ubi 🍠 @konijnterbang - Tumblr Blog

Dec 30, 2024

aestival, c.xs

pairing :: cheng xiaoshi x gender neutral!reader

word count :: 18.7k

genre :: high school!au, senior!au, popular boy!xiaoshi, lovesick!xiaoshi, mutual pining from the start (like he's absolutely smitten for you i swear)

warnings :: explicit language, mentions of wounds, mentions of medical supplies (band aid, antibiotic), eating food truck food

author's note :: i got this fic idea in class and just . threw up words HAHA anyways i love cheng xiaoshi our bbg pls enjoy pure mutual pining!!

masterlist. navigation.

i. meet.

Cheng Xiaoshi's backpack is severely under-packed for senior year. It even seems deflated to Lu Guang as they walk into the school campus.

"I'm surprised you weren't held back a year." Says the younger boy, though his tone does not hold any hint of jest. Nevertheless, Xiaoshi laughs at the comment.

There's a small jump in each of his steps. Breathing in, Xiaoshi looks around and takes note of how… different it seems this year.

The grass is greener, the sky is clearer, the students are chattier. As the sun shines its warm rays against the skin of his arms and cheeks, he beams.

"Y'know, I have a hunch."

"Shoot me." Replies Lu Guang, his face already resembling one of amusement. Whatever Xiaoshi has to say always humors him. "I've got a feeling senior year has something in store for me." Hums the boy, shaking a hand through his raven locks. His friend, in return, deadpans.

"What makes you think that?" Of course: the standard logical Lu Guang response.

Xiaoshi smiles, "I've got a funny feeling in my bones."

"A funny feeling?" Lu Guang repeats in a laugh. "You're basing a statement for the year off of your funny bones?"

Xiaoshi's mouth hangs open as he's about to retort back with something that would not help his case at all— but a grunt escapes his lips instead as something comes crashing against his abdomen.

"Shit- sorry!"

In front of him is a scrambling student, apologizing profusely. He freezes.

As you gather yourself and apologize to the boy, he leans down and grasps the spine of your chem textbook, lifting and handling it towards your direction.

"Oh, thank you. Sorry, again," You sigh, taking the thick textbook from him. The tip of your finger grazes his and Xiaoshi's sense of time stops. He takes a good look at you within a split second– the warm sun and cold morning air hitting your cheeks makes you look absolutely ethereal.

Cheng Xiaoshi had gone to this school for the past 6 years of his life– but not once had he met anyone that looked as pretty as you do right in this moment. You send him a small, tight-lipped smile that seems grateful and still a little apologetic. Your chin scrunches and your cheeks puff out when you do, and he likes the sight of it.

The whole ordeal happened quick. Too quick. You stand up and pat off the material of your uniform, adjusting your hold on your textbook. Xiaoshi stares. After noticing you shift and tilt your head at the gawking boy, Lu Guang nudges and pushes against his friend’s elbow, sending you a quick ‘goodbye’ and dragging Xiaoshi away.

Xiaoshi doesn’t want to leave. In fact, he refuses to. But what’s the use, you had already left, the only remnants of you being your warm floral scent in the summer morning breeze. He breathes deeply, feet planted firm on the ground and feeling a little strange when his nose tingles at your smell.

“That was the most beautiful, pretty, breathtaking person I’ve ever spoken to.” He sighs. “You’re acting like you’ve never spoken to a human before in your life, Xiaoshi,” Comments Lu Guang as he starts treading away.

“I haven’t spoken to a human that looks as if the sun and the moon shared a hug and a million stars danced with each other and everything in the milky way was perfect and not one person on earth had lactose intolerance!”

“What the hell are you even saying? Are you okay?” Lu Guang is starting to grow genuinely worried. The last time he’d seen Xiaoshi act like this was when he had a full-on obsession over Angelina Jolie for a solid 3 hours.

Xiaoshi feverishly shakes his head, cheeks flamed.“No! Do you know who that was?”

“No.”

“That makes things worse,” Groans Xiaoshi into the palm of his hands. He can feel how hot his skin had turned just remembering how pretty you looked.

“What if I never see them ever again? Do you know how bad I potentially just fumbled the bag here?”

“You’re saying that as if they’d like you back.” Lu Guang can’t help but let his eyes roll. Xiaoshi cries something along the lines of ‘harsh, much?’ and proceeds to whine about having just let you walk away as he stumbles his way to class, Lu Guang directioning him the whole way for the most part.

Cheng Xiaoshi, though he doesn’t seem it, is a hopeless romantic. As his feet drag against the tiled floor almost automatically, Xiaoshi wonders if whoever you were could have been more to him. He’d let fate decide: An acquaintance, a friend, an enemy, a lover. Maybe all of those in that order. Maybe you could be, somewhere in the future.

But he doesn’t really like the idea of waiting for fate. Not when he’s so eager to run into you again– why hadn’t he met you earlier? In sophomore or junior year? Had the universe intended to keep you cooped up away from him until you swept and escaped from its grasp to get back to him?

He knows he’s getting ahead of himself. Nonetheless, he hopes you bump into him again, maybe holding an extra book or two so he could retrieve them for you. Or maybe, if the universe was kind enough to him for a second time (the first was meeting you.), he’d bump into you.

The soccer field is on a large strangely elevated patch of grass. Xiaoshi doesn’t like the extra flight of stairs he has to travel up on in order to enter it. It was originally a large hill, he heard from Lu Guang, but the school thought it’d be of better use if it were a soccer field.

The summer sun is blaring too hot, the boy thinks, as he wipes his sweat off of his brow.

“I’m open!” Yells Xiaoshi, waving his arms.

Far too much movement out in the open sun.

The senior feels sticky and his feet feel like jelly. He doesn’t know how long he’d been playing at this point. Frankly, Xiaoshi doesn’t know why he’d called out for the ball. Instinctual, he supposes.

The ball comes flying at him, and being the basketball-loving goof he is, reaches out to grab it with his hands. Within the last split second, and Lu Guang shouting at him to take it to the chest instead, he forces his arms down, taking the impact to his face instead.

Xiaoshi is wordless as he grasps at his face, feeling extremely dazed.

“Shoot, sorry! Are you good, man?” Shouts a fellow player, though it sounds warped in his ears.

As he waves the concerned murmurs off, he lets his feet lead him to the bleachers, calling for a quick break. It is too damn hot out today, he thinks, heaving at the thick warm afternoon air. Xiaoshi still holds his palm to his face, shielding his eyes from the bright sun that seemed to burn.

Reaching out, Xiaoshi expects to feel the cold metal of the railings that stand in front of the bleachers, but is met with nothing but the air his fingers cut through as he sweeps his hand around. “Wh-?”

Uncovering his eyes, his feet travel forward before he could process where he’d been walking into.

The yelp Xiaoshi lets out embarrasses him and he blushes a little, though none of that really mattered anymore when he realizes he’s tumbling down the other side of the hill, stray twigs and leaves pricking him as he rolls down the grass. He doesn’t let out one noise, the whole situation happening too quick for him to react properly to.

Before he realized it, he’d stopped rolling. Probably for a good few seconds already, but his head needed time to stop swaying.

“Ugh,” Groans Xiaoshi, gripping his hair as his vision seems to keep spinning.

It takes him a solid moment to fully absorb what had happened and where he is. He first looks at the grass around him. Unlike the field he’d just been playing in, these were shaded by tall canopies of trees– the ones on the opposite side of the field, facing the bleachers from at least 100 meters away.

The second thing he notices are the pair of crossed legs in front of his, tensed and pressed up against a chest. Xiaoshi makes an effort to tilt his head up— as much as it made him nauseous— and face the owner of said pair of legs.

There you sit, your book discarded and arms length to the side, eyes blown wide as you scrutinize the boy. “Are you- are you okay?”

Xiaoshi’s mouth hangs open dangerously wide as he meets eyes with you. His skin burns– and he can’t tell if its from

spending so much time in the sun and overheating, or because you just witnessed what might be the most embarrassing moment of his life.

“I’m… fine.” Is all he’s able to say. A little bit of everywhere stings. His elbows, his knees, his head especially. But it’s alright because Xiaoshi thinks you look absolutely ethereal with bits and patches of sunlight peeking through the leaves of the trees standing above you two, as if shielding you both from the reality of the world. The sunrays frame your face in a kind and soft way, lighting up your nose and cheeks when you lean over to check up on him.

Xiaoshi admires you (almost shamelessly) but you can’t care to notice because you’re busy fussing about him.

“You’re- bleeding! You need help!”

“It’s fine,” Scoffs Xiaoshi. “It’s barely anything.”

But as you carefully fish a handkerchief out of your pocket (of course you’d have one, thinks Xiaoshi, it’s also bear-patterned!) and slowly press it against his shin, the boy winces, flinching his leg away with a whine as his hand instinctively flies up to grip at your wrist.

“I’m sorry,” You apologize. “Could you hold that for me there? I promise it’ll just be a moment.” Your fingers grace over his knuckles as you instruct him, and Xiaoshi doesn’t even think once about protesting, immediately following and holding the cloth in place.

He can feel the pads of your fingers linger for a little longer, and although he’s already overheated from the hot summer sun, your fingers radiate a different kind of warmth– a friendly, homely warmth that reminds him of all his favorite things. A kind of warmth that feels like a ladybug crawling across his arm, but he lets it be for the good luck.

“I’ve got an antibiotic in here somewhere,” Rummaging through your bag, you briefly look up to send the boy an assuring and calm smile. His chest thumps violently. Your sheer persistence to help out someone you’d only talked to once— though Xiaoshi doubts you even remember that encounter— moves him.

As you search, the raven-haired boy lets his free hand travel down the grass he sits on, relishing in the chill contrast of it compared to the blazing hot field. He picks at a weed, then a daisy that grows right by his thigh, and threads them together, creating a braid long enough to circle around his pinky finger. He binds them together with a knot and slips it onto his pinky finger, a small, boyish ingenuous grin spreading across his lips.

“Here,” Tenderly lifting his fingers, Xiaoshi lets you pry his hand off his leg, watching as you dab a small amount of antibiotic cream on the cloth.

“Could you press this in place again? I have to find you a bandaid,”

“Yeah, of course,”

Dazed, Xiaoshi doesn’t react at the first contact the rag makes with his wound. And a moment later, after having enough of his fill of watching you, he returns to wincing, wearing a sour grimace on his face as he refuses to take the cloth off just because you ordered him not to.

