Archive of Our Own

Jiang YanLi isn't stupid, contrary to popular belief. She isn't puny or defenseless, nor is she easy to manipulate. All in all, Jiang YanLi knows that the local antique store, Perfectly Reasonable Transactions, is shady as fuck.

It's not even an antique store, really, it's just a store that sells weird stuff.

In any case.

It isn't really about the eerie chill that seems to always fill the shop, or the flickering lights or the constantly changing shopkeepers, not even the suspicious stain on the floor. That's--well not red, but one could generously say a very orange brown. Crimsonish.

She wouldn't exactly go as far as to say "yes this is clearly a front for the mafia" because she wasn't well versed in mafia business and thus, it remained unclear whether the mafia often dabbled in potentially occult wind chimes.

Therefore, somehow what drives the point home for YanLi is the bells at the door. One time she asked one of the shopkeepers - some middle aged lady with ebony hair and icy eyes she never saw again - where they came from, as no matter how slow or how sudden she pushed the door open, the bells always made the same noises.

"I don't know, honestly, dear, ask Madam SanRen."

Madam SanRen, as it turns out, is a notoriously hard person to find. As in, according to one of her younger brother's mild coffee induced 3 am hysteria moments, she doesn't exist.

"I have no damn clue why you are so obsessed with this place," Jiang Cheng had muttered back then, pretending he wasn't as taken as them, the three sat together around a table, pleasantly buzzed, scouring the Internet for anyone who could pass as an antique shop owner, named SanRen. She wasn’t exactly sure what it was they were searching for, but she really, really hoped that someone who was in the business would just… have a look at them. You know?

"Y'know what's odd, the name rings vaguely familiar. Lan Zhan is most likely to remember..." Wei Ying had muttered and then no one brought it up ever again.

Cool cool cool. YanLi could deal with that on her own.

She doesn't know why she goes back so often, yet every week finds her back at the shop, where a new face greets her, but she never buys anything, merely browsing the items. She comes very close to purchasing a set of three bells, for her and her brothers, but oddly finds she had no money on her. Every time she leaves, the features of the employees fade from her memory, and she can never recall what their name tag says. If there even is one. Whatever.

(There’s a woman who keeps coming into the shop. It’s irritating at first, seeing her face through the muddy glass, knowing she will open the door. That damned chime keeps playing the same noise, has been ever since she hung it up. She begins to think it’s a summoner of some type. The woman has no ill intent, she can’t sense anything from her.

All that she knows is that if someone were to have her describe the woman of her dreams, she’d most likely look like her)

Perfectly Reasonable Transactions is a place of wonder, no doubt.

"Of course something is up with it," Jin ZiXuan, her boyfriend, says one night during a dinner date, sounding insultingly offended. "No one ever goes there. Half the campus doesn't even know it exists, despite the fact that it's literally right there."

She breaks up with Jin ZiXuan, but not because he thinks her interest in the shop is ridiculous or anything, it's more because his cousin tries to kill her younger brother in a car crash and he sides with him and his family out of fear of his parents.

Unlike Jin GuangYao, now back to Meng Yao, who gives her a pat on the back before he invites her over and they drown three bottles of cheap baijiu, to the utter horror of one concerned Lan Huan and the interminable amusement of their third, MingJue.

For a while, with things pretty much falling apart and everything Jin GuangShan had ever done coming to the surface, Wei Ying being disowned, YanLi and Jiang Cheng cutting off their parents, YanLi forgets the antique shop.

For a while.

A… rather short while.

It isn't until next week, finals week, when high on coffee and stress, YanLi is convinced by Nie HuaiSang to get herself a lucky charm for her last exam - also the one she’d been dreading the most. It’s how she finds herself making her way down the street, stepping more lightly with one foot because she'd forgotten to put a plaster on her big toe and her new sneakers hate her. She makes her way with a determined stride until the rusted sign of Perfectly Reasonable Transactions appears in her peripheral vision.

Checking both ways, YanLi crosses the street and stares dumbly at the window display, where a tiny cat keychain waves at her. YanLi suddenly needs it very very badly.

She enters the shop and a chill runs down her spine, a combination of the perpetual cold and the familiar chime. She plucks the keychain from the shelf, without giving herself time to hesitate, and steps up to the register.

(She steps up to the register!??! She’s never done that before! She- she’s getting closer, heavens, why is she panicking she’s not panicking that would be silly, she’s talking now-?)

The shopkeeper this time is a young woman, maybe YanLi's age, if a little younger, with dark hair caught in a high ponytail and short, chipped nails. She sits hunched over the wood, pouring over a thick book with a crease between her eyebrows. Her fingers and her ears are adjourned with black and silver jewelry and when YanLi clears her throat, she startles violently.

"Oh I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to creep up on you!"

The shopkeeper, though guarded and posture rigid, nods silently. "It's alright." She croaks out. "Can I help you?"

When those eyes fall on her, Jiang YanLi’s throat dries a little and her mind screeches to an abrupt stop, because- because whoa, yeah alright.

There’s something about her eyes that floors her, her face, her demeanor, the way she seems to be dedicating her entire focus to YanLi and no one else, unlike anyone else.

“C-can I help you?”

The question is repeated again, slightly more unsure, and YanLi flushes.

"Ah." She sets the trinket down on the counter and smiles politely. "Just this, please."

Something somber passes over the other's face and she clears her throat, before saying, evenly, "You know, everything in this place has a price."

Taken aback, YanLi titles her head. "Oh. Yes, I’m familiar with how a shop works."

The woman at the counter seems equally confused as she shuts the book with a heavy thud, before grabbing the keychain and bringing it to eye level, with a murmured "Let's see…". A draft of cold air comes in from the side and YanLi shivers, trying to maintain her friendly façade as her purchase is rung up and then put in a tasteful little bag.

"Anything else? There's… many things to… acquire from here."

Jiang YanLi gives a proprietary look around and nods encouragingly. "Mn. There's quite some stuff here! In your. Shop."

The woman looks pained. Jiang YanLi bids her farewell and exits the shop, gingerly closing the door, before exhaling.

