Having to wait painstakingly patiently for an injury to heal is one of the most boring and anxiety-inducing things Zitao has ever done, and by the time his ankle fully heals, it has now brushed upon the early breaths of summertime, where he is one year older, and he feels fulfilled in a way in which he would personally consider his recovery a birthday milestone.

Now being able to use his feet again, Zitao has started to go on daily jogs, and it’s beginning to help him clear his mind each and every day.

Since having arrived at his mother’s room earlier that day, Zitao had made a very clear mental note that he has not yet seen the president step foot into the hospital, and with that knowledge, he finds himself a perfectly opportune slot in his schedule to slink out of his mother’s room, head to the bathroom for a mask, and go exploring. If the president has not come yet, then that gives Zitao a once-in-a-lifetime window of opportunity to see his mother all by himself. 

He knows that inviting himself somewhere he doesn’t belong could both be considered disrespectful as well as dangerous, for it may be only moments before the president walks through that door and catches him, but Zitao cannot seem to help himself. 

Silently, he tiptoes toward the woman’s door and peers carefully in, once again being faced with the sight of the president’s mother asleep in her little cot, wispy dark gray hairs limp against the pillow where she lays motionless and her bedside monitor beeps in time with her heartbeat, and Zitao wonders why it is that the president’s mother is monitored as compared to his mother who is not, and what, medically, must differentiate that decision to monitor a patient’s heartbeat. 

Quietly, he sighs as he watches her sleep. She must have been a wonderful, lovely mother, and Zitao hates that he can relate all too well to having to be the source of vital income to keep a mother alive, and he empathizes with the president far too deeply. He cannot begin to imagine how much pain it will cause him should he lose his mother, when as the owner and proprietor of a fashion line and a modeling firm, he already has enough on his plate. 

As he’s peering curiously, he feels a series of gentle taps on his shoulder, and immediately thinking they may be the president, he jumps in surprise and whips around, his eyes wide - yet they soften just a smidge for it is merely a nurse, a brown-haired lady with small eyes and a clipboard in her hand. “Excuse me,” she says softly. “Are you here to visit Ms. Wu?”

Beneath the mask, his breaths come short. “Y-yes,” he stutters, unsure of how to dictate whether or not he is in trouble. 

“May I ask who you are?” The nurse requests sweetly, purely, and Zitao’s hands jitter on the doorframe. “We are required to only allow the afore-selected family members access to Ms. Wu’s room - it is simple protocol, you see.”

“I, um,” he begins unsurely. “I’m, um… Ms. Huang’s son down the hall. I know I’m not family, but I - I know Ms. Wu’s son and I… just wanted to come give my, um… my condolences.”

“Unfortunately, we are not supposed to allow you to interact with the patient if you are not part of the allotted visitation selection of family, but I suppose you may go in if you do not interact with her,” the nurse tells him, and Zitao breathes an internal sigh of relief. “She is having her midday nap right about now, so I will need you to be sure that you remain extremely quiet, please.”

As he nods, the nurse steps around him with quiet little feet as she strides over to the woman’s bedside and begins to check on her intravenous status. As she lingers by the monitor, Zitao takes it as an immediate okay to follow her, and he tiptoes into the room beside her, his fingers awkwardly knotted together where they linger on the front of his body, as he soaks up the sight of the president’s mother this close up. 

His only previous experience with this harmless stalking had been from afar, having lingered by the doorframe in the safety of his decrepit veiling of the unknown, where the president had been unsuspecting and Zitao had been able to carefully peek. Now that he gets to view the woman up-close and in person, it proves to be a little bit upsetting. She’s an emaciated little thing, skin pallid and sallow where her intravenous tube trails into her arm, skin flourished in brights as though a bruised peach. Unlike his own mother, she has no medical bedside tag - and Zitao finds comfort in the assumption that that was a privacy decision, that perhaps the president doesn’t exactly enjoy broadcasting to the world what exactly is wrong with his mother. Zitao understands, and Zitao sympathizes. 

