Tears
—
Thanks to Katy's quick driving and planning, they were all able to book economy plane seats to Macau. Enara couldn't help but be proud at how many calories she had burnt running all the way back to her apartment, pack and change, then to Katy's, and finally being able to help catch a cab to the airport. "Wear that to work and see what bonus the boss will give.." Katy snickered about the smug expression that Enara wore on her face.
Unfortunately, the flight will at least take 19 hours, which means they'd need to intersect and change planes. Enara mourned at the thought of moving again.
The first flight was already hours in, and presumably the sky outside had already started to turn dark. The lights of the airplane had dimmed down, passengers had started to set their recliners backwards, and put on their sleeping masks, while others wore headphones and had relaxing music nursing them to sleep. Soon enough, the plane's atmosphere had entered silence.
Not even the trio had spoken much since boarding the plane. Both Shaun and Enara had their heads resting and staring at the ceiling, while Katy was enjoying her apple juice. Enara too was getting sleepy, feeling her eyelids droop and her energy vanquish.
Suddenly, as she was about to pass out, Katy's voice pitched in. "Yo, Shaun, you still haven't told us what and where the heck those moves you performed came from." She said, her mouth slightly filled with apple juice.
"Ngnnnnn...yeah Shaun." Enara added in, forcing herself to fall out of her sleeping phase and flashing back to the intense fight on the bus. "You thought you could escape from us?"
Shaun sighed exasperatedly; he was already tired of so many things. Tired of having to bring up the pass, tired from the tremendous stress that he had on the line, and even a bit tired of these two constantly butting questions.
"... I guess a promise is a promise." He said with a sad smile.
—
What the girls had just heard was utterly unbelievable, and even ridiculous. It turns out that Shaun grew up in an ancient forretress deep in the mountains of China beside a renowned leader of a hidden scandalous society, or rather; his father, named Wenwu. It was said he has lived for thousands and thousands of years not only thanks to his empire but also to the power of strange artefacts called the ten rings, which grant immortality and immense strength, enough to be able to disrupt history and conquer land for his own.
But when Wenwu landed his eyes on a beautiful woman by the name Ying Li in an attempt to enter and conquer Ta Lo, a sacred land only accessible by portal, all his evil deeds of ruling the world had faded away in the wind. It wasn't long until the two had decided to start a family together.
Except, the people of Ta Lo didn't seem to agree on the idea of their marriage. And so, for their love, Ying Li had sacrificed her role as the guardian of Ta Lo, leaving it as she embraced the human world with Wenwu, giving birth to two blessed and beautiful babies, Shaun, and his sister, Xialing. Throughout the years, they were living their lives happily, as a family, laughing, embracing, loving, away from danger.
How wrong they were.
One snowy, cold night, men dressed in metallic black, unknown to anyone, had taken their steps in the family's territory. While Shaun and his sister were confused, Ying Li had exactly known the reason upon their arrival. Ushering for her children to hide, Ying Li had fought the hardest she could against the men, but they just kept on coming, and she... she felt so tired.
When Wenwu had returned from the outside on that cold and snowy night, he was greeted by his crying children, and his lifeless wife, drenched in a pool of blood.
From then on, Shaun had been forced by his father to adapt to both a handful of harsh training, martial arts, kung fu, philosophical disciplines, and honour, for Wenwu could not have ever forgiven himself for not harshly disciplining and training his son to defend his mother. The killer picked back up the ten rings and resurrected his organisation, swearing to defend his oath.
Many tears, scars, and years later, Shaun was grown up, he could be a killing machine, but despite showing his father how hardworking he was, he had known his evil deeds all along, and chose wisely to not go down his path. Instead, he had a plan all along.
To complete the last step to gain the trust of his father, he was thus tasked by his father and the ten rings society to assassinate a long time enemy of his father, who happens to be the leader of the same gang that killed his mother. He took this as an opportunity to escape and avenge his mother, but at the same time having to throw everything he loved behind him; including his sister.
After completing his mission, he then fled to San Francisco, and ended up where he was today. Little did he know after 10 years of living his life his father would find him once again.
"I should probably also tell you my name isn't technically Shaun.." He added, looking down at his hands. Both of the girls stared at him in shock, Enara even choked on her glass of water she was drinking.
"What.. what is it then?" Katy asked, still a bit stunned as Enara coughed; still trying to recover.
"it's.. Shang-Chi." He said.
"Shan Qi" Katy tried mimicking, her shoulders shrugging as she tried to pronounce it properly.
"N-.. Shang Chi."
"Shan Chi" She lifted her index finger.
"Shang."
"Shan."
"Shang."
"Shh..an."
Enara rolled her eyes. "It's S. h. a. n. g Shàng, right?"
"Yes."
"Bleh, When did you learn how to speak chinese?" Katy stuck her tongue out.
"I thought it was in your blood." Enara shrugged back. "Didn't your mom teach you to speak?"
Her gaze then turned to Shang, her expression going from stubborn to a silly grin. "Anyway, So you're telling us, you changed your name from Shang, to Shaun?"
"Yeah Shang! I mean, I wonder how your father found you." Katy snickered, throwing her grudge behind as she tried to not laugh out loud. "Where's your name logic? Your name is Michael and you changed it to... Mitchell?"
"Okay, I was 15 years old-"
"His fifteen year old brain probably went back to learning abc and one two three? Or did he get drunk before he left?" Enara teased, and in return got smacked in the shoulders by Shaun.
"His brain went on holiday?"
"No, it probably did drugs."
