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“And nobody knows this pain inside me. My world is crumbling, I should never have let you go.
I think I'm lost without you, I just feel crushed without you
I've been strong for so long that I never thought how much I needed you. I never thought how much I love you”
Dry leaves were carried by the cold breeze, being dragged along the pavement of the silent street. At that time, there was no longer the fragile autumn sun to warm the hands a little or light the way back home. Even though it was still early evening, the dark clouds hid the remnants of the sunset and any signs of stars. No color, no shine. A grayish path.
A path that Zhao Yunlan didn't want to take that day. There was no point in coming home early, just as there was no point in going home at all.
It was nothing but an empty prison now.
He took the pack of cigarettes out of his coat pocket, pulling one out with his lips, noting it was the last one - he had smoked more that day than he used to smoke in a whole week. He put the crumpled empty pack back in his pocket and brought the lighter between his hands. Impatient, he tried repeatedly to light it, shielding the flame with his cupped hand when he finally succeeded.
But it was silly, the habit of a fool. He knew that the cigarette no longer served as a tranquilizer or disguise.
How many months had he struggled? How long had he cursed the fact that he was leading a life he hadn't chosen for himself? So why, now that this should be over, did he feel so miserable?
With the freezing wind hitting his face and blowing his already messy hair, making his skin crawl with the uncomfortable cold, he thought that this was how it should be, that he deserved every little misfortune that life could offer him - it would still be a small price to pay after what he had done.
A few more blocks and there was his front door, and all the windows were closed and no light came from behind the panes. That was not how he used to find the house when he came back every day in the last year.
Zhao Yunlan stopped on the sidewalk, watching the house for a moment. It was a good house. He could have been happy there, he thought. However, looking at what had remained in the past, he had wasted his present.
He took a drag on the cigarette and exhaled slowly as he walked to the door and took the key out of his pants pocket. With his hand on the doorknob, he thought about going back and doing something he hadn't done in a long time - go drinking with his friends. But if he was drunk, maybe he'd say he missed the spouse he never wanted. Maybe he said in the crowd, out loud, everything he had never said to his spouse - because he just hadn't realized he had those words to say to him. And it would be unfair to let other people hear what his spouse would never hear.
Entering the house, he didn't turn on the lights. He stopped in the hall and listened, but there weren't the usual sounds coming from the kitchen, like the radio on, the voice that usually talked to the black cat as if it could understand. There was only silence and an empty house. The utter silence of a dead place.
He tried not to think about the hurt in his spouse's eyes the last time they had talked. He had waved goodbye to that person as if he were a complete stranger - because that was how Shen Wei had entered his life the day they got married: a complete stranger.
Walking into the room in the dim light, a little light coming from the outside made the contours of the furniture more visible and the glasses of the liquor bottles glittered like small crystals, reflecting bright spots on the wall.
Zhao Yunlan swallowed the bitterness of his cigarette, thinking about how Shen Wei irritated him because he liked the small crystals in the dome of a lamp he had bought in an antique shop, because they reflected exactly like the bottles receiving light from the street now.
He tossed his coat on the couch and walked over to the bottles, loosening the tie he hated. Finding the whiskey bottle, he poured a full glass and drank it down, standing there, pouring another glass before heading to the couch and slumping there, staring at the wall. He thought of how the lamp's bright dots shone down on Shen Wei’s pale skin and rosy lips when he fell asleep while reading.
If Shen Wei had ever noticed that Zhao Yunlan closed his book, placed it on the bedside table, settled him down on the bed and covered him with the blankets, he never had commented. That was the most he had ever touched Shen Wei when they were in bed.
He didn't even know what his spouse's kiss really tasted like. The only kiss they'd shared had been a very brief and superficial one at the wedding ceremony. A kiss neither of them wanted.
Now, alone there, Zhao Yunlan thought about that and how he had been so angry about the situation for so long that he hadn't even tried to figure out how his spouse's embrace and kiss felt.
His spouse . Not anymore.
He was gone away.
Not because he said he wanted to leave, but because Zhao Yunlan had told him to go. He had told Shen Wei that that damn deal between their families was stupid and that Shen Wei should go away and have his own life, because here, where he hadn't chosen to be, he would never have anything to call happiness. Such a cruel thing to say, he realized, even to a person that wasn’t supposed to feel anything for him.