“Here.” Taking Xiaoshi’s free hand, you place the bandaid into his palm and take hold of your handkerchief again. With an open palm, the boy looks at it, the corner of his lip twitching upwards at its animal pattern.

“Thank you,” Says Xiaoshi in a small voice. You nod, “It’s alright, I’m just glad you’re fine. Although,” Pausing, you lean forward, face nearing his as you press the back of your hand against his cheek. He inhales sharply, eyes widening at the feeling of your soft fingers against the skin of his face.

“You’re burning up.” You conclude. “You did put on sunscreen before playing, right?”

Xiaoshi’s silence answers your question, but the guilty glance towards the field tells you more than you need to know.

You shake your head, “Wear a hat next time; that’s the least thing you could do. Sunburns are no pretty thing.” You pause, tilting your head to the side with a teasing look in your eyes. “But red’s a good shade on you.”

It’s until now when Xiaoshi realizes how close you’d been, his breath hitting the peach fuzz on your face. “Shut up,” He groans, pushing at your shoulder. Letting out a quick chuckle, you let him push you back into your original position and watch as he applies the band aid across his wound.

“You’re… the guy I bumped into a few weeks ago, aren’t you?”

Oh. He hadn’t expected you to remember that, considering how fast the whole thing had happened.

“Yeah,” Replies Xiaoshi with a nod. “I forgot to ask… for your name,” He says, fidgeting and looking to the side, discovering a shy part of him he hadn’t known existed.

“It’s Y/N L/N.”

“Y/N L/N,” He repeats. It rolls off his tongue nicely, he thinks, and he wants to say it again. “I’m Xiaoshi. Cheng Xiaoshi.”

“Cheng Xiaoshi.” You say, repeating his name like he did yours. You say it again under your breath and at the sound of it, he thinks everything is right and beautiful in the world.

“We’ve got to go,” You mention, checking the time on your phone as you stuff your bag with your belongings you’d taken out. “We’ve got seven minutes ‘till class.”

Xiaoshi watches as you rush to your feet, patting against your legs and uniform. You offer to help him up, but he shakes his head politely, picking up the novel you’d been reading and wiping off the little dirt that had gotten on the cover with his slender fingers.

“Will I see you again?” Asks Xiaoshi, though he hadn’t thought before he let the question slip past his lips. You look back at him, offering a smile, “I’m not sure… but we’ll see, I guess. Bye, Cheng Xiaoshi.”

“Bye, Y/N L/N.”

His cheeks burn, this time not because of a near-sunburn he’d gotten playing soccer in nothing but his uniform.

ii. cheng xiaoshi!

You hadn’t realized you’d lost your book until after arriving home from school a few days ago. Now here you are, sitting next to your upperclassman and lab partner, Qiao Ling, legs leaning against the bleacher in front of you. Even under the shades of the thin metal ceiling the bleachers came with, you felt like you were being boiled alive.

The two of you watch a mix of seniors and juniors play a friendly match of soccer, and you can’t help but wonder where Xiaoshi had been since the last time you’d seen him.

After him stumbling into you— almost literally— you hadn’t seen him all week. Not like he’d been looking for you either.

Fun fact: he actually was.

Xiaoshi sits in the spot he’d last met you in, fingers grazing across the title etched onto the hardcover of your novel that you’d forgotten with him. Wearing a small pout, the boy heaves a childish sigh, letting his back fall onto the fresh grass under him, admiring the canopies towering over him.

It’s definitely a peaceful and sound place, but there was a sense of beauty knowing it was exclusively yours. He can see remnants of you everywhere: a dented patch of grass that he imagines happened because you’d sat there every time, several traces of plucked weeds and flowers, your initials you’d scratched onto a tree because you’d been bored one day.

Xiaoshi’s fingers travel up to the rough, textured bark that spelled out your initials, inhaling its earthy scent of oak. He imagines you, with a pen or a pocket knife, etching the letters onto the dark and dull bark with the same concentrated look you’d worn a few days ago.

His phone suddenly vibrates in the pocket of his uniform. Still staring at the engraved letters, Xiaoshi takes his device out and unlocks it, finally turning to his screen.

Lu Guang

| Where are you?

| Sociology starts in 10 minutes.

Cheng Xiaoshi

| im omw

Standing by himself in the deserted hall in front of the library, Lu Guang scoffs to himself, knowing very well his friend is not in fact on his way.

Lu Guang

| Please hurry

| Those popular douchebags are here and I can’t stand putting up with your nonsense, let alone theirs.

Cheng Xiaoshi

| those “douchebags” are my friends, Guang :l

Lu Guang doesn’t respond, having gone offline, and Xiaoshi takes that as his cue to get to class.

He hadn’t realized it, but when he looks down, he can make out the faint trail you’d made with your frequenting visits here, a beeline of thinning grass and hardening soil leading him towards the campus. It seemed like a little portal between the calm of the forest and the bustle of high school.

Finally, Xiaoshi arrives at the bottom of the hill, staring up at the flight of stairs leading into the bleachers. The air feels extremely more humid from where he stands, letting the sun hit his skin (but he’d worn sunscreen this morning, just because you’d told him too, of course.)

The first step up feels somewhat like a struggle. A feeling like something in between refusing and complaining. But he’s just being dramatic, really. Xiaoshi walks up the rest of the stairs like it was nothing.

Finally on the top of the stairs and shielded from the sun under the ceiling of the bleachers, Cheng Xiaoshi feels like his stomach tightens at the sight of you talking with Qiao Ling and lets his mouth hang open, eyes wide like buttons.

“Y/N L/N!”

Your shoulders shrug up at the sudden yell of your name, and it seems like everyone has stopped talking, just as startled. Turning around, your eyes widen when they meet with Xiaoshi’s, your mouth parting slightly, though you’re not sure what to say.

“Cheng… Xiaoshi?”

Qiao Ling, who hadn’t bothered to look (because things like this had happened too often to her, though she should’ve known it was Xiaoshi), whips her head towards his direction, ridiculed.

There’s a moment when you both look at each other and everyone else goes back to minding their own business. Xiaoshi’s cheeks are dusted pink from both the walk in the sun and meeting you here coincidentally. He holds your book up, his fingers wrapped around the spine of it, giving you a grin.

Charming, you think. His smile is charming. And teethy.

“I’ve… got your book.” He says. Brows raising, you let out an exasperated breath. That was, in fact, the book you’d been searching for during the past few days. “Oh,” You can’t resist the small smile growing across your lips as he offers it to you. You take it with nimble fingers, brushing against the cover, then looking up at him. “Thank you.”

What followed was another moment of silence.

Was this going to be a usual thing between you two?

“Hold on, you know him?” Qiao Ling, who had been ogling at your interaction the whole time speechless, plants a hand on your shoulder, completely disregarding the enthusiastic “yeah!” Xiaoshi replies with.

“Yeah, met him on our first day this year. I bumped into him, actually…” Although the whole ordeal has passed, you still wear a shameful smile. Qiao Ling narrows her eyes at Xiaoshi, “Oh you’re the golden boy they talked about?”

“Golden boy? Talked about?”

“Um,” You hiss before he could question any more, giving Qiao Ling an embarrassed and pointed look. A realization settles into her and she apologizes quietly, though she seems more teasing than anything. “Class is like, pretty soon, is it not?” You chuckle nervously, two fingers fiddling and pinching the cover of your book.

“Right, yeah, I was on my way to sociology.” Says Xiaoshi, though it seems like he’d just remember himself. “Oh, I’ve got advanced math— which is like, right down the hall to your class.”

“I can walk you there!”

“That’d be cool, yeah,”

Qiao Ling wants to interject. Remind you two of her presence. But she’s completely dumbfounded at the fact that she knows very well that if she did, neither of you would acknowledge it, too lost in the small talk and shared glances.

“Right, well, while you two do that, I’ll be here, I guess.”

“You’re not going to class?” You ask. “Nope.” Her ‘P’ pops against her lips as she leans back against the bleacher. “I’ve got a free period. Pros of being a future valedictorian, eh?”

“Shouldn’t you be using that time to study?”

“Oh, you’re one to talk, Xiaoshi. Go, shoo, before you’re late. As far as I know, Mr. Lee doesn’t like tardiness.”

“Shit, that’s my class.” Groans Xiaoshi, wiping a hand against his sweaty face. “Let’s go, Y/N L/N.” As you tread after him and wave goodbye to QIao Ling, you can’t help but laugh at the boy. “You could just call me Y/N.”

“But I like saying Y/N L/N. It rolls off nice on the tongue.”

“So does Cheng Xiaoshi.”

Shit. Is this flirting? Is Cheng Xiaoshi really flirting with the prettiest person he’s ever met? Xiaoshi seems to sweat even more, despite already entering the air-conditioned campus building. Your finger brushes against his lightly while you walk next to him, but he doesn’t think you noticed. You’re still complaining about taking advanced math with Mrs. Wang.

“I don’t get it,” Xiaoshi interjects. “Why did you pick it in the first place?” Your cheeks dust red. “Er, well,” You sigh. “I thought I’d look smart if I took the class. Turns out absolutely none of her students understand the material and we’re all left to fend for ourselves with youtube tutors and a really, really thick textbook that amounts to nothing but yet another droning lecturer.”

“Isn’t Lu Guang taking that class?”

“Lu Guang?” You hum, tilting your head. “Your friend?” Xiaoshi nods, “Yeah, the one with the white hair. People absolutely fawn over him.”

“He’s taking the class on Wednesday, then, I’m assuming.” You shrug. The both of you turned the corner and there Xiaoshi’s class was. The big metal door stands heavily in all its glory, declaring itself an entrance and separation from you. You look beyond the hallway, and spot the familiar graffitied door of Mr. Huang’s class (so many students had failed his class that they’d graffiti on his door in a feat of protest. The old man never minded it, though, it just reminded him more of his streak in paining high school kids).

“I’ll see you later,” You pause, looking up at him. “Cheng Xiaoshi.”

“You too,” He smiles. “Y/N L/N.”

The next time Xiaoshi sees you, you’re typing away at your laptop on a lunch table out in the courtyard, shaded by a generously thick tree. You’re completely neglecting your food, absolutely focused on your task at hand.

“Ahoy there, Y/N L/N.”

Cheng Xiaoshi greeting you boldly and loudly out of the blue does not faze you anymore. Not when he’s been doing it for weeks on end. Sipping on your soda with a straw stuck into the can, you swallow with a fresh sigh.

“Hello, Cheng Xiaoshi.”

