A Christmas Miracle || Eloise, Brett and Qianneng
The cat came back.
The Christmas market was something that Brett found himself always looking forward to. The place smelled wonderful, with various foods and drinks being served, and the ever playing music to bring about Christmas cheer. Last Christmas he hadn't been in the best place to truly appreciate this particularly market but this year, he was going to make the most of it and he got to share the experience with an overly excited Eloise. What more could he ask for?
As they made their way over to the stalls, hand in hand, he realised how easily distracted Eloise was as she dashed from stall to stall, showing him various things. He tended to stay quite close to one edge, looking at the hand painted trinkets and the beautifully smelling creams and candles. He picked a few things up to look at, but mostly was more absorbed with the excitement running through Eloise. "Do you think we should get some hot cocoa?"
Eloise kept a firm grip on his hand to keep him close despite the crowd as she tugged him onward. "Hot cocoa sounds great!" she replied, pulling him to slip between two people and close to the next stand. "If we can find a cocoa place without lines that are a mile long. Can you believe there are that many people living in town?" Maybe things were a little uncertain right now, and more often than not, she found herself in a sort of dump she couldn't easily climb out of, but at the same time, Eloise had always been easily distracted. Music and overpriced market stand food and the nipping cold and her precious boyfriend in hand - what more could she ask for? Eloise stopped as she saw the rows of what looked like piles of hand-knitted hats and scarves and gloves, but much unlike the usual things you would find at a market stand, these seemed a little more original. The creator seemed to have taken a rather imaginative approach to the design, incorporating more than a few aspects of Ashkent Creek's darker nature. "Wow." Eloise ran her fingers along a hat that looked like something between a ravenous bat and a reindeer, certainly a strange creation, then picked up a scarf made of several intertwined knitted snake heads. "Never thought I'd see all that stuff as handknitted wearables again." Qianneng: Marketplaces were usually a source of comfort for Qianneng, the bustling crowds and their background chatter as people bought and sold their various wares reminded him of home. Today though, he felt no such comfort. Maybe it was the cold weather, maybe it was the different items being sold, or possibly the small reminder itself left a sour taste in his mouth. Either way, Qianneng could not shake off the looming spectre of dread that had followed him into this town ever since his return. He shook his head. He would deal with it. Eventually. For now, Qianneng let himself get caught up in looking at the stalls of winter wear. Even if his funds were running low, it might be wise to invest in some. He blew hot air into his hands. These gloves he had on wouldn’t last for much longer.
Brett glanced around, trying to find some place where there wasn't a huge queue for hot drinks. If he had been sensible, he would have packed his own so this wouldn't have been an issue but hind sight was a great thing. He spotted a stall that didn't seem to have too many people in it but before he even had a chance Eloise was off again, looking at something else on another stall. She was very distracted in the market and he'd have to remember that next time he tried to go to the market. It was a good thing there wasn't a real purpose for them to be here. He looked at the scarf she had picked up, draping it around her neck. "It's certainly a strange design but it also goes quite well with your outfit," Brett told her with a smile, picking up a hat and putting it on for her. "How does this look?"
Eloise giggled at the bizarre-looking hat he'd put on, staying close to him. "It looks so strange but also kind of oddly flattering? At any rate, it beats walking around hatless. What'd you do with the hat I gave you last year, anyway?" she asked him conversationally, before positively bouncing in spot when she spied a hot chocolate stand nearby. "Okay, follow me!" she chirped, remembering to remove the scarf from around her neck before grabbing his hand again and pulling him onward through the crowds. With some sporting elbowing, she managed to find them a place in the line and beamed up at him. Before long, she was making her order - a big mug of hot cocoa with an extra dash of cinnamon, and stepping aside for him to make his.
Brett: "Oddly flattering? I will take that as a compliment then," Brett joked, taking the hat back off and placing it back on the stall. "Your hat is somewhere in the house. I've misplaced it in a pile of paper somewhere. It might be in the study." He was glad he put the hat back as she didn't take long to drag him off towards the hot cocoa. He held her hand tightly, not wanting to lose his little firecracker in amongst the crowds. He was easy to spot but she was not so easy. He ordered his hot cocoa, strong and with a dash of peppermint and cinnamon, before he paid for the both. "One of my favourite parts of Christmas are the drinks."
