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Lan Zhan surveyed the mess before him, struggling to decide where to begin. Wei Ying was downstairs, helping Jiang Cheng squeeze their suitcases into the tiny car Jiang Cheng had purchased the previous year. Lan Zhan had asked how he could assist, and Wei Ying had sent him upstairs to get “that bag with the broken handle, you know, the yellow one— or maybe it’s green?” It wasn’t much to go on, and Wei Ying’s room in the apartment he and Jiang Cheng shared looked like it had been ransacked by a hippopotamus with a grudge.
Starting with the closet, Lan Zhan shoved aside hangers and boxes overflowing with papers and art supplies and books. There was no yellow or green bag there. He checked under the bed next, then in every drawer of Wei Ying’s supremely unorganized desk. No bag. He had decided long ago that when he and Wei Ying moved in together (a reasonable amount of time after they graduated, as they had agreed) they would require a two bedroom apartment so that Wei Ying could have at least one room in which he could be as messy as he liked. A studio, perhaps, to ensure that no matter what job he had, he wouldn’t give up on his art.
Giving up on the bedroom, Lan Zhan searched the rest of the apartment, which was much tidier thanks to Jiang Cheng’s influence and constant nagging. He finally found the bag hanging from the doorknob of the bathroom, which would have seemed odd if he didn’t know Wei Ying’s system: “if you don’t want to forget something, always hang it on a doorknob.” Lan Zhan felt it might have been more effective to hang it on the knob of the front door, but he kept such thoughts to himself.
He was turning to go when the front door swung open and Wei Ying dashed inside, panting like he had run all the way up the stairs.
“Oh good,” he said when he saw Lan Zhan holding the bag. “You found it. I can’t believe I almost forgot it! I used my system and everything.”
“Mn,” Lan Zhan said, suppressing a smile. He held the bag out to Wei Ying, who took it.
“Don’t you want to guess what it is?”
“If you want me to,” Lan Zhan said.
“You’re no fun. Come on, guess!” Wei Ying pulled the bag’s unbroken strap up to his shoulder and looped his arms around Lan Zhan’s neck. “You have three tries.”
Lan Zhan pretended to think. “It is the secret project for your sister that you have been working on that no one is allowed to see.”
Wei Ying squawked. “How do you know about that?”
Lan Zhan planted a kiss on his nose. “You are not subtle.”
Wei Ying pulled away in mock affront, but he was smiling within seconds. “I really hope she likes it. Jiang Cheng says I should have just gotten her a onesie, but anyone could get a onesie. I bet Jin Zixuan bought her every onesie he could find.”
“How dare he?” Lan Zhan teased. Wei Ying still kept up the pretense of hating Jin Zixuan, who had graduated two years ago and embarked on a whirlwind— and, in Wei Ying’s opinion, ill-advised— romance with Jiang Yanli. They had married the summer after Wei Ying’s junior year, and now their first child was on the way. Lan Zhan knew that Wei Ying was not-so-secretly ecstatic, even if he accused Jin Zixuan of being “whatever the opposite of a cradle robber is.”
“Ugh, Lan Zhan, no one understands me.”
Wei Ying disentangled himself from Lan Zhan and took his hand, pulling him towards the front door. “Come on, Jiang Cheng’s getting impatient. If we don’t get down there soon he might leave without us.”
The ride to the airport was cramped. Wei Ying called shotgun, but Jiang Cheng accused him of being a bad boyfriend and pointed out that Lan Zhan was taller and also their guest, technically. Wei Ying gave in and let Lan Zhan ride up front. Lan Zhan probably would have preferred to sit in the back, pressed between the window and Wei Ying’s enormous suitcase, than up front with Jiang Cheng, but he thought it might be rude to admit that. Luckily, Jiang Cheng wasn’t bad company when Nie Huaisang and Wei Ying weren’t riling him up. He asked Lan Zhan about his classes and his plans after graduation, and congratulated him on the departmental award he had received at the end of the semester.