It isn't until she gets home that two essential things occur to her, that she should have really realised before: one, she never actually paid any money for the keychain, and two, she still, very vividly, recalls the shopkeeper's face.

(Is she some sort of fiend!? A shapeshifter? A trickster? The book holds no answers, as she frantically shuffles through chipped pages. Has she been somehow charmed?

Why is she so beautiful??)

“So it’s a fucked up store, in a fucked up city, what of it,” Luo QingYang waves her hand dismissively. “It’s probably some front for the mafia, hence the changing staff. For all you know all those creepy rocks are just crystal meth.”

“Maybe they're dead,” Qin Su pipes in and Jiang YanLi groans.

“You’re both awful.”

The two shrug and sip their lattes. The coffee shop they’d picked was lively with chatter and shuffling of students cramming for their finals and last minute essays. YanLi wants to wrap the dude crying by the door in a blanket and give him a pat on the back. She’d just finished her last exam a few hours ago and it felt as though life had meaning again. Graduation was so close she could smell it. After taking the best nap of her life, YanLi was dragged by her two best friends for brunch.

And now she is on the verge of her psychotic break, which felt illegal considering exams were done. Someone should wrap her in a damn blanket.

“It’s-” she tries again. “This time it was different! I can’t explain it but something was off. Wait, I mean like off in a different way than it usually is.”

“Babe,” Luo QingYang deadpans, “you probably imagined it. Last year I imagined an entire convoluted murder mystery plot during exam season after drowning twenty espresso shots. You’re thinking too in-depth about it.” She takes a moment to think, before whispering, “I almost took A-Su’s brother to the police.”

“Besides,” Qin Su yet again chimes in, cutting short what would have probably turned into an explicit retelling of a dream everyone in their social circle hears every month at dinner.  “You can just go check?”

“Huh.”

Huh.

Shaking her head, YanLi takes a deep breath. “You’re right. Whatever. MianMian, how’s that new perfume coming about by the way?”

“This is a horrible idea.”

“Of course it is,” Jiang Cheng grumbles, “It’s Wei Ying's.”

"Hey!"

“Boys,” YanLi chastises. “We wouldn’t even have to do this if someone had told me Zhan-di and Lan Huan are coming tomorrow for brunch.”

Looking thoroughly scolded, they dropped their argument.

After a third knock against the stairs of their condo, Wei Ying's phone finally powers up and he grins and turns to them with a clear 'ready to go' expression.

There was just something about late night supply runs that set her on edge. And late night supply runs turned 'let's check out the creepy shop on our way' didn't really make her feel better. Neither did the fact that with every moment she spent here and not in her bed, the sleep she’d be getting tonight was depleting quicker than Wei Ying’s stash of chili powder.

“Is this illegal? It feels like it’s illegal," Jiang Cheng asked.

YanLi, “Is shopping in a corporate dominated capitalist society illegal?”

“At night?”

“Many shops are open until the morning.” Wei Ying reasons as they set off towards the shop.

Jiang Cheng levels him with a flat gaze. “Bars. You’re thinking of bars, Wei Ying.”

Wei Ying taps his nose in thought. “Oh. I was thinking more like strip clubs but sure.”

Caught up in the high of her two brothers passionately debating whether a strip club is also inherently a bar, she almost misses the fact that Perfectly Reasonable Transactions is, somehow, open. The watch on her wrist reads 12:03 pm and Jiang YanLi realises maybe she shouldn’t have worn so much black, but she’d barely had time to do laundry. Wei Ying is pleasantly surprised by this development, and their steps are livelier as they approach-

And then the lights inside the shop go out just as Wei Ying reaches for the door handle, and the three are met with the sad image of themselves standing in the middle of the street. The OPEN sign is flipped over by a disembodied hand, the rest of the employee disappearing in the darkness within and Wei Ying shrieks and jumps back.

Jiang Cheng startles as well, and quickly admonishes, "What are you shouting for?! It's just-"

"It's a hand, A-Cheng it was a hand!! There was just a hand!"

“People have hands!?”

“But-”

YanLi hums. “It is very late, A-Xian, let’s come back tomorrow."

They buy their ramen and collapse back at home.

Tomorrow, however, the exact thing happens. It wouldn’t be worth mentioning, but it was barely one in the afternoon on a Tuesday which was, in YanLi’s personal and unprofessional opinion, an inefficient closing hour. Except- except when she approaches, she stops dead in her tracks, peering dumbly at the silhouette of the employee, no longer bathed and hidden by that eerie darkness, turning the sign.

It was the same woman who’d sold her the keychain.

With school over, YanLi has even more time to fill in her daily schedule before she begins her first year of official employment at the Unclean Realm, a local restaurant, highly rated and thankfully only two bus stations away from her flat. It’s a horrifying prospect, but the owner was Nie MingJue, who was maybe a year older than her and he was one of the nicest people she’d met in her entire life. Truly, it was incredible finding a job so easily.

Maybe it was nepotism, maybe it was her skills, passion and dedication she’d been harbouring her entire life. Her Mother probably wouldn't have been able to make her mind up, were she still in the picture.

A two week window of free time put her off a little and she only lasts until the next day before she goes to the antique shop again. It had never before happened for her to see the same employee there twice.

For some reason, her face keeps popping up in her mind, at most random times. Cooking, watching TV, on walks, a very weird dream, those coal eyes and the sharp cheekbones haunted her with unsettling consistency. At first it struck her as weird, somewhat invasive, but it became normal. It became a part of her routine.

There was only so much she could blame on stress. Also she really wanted to pay for her purchase before the government - or the mafia - came for her or something.

The chime resonated in the barren space, a mocking echo and she found the shop completely empty. At least not closed again, YanLi thought.

Although, at a first glance, the place looked identical, it felt as though a blanket had been lowered over it. The electricity-like energy that the trinkets usually gave off felt muted somehow, dampened by some unseen layer of fog, and the atmosphere of the shop didn’t make her want to bolt instantly. All of this amounted to something even more off-putting than the regular ‘ominous’ she’d been- she’d been looking forward to, for some reason.

Behind her, someone cleared their throat and Jiang YanLi ascended to the heavens then and there.