Qianneng flitted through the stalls, one foot in reality and one foot in the haze of his own thoughts. He tried not to make obvious faces at the more "eccentric" items on sale. What was he supposed to be doing called? Laying low? In any case, he was in no position to do anything in the first place, so why bother getting upset in the first place. He just needed to bide his time and wait for the right opportunities to come by. He loathed to ask for help from people he felt he couldn't trust, but he knew he would need to eventually. Sooner rather than later.
Eloise blew intensely on her cocoa before giving it a greey sip and closing her eyes. "Mmm, okay, this is great. It's just what I needed," she said appreciatively, then hooked an arm through his elbow to tug him out of the way of the advancing line. She took another careful sip. "You got peppermint, right? Fancy. You should let me taste some before you're done with it. One way or the other," she added in a more teasing voice, low and secretive like her smile, and flicked her eyes to his mouth deliberately. Few things beat making him blush in public.
She took more slow, measured sips of her cocoa, but as they moved to the side, Eloise spotted something she hadn't seen before. "Oh my gosh," she said, her focus immediately drawn to the music and the flitting figures of ice skaters on the rink she could see not too far away. She turned to Brett with a wild grin. "Okay, I know what we're doing next. Follow me."
She scarcely gave him a second to hesitate, only slipping her hand into his and gripping tight, then slipping into the crowd, her arm held out behind her and him attacked like the wagon of a little humanoid train. She couldn't wait to ice skate again, and was determined to beat the group of people with ice skate-shaped bags who were strolling towards the already lengthy line. Eloise sped up her step, thrumming with excitement, and had nearly reached the line for the ice skating rink when a little kid all but sprinted across her path, and Eloise had to skid to a stop awkwardly on the slippery ground to avoid colliding with him. One hand still latched onto Brett's, she practically stumbled into another man to avoid falling, instead, just as he turned around, and Eloise was already cringing to herself when the remnants of her delicious hot cocoa went spilling over her fingers and over the man's jacket.
"Oh my god, I'm so so...," Eloise stammered, her face already burning in embarrassment. She glanced up into the no-doubt furious face of the poor victim of chocolate... and stopped, something about the lean, taut line of his shoulders and even the stance registering as strangely, achingly familiar. Maybe half a foot taller than her. She barely even noticed when the near-empty cup she was still holding in her fingers slipped out, and toppled to the ground. "...sorry," she finished, only just managing to speak past the recognition that she knew this man, was all but certain that she knew him, just as certain as the fact that she'd never expected to see him again.
Brett held the cocoa in both of his hands for a moment, taking a long sip and feeling the warmth rolling down his throat. He instantly felt less cold though he knew it would last for too long. Hot drinks were the greatest thing when it came to the cold. Hot drinks and hot soup: the way forward. "It is pretty great, I must admit. I should have got a business card or something to see if they have a shop around here somewhere. It might have been switched out though at this rate." He certainly flushed when she mentioned tasting his drink one way or another. That definitely implied kissing.
Brett had no real time to protest before he was being dragged off once again by his whirlwind of a girlfriend towards the skating rink. The first time has been quite a disaster but he was willing to give it another shot with a much more optimistic view. He felt like he was being some sort of rag doll for Eloise to drag around the market today but he was quite happy to be that because she was so enthusiastic. It was incredibly infectious.
Brett didn't really have time to react himself when the kid ran in front of them and then there was chocolate being spilt over the poor man in front of them. "Oh, I'm really sorry! Do you want me to..." He noticed Eloise dropping the cup and then his eyes went to the man they had spilt chocolate on. It was... no, it couldn't be. A whole year and then.... "Qianneng! It's you!"
Qianneng registered the hot bloom across his front before anything else. His parents and teachers told him growing up that he had the tendency to stay in his own head too often, and he did get into trouble for it sometimes. However, nothing like this had happened to him before. He looked down as his chest. Hot cocoa, judging from the smell. It was quickly becoming gummy and uncomfortable in the winter air. Looking up again, he was about to calm who was certainly an embarrassed person when he stopped cold. It was as if a frozen spike had been rammed down his spine, completely unrelated to the chilly weather around him. Eloise and Brett. The people he had abandoned without a word a year ago. He opened his mouth, but closed it just as suddenly. A stinging sensation welled up in the corners of his eyes. What could he even say?