And now Zhao Yunlan wondered if he might not have tried to find some happiness with the spouse who was once his. Perhaps it was his fault more than anyone else's for all the tears he had seen Shen Wei shed. Perhaps he had wasted countless chances, day after day, to take one more step, try to walk forward and not look back, and find out if Shen Wei was capable of feeling a love that Zhao Yunlan-
He did not want it.
And maybe he wanted it, for all that time. But he would never again get the chance to try to say it.
The glass in his hand could slip and shatter on the floor, he wouldn’t care. Everything seemed shattered anyway.
Shen Wei… every day you were kind to me, even when my heart was so hardened… Even when you didn't love me, you were still kind to me. I didn't want you to stay, because I just saw you suffer for all these months… almost a whole year. And I guess I'll never know if you suffered from being pushed into a marriage you didn't choose... or if it was because your husband never understood that he needed to overcome his own pain, forget the past and cherish you. I wish I could ask you for forgiveness, at least. But now I don't even know where you are... and who would have guessed, I miss you. I don't know if I'll be able to fall asleep when I realize you're not in that bed… I think I just lost the man I can't live without.
He didn't quite finish the second glass of whiskey, setting it aside on the coffee table, leaning forward to rest his head in his hands in anguish of realization.
He didn't want Shen Wei to leave. But it was too late, Shen Wei was already gone.
For the whole day, he didn't know what people were talking about at the police station. He hadn't been able to focus on anything. Only in the last image of Shen Wei, on the front sidewalk, wearing a coat and a green scarf, with the suitcase in his hands and tears in his eyes, fogging his glasses - and only at the moment when the taxi door had closed, had Zhao Yunlan noticed: that green scarf belonged to him.
He should have screamed and been crazy and not let that taxi go. Now, all he could do was go upstairs and face the empty bedroom and the other side of the bed just cold.
Each step of the stairs opened the wound in his chest a little more.
In an instant, he was staring at the closed bedroom door, working up the courage to enter. He felt his heart race, cursing himself because he wished he could have felt that anticipation in a positive way months ago, when he stood in the doorway of the bedroom on his wedding night. But he had just walked through the door and ignored Shen Wei and laid with his back to him and never gave him a word of comfort because he was also suffering. And he had heard Shen Wei cry softly that night, but he hadn't turned to him and offered him even some sympathy.
It was hard to swallow now that he thought about how cruel he had been to his spouse, who had never done him any harm and was just a victim of the same circumstances.
All that was left was to try to live knowing that he had lost his spouse without even trying to be a husband.
He opened the door slowly, as if his worst fear was inside. Still, he thought he deserved all the pain that might come from what he would face from now on, so the first thing he did, was to reach for Shen Wei's lamp and turn it on, seeing the light glint on the small crystals and dots sparkles fling themselves onto the empty pillow.
Shen Wei's bedside book had been left behind. He loved that book. Zhao Yunlan realized the weight of that departure now, for someone to leave behind something he loved and perhaps not even notice it.
Zhao Yunlan sighed heavily, still refusing to let that burning in his eyes turn into tears, "What do I do without you now? I just don't know what to do with this life without you..."
“So you didn’t want me to go away…”
In surprise and shock, Zhao Yunlan turned around to look for where that voice was coming from and make sure he wasn't just imagining it.
On the other side of the room, in the old armchair that had always been in that corner, was Shen Wei, wearing the same clothes he was wearing in the morning when he left the house, except for the coat that was lying on the suitcase on the floor by the door, the shoes lying on either side of the armchair, and the green scarf that was held between the hands of the man with a face like he had been crying for hours, the tear tracks on his cheeks, the long wet eyelashes lining his sorrowful eyes.
He wasn't gone, he really wasn't. And Zhao Yunlan didn't have the slightest idea of any reason for that. He wanted to get closer, but feared he didn't have the right to try. At that moment, he just desperately wanted to get a little closer to his spouse.
“I didn’t want it,” he managed to say, “But I also don’t want you to stay just to be like this…” he gestured to Shen Wei’s tearful face. Taking a deep breath, he looked into his spouse’s eyes, holding the gaze, “We never talked before our wedding day, but I knew you from afar, I used to see you around your brother and Doctor Cheng and you were always smiling. Now you don’t smile anymore. Everything I see in you are tears. Your joy of living is gone. And I don’t want to see you like this.” I was the one who first made you cry, I know this… but now… To see you suffering tears me apart, now I understand this.
