Chapter Text
The smell of smoke crawled around Xie Lian’s dreams. Dreams turned swiftly into nightmares and he was soon forced awake, hot fingers strangling around his neck and in his throat. What’s going on? He couldn’t breathe well. And what was that smell—?
When he opened his eyes, he really couldn’t see anything at first. Nothing out the sides of his window curtains, despite his closest neighbor always keeping their yard lights on. Not his glow-in-the-dark jewelry tray that sat on the desk across the room. Not even the red digits of the alarm clock. But it sounded like an alarm was going off.
Xie Lian finally jolted upright. A haze of thick, acrid smoke hung in the air around him, even darker than the aura of nighttime and heavy enough to sting his eyes. The disorientation of waking so suddenly ended just as quick as it came.
Smoke. Fire.
There wasn’t any time to process anything.
The smoke alarm only just began going off down the hallway. He stumbled out of his room, pulling his half-charged cellphone from the wall and clumsily trying to dial on it. As he inhaled to speak, he realized he was unable to take a full breath.
“Emergency services. Do you need fire, ambulance or police?”
Remembering all those over-the-top presentations elementary schools put on, he dropped to the floor and found himself underneath the wall of smoke. One of his hands held his phone and the other was navigating along the side of the wall. Part of his head was screaming, what’s happening, what’s going on?? The other part just wanted him to get out, and that was the part he followed.
A fire had started somewhere on his property. He didn’t know where, whether it was in his house or the shop connected to it. The fear was almost as suffocating as the smoke. He didn’t have time to do anything other than crawl his way down the stairs, coughing and choking, and find his way out into the cold.
Autumn was ending in an inferno.
An unknown amount of time passed in a blur. Between the waking up, the phone call, the firetrucks arriving with all their bells and whistles blazing, he was hovering in stasis.
Just…staring. Watching the fire.
When the adrenaline was only just starting to wear off, he found himself standing beneath a single street lamp by his driveway, wrapped in one of those silvery emergency blankets that the firefighters provided, watching as his life’s work was drowned in fire and water. His whole body was numb. Cold outside. Hot fire. Numb.
Violent tendrils of fire whipped out from the windows on one side of the building, impossibly loud and bright, mixed in with the flashing lights and sirens. Water blasted into the windows to fight the flames but it didn’t seem to be letting up. How long could this take??
He couldn’t look away. He could feel the heat from the fire even from that distance.
One of the firefighters had his helmet visor flipped up and was holding a clipboard under the flashing lights. He was asking all sorts of questions, Xie Lian was too shocked to answer properly. When was the last electrical inspection you had? When was the building construction? What kind of stove do you have?
Xie Lian was shaking so hard that he couldn’t see properly. All of the smoke he’d been exposed to was burning through his lungs and eyes, but didn’t really feel it.
All he felt was the fear of losing his entire world.
The morning passed like wave of molasses, an onslaught of emotions riding the tide. Xie Lian wasn’t sure he’d survive it. Time meant nothing to him.
His best friend picked him up and took them to a diner as soon as they were able. It was the first time in twelve hours where his body began crashing back down to Earth. He really couldn’t hear much of what they were saying, but at least he was beginning to feel his fingers and toes again.
“I’m so, so sorry this is happening, A-Lian.” Shi Qingxuan held onto Xie Lian’s dry, shaking hands tightly. Their eyes shone with sympathy. “I can’t imagine how you must be feeling right now.”
Awful. Terrible. Xie Lian’s forehead was on the café table, holding his friend’s hands and surely looking as miserable as he felt. His whole face was swollen and itchy from failing to hold in so many tears over the morning, and he wished he could just curl up in himself and disappear.
Curling up and disappearing sounded nice. Easy. He was feeling like a crushed can in a trash compactor at that point.
“…At least not everything is gone, right?”
The scalding lump in his throat didn’t retreat. “...Not everything. But enough.”
Sometime in the next few days, the inspector will call him with the details. But Xie Lian had watched the fire himself; there was no way his home was intact. Maybe the business part, his store that he’d spent years building, wasn’t too bad. Maybe.
If he was lucky, and he was never lucky, the damage was something he could afford to fix.
“God, my insurance is awful. It’s so, so bad.” Xie Lian whined into his sleeve, and the whine turned into a cough. His throat still burned from the smoke, but he hadn’t gone to a doctor for it at all and wasn’t planning on it. This…sucks.
Everything sucked. Despite the ups and downs of his life, Xie Lian prided himself in being resilient, a go-with-the-flow kind of man. He was used to misfortune. Challenges usually only strengthened his mindset, but this tested him in a way he wasn’t prepared for.
His home. His livelihood. Turned to ashes.
Any time he closed his eyes, he saw the flashing firetruck lights behind his eyelids and the heard the powerful spray of hoses. It felt as though it was still actively happening, even though the fire was officially put out hours ago. All he could smell was smoke.
Shi Qingxuan, his best (and only) friend, continued to hold his hands and comfort him over their greasy diner food.
The two of them had met a few years ago and were nearly polar opposites, but it worked out for them. Qingxuan was vibrant and loud and gorgeous, unafraid of speaking their mind and unable to pick any hills to die on. They cared deeply and expressively about everything. Xie Lian, on the other hand, was less vibrant.
It wasn’t that he didn’t care about anything; he just picked his battles carefully and knew there was too much outside of his control to impact. He hardly cared about his lackluster appearance (where Shi Qingxuan was a beauty guru), hardly cared about relationships (where Shi Qingxuan was a social butterfly).