“Excuse me, miss,” he whispers quietly to the nurse, who turns a little on her heel where she’d been refilling the woman’s intravenous bag. “I know the answer is probably no, but… would I be allowed to know what is wrong with Ms. Wu? I don’t need details, I just… is she terminally ill or - is it something minor?”

“I cannot reveal that information,” the nurse tells him as she shakes her head, her tied-back hair bouncing behind her. “The only person who has the permission to dictate to whom the familial and intrapersonal information may be given out to is her eldest son. When he is not here, I do not have the power to ask him for permission.”

Sighing softly, Zitao nods as he glances back to the president’s mother as she sleeps. It would make sense for the president to be stingy about keeping his mother’s information as well as condition updates secret, as he is a public figure, after all, and just about anybody could come in here and lie and say that they were family simply to eavesdrop. “How often does the son come here?” He asks quietly. “Does he come every day?”

“He comes most days,” the nurse confirms as she turns away from the monitors and faces Zitao. “Usually in the evening-time on weekdays, he will arrive and will often stay until the nighttime. He is Ms. Wu’s only source of support and companionship, at the moment.” 

Heartbeat skipping, the corners of his lips begin to pull downward in a frown; does she really have nobody else other than her son? Zitao’s eyes begin to gloss over and fog, for he cannot imagine having to live such a lonely life - how could people abandon such a poor lady that way? “What does he do for her when he’s here?” He asks quietly from behind the mask.

The nurse takes in a slow little breath through the nose as she drums her fingers softly on her clipboard before she says, “He checks up on her, as medically expected. He helps us to feed her, he helps us to bathe her, and he helps us to change her as well as her bed pan and her bedding when need be. He usually stays for several hours to keep her company, but often cannot stay for too long of a time for he does work full-time. There was one day about a month ago, however, that we did see him come in, but he never came to Ms. Wu’s room. Not very sure what he was doing if he hadn’t been beelining straight here, but he had a collections folder in his hand that day. Strange.”

He nods to himself, for he has no idea what the man might have been doing here with a handful of documents, either. He would assume that having a mother who is very ill and even lonelier at that, would require him to have to do a lot while he was here - especially visiting the financial department if they ever gave the president the that they gave Zitao about payment.

“Young man,” the nurse mumbles in a soft voice, and Zitao jitters out of his thoughts as he glances up at her, his thumbs crossed in his lap. “I have to take Ms. Wu’s dishes back to the commissary - the hospital protocol is that you must leave while nobody else is in her presence, so I will require you to have left by the time I return - understand?”

“Yes, miss,” he tells her, having no ill intention of getting himself in trouble. Politely, the nurse bids him a brief goodbye before she steps out of the room with the emptied, used dishes in her hand, and as the palatable silence sinks down onto Zitao’s skin in microparticles, he turns his head back to the woman laid in the bed in front of him. 

How does the president feel about his mother having nobody else there for her, Zitao wonders? He can’t imagine that the president would be anywhere near pleased about that matter, and he wonders if that, coupled with the guilt built up in himself over Mochou’s death, would explain why the president has made absolutely no attempt to build a better life for himself with another woman and perhaps a few children, should he want them. 

Amidst his observing, Zitao finds himself too curious, for he is not sure when another opportunity like this one will arise, and he quietly slides his seat closer to the side of her bed as though familially, and reaches out to touch her hand. I’m so sorry that this has happened to you, he thinks, hoping to permeate her thoughts with his own telepathically. I’m so sorry that the world has been cruel to you when you have such a wonderful, successful, beautiful son who needs you very much. 

Her skin is wrinkled, a little bit taut in places and plenty malleable in others, and her veins bulge along the back of her hand as though starved and yearning. He doesn’t do more than touch, simply brushing the pad of his thumb over her skin as his expression falls pained, hating to know that somebody he cares for has to have their entire world laid out in a hospital bed hooked up to wires and monitors. He sighs, for tears have begun to gather at his waterlines amidst his thoughts, and the world once again proves to be too cruel for tender-hearted people such as himself.

