Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Baba, can you tell me a story?”

“Well, which one do you want to hear?”

“The story of how you met A-die.”

“A-Yuan, it’s too late for that.” Lan Zhan shakes his head, tucking A-Yuan into the covers. “You have school tomorrow. Another time.”

“You always say that,” A-Yuan mumbles, “and you never do.”

“Next time. I promise.”

A-Yuan pouts, but he begrudgingly snuggles back under the covers, turning away from Lan Zhan.

He clicks off the nightlight.

“Good night, A-Yuan,” he whispers into the dark. He drops a kiss on his son’s forehead. “And I’m sorry.”

—-----

Wei Ying has just settled down in hopes of finishing some last minute grading when he hears the doorbell ring. He is immediately greeted by a child and a backpack being shoved into his arms.

“Hi.” The kid stares up at him with big brown eyes. “I’m Lan Yuan. I’m seven. Do you have snacks?”

“Nice to meet you… A-Yuan?” He readjusts his hold on the kid, and glares at Luo Qingyang, who is holding a small purse, looking very stressed. “Whose kid is this? Why are you here?”

“I’m so sorry for the late notice,” Mianmian starts, wincing, “but can you watch A-Yuan until his dad gets here? I think he’s running late, but he isn’t picking up his phone, and I’m running late for a date so I can’t bring A-Yuan with me, and here—“ she rummages through her purse and presents Wei Ying with a post-it note, which he takes. “This is his dad’s contact information, name is Dr. Lan. Call me if you have any questions, and A-Yuan is allergic to bees! Bye and thank you!”

And before Wei Ying can ask any follow up questions, she’s already gone, practically leaving a trail of smoke in her wake.

She’s lucky it was his day off.

He’s handled kids before. Jin Ling is four, and he’s definitely more fragile than this one, right? Wei Ying can panic later.

“Well,” he begins, turning back inside his apartment and closing the door behind him to gain some semblance of normalcy, “it looks like it’s just you and me. What do you want to do?”

“Who are you?”

“Oh! I’m Wei Ying.” He puts Lan Yuan down, kneels, and shakes his hand. “You can just call me Gege. I like your backpack!”

A-Yuan tilts his head, considering it. “Okay… Ying-gege. And thank you!” He beams, showing off 2 missing teeth. “Do you have snacks? I’m hungry.”

“Oh!” Wei Ying rubs his nose. “Well, let’s take a look.”

Wei Ying’s pantry isn’t exactly equipped for feeding seven year olds. There’s three cans of Red Bull and some assorted snacks, so honestly, he doesn’t think it’s equipped for feeding grown adults either. He manages to find a box of half-opened Hello Panda near the back, which A-Yuan takes without question.

As he munches away at the dining table, trying to avoid the two gummy gaps where his baby teeth once were, Wei Ying decides to try and get some basic information out of the kid. Mianmian gave him almost nothing to work with. All he knows from the post-it is that A-Yuan’s dad is a neurosurgeon at the university hospital. Wei Ying figures that he’s probably just running late after a procedure. And the kid doesn’t look particularly concerned, so this must happen pretty often.

But still, what doctor lets their kid get dropped off at a stranger’s doorstep with nothing but a post-it note and a vague allergy warning?

Might as well ask about his family. If this happens again—and it might—Wei Ying wouldn’t mind watching him. It beats any alternate solution, and he likes working with kids. He’d always had dreams of being a dad, although it’s more of a distant fantasy now- for a variety of reasons.

“I don’t have a mom. It’s just me and my baba,” A-Yuan answers in between bites. “And Bobo, but he doesn’t live with us. Mianmian-jie is my babysitter after school.”

So this Dr. Lan is a single dad and a neurosurgeon? Why is his life on max difficulty?

“Does your baba usually come back late?”

A-Yuan considers this. “Yeah, but he never forgets to pick me up before dinner. Today he was supposed to make my favorite food.”

Wei Ying tilts his head. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Because I told him I was mad at him.”

Huh. “Why were you mad at him?”

”He didn’t tell me the story of how he met A-die. Again! Every time I ask he says—“ he drops his voice, probably trying to mimic his dad— “‘Next time, A-Yuan.’ All I know about A-die is that he— Wait!” A-Yuan suddenly gasps, covering his mouth. “I’m not supposed to talk about A-Die to strangers.”

A-Die? And Baba? Wei Ying doesn’t think they’re actually married, for obvious reasons. Maybe they adopted a kid unofficially? That might explain the secrecy. Dr. Lan is clearly in a high stakes job.

He tries to get A-Yuan to finish what he was saying, though. “What do you know about your A-die?” he coaxes. “It’s ok, you can tell me, A-Yuan.” He doubts the small rainbow flag he has on his bookshelf means anything to the kid, but oh well.

A-Yuan hesitates slightly. His gaze drops to the floor, and he slowly begins to speak. “A-die died when I was two. Baba doesn’t like to talk about him because it makes him sad, but he says A-die is the one who wanted to adopt me at first. But—“ He suddenly looks up at Wei Ying, wide eyes brimming with tears, “But I don’t even know his name!”

Wei Ying blinks. “Hey- hey, don’t cry, A-Yuan,” He crouches, gently patting A-Yuan’s back. “It’s ok. I’m sure your Baba has his reasons, ok?”

He might have his “reasons”, but this just adds to Wei Ying’s quickly forming list of grievances against Dr. Lan. It’s one thing to avoid the topic of your ex-something because it makes you sad, but he won’t even tell their shared kid his other parent’s name? What, is Dr. Lan scared that A-Yuan is going to bring his A-die back from the dead just by invoking his name? That he'd ruin his A-die’s peace just by existing?

He runs his fingers through A-Yuan’s hair. “Do you want to go watch something fun?” he asks, voice lighter than he feels.

“Yeah,” comes the quiet reply.

—------

It’s nearly 7 pm when Lan Zhan finally completes the procedure, peels off his gloves, and wearily heads back to his car.

He checks his phone.

10 missed calls. All from Mianmian.

Heart lurching, he immediately dials her back. It goes straight to voicemail.

He doesn’t even bother listening to the tone- instead he frantically opens his texts, pulse racing, where he finds several voice messages.

He catches: I’m so sorry… appointment at 5… my neighbor… good with kids… Don’t be mad… then a text with a name, address, and phone number.

He stops breathing when he reads it.

He reads the name over and over again. The characters don’t change. Of course they don’t.

He starts the car and begins what feels like the longest drive of his life.

—-------

A-Yuan’s head rests on Wei Ying’s lap as he caresses his hair. His breathing is soft and quiet. They’re watching some cartoon in his living room, but Wei Ying is barely paying attention.

Suddenly, the doorbell rings, and he gently helps A-Yuan sit up before he goes to answer it.

Haggard is one way to describe the man at the door —presumably Dr. Lan. He’s still dressed in scrubs, clean but a little wrinkled. Thin rimmed round glasses are perched on his nose. They’re cute, but do nothing to hide the fact that he looks like he hasn’t slept in days.

That definitely isn’t obvious at first glance, though. His posture is immaculate, his hair looks like it’s out of a shampoo ad, and his expression looks perfectly neutral. But Wei Ying can see it anyway, somehow— in the tight line of his mouth, in the way his amber eyes don’t really land on anything.

He’s not just tired. He looks drained. And whatever anger Wei Ying held against him earlier seems to suddenly evaporate.

It’s partly out of pity, and partly because he’s the hottest man Wei Ying has ever seen.

But when Dr. Lan’s eyes finally meet Wei Ying’s, he freezes, and just stares at him, jaw slack, like he’s drinking in the very sight of him.

Yeesh. Poor guy, Wei Ying thinks. I’m probably the first person he’s seen outside of the hospital today. Post surgery haze must be awful.

But then Dr. Lan’s gaze drops— just slightly, and his eyes widen when he notices the faint scar on Wei Ying’s left cheek.

Wei Ying puts his fingers up to it without thinking. “Ah, this?” He rubs his neck awkwardly. “Got in an accident a couple years ago. But hey, still pretty, right?”

Dr. Lan says nothing.

Wei Ying clears his throat. “Anyway, come in,” he begins. “I’m Wei Ying! Though I’m sure you already know that. A-Yuan is in the living room. He’s such a sweet kid, you’ve really raised him well!”

Dr. Lan finally seems to snap out of it when Wei Ying mentions A-Yuan.

“Thank you for watching him,” he says, voice low. “Usually I don’t come home this late. Mianmian mentioned her appointment. I thought I would be done in time.”

“Oh, don’t worry about it, Dr. Lan! It was my day off, I was happy to watch— Wait, what are y—I can’t accept this!”

“It’s the least I could give you for watching him under such short notice,” he insists. “Please, take it.”

“Aiya, you doctor types, throwing around a thousand yuan like it’s nothing.” He chuckles. “If I took this, my conscience would murder me in my sleep.” He sighs, and hands the envelope back. “Go buy A-Yuan something cute and overpriced.”

Dr. Lan doesn’t argue after that. He just nods once and slips the note back into his wallet. As they start making their way towards the living room, Dr. Lan pauses.

“By the way. You can call me Lan Zhan.”

“Lan Zhan, huh? Your name sounds familiar— Oh, wait!” Wei Ying blinks, then snaps his fingers. “I think you’re one of my fianceè’s colleagues!”

He pretends not to notice Lan Zhan stumble almost imperceptibly at the word fianceè. Apparently no one expects his ass to be engaged.

“Do you know a Wen Qing?” he asks. “Trauma wing, same hospital? She’s mentioned you a couple times.”

“I do not.” Lan Zhan’s mouth is a straight line.

“Oh.” Wei Ying shrugs. “You must be popular then.”

“Mn.”

“Baba!” A-Yuan bounds over from the living room, arms wide open. He’s practically tripping over his own feet. “I missed you!” Lan Zhan immediately drops to his knees, and A-Yuan flings himself into his arms, burying his face into his baba’s hair.

Lan Zhan pats A-Yuan’s head, smiling softly. Wei Ying didn’t know he was capable of making facial expressions. “I’m sorry I was late.”

A-Yuan pulls back. “It’s ok, I had a lot of fun with Ying-gege!” He grins. “He gave me Hello Panda and we watched cartoons.”

“Mn.”

“He said he liked my backpack too!”

“Mn. Ready to go home?”

A-Yuan hesitates at this. His voice suddenly goes very small.

“Baba… do you remember your promise?”

“Yes.” Lan Zhan’s shoulders tense. “I told you I’d tell that story later.”

“But I want you to tell me that story now.”

At this, Lan Zhan’s brows furrow. “At home, A-Yuan. Another time.”

“You always say that!” A-Yuan yanks away from Lan Zhan entirely. “When we go home, you’ll say it’s too late, and then you won’t tell me the story!” He crosses his arms. “Well, I’m not leaving Ying-gege’s house until you tell me the story!”

Lan Zhan sounds strained. “A-Yuan—“

“Lan Zhan.” Wei Ying touches his shoulder gently. “A-Yuan already told me about… your family situation. If that’s what you’re worried about, rest assured that I understand.” He holds Lan Zhan’s gaze, hoping the message lands. I spent most of my life hiding who I was, just like you.

“And I promise,” he adds softly, “not a word of your story will leave this house. But please, don’t deprive A-Yuan of knowing his A-die. Memories are the only thing the dead leave behind.”

Lan Zhan takes a deep breath, and exhales just as severely. He gazes back up at Wei Ying, something dark and complicated behind his amber eyes.

“Ok, A-Yuan.” He takes his son’s hands. “Can you take me to your Ying-gege’s living room?”

Wei Ying hopes that the sheer joy on A-Yuan’s face right now makes it all worth it for Lan Zhan in the end.

A-Yuan drags Lan Zhan and Wei Ying to the couch, grabbing both of their hands. They plop down, A-Yuan in the middle, his Baba and Wei Ying on either side of him. He rests his head on Wei Ying’s arm, and Wei Ying pulls him close.

Lan Zhan closes his eyes and exhales, slow and quiet.

“My shushu forced me to take a gap year after college,” He begins, solemnly.

Wei Ying groans. “Aiya, Lan Zhan, that’s the opening line to your epic love story? Where’s the romance? Where’s the drama? I thought his A-Die was a hero!”

“Wei Ying.”

“Fine, fine, keep going.”

“I was volunteering as a medic in rural Yunnan. That’s where I met your A-die. He was volunteering as—“

“Wait, Baba.”

“A-Yuan?”

His voice is quiet and hesitant. “How do I imagine A-Die?” He pauses. “I’ve never seen any photos of him.”

Lan Zhan is helplessly silent.
But he can’t leave A-Yuan with more silence— not when it’s all the kid has ever been given.

“A-Yuan,” Wei Ying hears himself say, softly. “If you want… you can imagine me as your A-Die.”

Chapter Text

“We have a guy here,” comes a shout from the front entrance of the medical tent. “Says he sliced his palm open trying to… um, catch a runaway chicken? Can you check him out? He’s really bleeding out.”

Of all the absurd things Lan Zhan has heard since he got here two weeks ago, this one might win. He quickly makes his way to the entrance, first aid kit in hand.

The so-called chicken savior is tall, with ruffled dark hair and a small, strangely distracting mole just underneath his bottom lip. If his attire is anything to go by, he’s not a local: he’s wearing a worn oversized hoodie and ripped jeans. There’s a tote bag with keychains swung over his left shoulder.

And despite the fact that his right hand is gushing out blood like a small waterfall, he’s smiling.

He extends his bleeding palm out to Lan Zhan, who opens his kit and immediately gets to work, wrapping gauze around the cut and pinning it in place. “Come back in 5 hours so I can replace your bandaging,” Lan Zhan instructs. “No manual labor. Avoid using that hand.”

“Understood, doctor!” Chicken savior attempts a three-finger salute with his injured hand, like he’s the noble protagonist of a wuxia novel. To no one’s surprise but his own, this only leads to him yelping in pain, clutching his palm. “Owww…”

Lan Zhan glares at him. “What did I just say?”

“How was I supposed to know I can’t even move my fingers?” the other man protests.

“Common sense?”

“For you! You’re the doctor!”

“Not a doctor yet.”

“Huh?”

“I’m not a doctor yet,” Lan Zhan repeats. “I just finished college.”

“So you’re an amateur treating me?” He narrows his eyes in mock suspicion. “How am I supposed to trust that you did a good job… Lan Zhan?”

“Stop looking at my name tag.” He clenches his fist behind his back. “And I know what I’m doing.”

“If you say so, Lan Zhan,” Chicken savior says breezily. “I’ll see you in five hours. Try not to kill anyone while I'm gone!” He pats Lan Zhan’s shoulder once with his uninjured hand before turning around and sauntering away.

He’s almost halfway down the path before Lan Zhan calls out, “Wait!”

The other man whirls around.

“I need your name for my patient log.”

“Mo Xuanyu!” he yells, already turning and jogging off.

——————-

Mo Xuanyu returns to the tent several hours later with a gaggle of children in tow, all aged between 6 and 10.

“Whose kids are these?” Lan Zhan asks.

“Oh,” he grins. “They’re mine!”

He looks much too young to be a father. Maybe they’re his siblings?

Lan Zhan accepts this mental theory without question, until Mo Xuanyu announces, “I gave birth to them all by myself.” He has the audacity to look proud, as he puffs out his chest.“What do you think, Lan Zhan?” He puts his hands around one of the kid’s shoulders. “Did they inherit my good looks?”

They did. He hates that it’s the first thing that comes to mind.

Feeling his traitorous ears heat up, Lan Zhan tightens his grip on the first aid kit. “Shameless,” he mutters.

“Oh my god, Lan Zhan,” Mo Xuanyu gapes. “Don’t tell me you actually believed that. These are the students in my teaching group!”

Lan Zhan glares at him. “Hand,” he grits out. “Now.”

He puts all his focus into redressing the wound, pretending not to notice the way Mo Xuanyu’s face contorts as he tries not to burst into laughter.

Lan Zhan is already dreading seeing Mo Xuanyu again. And yet, when the bandaging is done, he tells him to come back tomorrow.

“I’m looking forward to it!” Mo Xuanyu beams, and his face is like sunlight incarnate.

It haunts Lan Zhan all night.

Lying in bed, he stares up at the ceiling, hands folded in perfect posture. He tries to tell himself that he’s just concerned. That he’s worried Mo Xuanyu will do something stupid and reckless, and his palm will get infected.

He isn’t fooling anyone. Especially not himself.

Lan Zhan is not a stranger to attraction.

Being desired is not unfamiliar to him. But he’s never had the privilege of experiencing it without some kind of grief.

When he was younger, sometimes he’d catch himself staring a bit too long at his older brother’s best friend. He remembers watching a Takeshi Kaneshiro movie when he was thirteen, and immediately tracking down every magazine with his face on it. He kept them under his bed until he was seventeen. He burned every last one after a family friend found them by accident.

Lan Zhan has long resigned himself to his fate. This part of who he is will stay buried for as long as he is alive.

But Mo Xuanyu? He’s a walking headache. A firecracker with no fuse. But somehow, he’s a reassurance. He reminds Lan Zhan of something he never meant to remember.

He’s proof that Lan Zhan hasn’t forgotten how to feel. Not yet.

And maybe that’s why, when he finally closes his eyes, it’s the curve of a smile and a teasing mole under lips that follows him into sleep.

—————

He walks into the medical tent early next morning, fully expecting to see Mo Xuanyu gleefully waiting at the entrance for his follow up appointment.

But there’s no sign of him.

Lan Zhan tries to smother the embarrassing sense of disappointment he feels. He figures Mo Xuanyu is just busy, or still sleeping, or doing something stupid to get his other palm slashed open.

He begins logging the patients that are trickling in, but pauses when he notices a little girl making a beeline for him.

“Mo-laoshi isn’t running class today,” she says, handing him a small folded paper. “He wanted me to give you this.”

Lan Zhan, the note reads, Thank you for treating my hand. I think I’ve caught something, and I don’t want to infect others at your clinic. I know you see lots of immunocompromised and elderly people. I’ll come in for my follow up once my fever goes down. Until then, don’t worry about me! I’m quarantining like a responsible adult!

There’s a smiley face drawn at the bottom.

“Where does your Mo-laoshi stay?” Lan Zhan hears himself say. The little girl tells him there’s a local inn about half a kilometer from the village school.

He knows Mo Xuanyu told him not to worry, but the man’s self-preservation skills are clearly… lacking. What if he’s gotten sepsis? Lan Zhan wonders. A fever is one of the earliest symptoms. Does the clinic even have a ventilator to treat a septic patient? Should I check on him at his home? No. No. That would be inappropriate. But—

He shakes himself out of it. Mo Xuanyu spends lots of time with kids, and viral infections are common this time of year.

So why does Lan Zhan find himself standing in front of Mo Xuanyu’s room at the inn later that evening, gauze packets and fever medication in hand?

He raises a hand to knock, heart beating so violently he wonders if he even needs to. His hand hovers in the air for a second, hesitating, before he drops it. Maybe he should just give the supplies to the aunty at the front, and have her drop it off instead. Then he doesn’t have to see Mo Xuanyu’s face at all. Doesn’t have to see his messy hair, his annoying mole, the idiotic smile he’d give Lan Zhan even if his organs were failing, one by one.

But when did Lan Zhan become so pathetic? What good will he be as a doctor? Mo Xuanyu could be dying on the other side of this door, and he’s busy worrying about the superficial.

So he finally raps on the door, a little bit louder than usual. When he doesn’t get a response, he knocks again, heart beginning to pound. Relief floods through him when he hears shuffling noises and a thud from within the room.

“Aiya, I’m coming,” a voice groans. “Give me a second.”

Before Mo Xuanyu even fully opens the door, he’s already launched into a whole speech, and his eyes are barely open. “I already told A-Li that I’m running class tomorrow. And they’ll have a makeup day scheduled sometime next week so they don’t fall behind on the curriculum, so don’t worry, I've got it all—"

"Mo Xuanyu."

"Lan Zhan?” His eyes widen when he realizes who he’s been rambling to this entire time. “My bad, I just woke up.” He tilts his head and rubs his eyes. “What are you doing here?”

Mo Xuanyu is dressed in nothing but an oversized black t-shirt and shorts that barely reach his mid-thighs. He has a blanket tied around him like a cloak, but that doesn’t stop Lan Zhan from wanting to bolt immediately. He shoves the care kit into Mo Xuanyu’s face, already hearing his uncle’s disapproval echoing in his skull.

“Thank… you?” Mo Xuanyu hesitantly takes the kit from him. “Wait. Did you come all the way here just to give this to me?”

“I do not trust your survival skills.”

“Survival skills?” Mo Xuanyu gawks. “You don’t think I can take care of myself? You were worried?"

“A fever is the first symptom of septic shock.” Lan Zhan tries to keep his voice as level as possible. “The clinic doesn’t have a ventilator.”

“So you were worried about me!” He snickers. “I’m never going to let you live this down, Lan Zha— hey, where are you going? I can’t redress my palm myself! I was just kidding!”

”Lan Zhaaaan!”

Chapter Text

The tea shows up one morning while Lan Zhan’s disinfecting a thermometer.

“It’s homemade! Take it as a token of my gratitude,” Mo Xuanyu says cheerfully, sliding a thermos across the table like he’s trying to make a drug deal. And when he leans in conspiratorially, telling Lan Zhan he added his favorite “secret ingredient,” it only adds to the illusion.

Lan Zhan barely looks up. “I didn’t ask for tea.”

“I mean— it’s not just for you,” Mo Xuanyu says quickly. “If you’re feeling generous, you can share it with your coworkers—can you stop looking at me like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like I’m a sanitation hazard.”

Lan Zhan stares at him. “You are a sanitation hazard.”

“Only because I work with kids,” he huffs, “and they didn’t get their hands on this tea. It’s completely fresh, I promise.” He attempts a wuxia-style three finger salute again, and this time, he doesn’t double over in pain.

“Your palm is looking a lot better,” Lan Zhan notes. He hasn’t seen Mo Xuanyu in a week, not since he fled his inn room, came back to redress his wound, and then fled again.

“Yup,” Mo Xuanyu flexes his right hand. “All thanks to you! Guess you weren’t an amateur after all. It’s been healing up nicely and—”

“Mo-laoshi!” comes a call from down the street. “It’s 8:15 already!”

“Give me one more minute, A-Li!” he yells back. He turns to Lan Zhan. “I have to go, but promise me you’ll try the tea, ok? At least a little!” He pats him on the shoulder before sprinting away.

“I really think you’ll like it!” he calls behind him.

Lan Zhan waits until Mo Xuanyu is fully out of sight to finally try it. He unscrews the thermos and pours the tea into the lid, catching an unfamiliar, strong scent. It’s not chemical, really— it’s warm, aromatic, and sharp.

What on earth did Mo Xuanyu put in this?

Instinctively, Lan Zhan runs through a mental list of irritants and allergens— something he picked up during clinical rotations in college— but nothing quite matches. He figures it’s probably just some kind of regional spice, so he takes one cautious sip.

He spits it out immediately, gagging, eyes and face burning. His glasses are fogging up, and his tongue feels like it’s on fire.

Mo Xuanyu’s “secret ingredient” was chili powder.

Lan Zhan wonders if this was an elaborate prank, or if Mo Xuanyu genuinely thought he would enjoy this. But when had Lan Zhan given any indication that he liked spicy food, when it couldn’t be further from the truth?

He’s going to kill him when he gets back.

But when Mo Xuanyu does stop by during his lunch break, practically bouncing on his heels as he asks what Lan Zhan thought about the tea, he is at a loss for words.

Looking into his eyes, it’s clear that it wasn’t a prank. There’s no mischievous glint, and no smirk playing on his lips. Just open, hopeful sincerity, and it kills Lan Zhan a little. He would have told anyone else the blunt truth, straight to their face, and never looked back. But he can’t imagine how heartbreak would look on Mo Xuanyu, and he realizes he never wants to find out.

So instead, he hears himself say, “It was delicious. What’s your recipe?”

And Lan Zhan would finish the entire thermos ten times over if it meant seeing Mo Xuanyu’s face light up like this again, beaming as he rambles about his tea making process like it’s some kind of sacred art.

He knows the tea will keep coming now, but he can’t find it in himself to care.

———————

Mo Xuanyu begins arriving before school to drop off his tea, and Lan Zhan drops off the empty thermos after his shift. It’s absurd— three weeks, and he’s already looking forward to seeing Mo Xuanyu every day, every time they trade off the thermos. They always end up chatting for a bit, before running off again to their various responsibilities.

And by “chatting”, Lan Zhan means that Mo Xuanyu will be speaking, and he will occasionally contribute monosyllabic responses to show he’s paying attention. The man is excellent at having conversations with himself.

He has never been one for small talk, but he’s genuinely happy to listen to what Mo Xuanyu has to say, and learned a lot about him these past two weeks.

Mo Xuanyu has family he would die for, family who would die for him, and family who want him dead. He likes cats. He graduated two years ago, with a prestigious job offer straight out of college. He got fired after protesting against their horrifying carbon footprint. He punched his brother-in-law once. He works as a freelance IT specialist right now, alongside volunteering here in Yunnan. If a genie granted him one wish, it would be to drink a bowl of soup from home right now.

It’s so good, Lan Zhan, he had said, a faraway look in his eyes. It just– it just feels like a hug. I don’t know how else to explain it. Someday, you should come to my place and try it!

It’s moments like these when Lan Zhan wants to bottle up Mo Xuanyu’s voice– the way it brightens when he talks about his students, the quiet laugh when he mentions home– just so he can get drunk on it every night.

He’s never experienced anything like this before, but it’s becoming second nature to him— slowly falling into Mo Xuanyu’s orbit, with every handoff of the thermos.

Which, of course, doesn’t empty itself.

Over the past two weeks, Lan Zhan has found that some of the kids at the clinic have taken a liking to Mo Xuanyu’s tea. He’s more than happy to oblige, because the actual level of spice in it is mercifully tame now. Unfortunately, it’s still too much for Lan Zhan, and that’s probably because he’s spent the last 20 years believing salt was a seasoning.

Mo Xuanyu doesn’t need to know that, though.

When Lan Zhan passes by the schoolyard to drop off the empty thermos, Mo Xuanyu will flash a smile and a wave through the classroom window when they make eye contact.