“Why does this matter?” Shen Wei laid the scarf aside on the armchair and stood up, barely feeling the cold floor beneath his feet. He had clutched that scarf tightly at all times that day, because if he was gone, that would have been the only memory he would have of the husband he had silently grown to love.
“Because I-” As Zhao Yunlan tried to speak, Shen Wei watched the reluctance in his husband's expression, a rare thing to see. “I care, Shen Wei. I care about you. The same way you care about me and couldn’t simply go away and get your freedom back. You could, you had the chance… I wouldn’t say a thing to our families until it was too late for them to find you. And yet, you didn’t go…” He had always been reticent about showing himself vulnerable. He lacked the desire to share what was intimate with another, and even in the relationship he had risked to have in the past, he was still reluctant to let go of all his reservations.
A little affection was a big display of vulnerability, but Shen Wei didn't know that when Zhao Yunlan let him see him in his worrying moments, or shared a glass of wine with his spouse to celebrate the successful closing of a case, it meant trust and affection growing little by little in his heart. He was a little vulnerable in those moments - especially the ones where he smiled.
“How could I abandon you?” Shen Wei was afraid of expressing himself with all the intensity he felt. Leaving wasn't his wish - and even though he was in a marriage that hadn't been his choice, the thought of leaving had never occurred to him. In fact, he believed that it would be Zhao Yunlan who would eventually abandon him. Still, falling in love with his husband had been unexpected - and unavoidable. “I also knew you from afar, and the things I heard about you… I know you liked to hang out with your friends and stay up late drinking. But not even a single day since you married me, you came home late if not for working reasons. Every time you had to stay at the police station, you called me to tell me to not wait for you for dinner…” It seemed trivial, yet he held it fondly to his chest. When Zhao Yunlan had told him that he could leave, Shen Wei had thought that, perhaps, this was the only option between them. That was the best way to not end up being hated by the other.
He had thought that there would be nothing as painful as being hated by the one he loved. When he had decided to leave, it had been with the belief that Zhao Yunlan didn't want him around, that he had hopes of resuming the life he had left behind, if Shen Wei wasn't there to get in the way.
“And every time, you waited for me anyway.” When Zhao Yunlan reached for his hand, Shen Wei didn't know how to deal with the warm feeling of holding his husband's hand for the first time. “You don’t eat until I’m home. You never tell me, but I know. I don’t understand so many things you do. I don’t know why you come home earlier from the library just to make dinner; I never asked you to do that…” I never asked you to take care of me, and yet…
“Your cooking is awful. You’ll die if I don’t cook something good for you.” Shen Wei lost his gaze on their joined hands, unsure whether he or Zhao Yunlan was the one holding so tightly.
“It’s not your responsibility,” Zhao Yunlan whispered, following Shen Wei's gaze, thinking that his spouse was his responsibility and he had simply sent him away. How heartless was he for that?
Shen Wei frowned as he stared back at his husband. “It’s my husband we’re talking about. His well-being is my concern and responsibility.” On the way to the train station, he had thought back on all the months the two of them had lived together. He had looked carefully at how life had progressed alongside each other. He remembered the agonizing anticipation of the wedding night, expecting not the nonexistent romance and not even the moment's pertinent touch - but he hoped that, at least, they could talk and try to start understanding each other; after all, they would lead a life together from then on. However, he hadn't received a single word from his husband, and the realization of how unwanted he was had broken him right there.
He had persisted in communicating with his husband over the next few days, and gradually his persistence had paid off. Though often taciturn and short-tempered to most people, Zhao Yunlan had proven himself to be a kind man in private life, and that sad impression of a cold man he had left on their wedding night was left behind.
Shen Wei watched him for all that time and took silent pleasure in knowing that his husband had a kind heart that he didn't let others see easily. In their world, kindness was often seen as weakness and could become a weapon against oneself. Zhao Yunlan knew the rules well and was careful not to fall prey to his qualities. In his job, being too kind could get him killed.
“Shen Wei…” Zhao Yunlan took a deep breath before continuing, determined to find the right words so that he no longer had to feel the anguish of seeing his spouse leaving, whether due to his own stupidity or any other reason. “I know you didn’t want this before, and neither did I. I was angry at having my freedom ripped away from me for the benefit of others… But you also went through that… and you didn’t go away when I gave you the chance to. Is it a problem if your husband just… wants to be really your husband, from now on?” He saw the surprise in Shen Wei's wide eyes, as well as feelings he couldn't quite put his finger on, far from joy or sadness, and maybe it was too late to ask for that, so there was fear and doubt left.