Exhaling softly, he pulls slightly back, his pressured gaze soft as he watches her sleep, her chest slowly rising and falling as though perhaps too slowly, when he hears a shuffling sound off to the side and doesn’t get any time to piece it together in his mind before it’s followed by a loud, “Who are you?”

He jerks in surprise, for he hadn’t been expecting anybody other than the nurse, and the chair clatters loudly against the ground as he jolts upward and meets the eyes of his boss, looking very displeased and plenty bothered that a stranger had been hovering over his mother like a shadow. As the man’s mother opens her eyes, then, startled by the commotion, Zitao finds himself wordless as his hands tremble in the open air, as though searching for an excuse, when he hears the woman beside him say, “Oh, Yifan, stop it, he wasn’t doing anything.” 

His eyebrows knit together at that, his lips parted behind the mask. Yifan? Is that the president’s name?

Then, the president’s gaze sharpens as he takes several steps into the room as though to get a closer look at him before he falters and stills in the middle of the woman’s room. “You’re that patient from the other day,” the man mutters in displeasure, and Zitao’s throat works in a cottony swallow. 

No, he can’t get caught here. Not like this.

Anxious and brave, Zitao bursts forward, brushing past the president as he dashes out of the door, jogging quickly to his mother’s room and not stopping even as the man’s shoes click against the glossed hallway floor as he calls out a shouted, “Wait!”

“Time for your weigh-in, Yingtao,” Qian tells him that morning when he comes to work, and Zitao nods at the command and begins to remove his bulky attire as directed, setting his shoes off to the side beside the scale and removing his jewelry, as well, laying each piece on the nearest vanity. 

The weigh-ins have become routine for him, like clockwork, and they require no effort at all from him to stand on a scale and have Qian measure him and document his progress. Sighing softly, he steps onto the scale in front of the walled mirror and stares at his reflection, having stripped down to his undershorts and his undershirt, merely a tank top he’d worn over his pads to help conceal them. He relaxes as Qian’s tape measure slides against his skin as she measures him, recording every tidbit in the folder she keeps about him. “You’re at sixty-one kilograms,” she comments, and Zitao’s eyebrows raise. Has he really lost four kilograms since starting this job mere months ago? “And your waist has slimmed down a little - I don’t know if you can tell, but last month’s weigh-in had your waist at thirty-one and you are now at twenty-nine.” 

“That sounds like a lot,” he mumbles to himself, and Qian chuckles off to the side as the measuring tape slithers away. 

“You’re making good progress,” she confirms. “I think we’ll keep you on the low-fat diet, and we’ll check you again in another month, yeah?”

Zitao nods, for he cannot say no. This was the requirement for working here, and he is very much aware of his obligation to follow the rules and lose the weight that he was assigned to lose. As he lifts his undershirt when Qian turns away, he finds himself frowning as his fingers meet the very beginning of lines along his upper torso - the telltale ridges of his ribcage beginning to peek through. Zitao wonders how the girls around here survive if all the president does is starve them like this, and require them to shed weight to this degree. He knows it must only be a matter of time before somebody’s health deteriorates from these strict dieting rules, and he can only hope that it won’t be him. 

Being alone in the studio this morning aside from the coordinators, Zitao finds more comfort in unchanging and redressing out in the open aside from within the shoe closet, and he begins to feel proud of himself - is this character development, he wonders? Is he beginning to become more comfortable with this side of himself to a point where he is no longer petrified to show his masculine imperfections?

“Yingtao,” Qian calls out, and Zitao turns around as he’s been called to see his coordinator stood by the sofas with a mobile phone in her hand and an informed look in her eye. “The president just called - he wants to see you up in his office.”

Lips parting, a bolt of worry floods through him. It’s probably nothing, but what if it is? What else has he ed up now? Knowing himself and his tendency to mess everything up, he wouldn’t be surprised if he were being reprimanded for something like taking too long of a lunch break without having realized. 

