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I spy with my little tired eye, tiny as a firefly, a pebble that we picked up last July.
Their photographs found their homes scattered across their apartment.
Rin was never one to have her picture taken—but he’d always insisted. His family, growing up, had kept carefully curated albums of him and all his siblings, and Nezha had picked up the habit—after he’d graduated high school, he bought a camera and started taking photos of the moments he thought were worth remembering. Mementos of times to be preserved in a state of perpetual happiness, a fleeting moment of joy frozen behind glass.
He’d stopped when he realized there’s not much of his life he wanted to document.
He’d started again when he became friends with Rin, and rekindled his friendships with Kitay and Venka in his third year of college.
Now, the evidence of his little hobby is on full-display in their apartment, unlike the privately hidden collection of albums at his family house. Group photos with Rin, Kitay, and Venka sightseeing in God knows how many places. Candid shots of Mingzha playing with their family dogs at home. Photobooth strips stuck to the fridge with magnets of all four of them doing silly poses that would have never have put into view if his parents had anything to say about it. And so many pictures of him and Rin together—of them holding hands, of his arms encircled around her and his chin resting on her shoulder, of his lips pressed against the top of her head.
His favorite, however, is a picture of Rin alone.
It’s a photo of her back resting against a tree, the breeze brushing the ends of her hair back, eyes closed as the glow of the sunset paints her in an ethereal golden glow. Nezha didn’t even realize he had taken the photo until her eyes flew open at his camera’s click to glare at him, far too taken by the view of her to even register the involuntary reflex of snapping a picture.
But he’s glad that he did.
It’s tucked away in his wallet, taken out at frequent, random intervals when he’s away from her to be admired, wishing he could have the real thing in his arms.
After a long day at his internship, he likes to take a walk around their apartment.
He drinks in their photos, and he finds that he never gets tired no matter how long or often he stares at them.
Rin always rolls her eyes at him for his almost-obsessive need, but his secret routine of exploring the museum of his own making gives him a certain semblance of peace.
Today, he does it slower than usual. It was an overbearing day at the company—an absurd amount of paperwork and meetings and snobbery of high-ranking executives he could have done well without, and he’d taken Rin’s photo out every chance he got to get some semblance of clarity in the chaos.
When he’s done, he settles in their bedroom, finally changing into more comfortable clothes. Rin is working overtime tonight, so he decides to call to have food delivered for their dinner. As he’s getting comfortable, his foot hits something under the frame of their bed, rattling softly.
Nezha pauses, bending over to find a small box that he doesn’t recognize hidden away in the corner, jostled slightly by his movement.
Something inside him sparks with curiosity—the box is made of simple brown cardboard, with no other markings or logos to give him an idea of what’s inside.
It must be Rin’s, then, which only makes the curiosity grow from a flicker to a steady fire.
Before he can talk himself out of it, he lifts the lid and peers inside.
Nezha blinks—his first impression of its contents is that it’s a mismatched pile of junk. A bunch of random objects like papers are placed haphazardly in the box, and he can’t help but raise an eyebrow.
“Ripped gift wrapper?” he murmurs to himself, plucking it out and smoothing its creases out on his lap. He thinks it looks vaguely familiar, but he can’t place where he’d seen it before. He sees a shirt button, hair clips, ticket stubs, all things he thinks he can recognize but can’t quite place.
And then, in the corner of the box, sits the most mundane yet unusual thing of them all.
A tiny rock no bigger than a coin.
And the realization hits.
He’s surprised he recognizes this, of all things—a misshapen pebble from their first-ever beach trip in Khurdalain. Kitay and Venka had retreated into their hotel rooms for the night, but Rin had been bursting with energy, wanting to make the most of the trip before summer break ended and Sinegard University dragged them back for the new term. It had been her first vacation that didn’t involve going home to her foster family or being stuck in a part-time waiting job, and her excitement was palpable the whole drive there.
It'd been a stupid dare—but Rin never says no to one, no matter how absurd. She’d gotten bored of walking barefoot on the shore with him, and he had tried to make it entertaining for her before her irritation got the best of her.