(She’s back, why is she back, why is she back!? Heavens above what kind of pranks are you playing? Is it really appropriate, to bring her dreams to-)

“Can I help you?” the same deep and rich voice inquired and she turned to see the short haired woman, clad in some overalls and holding a long mop, bangs escaping from her tight ponytail. YanLi swallowed the knot in her throat.

Ah yes. Excuse me, why are you still working here even though you were working here yesterday and the day before that, two days in a row?

Pardon, how dare you have a lasting job?

You are way too pretty to be real.

Are these tiny crystals actually drugs?

What YanLi does, instead say, is a very eloquent, “I believe I forgot to pay last time.”

A pretty big oversight if you're trying to run a business, she almost adds but doesn't because YanLi was raised to be polite, alright.

The keep purses her lips and her grip visibly tightens on the mop. The veins in her arms are an angry purple and visible through the odd translucentness of her tan skin. She never understood people who found visible veins attractive, but Heavens help her, this was not the time for karma to act up. However, YanLi doesn't bat an eye. Having veins is expected.

"Is that why you're here?"

YanLi blinks, and peers behind her, half expecting for someone else to have joined the conversation while she was gawking at the employee's forearms. "I, uh… yes? I don't want to have a reputation for inadvertently stealing," she says and smiles, her sweetest one.

(How can someone just smile like that?)

Though appearing confusingly conflicted, the keep says nothing, instead precariously balances the mop against the wall and pushes past YanLi, towards the counter. The other breathes a sigh of relief, and if she notices, she doesn't show it.

The counter is messy, sprawled with papers and candy wrappers. There is a heavy book on one of the corners, stuffed with page markers, hanging limply out of the cover. Besides it, a heavy looking metal cube sits quietly. Its surface is shiny, almost sheer, reflecting the dim lighting of the shop.

“Do not mind the clutter,” the keep asks, and although there's no real inflection to her voice, YanLi senses a subtle embarrassment. She smiles politely, and the sound of a drawer being pulled out startles her. The woman then proceeds to land a thick folder on the counter, and clears her throat.

“So. You were here the day before yesterday?”

Had she?

“Yes.”

She grimaces visibly this time, as though the knowledge that YanLi had visited the previous day was the worst news she’d ever received. And even if YanLi doesn’t make it a point to try and peer at the papers in the folder, she still notes their incoherence. Perhaps a foreign language?

“What was it you bought again?”

She’s snapped out of her snooping and when she looks out, she finds she’s leaned forward, the other’s face now way too close. The shopkeeper is even… more striking up close, some hidden freckles now popping up like stars everywhere she looked, a little scar between her eyebrows, her lips are red where skin has been peeled off, maybe a nervous-

“Ah- uhm this… keychain.”

The shopkeeper examines the offending item as if it killed her entire family. YanLi leans back, ashamed.

“Is… there a problem?” YanLi questions when the silence stretches on, enough for her embarrassment to die down. There is a momentary doubt that rapidly blooms in her chest, and all over her dismissal of illegal activities cooked up at Perfectly Reasonable Transactions fades in its confidence. Oh Gods, she thinks, I’m going to get abducted. They’re gonna pull my teeth out.

“...it just doesn’t happen often. I can talk to my boss, if you aren’t in a hurry?”

YanLi nods. Is lingchi still in practice?

Wen Qing has a problem. Other than the problems she usually has, but a problem in the form of a customer who might just be her greatest enemy. She is clearly cunning, and with every second she is unable to decipher her opponent, she feels mocked. She’d always thought of herself as quick witted, as intelligent and in the past, it had been a breeze to smell out ploys and stop the threat before it could get too bad.

(Her hair looks really soft, like really soft, tied into some loose space buns, with intricate braids and everything. There was the light blush on her cheeks, the subtle makeup, the way her clothes-)

But this was the second conversation they’d ever had, ever since she started visiting the place for the past months. Wen Qing wasn’t freaking out or something.

(Her voice was so nice)

(That’s a potential enemy for Heaven’s sake?!)

In the backroom of the shop, she takes a well-earned moment to dissolve into a bone-shaking panic. When that’s done, she turns to the emergency phone, and ancient looking thing, with peeling paint and what might be rust. It’s a heavy and cold thing and she doesn’t have to input any numbers before a gentle, calming voice asks, “Is everything alright, dear?”

She could cry. Lan Yi doesn’t say anything else, so Wen Qing reassures, “There isn’t an immediate threat, Madam Lan, please forgive me.”

There’s shuffling at the other end of the line, before, amused, “That’s quite a relief. And I’ve told you to drop the formalities, A-Qing. So what is bothering you?”

“There’s a woman here she’s uh… Well, I sold her this keychain, the cat one, the one A-Ning brought in the other day, and not only has she returned, but she claims she hasn’t paid for it.” She rubs at her cheekbone. “I checked and checked the register again, but I can’t figure out what it does.”

Lan Yi remains quiet, so Wen Qing quickly adds, “Also, she has remembered my face.” When still, there is no reply, she chews on her bottom lip, before inquiring anxiously, “Is it something I did? That the charms failed?”

To this, however, Lan Yi is quick to calm her down. “What a silly thing to say, A-Qing, don’t think like that. It’s likely the keychain has some sort of cancelling effect, rather…” Her lulling explanation cuts off and there’s a muffled sound, a hand covering the receptor momentarily. She can’t make out anything from the following muffled conversation, before the pressure on the microphone is relieved and she continues, “Listen, dear, is she… perhaps a woman of your age, with ebony hair and kind, purple-ish eyes? Rounder face, thinner lips, pale… The one who first came in when you hung the windchime A-Ren brought?”

That’s way too specific for comfort. “Uh… that does sound rather accurate.”

Muffled words are exchanged and she holds the receiver a little away from her ear as the clear sounds of Lan Yi’s palms against the receptor ring loudly. “Be at ease, dear, here’s what you must do…”

When the shopkeeper reemerges, it's as if YanLi is awakened from a trance. She glances at her wrist watch and sees that barely a minute has passed, though it has certainly felt like more… When she meets the other’s coal eyes, she’s surprised to find them more relaxed. The tension is gone from her body, and the woman actually offers a polite little smile as she shuffles papers around the counter.

