Fu Hui and Lan Xi were stubborn in their own different ways.
When Lan Xi was little, Fu Hui had tried every trick he knew to raise him safely and peacefully.
And Lan Xi was just the same…
Fu Hui was determined to teach Lan Xi the meaning of personal boundaries.
So Lan Xi decided to show him what an unbathed Lan Xi looked like.
“Fine! We’ll see which one of us gives in first!” Lan Xi declared fiercely from his perch on Fu Hui’s back.
Fu Hui said, “…Put your clothes on first.”
Lan Xi pretended not to hear.
Fu Hui had no choice but to say, “I’m going to carry you out into the garden.”
Only then did Lan Xi jump down, run into the bathroom, and put on his clothes.
Fu Hui breathed a sigh of relief.
Lan Xi might be a demon, but he still had a sense of shame. He wasn’t willing to run around naked in broad daylight.
Surely the rest of this lesson would go smoothly…
As if!
That night, Lan Xi climbed into bed early, still dressed in his daytime clothes. He lay beneath Fu Hui’s quilt, held up one corner, and called to him with a strange, gleeful chuckle, “Big Brother, come to bed!”
Fu Hui said, “…Aren’t you changing into your pajamas?”
Lan Xi blinked his big eyes. “I can only change into pajamas after I’ve had a bath, and I haven’t had one yet.”
Fu Hui had never been able to stand Lan Xi eating on the bed, even when he was tiny. Could he possibly tolerate this?
Of course he couldn’t.
And if he couldn’t, he’d just have to bathe Lan Xi!
Lan Xi’s little scheme was working out beautifully, at least in his own mind.
But Fu Hui neither lost his temper nor looked anxious. After thinking for a moment, he said, “That’s fine. Lan Xi’s growing up, too. We can start sleeping in separate beds.”
Lan Xi: ???
Was that how this was supposed to go?
Fu Hui turned to leave. “I’ll sleep in Dad’s room.”
Lan Xi sprang off the bed. “No! I won’t allow it!”
Fu Hui stopped, turned around, and picked him up.
Oh, oh! Was he finally giving in?
Lan Xi looked at Fu Hui expectantly.
Fu Hui simply tucked him back under the covers. “Go to sleep. Having a whole big bed to yourself is wonderful. You can roll around as much as you like without anything getting in your way.”
The first half of that speech instantly put Lan Xi on alert. “So Fu Hui likes sleeping alone? That’s why you don’t want Lan Xi anymore, right?”
With heartbreak written all over his face, he declared, “I know now. I understand!”
Fu Hui opened his mouth. “…That’s not it.”
Lan Xi yanked the quilt over his head. “Fine. You’re happy now. Go on, leave. Go sleep in your big bed all by yourself.”
Now it was Fu Hui’s turn to be at a loss.
It took all his willpower not to go over and pull back the quilt.
When he reached Fu Lin’s room, he called his father first and told him that he and Lan Xi would come to see him the next day.
He also mentioned that he would be sleeping in his father’s room.
Fu Lin sounded rather surprised. His first response was, “What’s wrong? Did you two have a fight? Was it that serious?”
“No,” Fu Hui said.
Fu Lin laughed over the phone. “Then why are you sleeping separately? When you were little, you said you’d always be with Lan Xi.”
That made Fu Hui pause.
He had already been eight when he’d said it, so of course he remembered it clearly.
Even now, he still believed he and Lan Xi would live together forever. But that didn’t mean they needed to keep sharing a bed… Fu Hui had already taken classes on human physiology. He thought that certain awkward situations might arise from time to time.
It would be better to avoid them!
Fu Lin was only teasing him a little. He soon said, “All right, it’s nothing serious. Just make up soon. If you need someone to mediate, call me again.”
“Mm.” Fu Hui didn’t forget to insist, “We didn’t fight.”
After Fu Hui hung up, Lan Xi poked his head out from beneath the quilt.
Hah!
Was sleeping alone really so wonderful?
Lan Xi tried rolling over once.
All right, it was a little wonderful… But how could it possibly be more fun than sleeping together with Lan Xi? He wouldn’t allow it!
