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- but if you wake up, you’re on your own again
The faint smell of smoke lingers, whisps of milky-white curling around him, soon to be swallowed by the encroaching darkness. It settles his quivering stomach a little bit, the nervous twinge of it soothed, at least momentarily – man-made salvation from a nature-borne disaster.
His fingertips sting as the fire climbs downdowndown the match, its white-hot tongue licking at his skin with the same ferocious hunger that water lapped at their heels, a tiny flicker of light cradled within his palm – his greatest treasure; it smarts, but he clings to the flimsy piece of charring wood with all of the strength left in his small, shaking hands anyway, desperate for another few seconds of that fragile light illuminating the hungry, dark, water-logged abyss down below. Like this, cautiously sat on the edge of a damp piece of cardboard, he can just about make out the silhouette of his mother, bobbing in the water like a water lily with its roots torn – white dress unfolding like fallen petals, face hidden behind the curtain of her long, dark hair.
This is the first lesson he learns: light hurts.
Trying to grasp it, make it his, just for a moment longer, piously cradling it in his palms, makes his fingers burn, skin peeling off, red and raw like an overripe fruit; looking at it, the jerky dance of the flame casting shaky, torn shadows onto the rickety walls of the shed, makes his eyes water: the image of his mother's lifeless corpse, half illuminated, half swallowed by the dark, imprinted on the back of his eyelids – there even with his eyes closed.
With every short-lived burst of the flame, he finds himself praying – cracked lips covered in a fine layer of salt moving silently in a desperate plea. He hopes, against all odds, for a divine intervention – an all-mighty hand to part the dark waters and save him from the clutches of the abyss, to breathe the life back into his mother’s body, to take them both to a land far away.
Once he's run out of matches, crumpling the empty matchbox in his blistered hand, the darkness, long since poised for a strike, an untamable beast with its maw stretched wide, gobbles him up, ravenous, and it feels like the greatest mercy.
Like this, surrounded by pitch black nothingness, hearing nothing but his own shaky breath, he can pretend that it's all just a dream, a too-vivid nightmare lingering for a moment too long before dawn, soon to be chased away by the first tangerine-colored rays of sunlight, and his mother's warm embrace. She's waiting for him, awash in that gentle morning light, still alive, breath just held in anticipation, her skin sun-kissed and her hair windswept. She’ll take him in his arms very soon, face cradled protectively in the crook of her neck, lulled to sleep by the scent of wildflowers that always clings to her skin. Her voice will be low and soothing, and she’ll press gentle kisses to the crown of his head, the two of them tucked away somewhere far beyond anyone’s reach.
The second lesson: he's great at lying to himself.
The fantasy unfolds in his mind, bright and multicolored, broken, sharp-edged fragments of childhood memories slotting into place like the most exquisite of kaleidoscopes, even as the murky darkness beyond his closed eyes persists, heavy with the dead silence and vicious with the smell of sea water.
The stairway to heaven built with his mother's dying breath wobbles and groans, misshaped pieces of junk threatening to fall apart at the slightest of movements, and for a moment he comes back to himself, a lost, forsaken soul, soaked to the bone in saltwater – considers reaching his hand out into the abyss and letting the whole thing topple over, plunging him into the water right beside his mother, sending himself off into her waiting embrace.
He's not scared anymore, having spent who knows how long stuck in this hellish place, his mother and him both apparently forgotten by the gods – his fervent prayers having fallen on deaf ears. No, he’s not scared of dying, not like he had been when they were running for their lives, his face hidden against his mother's neck, hoping that the familiar wildflower scent would drown out the damp stench of the rushing waves and the sharp odor of animal fear spreading through the throngs of the panicking people.
He’d wanted to scream, then, heart hammering rabbit-fast all the way up in his throat, fingers clutching tight at his mother’s white dress, as his blood rushed in his ears to the same rhythm the waves did, drowning out everything but his mother’s pounding heartbeat, steadfast like a beacon in the eye of the storm.
But he thinks he could do it now – give up and stop struggling and let himself sink to the bottom alongside her; close his eyes and let the tides claim him, desperate for a quick reunion with her.
