA!” She held something up in the air and marched back over to the bed. “For you, when you need it.” She placed a solitary condom packet in his hand, positively beaming his way. “I can’t believe I remembered I had that in my wallet, ahaha! Hence: past-me is a genius!” 

His eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Why do you keep condoms in your wallet?” 

And why couldn't you have realized earlier before I came in your throat?! But the more he thought about it, the more he realized that would probably create another problem that he would have similar trouble explaining away…

“Well, it’s been there for like two years,” she admitted. “I started carrying girly stuff around in my purse during university, like tampons and pads in case my friends ever needed them. Figured it wouldn’t be a terrible idea to keep some condoms, just in case. Some of my friends were wild during my partying days, hahaha. I always like being prepared. And there was this guy I was dating at the time who always talked about how he never used them, so just in case we ever did anything, I wanted to have one. Safe sex is important! Honestly, it was such a red flag that he openly admitted he hated how condoms felt—”

She suddenly shut her mouth and shook her head. She could feel herself about to go into ranting mode. 

Once, she’d ranted and raved about the extremely detailed, tragic line of events that led her to dropping out to poor, captive audience Xie Lian and his boyfriend for about four hours straight in their apartment a couple months after she dropped out. Hua Cheng had secretly set a timer.

“Whatever! That’s not important right now!” she realized. “Anyways! So, yeah. Long story short: condom in my wallet, my ex is the worst. Yeah. I’ll tell you the whole story one day if you ever wanna hear it, but we have much more important and interesting things to be doing!”

As she sat, she took the jar of aloe from him and offered to show him how to stretch her open.

But he’d heard something earlier that sounded especially enticing. He lowered her hand holding the jar and said, “I want… t-to eat you out first. If… that’s okay.”

“Hahaha, I thought you might!”

She was secretly hoping he would want to try it. She had a sneaking suspicion he was going to be really good at it judging from his insatiable appetite. 

She shooed him off the bed for a moment so she could get on all fours on the tiny cot, ass up, and facing him. She glanced back over her shoulder and said, “It’ll probably be easier for you like this.”

He stared at her perfectly rounded ass for a long time, trying to make sense of the freckle constellations in her skin. When he’d heard her say “eat ass” and “use your tongue,” he was intrigued. But now that he was staring at her ass, it was a daunting task. How exactly should he go about it? “Use your tongue” was more than a little vague to use as specific instructions.

She could practically smell the smoke from the gears turning in his brain as he stared at her, like someone had pressed the pause button on him. 

“You good?” she asked.

He narrowed his eyes, unsure if he should ask anything.

Shi Qingxuan understood his hesitation all too well. He was probably overthinking everything. She’d done the same thing the first time she’d given someone a blowjob. It was kinda scary getting started.

“You just kinda… I don’t know… Get in there and lick around, you know?” she offered, trying to help. “I’ve never really done it before, so I don’t have any pointers for you, sorry. But I’ll tell you what feels good. I’m betting it’s one of those things you just gotta jump in and then let instincts take over, you know? And I know how good you are at eating, haha!”

Eating. 

Let instinct take over. 

Get in there and lick around, she said. 

All of that, he could do.

Kissing and gently nipped around her ass and the backs of her thighs, squeezing with a free hand, and holding onto her hip with the other, he took his time teasing around before he finally moved to the main attraction.

She let out a long sigh when he finally spread her apart with one hand, careful and steady.

He Xuan took a moment to breathe. There it was. A delicate ring, private and perfect. And all his for the taking. She trusted him enough to do this. He did not take that responsibility lightly.

His tongue flicked out, testing and curious, warm and cautious. She sighed again, pleased and surprised. Her whole body leaned in closer to his tongue, searching, aching for more. 

“Yeah, like that, mmm,” she encouraged.

Her soft hum fueled him to explore even further.

Slowly, he relaxed and let himself give in to his instincts. He licked around, teasing and circling, listening intently for any little shift in her breath. Every nervous thought within him faded into a distant memory, shifting instead to desire, to lust, to devouring, to worshiping.

Shi Qingxuan moaned wantonly, pushing her hips back ever so slightly to get more purchase of his tongue. He grabbed ahold of her ass with rougher hands, spreading her even wider. And he pressed his tongue in, slow and deep.

She gasped his name, a trembling sound that went straight to his cock. God, his name sounded beautiful on her tongue, needy and soft, and all for him.

Shi Qingxuan tasted like mint, clean and subtle, and so sweet. And He Xuan wanted more of it, like it was something he’d been depriving himself of all his life. 

“Wow, ahh, you’re doing… s-so good,” she gasped. She knew he was going to be a natural at this.

The praise went straight to He Xuan’s head. He pulled back only to breathe for a millisecond. He smirked against her ass, lips slick and ready for another round. Attacking in between her cheeks again, circling all around her rim and flicking on and around with a punishing rhythm that made her legs shake. 

She involuntarily squeezed her thighs together, excess energy manifesting in her body wiggling. Gasping his name again, she was in heaven. Dull pressure building up in her abdomen. 

“You like that?” he growled, pulling away, squeezing her cheeks.

“Mn… Fuck, yes,” she breathed, pushing her hips back, searching for him again.

He Xuan wanted to eat her from the inside out. Every twitch, gasp, moan, wiggle. Everything she had to give him, he wanted it all. She arched her back into his touch, trying to get impossibly closer to his tongue. 

Shi Qingxuan was about to snap. And usually it took way more than just a little while to make her this close on her own.