His face darkening, Lan Xi gripped the edge of the quilt tightly and came up with a brilliant idea.
…
Fu Hui, meanwhile, took a shower, changed into pajamas, and went to bed early to coax himself to sleep… Nine o’clock came, then ten, then eleven… and he still hadn’t managed to feel sleepy.
He stretched out his arms and legs.
He couldn’t sleep.
After staring at the ceiling for a full two minutes, Fu Hui made a decisive choice: he would get up and read.
Every so often, he would stop reading and glance toward the telephone.
But Lan Xi neither called him on the internal line nor came to pound on his door.
What was Lan Xi doing now? Had he fallen asleep? Would he cry?
Ever since Lan Xi had started school with him as a child, Fu Hui had stopped “monitoring” the details of his daily routine.
Now, though, he was so restless he wanted to grab a tablet and bring up its little grid of camera feeds, each showing Lan Xi from a different angle.
Just as he was getting distracted, a sudden thud rang out in the quiet night.
Fu Hui shot to his feet.
Instinctively, he strode out and headed straight to his own room.
The quilt still bulged on the bed in the shape of a person.
Fu Hui approached quietly to take a peek. But there wasn’t any demon beneath the covers!
Had Lan Xi run away from home?
Fu Hui’s heart leaped into his throat. He turned toward the window… Hm?
On the other side of the bed, a small figure was lying on the carpet, looking no different from the little Lan Xi of years ago, his belly rising and falling gently.
Fu Hui’s breath caught. He hurried over and scooped Lan Xi up from the carpet.
Only then did Lan Xi rub his eyes, as though he had just woken in a daze. “…How did I end up on the floor?”
“You fell out of bed.”
“Oh, oh.” Lan Xi pouted. “Sleeping alone isn’t good at all. You fall on the floor.”
He rested his head on Fu Hui’s shoulder. “It hurts so much where I fell.”
That acting… was truly terrible.
If the fall had hurt, how could he have slept right through it?
Fu Hui’s face was grim as he pulled up Lan Xi’s shirt. “Let me see if you’re hurt.”
Lan Xi put on a show of surprise. “Well! Lan Xi isn’t allowed to take his clothes off in front of Fu Hui, but Fu Hui is allowed to take Lan Xi’s clothes off?”
Fu Hui… really had no answer to that.
All he could say was, “I’m worried about you.”
Lan Xi kept pressing him. “So if you’re worried, it doesn’t count as taking my clothes off casually?”
“…No.”
“Ohhh.”
Lying in the crook of Fu Hui’s arm, Lan Xi said, “Then go on, have a look.”
Fu Hui rolled up the hem of Lan Xi’s shirt, exposing a strip of his waist. There really was a reddened patch where he had hit the floor.
And precisely because Fu Hui knew Lan Xi was putting on an act, knew that he had deliberately fallen out of bed and hurt himself…
…Fu Hui felt all the more that he had done something terribly wrong.
He began to reconsider why he had been so determined that they should sleep in separate beds.
First, he wanted Lan Xi to understand privacy and the boundaries between people. But couldn’t he simply teach him to maintain those boundaries with other people?
Second, certain embarrassing physiological situations might occur… Well, a little embarrassment wouldn’t kill him.
Fu Hui closed his eyes briefly. “I’m sorry. Let’s keep sleeping together. If I’m there to block the edge, Lan Xi won’t fall out of bed.”
Lan Xi immediately brightened, absolutely triumphant.
He was so clever!
“Mm-hmm, mm-hmm! All right, I forgive you…” Lan Xi began issuing orders. “Carry me onto the bed.” Then he contradicted himself. “No, no, no! A bath first.”
Fu Hui knitted his brows, thought a moment, and said, “All right.”
That would also let him check whether Lan Xi had been hurt.
Even if Lan Xi was a little demon… what if he really had been hurt?
Sitting in the tub amid rising clouds of steam, Lan Xi marveled once again at his own brilliance.
He wouldn’t have to go days without a bath to stink Fu Hui into submission. Fu Hui had already given in!
Half an hour later, Lan Xi had enjoyed a thoroughly fragrant bath. Still bubbling with excitement, he stuck out his bottom as he had when he was younger and urged Fu Hui, “Look! Has my tail grown at all?”
