[fic] La Saudade
Title: La Saudade
Prompt: Urban Legends - The Midnight Bus
Pairing: Kris / Tao
Rating: PG
Synopsis: zitao jerks awake as the bus rumbles over a pothole and his temple smacks against the glass of the bus window.
Word Count: 4,736
Zitao jerks awake as the bus rumbles over a pothole and his temple smacks against the glass of the bus window. There’s a little bit of drool at the corner of his lips, and Zitao hastily, if blearily, wipes it away. The commute from the gym to the flat is too far. Zitao can feel the exhaustion dragging deep in his bones, his body pushed to the limit. He really should have fought harder for that high-rise overlooking the rest of the city, but Yifan can be convincing when he wants. That, and he knows all of Zitao’s weak spots, like the corner of his mouth, where Yifan had mistakenly kissed him the first time; he’d been aiming for the bow of his lips, but somehow misjudged the distance.
(When they were picking out flats, Yifan had kissed him once at the corner of his mouth, and then once again, more deeply, on the mouth proper-hard enough to make Zitao’s head spin but soft enough to make his heart stumble. He’d said, “But this has two bedrooms,” and then splayed his hand over Zitao’s flat stomach, which, of course, was just like Yifan. He was always good at saying things without really saying them and then making a fool of himself, as if by doing that, he could play it off as a joke.
Taken off-guard, Zitao had punched him in the arm and then, embarrassingly, cried into Yifan’s shoulder when Yifan assured him he meant it. Which, of course, was just like Zitao: hot-headed reactions and belated embarrassment at them.)
With a quick look out the window-embarrassedly fogged up by Zitao’s mouth-breathing-to reassure himself that he hasn’t slept past his stop, Zitao resettles back in his seat and shivers. The aircon is on full blast on the bus, as it always is to compensate for Beijing’s muggy summer weather, and Zitao’s sat directly underneath the machine only in his t-shirt and shorts. He hadn’t thought to bring a jacket.
Usually, Zitao isn’t alone on the bus home; there’s always someone else riding the midnight bus with him. Beijing might not be the city that never sleeps, but it could be the city that trudges at home at five in the morning with a work shift that starts at eight the next day. Normally, it’s only Zitao and a few other businessmen and workers heading back home, but it is a Friday. Zitao wouldn’t be surprised to see university students trudging out of their apartments and dormitories, free with the weekend stretched out in front of them.
The bus screeches to a halt at its next stop with a cool female voice announcing the stop’s name. Five away from the flat. Zitao rubs at his eyes with the back of his hand. There’s an expat who rides the bus with Zitao every so often who gets off at this stop. He has sharp cheekbones and always wears a snapback with the brim pulled sideways, and sometimes, he smiles at Zitao when Zitao boards, despite the fact he’s almost always on his phone, talking to a Joonmyun-hyung. His lips curl upward at the ends when he smiles, like a cat’s. Zitao calls him Chen in his head, shamelessly transferring the name of his childhood cat to the expat. Yifan had laughed when Zitao told him about it, his eyes crinkling, almost childishly delighted.
Chen hadn’t smiled at Zitao when he boarded today, too engrossed in fiddling with his phone, his huge headphones dangling around his neck. Zitao doesn’t mind. Sometimes they smile at each other, and sometimes they look out the window, two strangers who happen to ride the same bus.
At the stop, Chen disembarks, his red snapback bobbing away in the darkness. The two men who board look to be about university age. One carries a large guitar case on his back. The other looks younger, his face fine-boned and sharp, and they both speak familiarly with the bus driver, patting him on the shoulder before they make their way down the aisle.
The two of them take the seat right in front of Zitao, and he nearly gets whacked in the face as the one with the guitar case sits right in front of him and the case comes swinging at him. The pretty one falls into the seat right next to his uncoordinated friend, despite the fact that there are more than enough seats further away and spread out so Zitao doesn’t have to brace his arm against the back of the seat to avoid getting hit in the face as the bus rattles onward.
The two of them start prattling on about their assignment, loud and obnoxious enough to be heard even over the whirring of the aircon. Apparently, tonight is the deadline. Zitao rolls his eyes. Students, then. Annoyed, Zitao thinks about moving, but just as he’s about to, a commotion breaks out at the front of the bus. The only other two passengers on the bus seem to be arguing about something, and soon, the argument is loud enough that Zitao can hear every word.
“I didn’t steal your wallet!” the one insists angrily. He has a suit on, but his tie is askew and clumsily done, and he looks very, very young-probably younger than Zitao even. Zitao doesn’t recognize him, so he must be new to the area, too. His accent is heavy, the words carefully pronounced and over-enunciated. He has a lisp. “I was sitting here this entire time!”
“Don’t lie,” the other one snarls. He has an accent, too, but it’s lighter and less noticeable. Zitao peers between the two students’ heads to watch the incident unfold. The accuser is almost comically tinier than the accused, but the look on his face makes Zitao think he’d be the wrong person to cross. His eyes are frighteningly wide. “I saw you reach into my briefcase when I turned away to look out the window.”
“You should get your eyes checked,” the first man retorts, and the wide-eyed one makes a sharp comment in a different language. Korean. It sounds like the dramas Zitao streams onto his laptop on his days off when Yifan’s at work.
The arguing escalates, the foreign syllables falling from their mouths in increasing volume until, finally, the bus driver has to intervene. He slams on the brakes, jolting Zitao forward and almost into the guitar case of the student in front of him. His voice is harsh and rough when he says, “Alright, the both of you-get out! I won’t have any fighting while I’m driving. There’s a police station right there. Use it and settle your differences with the authorities.”
Both of them, red-faced and clearly still angry, march off the bus, still ranting at each other. Zitao watches them go curiously but loses interest when the bus doors close and they move on. The students sitting in front of him however have apparently never seen such an altercation on public transport and shove their heads together to whisper furiously to each other.
