Page 7 of From Beijing, With Love

“Come on. Let’s go.” Yang patted Daniel’s shoulder. Pointing off into the distance, past the other tourists dotting the winding walkway, he said, “We are going to hike to the twenty-third watchtower.”

“And which one are we on right now?”

“Six,” Yang said with a straight face. “And there are quite a lot of stairs. Never skip leg day, right?”

“Fuck my life,” Daniel muttered. That drew another laugh out of Yang.

And for some reason, that laugh made Daniel look forward to the grueling hike ahead of him.

The wall sat snugly on top of the rugged mountain, rising and falling with its peaks and valleys. In practical terms, it just meant a hell of a lot of stairs. Going up the stairs was the kind of booty-blast bootcamp that people paid good money for. Meanwhile, going down the stairs was brain camp, since the steps seemed to vary in height without warning. Each time Daniel miscalculated the height, he’d get a sudden jolt. It was excitement he didn’t need in his life.

“Need a break?” Yang looked up at him from a few steps below.

“How can you tell?” Daniel asked as a drop of sweat dripped into his eye. He hadn’t known it was possible to sweat this much.

“Call it an educated guess,” Yang said, his smirk making a comeback.

Daniel stared at that stupid, lopsided smile for a few seconds too long before averting his eyes. He was probably on the verge of hyperthermia, as all he could think about was how the overhead sun turned Yang’s brown eyes into pools of warm amber.

That was it. Hyperthermia with a side of jet lag.

Daniel was totally fine. And normal. And not a weirdo with a staring problem on top of a sweating problem that could only be explained by a medical condition. To prove how completely normal he was, he flashed Yang his best smile (still got it) and took a step forward.

And miscalculated the height once again.

Gravity took care of the rest and drove him into a downward spiral—not the kind that he was used to. Like a giant bowling ball, he collided into the only object in his way: Yang.

With an oomph, they fell to the bottom of the stairs.

“Oh shit! I’m so sorry.” Daniel propped himself up. His face was inches from Yang’s, close enough to make out the hint of stubble on his chin and the grimace in his brows. “Are you okay?”

“I’m … fine,” Yang said, a blush creeping up from his shirt collar. “Can I have just a bit of space?”

“Sorry, of course.” Daniel rolled off Yang, then for some unfathomable reason, he said, “I blame physics.”

“What?” Yang pushed himself up.

“I blame physics.” Repeating the same dumb joke for a second time was more painful than the fall itself.

Yang rubbed his elbow. “How’s your inability to watch your step the fault of physics?”

“Because, you know, gravity.” Daniel was doing what he did best—digging himself into a hole. “Gravity is like a physics thing.”

“Oh, is it? I’m only four years into my PhD in physics, so forgive me if my grasp on the concept of gravity is still shaky.” Yang’s lips stretched into a wry smile.

“Oh” was all Daniel managed to say. He was ready to die of embarrassment. What did he expect, that Yang was a full-time tour guide who had gone to tour-guide college and studied tour-guide sciences?

Yang got up and dusted off his shorts. He offered Daniel a hand. “Come on. We are only halfway there.”

Daniel wanted to stay on the ground a while longer to ride out the pain in his ankle, but his pride (whatever was left of it) made him take Yang’s hand like he was fine. Perfectly fine.

The farther they hiked, the thinner the crowd got. After they passed the twentieth watchtower, they were alone. The only sounds were the singing cicadas and their own steps on the ancient wall. When they reached the twenty-third watchtower, Daniel breathed a sigh of relief. The air smelled sweet, of pine and earth. Leaning on the crenulated wall, he stared out at the wilderness, a mosaic of different shades of green.

He was still processing the fact that he was standing on the same ancient structure his dad had stood on three decades ago. The weight of it hit him all at once, and it was almost too much to bear.

“Would you like a photo?” Yang asked, snapping Daniel out of his head.

“Yeah, that’d be great,” Daniel said, then a thought came to him. Pulling up a digital version of the photo of his dad on his phone, he showed Yang. “Can we take it like this?”