“Zhou-ge, what are you doing?”
Shan Yutian clutches a thermos. He obviously sent himself over in the name of hospitality, only to find his guest making a (neat) mess of things.
Heh… Zhou Xiwei guiltily turns around.
“Oh! I just saw some paper peeling, and I-” Fuck, why is he lying to someone as kind as A-Tian? That’s not very good karma. A-Tian hasn’t lied to him, not even about difficult and private things. Zhou Xiwei shakes his head and fesses up. “-Okay, I peeled it. With the boat leaving and rescue coming, I… wanted to see how you two could come along. From what your brother said, it seemed like-”
Oh, why does Shan Yutian look so pale?
“Are you okay? I- I really will fix everything back up. I promise.”
“…What did he say?”
“A-Tian?”
“What did my brother say?”
Zhou Xiwei can’t figure out why he looks so scared.
“He just mentioned trying to leave and being unable to. I don’t want to scare you, but, if there’s something that’s keeping him stuck here, I thought maybe I could-”
“You can’t.”
???
Shan Yutian sets down the thermos and squares his shoulders, looking for a moment like a man rather than a boy. It’s actually…intimidating?
Uncovering this dark little door might have been a bad play.
Especially when Shan Yutian speaks to him, not as an elder that he respects, but as an equal that’s doing something foolish.
“Whatever you think you can fix, you can’t, okay? You should just be good to him, happy here, and not- not go ripping out stitches!” There’s a tremor of vulnerable rage in his voice, before he walks back to pleading. “Zhou-ge, if it was that easy to help him leave, do you really think I would let him stay like this? Surrounded by death and only ever visited by strangers that reject us?”
“No, I didn’t! I just- everyone needs helps some time. I didn’t mean to dismiss…” He really didn’t. But Shan Yutian has been so gentle that Zhou Xiwei is guilty of treating him the way he hates being treated– as someone who’s non-confrontational nature is taken as youthfulness. Who lacks their own agency.
Sure, A-Tian looks young. But he’s not, is he? Not in the ways that matter. He cooks all the meals, he seems to be the one holding the island together–
He might look about sixteen, but he’s been acting as an adult longer than Zhou Xiwei has. It must be patronizing, to have a newcomer casually talk about breaking a curse that they’ve been living under for who knows how many years.
If it was easy, they would have already done it.
He should have realized that.
But Shan Yutian gets treated like a child for a reason– in addition to having a perpetually youthful face, he’s got the capacity for instant forgiveness that most people age out of as the world kicks the shit out of them.
“No, it’s-” Little A-Tian sighs and starts fiddling with the thermos again. “It means a lot. That you like my ge. That you- that you’re not just with him because there’s nothing else to do here-”
“I would never!”
“I know. You’re good. A good person and good for him. But if you do this kind of thing, I promise you’ll end up hurting him. Okay? There’s a reason we don’t try. There’s a reason that we carved out a life here. It’s dangerous to fight. Not for you, maybe, but for him. So please just…”
“Leave it?”
“Leave it.”
Zhou Xiwei looks at the dark door. He’s repentant, but- still confesses:
“…I don’t want him to be alone. I know you’re here. You and Director Xi and whoever has been on that fishing trip. But can’t we try again? Carefully? I’ll follow your directions, really, but I don’t want to give up. I want you to be happier, both of you-”
“We’re happy now. He’s happy. With you.”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
“Eluta. Vb, kf rtbeiv olcv j kjs atja tf mjc mbwf klat wf.”
“Yg sbe mbeiv rajs.”
Itbe Wlkfl’r wlcv ubfr yijcx ja atf qbrrlylilas.
—
Vajslcu?
Vajslcu bc jc lrijcv atja’r raffqfv lc reqfgcjaegji kflgvcfrr? Vajslcu obgfnfg lc atlr qijmf rb ojg jkjs ogbw fnfgsatlcu tf’r fnfg xcbkc, jcv atf qfbqif ktb tjnf lcnfrafv rb wemt lc tlw? Mgbw atf gfrqbcrlylilalfr kjlalcu yjmx tbwf?
He admits, he’s said some casual words while drunk off the sun’s warmth.
And he’s had more than a few idle thoughts, about how peaceful life is here- for him at least – and the wonder of being in a place where he’s accepted for who he is. Where there’s no pressure to twist himself into some impressive scion. He’s dreamt about what it would be like to belong here, to have always belonged here.
But he can’t-
He can’t actually stay forever.
