Prologue #2
Lincoln was right. When he first met Kai, I’d said that I wanted to meet him since he was actually from China.
Though I was quarter Chinese ethnically, I had never actually known one personally who wasn’t related to me.
Until Kai. So why did his being here upset me now?
He was as much a part of Lincoln’s life as Trevon was.
“I guess because I told you I didn’t want to make a big deal about today?”
“Well, it is kind of my birthday present for you. I know you can’t take your eyes off him.”
“Cheapskate.”
“You know, I’m a poor college student and all.”
“Whatever. I’ll be right down. I hope that seeing your friend again isn’t my only present.” I hopped out of my bed and ushered my brothers out of my room. “Five seconds.”
One sec was way too unrealistic, Chloe would say, so we had decided that we would say anything but one sec.
I’d thought that I would prefer to spend my birthday alone this year.
I even went out of my way to send Mom and Dad away on a trip.
I’d had an idea of what I wanted to do on this special day.
Cry my eyes out for my bestie. Light a fire and burn some of her favorite things for her to receive in the afterlife.
Being able to send the dead things by burning materialistic items made with origami used to sound silly to me.
But right now, it felt rather comforting that my ancestors had such a strong belief in life after death.
There was so much I wanted to send to her.
I wondered if people would cry for me if I died.
I think I would be really upset if no one cried for me. Am I not worth the tears? Not that I could control such things. I loved Chloe so much and my tears were proof.
Grief was a tricky thing. I never knew grief until now. Now, whenever I think of her, it burns. My tears shed uncontrollably again as my thoughts turned to her sweet face being burned alive.
Downstairs had been transformed. All the available wall space had been filled with string lights. Our home was modern and very tidy due to Mom’s obsession with cleaning – not necessarily done by herself, but by the cleaning staff. But today, the house looked totally different, like a dream.
I felt like I had stepped into a fairy land.
Like a princess . I had never felt that way before.
Suddenly, Kai appeared from nowhere, holding his hand out as I stepped off the stairs. I couldn’t help but feel like a real princess. With her prince by her side.
I never knew my brothers would care this much about me. Before this, I thought the only thing they were capable of was annoying the hell out of me. There was no way my brothers did all this by themselves.
I stared at the beautiful man in front of me and knew that this fantasy prince was too good to be true.
He probably wasn’t interested in girls. In my whole life up to that point, the only people good at decorating that I knew of – either from real life or on TV – were gay men. “You guys did all this?”
“We had help,” Lincoln said. I knew it. I was a little disappointed, but my face couldn’t help turning scorching hot as Kai winked at me.
It was such a shame. The first person I’ve ever been really attracted to was gay. Congratulations to me, I’ll probably die alone. He was simply too pretty to be straight.
Kai led me to the dining room where they all started singing Happy Birthday and I tried very hard not to cry. The short song felt extremely long and slow. At the end of the song, I closed my eyes and made a wish that I knew would never come true.
I wanted another chance to celebrate my birthday with Chloe again .
I knew it was silly. I should have wished to make it into the medical school of my choice easily without studying past midnight like Liam.
But that was the only thing I wanted right now.
Nodding, agreeing that I would have this wish no matter what, I opened my eyes and carefully blew out the candles.
It was hard not to spit any of my snot onto the cake.
My face was a mess again and my eyes were out of focus.
My brothers bent down to give me hugs and kisses then they went to get me my presents from their rooms.
Kai stood next to me and stooped down, his hand lightly cupping the side of my head as he planted a kiss on my forehead. “Happy birthday, princess.”
Did he think that the kisses were a custom or cultural thing? He really didn’t have to. But I was glad that he did. And for some messed up reason, my eyes were back in focus and suddenly my tears had dried.
I can’t be in love with this guy, can I? What kind of nonsense was true love anyway? Clearly that was a lie made up by adults. Just a fairy tale. It clearly did not exist.
Was that how Chloe felt about Liam? No matter how stupid his face looked, Chloe had said that it always made her happy when she saw him. Lincoln, on the other hand, always made Chloe angry for no reason, even when he was just doing nothing quietly at the far end of the room.
“This is for you.” Kai handed me a pale blue paper bag. I couldn’t believe that this guy I barely knew had bought me a present from Tiffany & Co.
Really?” My heart was racing and the boy just grinned like it was nothing for him. I reached inside the bag and found a thick envelope. “What is this?”
“Open it,” Liam said, as curious as everyone else in the room apart from Kai himself.
Perhaps it was just a birthday card with a small book. I reminded myself that we really didn’t know each other well, and he really didn’t need to get me anything.
“What the f–” Fuck!
“Ahem…” Lincoln cleared his throat. I rolled my eyes at my big brother for trying to control what came out of my mouth. “ You’re a lady ,” Lincoln mouthed. I never understood why it was cute when Chloe swore, but not me. Such a double standard.
