Work Text:
lu dinghao was blessed by the sun god. wherever he is, it is always sunny and there is never a cloud in the sky. the day he was born, there was a thunderstorm, but it stopped abruptly at the first cries of a new life. it was like the essence of the sun in the little body emitted energy that scared all the clouds away. his family cried in joy as they thought it brought in good luck. a beautiful baby boy who was blessed by the gods themselves.
our little sun, they called him as he learned how to crawl, spreading happiness and joy to those around him. he was, after all, a rainbow baby. one that was born to bring great fortune and serenity to the family. with his large eyes and beautiful smile, he casted all the negative emotions away. that’s why even though the crops had withered the second year in a row, his dad still smiled when he came home from work.
-
when lu dinghao was eight, he realized that his family was poor compared to a lot of the other boys in the village. he always wore hand me downs from his cousins and he wondered why his dad’s head was full of grey hair when all his friends’ dads had a head of dark hair fit for their age.
“daddy, why are you upset?”
his dad chuckles at how perceptive dinghao was at such a young age. it seems like they boy was very sensitive to emotions around him. “you are such a good boy xiao lu. daddy is upset that the crops burned again this year. but don’t worry i have a hunch that next year the gods will bless us with bountiful harvest.” he picks dinghao up under the arms and spins him around, the boy smiling all his worries away, like the always present sun.
the next year the crops burned down again. and the year after that. and the year after too.
-
lu dinghao was ten when he realized the reason why the crops keep burning was because it never rained in their village. he has never seen rain, but his mother tells him tales of water falling from the sky. it was so beautiful and serene and you could dance in all her glory. the rain covered the fields and danced around the hills. it pooled the valleys and was salvation for all the animals. it was a blessing for a farmer’s family when the goddess of rain descends on the field, she explains. she thinks about something, “haohao have you never seen the rain before?”
he shakes his head. she tells him with a gentle smile that it is the most beautiful thing in the world. he wants to see the rain so that year on his birthday he prays for a miracle.
the rain doesn’t come, but sickness does.
-
his mother passes quietly in a span of a few months. she looks a lot older than what dinghao remembers. there’s crows feet by her eyes when they burry her.
“she had always loved the rain. the rain goddess has taken her away at such a tender age.” dinghao over hears his grandma. he continues to pray for the rain every year.
-
lu dinghao was fifteen when he leaves home for the first time. he got into a high school at a city quite a distance from his village. he would have to live there for the semester. it wasn’t ideal but he wanted to learn and one day provide for his family so his dad didn’t have to carry boxes from the warehouse to a truck everyday to support him and his grandparents. he kisses all his relatives goodbye and hitches a ride with a salesman as he drives towards the city.
the city is new. its loud and bustling and there’s more people than he’s seen his entire life. everything is different. the people are colder, and the sky isn’t so blue. some days the sun can’t even been seen, obscured by the smog in the air.
he gets a call from his father, voice all choked up. it had rained. it had rained for the first time in fifteen years. the villagers all ran out to the fields and danced and prayed. they expressed their thanks and got on their knees to kiss the now softened ground. dinghao holds back tears as his father explained the rain to him. what a wonderful sight it must’ve been, his mother would’ve been happy. it just came five years too late.
dinghao prays again and cries that night. mom did you see the rain?
was it beautiful?
-
dinghao comes home on the same dingy old car he left on. when he comes back his father hugs him close to his chest.
“welcome back xiao lu.”
dinghao sniffles and wraps his thin arms around his father.
“missed you too, dad.”
he can smell the fresh grass after the last rainfall and taste the sweetness on his tongue. that night he goes outside and lies on the floor, inhaling the beauty of the earth. the ground is damp and he closes his eyes, imagining the rain falling down on him, hard.
that summer, it doesn’t rain again.
-
lu dinghao is sixteen when he realizes that he was cursed. the rain avoids him like he is the plague. yet he wants to see her beauty desperately. he makes sure to visit the village as little was possible, so they aren’t cursed like him. he doesn’t want them to be collateral damage, whatever the heavens have against him, the others didn’t have to bear his misfortune as well.
he still prays at night. prays for a miracle.
-
lu dinghao is eighteen when he stops praying. the rain isn’t going to come and he isn’t going to continue to wait.
he finishes high school, but he doesn’t return home. his dad is a farmer, he needs the rain to survive. his family can survive without him but they can’t survive without rain. he decides to head on over to Beijing to pursue post-secondary. he is going to travel the country one day and see what the rest of the world has to offer him.