“What’re you writing there?” Asks the boy as he plops down next to you, comfortably keeping a knee pressed against his chest as he plants his lunch next to yours. “It’s my English report. I planned on pulling an all-nighter last night, but,” You sigh, having been cut off when Xiaoshi offers half of his sandwich to you. You eye it, then lean down to smell it with a heavy whiff.

“You think I’d poison you, Y/N? And here I thought we were friends!” Xiaoshi mimics an arrow shooting straight through his chest, leaning against the table and dramatically hanging his head as if he’d just lost consciousness.

You laugh.

God, your laugh, Xiaoshi could live off of it alone. Your cheeks when you smile, the teeth you bare to him when you chuckle. He wishes to see it everyday.

“You called me Y/N. Like, Y/N only, Y/N.”

“Yeah, yeah, I guess you came around. Anyways, eat up.” Xiaoshi taps the bread of his sandwich against your mouth and you roll your eyes, taking a bite and wiping the crumbs off the corner of your lips.

“Thanksh.” You murmur through a mouthful. You push your lunch towards him. “I made fried rishe. Pleash try it out fohr me.”

Xiaoshi’s lip quips up at your strange, mouthful accent. “Of courshe.” He says obnoxiously at you, laughing when you push his cheek away with your hand. Picking up the stainless steel spoon you’d packed, Xiaoshi eats a spoonful of your cooking, smacking his lips as he chews obnoxiously.

You’re very aware he’s trying to cheer you up. You can’t imagine how grumpy you looked typing and frowning when he approached you.

“Well?” You say, finally swallowing down the little bit of his sandwich you’d eaten. “Is it any good?”

“Is it any good?” Repeats Xiaoshi. “Do fish live in the sea?”

“No,” You spit playfully, hands hovering back over your laptop keyboard. But before you could start working again, Xiaoshi smacks your hands and you gasp, looking at him wide-eyed as he closes your laptop shut.

“You did not just do that.” You hiss. Xiaoshi sticks a tongue out at you. “I just did. Anyways, give your little laptop a break would you? And yourself, too, of course.”

You suppose he’s right. A part of you appreciates Xiaoshi a little more (if that were possible) now as he munches on food, and another part wants to smack him in the face when you realize it’s your food he’s munching on.

“Cheng Xiaoshi! You just ate, like, half of my lunch, you goof!”

“It’s your fault you cooked it so good, Y/N L/N.”

You take Xiaoshi’s ham sandwich sourly, wanting to get back at him as you take a big bite right in front of his face. And although you think he’s as upset as you are for eating his lunch, Xiaoshi’s chest warms at the sight of you eating the rest of his lunch, and when he offers yours back, you snatch it and devour it quickly. His smile grows each spoonful of food you eat.

“Hey,” He says, leaning his head against his fist as he watches you eat. You hum in response through full cheeks. “I’m gonna buy a milkshake. Want one?”

You mouth something along the lines of Hannah montana and a strangely structured word.

“...what?”

You roll your eyes at him, swallowing and finally telling him: “banana, please.” Xiaoshi’s mouth forms an ‘o’ and he nods at you. “Don’t you mean ‘banana, pleash’?”

“I hate you. Like genuinely. Like I’m going to be friends with Lu Guang now instead.” You huff, and he juts his bottom lip out at you.

The milkshake stand in the small nook of the canteen is run by two freshman girls. You and Xiaoshi are in fact their first and top customers… and their only customers during this season. Xiaoshi offers them both a wide smile and orders one strawberry and one banana. As one scurries off to whip up their orders, Jia, the younger of the two, leans against the counter of their property (they have a cooking and selling permit from the principal herself until lunch hour ends) with a suggestive smile.

“So? How’s Y/N? How’re your kids?”

“Holy shit,” Groans Xiaoshi. This was the only reason he hadn’t asked for you to come along. Both Jia and Yanyu know about the senior’s harboring feelings for you. They also know about your harboring feelings for him.

You both had admitted to your feelings to them individually, unable to decipher their devious, knowing smile.

“Language!” Yells Yanyu over the blender. “Sorry,” Replies Xiaoshi, monotone. “But really, I don’t want to talk about it, Jia.”

“Uh oh. Trouble in paradise?” Says Jia, crossing her arms, her braided hair shifting against her shoulder. The boy scoffs, “Stop acting like we’re married.”

“You two may as well be. Quick, tell me, my therapist hours are open.”

Xiaoshi can’t believe he’s about to spill his heart’s heavy doubts to a 14 year old.

“They’re… not interested.” He sighs. Jia, wide-eyed, leans closer. “They told you that?”

“Well, no.” She deadpans. “You can’t just assume they aren’t. Communication. Is. Key.” She says, clapping her hands to corresponding syllables she speaks. Xiaoshi shrugs, “I’ve been trying to drop hints, but they’ve either been ignoring it or they’re really, really, blind.”

“It’s the latter.” Says Yanyu as she hands him his drinks. They both know too much about how you both can be ridiculously blind to dropped hints. She grimaces at the thought of you both prancing and dancing around a bush, Xiaoshi’s pathetic attempts to earn your heart when he doesn’t know it’s in his hands. “Definitely the latter.”

“Well, I just bought them a banana smoothie. Think that’ll be eye-opening enough?”

“Are you crazy?” Groans Jia, pinching the bridge of her nose. “You do that for each other all the time! Do something nice out of the blue or norm, like…”

“Tell ‘em you think they look pretty today!” Interjects Yanyu. Xiaoshi tilts his head, “But I think they look pretty everyday?”

Aw. Yanyu and Jia share a knowing look. “Well, do you tell them?”

“No, I guess not…” He hums. “Then this is your chance! Flatter them. Everyone loves that. Tell them you love their eyes, their lips, their hair– the way they part their hair.” Jia pauses, smiling cheekily as she watches his cheeks heat up. “In fact, tell them you love all their parts.”

“I can’t say that!”

“Sure, you can!” Sings Yanyu, planting her hands against his shoulders and directing him towards the table you sit in.

In the distance, the three of them can spot you, having finished both yours and Xiaoshi’s lunch. You write down in your notebook, scribbling almost aggressively, but he still thinks you look heavenly.

“Well, see ya, lover boy!” Jia pushes against his back lightly, nudging him as he takes a step forward. “And tell Y/N we said hi! And that we miss them!”

Yanyu tells him a few encouraging words but he can’t process them when he’s trying to figure out how to tell you how damn pretty he thinks you look everyday. The condensation of both your cold smoothies mix with the sweat of his palms– either from the humidity or just the thought of you– and he sits down next to you, eyes trained on you.

“Thanks, Xiaoshi,” You say, accepting the banana smoothie he’d handed to you subconsciously. But quicker than he’d wanted, you notice his intense gaze and gulp thickly.

“Is there… anything on my face?” You ask, wiping the back of your hand against your cheek self-consciously.

“Yeah,” Says Xiaoshi slowly. “Pretty… ness.”

What. Was that. So much for golden boy.

You give him a questioning look, taking a sip of the smoothie he’d just bought you. “Are you okay? Are you having a heat stroke? I told you to put on some sunscreen.”

“You look really pretty today.” Xiaoshi finally says in a blunt tone. “Oh,” You mumble, surprised. “Thanks.”

You hope you sound calm, because you definitely aren’t. Cheng Xiaoshi had just gone to buy you a smoothie and came back to tell you that you’re pretty. Totally not something the universe had personally hand-picked out of your delusional brain filled with fantasies.

“I think you look pretty, too.” You say in a small, breathy and shaky voice. “Thank you,” Replies Xiaoshi with a small smile.

“Wanna try some of my milkshake? You haven’t tried the strawberry one, right?”

“Oh, sure. Thanks.”

“Also, Jia and Yanyu miss you.”

Xiaoshi thinks this is a mission success. Your cheeks red from the sun (and from Xiaoshi complimenting you, but he denies that) as you try his smoothie, and he takes a sip of your banana flavored one. He told you he thought you looked pretty and you think he’s pretty too; definitely mission success.

You don't expect Xiaoshi to coincidentally have the same free period as you– let alone have him sit with you in the library as you highlight keywords and statements in your textbook.

"It's so weird that we've got the same free period," You mumble with half the effort, focused on skimming through your material. Xiaoshi lets out a 'pshh' sound with his breath: "Nah. I skipped class."

"You skipped class?" You repeat, dropping your book and highlighter as you furrow your brows at him. Though a little surprised at your reaction, the boy nods slowly. “No, one does not just ‘skip class’.” You cough. “You’ve gotta go through the paperwork and give the teacher a dismissal note for whatever reason you made up. And then have your classmates make an alibi for you as you’re out.”

“...or you could just walk out the door and never return.”

“No, Cheng Xiaoshi, you can’t just do that.” You laugh, though it's the kind of laugh where you’re in disbelief and somewhat in denial. “Holy shit.” Says Xiaoshi, leaning closer with a teasing smile. “You, Y/N L/N, have never skipped a class.”

“I have!” You say a little too loud for your liking, earning looks from the students at the table next over. Mumbling a small sorry, you clasp your hands together in a makeshift apology before rummaging your head into your open textbook.

“I have never skipped a class.” You admit, sullen.

Xiaoshi can’t help but chuckle lightly at your current state, and he can’t help but laugh even more when you look up at him with a frown. “You’re really laughing at me right now!? I’m never going to live a fun and rebellious high school life and you’re laughing at me!”

“I-I’m not,” Xiaoshi pauses to collect himself. He eases his chuckles as he pats on his chest with his hand, which makes you more upset at him. “Alright, I’m sorry. It’s all the more better that you’ve never skipped a class, really. There’s no hype to it or anything like that.”

“I don’t know,” You huff, watching your breath turn over a page of your textbook. “I don’t really want to graduate high school knowing I’ve never skipped a class. It’s unfulfilling, or something like that.” Your expression turns sour. “Winning perfect absence sounds cool, though,”

“You wanna win that?” Asks Xiaoshi, leaning down and pressing his cheek to the cold hardwood of the table, facing you. You look at him, at his squished cheek and his intent gaze. Something in you whirrs– tingles.

“...no.”

Xiaoshi laughs. “It’s not too late, you know. You’ve still got, like, a semester to go.”

You whine, squeezing your eyes shut as you groan and let your forehead hit the cover of your textbook. “It’s too late, Xiaoshi, I’m already too deep in. I’m going to receive that award with some half-assed smile and so many regrets. Imagine how many bobas I could have had if I did have the strength to skip a class. Or fried rice. Or food truck burritos! God, imagine how many burritos.”