“I didn’t go away because I want to stay with you, Zhao Yunlan,” Shen Wei easily admitted. Taking one step further and getting closer to his husband, though, was something he hesitated to do. “However… I’m aware I’m not the person you want. And I fear to be ruining your chances of leading the life you want if I don’t go away…” In so many fears and silences, Shen Wei had never let Zhao Yunlan know that he saw, admired and loved him. He couldn't say when he had started to love his husband, but one day he realized how painful was his desire for his husband to get a little closer to him, every time they lay down to sleep. His desire for his husband to touch him, to want him… to have him. But Zhao Yunlan had never touched Shen Wei more than necessary to arrange a blanket over him. At least with that, Shen Wei knew that he wasn't completely despised.
Hearing his spouse's reply, Zhao Yunlan felt angry at himself. He had given Shen Wei all the wrong impression by the reckless way he had told him to leave. He hated realizing how selfish a bastard he had sounded. “That’s not the reason why I told you that you could go if you wanted! I wasn’t thinking about- I just didn’t want to see you crying anymore!”
“But you don’t love me…” Even though Shen Wei believed he'd known that all along, that wasn't easy to think about, much less say out loud.
And that finally made Zhao Yunlan come closer, pull the hand that was holding his to his chest and keep it there, while he raised the free hand to touch Shen Wei's face and gently wipe the wet corners of his spouse's eyes with his thumb.
“Shen Wei…” His voice softened. “Maybe I do. Maybe this is why seeing you cry became so painful to me…” he said, as he carefully slid his hand down the side of the other's body, until it reached his waist and gently brought him closer to himself. And Shen Wei's warm body slowly snuggling into his felt so right. “I can’t go back to the things I didn’t do, in the choices I made and even in the choices I let others make for me. Those times were gone. I won’t ever know how my life could have been, because that didn’t happen. It’s pointless to attach to a shadow of what could have been. I think I’m a bitter person by nature, I’ve always been this way since I can remember. But the days have been less gray since the first day I came home after the wedding… to find the table set for two and you wrapped in an apron, telling my cat you weren't sure how to get me through this. Maybe I started loving you right there.”
Love wasn't a word Shen Wei expected to hear from Zhao Yunlan, not even in his wildest dreams. He had firmly believed that this man's love did not belong to him and never would, even if they found a way to live well as a couple. Hearing that was just too much. "Why didn't you tell me sooner?" That you love me too…
"Because I needed to think that I had lost you to realize all this… But I love you, Shen Wei. I know this now. I should have given you all the love you deserve from the beginning, but I was blinded by silly and transient things, and made you suffer instead. Can you forgive me? Could you just let me be your husband? For this whole day thinking that I would never see you again, there was nothing I wanted to be but your husband. This was the only thing that felt meaningful to me.” He feared letting go and losing forever, and with his heart aching in his chest, Zhao Yunlan held Shen Wei in his embrace even tighter.
With his heart pounding in his chest, Shen Wei closed his eyes, bringing his face closer, smelling the scent of his husband's woody cologne while softly kissing the corner of the other's lips, and stayed there, just like that, quiet for a moment. He needed some time to be sure it was real, that his husband was confessing to him, after all the pain and heartache he had been through. After all the insecurity and anxiety of deciding to stay and waiting alone and silent in that room, not knowing if he would be met with the disgust and hatred that terrified him so much in his thoughts. By all means, if he had anything he needed to forgive Zhao Yunlan for, he would not have returned. He understood his husband's mistakes and he believed that only deliberate meanness was something one needed to repent of and seek forgiveness for - and that had nothing to do with the man he had fallen in love with.
The one time Zhao Yunlan had ignored his tears, it had been in the past, and the man had been by his side every other time he had seen him cry, even the times Shen Wei refused to say the reasons. He was never angry and never pressured him. Zhao Yunlan was just there, close to Shen Wei, to let him know that he would not turn his back on him again.
Between gentleness and kind affection, that love had grown stronger.
"A dignified spouse does not hold grudges against his husband in order to have to forgive him. Love is forgiveness, and I have loved you with all my heart since I found the kindness of yours." He leaned his head to capture his husband's lips in a slow, deep kiss. Their first real kiss. The bitter flavors were gone, all they could taste was sweet in their mouths. Even the tobacco and whiskey felt sweet as they melted into each other.
In that kiss, Zhao Yunlan knew, despite all the things that came and went in his life and how or why some faded and some remained, what he had found with Shen Wei was meant to be forever.
