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The sense of longing hit Ao Lie so suddenly, without warning. Or maybe there were warnings. Maybe it had been building up inside him for a long while, and the New Year celebrations he saw in that village were the final straw.
When they stopped for camp—away from the festivities and in the middle of nowhere because brother monkey dampened the mood with his misconduct—Ao Lie excused himself and walked into a nearby forest.
Once he’d walked far enough, he let himself cry. It started with just a few tears, nothing too loud or messy. He thought about the festival decorations, the music, all the families celebrating on the streets and he cried.
He wondered if his family were still eating dinner right now. Whether there were any newborn relatives he hadn’t met. He cried harder, wailing and gasping for air, the train of thought touching a soft and vulnerable part in his heart.
“Waaaaahhh, a’niang!” Ao Lie cried like a little kid.
He couldn’t help it. He didn’t cry very often, the monotonous labour when he carried his Master everyday across all sorts of gruesome terrains numbed any sensitivities, so he allowed himself this much. Nobody could hear him that far out anyway.
He curled up by a tree, leaning against it as he sobbed into his sleeves. His robes were touching the forest floor, but that didn’t matter anymore. His clothes had long been dirtied to disrepair, his hair was greasy, and Ao Lie was suffocating with sticky sweat. He hadn’t washed in so many days, he felt repulsive.
He wondered what his mom would say if she saw him. “A’Lie ah,” she would probably call to him sweetly, her eyebrows furrowed with worry and heartache.
He sniffed, wiping snot and other muck from his face onto his sleeve. He should start heading back soon, before his Master started worrying and sent out one of his brothers to search for him.
“A’LIEEEE?”
Ah, too late.
A tumultuous tone cut through the forest like firecrackers, sending birds flying from the treetops. “ A’LIE?! You around here, buddy?”
His movements hastened as he scrubbed the tears from his face before he stumbled up. “Here! I’m right here!” he called out.
“Ah,” Wukong brightened when his eyes landed on him. “There you are! Why’d you come this far out? I was about to flatten the forest if I couldn’t find you soon,” he laughed.
He laughed a bit more as he got closer to Ao Lie, and then his face fell and he quickly tacked on, “I’m joking of course. Don’t tell Master I said that.”
Ao Lie giggled. “I know, I won’t.”
Wukong nodded with his arms crossed, “Good, good. God knows I can’t take another punishment, my head is still buzzing from lunchtime!”
“Did Master ask you to come look for me?”
“Master? Nah, I just wanted to find you because—” he gasped. “ ARE YOU CRYING?! You can’t cry on New Year’s!”
“I’m not!” Ao Lie covered his face. It was dark here with no fire or moonlight peeking through canopies to see, but Wukong always had freakish sixth senses.
“ Hmm, alright,” he easily dropped the topic. “I heard a stream nearby! Let’s go wash up!”
“What about our camp?”
“ Pshh, they can handle themselves for a little while. I wanna show you something,” and without room for protest, Wukong started pulling him by the hand, navigating past trees and over creeping tree trunks with ease.
The stream was only deep enough to reach his hips, but it was wide. It flowed swiftly, slithering and hitting rocks with sharp splashes like a melody and offering sweet promises of cleanliness and reprieve. Ao Lie stripped within seconds and waddled in.
He could hear his brother laughing behind him as Ao Lie crouched and dunked his head into the water. He stood up and shook his hair, spraying water everywhere like a dog.
“Stop, you’ll get me wet!” Wukong whined.
“Get in then! I’ll scrub your fur for you,” Ao Lie grinned, feeling light and cheerful for the first time in days. “I know how much it’s bothering you,” he says in a sing-song voice.
“I can’t, not yet,” Wukong shook his head with a huff. “I can’t get wet!”
“Why not?”
He did not answer. He looked away and moved his weight around on each foot. His tail was limp, just the tip flicking slightly—a telltale sign of nerves, something that Wukong did whenever he did something he knew he wasn’t supposed to.
Ao Lie tilted his head, eyes narrowing. He stepped onto the bank, water sliding off the few splatterings of scales on his skin. “What are you holding?”
“Holding?” Wukong’s hands shuffled behind him before he held both out, palms up. “I’m not holding anything.”
“Hmm… MASTER!” he suddenly cried, pointing at the treelines behind Wukong.
He whipped around, baring his back to Ao Lie. There was something stuck in between the silk bands around his waist.
“Aha!” Ao Lie grabbed it before Wukong could react. It was a firecracker.
“...!”
Ao Lie’s eyes widened when he recognized it. “This—!”
He was tackled before he could say anything else. They fell into the water with shrieks and shrill laughter. The impact rolled them across the streambed, dirtying them with more mud and algae.