“Can…” she started, almost immediately getting cut off by a choking moan. “Can you…? I want you. Ahhh, I want you next. I-I want to cum on y-your cock!”

He didn’t feel anywhere near satisfied from this little taste, but who was he to deny her when she asked so nicely? Breath hot against her skin, he kissed his way up her back.

“Show me how to open you up,” he demanded, breathless and hungry.

“Aloe. Condom,” she panted, shivering against his eagerness. 

It was too hard to think clearly, but this needed to go well or else she’d scare him off. He was back before she even realized he had left to grab them. The jar in her shaking hands, she tried to calm down, breathing in steady intervals as her heart raced with desire.

Sitting up, she unscrewed the top easier and dipped a finger into the jar of aloe. But she suddenly realized why this wasn’t going to work. A flush to her cheeks, panic, and she looked up at him. 

“What?” he asked, wondering if there was something wrong with the jar.

Shaking her head, “I’m so stupid.”

“What?”

“I have acrylics.”

“I don’t know what that means.” 

“My nails!” she cried, showing him her long, sharp, baby pink, almond-shaped acrylic nails. “I can’t finger myself open with long nails.”

He blinked at her.

“You’ll have to do it.”

She handed him the jar, wiping the excess on the lid. He looked like she had just asked him to jump off a bridge.

He Xuan was horrified, thoroughly unprepared for this. Babbling, somewhat incoherently, “I don’t know what to do… What if… I’ll hurt you… I’ll fuck it up… …bleed… I don’t want to hurt you—”

Now it was her turn to calm him down. She caught his face and smiled. “Shh. It’s okay. I can talk you through it, if you need me to. Just until you feel comfortable, then you can take over. But I know you won’t hurt me. I trust you. It’s also pretty easy. And you were already so good at eating me out, this is practically a cakewalk, I promise.” 

He swallowed and nodded. If she trusted him, then that was all the confidence he needed. 

“Okay.”

“You still want to try, right?” She felt the need to ask. “Because we don’t have to do this if you’re uncomfortable.”

“I’ll do it.”

“But… do you want to…?” She was confused and a little alarmed by his word choice. “Or do you just think I want you to, so you’re forcing yourself to do it? Ahaha, because we can stop if—”

“I want to make you feel good,” he clarified a little impatiently. “I want to fuck you. Now, show me how to do it.”

She breathed a sigh of relief. She was thankful for his blunt personality. Always straight to the point, even if she did misunderstand him sometimes. Shi Qingxuan brought him closer to give him a sweet kiss, finding her own taste on his lips.

Smiling up at him, “You got it, captain!” 

He Xuan rolled his eyes, annoyed by the stupid nickname. He let his gaze rest on the jar in his hands, staring with an intense look on his face while Shi Qingxuan got back into position— on her hands and knees on the tiny cot. 

“You’re gonna need lots of that stuff,” she encouraged. “Like, there’s literally no such thing as too much lube with anal. Everything needs to glide smoothly for it to feel good.”

He dipped his finger into the jar, a generous amount on his finger, and lathered up in between her cheeks, letting his short, chipped black polished fingertips circle around her rim slowly and reverently.

“Start with one finger,” she said, eyes drifting shut, trying to mentally prepare herself for this. “There’s no rush. Just take your time.”

He Xuan’s touch was careful, extremely delicate, like she’d break apart in pieces if he breathed too hard. He circled her entrance again over and over again, slow and deliberate. 

He was stalling. 

Shi Qingxuan let out a breathy sigh as he pushed in for the first time, body yielding to his intrusion.

“Is that okay? Are you alright?” he asked instantly, not daring to move.

“Yeah, it’s great,” she said, biting her bottom lip. “Just go slow, in and out. You’re doing fine, don’t worry. I’ll let you know if something hurts.”

“Mm.”

He obeyed, trying to get used to the way her body swallowed up his finger as he pushed in further. It was warm and soft. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but he was pleasantly surprised.

One finger was barely a stretch, especially after his tongue, but Shi Qingxuan still needed to get used to the feeling. She hadn’t done anything to herself in a long time because masturbating usually just made her feel sad. 

But this… This felt right, with him. 

She sighed pleasantly as He Xuan slowly pushed in and out in a steady rhythm. 

Yeah, it felt good.

“You can add another one,” she instructed, once she felt adequately adjusted. “Just slow and steady, like before. You’re doing great.”

He Xuan added his middle finger on the next push in. She hummed, feeling the initial stretch burn slightly before it bled into a pleasant sensation.

“Yeah, hmmmm, just like that,” she encouraged.

And he felt her clench around his fingers for the first time, gripping around him tightly like a vice. His eyes widened, trying to imagine what that might feel like on his cock. Fuck, she was so beautiful, so tight, all for him. All for him. 

She explained to him that he could get a little fun with it. Scissor around or hook his fingers a bit, if he wanted. 

He Xuan was still a little scared of hurting her, but if she was asking for it, he figured it must be alright.

Eventually he found a spot that when he grazed by, she moaned obscenely loud, practically begging him to do it again. He Xuan zeroed in, like it was his life’s mission to make her beg and plead and moan and cry and scream as he pressed down on that special spot over and over again.

“You! Y-you gotta, ah! I’ll cum, oh my god. I’ll cum!” she cried out, tears prickling in her eyes from the waves of intense, almost overwhelming pleasure flooding her system. “I wahh! w-want your cock! Please, please, please!”

But he only had two fingers in, it might hurt if he put it in now. He backed off the spot, wanting to make this last longer.