It’s tempting, dark waters beckoning him like a siren’s song, but he had promised her already – to survive where she couldn’t, to live where she didn’t get to. And so, he stays still on top of his high tower, shivers trailing up and down his spine, the chilling cold a heavy weight in his bones, as close to the gods and salvation as his mother could get him, and lies to himself again and again, for as long as he has to: it's dark because he has his eyes closed, counting down in his head for the usual game of hide-and-seek with his mother, waiting for her to find the best hiding spot. Then, he'll find her, her eyes alight with mirth at having been caught, and they will walk hand in hand, bathed in the golden hues of a seaside sunset, the air heavy with the sweet scent of wild roses.
When the rescue team wrenches the wooden door open, flooding the interior of the shed with harsh sunlight, his dream shatters, stained-glass shards swallowed by the waves. His eyes water, a hoarse scream trapped in his throat – a pitiful whine of a soft-bellied cub calling for its mother, and the tower shakes and crumbles, having served its purpose.
Underneath, they pull his mother's lifeless corpse out of the water – her face bloated into something unrecognizable, her hair trailing behind her like dead lotus stems.
The third lesson: the light still hurts. By trying to get him to heaven, his mother has doomed him to hell.
- the body of water
For years afterwards, he lives in it, this hell of her absence and his own making, paying for the sins he’s yet to commit – or perhaps paying for his gravest one: surviving where he was destined to perish.
There's sea water filling up his lungs, sea water rushing in his ears – he carries it with him everywhere he goes, a constant, harrowing sound that makes him want to scream until his lungs turn inside out, finally letting that vile, seaweed-filled goo spill. It doesn't go away no matter what he does, no matter how many times he smashes his head into the walls hoping to drown it out; the tangy aftertaste of sea salt clings to the back of his throat no matter how often he makes himself throw up.
Before, his mother used to bring him seashells, their sides white and smooth, insides pretty-pink and glossy, and press them to his ear, saying that he could hear the ocean just like that – the waves unhurriedly lapping at the shore right in his ear. He loved it – this secret piece of the ocean stollen from the nature by her nimble hands, presented solely for his enjoyment, gifted into his possession. He’d carry those seashell in his pockets, little treasures for two tucked away from the prying eyes.
Now, the sound haunts him, the rush of water washing over his head in his sleep and in the waking hours, a ceaseless stream of noise that drives him crazy, drags him by the feet back into that cloying darkness, only that now he's all alone in there, drowning by himself, no matches, no flicker of the flame to stow off the hungry sea.
He takes to carrying them with him at all times – boxes tucked into bags and pockets, piled high on his nightstand, like a small, palm-sized copy of that stairway to heaven, and clutched in his hand as he tries to sleep, thumb running up and down the rough edges of the box. He lights one up, and the sea recedes, the water still and quiet at the edges of his vision. Like this, his mother’s ghost comes to him, hands death-cold and ocean-pruned, but still ever so gentle as they cradle his face.
If he closes his eyes, he can almost feel it – her feather-light touch and shore-shallow breath.
And so, he chases her presence, the calm that comes with it once his vision goes hazy, smudged at the edges by the clash of humid darkness and warm, burning light. Bangs his head against the walls of his closet until it’s the right amounts of fuzzy, until the water is high enough to lap at his chin as he sits, shoulders slumped, the match still burning even as it’s swallowed by the murky waters.
And there it is – his hell and his heaven, both equally close and equally out of reach.
- a deluded mind is hell
The road to hell is paved with his mother's good intentions.
Laid down brick by brick, with the same painstaking effort it took to build him a stairway to heaven, piece by piece, with her trembling, exhausted hands, fingers bone-white and pruned from sea water. She had traded her last breath for it, that high tower turned one-way street, condemning him to a bitter, lonely existence in her absence.
He's been walking down that path ever since her death, feet scorched and blistered, knows its bloodied, worn cobblestones like the back of his hand, knows the stench of the fiery pit waiting for him at the end of it – the howling of hellhounds nipping at his heels a familiar, ever-present sound, just like the noise of rushing tides in his ears. A discordant, haunting melody of screams that follows him even in his sleep, a constant reminder of his fate-to-be.
He has committed countless sins to keep his promise, has learned to claw and bite, to spill lies like pouring merit water, to burn truth like incense sticks at the altar, selfish, vengeful desires his only offerings, has become nothing like the boy his mother had loved, and so he knows hell awaits him, wonders oftentimes if had really been worth it – this pathetic, joyless existence bartered for him with his mother’s life. If it hadn’t been better for him to perish alongside her on that fateful day, both of them then destined for a reunion among heaven’s flowery fields.