Zitao preoccupies himself with his phone to distract from the chill. He fires off a text to Yifan's phone-I'm cold TTTT-but gets no response. Yifan hates texting with a passion, says his fingers are too big for the keyboard. It's terrible and endearing, and sometimes Zitao's a little annoyed by it-how can Yifan not like texting-but Zitao takes it into stride. Besides, it's not that bad, Yifan having dustbins for hands, especially when they're big enough for Yifan to wrap one entirely around Zitao's wrists and pin him to the bed.
“Ahhh,” the pretty student sighs suddenly, jolting Zitao out of his memory. The two of them and Zitao are the only ones on the bus now, and his voice fills the empty bus. “It seems we’ve been found out.” Zitao blinks and looks up.
“And whose fault is that?” the guitar student says, cocking his head to look at his friend. “I told you, we should have put on the white robes to cover our feet.”
“But it’s so hot,” his friend whines. “Can you imagine how gross we’d be under those stuffy robes? I’m sweating enough as it is.”
Suddenly, as if planned, the two of them turn around and look at Zitao, effectively startling a squawk out of him. The pretty one smiles winningly, as if pulling a scream out of Zitao’s mouth had been his plan all along.
“Hello,” he says pleasantly, and Zitao just awkwardly looks at them, then looks away. “You know, we’ve already seen you looking at us, there’s no point in pretending.”
“Sorry,” Zitao mutters under his breath, still not looking at him. The cool female voice announces the next stop, but the bus doesn’t pause as it rattles on. No one needs to board, apparently.
“How rude,” the stranger sniffs. “Even when they’re dead, brats will still be brats.”
“Brat?” Zitao echoes incredulously, turning back to glare at the pretty stranger and his friend. Said friend has a hand covering his face, probably of embarrassment. “How old are you? Fourteen?” And then the rest of the sentence sinks in. Zitao feels the blood drain out of his face and he leans back as far as he can, muscles tensed for flight.
“Are you threatening me?” Zitao asks, trying to make himself sound tough but squeaking a little at the last syllable. The pretty stranger leers at him, twisting his pretty face into horribly ugly expressions, and Zitao recoils. He instinctively looks over the two of them, sizing them up for a fight. He could probably take them both, though that guitar case looks like it can pack a heavy punch, and the bus makes for uneven, shaking ground.
“Lu Han, stop making him nervous,” his friend says before massaging his temples with his fingers. “Nightmare, this one.” He smiles kindly at Zitao, a dimple appearing in his cheek. This doesn’t really reassure Zitao, who has never before let a dimple come between him and kicking a stranger’s ass. “He was telling the truth, though.”
“That what?” Zitao is mystified and still ready for a fight. “I’m a brat? How old even are you two? Where do you go to school?”
“Ugh, Yixing, they get dumber and dumber every year,” Lu Han says, and his friend-Yixing-just slaps a palm over Lu Han’s mouth. Good thing, too, because Zitao was genuinely considering doing the same, except with his fist.
“The truth about you being dead,” Yixing says cheerfully before pulling a face and snatching his hand back. “Ugh, you’re disgusting.”
Lu Han sticks out his tongue, which he’d presumably used to lick Yixing’s hand, then looks at Zitao. “It can be a little bit of a shock at first,” he says matter-of-factly. “Take your time.”
The incredulity of the statement shocks Zitao into silence, and Lu Han and Yixing fill the silence with half-hearted conversation. Most of those peter out when either Lu Han or Yixing look expectantly at Zitao, as if waiting for a reaction, but Zitao just sits there, staring at the two of them, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“You must be mistaken,” Zitao says when he can find his voice. He edges away a little, his grip on his phone tightening. The phone isn’t exactly useful at this point; Lu Han and Yixing could easily overpower him if they wanted to before Zitao could do more than try to unlock his phone and ring Yifan from speed dial, but Zitao still feels at least a little comforted with it clenched firmly in his sweaty palm. Just in case-
(“Just in case,” Yifan says, pressing the key into Zitao’s hand. His fingers are dry and warm, and Zitao takes the key and looks down at it. It’s warm, as if Yifan’s held it for a while.
“You’re giving me the key to your apartment?” Zitao asks, looking up at Yifan with a tiny smirk.
“Just in case I get locked out,” Yifan protests, even though Zitao’s apartment is on the other side of campus, and Zitao knows from experience Yifan always remembers his keys in the morning before going to class. “And, you know. If you wanted to come over.”
“Just come over?” Zitao presses insistently. Yifan’s ears go red and he cuts his eyes away to look down Zitao’s empty hallway. His profile is menacing and elegant and coldly beautiful, but Zitao feels so warm.
“Your lease is almost up, isn’t it?” Yifan says. He looks back at Zitao with a tentative smile. It’s the kind of same kind of smile that he’d shown Zitao when they first met, jumbled by the crush of students into sitting next to each other. Even back then, Zitao thought he could fall in love with that smile. “Are you maybe looking for a new place to stay?”)
Zitao blinks, belatedly realizing he’s been staring at a curious Lu Han for the last long seconds. He glances at Yixing, who looks impassive and a little grave. Whatever prank this is, it’s not a very funny one, and not a very credible one either. He starts, “I’m not-”
"Do you remember how you got on this bus?" Yixing interrupts. It’s such a sudden question, Zitao scoffs, dragging himself out of the daze of memory he’d just been in. Of course he remembers, he wants to say. He’d been-he’d been-
He doesn't remember. Zitao racks his brain fiercely for any hint, but he doesn't remember sitting at the bus stop, doesn't remember getting on. He doesn't even remember what he'd done earlier today.
The only thing he does remember is Yifan: the soft press of his hands against Zitao's hips, the feel of his mouth moving under Zitao's. Even his scent slips so easily into Zitao's subconscious that Zitao can't imagine ever having forgotten it.
His open mouth turns into a gape, and Lu Han says, "You can't, can you? Because you're a ghost, Zitao."
Zitao flinches, focuses in on Lu Han. “How do you know my name?”