But one late afternoon, their routine fractures.

The sky is overcast, and it’s drizzling. Lan Zhan arrives at the school later than usual, only to find the classroom empty.

But then, he notices movement— at the far end of the schoolyard.

It’s Mo Xuanyu, alone, still in his teaching clothes. He’s halfway up an aluminum ladder leaning against the school wall, struggling with what looks like a string of sagging red lanterns. The building is quiet, and the kids are long gone. The ladder is rusty, the ground is muddy, Mo Xuanyu’s reaching a bit too far to the left, and Lan Zhan’s heart is racing as the wind begins to pick up.

And just as he fears, the ladder shifts. The legs sink into the mud, and Mo Xuanyu jolts, yelping as he slips. He grabs the lantern line— stupidly, desperately.

It snaps.

Mo Xuanyu crashes towards the ground, and Lan Zhan sprints towards him, shouting his name, even though he’s too far away to break his fall.

But by the time Mo Xuanyu sits up, coughing and blinking rain out of his eyes, Lan Zhan is already crouching over him, absolutely soaked, fingers gripping Mo Xuanyu’s wrist. And he must look just as furious as he feels, because Mo Xuanyu flinches the second he meets his eyes.

“Stop staring at me like that,” he mumbles, weakly twisting out of Lan Zhan’s grip. “I’m fine.”

He is not, in fact, fine. There’s a massive gash on the left side of his torso, blood blooming red through his tattered t-shirt. He has two bruises on his temple, and he’s cradling his left elbow—probably because it’s been dislocated.

So without another word, Lan Zhan puts his arm over Mo Xuanyu’s shoulder, hoists him up, and drags him across the yard, jaw clenched, fingers digging in a little too tightly.

It’s the only way Lan Zhan can stop his hands from shaking.

He doesn’t let go until Mo Xuanyu is sitting on an empty cot in the medical tent. He removes his shirt, and Lan Zhan begins to clean the wound— focused, mechanical. It’s not deep, luckily, but Lan Zhan can’t help but wonder what would have happened if he hadn’t been there in time. If he had gotten there just ten minutes later.

Why does he insist on doing stupid things when no one is around to stop him? he thinks. Why does he always downplay his pain like it doesn’t matter?

Why does he act like no one cares what happens to him?

Lan Zhan presses his alcohol-soaked cloth a little too tight against the wound, and Mo Xuanyu winces. “You’re mad, aren’t you?”

“I’ve used that ladder lots of times,” Mo Xuanyu starts. “I didn’t think anything would happen.”

Lan Zhan doesn’t look up. “It was raining.”

“It was barely drizzling.”

“Doesn’t matter. You were alone.”

“Yeah, and I can handle myself!” His volume spikes. “The fall was a freak accident, and I could just have come to the clinic—“

“When? Once it gets so infected you can’t walk anymore? Once you pass out in front of your students and scare them?”

Lan Zhan just barely raises his voice, but it’s the loudest Mo Xuanyu has ever heard him. There’s a pause, as Mo Xuanyu searches his face.

“Why do you care so much?” he asks, softer now.

Lan Zhan doesn’t respond, even though the answer crawling up his throat is threatening to suffocate him.

Because I could never forgive myself if something happened to you. Because I—

He drops the gauze. “Hold still. I need to put your arm in a sling next.”

It’s easier to focus on bandages and antiseptics than to confront why he feels this way. He shouldn’t feel this way.

Mo Xuanyu has been in his life for less than three weeks, and Lan Zhan doesn’t know why he thinks it would kill him if he never saw him again.

——————-

“Lan Zhan!” Mo Xuanyu raises his right arm in surrender as he looms over the desk. “Don’t yell at me— I didn’t do anything reckless today, okay?”

Lan Zhan lifts an eyebrow. “You’re in your work clothes.”

“Ah—heh, well, that’s because I tried to show up to class this morning,” he says, rubbing his nose with his good hand. “The supervisor took one look at me and sent me home to rest.”

Lan Zhan adjusts his glasses. “Then why are you here, instead of resting like a normal person?”

“Aiya, quit complaining,” Mo Xuanyu mutters, swatting a hand at Lan Zhan. “I did listen to her. I didn’t even come by to drop off tea today, did you notice? I was being responsible.” He gestures dramatically. “I’ve been resting the whole day. It’s five in the evening now. I’m allowed to move.”

“So you came all the way here just to bother me?”

“Yup!” Mo Xuanyu grins, slapping his palm on the desk. “I’m here to invite you to our summer hot pot dinner.”

“Hot pot dinner?”

“All the school volunteers are hosting one next Friday, which is… a week and a half from now? They said we could bring guests, so I’m bringing you.” He beams. “I know it’ll be loud, and that’s probably not your thing because you’re kind of like a robot, but I think we’d have fun. And you like spicy food, just like me, so you’ll fit right in!”

Well.

Lan Zhan can’t exactly correct Mo Xuanyu about his culinary preferences. That’s something Mo Xuanyu will never find out about, if Lan Zhan has his way. But he can point out one other glaring logistical issue.

“I’m vegetarian.”

Mo Xuanyu stares at him, and sighs. “You know what? Of course you are. Fine, I’ll ask the organizers to add tofu or something so you don’t starve.”

“Thanks?”

“Yeah, yeah, anytime. And meet me in front of the school Friday evening so we can go together. Wear something nice!”

Chapter Text

And with that, Mo Xuanyu’s out the door, leaving Lan Zhan with more questions than answers, and a bubbling sense of anticipation. He’s excited, sure. But he wonders how much damage that hot pot broth is going to wreak on his delicate digestive system.

The dinner simmers on his mind all week. Lan Zhan’s going to be meeting Mo Xuanyu’s friends and coworkers for the first time, so he figures he should “wear something nice” so he can make a good impression.

But when he goes to meet Mo Xuanyu on Friday evening, just as they planned, the man doubles over and begins cackling the second he catches sight of him.

“Oh, Lan Zhan,” he wheezes, swiping a tear from his eye. “What are you wearing?”

Lan Zhan is dressed in white pleated pants, his uncle’s old belt, a cardigan, and a light blue ribbed polo shirt underneath. It’s professional, polished, and—he thought—perfectly reasonable attire for a dinner.

“What’s wrong with this?”

“Lan Zhan.” Mo Xuanyu gently places his hands on his shoulders and stares him in the eye, like he’s about to break some terrible news to him. “You look great. Incredible, even. However, we are having hot pot, not closing a property deal.”

Lan Zhan frowns. “You said dress nice.”

“Right,” Mo Xuanyu snickers, “but I didn’t think you’d take it that seriously!”

Meanwhile, he’s in dark khaki shorts and a loose red button up that’s only half tucked in. There’s a fanny pack strapped to his waist like he’s an uncle going out for his morning walk. The sling on his elbow came off yesterday, so he can move just fine. There shouldn’t be any excuse for his fashion crimes.

But the worst part is that it works, somehow. He doesn’t even look sloppy, and this is the same man who once admitted to Lan Zhan, without shame, that five-in-one shampoo was his holy grail. Yet here he is: hair perfectly tousled, skin glowing in the sunset. It’s the kind of effortless beauty that not everyone is blessed with— certainly not Lan Zhan, who has ten steps in his nightly skincare routine alone.

Surely, surely, Mo Xuanyu is the only one who put zero effort into his appearance, and Lan Zhan won’t look like a white-collar fool. He tells himself this all the way to the venue.

He is sorely disappointed.

Lan Zhan is used to stares. He is not used to smirks, whispers, and someone outright choking on their drink when he walks past. As they make their way through the courtyard, he wants to disappear a little. The fact that he doesn’t know anyone is one consolation. But what doesn’t help is Mo Xuanyu stopping every three seconds to catch up with someone he knows, dragging Lan Zhan along with him like his pet peacock.

Eventually, they find a seat at one of the foldout plastic tables, with a steaming pot over a portable butane burner already set at the center. The pot is split down the middle, with different broth on either side. The clear mushroom broth calls to Lan Zhan— aromatic, gentle, and perfectly mild. But because he’s an idiot who couldn’t lie to Mo Xuanyu’s face one time, his fate now lies with the bright red spicy broth instead.

He can feel his eyes watering already, just from the spices in the air. How is he going to survive this?

The seat across from them is quickly filled by someone Lan Zhan doesn’t recognize— not that he recognizes anyone here. He’s loud and sociable, and Mo Xuanyu is chatting away like he’s known him his whole life. But to his surprise, there’s a flash of recognition in his friend’s eyes when Mo Xuanyu finally introduces Lan Zhan.

“Wait,” he starts, his gaze flicking between the two of them, “are you the medic who made a house call for him? After he tried to catch that chicken?”

“…Yes?”

“Hah! God, Xuanyu wouldn’t shut up about you! It was Lan Zhan this Lan Zhan that for two weeks straight.” The friend tilts his head. “You know, he kept saying you were hot, but I didn’t think you looked like a fucking idol—“

Mo Xuanyu lunges across the table and smacks a hand over his friend’s mouth. His face is actively getting redder and redder, and the man hasn’t even had a sip of alcohol yet.

Lan Zhan is sure his ears are burning just as violently. “He was talking about me?”

“Mmph— Oh yeah! He was— get your fucking hands off of my face— so happy when you said you enjoyed that war crime he makes in the name of tea. And after he hurt his elbow, he wouldn’t hang out with us outside of work anymore— said he didn’t want to disappoint you. I’ve never seen him display any sense of basic self-preservation before.”

“Okay, that’s enough,” Mo Xuanyu singsongs, widening his eyes. His friend doesn’t say anything more— he just leans back and shrugs. “Anyway, why don’t we decide what we want to add to our hot pot? Lan Zhan, you start, since you’re the vegetarian here. And do you want drinks?”

“Tofu,” he responds absently, “and no alcohol.”

He’s still thinking about what Mo Xuanyu’s friend said, but he can’t get his hopes up. They are, well, friends at this point. It’s only natural that he would listen to Lan Zhan’s medical advice, and mention him to his other friends. Plus, Xuanyu flirts with anything that walks. There’s no reason to think he feels something different for Lan Zhan.

There’s no reason to think he’s even like Lan Zhan.

He shoves his messy thoughts aside, choosing to focus instead on his impending doom as the add-ins, dipping sauces, and drinks begin showing up at their table.

“I talked to one of the organizers,” Mo Xuanyu says, leaning in conspiratorially. “She said the red broth was Sichuan mala. It’s going to be so good! Heh, Lan Zhan—“ he bumps his shoulder, “let’s see if you can handle this level of spice!”

He can feel his stomach churning already. Lan Zhan hoped he could get away with just barely dipping the tofu in, but Mo Xuanyu is watching his every move right now, eyes filled with anticipation. So he takes a deep breath, picks up the tofu, dunks it in the broth, and shoves it in his mouth.

Lan Zhan’s tongue dies first, and his dignity follows.

His entire face feels like it’s melting, disintegrating, shriveling up like dried fruit in the sun. And with his entire body in survival mode, he grabs the nearest cup and chugs every last drop of what’s inside.

The last thing he sees before he passes out is Mo Xuanyu’s horrified expression as he shouts, “Lan Zhan, that’s baijiu!”

—————

This isn’t his room.

This isn’t his bed.

But Lan Zhan is neatly tucked under a blanket, the sour taste of alcohol still lingering in his mouth. He has a pounding headache. There’s a cup of warm water and his own glasses placed on the nightstand.

Panicking, he leaps from the bed and nearly trips over Mo Xuanyu, who’s sitting on the floor, back pressed against the bed frame.

“Oh, you’re awake,” he says, rubbing his eyes. “I didn’t think you’d be up this early.”

“Where am I?”

“This is my inn room— but you’ve never been inside. I don’t know where you live, so I brought you to my place. Do you remember passing out at the hot pot dinner?”

“Yes, but—“

“Aiya, you scared me so bad, Lan Zhan!” He suddenly exclaims, standing up. He walks over to Lan Zhan and grips his shoulders. “I thought I killed you. No matter how much we shook you, you didn’t move. We even dumped water on your face!”

He needs a couple seconds to process this information. Did Mo Xuanyu really drag Lan Zhan’s unconscious body all the way back here? This has to be a new low for him— passing out in public like some drunkard and waking up in someone else’s bed. What would his uncle think, if he saw him now?

“I’m so sorry, Xuanyu.” He’s practically bowing, at this point. “You didn’t have to—thank you. I don’t know what I would have done without you.”

“I mean, you probably would have done some property damage,” he snickers. “But it was nothing, Lan Zhan. This is what friends do for each other, okay?”

“Property damage?”

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” he says. “The important thing is that we got you somewhere safe, yeah?” He pats Lan Zhan on the shoulder and turns around, making his way towards the kitchenette. “So, do you want coffee or tea?”

“You said I passed out.”

“I told you, don’t worry about it,” he calls over his shoulder. “I’m going to make some tea now!”

“Xuanyu.” Lan Zhan stalks over, grabs his wrist, and whirls him around. ”Tell me what I did.”

He takes a deep breath. “Lan Zhan, we all do stupid stuff when we’re drunk.”

Oh, this is bad. “Xuanyu, please.”

“Fine, fine, I’ll tell you. Just quit glaring at me like that. It wasn’t even that embarrassing, okay? Five minutes after you passed out, you suddenly jerked awake like you were possessed or something. You looked absolutely blazed. It was hilarious, now that I think about it. I’ve never seen anyone get drunk after a single shot! But then…”

“Then what?”

“Then, uh…” Mo Xuanyu rubs his nose, suddenly not meeting Lan Zhan’s eyes. “You grabbed my face, um, locked eyes with me… smiled, and said, ‘You’d probably be really annoying if I didn’t like you so much.’”

Lan Zhan is horrified, but Mo Xuanyu keeps rolling. “Before I could even process that, you started trying to fight the shabu pot! We had to hold you back, while you kept insisting that it betrayed you and ruined your honor or something.”

“Xuanyu…”

“Oh no, it was fine!” He frantically waves his hands. “You didn’t spill it over or make a big scene! I was kidding about the property damage part. Kind of.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Oh, you’re worried about what you said? I’m not offended, don’t worry. You’re not the first person to call me annoying.” He chuckles. “But it was a little terrifying seeing you smile for the first time. Not because your smile is scary—it’s actually kind of cute—but not—never mind.” He’s turning redder by the minute. “Anyway, I know you didn’t mean much by it, okay? Just relax.”

Lan Zhan did in fact, mean much by it.

He just never planned on saying it out loud— not unless he was on his deathbed.

Mo Xuanyu tells him to go get freshened up as he returns to making tea for the both of them. He says it’s great for hangovers, which Lan Zhan can’t really dispute. He’s never gotten drunk before today, but he knows their anti-inflammatory properties should help clear his head.

…in theory.

Lan Zhan’s headache can’t be completely blamed on the alcohol. He’s still reeling from the fact that he said something like that— out loud, to Mo Xuanyu.

He should be relieved that he laughed it off. That Xuanyu reassured him, telling him everyone does stupid things when they’re drunk. If it was anyone else who heard that… would they still smile at him, like he is? Would they let Lan Zhan sleep in their bed, in their home? Lan Zhan should be holding onto Mo Xuanyu’s apathy like a lifeline, something precious. He should be thankful.

So why does it sting?

Easy. Because all Lan Zhan ever does is want, and want, and want.

Xuanyu’s kindness is effortless, unthinking, doled out to everyone and anyone. But Lan Zhan wants something that feels like it’s his, something that means he isn’t the only one falling.

He knows it’s too much to ask for.

He turns on the sink faucet. The water runs cold. He rinses his mouth out, splashes his face a couple times. Then he braces his palms against the edge of the sink, white-knuckle gripping as he stares at himself in the mirror.

“Lan Zhan?” Mo Xuanyu knocks gently on the bathroom door. “The tea is ready. Are you alright?”

He’s not alright, but how could Mo Xuanyu ever know that?

He stumbles out of the bathroom, and smells something warm and floral wafting through the air. Mo Xuanyu is sitting at the edge of the bed, two cups of tea in hand.

“It’s green tea,” he says, handing one cup to Lan Zhan. “It’s not what I usually make, of course. I figured you wouldn’t want anything spicy after… you know. Let me know what you think, okay?”

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan takes the cup from Mo Xuanyu, and sips it gingerly. “It’s delicious,” he says, and he actually means it this time. It’s rich, sweet, and perfectly mellow— the tea he’s had back in the city pales in comparison to the cup in his hands right now.

Mo Xuanyu brightens. “I picked it up from a local stall, actually! Everyone talks about Yunnan’s Pu’er tea, but I think their green tea is underrated. And, you know— it can help with hangovers.” He shrugs. “Not that I get drunk very often.”

“You have a high alcohol tolerance?” Lan Zhan has never seen him drink excessively—no tremors, no flushing, no real signs of dependence. But it’s still hard to believe he does anything in moderation.

Xuanyu chuckles. “Yeah, I think it’s genetic or something. Apparently my mom could drink anyone under the table too.”

“Apparently?”

“Oh, um, she died when I was two.” He rubs his nose. “My dad passed away before I was born, so everything I know about them comes from my adoptive father. He was a close friend of theirs.” He smiles, smaller this time. “He always said I inherited my mom’s personality. Though I doubt that’s genetic. You should know, you’re the doctor.”

It’s not genetic, not really. But it’s a comforting thought. Lan Zhan has always wished that he carried more of his mother than just her golden eyes. Even at six, he admired the way she held herself, how she’d remind her sons that all stories had happy endings. Her sardonic sense of humor. The way she’d tease Lan Zhan and then pinch his cheeks when he got mad.

Her quiet strength, even as the leukemia drained the light from her eyes.

He hasn’t talked about her in years. Yet somehow, sitting here in this borrowed quiet, a cup of warm tea in his palms— he almost wants to.

But then Mo Xuanyu takes a sip of his tea, grins, and leans in so close that his breath ghosts over Lan Zhan’s lips.

“So, what do you think? Was my mom just as annoying as me?” He watches Lan Zhan through his half-lidded eyes, voice low and soft. “Or did my dad just like her enough to put up with her?”

He’s close, too close.

Lan Zhan can feel his ears burning violently. The warmth in his chest turns to ice as he stiffens, setting the cup down a little too hard. “I’m sorry,” he mutters, already rising to his feet.

Mo Xuanyu immediately pulls back. “No, no— Lan Zhan, I’m sorry!” He exclaims, hands raised. “I was just teasing, I just—I know you didn’t mean it like that when you were drunk, okay? Don’t leave!“

Lan Zhan doesn’t meet his eyes. “Thank you for the tea.”

Xuanyu’s fingers twitch, like he wants to reach out. But Lan Zhan is out the door before he can say anything else.

——————

Thirty minutes ago, Lan Zhan was silently lamenting Mo Xuanyu’s dismissal of his thinly-veiled drunken almost-confession.

But now, he feels cracked, soft and spilling and so, so open. Sure, Xuanyu was making fun of him, but Lan Zhan knows that it wasn’t meant to wound. It lodged itself like a shard of glass in his ribs anyway, but that shouldn’t matter— Mo Xuanyu took care of him when he didn’t have to, and Lan Zhan repaid him by fleeing with zero explanation. Mo Xuanyu’s freshly brewed tea and silly jokes and Lan Zhan’s stupid, stupid feelings.

He doesn’t know if Mo Xuanyu feels just as awful as he does. He only knows that he didn’t deserve to be left like that.

So Lan Zhan walks. Not home, not yet— he wants to clear his mind. He doesn’t know where he’s headed, but there’s only so far you can go in this sleepy village.

He ends up by the schoolhouse, which is quiet and empty, of course. It’s also dark, with the exception of one emergency tube light glowing faintly above the entrance. It’s always been on—ever since the building was designated as a gathering point in case of landslides and during flood season.

So it’s strange when it flickers.

Lan Zhan blinks, wondering if it was a trick of the eye. But then it flickers again. He knows the schoolhouse wiring is old, but the air feels heavier, and some clouds are slowly beginning to gather above him. It’s his day off, but he decides to make his way to the clinic, planning to secure any sensitive medical equipment in case of a power surge.

There are a couple medics and patients at the tent already, but Lan Zhan makes a beeline for the main building. He checks the generator backup. It’s not out of fuel, so he unplugs what needs unplugging, and moves some medicines and vaccines into the backup cooling system.

But when he reaches into his back pocket, hoping to send a message to the clinic’s communication thread, his phone is nowhere to be found.

Shit. He must have left it back at Mo Xuanyu’s place.

He groans silently. His skin isn’t thick enough to face the man again so quickly. But when he hears thunder faintly rolling in the distance, and notices the sky darkening, Lan Zhan realizes he needs to send that message before the network goes down for good. The staff will have his head if he doesn’t log what he moved around.

So he sucks it up, and grabs an umbrella before he ventures outside.

The walk to Mo Xuanyu’s inn isn’t far, but the dirt path is quickly softening into mud beneath the rain.

He’s about halfway there when he spots two figures a few meters ahead—one of them crouched beside a small scooter that’s clearly seen better days, the other holding an umbrella over both their heads.
It takes Lan Zhan a moment to register who it is, since their faces are obscured through the curtain of rain.

It’s Mo Xuanyu, soaked from the shoulders down, sleeves rolled up as he struggles to lift the scooter upright. The woman beside him is someone Lan Zhan vaguely recognizes— She’s one of the elderly women who frequents the clinic for arthritis medication.

Lan Zhan stops cold. Mo Xuanyu hasn’t noticed him yet, which means it’s not too late to turn around. Maybe he can borrow a phone from someone back at the clinic. Problem solved. Sure, it’ll be a pain, but this way he can cling to his plan of avoiding Mo Xuanyu for the next three to five business days.

He’s already moving his feet in the opposite direction when he hears, “—you’re not walking home alone in this weather, auntie. The rain is picking up! I’ll push it to your doorstep, okay?“

And just like that, walking away isn’t an option anymore, because if he did, Lan Zhan thinks his uncle would catch the next flight over and kill him himself.

Beyond being a disappointment, Lan Zhan can’t just leave Mo Xuanyu and that elderly woman behind. A doctor doesn’t abandon a person in need, even if seeing that person again makes them want to die a little.

So he sighs and makes his way towards them, calling out to Mo Xuanyu.

His head whips around. “What are you doing here?”

“I can take the scooter. Move.”

Mo Xuanyu’s brows furrow, and his grip tightens on the handlebar. “Why?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t look at the other man. “Your arm isn’t fully healed.” Mo Xuanyu’s sling may be off, but his re-dislocation risk is still high. “The scooter is heavy, and it’s muddy.”

“It’s fine,” he insists, stubborn as always. “I said I would—“

The old woman puts a hand on his shoulder, and motions towards Lan Zhan. “Let him take the scooter.”

Mo Xuanyu opens his mouth like he wants to protest, but when thunder suddenly rumbles in the distance, he begrudgingly turns the handlebar over to Lan Zhan. They trudge along in silence. By the time they drop the old woman and her scooter off at her home, the rain is steadily pouring.

Mo Xuanyu’s eyes reflect the dark, swirling sky as he stares up at it. Wet strands of dark hair cling to his face, curling around his temples like spilled calligraphy ink. Raindrops glisten like small diamonds on his eyelashes. And when he blinks, one trails down his cheek, over his lightly parted lips, along the sharp line of his jaw.

He has always been beautiful. But standing here, in front of the old woman’s house, absolutely soaked to the bone, he looks like something Lan Zhan shouldn’t be allowed to want.

“Thanks,” Mo Xuanyu mumbles, not quite meeting Lan Zhan’s eyes. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“You were struggling.” Lan Zhan says, bluntly. “I wanted to help.”

He snorts. “Fine. But what were you even doing out there? You never answered me when I asked you the first time.”

“I was actually looking for you.”

Mo Xuanyu’s eyes widen. “Why?”

“I left my—“

“Oh! Phone?” He interrupts, before rummaging around in his back pocket and presenting it to Lan Zhan. “Good thing I had it on me, right?” He grins faintly. “Otherwise you’d be stuck walking with me for another twenty minutes in this downpour. The inn’s at the other end of the village, which means I have to get going soon.”

As he begins walking into the street, Lan Zhan suddenly blurts, “You don’t have to go all the way back.”

Mo Xuanyu tilts his head. “What?”

“My quarters are closer,” he hears himself say, quietly. “You could come with me. If you would like.”

Mo Xuanyu blinks. For one agonizing moment, the roaring of rain is the only sound, before he finally whispers a quiet “okay.”

———————

The two of them are a mess compared to the pristine interior of Lan Zhan’s unit— shoes slathered with mud and who knows what else, hair plastered to their faces, clothes drenched beyond recognition.

Lan Zhan tries flicking the light switch on. Nothing. The outage must have hit already. There’s still some light leaking through the open window, so he takes off his shoes and makes his way to the laundry room. He returns with two big towels, pressing one wordlessly into Mo Xuanyu’s arms.

“Thanks, Lan Zhan, but, uh—do you maybe have a change of clothes?” He asks, towel draped over his head like a makeshift cloak. “I don’t think this will soak up everything, and I don’t wanna make a huge mess. Or, well—“ he glances at the massive puddle of rainwater at their feet. “more of a mess.”

Lan Zhan finds an oversized cotton shirt and a pair of drawstring pants at the bottom of his drawer— they’re loose, clean, and safe.

But when Mo Xuanyu reappears from the bathroom, beads of water slipping down his neck, a sliver of collarbone peeking out from the too-loose shirt— Lan Zhan gives up on breathing altogether.

He’s a grown man. So why is his mind short-circuiting at the sight of Mo Xuanyu sitting on his bed, wearing his clothes, like he belongs here?

“So,” Mo Xuanyu clears his throat, fidgeting with his thumbs. “Were you able to send your message?”

Lan Zhan blinks. Right. The message.

He drags his eyes away, retreating to the desk where he’d left his phone, still slick from the rain. “Yes,” he says, unlocking it. “I sent it. The signal held.”

“Good,” Mo Xuanyu says, voice soft. “That’s good— wait, where are you going?”

“We need to find a lamp. It’s getting dark.”

Mo Xuanyu glances at the window. The wind is howling, and the rain hasn’t let up. “Let me help you.”

