Male God fanfic: Rong Si’s parents Part 5

maripaz: Yay! After a non-happy story, it’s time to get some peace and closure for everyone! I felt like the story was “finished” with the last part, but I wanted everyone feeling happy again. Please read on for a more light-hearted epilogue and a (very brief) bonus appearance by some old friends. : )

Part 5: Epilogue

At Rong Si and Li Erqin’s wedding reception, the bride is a little flushed, her eyes are glazed and she’s looking off into the distance. They have just gone through the rounds of congratulatory shots, and he knows that his wife cannot hold her liquor. He moves to block her slightly from view and speaks in a low voice.

“Erlan, it’s almost over. Close your eyes and rest for a bi–”

The lower half of her body does not move, but her upper half tilts ever so slightly like a stiff flower bowing sideways to the wind. Her small head peeks out past Rong Si’s arms (she still does not reach his shoulders, even with heels on), and her face is sporting her signature “facial paralysis” look.

Rong Si can tell that there is a bit of wonderment to her mien though. Still in her odd position, she remarks simply, “Look.”

He turns around and a brief flit of surprise passes through his face. Across the room, his mom is sitting next to his dad, jokingly slapping his arm. They are smiling and laughing, and they both look completely relaxed and at ease.

He moves to stand next to his wife and holds her hand. As she looks at him through those unfamiliar fake lashes, she sees a slight smile on his face and a deep sense of peace that seems to emanate from within. She gives his hand a squeeze and smiles up at him just as Peng Zige and Su Zi bound toward them.

Lin Feiyun looks over at her son and his beautiful wife, surrounded by their happy and loving friends, and smiles at Rong Cheng.

“You did a great job raising him.”

He smiles in response and raises his glass. “It’s good to have you back.”

In the bridal suite where all the congratulatory red envelopes are kept, there is a small, handmade manga book tucked underneath the pile. Along the bottom of the last page are the lines: “Dearest Rong Si and Erqin, we love you, Dad + Mom”

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In the end, Lin Feiyun was still a bit embarrassed to meet Li Erqin without first having a meeting with Rong Si by herself. She decided to invite him over to her apartment, and despite having a good few days to ruminate, she still did not know what to say or how she should act right up to the moment when he rang her buzzer.

She opened the door and saw the younger version of the Male God looking back at her. Her face broke out into a smile, and she reached up to hug her boy.

“Rong Si!! Rong Si!!! You’re so handsome!! Look at you!” The smile would not leave her face. She felt so ridiculously happy.

She dragged him to the sofa and sat him down. Her cheeks were beginning to hurt, but she waved that away. She touched her son like a starved mother and elation began to fill up.

“Rong Si! How are you so beautiful?? You’re just like your dad. I am so happy you contacted me. I’m so embarrassed to be your mom. You know that, right? You don’t have to forgive me. I left you and your dad. I wrote a flimsy letter. What did that letter even mean? I’m so sorry. I’m sorry every day.

“And I don’t want to be shameless. Don’t think of me as your mom. Tell me objectively, you’re your dad so I know you can be rational, let me know what you wanted from contacting me. If you just want to let me know you’re getting married and then keep a distance, that’s OK. I understand.

“If you want to know what I’ve been doing, if you’d like an explanation, I will tell you. And I expect nothing. You can listen and then walk out. If you don’t want any more contact, that’s OK. I want to know what you’ve been doing and what Li Erqin is like. I’m so happy I get to see you again. I’m so happy to see you well and getting married. If you’re not well and not happy, that’s OK too.

“Mommy is happy now. You don’t have to worry about me. You don’t have to feel obligated or do anything you don’t want to. I will listen, and I’m in a place where I can think about the other person again. I love you so much. And I am so happy to see you again.” Feifei paused and continued, “I will do whatever you want. Thank you already for reaching out to me. That’s all I need, and if I can do anything as a–”

She paused again and gave a sad smile. “Just let me know what you expected and what you’d like. Hmm?”

Rong Si looked at his mother, and even after all those years, he wanted to put her out of her misery. He smiled and wrapped his arms around her.

“Mama, relax.” He stroked her back. “You don’t have to get so worked up. I’m happy you’re happy. That’s all. If you’d feel better explaining yourself and telling me what happened, then you can do me the favor of telling it to both me and Erqin.”

The thought crossed her mind that her son was too lazy to recount the details to his fiancee and was looking for a way to streamline the process, conveniently exploiting her mom guilt for this “favor”. Maybe he was the shameless one, but what did it matter? This was a small thing anyway, and she did promise to do whatever he wanted.

As it turned out, Li Erqin was just downstairs at the time. She had insisted on accompanying him so that he wouldn’t be alone after the meeting, but it almost seemed like Rong Si had planned the whole thing conveniently.

He called Erqin up to the apartment, and Feifei felt quite ill-prepared to go into everything, and to a stranger too, but she admired Rong Si’s efficiency.