“We know lots of things,” Lu Han says self-importantly.
“And it’s on your gym bag, if you’ve forgotten,” Yixing points out, twisting impossibly around his large guitar case and pointing at the gym bag that, indeed, has a tag with Zitao’s name on it. Zitao looks at it, and then back at the two of them just in time to see Lu Han give Yixing a high-five.
"I remember some things," Zitao protests, but weakly. He's loathe to say anything about Yifan, but he has to prove to Lu Han and Yixing that he's not-he can't be dead. "My-I have a husb-partner, waiting for me at our apartment"-Yifan's face flashes in his mind, his eyes crinkled up in a smile-"I'm on my way home."
The image gets stronger: Zitao can see the rest of their flat around him. Yifan is in the kitchen, wearing that stupid apron Zitao's co-worker, Baekhyun, had given to him as a gag gift, and he's smiling his gummy smile, the one that he never lets anyone else see. His mouth moves, but Zitao doesn't know what he says. He's too far away to hear.
The cool female voice sounds again as the bus lurches to a pause, but no one boards and no one gets off, so the bus rattles on. One more stop.
Yixing makes a soft noise of triumph. "So that's what's keeping you here," he says. "Your tether to this world."
Lu Han wrinkles his nose. "Ugh, he’s a romantic."
"Stop that," Zitao snaps. "I'm not dead. How can I be talking to you if I'm dead?"
"Because we're dead too," Lu Han says matter-of-factly. Zitao is about to scoff and wave them off completely, but the light from the street lamp catches Lu Han’s face wrongly, and his face starts to flicker. At first, Zitao thinks he's just seeing things, but then the flesh of Lu Han's face starts melting away, his cheek gaping open so that Zitao can see every delicate bone of his face. The macabre gap in his face spreads out like a ripple in water, like seismic activity with aftershocks that steal Lu Han’s good looks and replace them with a half-decomposed body. Lu Han’s eyes look even bigger bulging out of empty eye sockets.
Zitao screams and throws himself out into the aisle, his heart ramming in his throat. Cowering on the floor, his muscles frozen rigid with fear, he screams for the bus driver to stop, to look, to help, but the bus driver doesn't even look back. He just keeps driving, as if he hadn’t heard Zitao at all, and Zitao stares at the back of the driver’s head, feeling unreasonably betrayed.
“He’s with us,” the corpse that was-is?-Lu Han says casually, following Zitao’s line of sight. Zitao watches Lu Han’s muscles work to move his jaw, and he feels like he's about to be sick.
"Lu Han," Yixing admonishes, and Lu Han sighs. Zitao can see the flutter of torn muscle tissue as the breath impossibly leaves Lu Han's mouth, and he turns away to retch a few times. Nothing comes up. Zitao finds he can't remember the last meal he ate.
"What are you?" Zitao asks, his voice wobbling precariously. He still doesn't dare look back at them.
"Reapers," Lu Han says, and Zitao flinches at his voice. "We gather up stubborn souls like you and cut your tethers so you can move on. You're lucky you met us when you did. We're due back home by witching hour tonight, and we won't be around for another year."
"You can look at us now, by the way," Yixing says. "Lu Han's fixed his face. Well, as much as he can."
"If you weren't already dead, I'd kill you," Lu Han snaps as Zitao slowly turns back to them. True to Yixing's word, Lu Han looks just as normal as ever, but Zitao can't stop seeing the gaping hole in Lu Han's cheek, the bone white against the dark red flesh, in his mind's eye. The bus rounds a bend, sliding Zitao into the seats on the other side of the aisle; the uneven surface isn’t helping his nausea.
Zitao doesn’t bother to get up from where he’s sat in the aisle. It’s not as far as he can be from the-the reapers, but his muscles are locked into place by fear. "S-so what?" Zitao asks in a tremulous voice. "You're here to-to cut off my tether? What does that mean? Are you going to kill me?"
"We’re going to free you," Yixing says. "I’m not sure if that’s the same as being killed. But really, it's for the better. You're not meant to stay in this world, Zitao. If you're cut free, you can find peace. You could even become a reaper eventually."
"Full circle and all that," Lu Han adds.
This is a lot for midnight. Zitao can’t quite make the connection; all he knows is, he feels alive-and so, so tired. But there’s no other explanation for Lu Han’s ability to-Zitao squeezes his eyes shut and doesn’t continue down that thought path. "And-and if I don't want to go?" Zitao asks.
Yixing smiles sadly. "We can't make you leave," he says.
"We're surprisingly democratic," Lu Han says.
"But staying here isn't any way to exist," Yixing continues. "You're less than nothing here. You can't hold anything, touch anything. You can’t be heard or seen. All you can do is remember and watch."
"Drives some spirits mad," Lu Han says somberly. "That's when you start to see hauntings. Restless spirits with nowhere to go except inside their own heads. It's tragic."
Zitao gulps. "Why do they stay, if they know what'll happen to them?"
Yixing's face tightens for a moment before it relaxes again. "The process of cutting your ties to this world means forgetting," he says. "Some would rather remember."
Zitao falters. Yifan's smile flashes through his mind again, and with that, a slew of other images, other memories: Yifan getting out of bed, his dark hair messy and standing up on the side, a pillow crease across his cheek. Yifan with adoption papers on his desk and his glasses on and his hand jokingly pressed to Zitao's stomach. Yifan draped over Zitao's back, chest slick with sweat and almost unbearably hot, his voice, taut and harsh, whispering into Zitao's ear a mix of Mandarin and English, Zitao, fuck, you feel so good, you always feel so good, I love you, I love you, I love you-
A sharp stab of pain at the front of Zitao's head, in between his eyes, brings him back to the rattling bus. Both Yixing and Lu Han look concerned, peering down at him from their seats.
"I can't," Zitao says. He believes them, if only because Zitao feels the pull of his tether, dragging him back to the apartment, but he can’t leave Yifan behind. "If I'm going to forget, I can't. I'm staying. I need to find out what happened to me."