They came to a stop when Ao Lie hit the other side of the bank, firecracker still clenched in his hand. Wukong sat up, pouting when he saw it, “Aww, it’s broken now!”
Ao Lie spluttered, spewing water out of his mouth. “You stole another one?” This firecracker in his hand, it was the reason his senior brother was punished today.
He had stolen a bunch of stuff from some village shops when they stopped for lunch. Paper cut-out decorations, plates of nian gao, various firecrackers, stuff like that. Master was furious when he found out. He had him apologise to the shop owners for bothering them on New Year’s day. He filed the group out of the village so he could tighten Wukong’s circlet without disturbing the festive celebrations on the streets.
“Master was really disappointed, you know?”
Wukong sighed, rubbing the mud on the back of his head. “Yeah, I know. But it was a special occasion, I had to!”
Ao Lie hummed, rolling the useless piece of bamboo around in his palms.
“A’Lie?” Wukong leaned closer. His bottom lip jutted out as he blinked up at him with wide, watery eyes. “A’Lie, are you mad? I’m sorry.”
The rest of them were sort of punished, too, in association—they weren’t able to spend the night at the village as planned because Wukong soured the mood. Ao Lie didn’t mind that much, honestly. He wasn’t sure he could stand a night alone in a stables, especially on New Year’s.
“I’m not mad,” Ao Lie smiled. “But I wonder… How did you even hide this? I thought Master made you return all the stuff you stole.”
Wukong’s mood bounced back, a smug grin making its way onto his face. “You really think I couldn’t handle this much? I mean—sure I got caught or whatever, but hey! I wasn’t gonna leave completely empty handed!” Then, his swinging tail dropped back into the water when Ao Lie lifted the wet firecracker. “Well, I guess it was all for naught in the end.”
“It was a good effort,” Ao Lie laughed. “Actually… I have an idea!” He pulled Wukong through the water and onto the bank. They started picking pieces of sticks and fallen leaves, gathering them in a small pile with the dried piece of firecracker bamboo in the middle.
Ao Lie mustered energy from his core, heat tickling his throat as he coughed and huffed. Flick, flick, and a spark caught on.
When the fire crackled to life, Ao Lie saw Wukong clearly for the first time in hours. Dried blood caked his fur, streaks of it mixed with mud slid across his face. His red eyes were wide with wonder, spots of light dancing off in reflections. Ao Lie watched them squeeze shut and watched Wukong pull away when he was suddenly hit by a burning zip.
He covered himself with his sleeve as he fell back, a shriek caught in his throat. Sparks jumped off the fire in erratic pops, making the two pilgrims duck with high, nervous laughter. Wukong grabbed his hand and they made a run for the stream.
The bamboo jumped in the fire, spitting angrily as pops of gold lit up the bank. Wukong stuck close to him as they awed and oo-ed, his soaked fur only marginally warmer against Ao Lie’s shivering body. Eventually, they had to rush out when a nearby shrub caught on fire. The firecracker died soon after, but it served its purpose as Ao Lie’s heart felt much lighter.
“I just… I miss my family a lot,” he admitted quietly as they walked back to camp, hand in hand.
There was usually an instinctual fear when walking in the forest at night. Of tigers. Of demons. But the two unassuming small figures happened to fear neither of those, so it just felt rather peaceful to Ao Lie. Safe, even.
He looked at the back of Wukong’s head, freshly washed of blood and gunk. “Do you ever miss your people?”
“Hmm, not really,” Wukong tilted his head in thought. “Maybe a little bit, but most of the older monkeys I was familiar with are all gone by now. Besides, Flower Fruit Mountain will always be there for me to return to, so I’m not worried.”
He turned to glance at Ao Lie, saying, “I think I’d be more sad if I was away from you guys though.”
“Us? But we’re not family.”
Wukong’s eyes widened comically as he halted. “We’re not?”
“I mean—we’re brothers, but that’s only in name,” Ao Lie rubbed the back of his head with his free hand. “Because we are disciples of the same Master.”
“Oh.”
…
“Sorry, I never had a family, so I don’t really get the specifics.”
“No, you’re right. I never had anyone else except my family, so I don’t understand anything beyond that,” Ao Lie muttered, a little embarrassed by his sheltered upbringing. “But I get it now, I think. We count as family too.”
“Really?” Wukong asked, looking at him with hopeful eyes.
“Yeah, family, friends,” Ao Lie grinned. “I’ve spent more time with you than any other children of my generation in my family. When I think the word ‘brother’, I think of you and my other two pilgrim brothers.”
He was pulled into a tight hug as Wukong hopped from foot to foot. Ao Lie laughed and hugged back, adjusting his rhythm to match his hops. The two little pilgrims hugged and laughed in giddy joy until Bajie found them and dragged them back to camp.