Yan Jiang follows her son to the kitchen, leaving Yao Shen and Xin Hulei to stare at each other in shock.

"Did she..." Yao Shen starts, not sure how he\'s supposed to finish that thought.

"I think she did."

Yan Jiang returns a few moments later with an apologetic smile. "I\'m sorry about that, he can be a handful." She sits back on the armchair with a huff. "I hoped that he would have his namesake\'s calm temperament, but no such luck."

"You named him after Yan Shuyi?" Yao Shen asks, his tone tentative.

Yan Jiang nods, picking up her forgotten teacup again. "It seemed apt, what with our family name." She notices the looks on their faces but doesn\'t understand their confusion. "I mean, he\'s a fictional character, there\'s no harm in it." Her eyes widen suddenly. "Did you ancestor name him after a real person?"

Yao Shen shifts around on his seat. How is he supposed to answer that? "I was just surprised," he says, sidestepping the question entirely.

She laughs, self-consciously. "Ah well, I wasn\'t making very sound decisions back then." She remembers something suddenly, and laughs again. "You know what\'s funny? A little boy a few doors over is named Xie Huan."

Xin Hulei digs his fingers into the loveseat\'s upholstery. "Is that so?"

Yan Jiang nods, completely unaware of the turmoil brewing inside both of them. "Life is full of coincidences, turns out his mother is a fan of the novel! Not that she knows I\'m the author, but people make assumptions because of A-Shu\'s name, she was happy to meet a fellow fan."

Yao Shen keeps chancing sideways glances at Xin Hulei, trying to see how he\'s doing through all these revelations.

"Well, her husband\'s surname is Xie, same character as Xie Huan\'s family name, so she thought it would be cute if she named her son Xie Huan, because he\'s fer favourite character." She shakes her head. "What are the odds, uh?"

Yao Shen isn\'t touching that, he just hums noncommittally. "Indeed."

She\'s on a roll now, and is going to keep talking about it no matter how much neither of them want her too. "Pity they don\'t get along," she chuckles," of course there\'s the age difference, but Little Huan likes to pester A-Shu and he just loses his temper with him. What are you going to do, children, right?"

"Right," Yao Shen says, gritting his teeth. He spares one last sideways look at Xin Hulei and gets up from his seat. "Well, we should get going, we\'ve already taken too much of your time."

Xin Hulei gets up as well, lost in his own thoughts.

"Nonsense, it was a pleasure having you over, it\'s not everyday I meet two famous actors," she giggles. "Don\'t worry, I won\'t tell anyone you were here."

She walks them to the door, still smiling.

Yao Shen is already across the threshold when he remembers something. "I\'m sorry for being curious, but...how did you come up with the pen name \'Shi Shi\'?"

Her eyes widen, as if just remembering something. She reaches for the file under Yao Shen\'s arm and rummages through it. She takes out a yellowed photo, blurry and water-damaged. It shows a young man wearing an improvised uniform. The most visible thing about the photo is the "1010" emblazoned above his breast pocket.

Yan Jiang shows the photo to Yao Shen. "I believe this might have been your ancestor, most of those pages are signed "1010". I came up with the pen name as an homage to him." She frowns, paying closer attention to the photo. "The two of you really look alike."

Xin Hulei takes the picture from between Yan Jiang\'s fingers and inspects it closely. His eyes move over the image avidly, drinking it all in.

If he remembers that soldier he saved from certain death in a flash all those years ago, Yao Shen can\'t say, but he pockets the photo all the same.

"Thank you for your time," he tells a very confused Yan Jiang. "We\'ll be on our way."

She smiles at the two of them and nods, it\'s obvious she\'s still deeply confused about the motive of their sudden visit, but Yao Shen trusts that she won\'t share it with anyone.

---

Back in the Hengdian apartment Xin Hulei inspects the photo again. "I think I saw you, it was just a split-second, but...I remember."

Yao Shen plasters himself to his back and hugs him from behind. "Don\'t think about that now."