She really is stunning…

“Forgive me for my absence-”

“It really is no trouble.”

There is a tight smile playing on her lips. “I am afraid I cannot find a record for the keychain. Would it be alright to hold it back and have my boss evaluate its worth. We would of course provide you with a clear report. I’d invite you to be present, but it is hard to keep the Manager in one place…”

YanLi feels a strange detachment thinking about leaving the trinket behind. It really doesn’t look like anything special, rather as if it would be available at any other chain store. Nevertheless…

It’s my only excuse to keep coming here without looking insane.

“...I’d hate to cheat you out of your money by making a wrong assessment.”

They stare at each other for a solid minute, until YanLi clears her throat. “That would be alright.”

Her eyes glitter and YanLi leans back a little. There is an odd warmth bubbling up in her stomach at the sight and she can’t help but smile a little too.

“You may check back tomorrow.”

At home, YanLi dreams of dark eyes, of strong arms and plush lips, and in the morning, it fades into the back of her mind, a pleasant, forgotten comfort.

Wen Qing is in a very good mood the following day. She was beyond relieved that the issue with the keychain had been resolved so swiftly and efficiently. She’s humming along to some tune as she wipes down the glass barriers, a solid hour before opening hours. She’s wrapped herself up with a woolen scarf today, the shop chillier than usual. Her clean boots squeaked rhythmically on the floor as she dabbed at invisible spots on the counter.

“Jie!”

She turns around in time to see a sleepy Wen Ning from the back and her features settle into a benign gaze. He’s wearing clothes too loose for his form, borrowed from Madam Lan, as he groggily rubs at one of his eyes.

“A-Ning. Have you eaten?”

“W-w-what are you doing up s-so early?” Through a yawn he adds, “The sun hasn’t even risen yet.”

Her chuckle startles Wen Ning and she only cracks up more at his surprise. Truthfully, she may not be so at ease most days, but she can’t help but take a little offense at his shock. Her brother flushes with the embarrassment of being caught. “I guess I just slept well.”

Wen Ning shakes his head. “A-alright then.”

When he says nothing more, Wen Qing tilts her head with a soft sigh. “Go sleep some more, didi. You had a busy day yesterday, with the new batch of river stones.” She wipes the sweat off her forehead. “Mother said she and Madam Lan will be back later tonight.”

“I’ll go to the shops a little l-l-later then pick some things up for dinner…”

Their eyes meet, and Wen Qing tries for sternness with a, “But first you’ll get some more sleep.”

He acquiesces finally, and paddles back behind the curtain and upstairs.

The chimes on the door break the stillness that follows, and despite the fact that the door had been decisively locked, in walks Lan Huan, like a ray of early sunrise.

“Qing-Jie. Forgive my intrusion at such hours.”

Lan Huan is a weird, yet prominent figure in her life.

Ever since BaoShan SanRen had picked her and her brother up off of the street, two random orphans, thrown out by a family long forgotten, and showed them her little pocket of a very unusual world, Wen Qing had had to deal with a lot of weird people. It had taken years for her to warm up to their new guardian. Already too old at her puny nine years of age, so jumpy and paranoid, only thinking of her frail brother.

Madam SanRen had been kind, if a little distant. She never told Wen Ning that he is a girl and never told Wen Qing that she is a boy. She’d bathed them in her knowledge, and when one night, starry eyed, Wen Ning had asked if magic was real, she’d laughed, though not unkindly, never denied or confirmed anything and that was that.

Wen Qing looked up to her. It was peaceful for a few years, with BaoShan SanRen showing them the ropes, what they should touch and what they shouldn’t, what to say and what to not say, doing little chores around the shop. At some point, however, their guardian had sat them down at the table, around the time Wen Ning had turned seven, and said she wanted them to get an education.

That was how Wen Qing met Lan Yi. There was something between the two women, something Wen Qing was too young to understand, but Madam Lan had begun lecturing them on all sorts of topics, teaching them to read and write, and at some point had gotten married to Madam SanRen. To Mother.

And that was where Wen Qing met the two Lan brothers. She vividly recalls the wedding celebrations, when the four children had been stuffed in a room, away from the adults, where Lan Huan single-handedly carried the conversation for four hours. It’d been impressive.

Said Lan Huan had grown to be as kind and gentle as she remembered him, eloquent and open, wearing his heart on his sleeve. From what she’d heard from Madam Lan, he’d gotten himself a pair of boyfriends, and if she’d been told their names, it had flown right by her ears.

“Lan Huan, it is fine.” Wen Qing used to call him only Young Master Lan until, tearing up, he’d said Please, just Huan-di at which point she’d conformed only out of shock. “How can I help you?”

She ushered him towards the back, where she offered tea, which he politely denied. “Not to be impolite, really, but I’m simply passing by. I have some errands to run. I was here to see Ayi, but I see she is out.”

“Is something the matter?”

Lan Huan laughed, a crystalline sound which surely would have made Wen Qing fall for him hard and fast, were she not a lesbian. Really, it would have been a surprise if this faux-cousin of hers had gathered less than two lovers. “Qing-jie, you worry too much. It’s about a family gathering.”

Wen Qing really tried not to appear displeased, but by Lan Huan’s gleaming eyes, she deduced she’d failed. “I’ll tell her to call you then. Both her and Moth- dam SanRen should be back by tonight.”

“You-”

His appreciation is unfortunately cut short by the bells at the door. Wen Qing frowns and the other raises his hands, with a bashful, “I forgot the charms must be locked manually after being nullified, I truly am sorry.”

But she’s not listening to his apology (even if she does appreciate it, would a little more if everything that came out of his mouth didn't always sound like an apology) because she knows that chime. She knows that fucking chime. Lan Huan must sense something is wrong; he stiffens, though she barely spares him a glance.

No way, no way.

They step through the curtain to the front of the shop and Wen Qing feels as if she’d been doused with cold water. The customer also freezes and it must be the early hours of the morning, her quickly plummeting mood, because Wen Qing points rudely at the woman and accuses, “You!”