Qianneng. There it was, that name. Somehow, hearing it bubble so easily from Brett's lips made the illusion in front of her so much more real. He was real, wasn't he? Of course he had to be; she could see the cocoa dripping down the front of his coat... disgusting, really. Mechanically, almost mindlessly, Eloise slowly pulled a clean kleenex out of her bag and pressed it almost gingerly to Qianneng's chest. Ostensibly to deal with the spill, more likely to make sure that he was really solid. She didn't know what this meant - he had gone missing, vanished as if he'd dropped through the ground, not a trace and not a single hint for where he'd gone, only his things looming in his forgotten room like a lantern of shadows across the house. And yet here he was. "Oh my god..." She could hear someone's words in her ears. Were they her own? "You..." Her gaze flicked over his frame, now, and she gave him a firmer poke with the napkin. Her eyes narrowed, taking in his expression. "Holy shit. It is you. Holy shit."
It seemed that both of them were rooted to the spot and unable to process what was going on. All Brett felt right now was an overwhelming relief that he hadn't died in the battle and that he seemed physically unharmed. A very good sign indeed. "I can't believe it's you! We thought you might have... you might have died with all... the Liberation situation...." His voice dropped, looking between Eloise and Qianneng. Where had he been all this time? Why hadn't he let them know he was at least okay? What if he wasn't the Ashkent Creek version?
Qianneng just stared as he watched Eloise pull out tissue paper and attempt to clean him. In the back of his mind, he felt that he should help her with this or maybe even push her away to deal with the mess himself, but he just stood there. He barely even registered her poking at him. Qianneng felt as if someone could knock him over with a firm shove and he would just topple over, not doing anything to prevent it. He turned his head slightly as he realized Brett was talking to him directly now. Right, how should he begin? “What?” he managed to croak out after what felt like a full minute.
Concern flickered over Eloise's face. Qianneng - if it was him - had uttered precisely one word since they'd bumped into him, and... and she was growing more and more unsettled with the way he was looking at them. There was an undeniable recognition in his eyes, but aside from that, the reaction wasn't entirely encouraging. What was this? A ghost possession? Some alternate dimension version of him? "Okay," she said firmly, resolsing to take the bull by the horns. She turned to look at Brett, meeting his eyes and seeming to alight on the same thought at the same time. With a nod, she took Brett's cup of cocoa and pressed it firmly into Qianneng's hands, closing his fingers around it. Then she took him by the elbow and carefully steered both of them out of the thickest part of the crowd. She wasn't above using a quick jolt of manifested fear to spook away an annoying teenager who'd been taking up half a bench, sending him scrambling away from them in panic, and pushed Qianneng into the seat instead. "Okay. First question. Do you recognise me?" she asked him, only just resisting the urge to wave a hand in front of his face.
Clearly, there was something going on with Qianneng and he wasn't responding to what Brett was asking. Either he was talking too fast or this really wasn't the Qianneng they knew. Wasn't exactly far from impossible in this town. Brett seemed to be the cup holder for Eloise as she took his drink and handed it to Qianneng. He was going to give it to him anyway but the fact of being dragged around didn't seem to be stopping today, even with this new revelation. He was certain that one teenager was staring at Eloise like she was some sort of ghost and he was half tempted to ask if she had just used her power on the poor guy but it seemed Eloise had decided to take control of the situation so Brett stood, rather like a spare part, near the two.
Qianneng didn’t fight it as Eloise put another cup of cocoa into his hands and guided him towards a bench. He sat down mechanically. Every one of his action seemed to be mechanic lately, as if his body was running on autopilot to deal with the shock he was facing. Grounding himself with the heat of the drink in his hands, he looked up at Eloise. “Yes of course I do,” he said softly. He took a breath to gather up the strength of his next sentence. “I am just surprised that you remember me…”
Eloise sputtered. She couldn't help it. She didn't know what she'd been expecting - a story of a possession, an abduction, some strange string of circumstances to explain why he'd just dropped off the face of the earth on them - but that had caught her entirely flat-footed. Her mouth moved to make noises, but instead, she just turned to Brett helplessly. Maybe he could come up with good words for this.
Surprised that they remembered him? What on earth would have to have happened to him to think that his friends wouldn't remember him? Brett decided he best take over from Eloise when she stared at him so helplessly and moved to sit beside Qianneng on the bench. "Of course we remember you. You're our friend and we were extremely worried about you. We're both very glad you're back and you're not... dead. But... are you okay?"
