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The physiotherapist’s office is a lot like every other physiotherapist’s office Binghe has ever been in, which is to say: bland. It smells of antiseptic and arnica. The walls are a shade of pastel mint, all the furniture is exactingly ergonomic, and there is a selection of anatomical posters on the wall, clean and bloodless.
Binghe has seen a surprising number of physiotherapists for a twenty-year-old but relatively few for a professional athlete. He’d assumed it was some rich-people nonsense. He heals up perfectly well whether he does the exercises or not, so it’s always seemed a bit pointless.
His assumptions were challenged when the left side of his hamstring had a sudden and dramatic parting of ways with the right side during the premiership final.
They’d won the game, at least. Binghe isn’t sure he’d be able to cope if he’d suffered a potentially career-ending injury in a game they’d lost.
“What’s that face?” Meng Mo demands as he sweeps into the waiting room. “Are you feeling sorry for yourself, young man? Are you catastrophising?”
“No,” Binghe lies.
“Hmph,” Meng Mo says. “Well, you’re early. Stay put.”
Binghe looks down at his leg and the pair of crutches resting beside his lap. “Where exactly am I going like this?”
Meng Mo opens his mouth, then closes it again as the bell above the door chimes. Binghe slumps in his chair, looking at his leg. It looks ridiculous, the compression bandage straining to fit over his thigh muscle. It hadn’t been as hard to bear while he was still on strict orders not to use his leg, but now the wound is mostly healed. Binghe should be able to use the damn leg by now.
There’s a clatter as the new arrival struggles through the door, and then a gentle voice says, “I have it, Jiu-ge. Jiu-ge – Jiu-ge, I have it, stop.”
Binghe looks up. His jaw drops for a second, and he has to snap it shut.
The two most beautiful men he’s ever seen have just walked into the office. One of them – slightly taller, with a stronger jawline and a glare like liquid nitrogen – is helping the other – shorter, incredibly slight, with cheekbones that could kill a man and a compression bandage just like Binghe’s worn over a pair of skintight black leggings. The help isn’t going well; the tall one’s determination to help is mostly just getting in the way of the short one’s crutches.
There’s a brief struggle at the threshold, which the shorter man wins by looking up at the tall one with huge puppy-dog eyes and saying, “Thank you, Jiu-ge. Will you get me a drink for after?”
Jiu-ge’s glare eases very, very slightly. “Fine. Make sure you write down everything Mu Qingfang tells you.”
“This isn’t my first rodeo, Jiu-ge,” the man on crutches says and eases himself down into a chair beside Binghe. “Go on. You’re scaring the patients.”
Jiu-ge hovers for a moment longer, giving Binghe a truly poisonous look – which, what the hell did Binghe do to deserve that? – and sweeps out of the room with another tinkling of bells.
The remaining man looks at Binghe with dark, liquid eyes and offers a sheepish smile. “Sorry about him.”
“What?” Binghe asks intelligently. Then, “No need to apologise, gege.”
The man brightens. “You speak Mandarin?” He leans awkwardly around his crutches and offers Binghe his hand. “I’m Shen Yuan.”
“Luo Binghe,” Binghe replies and shakes his hand.
Shen Yuan gasps. “I thought you looked familiar!” His eyes drop down to Binghe’s bandage leg, then back up to his face, lingering briefly on Binghe’s chest.
Binghe is, all at once, on much firmer ground. “Oh? You’re a rugby fan?” He drops his gaze and looks up at Shen Yuan through his lashes – a challenge when even sitting he’s easily six inches taller.
Shen Yuan swallows audibly. Binghe inwardly cheers with triumph.
“I mean – I wouldn’t say I’m a fan, exactly – but one does keep up with one’s hometown team, don’t they?” Shen Yuan says. He hasn’t yet let go of Binghe’s hand. He doesn’t seem to realise that, and Binghe certainly isn’t going to remind him. “Anyway, I trained some of your teammates during the off-season – it would have been just before you started.”
“Gege doesn’t look like a rugby player,” Binghe says. He rubs his thumb across the back of Shen Yuan’s knuckles.