They split up to search— Lan Zhan takes the kitchen cabinets, while Mo Xuanyu digs though the dresser drawers, muttering under his breath as he goes.

Suddenly, he exclaims, “Lan Zhan!” from across the room.

He races over, wondering if Xuanyu got hurt somehow— only to find him holding a plastic nightlight in his palms, grinning from ear to ear.

“Lan Zhan,” he giggles, “I didn’t know you liked bunnies!”

The nightlight is tiny, perfectly rotund, and Lan Zhan had completely forgotten about it. He swipes it out of Mo Xuanyu’s hands, embarrassingly fast. “It was a gift from my brother. When I was… twelve.” One small mercy is that the bunny’s original cutesy face has long since faded. “He insisted that I bring it with me.”

It’s something to keep you company, A-Zhan, Lan Huan had burbled, trying to discreetly shove it into Lan Zhan’s suitcase. You’re going to be so far from home! Make sure you take care of it!

“Aiya, don’t be embarrassed, Lan Zhan. I like bunnies too!” Mo Xuanyu says, before adding with a wink, “I like to eat them!”

Lan Zhan stares at him. “That is not the same thing.”

Xuanyu shrugs. “We can agree to disagree. But I wouldn’t eat your xiao-tuzi— he’s so cute!” He sets the nightlight on the side table across from the bed, and switches it on. The new light bathes the entire room in a soft, ambient glow. “Wow, functional and adorable!” he says, eyes gleaming as they both plop back onto the bed. “Now I definitely can’t eat him.”

He huffs out a quiet laugh, feeling the corners of his mouth gently tip upwards.

“Lan Zhan, are you smiling?” Xuanyu gasps. “Oh my god, you are! Who knew you were capable of it?”

Lan Zhan’s brows furrow. “I smile sometimes.”

Xuanyu snorts. “Yeah, maybe in your imagination. You always look pissed when I’m around. I get it, though, I would be annoyed if I hung out with me too.” He blows a piece of hair out of his face, before flashing Lan Zhan a sideways smile. “I’m just surprised you do it anyway.”

He blinks. Is that how he comes across?

“You don’t piss me off. I like spending time with you.”

“I mean, you bolted the last time we talked.” Xuanyu's smile doesn’t meet his eyes. “You can’t be saying you like spending time with me after that.”

Lan Zhan opens his mouth, then closes it again.

He doesn’t know how to say it—how to explain that he left not because he didn’t want to be there, but because he wanted it too much. Because Mo Xuanyu had leaned in, smiling, teasing, so, so close, and Lan Zhan felt unbearably exposed.

“…I wasn’t uncomfortable,” he says finally. “I was overwhelmed.”

“What?”

He takes a deep breath. “I meant what I said when I was drunk.” He pauses, before adding, “I meant it like that.”

A flicker of something passes over Xuanyu’s face—uncertainty, maybe. Confusion, disbelief.

Telling him the truth might ruin everything between them, but he can’t let Mo Xuanyu go on thinking that Lan Zhan never cared for him.

“I really like you.”

The rain pounds against the bedroom window. Mo Xuanyu opens his mouth like he wants to interrupt, but Lan Zhan keeps going before he can regret his decision.

“I didn’t mean to. You were loud, always making stupid jokes just to get my reaction. You acted like nothing ever got to you. But then you got hurt, and I realized… that you didn’t think anyone cared what happened to you.”

“But I cared, Xuanyu.” Lan Zhan gazes into his storm-colored eyes. In this, he cannot afford to be misunderstood. “Not as a doctor. I cared because it was you.”

He exhales, shakily. “I understand if you do not return my feelings. But—“

Before he can say anything else, Mo Xuanyu cups his face and pulls him close, pressing their lips together. It’s tender, and warm, and everything Lan Zhan has ever wanted.

But he knows he can't have this.

So he recoils, like he’s been stung. Mo Xuanyu pulls back too, breath catching, hurt written all over his face.

His hands haven’t left Lan Zhan’s cheeks. He lets them burn there.

“Xuanyu,” he whispers, a mess of emotions writhing in the pit of his stomach. He wants to cry, wants to shove him away, wants to grab his shirt and kiss him all over again. “Don’t do this to me again if you don’t mean it.”

“Lan Zhan,” he says, and his voice is soft, so soft. “Do you think I would kiss you like that if I didn’t mean it?”

The breath is sucked from his lungs. “You—?”

“I like you too, Lan Zhan.” He smiles, eyes sparkling.

And before his mind can catch up, one hand comes up to cradle Mo Xuanyu’s jaw, like it’s instinct, and then Lan Zhan's kissing him. He imbues it with as much sweetness as he can pour into his lips, every movement desperate.

Mo Xuanyu melts into it, threading his fingers into Lan Zhan’s hair like he never wants to let go. Lan Zhan thinks he could stay like this forever, in Mo Xuanyu’s arms, in this stolen space between lightning strikes.

And when they tumble onto the bed together, limbs tangled, breath uneven, he doesn’t stop himself. Doesn’t pull away, doesn’t hold back.

For once, Lan Zhan lets himself want.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan wakes to the steady cadence of Mo Xuanyu’s quiet snoring, the rise and fall of his chest against Lan Zhan’s shoulder, the weight of his arm draped across his torso. Outside, the sky is beginning to brighten, soft gray bleeding into pale gold. And lying here in this new warmth, of Mo Xuanyu’s body tangled with his, Lan Zhan really, really wishes he could go back to sleep. But years of strict conditioning betray him once again.

He tries to gently extricate himself from Mo Xuanyu’s arms, wriggling to the edge of the bed inch by inch, but Mo Xuanyu stirs anyway, mumbling as he rubs his eyes.

“Hi, Lan Zhan,” he whispers, giving him a bleary-eyed smile as he drops a kiss over his cheek. The two of them lie on the bed, facing each other. “What time is it?”

“It’s 6 am,” Lan Zhan whispers back. “I’m sorry I woke you up.”

“That’s okay,” he mumbles, burrowing back into the blanket and closing his eyes. “I’ll be up in a bit, just…”

He trails off, already asleep again. Lan Zhan huffs out a tiny laugh, half in amusement, half in disbelief— that he even gets to have this.

And for the rest of that summer, Lan Zhan learns what it means to be wanted— softly, quietly, but whole-heartedly.

They’ll sneak off after their shifts at the clinic and the school. They'll buy ripe, juicy mangoes from the vendor uncle. There’s a spot, halfway up the hill, where the tea terraces thin out. Wildflowers peek through the grass, and through the cracks in the old irrigation stones. They’ll sit under the shade of a crooked fig tree, mango juice sticky on their intertwined fingers. Mo Xuanyu will rest his head on Lan Zhan’s shoulder, and Lan Zhan will listen intently to his long winded, meandering stories from home.

Sometimes he’ll pick the wildflowers and braid them into a little crown, setting it on Lan Zhan’s head, beaming at the finished result.

You look like one of those western princesses, he’d snickered, the first time he’d done it. Like Rapunzel. You know, the one with the long hair. Are you going to run away with me, away from your uncle, just like she did?

He’d rolled his eyes, then. But later, when Mo Xuanyu had fallen asleep against his side, with drying mango juice on his fingers and grass in his hair, Lan Zhan had whispered a quiet “yes” into the wind.

If he isn’t teaching, Mo Xuanyu accompanies Lan Zhan to the outskirts of the village, where he makes house calls for patients who live too far from the clinic. They’ll squeeze onto the same economical bike, a cooler with medicines strapped to the back. Xuanyu’s arms snug around Lan Zhan’s waist, as they ride over the sun-dappled dirt path.

He tags along with endless patience as Lan Zhan visits each house in his assigned sector.

He’ll distract a toddler, making stupid noises while Lan Zhan quietly injects the vaccine into the kid’s left arm. He helps convince some of the more stubborn old men that this medication is, in fact, good for them, and they will not die if they take it. He even charms some of the aunties, as they pinch his cheeks and ask him when he’s getting a girlfriend, to which he’ll shrug and say with a smirk, “I don’t know, auntie. Maybe you could introduce me to one of your daughters— but she has to be as pretty as you are!”

They eat it up every time, as Lan Zhan’s ears burn.

It’s fine. At least now they’ll take any medication Lan Zhan prescribes them with zero complaining, as long as Mo Xuanyu endorses it.

And if Lan Zhan ever has the audacity to do his job and visit their homes alone, they’ll peek out with narrowed eyes, asking about “the loud boy,” wondering if Lan Zhan finally scared him off with that “mean face of his.”

He doesn’t correct them, just tells them to take their medicine and keep the gossip to themselves.

One day, after their rounds, Mo Xuanyu tells Lan Zhan that there’s somewhere he wants to take him. It’s pretty far out of the way, about a mile south of the village outskirts, and the sun is high in the midday sky when they finally arrive.

Shrouded beneath a canopy of willow-leaved fig trees is a small lake of lotuses, with water so clear that Lan Zhan can see the bottom. The soft breeze forms gentle ripples over the surface, where reeds sway and petals float. The two of them sit in the grass overlooking it, shoes off as they curl their toes into the dirt.

Mo Xuanyu tilts his head back and closes his eyes. “I found this place my first week here, but I didn’t have anyone to bring. Until now, of course.” He plucks a small flower from the ground and taps Lan Zhan’s nose with the stem, before tucking it behind his ear. “Isn’t it pretty, Lan Zhan?” He smiles, hair tousling in the wind.

“Mn,” he nods, even though the lake doesn’t hold a candle to the man sitting beside him.

“Oi, Lan Zhan!” his eyes widen as he suddenly sits up, grinning. “Do you wanna go for a swim?”

“I don’t know how to swim,” he answers, not quite telling the truth. He took lessons as a kid, but he’s never actually had the chance to apply what he’s learned, courtesy of living in a mountainous area.

He doesn’t want to take his chances either. Better to not make a fool of himself. Again.

“It’s not really swimming,” Mo Xuanyu reassures him, already taking off his shirt. “The water’s barely a meter deep.”

“I don’t—“

“Come on, Lan Zhan!” He pulls him up so he’s standing too. “You’ll have fun, I promise!”

So, shirt and glasses abandoned, he lets Mo Xuanyu drag him down the slope, hand in hand. The river grass tickles their ankles as they wade into the shallows, and the water laps gently at their calves, cool and clean against sun-warmed skin. Silt shifts beneath their toes as they step further in, slowly, carefully.

When they reach the deepest part, water coming up to their mid torsos, Mo Xuanyu quickly dunks his head, and gasps when he comes up just as fast.

“It’s so clean, Lan Zhan! You try!” He slicks his wet hair back, a sly grin spreading across his face. “Or here, I’ll do it for you!”

Mo Xuanyu splashes a small handful of water into Lan Zhan’s face, not enough to disorient him, but enough to catch him off guard. He starts cackling hysterically when Lan Zhan just stares at him, feeling like a downed cat with his hair clinging to his face.

He doesn’t say anything. Instead he bends down—slowly, deliberately—then flicks both hands through the water in one clean motion, sending an icy wave crashing over Mo Xuanyu’s entire torso.

“Lan Zhan!” He gawks, blinking water from his lashes as he drifts back, stunned. “I didn’t know you had that in you— just look at your face, you smug bastard! I’m gonna get you back so good.”

Lan Zhan braces his feet in the silt, locking into position as he waits for another big splash.

Instead, Mo Xuanyu lunges at him, grabs his face, and kisses him so hard that they both fall into the water, limbs flailing, arms wrapped around each other.

When they finally surface, Mo Xuanyu has his head tilted back, laughing and breathless and glowing. Lan Zhan peppers tiny kisses all over his face, the corners of his mouth, his cheek, his temple. Like he’s trying to memorize the shape of Mo Xuanyu’s smile.

They watch the sunset through the trees together, curled up on the grass.

Lan Zhan wonders how much longer he gets to keep these moments. Before they slip through his grasping palms like the silt beneath his feet.

He doesn’t remember the last time he was ever this happy.

—————

Monsoon season rolls around, bringing bloated, swirling clouds and torrential rains. Life in the village slows to a crawl, days blur together in gray and green and the steady pattering of raindrops against the window.

The downpour keeps them indoors after work, tucked into Lan Zhan’s tiny quarters. They’ll make tea, trying a new variety every time. They’ll make out until their lips are swollen. And they’ll play cards, as the steam from the tea slowly dissipates.

Lan Zhan once suggested they play xiangqi, remembering how much he and his brother enjoyed it as kids. Mo Xuanyu hadn’t played before, said he’d always wanted to learn, but never had anyone to teach him. Lan Zhan had offered him a trial round, so he could get the rules down.

It was the first and last time Lan Zhan won a game against him.

Mo Xuanyu usually stays the night. He’ll whisper filth and sweet nothings into Lan Zhan’s flushed lips, his ears, the crook of his neck. One hand resting on his waist, the other one laced in his hair. Until there’s nothing but the warmth between their tangled, fevered bodies and the mattress.

But on weekday mornings, Lan Zhan always wakes up to an empty bed— rumpled bedsheets and bruises on his neck as the only evidence that Mo Xuanyu was ever there.

It’s part of their unspoken arrangement: to never be seen leaving the same room in the morning.

But while Mo Xuanyu still has Lan Zhan, sometimes they’ll just talk.

They’re curled up on the couch one Friday night as the wind whistles outside. Mo Xuanyu’s head rests against Lan Zhan’s shoulder. The tea between them has long gone cold.

“I’ve been thinking about next year,” Lan Zhan starts, quietly. “I have an interview at a hospital in August. For my residency.”

Mo Xuanyu’s face immediately brightens. “Aiya, Lan Zhan, why didn’t you tell me?” He turns to give him a kiss on the cheek, then lightly punches his arm. “You should be proud! Why do you look so sad, huh?”

“It’s in Beijing. If it goes through, I’ll have to relocate there.”

Xuanyu stills. “Oh?” His tone is unreadable. Lan Zhan doesn’t know what to make of it.

“That’s where the rest of my family lives,” he adds, tapping his fingers against his knee. “Haven’t been back since I lost my job. Small world.”

He falls silent after that, eyes fixed on his knee.

“So,” he says after a pause, stilling his fingers.“When were you planning on telling me that part?”

Lan Zhan shifts. “…I’m telling you now.”

He snorts. “Right, barely 3 weeks ahead of time. After a nice makeout session and two cups of tea.”

“Xuanyu.”

“I mean, you’re talking about the future, right?” He picks a piece of fluff off his jeans, before flicking it into the air. “What, am I some kind of summer fling you’re gonna leave behind?”

That couldn’t be further from the truth. “I didn’t know how to bring it up,” Lan Zhan says, helplessly. “It’s not finalized yet.”

“It was planned, though.”

“Yes, but—“

“Lan Zhan, we both knew this wasn’t gonna be forever.” He sighs. “We don’t even have a name for—” he gestures wildly, ”—whatever this is, whatever we’re doing. But whatever plans you and I were making… I thought they would be ours.”

Lan Zhan opens his mouth, but nothing comes out.

He wants to reach for Mo Xuanyu’s hand, but it’s curled too tightly into his own lap. He wants to say something reassuring, something that doesn’t feel like empty promises. But all he can think about is the way Mo Xuanyu said ours.

It was so easily given, and it could be so easily taken away.

His throat tightens.

“You could come with me.”

He hears the words only after he’s said them.

Mo Xuanyu looks up at him. “What?”

“You have your freelance IT work.”

“And?” He prompts, cautiously.

“We could move in together.”

“Lan Zhan!” He huffs out a laugh, exasperated. “Aiya, you know there’s a reason I moved away, right?” He shakes his head, a tiny smile playing on his lips. It doesn’t meet his eyes.

“Xuanyu. I want to make this work.”

“I know you do.” He leans his head back against Lan Zhan’s shoulder. “We’ll figure it out,” he says softly, sounding more like a consolation than a promise.

——————

Mo Xuanyu bursts through the door one day with a tote bag full of paper cranes and strange snacks. “Guess what day it is?”

Lan Zhan looks up from his textbook. “What day is it?”

Mo Xuanyu groans. “You’re supposed to guess!”

Lan Zhan genuinely does not have a clue. It’s way too early for the mid-autumn festival, and their one month anniversary passed a week ago. So what..?

“It’s Qixi!” Mo Xuanyu exclaims. “You didn’t even know when it was this year?”

His family has never been in the habit of acknowledging Qixi, much less celebrating it. But he remembers one summer, years ago— his mother sitting between him and his brother, telling them the story of Zhinü and Niulang. The cowherd who loved a goddess. How the Jade emperor banished them to opposite ends of the sky, how they could only meet once a year.

She never told the story again. It took Lan Zhan years to understand why.

“Anyway,” Mo Xuanyu says, dragging him back to the present. “The kids at school made a bunch of paper cranes to celebrate. I had them write little notes inside, too.” He plops down on the floor and dumps out his tote bag. “Come look, Lan Zhan!”

Lan Zhan joins him on the floor, and picks up one of the papers. “This one says, ‘I want to marry someone who makes me laugh every day.’” He raises an eyebrow. “That’s specific.”

“Hey, is that A-Bao’s paper?” Lan Zhan passes it to Mo Xuanyu. “Wow, his handwriting has really improved,” he mumbles, inspecting it. “It used to be illegible.”

“That just means you’re a good teacher,” Lan Zhan smiles.

“You think so?”

“I know so.”

He beams, before reaching for another paper crane and unfolding it dramatically. “‘I wish to eat ice cream every day for the rest of my life.’” He nods. “Solid aspiration. Oh, this one says: ‘I want a pet rabbit because they are very soft.’ Hah, Lan Zhan, is this your secret kid or something?”

“Rabbits are very soft,” he says, matter-of-factly. “There’s plenty of people that would want one.”

“Yeah, maybe for hotpot,” Mo Xuanyu snorts. “Now let’s open this next one!”

They sit like that for a while, knees brushing, sorting through these kids’ tiny, folded dreams and aspirations. They’re paper cranes of hope and longing and joy. And then—

“Hey, um…” Mo Xuanyu taps his fingers on Lan Zhan’s arm. “There’s something else I wanted to do today… if you’re not too busy. I know you have studying to do.”

Lan Zhan looks up from the note in his hand. “Tell me.”

“There’s a shrine a little ways past the river,” Mo Xuanyu says. “It’s not really a Qixi thing, but people go there to just… pray for their person. Or make a wish. I don’t know, I’ve never been.”

He hesitates, just for a second. “Do you want to come with me?”

There is very little in this world that Lan Zhan would refuse Mo Xuanyu. A Qixi date is not one of them, even if the biggest interview of his life is two weeks away.

—-----------

The sky is clear for the first time in weeks, and the village seems to have come back to life again. They walk past dim lanterns swaying throughout the street, red thread and flower petals glinting in the breeze.

The shrine is humble, half-swallowed by moss. There’s some old offerings still on the altar, flowers long dried, with the faint smell of incense permeating the inside.

Which reminds Lan Zhan— they don’t have any.

“It’s fine,” Mo Xuanyu shrugs. “I mean, it’s the thought that counts, right?” He clasps his hands together and closes his eyes. “I pray for—“

“You’re not supposed to say it out loud,” Lan Zhan blurts.

Mo Xuanyu opens one eye and raises an eyebrow. “I didn’t know you were superstitious.”

“It’s not superstition.” He frowns. “It’s for the serenity of the shrine. And you’re supposed to bring something too.”

“I brought you, right? What god wouldn’t be happy with that? Now hurry up and close your eyes.”

He goes back to praying, brows furrowed, as if he didn’t just kill and resurrect Lan Zhan’s heart with two sentences.

When they’re done bowing three times in silence, they step out of the shrine and venture back to the main village, where vendors are setting up shop, hawking snacks and fruit. They pass one auntie selling red string charms. She’s bundled up against the breeze, humming to herself as she weaves thin scarlet cords into neat little loops.

“Two yuan,” she announces. “Buy a string and your love will last!”

Mo Xuanyu stops in front of the stall, eyes flicking towards the charms. “Lan Zhan!” he whisper-shouts. “Should we get one?”

Lan Zhan opens his mouth to say yes—immediately, instinctively—but then he catches sight of a group of regulars from the clinic, standing a few stalls down. He swallows it down.

“They’re for couples,” he says carefully.

“So?"

“We’re not—”

“Right,” Mo Xuanyu cuts in, smile dimming just slightly. “Of course.” He turns to the auntie. “I’ll take one anyway! It’s good luck, right?”

She chuckles as she slips a red thread into his palm. “Remember, the string may tangle or fray, but they say it will never snap,” she says, eyes crinkling. “Give it to someone you love.”

“I will,” he promises, grinning as he pulls that silly wuxia salute, for the first time in a while. It pissed Lan Zhan off to an unreasonable extent when they first met, back when he thought Mo Xuanyu was a stuck-up, irritatingly attractive fool. Back when kissing the mole under Mo Xuanyu’s lip was nothing but an astronomically distant, horribly embarrassing fantasy.

The salute is still stupid, but endearingly so.

Mo Xuanyu haggles as they traverse every stall, and by the time they’re making their way up their usual hill, they’ve made off with two bottles of fresh juice, a bag of dried hawthorn slices, and some overripe peaches.

No alcohol for you, Lan Zhan, he had said, tapping Lan Zhan’s nose, before passing by someone selling fenjiu. He liked to do that, said the way he scrunched his nose in response was cute. I’m not carrying you on my shoulders all the way back to your room again. Do you even know how heavy you are?

The juice bottles clink in Mo Xuanyu’s tote bag as they reach the top of the hill, the sky a deep lavender as dusk settles over the tea terraces.

The hill is quiet this time of evening, and the fig tree casts long shadows as the last of the sunlight slips beyond the horizon. The grass is still damp from last week’s rain, but Mo Xuanyu drops his tote bag anyway, spreading out the crumpled checkered cloth he keeps tucked inside as usual.

He kicks off his shoes and stretches out with a dramatic groan, folding his arms behind his head. The two of them sit cross-legged in the soft grass, as Mo Xuanyu begins munching away at the bag of hawthorn slices between them.

“Lan Zhan, have something!” He chirps, offering a minimally bruised peach. “I don’t want you to just watch me eat!”

“It’s fine. I’m not hungry.”

“How?” he asks, dumbfounded. “You walked all the way here with me.”

“I already had dinner before we left.”

Mo Xuanyu stares at him. “Of course you did. You and your merciless circadian rhythm. See, I’d get it if you were still sleeping at 9 pm like your uncle’s perfect little boy,” he says, wagging a hawthorn slice in Lan Zhan’s face, “but I don’t know why you even bother when I haven’t let you do that in, what, a month?”

Lan Zhan’s ears burn. “Just eat your food,” he clenches out.

“Fine,” Mo Xuanyu snickers, popping another slice into his mouth. “But you should at least drink something. Here, have the orange juice. It’s good for memory, you know.”

As he passes the bottle to him, Lan Zhan notices the charm still on Mo Xuanyu’s hand, dangling loosely from his fingers in a sloppy crimson knot.

Without thinking, he reaches out, opening his palm. “Give it to me.”

Mo Xuanyu blinks. “Give you what? I just handed you the juice.”

“The thread.”

“Oh.” He untangles it from his fingers and gingerly places it into Lan Zhan’s hands, storm-gray eyes studying his face. And Lan Zhan, silent and focused, begins to tie it gently around Mo Xuanyu’s wrist. One knot, and then another, unshaking and precise. In some distant part of his mind, he thinks about the way brides once wore red silk tied around their waists. The way it meant a promise. The way it bound someone to you, even when no one else was watching.

He doesn’t know why he’s suddenly reminded of it.

“You know,” Mo Xuanyu whispers, eyes shining. “You’re not supposed to do that unless you mean it. You’re the superstitious one, right?”

“I’m not superstitious,” Lan Zhan sighs, brushing his thumb over the inside of Mo Xuanyu’s wrist. “But… I do mean it.”

Mo Xuanyu’s mouth tilts up into a watery smile. “Fine,” he manages, glancing at the charm on his wrist gleaming in the twilight. “Then if you’re not superstitious, tell me what you wished for at the shrine.”

Lan Zhan gazes at him, gold eyes meeting silver. “I didn’t wish for anything.”

“What?” he gapes. “You mean I dragged you out there for nothing?”

“No. It’s Qixi. Everyone wishes for something they don’t have.” Lan Zhan gives him a sideways smile. “Why would I do that, when everything I have ever wanted is sitting in front of me?”

A bright pink flush makes its way up Mo Xuanyu’s neck, blooming across his ears before spilling over his cheeks like hawthorn wine. His lips are parted ever so slightly, eyes impossibly wide.

“Lan Zhan,” he mutters, breathless. “You’re so… god, you’re so…”

He doesn't finish. He just leans in fast, eyes firmly shut, fingers curling into Lan Zhan’s hair. He kisses him like he’s trying to imprint the memory of his lips on Lan Zhan’s own– it’s hot and fast and messy and everything.

After what might have been five minutes, might have been five days, he finally pulls back, hands still warm around Lan Zhan’s neck. His voice is barely a whisper. “You can’t just say things like that without giving me a warning.”

“I just thought you should know.” Lan Zhan whispers back.

“Oh yeah?” he swallows. “Well, I think there’s something you should know too.”

“And what’s that?”

“I love you.”

Chapter Text

Looking at Dr. Lan now— tight-lipped, purple bruises blooming under his hollow eyes— Wei Ying finds it hard to imagine him ever being that happy.

But Wei Ying also can’t imagine what it would be like to have that kind of joy ripped from you.

“That’s enough for today,” Dr. Lan says, rising with practiced finality. He picks up the dinosaur backpack from the floor and hoists it over one shoulder. “Time to go home, A-Yuan.”

But when his father reaches for him, A-Yuan shrinks back, clutching onto Wei Ying’s arm instead. He looks guilty enough, staring up at his father, but his grip is still tight. “Baba,” he whines. “I want to hear more of the story! Like when… when did you meet me?”

Dr. Lan’s jaw tightens ever so slightly. He exhales through his nose, slow and hard, as his outstretched hand curls back into his lap. “No. It’s late.”

“I don’t have school tomorrow!”

“Doesn’t matter. You haven’t eaten yet.”

“But—“

“No.” His voice drops to a whisper. “Please.”