“Not yet,” he growled, smirking. 

He Xuan enjoyed the power struggle between them. Although Shi Qingxuan was telling him how to please her, he was the one in control. It was going to his head more than a little bit.

Shi Qingxuan whined pathetically back at him, thoroughly upset he wasn’t heeding her every whim. She was going to go insane if he didn’t fill her up right this instant. 

A tragedy, having to wait just a bit longer!

He Xuan added a third finger unprompted, and Shi Qingxuan screamed. He almost pulled his fingers out, thinking he’d hurt her. But she clenched around his fingers, not letting them escape just yet.

“Yes, ahh! Yes, deeper! Harder!” 

Okay, so that was a good scream. He was learning. He wanted to learn every possible sound she could make and catalogue it into a playlist or music library so he could play them back whenever he wanted.

Shi Qingxuan was rocking her hips back, trying to get his fingers to go deeper. Pride was going straight to his cock, seeing her coming undone like this. 

No one else had seen her like this. No one else ever would. 

This was all for him. 

He smirked at the thought, savoring the taste of possessing her fully.

Shi Qingxuan was already pretty far gone to give any more coherent instructions. Once He Xuan deemed her ready, he slid his fingers out to open up the condom packet and roll it on. 

Collapsing on the cot, legs and arms shaking. Just a mess, really. So much so, that she couldn’t even hold her own weight. Her hole clenched around nothing, missing his heavenly fingers.

“Let me roll over,” she gasped, looking back at him, thoroughly debauched, blushing and eyes glazed over with pleasure. “I can’t… I can’t keep holding myself up.”

He momentarily got up, letting her roll over onto her back. This position, he was familiar with. Missionary, he thought someone called it once. He Xuan felt like he knew what to do from here. And it was better this way, he thought. He wanted to see her face and to kiss and to bite her while he fucked her.

“M-more lube,” she called out, still dazed and panting a bit. “‘Cuz of the condom…”

He obliged, coating his impossibly hard erection trapped in a condom with gratuitous amounts of the aloe.

He Xuan pushed aside her trembling legs and slotted himself on top of her. One of her legs was trapped against the cold metal wall of the boat and the other was basically hanging off the edge cot. 

Open and honest and intimate. 

Two celestial bodies getting ready to collide. 

He Xuan felt like his whole life led up to this exact moment. 

“Ready?” 

“Yes, please,” she said so sweetly. “Just, slow. Really slow at first.” A hint of anxiety making her voice break slightly. She was just as nervous as he felt.

He nodded, heart swelling with anticipation and affection for the beautiful woman underneath him. 

He Xuan lined up the tip of his cock with her tight heat and pushed in. A flash of something bigger than him or her, something bigger than this lifetime. Raw and cosmic, two bodies slowly coming into orbit around each other. Not driven by lust or love, but by an eternal, soul-deep need.

Shi Qingxuan gasped, feeling the sting of the initial stretch. Oh my god, did he feel even better than she could’ve imagined.

“Are you okay?” he asked, wondering if it was alright to push further.

She squeaked a confirmation, too overwhelmed to speak.

Slowly, steadily, he pushed his way inside, bit by bit. 

He Xuan couldn’t decide where he wanted to look more— at her face and all the different expressions flashing by or at her hole that swallowed him up, where they were becoming one. Shi Qingxuan was like a warm, cushiony paradise inside to He Xuan. His mind was rapidly going blank from how amazing she felt, but he was trying desperately to hold onto reality until she adjusted to his cock. 

Only after, could he lose his mind.

And after what felt like an eternity of the slow drag of sensations, He Xuan bottomed out. Hips resting against hips. Both breathing heavier than normal, even heavier than when they climbed the lighthouse steps. 

“It’s in,” he grunted, eyes hooded with barely-restrained pleasure.

“G-gimme… gimme a sec,” she choked, hands instantly going to his chest to ground herself.

She felt so full, like he was pressing up into her ribcage from how long his cock was. The stretch was there, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as she imagined. Her hips wiggled around, trying to find a comfortable position underneath him, and it was a very strange feeling to have his cock move around inside as she adjusted. 

He Xuan watched her with rapt attention, still on the verge of shattering his composure. After a long moment to relax and adjust, she gave him the go ahead to start moving.

“Slow,” she kept reminding him.

He Xuan pulled back just a little bit and pushed back in, testing the waters slow and deep. 

Shi Qingxuan moaned, the ache of fullness bleeding back into pleasure the longer he dragged along her tight walls.

“You’re so perfect,” he strained a whisper, kissing her neck. “You feel… so… so f-fucking good.”

He kept a steady pace for her, until he could start to feel the glide of his cock become smoother and easier. 

She was ready. 

He really was a quick study.

Now, when he pushed inside, there was no hesitation. Her gravity was drawing him in, forcing them to collide over and over again. Like the universe had pulled them together across infinite space so that they could crash into each other right here.

He pounded into her, like a meteor shower or an asteroid into her celestial body, devastating and marring. Bruises littered the surface, like craters, covering her skin from where he’d sunk his teeth in earlier. She would never be the same after this, and neither would he.

He Xuan was going to lose his mind. He’d never known pleasure like this before, all consuming and addicting. He just hoped she was feeling the same.

He shifted positions so that he was holding her close, practically folding her in half in a mating press, and continued his heavenly assault. Wrapping her arms around him, pulling infinitely closer, she chased after his lips, intertwining tongues and exchanging hot breaths.