The one in question isn’t even looking at her, but instead gawking at her cousin, croaking a faint, “Lan Huan?”

“Jiang YanLi?”

“Jiejie would you like s-some coff-”

They all turned towards Wen Ning, whose eyes widened comedically at the trio.

Surprisingly, it is Jiang YanLi (what a pretty name-) who speaks up first. “Lan Huan, I didn't know you knew this place.”

Even as YanLi stood in the middle of Perfectly Reasonable Transactions, she couldn’t help but feel like, as Wei Ying sometimes put it when drunk, a silly goose. A jester if you will, ready to dangle her stupid little bell hat and sing a stupid little song. The harder she wracked her brain, for the life of her she could never recall ever seeing anyone else other than her and the teller whenever she entered the store.

Maybe she should’ve never bought that keychain.

Or attempted to buy it.

“Ah.” Lan Huan eloquently said. She’d never seen him nervous, but to be fair, she’d only actually seen him a staggering three times. “Ahahahahah…”

YanLi joins in his laughter, because what else can she do? The shopkeeper bursts into tense, nervous chuckles as well, watching the two of them as though they were mad, and at this point, standing in the middle of a shop with a name worse than any of Jiang Cheng’s pets, YanLi doesn’t feel as confident as she usually would when saying she’s mentally stable.

A phone rings in the back, and Lan Huan claps loudly, shutting their mouths. “Would you look at that! Wen Qing, it seems you have a customer, so I’ll take it!”

Used as she is with picking up mumbled insults, YanLi hears the shopkeeper (Wen Qing!) grumble an offended, “Slippery bastard.”

She’s never heard anyone ever refer to the sun that is Lan Huan as a bastard.

It is.. Oddly charming.

She’s also never found herself in a fucked up shop with an incredibly beautiful woman who was gazing at her as though she’d grown a second head. Life truly finds a way.

Wen Qing narrows her eyes. “Right, then, what are you doing here?”

YanLi nervously smiles, a little shaky under such intense eyes, not much different from two smoldering pieces of coal. “W- what?”

“I mean, why are you back here?”

It’s then she does a double take. “Wh- you asked me to? You said to come back tomorrow?”

“And you remember that?!”

“It was yesterday? It was less than twelve hours ago?? Was I not supposed to?”

YanLi really doesn’t enjoy putting retail employees in difficult situations, but the room is almost spinning with how little sense all of this is making. She doesn’t think she could avoid puzzling Wen Qing even if she tried. “What sort of business is this?”

“Are you an enemy?”

“I’m sorry?”

“You come in here with that pretty face of yours, remember me twice, purchase a-”

YanLi doesn’t mean to, she really, really doesn’t, maybe it’s the mental stress of it all but she bursts out, “You think I’m pretty?”

It’s Wen Qing’s turn to do a double take, and then Lan Huan chooses to step back out from behind the curtain, a lot more put together than before, and announcing, “Ladies, there’s coffee. Would you like some?”

Lan Huan, truly a diplomat, does a brilliant job explaining everything, and by the end- by the time the clock strikes six fucking thirty am, YanLi is a lot more confused. He tells her about his distant aunt, her wife, her wife’s shop, and formally introduces Wen Qing, her younger brother Wen Ning as his distant cousins, as he came to bring them coffee and declined their invitation to hang around.

“Does… does Lan Zhan know?”

Lan Huan purses his lips. “He met Qing-jie and Ning-di when he was little. I don’t know how much he knows- I mean he definitely knows Ayi and BaoShan-furen. Though I’m unsure how up to date he’s on the more… weird side of this shop.”

“And what about that? I mean… everything in here? The chime? The- you know?” She gestures vaguely at the shop and Lan Huan hums, bringing the coffee to his lips.

Wen Qing grins, and YanLi’s stomach does a funny little swoop.

They’ve relaxed, standing around the messy counter of the shop, Lan Huan’s choked explanation having slowly morphed into an actual conversation. She learns a lot about the two, and, embarrassed, she talks about her and her friends’ attempts to figure out what was going on.

They don’t make fun of her per se but it’s not too far off.

(“The mafia!?” Lan Huan exclaims with something eerily edging towards delight.

 “Calling it the ‘family business’ didn’t exactly help us, Huan-di,” Wen Qing playfully adds, winking at YanLi.)

At the same time, Wen Qing, though still a little reserved, has more or less stopped treating her as if she were here to rob her blind.

And she was a sight to behold, that hadn't changed. (If MianMian were there, she’d make fun of her for thinking the sight of a heated Wen Qing, ready to throttle her had only been a plus-).

“I actually hung that chime the very day you came in. I… did not think it was odd, but I can ask Madam Lan to check it out?” Wen Qing smiles a little at YanLi’s visible excitement, before adding with a tilt of her head. “As for the rest… Madam SanRen says it’s just a little odd.”

And that’s that.

So, now that Jiang YanLi know that Perfectly Reasonable Transactions is, indeed, shady as fuck, there is one less constant in her mind. One l- well not really, but, one less ominous and messed up constant, bordering on a little obsession as all fun things in life do. Rather, one constant is replaced with another.

Wen Qing.

She visits her every other day, as opposed to once a month, and she finds that there is a lot more self control required not to see her every fucking day, which is a little embarrassing.

But how can she help it? She feels so drawn to the shop, to her that she often finds herself wondering if maybe she’s under some sort of spell. Wen Qing and Lan Huan had told her about the charms, why it was she always thought she found a different person behind the counter when in turn, it really only was Wen Ning or Lan Yi (whom it turns out she had actually met, and turned out to be the woman who told her about Madam SanRen).

Half the reason she keeps coming back is because a question lingers: why had the charms stopped working on her?

(Not because of Wen Qing or anything)

Was it the cat keychain?

True to her word, BaoShan SanRen had actually come in to see the trinket and then laughed for three minutes because it was that: a cheap trinket which had mixed in with the rest of the artifacts.

There is absolutely no other reason why she so often thinks about her. Her-uh, the shop, not her. Naturally.