All that Xie Lian had was his best friend and his antique shop. And one of them…
“It’ll be alright, sweetheart. You don’t know how totally bad it is yet. You might even be surprised.”
Xie Lian lifted his head to look up. There was hair stuck to the corner of his mouth and tears crusting to his eyelashes. Shi Qingxuan must’ve been startled by his haggard appearance, since they winced.
“I barely break even as-is.” He put his head back down. The food was likely getting cold by then since neither of them were eating. “The way that stupid building is constructed, I just can’t imagine it being anything better than the worst.”
That “stupid building” was his home. To anyone else, it wouldn’t look anything outside of ordinary.
The antique shop was just a small building located in a grubby part of the city outskirts. Decades ago, the original owner had attached a double-wide trailer to the back of the shop, connected by a thin hallway, and upgraded it to be comfortable. They poured a real foundation under the trailer (removing the classification of “mobile” home) and even built a second story to it.
The residential portion itself was small; the living room and kitchen was a standard Western layout with a bar separating the two spaces. The bathroom still had its original baby-blue ceramic from when it was built in the 70’s, weirdly charming to him, and the bedroom had a single window that looked into the little backyard vegetable garden.
Most people looked at the building and saw nothing special. But it was Xie Lian’s entire world. It was a shop he’d worked tirelessly for years to obtain, something that belonged only to him and was his pride and joy.
He’d taken a run-down building and made it into something so special. The antique shop was what mattered. The only thing.
Xie Lian was the singular employee there, and he knew the exact shade of paint on its walls, how many tiles made up the floorspace, and the inventory down to each tarnished silver earring. Every inch of that shop was engraved into his heart.
And the electrical box had caught fire in the middle of the night.
“I couldn’t afford the re-wiring it needed,” Xie Lian groaned against the table. Guilt and self-loathing rolled around inside of him. If he had only bit the bullet and fixed the wiring… So many “what if”s.
Shi Qingxuan let go of one of his hands to push the pitcher of water closer to him. “At least drink some water,” they suggested gently. “All those tears have probably dehydrated you.”
Xie Lian sat up and obliged. The water tasted like iron.
Only then did Qingxuan smile. It made dimples pop out on both of their freckled cheeks. “There we go.” The smile, still as pretty as always, did turn a bit remorseful. “…I am really sorry you can’t stay at my place, A-Lian. I feel awful.”
“No, it’s okay. That’s not your responsibility.”
There was a brief silence that ended when they bit their bottom lip. “Where will you stay in the meantime?”
It was a question Xie Lian had been asking himself this entire time. He knew what his bank account looked like, but he said anyways, “Probably a motel or something.”
If he had owned a car, he’d be living in that. But he didn’t because he couldn’t afford it. He couldn’t afford any of this. He dipped one of his cold chicken tenders into ketchup but it made his stomach twist. He couldn’t even afford this lunch. His existence was suddenly downgraded to nothing.
Now that Xie Lian was sitting up and wet his mouth, his thoughts tried to pull themselves up too. He knew there was no good use in wallowing too much in this waiting period. He had to wait until the official report from the damage inspector before letting his panic spread any further. When will that be?
“...I’m going to need another job,” that much was obvious, “while it’s being repaired. However long that’ll take...” The hot coal in his throat grew heavier. “And who knows how much the repairs will cost? If anything is even salvageable at all.”
Everything felt bad bad bad. He continued to wallow.
Sweet Qingxuan really tried their best to look on the bright side, but it wasn’t easy with a walking rain cloud sitting across from them. “This might not be the best thing to suggest,” their tone shifted carefully, “but would it be worth just…cutting your losses? Is that insensitive of me to ask?”
Xie Lian looked at them like they’d grown a second head.
“I just mean, like, if it’s too much to repair. Maybe your money could be better spent on renting an apartment or something. Just repair the shop and not the house part? Or even selling the shop?”
The second head grew a third head.
Qingxuan held up their hands in defense. “I know you really like your house, but is it worth it?”
It wasn’t their fault. They didn’t know Xie Lian’s entire history, and that really wasn’t their fault, but it would be really hard to Xie Lian to explain it all without sounding crazy.
The house wasn’t just a house to him. It was his first home. His only home. The first eighteen years of his life wasn’t the greatest, and the first several years of his adulthood was even worse. He worked harder than he ever would’ve dreamed to be where he was. Working three jobs at a time without sleep, taking business classes at the university, saving every penny he had to buy a building that looked like someone had built it in their sleep.
The fire had destroyed his home. All the food in his fridge, the clothes in his closet, the only photo he had left from his childhood. His laptop. His favorite mug.
Tears burned in Xie Lian’s eyes. That mug was the first real thing I ever bought myself.
His home there was the most important thing to him in his whole life. He couldn’t give it up. He wouldn’t give it up. He gave up on himself too many times in his life, and he didn’t want this to be just another one of his sad stories. Selling it or “cutting his losses” was out of the question.
When Xie Lian didn’t answer, Qingxuan dropped it. They reached out and swapped their lunches since the chicken tenders clearly made Xie Lian want to vomit.
“You know, A-Lian...” They continued using a pacifying tone. “If you’re looking for another job, my brother works in management at the hotel I bartend. I could probably convince him to hire you for something, if you’re interested?”
“…Your hotel?”
Shi Qingxuan nodded.
“You haven’t exactly painted a good picture any time you talk about it.”
They waved their hand dismissively. “No one ever talks highly about their jobs. It’s really not a bad place, it just attracts a different kind of crowd. That part of the city is just different, that’s all.”