And that plea is what undoes A-Yuan. He loosens his grip on Wei Ying’s arm. But the look he throws over his shoulder as Dr. Lan picks him up is aching, heartbreak written all over his face as he gazes back at Wei Ying.

And something stirs in him, gnawing at him from the pit of his stomach. Wei Ying can’t stand seeing the kid like this, tears brimming in his eyes as he’s taken out of his arms.

Before he realizes what he’s doing, he leans forward and pulls the kid back towards him.

“You can’t leave,” he says to Dr. Lan, breath catching.

Dr. Lan’s gaze snaps to Wei Ying, pale eyes glinting like ice.

It’s scary as hell, but deep down, he knows he deserves the reaction. He’s already forced Lan Zhan to pick at a wound that probably never even got the chance to scar. And for what? His own morbid curiosity? He doesn’t even know this man. What right does he have to demand any more from him than what he’s already given?

And yet—

“You told A-Yuan that his A-die is the one who wanted to adopt him,” Wei Ying says, voice firm but low, with a conviction he didn’t know he had. “How much did he love the kid, to want to take him in at, what, twenty-five?”

“Stop.” Dr. Lan says, equally unyielding. “This is between me and my son. Not you.”

“So?” Wei Ying gets up from the couch, sharp and sudden. “He deserves to know.” The words that follow spill out of him, and he’s not even sure where they’re coming from. “Did his A-die hold his hands when he took his first steps? Kiss his bruises when he tumbled down? Did—did he ever fall asleep with A-Yuan on his chest? He—“

“I said stop.” He barely raises his voice, but it cuts through the room like shattered glass.

Wei Ying flinches, and so does A-Yuan. The room is frozen for one horrible moment. He lets go— of A-Yuan, of the heat in his chest, of whatever wild impulse made him stand up in the first place.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, but he’s not sure if he’s apologizing to A-Yuan or Dr. Lan. “I didn’t mean to make you upset. You should eat first.”

A-Yuan looks between them, confused, eyes shiny.

And Lan Zhan, still taut, breathes in once. Then again. His jaw relaxes just a fraction.

“Eat first,” he says to his son, voice rasping like it’s fighting its way out of him. “Then… we’ll see.”

A-Yuan blinks, and slides off Wei Ying’s lap. He and his father walk toward the kitchen like it’s a truce.

And Wei Ying follows after them, stunned.

He doesn’t know what that exchange was. He doesn’t know why his throat aches. He just knows he’s staying.

They eat in silence, save for A-Yuan’s occasional slurping and the soft clink of chopsticks against ceramic. Wei Ying can’t bring himself to look at Lan Zhan again—not after what he said, not after what almost broke out of him.

But once his plate is clean, A-Yuan looks up with those wide, unblinking brown eyes.

“Baba,” he says quietly. “You said you’d keep going.”

Dr. Lan’s hands are curled around a teacup. For a long moment, it seems like he won’t answer.

But when he he finally whispers "okay," A-Yuan beams and scrambles into the spot between them on the couch, somehow filled with unwavering childlike joy all over again.

Dr. Lan exhales, thumb tracing the rim of his cup before he sets it down. It’s filled with green tea. Wei Ying didn’t have anything else.

“We moved to Beijing in early October,” he begins, gaze distant. “The interview went well. I had six months before residency started.”

His voice rolls on, soft but clear.

“We weren’t sure how to live together, at first. Neither of us had ever been in a live-in relationship before. He unpacked all the boxes in a day, whined about it, and then asked me to massage his arms the entire night. He color-coded the spice rack. He installed curtains before we even bought a dining table. And we—”

A faint smile ghosts across his lips, like it hurts to be there.

“You got your A-Die’s story, A-Yuan.” Dr. Lan exhales. “Now, will you listen to your baba’s story?”

———

The apartment smells like scallion oil and steamed rice when Lan Zhan opens the door, and from the living room, Mo Xuanyu calls out—“You’re late, but I saved you the crispy bits!”

He turns the corner to find Mo Xuanyu tucked into the couch, wearing Lan Zhan’s old navy ZJU hoodie. It’s slightly oversized on him, but not nearly big enough to swallow him whole. His laptop is open in front of him on the coffee table, some kind of code running in the background. When he notices Lan Zhan enter, he waves at him, eyes crinkling, a mouthful of food puffing out his cheeks.

A grain of rice sticks to his bottom lip, before it falls off and lands on the hoodie.

God, Lan Zhan loves this man.

“Whoops!” He picks up the rice and drops it right back into his bowl. “Don’t want to get my favorite hoodie messy.”

Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow. “Your hoodie.”

“Yup. My hoodie.” Mo Xuanyu snickers. “But really, it’s crazy that you even went here. And now you’re gonna be at Xiehe for neurosurgery!” He reaches up and pinches Lan Zhan’s cheek. “Aiya, so smart, my Lan Zhan!”

Lan Zhan gives him a tiny smile. “Says the one who went to Tsinghua. For computer science.”

“Yeah, and look what good it did me.” He snorts, gesturing to himself dramatically. “Sitting on the couch with scallion rice on my boyfriend’s hoodie while— hey, why are you looking at me like that?”

Lan Zhan blinks. “You said boyfriend.”

Mo Xuanyu squints at him. “And?”

“You’ve never called me that before.”

“Lan Zhan!” he gapes. “We’ve been together for five months! Don’t tell me I’ve never called you that!”

He shakes his head.

“Really? Well, if you don’t like it, there are always other options.” He taps his chin in mock contemplation. “Like stinky baby, or maybe little piglet? Ooh, how about gege, huh? Oh, you like that one, don’t you? Look at how red your ears are!”

“You’re older than me,” Lan Zhan grits out.

“Only by three months! Now come sit by me, gege. Or would it be er-gege? Don’t you have an older brother?”

“I need to get my dinner,” Lan Zhan announces, turning back towards the kitchen.

“Yeah, and come back once you do,” Mo Xuanyu calls behind Lan Zhan. “These new curtains aren’t going to hang themselves!”

Lan Zhan gets his bowl, but the moment he sits down, Xuanyu’s already calling for backup. Hanging curtains is a two-person job, apparently. He insists on using their rickety old stepstool to attach the curtain rod, before Lan Zhan smacks the back of his head and reminds him of his track record.

“So what?” he shrugs. “I survived, right? And this one is barely three feet high!”

Lan Zhan smacks him again.

So they switch it out for a bar chair with dubious structural integrity, but it definitely beats the step stool. It gives Mo Xuanyu the boost he needs to reach the top of the floor to ceiling windows. He’d loved them from the moment they toured the apartment back in September, and it was the reason he begged Lan Zhan to consider the place.
The apartment itself is nice— not nearly as elegant as Lan Zhan’s childhood home, but there’s still plenty of space for the two of them.

And that’s all they need, really.

Mo Xuanyu mutters to himself as he readjusts the curtain rod, and Lan Zhan catches stupid design, why did we buy this, and occasional yelps of “Oh!” before he messes with it again.

“Maybe you would have better luck if the instruction manual wasn’t currently under your bowl of rice,” Lan Zhan points out.

“I don’t want to read all that,” he grumbles, readjusting the length of the curtain rod before he suddenly hears a quick click. He looks down at Lan Zhan with the most self-effacing expression possible. “See! I didn’t need it anyway. Now gimme.” He makes little grabby hands at Lan Zhan, who sighs and rolls his eyes.

He reaches up and passes the swaying curtains to Mo Xuanyu, who hooks them over the rod, one after another.

“You know, if I fall… I’m blaming you," he says, grinning down at Lan Zhan as he scoots each attached hook along the curtain rod.

Lan Zhan is currently anchoring the chair with his entire body weight. What more could Mo Xuanyu possibly need?

“Why would you blame me?”

“For distracting me, obviously.”

“…how?”

“Because you’re so pretty,” Mo Xuanyu says, winking. “Can’t keep my eyes where they’re supposed to be.”

“Mn,” Lan Zhan responds noncommittally, but the slight twitch of his lips gives him away.

“Wow. I can’t believe that stupid pick up line actually worked. Not my best work.” He reaches down and pats Lan Zhan’s head. “Ugh, I’m so glad you smiled. You looked so tired when you got home today.”

He crouches down, still balancing on the chair, and cups Lan Zhan’s jaw with both hands.

“Come here,” he whispers, voice suddenly soft.

And Lan Zhan goes.

His hands lift instinctively, one settling at Xuanyu’s waist, the other sliding behind his neck, fingers threading into his hair. It still smells like aromatic scallion oil.

Their mouths meet in a kiss that’s warm and languid, unhurried. The curtain brushes against Lan Zhan’s arm as it sways gently behind them, forgotten.

Mo Xuanyu tilts his head, deepening the kiss just slightly. When they finally part, his forehead rests against Lan Zhan’s.

“You don’t mind that I accidentally put the curtains on backwards?” he murmurs, grinning against Lan Zhan’s mouth.

“I didn’t even notice,” Lan Zhan whispers back.“You distracted me.”

Mo Xuanyu giggles and taps his nose at that. “You’re so funny, Lan Zhan. Has anyone ever told you that?”

For some strange, possibly incomprehensible reason, “funny” isn’t a word that people often use to describe him. He hadn’t realized he could be, or that he even wanted to be, until Mo Xuanyu. If Mo Xuanyu were the only person on earth to think of him that way, it would be more than alright. Another part of Lan Zhan, unearthed just for him.

When he finally tears himself away from his soft gaze, Lan Zhan demotes him from curtain hanger to chair holder, which Mo Xuanyu grumbles about.

But they admire their handiwork together, when they finish. The curtains are a soft powder white, swaying like gossamer under the breeze of the ceiling fan. Sure, the rod is a little crooked on the left, but the sunset glimmers through the curtains anyway, bathing the entire room in soft orange and red.

They’re just curtains, but in that moment, Lan Zhan imagines dancing in the living room every evening as the sky lights up like this. Dinners, and old movies. A quiet kind of forever.

He can imagine a life here.

He lets himself imagine their life here.

———

Lan Zhan finds out about Mo Xuanyu’s birthday through an event labeled “Release Date” on their shared calendar.

“I was a c-section baby,” he snickers, after being confronted about what on earth that label was supposed to mean.

Lan Zhan pinches his nose. On-brand, dumb joke aside, November 6th is in barely a month. Neither of them have anything planned, and Mo Xuanyu is turning twenty-five. It’s a milestone birthday. It’s when the prefrontal cortex is supposed to be fully developed… for most people. Mo Xuanyu has the attention span of a toddler and non-existent self-preservation instincts. Being a prodigy only gets you so far, apparently.

Lan Zhan also has no idea how to go about planning a birthday, given his embarrassing lack of experience. Having one “friend” (his brother) growing up meant going to exactly one party a year, which was usually in his own house. And he barely acknowledges his own birthdays, since his definition of a “celebration” the past few years has been taking a break from studying for one night.

And for the past week, Mo Xuanyu has been flooding him with Don’t make it a big deal, it’s really fine, and Aiyo, Lan Zhan, you have so much to do already!

But he is having none of it. This is something he wants to do for Mo Xuanyu. And clearly, Mo Xuanyu wants it too, no matter how much he pretends otherwise.

But when Lan Zhan finally musters up the courage to ask him about a dinner cruise that he’s been looking into, Mo Xuanyu just gives him an exasperated smile and pats his cheek.

“You don’t have to do anything fancy for me,” he chuckles, softly. “I mean, my idea of a good time is just going out with friends and getting blackout drunk at the bar. That’s literally your worst nightmare. So it’s fine— really!”

“I want to do something,” Lan Zhan tells him, helplessly.

“How about we just spend the day together, instead?” He offers. “It’s gonna be so cold outside anyway. We can cook, maybe, or we can pick something up from that restaurant I was talking about. And then we can watch a movie! And after that… maybe you can give me a really special—“

“Fine! But only after your birthday.”

Mo Xuanyu tilts his head. “Why?”

“My brother will be here. He booked his ticket back in August.”

“I mean… it’s fine?” he shrugs. “We can do something with him too.”

“That would be awkward. For you. And him.”

“Wait. Does he… know about me?” Mo Xuanyu’s face twitches, just slightly. “About us?”

Lan Zhan winces. “Not yet.”

“Oh. That— that’s fine.” Mo Xuanyu exhales, before plastering the smile from before back onto his face. “But whatever I just told you, let’s stick to it, okay?” He leans in and pecks Lan Zhan’s cheek before turning back to his laptop.

He hums like nothing’s wrong— an off-key little tune as he looks back at the code on his screen.

But his fingers are still, frozen above the keyboard.

———

Lan Huan arrives two weeks later, with a warm smile and a bag of snow lotus root in hand—Lan Zhan’s favorite hometown delicacy.

He’s here in Beijing for a one-day national healthcare conference, but decided to stay an extra day just to “catch up.” Mo Xuanyu is meeting his siblings for lunch today, so they have the apartment to themselves. Lan Zhan and his brother sit in the living room, a pot of steaming Pu’er tea between them.

“So, A-Zhan,” Lan Huan begins, swirling the tea in his cup, “Congrats on the Xiehe residency! Shushu is very proud, even if he won’t tell you directly. How are your preparations going?”

“Thank you, Ge. Paperwork is done. I’ve been studying otherwise.”

“Good, good.” He glances around the apartment, gaze lingering on the line of potted plants arranged by the window. “By the way, A-Zhan, I love what you’ve done with the place. It’s so cozy. Nothing like our Gusu home.” A sideways smile tugs at the corner of his mouth. “I’m pleasantly surprised— I didn’t think you had time for interior design.”

“I… have a roommate,” Lan Zhan says, telling himself that it doesn’t count as lying since it’s a half truth. “He insisted on decorating.”

“Oh?” His smile is still warm, but there’s a flicker of curiosity behind it now. “You never told me. I would love to meet him.”

For all of his good qualities, Lan Zhan had forgotten how nosy his older brother was. “He isn’t home right now.”

“That’s a shame.” He takes another sip. “But I would love to see what else he’s done with the place. Clearly he’s a good influence on you—“

“No!” Lan Zhan blurts. It comes out much, much louder than intended. Lan Huan visibly flinches, concern written all over his face.

“Why?”

Lan Zhan is not about to tell his brother that he lives in a one bedroom apartment. It’s messy is the only excuse he can manage.

His brother’s eyebrows threaten to meet his hairline. “Messy? You? A-Zhan, you used to complain to Shushu if I had one shirt on the bed.”

He tries to keep his face as still as possible. “I haven’t had time to clean yet.”

Lan Huan presses his lips together. “Fine. But… you know you don’t have to hide anything from me, right?”

Lan Zhan busies himself trying to refill his cup. “Everything is all right. I’m just busy.”

His brother doesn’t buy it. Lan Zhan can tell. Lan Huan has always been able to see through him, ever since they were kids— always translating his silence, always noticing every twitch of his lips, every tremble of his hands. Deep down, Lan Zhan knows that his brother would never disapprove of what he has with Mo Xuanyu. He would be happy for him, if anything— and that’s why he feels guilty about lying to his face.

But Lan Zhan isn’t just “seeing someone.” He doesn’t even know how to explain what Mo Xuanyu is to him. All he knows is that he’s the first thing he’s had that feels entirely his, in a life of unspoken, open secrets. He’s not ready to share it— not even with his brother.

“Okay.” Lan Huan says softly. “You don’t have to tell me everything, but I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

“I’m fine,” Lan Zhan says, truthfully. He’s happier than he’s ever been. “Really. You don’t have to worry.”

His brother gives him a tiny smile before opening his phone, probably to catch up on any outstanding emails. Lan Zhan does the same, fingers instinctively opening his chat with Mo Xuanyu.

There are three new messages:

1:17 PM: What does your brother like to drink I’m bringing alcohol

1:18 PM: Waitwait never mind I don’t want to kill him

1:18 PM: Ok I’m bringing aiwowo instead 👍 can’t wait to meet him!

You’re done already? Lan Zhan texts back.

Yeah, comes the instant reply. My brother had to go home to his very pregnant wife

Lan Zhan: Are you on your way back?

Mo Xuanyu: Yup! Wait don’t tell me your brother left

Lan Zhan: No, he’s still here. He wanted to meet you.

Mo Xuanyu:: Oh good!

And then, after a pause, the dreaded question appears on Lan Zhan’s screen.

Mo Xuanyu: He knows that we’re dating right

Mo Xuanyu: Right?

Mo Xuanyu: Lan Zhan

Mo Xuanyu: What happened

Mo Xuanyu: Hey it’s fine if you didn’t tell him okay? At least respond? I can see you’re reading these

Lan Zhan turns the phone off. It’s fine. He’ll just explain later. When he knows how to.

But he does not get the grace time he hoped for, because as soon as he reaches for his cup of tea on the coffee table, the front door clicks open.

It’s Mo Xuanyu, somehow cheerful as ever, carrying a box of Aiwowo as he enters the living room. He sets it down on the coffee table and extends a hand to Lan Huan, who stands up and reciprocates the handshake.

“You must be Lan Huan,” he chirps, flashing his brightest grin. “It’s nice to meet you. And wow, you guys look so alike! How are you enjoying Beijing?”

The smile is forced. Lan Zhan can see it in the too-tight line of his lips.

“Beijing is wonderful so far,” Lan Huan says. “It’s unfortunate that I have to leave so soon. And it’s nice to meet you too– I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

“It’s Mo Xuanyu,” he responds, barely missing a beat. But Lan Zhan doesn’t miss the way his nails dig into his left palm. “I’ve heard so much about you! It’s a shame that it wasn’t mutual.”

Lan Zhan blinks. Did he just–?

“But please, you can sit, Huan-ge!” Mo Xuanyu takes a seat on the armchair across from the couch. “Help yourself to some Aiwowo.”

“Thank you.” Lan Huan picks one up, and takes a bite. His eyes widen in delight. “It’s delicious.”

“I’m glad! I made sure to get the freshest batch.”

“I can see that.” He swallows, before asking Mo Xuanyu what he does for a living.

“Oh, I graduated from Tsinghua a couple years ago.” He reclines back against the armchair, and nibbles at his own Aiwowo. “Right now I’m freelance— I work in cybersecurity. Money is pretty good.”

“That sounds very cool. But I also hear that you’re responsible for making this apartment actually look like a home and not a soulless set of four walls.”

“Oh! I’m no designer. But I figured that if we’re going to be here for the foreseeable future, might as well make it livable. And you know how Lan Zhan is— so busy, so hardworking. It’s not like he has time for this kind of stuff.”

And the two of them talk like they’ve known each other for years— about Beijing traffic, about Gusu winters, about Lan Zhan’s not-so-secret affinity for bunnies. Mo Xuanyu smiles through it all, while Lan Zhan sits frozen between them, barely processing anything.

He doesn’t speak for the rest of the visit. Not because he has nothing to say, but because every word feels like a door that’s too heavy to open. And he watches as Mo Xuanyu plays the gracious host until Lan Huan leaves, right down to offering him the rest of the Aiwowo for the road.

He doesn’t say a single word to Lan Zhan until the door clicks shut. The easy smile dissolves off his face like steam off a cooling teacup as he turns back around.

“Xuanyu—”

“Lan Zhan,” he sighs. “Just… it’s whatever.”

“No. I want to explain.”

“Explain what, Lan Zhan?” He hasn’t moved an inch from the door. “Why the closest person in your life didn’t know I existed until three hours ago?”

He doesn’t raise his voice. Lan Zhan almost wishes he did, because he’s not even angry. He just sounds tired. Resigned.

And Lan Zhan hates it. Hates that he did this. Hates that he let Mo Xuanyu feel this way.

And most of all, he hates that he knows what he wants to say, but doesn’t know how to say it.

“It’s been five months,” Mo Xuanyu says. “I know you guys call.”

“I’m sorry,” Lan Zhan flounders, “I wasn’t ready—“

“It’s not like I asked you to out yourself, Lan Zhan.” His voice doesn’t crack. But his knuckles do, faint and sharp as he clenches the doorknob tighter. He stares at the ground. “You could have mentioned me as your friend. Your roommate. Someone who meant something to you.” He looks at Lan Zhan again, eyes like charred coal. “Not an afterthought.”

Lan Zhan wants to reach for Mo Xuanyu.

Instead, he lets him walk away, back to their bedroom, at four in the afternoon.

This is no one’s fault but Lan Zhan’s own. He is all too aware of this.

———

But at seven, he finds himself knocking on the bedroom door.

It’s still Mo Xuanyu’s birthday, and the kiss he gave him this morning isn’t going to cut it. He deserves an apology, a gift, a nice movie, maybe some really special—

“What do you want, Lan Zhan.”

It’s a statement, not even a question. Mo Xuanyu is leaning against the doorframe, earbuds hanging from one ear, one hand on the door knob.

He looks infuriatingly good like this—hoodie rumpled, hair mussed—and Lan Zhan hates himself for noticing it now.

But that’s besides the point. He takes a deep breath. “I wanted to do something with you. It’s not that late yet.”

Mo Xuanyu’s eyes visibly soften. “Fine. But can you give me five minutes to finish this up?”

“Of course.”

———

After three failed attempts at making Dou Fu Nao in their kitchen, they find themselves back on the couch, boxes of takeout laid out on the coffee table like some kind of emperor’s feast.

“We could have salvaged that tofu,” Mo Xuanyu grumbles as he munches away at some noodles.

“Tofu should stay tofu. Not turn into coal.”

“Well, what if I like it a little crispy, huh?”

Lan Zhan nibbles at the steamed bao. “Then you can die of food poisoning yourself.”

“Hah! You wouldn’t last a day without me.”

Lan Zhan doesn’t answer. He just smiles, the kind that means ‘unfortunately, yes.’

Mo Xuanyu slurps down the last of his noodles and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “This is the part where you tell me I’m gross.”

“You are,” Lan Zhan says, without looking up. He reaches for another bao. “You left a drop on your chin.”

Mo Xuanyu snorts, and wipes it off. “Not everyone can be as graceful as you, Lan Zhan.”

“That’s why it takes me twice the time to finish my food.”

“Fair.”

They fall into a rhythm again, quiet clinks of chopsticks and the low hum of the heater filling the silence. Outside, the wind howls against the windows, rattling ever so slightly.

Mo Xuanyu’s legs stretch out on the couch and slide under Lan Zhan’s knees. His limbs are always cold, and even if they’re snuggled under the blanket they dragged from the bedroom earlier, Lan Zhan doesn’t mind giving Mo
Xuanyu an extra layer of warmth.

“So…” he says, voice light, “Is this the part where I get my birthday present?”

Lan Zhan reaches under the couch cushion and pulls out a small package. It’s wrapped with precision—folded corners, not a single wrinkle.

“Open it.”

Mo Xuanyu does, with a surprising level of care— tearing through the paper until he lifts the contents out: a bottle of translucent amber liquid, sealed with red ribbon and a familiar Gusu label.

“…Is this—” His eyes widen. “No way. Gusu Emperor’s Smile? You hate this stuff.”

“I don’t hate it. Just never tried it. But you’re always talking about it.”

Mo Xuanyu holds the bottle with a level of awe usually reserved for ancient artifacts. “How did you even—”

“My brother. He… had a lot of questions.”

Mo Xuanyu’s laugh starts out quiet, as it always does, and then it just bursts forth, loud and bright, and the unbearably fond grin splitting his face is blinding.

Lan Zhan doesn’t think he needs Emperor’s Smile to get drunk—not when Mo Xuanyu’s head is on his shoulder, wheezing as he wipes away a tear.

“Oh, Lan Zhan,” he manages. “Did he think his beloved baby brother was becoming an alcoholic? Oh, man, this thing is like seventy percent!”

“I had no idea.”

“Well, now you do,” he smirks, elbowing him. “Do you wanna try it with me?”

And Lan Zhan must look panicked enough, because Xuanyu immediately backtracks, hands up in retreat. “I was just kidding! I’ll grab a shot glass, and you stay here, okay?”

He extricates himself out of their crisscrossed legs and returns five minutes later with a tea cup in hand.

“Why didn’t you tell me we don’t have shot glasses?” he whines. “This is so embarrassing.”

“You’ll live.” Lan Zhan reassures him, opening the bottle. “Now try it.”

Mo Xuanyu grumbles as he pours the Emperor’s Smile into the cup, but when he takes a sip, his eyes widen in delight. “Lan Zhan,” he exclaims, “It’s even better than I thought! It’s mild but rich, fragrant but mellow, and gentle, but not chilly.”

Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow. “You sound like you’re describing a person. Are you drunk already?”

“Obviously not,” Mo Xuanyu huffs. “It’s just that good. Reminds me of something else I love. Like…”

“I have something else for you.”

Mo Xuanyu freezes. “More?”

Before he can regret his decision, Lan Zhan pulls a smaller box from his shirt pocket. It’s plain, and matte black. It clicks when opened, revealing two delicate jade pendants on thin chains—simple, smooth, identical.

One for each of them.

“…Lan Zhan?”

“You don’t have to wear them,” Lan Zhan says, quickly. “That’s not what I meant. I just—thought we could keep them. Close. If you wanted.”

Mo Xuanyu doesn’t say anything. He lifts one of the chains, watching it dangle from his fingers. The jade spins in the air, catching the light.

He places it gingerly back on the coffee table, and for one horrible moment, Lan Zhan thinks it’s a rejection. Confirmation that this was a stupid idea, that he’s moving too fast, that he should have never—

But then Mo Xuanyu leans over and kisses him, hard and sudden and so, so sweet. It’s not their usual kind of kiss—not teasing, not lazy. It’s the kind you give someone when your chest is too full to speak. It’s the kind that tastes like hope and want and Emperor’s smile.

They pull apart only when the room gets too quiet again.

Mo Xuanyu picks up the jade pendant from the coffee table.“I didn’t want it to get crushed.”

“Don’t scare me like that again,” Lan Zhan huffs. “I thought you hated it.”

“Don’t be silly, Lan Zhan. How could I hate something that came from you?”

“But about earlier?”

He sighs with a faint smile, and pats Lan Zhan’s cheek. “You’re trying. I know that. And this—“ he glances at the pendant— “means so, so much.” He hooks the chain around his neck, letting the pendant fall just under his collarbone, and he presses his lips to the cool jade.

It’s like sunflowers have blossomed in Lan Zhan’s chest.

