Coveting the Moon

The city was silent as Ruan Ling stepped off the night shift, the loneliness a familiar companion. As he walked home, a faint glow caught his eye from a dark alley. Curiosity overriding fear, he found a transparent fluorescent stone beneath a discarded can. It seemed worthless, yet he pocketed it.
Later, at home, a message from a friend—a photo of their new, muscular boyfriend—stirred a familiar ache of longing and past hurt. In the bathroom, seeking solace in water, the echoes of his ex-boyfriend's cruel words resurfaced, a painful reminder of his 'perversion.' The suffocating feeling returned, but was abruptly interrupted by a burning heat in his pocket. The glowstone, now radiating a blinding light, revealed strange, ancient words: "Coveting the Moon."
