[Lin Mansion — September 15, 10:25 PM]
The car came up the east drive and stopped. The engine went quiet under Lin Weiwei's hand.
She had driven the whole way back. Beside her, Lin Feng sat still, his body pulling toward sleep. The whole ride was quiet save for a few stolen glances from Lin Weiwei.
The moment the car stopped, she killed the headlights. Then she opened the driver's seat door and rushed toward Lin Feng's side.
Before he could open the passenger door, she already opened it for him. "Big Brother, we're home!" she said, reaching out a hand for him to take.
For a moment, Lin Feng stopped, looking at her hand, then at her face. He then smiled and shook his head. "Okay… Thanks for the drive."
He then stepped out of the car, his eyes landing on the sky for a moment.
It wasn't dark.
It was already past ten, and the sky over the mansion was still bright — not the orange wash of a city at night, but a high, even paleness, like a very long afternoon that had forgotten to end.
On the sky sat islands of color, soft and stationary, the way very high clouds sit when there's no wind to move them.
Across the bright 10 PM sky were zeppelins. There were so many of them, some flying high above, others stretching for what seemed like kilometers. Colorful, bright, drifting above like flying whales.
The moon hung in it, fat and a little fuzzy at the edge, brighter than it had any right to be, absent of the lunar seas that marked his moon and in its place was a hazy blanket covering white and pale gold.
As if it was reminding him that he's a universe away from Earth.
His gaze wandered across the new world he was in, then drifted down past the main house to the building behind it.
There lay a building. Though it was closer to a shed, and inside was what looked like a boiler made of glass. Through the glass he could see the rods — slightly yellowish, metallic, upright, half-submerged in water that churned without anything stirring it.
Steam curled off the vents along the roofline and rose pale against the pale sky. For half a second the water flickered. A faint blue shimmer, there and then not there, gone before he could decide he'd seen it.
From there, he could hear a slight hum of machinery, the sound of steel moving as heated water moved the gears inside.
He watched it.
Beside him and Lin Weiwei, the driver came around to take the keys and did not glance at the building once. The two guards at the gate stood with their backs to it.
The driver then took the car away, the guards walking away after the car left, leaving him alone with her.
"Big Brother?" Lin Weiwei looked at him, slipping her hand into his. "Let's come inside. I'm feeling sleepy already."
Then she followed his gaze to the steam powerplant.
Lin Feng turned his head towards the source of the sound, only to find that she was also looking at it.
"I wonder when will the technicians come…" Lin Weiwei said as she turned her gaze away from it and back to Lin Feng. "It has been very noisy recently. They said some of the bearings have already been worn out."
Then she tugged his hand, turning towards the door. "Come on. Big Brother. Let's get inside."
Lin Feng nodded and let her drag him back to the mansion.
The main house stood dark above them, every window black. Whoever was in it — his father, the stepmother he had not yet met — was long asleep.
Lin Weiwei, in her rabbit-eared slippers and pajamas, the top button of her blouse undone, led Lin Feng towards their side of the house. The two of them shared the east wing, with the west wing owned by their Big Sister.
Yet it was not without its own luxuries, its own entrance, its own quiet.
One more privilege of being the young master and young lady of a family that had built all of this out of nothing in a single generation.
They walked toward it side by side, not hurrying, shoulders not quite touching.
Behind them, the building hummed and the world remained with its everlasting twilight.
-------------------
They went up the east stairs together, footsteps soft on the runner, the hallway dim and empty. The whole wing was theirs. It had always been like that. Though tonight it felt smaller.
At his bedroom door, Lin Weiwei stopped.
She had started fidgeting somewhere on the stairs and hadn't stopped — her grip on his hand getting uneven, the fingers of her free hand twisting the edge of her blouse, her weight shifting foot to foot. She looked down at the floor, her face red and flustered.
"Big Brother…"
"Mm."
"I'm… still scared. From the movie."
Lin Feng turned to face her.
"Are you?"
She nodded. Too fast. Her eyes were wide and aggressively sincere.
"Very. What if the ghost followed me home?"
"Weiwei."
"Yes?"
"We watched movies like that as kids, I think…" He let it sit. "And I doubt you were scared back then."
The color went up her neck all at once. Caught. She pressed on anyway, the way she always pressed on.
"Actually…" Lin Weiwei paused, her head turned to look at the floor. "I'm more sensitive now. Older. I'm — I'm more aware of ghosts than I used to be."
Lin Feng watched her tell it. The gaze that kept landing on his face and skating off. The pink climbing past her collar. Then he shook his head.
"So what does my adorable fiancée want?" he said.
She looked back at him, breathed in. Mustered all the courage she had and finally asked him the question.