“So many burritos.” Xiaoshi lets out a melancholic sigh, and it somewhat humors you and comforts you as you turn to face him. You meet eyes with him, both your faces pressed against the table and you give him a small laugh when he repeats more and more foods you could have enjoyed if you’d ever skipped a class.

If you ever could.

iii. 3.27 PM

The fact that Cheng Xiaoshi stands at the door frame of your math advanced class doesn’t surprise you. Neither is the fact that he’s looking at your teacher with a bitter look. Though, the fact that those two don’t surprise you is just a bit concerning. Just a bit.

“Hello,” You say, pushing at his chest as you both exit your classroom.

“You’re so right,” Says Xiaosh a little too loud for your comfort, pausing to take another good look at your professor over your shoulder. “She does look divorced.”

“Holy shit.” You cough when her head whips to the both of you. “Great, now my advanced math teacher hates me. How could I ever repay you?” You groan sarcastically, bumping your knee to his. “Actually!” Beams Xiaoshi. “There is. You were called to the office.”

“Me? Called to the office?” You repeat, suspicious. “Should Mrs. Wang kno-”

“Nuh-uh! They told me it was urgent. Involves the both of us, apparently.” Xiaoshi is quick– almost too quick, too eager– to cut you off, grabbing a hold of your wrist. The action alone makes the ends of your fingers tingle and your chest to swell, and you hope Xiaoshi can’t tell your elevating heartbeat from the beating spot of skin in your wrist.

“Did you just say nuh-uh?” You say in a small snicker, letting him drag you down the hall and several flights of stairs. “Shut up.” Laughs Xiaoshi, his stomach caving in at the sound of your enjoyment.

Though Xiaoshi mentioned the office, for some ridiculous reason, you both end up walking up to the front gates, still hand in hand. You look back, the earthy scent of autumn enveloping you as you stare at the old, wet campus building.

“Why are you taking me outside.” You ask, though it sounds more like a demand. Xiaoshi’s mouth opens, but nothing comes out. He pauses for a moment, looks back at you, then looks back at the front gates you’d just walked out of, and then turns back around.

“I’ll tell you in a minute.”

Something in you wonders why you’re letting him drag you away from the school grounds, and to the opposite direction of where you’re supposed to be right now. But the answer is clearly obvious:

You have the biggest fattest crush on this boy.

You’re not sure when it happened, but it happened, alright. You’d realized when you were talking to him as he took a break from playing basketball, and when he’d confessed that he hadn’t put sunscreen on, you immediately whipped yours out and applied it to his skin yourself. As your fingers traveled and graced across the milky, plush skin of his face, you found yourself fawning over how he just sat there, eyes shut closed, and let you.

In the end, he retreated back to his teammates with a childish smile, with his cap on your head.

“In return for the facial!”

“It was sunscreen.”

But as you clutched the hat to your chest where your heart bloomed, you realized how much he’d grown on you.

“Okay.” Says Xiaoshi, letting your hand go to adjust his jean jacket, then the thick sweater layered under it. It’s until now when you realize you’re severely underdressed for this rainy weather, but with clutched and crossed arms, you let him speak.

“Congratulations Y/N L/N! You’ve just skipped your first class!”

What. The fuck. You can’t help but think. Wordless, you stare at him blankly, waiting for a punchline or a big reveal that this had been a silly prank. But as Xiaoshi pats both your shoulders and puffs his chest out as he tells you how proud of you he is, you grimace.

“There’s no fucking way I just fell for that.” Your hand travels up to clutch the side of your face. “You just dragged me out of class! Just like that!”

“I did!” Cheers Xiaoshi. He’s too cute to be mad at, really, but you just can’t believe he did that. “Xiaoshi! This is not something to be happy about!” You declare, though you’re trying to hold back a laugh when your best friend starts wiggling his arms and shaking his hips in what you think is a celebratory dance.

“In legal terms, you just kidnapped me. You’ve kidnapped me, Cheng Xiaoshi.” You say in a dramatic voice, flailing your arms at him. “Do you realize I left my jacket in class? I’m so underdressed for this.”

Xiaoshi takes a good look at you. Scans you up and down. Then frantic, he gingerly throws his jean jacket off and ties it around his waist, rushing to escape the warm binds of his sweater. The bottom hem of his uniform lifts as he tries to get his sweater off and you pull on it, laughing when you hear a muffled thanks through his multiple layers of clothes.

Finally, he’s rid of his green sweater— it's the type of green you like, and he very well knows that— and hands it to you with a toothy grin.

Like a puppy… You think when he seems to shake like a wagging tail.

“Thank you.” Is the only thing you can say as you accept the sweater. As you bow to put it on, you’re completely engulfed in his scent. He smells warm and earthy. Like fresh blades of grass after a light rain. He smells like the sun shines– not too hot, but warm enough for a good rest under the rays of light.

There’s a hint of AXE body spray, too. A very subtle hint of it.

The feeling of personally wearing a sweater that belongs to Cheng Xiaoshi is frankly… surreal to you. The sleeves are too long for you and you bunch the extra bit of it up until it reaches the palm of your hands, breathing into them for extra warmth.

Though he’s not wearing a jacket, Xiaoshi thinks seeing you in his sweater is enough to heat him up. There’s a shiver that descends from the top of his head down his spine and he thinks he likes it– or maybe it's the cold finally getting to him.

As he throws his jean jacket back on, Xiaoshi bumps his hip into yours, “Where do you want to go now, you class-skipping menace?”

You take no time to ponder:

“We’re going to have burritos. All the burritos.”

“So many burritos.”

It’s odd how warm you suddenly feel as soon as you take the first bite into your burrito. Maybe because it’s freshly made because they just opened, maybe it’s because Xiaoshi insisted on paying for it when you realized you left your wallet in class.

You frankly left everything in there, save for yourself and your phone.

Xiaoshi hums when he finally gets a taste of his burrito, wiping at the sauce that spilled on the corner of his lips with the back of his hand. After swallowing your bite, you nod at him with a knowing, smug smirk.

“Good, huh?”

The boy nods eagerly in response, which humors you a little. You pull the thick sleeves of Xiaoshi’s sweater up to your elbows so as to not get it dirty or spilled on, but it’s evident that you’re growing cold without the extra layer (and the pits of your elbows start to sweat a little too much). Xiaoshi, noticing the thoughtful gesture, assures you to keep your forearms covered with a full mouth.

“But I’m gonna get ‘em dirty!”

“It’sh foine!” He says through the several ingredients of his burrito (which consists of: a flour tortilla, beef, baked beans and several veggies).

“Are you shore?” You mimic him, pulling your sleeves down. Despite his eyes rolling at your antics, Xiaoshi sets his food down to help you with it, the warmth of his fingers alone radiating off of your skin that he begins to help cover.

Your stomach churns as you look down at the action. His gentle fingers help unbunch the material of his sweater and they wrap around your wrist for the second time today, his thumb rubbing across the bottom of your palm.

Chest wavering, your eyes cast up and they unexpectedly meet Xiaoshi’s (though he was staring at you the whole time). There’s a moment– he gives you a moment to make up something to say to him in return– but he’s really expecting a quiet, shy thank you and a full-blown confession. “Thanksh.” You say, cracking into a smile when he groans.

“You won’t let that live down?”

“You didn’t in the summer.”

Xiaoshi ignores your response with a pout, his hands fishing for his burrito and grabbing hold of it to take another dangerously obnoxious bite into it. Boy likes his beef and baked beans.

You watch him, watch as more and more crumbs build up onto his chin until he wipes it off with a napkin and shoots it at an absurdly small trash can that sits a few feet away from you two, laughing at him when it hits the rim and misses.

“I’m bored.” You mention out of the blue when you’re finished with your burrito, crumpling the thin paper you’d used to hold your burrito with and used tissues into a big ball, handing it to Xiaoshi when he asks to have another shot into the bin. He misses.

“How the hell am I on the basketball team,” he laughs. You freeze, fingers playing with the plastic fork you were given as you ask: “you’re in the basketball team?”

“Hell yeah, I am.” Answers Xiaoshi with pride. And then a realization hits you. You’ve known Cheng Xiaoshi for nearly half a year and you barely know anything about him aside from the fact that he’s a big (maybe the biggest) goofball and he’s purely a golden retriever.

“Let’s play 21 questions.”

“All of a sudden?” He hums, swiping his hair up away from his forehead. Your head spins a little at how charming the action alone had made him. “Mhm. I barely know anything about you, and I doubt you know me more than I know you. So,”

“What I’m getting here,” Xiaoshi pauses, his face leaning closer to yours as he plants his elbow against the table. He wears a boyish smile and it makes your head buzz. “You wanna get to know me better, huh?”

“Exactly.” You say in a whisper, the ends of your fingers tingling when his smile grows at your response alone.

“Alright, I’ll go first: what’s your shoe size?”

You can’t help but let out a loud chuckle, “You’re so weird!”

“21 questions are 21 questions! Answer me.” Defends Xiaoshi, though he’s laughing with you.

“Alright, I’m like a decent size 40.”

“Only? I’m like, 43. I win.”

You’re about to comment on the fact that Xiaoshi just considered comparing shoe sizes for competition, but you don’t think you want to when he tells you not to be sour in a coo, patting your arm. He teases you in a sweet way, and you know he means no ill intent.

“Opinion on pineapple on pizza?”

“I’m neutral.” You shrug. Nodding, Xiaoshi wears a contemplating look, “I, for one, am all for it. You can never go bad with sweet and savory. In my opinion,” He pauses to press a hand against his chest. “I think they make a great pair. Soulmates, even.”

“Oh, yeah?” You hum. “That’s an interesting way to think of it. Between the two of us, who would you think is the sweet and who’s the savory?”

Oh. Xiaoshi looks at you, a light in his eyes as he wonders. You think he’s pondering for the answer, but he’s already got that figured out. You were the sweet to his savory. What he really was wondering was: were you regarding him as your soulmate when you asked that? He can’t tell. You’d said it in such a naive, innocent, genuine tone that makes him fold.

“You,” He starts, tapping his heel against the pavement of the street floor. “are a sweet cutie patootie sugar booger honey bun-”

“Oh my god, shut up.” You laugh loudly, leaning over to lightly press your hand against the direct front of his face that he teases nearer you. “Your turn, savory.”

“It’s your turn, sweets. Don’t you know how taking turns works?” Jests Xiaoshi, his cheek still pressed against your outstretched hand. You shake your head, "I took it already– I just asked you which of us were sweet and savory– don't you know how questions work?"

“Very well,” He replies, removing his face from your taunting grasp. “Favorite Pringles flavor?”

“Sour cream and onion.”