Shen Yuan flushes but still doesn’t move his hand. “I mean – you know, your coach wanted you to do cross-training, so he came to me.”
“What sport do you play, gege?” Binghe asks. He isn’t sure how old Shen Yuan is, but whenever he says gege Shen Yuan’s hand clenches around his. Binghe is, at heart, a simple creature. Behavioural conditioning has always been highly effective, and he will hit that button until it stops dispensing treats.
“I’m a principal at the Queensland Ballet,” Shen Yuan says.
Before Binghe can adequately process that, someone gently clears their throat, and the world around him rapidly expands. He is re-introduced to the waiting room, Meng Mo behind the desk, and the other physiotherapist, Mu Qingfang, standing in the hallway.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” Mu Qingfang says. He sounds genuinely sorry, which somehow calms Binghe’s desire to rip out his mustache hairs one by one to distract him from Shen Yuan.
“Not at all,” Shen Yuan says. He levers himself up on his crutches. “I was just making a new friend.”
“I see,” Mu Qingfang says.
“They were flirting,” Meng Mo says, shaking his head in disgust.
“Excuse you,” Shen Yuan says. “You can’t make assumptions about my sexuality based on my profession.”
“Whatever,” Meng Mo says. “Come on, hamstring boy. Torture time.”
Binghe gets up, stifling an unattractive grunt as his leg twinges painfully.
“Good luck,” Shen Yuan says. “I’ll see you in an hour, I suppose.”
“If we survive,” Binghe says, “I’ll buy you a drink.”
He hobbles after Meng Mo down the hallway to a treatment room. Behind him, he hears Mu Qingfang:
“It’s not every day a danseur and a rugby prop give themselves the same injury. Perhaps we should treat you together; you might actually do your exercises if you have a strapping young lad looking up to you.”
“What are you smirking about?” Meng Mo asks as Binghe levers himself onto the massage table.
“Nothing,” Binghe lies and folds his arms behind his head. “All right, Uncle Nightmare. Let’s do this.”
By the time Mu Qingfang is done with him, Shen Yuan is sweating and trembling.
“Your range of motion hasn’t increased enough,” Qingfang says ruthlessly while Shen Yuan wobbles upright. “If you do your exercises, you should have at least five degrees more by next week.”
“Uh-huh,” Shen Yuan says. He towels the sweat off his face and chugs half a litre of water from his bottle.
Mu Qingfang hands him a printout of his exercise plan. “I’m emailing this to your brother.”
“Nooo,” Shen Yuan says. Well. Perhaps he whines. He can’t help it! Mu Qingfang is being totally unreasonable.
Mu Qingfang is unrepentant. “You are going to do your exercises. You are going to be back on stage by next season. You are not going to make me look incompetent in the eyes of Li Cunxin.”
Shen Yuan rolls his eyes but subsides. Nobody wants to disappoint Li Cunxin.
“What do you know about that young man I met in the waiting room?” he asks instead.
“Binghe?” Qingfang shrugs. “Only what I’ve seen in the news. I don’t follow AFL.”
“Mu Qingang!” Shen Yuan levers himself to his feet with his crutches. “How long have you lived in Brisbane? Surely you know by now that the Broncos are an NRL team!”
“Shen Yuan,” Mu Qingang says kindly, “I don’t care. Do your exercises. I’ll see you next week.”
Shen Yuan is still trembling as he shuffles out to the waiting room. Shen Jiu hasn’t arrived yet, which is unusual but not unwelcome. With a few more minutes to get his breath back, Shen Yuan will look less like a recently exhumed corpse, and Shen Jiu will be less likely to fuss over him.
Luo Binghe comes down the corridor a few minutes later. He looks as wrung-out as Shen Yuan feels, although he’s so handsome that it doesn’t have an impact. If anything, he might be more attractive, all flushed and touselled.
Binghe’s hair is in a ponytail down his back, long, thick, and curly. It looks very soft. When he plays rugby, he has it up in a tight knot at the back of his head; there’s far more of it than Shen Yuan could ever have guessed from seeing him on TV.
