[XiErXi]: @MrJiong you need to let your team PR know

[XiErXi]: jj’s wild-ass fans data mined you out somehow

[XiErXi]: let me know if your guys need any help from me or jj, ok?

[MrJiong]: [away message:] Xi-er~ wait for my reply~~

That was as much as Xi could do right now, considering the fact that Jiong was likely knee deep in team practice, or maybe even closeted away and being shouted at by team PR if they were super on the ball. Sighing, Xi minimized that chat window and opened up his old, hoary copy of Press-2-Release. “I wonder how long it’s been since I needed this piece of crap…”

[Welcome back, XiXi!]

[It has been 252 days since you Pressed 2 Release!]

“Well, now I know.”

[Would you like to use a Template, or start a New Release from scratch?]

Sighing again, Xi decided to check out his old template. Funnily enough, not much needed to be updated, even though the last incident that had prompted the need for anything like this couldn’t be more different. That time last year—252 days ago, as the stupid software reminded him—Janey had called into Xi’s chaotic birthday stream to sing him a somewhat drunken Happy Birthday. Unfortunately, she’d called in and sung as ‘Nameless God’ by mistake, which none of her hardcore fans could possibly have forgotten was the old ID she had used as part of XYBU, and so two days of feverish speculation had begun.

J.E.M. was an alcoholic. J.E.M. missed her old karaoke group so desperately that she was about to commit suicide. The press had lied to the fans for 8 years straight, and J.E.M. and Xi had been an item all along!! No, no, it was even worse, the press hadn’t lied, Xi hadn’t lied, but J.E.M., the poor girl, had been strung along for 8 years, pining for her gay best friend and never being able to reach his heart, ah, such a tragedy ah…

The theories only got more ridiculous from there. Xi had had to lock down his stream to prevent a flood of new, furious, motivated subscribers shitting things up for everyone else, and he’d had to issue a statement about how he and Janey and the rest of the group were still close friends, look, here’s some fucking proof. Thankfully, they all had a few innocuous clips of public well-wishes to cram in, as well as a somewhat silly video of Xi and the group doing a brief, dumb little routine to celebrate Janey’s 5-year anniversary at her company.

God only knew what this round of ritual public sacrifice would require to sate it. Xi, watching the likes for the image-laden comment continue to rack up—and watching as more amateur sleuths contributed data mined pics—couldn’t help but feel tired.

Looks like Jiong wasn’t being too paranoid after all, he thought, bitterly, remembering the brief exchange they’d had about whether or not to keep the privacy shades up on all the windows in here. Xi had been leaning towards shrugging it off, but Jiong had leant very much the other way. You never know, he’d said, very seriously. Inside the building’s one thing, access is fairly well limited, but outside?

[XiErXi]: @MrJiong I’ve got a basic statement slapped together

[XiErXi]: [press release.doc]

[XiErXi]: let me know if that passes muster

[XiErXi]: also probably gonna head home in a min, call me at any time, I’m good to chat if you need to rant, ok?

[MrJiong]: wait!!!

[MrJiong]: don’t leave yet!!!!

[XiErXi]: o_O? Okay?

[MrJiong]: those quick click fucks have our picture somehow [quickclicks.com]

In just one glance at the front page of that website, Xi understood why Jiong had warned him; the picture underneath their main, lurid headline for today was a shadowed, somewhat blurry shot of him and the captain kissing at the door to his flat.

Worse, that wasn’t a shot from last night, but one from this morning, with Xi’s only attire a skimpy terrycloth bathrobe that just barely hit him at mid-thigh, and had been half-off his bare left shoulder, revealing two livid love bites from the night before. It was immediately obvious what had happened between them that night; the picture could have served as its own headline.

Naturally, Quick Clicks had not stinted at all with said headline, or indeed, with any of the subheadings. STARMIKE’S NEW SIREN SLUT. Picking Up a Pervy Old Pattern? Standards Slipping?

[MrJiong]: are you alright?

[XiErXi]: haha, yeah

[XiErXi]: I’ve seen worse

That was Xi’s first, and hopefully last, sneaky little misstatement of the day. He had seen worse; it just hadn’t been directed so squarely at him, at least not in quite this manner.

