“Liu Xiening…” Yiyang’s voice is cool, her impression inscrutable. “Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

“I-I can explain!” Xiening’s voice cracks, of course, in a decidedly panicked way. “It wasn’t what it looked like!”

Yiyang raises an eyebrow. “I’m listening.”

“I, um, my mouth just…happened to land on Yijin’s? And Zhao Yue’s…and Yifan’s…and Nene’s…”

“This explanation really isn’t doing you any favours,” Yiyang says dryly.

“But it wasn’t like I kissed kissed them, okay?” Xiening pinwheels her arms like that’s supposed to add to her point. “You know they’re all my sisters. They were just friendly, sisterly kisses.” Yiyang just stares at her, and Xiening hangs her head. “…okay, that makes it sound even worse, doesn’t it?”

“You are really bad at explaining,” Yiyang says, but is twitching at the corners and she’s clearly straining to keep up her aggrieved expression. “And to think I once thought you were a smooth talker.”

“I am a smooth talker!” Xiening says, except with her voice cracking it rather ruins the effect. She literally can’t talk smoothly, she mentally grumbles. “Do you want me to prove it?”

“Not really, no,” Yiyang says, giving a bright smile at Xiening’s pout.

“Yangyang,” Xiening whines. “Come on, I totally am! Look, you couldn’t resist my charms, right?”

“That’s true,” Yiyang says, surprisingly agreeable. “I guess my Achilles heel is dorks who like insoles way too much and have voices that crack.”

Xiening thinks about protesting that insole part (the voice thing is a lost cause by this point), but there’s something about Yiyang’s gaze that makes the words stick in . Her statement is casual, playful, but the look in her eyes isn’t, it’s—

Xiening swallows. “You can’t afford to have an Achilles heel,” she makes herself say instead. “You pick at your feet so much you’d probably poke right through it.”

“That’s true,” Yiyang says thoughtfully. “I guess I’d need to curb that habit.” She makes a face like she’s weighing the pros and cons of that and the cons are winning.

“Don’t worry,” Xiening says. “I’d make a heel guard for you. A weihuai^[1],” she says, alight with her own ingenuity, and is treated to Yiyang bursting into laughter.

“A weihuai for my weiyi,” Xiening says. A heel guard for my one and only. She watches a soft flush settle over Yiyang’s cheeks and is left alight in a different sense.

“Nobody else gets one?” Yiyang asks.

“Nobody else,” Xiening promises. “Only you.” Not just her one but her only.

A/N: [1] Yiyang's fans are called 卫衣 / Wèiyī, which means hoodie and sounds similar to 唯一 / Wéiyī, which means "one and only." I took the puns further and made up 卫踝 (Wèihuái) which means "ankle guard."