It’s two weeks in, when she’d already started her apprenticeship at the Unclean Realm. Her and Nie MingJue had clicked, but their familiarity might also draw from the fact that she’d been added to a group chat the day she officially met Wen Qing, with her, Lan Huan and MingJue, apparently based on the fact that they were all older siblings.

One night after her shift, MingJue tells her that Meng Yao often bitches about keeping him out of Big Sibling affairs, with no real heat behind it, so she insists they add him.

She learns a lot more about Wen Qing over the month, both things she tells her and things she doesn't. She meets Wen Ning and, to his sisters delight, she immediately understands all of Wen Qing's rants about pinching cheeks and committing murder for him. Her growing interest in Wen Qing is rising at alarming rates, if her weekly braincell meeting has anything to say about it. She has several tattoos, always gets excited about jewelry and medicine, she’s confident, charismatic and witty, and YanLi has never laughed this much.

Jiang YanLi is rather fond of Wen Qing.

Though so much has changed, it doesn’t really change anything. Now that she doesn’t bring it up regularly, MianMian and QinSu seem to have forgotten about Perfectly Reasonable Transactions, and Wei Ying doesn’t bring it up either.

“You’re totally in love! A-Yao, look she’s in love!” MianMian insists, an arm wrapped around Qin Su’s waist, who’s dozing off on her shoulder, undeterred by her girlfriend’s loud mouth. Meng Yao just hums, fingers moving away at abhorrent speed on his keyboard.

YanLi laughs nervously. “I am certainly not? Who would I be in love with?”

QingYang narrows her eyes. “You can’t hide from me! I’ll figure you out!”

When her sleepy lover finally startles awake to have enough clarity and drag them home (“All-nighters really take a lot out of A-Su”, QingYang explains, gathering their stuff. “The semester is over,” Meng Yao says drily, to which MianMian grins and throws up a peace sign) it’s just her and Meng Yao sipping their iced tea.

YanLi likes Meng Yao. He’s blunt and clever, when he wants to, and when he doesn’t, he reminds her a lot of herself. With his underhand way of saying things, his ability to make you think his ideas are your own, his ability to meditate every outburst he comes across. She’s not sure when or how they struck a friendship, but she’s honoured he appreciates her enough to lend her an ear and promises to help with resolving any murderous intentions she may feel. He also always pays for brunch, while saying it’s a delight to spend Lan money. YanLi isn’t yet sure what to take that for so she always responds with a sort of ‘what can you do’ gesture.

It’s clear there’s something he wants to say, so she offers a saccharine smile. He takes it as a cue and says, “Er-ge told me. How do you find Wen Qing?”

YanLi takes everything back. She hates him.

“That’s so up-front for you, Yao-di!” she says, pointedly though innocently enough, but Meng Yao just smiles sweetly.

“Is it? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

He’s not even trying to be subtle, the little snake.

“Ahaha…”

YanLi loudly slurps her tea, something so impolite she can almost feel her mother bucking around like a rattlesnake from stress. Meng Yao looks delighted, but he leans back, his face smug. He doesn't even need to say anything else, and does not comment on YanLi's poor attempt to change the topic to something less heavy, such as what sort of consequences should Jin ZiXun face for blowing up Wei Ying's car.

When she gets home, toes her shoes off and thinks about Wen Qing whilst washing her hands, it occurs to her maybe it’s a little pathetic to deny her crush any longer.

Nevertheless, it doesn’t stop her! Who hasn’t been a little pathetic at some point in their life! She would pine for a while, maybe get drunk about it, throw a pillow or two at a window then have a revelation about the fleeting nature of human emotion - perhaps life itself - before baking a tray of pies and be done with it. It wasn’t as though YanLi was lonely.

As she lays in bed at night, the fleeting image of a warm body besides her own plagues her dreams.

“Wen Qing!”

There’s a loud crash from behind one of the shelves, one stacked with rows of jars, which doesn't seem to be a brilliant combination. She advances through the shop, the sound of the wind chime already more of a comfort than anything, its familiar tune sending pleasant shivers up her arms.

“Y-YanLi!”

She emerges, her cheeks tinted a slight red and YanLi almost wants to coo. She’d have never described Wen Qing as cute but…

“You’re here early!” The two wince at the roughness of her voice, before she clears her throat and smiles. “A-Ning made some tea, if you want to try it!”

Sometimes, she did this: she offered some snacks that she’d coincidentally just prepared, or some refreshments. Perhaps YanLi was reading too much into it, perhaps it was her own inf- interest that was making her see things where there were none.

Even so, it lights up something in her chest, wild and heated tucked away behind her ribs, threatening to explode, to morph into something bigger, to mean more. It is almost overwhelming. Almost.

Meng Yao’s noisy pestering had only made her more paranoid, as Wen Qing grabs her wrist loosely and drags her in the back.

There is something off about her today, YanLi notices as she sits on a chair that somehow had become hers. Silently twiddling her fingers, she peers at the other, rushing about the space to throw some water into an iron pitcher, which begins heating up with no stove in sight.

If asked, Jiang YanLi wouldn’t be able to put her finger on it. It was in Wen Qing’s unusually disheveled appearance, her shoulders drawn together. “Is everything alright?”

With her back turned, Wen Qing sighs, and her posture sags. YanLi stands, worried, and reaches a hesitant hand to the other’s shoulder, retracting it quickly when she turns, a light blush on her cheeks. Wen Qing doesn’t, thankfully, notice her aborted attempt, running a hand through her bangs. “There’s uh- there’s a family meet-up. This week.”

YanLi hums. That she understands.

Family meet-ups used to be a nightmare, for everyone involved back when she’d been dating Jin ZiXuan, back when her parents were in the picture. Hours upon hours spent exhausting herself to keep everyone from erupting into screaming, Wei Ying doing his best to disappear as soon as he possibly could, Jin ZiXuan’s overall awkwardness and just Jin GuangShan in general.