That was the nicest way they could’ve described it. Every time they were talking about their job, Shi Qingxuan would talk about all the shady guests who spent unimaginable amounts of money. The shifting eyes. How no one would actually walk around on the sidewalks in that part of the city; they had to take cabs, even if they were just going a block away.
The only reason that it was safe for someone like Shi Qingxuan was probably because their brother worked in management. You had to have connections to work or live in that part of the city. There were all sorts of rumors floating around, none of them pleasant.
“I don’t know.” The condensation on the side of Xie Lian’s water glass made his fingertips moist. He traced the droplets. “It’s all the way across the city.” And I don’t want to get murdered.
“It would probably pay better than most other entry-level jobs around. Plus, it would probably come with tips. More money.”
Damn, Qingxuan had a good point with that. Money was the most important thing right now. Xie Lian could easily wallow in his misery and anxiety for the rest of the year like that, but he simply didn’t have enough money to do anything. Between repairs, whatever crummy motel he would have to stay in, everything else…
“Rich people who value their privacy tip really well, too.”
He grimaced at Shi Qingxuan.
“There’s plenty security at the hotel, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“Okay, okay.” Xie Lian wiped his hands off with a paper napkin and sighed. The young waitress was heading in their direction with a receipt in her hand. “Fine. You can ask your brother, but it’s no big deal if there aren’t any openings. And…thank you for being willing to help me.”
Shi Qingxuan’s expression lightened, triumphant. They put both elbows on the table and placed their chin on both hands. “I can’t wait for us to be temporary coworkers. It’ll be worth it.”
“Just please promise me that I won’t get kidnapped or anything.”
“As cute as you are, A-Lian, you may need some extra security.”
For the first time that day, an exasperated smile lifted Xie Lian’s mouth. Maybe it wouldn’t be that bad.
Xie Lian returned to his property that first night after the inspectors had left for the day. He knew it would take a while to get a full statement of damages (and longer than that to get a cost estimate), but that didn’t mean he wasn’t able to walk around the outside.
And god, it was awful.
House fires smelled different than any sort of campfire you could ever smell. The air was sharp with burnt electrical cords, melted plastics and rubber, fiberglass insulation. It lined Xie Lian’s throat like he was breathing in poison despite the mask he wore. He wasn’t even allowed to go inside until everything was cleared for asbestos.
The front of the building, the shop, looked remarkably undisturbed. No one would be able to tell it was really damaged until they walked around to the side to the house add-on. Xie Lian stared for what felt like hours at it. So much of it was just a skeleton of charcoal. That used to be my kitchen, he thought, staring directly through burnt studs into a cave of sludge. All that water used to put out all that fire created that.
He should’ve known. He should’ve had his electrical system inspected more regularly. It was built off of a trailer home, after all, which are known to be death traps. He should’ve…he could have… He was helpless. All he could do was pace around and torture himself.
That looked like the upstairs toilet fell through the floor. That must’ve been the linen closet. There’s the TV reduced to a blob in what used to be the living room. It felt so unreal, like this couldn’t have possibly happened to him.
This couldn’t be real. Housefires always happened to other people, not to him. But he supposed, he was “other people” to other people.
Xie Lian sat down on the edge of his little gravel parking lot and put his head in his hands. Maybe if he closed his eyes long enough, everything would be fine when he opened them.
Everything had to be fine. Hadn’t it?
***
Shi Qingxuan’s hotel was everything they described and more.
Flora City Lofts was one of the crown jewels of the downtown district. It was a hotel by definition but nothing short of a modern-day architectural marvel. Forty stories tall, sharp angles and black metal. The entire west side of the building was lined with panes of glass that had a perfect angle to reflect the setting sun.
It wasn’t the tallest silhouette of the skyline, but it was easily the most striking. Anyone would be able to point it out on a postcard.
During his first time setting foot in the hotel, Xie Lian found himself feeling thunderstruck and wildly out of place. It was like stepping into another world— The obsidian floor was polished like a mirror, reflecting chandelier lights high above their heads, and exotic plants stood on every surface.
Everything was spotless, extravagant, and dripping in layers of severe red and black between the green of the plants. From the small bit of research he did, just one night at the hotel was ten times what he paid for his current motel room. These guests were filthy rich.
Shi Qingxuan’s brother, Shi Wudu, did offer Xie Lian a position at the restaurant there on the first floor. It was only as a waiter and promised no glory, which he couldn’t complain about. The filthy rich guests of the hotel could eat their filthy rich meals and get wasted at the bar next door.
On his first day at the job, Xie Lian arrived early and joined Shi Qingxuan in the employee restrooms. There were tiny bottles of cologne and rolls of towels next to the black marble sinks. Even the restrooms were opulent.
“You look as good as I thought you would in that, A-Lian!”
They were both staring in the full-length mirror at Xie Lian, who was donning his waiter uniform for the first time. He’d never worn a real uniform before and didn’t feel particular different in it. It was just solid black slacks and button-up with a neat maroon apron, fitting in with the entire hotel’s color scheme.
Shi Qingxuan was too enthusiastic about the getup, trying to compensate for the bad situation that led to this point.
I would rather be at my shop, he thought miserably. But he was doing all this for his shop. He’d take the bus an hour across the city, wear the uniform, do his very best at this new job. As long as it meant he could eventually return to the life he loved. There was hope on the horizon, it was just so, so far away.
“How are you feeling?” Shi Qingxuan asked when the silence lasted too long. “Those circles under your eyes look extra…sleepy today.”
That was their polite way of telling Xie Lian that he looked terrible.
“I’m okay,” Xie Lian responded, though his facial expression spoke the truth better than his words did. “Everything will be fine. You look good in your uniform too, Shi-Xiong.”