“xiao lu, dad misses you. i’m getting old so you better come home soon and massage my back ok?” dinghao’s father jokes.
dinghao can hear the exhaustion in his voice but he can’t bring himself to come home just yet.
“ill come home for new years dad, so you better prepare a feast for me!” dinghao jokes back. he hears his dad laugh and he cracks a smile himself.
he wonders if his father knows that he’s cursed. he wonders if he would still want him back if he did.
-
lu dinghao is twenty two, he finished university and realizes that his curse could actually help people. he monitors the weather channel for news of flood and buys the first train ticket when he sees signs. when he arrives to those cities, the flood is already gone. he always misses the rain but he doesn’t mind when he sees the wonder on people’s faces.
“can you believe it? it was pouring just half an hour ago.”
“it’s a miracle, we should pray and say our blessings.”
dinghao can only smile and breathe in the damp air, the only evidence that it was even raining just moments ago.
dinghao travels to fifteen different cities that year, always learning something new along the way. he decides to become a journalist, writing down his adventures and experiences in these towns and cities. it is surprisingly well taken by the public and the funds he receives is enough to allow him to continue travelling as well as to send some of it back home.
he doesn’t mind that he doesn’t get to see the rain, he tells himself, after all he stopped praying many years ago. it is only at night when he’s fast asleep does he dream of his mother’s face and he’s ten again, they are in the village; they hold hands and dance in the gentle curtain of rainfall.
-
lu dinghao is twenty four when he meets him. he is in anhui, walking around, it reminds him of his hometown with all the scenery. he walks up to the bus stop to board the next bus heading to the city when he makes eye contact with a tall man. as soon as they make eye contact dinghao hears thunder roaring in the background. he sees clouds rolling over the mountains and he doesn’t believe his eyes. he’s never seen a cloud this dark in his life.
in a matter of seconds the rain pours down on them. dinghao is shaken to his bones, he doesn’t move, he cant move. the rain soaks his clothes and yet it feels so warm and inviting. so you’ve finally decided to greet me after all those years, dinghao thinks. he closes his eyes and takes everything in. the touch of rain on his skin is better than he’s ever imagined. he looks up and sees a dreary sky, he feels hot tears streaming down his face before he even realizes that he was crying. it was like lifting off a huge weight from his shoulders. he felt liberated. this feeling of freedom was cut short when the tall guy pulled on his wrist, leading him to the nearest shelter. dinghao was still too stunned to refuse.
the other man pulls dinghao towards the bus shelter and continuously glances back at dinghao who didn’t move an inch when it started pouring. he was confused, why didn’t the other man move when it started raining? only when they reached the bus shelter did he open his mouth. “hey are you ok?”
dinghao looks over at him, still at a loss of words. the man was very handsome, was the only cohesive thought he made.
“are you crying?” the man continues, genuinely worried at this point.
“im good, better than good actually. thank you.” dinghao says, with a genuine smile, before walking into the rain again. the other man can only stare in confusion before boarding the bus, which just arrived.
dinghao continues to just stand there in peace.
that night he writes a post on his blog about the rainstorm in anhui. the people are a bit confused, his posts usually had rain as a motif but this post sounded like a man who had not had a drink of water in decades. a man dying of thirst only to be drenched in an oasis in the middle of the desert.
he ends off his post with: hey mom i danced in the rain today, it was breathtaking. did you see me?
i love you.
-
in a week he sees the other man again. they were both about to enter the same restaurant when they bumped into each other. it had been clear all day but as soon as they made eye contact again, it stared raining. in a matter of seconds, they were drenched again.
“is this some sort bad luck?” the man yells as he runs for the restaurant.
dinghao only laughs as he stands still. he lifts up his arms and feels the rain hitting against his skin. the feeling of water on his face and in his hair makes the rest of the world fuzzy.
“are you crazy? what are you doing? come here.” the man is standing at the entrance of the restaurant beckoning dinghao to enter as well.
“no thanks i think im going to stay here a bit longer.” dinghao replies with a wide grin on his face. he can feel his eyes tearing up again so he starts laughing. he dances.
the man can only watch dinghao as he soaks himself with rainwater. but instead of feeling wet and uncomfortable for him, he feels a sense of ease. he has never seen anyone dance so carefree in the rain, he looks free of inhibitions and worries. “fuck it.” he says before joining dinghao in the rain.
“you are dancing too! do you love the rain as well?” dinghao says between breaths as he continues to dance around.
