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Xingqiu yawns, stretching his arms and putting his book face down on his bed. He glances up to take a quick look at Chongyun, sitting at the other edge of the bed reading one of Xingqiu’s martial arts novels that he was allowing him to borrow for the time being.
“Uhm, what are you staring at?” Chongyun asks, enough to break Xingqiu out of his temporary daydream. Considering how pretty and focused his boyfriend looked when reading, you couldn’t blame Xingqiu for his long stare.
“My head hurts,” he answers, gripping at his hair dramatically, “Wanna get something to eat?” Xingqiu sprawls himself out on the bed, practically begging for the attention of the latter.
Chongyun looks at the other side of the room for a second, pensive for a moment. “Sure, let’s go.”
With a sudden jolt of energy, Xingqiu jumps up, clapping his hands softly. “Let’s go to Wanmin! We can pay Xiangling a visit.”
“What if she has some weird new recipe she wants us to try?” Chongyun worries, his eyes widening. “I think it’s best if we steer clear from there-”
“Oh it’ll be fine,” Xingqiu says, grabbing his boyfriend by the arm, “up you get.”
Although Chongyun doesn’t explicitly agree, Xingqiu hears him mutter a quiet ‘fine’ and that’s all he needs.
The two take their time walking to the restaurant, Xingqiu walks with a little skip in his step. Even if it is a small detail, Chongyun had taken quite a liking to this small thing about Xingqiu. He wishes he could watch him walk so happy and joyful for a little longer but before he knows it, they’re already at Wanmin.
The first thing they see is Xiangling walking by with plates stacked high in her hands. “Oh, hi guys!” She says while trying to wave even with all the dishes in her hands. “Grab yourself a seat and I’ll come by later with my newest recipe I’ve been working on!” There’s a sense of malice in her face.
“Xiangling, it’s okay. We don’t need to try your new recipe, I bet it’s super good!” Xingqiu says sheepishly, a bit worried.
“No please, I insist! I got these new fancy ingredients from Fontaine. There’s these crazy big crabs underwater, I just had to give cooking them a try,” she tries her best to persuade the other two.
Chongyun and Xingqiu look at each other for a second. “That sounds, pretty normal actually,” Chongyun points out.
“Yeah,” Xingqiu adds, “it can’t be that bad right.”
Xiangling’s face immediately lights up, “Awesome! Get yourself seated and I’ll bring it out in just a second.”
They sit down at their standard spot, right next to the window. The sun was out, the sky was a bright blue, and, like usual, the birds outside were perched on the window sill.
“Aren’t they cute?” Xingqiu says, admiring the birds. Chongyun only nods in agreement.
“Do you know why they’re so attracted to this window in particular?” Chongyun asks. For the past month, every time they came to Wanmin, they’d see the same group of birds sitting and waiting at the windowsill.
“Perhaps Xiangling is feeding them?” Xingqiu proposes, resting his face on his hand.
“Isn’t that… really illegal?” Chongyun reminds him, “They get all dependent on the food and then when you stop feeding them, they can’t fend for themselves.”
“I don’t do anything illegal,” Xiangling comes at just the right time, “I don’t know why these birds love this window so much in particular. I already have you two lovebirds! I don’t need more.” She sighs, placing the two plates down on the table.
“Well, then maybe they like it here because they can sense that we’re their kind,” Xingqiu chuckles, “Thanks Xiangling.” He grabs his chopsticks and begins to dig in before coming to a halting discovery.
“Xiangling! You didn’t tell me there were carrots in this dish?” He snaps, “I would’ve never agreed to try this if you told me that! And why didn’t you remove them? You know I hate carrots!”
“And I also tell you to stop being so picky about your food,” Xiangling retaliates. “Just suck it up and eat them. They’re just carrots.”
“I can have your carrots,” Chongyun offers, looking a bit nervous.
Xiangling sighs, “Luckily you have your boyfriend here to save you. Carrot theory as always.”
However, Xingqiu’s face lights up with a smile immediately. “Thanks Chongyun! You’re the best!” Without skipping a beat, he uses his chopsticks and picks out all of his carrots out of his bowl, and puts them in Chongyun’s.
“What’s carrot theory?” Chongyun asks as Xingqiu picks out his carrots.
“It’s just a little thing I made up. It’s meant to be ‘the olive theory’. I saw it in this one TV show. One person in the relationship loves olives and the other doesn’t. Apparently, that helps with their relationship or whatever,” Xiangling shrugs her shoulders, sounding a bit unsure. “Haven’t watched it in a while. But yeah! Enjoy your meal guys!” She says in a cheery manner before going off to help the other guests.
“Carrot theory…” Xingqiu mutters, “I guess we were meant to be!” He giggles, continuing to enjoy the meal.
“Yeah…” Chongyun says, looking a bit flustered. He loved looking at Xingqiu in such a happy state. He then looks back at his own bowl, dreading the inevitable.
In the time he has known Xingqiu, he never told him the truth. The truth was that he hated carrots with a burning passion just like him. Ever since he was young, he would refuse to eat any dish that his parents gave him if it contained carrots.
And then one day he met Xingqiu.
Xingqiu had expressed a hatred for carrots as well, asking Chongyun to take them. Reluctantly, he had agreed. Once he had a chance to glance back at Xingqiu, he saw the radiant smile on his face that wasn’t there before. And it may have been the prettiest thing Chongyun had seen in his entire life.
From that day forward, Chongyun would eat every single carrot Xingqiu offered him even if it made him sick.
Because, well, nothing was worth more than seeing his favourite person’s glowing smile.