Flurries of snow swirled in the air when they stepped out in the parking lot, and Wei Ying shivered and pressed himself against Lan Zhan, complaining that he had been left out of the conversation for the whole half hour ride. They lugged their suitcases into the airport and made it through security with barely a hitch. Wei Ying kept his yellow-ish green bag when they checked their luggage, claiming it as his carry-on.
While they waited for their flight to board, Jiang Cheng wandered off to find coffee and Wei Ying leaned his head on Lan Zhan’s shoulder and wrapped his scarf around both of them.
“Do you think she’ll like my gift?” he mumbled.
Lan Zhan sought out Wei Ying’s hand and threaded their fingers together. “I do not know what it is.”
“Yeah, but…”
“But I know she will like it.”
“I mean, she’ll like it cause it’s from me, and she’ll be nice about it. But do you think she’ll, like, actually like it?”
Lan Zhan paused for a moment, not because he was hesitating but because he wanted Wei Ying to know he wasn’t answering flippantly. “You worked on the gift for weeks. You are very talented.”
“Lan Zhan .”
“Everyone in Stitch & Bitch wishes you to teach them.” In the end, Lan Zhan hadn’t had the heart to change the name when he became president. It was Mianmian’s legacy, and Wei Ying laughed every time he said it.
“They want you to teach them. What are all our little ducklings going to do when you graduate? Who will they pester with all of their questions? Who will they call crying when they get broken up with?”
Lan Zhan had not anticipated the role he would come to play as president of Stitch & Bitch. He asked a crying freshman what was wrong one time and the next thing he knew they all had his number and treated him as some combination of RA, friend, and distinguished professor. The arrangement secretly pleased him, but he wasn’t going to allow Wei Ying to distract him.
“Yanli will like your gift,” he said.
Wei Ying sighed. “I hope she does. She’s the best, I just want...I want to be as good a brother as she is a sister.” He squeezed Lan Zhan’s hand. “I can’t wait for you to meet her.”
Lan Zhan smiled into Wei Ying’s scarf. Wei Ying had met Xichen a few times over the past two years. When Xichen learned that Lan Zhan had a boyfriend, he insisted on buying them both lunch when he came to pick Lan Zhan up at the end of the semester sophomore year. It had become a tradition, and it usually involved a fancy restaurant Xichen insisted on paying for and a very long exchange of embarrassing stories about Lan Zhan. Wei Ying now knew about the two-year period of Lan Zhan’s childhood during which he had a painfully obvious crush on Prince Eric from The Little Mermaid , a movie Uncle disapproved of but was forced by Lan Zhan’s insistent begging to allow them to watch, and Xichen had seen the series of artless, stoic-faced pictures Lan Zhan had sent to Wei Ying when he was still learning how to take selfies. Lan Zhan hoped Yanli would tell him many embarrassing stories about Wei Ying. He hoped there would be photo albums.
There were, indeed, photo albums.
“I’m sorry I don’t have more,” Yanli said, dropping three enormous albums onto the coffee table with a resounding thump . “My parents have most of them, but I smuggled a few when I moved out.”
Jin Zixuan hovered behind her, clearly nervous about the fact that his very pregnant wife was lugging around piles of heavy books. Yanli ignored him; in general, she treated her pregnant belly as a useful extension of her body, using it to balance bowls of popcorn or laundry baskets.
“Those better not be the baby albums!” Wei Ying cried, hurrying in from the other room. Since arriving at Yanli’s house two days earlier, he had done nothing but watch TV, eat copious amounts of his sister’s cooking, and complain that Lan Zhan was “moving around too much” and “not being cuddly enough.” Jiang Cheng assured Lan Zhan that this was just how Wei Ying was during school breaks, and that eventually he would get bored of himself and start doing things again. Lan Zhan didn’t mind, though. He liked to see Wei Ying completely relaxed, and it gave him time to get to know Yanli.
“They are, and you’re not stopping us,” Yanli said, plopping onto the couch beside Lan Zhan and reaching for the first albums.
“It is only fair,” Lan Zhan said as Wei Ying settled on his other side, cuddling into him.