There was only a glass wall between the restaurant and the bar where Qingxuan worked. They were one of the most popular bartenders (according to their own believable report) and wore a uniform as well, but it was a bit less plain than Xie Lian’s.
Shi Qingxuan was only slightly taller than Xie Lian’s petite frame and had waves of curly, caramel-colored hair that was always perfectly styled. Pretty green eyes, freckles, and a grin that always spoke of trouble. The tight translucent bartender uniform made them look more like a model than anything. Now those were good tips.
Shi Qingxuan had been working at this bar for many years now. From the restaurant, Xie Lian would be able to see them against the neon lighting and could wave. Every time they made eye contact, Qingxuan looked like they were having the time of their lives.
But Xie Lian wasn’t comfortable and doubted he ever would be.
***
The first few days of work went well. Xie Lian was a fast learner, and his new coworkers seemed nice enough. It was nearly impossible to put all of his focus in, though.
His days only measured by the amount of information he got back from the inspectors.
All tests for asbestos finally came back negative. The inspectors did warn Xie Lian about potential instabilities and safety hazards, as was legally required, but he returned home the second he was able.
The same chipped-paint siding and wooden awning greeted him. “Little Heavens,” the sign on the awning said. Xie Lian could still remember the day he hammered the sign up there, staring at it from the road for ten minutes with pride before doing anything else.
That day was one of the best. He had been covered in paint and was nursing a broken toe, but it was perfect.
This building meant the entire world to him. He had painted it light blue, keeping the trim white, and set up flower boxes in each of the three windows looking out front. When the lights were on inside, they glowed a warm yellow. It looked to him like a perfect little dollhouse.
On the outside from the front angle, it almost looked like nothing had changed, but everything was different when he unlocked the front door and stepped in.
Hell. The smell of smoke hit the back of his throat like a freight train. That same acrid, poisonous smell. Even though the shop was (thankfully) largely unaffected by flames, the smoke of a fire that violent had crept through the cracks. He doubted that propping the door open would make a dent in the miasma but still did it.
Xie Lian tried the light switches. Of course, they didn’t work. The electricity was off, as was the heat and most of the plumbing. Only the tiny bathroom connected to the breakroom had water (though it wasn’t potable anymore). He had to pull open the front curtains to get more light inside.
It reeked. The smoke had discolored the ceiling and caused an ugly gradient up the walls. All the wallpaper he lovingly picked out several years ago was now ruined. None of the shelves looked disturbed, but he knew that the smoke could’ve caused a lot of damage to his delicate antiques, and it likely did hurt some of them. His brain was already whirring with a to-do list.
What can be wiped off? What has to go to the dry cleaning? What can be salvaged? What has to be thrown away? I’m going to need to rent a dumpster…
He hardly cared about his own stuff at that point. He would need new clothes eventually, but that was not important. Part of what made his antiques valuable was that he took perfect care of them and kept them in good condition. All that smoke could’ve easily ruined it all.
Dread as thick as tar began weighing his stomach down. What would his inventory look like? He wasn’t going to be able to open the shop for a long time… God, what can I do?? He couldn’t even grab a notebook for this project because all of his notebooks had been burned.
“Step one.” He rubbed his hands down his face, eyes stinging from smoke and stress. “Buy a notebook. Step two…everything else.”
“If I had known what people called that area, I might not have taken the job.” Xie Lian, with his cellphone on speaker, sat cross-legged on his shop floor with a porcelain doll on his lap. “Did you purposefully not tell me because you knew that?”
“That’s so dramatic!” Shi Qingxuan kept him company on the other end of the phone. “If I said Ghost City, you would think of something dead and haunted, right?”
“…Okay, yes, sure.”
“So that nickname is nothing but a bunch of nonsense. Ghost City is hardly dead. Maybe a little haunted, but definitely not dead.”
The doll on Xie Lian’s lap was probably haunted as well. He’d bought it from an estate sale in the springtime and swore her eyes followed him, but she hadn’t given him any trouble. Her sweet painted face looked like she adored him as much as he adored her.
He was currently cleaning smoke residue from her dress. “Maybe I haven’t gotten the full story,” he dipped his rag into a bowl of vinegar water, “but it just sounds like the finance company is secretive, but like…not under the table. Right?”
“Are you asking me if it’s run by the mafia?”
“When I asked my coworker about the CEO, she looked like they were going to crawl out of the drain and break her kneecaps. So maybe I am worried about the mafia.”
A loud laugh barked from the other end of the phone call. It sounded like Shi Qingxuan had almost dropped their phone in the process. “People are so scared of him!! It’s hilarious!” Their laughter died into a snort. “Flora City Financials is completely above-the-board, according to my brother. They’re a legit company even if they have a stupid name.”
Now Xie Lian chuckled, too. The smoke on the doll’s dress was cleaning remarkably well. Flora City Financials obviously owned Flora City Lofts (most of downtown actually), and no one was brave enough to outwardly make fun of how silly they sounded. “And this elusive CEO?”
“Even if he’s not a ghost, he’s sure scary as hell. Pretty sure most everyone who owns businesses downtown are indebted to him forever, but he’s involved in other stuff.”
“So ‘other stuff’ doesn’t mean money laundering or drug smuggling?”
“You joke about that, but a guy with that much power might sue you for slander if he hears you say things like that. That much money can turn anyone evil.”
Xie Lian understood what Qingxuan was saying. He highly doubted that he, a simple waiter in a hotel restaurant, would ever encounter someone like the CEO. Their worlds would likely never collide. The hotel was ritzy, but probably not ritzy enough for someone who owned the entire city district.