Xin Hulei rests his hands above Yao Shen\'s, laced across his waist. "I was so sure there might have been something nefarious behind the novel," he chuckles. "All those changes... I was convinced that someone was trying to send me a message."

Yao Shen chuckles against the fabric of Xin Hulei\'s hoodie. "Yes, that romance sells, and that no one likes sad endings."

He can feel the rumbling of a laugh through the muscles in Xin Hulei\'s abdomen. It feels like such a luxury that they can joke about this. It\'s been centuries since Xie Huan\'s and Yan Shuyi\'s death, but maybe only now can Xin Hulei truly begin healing.

Both of them can.

"You know, maybe it\'s not a bad thing," Xin Hulei says, after a few minutes of silence in which they remain hugging quietly in the middle of the living room. "Shizun and Xie Huan deserve a happy ending, in whichever way they can get it. They deserved it in real life, but maybe some part of them can live on in people\'s imagination, as two lovers who defeated all odds and found happiness together."

Yao Shen hums, he agrees with the sentiment, but there\'s something that worries him. "Do you feel guilty? That we got our happy ending?"

Xin Hulei turns around, and pulls Yao Shen\'s arms from his waist to around his neck. "I think we deserve to be happy too, and I think it took a lot for us to get here." He lowers his head and cups Yao Shen\'s cheek, after a moment just looking down into his eyes he kisses Yao Shen. "I don\'t feel guilty, I feel glad."

Yao Shen lifts himself on his tiptoes and hooks his arms tighter around Xin Hulei\'s neck, pressing their bodies together, chest to chest. Xin Hulei\'s hands slide from Yao Shen\'s back down to his ass. He hoists Yao Shen up into his hips, Yao Shen wraps his legs around his waist. Xin Hulei carries him to the bedroom like that.

---

Their bedroom is dark, illuminated only by the pale glow of the moon outside the window, the light pollution hiding all the stars from view.

But the moon is all Yao Shen needs to see the sharp relief of Xin Hulei\'s body as he rides him into the mattress, his cock buried so far inside him that Yao Shen thinks it\'s permanently changing his insides.

He likes that mental image, the idea of Xin Hulei changing him forever inside, making a space for himself that only he can fill. He brings his hips down hard, feeling the delicious drag of Xin Hulei\'s thick cockhead against the spot inside that makes him see stars.

Below him, Xin Hulei looks feverish, his eyes glinting and wet, and fully focused on Yao Shen.

For once, he doesn\'t look in control, he looks like he\'s about to die from how good it feels to be buried inside Yao Shen.

It sends a wave of heady pleasure to Yao Shen\'s head, it makes him almost mean. He rakes his fingers down Xin Hulei\'s washboard abs, just to hear him hiss.

"I\'m the only one for you," Yao Shen says, contracting his muscles, squeezing Xin Hulei\'s cock in the velvet grip of his tight hole. "You were made for me."

Eyes wide, biting his lower lip to hold back his gasps, Xin Hulei nods. "For you."

Yao Shen has never seen him so overcome in bed. He looks as if he\'s on the verge of unravelling. Yao Shen decides to push him along by speeding up his pace, fucking himself faster on Xin Hulei\'s thick cock. His own orgasm is drawing nearer, and his rhythm is messy and uncoordinated.

It doesn\'t matter, it\'s enough for both of them. Xin Hulei reaches for Yao Shen and squeezes his leaking cock in his fist, pumping it in the rhythm of Yao Shen\'s hips.

Yao Shen curses, he\'s so close he can nearly taste it.

Incensed, he takes Xin Hulei\'s free hand and brings it just below his navel. He presses the fingers against his heated skin. "This is how far deep inside me you are. Can you feel yourself?"

Xin Hulei\'s nostrils flare, he comes inside Yao Shen with a pained groan, as if he\'s leaving part of himself behind. The look in his eyes, and the tight tunnel of his fist pushes Yao Shen\'s over the edge, he comes all over Xin Hulei\'s heaving chest with a ragged moan.

Some of his come hits Xin Hulei\'s mouth, his red tongue darts out to catch all of it.. He savours the taste with his eyes closed.