He can’t leave his sister alone, and even if he wanted to– Well, there’s no way the Song family will allow him to run away. And that’s what they’d see this as. Fleeing. They wouldn’t be wrong either– he’d be here not just for Shan Haoyu, but for the lack of business games present in such a place.
He can visit.
He will visit, if Shan Haoyu is willing to have him. After all, he’s never met anyone that he is so at ease with, and he’s not willing to casually give that up. Their personalities, their feelings, their bodies– they all align in a manner that’s so seamless that at times it’s scary.
But just visiting?
He’s worried there’s no long term future in that, worried their feelings will dwindle from separate sides of the ocean. Especially without the wonders of the internet to connect them when they’re apart. He’s worried that the unique characteristics of the island will come between them.
What if he grows bad, and the island starts rejecting him? What if it just doesn’t let him back one day, and he’s left to float along, never able to return to his lover or even let him know that he wasn’t abandoned? How much would that hurt?
Worst of all, what if someone new comes, and hurts Yu’er? Clearly, violence is the norm. What if someday, the island’s protection slips, and Yu’er or A-Tian are successfully targeted by some new group of ungrateful visitors?
If that happens… He’ll be too far away to help.
He’ll be useless! They could- anything at all, any kind of violence could occur, and he won’t be able to shield his person. He wouldn’t even know! He wouldn’t know anything was wrong, until his next visit. He wouldn’t know until he found an empty island. Maybe even Yu’er’s corpse, left like carrion.
Zhou Xiwei physically recoils from the thought, backing up against the locked door. He doesn’t-
He doesn’t even want to imagine it. If he has to go away and only visit a few times a year, the anxiety over what might happen in his blind spot will drive him mad, especially as his feelings grow deeper.
Pressed against the door, he falls into a dream, a memory, a nightmare-
Of Shan Haoyu, young and old and alone in the world.
—
Zhou Xiwei’s panic attack is obvious and fast. Shan Yutian hovers over him, trying to get him to focus, a whole stack of books overturned by his dance of ‘can I or can’t I touch him.’
This is the scene that Shan Haoyu walks in on, when his little brother is gone too long and his own distance collapses under the weight of wanting to see his person. But he doesn’t like what he sees– not a scared A-Tian, not a slumped Zhou-ge, and not that strange door that makes the edges of his vision start to blur.
Sensing danger, he strides forward and pulls Zhou Xiwei away, regretting the action when the careless pulling scrapes the top of Zhou-ge’s third knuckle and leaves it an abraded pink, with blood beading up. Shan Haoyu blanches like it’s his blood smearing the wood.
“I didn’t-”
Running on unhygienic impulse, he drops to his knees and sucks Zhou Xiwei’s injured finger into his mouth, only to guiltily drop it when the man groans beneath him. I didn’t mean to.
Now he’s the one backing away. It’s just a scrape, just a small wince of pain for when Zhou-ge awakens. But Shan Haoyu doesn’t want Zhou Xiwei to feel any pain at all. He feels revulsion that his unthinking actions led to even this small amount of damage.
A more experienced and even-keeled lover wouldn’t react to a fucking door in such a manner. He really is-
“Da-ge, calm down, okay? He- he’s fine, so calm down–” Shan Yutian’s worry hits exactly the wrong notes.
Shan Haoyu’s blind to the spider-fine cracks that are racing up from the wrist he used to grab Zhou Xiwei to the mouth he used to apologize for it. He just thinks that his brother is worried about him scaring Zhou-ge with his dark face.
…He’s scared all right, but it’s because he’s seen the island grant these kinds of touch memories before. He knows they can pass quickly, and he doesn’t want-
…Doesn’t want exactly what ends up happening, as Shan Haoyu’s skin continues to crackle between them, even as Zhou Xiwei’s eyes open.
He doesn’t want Zhou Xiwei to see. He doesn’t want him to ask those questions. He can’t!
—
Zhou Xiwei found himself in a dream that isn’t.
He can’t explain it, but he knows he isn’t asleep–
Ironically, not being asleep makes it far more difficult to wake. His old standbys won’t work, and he’s stuck. Whether it’s a dream or a hallucination or the world’s most high-production stroke, he finds that he’s once more in a familiar place and a familiar past.
The church is still standing. Stone doesn’t show age as fast as wood, but the building and the plantings look identical to his first dream. He silently orients himself close to the timeline of Shan Haoyu’s childhood. But this time, there’s no children. Not digging for clams on the beach, not lounging on the fields, and not washing at the trough.