He rinsed the doll’s dress in warm water and laid it flat onto a towel. “As long as you were only joking about the human trafficking, I’ll choose to believe you. I guess I’ll trust Shi Wudu.”
“And you probably won’t regret it. Probably.”
Xie Lian hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep in the last week or so. Between training at his new job, DIY’ing repairs around his building, and going through the store inventory, he didn’t really sleep much anymore. It didn’t help that he left the crappy motel after a few days and decided to set up camp in his freezing-cold breakroom.
But there wasn’t any other solution to his predicament currently. All he could do was his best.
He chatted with his friend whenever he had the time, though most of his energy went to his shop. Every penny he had went into it as well. Tarps for the exposed walls and roof. Industrial cleanup crew for the charcoaled remnants of the fire. Taxis were expensive to and from the hotel as well, since the buses didn’t run 24/7.
Everything cost money. Xie Lian didn’t have any by the time he received his first pay stub (with three days of work on it), but he stopped complaining quickly. Shi Qingxuan had been right: the tips were fantastic.
When six days passed, he was still in the middle of training when he got an email from the inspectors. He was both relieved and devastated. Most of the information in the report went over his head; all that really mattered was the cost to fix it. That would be in a separate report.
Almost all the damage was done to the residential portion of the building. His shop was officially mostly fine, but—
“No phones on the floor.” One of the restaurant managers shot Xie Lian a harsh look and watched him shove his phone back into his pocket. “Focus on your trainer, please.”
“Apologies, laoban.”
Two weeks after the fire, Xie Lian finally had the answers he was dreading. The cost.
It was nearly 11:00PM, and he was the last one on the restaurant floor. The lights were dimmed, chairs put away, and the cleaning crew would be arriving soon. A little less menacing once the diners were gone.
At this point in the night, the large glass doors between the restaurant and the bar were closed. He could see the bar was very much alive and would likely stay that way all night. That’s usually where the lingering restaurant patrons ended up after closing since those kinds of people didn’t seem to sleep.
Xie Lian could see the entire restaurant from where he stood at one of the busser stations. The place was divided into one lower level and one higher, separated by a fancy stained-glass partition. A small stage was set up along the higher portion of the partition where live music played every evening.
It was a beautiful restaurant—one that he thought his mother and father would’ve liked to go to twenty years ago.
His thoughts weren’t on the past at the moment. He only had a few minutes left of his shift, and he had his phone propped up behind a menu reading the repair cost report for the eighth time.
The water damage was almost worse than the fire damage, which was significant. Of course the plumbing needed to be replaced, electrical too. Foundation heavily damaged, the entire roof needed replacing. The second floor was completely a lost cause. He knew all this when the original inspection was finished—but the price of all these repairs was enormous.
“How am I ever going to afford this?” he whispered to himself, trying not to let himself drown in panic. The last two weeks had been spent partially wallowing in anxiety and self-pity. Now he knew how much money it would take to fix it…
Xie Lian’s hands shook a little harder. All efforts to contain his panic were failing miserably. He scrolled back up to the top of the page to read it again, like maybe the numbers would change the ninth time. To something he could afford.
It was all just so much. He was trying hard not to let himself go into full mourning mode again. Not everything had been destroyed. But he was already struggling with money and could never forget how horrendous it was to be homeless when he was younger.
He could do it. He was strong. But he was terrified. Anxiety, grief and trauma pulled at the fraying threads of his sanity. At least the shop is mostly okay. He had to remind himself of that. There might’ve been some smoke damage, but the fire hadn’t destroyed anything in that part of the building but some drywall.
The shop was standing. Most of his treasures were fine. He will be fine. He has to be.
He has to be fine.
Xie Lian blinked furiously, trying to calm his erratic breathing. It felt like there were bubbles rising in his fingertips, an uncomfortable precursor of a panic attack. Very inconvenient timing, since he was still at work. Breathe in. Breathe out.
“Excuse me.”
A voice disrupted Xie Lian’s spiral and he jumped upright. I must not have locked the doors properly. “I-I’m sorry, we’re closed. If you…” His eyes focused and landed on the guest in front of him.
It was a man, dressed in an ornate bloodred suit and was significantly taller than Xie Lian. His black hair was long and styled haphazardly (though definitely better than Xie Lian’s own long hair), silver jewelry visible around his neck and ears. There was a sort of elegant gothic look to the way he styled himself, but that wasn’t the most shocking part of his appearance. One of his eyes was hidden behind an eyepatch and the other was staring at him like it was looking through him.
He smelled of expensive, spicy aftershave.
Most of the restaurant patrons didn’t look like “average” people, but this man was on a whole other level. It wasn’t just the obvious wealth from the suit and jewelry. His presence was overpowering enough, Xie Lian almost instinctually shrank down. Even the lump in his throat had been startled away.
“I know you’re closed,” the man said. His voice was deep and smooth, but his tone wasn’t unfriendly. “I believe I left my cellphone here earlier. Would you check to see if one was recovered, please?”
Xie Lian realized quickly that he hadn’t blinked. His eyes ached, which was likely a combination of the tears and also looking upwards. “Ah, of course.” At least he said please. Most people were not so polite. “What does it look like?”
“Smartphone, black case with a clip on the back. The lock screen is a painting.”
“Right, I’ll check.”
The lost and found was in a safe located outside the manager’s office. It gave Xie Lian a chance to discreetly rub his face and take a few big gulps of air. All he had to do was retrieve the phone and finish the rest of his shift.
