Walking through the school hallway on a Monday morning was more difficult than usual. Eyes seemed to stick onto Yao for longer, their gaze following, their lips moving with whispers and snickers. On any other day, Yao might have ignored it. But with the warm memory of his clumsy kiss with Ivan, with the haunting of that troublesome camera click, he felt sure, almost certain, that all of Oldbrook knew. He picked up his pace, footsteps lighter than usual as he zipped through the crowd in an effort to get to Biology class before anyone could stop him.
He ducked into the Biology classroom, ignoring a piercing whistle from a group of boys out in the hallway. He shut the door behind him, finding a classroom that was almost full, and yet unusually quiet. He took his seat near the front with his eyes averted to the ground. His fingers trembled when he opened up his notebook to a fresh page.
They couldn't have already found out, could they? Surely not. Who was to say the whispers and murmurs behind his back were about him and Ivan? And as for the staring, the whistling, what was so new about that anyway? Yao was only being paranoid, that was all. What could a person do with a photo like that, anyway? Share it, and expose themselves as perverts for watching?
Yao had crossed out and rewritten the date several times by the time the bell rang – he couldn't think straight, and nothing was really making sense. There didn't even have to be a photo. What if he imagined that up, too?
He glanced up at the clock, wondering why class hadn't started yet. Everyone had gone quiet. The teacher was pacing around the front of the room, idly looking around to disguise the fact that she was taking glances at Yao. He felt his pulse quicken. Was it that obvious? Did he look that guilty? He squeezed the pencil in his hand wondering when she would finally break this awful silence. She stopped at her desk and glanced down at a folded newspaper. Yao leaned over, peering at the paper though he already had the sinking feeling that he knew what he would find.
A grainy, shadowy picture almost covered the entire front page. It was sloppy: the flash was much too strong, and the cameraperson had forgotten to move their finger away from the corner of the lens. But in that photo, illuminated by a much too bright light, was Yao and Ivan's faces, pressed together and smiling stupidly. Yao wished he could completely shrink into his seat, curl up into a ball so that maybe the painful knot in his stomach might ease.
The classroom door made a timid click open. Ivan slid into the room, glancing around sheepishly as he made his way to the seat next to Yao. He looked to Yao with a furrowed brow, probably wondering why it was so quiet. Yao's throat was too dry to explain.
'Braginsky. Wang.' The teacher sighed, folding the newspaper up into a tight roll in her hands. 'You're wanted in the Principal's office.'
Neither Yao nor Ivan had to say anything to each other to understand what was happening. Silently, they left the room with their gazes averted, keeping that way even through the hallway. Their teacher stood at the classroom door and watched them leave. When they had reached the office, Alfred, Arthur and Francis were already sitting in the waiting area. Two other boys were there, too, though Yao didn't recognize either of them.
Arthur, who had been pre-occupied staring into the space of the carpet, glared up at them and huffed out. 'You couldn't have saved it for the hotel room?'
Yao and Ivan quickly took their seats without saying a word, only glancing at each other, maybe in hope of comfort, only to find that they were both just as uncertain.
There was a tiny pop of sound in the room. Alfred had just smacked out a bubble of chewing gum. Noticing that he had Yao's attention, Alfred leaned forward and offered a small, aluminium wrapped stick.
'Want some?'
'No,' Yao said, the sound coming out as a wispy croak. Alfred shrugged and leaned back in his seat, a smile and an easy look on his face that Yao wasn't expecting. Alfred's eyes stuck onto him longer than needed, and it sparked sudden anger in Yao. That sugar-glazed smile, the cautionary words Alfred had not so subtly given to Yao and Ivan on the night before the tournament – they had been sold, that was what had happened. Alfred had sold them, who knows why, and here he had the gall to smile at Yao.
'Oh, enough with the meekness,' Arthur growled at Yao, sitting forward in his seat. 'Do you realise what this means for us? How you've completely and utterly destroyed our future prospects? Forget the bloody debate club, you've ruined us all academically, for life –'
'Will you shut it?' Yao snapped. He swallowed, his throat really itching for a glass of water. It was warm in here, and all eyes were sticking onto him, asking questions without saying them out loud. Maybe it was a bit bold, or maybe it didn't even matter anymore, but Ivan's hand reassuringly touched against his, reaching to hold when the office door opened and startled them all. Principal Gibson stood at the doorway, scanning them all with a brooding frown. He stopped at Yao.
'Yao Wang? Let's have a talk in my office.'
'Just me?'
The principal pushed the door open and waited for Yao. Yao glanced to the others for a quick moment before entering the office, his pulse quickening once again as he took a seat in front of the principal's desk. He didn't want to have to explain the photo, didn't want to hear from someone else what Yao had been telling himself already.
The principal pushed a folded newspaper forward on the desk. 'Wang, do you know what this looks like?'
Yao barely looked at the paper before responding quietly: 'Yes, sir.'
'And what does it look like?'
Yao glanced up at the principal, his brows pinching. How would he even say it?
The principal's voice sharpened. 'What kind of message does this picture give, Wang?'
