Meng Meiqi, she would like to think, is a name well known by a passable bit of the world’s populace.

 

And, no, she isn't known for being an actress, or an Olympic athlete, or a kpop idol. She was a part-time model who landed a rather big gig for some Chinese fashion magazine. And, no, she isn't known for that either.

 

What she's most well known for is for marrying the seventy-six year old tycoon who owned the company that produces the magazine. He stank of money wherever he went (or maybe it was just his cologne. That's probably why his cologne is so expensive).

 

People scorned it. Meiqi was merely eighteen at the time - he could be her grandfather. Like, a really, really rich grandfather. Her parents were on the brink of either disowning her or thanking her, they didn't know which was better.

 

People asked her why. She usually rolls her eyes internally. They know why.

 

Oh, because he's such a nice guy, she'd say, as though some seventy-six year old billionaire marrying her isn't low-highkey ic. So nice to me, she'd say. It's a public persona that she keeps up all the time.

 

She'd consider home as a place to uphold her public persona still. Home meaning where her withered husband would be sitting on the sofa, reading documents on businesses and whatever. She'd have to smile happily, greet him whenever he comes back.

 

Sleeping is the worst. They'd share the bed, and she’d cling on to the edge of the bed like her life depends on it, staying as far away from her husband as possible. His hands tend to creep places, she realises, and there's no way she wants him touching anywhere close to her.

 

“Ten million dollars,” he'd say, whenever she lets her smile drop for a second in front of him. He'd smile creepily, wrinkles pulling, “ten million for your parents, lots more for you. Aren't you happy?”

 

Of course I am, she'd say. It's not just about the money, dear. Don't say that.

 

Oh, he’s repulsive. But her family needs the money, and for them she'll stick with it. Her modelling can only get her this far, can only sustain her for this long.

 

She has to attend his conferences sometimes, appear with him briefly for an interview or two, clinging to his arm and smiling as though she's having the time of her life. His public persona is bearable, but it's when it's at home that she has to draw the lines distinctly.

 

There's not much comfort for her anywhere - she has few friends, and she only really talks to her parents. But she attends her husband’s business parties sometimes, and it was at those that she met her.

 

Wu Xuanyi, one of the youngest female billionaires on the planet. She, who displayed a prodigious knack for the business world, is the founder of a humongous manufacturing firm and the owner of a well known dried seaweed brand that is distributed globally.

 

It was only at the second party she'd attended that she met her. Her husband was busy chatting it up with some other potential clients, and Meiqi had drifted from him, repelled by the obnoxiously loud male laughter and the covert looks they'd shoot at her young face.

 

She was wandering around the hall, a half-finished glass of champagne in her hand. She'd settled at a table a considerable distance away from all the CEOs talking.

 

She was sitting and sipping when she saw her walking towards her table. Xuanyi was dressed in a simple long dress, and her honey brown hair was twisted in an elegant updo. Meiqi didn't think much of it at first - she was more bent on staying far away from her husband than looking at ladies.

 

But then Xuanyi had seated herself opposite Meiqi, and she had snapped to attention, throat drying slightly when she sees the woman sitting opposite her.

 

“Hi,” Xuanyi had said, smiling and showing two rows of impeccably white teeth. “You must be the gorgeous Meng Meiqi I've been hearing tales about.”

 

Meiqi didn't give herself space to be flustered, though she was. Extremely. She shouldn't be getting flustered over someone calling her gorgeous, but she was.

 

“Yes, I am Meng Meiqi. And you are?”

 

“Wu Xuanyi,” Xuanyi said, sticking a hand out over the table.

 

Meiqi’s eyes widened a little, and Xuanyi must have noticed, because she laughed. She had a pretty laugh. Meiqi did her research - she knew most of her husband’s business partners, and though she'd heard of Xuanyi, she'd certainly never met her before.

 

“Oh, my apologies, Miss Wu,” Meiqi said, easing her hand into Xuanyi’s and shaking firmly. Xuanyi’s hand was soft, so unlike the rough surface of her husband’s palms.

 

“Just Xuanyi will do.” Xuanyi smiled wider.

 

Meiqi had then realised how exceedingly beautiful Wu Xuanyi really was - she'd heard that the young tycoon was pretty, and she'd seen pictures occasionally, but nothing compared to seeing her in real life.

 

It was like looking at the dusky sun after a long day shut up in a musty old room; a reprieve.

 

“Okay,” Meiqi let go of her hand and returned to sipping her champagne.