“I thought you were sweet,”

You roll your eyes, ignoring his quip, “Go-to takeout?”

“Pizza. And boba. Favorite movie?”

“It has to be any of Wes Anderson’s movies. Oh wait! Ghibli, too,” You nod your head momentarily. “You?”

“Say Something for sure. A classic.” Answers Xiaoshi with his whole chest, nodding with a proud smile. You stay quiet, lips thinned and fingers retreating to play with the sleeve of his sweater. It takes the boy a moment to fully digest the look you wear: one of a little embarrassment and guilt.

“No.” He gasps. “You’ve never watched Say Something?” There’s a shock and what sounds to you a small bit of hurt (feigned, of course). Wordless, you answer with a shake of your head. He presses the back of his palm against his forehead, faking a faint as he falls back against his chair.

“You’ve wounded me, Y/N. Look at me, a dead man!” You scoff, nudging his knee with yours under the table, and it sends a little electricity through him. “Stop being so dramatic! You’ll get over it.”

“Anyways, what’s the daily agenda of the oh-so-popular golden boy, hm?” You ask. Xiaoshi, still slouched back into his chair, gives you a questioning look, “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you have a lot of friends. A lot of friends mean a lot of plans. A lot of basketball games, a lot of karaoke runs, a lot of parties. Am I right?”

The look the boy gives you says you’re absolutely wrong. He stays silent for a moment, spending his time to think as he watches your expression fall from a smile to one of a lost thought. “I don’t have a lot of friends, Y/N,” He admits. “I just know a lot of people. I don’t take anyone out to a food truck burrito run.”

Your stomach caves in at the way he regards you. Or rather, the fact that he emphasized the fact that he treated you differently.

“And I don’t party. Well- okay, I’ve been to a few, but it’s not my type of genre, you feel me?” Xiaoshi’s hands press together and he looks at you a certain way as if waiting for your verdict.

“Oh.” Is all you can say. You’re surprised. But something in you tells you that you shouldn’t be, because he’s literally eating burritos with you right now. Why on earth would he hang out with you if he had other friends to spend time with?

“You seem disappointed.” He deadpans. Immediately, you shake your hands and head at him, denying fervently. “No, no, no, not like that! It just seemed like you were a big party person.” You confess with a certain tone in your voice, one of slight remorse. “It’s… surprising you’d hang out with me, actually. But it’s nice of you to. I like spending time with you.”

You bloom a certain warmth in Xiaoshi’s chest. It swirls and spirals, accumulating enough to just burst out of his abdomen. He feels as if he’s about to float. All the fall cold that had been itching its way past his layers and onto his skin had just melted away merely by the heat he radiated after hearing you say that you’d enjoyed spending time with him. He feels like he could fly and fall at the same time, but he thinks he prefers falling if you’re there to catch him in the end.

Oh. This is bad. This is really, really bad. Here, in the cold hour of 3.27 PM, on a table that you’d just shared burritos with, the realization that Cheng Xiaoshi had fallen in love with you just hit him.

Though, it doesn’t really seem bad anymore. Falling in love in front of a food truck could be romantic, right? It doesn’t really matter to him. Not when his mouth parts, voice lumped and stuck in his throat as he attempts to tell you how sudden and how hard you’d just made him fall in love with you. He wants to tell you in the form of words; in the form of touch; in the form of mingling breaths and intertwined fingers; in the form of his palm pressed against the skin of your jaw, drawing you closer as his whispers fan the lobe of your ear.

But, no. All that comes out is a quiet, shaky:

“I like spending time with you. Too.”

You wear a smile. Then you give him a small, but bashful and shy laugh. He thinks he might die at the sight. Cheng Xiaoshi wants nothing in the world right now but to hold you in his arms– or be held in your arms. Either way, as long as his skin is pressed against yours, he’s all for it. He wants you to run your fingers through his hair, for his head to rest on the soft flesh of your thighs or arms or frankly any limb you’d be willing to offer to him because god your touch looks just too good to waste.

But he knows he can’t. Not now. Not when you’re telling him to ask you a question and when he does, it’s a dumb, shallow, vague one that you answer with heart and mind anyway because you care about this game. You care about getting to know him. That’s what makes you worth every bit of love this universe has to offer, he thinks.

“That’s enough,” You groan, staring into a street light– which you really shouldn’t, because it’s illuminating light shines and blinds directly into your eyes, and you groan everytime that happens.

“One more,” Pants Xiaoshi, picking up the round and faded basketball, dribbling it past the 3-point indicator line. He repositions himself, his knees bending just slightly as he adjusts his aim. With a jump, he stretches his arms out, the ball flying out of his hand and traveling right through the center of the ring.

Xiaoshi sings a little ‘whoop!’ as he jogs over to you.

You’re laid out on the court floor, bored out of your mind as you start staring straight at the streetlight just to feel a little entertained. You fiddle with the boy’s bottle in both your hands, and he lends down to pick it out of your hands, sounding a thank you, though you don’t respond.

Xiaoshi sits by your feet, tilting his head at your lack of response. “Sweets? You good?”

That damned nickname. Ever since he’d forced you to bail and went to get burritos with you, it was all he ever called you. Not like you’re complaining, but how could he frankly expect you to return a verbal, sane response after what’s practically a couple’s pet name?

But you do respond, of course, throwing a thumbs up his way as you nudge him with your shoe.

“You know,” Xiaoshi starts, setting his bottle down to lay down next to you. This doesn’t help your case at all, your body tingling when his hand brushes against yours during the action. “You can just go home. You don’t have to stay with me while I practice.”

“Nuh-uh,” You reply, shaking a finger at him. “I’m like, officially your number one fan. Who else would be your fanclub president if not me?”

“I’m just saying, a fan doesn’t spend hours with their idols. They always say: ‘never meet your idols.’” Xiaoshi shrugs, and you can feel his arm brushing up against your uniform. It makes you nervous. Nevertheless, you face him, stomach churning when he mimics you, your noses nearly touching at the close proximity.

“You’re not so bad to meet.”

Xiaoshi doesn’t think you know just how crazy you make him feel. His heart beats faster and more rapidly than when he was shooting hoops and doing drills. He lets a moment pass by, the air settling as he counts how many times he can feel your breath brush his chin.

“Neither are you.”

You smile. He can see your teeth a little. Your cheeks puff out and your lips stretch in a nice way that makes him want to kiss you until you can’t breathe.

But he can’t do that.

Not when you’re sitting up and patting his thigh and urging him to walk you home. Not when you hand him his bottle and brush the dirt off his sweater that you still haven’t returned (but he doesn’t mind because it just means in the ultimate time you do, it’ll smell like you). Not when he carries both your backpacks and pats a beat against yours that he has pressed to his chest.

But he really wants to, though.

There’s a little bounce in your step as you walk a few feet ahead of him, cooing at how much faster at walking you are than a basketball player, but he’s really just staying behind because he likes watching you walk.

Suddenly, there’s a lump in his throat. He attempts to swallow it down. It doesn’t work. He wonders what it is, but he doesn’t think he cares because you rub your hands together with the sleeves of his hoodie and he likes the sight of it. But whatever it is, it’s bubbling and rising and it tastes weird in the back of his mouth.

Suddenly it spills out. The words spill out.

You’d stopped in your tracks, turning around slowly at him with a shocked expression.

Shit! What had he said?

“What?” It seems you don’t know either, because you tilt your head at him (and he thinks it's adorable) and ask him to repeat what he’d said. Xiaoshi shakes his head, “Wait, I blanked out. What did I say?”

“You screamed something along the lines of ‘date and say something.’”

Oh shit. Cheng Xiaoshi had asked you out on a date unconsciously.

“Oh, there’s, uh, a showing of Say Something in the local theater. They like to rerun old films. No one really goes there, anymore, so we don’t have to if you don’t want to-”

“No!” You suddenly yell, and for some reason, you both jump. “I’d really, really like to see Say Something with you. Y’know, since you were so hurt by the fact that I haven’t watched it.”

There it is again. The blooming in his chest. It’s crazy he hasn’t fallen into a cardiac arrest yet. You smile at him, and he finds it contagious, smiling back even harder. You tell him something about you having to hurry home and telling him to hurry, and he does. He runs with you, the two backpacks that had just weighed him down now feeling weightless as they bounce against his back and chest because he’s jogging down a hill towards your house.

iv. unsaid.

Cheng Xiaoshi is dressed in his best pair of jeans and his favorite bomber jacket layered with a sweater underneath– he hopes you aren’t wearing anything thick enough so he could lend this one to you too, as stupid as the idea is.

He spends a solid five minutes in front of the mirror, telling himself many things:

“You got this.”

“Don’t screw up.”

“Act cool.”

“Do not screw it up.”

He takes one last good look at himself, huffing as he smooths the collar of his sweater, unable to rest at the thought of spending a night alone with you in what will most likely be a deserted theater. Nothing to screw up there.

Grabbing the house keys– because both Qiao Ling and Lu Guang had better plans to do rather than stay at home and help Xiaoshi get ready after he begged the both of them to– and stuffing them into the pocket of his bomber jacket, he repeats the three crucial words to himself over and over: “Don’t screw up.”

There’s not one thought running through his mind that’s not about you as he twists at the doorknob, mindlessly stepping out and turning around to lock the front door. Completely disregarding the fact that his teammates are pulled up in a red camaro in front of his house, Xiaoshi doesn’t think twice about immediately turning to the direction of the theater.

“Hey, Cheng Xiaoshi!”

Shocked, the said boy’s shoulders shrug up as he turns around, feet almost stumbling against the small bit of ice that had frozen on the pavement overnight. “Oh- hey! What are you doing here?”

“Giving you a ride to Hu’s, what else?”

Oh shit. Cheng Xiaoshi had completely forgotten about the pregame party he’d been invited to. Of course, he had no intention to go. But his teammates are stubborn, too stubborn.

“Sorry, guys, I can’t make it tonight.” Replies Xiaoshi, trying his best to sound guilty. One of them tilts his head, looks him up and down and asks: “Where else are you going, dressed like that?”

“I’ve… got a date.”

“Ah, come on!” His teammate scoffs, waving his hand in the air. “You can’t win yourself plenty of dates at the party. What’s one?”

One is with you. He can’t really afford to miss it, not for the world. Xiaoshi shrugs, turning around as he tells them: “Sorry, I can’t just stand someone up like that.”

“How do you know they’re not at the party? Can’t you just invite them there, whoever you’re going out with?”