'I-I don't know,' Yao blurted out. He almost felt sick with the way his face was burning up, with the deliberate pointed-ness of the way his last name was spoken. If humiliation was Principal Gibson's intention, he was getting a good head start. He shrugged when the principal's silence persisted. 'I don't know.'
The principal folded his arms and leaned forward on over the desk. 'You forget that you're more than just a foreigner here in Oldbrook. You're a student of its finest academy. You reflect it. And when word goes around that we have homosexuals at our establishment, how do you think that makes us look?'
'Bad.'
'That's right. Bad. Indecent. Immoral. You've left a stain on the Academy's reputation, and no amount of polishing is going to clear it up. We normally discipline students with unnatural tendencies like yours, though in this case the matter has gotten too far out of hand already.'
Would an apology be enough? Yao bit the inside of his cheek, his throat growing tight at the thought of facing expulsion. That was a mark on your record that never went away, a mark his parents would never fail to remind him of if he went home with that kind of news. If he pleaded, if he made some kind of deal – detention for a year, clean-up duty, a public apology, anything – would that be enough to keep him here?
'You can improve your chances by telling me the full-situation,' the principal continued. 'I understand that it's easy for boys your size and appearance to get pushed around. You're a good student, Wang, if not for this incident.' The principal's brow raised. 'It wouldn't be the first time a young man's been corrupted by an unnatural relationship.'
There it was again, this 'corruption', this 'subversion' that hung over Yao's relationship with Ivan. What was it that Alfred had called it once? Subversion to Ivan's communist ways? It sounded ridiculous, because if anything, Yao had been all the better for his friendship with Ivan, had been made to feel kind and wanted and, strangely, he had been made to feel normal. The principal could call it whatever he wanted, but Yao wouldn't pretend that kiss had been anything but his own choosing. Dangerously, he felt a spark of defiance.
'Nothing like that, sir,' Yao said, looking the principal straight in the eyes despite also wanting to leave the room straightaway instead. 'If anything, I initiated it.'
The principal's frown deepened, staying quiet for a moment as though Yao would change his mind and revise his statement. 'Fine, then. The disciplinary office will decide what to do with you – if you're lucky, you'll only get a referral and detention for the rest of term. Until then, you're dismissed early today. Your parents have already been called and will be picking you up at twelve. Fewer classroom disturbances this way, you see.'
Yao felt a wave of nausea. 'They're picking me up?'
'Don't worry.' The principal made an attempt at a smile with his weathered face. 'I'll fill them in on your situation. Including what you've told me. You're dismissed, Wang.'
Yao got up on weak legs and left the office. In that moment, he felt almost certain that he would rather stay cooped up in a locker than face his parents.
.
'Have a seat, Jones.'
Alfred plopped down onto the seat, sighing as he prepared himself for the principal to go on repeat with the same speech he'd given Yao. Not that Alfred was planning on listening anyway. He had a vague idea of what was to come and just wanted to get it over with. He had things to do. Poppy was in desperate need of a polish, and those newspaper clippings wouldn't cut themselves out. Apparently there had also been a sighting of a UFO down by the waterfront –
'How is your father?'
Alfred blinked out of his gaze, focusing on Principal Gibson seated across. He slowed his chewing to a halt. Gibson didn't seem to notice or care about the gum. 'My dad? He's fine. Why?'
'I spoke with him the other week.'
'About me?'
'No, not really. As you already know, your father has done a lot for this school. The board of directors greatly appreciate his contributions. He was considering making a donation for a new library.' Gibson paused, looking at Alfred straight in the eyes. 'Provided that students actually use it.'
'Oh. Yeah.' Alfred leant back, resuming with the chewing of his gum and wondering when he'd get to the bit where they slapped him on the wrist with a ruler and let him go. It was already punishment enough to sit in that waiting room with Arthur. Alfred had made such an idiot out of himself last night – what was he even thinking? A dream like that was never meant for anyone else's ears. It was one of those secrets that a man carried to his grave, and now Arthur knew. God, it must have embarrassed Arthur, too, having to sit there with someone crying on them like child. Arthur was probably disgusted, both at the tears and snot and whatever crazy hooey Alfred was spewing out –
Gibson slammed the desk with his palm. 'Spit that gum out!'
Alfred froze. 'Sorry.'
Gibson held up a small bin and waited for Alfred to spit his gum out. 'As I was saying, Jones, you're a… You're a fine Oldbrook boy. The pride of this school, Alfred.' Something like a grimace twitched on Gibson's face. With a sigh, it was gone. 'The world is your oyster if you'd only accept it.'
Alfred smiled weakly. Pride – it sounded funny so close to his name. He'd been making a habit of bunking classes since the 6th grade. The only tests he'd ever done well in were retakes. He was a nuisance to every classmate and teacher. And on top of that… he'd pushed away the one person who ever had a chance at understanding him. Pride? Only through his father's name.
'We already spoke last time about your association with the… 'debate' club, Jones.' Gibson rubbed his brow. 'And I'll say what I told you then: this is no bunch to stick around with. For your own sake and the school's, you must cut your ties with them. 'Lavender lads' or not, you have no business mixing in with foreigners so much. It doesn't look natural. People wonder why you can't get along with students like yourself, why you must resort to making friends with the foreign students. Each time I see you in my office, it seems as though you've strung along some new oriental or continental or any other walk of life than your own –'
Was it possible to forget? Alfred drifted his gaze out to the window, wondering what might happen if he were to pretend last night never happened. If he bothered Arthur with a half-truth UFO story, and grinned brightly with pretend excitement. Would Arthur play along?