 

They'd talked little then; just some small talk before Xuanyi left to talk to someone else, and Meiqi was reined in by her husband again.

 

“Were you talking to Wu Xuanyi just now, dear?” He'd asked, hand on her slim waist.

 

“Yes,” she'd replied, robotic smile appearing like a clockwork. She was a master at hiding her repulsion.

 

He'd smiled then, too. “Excellent. I was intending to set a plan to work with her company. Keep talking to her, Mei. If she likes you then she'll be more receptive towards my proposals.”

 

Meiqi had agreed - she couldn't say no, anyway.

 

Many a night had she toiled, clinging to the edge of her bed to escape her husband’s wandering hands, smiling whenever she saw him, assuring him that she wouldn't have it any other way.

 

Then they'd gone to another party. And another, and another, and Meiqi had begun truly talking to Wu Xuanyi. She knows she's being watched, so she keeps herself discreet when they talk. Xuanyi is easy to talk to: there's no awkwardness, because she has a genuinely sweet personality.

 

It's been more than a year now since they first met.

 

They're pretty close in age - Xuanyi is three years older than Meiqi. They'd talked, and Meiqi had also realised that, besides being beautiful and owning an extremely sharpened mind, Xuanyi is also abhorrently clumsy.

 

It's nothing more than a business venture, of course. These conversations. A way to help her husband take steps further into this industry - or at least that's what she likes telling herself.

 

“Mr and Mrs Li.”

 

“Pleasure to see you here again, Miss Wu,” Meiqi’s standing stiffly beside her husband, who's looking at Xuanyi with somewhat lecherous eyes. Meiqi isn't surprised anymore - it seems the old men here like to divest themselves in ogling at the younger ladies. Even the married old men.

 

Meiqi loathes the way Mrs Li rolls off Xuanyi’s tongue. Loathes the glint in the other woman’s eyes, as if she knows much more than she lets on.

 

“I'm assuming your business is going well, Mr Li,” Xuanyi says, ever the smooth conversationalist. She has a way of working her charm so that people just can't feel uncomfortable around her.

 

“Yes. We are in good shape right now. I am looking forward to signing our business agreement,” He smiles, dry lips pulling back over false teeth. The smile is leery, and Meiqi hates it.

 

“As am I,” Xuanyi shoots Meiqi a coy look from the corner of her eye, side of lifting slightly. “I am confident that our venture will be successful.”

 

“I appreciate the confidence, Miss Wu,” Mr Li says, free hand reaching up to scratch at the hairs drooping from his double chin. Someone calls his name, and he responds with equal fervour. “I will excuse myself now. Would you like to accompany me, darling?”

 

Meiqi hates the way his voice sounds so close to her ear, how she can feel the breath against her skin.

 

But she smiles dotingly, laying a hand on his sagging arm, “no, it's okay dear, I will remain and talk to Miss Wu.”

 

Mr Li detaches himself from her. Meiqi breathes out quietly.

 

Xuanyi watches her, then grabs a flute from a passing waiter and hands it to her, champagne bubbling. She doesn't mention the sigh. “You look tired today, Meiqi.”

 

Xuanyi looks really, really good today. She'd dyed her hair black, coincidentally matching Meiqi’s new dye job. Meiqi isn't sure if it's really such a coincidence. The world isn't that small. But whatever.

 

She is tired - tired of having to be married to her husband. It's been three years. Three years of sleeping at the edge of the bed, of fake smiling, of now feeling a building pressure as she works to help him. Meiqi may have only been a model, but she's very sharp. And that sharpness is really backfiring on her now.

 

“What's it to you, Miss Wu?” Meiqi asks, sipping a mouthful of sweet and bitter bubbles.

 

“The fact that we are about to become business partners is quite to me, Mrs Li.”

 

Xuanyi must know she hates it. She must know. She wouldn't be giving her that sly half smile if she didn't. But Meiqi ignores the name, because she's supposed to be displaying her public persona.

 

“A toast to revenue,” Meiqi says. They tap their glasses. “So, are you still single, or have you found yourself a beau?”

 

“Still very much single,” Xuanyi says, swirling the bubbly golden liquid in her flute. Condensed water runs down her finger. She laughs. “Probably the only single billionaire in the world.”

 

“Well, you're still young.”

 

There's the unspoken meaning behind it. Xuanyi’s swirling slows, before picking up speed again. She's looking at the champagne. Meiqi can sense what she's thinking succinctly.

 

You're young too.