"Can I sleep in your room tonight? Just tonight," she added, fast. "Because of the ghost. That — very scary ghost. In case it follows me."
"The ghost."
"Yes."
He looked at her a moment longer.
"Alright."
She blinked. "Really?"
"But we shower first. It's late." He pushed the door open and stepped through. "Come in."
Behind him the hallway went very quiet.
"…W-what?"
"It's late," he said again, from inside. "We both shower before bed. Are you coming in or not?"
Lin Weiwei looked at him as if he had just told her something naughty. She froze, her eyes widening, her brain short-circuiting.
Lin Feng immediately realized his mistake and quickly corrected himself. "No, I don't mean we shower together. Just one by one."
However, Lin Weiwei didn't seem to have heard him and moved like she was hovering in mid-air.
She stepped out to her own room next door. A bag sat just inside, already packed and waiting. Grabbing it, she closed the door behind her and barged into his room as if walking in the clouds.
-------------------
Lin Weiwei was finally inside his room.
She then placed her bag on the nearby table. Just as she was about to open it, she saw the thing she least wanted to see in that room.
A photo frame by the nightstand.
Lin Feng followed her gaze to it. The original had kept it where he'd see it last thing before the lights went off.
It was a vacation shot — two people standing at a rail behind a river where a great waterfall could be seen in the distance, water roaring white behind them, mist softening the air. It somewhat looked like a famous American falls from his previous life, though its name escaped him.
Behind the two, a flag flew on a pole above the overlook, broad and bright. However, nothing about the flag sparked a memory in him. Just something with a name that starts with 'Bri'.
The picture didn't look like a couple photo at all. There was a careful distance between them, the woman standing farther than an arm's length away from him, her expression annoyed and aloof at the same time.
The two people in the picture were the original Lin Feng and Su Qingxue.
Not that it mattered to him.
While Lin Feng was looking at the picture, Lin Weiwei crossed the room.
She picked the frame up, looked at it for less than a second, and laid it face-down on the nightstand.
Right in front of him.
She didn't try to hide what she'd done. She wanted him to see her do it.
Lin Feng said nothing nor put the picture back in its place.
"There, the room is cleaner now." Lin Weiwei then slowly went back to the table where she placed her bag.
Lin Feng had not moved from the door.
The bag was more like a duffle than anything. And it was full of her things.
Lin Feng walked beside her as she rummaged through her things. There he saw bottles of skincare products. A folded set of sleeping clothes. And the blunt corner of what looked like a hair dryer.
Lin Weiwei stopped for a moment and looked at Lin Feng who stood beside her. She studied him as if she was thinking about something, then she gave a shrug and continued looking for whatever she was trying to find.
"You brought a hair dryer?"
"Uhmm… Yes. After all, I don't want to sleep right beside you with my hair still wet."
Then the bag shifted in her hands, and the pajamas folded on top slid an inch, and something underneath caught the light.
There, Lin Feng could see a few small flat boxes. The kind that came three to a pack. One of them was the transparent type, while the others looked like they were flavored.
Beside them was a little pump bottle, the liquid in it clear, slow and unmistakable.
Then Lin Weiwei grabbed a pair of pajamas, then her underwear, which she suspiciously laid on top of the pile for him to see. Beside the night clothes pile sat bottles of shampoo and soap.
She also took the hair dryer out, closed the bag and turned towards Lin Feng. For a moment, the two of them did not say a thing. Then she fixed a strand of her hair back to her ear and looked away from him.
Weiwei. Oh dear Weiwei. We aren't blood related, fine. But how am I supposed to keep calling you little sister when you came to my room, asking for a sleepover, while packing a lot of armor.
Is it really going to happen tonight? On my first night in this world?
The silence continued on for a few more moments.
"I just like to be prepared," she finally mumbled, looking at the floor as if there was something very interesting there. "So Big Brother, would you like to shower first, or should I go?"
Lin Feng's gaze dropped once more to the bag — to the exact spot where the foil had been — then rose to her face.
"Well… Uhmm… You can go first," he said as he looked away from her. "I'll take a shower later."
Lin Weiwei then gave a small nod as she walked towards the bathroom.
-------------------
"Big Brother." Lin Weiwei turned back, a hand on the bathroom door handle and stopped. Her gaze on him this time was firmer, though her face burned a deep crimson.
"Mm."
"Can you…" The pair of pajamas twisted in her fists, her voice dropped to almost nothing. "Can you come with me."
He raised an eyebrow.
"NO — not in the shower!" One hand flew up, waving the idea away, the bottles almost falling to the floor. "I mean outside. Just guard the door. From the outside."
"Guard the door?"
