Now’s a bad time to mention you love me, considering we’re in the middle of a heist.

Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – Foreign Songs
Current Date: May 25, 2023

Character: Qiu Zhan
Race: Human
Age: 28
Current residence: Wenzhou, China
 

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Nestled quietly together on his couch, his fingers in my hair distracting me from the plot of the movie which, if I’m being honest, isn’t all that interesting, and I find myself dozing off as he murmurs something I don’t catch. That’s fine, he’ll be repeating those words more than once and I know what they are, they’re the sweet, sweet words he’s taken to repeating whenever we’re settled close and quiet like this and every time, even if I don’t fully hear them, I know he’s spoken them and they make me shiver in a good way.

Thinking back, I never imagined that I would find myself in this position, in a relationship. My parents had not made it easy for me to be able even truly love myself or find myself at all. Their focus had always been on Wei, and once they had realized that she was gone, passed to the other side never to come back, they tried to turn me into my sister.

I could never be my sister; I was much more focused on the academic side of things whereas she had been more focused on the sporting side of things. My parents were the opposite of the stereotypical Asian parent hounding their kids for their grades; they hadn’t cared about my grades, they cared that I get good at one sport, and I’d get a scholarship in that sport. No, thank you.

I don’t know that I ever fell out of love with my parents if that’s even a thing. There’s this belief that kids have to love their parents unconditionally, but it wasn’t a thing for me and that for so many different reasons.

Eden’s fingers tug at my hair gently, it makes me laugh and the sound is drowsy because clearly, I was on the edge of falling asleep just there, nestled with my head against his lap. I’m not even sure what kind of half-hearted murmur of complaint I offer him in turn and his only answer is another sweetly murmured, “I love you.”

Which, at this point, finds itself just partially ruined, if you would, as suddenly from the television, as though the volume had just been kicked all the way up to the maximum, a male voice cries out that you—whoever this you is in the movie—can’t do this, they were in the middle of a heist. The sudden addition of those words to Eden’s own sweet ones, so close to one another as though the character had been answering him, startles me into a state of awareness and the giggling begins.

Now, I don’t have the giggles often; I think I’ve discovered that I could laugh at all with him at my side and the look he gives me is full of amusement. I don’t even have to explain myself or why I’m just giggling at his show of affection. We both know that the random—to us, not as far as the movie is concerned—and very loud mention of the heist is what startled me back to the light.

We snicker about it for a few moments before it’s clear that I won’t be able to watch the rest of the movie. The look we exchange is sweet and without much of a word more, the television is off and we’re going through our recent bedtime routine. It’s so rare that we’re able to go to bed together that I cherish every moment of it. I would never ask him to change his hours for me and he knows that, for the sake of my job, I can’t change mine.

We make it work; I think this is the part that still amazes me as far as our relationship is concerned. I grew up always being compared to others, being made to act like others and being erased as my own person. That we’re still so different from one another but we’re making things work is something I marvel at every single day.

Nestling closer to him while in bed is a magical feeling that I can’t get enough of. It makes me feel alive in ways I never thought I would get to feel, and he always finds just the perfect words to put me at ease again when my mind keeps on wandering and refuses to turn off for the night.

Never mind that today’s movie has a place in our settling for bedtime when I murmur that I love him and he gasps, playfully, and tells me that I can’t be telling him that now, we’re in the middle of a heist! It starts the giggling anew and the rest of our evening leading into the night is delightful in ways I never thought would happen. It makes me warm in so many ways that I wouldn’t even know where to begin and it’s more than all right.

Final Word Count: 817

I refuse to live in anyone’s shadow. It’s not who I am.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – Foreign Songs
Characters: Qiu Zhan
Race: Human
Age: 27
Current residence: Wenzhou, China
Final Word Count: 746 words
 

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I had an older sister. The use of the past tense is intentional as she died when I was twelve, she’d been eighteen.

There were no bigger opposites than the two of us, she was sporty, she made friends easily, her grades in school, however, were not exactly great, but she still made a huge impression on everyone she met and, well, as she was six years my elder, whenever someone learned that she was my older sister, they expected of me much the same things they had come to know from her and, well the rest is history.