"You're making a mistake," Lu Han starts, but Yixing puts a hand on Lu Han's shoulder.
"We can't make you come with us," he says. "Like we said, it's your decision."
"I need to go home," Zitao says. He feels suddenly like crying, but he manages to keep the tears unshed. They move to his throat and thicken his voice, and he looks down, embarrassed but determined. "I want to go home."
As if summoned by magic, the cool, automated female voice announces Zitao's stop, and Yixing turns to pull on the yellow cord. The bus comes slowly to a stop, the wheels creaking in a metallic screech, and the bus driver pulls the door open. Lu Han extends a hand down to Zitao, who takes it after a moment's hesitation, and pulls him up.
"Good luck, then," Yixing says as Zitao hefts his gym bag over his shoulder and makes his way to the doors at the front. "I hope he's worth it."
Zitao grins a little as he pauses by the bus driver. "Yifan is," he says before he gets off. The bus doors close behind him with a screech, and the bus takes off again, leaving Zitao standing there, alone. The Beijing air is warm and muggy around him, the cicadas screeching, but now that Zitao's aware of it, there is that chill prickling at the back of his neck, and even the noise seems a little distorted. He hadn’t been able to notice the difference under the heavy aircon white noise.
The security guard doesn't notice when Zitao walks in and slips into the elevator, though he does look up, surprised when the elevator doors open, then close of their own accord. Zitao doesn’t remember what floor he lives on, but his hands and arms move on their own, pressing the button for the sixth floor. When the doors open again, Zitao obeys whatever instinct is driving him forward.
The hallway is the same as Zitao remembers it-what he can remember, anyway-and his feet carry him to the far end of the long stretching corridor. (“6800,” Yifan had said that first day, sounding proud and a little out of breath from lugging their boxes from the elevator to the end of the hallway. He looked good in his mandatory suit and tie for work, but Zitao thought he liked him best like this, plainly dressed, his hair sticking a little to his forehead. Zitao could almost forgive him for making Zitao carry up his heavy books. “This is us.”)
Now that Zitao’s away from the midnight bus, he realizes suddenly, terribly, that he doesn't know how long he's been dead. Everything had looked the same on the way back, which comforts Zitao because Beijing is a city and cities continually change, but what if it’s been months? What if Yifan's moved on?
He stops in front of their apartment, the familiar mahogany door gleaming in the lit hallway. A memory rises to the forefront of his mind: Yifan is kissing him goodbye behind this very door. There are adoption papers in his briefcase, Zitao somehow knows, and an unobtrusive silver ring on his left hand that feels cool on Zitao's cheek when Yifan reaches up to cup Zitao’s jaw. His hands are dry and warm and strong enough to hold Zitao’s world.
"See you tonight," Yifan says, and his smile is so close and so tangible, Zitao doesn't know if he's imagining it or seeing it with his own two eyes.
There's noise behind the door; Zitao can hear it, the crashing of something onto the hardwood floor. Two voices. One is low, and the other one is unmistakably a child's. Zitao's heart swells suddenly. It doesn't matter, Zitao decides. It'd be enough just to see him again. Just to be near him.
Zitao breathes in. Breathes out. Puts his hand on the doorknob and turns it.
"Well," Lu Han says, "this year was a bust. Thank God it's nearly witching hour, I'm ready to go back."
"Hmm," Yixing says noncommittally, staring out the window as the bus drives to the Rift, the point of divergence where they'll be able to slip back into the spirit world.
"Are you still thinking about Zitao?" Lu Han asks, and Yixing looks at him. He looks a little sad. "Should've let me threaten him more with my face."
"You know the rules," Yixing says. "Once they say no, you have to respect it." He glances out the window again, and Lu Han has been Yixing’s partner long enough to know he’s still thinking about Zitao. He reaches over to rest a hand on Yixing’s shoulder and squeezes it comfortingly.
"Hey," Lu Han tells him gently. "We did what we were supposed to. We'll just have to hope that next year, he comes around."
"If he's even around next year," Yixing sighs. They both know the more time spent on this corporeal plane, the more quickly a spirit will corrode away. A year from now, Zitao may not even have a distinguishable form. He might only be just a whisper of a spirit. Just a memory.
"Who knows," Lu Han says. "He might be. He seems strong. And enamored with that partner of his. China’s definitely changed a lot since I last remember it." He leans over the railing separating the seats from the driver's seat and digs his sharp chin into the bus driver's shoulder. The bus driver makes a low noise from the back of his throat but doesn’t shake him off. "What d'you think, Kris? Weren’t you picked up in Beijing too?"
There’s only silence, save for the rumble of their bus underneath them. Lu Han frowns. "Kris?"
"Hm?" Kris jerks, his slack grip on the wheel tightening. If the three of them weren’t already reapers, Lu Han might admonish him for being careless. Kris flips the brim of his bus driver’s cap up. He looks tired and wan in the half-darkness. "Sorry, I was just thinking of something." He looks confused, though, and a touch wistful.
"What were you thinking about?" Lu Han asks. Kris is the newest addition to their team, a reaper of improbable height and even more improbable clumsiness. For all his impressive looks, he tends to be a little scatterbrained, lost in his own head. It's probably why he and Yixing get along so well.
Kris opens his mouth, and then frowns. His mouth is a slash on his face, his lips pressed into a thin line as whatever it is he was thinking of escapes him. "You know what?" he says instead, laughing a little. "I can't really remember."
“Well, come on then,” Lu Han says impatiently. “Let’s get to the Rift. I’m tired, and Minseok is probably already there waiting for us.”
“Right,” Kris says. Lu Han feels the lurch of the bus accelerating, and Lu Han falls back obligingly onto his seat to rest his head on Yixing’s bony shoulder.
“Whoever that Yifan was,” Yixing says, “I hope Zitao finds him.”
Lu Han hums noncommittally and lets himself close his eyes. “Me too,” he says, quiet and barely discernable over the midnight bus, rattling on into the night.
