He started planning out our dates too. Long midday walks around Chaoyang Park, finding a patch of grass to fall back on when we were tired, him using his arm to shield the sun from my eyes. A nighttime visit to the local aquarium, his silhouette edged by the blue glow of the water, pointing out all the different fish he knew, laughing when I admitted that I only knew two, and that was fromFinding Nemo. Baking at his place,his hands around mine to steady them as I squeezed blueberry batter into heart-shaped pans. Building forts in my new living room, pushing the chairs back to make space for the hot flush of pleasure in my chest, lying together on the cushions imported from France and gazing at the glow-in-the-dark star stickers he’d ordered for me.
It was his idea to try a new restaurant every couple days. “What are you craving?”he would ask, and I would tell him whatever came to mind: Korean barbecue tonight, or Sichuan food, or something as specific as scallion beef pancakes. And every time, he would return an hour later with at least three different restaurant options to choose from and a detailed overview of each, noting which ones had good lighting for photos and which ones offered the best seating. He would let me pick whatever I wanted from the menu, and he would always offer me a bite of his dish first, and if I decided I actually liked his meal over what I’d chosen, he would just smile and slide it over to me.
When we did go out to eat, I could still hear my mom’s voice in my head.Are you really going to finish all that? Control yourself, Chanel.There were still those flashes of guilt where I felt the compulsion to make a list of all the foods I ate like someone at a confessional, sorting them into goodand badand inventing new, arbitrary rules to torture myself over what was on my plate.But it was getting easier to ignore the voices and the rules, easier to sink my teeth into the food and actually enjoy it, to say yesto dessert because I felt like it and maybe itcouldbe that simple. Life could be that good.
Then, three weeks ago, we watched a new action blockbuster together at the theater in Solana.
A movie date.Our very first one—something that felt extraordinary because of how ordinary it was, the kind of couple activity I used to dream about when the idea of being together with Ares seemed impossible.
The movie itself was awful. Despite the rave reviews, all the promotion that had been slapped onto billboards and bus station posters and social media ads, I could barely bring myself to watch it. Influencers had been filming themselves walking out of theaters crying; the only times my eyes teared up was from yawning.
And yet I had no desire to leave. I was happy to lie on those leather seats for hours, watching the actors stumble through recycled jokes and buses explode on-screen with Ares next to me, his arm around my shoulders, leaning over to grab a handful of caramel popcorn or whisper in my ear about how horrible the acting was.
After, we went back to his apartment, debating the whole way whether the glowing reviews were fake or if there was some kind of bigger conspiracy involved, and as soon as the door clicked shut behind us, I was pulling him to me. I still held the half-filled popcorn bucket in one hand, didn’t have time to think about setting it down, didn’t care. He tasted like caramel and butter when he kissed me, his lips just as soft, and I stood on my tiptoes, wanting even more.
“Wait, Chanel,” he said between breaths. “There’s something I... need to ask you.”
“What? Don’t tell me you’re proposing.” I was joking, but his face flushed as he drew back a few inches to look at me properly.
“I know we’ve been doing this for a while, and it’s never been a question, whether I belong to you,” he began, more formal than I’d ever heard him. “But I did want to make sure, in case you felt differently—do I get to call you my girlfriend?”
I stared at him, the champagne-bubble thrill of the moment—the burnt sugar on my tongue, his hands on my waist—melting into a deeper, more potent pleasure, almost an ache. The emotion rose in my throat, and I ducked my head, laughing, barely able to form words.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
“No, it’s not funny,” I said, wondering how I could possibly explain it to him. This was what the poems and the ballads and the paintings were for, I thought. This precise feeling. “I’m just really, really happy.”
But maybe I didn’t need to explain, because the look that crossed his face—I suspected he knew. He took the popcorn bucket from me and placed it on the counter behind him, eliminating any remaining obstacle between us, any distance, any doubts I’d ever had. I could feel the hitch in his breath when he wrapped his arms around me and murmured, “Is that ayes?”
“Yes,” I said.Yes,yes,yes,my heart echoed, a thousand times over. “I feel like I should warn you, though. Being my boyfriend isn’t an easy job. I like to buy pretty things—”
“I’ll buy you anything you want,” he said instantly.
I bit back a smile. “I can take forever to pick out my outfits, especially if we’re going to a big event—”
“I don’t mind waiting for you. However long it takes.”
“And there area lotof bigevents I need to go to,” I continued, my words half muffled by the cotton of his shirt.
“I can hold your purse and your coat on the way there, and I can hold your heels for you on the way back.”
“People might gossip about you, if you’re with me. I mean, they’re definitely going to find out, one way or another.”
“That’s a good thing,” he said, without missing a beat. “That way they’ll all know you’re taken.”
“I can be temperamental too.”
“Helps keep things interesting.”
“I’m extremely high-maintenance.”
“It’d be an honor to maintain you.”
“And I might need you to help take photos of me.”
“I would hope so. It gives me an excuse to look at you.”
With a small, contented sigh, I did something I’d never done with anyone else before: I sank completely into his arms, letting him carry the full weight of me. “You really have an answer for everything, don’t you?”