(Lan Zhan had asked Wei Ying, before they arrived, if he was comfortable with Lan Zhan seeing old pictures of him before his transition. Wei Ying had shrugged and said it was fine. “I just see me when I look at old pictures. I mean, dressed different or whatever, but it’s still me.”)
“Yeah, yeah, whatever, just don’t make fun of me. I didn’t develop my good looks until later in life.”
This was decidedly untrue. Yanli opened the first album, flipping past some pictures of herself and Jiang Cheng as babies and toddlers, until she reached a photograph of three children crowded together in front of a big blue house.
“That’s the day Wei Ying came home to us,” she said, tapping the photo with a manicured nail. Lan Zhan leaned in closer. Yanli looked twelve or thirteen, wearing purple overalls with her hair in two braids. A young boy with very short hair pressed into her side, pouting thunderously— it had to be Jiang Cheng. On the other side, Yanli had her arm around another child that was vividly, unmistakably, Wei Ying. He wore a bright yellow shirt and orange shorts with flowers on them. His long hair was unbrushed, sticking up in multiple directions, and he was smiling so big it swallowed his face, dimpling his pudgy little cheeks.
“He always smiled like that for pictures,” Yanli said fondly. “So big it looked like it hurt.”
“Stop looking at it, I look like a deranged chipmunk,” Wei Ying moaned.
Lan Zhan reached over and pinched his cheek, no longer so chubby. “You do not look like a chipmunk.”
Wei Ying squirmed away. “When do I get to see your baby pictures, huh?”
“Never,” Lan Zhan said solemnly, then smiled so Wei Ying would know he was kidding. When Lan Zhan was young, his uncle had dressed him up like an expensive doll with frilly dresses and ribbons. No one was ever allowed to see those pictures, but Wei Ying was an exception.
They made it through all three albums. Wei Ying left halfway through the second, wailing that he was being tortured.
“We can stop if you get bored,” Yanli said, but Lan Zhan shook his head. He would never be bored of this. There was Wei Ying on his first day of second grade, his little uniform already in disarray. There was Wei Ying holding Jiang Cheng in a headlock. There was Wei Ying wearing a small trash can upside down on his head.
“He was pretending to be a robot,” Yanli said. “He ran into the side of the house so hard I was scared he had a concussion. But he just got right back up again.”
In many of the pictures, Wei Ying wore boys’ clothes. When Lan Zhan remarked on this, Yanli smiled.
“He used to steal Jiang Cheng’s clothes. My mom would get so mad— she bought him all these dresses and pink clothes. But you know Wei Ying. He’s so stubborn, eventually Mom just gave in.”
Lan Zhan smiled at the thought of Wei Ying running around in stolen clothes, escaping his aunt’s grasp. He knew things hadn’t been easy for him, but his indomitable spirit was visible in every picture, shining through as bright as his smile.
When they finally ran out of photographs, Lan Zhan went off in search of Wei Ying. He found him in the guest bedroom, swaddled in blankets, watching Netflix on his phone. Lan Zhan crawled in beside him and waited for Wei Ying to pause what he was watching.
“Hey,” Wei Ying said.
“Hello.” Lan Zhan brushed the stray hairs away from Wei Ying’s face, studying it. “Are you upset?”
“Huh? No, why would I be upset?”
Lan Zhan waited.
“Because of the pictures? I told you, I don’t actually care about that.” He smiled. “I was just being dramatic. It’s fun.”
“You are sure?”
Wei Ying tugged the edge of the blanket free so he could wrap it around Lan Zhan as well. “Okay, you can’t tell jiejie I said this, but…” He sighed. “I’m glad she showed you the albums. I wanted you to see my kid pictures.”
Lan Zhan’s heart warmed. “You did?”
“It’s like...a couple-y thing, right? I want you to know all of the embarrassing stories about me, and I want to know all the embarrassing stories about you. Besides, I know how cute I was. I mean, I had dimples. ”
“You still do.” Lan Zhan poked one of the dimples as it revealed himself with Wei Ying’s smile.