Fu Hui patted his waist and gently pushed him back down. “You can’t make gestures like that anymore.”
Lan Xi was displeased. “Why? Oh, is this because I’ve grown up again? I told you, I don’t want to grow up.”
“But hasn’t Lan Xi been very happy about getting taller?”
Lan Xi was put in a difficult position. “Is there no way to get taller without growing up?”
Fu Hui gave him the merciless answer: “No.”
Lan Xi promptly kicked water into Fu Hui’s face in a fit of pique.
Fu Hui said, “…” He raised a hand to wipe it off, but Lan Xi refused to let him. Only after he had put on his pajamas did he deliberately rub the water off Fu Hui’s face with the fabric.
He really was wicked through and through.
After all that commotion, it was three in the morning before they finally ended up lying in the same bed again.
Naturally, they had changed the sheets and quilt as well.
Sleepiness washed over Fu Hui, and he felt as though he could drop off at any moment.
But Lan Xi suddenly thought of something and insisted on tugging at Fu Hui’s eyelids while preaching his own ridiculous logic. “Lan Xi is a demon, right?”
“…Mm.”
“Then why do I have to follow human rules?”
“…”
“Don’t I have a point?”
“…”
“Demons don’t have to be like humans! Lan Xi wants to take off his clothes in front of Fu Hui whenever he likes, wants Fu Hui to give him baths, and wants to sleep in the same bed as Fu Hui! I do, I do!” After freely expounding his philosophy, Lan Xi finally stopped bothering him and went contentedly to sleep.
Half asleep, Fu Hui murmured, “…Mm.”
Despite the late night, their body clocks were well established. They woke early the next morning and ate breakfast while yawning.
To put his declaration that he wouldn’t grow up into practice, Lan Xi abruptly put down his chopsticks. “Fu Hui has to feed me.”
He didn’t want to do things for himself.
He didn’t want to be independent.
He wanted to be permanently attached to Fu Hui. Hmm… Lan Xi thought that was a wonderful idea.
Still shaken by Lan Xi’s deliberate tumble from bed the night before, Fu Hui didn’t refuse this new demand.
He would feed him, then.
After all, Lan Xi would soon complain that Fu Hui was feeding him too slowly and that eating by himself was faster.
Fu Hui picked up a spoon.
Lan Xi pointed to the steamed egg custard. “That one, that one.”
The first spoonful went down, then the second… It seemed Lan Xi intended to maintain his “little baby” act all day.
Before long, Secretary Li arrived at the house. Seeing them, he laughed. “Why are you still exactly like you were when you were little?”
Lan Xi rubbed his belly and grinned. “Of course! I’ll be like I was when I was little for my whole life.”
Secretary Li didn’t take him seriously. What childish things he said!
Little Lan Xi was so innocent and naive!
Secretary Li had come to take them out to see Fu Lin.
Fu Lin’s schedule was packed that day, and he had little free time.
What Secretary Li witnessed next was a fine demonstration of just how unreasonable a “little baby” could be.
Lan Xi refused to walk. Fu Hui had to carry him.
As Fu Hui carried him into the car, Lan Xi smacked his lips and offered his assessment. “It’s good that Fu Hui’s grown up. You can carry me so easily. Fu Hui can be the only one who grows up.”
Secretary Li laughed so hard he could barely contain himself.
The little succubus was wicked, yet oddly innocent.
Shaking his head, Secretary Li said, “I don’t think little Lan Xi is ever going to grow up.”
“Really? That’s wonderful!” Lan Xi exclaimed.
Fu Hui cut in with a question. “Why?”
Secretary Li pointed at Fu Hui. “First there’s you, and then all the people in this family. You spoil Lan Xi far too much. Of course a child who’s raised with that much affection will always keep something of his childhood outlook.”
Did making Lan Xi grow up mean they couldn’t spoil him anymore?
In that case, forget it.
Fu Hui tightened his hold on Lan Xi.
Then he could stay a little baby. He could be a little baby all his life.
Anyone who spoke ill of Lan Xi could simply be dealt with!
Fu Hui decided that approach was much more straightforward.