Then he could return to his shop (the closet-size breakroom), wash his clothes and body in the sink with hand soap, sleep on the floor, and then do it all over again tomorrow. And somehow, somehow, he’ll save up all these paychecks to afford the nearly half-million-yuan bill on his hands.
There was only one cellphone in the lost and found, and it matched the description the man gave. The background of the phone was a colorful nature painting by one of Xie Lian’s favorite Russian artists. Just the sight of it allowed a bit of comfort settle the pain in his heart.
The man was still waiting patiently back on the floor of the restaurant. Goodness, he really is tall, Xie Lian thought. And that eyepatch made him look much scarier than he probably would’ve looked without it. Was it part of his style, or was he actually missing an eye?
Xie Lian handed the phone over. “I like your lock screen. Some of that artist’s collection toured this part of the country when I was in high school. I love the way he used colors.”
There was a second of silence when both of their hands were on the phone. Before Xie Lian could pass away from embarrassment, the other man smiled. It lifted his single eye into a crescent and made Xie Lian feel a little less stupid.
“I heard about the tour, but I was in primary school and didn’t get to see it. I’m a little jealous.” He sounded genuine, like he wasn’t just forcing an awkward conversation that Xie Lian started.
So he’s younger than me. He lamented in the fact that this man was more successful than he would ever be.
Exhausted from the emotions of the day, Xie Lian wanted to chase the comfort of his favorite subject. “I have one of his originals in my shop, but…” He stopped himself. “Ah, excuse me. I don’t mean to keep you.”
There was something intriguing in the way the man looked at him. It was difficult to pinpoint right away. Most of the intimidatingly wealthy people who visited the restaurant didn’t even look at him unless they were sneering, didn’t talk to him unless they were complaining. This man didn’t seem like he was looking down on Xie Lian at all other than in the literal sense.
The five seconds of silence after he stopped himself was more awkward than mentioning the artist. Five seconds of this handsome stranger just staring at him.
Then the man smiled and nodded thoughtfully. “Thank you for finding my phone. Have a good rest of your night.” He waved the phone in a goodbye gesture as he turned.
Xie Lian watched him walk out the restaurant doors. They locked closed behind him.
Ten past midnight, Xie Lian found himself still awake on the makeshift bed he’d set up on the breakroom floor of his shop. The room was barely big enough for him to stretch out completely. There were two coat hangers, a cabinet, and a folding chair. It just happened to be intact from the fire—so it was his new bedroom for now.
One blanket over him and two underneath as a makeshift mattress. The heat was out, and being the beginning of winter meant he would either have to buy more blankets or get a space heater to stop from freezing to death. For the time being, he was okay just huddling. There weren’t a lot of options at the moment.
He was awake in the pitch-darkness on his cell phone. There was an app he used for inventory (using his laptop was always easier, but it had been destroyed in the fire), and he was currently thumbing through.
The entry soon popped up on screen. Otrazheniye, Oleg Lipkovich ,1892, Oil on Canvas. A painting of a young man sitting at the edge of a pond, hanging on the back shelf of his antique shop. The face of the man was turned downwards but was not staring into the water, instead a little to his side. Xie Lian liked to think he was watching over the shop like that.
It was a painting by the same artist from the handsome stranger’s lock screen. And Xie Lian owned an original! He doubted he could ever sell it at the price it was worth, not with his current customer demographic and shop location, but it was still one of his favorite gems. Hopefully it wasn’t too damaged by the smoke.
He had forgotten to take a picture of it when he was out on the store floor, so he took a screenshot of the photo before turning off his phone. If he ever saw that man again, he could show him.
The air around him was frigid and stunk of smoke, but his exhaustion still made it possible to sleep. In a matter of seconds, Xie Lian fell unconscious with his phone on his chest and the Russian impressionist paintings in his head.
Fifteen Years Ago
The night wasn’t very cold for September. Few lights were on other than the grimy lamps that lined the street, though some of them were broken, and even fewer windows from the buildings were on that late. Xie Lian sat on a park bench that was nestled in inky darkness between lights; it wasn’t as hard to hide in this part of the city.
Distant sirens wailed and dogs howled from their yards.
Xie Lian sat silently, hands in his pants pockets, staring down the adjacent alleyway. It had been a while since he felt hungry anymore. Now the hunger just a general ache throughout his whole body. With winter approaching, he knew that he should be getting better prepared, but there was really nothing to motivate him.
I should at least find a hat.
He didn’t move. His feet still hurt from walking so much with his broken shoes. He didn’t want to walk like that again any time soon. There was one less shelter open on this side of the city due to reduction in funding (or so they said), so he wasn’t confident he’d get a bed even if he tried.
The time passed sickeningly slow.
Xie Lian couldn’t lay down on this type of bench (unfriendly architecture, as he was familiar with), so he tried to sleep propped up.
Sleep wasn’t easy to come by, yet it was all he could do.
“Got a light?”
He jolted, heart rate immediately skyrocketing. THUMP, THUMP. There was black figure, standing around ten feet away, silhouetted completed from the streetlamp behind him. Gang member? Xie Lian didn’t have any knives or anything. He scrambled at his pockets for something he could use to defend himself. THUMP, THUMP.
The silhouette reacted just as swift, holding up its hands like a surrender. It began walking backwards. “Shit, nevermind. Don’t freak out, I’ll leave. Sorry.”
On the word “sorry,” the voice cracked. It was frightened. It was…a boy.
Xie Lian held his own hands up. His sleep hadn’t been restful, but it was still jarring waking up like that. “I’m sorry,” he responded. His own voice sounded terrible, raspy and unpracticed, but it made the kid stop. “You scared me. I’m not… I won’t hurt you. I don’t have a lighter, though. Sorry.”