He had challenged the both of them to find a rock the exact shade of the other’s eyes first.
It was ridiculous, really. Nezha barely put in the effort in looking, far too dark to even see anything properly with just the moon as his light, and had never expected her to go bounding up to him twenty minutes later with a smug grin on her face and hold up the tiniest pebble up to his cheek—least of all, to get it completely right when she’d compared the two with her phone’s flashlight.
He remembers staring at her slack-jawed, ears burning, before swallowing and giving her a cheeky grin. “Staring at my eyes often, then?”
He supposes he deserved to get tackled into the water after that.
Nezha could hardly believe Rin would even bother saving all of this—she would always argue with him about buying and keeping so many ‘useless’ things for her, even when he could very much so afford them.
But she kept it. She’s kept so many small tokens of their relationship, he sees now—a movie ticket, a restaurant receipt, a dried flower pressed between tiny notes he’d passed her in class when he was bored out of his mind during their shared lectures.
His heart squeezes with such fondness he thinks it’s going to burst.
Nezha smiles. Places the pebble back in its place. Puts the lid of the box back on and slides it carefully back into his hiding place.
The familiar need to tease her in retaliation arises, and he breaks into an even wider grin. He can picture her now—her furrowed brows, balled fists, and heated glare as he laughs at her. She’d smack his arm, cheeks flushing, before cursing him out and sulking in their bedroom. Then he’d coax her out and she’d end up kicking at him before grudgingly sleeping in his arms.
He’s sorely tempted, to say the least.
Then he thinks better of it.
Let Rin have this secret of hers, her own little personal treasure trove. It’s enough to simply know.
After all, she indulges him more often than he deserves to be.
~*~
On the way home, I wrote a poem, you say, “What a mind.”.
“I was thinking,” Nezha says, staring at Rin from the corner of his eye in the back of the cab. She tenses up, giving him a wary look like she usually does when he says something like this. He can’t blame her—most instances involve some kind of stupid request that involves spending money. No matter how hard he tries to convince her money isn’t going to be an issue, he guesses nothing can ever truly erase that instinct that’s been ingrained in her since before they even met—the will to survive.
“Never a good sign.”
“Shut up. I just wondered if you would want to go to Arlong next month.”
“You’re fucking joking,” she says, giving him an unimpressed look.
“I’m really not. The weather is really nice in the spring.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, didn’t we just go to Golyn Niis two months ago?”
He frowns, sitting up a little straighter. “But that was two months ago.”
Rin grimaces. “You’re insane.
“It’d be nice, wouldn’t it? It’s our anniversary, too. We had our third date there, so for our third anniversary—”
“That’s disgusting,” Rin replies, crossing her arms stubbornly. “I can’t believe you were counting.”
“It’s romantic,” he defends, giving her a dirty look. “Just because you have no soft bone in your body—”
“Bones are not supposed to be soft, you idiot—”
“It’s metaphorical—”
“You can shove all your metaphors up your ass.”
“Just because you’re too unsophisticated to appreciate a good metaphor—that one wasn’t even that good, by the way—doesn’t mean they’re useless.”
“No shitty metaphor in the world has ever made me get a raise.”
“No, but they certainly make your life a lot better.”
“Alright, I’ll fucking bite, tell me how.”
“Didn’t I write you a poem to ask you out? You said yes, and you started dating me. That poem had metaphors. So, a metaphor made your life better.”
She’s always mocked him for being sentimental, and yet when it matters the most, she leaves him to his devices, lets him wrap her with his affection.
“What a mind,” Rin snorts, looking out the car window, but her flushed cheeks betray her sincerity. “How will anyone else ever compare to your snobby, pretentious upbringing, smartass?”
He grabs her hand and threads their fingers together. She doesn’t pull away, only sighs and scoots closer toward him, and rests her head on his arm.
It’s her way of saying yes. A grudging yes, but a yes nonetheless.