“You’re everything,” he breathes.

Mo Xuanyu snorts. “Say that again, but after I’ve had two shots. No, wait. Three. And after I’ve forced you to watch Crazy Stone with me.”

Lan Zhan reaches for the bottle.

“Deal.”

Chapter Text

In his years as a medical student, Lan Zhan has experienced his fair share of surprises. Patients seizing up mid sentence. Waking up during a surgery because the anesthesiologist screwed up. Projectile vomiting onto his freshly ironed shirt.

But this?

There is a baby on his kitchen counter. There is a glob of congee in Mo Xuanyu’s hair. Neither of these things should be where they are.

“Oh, hi, Lan Zhan!” he chirps, entirely too casual. The congee drips onto his forehead. “I didn’t see you there. How was your studying?”

“What.”

“How was your studying?” he repeats, louder. Like that was the problem.

“Whose child is that?”

“Oh! This is A-Yuan,” he says, introducing him like he’s a coworker and not a toddler eating undercooked starch. “He’s a friend’s nephew. Usually I watch him at his place. Don’t worry, he won’t be here for— do NOT shove that in your mouth!”

Mo Xuanyu yanks the baby feeding spoon out of A-Yuan’s throat, before giving him a tiny smack on the head like some kind of auntie in training.

“That’s very bad for you,” he admonishes, wagging a finger at A-Yuan who is entirely unbothered. In fact, he’s already eying his next victim— a tantalizing lock of Mo Xuanyu’s hair.

“Give him some of the leftover rice in the fridge.”

Mo Xuanyu’s head snaps towards Lan Zhan. “Why? He can’t—“

“How old is he?”

“14 months? But what does that have to do with—“

That’s what Lan Zhan thought, even though the kid’s small for his age. “He can eat solid food. You should diversify his palate.”

“Okay, doctor.” Mo Xuanyu’s eyebrows skyrocket up his forehead, but he walks over to the fridge anyway. “Didn’t know you dabbled in pediatrics.”

He opens the fridge, muttering under his breath. “I should’ve known you’d have opinions about baby nutrition. What’s next? Lecture on infant gut flora?”

Lan Zhan ignores him, stepping fully into the kitchen like he’s entering an operating theater. If he’s not going to get any answers, the least he can do is help. He walks over to A-Yuan, who is now using the baby spoon to drum against the marble counter with great enthusiasm.

“Stop that,” Lan Zhan says.

A-Yuan does not stop that.

Mo Xuanyu glances over his shoulder. “He’s got your stubbornness. Now you know how it feels.”

“I’m not stubborn.”

“Sure.” Mo Xuanyu pulls out the rice container and plops a scoop into a bowl next to A-Yuan. “Should I season it, or are you afraid that’ll disrupt his palate development?”

“You already put soy sauce in the congee.”

“He liked it! So much so that he tried to eat the spoon, remember?”

“He was teething.”

“No, he was appreciating my culinary efforts!”

“He is one year old.”

They both fall silent as A-Yuan lets out a squeal of joy, flings the spoon across the kitchen like a javelin, and smears a fistful of rice into the countertop.

Lan Zhan closes his eyes. “Why is he on the counter anyway?”

Mo Xuanyu raises an eyebrow. “Would you rather have him on the couch?” He picks up the spoon, now twenty feet away, and drops it in the sink. Lan Zhan passes him a new one from the drawer.

“Here comes the airplane,” Mo Xuanyu singsongs, guiding the new spoon toward A-Yuan’s mouth.

But this time, A-Yuan goes for the bowl. It clatters to the floor, rice and soy sauce staining the tile. Then he claps, delighted with himself.

“Lan Zhan,” Mo Xuanyu deadpans. “Your child has no respect for me.”

“He is not my child.”

Mo Xuanyu snickers. “Then why does he have your nose?”

Lan Zhan stares at A-Yuan. Round. Wide nostrils. Flat bridge.

Damn it. Mo Xuanyu is right.

“See! Now come here and hold your not-child while I mop this up.”

Lan Zhan has never held a child.

He doesn’t know if he even wants to.

“He can sit upright,” he tries. “He’s old enough.”

Mo Xuanyu huffs out an exasperated laugh, and passes A-Yuan into Lan Zhan’s arms anyway.

“Stop being a doctor for a bit,” he whispers, “and hold the damn baby."

So Lan Zhan does.

A-Yuan is light, warm, and inexplicably sticky. He smells faintly like laundry detergent and soy sauce. He wiggles until he’s upright against Lan Zhan’s chest, pudgy fingers gripping the wool of Lan Zhan’s sweater. He babbles, innocent and pleased— until he looks up and sees Lan Zhan’s face.

His face contorts first, twisting as his cheeks become blotchy red and his eyes fill with fat tears. His lips wobble, at first, and then his jaw unhinges like some kind of venomous snake.

He launches into an ear splitting wail.

Mo Xuanyu looks up from scrubbing the food off the floor, and explodes into a fit of cackles.

“Oh my god, Lan Zhan! What did you do?”

Lan Zhan is truly at a loss for words, frozen as A-Yuan continues his tirade, screaming like he’s in possession of an opera singer’s seasoned lungs. “I don’t—“

Mo Xuanyu— still giggling— rises and scoops him out of Lan Zhan’s arms. He bounces A-Yuan up and down, placating him with “Aiyo… did that gege scare you? Huh? Did he scare you with his mean face? I’ll scold him, okay?“ He slaps Lan Zhan’s arm with significantly more force than necessary. “See, now he won’t scare A-Yuan anymore! Shhh… no more crying, A-Yuan. Shhh…”

Mo Xuanyu’s a natural, apparently, because it works somehow. A-Yuan’s sobs quiet into hiccups, and he buries his face into Mo Xuanyu’s hoodie. He throws Lan Zhan a helpless smile. “All the kid wanted was revenge, apparently.”

Lan Zhan wonders how long Mo Xuanyu has known A-Yuan, to be able to comfort him that easily.

“Why did he cry?”

“See, Lan Zhan— you are very pretty. Everyone knows that.” He gestures at Lan Zhan’s face with his free hand. “Eyes like molten honey, perfect jawline, features that could get you a modeling career if you weren’t so studious. But the baby can’t tell all that. All he can see is your terrifying resting bitch face."

“Oh.” Lan Zhan didn’t think it was bad enough to make a child cry.

“You know what? Here.” Mo Xuanyu passes A-Yuan back to Lan Zhan. “Try holding him again— and I don’t know, maybe smile at him this time?”

Lan Zhan looks down. Turns out he doesn’t have to. A-Yuan’s eyes are already closed. His breathing is measured, tiny breaths in and out. He’s even drooling slightly onto Lan Zhan’s sweater, dark spots blooming on the fabric.

He shouldn’t hate it. A-Yuan is content in his arms, all previous misgivings apparently forgiven.

So why does he feel unease creeping up on him when he lifts a hand to caress A-Yuan’s downy hair? Why does it feel like rivulets of ice cold water trailing down his neck?

It’s not because the baby is unpleasant— he isn’t, now that he’s not shrieking. He’s soft. Warm. But the image of it, the reality of it— it terrifies Lan Zhan.

He shifts his weight, gently adjusting A-Yuan’s head. Mo Xuanyu looks up and sees the expression on his face.

He sobers instantly.

“Hey,” he says quietly. “It’s just for the afternoon. You don’t have to… freak out or anything.”

“I’m not—”

“I know.” Mo Xuanyu sets down the dishcloth, moving slowly toward them. “But why do you look scared?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t answer.

Mo Xuanyu places a light hand on A-Yuan’s back. “I mean, I do want kids someday,” he says, so softly it’s barely audible. “And I know you do too. But not now, I promise. I just… he needed somewhere to go. And I had a free day. That’s all.”

He leans in, pressing a quick kiss to Lan Zhan’s cheek.

“You can breathe, you know.”

Lan Zhan exhales, slowly.

And A-Yuan, with diabolical timing, chooses that moment to spit up directly onto Lan Zhan’s chest.

There is a moment of absolute silence as he looks down at the traitorous baby tucked against him. Eyes still closed, still drooling, residual soy sauce staining his chubby cheeks.

Mo Xuanyu beams. “He likes you.”

Lan Zhan sighs, long-suffering. “Just help me clean this up.”

———

Someone comes to pick A-Yuan up later that night. Mo Xuanyu slips out of bed, as quietly as possible, taking the baby carrier with him. Lan Zhan hears hushed whispers at the doorstep, and then Mo Xuanyu’s footsteps back towards the bedroom.

When he lies back down under the covers, he just sighs, staring up at the ceiling. Usually he makes a beeline for the crook of Lan Zhan’s shoulder, snuggling up against his warmth, making himself comfortable without hesitation.

“What’s wrong?” Lan Zhan whispers.

He jumps. “Why aren’t you asleep yet?”

“I wanted to stay awake. In case anything happened.”

“Of course you did,” he murmurs, fond and tired. He rolls over to face Lan Zhan, resting his palm on Lan Zhan’s cheek. “But he was fine, right? You can go to sleep now.”

Lan Zhan places his hand over his. “I want to know what’s bothering you.”

Mo Xuanyu is silent for a moment, before he finally exhales. “His grandmother’s not getting any better.”

“His grandmother?"

“She’s the one who’s taking care of him right now. My friend— you know, the one that picked him up— he’s still in college. And his sister is doing her residency, just like you. And if his grandmother gets worse… Lan Zhan, he doesn’t have anyone else. What if—“

“Xuanyu.” He caresses the back of his hand with his thumb, rubbing it back and forth. "Nothing will happen."

“I know, I know. I just—I’m worried. He’s so small. He didn’t do anything to deserve this. I don’t want him to be left behind.”

Lan Zhan has an idea of what Mo Xuanyu’s own childhood was like, through secrets whispered in the dark, through subtle, one word answers.

Both parents dead before he was even old enough to remember them. Underfunded state orphanage, then foster care. Street dogs. Five years, six different homes. Because no one wanted a hyperactive, hungry child.

Lan Zhan can tell what A-Yuan means to him.

So he kisses Mo Xuanyu’s forehead, and hopes, ardently, that A-Yuan’s grandmother will be able to keep him.

———

They find themselves at the grocery store the next morning, A-Yuan babbling in Mo Xuanyu’s arms as the three of them meander through the brightly lit baby food aisle.

He’d been dropped off at 6 am sharp today, since his grandmother had a doctor’s appointment. Lan Zhan doesn’t know when Mo Xuanyu became the designated babysitter, just that it happened gradually, the way plants grow towards light.

So far, they’ve gotten a couple of looks— an odd mix of baby squeals and two tired twenty-somethings tends to draw attention— but no one really says anything.

Until a woman pushing a stroller slows beside them. She sizes them up—Lan Zhan clutching a box of Biostine formula like it might explode, Mo Xuanyu wearing A-Yuan like an accessory—and smiles.

“You want this one,” she says, holding out a pouch. “Walnut and red date porridge. Good for babies his age. Helps with energy.”

She pinches A-Yuan’s cheek, and he lets out a gleeful squeal. Then she glances between them again. “Are you his big brothers? You boys must be so helpful to your parents!”

Lan Zhan freezes.

He and Mo Xuanyu blink at each other, equally horrified. They’d expected the odd looks… not being accused of straight-up brotherhood.

Mo Xuanyu recovers first, and turns back to the woman. “No, he’s my cousin’s kid,” he says, a bit too breezily. “We’re just taking him out for the day, helping his mom with groceries."

“Hm.” She nods approvingly. “That’s nice of you boys. Let me know if you need anything else.”

She wheels away down the aisle. A-Yuan munches away on the strap of Mo Xuanyu’s tote bag. Neither of them stop him.

“I can’t believe she thought we were related,” Mo Xuanyu mutters. “We don’t even look similar. You have a baby face."

“Would it have been better if she thought we were co-parenting?” Lan Zhan says, dryly.

He meant it as a joke, but he notices something unreadable flickering across Mo Xuanyu’s face. But it flits away so quickly, replaced by his usual snarky grin, that Lan Zhan wonders if he’d imagined it.

“Co-parenting a one-year-old,” he quips, “At our age? She’d think we were rich! And that we know what we actually know what we’re doing.”

“No more free advice then.”

“You’re right. We’d be even more lost. Oi, A-Yuan, stop eating my tote bag.”

A-Yuan, in an unprecedented turn of events, does in fact stop eating Mo Xuanyu’s tote bag. He stares back up at him with big brown eyes, and promptly spits up on his shirt.

“Great,” Mo Xuanyu deadpans, as Lan Zhan feels the corners of his mouth twitch. “Now where the hell am I supposed to get this cleaned off?”

“Go to the restroom. I can hold him.”

Mo Xuanyu passes A-Yuan over without a word, and stalks over to the men’s restroom in the back.

He really shouldn’t have any more acid reflux left in his system, so Lan Zhan’s sweater vest should be safe for the time being. A-Yuan gurgles, and stuffs his entire hand inside his mouth.

“Stop that.”

A-Yuan does stop that.

They might be getting somewhere.

Lan Zhan hoists the kid up by his armpits. A-Yuan just dangles, aloft in the air, accepting his fate. Lan Zhan squints at him— at his blue onesie, his round button nose, his mantou cheeks, his permanently upturned lips. He sets him back down on the handle of the cart. And out of some inexplicable impulse, Lan Zhan gently pokes the side of his face. A-Yuan giggles, squealing in delight.

Baffled, he pokes A-Yuan’s plump cheek again. He cackles even louder.

It’s addicting.

His laugh is melodic and rambunctious at the same time, and in some strange way, Lan Zhan is reminded of Mo Xuanyu. They both sound like they’ve ingested some kind of liquid joy, like nothing in this world has ever hurt them before.

And Lan Zhan knows how far that is from the truth.

He studies the baby again. How easily he laughs. How easily he trusts. How he’s got Lan Zhan wrapped around his tiny little thumb, poking his face like it’s the highlight of his week.

Mo Xuanyu returns from the restroom, shirt soaked to the bone, hair slightly wet. He looks like he’s fought a brutal, vicious war with the sink… and lost.

The spit-up is still very visible.

But his face brightens as soon as he hears A-Yuan shriek in joy, his tiny hands reaching for Mo Xuanyu as he tries to wriggle out of Lan Zhan’s arms.

Mo Xuanyu scoops him up, lifts him up into the air and buries his face into A-Yuan’s cheek, giving him a raspberry kiss. A-Yuan giggles, bubbly and overjoyed and overflowing, even when Mo Xuanyu pulls back and taps his nose. “Did you miss me already?” he asks, and A-Yuan plants his entire hand over his face, still smiling.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he mutters, muffled under A-Yuan’s palm.

He’d volunteered, six months ago, to watch this kid on occasion. To help out a friend he’d known for years. And now, he laughs like this tiny, sticky baby is his sun, something he orbits, something that makes him indescribably happy.

Lan Zhan peels A-Yuan’s fingers off of Mo Xuanyu’s face, and tries to pretend that there isn’t pressure building up in his throat.

“Let’s get going soon,” Mo Xuanyu says. “I can’t last another minute in this shirt.”

“We still have to pick something up for Chinese New Year.”

“I completely forgot. Last holiday before your residency starts, right?”

“Mn.”

“Let’s go to the snack aisle. Hey, Lan Zhan, what’s your favorite thing to eat for Chinese New Year? And should we decorate? Do we even have the space?”

It's nice playing house for the day like this. Pretending they could have this for real, someday.

They check out without fanfare, extra snacks in the cart, Mo Xuanyu rambling away. But as he loops A-Yuan’s bag over his shoulder and nudges Lan Zhan toward the exit, all Lan Zhan can think about is the residency letter in his inbox. The clock is ticking. This isn’t forever. And neither of them are saying it.

Six day weeks. 48 hour shifts.

A-Yuan would forget his face in a month.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan doesn’t know when this squealing baby—who somehow shares his nose—managed to wriggle his way into his life and make a home inside his heart, but here he is.

The sight of A-Yuan on the couch with a glob of applesauce smeared over his cheek is quickly becoming part of Lan Zhan’s daily routine. Mo Xuanyu works from home anyway, so Lan Zhan usually finds him mid-chaos— laptop balanced on one knee, A-Yuan bouncing on the other, and Pei Pei Zhu (that pastel pig, their daily tormentor) wailing from the TV.

What had started as the occasional favor—watching A-Yuan when his grandmother had check-ups—had quietly become something else. Her hospital visits were more frequent now, her energy lower. His aunt was drowning in her residency. His uncle was focused on his classes. And somehow, without meaning to, Xuanyu had become the person who showed up.

Lan Zhan didn’t always engage at first. He’s good at pretending he’s just passing through, heading to study, too busy to linger. But sometimes he gets caught. He’s handed a rattle and told to “shake it like you mean it,” or guilted into reading nursery rhymes out loud while A-Yuan gnaws on the corner of the book.

But a week ago he’d searched up “best crib mattress for toddler spinal development” at 2 a.m. and quietly ordered a tiny IKEA crib. He assembled it on the living room floor instead of reviewing his looming list of osteopathic case studies. Just so A-Yuan wouldn’t have to sleep in the baby carrier anymore.

It’s for his posture, Lan Zhan had told Mo Xuanyu, after he caught him admiring his handiwork.

Mo Xuanyu didn’t buy it.

Last week, A-Yuan figured out how to remove his socks, and his favorite hobby is now chucking them across the room. He’s working on his gross motor skills, apparently. Fetching them feels like a time bomb, because A-Yuan will start screaming if he doesn’t get them back fast enough. He’s also expanding his vocabulary. Yesterday, he sank his gummy mouth into Mo Xuanyu’s arm, looked up at him, and whispered “uh oh” in the tiniest voice imaginable.

Both Lan Zhan and Mo Xuanyu were speechless.

Last Wednesday, A-Yuan dropped an antique teacup on the kitchen floor and giggled when it shattered. On Thursday, he made sure that neither Lan Zhan nor Mo Xuanyu got a wink of sleep by screaming the entire night. On Friday, Mo Xuanyu caught him gnawing at his extension cord, and promptly yanked him away. In response, A-Yuan threw the biggest, loudest tantrum Lan Zhan has ever heard out of a child, wailing for two hours straight.

With purple bruises under their eyes and two cans of Red Bull between them, Lan Zhan and Mo Xuanyu had made a beeline back to their local supermarket, hoping to find some more suitable teething toys for the kid.

On Saturday, they’d witnessed A-Yuan take three wobbly steps between the couch and the coffee table. Eyes brimming with pride and joy, Mo Xuanyu nearly shoved Lan Zhan out of the way trying to grab his phone.

But the second he’d started recording, A-Yuan dropped to the floor and went right back to crawling, like nothing had happened.

Lan Zhan swears he did it on purpose.

Mo Xuanyu had nearly cried.

But on Sunday, A-Yuan hits another milestone.
The three of them are huddled together in the kitchen, A-Yuan babbling away while he bangs his favorite spoon against the counter. He’s making plenty of noises, as usual, but no real words. Lan Zhan is sautéing eggplants and oyster sauce over the stove. The aroma drifts through the apartment, warm and rich and definitely better than the instant noodles they’ve been having for the past week. Mo Xuanyu is at Lan Zhan’s side, one arm curled around his waist, the other propping up A-Yuan. He has his chin propped over Lan Zhan’s shoulder, begging every two minutes to try the dish because Lan Zhan it just smells soooo good!

His hair tickles the back of Lan Zhan’s neck, as he turns his head to press a kiss there. There’s some old ballad from the 90s playing in the background. The sunset glimmers through their curtains, and the entire apartment is warm and golden and glowing.

Lan Zhan shakes his head and exhales, fond and exasperated. “It’s not ready yet.”

He can’t see his face, but Lan Zhan can practically hear the exaggerated pout over Mo Xuanyu’s lips when he drawls, “Aiya, you’re so mean to me. The eggplant was ready so long ago. A-Yuan, help me out here.”

Neither of them expect the toddler to even acknowledge that, much less respond to it. Lan Zhan nearly drops his spatula into the pan when he hears a quiet “Ba… ba. No. Hehe!”

A-Yuan keeps smacking the spoon against the marble, giggling to himself, blissfully unaware of what he has done.

Mo Xuanyu immediately stiffens. He awkwardly laughs behind Lan Zhan, letting go of his waist to rub his nose. He doesn’t look at Lan Zhan when he mutters, “Who, uh, who taught him that?”

Lan Zhan sincerely hopes that he picked this up from anywhere but within this house. Mo Xuanyu wouldn’t have… no, right? He knows it’s a common sound. He knows that toddlers echo everything. He knows they probably mean nothing to A-Yuan, and Lan Zhan is just overthinking this.

Baba. No. Two syllables. Clear tones. His mouth feels dry. Of all the sounds A-Yuan has made today, why that one? Why now? Why do his ribs feel like they’re closing in?

How attached has he gotten, a week before his life turns itself on his head? How did it get this far? When did he—

“…you doing? Lan Zhan! It’s burning!”

He jumps and immediately moves to shut off the stove, but it’s too late. The eggplants are scorched. The entire apartment smells like acrid smoke. A-Yuan, unfazed as ever, giggles again, shouting “Ba-ba!” before exploding into a fit of coughs.

Mo Xuanyu picks him up without a word, and gently pats his back. He walks towards the fridge to get A-Yuan a glass of water, and shoots Lan Zhan a strange look over his shoulder.

“Ba-ba,” A-Yuan tries again, between wheezes. Lan Zhan knows he’s just trying to get another reaction. It’s just what babies do. It doesn’t mean anything. It shouldn’t mean anything.

But to Lan Zhan, it’s a kiss and a punch in one fell swoop.

———

They don’t talk about it.

The decorations arrive the next morning, and they both pretend like they’ve been waiting for it.
The box is big enough to fit a whole toddler, crammed with red streamers, fake cherry blossoms, and foil cutouts of plump cartoon rabbits. Mo Xuanyu opens it with a flourish and a cheery “Happy New Year!”, as if there aren’t purple shadows staining his undereyes. As if Lan Zhan didn’t hear him quietly sniffling in the bathroom last night.

Lan Zhan didn’t have the guts to say anything then. And he doesn’t have it in him to say anything now.
He quietly untangles a string of lanterns while A-Yuan sits in his lap, clapping. The apartment smells like stale smoke, raw dough, and citrus cleaning spray.

He notices Mo Xuanyu fidgeting around in his back pocket, before finally pulling out a bright red envelope. He opens the palm of A-Yuan’s hand—the one that isn’t currently stuffed in his mouth—and gingerly places it inside, before curling his tiny fingers back around the envelope. He pinches his cheeks before pulling away.

“Oi, quit looking so panicked,” he says, frowning at Lan Zhan. “It’s from my family.”

“You told them?”

“I mean… yes?” He tilts his head, and snorts. “Book knowledge only gets you so far, doctor. And I had to give them a reason why I wasn’t meeting them for dinner today.”

“What did you tell them?”

“…Why do you want to know?” His voice drops, and his eyes narrow.

”I just—“

“Don’t worry,” he cuts in, rolling his eyes. “I didn’t tell them he’s ours, or anything like that. Or that we’ve spent more time with him than his parents ever did. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

Lan Zhan has no idea how to respond to that.

A-Yuan throws streamers across the floor, and Mo Xuanyu sprinkles flower petals on his head. He giggles, as they fall down his face and tickle his nose. Mo Xuanyu still doesn’t look Lan Zhan in the eye.

Red and gold threads glint in every corner of the apartment. In this, at least, the atmosphere feels celebratory.

The call comes when they’re in the middle of folding and filling vegetarian Xiao Long Bao. Mo Xuanyu steps into the bedroom to take it, and comes back stiff and quiet.

He doesn’t say anything when he returns— just walks back to the kitchen, stands there, and then picks up the dumpling wrapper he was working on. Lan Zhan watches him robotically tuck a spoonful of soup jelly into the dough, and pinch the wrapper like it’s muscle memory.

Lan Zhan places a hand over Mo Xuanyu’s own. He doesn’t resist, but his gray eyes look straight ahead, still not meeting Lan Zhan.

“Xuanyu,” he whispers, and that’s it. Lan Zhan knows him well enough. All he needs is time to figure out what he wants to say, and he’ll open up on his own.

And he does, after a moment.

“Her kidneys are shutting down,” he says, flatly. “Hospital doesn’t think she’ll make it more than three months. She wants to spend more time with A-Yuan before then, but after that…”

“She’s all he had left,” Mo Xuanyu rasps out. “When she’s gone, the state’s going to take him. They’re going to stick him in a room with seven other screaming kids, Lan Zhan, where no one will remember his name unless he screams louder.”

“Xuanyu—“

“And when they start passing him around like some kind of charity case— smiled at, pitied, and of course, finally returned— he’ll spend the rest of his life thinking it was his fault that no one wanted him.”

Lan Zhan tightens his grip on Mo Xuanyu’s hand, secretly bracing himself for the inevitable words that will follow, while disguising it as reassurance. He makes himself sick.

Mo Xuanyu finally raises his eyes, and they’re red-rimmed. “I can’t let that happen to him.”

Lan Zhan is silent for a moment too long. Carefully, like he’s talking to a spooked animal, he says, “You should look into what legal guardianship entails.”

Mo Xuanyu blinks at him. “What?”

“There are options. Interim care. You have family in Beijing. Or his uncle—”

“His uncle?” He laughs, cynically. “You want to hand a toddler over to a college student? Do you even hear yourself, Lan Zhan?”

“It would not be permanent,” Lan Zhan says. He does not raise his voice. He never does, and especially not now, when he can tell Mo Xuanyu is speaking for his inner child, who is hurt and angry and grimy and so, so scared. “It would only be until things are more certain. Until I know where I’ll be.”

“And then what, you’ll check in on holidays? Send him a postcard from whatever province you get placed in?”

“I am not his parent. I have known him for a month.”

I am not a promise, Lan Zhan wants to say. A month is all I could give you.

Mo Xuanyu grips the counter. “He calls you baba, for god’s sake! You think I taught him that?”

“I didn’t either!”

“It doesn’t matter! We’re all he has!” Mo Xuanyu shouts, and his voice cracks open, sharp and spilling.

Lan Zhan flinches. Mo Xuanyu stands up so fast his chair legs screech. A-Yuan startles where he sits in his high chair and lets out a confused little whimper.