There was a portion of Janey’s fans who refused to believe that there wasn’t, and had never been anything between Xi and Janey; said portion was equally split between either treating him like a low, spineless deceiver, too cowardly to stand up and take the heat he’d get as Janey’s publicly acknowledged spouse, or like a fickle, heartless bitch too enamoured with Janey’s devotion to make it clear that she’d never be the first in his heart. Xi’s documented public relationships with various men were either just a long, elaborate sham, or evidence of his disgusting infidelity to their idol.

He’d been called both a shapeless, corpulent blob too heartless and mercenary to cut poor Janey loose, and a shapeless, corpulent blob too cowardly to step into the light and reward Janey’s undeserved love for him. Last year, when both views of him had been at an all-time high, he’d joked to his friends that he really couldn’t decide which of them was more unflattering; both camps had tried so very, very hard to promote theirs as the worst.

Now, with the spirited entrance of a new, strong contender playing out before his eyes, Xi couldn’t help but think, with a sinking feeling, that this newest iteration of his public image was going to be a little tough to deal with.

It really, really, really didn’t help that Quick Clicks had been so uncharitable as to post a sloppy image of Xi cooking in his ratty singlet on stream alongside glamour pics of the various fresh-faced 16- and 17-year old twinks Jiong had been connected with in the past.

[MrJiong]: you know I love how you look, right??

[XiErXi]: lol, I’d worry about you if you didn’t

[XiErXi]: no call to be so dedicated about licking this fat ass open if you didn’t really want to plug it up, right?

[MrJiong]: [blushes]

[XiErXi]: …

[XiErXi]: you know, I think that might have been the first time you blushed for a sensible reason

[XiErXi]: fuck, this feels so wrong QAQ

[MrJiong]: [hugs]

[MrJiong]: anyway, it’s definitely gonna be me getting done up next

[MrJiong]: no way they don’t link @starmike with @MrJiong, it’s so easy if you go by who bought buns

[MrJiong]: iirc, you shipped mine to the club mailbox >.

[XiErXi]: omg yeah

[XiErXi]: could this be the end of jiongjiong disease???

[MrJiong]: never~ never~

Meanwhile, in the suddenly far too lively karaoke old-timers’ stream that Xi had half forgotten:

> yuri: omg @XiXi!!! those pics!!!!!

> erich: dunno whether to feel sorry or not

> erich: i mean, you can see from the bruises, this Star guy’s got some heavy fucking tastes

> phink: omg you pansy, aren’t those just love bites?

> erich: eh, but, shouldn’t our Xi have been on top???

> hail: yeah, star-nim’s tall, but he looks weak

> hail: easy to push down

> yuri: esp when you feast your eyes on how he used to look [cute young starmike.jpg]

> phink: lolol wtf

> itsB: wow!! reporting the usage of excessive growth hormones!!!!

> hail: report +1

> erich: yup, 99% uke looks

> yuri: so @XiXi, we gotta ask, just how long have you been skipping leg day huh?

> XiXi: fuck you all, lol

> XiXi: don’t you all know by now that laozi doesn’t do sweaty work??

> hail: lolol preach

> XiXi: i mean, what’s a big man like that for if I can’t fucking ride him?

[MrJiong]: everything okay? You just went quiet…

[XiErXi]: lol it’s fine, roasting this shit with my friends rn

[MrJiong]: as long as you’re all right [hugs]

Xi, five parts all right and four parts panicking, couldn’t help but feel a strong, sudden urge to fly over to the DOM-V team house and barge in so he could have one real, long, crushing hug. That was the most obvious way Jiong’s soldier-bred strength had always been apparent; he squeezed just a little too hard whenever they had to part. Xi thought of how he’d rolled his eyes and mocked Jiong for that this morning, even as he did his best to squeeze back.

“We’ll see each other tonight,” Xi had whispered, because that had been the plan from the start. They’d never quite settled on where, or on what they’d be doing, but it had been in the cards to take advantage of this last day in the lull between the regular season and playoffs, and he had been looking forward to it so fucking much, and now, now he wasn’t even sure if he’d be able to sneak back home without being followed and harassed.

[MrJiong]: Xi??

[XiErXi]: …

[XiErXi]: just thinking. Does it make sense for us to still be on for tonight?

[MrJiong]: …FUCK.

[MrJiong]: totally forgot [head in hands.jpg]

[XiErXi]: they’d totally follow me home, right…?

[MrJiong]: …

[MrJiong]: …yeah. Sorry.

[XiErXi]: …haha [crying]

[MrJiong]: !!