 

Too young, maybe. Too young to be bound by a commitment to last a lifetime.

 

“To youth,” Xuanyi says finally, raising her glass.

 

Meiqi taps her glass against Xuanyi’s. The tap is full of unsaid words.

 

“To youth,” she echoes, drinking. To the years of my youth that I have lost, too.

 

“You look particularly stunning today, Meng Meiqi. Here without Mr Li today?”

 

Meiqi normally doesn't go to parties if her husband doesn't go. But, not for the first time, she just needs to get away from his probing hands and his leery grin.

 

“I am perfectly capable of handling myself without his presence,” Meiqi says. She's already greeted many of her husband’s business partners, most of whom now know her by name. Xuanyi’s dressed a little more luxuriously than usual today, what with the extra shawl draped around her shoulders and her glittery dress.

 

“Certainly didn't look that way when you clung on to his arm like a baby koala at the press conference last Thursday,” Xuanyi’s voice is light and full of mirth. Even her voice is luxurious.

 

“Just because I cling onto him doesn't mean that I am completely dependent on him,” Meiqi says defensively, reaching towards the little dish on the table for a peanut.

 

Xuanyi reaches for one too, and their fingers brush. Meiqi feels a tingle.

 

“You should try to control him a bit, Mrs Li. Don't think I haven't noticed the way he looks at me,” Xuanyi says, mockingly, the teasing clear in her glittery brown eyes.

 

Oh, she must know.

 

Meiqi never voices her vexation. She merely smiles, waves it off, and she says, “Oh, you know what these old men like to do. Just let him be. I trust him.”

 

She loathes her husband’s lecherousness. She loathes how his gaze is either calculative or predatory when he looks at her - how he always looks at her, really - and other women. But she understands. That their relationship was not built on love.

 

“An assuring sentiment,” Xuanyi says, tipping her glass slightly to her. Their eyes meet, mildly glittery brown and brown greyed by coloured contact lenses. Still mocking.

 

Xuanyi has always been an excellent orator. That's why she's a goddamn billionaire at twenty four. But when she's trying to be ‘subtle’, even in regular conversations, she uses her eyes and her gestures to communicate what her words can't. And Meiqi is beginning to realise the extent of how skilled the woman in front of her is at communicating. A true businesswoman.

 

“Do you not have other potentials to converse with?” Meiqi asks. Xuanyi, she realises, has always spent more time talking to her.

 

Xuanyi taps her chin. Smiles that coy smile. “Consider this a lengthy conversation with a successful potential. Now, I am curious of your taste in dim sum.”

 

Being around Wu Xuanyi has always been something of a suppressed joy to Meiqi. Finally someone who she can talk to, without having to speak in honeyed tones. She still has to lie. But she can sense it - in all the bones that feel less weak around her. That Xuanyi knows that she's lying.

 

Xuanyi never fails to compliment her on her outfits - which should be normal, really, Meiqi’s glowing vigour and youthful visage has attracted many compliments.

 

But from Xuanyi, everything just feels different - it's really as though Meiqi is secretly happy to impress her.

 

Meiqi isn't sure how much of this she can take.

 

Having to fuss and pretend to care about the old Chinese man she's married to, have his blotched hands touch her arms and embrace her. The looks she'd get from people who recognise her - the young wife of Mr Li, obviously just married for the money.

 

The looks of increasing intensity from a certain young female billionaire as more rumours surface upon Mr Li’s new venture into trying to form a C-pop girl group. The little jaded jibes shielded by craftily meaningful sentences.

 

Her dreams, as she clings fervently onto the edge of the mattress, are plagued by glittering brown eyes and hair dyed black as midnight.

 

Sitting upright in the morning, tears fresh in her eyes, the vague flash of glittering brown slashed to nonexistence upon laying eyes on the sight of her husband lying on his back in a singlet, arm more often than not splayed out too close to her rear.

 

She'd slip quietly out of bed. Go to the bathroom, splash her face with water. Look upon her smooth skin, untouched yet by the unrelenting hands of age.

 

You're young too. She'd remember, and the tears would well before she forces them back again.

 

She's tired, she's just - tired.

 

The news came as a shocking blow to the nation.

 

“Mr Li, founder of LiF, a company that has partnered with many others and garnered an astonishing net worth…”

 

A heart attack.

 

Meiqi sits on the cold plastic chair in the hospital, breathing in and out calmly. The television hanging from the ceiling in a corner is reporting - she doesn't know how it got out so fast. Or maybe she's just been sitting for too long.