Prompt: Urban Legends - The Midnight Bus
Pairing: Kris / Tao
Rating: PG
Synopsis: zitao jerks awake as the bus rumbles over a pothole and his temple smacks against the glass of the bus window.
Word Count: 4,736
Zitao jerks awake as the bus rumbles over a pothole and his temple smacks against the glass of the bus window. There’s a little bit of drool at the corner of his lips, and Zitao hastily, if blearily, wipes it away. The commute from the gym to the flat is too far. Zitao can feel the exhaustion dragging deep in his bones, his body pushed to the limit. He really should have fought harder for that high-rise overlooking the rest of the city, but Yifan can be convincing when he wants. That, and he knows all of Zitao’s weak spots, like the corner of his mouth, where Yifan had mistakenly kissed him the first time; he’d been aiming for the bow of his lips, but somehow misjudged the distance.
(When they were picking out flats, Yifan had kissed him once at the corner of his mouth, and then once again, more deeply, on the mouth proper-hard enough to make Zitao’s head spin but soft enough to make his heart stumble. He’d said, “But this has two bedrooms,” and then splayed his hand over Zitao’s flat stomach, which, of course, was just like Yifan. He was always good at saying things without really saying them and then making a fool of himself, as if by doing that, he could play it off as a joke.
Taken off-guard, Zitao had punched him in the arm and then, embarrassingly, cried into Yifan’s shoulder when Yifan assured him he meant it. Which, of course, was just like Zitao: hot-headed reactions and belated embarrassment at them.)
With a quick look out the window-embarrassedly fogged up by Zitao’s mouth-breathing-to reassure himself that he hasn’t slept past his stop, Zitao resettles back in his seat and shivers. The aircon is on full blast on the bus, as it always is to compensate for Beijing’s muggy summer weather, and Zitao’s sat directly underneath the machine only in his t-shirt and shorts. He hadn’t thought to bring a jacket.
Usually, Zitao isn’t alone on the bus home; there’s always someone else riding the midnight bus with him. Beijing might not be the city that never sleeps, but it could be the city that trudges at home at five in the morning with a work shift that starts at eight the next day. Normally, it’s only Zitao and a few other businessmen and workers heading back home, but it is a Friday. Zitao wouldn’t be surprised to see university students trudging out of their apartments and dormitories, free with the weekend stretched out in front of them.
The bus screeches to a halt at its next stop with a cool female voice announcing the stop’s name. Five away from the flat. Zitao rubs at his eyes with the back of his hand. There’s an expat who rides the bus with Zitao every so often who gets off at this stop. He has sharp cheekbones and always wears a snapback with the brim pulled sideways, and sometimes, he smiles at Zitao when Zitao boards, despite the fact he’s almost always on his phone, talking to a Joonmyun-hyung. His lips curl upward at the ends when he smiles, like a cat’s. Zitao calls him Chen in his head, shamelessly transferring the name of his childhood cat to the expat. Yifan had laughed when Zitao told him about it, his eyes crinkling, almost childishly delighted.
Chen hadn’t smiled at Zitao when he boarded today, too engrossed in fiddling with his phone, his huge headphones dangling around his neck. Zitao doesn’t mind. Sometimes they smile at each other, and sometimes they look out the window, two strangers who happen to ride the same bus.
At the stop, Chen disembarks, his red snapback bobbing away in the darkness. The two men who board look to be about university age. One carries a large guitar case on his back. The other looks younger, his face fine-boned and sharp, and they both speak familiarly with the bus driver, patting him on the shoulder before they make their way down the aisle.
The two of them take the seat right in front of Zitao, and he nearly gets whacked in the face as the one with the guitar case sits right in front of him and the case comes swinging at him. The pretty one falls into the seat right next to his uncoordinated friend, despite the fact that there are more than enough seats further away and spread out so Zitao doesn’t have to brace his arm against the back of the seat to avoid getting hit in the face as the bus rattles onward.
The two of them start prattling on about their assignment, loud and obnoxious enough to be heard even over the whirring of the aircon. Apparently, tonight is the deadline. Zitao rolls his eyes. Students, then. Annoyed, Zitao thinks about moving, but just as he’s about to, a commotion breaks out at the front of the bus. The only other two passengers on the bus seem to be arguing about something, and soon, the argument is loud enough that Zitao can hear every word.
“I didn’t steal your wallet!” the one insists angrily. He has a suit on, but his tie is askew and clumsily done, and he looks very, very young-probably younger than Zitao even. Zitao doesn’t recognize him, so he must be new to the area, too. His accent is heavy, the words carefully pronounced and over-enunciated. He has a lisp. “I was sitting here this entire time!”
“Don’t lie,” the other one snarls. He has an accent, too, but it’s lighter and less noticeable. Zitao peers between the two students’ heads to watch the incident unfold. The accuser is almost comically tinier than the accused, but the look on his face makes Zitao think he’d be the wrong person to cross. His eyes are frighteningly wide. “I saw you reach into my briefcase when I turned away to look out the window.”
“You should get your eyes checked,” the first man retorts, and the wide-eyed one makes a sharp comment in a different language. Korean. It sounds like the dramas Zitao streams onto his laptop on his days off when Yifan’s at work.
The arguing escalates, the foreign syllables falling from their mouths in increasing volume until, finally, the bus driver has to intervene. He slams on the brakes, jolting Zitao forward and almost into the guitar case of the student in front of him. His voice is harsh and rough when he says, “Alright, the both of you-get out! I won’t have any fighting while I’m driving. There’s a police station right there. Use it and settle your differences with the authorities.”
Both of them, red-faced and clearly still angry, march off the bus, still ranting at each other. Zitao watches them go curiously but loses interest when the bus doors close and they move on. The students sitting in front of him however have apparently never seen such an altercation on public transport and shove their heads together to whisper furiously to each other.