Gibson cleared his throat. 'Jones –'
'Can I go now?'
'When will you let yourself fit in, for once?'
Alfred sunk back into his seat, resisting the urge to roll his eyes at a dumb question like that. Fit in. It was more like being squeezed out. But that was something Alfred couldn't care less about. He had enough of all this. No more Nancy boy nonsense, no more debate club, no more running around trying to get people to like him, no more struggling to get along with Arthur more than what was humanly possible. Life from here on out would be an easy cruise.
'Don't you worry about that, Gibs.' Alfred got up and stretched his arms. He grinned and gave a mock-salute. 'I'll see you around.'
He left the office hearing the principal's frustrated sigh. And with that, Alfred was ready to pretend the past few months had never happened at all.
.
Ivan's scarf was wrung tight in his clasped hands, the fabric now dampening in his grip. Yao had been so pale when he came out the office; he had almost looked like he was ready to bolt out the room, had Ivan not drawn him to take a seat. And every time he made a gentle nudge to Yao's shrunken frame and asked if he was okay, he only got a tight-lipped nod. They'd go back to class together, Ivan reassured him, they'd figure something out. Still, Yao stayed quiet.
Maybe Yao could hear that Ivan didn't fully believe in these reassurances either. Maybe that was why he seemed so frightened. They had done something wrong and there was no taking it back. No amount of apology or pleading could erase it. They would have to carry this mark for as long as Oldbrook existed. And Ivan, he did this, he broke down in that hallway like a child and put them in that situation, had been toying this entire time with something far more serious than he anticipated. He had been worried that his sisters would not approve. But in this waiting room, it was clear that far more was at stake.
The door clicked open. The principal's heavy sigh escaped through as Alfred shuffled out with an odd grin on his face. The principal called out from his desk: 'Get Braginsky in here –'
Alfred shut the door. He paused when he walked past Ivan and turned to look at him. It was then that Ivan noticed the grin was worn thinly over Alfred's face, like a sheet. It was the eyes, maybe. They didn't match the smile.
'Principal wants you.'
Ivan got out of his seat and entered the office, the principal waiting for him at the desk. The principal instructed him to take a seat. Ivan sat in the chair opposite the principal, his heart faintly but quickly pulsing in his ears. He wondered if this would be anything like debate, where people threw sharp questions at you, and you had to scramble just to answer them coherently.
'How have you been finding Oldbrook, Ivan?'
Ivan blinked. He didn't expect a courteous question like that. Distrusting it, he fumbled to answer. 'G-Good, sir.'
The principal nodded and smiled weakly. 'Good. That's good.' He sighed. 'Now listen, I'm going to have to get down to the matter at heart here. You're a valuable student, Braginsky. When I found out that you were to receive our scholarship, I'll admit I was a little concerned. You were very quiet. Your teachers were worried you wouldn't make it here.'
Ivan swallowed and felt a timid smile creep up on his lips, remembering how some of his teachers, the principal included, spoke very slow English to him – despite it being on record that he'd been in America since he was eleven, and understood it perfectly well enough.
'We were pleasantly surprised to see you achieve grades higher than most of our finest, long-attending students. You came here barely able to speak English, and yet here you are now with the highest marks in Maths and Science. You're our greatest success story.'
'Thank you,' Ivan murmured.
'But now?' The principal held up the newspaper. 'These are grounds for revoking scholarships. You must realise that. No one at home is paying to keep you here. It's completely up to the board of directors.'
Ivan felt his face grow hot, already feeling the shame of when he'd have to go home and tell his sisters this – that he'd dashed away the chance to be here at Oldbrook Academy, an education his family could have never afforded had it not been for the scholarship. And when Katyusha found out why Ivan had dashed it away, she would weep. Ivan was sure of it, she would weep because her brother was yet another one of those perverts in the newspaper.
Was this what had sent Yao pale before? The thought of going home? If it was, Ivan could understand it.
The newspaper slapped down on the desk. 'I think you understand very well, Braginsky, that at least here in America, behaviour like this is intolerable. Your academic performance might just save you, but I wouldn't count on the board of directors to feel any sympathy for you when they make their decision to keep you here or not. Until then, you'll be dismissed early from classes today. I trust that you'll be off school grounds by twelve. And try to stay away from Mr. Wang, if you know what's best for you.'
.
Arthur wished for a pair of ear plugs.
Alfred was sitting across from him in the waiting room, chewing his gum like a ticking clock, counting the seconds of terse silence. Every 'smack' was a not-so-gentle reminder that Alfred was here, not teary-eyed or sullen, but chipper and restless. Alfred's feet tapped and danced on the floor in impatience, and he kept making conversation with Francis like they were waiting for the bus and not the principal's punishment. Occasionally, his eyes met Arthur's, only for them both to dart their glances away like they had just been stung. Arthur wasn't sure what to make of it.
