“You tell me first,” I say. “How much do you already know about him?”
He hesitates, and I can see him making the same silent calculations. How much to say, how much to withhold, how much we can give each other.
Sometimes I feel closer to Ares Yin than I’ve ever felt with anyone in my whole life—closer than I thought two people could possibly be. Times when he’s as intimate and essential as the air in my lungs, the very blood in my veins.
Then there are times, like now, when he’s as distant and cold as the moon. Even when he’s right in front of me, there’s this impenetrable look in his eyes, an entire universe between us, filled with every question I’m too scared to ask. I want to shake him, force him to reallylookat me, tell me what he’s thinking.
Or better yet, I want to crawl inside his brain and rifle through it like a thief in a mansion, ripping through the closets and turning over the drawers, desperate to find something of value. And it’s startling how I know the exact half-stifled sound he makes when we’re kissing and he loses control, how I’ve memorized the contours of his chest, all the softest and hardest places on his body, but I couldn’t begin to guess what he’ll do next.
“The fight club I was in... ,” Ares says haltingly. “He’s the one who founded it. He commands a lot of respect and power there. But from what I’ve gathered, it’s not just the fight club that he owns. He moves between circles, gets up to a bunch of shady stuff.”
“Right,” I say, a little dizzy, trying to piece everything together. Reminds me of when I’d sit through entire lectures at school, not understanding a single word the teachers had said, until the night before the exam, when Alice would patiently explain the fundamental concepts to me, and things would only start making sense in hindsight. Like why Ares had beentracking Long Ge down at the nightclub. I’d initially feared they might be accomplices, but it doesn’t sound like Ares has even spoken to the man before. “Right, okay.”
“Where did you see him?” Ares asks. Then, more urgently: “Did he hurt you?”
I shake my head. “No, but... he was at my mom’s party tonight.”
Surprise flashes over his face. “At her party? Why?”
“They’ve been talking. He reached out to her after hearing about the divorce, but they used to be high school classmates. Friends. I think...” I swallow. My throat feels constricted, like I can’t inhale fully. “No, Iknow. He’s obsessed with my mom. At the party just now... he was trying to convince my mom to sign with this new media agency of his or whatever, but I feel like that’s all just a ruse to get closer to her.” I watch Ares’s face intently as I speak, searching for the version of him I’d seen in the lake, the one holding the lighter as my house burned with my mom inside it.
But he only looks confused, if not concerned, his dark brows furrowed. “Did you warn your mom about him?”
Like he actually cares about my mom’s safety. And maybe he really does in the present moment. So what will happen between now and then to change that? “I tried to warn my mom,” I say. “But I can’t get through to her. She won’t take me seriously.”
“Did Long Ge do anything else? Say anything?”
“I left the party early, so I’m not sure. I didn’t think he’d do anything terrible while there were so many people around. Not for tonight, at least.”
“No, you’re right. He’s more careful than that,” Ares says. “Or else he wouldn’t have made it this far.” He releases a low breath. “Look, whatever, we can figure that shit out later—I’m just glad you’re safe.”
I glance up at him, and it’s only then that I register the pastel pink box in his hands.
“What is that?”
His fingers shift over it, like he has half a mind to hide the whole box behind his back and pretend it doesn’t exist. He licks his lips but doesn’t speak. If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was nervous.
“Well?” I prompt, when the silence stretches on long enough that I wonder if his plan is actually just to wait for me to get distracted and forget my own question.
“It’s... a birthday cake,” he says at last, as if he’s confessing a grave sin.
“A birthday cake?” I repeat. “Whose birthday is it?”
“Nobody’s.”
“So are we just celebrating random days now? I don’t have anything against the idea, by the way—I’m as much a fan of nonevents as I am of events.”
“No. Or... yes, yours. It’s for you,” he tells me, setting the box down on one of the tables the old Beijing uncles like to use for their chess games, the surface marked with lines for weiqi pieces. He tugs the ribbon free, then pushes the pink flaps of the cardboard to the side, revealing the cake within.
My eyes widen.
All of a sudden I’m back in Paris, staring longingly at thebirthday cake on display before me. It could be the exact same cake, transported through time and space. Everything about it is how I remember: the shiny lychees glistening like gems atop the thick white cream, the delicate strawberry-pink swirls, the chocolate icing spelling out my full name, all the details illuminated by the soft orange glow of the lamppost.
But instead of near-strangers crowding around me in a foreign room, singing “Happy Birthday” like a hired chorus, the rapid-fire clicks of cameras sounding in the background, there’s only the whisper of the wind through the grass, and Ares. Ares, who’s watching me intently, waiting for my reaction.
“You got this for me,” I say slowly. “Why?”
I can see him weighing his response. “That story you told me, about your thirteenth birthday party. I couldn’t stop thinking about it.” The pulse of his throat as he swallows. “You.”