 

There'll be no more leery grins from across the bed, no more hands trying to go places, no more having to fake being happy around a man that never, could never have made her happy.

 

There was three days after that, in which everything is sorrowful. But she doesn't shed unnecessary tears. The three days are for family and for quiet.

 

But when the grace period is over, life barrels on unrelentlessly. Like water crashing through a dam long bent under the weight of a rushing river.

 

She's his only living family, since he never had any kids and he didn't have any close relatives. It's written specifically in the document, signed by his hands - that LiF, all of his property, his money, and all his worldly possessions would be willed to her.

 

Over the span of a single day, she changed from Meng Meiqi the Wife to Meng Meiqi, the Youngest Billionaire in China.

 

She exits the law firm with her strides more confident than any model’s, shades on to prevent her from being blinded by the flashes she's grown so accustomed to. The reporters rush up to her like starving animals to food.

 

“Miss Meng! What are your thoughts on inheriting-”

 

“What does it fe-”

 

“Are you planning to-”

 

Meiqi’s bodyguards clear a path for her to walk through. She keeps firmly zipped, walking forward on legs that feel like they could walk the span of the world.

 

Billions. A company. No more lecherous hands trying to touch her. It's a lot to absorb in one day.

 

It takes several days for her to absorb it fully, but then, she makes up for lost time by putting her diploma to good use.

 

She picks LiF up, has a huge board meeting, and begins revamp work on certain areas of the fashion sector. She forgoes sleep for two days just to see the company back into its place up there in the stock market.

 

There's the rumours that fly, of course. That she'd somehow had a hand in it. She married him for the money, that everyone knows by now, and that is a rumour she doesn't care much about now, but to say that she'd orchestrated his heart attack? Ridiculous. The internet is in chaos.

 

Nobody can see the eerie little smile on her face as she puts her tablet down. Oh, yes, very ridiculous.

 

Ridiculous when she'd known of his pre existing conditions. Ridiculous when she'd done the simple job of taking the pills from his office, depriving him of any source of personal help.

 

But nobody knows. No one suspects such a thing - a heart attack can't be orchestrated so. They think of fake news. Of bloody murder. But they can't prove anything. Meiqi is free.

 

She doesn't let the rumours sway her. Exits buildings with her shades and an impassive expression on, and firmly closed.

 

Perhaps people would've expected her to appoint another person from the board as the new acting CEO of LiF. They probably didn't anticipate the fact that Meiqi herself has an acutely sensitive flare for business.

 

Within a couple of weeks the company is back in the game at full force - magazines selling, clothes selling, new designs personally vetted by her being pumped out to manufacturers around China. She keeps contact with business partners, all of whom are now forced to know her by name.

 

They have to know her by name. In fact, much of China, and maybe even some of the world, knows her by name - Meng Meiqi, the billionaire.

 

Two months pass in a whirl, what with the increasing need for business models to be upgraded with the new global competition. Meiqi handles it gallantly, vetting major designs and having board meetings left and right.

 

LiF makes extraordinary profits from her push for upgrades - the millions in her bank accounts are slowly increasing with every tiny portion of the profits she takes. (The rest of the millions to make up the billions come in the form of investments).

 

Her employees all get pay rises - their checks aren't as fat, but then again, she has rights as the CEO.

 

Meiqi supposes that the big jump in success is because she's decidedly younger and she knows what trends are going on. Weibo? She has it. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook? She has them all. She keeps up with the times; in LiF’s industry, she needs to know the trends. And those she utilises.

 

She's working on establishing LiF as a more high class clothing brand. Already she has upgraded designs for teens and young adults - the clothing is selling fairly well.

 

It takes a few months more before everything stabilises. There's less of the hectic rush to upgrade and switch up the company and more of the routine daily jobs.

 

That's when Meiqi decides that it's been long enough.

 

She's greeted with warm applause and loud male laughter when she steps in. It's a familiar atmosphere - one reeking of money, of infinitesimal power. And now, she fits right in.

 

“Miss Meng!”

 

No more Mrs Li.

 

She's politely shaking hands with sponsors and business partners who she hasn't seen face to face in a while. It's more old men, with leery gazes. But it's no more her old men.

 

A couple glasses of champagne go round as she speaks to them - not as a trophy wife, but as an equal. It's rather empowering. Standing at the table, being able to talk to them and have them listen, because they all know that she's turned into the new dai lou - the new big brother.