Perhaps it had all been forgotten. Perhaps, after the lake, Alfred had gone home and laughed it off, had realized that it was only their friendship he had missed, had slept in peace because it was nothing more than that. Arthur hoped so, because he certainly hadn't. In agitated guilt he kept waking up through the night, suddenly overwhelmed with an imagined scenario in which he hadn't rejected Alfred, in which the evening hadn't ended in tears.
And now to find out that Alfred had sold them out? Arthur wasn't stupid – he could see the dirty looks Lovino, one half of the newspaper club duo, was giving Alfred. If he had to guess, he would say that Alfred had made some convincing salesman pitch on the headline. Maybe even tipped Lovino and Feliciano as to where to get their front page photo. Who knew why or what for, but it wouldn't be the first time Alfred sabotaged the club.
When Arthur was finally called in, he took a deep breath, ready to spill out his defence to Principal Gibson.
'Sir –'
'Before you start, Kirkland,' the principal interrupted, 'let me make my case.'
Arthur pursed his lips. He listened through an expected lecture on public decency, curtly nodding through a speech about the reputation of Oldbrook Academy and how its 'character' is only as good as those of its students, how Arthur's chances in getting into a prestigious university were close to nil now that he had this mark of suspicious behaviour on his record. Except –
'I'm not even involved!'
Principal Gibson paused and gave Arthur a stern look. 'You're in the middle of it all, Kirkland, and there's no denying it.'
'So I happen to run the club those two are in.' Arthur pointed to the newspaper on the desk. 'Why does that implicate me in that? Sir, I run Oldbrook's best performing debate club since 1945! We won second place at state finals!'
'Yes, and according to this newspaper article, only second place due to all the time spent frolicking around.'
'Newspaper article? It's a bloody tabloid!'
Principal Gibson raised a judgemental brow at him. Arthur cleared his throat and kept his voice level.
'It's a tabloid, sir.'
'I'm aware of the school paper's reputation. But as you must know, where there's smoke –'
'There's fire, yes, I'm aware.'
Principal Gibson's mouth twitched. 'We may even have evidence of fire in this 'tabloid', as you call it. Have you read it?' In response to Arthur's puzzled frown, the principal picked up the newspaper and began to read it out: 'A student, who has asked to remain anonymous, claims to have seen Arthur Kirkland, the head of the debate club, hurrying a man into his room from his balcony window at odd hours into the night sometime in October. Perhaps school and leisure got mixed up along the way to give us a club that was more secret rendezvous than it was debate.'
Arthur's ears grew hot. 'I'd hardly call that evidence.'
'And I would agree with you on that. But the damage is already done, and it will continue on if we don't take action. We don't take these offences lightly, Kirkland. As an adult, you could face jail-time.'
'Is that what you told Alfred, too?' Arthur snapped. 'Or was your pocket too full of his father's money to care?'
Principal Gibson's eyes narrowed. He leaned forward over his desk. 'Maybe you should start bargaining for how much longer you can stay here instead. My patience is running thin, and so is my tolerance for your talking back.'
Arthur sighed through his nose and relented, if only for those few minutes in which he reverted back to formalities, carefully apologizing and showing fake remorse for things he didn't do. Whether or not Principal Gibson bought it didn't matter. In Oldbrook, it was all about appearances. Arthur would have to attend detention for the rest of term. He, and the others, would have to make a formal apology in the school paper's final publication. The debate club would be disbanded, and any further suspicious behaviour would result in expulsion. A neat little referral would go into his school record. Universities would think twice before accepting him.
Walking out of the principal's office, Arthur was met with curious glances. He ignored them and took his seat. Francis was called into the office, leaving Alfred without someone to pre-occupy himself with. In classic Alfred-fashion, he leaned over towards Arthur, making an excited face at him and opening his mouth to speak.
'Hey… Arthur. You're not going to believe what I saw last night on the way home.'
Arthur blinked, noticing that despite the jittery attitude, Alfred's eyes never quite met his. Perhaps Alfred felt guilty for selling the club out, perhaps he felt cut open and exposed to the light like he was in that nightmare of his. But what was certain was that neither of them wanted to talk about it. In some way, this was their forgiveness of each other – to forgive, and most importantly, to forget. And so, without failing to irritably sigh as Arthur might have once done on a school bus long ago, he replied: 'Try me.'
.
Yao clutched at his stomach, puke almost rising up his throat when the lunch bell rang. He leaned back against the wall of the bathroom stall, withholding a nauseous groan and wishing for time to go by faster – or even better, backwards. Back before the principal had called him in for a humiliating talk, before this morning had ever happened, before he had ever done something as foolish as kiss Ivan out in the open.
He watched Ivan's shifting shadow lurking just outside the stall, shuffling around with uncertainty. Yao had forgotten that wherever he went, Ivan would follow. They had both gone back to class after the principal finished with their talks, though Yao couldn't stand a minute of it. A student sitting behind him had kept touching him, refusing to leave him alone, and all around Yao could feel eyes on him. He felt ill and left for the bathroom, for whatever few minutes of class were left. He wanted this opportunity to breathe, for a moment, to have this small and safe square of space just to himself. But now booming voices bombarded the hallway outside; soon they would be pouring in.
Ivan knocked gently on the door. 'Yao, are you okay?'