Courteously, however, he thanks her and bows, as he turns on his heel to head out of the studio and toward the elevators. Surely he’s not in any kind of trouble, right? Surely he’s done nothing wrong since the last time he’d fought with Jessica - he’d been off his foot for six weeks as he had been medically instructed, yet had continued to take pictures and sell public prints as his job requires, and he’s sure there’s nowhere else for him to be promoted to - so what must it be that the president wants to see him for? 

Taking a deep breath, he knocks on the frosted glass doors to the president’s office and bites down on his bottom lip when the president gives him verbalized permission to enter.

When he enters, the president’s office is in exactly the same state and shape that he has always seen it in, where the president is sitting alone at his desk with not a single accompanier lingering around him, and Zitao’s fingers instinctively knit at his front. “You wanted to speak to me, sir?” He asks, and the president glances up at him from over the top rim of his reading glasses, registering that Zitao has arrived before he stands smoothly from his seat and gives him a nod. 

“I have something for you,” the president says, and Zitao’s eyes widen just a little bit. Is it some kind of reward, he wonders? Curiously, he steps forward, growing closer, before stopping just inches from the edge of the president’s desk, as he awaits this something that he is being given. 

The president, as handsome as he is today with his rectangular-lensed reading glasses and his eggplant suit with silver latticework, bends to take something out of one of the drawers in his desk, and when he brings it up to hold in his hand as he closes the drawer, Zitao sees that it is a folder with several documents inside. “To make up, to you, for what happened in Shanghai,” the president tells him coolly, meeting his eye over the rim of his glasses, “I am attending a business banquet this Friday evening to meet with several designers to discuss the spring release of next year. I am required, by courtship protocol, to bring a plus-one to the event. Seeing as how you had to be removed from the show and therefore removed from the event, I would like for you to attend this function with me to make up for it.”

Hands going numb, Zitao’s lips part as his eyes widen, absolutely positive, this time, that he is dreaming. “A… a banquet?” He asks dumbly. “With you?”

“Yes, a banquet,” the president confirms with a flat expression. “A place where food is served as colleagues converse about business alterations.”

Taken by surprise, Zitao finds himself unable to take his eyes off of the invitation slip that lies within the folder as the president hands it to him, his to take and his to keep. This seems far too intimate of an event to attend simply to make up for having to sit out of a show because of a fractured ankle. Yet, for everything that he has had to experience in the past few months regarding the president’s tender-hearted past and his personal bias, Zitao wouldn’t exactly put it past him to masquerade a date under the guise that it’s a business trip. “Sir,” he breathes out, his manicured fingers stuttering around the edge of the sheet of paper. “Are you sure this is okay?”

“Of course it is,” the president responds flatly, and Zitao feels his cheeks flushing at the underlying tones within the gesture of inviting him privately to a banquet. “When regarding outings that will spur positive outcomes on my company, it is very common for me to need to borrow models to wear my products whilst there - this is bribery, Miss Huang, for ingenuity is one of my strongest suits.”

Biting softly on his rouged lower lip, Zitao knows very well that not only are company business trips not uncommon, for each public show that the company holds could be considered a business trip, but that something specifically privatized for two people could not be considered a business trip - this is a date, whether the president wants to admit it or not. 

“Do you object?” The president asks him, then, in a slightly softer tone, and Zitao realizes he must have been silent for quite a long time, too wrapped up in his own thoughts. “If you are not comfortable with accepting this request, then I will gladly find somebody else to attend the event.”

“No,” he says quickly, his voice perhaps too thick, “I - I would like to go. Thank you, sir.”

“I thank you on behalf of your agreement, Miss Huang,” the president praises him cordially, his lips pressed together in what Zitao can see is an attempt at a business grin, merely a shadow of the real thing. “Thursday when you arrive for work, you will find a packet waiting for you in your studio, within which will be instructions you are to follow regarding the formality of dress as well as your means of departure - in regards to this, you are to depart with me as well as arrive with me.”