[MrJiong]: you’re not… you’re not actually crying right????

This fucking… how would anyone even come to that conclusion? It was an emote, okay, a motherfucking emote!! Being this sensitive, this, this pushy with his caring, like Xi was some fragile white lotus1 that would faint over your average, unflattering tabloid photo spread, fuck, it was so embarrassing, and so very Jiong that Xi found himself needing a few fierce blinks to clear his suddenly blurry gaze before responding.

[XiErXi]: WHO FUCKING WOULD???

[MrJiong]: ah, um, I thought too much, sorry [sweats]

[XiErXi]: as you fucking should be!!

[XiErXi]: obviously the fact that we can’t meet at mine now fucking sucks!!!

[XiErXi]: but that doesn’t mean I’m going to fxcking cry! I’ve worked remote pretty much all day already, what’s a few more motherfucking hours!!!!!

[MrJiong]: [gasps] you want to stay at mine?

[MrJiong]: ah, but, there’s practically nothing there in the fridge

[MrJiong]: and I’ve barely any pans or anything in the kitchen

[MrJiong]: and, and if you order out, then you’ll need to answer the door

[XiErXi]: don’t you have in-home delivery? Bread & eggs & rice, you didn’t go out for those this morning right?

[XiErXi]: can’t I just order a couple more things? We’ll eat in no problem

[MrJiong]: but… isn’t Xi-er still tired from, from… [blushes]

[XiErXi]: haha [cold smile]

[XiErXi]: only fxxing reflecting now, hm?

[XiErXi]: don’t worry, I’ll make sure there’s an extra couple bowls of plain rice just for you

[MrJiong]: [kowtows]!!!

[MrJiong]: may emperor forgive this lowly servant!!

[MrJiong]: this lowly servant was thoughtless and wicked!!!!!

[XiErXi]: haha.

[MrJiong]: [crying]

[XiErXi]: HA. HA.

[MrJiong]: this lowly servant is still a growing boy QAQ

[MrJiong]: this lowly servant won’t perform his insignificant work well without meat ah [crying] [crying] [crying]

[XiErXi]: refusing to work, zhen thinks there’s no need for such a worthless servant to eat.

[MrJiong]: [grabbing emperor’s shapely thigh] emperor please show mercy!!!

[XiErXi]: this worthless servant! Clearly tell zhen your delivery box number, or be put to death!!

Oh for the days when Xi still felt a shred of embarrassment while carrying on this shameful kind of exchange. Fuck, he was even a little hard right now, thinking of how Jiong would probably bow and scrape and curry favour with him tonight, even though there was no chance in hell that Xi would ever even think of deliberately refusing to allow his lover a share of whatever tasty things he’d made.

Jiong, motivated by said imaginary threats, was very quick about handing over the information needed for Xi to have his usual service deliver a few things. He was also almost alarmingly joyous when Xi casually sought his opinion on whether he wanted there to be leftovers.

[MrJiong]: ah, ah~ tomorrow’s love love lunch ah~

[XiErXi]: …you

[XiErXi]: you know I’m literally just making rice and a side dish or two, right??

[XiErXi]: what the fck is ‘love love’ about rice and some fucking meat??

[MrJiong]: made with love~~ made with love~~

Well, it looked like all was finally right in the world of Jiongjiong. Xi rolled his eyes, pressed enter on the order form, and went rifling through the kitchen cupboards to see if there were any possibilities he’d overlooked in his somewhat haphazard earlier search for sustenance. Said search yielded a large, never-used frying pan in its original packaging, and three packages of long expired ramen, so the menu for the night was tentatively updated to ‘shitty stir fry and rice’, and then forgotten in favour of work.

Well, work and keeping an eye on the news, and allowing himself only one peek or two at his default search of Janey’s stage name. Much as he refused to let himself reopen the stupid trending comment thread on her video, he couldn’t help but want to know how much attention that piece of news was getting, in amidst the scandalous photos of Janey and Sylina getting soused and touchy-feely at a bar in Haeguk.

Thankfully, the comment thread only continued to barely stay on the front page of the search, ruthlessly suppressed by the media’s eager revisiting of every other time Janey had been rumoured to be fucking someone. After eyeing the results for the second time, Xi let out a half relieved, half guilty sigh—surely the last thing Sy and Janey would have wanted was to wake up to bullshit like this—and then forced his attention back to the document he’d been working on.