Zitao preoccupies himself with his phone to distract from the chill. He fires off a text to Yifan's phone-I'm cold TTTT-but gets no response. Yifan hates texting with a passion, says his fingers are too big for the keyboard. It's terrible and endearing, and sometimes Zitao's a little annoyed by it-how can Yifan not like texting-but Zitao takes it into stride. Besides, it's not that bad, Yifan having dustbins for hands, especially when they're big enough for Yifan to wrap one entirely around Zitao's wrists and pin him to the bed.
“Ahhh,” the pretty student sighs suddenly, jolting Zitao out of his memory. The two of them and Zitao are the only ones on the bus now, and his voice fills the empty bus. “It seems we’ve been found out.” Zitao blinks and looks up.
“And whose fault is that?” the guitar student says, cocking his head to look at his friend. “I told you, we should have put on the white robes to cover our feet.”
“But it’s so hot,” his friend whines. “Can you imagine how gross we’d be under those stuffy robes? I’m sweating enough as it is.”
Suddenly, as if planned, the two of them turn around and look at Zitao, effectively startling a squawk out of him. The pretty one smiles winningly, as if pulling a scream out of Zitao’s mouth had been his plan all along.
“Hello,” he says pleasantly, and Zitao just awkwardly looks at them, then looks away. “You know, we’ve already seen you looking at us, there’s no point in pretending.”
“Sorry,” Zitao mutters under his breath, still not looking at him. The cool female voice announces the next stop, but the bus doesn’t pause as it rattles on. No one needs to board, apparently.
“How rude,” the stranger sniffs. “Even when they’re dead, brats will still be brats.”
“Brat?” Zitao echoes incredulously, turning back to glare at the pretty stranger and his friend. Said friend has a hand covering his face, probably of embarrassment. “How old are you? Fourteen?” And then the rest of the sentence sinks in. Zitao feels the blood drain out of his face and he leans back as far as he can, muscles tensed for flight.
“Are you threatening me?” Zitao asks, trying to make himself sound tough but squeaking a little at the last syllable. The pretty stranger leers at him, twisting his pretty face into horribly ugly expressions, and Zitao recoils. He instinctively looks over the two of them, sizing them up for a fight. He could probably take them both, though that guitar case looks like it can pack a heavy punch, and the bus makes for uneven, shaking ground.
“Lu Han, stop making him nervous,” his friend says before massaging his temples with his fingers. “Nightmare, this one.” He smiles kindly at Zitao, a dimple appearing in his cheek. This doesn’t really reassure Zitao, who has never before let a dimple come between him and kicking a stranger’s ass. “He was telling the truth, though.”
“That what?” Zitao is mystified and still ready for a fight. “I’m a brat? How old even are you two? Where do you go to school?”
“Ugh, Yixing, they get dumber and dumber every year,” Lu Han says, and his friend-Yixing-just slaps a palm over Lu Han’s mouth. Good thing, too, because Zitao was genuinely considering doing the same, except with his fist.
“The truth about you being dead,” Yixing says cheerfully before pulling a face and snatching his hand back. “Ugh, you’re disgusting.”
Lu Han sticks out his tongue, which he’d presumably used to lick Yixing’s hand, then looks at Zitao. “It can be a little bit of a shock at first,” he says matter-of-factly. “Take your time.”
The incredulity of the statement shocks Zitao into silence, and Lu Han and Yixing fill the silence with half-hearted conversation. Most of those peter out when either Lu Han or Yixing look expectantly at Zitao, as if waiting for a reaction, but Zitao just sits there, staring at the two of them, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“You must be mistaken,” Zitao says when he can find his voice. He edges away a little, his grip on his phone tightening. The phone isn’t exactly useful at this point; Lu Han and Yixing could easily overpower him if they wanted to before Zitao could do more than try to unlock his phone and ring Yifan from speed dial, but Zitao still feels at least a little comforted with it clenched firmly in his sweaty palm. Just in case-
(“Just in case,” Yifan says, pressing the key into Zitao’s hand. His fingers are dry and warm, and Zitao takes the key and looks down at it. It’s warm, as if Yifan’s held it for a while.
“You’re giving me the key to your apartment?” Zitao asks, looking up at Yifan with a tiny smirk.
“Just in case I get locked out,” Yifan protests, even though Zitao’s apartment is on the other side of campus, and Zitao knows from experience Yifan always remembers his keys in the morning before going to class. “And, you know. If you wanted to come over.”
“Just come over?” Zitao presses insistently. Yifan’s ears go red and he cuts his eyes away to look down Zitao’s empty hallway. His profile is menacing and elegant and coldly beautiful, but Zitao feels so warm.
“Your lease is almost up, isn’t it?” Yifan says. He looks back at Zitao with a tentative smile. It’s the kind of same kind of smile that he’d shown Zitao when they first met, jumbled by the crush of students into sitting next to each other. Even back then, Zitao thought he could fall in love with that smile. “Are you maybe looking for a new place to stay?”)
Zitao blinks, belatedly realizing he’s been staring at a curious Lu Han for the last long seconds. He glances at Yixing, who looks impassive and a little grave. Whatever prank this is, it’s not a very funny one, and not a very credible one either. He starts, “I’m not-”
"Do you remember how you got on this bus?" Yixing interrupts. It’s such a sudden question, Zitao scoffs, dragging himself out of the daze of memory he’d just been in. Of course he remembers, he wants to say. He’d been-he’d been-
He doesn't remember. Zitao racks his brain fiercely for any hint, but he doesn't remember sitting at the bus stop, doesn't remember getting on. He doesn't even remember what he'd done earlier today.
The only thing he does remember is Yifan: the soft press of his hands against Zitao's hips, the feel of his mouth moving under Zitao's. Even his scent slips so easily into Zitao's subconscious that Zitao can't imagine ever having forgotten it.
His open mouth turns into a gape, and Lu Han says, "You can't, can you? Because you're a ghost, Zitao."
Zitao flinches, focuses in on Lu Han. “How do you know my name?”
“We know lots of things,” Lu Han says self-importantly.