"Can you? Big Brother?"
Lin Feng's face stayed even, though the edge of his left eyelid twitched.
"Please," she tried, clasping her hands, summoning her most pitiful expression.
"Alright." Lin Feng let out a deep sigh and went near the door.
She went in. The door swung most of the way shut behind her — and then didn't latch. It rested a finger's width open.
He sat down on the floor with his back to the wall beside it, where she'd put him.
The water came on.
Inside, past the gap, the sounds of her: water on tile, water on skin, the small economical movements of someone bathing and taking her time.
Damn girl. She definitely left the door ajar on purpose.
Lin Feng shook his head. His eyes then wandered back to the 'overnight' bag.
Soon, the water stopped. Then a towel, followed by the sound of cloth being pulled over damp skin. Then the door opened all the way.
She came out in clean pajamas, modest cotton, hair dark and heavy with water, her face scrubbed and bright with the heat. The clothes were nothing. She made them look like something anyway. She always would.
"Your turn, Big Brother."
His eyelids twitched as she stood on the other side of the door, as if she were some security guard.
Lin Feng then stood. Took his time about it. Let his gaze rest on her one beat past necessary, then stepped past her to the bathroom.
He then pulled the door shut behind him — most of the way.
Then left it a finger's width open.
Behind him, in the room, he heard her breath catch.
She understood at once. He'd handed her own move back to her, completely turning the tables on her. He could picture the outrage and the delight fighting it out on her face and didn't need to see it.
He showered slowly. When he came out — t-shirt, sleep pants, hair dripping — her position had changed.
She was now against the wall in the precise spot where he last sat, crouching on the floor, trying very hard to look like a person who had not been listening to every sound through a deliberately open door.
Like a person who did not think to sneak a peek at him.
She failed at it completely.
"Thank you for guarding me," he said, with great seriousness.
"Of—Of course, Big Brother."
Lin Weiwei stammered, wiping at the corner of her mouth as she spoke.
-------------------
He noticed her hair was still wet. The hair dryer sat on the table — he plugged it into the nearest socket and sat on the bed.
"Sit." He nodded, tapping his lap.
"Hm?" Lin Weiwei's eyebrows moved upwards.
"Let's get your hair dry, or you'll catch cold."
She then nodded and sat on his lap like it was the most natural thing in the world. Soon, Lin Feng switched on the hair dryer. He then aimed it into her hair, his fingers lifting it in sections as the warm air blew over them.
As he blew her hair with the hair dryer, a thought came to him.
This is interesting… I have never done anything like hair drying before.
Though it felt quite natural.
He traced along her hair, lifting a damp strand near her temple, and aimed the dryer at it.
I wonder… am I still myself? Major Lin Feng from China?
Or am I becoming the Lin Feng of this world?
Or have I always been that Lin Feng, and simply gained the memories, thoughts, and personality of a stranger from another world?
Lin Feng continued drying her hair.
Meanwhile, Lin Weiwei closed her eyes.
She didn't speak. There was only the drone of the dryer and, under it, her heartbeat going faster than a girl getting her hair dried had any reason for.
Domestic. The word arrived unasked.
Like we've done this for years. Like we'll do it for years.
I hope this moment lasts forever…
"Done." He clicked it off.
She stood up fast, flustered by how much she'd liked it.
"Your turn."
"Weiwei—"
She took the hair dryer from him, spread her thighs wide open and pointed at the space between them.
Lin Feng paused for a moment. Then Lin Weiwei tapped the free space for him one more time. "Come on Big Brother. Let's get your hair dry or it will make you sick."
Conceding to her, Lin Feng sat in between her thighs. Then she crossed them in front of him, though she did not press herself into him.
In that position, she was still having difficulty reaching up for his hair as Lin Feng was taller than her. Her fingers were unsteady as they reached out to touch his head.
Oh, so that's why she did that. Lin Feng thought, finally understanding that the gesture was not sexual at all, but just practicality.
His hair was short, quick work, nothing to it — and she took her time anyway, drawing it out, her hands in his hair. But the dryer kept clipping the side of his head. In the end, she rose and stood over him, drying the rest from above.
"Done," she said at last, placing the hair dryer back on the table.
Then she looked back at the bed. Lin Feng's bed was enormous. It had never once felt small. Yet it did now.
Lin Feng's head then turned towards the bag. Lin Weiwei's followed.
Then the two of them noticed they were looking at the same thing and understood what they were thinking at that moment.
"Which side," she asked, turning her head away with a flustered expression, "do you…"
"Whichever you want." Lin Feng quickly answered, also flustered and looking away from the sinful bag.
Without a second glance at the bag, she took the left side — away from the door, the far corner facing the window.