–
That July, Lan Xi’s new film was released.
He played a mute vampire whose total screen time was less than three minutes.
His almost extravagantly gorgeous looks were perfectly matched by a touch of eerie, ghostly allure.
The handful of frames featuring him in the trailer spread widely once again.
His fans were used to this by now.
[I’m surviving on these few seconds of footage.]
[All I want to know is… when is he finally going to get some lines?]
As everyone marveled at how beautiful he was, insisting he alone truly deserved the title “beautiful boy,” someone else asked: [Wait, is he actually mute?]
One fan calmly replied: [Of course not. He did speak a couple of lines when he was younger.]
[Seriously, only two lines?]
[Yep. We’ve replayed that adorable little-kid voice so many times we’ve practically worn the clip smooth.]
Someone else wondered: [Does he have powerful backing or not? Without connections, how does he keep getting cast in major directors’ films? But if he does have connections, why won’t anyone give him any lines?]
[Maybe he’s so bad at delivering lines that he’s too embarrassed to speak.]
That was a comment from a hater.
[Doesn’t that just show he knows his own strengths? He knows his face is his best feature, so he lets everyone enjoy looking at it.]
That was a neutral commenter speaking up for him.
Fu Hui went through the online comments in this way.
Fortunately, although there were some obnoxious haters, nobody had said anything too outrageous.
Far more people liked Lan Xi.
[Oh my god, Lan Xi’s profile is so beautiful.]
What part of him wasn’t beautiful?
[Why does this gorgeous baby love those huge phones so much? At the last shoot, someone caught his slender hands holding a brick of a phone… I nearly died from how cute it was.]
Mm, it was cute indeed.
Fu Hui liked looking at those pictures too.
[What sort of family was Lan Xi born and raised in? Doesn’t he have classmates or relatives who can tell us something? I’m so curious. Were his eyes naturally purple? No colored contacts? They really look like gems. I wish I could treasure them.]
What exactly was it you wanted to treasure?
[Could it be some rare disease?]
You’re the one with a disease.
[I want to lick, lick, lick!]
Lick what, exactly?
Fu Hui frowned, then instructed someone nearby, “Contact the platform and have those three accounts banned.”
At first, Fu Hui followed the online discussion simply because he wanted to keep an eye on it and stop anyone from hurting Lan Xi.
But later he discovered that lurking among the fans could uncover all sorts of interesting things.
For example, fans had clipped out one very short passage of Lan Xi’s adorable little-child voice from one of his films. Fu Hui saved a copy too and listened to it over and over.
Eventually, Lan Xi happened to hear him playing it.
Lan Xi was deeply displeased.
Pointing at his younger self in the film, he demanded, “Do you like this one better, or the Lan Xi standing right in front of you?”
In the end, Lan Xi insisted on recording a new clip especially for Fu Hui.
He wanted Fu Hui to listen every day. After thinking it over, he ordered, “Make it your wake-up alarm.”
Fu Hui said, “…Maybe not that.”
Lan Xi grew furious. “You said no?!”
Fu Hui tried to explain, “No matter what it is, once it becomes the sound that wakes you up, it won’t seem nearly as wonderful anymore.”
Lan Xi insisted, “But Lan Xi is different!”
In the end, Fu Hui’s morning alarm became a recording of Lan Xi’s voice anyway.
Sometimes it would perform a duet beside his ear with the voice of the real Lan Xi.
Even that wasn’t enough for Lan Xi. He made Fu Hui a special ringtone too, conscientiously remembering Fu Hui’s rule about calling him “Big Brother” when they were outside.
“Big Brother, answer your phone!”
That was Fu Hui’s ringtone now.
When the others heard it, Dad Fu Lin wanted one too. So did Song Xu, his younger uncle, his older male cousins, his older female cousins… They all wanted one.
Secretary Li chimed in, “Then could I also…”
Lan Xi coldly rejected them all on the spot. “What do you mean, you want one? Are you trying to work me to death?”
He waved them away. “I’m not recording any more!”
Fu Hui stepped forward to explain the very real difficulty. “Right. Lan Xi’s studies keep him far too busy. His throat’s practically smoking from reciting vocabulary.”