“How was your torture session?” he jokes.
“Outstanding,” Binghe says, easing himself down into the chair beside Shen Yuan’s with a sigh. He gives Shen Yuan an adorably crooked smile. “Tens across the board. Emotional damage, physical suffering; Meng Mo does it all.”
“Emotional damage?” Shen Yuan frowns. A physio needs to motivate their patients, of course, but Binghe is only young. Is Meng Mo too hard on him? “You know, you can change to a different physio if you like. Even if the club is funding it, you have the right to choose your provider—”
Binghe’s voice drops into a low rumbling purr. “Is Yuan-ge worried about me?”
Shen Yuan blushes, which is ridiculous. Binghe is just being friendly! It’s normal to be called gege by a younger man! Maybe not in that exact tone of voice, but probably Binghe just sounds like that. “It’s the job of old men like me to look out for youngsters like you.”
“Yuan-ge isn’t old,” Binghe says.
Shen Yuan laughs. “That’s kind of you to say, Binghe, but it’s unnecessary. Even if I hadn’t blown out my hamstring, I would probably be retiring soon.”
Binghe frowns in what looks like genuine confusion. “Wait, what? You can’t be more than… twenty-eight? Thirty?”
Shen Yuan leans in and says, in conspiratorial tones, “Thirty-five. That’s almost seventy in ballet years.”
Binghe’s jaw drops. “You really are gege,” he says very quietly. Then, at an average volume, “So how about that drink I owe you?”
Shen Yuan waves his hand dismissively. “You were joking. I won’t hold it against you.”
“But I want you to hold it against me,” Binghe says. He picks up Shen Yuan’s hand with warm, callused fingers. “Are you doing anything after this, gege?”
Shen Yuan’s brain takes a moment to re-engage. “I – well, yes, actually, but – I mean—”
“Later, then,” Binghe says. He fishes in the pockets of his tiny football shorts and comes up with a business card and a pen. He scribbles something on the business card and hands it to Shen Yuan. “We can test out our flexibility.”
Shen Yuan takes the business card with a sigh of relief. Binghe wants a stretching buddy! It must be hard to watch the rest of his team going through their off-season training together while he has to rebuild his muscle. And he’s probably nervous about the damage it could do to his career, too. Shen Yuan has torn muscles and ligaments in both ankles, a knee, and a hip, and has gone on to new heights in his career after each injury. He can certainly guide Binghe through this time of uncertainty.
“Of course,” he says warmly. “Why don’t you come to my house sometime? I’ll check my calendar and get in touch.”
He takes the card. It clearly doesn’t belong to Binghe; someone else’s details have been scribbled out, and a new phone number written in, along with Luo Binghe’s name in slightly wonky characters.
The doorbell chimes and Shen Yuan hastily shoves the card into the pocket of his leggings as Shen Jiu glides into the waiting room.
“You don’t look entirely wretched,” Shen Jiu observes.
“You do wonders for my self-esteem, Jiu-ge,” Shen Yuan says and hauls himself up. “Did you get me a drink?”
Shen Jiu glares at him and holds the door open pointedly until Shen Yuan limps towards the car. Once Shen Yuan is safely in the back, his injured leg stretched out and his crutches resting in the footwell, Shen Jiu turns around from the driver’s seat and shoves a shimmery pink boba into his hand.
“I love you, Jiu-ge,” Shen Yuan says and sticks the straw in his mouth.
Shen Jiu harrumphs and turns around to start the car.
Shen Yuan drinks his boba and contemplates how he can get his overprotective older brother to leave him alone long enough to invite Luo Binghe over.
Luo Binghe is not in the habit of waiting for people to call him. He’s usually the one collecting phone numbers, and usually, people will bend over backwards to make time for him. Or, at least, they do now that he’s a Bronco. But he doesn’t have Shen Yuan’s number, and doubts are starting to creep in without Shen Yuan in front of him. Maybe he just imagined the way Shen Yuan’s pupils dilated when Binghe stroked his palm. Maybe when Shen Yuan made the joke about people assuming his sexuality, he was trying to let Binghe down easy.