Jesus. It’s not that easy, is it? Xiaoshi isn’t the golden boy they make him out to be. Their Xiaoshi was hand crafted and molded by their standards of a tall, charming basketball player that had many admirers. A porcelain that’s hollow inside. Hollow and filled with echoes of what they claim him to be. A player, a charmer, and MVP.

Almost all his life, Xiaoshi had been living to fit what everyone wants and expects him to be. And though he really, really wants to break through that porcelain and completely deny what they demand, he doesn’t think he has the strength to do that. Not even now, as his mind races with thoughts about you: how you look waiting for him in front of the theater, how you smell of cinnamon and gingerbread because you’d been making cookies with your mother at home, how warm you feel as you sit next to him, your arm pressed up against his.

Xiaoshi can hear his teammates begging him to come, and he absolutely despises it. Despises how his chest aches with guilt because his friends just want him to have fun with them.

He turns around, gives them a serious, pointed look, “Ten minutes, and then you drive me to the theater. Got it?”

“Got it! You’re the best, Cheng Xiaoshi!”

The tip of your nose is numb and you rub it in hopes that its sense will return. The theater is open and its warmth lures you in to welcome you, but you don’t want to enter before meeting with Xiaoshi.

You bring the collar of the hoodie you wear up to your chin, closing your eyes shut as if it’d help. It doesn’t. Taking out your phone from your pocket, on its screen projects the fact that Xiaoshi is ten minutes late. Your stomach drops, but you scold yourself for it, refusing to think lowly of Xiaoshi.

He’s going to show up any second now, sweating although it’s extremely cold out, nearly slipping on ice as he spits a spew of feverish apologies, cheeks dusted pink because of the cold. And you’re going to lean up, swipe a few snowflakes out of his hair and reassure him that you hadn’t been waiting too long. He’s going to lead you inside, take you by the arm and sit you right next to him in the warm seats of the theater, and whisper a few words in your ear; something along the lines of “you’ll love this movie, I promise you” or “you’re going to see what I was dying about, sweets.”

And he’s going to call you that name. That god-forbidden name that shouldn’t make you absolutely melt into an icky, thick puddle because it’s generic and commonly used in western movies. But it does. He does. Cheng Xiaoshi makes you melt as if you’re stuck in the summer, when you first met him, the electricity he sent when he’d handed you your book and your fingers brushed still humming through your fingers until now.

But he doesn’t.

You wait another ten minutes, then twenty, then thirty. A solid hour had passed and you’re still left outside in the cold, shaking and jittering as you constantly check your phone for any sign of him.

The old janitor had spotted you and called you to enter many times, but every time you informed him: “I’m waiting for someone.”

And he responds: “I hope this someone is worth waiting in the cold for.”

And typically, you’d completely agree with the statement. But now, as nearly all your limbs are frozen from either the cold or from standing for a solid hour, you don’t think you can agree with it. Not when your hopes had been so incredibly high. Not when you’d spent the whole day getting ready both mentally and physically. Not when your mother kissed the crown of your head and reassured you of the fact that this night was going to be as warm and as welcoming and as safe as it was in every other season.

No. The cold bites at your skin and you grow bitter and tired and cold.

“You promised me you would drive me to the theater.”

“Do I look like I’m in the condition to drive?”

Xiaoshi wants to punch this guy. Square in the jaw, or nose, or frankly anywhere. With the way he’s slurring his words and swinging his drink around in his hand makes himself practically a target with a big red circle in his face. But he knows better. Especially when he knows something as worth it as you awaits for him later.

“Okay,” Replies Xiaoshi, holding back the urge to roll his eyes as he sets his friend down on the couch. “You take it easy, alright cap? I gotta head out.”

“What? No! If this is about your stupid date, I swear to god we can find you one here that’s probably better than wherever you originally planned to be tonight.”

Okay, this guy was really testing his limits. Xiaoshi’s hands fist at his sides and he gives him a look, a dangerous one that no one had ever seen him wear. After a moment of contemplation, his teammate finally groans, waving with his hand, “Fine, bye. Go have fun on that super fun date.”

Xiaoshi doesn’t spare anyone one second to greet them goodbye, he grabs his bomber jacket that had been hung up on a coat hanger and immediately sprints out of the house, nearly tripping over the ice and the snow because Hu hadn’t shoveled his damn driveway and he can barely see because the sun had already disappeared.

“Shit, shit, shit.” The one thing Xiaoshi had to do was to not screw it up. What had happened? He screwed it up, because he’s such a damn people pleaser he can’t make one decision for himself.

The theater is a solid half an hour away on foot from Hu’s, but Xiaoshi made it in 10. His stomach drops and his head spins when he suddenly stops to a halt, his heels skidding against the ice against the pavement. You’re not here. You don’t stand in front of the theater like he’d imagined, and he thinks he wants to scream.

He rushes inside, breathless, searching frantically everywhere and calling out your name.

“If yer the fella that lovely one’s been waitin’ for,” An elderly suddenly speaks, his voice seemingly echoing and ricocheting against the walls of the theater, though it was built to be soundproof. “They’ve just gone. Probably still a block or two away.”

Xiaoshi mutters a quick thank you and wastes absolutely no time in sprinting, nearly falling to his knees when he takes a sharp turn to the left. And there you were, walking with a sullen face underneath a streetlamp.

This part of town was one of the first sections to be built, so many of the antique streetlights are either too dim to see, or have completely died. But the one you stand under illuminates brightly, showing your breath dissipating in the air as you heave a sigh.

His feet act before he thinks. He runs through the snow, the crunch against ice alerting you when he’s nearly a few feet away from you. You don’t want to look. Not when there are tears brimming your eyes.

“Y/N, I’m-” Xiaoshi is completely winded– not because he’d just sprinted nearly across town, but because he can see he had clearly hurt you. He can’t tell how long you’d been waiting for him, but considering the sour look you give him, he assumes you’d been waiting a long time, and he aches inside.

“I’m sorry.”

That’s all he can say. All that he’s willing to say. He’s afraid that if he let out any more, it’d escalate and he’d be going on and on about how deep in love he is with you and how much remorse in him there is right now and how much self poison is boiling in his stomach, bubbling and popping nearly out of his throat.

You look at him dead in the eye. Though he’d made you wait all that time, you don’t think you can look at him as if he had done you wrong. You look at him as if you try to understand him and what he’s going through– because you want to. You want to look at him like you hate him, and you want to say it too, but you can’t help but do the opposite.

“I love you, Cheng Xiaoshi.” You let out, and the boy twitches, as if you’d snapped something in him. But he’s still wordless, and you think you hate that.

“I love you, like a lot. And I’m not going to let one mishap get in the way of our friendship over these months. But waiting for you, out there, in the cold and in the snow, I felt embarrassed. Like I was throwing away my time– and maybe I was.” Tears flow down from the rims of your eyes and trail down your cheeks. Though it’s nearly a negative temperature out, your tears are hot against your skin. They’re hot and boiling and filled with both love and hatred.

Suddenly, you step forward and hit him in the chest. He lets you. You do it again, a sound escaping you. “Where were you? You better tell me the damn truth.” You spit.

“I was at a party.” Answers Xiaoshi with no hesitation. It just came out. He wants to explain about how his asshole teammates that he can’t believe he’d called his friends forced him into coming and refused to let him go anywhere else, but his body doesn’t let him.

You let out a laugh, one of disbelief. “You are the school’s golden boy, aren’t you? You are every little stereotype they call you. You’re charming, you’re handsome. You’re friendly.” You pause, letting out a shaky breath. “You’re a liar.”

“No,” Whispers Xiaoshi, though strained. You shake your head at him. “You’re a liar and a thief.” He’d stolen your heart, afterall, “You’re the golden boy. And I hate that I’ve learned to love every part of you, even the ones that hurt me.”

You want to turn around a walk away, but a part of you forces you to stay. Forces you to look him in the eye, forces a little bit of hope into your chest as he looks back at you. His mouth parts, and something in you jumps.

"I'm... sorry."

You don't know what he's sorry for: leaving you to wait for him in the snow for an hour, or you loving him. You don't want to find out, nodding as you bite the flesh on the inside of your cheek, resisting the tears that urge to fall from your eyes.

You’re walking away now. He hadn’t fully processed it, but as you're walking away, he can make out the crunch of the snow under your feet, and the sounds of your sniffles traveling away, further and further. His fingers twitch.

He screwed up. He always screws up.

But he can’t believe he’d screwed up in telling you how much he loved you. How much he’d wanted to reach out and caress you, whisper apologies in his ear in every form he has to offer. How much he was willing to bet he loved you more than anyone could love him.

Cheng Xiaoshi is always one to leave things unsaid, because in most cases it’s better if he does. But he’s become so conditioned to it that in times like this, his body is not his own anymore, and what he wants to say doesn’t come out, and what he wants to do doesn’t happen.

He can still see your silhouette under another streetlight shining, or maybe it’s just a light that follows you. And as much as he hated it, Xiaoshi had noticed that even when you beat at his chest, crying and overflowing with tears, you still felt warm. He doesn’t think he deserves to feel that warmth anymore.

v. winner, winner, chicken dinner!

You don’t know what you’re doing. Legs pressed up against your chest, you bite at your nails as your free hand hovers over the spacebar key of your laptop. The opening scene of the wretched movie ‘Say Something’ is projected across your screen and you fully intend on watching it, as much as it hurts you. A film or a memory to hold on to because Cheng Xiaoshi will not be wanting to see you anymore.

And as the film introduces its main character, Lloyd Dobler, you hate the fact that he reminds you so much of him. Just a big and strong guy that doesn’t stop chasing this girl that he likes– though you don’t think you could play the role of Diane. Not in this story.

Cheng Xiaoshi is like Lloyd Dobler in many ways. He’s not the brightest, but he’s loyal. He loves his family. He can’t keep still. In some cases, you even think he can box, too. He’s supportive of those he keeps close to him. He’d rather live in the moment, and can barely think about the future without letting his mouth run about what he thinks of his future.

And you hate that you know all this, because you still love him. You know you shouldn’t, because he practically rejected you with that last apology, but god, was it hard to hate someone like him.

He’s the golden boy. Shiny and untouchable.

You’re honestly surprised you let your feelings brew this much before realizing that he is untouchable. And it’ll always remain that way.

You’ve reached the part of the movie where Diane and Lloyd kiss after she’d led him to nearly break his nose, whispering apologies and reasons why she loves him and needs him. You ache inside. Bitter, you huff and close your laptop shut (a little too harshly) and bury your face into the covers of your bed, wanting nothing but to scream. And you do, and it creates this wet spot on your pillow but you’re too miserable to feel disgusted and wipe it away.