“I’m… ah, I’m so close!” she screamed, whimpering and crying from the intensity. “Harder, please! Harder, harder, harder!”

He Xuan was also incredibly close to tipping over the edge. He growled in her ears, biting onto her neck, and increased his already bruising pace.

Shi Qingxuan clung to his shoulders, scratching down his back, happy to drown in this overwhelming tidal wave of pleasure. She couldn’t figure out where she ended and he began. There was only an infinite plane white-hot desire. There was only them. 

She trembled, bound to shatter any second. Tightening around him, like the pull of a black hole, she finally came. A soundless scream in the blackness of space, body convulsing, like she was being ripped apart in every direction.

He Xuan followed after her, a strangled growl, spilling into her as the world vanished around them. His orgasm tore through him like a star going supernova, hot, obliterating, infinite, beautiful. 

He collapsed on top of her, bodies slick, exhausted, tangled and shaking. A mess of stardust and panting, their hearts racing in tandem. Two souls, writhing in the stars. 

Shi Qingxuan’s head was filled with cotton. Everything felt so far away and distant. She couldn’t comprehend what was happening until suddenly she felt cold and reached out to grab the warm thing that she was previously cuddling.

“I’m just going to get another rag,” he promised, giving her a kiss on the forehead.

She didn’t hear him, whimpering pathetically at the loss of contact. 

While he was up, he found a spare moment to get rid of the used condom discreetly. She didn’t need to see that it was filled with black sludge. 

He Xuan also cleaned up any black remnants left on his dick until everything looked normal. Human. He picked up the water bottle she’d drank from earlier and wet another clean rag he found under the sink to go clean her off. 

Shi Qingxuan squirmed on the bed, whining softly when the cold of the rag touched her abdomen. He Xuan cleaned her up gently, kissing her all over. She hissed vaguely when he started cleaning up where she was still incredibly sensitive. 

It was nowhere near close to a shower or bath that they so desperately needed, but it would do for now, he thought.

He crept back onto the cot, pushing his way next to the wall and under her. Pulling her into his arms, she instantly smiled brightly, giggling softly and clung to him like a koala. Resting her head on his chest, hair wild, damp, and tangled, she closed her eyes and fell asleep almost instantly. He Xuan’s expression softened, thinking she was exceptionally cute like this. Glowing, even. He kissed her forehead and around her crown since it was the easiest to reach in this position. Eventually, he drifted off, too.

Chapter Text

[…THREE YEARS AGO]

The living room of someone she didn’t know pulsed with bass, lights strobing across faces that were already a little too flushed. A couple of guys were shouting over a game of beer pong set up in the corner. Someone she thought Xie Lian had once introduced as Mu Qing was passed out on the couch with a gaudy plastic tiara crooked on his head leaning up against another guy who was passed out. The whole house reeked of cheap beer and sugary vodka mixers. Someone with long black hair and a demon mask tied around his head (even though she was pretty sure this wasn’t a costume party) was making out with a really buff guy with fluffy hair in the corner with his mask tilted up just so they could get nasty.

It was perfect for a Saturday night at university!

“Heyyyy girl!” Shi Qingxuan called, offering a wave as she spotted Xie Lian across the crowd, looking lost.

She slipped past a group at the DJ booth (a cardboard box with a portable speaker in it) arguing about bluetooth and playlist rights. She gave her new friend a quick side hug, and air-kissed both his cheeks warmly.

“Oh, hey, Qingxuan!” Xie Lian turned around, clearly relieved to see a friendly face amid the chaos. “I didn’t know you’d be here! I would’ve tried to find you sooner…” He glanced back at the group of ducklings— first years— practically glued to his side that had followed him around all night. Just another perk of being an upperclassman in the tutoring department and an RA.

Shi Qingxuan followed his eyes over to them briefly, before responding, “Ahaha, I didn’t know I was coming until like an hour ago! Do you want anything to drink? I was just about to stake out the snack table and the punch bowl!”

“I’m alright,” he said, smiling sheepishly. “I’m staying sober in case someone needs a ride home later.”

“God, you’re such a do-gooder. It’s inspiring, really. I, however, will be partaking! Gratuitously!”

He laughed her off, then gestured to his gaggle of groupies behind. “Here, let me introduce you to some friends!”

When he turned, about half of the group scattered, instantly embarrassed they’d been found out.

The three boys left stood in a loose, uneven cluster. One had amber hair, broad shoulders, and a grin so open it nearly lit the whole room. The other two lingered behind, whispering into each other’s ears like they’d already judged her.

“Lang Qianqiu,” the amber-haired boy said, extending his hand with almost comical enthusiasm.

She returned the handshake with a bright smile. “Lang? Like the Tigers’ owners, Lang?” He nodded. “I think our parents used to know each other. I’m Shi Qingxuan.”

So this was the son of the family that hosted the last party her parents ever went to. She vaguely remembered seeing the back of his head at the funeral, but they’d never met formally.

“Wait, the oil-Shis or the tech-Shis?” Lang Qianqiu asked, recognizing her name, too.

“Oil,” she said, shifting uncomfortably. Maybe he didn’t remember her parents, after all… “But I’m not really affiliated with the company. I’m doing my own thing. That’s all my brother. He’s big on carrying on the legacy.”

“Oh, don’t I know what that’s like, ahaha!” he said cheerily. Turning towards the other two, he continued, “These are my roommates, An Le and Qi Rong.”

She held out her hand again, bright and polite. Neither moved. An Le’s lips twitched into something that wasn’t quite a smile, while Qi Rong just stared at her, eyes sharp and invasive.