The two of them were frozen, hackles raised
The kid lowered his hands halfway. He was still nothing more than a silhouette, but as Xie Lian’s eyes adjusted, he was able to notice the body language a little better. How skinny the kid was. A hoodie pulled over his head made the silhouette look like misshapen.
“What kind of hobo doesn’t have a light?” the kid insisted. Despite trying to sound tough, he was clearly still shaken.
Xie Lian almost laughed. Hobo. It was a little funny. “Sorry to disappoint you.”
“…Are you on something?”
“You’re not very smart for talking to strangers in the middle of the night like this. Especially with an attitude.” He settled back onto his bench, making sure to feel the shape of his wallet under his shirt. “If I was on something, I probably wouldn’t like a brat sneaking up on me.”
Silence. Another siren started a few streets over.
“Go home. You’re lucky that I’m the one you chose to bother and not any of the others.”
Still nothing. The boy didn’t move at all. Xie Lian closed his eyes and tried to forget he was there. It wasn’t his responsibility to protect any idiot kids that wandered outside in the middle of the night. Maybe he could sleep after all.
A minute passed without any sounds of retreating footsteps.
Xie Lian opened an eye and saw the kid fidgeting with something in both hands. His normal instincts would’ve told him to leave the scene just in case it was a weapon, but he didn’t.
“You snuck out in the middle of the night to smoke something?” Xie Lian asked. “Do you live close by?”
“I don’t want to go back,” the kid said immediately. His words were fierce, like he’d been repeating them to himself for a while, stuck in his head. “I’m not going back.”
“You sure and hell can’t stay out here. Your survival instincts aren’t good enough to be a hobo.” The word made Xie Lian almost laugh again. It wasn’t a title he ever liked hearing, but he could use it on himself. “I’m serious.”
“So am I. I’m not going back.”
“How old even are you?”
“…Seventeen.”
“Bullshit.”
The kid turned his head sharply like he’d been slapped. For another few seconds, he stood where he was, but eventually he shuffled a few steps out of the direct shadow. He was now between the sidewalk and a cluster of shrubbery. The dim lighting hit his face and Xie Lian could see it better.
The boy was gaunt, pale skin and black hair hanging shaggy over his face. Even though there were still shadows cast over the hooded sweatshirt, a deep bruise could still easily be seen across his swollen right eye. The baggy clothes probably made him look even younger than he was.
“Eleven?” Xie Lian guessed.
“Thirteen,” the boy snapped back. He crossed his arms tightly like he was throwing a fit. “You look like you’re fifty.”
That time, Xie Lian actually did laugh. It was the first time he’d laughed in a very long time, and it hurt his throat. He was severely dehydrated, definitely. “I’m only twenty. And you are too young to be smoking. Your lungs are still developing. Don’t make any more stupid decisions than you already have.”
“Fuck off, why would I listen to you??”
Okay. He obviously wouldn’t be able to get his peace tonight. Xie Lian stood up off the bench slowly, trying to stretch some of the cricks out, before turning to the boy. He watched him flinch but not retreat.
He’s just a stray kitten, he thought suddenly. A feral cat that’d been kicked too many times. Refusing to leave the human’s side but trying to scratch anyone who got close enough. It was almost endearing, but Xie Lian wasn’t kidding when he said it was dangerous outside. There were plenty of houseless individuals who would have hurt him.
He reached under his shirt (the boy’s shoulders tightened) and pulled out his pathetic excuse for a wallet that was held together by duct tape. Inside was ¥10 and a few small jiao.
“Here.” He removed the yuan and held it out to the boy. “There’s a 24-hour fast food place around the corner. Get yourself a drink and stay until they kick you out. It would be safer than out here, at least.”
The boy stared at the money for a second too long before scowling and turning away. The expression contorted his swollen eye even further. It looked painful. “I don’t need a hobo’s last yuan. I’d rather rob the McDonald’s than rob you.”
Again, Xie Lian laughed. He had never experienced anything quite like it. It wasn’t exactly better than sleeping through the night, but he was intrigued and felt sympathetic towards this angry stray. There was no way that boy had any experience robbing anyone. All hiss and no scratch.
“Fine, then.” He put his money back into his wallet and put that back under his shirt. “Do what you want. But the bench is better than standing, so you’re welcome to join me.”
Xie Lian sat back down. His lower back hated these types of benches, but it was also better than sitting directly on the cold ground.
It took several more minutes for the boy to actually approach and sit at the other end of the bench. Neither of them said anything. Eventually, Xie Lian fell asleep, and the boy was gone when he woke the next morning.
He must not have scared the boy well enough, though, because he came back.
The day was much colder than the last one had been, and Xie Lian had pulled his arms into his ragged jacket to keep his hands warm. He still hadn’t gone out to find a hat or gloves, but he didn’t want to give up this perfect bench spot he’d found.
It was two days after they first met, some time in the morning, when the kid returned.
He was in a hooded sweatshirt again (possibly the same one as last time), ripped pants, and was carrying a backpack on his chest rather than his back. The biggest difference was that it was daylight and Xie Lian could see him better.
That bruise on his face looked terrible as it healed, all green and yellow and purple, but less swollen. The split lip was newer.
“Still here?” He tried to speak tough again. He still kept his head down, hair hanging in his eyes. “Don’t have anywhere better to be?”
“You’re pretty hypocritical.” Xie Lian didn’t respond to the dumb question.
“Whatever.”