As much as Xiaoshi reminded you of Lloyd, he was Diane in this situation. He’d hurt you and left you to fend for yourself.

It is officially spring and a solid week before Xiaoshi plays against what might be the nation’s best high school basketball team, and he’s worried completely about something else. His arms stretch up and he shoots the firm basketball out of his palms, grimacing when it all but just bounces off the rim of the ring.

Shit.

This is not good. Why the hell was he here, anyway? He should be jogging to your house, knocking on every crevice because you’d refuse to open the front door for him. He should be climbing up to your window, looking at you with desperate eyes and tell you how much he loves you and how much he doesn’t deserve to be loved by you.

As it happens, he doesn’t believe you in fact love him. Not as much as he adores you, at least, because he finds himself utterly unlovable yet that’s the one thing he asks of you. To be loved, to be held, to be comforted and appreciated.

Xiaoshi can’t make his mind up and he’s extremely furious at himself for it. This is no love or hate situation, but he can’t help the latter. The hate. Not towards you, but towards himself. There’s no way in this world anyone could convince him he could be loved as much as he loved– and yet, you did. You convinced him one winter night, where the first snowfall had happened.

Something so sweet and innocent, ruined by tragedy and his stupidity.

“Hey.” Xiaoshi is startled out of his inattentive state with a firm hand smacked to his shoulder. “You alright, man? You aren’t looking good these days.” Though his teammate voices clear concern, it’s obvious he only cares because of an upcoming game that Xiaoshi really needs his head in the game for.

“I’m good,” Answers Xiaoshi, brushing his hand off with a hollow smile. “Just bad sleep.”

Bad sleep, his ass. Bad sleep, anyone's ass! He couldn’t get a wink of sleep because he’s always up thinking about you, about what he should have said to you on that winter night.

Cheng Xiaoshi’s chest beats erratically in his chest, and he can’t tell if it's pre-game shivers or the fact that you’re sitting on a bleacher next to Lu Guang and Qiao Ling, clad in the sweater you still haven’t returned since autumn. He hadn’t seen or talked to you since the day he tried to apologize. He was convinced you’d hate his guts– but here you were. He knows you’re not the type of person to hold an argument like that to heart, but you’d still avoided him the whole half month he tried to reach out to you in the halls or through your number.

Frankly, you don’t even know why you’re here, either. Xiaoshi had rejected you (though he really doesn’t realize you think so): shouldn’t that be enough of a hint for you to back off?

“There he is,” Qiao Ling mentions as the basketball team makes their way onto the court. As you turn to watch said team, Xiaoshi’s eyes meet yours for a brief second, and you can clearly read the surprise in them, but ignore it with thinned lips as you tear your gaze from him, electing that striking up a conversation with Lu Guang would ease the harsh thumping against your chest.

“I don’t get it; why didn’t you join the team?” You ask Lu Guang, his lowly-lidded eyes examining the opposing team. “Sure, I’m good,” He says, blunt. “But I play purely for fun. Plus, I don’t like getting too sweaty.”

“Please, don’t you know how many more people would fawn over you if they knew you were smart and skilled in sports?”

“I am not skilled in sports. Plus, that’s just more of a reason for me not to join. I don’t like people.”

Wow. A very Lu Guang thing to say coming from the boy himself.

“Aren’t they the team that made it to nationals last year?” Gasps Qiao Ling as she swings an arm around your shoulder, urging you to look with her. With your shoulder pressed against hers, you do in fact recognize the logo and jerseys from the sports channel you’d distinctly watched last year– your classmate had made you watch it with him.

Qiao Ling mutters a small, quiet curse under her breath, “You think he can beat them?”

Without a beat or a second of hesitation, you answer firmly: “Yeah.”

The older girl turns and gives you a look, and you roll your eyes at her, “I’ve seen the boy play. Surely you have, too,”

“Yeah, but, you answered in like, a heartbeat.”

“He’s like, a basketball god, Qiao Ling. He’s not the golden boy for no reason.”

You hate the fact that you admit it, even though you’ve said it nearly a million times before. Qiao Ling is about to say something, but the two, very bold, student commentators cut her sentence short with a brief introduction to the match and each team player.

Your mind blanks. You can hear cheering from both the students of your school and the opposing school. The commentators introduce their MVP first: Xiaoshi. He wears a shy smile as he jogs to the center of the court, bowing politely. You can’t help but smile a little at his bashful behavior. And for a moment, you think he looks at you. You can’t tell by the students’ waving arms in front of you nearly blocking your vision. But even if he did or not, your heart nearly pauses for a second, and your hearing becomes faded and warped– as if you were underwater.

All you can hear now is your slow breathing, your heartbeat; all you can feel is the warmth you relish in as you wear his sweater, even though it’s spring and unnecessary.

And then he takes a look at the other side of the bleachers, smiling brightly when his friends from sociology cheer his name like fanboys.

Qiao Ling comments something about the biggest player on the opposing team and you nod, though you didn’t really fully comprehend what she’d said.

Xiaoshi is completely short of breath and he hadn’t even started playing. He tries to convince himself it’s because nearly the whole crowd had cheered him on, but he knows better. The one fleeting second he had stolen just to look at you left him dazed and he doesn’t think he can play if you’re going to be looking at him like that the whole time.

Standing in the center, the match begins with a loudd whistle from the referee, andd suddenly everything around him is moving rapidly. The muscles of his legs force him to move and suddenly he’s jogging past an opponent, his arm stretching out and waving for the ball.

Every part of his body that functions right now is running off of pure adrenaline and muscle memory, his mind still in a fuzzy haze that clears slowly. He suddenly feels the rough edge of the ball in his hand. His fingers trace and grip along the leather material of the basketball, and in pure instinct, his knees bend low and his hands dribble the ball like it was as easy as breathing.

Swift and nearly too quick to miss, Xiaoshi races across the court with the ball bouncing in his hand, and he runs up to the ring, jumping and scoring a point for his team with a right hand layup.

The crowd screams. The haze that had clouded Xiaoshi’s mind fades and clears, and with a bright, toothy grin, he turns immediately to your side of the bleachers, meeting eyes with you.

You, who’s stunned and hands cover your mouth because the whole thing had happened so fast and so early within the game. You, who doesn’t look away this time, but instead cups your hands around your mouth as you shout: “Go, Cheng Xiaoshi!” You, who can’t help but let out a joyous laugh when he throws two thumbs up in the air, winking. The crowd goes wild over the sight, chanting his name over and over.

For the remainder of the match, Xiaoshi scores and scores and scores, and everytime he spins to look at you. And when you cheer for him, he feels like the energy he had just exerted throughout the game was recharged and even doubled. You look at him with a toothy grin, throwing a thumb-up at him, and he literally thinks the whole world revolves around him and the fact that you just gave him one.

There’s one last minute left of the game. The entire gymnasium is quiet, save for the players’ quick pants and sneakers squeaking under the polished wood. Your breath is bated, and you don’t know whether to watch the ball, the opponents, or Xiaoshi. The ball flies from one teammate’s grasp to another and every time it does

your fingers stretch and flinch a little and even muscle and bone in your body pauses. It’s frankly killing you.

The ball travels between at least every player on the team, until it eventually falls into the hands of Cheng Xiaoshi.

With 10 seconds to his name, the boy aims, his breath cutting short in his throat, his knees bending naturally as he prepares himself to shoot. And then his fingers flex, and the ball flies out of his hands, traveling gracefully yet painstakingly in the air. It bounces against the rim once. Then twice.

You think it’s going to bounce again one more time, but you’re wrong because Lu Guang exhales just a split second the orange leathery ball rolls through the ring. He’d known. He could tell already.

You’re shocked.

But you don’t have time to be, because after at least 5 seconds worth of silence, the entire gymnasium erupts in cheers and everyone around you is standing up, save for Lu Guang who wears a rare smile.

Qiao Ling grabs onto your arm and shakes it, jumping with her eyes shut as she yells: “Holy shit- we won!”

Holy shit. They won. We won. He won.

Grabbing onto her two hands with your own, you jump up and down with her, at some point grabbing onto Lu Guang’s hand and nearly forcing him to bounce with the both of you.

Xiaoshi, from below, watches as the three of you celebrate, his face warming when he sees you mouth the words: “Oh my god” over and over again. Although the entire team and nearly the entire student body that had come to watch rushed down to him, he had zero intentions with anyone else. All he wanted to do right now was be with you, letting you hold his hand as you tell him how crazy his last shot had been.

But he can’t, because his legs turn jelly and the adrenaline that had been piloting him the whole time is suddenly shut off. The team captain swings his arm around Xiaoshi’s shoulders, yelling, “To our MVP!” But everything feels and sounds warped to the said boy.

“Don’t miss out on the post-game party!”

Great, thinks Xiaoshi. Another party to get mad at my friends at. Though, he’s convinced even you might be there, so he might just go.

“Post-game party?” You repeat, turning to both your friends. “Are you guys going?”

“Obviously not.”

“Yeah, I am.”

Lu Guang and Qiao Ling both give each other looks due to the difference in answers, and it almost cracks you up. The girl turns to you, her expression hopeful, but you almost immediately shake your head at her, “Sorry, you know I’m not a party person.”

“But come for me!”

“I already attended this game for you!”

“Okay, fair,” Hums Qiao Ling, her finger tapping against her cheek before she sighs with a click of her tongue. “Fine, have fun, you cozy homebodies!”

“We will.” Answers Lu Guang as you both watch her walk away with a friend that had called her over. The boy turns to you, “You,” he plants his hand to your shoulder, and you almost shiver. You’d never seen this look on his face. It almost seems… conflicted. “You’d better make things right with Xiaoshi. Please. He keeps whining about trying to think of ways to make it up to you.”

“To make it up to me? I’m in the wrong here, am I not?”

“You think so?” Lu Guang’s voice is graced with slight sarcasm, and you think you like it that way. You nod, “Yeah, I’m pretty sure.”

“...this is a conversation you should be having with Xiaoshi.”

After sending you an encouraging squeeze to the shoulder and a gentle , tight-lipped smile, Lu Guang descends from the bleachers, swiping through the crowd almost too easily. You watch him, chest growing heavier yet lighter at the same time at the mere thought of talking to Xiaoshi again after months of avoiding each other and exams and basketball.

You don’t think you can bear it, frankly, but you feel like it’s a tide. It’s slow but inevitable. As you step down from the bleachers, you look back at the center of the court, where the basketball team has a brief talk with the coach, and through the many figures of his teammates, Xiaoshi still somehow meets eyes with you, his shining in something you can’t figure out yet.