He beams at her, brushing his thumb against her knuckles and bringing it to his lips.
When he sees her tiny, suppressed smile, Nezha practically glows with warmth, like the sun was rising in his chest.
This happens all the time.
~*~
Industry disruptors and soul deconstructors and smooth-talking hucksters out glad-handing each other, and the voices that implore, “You should be doing more.” …
They rarely fight anymore.
Before they got together, they had a rocky start to their friendship. He’d been an angry, arrogant child, and he’d targeted Rin for no other reason other than the prejudice he’d been ingrained with. She’d rightfully punched him in the face, called him out on his bullshit, and his pride couldn’t take it. They’d spent more than a year at each other’s throats.
They’d gotten past that—he had apologized, they’d grown into good friends, and then he’d downed one too many glasses of sorghum wine one night and kissed her, and she’d grabbed him by the collar and kissed him back so hard his lips bruised. Yes, they argue, they bicker, they piss each other off, but it was never serious, and at the end of the day, he’d always come home to her. Most of the time, they weren’t fights—not really.
This is not one of those times.
But Rin had a horrible day at work the day before, and he—with his mind still muddled from his own workload—absentmindedly suggested she just quit her job if it upsets her so much.
He’d known he’d struck a nerve—Rin had always been touchy with her job, had always strived to be independent from him—but he felt his headache pounding against his temple and the ache in his back, and when she’d exploded, he’d exploded right back.
She slammed the door on her way out of the apartment.
Nezha waited on the sofa all night for her to come back. Calling her phone without an answer. Sitting, standing, pacing, listening for the telltale creak of the door to signify her return.
She didn’t.
He spent the entire day at work more distracted than he’d ever been, guilt gnawing at his insides, checking his phone to see if she’d decided to talk to him, but all he got was a text message from Kitay telling him she was staying at his place.
It was no surprise that his father confronted him about his demeanor.
And if there was one thing he knew about his father, it was that he never minced words.
That doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt.
Nezha didn’t know why he expected anything else. He didn’t know why he thought his father would coddle him just because he had a fight with Rin and she didn’t come home the same night. He didn’t understand why he’d been so stupid to look for comfort, or at the very least, some semblance of concern from a person who’d only given him grief his whole life.
When he got home, he barely registered Rin’s presence, just raced past her and collapsed on their bed, burying his face into a pillow, which only made him feel guiltier when he did notice her.
He's sinking again, and he can only fight the current so much.
“Hey.”
Her voice is softer than he's ever heard it before, tinged with worry. Nezha hears her footsteps pad across their wooden floor as she settles on the edge of the bed. He yearns to reach out and hold her, but if he does, he knows the pressure in his chest will give, and he doesn't want anyone else to see that, especially not her, not after their fight.
“Shitty day today, then. Mine was, too.”
It's not an apology. But it's close enough. It's Rin's extended olive branch to him, a silent offer of comfort.
“I’m sorry,” he chokes out, garbled and muffled against the pillow. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
“I know.”
Rin lets a long breath loose.
“Your father is the worst.”
Some morsel of indignation sparks in his chest but dies immediately. She's never been good with words. He knows that.
“He's wrong about you. Whatever that asshole said to you, it's not true.”
His throat closes up.
No, she's never good with words.
But right now, they're enough. They're enough.
He looks up from where he'd buried his face in his pillow and finds her staring fiercely at him.
He reaches a hand out.
She takes it.
Nezha pulls her close, and he finally lets the tears fall.
She doesn't say anything. And that’s okay, Nezha thinks. He knows she understands. He knows.
She runs a hand through his hair, cradles him gentler than she ever has before. Holds him tightly. Anchors him to reality and guides him back to the surface.
And it's enough.
It's enough.
… to you, I can admit, that I’m just too soft for all of it.
~*~
They said the end is coming, everyone’s up to something, I find myself running home to your sweet nothings.
“You’re so fucking clingy,” Rin complains, shrugging her arms out of his tight hold and shifting in her chair. “I’m going to end up chopping your fingers off.”