“I’m not letting you raise him by yourself,” Lan Zhan says, trying to keep his voice as level as possible.

“Then don’t!”

“I can’t! Do you think I haven’t imagined it? Waking up next to him? Picking him up from school? Reading him bedtime stories?” His voice wavers, dropping to a whisper. “Do you think I don’t want that?”

Mo Xuanyu’s arms curl around A-Yuan. “What’s stopping you?”

Lan Zhan exhales. “Me.”

That’s the only thing he can give, and he can’t even promise it. It’s not enough. It could never be enough.

“You’re a coward, Lan Zhan. At least my parents had the excuse of being dead,” Mo Xuanyu hisses. “You love him like he’s yours until the second it might mean something. Until he might ask you to stay.”

He scoops up A-Yuan, whose lips are beginning to wobble. He brushes his hair, places a kiss to the side of his head, and walks away, back to their bedroom.

———

Mo Xuanyu doesn’t talk to him for the rest of the day. Doesn’t interact, doesn’t even come out for dinner.

But when Lan Zhan finally musters up the courage to enter the bedroom, he finds A-Yuan fast asleep on Mo Xuanyu’s chest, huffing out tiny, soft breaths. Mo Xuanyu is asleep too, mouth open, one hand on A-Yuan’s back, the other still tangled in his hair, like he was in the middle of caressing it.

Lan Zhan drapes the blanket over the two of them, tucking in the corners, pushing a stray lock of Mo Xuanyu’s hair out of his face.

He doesn’t know how to explain the way his heart feels like it’s going to burst. The way his lungs feel like they’re going to crumble. The indescribable mess of emotions swirling around inside him, as he looks at this little family— his little family— and remembers: he said he didn’t want this.

But he realizes that he knows this shape.

It’s love, devotion, and a gilded cage all at once.

His father loved his mother too. And both of them still lived and died like a ghost in their own homes.

Mo Xuanyu laughs when he’s tired— a creaky, weary sound. He’ll press a palm to his eyes when he’s about to cry. He smiles when he’s cracking.

It’s familiar. The too-quiet comfort. The tender exhaustion. The kind of love that folds itself into small moments and forgets to ask for more. His mother used to sit like that—hands curled around nothing, barely holding on.

She’d loved her children with the same quiet intensity that Mo Xuanyu loves this baby. She smiled, too, even when she was vanishing.

And his father, he—

He thought love was enough.

His father stayed, and still let the woman he loved disintegrate under the weight of solitude and sickness. In silence he never broke and a house he never left.

Lan Zhan grew up with a ghost in one room and a stranger in the other.

He can’t let A-Yuan grow up like that.

He won’t let Mo Xuanyu live like that.

So no. He won’t adopt A-Yuan. He won’t let them count on a future he can’t promise. He won’t build a home if he’s not sure he can stay in it.

Instead, he chooses the only thing he’s good at—walking away before the damage begins.

He presses two kisses over both of their foreheads. Featherlight, so he doesn’t rouse them from sleep.

There are few things in this world Lan Zhan would ever deny the love of his life.

He wishes a child wasn’t one of them.

But he turns away anyway, heart lodged in his throat.

Chapter Text

“Your shift ended three hours ago.”

Lan Zhan startles awake from the bench he’s sitting at, blinking as he readjusts his slightly crooked glasses. He rubs his eyes blearily, and when his vision finally focuses, he looks up to find his attending looming over him, arms crossed, lips tight enough to rival her perfect bun. She doesn’t look disappointed— just vaguely exasperated.

“Go home,” she sighs, before turning away, muttering something about newbies under her breath.

It’s been roughly a week since Lan Zhan started at Xiehe, and therefore a week since he’s had any semblance of a sleep schedule. As much as Lan Zhan’s conscience would like to spend his downtime doing charts or lab work, his circadian rhythm often overrules his well-meaning diligence.

He feels his phone buzzing. He blinks out the last of his sleepy haze, and fishes it out from his back pocket. It’s already 9:45 pm. There’s two new messages from his brother— just him checking in.

Lan Zhan stares at his lockscreen. It cycles through photos in his camera roll, and right now, it’s a silly picture of Mo Xuanyu that Lan Zhan couldn’t help but snap while he was asleep. Arms splayed like a starfish, mouth fully agape, dark hair scattered all over the pillow. There’s even a tiny line of drool trailing over the freckle below his lip— it’s so soft, and so gross. Mo Xuanyu is a light sleeper, but here? He’s unguarded, blissfully asleep, and for Lan Zhan’s eyes only.

Not long ago, he would have gone home to find him exactly like this. And instead of settling into his usual rigid posture when he gets into their bed, Lan Zhan is sure that he’d reach for Mo Xuanyu’s warmth, nestle his head in the crook between Mo Xuanyu’s shoulder and the pillow, whisper I love you against the line of his jaw.

And maybe— just maybe— Mo Xuanyu would whisper it back. Faint enough for Lan Zhan to wonder if he’d imagined it, and then he’d pull him closer into his arms.

But not today.

Not when he glares at Lan Zhan with storms in his eyes. Not when he sleeps facing the wall. Not when he thinks that Lan Zhan is a selfish coward, and Lan Zhan just lets him.

As he grabs his coat and checks out for the day, he still finds himself hoping— briefly, stupidly— for a text from Mo Xuanyu. An acknowledgement. Something. Anything. Lan Zhan knows he’s awake.

And it’s embarrassing, the way his heart leaps when he notices three oscillating dots over their chat. He waits in the seat of his car for a whole minute, scrolling through their old messages, waiting for the dancing circles to finally become words.

But they vanish, leaving Lan Zhan with nothing but his own gaunt reflection in the blank screen. He’s reminded that Mo Xuanyu is nothing if not stubborn. He’s prideful, not performative.

He tells himself he can get used to silence. He tells himself distance is safer. But even now, he keeps the chat open, as if waiting for a sign that it’s worth walking back into the fire.

———

He’s learning to compartmentalize. To bury emotion under protocol, silence, and checklists. He tells himself that’s what doctors do. But he knows, deep down, that it’s the same thing he’s been doing at home.

He helps save his first patient on Tuesday.

Ten years old. A craniopharyngioma— benign, but brutal— pressing dangerously close to the hypothalamus. He wasn’t the one holding the scalpel, but he was close.

Retractor. Suction. Irrigation. Eight hours. No mistakes. Keep your hands steady. Watch every movement like it might be the one that saves her.

Two days later, she was home. Eating congee and smiling in her discharge photo.

The other residents had patted him on the back. The attending said he had “excellent instincts.” Lan Zhan felt, briefly, that maybe he was finally becoming someone his uncle could be proud of.

He loses his first patient on Thursday.

Acute cerebral edema. Seizure in the early hours. The little girl was back in the hospital. Her sodium had spiked—diabetes insipidus, they said. A known complication. Inevitable, sometimes. But that doesn’t make the flatline beep any quieter. Or her mother’s scream any less anguished, as she pounds against the glass doors of the operating room.

Lan Zhan stands frozen outside the PICU, hands clenched, fingernails biting into his palms. He’s always known that he feels too much. He swallows it all down with a watery cup of hospital tea and goes back to rounds. He keeps his voice steady in the discharge meeting, keeps his pen stable through charting. But his hands don’t stop shaking until they’re wrapped around his doorknob.

He gets home at 1:42 a.m., scrubs still damp with sweat and disinfectant under his coat. He plans to make a beeline for the shower. The apartment is dark, save for the dim kitchen light and the glow from Mo Xuanyu’s laptop. He’s curled up on the couch with a bag of chips balanced on his chest, hoodie sleeves pushed up, hair in a messy knot. He doesn’t even look towards the door when it opens.

“Why are you home so late?” he asks, stopping Lan Zhan in his tracks. His eyes haven’t left his computer screen, and he’s still typing.

“Emergency surgery,” Lan Zhan clips, also not looking at Mo Xuanyu. “Patient coded.” He wants this conversation to end as soon as possible, but as he looks around the apartment, he asks, “is A-Yuan still here?”

“Popo has him,” Mo Xuanyu says. “Great news for you, right?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t even have it in him to roll his eyes. As expected, Mo Xuanyu briefly turns to Lan Zhan— probably hoping for a reaction. The look he flashes starts as irritation—but when he meets Lan Zhan’s eyes, it shifts fast, concern flooding over like a tide.

“God,” he mutters, as he gets up from the couch and slowly walks towards Lan Zhan. “You look like shit.”

Pride is nothing in the face of bone-deep exhaustion. Before he can think any better, Lan Zhan drops his bag and steps forward to meet Mo Xuanyu, reaching blindly until his face is buried in the curve of his neck. He smells like that cologne— citrus, bergamot— the warm scent that clung to Lan Zhan’s bedsheets all summer.

Mo Xuanyu stiffens at first, caught off guard, but one hand finds the middle of Lan Zhan’s back. Circles, slow and steady. The other curls into his hair. “Hey,” Mo Xuanyu whispers. “What happened?”

“Nothing,” Lan Zhan mumbles into his shoulder. “Just… tired.”

Mo Xuanyu doesn’t say anything more. He just tightens his arms around him, almost involuntarily. It doesn’t mean you’re okay, Lan Zhan reminds himself. It just means that you looked pathetic, and he felt bad for you.

He stays, just long enough to lose the tremble in his hands, just long enough to remember what it feels like to be held without earning it. Long enough to forget how awful the day was— only to remember how awful everything else still is. Mo Xuanyu doesn’t ask again, and Lan Zhan doesn’t offer anything else. They break apart in silence, and the warmth of the moment fades into nothing like dissipating steam.

Lan Zhan goes to take a cold shower, and when he emerges from the bathroom, he finds Mo Xuanyu still coding, the blue light of his laptop illuminating the hollow of his eyes. He yawns, blinks owlishly, and just stares absently at the screen. His fingers hover over the keys, instead of his usual furious typing.

Watching him from afar, Lan Zhan wonders why exactly he’s doing this to himself. He knows the two of them run on his salary, but they’re not running low on cash and they’ve paid their bills for the month. But when Lan Zhan notices the way Mo Xuanyu scrunches up his nose in mock concentration, it hits him.

He’s staying up just to avoid falling asleep alongside Lan Zhan.

This is new.

It's unfair.

Lan Zhan feels… bitter. Quiet anger, indignation, bubbling up from the pit of his stomach. He didn’t ask to be comforted. He didn’t ask for two minutes of intimacy, and then petty silence like a slap to the face.

Mo Xuanyu used to hold Lan Zhan like that because he wanted to, not out of pity. And Lan Zhan doesn’t want to be pitied, anymore. He’s drained. He’s running on three hours of sleep. He just watched a child die.

And he’s twenty four years old. Stretched impossibly thin. How, exactly, is he the villain here, for not wanting to bring a child into this life?

So he crawls into an empty bed, and this time, he’s the one facing the wall. Out of instinct, he almost opens his mouth to ask if Mo Xuanyu was coming to bed— then swallows it down. No more digging his own grave. He pushes the covers up to his chin, shuts off the lights, and locks away his distant fantasies of I love you’s whispered in the dark.

He closes his eyes and tries to pretend the silence is peace, not punishment.

———

By the second week, the days start bleeding together.

He wakes up with throbbing headaches, pops an aspirin, and gets on with his rounds. Home-cooked meals are a distant memory, because the only thing that fills his aching stomach these days is vending machine slop. He snaps at a nurse, and regrets it for the rest of the day. He forgets to respond to emails, forgets where he parked. He used to pride himself on his memory.

Lan Zhan thought he would have thrived here, once. At seventeen, as a naïve medical student, bright-eyed and determined. With memories of his mother’s slow, agonizing death still raw in his mind. He’d spent the entirety of his childhood under his uncle’s family rules, growing up privileged and precocious in a very small world. And so he was painfully disillusioned into thinking he could be ready for the brutal shifts, the quiet judgement that came with every little mistake. Never getting attached to patients, because you don’t know who has days left to live.

But throughout it all, he allowed himself one small fantasy— that someone would always be there for him. He’d ignore the fact that he planned on staying in the closet for the rest of his life, and imagined that he’d come home to a peaceful home. A steaming bowl of lotus root congee. Shared laughs and warm arms that would pull him close.

Now, five years later, he lives in the echo of that dream— close enough to taste, far enough to choke on.

Mo Xuanyu comes to bed late, after he thinks Lan Zhan is asleep. He lies down facing away, as usual, but through the night, Lan Zhan will feel a hand ghost over his back, just for a second. Sometimes two callused fingers, a thumb and forefinger, tracing his face. And every morning, he convinces himself that it was nothing but a pathetic hallucination— it’s just his mind, missing the warm body that used to hold him like a lifeline in sleep.

A-Yuan is with his grandmother more often. Mo Xuanyu stops updating him on pickup times or tantrum reports, and Lan Zhan never asks. They pass each other like ghosts in the hallway. Mo Xuanyu microwaves his leftovers after Lan Zhan’s gone to bed. Lan Zhan rinses out the bowls he leaves in the sink.

Once, he comes across a half-eaten bowl of instant noodles on the table, barely touched. Lan Zhan recognizes it— bright red lid, cheap foil seal half-peeled. The one Mo Xuanyu used to joke was his antidepressant during his undergrad. He loves this stuff, but it looks like it’s been untouched for hours.

He probably just wasn’t hungry, so Lan Zhan decides not to dwell on it. It’s just another dirty dish on his hands, another mess of Mo Xuanyu’s that he’s left to clean, so he tosses it in the sink with everything else.

By week three, even the silence starts to feel choreographed.

It’s a pattern now— they come home, avoid eye contact if they cross paths, sleep in separate positions on the same bed like strangers. And still, no one talks first. No one reaches out. Both of them quietly bitter, for different reasons.

Lan Zhan realizes he doesn’t remember the last time he heard Mo Xuanyu laugh. The real one— that splits his face into a grin when Lan Zhan kisses him silly. The one that starts out as quiet giggles and then bursts forth like floodwater through a dam— loud and bright and unescapable.

Not the one he forces out on the phone with his siblings whenever Lan Zhan walks by.

The tension in the apartment is not the lingering resentment that brews after a fight, anymore. It’s more like a fever. Constant, pulsing, just high enough to keep them both sick.

He doesn’t notice how much he’s withdrawn until he’s tucked into the corner of the hospital cafeteria one day. He opens his phone to find a missed call from his brother and four unread messages stacked like a quiet intervention.

One of them is a photo of a garden—gorgeous white gentians in bloom, with a caption: Ma would have loved these.

Lan Zhan stares at it longer than he should. Then, maybe out of guilt, or maybe because his hands won’t stop shaking again, he calls back.

Lan Huan picks up on the second ring. “A-Zhan?”

His voice is too warm. Too familiar. Lan Zhan hadn’t realized how much he’d missed him, and it makes his throat ache.

“I’m sorry for missing your call, Ge,” he says, clearing his throat. “I’ve just… been busy.”

“No, don’t apologize.” Lan Huan replies gently. “I can only imagine how swamped you are. How are you feeling?”

“Tired, ge,” he responds honestly. “But I’m getting used to it. Slowly.”

There’s silence on the other end, before his brother says, “I know that tone. What happened?”

There’s no point in hiding anything from him. Lan Zhan presses his fingers against his forehead. “I lost my first patient,” he whispers. “A child. Complication we should’ve expected. I keep going over her labs. I still… I still don’t know what I missed.”

There’s a soft sigh on the other end. “You didn’t miss anything. You couldn’t have known. Sometimes it happens.”

“I could’ve done something,” he insists. “Could have kept her in observation for one more day. Maybe—“

“You can’t save everyone, A-Zhan.” There’s no judgment in his brother’s voice—just quiet certainty. “I’m telling you this from my experience, not just as your brother. You can do everything right and still lose.”

“Mn.”

“Focus on your life, didi. Patients are patients. I’m not saying their lives are worth less, but they are not your loved ones. You will kill a patient, and you will be expected to live with it. I don’t— I don’t even remember the first patient I lost. No one—“ he sighs, “would expect you to do that for your family.”

Lan Zhan has already seen it happening to him. He’s started subconsciously categorizing his patients by room number because their names blur together. Patient 304 needs an MRI. 507 is scheduled for a laser ablation. 345 has beautiful gray eyes that Lan Zhan has only ever seen on one other person. He has six months to live, at most.

And that’s why he lets their stories blur together too. It’s easier— and so, so selfish— if you see a room number instead of a life when you tell someone they’re dying. But his brother is right— after all, he’s been a trauma surgeon for the last five years. Car accidents, domestic abuse, murder attempts— he’s seen it all. He would know better than anyone how much desensitization is a survival skill.

Maybe Lan Zhan shouldn’t hate himself for it.

After a while, Lan Huan speaks again, even softer this time. “How’s your roommate?” he asks, in an attempt to divert the conversation into something lighter. If only he knew.

But if he’s having a heart-to-heart with his brother about his professional struggles, Lan Zhan might as well come clean about his life struggles while he’s at it. He does, desperately, want someone to reach out to about this. And if the way his brother acts with his best friend is any indication, Lan Zhan is sure he won’t be scorned.

“He’s not just my roommate,” he says, making sure to keep his voice low. “I met him over the summer. In Yunnan. We’ve been together for eight months.”

“Oh, so that was who the Emperor’s Smile was for,” he snickers. “I’m so happy for you, didi! Mo Xuanyu, wasn’t it? I liked him a lot. How is he doing?”

There’s no point in lying— Lan Zhan knows he’s terrible at it. So he sighs, mentally, and quietly resigns himself to his fate. “He’s— not great,” he grits out. “We are not…”

“Oh, didi, I’m sorry. What happened?”

“We fought,” he says, miserably.

“Oh.” His brother pauses, before adding, “You don’t have to tell me why, A-Zhan, don’t—“

“No,” Lan Zhan interrupts. “I want to talk to you.”

He exhales, and tells his brother that there’s something Mo Xuanyu wants, something that he knows is unfair to Lan Zhan. It means the world to him— but Lan Zhan can’t promise it. And it is silently tearing them apart.

“A-Zhan. Do you remember what you were like after Ma died?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t answer, but of course he does.

Hushed whispers. Wilted bouquets. Begging his uncle to visit the hospital, and being told no, with red-rimmed eyes. He remembers once, in a moment of desperate, aching hope, throwing himself out of a moving car just to get to the hospital again—just to be close to her.

Six years old, and he’d nearly killed himself instead of accepting she was gone.

He’d gotten admitted, and wandered the hospital in his bloody pajamas, staggering through the hallway outside her empty room. Kneeling outside her door, concussed, eyes dry—not because he didn’t feel like crying, but because he knew it would make her sad if he did. Because he thought if he was good enough, she’d come back.

Lan Huan’s voice breaks through, gentle but firm. “You’ve always been like this. You love with everything you have, and you don’t know what to do with yourself when things change.”

Lan Zhan exhales, shaky.

“A-Zhan,” he continues, “You’re scared of breaking something you care about– but you’d rather walk away instead of trying to hold it together. And… I get it.”

He inhales, and Lan Zhan can practically hear his gentle, reassuring smile. “But maybe your Xuanyu didn’t ask because he wanted a guarantee. Maybe he just wanted you to try. To want it badly enough that the fear didn’t matter.”

“But I can’t.” Lan Zhan leans back against the wall. The ceiling looks blurry. “I can’t become our father.”

His brother makes a confused noise. “Our father?”

“Didn’t he try too?” Lan Zhan’s eyes sting, voice rising, threatening to break. “He married Ma and went against his entire family. And in the end, neither you nor I knew him enough to even cry for him. I just— I can’t become a stranger to Xuanyu too. And it scares me, he’s so much like Ma, Ge, it’s—“

“You’re not our father.” Lan Huan’s voice sharpens—just slightly. “And your Xuanyu is not our mother. You chose each other, A-Zhan. You’re not trapped together.”

It hasn’t felt like that, recently. But Lan Zhan doesn’t say anything.

“I have to go. Take care of yourself,” his brother says, “and take care of each other. Talk to me, please. Whenever you want. I will always be there to listen.”

“Thank you,” Lan Zhan rasps out, not trusting himself to say any more. He hangs up, chugs down the rest of his lukewarm coffee, and heads out to check in on his next patient.

———

Halfway through his shift, a nurse flags him down in the hallway, cellphone in hand and an unreadable expression on her face. “Emergency contact for Lan Zhan?” she asks. His stomach drops. For a second, he thinks it’s his brother again, or worse—his uncle. But when he takes the phone and hears Mo Xuanyu’s voice on the other end—thin, strained, and trembling—Lan Zhan knows. He doesn’t need to hear the full sentence. The words “Popo,” “collapsed,” and “ICU” are enough to send his pen clattering to the floor and his body into motion before he’s even aware of it.

The rest is instinct—coat, keys, the echo of Mo Xuanyu’s wavering voice in his ear. Lan Zhan’s moving before his mind catches up, the hospital corridors stretching and narrowing all at once.

A-Yuan’s grandmother is already unconscious by the time they wheel her past him. Her skin is ashen, her breaths shallow. Outside the OR, Lan Zhan catches fragments not meant for him—“organ failure,” “comfort measures,” “matter of days.”

Around the corner, Mo Xuanyu sits slumped on a bench, A-Yuan clutched tight in one arm, a rattle dangling forgotten in the other. His cheeks are blotchy. When he spots Lan Zhan, he tries for composure, swiping at his nose.

He’s shivering, Lan Zhan notices. Under his hoodie and his racer jacket.

Lan Zhan crosses the hall, already shrugging off his coat to drape over Xuanyu’s shoulders. He knows the temperature isn’t the problem, but it gives him an excuse to hold him. He sits beside him, and curls one arm around his waist, tugging him closer and closer until he stops shaking. Mo Xuanyu doesn’t resist. Their knees are touching. His hair hasn’t been brushed. There’s shadows blooming under his steel-gray eyes.

And without thinking, Lan Zhan quietly brushes away a tear from his cheek, one that managed to stray down his face without him noticing. In response to the sudden touch, Mo Xuanyu blinks up at him, brows furrowed, lips slightly parted.

He might have held Lan Zhan out of pity, weeks ago. But to Lan Zhan, it’s instinct. To never want to see him broken, shattered. And as Mo Xuanyu melts into his touch, he wonders— has the silence been killing him the same way it’s been killing Lan Zhan?

They quickly pull apart when one of the nurses pops her head outside. The warmth is not unmissed, this time. It doesn’t dissipate like steam. Instead, it pools around them, curling like smoke in the space between their fingers, quietly intertwined inside Mo Xuanyu’s jacket pocket.

“She’s stable, but unconscious,” the nurse informs them. “For now. You can come visit her.”

Lan Zhan and Mo Xuanyu turn to each other. “We–we’re not her grandchildren,” Mo Xuanyu tells her, voice cracking. “They’re still on the way. Is there–”

“You brought her in. She knows you, yes?”

“Yes, but–”

“She doesn’t have much longer. Come in while you can.”

Mo Xuanyu rises from the bench, hoisting A-Yuan higher over his shoulder. He passes the coat back to Lan Zhan, and frowns when he notices that Lan Zhan hasn’t made any move to get up.

“You’re not coming?”

He shakes his head.

Mo Xuanyu doesn’t say anything more, and whisks A-Yuan into the room with him.

Alone in the hallway, Lan Zhan watches through the ICU glass as A-Yuan holds his grandmother’s limp hand— his entire fist, wrapped around one finger. So small. He’s already lost so much. Does he ever cry for his parents? Will he reach for his grandmother in sleep when she’s gone? Would he kneel outside a hospital door, waiting for someone who was never coming back?

Or has Mo Xuanyu already become everything he needs? Taking on every role in A-Yuan’s life, just so he would never feel unwanted or alone. Father, mother, grandmother— at twenty-five. To an child who wasn’t even his to begin with.

How could he possibly carry this on his own? And how could Lan Zhan let him?

The thought forms before he can stop it: He shouldn’t have to. It lodges there, heavy and certain, a truth that will not leave him, no matter how far back he steps.

His brother’s voice echoes in his mind. Maybe he just wanted you to try.

It follows him down the hallway, through the antiseptic brightness of the ICU, out into the bitter night air where his breath fogs in the streetlight.

He doesn’t go home— not yet. Not while Xuanyu is still in that room, not while the weight of A-Yuan’s future still hangs in the balance.

By the time they leave the hospital together, it’s past midnight. Xuanyu’s eyes are swollen. A-Yuan is fast asleep on his shoulder, cheeks flushed with baby heat.

In the car, neither of them speaks. Lan Zhan watches Mo Xuanyu in the passenger seat, the way his hand cups the back of A-Yuan’s head instinctively when the tires bump over a pothole. The way he leans in, almost imperceptibly, like he can shield the child from anything.

It hits him then—not in a rush, but in the slow, cold clarity that comes after the adrenaline wears off: Mo Xuanyu will do this whether Lan Zhan is standing beside him or not. He will fight, and stretch himself thin, and give everything until there’s nothing left, because he doesn’t know how to stop.

He, too, loves with everything he has.

And if Lan Zhan steps back now, he’ll be no different than the people who left Mo Xuanyu to fend for himself before.

“You’re still going to say no, aren’t you?”

They’re parked underneath their apartment building. The doors are unlocked, but Mo Xuanyu is still rooted to his seat. He’s staring at his shoes. His voice is hoarse from an evening of barely holding himself together.

“I—“

“You think I don’t see it? You’ve been halfway out the door for weeks. I get it, okay? You don’t want this. You think I’m being stupid, or selfish, or both.” He turns, eyes red but still dry. “But I can’t leave him.”

Lan Zhan puts a hand up to A-Yuan’s back, gently caressing his downy hair. A-Yuan stirs, briefly, before smacking his lips together and nuzzling back against Mo Xuanyu’s chest.

“I’m not ready,” Lan Zhan whispers. “You know that.”

“I do.” Mo Xuanyu inhales, shaky. “But I’m doing this no matter what you say. And it’s not like— it’s not like you have to sign anything.”

Of course. He can only be one of theirs on paper.

“Xuanyu.” Lan Zhan takes his free hand, and turns it over. He runs his thumb over the crimson thread around his wrist. It’s the one from Qixi. The one that symbolized a promise. The promise he meant, with every part of him. Even when no one was watching.