Now it was her and her brothers, Lan Zhan and the newest addition, Nie HuaiSang since they started dating Jiang Cheng. It may or may not have escalated, when Lan Huan and Nie MingJue started to show up, naturally dragging Meng Yao along, which soon turned into Meng Yao’s siblings coming given YanLi had a few words to say about it. (Minus Jin ZiXuan). That now also meant Luo QingYang, hanging off of Qin Su’s arm, and the recent youngest, Mo XuanYu, an absolute delight who took to Wei Ying like a duck to water.

It felt like a breath of fresh air, replacing awful memories of stilted small talk and glares and petty comments on her figure, on her demeanour, on her everything Madam Yu could lay eyes upon.

YanLi doesn’t realise she’s starting to think of an excuse to link Wen Qing to someone, only to have her attend monthly family dinner, until she’s called out on it.

Wen Qing continues, “It, you know it really shouldn’t be a big thing, most of the time I don’t hear about it since Mother and Madam Li take care of it, but… why are you staring at me like that?”

She shakes her head, blushing lightly, and, a bit reticent, Wen Qing resumes: “But they’re caught up with something, and… the Lans are very particular, no matter how liberal the two of them are.” It’s clear she’s frustrated, and defeated, she throws her hands up, “Fuck’s sake I don’t even know why this one’s so important! And Madam Lan suggested I go in their stead. And now I’m freaking out over it! Because I don’t want to let them down I-”

It’s not until she looks down at her shaking hands, cradled tenderly in between YanLi’s, who is rubbing soothing circles into her skin.

(Wen Qing has never been a Lan, much the way BaoShan SanRen hasn’t either. It was never a question of taking the name, never a question of joining the main branch of the family. Wen Qing was reluctant enough to be in Madam SanRen’s care. Too afraid to call it a family. Too skittish. Too distant.

Wen Qing has always been too afraid to consider herself a Lan. To consider herself safe in her own home.

It starts shifting when she is eighteen, frantically packing, making plans of where she would go, how she would provide for Wen Ning without a proper, official education, with no background and no future, in the dead of the night. All for when, inevitably, she’d awaken the next morning and the two women would kick her out, fed up with her leeching off of their old money, their kindness.

“A-Qing? What are you doing up so late?”

Wen Qing falls off her feet and then backs away from the door, caught in the act. She’s breathing hard, vision unfocused and it takes a moment to register that BaoShan SanRen had moved from the doorway. There was a hand around her shoulders, someone counting, telling her to breathe and she did. Like a good girl.

“...ou hear me? Can you hear me, A-Qing?”

Distrustful of her own voice, she nods.

“Good, that’s good. That’s my good A-Qing.”

She knows it, she’s rambling, but what else can she do? “Please, one more day, one more day, please don’t throw me out, please, just tomorrow…”

It’s pathetic, and there’s the ghastly heaviness in her stomach, weighing her down. She’s weak, she's so weak.

“Oh, my dear. My strong A-Qing, sleep. Sleep with me, let’s rest.”

They talk in the morning, and she thinks she cries, but it doesn’t feel choking, it doesn’t feel like all those times she’s sobbed in her pillow. And a few weeks later, she calls Madam SanRen mother, and no one even mentions it, and then Wen Ning does it too and it’s a little better.)

Here is what YanLi means to say:

You can not go if you truly don’t want to. I know Madam SanRen and Madam Yi would understand, and I know Lan Huan would be more than willing to cover for you.

Here’s what YanLi actually says:

“What if I went with you?”

What?

“What?”

“...eh?”

In any case, that must be how Jiang YanLi finds herself outside the Cloud Recesses a Lan restaurant restaurant, with traditional architecture, elegant arches and dark wood floors, filled to the brim with people in elegant robes or suits, fluttering about akin to snowflakes in a globe, stiff and cold. She’d known the family was refined, but it was strikingly different from the Jins and their brand of high society.

Not in a bad way. A lot more quiet. YanLi liked quiet.

Waiting outside the establishment was a lot less entertaining than she’d hoped, though she supposes the price for getting somewhere fifteen minutes early wasn’t delightful. Either way, the night is chilly and the more Lan family members pass by her, the more she worries she is underdressed.

Her mother had always told her how average she was, how she had to put in the work to be at least half presentable, and with every proprietary glance thrown her way by a passerby, her words ring in her head, even now, so long after she’d last spoken to Madam Yu. Her dress feels stifling, the pastel purple skirt, dropping past her knees, the layered top, her jacket pulled around her shoulders. Her make-up feels heavy on her face and her shoes are way too constricting all of the sudden.

YanLi is almost ready to bail, when an arm finds hers and she startles.

“YanLi! I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Wen Qing is gorgeous. Wen Qing is always gorgeous but tonight, she’s a sight to behold, her hair tied carefully, pressed, elegant clothes, a crisp white shirt, flowy in a way that she was sure it’d look ridiculous on most other people, and a pair of dark crimson slacks. She wore all her jewelry, even more if YanLi were to count, but she didn’t because that was weird. Her eyelids are decorated with dark eyeshadow. Her lips look so kis- soft. She was every bit a person who would fit right in at the high class Cloud Recesses.

“Y-you…” Wen Qing clears her throat and lets go of her arm, bringing it up to scratch at the back of her neck before dropping it, limp by her side. It’s oddly… endearing. “You are stunning.”

YanLi preens, and the weight on her shoulders dissipates.

There was a jittery feeling to Wen Qing’s presence, as though there was something she wanted to say, as though words pressed eagerly upon her tongue, and YanLI realised she was waiting for her to say something.

She cleared her throat.

“You didn’t startle me, I was just… lost in thought.”

(When YanLi had told Wen Qing about her parents, she had expected it to hurt, to feel as if she was opening up her body for the other to take a look inside, to examine and prod at here every rib and bone and then call her a failure. Wen Qing never gave her the much dreaded pity, the horrific look of false empathy, she nodded along, let her go at her own pace and asked if she needed to take a break every time YanLi fell silent for too long.

Afterwards, Wen Qing had made her ramen, asked for consent and then proceeded to roast the living hell out of Jin ZiXuan, about Madam Yu, and in the crammed backroom of Perfectly Reasonable Transactions, her mother had stopped looking quite so big, quite so monstrous; Wen Qing made her out for what she was: a bad parent.

