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Shaoshang thinks her favorite person in the world might be Wan Qiqi.
She loves Zisheng above all others, of course. She loves him so much that she had been able to forgive him for the worst sort of betrayal she could suffer.
Though Shaoshang’s relationship with her family is now generally a positive force in her life, she finsd that the wounds of her childhood are not so easily healed.
There is a yawning chasm in her chest that craves the love she never received in her childhood.
In darker moments, she wonders if her forgiveness of Zisheng was not so much love triumphing over broken trust, but rather her need to be loved triumphing over her sense of self-preservation.
Wan Qiqi is different.
She was kind to Shaoshang from the first moment that they met; she has never looked down on Shaoshang, and she had not abandoned Shaoshang’s brother at his lowest moment.
Shaoshang’s favorite days are those spent with Wan Qiqi.
Wan Qiqi’s idea of fun isn’t always the sort met with their husbands’ approval, of course. Several times since their respective marriages, Shaoshang and Wan Qiqi have been carried home drunk by exasperated husbands.
Shaoshang would not trade this for the world.
She can tell Wan Qiqi anything.
Anything.
“Sometimes I think I was wrong to forgive Zisheng,” Shaoshang confides in her once over a bottle of wine they’ve smuggled into a shrub where it will take their husbands longer to find them.
“Are you unhappy with him?” asks Wan Qiqi, her face serious. “Do you need help to escape?”
“It’s not like that,” Shaoshang says with a dismissive wave of her hand. “It’s just, my world revolves around Zisheng now. It was bad enough when he abandoned me last time, when we were only engaged. Now? I’m not sure I could recover.”
Wan Qiqi, to her credit, does not dismiss Shaoshang’s words. She is silent for a long moment.
“From where I’m standing?” she says at last. “It doesn’t seem like that is all that likely. It seems like he regrets betraying you more than anything he’s ever done.”
Shaoshang does not respond. Wan Qiqi is right. Her dread is not a reasonable one.
“Honestly, even the betrayal, from where I’m standing, it seems understandable. It was all he’d lived or, avenging his father. He left you on that cliff to save your life. Was it really so bad?”
“I was ready to tie my life to his. I wanted to live my life bound to his, and he threw that away. I asked so many times, and he didn’t tell me. I wouldn’t have stopped him, yet he didn’t tell me. And when I found out on my own and showed up, he tossed me aside.”
Wan Qiqi is silent. Shaoshang looks at her.
“You snuck into the prison to see my brother. You went dressed in your wedding finery to bind your life to his. Would you have forgiven him if he had cast you aside then?”
Wan Qiqi opens her mouth, indignation on her face. She closes it a moment later, her expression thoughtful.
“I think it would have wounded my pride enough that I would have required a lot of groveling afterward. But it wouldn’t have been a deal breaker.”
Shaoshang cannot understand this. Wan Qiqi’s actions had put everything on the line, no less than Shaoshang had when she had brought her family to Zisheng’s aid as he carried out his extrajudicial vengeance.
“But I think it makes a big difference that I feel my family would never abandon me,” Wan Qiqi spoke again. Shaoshang’s eyes snapped to her. Wan Qiqi’s eyes were clear and serious. “You two...you both have never had anyone but yourselves. In that light, I can understand why he wouldn’t trust you. He wasn’t used to having another person he could trust. He only had his aunt all his life, and had to live a lie to survive. But you, too, had lived alone. You didn’t know you could trust your family after the way you had been treated, and you had given everything over to him, and he didn’t accept you. I think I can understand your reaction, even though it was not the same as mine might have been in the same situation.”
“You think I’m vengeful.”
“Of course you are. It’s one of your best qualities. I’ll never forget what you did to that bridge.”
“How did you know it was me?”
Before Wan Qiqi can answer, the shrub parts around them to reveal Zisheng’s deceptively impervious face.
“Why are you two drinking in a shrub?”
“You’d make us stop otherwise,” Shaoshang says with a pout that is entirely unconscious.
“I would rather you drink indoors than in a shrub,” Zisheng counters.
“Then you should be less overbearing.”
“I try not to be. It’s just that when you two are together, you usually drink so much you don’t feel well the next day.”
Zisheng looks so genuinely troubled by this that Shaoshang almost feels bad.
Almost.
“So what? It’s our business if we drink too much.”
Zisheng heaves a weary sigh and steps forward to lift Shaoshang into his arms.
“You should leave me to make my own bad choices,” Shaoshang says sulkily.
“You should tell her she’s the center of your world,” Wan Qiqi says. “I don’t think she knows yet.”
“You’re the center of my world,” Zisheng says without once glancing away from Shaoshang. “It pains me to see you unwell, as you will be tomorrow morning.”
He sounds so sincere that Shaoshang honestly feels a little taken aback.
“You’re only saying that because Wan Qiqi told you to,” she accuses, but her heart isn’t in it.
“I don’t tell you all the time because I don’t wish to sound like I expect anything from you,” Zisheng says, his tone firm but gentle. “But I have no reason to hold back a truth when someone suggests I should give voice to it.”
Shaoshang looks up at him with narrowed eyes.
“You are my world. I wish you to be well, and I wish you to be happy. These drinking sessions trouble me because I know they make you happy now, but you will be miserable tomorrow.”
It occurs to Shaoshang that while he has lifted her into his arms, he has not carried her away from Wan Qiqi or the shrubbery.
She can feel his uncertainty, now that she is looking for it. She can see in his eyes that he is not sure his choice is the correct one.
“You can take me home,” she concedes, wrapping her arms around his neck.
“Have fun!” calls out Wan Qiqi.
“It’s not that kind of night!” Shaoshang yells back.
Zisheng’s ears are red, but he does not chide her.
“You’re my world too,” Shaoshang says quietly, a whisper into his ear for him and him alone.
Zisheng responds only by holding her more tightly against his chest.
That, Shaoshang realizes, is more than enough.