Lin Feng took the right side of the bed.
The two of them soon got under the covers with the lights still on, an ocean of pale sheet between them, both of them flat on their backs staring up at a ceiling neither of them was looking at.
"Comfortable?" he asked.
"Yes."
Quiet.
"Still scared?"
A swallow. "A little."
Was she scared because of the movie? Or was she scared because of that…
He reached over and turned off the lamp.
The dark came down whole. Just the two of them and the bed and the sound of their own breathing — suddenly loud, suddenly the only thing in the room.
She lay still for a long moment.
Then she moved.
She moved a few inches first. It was a test, her breath held behind it, waiting for him to say something. To stop her. He didn't. So she moved again, and again, closing the distance between them a hand's width at a time. Until he could feel the warmth coming off her through the thin cotton.
And then she was against him. Her head found his shoulder. Her arm came across his waist. Her body folded into his side like it had been measured for the space.
"Allow me to have this luxury… please…" she whispered. "Big Brother."
He brought his arm around her and drew her in, as if accepting her request, and she fit, the way she'd clearly always known she would.
-------------------
For a while neither of them said anything. Lin Weiwei's breathing slowed against his ribs. The room ticked and settled around them.
Then her voice came, small:
"Big Brother. Remember when my mother and I first moved in?"
Lin Feng tried to recall that moment.
Then fragments surfaced — coming through him like grasping at water. Feelings that were quite familiar yet alien to him arrived ahead of the pictures. A small girl. Angry eyes in a doorway. The sound of something breaking on a floor.
"I think I remember you hating me," he said.
She flinched against him.
"I was awful to you."
"I threw your things away." Her words came slow, as if each one cost her. "I wouldn't eat at the table with you. I told you I didn't want anything from you. Or your family."
As she spoke, a fragment surfaced within Lin Feng's memories— a small boy sitting alone at a table laid for two.
As if that were his.
Then, Lin Weiwei's grip tightened on his shirt.
"I don't even know why I was like that. For years. I was just — cruel."
"You were still a child back then…" His thumb moved on her shoulder, drawing small circles, an instinct he didn't examine. "And scared," Lin Feng said, placing his other hand over hers, holding it gently.
And also because you are a heroine. All heroines are meant to hate Lin Feng. To be honest, I'm still puzzled as to why you and Xiao Yue are the anomalies.
I always wanted to know — what makes you and Xiao Yue different from the rest?
"That's not an excuse." Her voice cracked. "You were kind. You always remained good to me. You gave me things on my birthday when I wouldn't even look at you. Made me food when I wouldn't eat it."
"You even asked me to watch that horror film with you…"
The pictures flickered with each thing she named. Torn paper, untouched. A cold plate carried back to the kitchen.
"So, do you still have it?" he asked. "The notebook?"
He was guessing. The memory was blurry but he could remember giving her something that looked like a bound stack of paper with a metal coil on one of its edges.
She went still.
"…You remember the notebook."
He didn't. He let the silence be a yes.
"Eighth grade," she said softly. "You gave it to me. I told you it was ugly." A small, wrecked laugh. "I lied. It was beautiful. I never used it. I — I'm saving it. For something. I don't know what yet."
Her fingers had loosened on his shirt. Now they tightened again.
"There was the incident, too," she said. "After. When I sat with you. When I told you I'd never be that girl again. That I'd never be bad to you, never treat you like that, never—"
He reached for that and the memory returned to him like mist moving through fog.
It came in fragments. A sterile white light overhead. A younger Lin Weiwei's face wet and saying I'm sorry on repeat. Tubes. A body that couldn't move, his and not his, wired to machines that pumped air to him. And around the edges of all of it, where the why should have been, nothing. Static like a film with the middle reels gone.
The harder he pushed at it, the faster it dissolved.
"You kept the promise," he said. Though he didn't know what else to say to her.
He had no memory of what truly happened and why he was in a hospital in the first place.
"I kept everything you ever gave me," she continued, her voice muffled against his chest, thick. "After that."
"Big Brother…" Lin Weiwei paused, her face torn about the thought that was on her mind.
"Tell me Weiwei, what is it?"
"Big Brother, I don't know if this is just a dream, or if this is real, will tonight be the only time when we will be like this…"
"Of course Weiwei, we will—" Before he could finish, Lin Weiwei placed a finger on his lips.
"Please don't give me too much hope…" she said, gathering her composure. "Big Brother, I love you."
"Not as a brother, but as a man."
Lin Feng didn't move.
Lin Weiwei drew in another breath.
"And I…"
She stopped.
"I hope you forgive me for all the wrong things that I had done to you."
-------------------
[End of Chapter]