“Are you glad you came here for break?” Wei Ying asked after a moment.
Lan Zhan nodded.
“Really? You don’t miss your family?”
Lan Zhan pulled the blanket up to his chin. His uncle had not been pleased when Lan Zhan said he was not coming home between the semesters, though he grudgingly allowed it. Lan Zhan would miss playing violin together in the evenings, and talking quietly with Xichen while they cleaned the kitchen together, and going for silent hikes on the weekends, and their sedate dongzhi celebration. But the truth was, Lan Zhan wanted to be here with Wei Ying, in a lively home where people called to each other from different rooms and laughed while they ate. When he imagined a life for himself in the future, a home and a family and traditions of his own, it no longer looked like the home he had grown up in. At first, this had felt like a betrayal of his uncle. But he realized now that it wasn’t; it was just his own slow discovery of what he wanted his life to be.
“I am not sad,” Lan Zhan said softly. “I am happy to be here.”
“Good,” Wei Ying said, snuggling closer. “I’m so happy you’re here.”
The night before they were meant to drive to Wei Ying’s aunt and uncle’s house for donghzi, an icy snowstorm descended on the city. Lan Zhan stood at the window, watching it fall in swirling curtains as the wind battered branches against the house.
“I guess we’re not going to make it,” Wei Ying said, coming up behind him. He didn’t sound even remotely disappointed.
Two hours later, the power went out. Jin Zixuan brought out a truly impressive number of candles and lit them on every available surface in the living room. Dozens of smells, from lavender to cinnamon apple, competed for attention.
“Don’t tell him I told you,” Yanli whispered to Lan Zhan. “But the candles are all his.”
“So what are we going to do?” Jiang Cheng asked. He had just gotten off the phone with his mother, his side of the conversation mostly consisting of apologies. Everyone was gathered in the living room, bundled in every blanket Yanli and Jin Zixuan owned. Lan Zhan and Wei Ying were fully wrapped around each other— for warmth, of course.
“What do you mean?” Jin Zixuan asked. “We just have to wait for the lights to come back.”
“No, I mean about dongzhi. How are we going to celebrate?”
“I mean, I think this is it,” Jin Zixuan said. “Unless you secretly prepared some tangyuan before we lost power.”
“Wait!” Wei Ying said, his head jerking up and nearly smacking into Lan Zhan’s chin. “We can do my plan!”
Jin Zixuan and Jiang Cheng groaned as Yanli said, “Oh, yes!”
Wei Ying’s plan, which he had proposed a few days earlier, was to skip his aunt and uncle’s celebration and instead celebrate every winter holiday at once, to get them all over with. “We can eat tangyuan and sing Christmas carols and burn a Yule log...” Jin Zixuan had protested that none of them were part of any religion that celebrated the Solstice with a Yule log, and he was the only one who had grown up celebrating Christmas. Jiang Cheng just wanted to go home and celebrate the holidays like he always did. But now, of course, no one was going anywhere.
“We’ve already got candles,” Wei Ying said, disentangling himself from Lan Zhan. “Those are solstice-y and wintery.”
“They represent warmth in the darkest time of the year,” Yanli said, lifting one close to her face.
“They represent the power being out,” Jiang Cheng grumbled.
“I could open a bottle of wine,” Jin Zixuan said grudgingly. “That’s festive.”
“That’s the spirit!” Wei Ying cried. “Hmm...we’ll have to eat that appetizer tray we got. Lan Zhan can play his violin!”
Lan Zhan’s ears warmed and he nudged Wei Ying under the blanket. Wei Ying nudged him back.
“I do not know appropriately themed songs.”
“Then play Beethoven or whatever, it’s still music.”
“It doesn’t really matter what we do,” Yanli said. “We’re already all together, and that’s the most important thing.”
Jiang Cheng groaned and flopped back in his chair. “Somebody help. I’m trapped in the world’s cheesiest movie.”
“Incorrect,” Lan Zhan said. “The world’s cheesiest movie is The Knight Before Christmas , starring Vanessa Hudgens.”