It’s way too easy to find almost everything about Shen Yuan on the internet. His social media is hardly locked down, and he’s way too comfortable with geotagging his exact location. With a few hours of research, Binghe is reasonably confident he can engineer a casual encounter at one of Shen Yuan’s usual haunts. Then again, Shen Yuan’s limited mobility means his routine has been disrupted; a lot of his recent activity is made up of reposts.
Well, Brisbane isn’t that big a city, and Shen Yuan isn’t that far away. Binghe turns on push notifications.
He also discovers why Shen Yuan was cross-training his team in the off-season. Shen Yuan’s older brother, Shen Jiu, is a retired dancer turned choreographer, apparently being groomed to succeed the current artistic director, who is some artistic bigshot Binghe has never heard of before. Shen Jiu is also married to Yue Qingyuan, Luo Binghe’s coach.
That’s not the only person they have in common, either; scrolling through Shen Yuan’s Instagram reveals a sliver of a very familiar face. Luo Binghe narrows his eyes at it, then picks up his phone and calls his accountant.
The first thing Shang Qinghua says when he picks up is, “Are you in jail?”
“No,” Binghe says.
“Are you about to be in jail? Is someone dead? Is someone pregnant? Are there drugs involved?”
“No! Why would you assume that?”
“Why else would you call me in the off-season?” Shang Qinghua asks. “I know this isn’t a social call! We’re not friends!”
“Maybe I want to be your friend, Qinghua,” Binghe says. “Did you ever think of that?”
“Not even for a second,” Qinghua says, which is fair enough. Binghe hasn’t done the best job of making friends with his team, much less the legion of support staff around them.
“Well, I’m not in trouble,” Binghe says. “I just had a question.”
“A money question?” Shang Qinghua asks. He sounds suspicious.
“No,” Binghe admits.
“If it doesn’t involve money or a telephoto lens, it’s not my department,” Shang Qinghua says, almost apologetically. “You know, I’m sure one of your teammates—”
“How do you know Shen Yuan?” Binghe interrupts.
“He’s been my best friend since university,” Shang Qinghua says. “How do you know Shen Yuan?”
“I met him at physiotherapy,” Binghe says.
“Oh, right,” Shang Qinghua says. “I forgot he blew his hammy again. No wonder he’s been even more of an asshole lately.”
Binghe ignores this slanderous lie and says, “I want his phone number.”
“You and every other muscle guy in town,” Shang Qinghua says. “He got you with the wife beam, huh? That man puts the queen in Queensland Ballet, and he doesn’t even know it. He thinks every rugby player he’s ever met is really friendly for no reason.”
“How many other rugby players has he met?” Binghe demands.
“All of them, dude,” Qinghua says. “He’s your coach’s brother-in-law; he’s at games all the time. You know, I was the one who got him into rugby, back when I thought sports journalism was a viable career? He used to leave lengthy hate comments on my columns. Anyway, Liu Qingge’s little sister is a ballet dancer too, so he’s been sniffing around him for eons—”
Binghe growls. Liu Qingge is widely considered the best winger in the league and plays exclusively for terrible teams. If Liu Qingge is his rival for Shen Yuan’s affections, Binghe has no choice but to grind him into the dirt as a matter of honour.
“No!” Shang Qinghua says. “No, you cannot have Liu Qingge murdered! I regret telling you anything!”
“I won’t have Liu Qingge murdered,” Binghe says, but he crosses his fingers, just in case. Best not to take anything off the table.
“Look, it doesn’t matter,” Shang Qinghua says. “Shen Yuan is completely oblivious. He doesn’t notice flirting, like, at all. One time Liu Q—I mean, someone practically invited him to move in together, and Shen Yuan went on a five-minute speech about how glad he was that this anonymous person hadn’t picked up the toxic attitudes about male friendships and affection so prevalent in the world of professional sport and blah, blah, blah.”