It was hard to live in her shadow. They kept on expecting me to excel in sports and I never did, whenever I aced my class work or exams, they thought I had cheated. My parents often failed to see the issue until I was in tears and trying to just get them to understand why it was just so hard going to that school when everyone expected me to act exactly like Wei.

One part of the story that is completely unhelpful is that there was no lost love between us. Wei was her own person and she looked down on me as though I was something of a nuisance for her. I mean, I had taken her spotlight away from her, after all. I didn’t ask to be born and she often made me feel as though I didn’t deserve to be alive. It was exhausting.

I did cry when she died, she still was my sister, even if she’d made my life miserable. My parents believe that she was hit by a drunk driver, but I know better. I might have only been twelve, but I already knew my way around newspapers and online searches and, well, people do talk. There was only one drunk driver when she died, and it was her.

Life only got worse after she died, though. My parents finally seemed to turn to me, as though realizing that hey, look, another child—not that they had ever treated me poorly, but their focus had always been on Wei. Now that she was gone, their focus was on me but somehow, they still wanted their first child. They wanted me to play sports, they didn’t mind all that much if I didn’t excel in school—I could get a scholarship if I got good enough at a sport after all.

Putting your foot down when you’re twelve isn’t easy. They didn’t take me seriously when I told them, as clearly as I could, that I refused to live in her shadow. I was my own person, I had my own hopes and dreams. I didn’t want to be a clone of my sister. Not helpful to that situation was the fact that I’d already started to question myself, and my gender.

That, of course, isn’t something I brought up to them. I don’t know that they would have understood.

At sixteen, I already knew that I was more neutral in my gender than anything else, but I still kept it to myself. My parents still were trying to see me as Wei’s replacement in their lives and I spent as little time around them as I could. I’d found a job, I’d been putting money aside and when I turned eighteen, my bags were packed, and I left. I’d already found an apartment building, it wasn’t a great place but it was what it was. I still had a job though I’d climbed a little bit in terms of where I was on the ladder.

The rest is still somewhat history. I studied nursing, I tried working at the hospital and I just couldn’t manage and now, well now I’m happy where I am and with Eden in my life, I’m happier than I ever thought I would be. When he first asked about my family, I avoided the subject; I wasn’t comfortable talking about it and he didn’t honestly push. That felt better than I thought it would.

Earlier this year, I did finally manage to tell him about it, I told him about how things had been while I was growing up and about Wei and everything. He told me a little bit about his own family but there doesn’t seem to be much to tell. I don’t mind, though. I don’t have to live in my sister’s shadow anymore and that’s all that matters to me.

I don’t think this is the biggest mistake you’ve made. It’s probably like…the third worst.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – Foreign Songs
Characters: Qiu Zhan
Race: Human
Age: 26
Final Word Count: 680 words
 

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Eden asking me out was just the sweetest thing. I had given it time, I could see all of the little signs but from all of the time we’d already spent together—his walking me home after his donation—I knew that he liked his personal space; I knew that he needed to figure things out himself. That didn’t really stop me from reaching out and touching his hand, his arm, or even his shoulder whenever we walked home but it was slight and, I’d like to think, subtle.

It’s been a few months now and they’ve been some of the sweetest months ever. I’ve been in a few relationships before but they never truly panned out. Some people have a hard time accepting that not everything falls into neat little black and white boxes. I certainly don’t fall into a neat little black or white box. I like my grey box just fine and until Eden, that had been the one thing that I’d had the most difficulty making people understand but with him, it like cutting into warm butter, it’s smooth and easy.

We spent both Christmas and New Year’s Eve and day together. Neither of us celebrates much but he had the days off and so did I, so it made sense to get together and just spend quality time together. We spent Christmas at his place and we celebrated the year change at mine. We didn’t have much to drink, only one small mixed glass of mimosa because that’s about the only time I’ll drink, and we were such giggly messes by the time the countdown started that I honestly don’t even remember if we saw the end of that.