He's not afraid of it, his inevitable miserable ending, that is, has set in stone with his own two hands: year by year as he carved it out from flesh and bone of his blood family, intent on winding the snares tight around their feet, trapping them in this nightmare of their own making, and dragging them along the road to hell with him, skin scraping of until they've screamed themselves hoarse, until they’ve learned what it feels like, to die alone and scared, swallowed up by the coiling darkness, lungs raw and aching.
He’ll make them pay, and if he has to go down just so he can take them with him, he’ll do it, leaving nothing but scorched earth in his wake.
He knows with certainty that once he's managed to drag them all before hell's gates, they will open, and hell will be empty, the devils having long since absconded to the mortal world, wearing human faces like second skin. He’s seen them, day in and day out, unafraid of the sunlight, their wickedness running amok in the wake of the gods’ complicit indifference, monsters and demons human in their selfishness, humans demonic and monstrous in their cruelty, divine in their apathy. All of them swollen with sin.
Still, it won't matter – he’ll see to the punishments himself. Until they’ve atoned, and then a hundred times more.
He's not afraid, only slightly regretful of never seeing his mother in the flesh again, of never getting to smell that sweet wild-flower scent, of never getting to feel the warmth of her embrace, and yet a small, shivering part of him, the one that still lives atop that rocking heavenly tower, forever suspended in that dreadful night, the one still drowning itself in childish dreams with its eyes closed – kaleidoscope-bright pieces of the past glued to its eyelids, keeps foolishly hoping for divine mercy: a strange, mighty god to offer their hand selflessly, unafraid of being stained by his vile sin, to grip him tight and raise him from perdition, to catch him in their arms when the tower, held together by his mother's dying breath, inevitably crumbles and topples into abyss. Wants those heavenly eyes to look at him and see: the dead, rotten core of him, the charred fingertips with white salt stuck under his fingernails, and the water-logged lungs; to see, and still deem him worthy of saving, still hold the hand out and promise redemption; to see and still stay, to promise him there is another way, that he still is the boy that can be loved.
He doesn't pray for it, of course, his salt-dried lips stay firmly pressed together, tongue heavy with disuse; he hasn't grown pathetic enough for that: has learned a long time ago that begging for scraps from the table like a stray dog gets you treated like one – offered nothing but a kick to the ribs and a foul-mouthed scolding. So, he never begs, not for salvation, not for anything else – learns to bite any hand that reaches to him, jaws clamped tight around that what he can’t have.
Instead, he surrounds himself with everything that is good and holy, godly visages carved into stone, steadfast and unyielding, paintings and statutes, their eyes vacant with far-away looks, faces serene and impassive; he stares them down in silence for hours, mouth set in a stubborn line, hoping they'll catch his gaze and take his wordless plea for what it is.
He hopes for a miracle, a mercy granted by buddha or bodhisattva, a pagan god, an ancestor’s spirit – a light that will not hurt him, a darkness that will not devour.
It's useless of course, the years trickle by, his sins accrue, the road grows shorter, and the gods stay silent – dispassionate in the face of his suffering, blind to all of the prayers he swallows. He keeps them around, still, a stinging reminder that he isn’t worth saving, has not been for more than a decade.
It is another lesson well-learned: hell is empty; demons continue to roam the human world, clad in human skin, spilling lies in divine voices. The gods slumber, blind and deaf. And people go on living, more wicked than the devils, as indifferent as the gods.
And so does he – the boy still stuck inside a tsunami, or the boy with a tsunami still stuck inside him, saltwater in his lungs and on the tip of his tongue, the churning of waves in his ears. Surviving or living, if there even is a difference.
He's drowning, has been for more than a decade, and so he’s gotten quite good at it. He’s drowning, and he's dragging them all down with him.
The road to hell has been lovingly paved for him already, after all.
- we decide what we worship
Then, there is You Shulang.
There is something about him that gives Fan Xiao pause at the very first glimpse of him, the car window half rolled down, gentle breeze ruffling at his hair: something about the way sunlight hits him, spilling along his face and shoulders like he's being cradled by it, painting his skin a gentle golden, making him glow from within – an ever-distant star finally descended to earth.
Curiously, his light does not hurt, doesn’t make Fan Xiao’s eyes water and sting, does not bite at his fingertips as he reaches his hand out to steady the man.