Only when he looks to the side and spies the fluttering of the crudely curtained dormitory windows is there the sense that children might still linger. But instead of being charming and curious, this visit just fills him with uneasiness.
He-
Well, he’s sure he doesn’t want to visit the dorms and see what happened to the children. He’s sure he doesn’t want to enter the church and be reminded of those sins against Shan Yutian. Compared to torturing himself, he’d rather spend this temporal shift trying to dig out something useful and untragic.
He turns to the school and despairs at how heavy his feet feel, as he tries and fails to jog over. He wants to see if the hidden door can be opened in the past, instead of in the present.
Fu-? He flinches, looks down in that dull, drunken manner of dreamers the world over, and finds a snake has bitten his finger and is now hanging on like a little leech, trying to coquettishly wrap around his wrist. Groaning, he shakes it off, only to discover that the little black viper is good luck–?
The molasses-slow field has disappeared, and he’s in front of a familiar wooden door, brass ventilation grate shining and entranceway not at all covered up. Okay, maybe snakes can be cute. Maybe the little thing was just biting him to make friends. He’ll forgive it, especially since he doesn’t have any other companions in this emptied world.
[Alright, Xiao She. I’ll take this as a sign of your friendship then].
The nailed-shut door easily opens, and Zhou Xiwei sees a perfectly ordinary, if antique, office. Mercury glass lanterns, a neat and tidy typewriter that smells of fresh ink and oil, and a whole row of waxed paper umbrellas held neatly against the wall between two old-school bookkeeper’s desks.
There’s also a red-ink calendar on the wall.
June of 1931.
Before he can take a step into the room to investigate the records that are surely waiting for him, the snake chirps against his wrist, and the dream ends. When he next opens his eyes, he’s in the present day.
Staring at Shan Haoyu, who looks shattered–
No, literally.
His skin, the right side of his body– he’s covered in fine gray and black cracks, like veins on a marble vanity- beautiful, but wrong. Not even the worst blood infection can make that kind of pattern. And why would it be pulsing?
What- Is this another dream then? Has he yet to wake up?
—
Like all people seeing something impossible, Zhou Xiwei blinks.
And like the most fortunate child, ill-prepared as he is for the truth, when his eyes next open, he sees a distraught but perfectly human Shan Haoyu before him. No signs of porcelain, like those worrying cracks were never there at all.
If it wasn’t for the terrified look on Shan Yutian’s face, Zhou Xiwei would believe that he imagined them.
But terrified, Shan Yutian is.
Not of his brother– he’s not even looking at him. But of… Zhou Xiwei? The impression is cemented when he rushes forward and helps him rise to his feet, whispering pleadingly, “Zhou-ge, ask me later, but for now, if you bring it up, you really might be the death of him.”
Zhou Xiwei swallows his words back down and feels them settle like cold stones in his gut.
Poor Shan Yutian has no idea that in trying to protect his brother, he’s exposed a secret that otherwise could have been written off for several more chapters. A tragically non-omniscient child, doing his very best.
Nodding in a way that he hopes conveys ‘we will speak about this again,’ Zhou Xiwei detaches from Shan Yutian, takes another good look at Shan Haoyu, and…
Runs as fast as he feet can carry him.
—
“Any minute now, morning at the very latest!” Mother Song adds the finishing touches to their things. She even ties handmade luggage tags to the modest little embroidered bags and repurposed rice sacks that are the result of her sewing labors over the last several days.
Neatly waiting under the deep porch of the dormitory is a small pile of hopes, ready to be loaded on a ship by well-tipped anybodies. And of course, she will mail the largest check to their hosts, even before the lawsuit finishes, to pay them back for their hospitality and for the borrowed fabric and clothing and the room and board they’ve availed themselves of.
Shan Yutian had assured them that it was no trouble. They were welcome, they didn’t have to pay, and they could certainly take their craft projects with them, with Uto’s well-wishes. Even if the luxurious guests wouldn’t normally care about such things…
Well, packing up to leave is a psychological thing!
A hint to your mind, and the universe, that a journey is ending, and your normal life is beckoning. Under the assumption that no one would spend a night at sea a month for groceries, the visitors had convinced themselves that any minute now, they’d hear a fog horn and be whisked back to civilization.
A day trip is all it should be, for Captain Li to find someone and arrange rescue for their party.
Personally, Zhou Xiwei’s sure they’re dreaming. Physical distance can’t compare to metaphysical impediments.