He’d started telling me little stories of his childhood and I reciprocated in turn, some of the stories were sad, some were sweet, others were hilarious and we were up to those funny ones when the countdown started. I don’t remember much. I mostly remember laughing breathlessly; I remember telling him that I didn’t think that what he’d done had been the biggest mistake he’d ever made. He paused, squinted at me in a way that was by far too adorable, and I told him that just maybe it was his third worst.

For some reason, that was even funnier than anything else had been up until this point and we both lost it even more. We laughed so hard that our sides were hurting. I can’t recall who calmed down first, not that it really matters, does it? I don’t think it does. We spent the rest of that hour just settled close and before long, we’d moved to bed for cuddling and sleep and light and curious wandering hands but no more. We were in no way in a clear enough mindset for anything of the sort.

Looking back, even now just a few days later, I’m not even sure I completely remember what his story was about; I just remember my reaction to it and the laughter that it brought. We might very well revisit these stories somewhere down the road but I think that the night we spent together was a good preview for what’s to come. We just click; we’re so compatible that I think I could weep. I’ve never felt this way for anyone before and while it feels like it would be rushing; I just want to tell him that I want to spend the rest of my life with him. I want us to be together until the end of everything.

I’ve known others who have rushed into marrying the person they thought they wanted to be with for eternity but it didn’t last and I don’t want to take that chance just yet. Our relationship is young, I’ll let it grow into something stronger yet and I think that we’ll just go from there. Baby steps. Delicious baby steps but baby steps. I know we’ll make it far but we don’t need to tie any ribbon or knot or put rings on it just yet, not really.

These cases are so cold they are freezing.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – Foreign Songs
Characters: Qiu Zhan
Race: Human
Age: 25
Final Word Count: 648 words
 

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I used to work in a hospital but I don’t think I was meant to handle it there. I mean, it wasn’t a bad place, my coworkers were all really nice and open to things and most didn’t even misgender me beyond the first time, but I think it was the guests, as I’ve always called them. I don’t mind people, I actually love being around people but I spent most of my working time at the last hospital in one of the wings where the sick were mostly left to die, I couldn’t handle it.

It didn’t take too much work for me to be able to find another job but stay within this particular branch. I ended up at a donating centre and I’ve never felt more useful. I switch my time between the front desk and the back where people are either giving blood, platelets, or plasma; we have a room for each and procedures for each. I like being at the front, though, I get to see everyone who comes in and greet them, help them get settled until they’re called in and, I admit, I might mostly ask to be in the blood donation room when I know Eden’s going to be by and he’s by so often, he’s like clockwork. But this is something else entirely and I’m not going to get into that.

When I’m at the front, I get to partially listen to the people in the little sitting-room just behind my desk, I even get to join them every so often when it’s quiet and we’re not expecting anyone else to come in. Even then, I can see people coming in from almost anywhere in the sitting room so I can always walk back to my spot.

A few weeks ago, there was a pair of off-duty cops, though they might have been investigators, or detectives, or whatever it is the proper term for what they do but they were talking about cold cases. I’ve heard about those, at least, I figure that’s what they were talking about, cases that have never been finished, killers never found or things of the sort. I tried to not listen to their discussion much because it felt like eavesdropping but it’s hard to ignore things when they were the only ones in the room at that point. It was late and we were on our last few visitors before we closed our doors for the day.

They were talking about how the cases they were studying were so cold they were freezing. I figured it to be a sort of play on words and it made me smile a little but at the same time, I think it’s just so sad that it’s possible the families linked to these cases might never find any closure because no one has ever been found to shoulder the blame for whatever it is that happened.

I don’t understand criminals, I don’t. I know that for several of them, it’s not something they can control. It’s in their genes or it’s in the head, it’s something that’s broken in the way they were made or something their parents broke in the way they were raised. There are a lot of reasons and things to explain behavioural issues like these but it still makes it hard to understand criminals, especially the ones who just kill to kill.

That might also mostly be the fact that after seeing so much death at the hospital, I just don’t have the stomach for it. It might also be why I ended up here, in the long run and oh—there’s Eden coming in now, right on time. If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got myself a cutie to say hi to and to chat up while I get him set up for his donation. Our last visitor for today.