Work Text:
As their attacker rushed forwards, Fang Duobing snatched Li Lianhua’s umbrella away from him and pushed him behind the nearest tree, opening the well-mended but still functional item into his opponent’s face and yelling a string of extremely colourful insults.
The upsettingly large goose hissed back at him.
Fang Duobing shook the umbrella once more, cursed again, and, finally, with a last snap of its vicious beak, the goose turned its long neck and waddled off to rejoin its mate, who was sitting placidly on a previously-unseen nest.
Another long neck then turned as Fang Duobing looked back to see what had become of Li Lianhua.
At first, Fang Duobing saw only the tree, but soon Li Lianhua came into view, peering around the trunk and then fully emerging, before almost immediately tripping on a root and stumbling forwards. And, without thinking, Fang Duobing dropped the umbrella and opened his arms.
For a moment, it was a picturesque scene, Fang Duobing holding Li Lianhua by the waist beneath the flowering branches, the petals shaken loose by the wind falling gently around them.
Then, Fang Duobing opened his mouth.
“Li Xiaohua! Watch where you’re going!”
“Ah,” Li Lianhua said, “You’re right, you’re right, how embarrassing. But, Duobing, that was very smart of you with the umbrella.”
Fang Duobing preened a little, and Li Lianhua watched as, without being asked, Fang Duobing retrieved the useful item and returned it to its owner, his bony fingers brushing against Li Lianhua’s hand as he did so.
“Whose idea was it to come this way, again?” Fang Duobing grumbled.
Li Lianhua smiled sweetly.
Behind them, a goose honked.
“Let’s go,” Fang Duobing said, but as he spoke, he noticed a petal still lodged in Li Lianhua’s hair, and, for the second time, he reached out without thinking.
“Hm?” said Li Lianhua, who had been studying something in the distance.
“I said ‘let’s go,’” Fang Duobing repeated, and, as one final petal fell to the ground, he pulled Li Lianhua along with him.