You let yourself linger, counting as your heart skips a beat or two, before tearing away, heaving a sigh you hadn’t meant to hold in.

Xiaoshi’s knee jumps up and down as he can barely watch you exit the court hall, holding back a whine because his coach is taking too long in debriefing and congratulating. He wipes at his browline, looking to the ceiling lights and squinting, attempting to ease the eagerness in him to just run after you.

And then he realizes: he’d been resisting to this whole half semester, why should he now? He’s earned it.

“And don’t forget your defense transitio-”

“Hey, coach?”

Xiaoshi interjects with a finger stuck up in the air, pulling his hair back with his other palm. His teacher, a little stunned, replies with a quiet ‘yes?’ and it takes nearly everything in the boy not to jump up from his spot on the polished floors.

“I need to go to the bathroom. Like, really, really bad.”

“...right now?”

“Yes, right now. I can’t hold it in, teach,”

Well, that’s half true. The coach looks at him, slightly humored as he waves a sign of permission with the back of his palm.

Immediately, he springs up to his feet, wasting no time in sprinting straight through the door and narrowly passing students taking their time in the hall.

Xiaoshi never realized how fast you walked, because within that minute of holding back in the court, you’d made it to the gates by the time he spotted you. The place is strangely deserted, but that’s probably because everyone is taking the way behind the school to get to the post-game party in the woods. Your hands are jammed into the pouch of his hoodie and you watch your feet as you move, and anyone could tell there was something troubling you just by looking at you.

Your name is stuck in his throat. He wants to yell for you, call out to you and just grab and engulf you in his arms, but he doesn’t want to scare you. It’s 8PM and he knows how jumpy you get when you’re out at night.

Instead, he lightly jogs behind you, nimble fingers stretching out to just barely graze his hoodie you wear. Though he’d barely touched anything, you stop almost promptly, feet planted right next to each other as you listen to the sound of the soles of Xiaoshi’s shoes scraping to a stop against the pavement ground.

“...Y/N.”

The sound of your name escaping his lips makes you inhale sharply, and you’re hesitant to turn around. But you do anyway, because there’s a pulling force gravitating you towards him, like the moon and the earth. The first part of him you see are his pair of jordans, slightly worn out with a loose yarn by the tongue of the shoe. Then you spot his knees, taking notice of how they’re a little darker than the rest of his legs, littered by a scab or two. His fingers clench and unclench in fists, and his elbows nearly lift towards you, and you’d let full heartedly let him hug you– you think you want him to right now.

“Xiaoshi.” You finally breathe back, nearly everything in you shivering once you meet his gaze. He looks at you as if full of remorse and want, and it shakes something in you.

“I missed you, sweets.” He says, voice hoarse and quiet. You nearly erupt in butterflies or honey bees or whatever bug invades your stomach that he never fails to elicit in you. His fingers stretch and pause in the air for a brief moment, before they settle, your sleeve pinched between his grip. He tugs a little, just a little, and yet it feels as if that alone had brought everything pieced together– his words to you, your feelings for him, his breath fanning your forehead as he breathes out a sigh.

“I’m sorry, too.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry.” You say, but this time you look at him and you mean it and it hurts him. “I’m sorry I told you how I felt about you with no regard to how you would feel. And for calling you a liar. And a thief.” The last parts come out in a guilty whisper, like a child confessing to their wrongdoing. “You have every right to tell me to get out of your face– and your life– and to not want to speak to me ever again.”

The air is thick when you finish, but Xiaoshi doesn’t let go of your sleeve. In fact, you think he grips it tighter, now in all five fingers instead of just the two.

“Actually,” You cough. “Frankly, I’m a liar. I-I said I wasted my time waiting for you. But I was wrong. Actually, I can’t believe I ever said that. You are worth… everything. Everything this universe— and I have to offer. You give so much to this world, you’re changing lives! And nothing, and I mean nothing can ever amount to waste when it comes to you.” You look up at him, your fingers tracing around and holding his wrist.

“I’m sorry.” And though you’d already said it earlier, the sound of your voice and the look in your eyes portray the exact same kind of apology Xiaoshi had given you that night. “You are a thief, though,” You laugh through bitterness, the confused tilt of his head far too adorable for you to hate it. “You’re a dirty thief for stealing the stupid, little thing in my chest that beats only when you’re around.”

Xiaoshi’s head might just explode at the load you’d just chucked at him with your own bare fist. The feeling of your fingers loosely hanging around his wrist that grips at your hoodie prickles and gives him a small shockwave– the nice one you always give him when your skin touches his.

“...you really don’t expect me to take without giving back, do you?”

“Huh?”

Suddenly you’re wrapped in Xiaoshi’s firm grip, his arms gripping around your waist and his chin tucked right on top of the crown of your head. “You’re so stupid sometimes, Y/N.” He sighs, the vibrations of his chest as he speaks ricocheting through you like echoes.

“What is that supposed to mean?” You can’t help but argue into his clothed shoulder, drooping your arms around his chest. “That’s rich coming from Mr. 50 points on his last math quiz.”

Xiaoshi pinches your sides lightly at your quick retort and you jump with a gasp, smacking his shoulder when he laughs. His scent, his warmth, his touch. you’re so relieved to feel all again. He sways you slowly from side to side, breath steadying but his heart still beating as fast as a racer’s– and you can feel it faintly when your cheek presses up against him.

There’s nothing to stop the both of you as you hold each other close. The rays of the sun become cooler as it sets, painting the skies several hues of pink and orange. Your shoes are pressed against his, his two feet planted on either side of yours, nearly completely engulfing you in him.

“I’m so madly in love with you, Y/N,” Xiaoshi finally says, though it really just… escaped him. You freeze against him and it forces him to slow the swaying to a halt, and it scares him. Your fingers bunch into the material of his jersey and you pull away, something unreadable swimming and wavering in your eyes as you ask him, “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“You’re not telling me this because you feel like you need to like me back?”

“No, not at all.”

You want to say something, be firm with him, but your throat betrays you as you let out a broken whisper:

“You better not be playing with me right now, Cheng Xiaoshi.”

The boy’s hands, leaving your sides, trail up your neck and rest at both sides of your face, fingers pressed against the base of your jaw. His thumb swipes at your cheekbones, then the outer lines of your eyes, and then they follow the lengths of your eyebrows. His right thumb traces down your nose bridge, then presses firmly against the button of your nose, wiggling and eliciting a small breathy laugh out of you.

Then, slowly– almost too slowly–, he lets the pad of his thumb feel down the underside of your nose, then the crease above your lips. He looks at your mouth, a burning feeling of want brewing in him as he presses his lips together.

Your lips part just a little, to let out an expecting breath, then they close as you gaze up at him, your eyes watching how his scrutinizes your face.

“I love you.”

“What?”

“I love you.” Xiaoshi says again, firm this time. You give him a smile, shaking your head. “No, what?” And then it clicks. He grins, chest puffing out a little at the reference you make.

The fact that you’d still watched Say Something meant a lot to him. It proved how much of an impact your little gestures make in his life.

“I love you. How many times do I have to say it?”

“One more time would be nice.” You hum, and he laughs, pressing his forehead against yours. “I love you.” He whispers, his voice little as he relishes the feeling of your skin pressed on his.

“You’re so incredibly pretty, Y/ L/N, I could just kiss you right now.”

“You’re so incredibly pretty, Cheng Xioashi, that I might just let you.”

Oh. Xiaoshi can’t seem to believe you’d just said that. “Wh- are you- are you sure? I mean, after all I’ve done– I stood you up! I ghosted you for half a semester. I don’t think it’s right. For me. To have the pleasure of planting my lips to yours. Frankly, I wouldn’t even want to kiss a guy who- oh!”

Seemingly growing tired of his rambling, your hand presses against his cheek and you stand on the tips of your toes to give him a gentle kiss, his lips molding to yours almost immediately. He smiles and when you pull away, he’s quick to pull you close by the neck, kissing you again, then again, then again.

His lips, though you’d imagined they’d be scorched and hot, are warm. Not temperature wise, but warm in an inviting way, like toasted marshmallows in hot chocolate. Or like fresh burritos in autumn. Or like the summer sun where you share a milkshake in the outdoor canteen. Like home.

Xiaoshi hums when he manages to steal you with a kiss again, and you can’t help but grin against him, murmuring against his lips, “You’re so stupid.”

“I’m your stupid.” He shoots back, lips chasing yours when you finally part from him. You bring a hand up to his mouth and it’s moist and warm, “Give me a break! We need to breathe, Xiaoshi,”

In response, he breathes out a heavy sigh, the weight on his back he’d carried for two months vanishing as he melts into your shoulder. “You don’t understand how lucky I am to be with you right now.”

“I’m not all that special-”

“You are! It may not seem like it to you, but to me, you’re everything. My energy, my breath, my best friend. Or, maybe, a little more than that, if you wanted to…?” He trails off nervously, facing down and planting his lips on your shoulder, which you find endearing. “I’m sorry I didn’t show up that night. I was forced to go to this party and I ended up pissing some of my friends and to add to all of that I pissed you off. And- and all I had to say to your confession was ‘I’m sorry’. ‘I’m sorry’!?” He pulls away, hands grabbing yours tightly.

“Who even says that!? Frankly, I’m surprised you didn’t punch me right then and there. I’m- I’m such an ass when it comes to stuff like this, ‘m sorry.”

“Hey!” You gasp, interlacing your fingers with his. “That’s my boyfriend you’re talking about!” You cough, “That is, uh, if you want to be my boyfriend.”

Xiaoshi, now beaming, flushes a bright pink, but he can’t bring himself to care when his arms wrap around you and you laugh into his chest as he squeezes you almost inhumanly tight. “‘M sorry, sweets, I’m so difficult.” He mumbles in your hair. “I’ve never really done anything like this.”

“Neither have I, big guy.” You let out a shaky sigh. “But I have faith in us. We’ll figure it out, right?”

Xiaoshi leans back and presses his forehead to yours, your nose brushing up against his affectionately. “Right.”

Summertime is a time of new opportunities. New year, new experiences, new companions. And though the warmth of summer doesn’t seem to stay all year long, it’ll always come back, just as fresh and welcoming. The fleeting moments of your first encounter with Xiaoshi will forever hold a place in your heart, as will the season of summer.

And as debatable as it is, the best moments in your life are aestival. Born and belonging in the summer.

to all the link click readers out there, and to boba bub.

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