At this, his eyes widen, the paper whispering against his fingers. “Mr. Wu?” He asks quietly, his voice merely a shy little peep. “You’re not insisting that we both take the same car, are you? Isn’t that quite intimate?”

“Of course I am, and of course it is not,” the man says as he adjusts his reading glasses where they’ve begun to slide down the breadth of his nose. “This is a plus-one event to discuss my brand - therefore, having my plus-one arrive either separately from me and having to wait for my plus-one to arrive or vice versa, or to arrive separately and be dressed in uncoordinated colors, looks disarranged and unprofessional. Additionally, on Thursday, you will receive a package in your studio along with the instruction packet. This will contain a coordinated outfit for you to don at this event, for there will be tens of hundreds of localized designers looking at you as a product - as my product, and as my product, you are to be dressed accordingly to represent me. Do you understand?”

More than likely blushing, he forces himself to nod. “Yes, sir,” he says breathily, taking a step back to give himself space away from the desk in order to bow. “I look forward to attending.”

“Remember, Miss Huang,” the president says before he leaves. “I will be picking you up at the address that you have provided me with within your application by the assigned time that will be in your instructional packet. If you are not ready by that time on the dot, I am leaving without you and you will not attend, for you are a plus-one.”

At the thought of the man driving to Zitao’s little apartment and picking him up privately as though taking him out on a date for the night, his heartbeat quickens, thumping quietly in his chest. “Yes, sir. I will see you Friday evening.”

No matter how hard he tries to distract himself with the shoot he’s scheduled with Dasom and Younghee, Zitao cannot draw his thoughts away from the anxiety of wanting Friday evening to arrive right now, and when Qian asks if he’s doing alright and if there’s anything on his mind, he finds himself far too afraid to tell anyone about his new development and his newfound scheduled plans for the end of this week.

“So, I have some news,” Zitao tells him as they converse on either side of the boy’s kitchen island, Zitao’s forearm resting comfortably on the cool granite while his best friend rests nonchalantly against the counter beside the refrigerator, “but you gotta like, grab a chair, or something, because you’re not going to believe this.”

Under instruction, his best friend nods, and dramatically sinks himself into a standing-seated position, as though sitting on an invisible chair, and Zitao snorts at the sight. “Alright,” his best friend smirks, crossing his arms over his chest. “I’m ready for the news.”

“Okay,” Zitao exhales slowly, theatrically using his hands to visually calm himself down and instruct his own breathing. “So, you know how my boss is kind-of… really scary?”

Flippantly, his best friend nods. “And also really hot, but continue.”

“Okay, well,” the boy preps himself for his big news, rubbing his palms together expectantly, “I may have… kind-of… gotten asked on a date by him but not really?”

Since it wasn’t actually a date but was an invitation to attend an event with him alone just like a date would inquire to be, Zitao finds more comfort in calling the kettle black rather than beating around the bush under the guise that it’s a so-called business event. Although young and inexperienced in a great number of things, Zitao is not stupid. Therefore, as expected, his best friend’s jaw drops and his eyes widen extensively, far enough to where Zitao begins to feel concerned that they may fall out of his sockets, and he can’t exactly say that he doesn’t blame him, for Zitao still feels as though he himself is asleep and thereafter, dreaming. “You’re ing kidding,” his best friend expresses in awe, and Zitao presses his lips together as he shakes his head, not believing even his own memories in regards to this. “Wait - so - he really asked you out?”

“Okay, well, not exactly,” Zitao clarifies quickly, and his best friend stands up from his stressed, seated position. “My boss asked me to attend a business event this Friday evening, but it’s a professional banquet and it’s only the two of us. It’s not even with several people from the company, it’s just me and my boss.”

“Holy ,” Luhan smiles, laughing. “You’re going on a date, look at you. I’m so proud of you - my little baby is growing up, oh no. He doesn’t need me as a rent-a-boyfriend anymore.”