Yao unlocked the stall with trembling hands and opened it by a peek, allowing Ivan's towering frame to peer in. 'I think it's best if we stay in here,' Yao croaked out. Every burst of laughter from the corridors set his stomach into a tighter coil. His hands itched to shut the door and lock it, had it not been for Ivan's worried face pressed through the doorway.
'Aren't your parents picking you up around now? They'll be outside –'
'They can wait,' Yao snapped. He flinched when someone started singing in the hallway. 'Just, get in here. Or grab another stall, I don't care. They'll come in here and try to mess with us if we don't get out of sight.'
'Then let's go outside.' Ivan reached his hand in to touch Yao's. A sweet but sad smile tugged at Ivan's lips. 'It's okay. We've already been told off once. What will one more lecture from our families do?'
'A lot. And if you're so keen on going, fine. Stay out there.'
Ivan protested as soon as Yao started closing the door on him. He managed to get a shoulder squeezed in, a helpless look on his face when he asked to Yao to let him in. Yao complied, opening the door just enough to let Ivan in. He shut and locked the door promptly after, pulling Ivan to the side of the stall. 'Stay quiet and keep your feet on this side, so they don't see you too easily. And duck your head down.'
'How long are we staying here for?'
Yao shrugged, crossing his arms and shrinking himself into the space beside Ivan. Ideally – forever. Sure, it was a grimy bathroom stall, and danger lurked just outside. But at least he had Ivan's company, and a locked door to keep anything or anyone else out. Pressing his shoulder to Ivan's arm, he could almost glean some sort of comfort from this moment, that, if anything, he wasn't alone in this tiny prison.
Ivan sighed softly, shifting to reach his arm around and run his fingers through Yao's ponytail. 'Yaochka…' A pleasant chill ran down the nape of his neck, the feeling at odds with the anxious cloud hanging over his head. There was no escape, was there? One way or another, they would find themselves caught yet again.
'Ivan –'
'Someone wrote on your back.'
Yao looked to Ivan. 'What do you mean?' He craned his neck as far as he could towards his back. 'How? What is it?'
'It's red crayon, or something… Lipstick, maybe.' Ivan rubbed away at the back of Yao's shirt. Yao made a growled sigh. The idiot sitting behind him and touching him must have done this, just before Yao left the room. No wonder he heard a few stifled snorts and gasps when he left for the bathroom.
'What does it say?'
Ivan hummed, pretending to be lost in thought to buy time. He continued to scrub at the markings. Yao turned around.
'What does it say?'
'I don't want to say.'
'Tell me.'
'No. It's terrible.'
'It's written on my back, I should know what it says –'
Bustling voices entered the bathroom. Yao froze, his heart immediately overworking itself, his pulse throbbing hard in his ears.
'Where'd the little faggot go?'
Yao held his breath, taking careful steps further away from the stall door, his heels pressed against the wall. He watched black-polished shoes enter view – one pair after the other.
'You think he's here?' Brandon asked, mockingly. Of course, he knew exactly who was in this stall. He was playing games, savouring them like a man preparing for an indulgent meal.
The stall door shook violently. Yao thought he might choke on nausea right then and there. The entire stall seemed to shake – or was he shaking? It seemed to stop when Ivan placed his hand on his shoulder.
'Go,' Ivan whispered in his ear, pointing at the gap between this stall and the next. With Yao's small frame, he could fit. But before he could ask how Ivan was going to get through, the stall door violently shook again.
Brandon laughed. 'You sure know how to make for a chase, don't you?'
'Go,' Ivan insisted. 'I'll catch up with you later.'
Yao nodded, falling to shaky knees and hands. He crawled on his stomach, squeezing through beneath the stall divider, crawling beneath the next, and the next, and the next. He climbed out, his knees wobbling as he stood up. He saw Brandon and his gang bunched up outside the stall at the end, one of them now climbing it. Yao banged his fist against a stall.
'Over here,' Yao yelled, though part of him wished he hadn't. Brandon's group turned to face him, shoes squeaking against tile as they charged towards him. Heart feeling like it was stuck in his throat, Yao made a dash for the hallway, running from the following, stomping footsteps behind him. He pushed through crowds, shoved past teachers, kept on putting one frenzied step in front of the other until he reached doors, until the pierce of cold air hit his lungs and his feet were thumping against pavement. He didn't know where he was going, only that he was running away, and anyplace over the horizon would do. He could still hear a pair of footsteps trailing his, the very sound keeping him going – until he tripped on an uprooted sidewalk tile. He skidded down onto the ground, his hands and knees scraping against the cement. Ivan's voice called out.
'Yao!'
A breath of relief burst out of Yao's lips. He didn't bother to get up, his body wanting to fall limp and rest there on the cold pavement, to give into it. Distantly, he heard Ivan's unanswered questions of concern, hovering hands attempting to guide him back up from the ground. Yao tiredly grabbed onto Ivan's arm and pulled himself up. He looked at Ivan for bruises or cuts. There were none.
'You're okay…'
'Yes, I'm okay. You're not,' Ivan panted, taking Yao's hands and turning them palm-up to reveal reddened grazes. Yao yanked his hands away, checking the road for passers-by or Brandon's gang. Worse still – his parents might have seen him running. He glanced over the cars in the distant school parking lot, looking for his father's car. 'Yao…'
'We should go.'