"But that's too plain. He got hit by a car?"
"That's too realistic. His situation is fantasy."
"If ten weird artefacts existed, would there be weird magic witches?"
"That is not what happened." He shook his head, failing to hide the grin that spread across his face
"... So you go like 'Hi my name is Jina and I change my name to Gina." Katy giggled. Shaun proceeded to put his earphones on, pointing at it as the girls rambled.
"Yeah no, you know you can hear us." They chanted, and he sighed.
"You two are absolutely horrendous."
—
Slowly, all three of them got back to doing their respective things: sleeping. Who knows how long they were going to. Could be one hour, could be two, none of them were counting. But it was late; not to mention Katy snoring a bit too loudly, too loudly for Shang that it woke him up even with his headphones on. To be fair; they were too tiny for his ears anyway.
He was about to shuffle back into a comfortable position, when he realised there was light weight on his left shoulder. Looking down, Enara had apparently fallen soundly asleep on his shoulders, steadily breathing with a peaceful smile that painted across her face, her right hand was resting on his knee. Shang smiled. She really was perfect. Beautiful; silky black olive hair, sun-kissed skin, an inquisitive and quirky personality, hardworking and determined too. Shang couldn't possibly see what was to hate.
As he was about to try to fall back asleep and avert any more staring, he felt his clothes start to stains. At first, he thought it was just the quality of the aircon, in which he was used to, but he couldn't see any droplets. Then, he realised those droplets were tears, tears that belonged to Enara. He assumed that she was having a nightmare, however the lack of movement and fear had him confused.
Before he could consider whether he should wake her up, Enara's eyes opened. Realising she was resting on Shang's shoulders, she immediately sat up, a bit flushed, but soon shook it off.
"Sorry..." She laughed awkwardly as she brushed the tears that soaked her vision.
"... it's okay. What were you dreaming about?"
"... Oh? nothing. Why?"
"It seemed like you were having a nightmare, you had tears flowing down your eyes." He paused.
"You know, you can tell us the stress that you may be carrying on your shoulders. Seems like it is bothering you quite a bit. Your stepmom did just pass away, after all."
She laughed again, and shook her head. "Shaun, or should I say, Shang, it's fine. I'm okay." She smiled.
But Shang knew something was wrong. Something had always been wrong with her since the day Katy had introduced him to her.
— Flashback —
"Hey Shaun!" Katy yelled across the locker room. He was unbuckling his belt, glancing down at his stomach. He had gotten a bit fatter; he probably should do more pushups in the morning.
Dividing his attention from his sudden gain, he was soon face to face with his grinning friend, dragging a girl who seems to be the new employer that his boss mentioned a few days ago.
The girl had flawless black and flowy hair, neatly combed, perfectly matching with her disarming smile. There wasn't a doubt that the sun rays would reflect beautifully off it. She wasn't too skinny, yet she wasn't overweight; she was in the perfect ratio every model would work countlessly for. The red velvet vest she wore with the white uniform shined perfectly off her.
However, beyond that innocent expression, her shy and flustered smile didn't really reach her black eyes. Sure, they glimmered with beauty, but he could see that the true light in them had faded away.
Anyhow, he shouldn't judge her too quickly.
"Shaun, Enara. Enara, Shaun." Katy introduced them, eyeing at Shaun
"Hey, nice to meet you. You must be the new employee here." Shaun said, extending his arm for a handshake, expecting the girl to greet normally and return it.
But she hesitated, before finally giving in, shaking his hand, putting on a play. "... Hello, and yes I am."
As Katy had blabbered about how and when she had met Enara, Shang had noticed that Enara's eyes had trailed off into the distance far from him. They looked a little lost.
She wasn't looking at him, but something behind him. Although when he did turn around, he didn't see anything. He frowned.
"Shaun? Hello? Are you listening?" Katy said as she smacked him.
"Huh— sorry, what were you saying?"
"Oh come on!"
—
A long moment of silence, accompanied by Katy's sudden snore, before Shang spoke up.
"... I just want to say, thanks for coming with me."
Enara swallowed a disheartening gulp. "Family over everything, right?" She smiled faintly.
It was hard for Enara, really. What things she wants to tell those who she trusts; she has to keep them all confidential to herself.
The feeling was still heavy as ever.
But she could not let this interfere with her determination to help her... her friend.
Glancing up at the ceiling, she could hear the voice again, calling out to her.
「凰夢...」"Huang Meng..."
Except this time, it sounded desperate, in more pain, in more agony, as if it was being tortured. Her eyes welled up in small tears. The angelic voice was cracking; and she couldn't do anything about it.
She also could feel the lotus mark on her arm start to burn, the spot growing hotter and hotter, although it wasn't as painful as an actual burn.
"... Enara?"
"hm?"
Without warning, Shang had suddenly wrapped his left hand around Enara's shoulders. Enara looked at him with surprise. He was rarely the hugging type. She knew; he had mentioned it countless times.
She sank in anyway, leaning in a bit as she let the tears stain her jeans and Shang's jacket.
It was so scary how vulnerable she was to the world, and what was to come.
—
Hello hello!! Sorry for not being able to update -c-)" Now not only have i got exams, boarding school and studies on my plate, but also family issues... :')
i'll need some time to recover from a loss even if i have been updating like a turtle holy hell. Maybe i'll go back and edit some chapters (also archive some useless pages ahahaha)
either way, the support i have been getting here is unbelievable. thank you so much: all of you, and i hope this book has brought and spread at least a few smiles :)
See you soon!!
~ 小悅 Luck