He couldn’t bring himself to go back into the still-humming private stream’s chat to talk to his friends, not now. Not when he’d gone from laughing at the ridiculous things his friends said about his lover to tearing up over the thought of not being able to see Jiong, and dying to be hugged to death by said same motherfucking Jiong.

I’ll stream to them tonight, Xi told himself. Fuck, I might as well just stream my own show like usual. His fans would love the extra excitement, and his wallet would love the extra spike in viewership by various gossip-hungry passers-by. There’d be a price to pay—bullshit headlines about how he was using Captain Michael Star as a stepping-stone to more lucrative fame, most likely. But he found himself thinking about what it would take to pull it off anyway.

Xi had streamed like usual even while the aftermath of Janey’s drunken birthday call had his stream mailbox constantly flooded with angry or pleading or disdainful comments from both fans and media hacks. It’d been a bit nerve-wracking to see his stream flirting with the karaoke genre front page while he puttered around turning a large batch of shortcrust pastry into tarts and meat pies and sausage rolls, but three days later, he’d been back on the sixth or seventh page like usual, and the message tide had already begun to recede.

Possibly, this time around, things wouldn’t blow over so quickly, since his relationship with Jiong invoked the intense curiosity of more than one large fan base. But it would eventually. Years of watching Janey and some of his other famous friends deal with this bullshit had taught him that this sort of scandal didn’t take very long to blow over.

That night, perhaps due to Xi’s bland press release and his careful preparations and contingency plans, the stream ended up rather pedestrian, at least for the first half-hour or so. The tiered, sub-only commenting block did its duty; the one or two hijacked subscriber accounts that spoke up with sly, intrusive questions after months of inactivity were quietly and efficiently probated, and the most rowdy the chat got was the first time Jiong was allowed to show his face on stream.

> Fan AAA: ohhhhhh the rumours were real??

> Xmyheart: heheheh, our Xi-er’s pulling power has always been destructive

> Fan Z: wow wow wow that’s a gamer?? A pro gamer???

> Fan Z: wtf!! Looks way too clean, too fresh ah

> swearmouse: meh, looks like some f***ing actor to me

> swearmouse: too handsome, if it wasn’t our Xi I’d say they paid a f***ing model to appear

Naturally, Claire could not bear to resist getting in a few covert, no, blatant licks in while she was still just some stream passerby, and Jiong was very much not.

> starmike: haha, thanks for all the praise [smile]

And of course Jiong wouldn’t take it lying down, even under the condition that he wasn’t allowed to jiongjiong, and had even had his MrJiong identity temporarily probated after one too many mutterings about how amusing it would be to have a screaming slapfight with himself over Xi’s metaphorical hand in marriage. At the time, he’d had his arms firmly around Xi’s waist, and his hands had been wandering deliciously, so Xi had had to resort to desperate measures to make his disdain of such cheap methods understood.

Cooking in Jiong’s under-equipped kitchen was already an experience; cooking while on stream, and thus having to pay attention to how he looked and what was in frame, and while resolutely ignoring the rapt way Jiong was watching him, was nothing more and nothing less than the greatest trial of Xi’s wretched life.

While the rice cooked, he chopped up some cabbage, spring onions and carrots and made up a hasty stir-fry sauce with lime, sugar, rice vinegar, fish sauce (which Jiong had mysteriously had a non-expired bottle of tucked away deep in a cupboard), sesame oil and red pepper. The half pound of pre-sliced pork was already marinating in the fridge, and the Chinese sausage2 had gone in on top of the rice, so that meant all the prep was done, and Xi was left twiddling his thumbs and eyeing the covered pot of rice while Jiong continued to rain down hatefully happy smiles in chat.

> starmike: so yeah, not really a romantic first meeting

> starmike: obviously I liked it anyway [smile]

> Xmyheart: …was that really your first meeting?

> starmike: ? yeah?

> Xmyheart: wellll, the thing is

> Xmyheart: I’m talking to someone rn that says it wasn’t??

White lotus (flower), 白蓮花: Chinese phrase/idiom, colloquial way to refer to a very pure, innocent, kind type of person. Has also become a way to refer to someone who assiduously pretends to be such a person on the surface, but engages in vicious schemes in private.↩

Chinese sausage: a generic term referring to many different types of sausages originating in China. The southern flavour of Chinese sausage is commonly known as lap cheong (Cantonese). It is monstrously good in fried rice.↩