He lifts it to his lips, as a gasp escapes Mo Xuanyu’s mouth.

“I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready,” Lan Zhan says, finally meeting eyes with him, “But I will be there. I won’t let you carry this burden on your own. I’ll try and find a way, some way, that will let me be by your side sooner. And I promise that I will stand by you, no matter how hard it gets. If you… will have me.”

And Mo Xuanyu breaks.

His mouth parts in disbelief. Tears—long overdue—brim from his storm-colored eyes, tracing down his cheeks before disappearing down his jaw. “Don’t say that if you don’t mean it,” He croaks.

“I meant every word,” Lan Zhan says, squeezing his hand even tighter. “I do not know if I can do everything right. But I will try, Xuanyu.”

And with that, Mo Xuanyu bursts into a bright grin, one that Lan Zhan hasn’t seen in weeks. He loops his free arm around Lan Zhan’s neck, and without squashing A-Yuan, he moves to embrace him, smiling into Lan Zhan’s scrubs, staining the fabric with every overjoyed sob.

“That’s all I needed,” he chokes out. “Thank you.”

Under the dim yellow tube light of an underground parking lot, in the passenger seat of his uncle’s old Volkswagen, Lan Zhan squeezes his eyes shut, and holds his newfound family. His little family. The love of his life and this sticky baby who giggles like sunshine and shares his nose.

“There is no need,” he whispers back, “for thank you or sorry between us.”

Mo Xuanyu sniffles. “Then come home with us, Lan Zhan.”

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan takes advantage of his one allotted rest day for the week. He knows they’re rare, but if not this, what else could he possibly need them for?

The first thing that greets him when he blinks awake is the glow of Mo Xuanyu’s face— hair sprawled across the pillow, one hand cupping Lan Zhan’s cheek, the corners of his mouth curving up. His eyes are still swollen, bleary, but Lan Zhan can glimpse every individual speckle of gray and dark brown in his glittering eyes, lit up by the golden sunlight spilling through the window behind him.

He is, in every essence of the word, beautiful.

“Hi, Lan Zhan,” he whispers, pressing a kiss to his cheek. Just like he did that sticky July morning, the first time Lan Zhan ever woke up next to him.

It hasn’t even been a few weeks, but he doesn’t know how he went so long without this. And now, he wants to drink it in all over again. Greedily, like an indulgence.

Lan Zhan loops an arm over his waist, leaning in to peck the tip of his nose, his temple, those smiling lips. He sinks his front teeth into Mo Xuanyu’s bottom lip before he lets go, just to hear the way he giggles against Lan Zhan before shoving him away.

And just as reaches up to tuck Mo Xuanyu’s messy hair behind his ear— an ear-splitting scream cuts through the room. A reminder that his family has expanded beyond the sunbathed linen and morning hugs.

“Did he cry like this when you were home alone?” Lan Zhan asks, wincing, already swinging his legs off the bed. It’s far from the first time A-Yuan has spent the night with them, and he doesn’t remember this being part of his mornings before his residency began.

“Yeah,” Mo Xuanyu snorts, yanking the blankets back over his head. “Every morning. Same time. Gives your circadian rhythm a run for its money. He always starts coughing after too.”

Vaguely, he recalls the way Mo Xuanyu’s eyes were constantly swollen when they’d pass each other, at the beginning. He figured it was just him torturing himself by staying up late, but he should have known better.

Mo Xuanyu thrives as a night owl. And in the mornings, he always sleeps in long after Lan Zhan is up, rolling around on the mattress, mumbling something about how warm the blankets are. At around 10, Lan Zhan would bribe him with promises of a fresh breakfast, and Mo Xuanyu would placate him with sleepy little kisses.

He meant it as a joke, but guilt still pinches at Lan Zhan’s chest as he hoists A-Yuan up from the crib. The kid’s tiny fists are balled, nose dripping, cheeks flushed with rage. And as promised, he launches into a fit of wet, violent coughs. Each one shudders through his tiny ribcage and into Lan Zhan’s own, rattling against his sternum.

He pats his back and bounces him gently, but can’t shake the image of Mo Xuanyu dealing with this alone every dawn— whether it was caused by illness, or separation anxiety, or even just teething pains.

“Have you ever noticed how much he spits up?” Mo Xuanyu suddenly blurts.

“What?”

“He always spits up on you, remember?” He sits up, blowing a strand of hair out of his face. “I looked it up. Apparently he’s too old for it. I wanted to ask you first, though.”

“How old is he?”

“Almost fifteen months?” He frowns. “I told you this, Lan Zhan.”

“Right, sorry.” Lan Zhan belatedly remembers, now. It was when he brought A-Yuan home for the first time. It feels like he’s lived lifetimes since then.

“So? What’s up with him?”

“Babies usually stop at twelve months.” He gently shifts A-Yuan. “But it’s not uncommon at fifteen. Or concerning, usually.”

“Oh, good,” he exhales, clutching his chest. “I tried getting him appointments at different pediatricians’ offices, but none of them would let me bring him in.”

He drums his fingers on the mattress. “I know why they wouldn’t let me, but I figured it was worth a shot.”

This was the weight Lan Zhan had promised not to leave Mo Xuanyu to carry alone, and it presses into him with every damp wheeze and hiccup against his shoulder.

He wants to tell himself that it’s temporary. That Mo Xuanyu won’t have to do this much longer. It’s true, in a way. Two years should go by in the blink of an eye— but not when you’re raising a toddler without the one person who was supposed to support you.

A-Yuan quiets down eventually, wheezes subsiding into quiet sniffles.

Mo Xuanyu gets up, and passes Lan Zhan a bottle of formula and a tissue without looking at him. It’s not avoidance this time, just the quiet ease of muscle memory. A-Yuan doesn’t put up a fight about the milk. Mo Xuanyu wanders into the bathroom alongside Lan Zhan, humming some c-drama opening under his breath. He smoothes a palm over A-Yuan’s hair as he gulps away, and for a little while, it’s almost like the weeks of silence never happened.

Almost.

———

Mo Xuanyu insists on having breakfast out. At home the bowls are chipped and the noodles taste stale; here sunlight glances off glass windows, milk tea comes hot in tall glasses, and the fried youtiao still crackles with oil.

It’s a hole-in-the-wall place across the street, already crowded with old men squabbling over newspapers. They squeeze into a narrow booth by the window. Xuanyu sets A-Yuan into the baby chair and rattles off the order like he hasn’t eaten in weeks: doujiang, jianbing, a plate of fried chicken cutlets, and— because it caught his eye at the counter— an egg tart, southern-style, its custard blistered gold.

“I’m starving,” Mo Xuanyu says, tapping his fingers against the menu while the waiter scribbles everything down.

Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow. “I can tell.” He pauses, before adding, “I missed this, by the way.”

Mo Xuanyu tilts his head. “Missed what? Having warm food? Oh, I bet. I don’t know what they were feeding you at that cafeteria, but I just know it tasted like—“

“What? No.” If he actually cared about what he ate, he wouldn’t have survived the first seventeen years of his life. Lan Zhan knots his brows, wondering how his boyfriend can be so smart, yet so dense. “I missed spending time with you.”

“Oh.” Mo Xuanyu blushes all the way down to his neck. Lan Zhan likes being able to get him like this, caught off guard. “Even though I was being a bitch to you?”

“Yes,” he answers, bluntly and honestly. What else is there to it? He didn’t fall in love without knowing Mo Xuanyu could be an unsavory character. He just liked him too much to care.

And in a way, that’s what he’s doing with A-Yuan’s presence in his life.

Mo Xuanyu’s eyes crinkle into half moons. “So,” he begins, leaning across the table, “What’s the craziest thing you saw this week? Any insane cases you couldn’t solve?”

Lan Zhan blinks. He’s asking about his work, the one part of Lan Zhan’s life that Mo Xuanyu supposedly hates? He didn’t think he’d see the day.

“Nothing odd medically,” he says, noncommittally. “Except one resident decided to take a nap inside the supply closet during our first week… while he was supposed to be doing rounds.”

Xuanyu perks up instantly. “What? No way. What did they do to him?”

“The patient backlog was unacceptable. The committee suspended him for six days due to his negligence.”

“Oof. Well, who found him in the first place?”

“…I did.”

“Lan Zhan, ah, Lan Zhan,” he snickers, “Always the model student, huh? But what were you doing in the supply closet?”

“I wasn’t looking for the supply closet,” he grumbles. “That idiot Su She somehow paged me in his sleep. I don’t even know how someone does that. This is what happens when you pay your way through your career.”

Mo Xuanyu leans back in his seat, eyebrows shooting up his forehead. “Woah, gossip from Dr. Lan? Isn’t that against your family rules or whatever?”

“Corruption is also against my family rules.”

“Of course it is.” He fidgets with his sleeve. “Anyway, speaking of stupid rich people, I have a couple of stories from my work. It’s nothing compared to saving lives, of course, but… do you want to hear them?”

Mo Xuanyu sounds oddly hesitant, and it sets off alarm bells in Lan Zhan’s head. It’s a strange sentiment, and even stranger coming from someone as confident as Mo Xuanyu.

Never in a million years could Lan Zhan even begin to understand how Mo Xuanyu’s mind works. He visualizes and codes groundbreaking algorithms like it’s nothing, and he helps countless people on top of it. How could he think his work is worth any less?

“Always.” Lan Zhan nods, sincerely.

Mo Xuanyu immediately brightens, then leans back with a sigh.

“So, one of my clients this week— a big-name tech CEO— he called me at three in the morning because someone hacked their ‘super secure’ system.”

“At three?

“Yeah. Turns out the password was literally ‘I love you forever’. 5201314. Like the password we all had when we were thirteen years old.” He drags a hand down his face. “I spent two hours fixing the breach while he complained that I wasn’t fast enough.”

Lan Zhan takes a sip of his water. “Why not tell him to choose a stronger password?”

“Oh, I did.” Xuanyu grins like he’s been waiting for this. “I suggested a 16-character string with randomized symbols, but he got offended. Said he couldn’t possibly remember it. Like they don’t have people for that. So, I asked him to create one.” Xuanyu groans, slumping against the booth. “Do you know what this multimillionaire CEO comes up with?”

“What?”

“‘7758258,’” he deadpans. “They don’t pay me enough to deal with this.”

For the first time all morning, Lan Zhan’s mouth twitches, and he moves to cover his mouth with his hands. “‘Kiss me and love me?’”

“Don’t—” Xuanyu warns, kicking him under the table— “Don’t laugh at my suffering. Like 5201314 wasn’t bad enough! Did he ask his teenage daughter to pick it out or something?”

Lan Zhan stifles a snort. “What makes you think he asked someone else to pick it?”

Mo Xuanyu swats at him, laughing, while Lan Zhan covers his head with a barely-concealed smile— but they freeze when A-Yuan launches into a wet cough, cheeks blotched red from the effort.

Mo Xuanyu pats his back without hesitation, murmuring, “He always does that. It’s fine.”

Lan Zhan nods, not entirely convinced. But across the table, Mo Xuanyu beams at him like nothing’s wrong, sunlight catching in his hair. And Lan Zhan lets himself look, even as the sound of that cough echoes in his chest long after it’s stopped.

A-Yuan returns to his regularly scheduled pastime— drumming a plastic spoon against the table like he’s summoning ancient demons. Mo Xuanyu reaches across and steadies the baby’s hand, smoothing his hair back with the kind of gentleness that makes Lan Zhan’s chest ache.

But when the food arrives, it’s chaos. Mo Xuanyu tears into his fried chicken cutlets, grease shining on his fingers. Out of the corner of his eye, Lan Zhan notices A-Yuan whining, making grabby hands at the yummy-smelling food on the table.

Heart softened, he offers him small pieces of a soft bun with chopsticks, and A-Yuan squeals in delight. Half of it ends up spat back onto Lan Zhan’s sleeve, which earns a laugh so sharp Mo Xuanyu nearly chokes on his drink.

“This is what you get for spoiling him,” Xuanyu manages, wiping his mouth before rummaging through his diaper bag. “We packed his own food for a reason.”

Lan Zhan wipes the sleeve clean without flinching. “He wanted this one.”

“Did he tell you that?” Xuanyu leans over to swipe at A-Yuan’s chin with a napkin. “You have to let him suffer a little. Can’t give in to anything he demands.”

Without dropping eye contact with Mo Xuanyu, Lan Zhan, perfectly calm, slowly slides the entire egg tart they were saving for dessert across the table. He digs out a spoonful of custard, and sets it in front of A-Yuan.

“Lan Zhan,” Mo Xuanyu sing-songs, eyes widening. “Don’t you dare.”

But it’s too late. A-Yuan kicks his legs and squeals, grabbing a fistful of custard as shoving it in his mouth, like this is the moment he’s been waiting for. Custard smears down his chin as he bangs the table with sticky hands, demanding more.

Lan Zhan’s face barely shifts, but he lets the faintest ghost of a smirk lift the corner of his lips. “He likes it,” he says, wiping A-Yuan clean with a napkin.

“Okay, and? He likes chewing on extension cords too.” Mo Xuanyu groans, smacking A-Yuan lightly on the back of his head. “You’re going to rot all his teeth out before he even grows them!”

Lan Zhan doesn’t argue.

He only watches the child gnaw happily at the egg tart, the sunlight catching on the curve of his nose, and thinks that he could get used to this. This bickering. The sounds of A-Yuan slurping up dessert. The way he feels comfortable warmth settling into every part of his body.

When their plates are wiped clean, Xuanyu wrestles the diaper bag shut with greasy fingers while Lan Zhan lifts A-Yuan against his shoulder. The baby’s already dozing, warm and heavy, his breath tickling Lan Zhan’s neck.

But the sweetness sits sharp in Lan Zhan’s chest, as bright and iridescent as spun sugar. He knows that with one misplaced puff of air, it’ll disintegrate into nothing before his eyes.

———

Loving A-Yuan is easier than fighting for his custody, as Lan Zhan quickly realizes.

It is a bureaucratic nightmare, wrapped in mounds of paperwork and legal hurdles he doesn’t even want to think about.

But they’re here anyway, sprawled out on the couch in a sea of papers and teacups, trying to figure out what the hell needs to be filled out. They’ve set a deadline for themselves: to have everything submitted before A-Yuan’s second birthday, which is next January— nine months from now. They can celebrate then, with friends and family and some of that carrot cake A-Yuan has taken a liking to. In their kitchen, for their baby.

But this dream will stay a dream if they don’t begin now.

Mo Xuanyu had already done his own research weeks prior, so at least they’re not coming in blind. His brother is a lawyer, and he was able to draft up some of the forms ahead of time. Lan Zhan still… doesn’t really know how to feel about that. Mo Xuanyu’s commitment to making sure A-Yuan’s childhood wouldn’t end up like his is commendable. But he was willing to drop Lan Zhan from the equation all together. Like it somehow wouldn’t affect his life too.

Mo Xuanyu burrows his legs under Lan Zhan’s thighs, as usual. Leans his head absently on his shoulder. Plays with a strand of his hair.

Lan Zhan flips another page, scanning the dense print until the characters start to blur. The papers are full of blank spaces that demand answers neither of them have. What do you even write when your parents were married only in name? Or when they didn’t put all of your documents in a nice little folder before they violently and tragically left this world?

The lies sting too.

They have it slightly better in Beijing, but Lan Zhan knows that a family like theirs is still something the law won’t acknowledge without a fight. Every form is a minefield, questions designed for perfect nuclear couples who fit neatly into boxes, signatures only valid if you know your entire family history.

When Mo Xuanyu hesitates over the box for single under Relationship Status pen hovering for a fraction too long, Lan Zhan feels it like a physical blow.

It doesn’t matter that he has a co-parent, that A-Yuan sleeps to the sound of his snoring, or that he makes enough to support the three of them, even without Lan Zhan’s share. As far as the law is concerned, Mo Xuanyu is single, a stranger to A-Yuan, living in an apartment with no stable income. What authority would leave a child in his care?

“Oi,” Mo Xuanyu snaps, shaking him out of his stupor. “Where are you floating off to?”

“I got distracted,” Lan Zhan mumbles.

“Yeah, clearly.” He sighs and shakes his head, exasperatedly smiling. “If this paperwork is too much for the doctor, what am I supposed to do? Let’s take a break.”

“Wait, let me finish this page.“

“Come on, Lan Zhan!” Mo Xuanyu tugs on his arm, pouting. “We haven’t done something together in so long!” He leans in and rests a hand on Lan Zhan’s thigh, a sly grin spreading across his face. “Plus, A-Yuan is asleep right now. So if we stay quiet, we can—“

Lan Zhan’s phone suddenly buzzes from his back pocket, and he fishes it out. It’s his attending, calling him in the middle of the day. As soon as he sees the name on the screen, Mo Xuanyu instantly deflates. He lets go of Lan Zhan, flopping back onto the couch.

“I thought you weren’t working,” he mutters, not meeting his eyes. But before the mask slips fully into place, there’s a flicker—his mouth softening, just for a breath. Then it’s gone, smoothed over into something blank and practiced.

“I’m not,” Lan Zhan says, helplessly. “I don’t know why she wants me.”

“Maybe she just knows you’ll drop anything for her,” Xuanyu says quietly. “Wish I had that kind of pull.”

It’s like ice cold water rushing into Lan Zhan’s chest. He turns to him, mouth twisting into a scowl. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing. Just pick up.”

He rolls his eyes and puts the phone on speaker, so that Mo Xuanyu can hear as well. Maybe then, he’ll realize that he’s not faking the ropes that control his life.

His attending’s voice is brisk, almost clipped, when she tells him she needs to meet with him in half an hour for an urgent surgery consultation. This is unfair, but far from uncommon. He knows this. And it’s just a glimpse into what the rest of his life might look like. Lan Zhan takes a deep breath, unclenches his jaw, and tells her he’ll be there.

Half an hour is how long it takes to get there. He’s going to have to leave now.

He gets up, and notices the way Mo Xuanyu’s face shutters. Blank, expressionless. He watches in confusion as he stacks the paperwork like he’s on autopilot, walks towards the front door, and hands Lan Zhan his coat.

“Come back soon,” he mumbles, before stalking off into the bedroom.

———

She lied.

There’s no surgery consult, no patients dying in agony. Lan Zhan is tempted to storm out the building, but he knows he would be taking his career with him too.

He stands in front of her desk, tucked inside her office room instead of the open conference room. It smells like overpowering lavender. He can hear clamoring on the other side of the door. Codes being called, wheels rolling, distant shouting. It’s silent inside, and a sinking feeling sets in, dread he hasn’t experienced since he was in high school. What did he mess up? And what will his uncle think?

But he isn’t seventeen anymore. Reality is not as straightforward.

His attending watches his face carefully, when she proposes it to him. “Last week, the Ministry approved an accelerated residency track for neurosurgery. It’s unprecedented, and your uncle argued strongly for it. You know your uncle is an esteemed member of the national medical education board, and his position was clear: the country cannot afford to waste three years on talent that could already be saving lives. The exemption passed because of him.”

Three years of training is the government-mandated requirement. His famously rigid uncle, advocating for shortcuts? What is she talking about?

When Lan Zhan doesn’t respond right away. His attending leans back against her chair, lacing her hands together. As if she can read his mind, she says, “Don’t misunderstand. He did not petition for a circumvention, and he certainly did not petition for you. That would have been blasphemy and favoritism. He petitioned for a change in the law itself— an option for the rare few who meet its criteria. You happen to be the first candidate. The board agreed you were… obvious.”

Her mouth quirks, not quite a smile. “But make no mistake, Dr. Lan. You aren’t being given a shortcut. You’re being placed on trial. If you succeed, you’ll set the precedent for the future. If you fail, you’ll drag him down with you.”

He listens in silence, but the words burrow deep, tightening around his chest like sutures pulled too tight. If he refuses, he looks ungrateful, selfish, weak. If he accepts, he is binding himself to a life he can already feel slipping through his fingers.

She tilts her head, voice dropping. “But you would be a Xiehe neurosurgeon, in one year. Locked in a surgical post before most of your peers even graduate. First choice of cases. You would be the pride of the Lan family. Whether you want it or not is irrelevant.”

One year.

Everything else dissolves.

For a moment, he imagines it: dinners not eaten in sterile cafeterias, A-Yuan heavy in his lap, Mo Xuanyu laughing over something small and stupid. If he takes this, he could finish faster, pull himself out of this endless tunnel of sleepless nights and blood-slick corridors. He could finally breathe. But the fantasy curdles as quickly as it comes.

Every word reeks of a pride he has never cared to claim. A demand dressed as opportunity. His uncle’s voice reaching to remind him, duty before desire, nation before self.

And yet, the self still claws at him. What he wants is small, selfish, shameful by Lan standards: a quiet kitchen, a child on his lap, a man at his side.

The thought festers like a wound— if he takes this, he may finish faster. But what if by the time he does, there’s nothing left to return to?

However, if this is the only way back to that life, if there’s a chance he can still keep them— then he will accept the chains and call them salvation.

He walks out of her office, trying to smother down the smoke smoldering in his lungs.

———

Lan Zhan walks in to find Mo Xuanyu pacing the length of the living room, one hand clutching his phone, the other bracing A-Yuan against his chest. The toddler’s face is blotchy and streaked with snot, his breaths shallow and wheezing. Relief crashes across Xuanyu’s face the second he sees Lan Zhan. He wordlessly passes A-Yuan into Lan Zhan’s arms, and snatches the car keys from his pocket.

“What happened?” Lan Zhan asks, as they race to the parking lot.

“I don’t know!” Mo Xuanyu shouts, not frustrated— just desperate. “He—he woke up wheezing and coughing from his nap, so I tried rocking him, patting his back, but nothing I did worked. And then…”

He turns away, swallowing the rest of his sentence. His lips are pressed tight, face pale, and his eyebrows are knit together. Lan Zhan stops him in front of the car door, and grips his shoulders. “What happened after, Xuanyu?”

“I fucked up, Lan Zhan!” He sobs. “I—I gave him water. I thought it would help his cough, but he— he started vomiting, and his face turned purple, and—“

Lan Zhan scoops A-Yuan— still coughing— out of Mo Xuanyu’s arms. He has a hunch of what could be ailing the toddler, so he pats him firmly in between his shoulder blades, trying to alleviate it. But he watches as Mo Xuanyu stares at the ground, chewing on his lip, fist clenched tight.

“Anyone would have done what you did,” Lan Zhan reassures him. “It wasn’t your fault.”

But he feels an odd mix of insurmountable relief and stark horror when— as he’d expected— A-Yuan’s coughs slowly begin to subside, replaced by wet sniffles. He tries to ignore the pit in his stomach, and focuses on what he needs to do next. The coughing fit will spike up again any minute.

The drive to the hospital is a blur of headlights, labored wheezing, and Xuanyu’s frantic half-sentences into the phone. By the time they reach the pediatric specialist, A-Yuan is exhausted, every exhale rattling inside his ribcage like dry leaves in the wind.

The receptionists attempt to pick a fight over Mo Xuanyu’s lack of documents. One glare from him and one hacking cough from A-Yuan shuts them up immediately.

The exam room is too white, too bright. The pediatrician asks to speak with them, while two nurses sweep A-Yuan out of Lan Zhan’s arms.

“How are you related to him?” She asks them, notepad in hand.

“We are A-Yuan’s family friends,” Lan Zhan cuts in, the lie falling far too easily from his lips. “A-Yuan is staying with us temporarily. His family is unable to care for him.”

“Are you his primary caretakers?”

“Yes,” he says, without hesitation.

She nods, jots down something, and disappears into the room behind the nurses.

Mo Xuanyu hunches over and buries his face in his hands, leaving two gaps between his fingers for his eyes. He inhales, deeply, and holds the breath in for a few seconds before finally exhaling it out. His knee hasn’t stopped shaking.

Lan Zhan watches the clock. Feels his pulse sync up to the tick of the second hand. A baby— his baby— is in the other room, fighting to breathe, and it feels like time is moving through tar. Sticky, slow, inconsiderate. Should he reach for Mo Xuanyu, who is drawn so far into himself that Lan Zhan wonders if he’ll ever unravel?

Five minutes in, Mo Xuanyu’s voice cuts through the silence, muffled between his palms. “Will he be okay?” he whispers.

Lan Zhan gently grasps his hands, and peels them from his face. Mo Xuanyu looks up at him, uncertainty swirling in the ash of his eyes. Lan Zhan caresses a thumb over the back of his hands, rubbing soft circles. “He will be fine,” he says, lying through his teeth for the second time today. It is incredible, how love has turned him into something unrecognizable.

Finally, the pediatrician steps back in. She pulls up a chair in front of them, and her voice is calm but firm as she runs through the notes.

“Chronic cough, excessive mucus production, and vomiting were his symptoms, yes?”

Mo Xuanyu nods. “He’s been like that for the past three weeks. I thought it was just a persistent cold that he was having trouble fighting. He’s small for his age. But it’s never been this bad.”

In the back of his mind, Lan Zhan notes that he didn’t mention his many attempts to book an appointment. He did know something was wrong. He probably just doesn’t want to complicate the situation and stop A-Yuan from getting care.

She hums in acknowledgment. “Have you noticed any strange textures on his skin? Any smell, any taste?”

Lan Zhan knows where this is going. He doesn’t trust himself to speak. He feels the pit in his stomach threatening to swallow him whole.

“Yeah,” Mo Xuanyu says. “He’s sticky, all the time.”

“Hm. We’ll need a sweat chloride test to confirm, but combined with today’s presentation, we have to strongly consider cystic fibrosis.”

And just like that, Lan Zhan’s entire world is turned inside out.

Cystic fibrosis was something he studied in textbooks, not something that would happen in his life. He knows it’s not a death sentence anymore, but he finds himself falling back into his old habits, the bullet points from college flashing before him:

Daily airway clearance. (How do you strap a chest machine onto someone this small?)

Nebulizer treatments multiple times a day. (How will we afford that?)

Pancreatic enzyme replacement with every meal. (How do you get a baby to swallow those vile pills?)

Frequent hospital visits—sometimes admissions, depending on complications. (How do you keep him alive when your own life isn’t yours to live?)