Qianneng blinked rapidly, struggling to come up with a response. "I'm, I'm..." he said, looking down into the cup again. He took another deep breath. He at least owed it to them to be honest, even if he wasn't ready to tell the whole truth. "No I'm not," he said, near a whisper. "Something bad happened and I needed to leave. I'm back now because I want to try to make things better. I don't know where to start though..." That was as close to the truth as he was comfortable getting right now.
Eloise was still having significant trouble finding words. She was overcome with confusing, conflicting emotions that she couldn't get a grasp on, shifting too quickly for her to process. Surprise? Disbelief? Relief? And something strangely close to anger, now. She hoped there was a good reason he hadn't so much as bothered to tell them he was alive, she really did. It slowly dawned on her that this meeting had been an accident, and if she hadn't spilled cocoa all over him, would he even have bothered to contact them, ever? Chest heaving, Eloise found herself patting his jacket mindlessly with the napkin a bit more before moving to grip his collar. It stung to think that they meant so little to him, but she fought not to let it overcome her. Not when she didn't know the whole story yet. God, she wanted to shake him so badly. Her fingers tightened in his collar. Rather than do something as violent as shaking, Eloise pulled him in to give him a crushing hug, sublimating the urge for violence into that, instead. She let her breath hiss out through her lips. "'It's okay," she told him, in a voice that made it clear it was very likely the farthest thing from okay, but that she was willing to pretend at it for the time being. "Welcome back." Maybe her voice broke around those two words a little, she wasn't sure. She didn't even care that she was probably getting cocoa stains over her coat right now. Cocoa stains could just merrily go to Hell.
Qianneng felt the wind get knocked out of him as Eloise pulled him into her vice grip of a hug. This wasn't the response he had been expecting. Yelling, definitely. Slapping, maybe. But hugging? Completely out of left field for him. He sighed and leaned slightly into the hug, wriggling out on of his arms to pat her on the back awkwardly. "Thank you," he sad softly. No, it wasn't okay and he didn't think he would be okay in a long time. But maybe soon he would feel okay enough to give them the explanation they truly deserved.
Eloise pulled back as soon as the impulse to strangle him seemed to be growing stronger than the impulse to hug him. "That does not mean I don't expect an explanation," she told him sternly, then turned to Brett with a slow, disbelieving grin. "Holy shit. Qianneng in the flesh. It's like some kind of literal Christmas miracle. We still have all your stuff, you know. Didn't... I mean, nobody showed up to pick it up," she said awkwardly, keeping a firm hand on the lapel of his jacket as if he might disappear.
Brett realised he didn't really need to ask if he was okay because he really knew he wasn't from the way he was acting. He wasn't going to press the point on what happened but he would eventually want him to explain why he had been gone for a whole year without even a phone call or a small note. He watched Eloise move to hug him, extremely glad that she had because the other male certainly seemed as if he needed some form of physical comfort right now and Brett was not the person for it. Brett gave Eloise a small smile but the concern was certainly an overriding feeling right now. "I think you should come back home with us. Where it's warm. I'll get soup prepared..."
Qianneng 's eyes widened as he realized what they were saying to him. Again, more unexpected things. They kept his things? Why would they do something like that if they didn't even know if he was alive? Qianneng would have much preferred it if they had sold his things; at least then they could have gotten something out of housing him. "Thank you for that," he said, still in disbelief, "It wasn't something you had to do." He glanced up at Brett, his wet jacket an uncomfortable reality. "I, I would like that, if it isn't too much trouble for you."
Brett shook his head."No, we didn't have to do it but we wanted to. You're our friend and even if we thought you... you might be dead, we wouldn't just throw your things away. We were waiting for either you or your family to pick the things up, but that didn't happen. It's your home too, Qianneng. Of course it isn't too much trouble. You can meet Matilda. She'll love you, I expect." The very thought that Qianneng might be too much trouble was insane. If anyone caused too much trouble in that house, it tended to be him and a line of blood. He still have the bleach marks to prove it. He should really paint over that some day.
Eloise nodded along fiercely and kept a tight grip on Qianneng's lapel. "Exactly." Now that the shock was fading, she couldn't stop something like a smile breaking out on her face. She had her friend back, something good had come of this Christmas that she'd never have dared to expect, and maybe now, things would get back a little closer to normal. "Welcome back, Qianneng."