“So I’ll need to be direct,” Binghe says. “Got it. What else?”
“I’m not helping you,” Shang Qinghua says. “You haven’t even got his number and you’re already being unbearable about this. I’m very busy and important. Go away.”
“Shang-xiong,” Binghe whines. “Can’t you show a little solidarity?”
“Solidarity? Solidarity?!” Shang Qinghua makes a series of outraged-sounding squawks. “What exactly do we have in common, you manipulative little monster?”
“We’re both queer Chinese men,” Binghe says, “who came to Australia looking for a chance to better ourselves after being abandoned by our birth families, with a petty streak the size of Uluru and a willingness to use whatever means necessary to get the job done.”
Shang Qinghua makes several more outraged noises.
“Plus, Mobei likes us both,” Binghe adds.
Shang Qinghua yowls and hangs up on him, but Binghe’s phone vibrates a minute later with an incoming text. It’s a phone number, and the words, DON’T MAKE ME REGRET THIS.
Binghe smiles.
Shen Yuan means to call Binghe. He really does. It’s just that Shang Qinghua sends him another terrible sports-anime-type novel to shred, and then Shen Jiu and Yue Qingyuan invite themselves over for dinner, and then he has to call Ning Yingying and help her with her training plan, and then he takes his evening painkillers and promptly passes out. Then, in the morning, fuzzy with pain, he tosses his leggings into the washing machine with the rest of his load of laundry, and he doesn’t check the pockets first. By the time he remembers, it’s too late. The business card is so much white pulp.
He resigns himself to trying to catch Binghe at physio next week – surely they’re on a similar schedule – and settles onto his couch to watch Yuri! On Ice and sulk.
He’s interrupted by his phone ringing. It’s an unknown number, so he ignores it, but then he gets a text message:
Yuan-ge, this is Luo Binghe. We have mutual friends – I hope you don’t mind that I got your number. 😊
Shen Yuan immediately calls him back.
“Of course I don’t mind,” he says when Binghe picks up. “I was just about to call you, but—”
“It’s okay, Yuan-ge,” Binghe says. His voice is so deep. Shen Yuan can practically feel how his chest would rumble. “I needed some time to recover after yesterday anyway.”
“Me too,” Shen Yuan says. Thanks for the excuse, Binghe! This old man will latch on with gratitude. “I haven’t done my stretches yet today, have you?”
“Not yet,” Binghe says. “Would Yuan-ge like some company?”
“Only if Binghe is feeling well enough,” Shen Yuan says sternly. “If you need to rest, you should stay home.”
“I’m feeling very vigorous today, gege,” Binghe promises. “When should I come by?”
They work out a time, and Shen Yuan gives Binghe his address. He hangs up, feeling pleased, and then realises he has several Broncos posters on his walls, several of which feature Binghe himself.
It takes some serious effort to get all the posters down, especially the high ones; it’s not like Shen Yuan can climb on a chair just now. Somehow, he manages and stuffs them all into his closet. His walls look weirdly empty, but maybe that’s just because he’s used to them. Anyway, he has plenty of merch from safer things as decoration.
He has to stretch out on the couch and do some serious resting while he waits for Binghe. His leg is aching enough that he can’t even really focus on his shows, so he reads another chapter of Shang Qinghua’s absolute dross instead, which at least makes him angry enough to sit up and type out some constructive criticism.
Before he knows it, someone’s knocking at his door. He knocks his crutches over in his startled flailing and then has to awkwardly shuffle around, trying to pick them up before he can get off the couch.
“Yuan-ge?” Binghe calls through the door. “Is everything all right?”
“It’s fine!” Shen Yuan calls. “I’m just slow with the crutches. One minute.”
He gets to the door, somehow, and swings it over.
Binghe is leaning on one crutch, smiling down at Shen Yuan. His hair is up in a ponytail again, and his shirt is very, very tight. He offers Shen Yuan a tiny pot of lucky bamboo in his free hand.
“To say thank you, gege,” he explains.