“Qi Rong is my cousin,” Xie Lian explained quickly when the silence dragged. “And An Le and Lang Qianqiu are half-brothers. They're all freshmen, like you!”

“Really?” she said, looking them over. She could definitely see the resemblance between the cousins. “That’s so cool that you all go to the same school! It’s like a family reunion!” The words slipped out more bitter than intended, but she smoothed her smile back in place, clearing her throat. “My brother’s way older than me, so I don’t really know anyone here except Xie Lian. But even then, we just met, ahaha.”

“So what are you studying?” Lang Qianqiu asked, his entire focus on her, warm and easy.

She instantly brightened. “Fashion design, with a business minor. Following my dreams!” At least someone here knew how to make small talk.

“That’s so cool! I could never do something artsy like that! I can barely draw an orange,” he said with a booming laugh. “I’m double majoring in kinesiology and business. Xie Lian’s been a lifesaver with econ in the tutoring department. He’s the best mentor ever!”

“Oh, I wouldn’t go that far,” Xie Lian mumbled, ducking his head.

“My cousin should be running the tutoring department,” Qi Rong cut in, his voice sharp as a blade.

Xie Lian flushed and waved his hands, embarrassed.

“Roommates, huh?” Shi Qingxuan changed the subject. “Do you guys live on campus, or…?”

“Off campus, but really close. We’re sharing an apartment, the three of us,” Lang Qianqiu explained. “It’s actually really great!”

“Shi Qingxuan lives in the same building as me,” Xie Lian explained. “It’s how we met, actually. I’m the RA for the Yujun dorm this year.”

Shi Qingxuan told the story of their unfortunate first meeting on move-in day. The box of clothes she dropped down the stairs after accidentally bumping into Xie Lian, trying to play it off as dramatic and funny. Lang Qianqiu laughed so loudly that people turned to stare, oblivious to the way An Le rolled his eyes and muttered something in Qi Rong’s ear. The two of them exchanged a high five behind Lang Qianqiu’s broad back.

Shi Qingxuan caught the gesture and her smile stiffened.

Xie Lian, mortified, tried to redirect. “Really, it was my fault—”

“Don’t apologize!” she said brightly, smacking him on the back. “He even folded the clothes for me. He’s really such a prince of a guy. So I adopted him!”

Qi Rong clapped Xie Lian on the shoulder hard enough to jostle him, mimicking her gesture in faux sincerity. “That’s my cousin, alright. A real prince-type. Don’t ya think so, An Le?”

“Yeah, I sure do,” An Le drawled, dripping with sarcasm.

Lang Qianqiu, meanwhile, was nodding earnestly. “Wait, you adopted him? That’s hilarious. He’s the upperclassman, ahaha!”

Oblivious to the tension humming between his half-brother, Xie Lian’s cousin, and this new girl, Lang Qianqiu kept chatting with Shi Qingxuan about first-year classes, grinning the whole time. When someone called his name from across the room, he gave her a friendly pat on the shoulder and bounded off into the crowd, radiating warmth like an unleashed dog.

Qi Rong and An Le lingered half a beat longer. Both gave her matching side-eyes before disappearing after him.

Xie Lian exhaled quietly beside her, shoulders tight.

“Well, Lang Qianqiu seems nice,” she said carefully.

“Yeah,” Xie Lian replied, though his eyes followed the retreating shapes of the other two with unease. “Just… be careful of my cousin. He can be a little—” Xie Lian faltered. “Family’s complicated.”

“Yeah. I get it.”

The bass thudded on around them, laughter bursting from another room, red cups clattering against the floor. In all of it, Lang Qianqiu’s laughter stood out like sunlight, while Qi Rong’s suspicious stares pierced into her skin like a cold dagger from across the room.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

The best way Shi Qingxuan could describe Lang Qianqiu was that he was a golden retriever in human form. He bounded through life with limitless energy, loyal to a fault, tongue almost too quick for his own good. He was impossibly popular, never without a crowd around him, yet completely free of malice. And now that she was getting closer with him, popularity seemed to follow her as well. He also said the most ridiculous things without realizing they were ridiculous, and people forgave him for it because his heart was so obviously in the right place.

Blunt. Honest. Stubbornly righteous. Always willing to lend a hand, even to strangers. All qualities Shi Qingxuan found herself admiring more than she liked to admit.

They saw each other a couple times a week, since they both suffered through the same Thursday afternoon Business Mathematics class. Afterward, she’d chat him up, and if he was free, they’d grab coffee. She’d spread her notes out all over the table like a battle map. Inevitably, their study sessions would get sidetracked by Lang Qianqiu telling her stories about rugby practice or some stray cat he’d fed behind the gym.

His family was big in the sports world, owning the Tigers basketball franchise, though Lang Qianqiu barely seemed to care. 

“Basketball’s not really my thing,” he told her sheepishly, like confessing a mortal sin. Instead, he played rugby with a passion that lit up his whole face whenever he talked about it. 

One afternoon, mid-sip of iced coffee, he blurted, “You should totally come to one of our games! You’d love it!” 

And of course she agreed, not that she was much into sports, but just to have a reason to get out and do fun things.

Word traveled fast, as it does on campus. People noticed how often they were together, how easy she laughed around him, how he always saved her a seat in class. Naturally, the rumor mill spun out of control. 

By the time Shi Qingxuan got a call from her brother, it was as if the whole world had already decided they were dating.

