Deer Luhan, With Love

47

Chapter 47 – In Which I Am Apparently Luhan’s Twin Brother

Deer Luhan,

I’m not sure where you came up with that excuse about your mum for dress shopping, but whatever floats your boat.  Those journalists really must have taken “the truth is stranger than fiction” to heart to fall for it.

Leigh

Kris was adjudicating a game of table football between Tao and Xiumin when we returned to the dorm later, several bags of clothes and Kai and D.O.’s presents in tow.

“Yo, Luhan!” Kris called as Luhan kicked off his shoes and set down the shopping backs.  “Or Leigh, actually.  Both of you.  I don’t even know.  You’ve made headlines.”

Luhan paused in the act of placing his shoes on the shoe rack and lifted his head.  “Both of us?”

“Yeah.”  Kris didn’t look particularly pleased.  “There are photos of you two out in town.  The first one’s right outside the embassy and then there are three of you with a grass mud horse pratting about in a clothes store.  Our manager wants a word.  He said he’d—”

The doorbell rang, and before I knew quite what was going on, Tao had vanished from the table football table and was hustling me into the bathroom.

“Wait!”  Luhan ran after us with the shopping bags.  “There’s a dress in here; he can’t see it.”

Tao held the door long enough for Luhan to fling the bags inside and then shut and locked it.

“We can’t let him see you,” he explained to me.  “Luhan’s probably going to have to make some kind of public statement about having relatives or something ridiculous, but things will turn ugly if the manager sees you in the dorm with us.”

I sat down heavily on the floor.  Being alone in the bathroom with Tao right next to the shower was making me feel a little awkward.  It didn’t seem to bother Tao in the slightest, though.  Which only made it more awkward for me.

“Did you get the visas sorted, then?” Tao asked.

I nodded.  “It’ll take a week for them to process and I have to go pick them up once they’re done.  The embassy offered to pay for the flight home because Luhan told them I’d been abducted.”

“It’s kind of true,” Tao pointed out.  “Fortunately things are ending happily, but it’s not like you chose to come.”

“Luhan told Kris he’d swap with me all over again if he had the option to go back in time.”

We lapsed into silence.  Sharp voices were audible on the other side of the door, but Tao didn’t give me much chance to dwell on it.

“I think Luhan likes torturing you,” he mused.  “You were only originally supposed to stay for, what, a week?  And it’s already been well over a month.”

“He’s not very good at keeping deadlines,” I agreed.  “Last one he set, we were supposed to swap back last Monday, but then he wanted to go rescue his aunt.”

“You should have told me where you were going when you left the dorm that night.”

“But you would have followed me.  And no offence, Tao, but you were being a little intimidating that day and I was scared you might try to stop me.”

“You still should have told me.”

“Are you dating her or not?” bellowed the manager’s voice, and we both jumped.