Everyone laughed, and Wei Ying brushed his foot against Lan Zhan’s under the blanket.
Eventually Jin Zixuan did open a bottle of wine and serve everyone cold appetizers. Wei Ying ran and got Lan Zhan’s violin and coaxed him into playing a snippet of the challenging piece he was currently learning. Then he attempted a Christmas carol and mangled it, though everyone insisted it sounded nice. Yanli dug out a stack of board games and Jiang Cheng beat everyone at Sorry! , then lost spectacularly in Scrabble (“Keeped is a word! It’s definitely a word!”).
When they had all sunk into a quiet stupor, games finished and food devoured, Lan Zhan nudged Wei Ying.
“You should give her your gift,” he whispered.
Wei Ying made a noncommittal sound. He had been stalling since they arrived, always inventing some reason why it was not the time to give Yanli his present. Jiang Cheng had already given her an impressive collection of baby socks, assuring her that they would be good for the baby’s hands as well as his feet, to keep him from scratching himself— information which Yanli almost certainly knew from the many baby books she had read.
Lan Zhan nudged Wei Ying again. “It is time,” he said.
“What are you two whispering about?” Jiang Cheng asked from across the room.
“Wei Ying’s gift for Yanli,” Lan Zhan said.
“Lan Zhan !” Wei Ying tackled him from the side, nearly pushing him off the couch. “I hate you, you know that?”
“Wei Ying, you didn’t have to get me anything,” Yanli said, snuggling closer to her husband. “I’m just happy to have you here.”
Lan Zhan saw Jiang Cheng roll his eyes in the candlelight.
“Ugh, I was going to wait, but I guess I have to get it now.” Wei Ying got to his feet, taking one of Lan Zhan’s blankets with him as a cape. He disappeared up the stairs and returned a few minutes later carrying the greenish yellow bag. He thrust it at Yanli. “I didn’t have a chance to wrap it. It’s really not that big a deal, I didn’t— you might not—”
“Thank you,” Yanli said firmly, taking the bag from him. Wei Ying hovered at her side as she reached into it and pulled out something small and lavender. Lan Zhan sat up straighter for a better view. It was a hand-crocheted sweater, no bigger than Yanli’s two hands together, with a delicate pattern that reminded Lan Zhan of seashells or spreading flowers. Yanli made a soft, admiring sound and held it up to the candlelight.
“Wei Ying, this is lovely. It’s so soft!”
“I used baby yarn,” Wei Ying muttered. “It’s cotton.”
“And look at the little sleeves. A-Xuan, look!”
Her husband took the sweater and ran his hands over the stitches. He smiled at Wei Ying, a little grudgingly. “It’s even nicer than that scarf you made me.”
Wei Ying made a face. “There’s more in the bag,” he said to Yanli.
She reached in again and pulled out a tiny hat with a purple pompom. “Oh, it’s adorable!” she hugged it to her chest. “I have to show the baby.” She pulled aside the blanket and pressed the hat to her belly. “Do you like it, little one? Aren’t you so excited to be born and wear this hat that A-Xian made you?”
Lan Zhan, watching Wei Ying closely, saw the exact moment that tears began to gather in his eyes, magnifying the orange glow of the light. Wei Ying cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck.
“You can let me know if it doesn’t fit. I can always make something else.”
“It will be perfect,” Yanli said. She reached out her arms to Wei Ying, and he bent over to hug her. It was rather awkward, with Jin Zixuan tucked into Yanli’s side and her belly presenting a significant obstacle, but they held on for a long time.
When they broke apart, Wei Ying shuffled back to Lan Zhan, curling up beside him. Yanli was still admiring the hat and sweater, and Jiang Cheng had gotten bored and was scrolling on his phone.
“I told you,” Lan Zhan murmured into Wei Ying’s hair. He swatted Lan Zhan half-heartedly.
“Thank you.”
Lan Zhan pulled the blanket up like a shield and kissed Wei Ying.
“Gross,” Jiang Cheng said. “Jiejie, make them stop.”