'Go where? We need to both go home. Our families are waiting.'
Yao bit his bottom lip, hating the way it was quivering. He shrugged. 'I…' He could already hear what his father's shouts would sound like in his ear, how his mother might spit at him in disgust – just like they did to his cousin Mei when she had eloped with an American soldier. It was too much thinking about going home, too breath-shortening and shoulder-sinking humiliating. 'I can't.'
Ivan's gaze on him softened. 'You can stay with me if you want.'
Yao shook his head. 'You probably have it as bad as me anyway.'
'Nyet, Yao, you're trembling. My sisters, they'll deny it all for at least a week. I'm fine. And I won't tell them you're with me. You can just stay in my room!'
'For how long?' Yao asked numbly, not believing he was even having this conversation. A car zipped by and his gaze followed it to see if he recognised the driver. Was he really planning to run away? If he disappeared, he wondered, would his parents hate him more? Or would they know? Would they understand how stomach-wrenchingly terrified he was, of everything, of everyone? Would they greet him with worried embraces instead of shouts if Yao went home after missing for a few days?
'As long as you need.' A smile glowed faintly on Ivan's lips, masking the fear for the both of them. It was as though all of Oldbrook was falling apart around them, the formalities and the just-barely-friendly faces crumbling into snarls and slurs. Yao didn't know what he would do tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after that. All he knew was that if he went home today, he might never see Ivan again.
.
Ivan opened the front door to his frigidly cold home, cautiously peering in before entering. His sister Natalya didn't finish school until three, and Katyusha always arrived back from work in the late afternoon, so the house would be empty for at least a few more hours. He ushered Yao in.
'No one's home. You can stay in my room when my sisters get back.'
Yao nodded, still looking pale and despondent as he awkwardly paced around the tiny hallway. His trousers were dusted with dirt at the knees, and his shirt was damp with sweat and clinging to his upper back, where the red writing was smudged. Ivan offered to lend him some clean clothes, to which Yao politely – and pridefully – refused for a decent few minutes before giving in. Ivan picked out the smallest clothes he could find and left Yao to change in private in his room.
When the door creaked open, Yao peeked his face through the doorway with a sigh.
'What is it?' Ivan asked, unable to help a smile when he sensed that Yao was irritated. It brought a colour to Yao's cheeks, something healthier and more alive than the cold fear that had taken over before.
'Nothing,' Yao said. 'I should have expected it.'
'Can I see?'
Yao drew his lips in a tight line of resignation, stepping back and opening the door fully. Ivan resisted the urge to smile wider, though it was more out of overwhelming fondness than amusement, of badly wanting to collect Yao up into his arms. Yao had chosen only to change his shirt in the end, into an oversized red sweater that reached below Yao's hips. The sleeves hung past Yao's knuckles, and perhaps in self-consciousness of that, Yao crossed his arms.
'Don't laugh.'
'I'm not.'
'You're smiling!'
Ivan shrugged. 'You just look… really comfortable.'
'Of course I do. I might as well be wearing a blanket for a shirt.'
Ivan couldn't hold in his chuckle after that, spotting with a glimmer of hope a small reciprocating smile on Yao's lips. 'I can give you a scarf to match,' Ivan said, to which Yao only scoffed and playfully pushed him.
The rest of the afternoon passed by as though it had been any other day spent together. They gave in to playing a few games of Red Hands, albeit Ivan found himself holding Yao's grazed hands more than he did slapping them. And when they grew bored of that, they fooled around in the kitchen making something to eat. Ivan made sure to keep him distracted by any means possible, from sharing the tiniest childhood memory to even making a sandwich talk in his desperate attempt to make Yao laugh a little. It worked, though the ordeal left him feeling both giddy and embarrassed.
But the question at heart couldn't stay unspoken for long. Perhaps Ivan had taken a moment too long picking a board game out of his shelf; when he sat on his bed, Yao had a pensive look on his face.
'Isn't it making you nervous? Waiting for your sisters to come home?'
Ivan set the board game between them on the bed and started setting it out. At the reminder that his sisters would be home soon, his stomach jittered a bit. 'A little. But it's easy to forget about it since you're here.'
'What do you think they'll say?'
Ivan shrugged, wanting to get back to the game and pretend all this wasn't happening. Yao's gaze on him refused to let him. 'Katyusha will think it's all a mistake, probably. If I'm lucky, she'll keep believing that. But that's optimistic. Once she realizes, I'll be hearing about it from her for weeks. She might think I'm ill. Natalya won't ever treat me the same, either.'
Yao's eyes softened, placing his hand lightly on Ivan's. But it didn't make him sad, knowing his sisters would treat him differently. It didn't break his heart, because he knew that despite the shame and anger his sisters would feel knowing about Ivan, they would still love him, somewhere beneath the surface. They'd gone through everything together. They'd survived their escape from the Germans who had ravaged their home village, had made up between each other the nurturing their parents could no longer give them, had made it through together in what could have been the cruellest and loneliest childhood. No newspaper headline would erase that. Ivan wasn't sure if Yao could say the same about his own family.
