Fullepub 
Chapter Twenty: Ten Thousand Reasons
CHAPTER TWENTY
TEN THOUSAND REASONS
Li Shimin looks worse coming out of the solitary cell than he did coming out of the fight. They didn’t take his glasses, but behind the thick lenses, his eyes are bleary and bloodshot. Dark circles hang under them, deep as the bruises that have developed on my cheek and neck and around Yizhi’s eye.
Guess we’ve all had a bad night.
Only after a long moment does he balk at my battered face and neck.
“I’m going to kill him!” His shout ricochets down the concrete hall after Sima Yi tells him what happened.
“No.” Sima Yi has to hold him back, and he gives a pacifying wave to the soldiers. “Leave the investigation to the disciplinary committee. You cannot afford to get into any more trouble. You’re testing the limits of the Sages’ patience as it is. This is Student Strategist Gao.” He points his thumb at Yizhi. “He happened to be wandering near your bunker and took a black eye to save your girl. Then he stayed outside all night to make sure she was safe, even after I posted soldiers at your door. He’s a good kid. Thank him. Don’t scheme about punching his other eye.”
“Oh.” Li Shimin sweeps his vein-laced eyes over Yizhi. “Um…thank you.”
Yizhi stares up at him, chest rising and falling. I don’t think he was mentally prepared for how imposing Li Shimin is in person. He reacts a second late. “It’s—it’s no problem! I’m a fan, you know. Read a lot about you.”
“Uh…” Li Shimin starts, but doesn’t seem to know how to go on.
Yizhi gulps. A blush reddens his ears, and a quizzical feeling stirs inside me.
Sometimes, I’ve wondered if Yizhi’s attractions extend beyond girls. We never dared stray onto topics like this during our forest liaisons for fear of admitting the tension between us, but I’ve wondered, because of the way he would talk about certain male celebrities. Things like this are a common topic of gossip back in my village, but honestly, I’ve been transfixed by pictures of women myself. The notion that men and women must be with only each other tires me as much as the pilot system.
But Yizhi only spends another moment looking winded by Li Shimin’s presence before he toughens his demeanor and launches into his spiel. Claiming to have been looking into Li Shimin because of the rumors of us having the power to take back the Zhou province, he offers to help him detox from alcohol with the best resources money can buy. Yizhi did discuss this with Sima Yi on our way here, and Sima Yi grudgingly agreed that we’d have much more of a fighting chance if Li Shimin piloted sober.
Li Shimin is not receptive to the idea, though. His expression snaps flat and emotionless. He starts walking away.
“No, listen.” Yizhi blocks him. It takes all my discipline not to cry for him to be careful. “I don’t know how things got this way, but I have faith in you. They say spirit pressure is really a measure of willpower. That means you have ten thousand reasons to at least try to beat this.”
A tender, conflicted pain squeezes around Li Shimin’s eyes. There’s a second where it seems he might say yes, but then he tries to slip away again. “Leave me alone.”
“No.” Yizhi snatches Li Shimin’s leash and pulls him to his eye level. The chain rattles. Both Sima Yi and I gasp out loud.
“Let go. Now.” Fury charges Li Shimin’s eyes, like someone switched his soul back on. The soldiers grasp their guns. His hands clench and unclench, but stay near his legs.
Yizhi holds on, his grip quavering yet his gaze chilling into that ice-cold, single-minded vacancy that never fails to surprise me when it overcomes him. The air crackles between him and Li Shimin. I forget how to breathe.
“If you don’t sober up, you’ll waste both your and Pilot Wu’s power,” Yizhi enunciates, sounding like a completely different person. No more blushing. “That is not fair to her.”
Li Shimin’s scowl twitches. “What does that matter to you?”
A tiny crack splits through Yizhi’s composure. I tense up, hoping only I know him well enough to have caught it.
He releases Li Shimin’s leash slowly, one finger at a time. “What does this matter to you? You must’ve been waiting a long time for a girl like Pilot Wu, haven’t you? There’s not a single pilot who doesn’t secretly long for his One True Match. You must’ve thought you would never find yours. Yet here she is.” Yizhi’s eyes drift toward me, gaining a wet sheen. “The girl who, against all odds, has made it to you.”
My body goes stiff as stone.
Look away, I silently plead. You’re being too obvious.
Yet when he does, it rips along a little piece of my heart.
“This isn’t just about you anymore,” Yizhi says to Li Shimin. “Look at her. Look at this girl. Are you really going to drag her down with you, even though you have ten thousand reasons to try to be better?”
Li Shimin stays silent for a long spell, but then closes his eyes and sighs through his nose. “It’s eighteen thousand reasons now, actually.”
“Good.” Yizhi’s voice shakes with loosening tension. “You will quit your vices, and you will be the best partner a girl could have. And I will be there to help you, in whatever way I can.”
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Oh, this won’t be weird at all.