They’d watched a movie, drank some tea and YanLi wanted to kiss Wen Qing when she left for home.

YanLi thinks maybe that’s when she was ready to admit that maybe, just maybe, there was a chance she’d fallen in love with this woman.)

“Did you wait long? Why didn’t you go inside?”

YanLi pursed her lips. “I just got here.”

“Should we then?”

Neither moved. It was odd, but YanLi simply stood, peering curiously into coal black eyes, alight with interest, with something that she desperately wanted to name but was too afraid. Meng Yao’s twinkling eyes found their way into her mind, his words.

It’s as though she’s on a boat, rocking on waves taller than her, threatening to submerge her, to not let her go, to drown her in emotions that loomed, too much for her tiny body, her frail mind, her overworked heart.

“The, uhm, the chime, on the door of the shop,” Wen Qing begins, her voice low. They’re still awkwardly clutching onto each other on the sidewalk, probably inconveniencing everyone in the area.

All YanLi can do is offer a tiny noise of acknowledgement in response.

Things are shifting, somehow, she can feel it, under her skin, in between her bones, excitedly singing a tune she doesn’t know. There’s a distinct patch of sweat on her lower back, which feels less like destiny and more like her poor choice of a belt.

“You know… Lan get-togethers are… awfully stuffy.”

“A-are it now?”

Wen Qing’s expression is oddly reminiscent of when YanLi bought the keychain. Her eyebrows drawn together, her sharp tongue at a loss, behind slightly pouty lips: annoyed, at herself, if anything; her gaze a little lost. It’s so familiar, YanLi truly can’t help it; she bursts into giggles, and the other’s eyes widen, now ever so slightly ashamed in her crimson blush and opening and closing mouth.

“I-I’m sorry… I’m not laughing at you!”

What can she do? Wen Qing starts laughing. It’s somewhat hysterical, somewhat fed up, and she shakes her head, muttering something under her breath.

“This is ridiculous,” she eventually decides, before grabbing YanLi’s other hand, bringing both to her chest, effectively shutting her up. It’s YanLi’s turn to gawk, leaning forward unconsciously. She blurts out, “Do you want to get some hot pot with me?”

This time, YanLi’s snort is both less dignified and more sudden, her throat scraping raw with the suddenness of it, before she explodes in disbelief, in inelegant chuckles, never moving her eyes away from Wen Qing.

She doesn’t think she could. Wen Qing groans broadly, so wide her head threatens to split open, eyes crinkling, into moon-like slits. She’s so stunning, she’s impossible and she’s standing right here, holding YanLi’s hand, looking at her as though she’d hung the moon and the stars.

They must appear insane, laughing on a sidewalk at eight pm, before a refined restaurant, where a glass of water would probably be half of YanLi’s rent.

“R-right now?!”

“Yes!” Wen Qing is alight, and her grip has tightened, the rings digging into her fingers, but she can’t get herself to care. Not when there is unbidden joy in her heart, racing like a car swerving off of a road. The blood is rushing through her body, and YanLi wants to run, to shout, to grab Wen Qing by her pretty face and kiss the daylights out of her.

“That’s… is that okay?”

“It will be,” a voice nearby says, kind and slow.

They turn to see XiChen smiling warmly at them, with Meng Yao and Nie MingJue hanging by his arms. YanLi has to physically restrain herself from tackling them to the ground. She hopes her thankfulness is apparent enough, and pointedly refuses to meet Meng Yao’s smug eyes. She can barely bring herself to feel any annoyance through her inexplicable rush of joy.

“Off you go, you two,” Nie MingJue orders, his voice always so gruff. “But I will see you tomorrow, Jiang YanLi.”

“Da-ge,” Meng Yao huffs, “Let the ladies have their fun…

The three start bickering, but YanLi isn’t really listening, because Wen Qing is dragging her by her hand, and she thinks that if she were to let go of her hand now, she would die.

Barely twenty minutes later, in a shabby hole in the wall, burning their tongues on cheap spicy broth, laughing and heaving, YanLi can’t really be bothered to think if this was fate or anything else. Her hand clasped in Wen Qing’s as they recount the last few days, as they talk about everything and nothing in particular. As Wen Qing tells her about a young boy bearing odd semblance to Wen Ning and her who wandered into the shop.

They walk back to YanLi’s apartment that night, swinging their hands between them like teenagers, YanLi suggests to Wen Qing a rebranding for Perfectly Reasonable Transactions, which earns her a kiss: she thinks it’s a pretty fair bargain.

“A-Yi? What are you up and about for… come back to bed,” BaoShan SanRen complains sleepily from the bundle of blankets. A peek at the clock on the nightstand reads twelve o’clock pm, way too late for her wife to be awake, the stupid Lan sleep schedule.

“Shh, what are you being so loud for?”

SanRen doesn’t open her eyes, but she hears the rustling of clothes, sounds of a sleeping robe being slid off, the grumbled scoot over, stop hogging the blankets. They settle in, legs tangled together, hands rubbing circles in whatever patch of skin they can find, a sweet kiss shared between the two women.

“A-Ren, it was A-Qing who hung the wind chime, right?”

It’s now she slides an eye open, groggy with sleep, though ever so slightly more alert at the whispered mention of their daughter. “The one we got from that lovely young person, what was their name… a Nie I’m pretty sure…” When Lan Yi makes a noise of agreement, SanRen sighs and adds, “Yes, what about it?”

“Mm,” Lan Yi hums, and falls silent, annoying BaoShan SanRen enough to push herself up on her elbow to glare at her wife, who simply looks smug at having the game be played to her tune. Screw her.

“What did you, sweet wife, learn of the wind chime that it was so important you defied centuries of Lan rules to research so late?”

Lan Yi chuckles, in that scratchy way of hers that even after all these years, is so enrapturing, so-

“I got curious, is all. It apparently draws soulmates together.”

SanRen smiles. “Does it now?”

“Mn.” Lan Yi pushes herself up as well and gently caresses her wife’s cheek. “We should get A-Ning to hang it up somewhere as well.”

The other laughs so hard, Lan Yi has to stifle her with a pillow.