Shen Yuan accepts the pot and cradles it against his chest with one hand, touched. “Thank you, Binghe. It’s lovely.” He hops to the side on his good leg and tilts his head at his loungeroom. “Come on in.”
Binghe comes inside and closes the door behind him.
Shen Yuan scoots himself over to the kitchen on his crutches and sets the little bamboo beside the sink in a beam of sunlight from the window. When he glances up, Binghe follows him, leaning his elbows on the kitchen counter. Despite how tight it is, Binghe’s shirt somehow manages to gape when he leans forward, giving Shen Yuan a look straight down into the shadowy valley between his pecs.
“Right!” Shen Yuan says. “Shall we get started?”
“So eager, gege,” Binghe says. He smiles.
Shen Yuan drags his gaze away from Binghe’s lips. “Well, no sense in putting it off, right? We can use the lounge room. Grab a yoga mat.”
He coaxes Binghe into settling on the floor, guiding him through the stretches. They have very similar exercise programs; Mu Qingfang wasn’t kidding about them having almost the same injury.
It’s too soon for them to be getting into the really complicated rehab. Their assigned stretches don’t take very long. Shen Yuan bites his lip, thinking of what he could say to encourage Binghe’s recovery, but Binghe beats him to the punch.
“Now,” he says, “will Yuan-ge show me how he stays so bendy?”
He rests one big warm hand on Shen Yuan’s knee.
“Absolutely,” Shen Yuan says, and puts Binghe through a nice, moderate ballet warm-up.
Binghe is fairly sure he’s dying.
Shen Yuan has a kind of cheerfully educative sadism that puts Meng Mo to shame. It even puts Binghe’s acupuncturist to shame, and Binghe is reasonably sure Madame Meiyin was an actual dominatrix in her youth. Binghe’s joints have bent in ways he had not known they could bend. He’s used muscles he didn’t know existed.
“I don’t think I’m cut out for ballet, Yuan-ge,” he wheezes.
“You’re starting late,” Shen Yuan acknowledges, “but that doesn’t mean you can’t catch up.”
Shen Yuan, naturally, had flowed through every implausible stretch and position with the grace of a bamboo stalk swaying in the breeze. If Binghe wasn’t dying, he would be very horny about it. Alas.
“You know,” he says, once he’s less winded, “you could’ve just said you’re not interested.”
“Not interested in what?” Shen Yuan asks, with all apparent sincerity.
Luo Binghe gestures at himself - implausibly tight shirt, extremely tiny shorts, and all. When Shen Yuan’s brow crinkles with incomprehension, Binghe sighs and chooses the direct approach: “Sex, Yuan-ge.”
Shen Yuan chokes on nothing and nearly falls over. It’s lucky he was already sitting on the yoga mat. Binghe cringes but waits it out. As painful as this is, it’s not as painful as the obliviousness.
“What are you talking about?” Shen Yuan croaks. “You’re Luo Binghe. You like women! Famously!”
“Bisexuality is a thing, Yuan-ge,” Binghe says patiently. As far as objections to sleeping with him go, thought you were straight is really quite surmountable.
It’s also very telling that, despite his apparent obliviousness, Shen Yuan’s first objection wasn’t that Shen Yuan was straight.
Binghe rolls onto his side and sets a hand on Shen Yuan’s ankle, drawing circles on the knob of bone with his thumb.
“I’m too old for you,” Shen Yuan says weakly.
“Let me be the judge of that,” Binghe says. He bats his lashes up at Shen Yuan. “Besides, doesn’t that just mean gege has more to teach me?”
Shen Yuan makes a noise like a deflating air mattress. “You - I - we–” His mouth works silently.
In the absence of productive conversation, Binghe leans up and kisses him.
Shen Yuan kisses back. When they break apart, both of Shen Yuan’s hands are firmly in Binghe’s hair.
“My leg hurts too much for anything - athletic,” Shen Yuan says.
“Don’t worry, Yuan-ge,” Binghe says. “I’m flexible too.”
There’s no stopping us now
We’re gonna do it again
It’s not a question of how
It’s just a matter of when
--“Let’s Go Broncos” chant