It took another few minutes for the boy to slouch over to the bench and sit down. Even on the opposite side of the seat, they were still only three or four feet apart. He pulled a book out of his backpack and on his lap without looking over. Intro to Geometry, busted on the corners and spine and had loose paper sticking out of pages between.
Silence yawned out between them. Xie Lian, not wanting to say anything to ruin the moment, and the kid writing with a chewed-on pencil in the cold without gloves. Even from that distance his handwriting looked abysmal. There was likely no one in his life to teach him properly.
There was a time when Xie Lian not only practiced calligraphy but excelled at it. He would tutor others in his class. Those days felt so long ago.
What was this though? They didn’t know each other. This grungy little middle schooler had no business being out on the streets of this part of town. He could trip and land in a pile of needles and be out for the rest of his life. Or someone could’ve jumped him on the way here.
Xie Lian watched for a while as he tried to do the homework. The first time he spoke was to point at the page. “Hexagon is six sides. ‘Hex’ for six. Pentagon is five.”
“I know that,” the kid spat back, but he was already scrubbing the pencil eraser across the page. Part of the paper ripped. “I’m not fucking stupid.”
“You have quite a vocabulary for someone…not stupid.”
He whipped his head to glare at Xie Lian. Even though the swelling had gone down in his right eye, it was still bloodshot and covered by greasy side bangs. The eye that wasn’t covered was a startling auburn, a color that had to be rare. He was definitely much skinnier than he ought to be.
Xie Lian didn’t have his yuan anymore so he couldn’t try to convince the kid to go eat something. He watched him return to his work. “…What’s your name?”
The kid answered while still writing, not looking up. “Tony Stark.”
“Okay, Mr. Stark, so why aren’t you doing your homework at home?”
The silence that followed was different than the original one. It was tense, stretched like a wire. Rather than immediately throwing a retort out, the kid began scribbling a circle into the side of his paper. Graphite began piling as the circle grew darker.
“Too loud,” he finally said. “My foster siblings are annoying. And the baby doesn’t shut up.”
Ah.
“Your foster parents are okay with you going outside like this? How far away is your home?”
“It’s just a house, not a home,” he grumbled. “They don’t even notice I’m gone. It doesn’t matter. It’s not like anyone would try to attack me while I’m with you, so it’s fine.”
Xie Lian tried not to smile, because it would probably look like he was making fun of him. The weather was a little less cold with company. “I don’t look that rough, do I? I’m still attackable. I have no mass.”
By some miracle, the kid lifted the corner of his mouth into a crooked smile. It was directed downwards at the textbook. “…I guess. You’re pretty short, too. I think I’m taller than you.”
“There’s no way you’re taller than me.”
At the same time Xie Lian stood from the bench, the kid put his book down and stood too. It was the first time they had been face-to-face. He smelled a little like cigarettes and unwashed clothes, but it couldn’t have possibly been worse than how Xie Lian smelled. They stood at almost the same height.
“See? Taller than you.” The kid mocked measuring them with his hand. “If any other hobos came to attach us, they’d take you first. I could trip you and run.”
“Rude little brat.”
Both of them laughed.
For just a moment, Xie Lian actually felt like a real person. His hands were cold, his stomach was empty, his shaved head was itchy. And he was laughing with somebody like he wasn’t invisible. He’s not invisible.
This kid was nothing like Xie Lian was at thirteen. Polar opposite, in fact, but there was a sweet sort of nostalgia that came with his presence. This was just a boy trying to fit into his own imperfect world just like he had been. Painful memories squeezed his stomach of everything he’d taken for granted.
They sat back down. Neither of them said anything else for a while, but the silence wasn’t as awkward as the last time. The kid even asked Xie Lian a few questions about his homework. It’d been a while since he last thought about geometry, but he’d been good enough in school to be a little helpful.
It was…nice. Xie Lian hadn’t realized how vastly lonely he was for those last few years. Even if his company was just a rough-around-the-edges kid.
After that day, they saw each other two or three times a week after school, even if just in passing.
Sometimes they would work on the kid’s homework. Sometimes they’d swap stories, or the kid would try to explain the current pop culture phenomenon while Xie Lian listened politely. Most often, Xie Lian just got the sense that this kid didn’t feel safe or cared for at home and needed someone to care.
The boy eventually told him where he lived and about his home life. It was a kind of terrible that was very different than Xie Lian had known growing up. Different, but he still empathized. Xie Lian sugarcoated most of his own backstory.
Even if they didn’t actively spend a ton of time together, Xie Lian continued caring. And the universe granted him that much at least.
For two months, until after the snow started flying, fate just kept pulling Xie Lian to the angry little kitten who hated being at home. He would see the kid in a gas station buying a soda or walking home from school in the cold. Most of those times, he didn’t announce his presence since it would probably seem like a random homeless man was following this kid.
But it made Xie Lian feel better that someone was watching over him. Someone cared whether the kid was safe (because his foster parents didn’t once make an appearance at the bus stops or gas stations).
On a random day, Xie Lian was walking his usual route that detoured close to the kid’s house (on his way to an employment agency), he saw that the condominium was closed down. There was a piece of paper stapled to the front door. He couldn’t read it from there, but he knew immediately that the kid’s foster family was gone. No blankets pinned to the inside of windows or trash under the porch. Everything was gone.
He didn’t see him again after that. It was as though the boy just vanished.
That winter, Xie Lian worked his way into a part-time job and eventually his own crummy apartment with the help of housing assistance. He continued to worry about the boy. Wherever he was. He hoped that he was being cared for.
If he wasn’t around for Xie Lian to care about, then maybe he ought to start caring for himself.