Everyone’s attention shifted, and they said sympathetically, “Goodness, is he working that hard?”
Their third older cousin remarked, “Actually, there’s no need to work so hard. You could just study casually. You’ll never have to worry about money anyway.”
His own father immediately kicked him.
Then his father whipped out his belt and made to give him a beating. “Do you fucking want to become a spoiled rich brat? Get over here! Are you trying to lead your younger brothers astray too?!”
Lan Xi watched wide-eyed as their third cousin was dragged away by his father. Then he turned and hid his face in Fu Hui’s arms, secretly laughing.
Afterward, the two of them ate dinner and returned to their own home as usual.
On the drive back, Lan Xi leaned lazily against Fu Hui and suddenly said with a smile, “It’s because Lan Xi doesn’t want to record anything for them.”
“I know,” Fu Hui answered.
That was why he had helped Lan Xi come up with excuses.
Lan Xi added, “I only want to record things for Fu Hui.”
Fu Hui paused.
He knew that too.
But even though he already knew, hearing Lan Xi say it still made him dizzy, as though a surging tide of feeling had suddenly filled him to bursting.
Fu Hui lifted an arm around Lan Xi’s shoulders. “Mm. Thank you, Lan Xi.”
Beneath his calm exterior, a mountain fire was raging.
He didn’t know how to settle the feeling, and for some reason he badly wanted to take a couple of bites out of Lan Xi.
But he was human, not a demon.
Fu Hui let out a quiet breath and turned toward the traffic flowing past outside the window.
Lan Xi, however, was so demanding that he insisted on turning Fu Hui’s face back toward him and making him look at him.
“Have you noticed anything different about Lan Xi?” he asked, his eyes full of expectation.
Before Fu Hui could answer, Lan Xi eagerly announced, “I’ve grown a little taller again!”
Now that Fu Hui was still willing to treat him as a little baby, Lan Xi had finally become less resistant to growing up. Besides, he’d always loved getting taller.
He no longer simply recorded his height and compared it with last year’s measurement. Now he liked comparing his height with Fu Hui’s.
He had never managed to catch up.
But that didn’t matter… Lan Xi would pat Fu Hui on the arm. “Pick me up! Pick me up!”
Fu Hui would put his arms around Lan Xi’s waist.
“No, no, not there,” Lan Xi would say.
So Fu Hui would bend slightly, wrap his arms around Lan Xi’s legs, and lift him bodily into the air.
With Lan Xi perched in the crook of Fu Hui’s arms, wasn’t he suddenly much taller than Fu Hui?
Lan Xi would brace his hands on Fu Hui’s shoulders and burst into delighted laughter.
He never tired of the game.
Secretary Li had long since grown used to seeing it.
But as Lan Xi grew older and taller, Secretary Li began to feel something oddly incongruous whenever he watched them.
What was so strange about it?
After a long moment, he realized: oh! Lan Xi’s hair had become so long that, sitting in Fu Hui’s arms like that, he looked for all the world like a girlfriend Fu Hui had started dating much too young!
Secretary Li privately laughed at himself. He really did have too much imagination.
He walked over without mentioning a word of it.
That year, Fu Hui was in his final year of high school.
Lan Xi received another offer to act in a film. This time, the part had quite a few lines. He skimmed through the script and said, “I want to do it.”
That brief answer stunned his agent so deeply that he thought he’d misheard. “What did you say?”
“I want to act in it.”
“But there are a lot of lines…”
“Mm-hmm, but they’re easy to memorize.” Lan Xi pointed to the character in the script. “It’s like me and Fu… and Big Brother.”
Lan Xi would proudly show off his sharp little fangs to every viewer.
He was a demon who simply couldn’t keep himself from showing off.
He wished he could let the whole world know how close he and Fu Hui were!
His agent suddenly understood.
The script was rooted so thoroughly in ordinary everyday life that Lan Xi could easily imagine himself in the situation. Naturally, that made the lines easy for him to remember too.
The agent was overjoyed.
For the first time, Lan Xi would perform a role with this much dialogue!
The novelty of that alone would surely draw a huge wave of attention, wouldn’t it?