With his back ramrod-straight, and his face impassive, he looks like an angel cast away from heaven, more divine than human, more tempting than sin. Up close, as Fan Xiao drapes his coat over the man’s shivering form, he is enticingly human, skin flushed pink and covered in goosebumps, carrying the scent of wild roses. That scent is unexpectedly sweet, so at odds with the man’s generally austere appearance that it almost knocks Fan Xiao off his feet, something about it devastatingly familiar, like an aftertaste of a long-forgotten dream.
From two paces away, no longer within an arm’s reach and engrossed in the conversation on his phone, the man also looks like he's one careless blink away from disappearing, a palm-sized flame swallowed by the dark; Fan Xiao’s stark black coat the only thing keeping him from dissipating into the sunlight.
Fan Xiao clenches his fist and tells himself that the hungry ache inside him, awakened at the first sight of this strange, light-spun man, is anger. That he’s filled to the brim with indignation at how the man, despite keeping a genial expression on his face, looks otherwise so detached and unflappable, as if a part of him has already achieved enlightenment and ascended to a higher plane, no longer concerned with mortal affairs.
A living buddha, Fan Xiao thinks to himself and barely keeps his lips from stretching into a cruel smirk, so high and mighty, so enlightened that he's risen above them mere mortals, indifferent in the face of their plight.
He’ll teach him a lesson: will snag a corner of that white shirt, pure as the driven snow, stain it with his soot-covered fingers, and drag him down from the clouds, making him crash and burn. The mere thought of this petty revenge already makes the hungry abyss inside him twitch contentedly, and Fan Xiao tells himself it’s enough to sate him; the man is of no particular importance, after all.
He doesn't matter at all, not at first, and yet the sweet scent of wild roses clings to Fan Xiao, both ephemeral and strangely persistent, even once he’s thrown the coat away (and it is a curious thing indeed, the way its fabric holds onto the warmth of someone seemingly so cold), filling his lungs with something other than saltwater for the first time in more than a decade, stilling the constant rush of water in his head.
It makes him long for things impossible, and so he slams the car’s door closed with a jerky motion, fingers curling around the stirring wheel, now strangely empty, lips twisted with disgust at this strange man and his tantalizing nauseating scent, at the momentary weakness in himself.
The hellhounds howl, water rising in his lungs again, and so he takes another step ahead, down the same scorching road, the man nothing more than an unhappy afterthought, the promise of revenge not even a little sweet on the tip of his tongue.
It doesn't matter, doesn't matter at all: he’s sunk too deep, where no light will ever be able to find him.
Except it does, because You Shulang foolishly strays into his path again, just as radiant under the hospital's fluorescent lights as he had been out under the sun. Again, he looks like a god – serene and self-possessed, his back just as straight and his eyes just as piercing, the cast on his arm nothing more than an afterthought, a trifling human affliction not worth mentioning.
Fan Xiao wonders with morbid curiosity what that moment of impact had looked like, man-made disaster against this buddha’s still mortal shell: whether Shulang had let out a pained breath, or a hoarse shout, or if he'd swallowed it all down, trapping the sound in his throat before it had the chance to escape, his face just as stoic, his manner just as unflinching as ever. If he had given any thought as to what this misfortune was brought by, had wondered about his own misdeeds, had spared any thought for Fan Xiao himself.
He indulges in that fantasy for a moment (those keen eyes trained on him, righteous indignation pressed like a blade against his throat), its taste sticky-sweet, and, consumed as he is by it, almost misses the moment of reckoning.
You Shulang is, indeed, a god.
He brushes death off like it is his birthright, reaches out his mangled hand and offers salvation like it's the easiest thing in the world, like he isn't blind and deaf to the pained cries of humanity. The sea of people parts before him, as if he is holy, bathed in divine light from head to toe. His voice is steadfast in the face of adversity, rational mind crystal-clear as it raises above the confused chaos of other people’s unraveling. His hands shake, the only human weakness breaking through the cracks of the godly, jade-gold façade, and yet they cradle the wailing infant with limitless gentle patience, steady and sure until he can pass the child off to the concerned nurses.
No, he is no buddha, no impassive statue carved from stone, it’s surface smooth but deathly cold, it's eyes indifferent and unseeing, face benevolent, but dispassionate. He is, instead, a bodhisattva, the myriad of his hands reaching out to all of those in need, his heart bleeding with compassion, and his eyes wet with merciful tears.