“Boys,” Yanli chastised. “Be good.”
Lan Zhan dropped the blanket, but Wei Ying grabbed it and pulled it all the way over their heads. “Blanket fort!”
“Hey, blanket forts are innocent ,” Jiang Cheng cried. “No defiling blanket forts.”
“We’re not defiling,” Wei Ying said, but the wicked grin he gave Lan Zhan, barely visible in the dim cocoon, said otherwise.
“Oh, we should make a real fort!” Yanli cried. “Like we used to when we were little. Remember Fort-topia?”
Whatever Fort-topia was, it seemed to be a fond memory for the Jiang siblings. Before Lan Zhan knew what was happening they had leapt into action, gathering all the blankets and dragging in chairs from the dining room and yanking the cushions off the couch. Lan Zhan was ousted to the floor where he sat cross legged, watching the proceedings. Mostly, he watched Wei Ying; the smile on his face was luminous.
When Fort-topia was finished, Wei Ying, Yanli, and Jiang Cheng crawled inside.
“Come on, Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying called.
“A-Xuan, come inside!”
Jin Zixuan and Lan Zhan exchanged a look. “After you,” Jin Zixuan said. Lan Zhan crawled in through the narrow opening. The blankets had been transformed into a tented roof, and the inside was carpeted with cushions. It was a tight squeeze, especially when Jin Zixuan crawled in behind him, and the only light was the flicker of candle flames on the other side of the blankets. But even Jiang Cheng was smiling.
“Remember when we turned the whole downstairs into a fort when Mom was out of town?” Yanli asked with a giggle.
“Somehow she blamed it all on me, even though it was Jiang Cheng’s idea,” Wei Ying said, but it didn’t seem to be a painful memory. He snuggled close to Lan Zhan. “It’s so warm in here. We should never leave.”
Jiang Cheng sighed. “As soon as the power turns back on, I’m going to make so much coffee.”
“Wouldn’t it be so funny if I went into labor right now?” Yanli mused.
“ NO ,” Jin Zixuan, Jiang Cheng, and Wei Ying said at once. Yanli caught Lan Zhan’s eye and smirked; he smiled back. He hoped he would see Yanli more often, now that they had met. Maybe he would end up near her when he graduated. Maybe Wei Ying would be close too.
When the candle flames began to gutter, the temperature was growing steadily colder, Yanli announced it was time for bed. They crawled out of the fort one by one, and Wei Ying and Jiang Cheng disassembled it solemnly, folding each blanket with ceremony. Jin Zixuan divided up the blankets evenly among them all.
“No being gross,” Jiang Cheng said, stifling a yawn as they trudged upstairs. He was sleeping on an air mattress in the guest bedroom while Wei Ying and Lan Zhan shared the bed. “I don’t even want to hear you cuddling.”
“How can you hear cuddling?” Wei Ying protested. They bickered the rest of the way up the stairs. Lan Zhan stopped halfway up and turned to look behind him, to where Jin Zixuan and Yanli were blowing out the candles. They paused together when they reached the last candle and, in its flickering light, leaned in and kissed. Jin Zixuan pressed a hand against her belly and whispered something in her ear. Then he bent down and blew out the last of the light.
“This was my favorite holiday ever,” Wei Ying whispered to Lan Zhan when they were curled in bed, cuddling undetected.
“Mn.” Lan Zhan pressed his face into Wei Ying’s neck. He was already picturing the horrors that would ensue if Wei Ying came to his house for a holiday: Wei Ying would break at least three of Uncle’s rules just by crossing the threshold. He would probably cry if Lan Zhan tried to wake him at five in the morning. Uncle would scold him, and Xichen would awkwardly try to mediate.
But it might be worth it, for Wei Ying to see the place where he had grown and the people who had raised him. To understand him in that new and complicated way. Lan Zhan tried not to think of the future too much. Unlike Jin Zixuan, he didn’t want to rush things. But here, surrounded by Wei Ying’s family, it was hard not to imagine it.
He drifted slowly to sleep and dreamed of blanket forts.