'What about you?' Ivan asked. 'What do you think your family will say?'
Yao sighed, pulling his hand away to rub at his face. 'I'm more worried about what they'll do. It's humiliating enough going home now that they know…'
Ivan furrowed his brows. 'What will they do?'
Yao played the question off with a limp, dismissive smile. 'I don't know. Maybe I'm overthinking it, but I keep imagining that they'll ship me off somewhere. Anywhere but here – anywhere to keep me away from them. They'll take my photos down and pretend I didn't exist. It'll be like how my cousin disappeared. My parent's will say stuff like, our only son, as if my younger brother was always the firstborn. My brother will have to play pretend, too. And one day when I come back to visit, they'll only give me blank stares. I'll be…'
Yao blinked, glanced away and chuckled. His eyes were glassy with the promise of tears.
'You can be with me,' Ivan finished his sentence, earning a watery look from Yao. 'We'll be each other's family.'
Yao swallowed, wiping his own tears away with his palms before they could fall. He exhaled a shaky laugh. 'You're too sweet, Vanya.'
Ivan leaned over, pulling Yao into a hug before any more tears could spill. His chest fluttered when Yao hugged back, smaller shoulders melting and sinking against his chest like they were wanting to disappear up into Ivan. Ivan hadn't lied or exaggerated when he said he would be Yao's family. He would hide Yao away in his room permanently if he had to, would earn enough money after graduation to buy themselves a small house of their own, a little haven where cruel outsiders had no place. He'd make a habit of holding Yao like this, with Yao's chin hooked over his shoulder and their warm, beating chests pressed together.
He could have stayed like that for an entire afternoon, had it not been for the unsettling sound of someone chopping with a knife in the kitchen.
'Who is that?' Yao murmured.
'Probably one of my sisters.' Ivan pulled away, worried that his sisters had come home early and overheard them. 'I'll go check.'
Ivan slipped out of his room and gently shut the door behind him. He carefully made his way down the steps, eyeing the clock in the living room and noting with relief that it was ten past three. Natalya must have just gotten home from school. He walked into the kitchen with as relaxed a face as he could muster. Over the kitchen counter, Natalya was chopping up cabbage. A single icy glance shot up at him.
'Grate the carrots.'
Ivan didn't hesitate to getting to work on grating the carrots, though in his head he replayed Natalya's demand and wondered if it was accusatory or just her usual bluntness. He didn't dare to ask if she knew what had happened at school.
'You left a mess before,' Natalya spoke up, pausing her knife. 'When did you have time to make something?'
'Right after I got back. From school,' Ivan replied, quickly. 'I was hungry.'
'Oh.' Natalya scraped the knife against the chopping board. She didn't say anything, but Ivan knew she suspected something. He hurried to finish grating the carrots.
'Done!' Ivan turned to make his escape from the kitchen – only to be stopped when Natalya grabbed his sleeve.
'The beetroot.'
Ivan glanced at the counter, where Natalya had set out all the ingredients for dinner. Some of which, were very deliberately placed near Ivan's chopping board. She intended to keep him here until dinner was ready, it seemed. He returned to his workspace, now grating the beets under Natalya's watchful eye. He had the unnerving sense that she could be onto him.
By the time dinner was almost ready, the winter sky had darkened and the door made its familiar click of the lock as Katyusha came home from work. Usually, the sound was followed by Katyusha's relieved sigh, and a cheery but tired greeting. This time, there was neither. She closed the door behind her, shed off her coat and bag, and looked at Ivan from the kitchen doorway for what could have been the longest moment of his life.
'Ivan Ivanovich, what trouble have you mixed yourself into?'
Ivan swallowed. 'I haven't.'
'Don't lie! I get a call in the middle of work telling me you've – And then you lie to me?' Katyusha strode into the kitchen. It was in her few and rare moments of anger that she reminded Ivan most of their mother, though somehow to hear sweet and gentle Katyusha close to yelling was far more terrifying. 'You're better than this.'
Natalya looked at Ivan, her brows furrowed. 'What happened?'
Ivan shifted his gaze away. 'I'm sorry.'
'So is it true then?' Katyusha asked. 'What the principal told me?'
Ivan nodded and kept his eyes glued to the floor, not wanting to see either of their expressions.
'What happened?' Natalya pressed. Katyusha ignored her and approached Ivan, softening her voice.
'But why, Vanya?'
Ivan shrugged.
'Was it an accident? Were you… were you drunk? Did someone tell you to do it? Did your friend play a joke on you? You can tell me –'
'I don't want to talk about it.'
'You have to.' Katyusha's brows pinched together. She grabbed Ivan's shoulders. 'Vanya, this could ruin your life. Tell me it was a mistake!'
'Dinner will go cold,' Natalya said, saving Ivan from having to say anything – for now. She touched Katyusha's arm, and spoke with a tenderness she only ever used to console either of them. 'Let's just eat. We'll sort this out later.'