Fan Xiao wants it with the ravenous hunger of a starved tiger: his mercy and his compassion, his bleeding heart and his silent tears, his light that doesn't hurt to look at – wants it all for himself, no scraps left for the rest of humanity, his teeth itching and his hands shaking, his gazed fixed on You Shulang like a silent prayer.
He won't beg him for salvation, just like he never did with other gods, but he will have it for himself, one way or another.
- my rot is as hungry as me
You Shulang tastes of liquor and cigarette smoke, of righteous heavenly fire tamed by human lips. He’s warm and solid beneath Fan Xiao’s fingers, skin flushed and smelling of roses, the pulse in his neck faint and quick like a bird’s. Fan Xiao clings to him with all of his body and tries to drink it all in: every gasp and breath stolen straight from Shulang’s lips and greedily swallowed, tucked safely into the pit of the bottomless abyss that lives in his ribcage.
His hands shake, and he hides it by clutching at You Shulang's pristine shirt so tight his knuckles go white, bunching the fabric up until it almost rips; he's hungry for the light caged between his arms, he's terrified of it slipping away from his grasp, like so many times before – the blood vessel behind his ear thrumming in an erratic rhythm, seawater and his own blood both rushing in his ears. He wants so much – all of the things he's never wanted, all of the things he could never claim and keep, destined to be swallowed by the ocean and dragged into its murky depths; and he is already so scared of losing them to the turbulent waters. Of losing You Shulang.
He is addicted to him in the same manner he is addicted to his matches, the minute sting and flicker of the flame, the heady, cloying scent of his cigarettes – like dying, rotten roses. Has been chasing the high of a new dose ever since their first meeting, desperate for another searching look, another sharp-tongued retort, another half-fond half-annoyed sigh, another second spent basking under those watchful eyes, all of You Shulang’s attention belonging to him, and him only. Another taste of his skin, sun-warmed and slightly salty, warmer still in the crook of his neck, blood thrumming underneath, true and alive; another taste of his lips, slightly chapped with the day’s worries, pinpricks of blood rising to the surface with each press of Fan Xiao’s mouth.
He’d been so still, the last time Fan Xiao had him this close, and it was not enough – he wanted the familiar push-and-pull of their interactions, Shulang's usually well-suppressed fire, and the gentle light of his eyes, the heady weight of his undivided attention, the stubborn set of his mouth and the stern lilt of his voice, the restrained strength and violence of his hands, only ever let loose when Fan Xiao had pushed far enough. He’d felt it this evening, briefly, when Shulang pinned him against the rough brick wall outside the gay club, mouth hot and insistent, something slightly wild in his eyes.
It felt like heaven, like ball lightning coming to life in the pit of his stomach.
It feels like something holy again, with You Shulang here, at long last in his arms, a solid, human warmth on top of him, and god, he is so warm, skin flushed and rosy, a sight made hundred times more tempting by how cold and untouchable he usually looks in the daylight – a divine omen not meant for mortal eyes, much less their filthy hands.
And yet he’s here, drowning in sin alongside Fan Xiao, his scorching lips trailing fire-hot kisses across Fan Xiao's sternum, branding the imprint of him into Fan Xiao's skin, and Fan Xiao shakes with it, his breath seashore-shallow and his heart rabbit-fast.
It is an old fear, stinging like matchstick fire at the fingertips, the instinctive knowledge he won't be able to cradle the light in his palm for much longer. A primal understanding – once you taste it, something this good never lasts too long.
It consumes him, drags him under, saltwater rising in his lungs and tides rushing in his ears, and so he pushes at Shulang with trembling hands and rolls away, tremulous fingers already clutching at a cigarette, the sickly-sweet smoke keeping the waves at bay.
He lies about everything, the rotten roots of his fear, the shallow depths of his own inexperience (beautiful girls and their plush, wine-soaked lips, gentle, practiced fingers and quiet sighs, but never this kind of scorching fire, never this kind of holy light) because it's easier than to bare his neck for slaughter and trust Shulang not to sink his teeth in, easier than to drag his sea-drenched, salt-boned skeletons out of the closet and into the light.
He’d let Shulang see some of it, of course, the soft-bellied, trembling him from the day before, hidden in the twilight shadows like a stupid child under a blanket, coming apart at the seams, the smell of the ocean too-real and too-near, the lapping of waves a nightmare come true. This crack in the mask, premediated but no less true for it, a trail of blood for Shulang and his compassionate heart to follow; bitter truth coated in a sweet lie of docility. Shulang has proven that he knows when to step in and reach his hand out, and when to let the pitiful thing wither and rot – so Fan Xiao’ll pretend that he’s drowning in shallow water, that he hasn’t jumped over the edge of the abyss a long time ago.