Shen Wei craved for all the sensations he could experience with his husband, and no more hesitations weighed his heart. He finished removing the other's tie, leaving it aside, to next start unbuttoning Zhao Yunlan's shirt.
Pulling away from the kiss, Zhao Yunlan briefly said, "It takes too long this way." Holding the hem of his shirt, he hurriedly took it off over his head.
Shen Wei giggled at the other's haste, but the sound was replaced by a low moan as he felt his husband's hands under his shirt, exploring his skin, from his waist over his ribs, to his shoulders, as they worked their way up the fabric, until the shirt was removed and tossed aside.
When they embraced again, skin to skin, the kiss was passionate and impatient as their hands were lost in caressing everything they could touch in each other’s bodies.
Shen Wei never forgot that his husband was a policeman, but he often ignored the strength that the other had, until he was surprised, although never before was the surprise that he himself was easily thrown onto the bed. He didn't have time to express it, though - Zhao Yunlan's hands were undoing the button on his pants and his mouth had already taken Shen Wei's in kisses again, eagerly devouring the addictive flavor he had discovered there.
Inwardly, Shen Wei smiled to himself, thinking how foolish he'd been to assume he'd never be seen by his husband, when the man actually had all that intense desire kept hidden inside of him.
The next thing he knew was that his husband's indecent mouth was going to relish his body without giving him time to think - he'd only had time to grab Zhao Yunlan's hair wildly, which just made Zhao Yunlan even more delighted.
…
The crystals in the lamp's dome shone their yellowish light in several bright spots on Shen Wei's slightly sweaty bare skin. Zhao Yunlan traced imaginary lines with his fingertips, connecting one point to another, forming constellation designs on the body lying in front of him. Naked, they snuggled close to each other, enjoying the intimacy they finally shared, slowly recovering their breaths.
"I used to hate your lamp," he said quietly before kissing his spouse's forehead, "but that's just because you look so pretty when you're enchanted by the lights."
"And that's bad?" Shen Wei chuckled, stroking his husband's face with both hands, brushing away the strands of hair that cling to the damp forehead or fell over the other’s eyes.
"It was bad when I thought it was… never going to be real. Glad you stayed.” Zhao Yunlan closed his eyes as he rested his head on Shen Wei's pillow, breathing in his scent.
Sliding his hands up to embrace his husband, Shen Wei felt his heart light for the first time in a long time. "Look at us now,” he tenderly kissed his husband's hair with the words, “and never forget how we were tonight. This is real. The way I love you."
(...)
One year later…
Red leaves were carried by the calm breeze, covering the pavement of the quiet street in the late afternoon. The sun had given way to an orange and indigo sky, and the first stars were already shining there, warming and bringing light to the heart on the way home.
Zhao Yunlan walked that way at a brisk pace, he wanted to be home soon.
In his sweet comfort of home.
He didn't have time to grab the pack of cigarettes, he was soon turning down the street, and he felt like the luckiest man in the world. The cool breeze felt like a caress on his face, and carried multicolored leaves across the pavement.
Right there was his front door, and a few windows were still open on the first floor, light streaming in through the panes, a vivid yellow that brightened from the inside out.
Zhao Yunlan stopped on the sidewalk, watching the house for a moment. It was a great and beautiful house. He was so happy there, he thought.
He didn't wait any longer, hurried to the door and went inside, as he took off his coat. He heard the radio on in the kitchen, Blues hanging in the air. He smiled, feeling the black cat brush against his legs.
"Fat cat, where's my Xiao Wei?" But the cat only meowed dismissively in response. "Traitor."
Caught off guard by arms around his neck, Zhao Yunlan turned to hug his spouse's waist.
His spouse, forever.
Shen Wei chuckled softly as he reached his husband's mouth for a kiss. When they pulled away, Zhao Yunlan could look at him, admiring the joy he found in his spouse's beautiful eyes and flushed cheeks. No shyness could stop Shen Wei from giving him a welcoming kiss.
"I'm home, baby." He leaned his forehead against the other’s, who gently brushed the tip of their noses together, a sweet habit that would always bring a warm smile to Zhao Yunlan’s lips.
"Welcome back, my love," Shen Wei softly whispered, as he hugged his husband, watching the colorful autumn through the open doorway behind them, and the leaves in many shades of red dancing in the breeze under a sky full of bright spots, like millions of crystals from his lamp shining in the immensity.
…