“And it’s on your gym bag, if you’ve forgotten,” Yixing points out, twisting impossibly around his large guitar case and pointing at the gym bag that, indeed, has a tag with Zitao’s name on it. Zitao looks at it, and then back at the two of them just in time to see Lu Han give Yixing a high-five.
"I remember some things," Zitao protests, but weakly. He's loathe to say anything about Yifan, but he has to prove to Lu Han and Yixing that he's not-he can't be dead. "My-I have a husb-partner, waiting for me at our apartment"-Yifan's face flashes in his mind, his eyes crinkled up in a smile-"I'm on my way home."
The image gets stronger: Zitao can see the rest of their flat around him. Yifan is in the kitchen, wearing that stupid apron Zitao's co-worker, Baekhyun, had given to him as a gag gift, and he's smiling his gummy smile, the one that he never lets anyone else see. His mouth moves, but Zitao doesn't know what he says. He's too far away to hear.
The cool female voice sounds again as the bus lurches to a pause, but no one boards and no one gets off, so the bus rattles on. One more stop.
Yixing makes a soft noise of triumph. "So that's what's keeping you here," he says. "Your tether to this world."
Lu Han wrinkles his nose. "Ugh, he’s a romantic."
"Stop that," Zitao snaps. "I'm not dead. How can I be talking to you if I'm dead?"
"Because we're dead too," Lu Han says matter-of-factly. Zitao is about to scoff and wave them off completely, but the light from the street lamp catches Lu Han’s face wrongly, and his face starts to flicker. At first, Zitao thinks he's just seeing things, but then the flesh of Lu Han's face starts melting away, his cheek gaping open so that Zitao can see every delicate bone of his face. The macabre gap in his face spreads out like a ripple in water, like seismic activity with aftershocks that steal Lu Han’s good looks and replace them with a half-decomposed body. Lu Han’s eyes look even bigger bulging out of empty eye sockets.
Zitao screams and throws himself out into the aisle, his heart ramming in his throat. Cowering on the floor, his muscles frozen rigid with fear, he screams for the bus driver to stop, to look, to help, but the bus driver doesn't even look back. He just keeps driving, as if he hadn’t heard Zitao at all, and Zitao stares at the back of the driver’s head, feeling unreasonably betrayed.
“He’s with us,” the corpse that was-is?-Lu Han says casually, following Zitao’s line of sight. Zitao watches Lu Han’s muscles work to move his jaw, and he feels like he's about to be sick.
"Lu Han," Yixing admonishes, and Lu Han sighs. Zitao can see the flutter of torn muscle tissue as the breath impossibly leaves Lu Han's mouth, and he turns away to retch a few times. Nothing comes up. Zitao finds he can't remember the last meal he ate.
"What are you?" Zitao asks, his voice wobbling precariously. He still doesn't dare look back at them.
"Reapers," Lu Han says, and Zitao flinches at his voice. "We gather up stubborn souls like you and cut your tethers so you can move on. You're lucky you met us when you did. We're due back home by witching hour tonight, and we won't be around for another year."
"You can look at us now, by the way," Yixing says. "Lu Han's fixed his face. Well, as much as he can."
"If you weren't already dead, I'd kill you," Lu Han snaps as Zitao slowly turns back to them. True to Yixing's word, Lu Han looks just as normal as ever, but Zitao can't stop seeing the gaping hole in Lu Han's cheek, the bone white against the dark red flesh, in his mind's eye. The bus rounds a bend, sliding Zitao into the seats on the other side of the aisle; the uneven surface isn’t helping his nausea.
Zitao doesn’t bother to get up from where he’s sat in the aisle. It’s not as far as he can be from the-the reapers, but his muscles are locked into place by fear. "S-so what?" Zitao asks in a tremulous voice. "You're here to-to cut off my tether? What does that mean? Are you going to kill me?"
"We’re going to free you," Yixing says. "I’m not sure if that’s the same as being killed. But really, it's for the better. You're not meant to stay in this world, Zitao. If you're cut free, you can find peace. You could even become a reaper eventually."
"Full circle and all that," Lu Han adds.
This is a lot for midnight. Zitao can’t quite make the connection; all he knows is, he feels alive-and so, so tired. But there’s no other explanation for Lu Han’s ability to-Zitao squeezes his eyes shut and doesn’t continue down that thought path. "And-and if I don't want to go?" Zitao asks.
Yixing smiles sadly. "We can't make you leave," he says.
"We're surprisingly democratic," Lu Han says.
"But staying here isn't any way to exist," Yixing continues. "You're less than nothing here. You can't hold anything, touch anything. You can’t be heard or seen. All you can do is remember and watch."
"Drives some spirits mad," Lu Han says somberly. "That's when you start to see hauntings. Restless spirits with nowhere to go except inside their own heads. It's tragic."
Zitao gulps. "Why do they stay, if they know what'll happen to them?"
Yixing's face tightens for a moment before it relaxes again. "The process of cutting your ties to this world means forgetting," he says. "Some would rather remember."
Zitao falters. Yifan's smile flashes through his mind again, and with that, a slew of other images, other memories: Yifan getting out of bed, his dark hair messy and standing up on the side, a pillow crease across his cheek. Yifan with adoption papers on his desk and his glasses on and his hand jokingly pressed to Zitao's stomach. Yifan draped over Zitao's back, chest slick with sweat and almost unbearably hot, his voice, taut and harsh, whispering into Zitao's ear a mix of Mandarin and English, Zitao, fuck, you feel so good, you always feel so good, I love you, I love you, I love you-
A sharp stab of pain at the front of Zitao's head, in between his eyes, brings him back to the rattling bus. Both Yixing and Lu Han look concerned, peering down at him from their seats.
"I can't," Zitao says. He believes them, if only because Zitao feels the pull of his tether, dragging him back to the apartment, but he can’t leave Yifan behind. "If I'm going to forget, I can't. I'm staying. I need to find out what happened to me."