“It’d be worth it,” he replies, already drifting half-asleep on her shoulder.
He feels more than hears her sigh, but she doesn’t push him away. Nezha takes that as permission to hold her even closer, unfazed by the sharp weapon she’s currently holding to cut carrots up.
“You could just sleep on the bed; my neck feels stiff just looking at you.”
“Too far from you,” Nezha mumbles, hands squeezing on her waist. “I’m okay here.”
He lets himself get lost in that lazy, drowsy daze, burying his face deeper into her shoulder. The song playing on her phone’s loudspeaker changes, and he feels the soft vibrations of her humming to the tune.
Every piece of bullshit he’d had to deal with—distant father, obsessive mother, pompous siblings, conniving executives that want him out of the company, seems so small when he’s with Rin. Nezha has never felt so safe and content before than sitting in their kitchen, the love of his life pressed against him, a real, constant, solid presence.
If he were to choose a moment to freeze in time and stay in forever, this would be it.
Outside they’re push and shoving, you’re in the kitchen humming.
His phone rings and Rin stiffens, her soft humming to the music cutting off.
“That’s the fifth time they called today,” she says hotly, glaring at his phone facing down on the table. “It’s your fucking day off—no, don’t you fucking dare answer that—”
He pauses, rubbing at his eyes. “I have to,” he replies, stifling a yawn. “It’s for an important project.”
“Fuck that shitty project, it’s your day-off. ”
“And if I get fired?”
“Then get fired for all I fucking care. I don’t mind,” Rin says, exasperated.
“Getting fired from my own family’s company. That’s a great look,” he says, just about to reach for his phone when she pulls him back by the sleeve. The phone stops ringing just as he manages to grasp it. Rin plucks it out of his hands and shuts it off. He sighs. “We have bills to pay, Rin.”
“I have a job.”
He snorts involuntarily and she glares, pointing the knife at him threateningly.
“Are you laughing at my salary grade? Are you fucking forgetting I have the means to stab you right now?”
“I love you, darling, but you have to admit you’re overworked but underpaid.”
She kicks at his legs. “You’re such an ass. The only reason you even have the salary grade you do is because of nepotism. Besides, I’d share a refrigerator box with you on the street if I have to.”
The words linger in the quiet Saturday morning air, sincerity coating its bluntness.
“Really?” he asks, quieter than he intended for it to be.
Rin is the furthest thing from materialistic—and yet. And yet. He couldn’t help but wonder what else he had to offer if not his money, his looks, and his family’s reputation and influence. That was what he was raised to value, and if Rin didn’t see much worth in any of that, then what else could she possibly want from him?
Rin rolls her eyes, her expression a tad bit softer than it had been a second ago, as if reading the thoughts running through his mind. He wonders how she manages to do that so easily.
“Of course. You wouldn’t survive a day without me. You’d be eating shitty take-out and cup noodles for lunch and dinner if I wasn’t around.”
He hums in agreement. “That’s true. I’d be lost without you, wouldn’t I?”
“You better fucking believe it.”
“So, you’ll just be fine with it if I suddenly become broke and penniless,” he says slowly, narrowing his eyes at her, half-joking, half-serious.
Things have never been this simple in his life. He'd always be waiting for a catch, waiting for the other shoe to fall.
But with Rin, maybe that's going to change. Maybe he's going to stop worrying that the floor would give beneath his feet with one wrong step, that he wouldn't have to beg for scraps when she'd readily give him all he needs, if only he'd ask.
She gives him an amused smile that makes him feel like he's falling in love all over again, and he finds he doesn't mind in the slightest.
“Yes, asshole. Maybe it’d teach you to save some money for fucking once, too,” she says, turning back to the cutting board. “Just go back to sleep, Nezha.”
“If you say so.”
Nezha rests his head back on her shoulder.
He hopes he isn’t imagining the lips brushing the crown of his head and the soft murmur of the words, I love you , against his forehead.
All that you ever wanted from me was sweet nothing.