If it was easy to reach one shore or the other, they would have at least had a near miss with the outside world before now. But they haven’t. Not a single washed-up fishing net or patch of garbage on the beach, not a single horn through the fog, not a blip on the horizon that might be something. Just isolation, so endless that even the rare bird or flash of a fin in the water is an event worth noting.
But no one wants to hear it, and the die is already cast, so he keeps his thoughts to himself and uses the excuse of being a quick packer to keep from having to join in the troublesome and premature ritual. For this, he is teased rather endlessly about his puppy love.
“Xiao Xi, even if you wait until it hits the dock, the difference in leaving will still be five minutes. If you can accomplish anything in that time, you should come with us and we’ll work on your stamina, ah.” As a straight man, Zhang Zhiping’s mixture of casual lewdness and profound disinterest will never not be confusing.
“XiXi, pack more, not less! Pack up all of their things and bring them along, smuggling is no problem, even a new identity can be arranged as soon as I go out to tea with Miss Zhang.” His sister and her connections, good-natured but oblivious in her attempts to treat romance like a quick business acquisition.
“XiXi, go on– stop looking for more time and use what you have. Be honest, you haven’t opened up my gift at all. Ah, so sweet, but there’s a difference between being a gentleman and letting the meat fall out of your mouth without biting!” In truth, he’s starting to have some concerns about his much-loved Song-ge’s approach to relationships. He knows the guy is being extra ‘friendly’ to try to breach the wound of that last warning, but it’s still hair-raising!
Maybe it’s for the best that Ding Dongqi’s still in no condition to speak. Surrounding oneself with scum can lead to a skewed sense of propriety. That’s the only explanation Zhou Xiwei has, for why his brother seems distressed and relieved at his relationship with Shan Haoyu, and the slow progress that he’s making. And not sharing.
Because why would he?!
He’s sure that real brothers don’t go around chatting about these kinds of things or counting prophylactics! Song-ge has made it painfully clear that pure brotherhood is what they should have, what they will have, all they can have, but now that Zhou Xiwei is inclined to agree with him- Song-ge is being nosy about things he shouldn’t!
Can’t you just apologize like a normal person instead of pretending you never said those rude things? Can’t you say ‘yes, okay, I trust your judgment’ without making it sound like all you want for Christmas is for me to get laid and laid again?
Bah.
Shan Haoyu is-
Shan Haoyu is his business, and even if they were taking those kinds of steps already, he wouldn’t dishonor him by casually spreading it out to other people. Not even for advice, tips, or congratulations. When- if- that happens, they’ll make their own way and keep their own counsel, thank you very much.
Of course, right now, their physical relationship is a bit-
Ah, running away from someone isn’t great, is it?
It’s been several hours and he hasn’t shown his face at all. Zhou Xiwei touches his nose and thinks that he should probably be steadier. He already knew (hoped, given the alternative) that Shan Haoyu was cursed. Just because he woke up from an unsettling vision and saw firsthand– that’s no reason to flinch. Rather, shouldn’t he go comfort his man?
No matter how long the ship takes, Zhou Xiwei believes it will come. It’s best to work with a sense of urgency in breaking curses and correcting his wrongs. Also, he… A tiny bit, even though they were just tangled up together this morning–
He might already miss Yu’er? A smidge? A smidge that is perhaps alarming? But finding the correct pace is damn hard, in a situation like theirs. First date, second date, he’s not sure how to count it, nevermind the fact that he doesn’t seem to have confessed yet?
Fuck, he really hasn’t!
…Oh, he feels more scummy than suspicious.
He owes Shan Haoyu some reassurances. But first, he needs to find Shan Yutian to gain an understanding of what should and shouldn’t be said, and also, what the hell is going on?
Author’s Corner:
Zhou Xiwei: I’ve connected the dots!
Shan Yutian: You haven’t connected shit. And that’s for the best!
Doorway: Come on, you know you’re not done with me yet~
the mystery is gonna kill me if i don’t get answers soon 🥹
Never thought I’ll be afraid of a door and here we are…
Thank you for the chapter of Zhou Xiwei tries to be the Scooby Gang in their absence and it’s a disaster
Thanks for the chapter ! ^^
Fascinating! I’m so intrigued! This is such a good story!
It’s cute that someone like Zhou Xiwei thinks everyone won’t know just by looking at him, when they do take that step together. I did notice that his fear of the idea of something happening to Shan Haoyu while he’s not there was much stronger than his reaction to the reality of seeing him cracking right in front of him. He’s in deep, our boy.
Honestly, I haven’t been afraid of a little door since Coraline.