"You're making a mistake," Lu Han starts, but Yixing puts a hand on Lu Han's shoulder.
"We can't make you come with us," he says. "Like we said, it's your decision."
"I need to go home," Zitao says. He feels suddenly like crying, but he manages to keep the tears unshed. They move to his throat and thicken his voice, and he looks down, embarrassed but determined. "I want to go home."
As if summoned by magic, the cool, automated female voice announces Zitao's stop, and Yixing turns to pull on the yellow cord. The bus comes slowly to a stop, the wheels creaking in a metallic screech, and the bus driver pulls the door open. Lu Han extends a hand down to Zitao, who takes it after a moment's hesitation, and pulls him up.
"Good luck, then," Yixing says as Zitao hefts his gym bag over his shoulder and makes his way to the doors at the front. "I hope he's worth it."
Zitao grins a little as he pauses by the bus driver. "Yifan is," he says before he gets off. The bus doors close behind him with a screech, and the bus takes off again, leaving Zitao standing there, alone. The Beijing air is warm and muggy around him, the cicadas screeching, but now that Zitao's aware of it, there is that chill prickling at the back of his neck, and even the noise seems a little distorted. He hadn’t been able to notice the difference under the heavy aircon white noise.
The security guard doesn't notice when Zitao walks in and slips into the elevator, though he does look up, surprised when the elevator doors open, then close of their own accord. Zitao doesn’t remember what floor he lives on, but his hands and arms move on their own, pressing the button for the sixth floor. When the doors open again, Zitao obeys whatever instinct is driving him forward.
The hallway is the same as Zitao remembers it-what he can remember, anyway-and his feet carry him to the far end of the long stretching corridor. (“6800,” Yifan had said that first day, sounding proud and a little out of breath from lugging their boxes from the elevator to the end of the hallway. He looked good in his mandatory suit and tie for work, but Zitao thought he liked him best like this, plainly dressed, his hair sticking a little to his forehead. Zitao could almost forgive him for making Zitao carry up his heavy books. “This is us.”)
Now that Zitao’s away from the midnight bus, he realizes suddenly, terribly, that he doesn't know how long he's been dead. Everything had looked the same on the way back, which comforts Zitao because Beijing is a city and cities continually change, but what if it’s been months? What if Yifan's moved on?
He stops in front of their apartment, the familiar mahogany door gleaming in the lit hallway. A memory rises to the forefront of his mind: Yifan is kissing him goodbye behind this very door. There are adoption papers in his briefcase, Zitao somehow knows, and an unobtrusive silver ring on his left hand that feels cool on Zitao's cheek when Yifan reaches up to cup Zitao’s jaw. His hands are dry and warm and strong enough to hold Zitao’s world.
"See you tonight," Yifan says, and his smile is so close and so tangible, Zitao doesn't know if he's imagining it or seeing it with his own two eyes.
There's noise behind the door; Zitao can hear it, the crashing of something onto the hardwood floor. Two voices. One is low, and the other one is unmistakably a child's. Zitao's heart swells suddenly. It doesn't matter, Zitao decides. It'd be enough just to see him again. Just to be near him.
Zitao breathes in. Breathes out. Puts his hand on the doorknob and turns it.
"Well," Lu Han says, "this year was a bust. Thank God it's nearly witching hour, I'm ready to go back."
"Hmm," Yixing says noncommittally, staring out the window as the bus drives to the Rift, the point of divergence where they'll be able to slip back into the spirit world.
"Are you still thinking about Zitao?" Lu Han asks, and Yixing looks at him. He looks a little sad. "Should've let me threaten him more with my face."
"You know the rules," Yixing says. "Once they say no, you have to respect it." He glances out the window again, and Lu Han has been Yixing’s partner long enough to know he’s still thinking about Zitao. He reaches over to rest a hand on Yixing’s shoulder and squeezes it comfortingly.
"Hey," Lu Han tells him gently. "We did what we were supposed to. We'll just have to hope that next year, he comes around."
"If he's even around next year," Yixing sighs. They both know the more time spent on this corporeal plane, the more quickly a spirit will corrode away. A year from now, Zitao may not even have a distinguishable form. He might only be just a whisper of a spirit. Just a memory.
"Who knows," Lu Han says. "He might be. He seems strong. And enamored with that partner of his. China’s definitely changed a lot since I last remember it." He leans over the railing separating the seats from the driver's seat and digs his sharp chin into the bus driver's shoulder. The bus driver makes a low noise from the back of his throat but doesn’t shake him off. "What d'you think, Kris? Weren’t you picked up in Beijing too?"
There’s only silence, save for the rumble of their bus underneath them. Lu Han frowns. "Kris?"
"Hm?" Kris jerks, his slack grip on the wheel tightening. If the three of them weren’t already reapers, Lu Han might admonish him for being careless. Kris flips the brim of his bus driver’s cap up. He looks tired and wan in the half-darkness. "Sorry, I was just thinking of something." He looks confused, though, and a touch wistful.
"What were you thinking about?" Lu Han asks. Kris is the newest addition to their team, a reaper of improbable height and even more improbable clumsiness. For all his impressive looks, he tends to be a little scatterbrained, lost in his own head. It's probably why he and Yixing get along so well.
Kris opens his mouth, and then frowns. His mouth is a slash on his face, his lips pressed into a thin line as whatever it is he was thinking of escapes him. "You know what?" he says instead, laughing a little. "I can't really remember."
“Well, come on then,” Lu Han says impatiently. “Let’s get to the Rift. I’m tired, and Minseok is probably already there waiting for us.”
“Right,” Kris says. Lu Han feels the lurch of the bus accelerating, and Lu Han falls back obligingly onto his seat to rest his head on Yixing’s bony shoulder.
“Whoever that Yifan was,” Yixing says, “I hope Zitao finds him.”
Lu Han hums noncommittally and lets himself close his eyes. “Me too,” he says, quiet and barely discernable over the midnight bus, rattling on into the night.