“yeah i mean it’s ok. i don’t love it but i have nothing against it.” the man says before joining dinghao and dancing as well.
“my name is dinghao, what’s yours?”
“yanjun. lin yanjun.”
“well yanjun, i think you might be my lucky charm”
-
dinghao and yanjun walk into the restaurant, after the short burst of rain, laughing and dripping with water from head to toe. the owner gives them questionable looks before sitting them near a heater, so their clothes dry up quickly.
“what is this weird luck, everytime i see you it starts pouring.” yanjun says as he takes a sip of tea.
dinghao’s eyes sparkle as he also takes a sip of tea. “you might not believe me yanjun but i think you are the kryptonite to my curse.”
dinghao laughs as yanjun scrunches his face in confusion.
“the only two times i’ve experienced rain was with you.”
yanjun widens his eyes in shock very animatedly. dinghao can only laugh again before shivering from the cold. yanjun notices right away and takes off his jacket before handing it to dinghao telling him it was waterproof.
dinghao decides that he was never going to let yanjun go.
he thinks back to high school when they had a single lesson in language class about chinese mythology. they learned that dragons were known as the bringers of good luck and rain, after that class dinghao would doodle a lot of snake like creatures with short limbs and long whiskers flying over hills and fields of lush green grass. he thinks that yanjun might be the dragon that was the result of many years of prayer.
-
dinghao finds out that yanjun is a photographer also exploring china and its many beautiful cities filled with history and art. they decide to travel for a while together, and in that time it rains. it rains consistently as if dinghao’s curse didn’t exist at all. dinghao doesn’t think that he will ever let yajun get away from him at this point. he is too hooked on the feeling of rain and the feeling of security that yanjun brings him, knowing that it will rain again and again and again.
a month turns into a year and they have gone from two single beds to a double at hotels. on the first night they lie together dinghao traces yanjun’s full back tattoo of a dragon. he finds fate and the universe awfully hilarious. when he surrenders himself to yanjun he also gives him the most vulnerable part of him. he tells yanjun about his village, about his mom, and about his curse. he hopes that yanjun can lock up his insecurities and anxieties and keep them safe and hidden away. he voices out what he’s been holding in all those years by himself.
“my curse killed my mom. she couldn’t be away from the rain, she was blessed by it. it was what kept her alive. but i killed her by cursing the rain away.”
yanjun shushes dinghao and pulls him close to his chest. “its not like you wished for it to never rain in your village. didn’t you pray every night for it to rain? you are the pride and joy of your family, this curse of yours is nothing but a blessing. when i look at you all my exhaustion fades away and im only left with happy thoughts. you are blessed by the sun god and the sun itself. embrace it and i will make sure that nothing bad ever comes your way.”
and dinghao truly believes him. he hugs him closer and prays that yanjun will stay by his side.
that night in his dreams he is ten years old again and he is in the same field and his mother is smiling at him.
“when you were born we celebrated because you were blessed by the heavens. dinghao never forsake the part of you that was given by the gods. i have never blamed you a single second of my life, i love you so much.”
and in his dream he hugs his mother and cries like a little boy.
-
they head to anhui again, a year after when they first met. a year fuller with knowledge of the world and of themselves.
they decide to climb huangshan. after 13 hours of hiking they make it to the top. the sky is clear, theres not a single dark cloud in the sky.
dinghao breathes it in. “i guess moments like this is when rain is not needed in the world. it sure is beautiful isn’t it?”
“yeah it sure is.” yanjun replies, snapping a picture of dinghao breathing in the fresh air, the sunset as his backdrop.
he isn’t sure when it happened but slowly and surely he began to fall in love with the boy. when he told him about his worries and his predicament with the rain, yanjun thought the whole premise was very tragic. he realized he would drop everything to make dinghao feel safe and secure.
“i once believed that i would never be able to stay in one place for long. that i’d have to move constantly to not bring misfortune to those around me. i haven’t visited my father in five years because i was afraid. afraid of becoming a burden and more afraid that i would become selfish enough to finally stay. im pathetic.”
“you don’t have to be afraid anymore dinghao. im here with you and im never going to leave.”
-
“are you ready?”
“yeah i think i have everything.”
“no i mean are you ready to go home?” yanjun asks again.
dinghao intertwines his fingers with yanjun and looks up with a smile, “i think im finally ready.”
and they walk on the dirt path back to dinghao’s village, clouds rolling in the distance.