 

Not in a literal sense, of course, but with her new immense wealth she's easily one the richest in the room. And the riches isn't shared; it's all hers.

 

She floats around the room for a while, making small talk with other business partners and sponsors, before standing at an empty table for a reprieve. She feels a tap on her shoulder.

 

“Miss Meng,” says a familiar voice.

 

“Miss Wu,” Meiqi says without looking. An involuntary smile graces her lips.

 

Xuanyi rounds the table. She's in a modest cocktail dress shimmering with sequin adornments, and her hair is longer, blonde again, flowing loose around her shoulders. She's just as breathtaking as Meiqi remembers.

 

“Haven't seen you in a long while,” Xuanyi says. Meiqi is sure she isn't imagining the flirtatious tone. The audacity of it nearly makes Meiqi’s smile widen.

 

“You look as beautiful as ever, Miss Wu,” Meiqi says, tilting her glass slightly.

 

“I should say the same about you. I offer my sincere condolences,” Xuanyi taps her glass against Meiqi’s, and sips from the golden bubbles. Their meets meet over the rims of their glasses. Glittering brown, brown greyed by contact lenses - just as right as Meiqi remembers.

 

“Thank you.”

 

Perhaps Xuanyi is noticing the confidence in her - the way she's standing up straight but not stiffly, the ease in her smiles, the relaxation on her youthful face. The vexed distress of being locked down has dissipated. Gone.

 

There's a polite silence, in which they sip from their flutes. It's good champagne, and it's good company that Meiqi has been craving. .

 

“The billions have changed you,” Xuanyi observes, leaning against the table. Her brilliant brown eyes dance over Meiqi’s face.

 

“I believe they would change anyone,” Meiqi says.

 

“The billions still ensure my singularity, for some strange reason,” Xuanyi sighs dramatically.

 

“I'm sure that there's plenty of fine men here who would love to turn your singularity around,” Meiqi says slyly, smiling. Xuanyi just makes a face, causing her to laugh.

 

“These men don't interest me, Miss Meng. They're all at least twice my age.”  

 

Meiqi leans forward, palm cupping her chin. Their faces are a foot and a half apart. She raises an eyebrow tauntingly. “Well, do any men interest you, really?”

 

Xuanyi contemplates, fingertip tapping her chin, lower lip poking out slightly. Her lips are tinted red, glossy in the warm lights from above. The left corner of lifts. The coy smile. “No, not really.”

 

There's eye contact. Meiqi is sure of her meaning.

 

“Then,” Meiqi tilts her head. “Just who would be so lucky as to be able to interest Miss Wu Xuanyi, the young female billionaire?”

 

“Oh, I don't know,” Xuanyi sips her champagne, eyes looking at Meiqi with false loftiness. “Maybe you should guess, Miss Meng Meiqi, the youngest female billionaire.”

 

“Certainly not me,” Meiqi says, mouth opening in mock horror. The playful dynamic between them is comfortable, and Meiqi finds herself enjoying their talk again. “Perhaps you'd be interested in that fine gentlemen over yonder - at a ripe age of forty.”

 

They laugh, and they chat more. But the conversation now is underlaid with a heavy tension that neither is willing to compromise - Xuanyi with her coyness, Meiqi with her fake ignorance. It's clear what the tension is really about.

 

The function hasn't ended, but Xuanyi needs to leave at ten. She's finishing up her last drop of champagne when Meiqi says, “If you would, hand me your phone.”

 

Xuanyi looks questioning, but hands the mobile over to Meiqi.

 

Meiqi opens her contacts list, taps in her personal number, and saves it under ‘Meng Meiqi’. She shows the screen to Xuanyi, who just smiles her beautiful crescent-eyed smile and laughs as she takes her phone back.

 

“Okay. Okay. I'll see you around, Meng Meiqi.”

 

Xuanyi leaves, and Meiqi is left to talk to more people. The smile on her face, for once, doesn't falter at all that night.

 

Xuanyi puts her number to good use. Meiqi receives a text that night, and they start messaging.

 

She's careful about what she types online. But so is Xuanyi - they don't talk about anything work related, for fear of unintentional information leakage. They talk about personal lives - about Xuanyi’s secret love for seaweed, and Meiqi’s passion for dancing.

 

There's nothing awkward between them - Xuanyi is easy to talk to, and Meiqi tries her best not to make anything weird.

 

They get closer, in a way, by knowing each other's personal lives. Like friends. Meiqi loves talking to her. Xuanyi’s nice, albeit taunting, but they both are, and this similarity is what she really, really likes about them.