Nothing more had been said after that, and the silence persisted all the way throughout dinner. Ivan had hoped for escape when he finished dinner and excused himself from the table – it was quickly dashed away when Katyusha told him to sit back down, and for Natalya to go wash the dishes in the kitchen. She wanted a 'private talk', one which turned into a long-winded back-and-forth on whether Ivan had wanted that kiss. Every time Ivan mustered up the courage to tell her in plain words that he did, or that no, it wasn't forced, she found a new factor to blame. Loneliness, peer-pressure, alcohol, stress. She even asked him if this was all because he was too shy, if maybe he was scared to ask a girl out and Yao was the easy option –
'I'm tired.'
And with that, Katyusha gave up, sighed, and told Ivan to just go to bed. He glanced at the clock in the living room. It was almost ten – had it really been several hours since dinner? It was no surprise he was exhausted. He slipped back into his room and shut the door, ready to whisper his apologies to Yao for being so late in returning, and forgetting to bring him food on top of that. He paused, noticing that Yao had made himself comfortable on Ivan's bed; curled up on his side, with shoulders making soft rises with each quiet breath. He was reminded of the hotel room, of watching Yao in his troubled sleep a few feet away, their beds right next to each other yet being unable to bridge that gap out of fear of being caught.
There was a chill in the room. He saw that the window had been opened, perhaps when Yao had gotten bored waiting or when the room got too stuffy. But now the entire room was cold enough to send Ivan shivering, so he shut the window and crew the curtains closed. He carefully crawled onto the bed and leaned over to see if Yao was asleep.
Yao's eyes were shut, his face peaceful in a way he'd never seen before. Not even a pinch of his brows, or the pensive focus of his eyes, the pursing of his lips – right now, Yao was without worry. It made Ivan feel warm at the thought that Yao was comfortable enough to fall asleep in his room, knowing Ivan would be coming back.
He changed into his pyjamas, shut the light, and curled up beside Yao, nuzzling his face into the dark mess of hair loosened and sprawled out on the pillow. He told himself he would stay exactly like this, wouldn't move an inch so Yao wouldn't wake up. It was a mere moment later that he allowed himself to move one arm out to wrap around Yao. And the next, he bargained for one leg to curl up and press against Yao's; it promptly became two. Before he knew it, he was holding Yao blissfully close to him, touching from head to toe – and had woken him up in the process.
Yao sighed and rolled over onto his back, a slight frown on his brow. His eyes were still closed.
'Sorry,' Ivan whispered.
Yao opened his eyes by a peek. 'You took so long…'
'I know. Go back to sleep, Yaochka.'
Yao shook his head, his dark irises now watching him, blinking softly like sleep might overtake him again at any moment. Ivan's heart fluttered in his chest, only now nervous about lying like this with Yao, with their limbs still half-tangled and their voices down to whispers.
'Vanya, I was thinking…'
'Hm?'
'We should write to each other.'
Ivan felt his fluttering heart sink. 'Why?'
'Why not?'
'I mean, why would we need to? Where are you going?'
'I don't know. Somewhere. Wherever my parents send me.'
'You don't know how they'll react when you go home. Maybe they'll let you stay here.'
Yao fell quiet, for a few seconds only breathing softly. Resigned, his voice sounded out gentler now. 'Maybe.' Yao's hand fumbled up to touch his face, cool fingertips tracing Ivan's brow and jawline. There was relief in the touch, fondness in how slack and trusting Yao was with him in this moment. Ivan didn't want to think it was the last, or one of the few left, but the way Yao so easily tilted his head to press a kiss to his chin made him think this was so. Ivan closed his eyes, cupping Yao's hand when the kiss lingered, when lips hesitated before pressing more firmly. The sheets rustled as Yao propped himself up to lean over Ivan, hair tumbling over and tickling his face when their lips met.
Ivan melted, felt like he was unravelling from head to toe in this embrace. A delightful shiver ran through him with every soft smack of their lips together, his chest stirring with every content sigh easing out of Yao. His heart felt like it was trembling, almost leaping when Yao's hands smoothed over his chest and stomach, travelling just the slightest bit further down with each stroke. When their hips came together and Ivan felt that the excitement was mutual, he instinctively jolted away in shyness.
'Yao –'
'I'm sorry –'
'No, please stay like that…' Ivan whispered, pulling Yao closer and feeling certain that if the light had been on, his face would be visibly flushed for Yao to see. He could hear Yao's breathy smile in the darkness as they resumed their timid touches, growing more confident with each encouraging murmur, more playful with each stifled nervous laugh. But among the exhilarating thrill of touching Yao this intimately, there was the overhanging feeling that this would not only be the first, but the last. It was all too precious, and all too fleeting. Every capture of the lips, every yearning arch and curl of Yao's body beneath his touch, every shared breath down to Yao's soft, little gasp in his ear and the clawing of his fingers into Ivan's arms –
'Goodnight, Vanya.'
Like this, their time together was coming to a close already. Now lying on his side, Ivan was barely able to keep his drowsy eyes open to see Yao curled up next to him, long after he had caught his breath and made himself comfortable in the bend of Ivan's embrace. His arm was tucked away in Yao's hold, open palm lazily kissed by tired, sated lips.
Ivan swallowed, fighting the heavy fall of his eyelids. He could stay here, for a bit more, for a few minutes more…
'Goodnight, Yaochka…'
Without ever wanting to, he slipped away into the night.