“Ge, you think everyone isn’t good enough for me,” she argued, pinching the bridge of her nose as he ranted, “but we’re not even dating!”

“Good,” her brother scoffed. “That child is a buffoon.”

She laughed, but the word stuck with her. Buffoon was… not entirely inaccurate.

Because the very next week, in the middle of a coffee-study session, Lang Qianqiu looked her dead in the eye, cleared his throat dramatically, and said, “So, we’ve been dating for a while.”

Shi Qingxuan froze mid-sip. “Wait, what? We’re dating…?”

“Yes,” he said with such confidence it almost convinced her. “And I was thinking it’s time we take the next step. I want you to be my girlfriend.”

Her matcha latte thunked onto the table. “Hold on. Since when were we dating?”

“Since I asked you out.”

“When did you ask me out?”

“To the rugby game.”

“…That was a date?”

“Yeah. Of course.” He tilted his head like a confused puppy. “Wait… you didn’t think it was a date?”

What date?! She had been in the stands the whole time cheering. They hadn’t even talked or hung out much afterwards… 

“Well, no—”

He groaned, covering his face with both hands, ears turning pink. “Oh my god. I thought we’ve been dating for weeks! Everyone said so!”

Shi Qingxuan burst out laughing, nearly spitting her coffee. “I think you actually have to tell someone they’re dating you for it to count, not just what everyone else says!”

“Okay… noted.” He peeked through his fingers, mortified. “Do you still—no, never mind, forget I said—”

“No, no,” she interrupted, leaning forward on her elbows, chin resting on her hands like she was indulging a particularly cute child. “Ask me again. I’m ready this time.”

His whole face lit up with cautious hope. “Do… Do you want to be my girlfriend?”

She pretended to ponder, tapping her chin. “Hmm. I want to say yes—”

His grin bloomed so fast it almost hurt to look at.

“But,” she added quickly, “you should know something important first.”

The grin wavered. For a split second, he panicked, sure she was about to tell him she was already dating someone, or worse, that she was into girls. 

Oh god, did he just ask out another lesbian?!

“I’m trans,” she said softly. “Is that going to be an issue?” She braced herself.

Lang Qianqiu blinked. The word didn’t even seem to compute.

Is that like a religious thing…? he wondered. Transcendentalism?

Then he said with absolute certainty, “I don’t really care about stuff like that. I just really like you. So whatever is cool with me. If you want to wait on, um, stuff, like sex, or whatever… I’ll wait as long as you need. You can count on me! I’ll be the best boyfriend you’ve ever had!”

Shi Qingxuan’s chest loosened, a smile spreading brighter than a rainbow. She reached across the table to take his hands. “Wow, that’s really such a relief! Then, yeah! I’d love to be your girlfriend!”

He practically launched himself across the table, arms wrapping around her in a rugby-strength embrace that nearly crushed her ribs.

Then he pulled back abruptly, eyes wide. “Wait, can I still kiss you though, right?”

She giggled, leaning in and pecking his cheek. “Of course you can kiss me.”

His blush deepened. “Can I kiss you right now?”

Laughing again, she closed her eyes and tilted her face up.

Lang Qianqiu kissed like he lived. Enthusiastic, overwhelming, sloppy, and utterly without restraint. Once he started, he didn’t seem to know how to stop, peppering her with kiss after kiss until she was laughing helplessly against his mouth.

Dating him was exactly like that. Chaotic, embarrassing, endearing. He tried so hard, always taking her on little outings, proudly showing her off like she was his best trophy, inviting her into his loud, messy life.

However, to say that meeting his family was awkward was the understatement of the century.

The fancy suite at the Tigers game reeked of polite guilt. Maybe Lang Qianqiu didn’t remember her parents or the story, but his parents definitely did.

His mother’s smile was stretched too tight, like her face might crack if she relaxed even a fraction. She asked about Shi Qingxuan’s studies, about the weather, about the traffic on the way to the arena, all with that surface-level brightness that screamed ‘we are pretending everything is normal.’ Every compliment sounded like an apology in disguise.

His father, meanwhile, avoided eye contact entirely. The man seemed to have decided the safest conversational topic in the world was her brother’s company, something Shi Qingxuan deliberately kept her distance from. The company was her brother’s baby. 

“Big expansion this year, right? Must be exciting for the family— I mean, you know what I mean. I didn’t mean… I just… You-you two must be proud,” he pressed, again and again, as if keeping the spotlight on her brother could erase the shadow of her parent’s crash.

She nodded vaguely, not even knowing the details of whatever he was talking about. 

And then, as if the air weren’t already heavy enough, his mother tilted her head with that polite, poisoned curiosity and said, “Forgive me if I’m misremembering, but… I thought the Shi family only had two boys?”

Shi Qingxuan froze, her smile wavering, a tightness rising in her chest. Lang Qianqiu, oblivious, was halfway through another mouthful of popcorn, staring at the court below.

“No, just one,” she corrected, her voice light, but sharp. “My older brother and me, their daughter.”

The silence that followed was jagged. His mother’s smile faltered before snapping back into place. “Of course,” she said too quickly.

But the damage was already done.

From the corner, An Le muttered something low to Qi Rong. Whatever it was, it made him snort, then lean in to whisper again, the two of them hiding their smirks behind their drinks.

Lang Qianqiu either didn’t hear or didn’t want to. He slung his arm around her shoulders, pointing excitedly toward the court, rattling on about a dunk like the whole suite wasn’t suffocating from the kind of silence that hurt worse than words.