 

She likes Wu Xuanyi. She makes her feel happy. And maybe that's just what Meiqi needs.

 

“Xuanyi,” Meiqi says, looking surprised.

 

“Meiqi,” Xuanyi steps into her office, looking around in mild interest before seating herself on the chair opposite Meiqi.

 

It's easy to forget how they're both at the geographical top of their business pyramids - when Meiqi looks at her dressed so normally for work, it's easy to forget how she's also a billionaire. Their phone chat just proves how inexorably young they are.

 

“What is your purpose here today, Miss Wu?”

 

“It's a personal agenda,” Xuanyi says, smiling her clear white smile. She looks gorgeous in a simple white button down and a blazer and a pencil skirt, and Meiqi just can't stop looking.

 

“And what may that be?” Meiqi asks wryly. She has papers to be signed under her palms, but she ignores that.

 

“I was just thinking,” Xuanyi leans forward on the desk casually, and Meiqi catches whiffs of her expensive perfume. It isn't overpowering like the choking colognes that all her male counterparts use. “About how I never seem to be interested in guys.”

 

“So you come to my office, naturally,” Meiqi says, shuffling her papers into a neat stack. She says it calmly, but her hands are shaking. Xuanyi always hides meanings behind her words.

 

“Well,” Xuanyi sits up straight, shuffling papers around in her work bag, “I have a proposal for you.”

 

“What?”

 

Meiqi feels a small disappointment well up in her stomach. She'd thought - almost - well, never mind. Whatever.

 

“A proposal,” Xuanyi repeats, producing a single document from her bag.

 

“For what? Your manufacturing firm is already working hand in hand with LiF,” Meiqi says, confused.

 

That's when Xuanyi smiles, the full on white toothed smile, glittering brown eyes curving into crescents. “Not that kind of proposal, .” She flips the document over, sliding it across the table to rest in front of Meiqi. It's there, in huge, bolded . Meiqi in a breath.

 

Marriage Proposal.

 

What a troll she is.

 

And Xuanyi pulls a box out from her bag. A velvet one, which she snaps open. Two gold rings glitter, with huge diamonds set delicately into the twisted bands of metal. It looks insanely expensive.

 

“A proposal,” Xuanyi says, raising the box. She's smiling wide, “to unite two of China’s richest billionaires.”

 

Meiqi’s stunned for a moment, before she slowly says, “Are you kidding me?”

 

“Fortunately, no. This is all for the money.” Xuanyi’s smiling that stupid coy smile that Meiqi’s grown to love.

 

Meiqi tears up a little. “All for the money.” She stands up abruptly, and Xuanyi’s smile drops slightly. But then Meiqi rounds the table, leans, and embraces Xuanyi as hard as she can.

 

Xuanyi’s arms wrap around her back as she stands, and Meiqi can rest her chin on Xuanyi’s shoulders and inhale her scent and God, yes, it smells like a beautiful union. Not just of riches, but of mutual endearment.

 

“This marriage will be illegal in China,” Meiqi mumbles. Xuanyi’s arms tighten around her.

 

“So sue me.”

 

Meiqi’s smiling hard. She leans back slightly - Xuanyi’s face is close, and she can see the little golden flecks in her glittering brown eyes. Then the eyelids close over the irises, and Meiqi feels a warmth against her lips.

 

Her entire body is tingling with the sheer power of the moment. And it is powerful - for all the love that flows between them, there is as much in physical wealth. With their combined riches...well, it's pretty unimaginable.

 

They step back. Xuanyi pulls a ring from the box. So does Meiqi.

 

“I know you didn't ask me directly, and that this is really abrupt because we actually didn't date each other or anything,” Meiqi says, “but yes.”

 

Xuanyi laughs, high pitched and pretty and Meiqi’s spirits lift. “Yes.”

 

Meiqi holds her left hand, and slides the ring onto Xuanyi’s slender fourth finger.

 

“To lesbian Chinese billionaires.”

 

Xuanyi smiles her beautiful coy smile and takes Meiqi’s left hand in a gentle grip. She pushes the ring onto her fourth finger, caressing her fingers softly.

 

“To being the richest couple alive.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-

 

QWHSJRKEJ This was the funniest thing to write even though there's like zero crack in it the context is amazing I couldn't pass up the opportunity

A troll but kind of not troll fic soz

 

@ twitter user merrymeiqi for boostin wjsn girlies with that amazing post  

Also @ taru and liz lmao

 

fluffsaur