I took out a big fat stash of cash, all in one-hundred-dollar bills.
“What the fuck!” Both my brothers cried in disbelief.
“Ahem…” I mimicked Lincoln. He could have a taste of his own medicine.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know that it was your birthday until this afternoon, and it was too late to get you something nice.”
They looked at each other for a few seconds, then I burst out in laughter, and the others followed.
I had no idea why it was funny. Maybe my laughter had been suppressed for so long, it just needed to be let out.
Tears were falling from my eyes now for a different reason for the first time in months.
“I can’t take this, but can I count it please? I’ve never seen so much cash in my life.”
“Oh? I’m sorry. Should I write you a check instead?” I busted out laughing again. Louder than the last time. This was a joke, right? I couldn’t tell anymore.
I counted ninety-nine.
I counted again.
Ninety-nine.
Did he mean to give me ten grand but miscounted? I wasn’t greedy but the perfectionist side of me needed things to be neat, and ninety-nine wasn’t neat.
“Ninety-nine,” Kai confirmed.
“Right. And it was intentional .” But why? The question was eating me up inside, though I felt too awkward to ask the beautiful man.
“Ninety-nine means longevity in Chinese. I thought you guys knew.” Kai looked confused.
I smiled in agreement. “Oh, I have heard that before.”
“She’s lying,” Lincoln chimed in. “Our parents never taught us anything related to our Chinese heritage.”
“Yeah, sorry.” I shrugged and another smile escaped my mouth.
After having the birthday cake and some food, Liam kissed me good night and went to bed.
He had an exam the next morning and he needed his rest. Lincoln volunteered to clean up the dishes and any mess that they had made while Kai and I argued about whether or not ninety-nine hundred dollars was an appropriate to gift to accept from a stranger.
Kai was still convinced that it was a good gift. It would have been an acceptable gift in China – a little too generous, but acceptable.
In the end, I said I would happily accept his ninety-nine hundred dollars as a birthday present in ten years’ time, if we still knew each other.
“Friends ,” he said.
That would be very nice indeed. If I could be his friend, and maybe more.
“Do you like KTV?” Kai changed the subject.
I had no idea what he meant. I had heard of MTV, but I had a feeling he was talking about something else. “I’m not too sure.”
“Come. I’ll show you.” Kai held out a hand and led me out to the living room. Being up-close to him made me realize how tall he was. A little over six foot, perhaps. And it made me feel a bit fuzzy, in a good way.
Kai turned on the television, along with two boxes that I had never seen before. As the TV came alive, the screen showed an original music video of a song by the Spice Girls without the singing voices. “Karaoke.” I recognized it right away.
“Yes, some people call it karaoke.” Kai gave me a microphone and a remote control. “You can find any song you want.”
“Any song?”
“Yes, any song. As long as you have the internet, you can connect to the server I subscribe to in China and download any song in the world.”
“Where did you get this?” Kai had these deep eyes that were like black holes that could suck out your soul. I shook my head to apologize for my behavior. If only Kai knew what I was thinking as I stared at him.
Someone as beautiful as Kai must get stared at a lot. On that note, I suddenly felt not as guilty.
“From China of course,” he explained.
Beautiful people are meant to be shared, no I mean stared at. Or shared. No, shut up.
“You brought this thing all the way from China?” Why would someone go through the trouble of shipping something like this over? “We have karaoke here you know?”
He turned his face and looked directly at me. “I know you have everything here, princess, but yours suck so bad.”
I was shocked but I didn’t know whether I was more shocked that he dared to suggest that our precious American products could possibly suck, or that he just called me princess again.
“Why do you keep calling me princess? Do you call every girl princess?”
He shrugged. “Not every girl. You know, when I was young, and reading those silly illustrated books about fairy tales…well, you’re exactly what I imagined a princess would look like.”
“I see.”
I shook off the thought of him being my prince and me being his princess and changed the topic.
Although I was genuinely curious about how the subscription worked, how artists get paid, whether it was legal at all…right now, I just wanted to enjoy the rest of my evening with this man. This man who had the ability to distract me from my pain, my grief, even just for a little bit.
My big brother joined us for a while before passing out on the couch.
I didn’t want the night to end. Chloe’s sudden departure had made me cling onto the present so much tighter than I used to.
The next morning, I woke up in my bed. The boys had gone back to their life, doing whatever they were supposed to be doing.
The last thing I remembered was leaning on Kai’s shoulder, singing to Jeff Buckley, wondering if it was less painful to die drowning compared to being burnt alive.
And that his cologne smells ridiculously amazing, calming and addictive .
I closed my eyes again, hoping that making a second, more realistic wish now, long after blowing out the candles would still count. I want to sniff him again .
Weird.