He lies about the reasons to himself as well, even better at this craft than he’d been as a child, pretends it's all a game and a ploy, a matter of his pride, and Shulang’s – imagines how much sweeter this betrayal will taste, how much more fun it will be to have this saintly being willingly lie under him, willingly surrender his trust and his body.
He tampers down another flash of fear – Shulang reaching inside him, and seeing him flinch, seeing the rot that eats at his insides, the decaying, putrid core of him, and leaving while he still has the chance, while Fan Xiao has not taken root in him yet, has not managed to lodge himself under his skin.
He waits for Shulang’s judgement with bated breath – just another test of his bodhisattva’s humility, nothing more to his reasoning – and Shulang, looking at him like he is something cherished, someone to protect, lets him, his eyes kind and his expression gently indulgent.
Yet, there is no surrender in the way he lays himself out across the bed, hair mussed and lips kiss-swollen, only a curious, playful challenge – come claim me like you wanted, if you can. No resignation in the way he bares his neck for Fan Xiao’s teeth, crooning softly at every too-fierce bite, hands tangled in Fan Xiao’s hair, sending scalding-hot flashes of pain with every tug. No shame in the way he works his and Fan Xiao’s pants open, hands sure and efficient, freeing them both – as if his body has nothing to hide, no shameful, wicked secrets spoiling in his stomach, no abyss eating him from the inside out. No retreat in how he stretches himself into pliancy under Fan Xiao's burning gaze, fingers skillful with years of careful practice and legs splayed open gracefully, eyes liquid like molten night, half-hidden behind the curtain of his eyelashes, voice still unbelievably level and steady, urging him to look and learn. No submission in the way he draws Fan Xiao back on top of himself, the muscles in his arms straining, hugging him close, some sort of mischievous secret lingering in the abyssal depth of his pupils, tugging the corners of his mouth into a forbearing smile.
His Shulang takes pain like someone well-acquainted with it, breathing through it with just a minute twitch to his brow, blunt nails digging into Fan Xiao’s back, still so careful, mindful of not breaking skin. Fan Xiao wants him to snap, for all of that long-cultivated restraint to crumble, to drive him mad with desire and keep him there, suspended on the edge of the abyss, to mark him up with his teeth and leave him breathless, to hear him scream, voice hoarse and eyes teary. Wants Shulang to claw his back bloody, awareness forgotten in the onslaught of pleasure.
And yet, it's Fan Xiao who loses it almost immediately, eyes shuttering closed and mouth going slack as he first presses into You Shulang, the heat of him overwhelming, nothing like the biting flickers of flame he’d felt on his skin before. Fan Xiao who has to hide his reddened face in the crook of Shulang's neck, teething at the skin there like a dumb wolf cub, overcome by the myriad of new sensations. Fan Xiao who just cannot seem to get the rhythm right, chasing his own hammering pulse, no matter how much Shulang tries to guide him, voice taut and lips bitten-red. Fan Xiao who cannot hold on any longer after a short while, slumping down onto You Shulang's body in defeat, utterly spent, muscles alight with residual tremors.
It is embarrassing and unbecoming, his own body a weak, traitorous shell, apparently incapable of completing even the easiest of tasks. He wants to expel this newfound weakness, strangle it with his own two hands and bury it somewhere in the backyard of their family's mansion, defeated and forgotten like so many other childhood fancies and weak spots.
He tucks his burning face back into Shulang’s shoulder, avoiding his knowing and mirthful eyes, and pretends not to hear his consolations, silently nursing his wounded pride. When he can stand those platitudes no longer, he covers Shulang’s mouth with his hand, peering at him from under his eyelashes, contrite. He feels a sudden urge to explain himself, to absolve this debilitating inadequacy with the excuse of inexperience, his earlier posturing be damned. Let his bodhisattva catch him in this lie, whatever it may cost him.
Again, no divine judgement comes: Shulang cradles his face in his hands, eyes alight with wonder, like this weakness of his inexperience is some sort of a gift, a thing to be cherished, and promises to teach him with a sly edge to his smile.
And isn't that what he'd wanted for so long – his god's undivided attention, his flesh to consume and his breath to drink in.
He'll learn, and he'll excel, and Shulang won't be anything but his.