Shi Qingxuan sat there, stomach twisting. She wanted to scream, wanted to bolt, wanted to claw out of this cage of polite smiles and judgemental laughter. But instead she smiled back, the air choking in her throat.

She turned down any other invitations to attend more basketball games after.

Still, when it was just the two of them, it was… almost perfect.

The only problems came from the same place as his charm. Lang Qianqiu was entirely incapable of saying no. Everyone took advantage of his kindness, and he simply couldn’t see it. Friends, classmates, strangers, his roommates… it didn’t matter. If someone asked, he gave. He’d give the shirt off his back if Qi Rong asked. 

And he did once. In the middle of campus. In January.

Shi Qingxuan screamed when she saw him jogging to class shivering in just his undershirt, because Qi Rong had whined about “forgetting” his hoodie. Lang Qianqiu hadn’t even thought twice.

And that was only one example.

If a classmate said they’d forgotten their calculator before an exam? Lang Qianqiu would hand his over, grin reassuringly, and then take the test without one, as if it were a fun little handicap.

If someone mentioned moving apartments? He was already hauling boxes into his big truck before they could stop him.

He once showed up late to a coffee date with Shi Qingxuan, sweaty and covered in saw dust, because a group of theater kids asked him to help move set pieces. 

“It looked heavy,” he explained sheepishly, like that excused everything.

Sometimes she wanted to grab him by those broad shoulders, shake him until his teeth rattled, and shout, “Don’t you see they’re using you?!”

But of course, he didn’t see.

Because Lang Qianqiu really was just a golden retriever boy. Loyal, trusting, convinced everyone was as good-hearted as he was. And how could she stay mad at someone like that, even when he drove her absolutely insane sometimes?

But what really frustrated Shi Qingxuan most was how blind he was to An Le and Qi Rong. No matter how obvious their manipulation, he brushed it off with that same loyal, earnest tone. Always ready to defend them. 

An Le and Qi Rong milked him constantly. Rides everywhere, borrowing cash for “emergencies” that never got repaid, even making him stand in line for them at the cafeteria when they “didn’t feel like waiting.”

Shi Qingxuan had lost count of the times he canceled plans with her because Qi Rong “needed” him to run some errand or An Le “forgot” a deadline and begged for Lang Qianqiu’s notes. 

And each time, he defended them with the same unwavering earnestness, “They’re my family. Of course I’ll help.”

Why did Qi Rong count as family…? Wasn’t he Xie Lian’s cousin?

They could have set the apartment on fire for fun and he’d still say they “meant well.”

Where An Le was more calculating, quiet, and snide, Qi Rong was crude, a little insane, and insanely annoying. Both, however, exceptionally unbearable.

Around the four-month mark of their relationship, during a sloppy make-out session back at his apartment, Shi Qingxuan intended to take things further with Lang Qianqiu for the first time. He seemed more than eager, too, finally ready to take that step together. He had a sexy music playlist playing in the background of his bedroom.

She’d always been clear that she wasn’t the type of girl to sleep around, so she wanted to wait until things felt serious before doing anything too intimate.

They were sprawled across his bed, tangled up in each other, when she finally gathered the courage to pose the question.

Swallowing hard, she whispered, “Can… can I give you a blowjob?”

Lang Qianqiu’s eyes grew wider than the grin on his face, practically vibrating with excitement. You’d have thought she’d just proposed marriage by the way he responded.

“Yes, yes! A million times yes!” he cried, crushing her against him in a rugby-tackle hug.

She laughed breathlessly, pushing at his chest. “You’re heavy!”

Only after peppering his girlfriend with a dozen giddy kisses, and growing obviously hard beneath his jeans, did he finally relent, sitting back against the pillows with a look of boyish anticipation.

The air shifted, humming with heat and nerves. She slid down to the floor, between his thighs, her hands a little shaky but determined. His eager little gasps and groans quickly replaced any hesitation she’d felt. By the time he was clutching the sheets, voice crying out as he pleaded for release, there was no mistaking how much she was undoing him.

When it was over, Lang Qianqiu collapsed back against the headboard, face pink, chest heaving. 

“Holy shit,” he panted. “That was… amazing.”

A chuckle from the doorway startled them both.

Qi Rong, leaning casually against the frame, let out a lewd whistle, hands clapping slowly, and a vicious grin on his face.

Lang Qianqiu scrambled for his pants.

“What the fuck…?” Shi Qingxuan shot to her feet, wiping at her mouth. Waves of disgust rattled through her body. “Were you… Were you watching us?!”

“Making such a racket, I had to check if my dear roomie was still alive,” Qi Rong said, hand pressed to his chest in mock concern. “Figured I’d stay for the show. You look great on your knees, by the way. What was your name again?”

“Get the fuck out!” she screamed, face blazing red with anger and humiliation.

“I live here, sweet cheeks.” He waved her off lazily, leaning against the doorframe. “Sooo… tell me. Do you do that with all the guys who can stomach it, or just the ones too dumb to notice? ’Cuz I’d love to take you for a spin after he’s done with you.”

Shi Qingxuan’s jaw dropped. Her chest tightened. She turned to Lang Qianqiu, begging with her eyes for him to say something. Anything.

Only when her eyes brimmed with tears did he finally choke out, “Qi Rong!”

That’s it?! she screamed inwardly.