“We’re not dating, don’t get ahead of yourself just yet,” he chuckles, shaking his head. “My boss is giving me a package at work on Thursday with an outfit he picked himself for me to wear because he said it’s more professional to be color-coordinated with your chauffeur, especially as a plus-one. What if it’s really cute? What if it’s y? What do I do?”

“I’ll tell you what we’re gonna do,” Luhan grins at him, his expression suddenly -eating and snide. “Friday? You come home from work, and I’ll be here by the time you get home. I was supposed to close this Friday, but my boss can my ing because I’m helping you get ready and I’m doing your makeup whether he likes it or not, and that’s final. I’ll have you looking so good, your boss will probably forget how to ing breathe when he sees you, Tao.”

“I’ve never been to a formal banquet,” he admits in a small voice. “What am I supposed to do there? How am I supposed to act?”

His best friend inhales through the nose, preparing his thoughts for expulsion. “Well,” he begins, “I’ve been to banquets before - some casual with family, and one time I went to one with one of my friends, which was really expensive and prestigious. They’re get-togethers, really, just with pre-organized and pre-paid dinners as well as alcohol and usually live entertainment. The last one I went to had this really beautiful, talented jazz singer who stood in the forefront of the room and sang the whole time. I can’t imagine how boring it must be to just sing for hours on end and not be allowed to stop.”

Food. Alcohol. Music. To Zitao, it sounds like a party, just much more mundane and less provocative, but does that make it less of a date? He isn’t necessarily sure. 

“So,” he begins to gather his thoughts, taking bits and pieces and patching them together to form a basic acquiescence, “it’s a date, then.”

Luhan snorts. “A poorly-disguised one, too. Besides, it’s probably against work policy to get involved in intimate relationships, so maybe your boss is trying to make a move without really making a move. Or, hey, maybe he just needs a little push to admit he likes you, or something - trust me, if I get you ready on Friday, you’ll have him kissing you on the by the end of the day.”

Zitao nods, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth, for he does not know which would be the more reasonable path of action to take, to assume that the president has feelings for him or to assume otherwise, for he knows very well which one he would prefer to take, but would his preferred road to walk down be the wisest? “I’m just nervous,” is what he responds with, for he knows that he could be getting himself too hyped up and could have too high of expectations for what this event may entail. 

“It’s alright, you’ll be fine. At least, you won’t die,” his best friend smirks. “God, I’m hungry. Can we go out to eat? My treat, I promise. Don’t even think about paying, mister.”

Pouting, Zitao had begun to reach for his wallet that lies in his back pocket, pressed against his clothed flesh. Despite having his credit cards and some spare change which has been designated as gas money, he knows that his accounts are constantly drained, as every cent he makes is taken by the hospital before he even gets to look at his earnings. “Fine,” he chastises, wanting, for once, to not feel like a selfish mooch by taking all of his best friend’s money. “I, um… I should probably dress up, right?”

Letting the words glide in the air, his best friend snorts, having only briefly mulled it over. “Of course you should. Out in public, you’re Yingtao, now. Zitao only exists in this apartment and in the hospital. Besides, I would be insulted if you didn’t partake in letting me rent my princess of a boyfriend for a night in his prettiest attire.”

From the gaudy flattery, Zitao finds himself grimacing, his nose scrunching as his lips curl. “You’re so gross,” he expresses with a brief little laugh. “Fine. You can take Yingtao out on a date, but make sure you return her home by eleven.”

Catchpenny by nature, then, his best friend shoots him a wink as he turns the corner around the little wall beside the island. “No promises,” he says, and Zitao finds himself sighing and shaking his head as he slinks off of his stool to head toward his own bedroom as his best friend gussies up in Zitao’s one and only spare bathroom. 

“I’m going to use the restroom, alright?” He asks carefully, lifting his cloth napkin from his lap to place it on the table as he makes a move to leave the booth. 

Not at all restrictive, his best friend nods as he slices into his filet once more. “Don’t fall in,” is all he offers in a humorous tone, and Zitao snorts as he slides free from the confinement of the booth, his rosy satin dres