Sui Zhou's WeChat starts firing off around midday, which does at least immediately pare down the pool of potential suspects. By the time he has a hand free to fish his phone out, the deluge of dings has stopped, if only, softening the edge of his non-surprise to see a wall of Tang Fan's syrupy nickname he insisted he be saved under.

If his frantic, sticker-punctuated messages are anything to go by, he is suffering a fate not unlike having his throat slit and his body left beside the King Street-Enmore Road intersection, and it's only Sui Zhou who can stop the bleeding. Sui Zhou is well versed enough in Tang Fan's crisis communication by now to know that the vibrant verbosity of today's missives are proof that, while for Tang Fan whatever is going on is the most dire emergent problem he's ever had in his entire life, the reality is that it's a non-issue with zero danger to him involved. Still, he's already around the Inner West of Sydney — or in it, if you ask anyone writing a travel blog or trying to sell an apartment — and he does, unfortunately, have nothing better to do. So he goes back to his car, tells Tang Fan he's on his way, then tosses his phone over onto the passenger's seat so he doesn't have to feel it vibrate against his thigh while he's driving.

It's a short trip from Alexandria to Newtown, even with Saturday traffic, and easily double that just to find a park. He eventually lucks into a spot behind the IGA, and puts a few hours into the meter to be safe over sorry. Tang Fan is apparently seeing fit to keep him apprised, all the while — Sui Zhou cops a glance at his notifications when he taps to pay, and might twinge a smile when some particularly complaintive word choices jump out. Sui Zhou elects not to update him. Bedford Square is only a few more minutes' walk away, and Tang Fan has likely presumed Sui Zhou started from up around the harbour, if he was anywhere to be in the city. It's pre-factored that into his expectations, however much he's already disappointed by them.

Sui Zhou's way over is eased by how he ends up following the course of the crowd, though it then takes him a few moments to cut through the cluster and noise and find Tang Fan amongst it. His gaze ends up catching on the person Tang Fan is standing with, first, by nature of their pastel-dyed fauxhawk, bedazzled collar, and bared chest. In what looks to be some sort of billowy, delicately-patterned long-sleeved shirt that splits open at the shoulders, Tang Fan's own conspicuity is comparatively muted, but still thematically ostentatious. Sui Zhou is only a few paces into his pointed, weaving approach when he's spied, in turn; Tang Fan's head swivels in his direction, his smile splitting into a grin that rides his cheekbones up tight against the frames of his love heart sunnies.

"Hey darl," he says the moment Sui Zhou is within inside voice distance, bumping up against his side. Fauxhawk has already cleared off somewhere, which Sui Zhou takes to mean that there won't be an introduction. "Scooch in," he instructs, feeling around in his bag one-handed, "I want a pic with the thing."

Sui Zhou holds still, but technically complies — the boyfriend ragdoll of relaxing full-body and accepting his fate better allows Tang Fan, once his phone is ensconced in-hand, to nudge him in the direction he wants, the selfie mode of his camera app acting as his compass. The 'thing' turns out to be a pillared statue in the colours of the progress pride flag; more into the thick of the gathering behind them, Sui Zhou can see a man who looks suspiciously like the Prime Minister. He is acutely out of his depth.

"This is the emergency?" Sui Zhou asks.

Tang Fan scrunches up his nose. "Of course not," is his claritive scoff. "Smile." Sui Zhou does not, but that in no way defers Tang Fan from leaning their faces together and hunching his shoulders to adopt his preferred position as the shorter and daintier one of their two. "The dog is missing," he declares, when he's done tapping his thumb in a rapid shutter-fire.

"The dog?" Sui Zhou prompts. He thinks the pace of his uptake can be forgiven, all considered, even if the raise of Tang Fan's eyebrows from behind his frames indicates he's extending him a rather ungenerous eyeroll.

"The dog," Tang Fan stresses. "With the spoon in its belly!"

Right. The statue. Sui Zhou is acquainted enough with the statue, at least as a host to various leaflets. "We could ask," seems to him to be both the wisest and most apposite remark he can make.

A dramatic sag of the shoulders accompanies Tang Fan's encore eyeroll. "We can't just ask, Sui Zhou!" he hisses under his breath. "It's delicate. Do you know what they'll do to us on Twitter?"

"I don't," says Sui Zhou. He doesn't have a Twitter. And from what he's seen of it, he has very much grown into the opinion that no one else should, either. But perhaps especially Tang Fan, whose adamant arguments about it being a necessary tool for keeping the powerful accountable have largely manifested into a personal practice of following local queens and snipping at The Greens.

Tang Fan sucks in a sharp breath through his nose, then forces it out; a creative interpretation of a relaxation exercise Sui Zhou does recognise from one of the Headspace worksheets Tang Fan keeps littering around his apartment. "Fine" he relents, after he's held the pause for an almost seamless beat. "How long did you park for?"

"A few hours," Sui Zhou answers, absolutely unconvinced by Tang Fan's feint.

Tang Fan turns to slip his phone away, then sidles back close, brushing their hands together. "I haven't eaten," he pouts up at him. "Pappa's?"

"All right," Sui Zhou agrees. It's hardly a concession: anywhere on the strip between here and Broadway runs towards tamely benevolent in the scheme of Tang Fan's many habitual designs on his wallet.

Though Tang Fan can be quite readable in his ulteriority, Sui Zhou knows his toothy grin is utterly, endearingly genuine. And the walk, at least, will give him time to flip through his mental rolodex for anyone at the local level he can ask — in apparently necessary confidence — as to the location of an art installation that is old enough to drink. Then he'll know the direction to start in on when he likely capitulates to taking Tang Fan's concocted case before he's even settled their bill.