“Oh, don’t give me that look,” Qi Rong went on, grinning wolfishly. “It’s a fair question. I mean, does he even know? Or is this like some kind of… fetish?” He crooked two fingers in the air, mock-quotation marks. “You’re real convincing, I’ll give you that. Cute little skirts, makeup, that fake voice. Damn, you almost had me fooled. Didn’t know they could look as good as you.”

The bottom dropped out of her stomach. Her whole body shook.

“Shut your fucking mouth!” she spat. “My voice isn’t fake!”

Qi Rong only chuckled, eyes gleaming mean. “Relax, sweetheart. This ancestor isn’t judging. Some guys are into… surprises. Maybe golden boy here just likes the thrill. Or maybe…” his grin widened, dangerous as broken glass, “…he really doesn’t know what he’s got in his bed yet. But I do, and I’m saying I’d still fuck you.”

Normally, Shi Qingxuan was opposed to violence. This was clearly an exception to the rule.

Her palm stung from the force of the slap across his face.

“Fuckin’…! Fucking hell, you dirty tranny slut!” Qi Rong spat, staggering back from the blow, one hand cradling his cheek. But after the initial shock, he grinned, eyes glittering with vicious delight, laughing as he licked his lips. “Ahaha! Feisty. Oh, this ancestor likes that. Didn’t know you could hit that hard, sweet cheeks. Guess you’ve still got some man left in you after—”

Shi Qingxuan’s chest heaved, anger vibrating through her bones. And still Lang Qianqiu said NOTHING. She grabbed her purse from the chair without sparing either of them another glance.

“Qingxuan—” Lang Qianqiu started, stepping toward her.

She whirled on him, voice shaking. “Now you say something?! When I’m leaving? You can’t be serious right now.”

Lang Qianqiu froze, hand limp like he wanted to reach for her.

Shi Qingxuan’s emerald eyes wavered, bright with fury and hurt. “You’re really just going to stand there? Let him… Let him say those things about me? To me?! And you just stand there like a coward? Fucking asshole!”

Lang Qianqiu’s mouth opened and closed, but nothing came out at first. Then, fumbling, he said, “He… he doesn’t mean it. He’s just playing with you.”

His words landed like a knife. 

Shi Qingxuan laughed, short and sharp, but there was no humor in it. “Really? You’re defending him?”

Qi Rong’s snicker filled the silence. “Playing? Hah. Just trying to give you a compliment, sweet cheeks. You’ve done a hell of a job with the whole act. The hair, tits, clothes, the voice even. Pretty convincing, really.” His eyes flicked down and back up again, his smirk widening. “Just saying… not everyone would be so understanding if they found out what’s under the hood, y’know?” He made a vulgar pantomime of jerking himself off.

Shi Qingxuan’s stomach twisted so hard she thought she might vomit.

“And what does this ancestor get for his kindness?” Qi Rong clutched his cheek in mock offense. “A slap. Fuckin’ hell. I could press charges, you know. Assault. But…” his grin spread wide and mean, “I’d be just as happy to settle out of court, sweet cheeks. Something physical. Bet you’re good at that. Hell, I’d even call you a lady while I’m doing it.”

Lang Qianqiu’s hands twitched uselessly at his sides, his face tight with discomfort. But his confusion was plain, almost pleading as he looked between them. “He’s just… being disgusting. That’s all. Don’t take it so seriously.”

“Don’t take it seriously?! This is hate speech, you realize that?” Shi Qingxuan shook her head, blinking fast to keep the tears from falling here, in front of them . “Unbelievable. Both of you are unbelievable right now! I can’t…” Her voice cracked on the last syllable.

She shoved past Qi Rong, hard enough to jostle him against the doorframe, and slammed the door to the apartment so hard the walls trembled.

“So that’s a no on sucking me off?” Qi Rong shouted after her. “Your loss, bitch!”

For a long moment, the room stayed still, the air heavy with her absence. Lang Qianqiu stood rooted to the floor, his hands still clenching and unclenching uselessly at his sides, shame creeping up his face. He wanted to chase after her, to say something, but the words caught in his throat.

Qi Rong massaged his jaw and chuckled low. “Fuckin’ hell. Your girl’s got quite the slap on her. Stronger than she looks. Almost makes you wonder, huh?”

Lang Qianqiu finally managed, weakly, “What the hell is wrong with you?” But the accusation rang hollow, more shame than fury.

Qi Rong tilted his head, grin sharp and mocking. “Relax. If she’s gonna lose it over a little teasing, she’s not worth the trouble. Pretty package, though. You sure you know what you’ve signed up for?”

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟

The more Shi Qingxuan thought about the whole situation, the more it didn’t make sense and unsettled her. Lang Qianqiu was always righteous and good-natured. Like, predictably so! He got angry when a restaurant got her order wrong! So why now, of all times, had he decided to stay quiet?! 

Shi Qingxuan SHOULD have broken up with him right there, but she didn’t. For some reason. But she did refuse to speak to him until he apologized, saying it wouldn’t happen again. And even then, she thoroughly refused to spend time at his apartment if either of his roommates were home.

With more boundaries set in place against his roommates, things got better. First year turned into second year, and they’d been dating for almost seven months.

Schedules changed, rugby practice got busier, and Shi Qingxuan was taking a pattern making and draping class that was absolutely kicking her ass. Long nights in the studio stressing over a dress form that she couldn't quite get to look right.

Finally, they had a night alone together. And with that, came a sort of… expectation. They’d been together for so long, but still hadn’t ever had sex. Lang Qianqiu was being such a champ about it, but she could tell he was getting a little frustrated with everything going on. And she was ready, she thought, to take that next step with him.