She liked even more that Erqin did not hide her disdain as she told her story. Li Erqin was polite and noncommittal, but Feifei could tell that in her eyes, nothing could warrant abandoning a child. And that was as it ought to be.

Feifei was happy that her son had found a partner who was his equal. She did not kowtow to Feifei just because Feifei was the future mother-in-law, but Feifei also knew that she would not judge her entirely by her past behavior. Her daughter-in-law could be slowly won over with acts of sincerity, and the fact that she would never completely forgive her actually made Feifei feel more at ease.

She sent them off with a smile that showed the depth and wisdom of the woman she had become and urged them to let her know if she could help with any of the wedding preparations.

As Feifei got ready for bed, an idea popped into her head.

The next day, she went back to her old home and knocked on the door to meet Rong Cheng. She knew the passcode, unless they had changed it, but that didn’t seem very polite.

Rong Cheng knew that Rong Si had met with Feifei the night before because that excellent Erqin had kept him informed. He wanted to know what happened, but he knew that Rong Si would take care of it well, and anyway, the comfort of a wife/fiancee is better than the comfort of one’s dad.

Just as he was mulling over what might have happened, he heard an unfamiliar knock on the door. Who could it be? He never had any visitors.

He was even more shocked when he opened the door and saw Lin Feifei standing outside, looking as breezy as ever. Only she had the ability to make the Original Male God lose his composure and his wits.

They stood in silence, staring at each other, before Feifei asked, “May I come in?”

Rong Cheng was ingloriously in an undershirt and boxers. He tried to stay proper when Rong Si was living with him, but after Rong Si moved out and he was reasonably assured that his son would not stop by without advance notice, he had begun to live a little more freely. His assignments around the world had exposed him to many different cultures and chipped away at his veneer, and after so many years acting as a caretaker, he at long last had the freedom to live a tiny bit as he had always longed to live.

Feifei cut to the chase. She apologized for her behavior, her lack of communication, how un-self-aware she was when she was with Rong Cheng and for all the pain she must have caused. She said she was doing well and that she would love to hear what Rong Cheng had been up to, but since Rong Si’s wedding was coming up, she was here to ask him if he’d like to get together and make a manga for Rong Si and Li Erqin’s wedding gift.

This was even more unexpected than her surprise visit. For a second, Rong Cheng didn’t even know what she was talking about. Actually, after Rong Si was born, Feifei went through a period of time where she seemed to vehemently reject anything about her past. She purged their apartment of countless items, including all manga books and sketchpads, and seemed to get tetchy when Rong Cheng brought it up.

After so many years without manga, Rong Cheng had fairly forgotten about their existence. As always though, he merely nodded to her suggestion and cleared his schedule to meet with her and work on this project.

In the ensuing months before the wedding, they would meet several times to complete the book. If their meeting time coincided with a meal time, they’d sit and eat, and in this way, they slowly updated each other on their lives.

Feifei forgave herself and understood rationally, though not emotionally, that Rong Cheng loved her and was happy to sacrifice himself to make her happy. She swatted away any oppressive feelings of guilt or inadequacy and was happy to see that, with effort, she could be herself around him again.

Rong Cheng had long ago analyzed their relationship and understood that his plodding level of passion was simply not what Feifei needed. Of course, he was even more in danger of falling hard for her all over again when he saw the newly mature, confident Feifei, and he took her good-natured ribbing about his new, younger co-worker in stride. She insisted that the work colleague was interested in him, but posh! His staid self could only take so much excitement at any given time.

For now, he was happy that Feifei was here and back in Rong Si’s life, and in his, peripherally.

Back at the wedding, he raises his glass to her. He doesn’t know what the future holds, but right now, he is happy and at peace. And so is she.

clink

Mazel tov!

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maripaz: Thanks to anyone who’s actually reading this! I came up with the story when we finished translating Male God last year, but later, when I went back and skimmed the parts about Rong Si’s parents, I realized the details seemed to point to Rong Si living with his mom and only getting to see his dad on holiday.

However, there was one scene where Erqin sneaks a peek into his house and describes it as sort of barren and grey, and I couldn’t picture a mom raising her kid in a lifeless atmosphere. It felt like a bachelor pad to me and he seemed to have a close relationship with his dad, so I tried to come up with an excuse for why he lives with his dad but only gets to see him on breaks. (i.e. his dad travels for work a lot.)

Obviously I played fast and loose with the time and facts, but I wanted Rong Si to have happy memories of his mom and no bitterness. He takes care of Erqin so well because he’s used to taking care of his mom, and while he’s as perfect and polite as his dad, he also has his mom’s “coolness” – that attitude that doesn’t care what other people think.

First person narration would not have been my choice as a first-time writer, but it’s how the story came to me, and I was happy to switch to third person for the epilogue. I couldn’t decide if the two got back together again, but I did want to see them at peace with each other and ready for whatever the next phase of life brings. And with that, peace and joy to anyone reading this. : ) Thank you to tranzgeek and the meraki site for letting me post my ramblings. ^_^

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[Part 4] [Table of Contents]