Page 22 of Prima
Lots of love affairs happen too, which is why some young people even look forward to it.
He stares at her. For the first time, it is not curiosity or desire that animates his attention, but anger. “So, to avoid a mere talking-to, a few weeks in the comfort of your own house, and extra service that may or may not be implemented, you dragged your feethere, knowing the danger you could encounter?
“What do you think those ‘volunteers’ who didn’t catch you might have done, if they hadn’t been incentivized not to mention you to anyone? One of them could very well have reported their sighting. And I’m not the only one who has heard about those Grand Tours. Do you think it will be impossible for Dawani Coast Watch to track you along the path you must take to return home?”
She twirls a strand of her hair. “So you, who would take my raft from me, now profess to care about my safety?”
“Even if I could have overpowered you, I wouldn’t have left you stranded in these waters.”
“Why not? I’m not even that beautiful.”
He glances heavenward, then scowls at her. “Do you know how much you smile? I’ve never seen anyone who smiles so much because she wants to. All the women and most of the men I grew up around smile because they must. But you are just happy. Do you not understand what a gift that is, to be your age and still be so light and carefree? You are in possession of something priceless and you willfully endangered it.”
She is so stunned at his vehemence that the piece of sea cucumber between her chopsticks hovers in midair for the longest time before she remembers to put it in her mouth. He has not raised his voice, yet she feels the lashing of his words, a shame that scalds her throat and her nape over her carelessness.
He, too, appears taken aback. He takes a deep breath. “And don’t ask me if I like your smile.”
“I won’t,” she murmurs. Because she already knows that he likes her smiles at least as much as she likes his scowls.
They eat silently, not quite looking at each other. But she’s aware every time the breeze lifts his hair; she’s memorized the pattern of small faded burns above his right wrist—he’s pushed up his sleeves and exposed shapely forearms with well-defined veins; and she’s hardly tasted anything at all of her probably very good braised sea cucumber because she is too busy surreptitiously inching her bare foot under the table closer to his. An effort that yields nothing because just as she is a mere centimeter away, he pulls his feet under his stool, foiling her nefarious attempt.
When only empty dishes remain on the table, she opens the hatch, descends into the understructure—he already knows about it so no point pretending it doesn’t exist—and reemerges with a plate of pastries. “I bought these mooncakes in Lion City. Would you like one for dessert?”
He stacks the dishes. “Nobody buys loose pastries in Lion City to take back home. Did you open a gift box intended for someone?”
She can honestly say that in the beginning she wanted him only for those etched abs—and maybe that face, too, so striking under starlight. But now she’s turned on by his perspicacity.
“These were for my mother,” she admits, a tiny bit sheepishly. “I’m hoping to rearrange the rest very artfully so she can’t tell.”
He studies the mooncakes, tiny, round confections stamped with Old Sinoscript characters far too advanced for the two years she’d studied it at school. “This one has durian filling. You can keep that for your mother—I won’t touch it.”
She’s amazed. “Is that what the characters tell you, what’s inside the crust?”
And then she’s even more amazed. “You can read Old Sinoscript?”
“I can read kitchen-boy Old Sinoscript,” he says with that perfect seriousness that means he’s having fun not telling her everything.
He picks up a mooncake. She bites into another one—and tastes its guava filling—but he only turns his around in his hand. “How long will this keep?”
“If you have refrigeration,”—as she does in the understructure— “another week without any problem. If not, best eat it as soon as possible.”
“My sister would have liked this.” He nibbles at the edge of the pastry. “But I won’t be able to get it to her in time.”
By this point the remaining tea in the pot will have lost its original delicate notes but gained enough body and astringency to serve as a foil to the pastry’s sweet, rich textures. She refills their cups, and in doing so rounds the table unnecessarily to stand next to him.
He looks up. There is wariness in his eyes, but also an intensity that makes her feel a little drunk. A little drunker, that is—his presence always goes directly to her head.
She sets down the teapot and lowers herself into a crouch, so that they are at eye level. “Do you not make mooncakes yourself? Did they not teach you in the Potentate’s kitchen?”
He tilts his head a degree or two and in doing so, comes a centimeter closer to her. “Cakes and sweets are made in a different kitchen altogether.”
She picks up her own mooncake and bites into it again. “Is that so?”
He stares at her lips and swallows. “It has always been so.”
She holds out her mooncake. “Want to try a bit of mine?”
He scrutinizes her half-consumed mooncake. She holds her breath, willing him succumb to the lure. To bend to her will.