Beside him, Xuanyu is motionless, fingers curled into his lap. When he finally whispers, it’s almost too quiet. “He’s just a baby. He can’t—he can’t have this.”

Lan Zhan promised, right?

But what about every single promise made to him? The ones that broke into slicing shards and lodged themselves into his chest, settling in the space between his ribs as his life grew around them.

First it was his mother, who told him she would never leave. Then it’s expectations— the promise of a bright, secure future if he just worked hard enough. And now it’s nature itself, telling Lan Zhan that he isn’t allowed to know any peace.

He remembers pressing his palm to his kid’s back, feeling the rasp of each fragile breath, and thinks: Of course. Of course it would be taken from me too.

The only thing that has ever made him happy since he was six years old, and it’s about to be ripped from his shaking, begging hands.

It’s not new to him. He was just stupid enough to think it wouldn’t happen again.

Chapter Text

5 MONTHS LATER

Lan Zhan is just about to leave for his shift when he finds Mo Xuanyu standing by the front door.

It’s 4 am, the apartment is still and quiet. The sun isn’t even up yet, but Mo Xuanyu is already dressed: suitcase in hand and a backpack slung over one shoulder. Mo Xuanyu— who in almost twenty-six years— has never known consciousness before 8 am. His eyes are dark, his face is blank. Lan Zhan can’t even tell how long he’s been standing there.

He’s wearing Lan Zhan’s ZJU hoodie, and it hangs off his frame like an old cloak. Absently, Lan Zhan wonders if it was always that big on him. He wouldn’t know. He doesn’t have the mental capacity to remember any of that, anymore.

All he knows is this: A-Yuan has been in and out of the hospital for the past week for treatment. Lan Zhan wants all of it to end.

“What are you—“

“I’m visiting my sister,” Mo Xuanyu cuts in, voice flat. “Gonna be staying with her for a week. Can you drop me off?”

Lan Zhan stares at him. “You’re telling me this now?”

He raises an eyebrow. “I didn’t know I needed your clearance to leave the house.”

“And A-Yuan?”

“I’ll take care of it.” He blows a piece of hair out of his face, and rolls his eyes. “Why do you care?”

“Just give me your suitcase,” Lan Zhan clenches out. He doesn’t have the energy to put up with this all over again.

Besides, he needs to get going as soon as possible. If he doesn’t clock in at five, his uncle will be hearing about it.

What he thought was hell five months ago is nothing compared to the agony he experiences now. He gets up every day wanting to die a little— assuming he’s even able to sleep. Blood and sweat and the crushing weight of expectations haunt him throughout his waking hours.

He loads his bags in the trunk, and they start the drive in silence. Mo Xuanyu’s hand props up his head, turned to the window, watching nothing. His other hand drums on the armrest. It’s been a while since the silence was intentional. Is Mo Xuanyu just tired? Half-asleep? Or is it because Lan Zhan can count on one hand how many times they’ve run into each other over the past few months?

After fifteen minutes. Mo Xuanyu’s voice cuts through, quiet as a knife, sharp enough to slice into Lan Zhan’s chest. He hasn’t moved an inch, body still turned away from Lan Zhan.

“You’re not even going to ask me why I’m leaving?”

“Your sister-in-law recently had a baby, right?” Lan Zhan keeps his eyes on the road. He knows it’s not the answer he wants.

Mo Xuanyu scoffs, quietly. He tilts his head against the glass, breath fogging faintly against it. “Right. Because I’m so good with kids. Because she only asked for me and not the doctor I live with.”

Lan Zhan exhales through his nose, steady but brittle. “You are good with A-Yuan,” he says, low, almost an accusation in its certainty. “Better than anyone.”

“Better than anyone?” A short, bitter, almost manic laugh escapes from Mo Xuanyu’s lips. “Lan Zhan, There’s no one left to compare against.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Lan Zhan replies, voice flat, almost clipped. “What matters is that A-Yuan is cared for.”

“Cared for? Oh, this is good.” Mo Xuanyu whirls towards him, and Lan Zhan startles at the mirth in his expression. “Lan Zhan, do you think it’s easy killing myself just so I can keep him?”

“No, I—“

“Do you think it’s easy to get a toddler to wear a nebulizer every single day? Do you think it’s easy feeding him, changing him, rocking him to sleep, tracking his meds, crushing them up into dust and then sneaking them into the only yogurt he ever eats?”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what— what the fuck else did you mean?” Mo Xuanyu’s laugh tears out of him again, but this time it stumbles. He drags his palms across his face, tilting his head back before pressing them to his eyes. His voice drops, raw, nearly breaking. “Lan Zhan, do you think it’s easy doing this alone?”

Lan Zhan’s grip tightens on the wheel. “I don’t—”

“You don’t what? You don’t know? Care? How could you, when you live like a fucking shadow?”

He drops his hands from his face, and curls them into the denim of his jeans, staring at his lap. His curtain of dark hair hides his expression.“You come home late, sleep on the couch, and say nothing. You barely look at me. I don’t— I’ve accepted that you don’t show up for me. But you don’t show up for him either.”

He looks up at Lan Zhan again, eyes rimmed red. “But remember, it doesn’t mean shit, Doctor Lan, if you can’t even do that.”

And Lan Zhan remembers— he doesn’t know about the accelerated track.

He thought about telling him. The words would rise up, sharp against his throat: They want me to finish in a year. They want me to burn myself alive and call it a torch for the future. But what good would it do? Mo Xuanyu can’t change anything. He’s also drowning, also sleepless.

What would be the point in adding this? It’s better that Lan Zhan swallowed it whole. And if he let himself admit the truth—that part of him wanted it, because it might mean finishing sooner, might mean a way back to this home—then he would see nothing but disappointment when he looked into Mo Xuanyu’s eyes.

But at least disappointment would mean he still cared. That he still felt something for Lan Zhan.

He told himself, once, that he never wanted to see heartbreak on Mo Xuanyu’s face. He turns to him now, and sees something so much worse.

Hatred.

Where did he go so wrong? And what did he do to deserve this?

“You know how stressed I am,” Lan Zhan manages.

Mo Xuanyu snorts, cracked around the edges. “Of course you are. All you care about is your damn residency.”

“That’s not true.”

“Isn’t it?” Mo Xuanyu tilts his head, eyes glittering with something between rage and grief. “Every choice you’ve made—every night you vanish into that hospital—you chose it over me. Over him. Don’t sit there and tell me this family mattered when it’s the last thing you ever fight for.”

Lan Zhan’s knuckles whiten on the wheel, as he bites back everything that’s been clawing at him for months. “You think I haven’t fought? You think I haven’t sacrificed?”

“Oh, you’ve sacrificed plenty,” Mo Xuanyu spits. “Sleep. Food. Sanity. Your life. But never your pride. Never your rules. God forbid Lan Zhan ever admit he wants something for himself.”

The words slam into him harder than he expects. He swallows, but the air in his throat feels jagged. “That isn’t—”

Xuanyu doesn’t let him finish. His voice cracks as he pushes harder. “Tell me, then. Do you even want this? Do you want me? Do you want him? Or are we just another duty you tick off your endless list?”

The car feels suffocating. He can’t do this anymore. Lan Zhan’s jaw locks. His voice comes out low, ragged.

“You’re the one who wanted to raise him. Not me.”

For a moment, Mo Xuanyu doesn’t move. Doesn’t breathe. The words hang between them, and Lan Zhan wishes he could take them back the instant they leave his mouth.

Then Mo Xuanyu laughs, again. A horrible sound—wet, cracked, unhinged. “There it is,” he whispers.

“Finally. You said it.”

“Xuanyu—”

“Don’t.” His hand shoots up, palm trembling, as if holding Lan Zhan at bay without touching him. “Don’t you dare try to take it back. You don’t get to make promises and then act like you never meant them.”

He’s shaking now, the words tumbling too fast, voice fraying into something desperate and raw. “You think I didn’t notice? Every time you came home late. Every time you couldn’t look me in the eye. Every time you left me alone with him— God, I told myself it was sacrifice, that you were doing it for us. But you weren’t, were you? You never even wanted us.”

Lan Zhan’s chest aches, but his voice stays low. “That isn’t true.”

“Then why say it?” Xuanyu’s laugh curdles into a sob, sharp and ugly. His nails dig crescents into his jeans. “Why the fuck would you say it, if that’s not the truth?”

Lan Zhan’s jaw locks, the words he wants to say dissolving before they reach his tongue. The car is silent, broken only by the rhythm of Mo Xuanyu’s uneven breathing.

When Mo Xuanyu finally speaks, his voice is stripped raw, emptied of bite. “Do you know what I think about, sometimes?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. His gaze stays fixed on the blur of streetlights outside the window.

“I think about that summer in Yunnan. How different everything could’ve been if it had been someone else, the day I cut my hand. If I never laughed with you, never touched you, never— never let myself believe you were mine.”

He tilts his head back against the car seat, shuddering exhales leaving his body as he tries to hold back tears.

“I wish I never fell in love with you, Lan Zhan,” he rasps. “Maybe then it wouldn’t hurt this much.”

Mo Xuanyu hasn’t let himself cry yet. Lan Zhan is not as strong. He bites into his lip, so hard that his tongue tastes metallic when he pulls away. His vision blurs with hot tears. He tries to blink them out, too far gone to care about them spilling. And so, just for a second, his gaze flicks away from the road ahead of him.

There’s blinding headlights. Tires screeching. Glass shattered, everywhere, everywhere— Lan Zhan’s chest, his arms. His glasses are cracked. A shard juts out from his shoulder. Oh. The passenger seat is empty. He stumbles out of the car, battered and bleeding, barely able to hold himself up.

The air is thick with the smell of iron and smoke. Lan Zhan notices a figure lying broken on the asphalt in front of him, and hears a scream echo, loud and wretched. Maybe it’s him. He doesn’t know.

He collapses. Eyes barely open, he watches, in morbid fascination, as his entire sleeve blooms crimson red.

If fate had any kindness, it would have been his own blood staining the fabric.

It belongs, instead, to the man who breathed life into Lan Zhan’s brittle heart. The man who stitched up his scars with patchwork kisses and then tore them open all over again. The only person Lan Zhan has ever, and will ever want.

His gray eyes are unblinking. Lan Zhan’s fall shut.

———

“Baba, no more!” A-Yuan shouts, flinging himself out of Wei Ying’s arms into his father’s. Dr. Lan lifts A-Yuan up, hoists him over his shoulder, and pats his back, gently.

“It was in the past, A-Yuan,” he murmurs, and it sounds like he’s comforting himself, too. He locks eyes with Wei Ying over A-Yuan’s shoulder, and frowns at him.

“Wei Ying.”

“What?”

“You’re crying.”

Confused, he brings two fingers to his cheek. They come back damp.

“Oh, yeah,” he laughs awkwardly, not entirely sure why he’s in tears all of a sudden. He swipes at his face, and rubs his nose. “I guess this just… reminded me of my own accident, you know? I— um. I didn’t remember anything past my third year of college. Just… poof. Gone. The doctors didn’t know what to make of it.”

“Mn. Retrograde amnesia,” Dr. Lan nods, face completely blank. In the back of his mind, he wonders how Mo Xuanyu ever got any reaction out of him. He returns his attention to his son, softly wiping away A-Yuan’s tears.

“Baba?” he whispers, “Can we go home?”

Without another word, Dr. Lan clutches him closer, and rises from the sofa. Wei Ying follows suit, and slowly walks around him so he’s facing A-Yuan. A-Yuan blinks up at him, cheeks blotchy and red. He looks miserable.

Wei Ying tries for a smile, but he knows it doesn’t meet his eyes. He reaches towards A-Yuan, tucking a strand of hair behind his ear, and tries to ignore the way Dr. Lan tenses at his touch.

“Oi, Yuan-er,” he whispers, pinching the kid’s cheek. “Don’t forget, we have to finish our show! Come visit your Ying-gege soon, okay?”

A-Yuan nods, wearily, and sniffles again.

“He’s tired,” comes his father’s gravelly voice. “Thank you for watching him.”

Dr. Lan sounds sincere enough, but Wei Ying hears the message underneath, loud and clear: Leave us alone. And who is he to argue with that, after what he’s put Dr. Lan through? Three hours ago, he thought this was a great idea, that he was doing something good for A-Yuan. Now he just feels guilty.

“Don’t mention it,” he shrugs, trying to overcompensate. “I’ll walk you down to your car. The apartment’s hard to navigate.”

It’s not. Wei Ying, pathetically, just doesn’t want to say goodbye yet.

———

He recognizes the Volkswagen from the story. It looks just as pristine, even five years later, and Wei Ying remembers that this is the car where Dr. Lan made the promise that changed everything. The promise that led to A-Yuan sleeping in his arms, his heartbeat against his chest.

And yet, Wei Ying finds himself wondering, horrifyingly, if Dr. Lan and Mo Xuanyu ever got up to anything in the backseat. His follow up thought is What the fuck is wrong with you? He slaps himself mentally, and hopes that the night hides his burning face.

“So, uh, Lan Zhan.”

Dr. Lan looks up from placing A-Yuan in his car seat, and everything about his face screams complete and utter hostility— from the tightness in his jaw to his unforgiving, stony gaze. His light-colored eyes would be beautiful, Wei Ying notes absently, if they weren’t so full of ice.

He fidgets with his sleeve. “I know you have your system with Mianmian already, but I just wanted to let you know that I— um, I would be willing to watch A-Yuan too. If you ever needed it. I’m at the university until two, but I’m open any time past that. And I would like to meet A-Yuan again. Really.”

Dr. Lan just stares at him, like he’s exasperated that this silly stranger is offering to babysit his kid. Again.

“You’ve done enough,” he finally sighs. “Go rest. It’s late.”

That wasn’t a flat out rejection. Maybe there’s hope for him. Wei Ying watches Dr. Lan and A-Yuan drive off, before he heads back up to his own apartment.

He steps into the living room, and for the first time, the place feels so much emptier.

———

Lan Zhan barely makes it inside the bathroom before he hurls.

He kneels at the toilet seat, trying desperately to muffle the gagging, and the retching, and the sobs that wrench out of his chest. He tastes iron again, sharp at the back of his throat. Smells smoke where there is none. A-Yuan is sleeping in the next room. Lan Zhan cannot let him find him like this.

He pulls himself up and staggers over to the sink. He splashes ice cold water into his face. His breath hitches, his chest heaves. Honestly, he’s surprised he even lasted this long. Seven hours of surgery. Three hours of reliving the best and worst thing that ever happened to him. All in front of the man who caused it all, and the child he wanted more than anything.

When sleep finally drags him under, it drags him back—to the one memory that he wishes he could erase from his being.

———

“He’s alive.”

Lan Zhan blinks awake to find Jiang Cheng seated in the corner of his hospital room. His arms are crossed, face gruff as ever. But he looks like he hasn’t slept in days.

He watches as Lan Zhan slumps back against the cot, dragging his IV-tethered arm across his face. He sobs with relief, feeling his cheeks flood over with silent tears. Wei Ying is alive. He’s alive.

The only thing stopping him from yanking out every tube in his body and running to Wei Ying is the fact that he physically cannot move. He blacked out from the sheer pain after the crash. The paramedics must have drugged him, which means his injuries must have been horrible, even with the seatbelt. But Wei Ying—

“How is he?” he rasps, voice shredded from disuse and thirst.

“Three broken ribs,” Jiang Cheng practically spits. “Severe head trauma. But he’s stable.”

Lan Zhan nods too quickly, breath shuddering. “Can I see him? Just once. From the window, even—”

The scrape of the chair is violent. Jiang Cheng is on his feet in a heartbeat, finger stabbing at him like a blade. “You think you get to look at him again?” His voice breaks into a near-shout. “After what you did?”

“I won’t— I won’t bother him,” Lan Zhan pleads, nearly sobbing again. “I promise. I just— please—“

“I could count all of his ribs, Lan Zhan.”

His breath dies in his chest. “…What?”

“All of them.” Jiang Cheng’s voice drops, hoarse with fury. “I haven’t seen him that thin since—since we first brought him home. And you—”

He surges forward, fisting the front of Lan Zhan’s hospital gown and hauling him upright. The IV line drags taut. Lan Zhan dangles, too shell-shocked to even resist, let alone react.

“You were supposed to be done with your adoption papers by now.” His voice is low, guttural, trembling with something worse than rage. He drops Lan Zhan back onto the bed with a thud. “Did you ever wonder why he hasn’t touched them in months?”

Jiang Cheng pulls out his phone from his pocket, opens a voice message dated from four days ago, and quietly sets it on the side table.

“Do you want to know why? Here. Listen.”

He presses play, and Wei Ying’s tinny, broken voice fills the room.

Hi, jiejie, he sniffles. Sorry, I, um… I think I’m a little drunk. I haven’t really slept this week, like, at all— so I thought drinking might help? But now I’m just… drunk and awake instead. Heh. Sorry. You don’t— you don’t have to listen to this, really. But I just wanted to say that I miss you. So much. And Jiang Cheng. I hope A-Ling is okay, I mean… I know he is, you’d tell me if— anything?

I wish I could be there. I do. But I have to stay with A-Yuan, and I can’t bring him over, not when— not when you’re already so busy, right? And Lan Zhan isn’t here, of course. It’s 2:48 am. He’s still not home.

He’s so… he’s so good, jiejie. He works so hard. Leaves before the sun comes up and sometimes he gets back and the sun’s up again, and I don’t— I don’t know how he does it. I really don’t.

Sometimes I— hic— I try to make lunch for him, and I make sure it’s not spicy. He hates spicy food. It’s the one thing I can still do for him. But then I always find it untouched in the fridge afterwards, so I just… eat it myself. Or I throw it out, because it tastes like shit— sorry, I know you hate when I curse. But that’s just how it feels. The food isn’t even bad, it just feels… wrong.

Maybe… maybe he doesn’t even know it’s there. Maybe he thinks I made it for myself. I haven’t even said anything about it. I can’t. His phone is always off. We— hic— haven’t slept together in weeks, eaten together in days. I don’t… I don’t even know when we last talked. And I try to initiate things, try to reach for him, I really do. But he just… he’s just so tired, jiejie. I know he’s tired. And who wouldn’t be?

But the thing is… I don’t know if he even wants me anymore, jiejie. It wasn’t always this bad. We used to talk. About us. About A-Yuan. About dinner plans. About his brother, about you and Jiang Cheng. He’s so— hic— quiet, now. He does lab work instead of coming home on his days off.

I know he’s doing this for us. I know— I know. But I miss falling asleep next to him. He sleeps on the couch now, did you know? And I miss his stupid, soft smile. The one that looks like… like the sun over snow. It’s been so long, jiejie. I don’t remember the last time he smiled at me. I miss him. So much. and I know it’s not fair and I shouldn’t feel this way, but I’m just— I’m so lonely, jiejie. And I can’t… I can’t even— I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I just—

The recording abruptly stops. “He sobbed into the speaker for the next three minutes,” Jiang Cheng says, picking up the phone. “Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve heard him cry, Lan Zhan?” He watches as Lan Zhan hyperventilates, hunched over in the cot, nails violently digging into the mattress.

“It’s been twenty fucking years,” Jiang Cheng whispers. “He wanted to leave you and your kid, Lan Zhan, because he was that miserable with you. You broke him, and you didn’t even notice.”

Lan Zhan swallows down the taste of bile rising up his throat. “Why are you telling me this?” he croaks.

“To make sure you don’t do it again.”

Lan Zhan swallows, not entirely understanding what Jiang Cheng is saying. He knows he’s the last person Wei Ying wants to see right now, but he can’t just leave him like this. Hasn’t he already done enough? Lan Zhan doesn’t care what it takes— he’ll change his life plans, quit his job, move somewhere they can get married, where A-Yuan can be both of theirs, where the law won’t stop them from building a future. One word from Wei Ying, and he would do it.

“Just once,” he pleads again. “I have to— I have to apologize, at least.” He sits up, using every bit of his strength as his arms quiver beneath him. His legs are still immobile, but he would drag himself across the entire hospital if it meant reaching Wei Ying.

Jiang Cheng’s face twists. He almost looks pitying, and that is somehow worse. “You still don’t get it, do you?” He shoves Lan Zhan back down on the bed, looming over him. His voice is low, deadly. “Wei Ying survived the accident with blunt force trauma-induced retrograde amnesia.”

Lan Zhan’s blood goes cold, and his eyes go wide. “What are you—“

“You don’t want it in your clinical language?” Jiang Cheng sneers. “You don’t want to hear about it like he’s a patient instead of your boyfriend? Fine.”

He leans in, so close that Lan Zhan can see every spot of red in his bloodshot eyes. “My brother doesn’t know who you are.”

At first it feels like mishearing, a trick of the drugs still dulling his veins. Lan Zhan doesn’t understand the words— he can’t. But his body reacts first: blood rushing so violently in his ears it drowns out the rest of the world, throat burning with a scream that will not come. The sickening lurch in his gut, the static clawing at his skull, the way every muscle locks as though bracing for an impact that’s already hit. It is pain without movement, devastation frozen in place.
The words keep echoing, ugly and unreal—he doesn’t know who you are.

His own mind betrays him, sharpening it, twisting it into the cruel realities Jiang Cheng never spoke: He is a stranger to Wei Ying, and so is A-Yuan.

It drags him through every memory at once, tearing him open with all proof of the life Wei Ying no longer remembers.

Echoes of his laugh spilling over the Yunnan tea terraces. Thermos exchanges and stupid wuxia salutes and bunny nightlights and hot pot and I would find you really annoying… if I didn’t like you so much.

And then I love you, whispered into Lan Zhan’s lips on that Qixi evening. Wei Ying’s quiet gasps, during their first time. The way his beautiful face flushed over, the way he caressed his cheek and smiled up at Lan Zhan like he was everything he’d ever wanted.

Gossamer curtains. Two jade pendants. More promises Lan Zhan couldn’t keep. The sound of Wei Ying’s snickering after teasing him, watching his ears go bright crimson. Wei Ying running around the house after stealing Lan Zhan’s glasses, collapsing into a fit of giggles when he was finally caught. It’s Wei Ying, it’s Wei Ying, and it is always Wei Ying— etched into every fiber of Lan Zhan’s being.

His warm hand clasped around A-Yuan’s, the spit up over his shirt, and the raspberry kisses he’d press to A-Yuan mantou cheeks. The exhausted fondness in his storm-colored eyes. His perpetually messy hair. Lan Zhan, mumbled into the crook of his neck in the middle of the night.

And yet, all of it burns away under the same brutal truth: If memories make a life, then what they had together was nothing more than a dream. And Lan Zhan is the only one still waking from it.

“He has a second chance now,” Jiang Cheng presses. “A second chance to find peace. So please—“ his voice shudders, and this time, he’s the one begging. “Don’t ruin this for him.”

With that, he leaves Lan Zhan alone in a cold hospital bed, quietly shaking as he tries to remember how to breathe.

Maybe pretending the love of his life is dead is the only promise he’ll ever be able to fulfill.

Chapter Text

Wei Ying feels a little ridiculous, standing outside the frosty oak door of Dr. Lan’s luxury apartment with a dinosaur water bottle swinging like a bribe. He doesn’t know why he half expected Dr. Lan to still live in the old apartment he once shared with Mo Xuanyu—and he doesn’t know why the thought leaves him vaguely disappointed.

Maybe it’s because Dr. Lan had hyped up Mo Xuanyu’s taste in plants and furniture. Wei Ying loves houseplants too. Or maybe it’s because when Dr. Lan spoke of their old place, his voice had carried a warmth that this polished, stiff building could never exude.

The engraved nameplate that reads “Lan” feels colder than the man who lives inside.

Who is not the man who just opened the door.

“Huan-ge?” Wei Ying smacks his forehead. “Sorry, sorry—Lan Huan! Nice to meet you!”

Lan Huan tilts his head. “Wei Ying?”

“Yup!” He beams, then squints. “Wait, how do you know my name?”

“Well,” Lan Huan begins slowly, “how do you know mine?”

“You look exactly how Lan Zhan described you! And wow, do you guys look alike. If he ever smiled, people might actually mistake you for twins. So…” Wei Ying crosses his arms. “How do you know my name?”

Lan Huan blanches, color draining from his face. “Oh, I—”

“Ge?” comes a low voice behind him. Dr. Lan steps into the doorway, scowling when his eyes land on Wei Ying. “Why are you here.”

“Hey, Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying chirps, undeterred. He hoists the bottle like evidence. “I have something that belongs to Yuan-er. Is he—?”

He cranes his neck to peek inside. Dr. Lan shifts deliberately to block his view. “A-Yuan is getting ready,” he says, before dramatically turning to his brother. “Ge, can you check on him? Thank you.”

With one confused glance between his brother and Wei Ying, Lan Huan takes his cue to leave, and turns back inside the house.

“He left his water bottle at my place,” Wei Ying informs Dr. Lan, dangling it in front of him to emphasize his point, and to establish that he is not an unemployed stalker.

“How did you get this address?” Dr. Lan questions, delivered like he’s cross examining a testifying criminal.

“I got it from Mianmian?” Wei Ying raises an eyebrow. “We have a mutual friend. Surprised you even have any if this is how you treat everyone. You know, I came before work just to drop this off,” he grumbles, shaking the bottle in the air. “And to check on A-Yuan! The least you could do is invite me inside.”

Lan Zhan stares at him for a long, glacial moment.

“Fine.”

Wei Ying blinks. “Fine?”

“Come in.”

“Oh.” He slowly lowers the bottle. “Okay.”

He wasn’t expecting it to be that easy. Honestly, he’d only been messing with Dr. Lan. He has class in thirty minutes, no time for tea.

But he can’t complain when the interior unfolds before him: pale blue and white, warm wood trim, a scattering of delicate plants. It looks like a set straight out of a period piece. Elegant, minimal. Beautiful.

Even the chest wall oscillation vest in the corner of the living room— ugly as it seemed when Wei Ying did his research— still blends in.

“Ying-gege!” A-Yuan’s voice bursts from the staircase, high and breathless. He barrels down the steps so fast Wei Ying instinctively braces himself, kneeling, just in time for the boy to fling his whole weight into his chest.

The hug nearly knocks him back. Wei Ying laughs, startled, but the sound comes out softer than he means it to. Dr. Lan rushes to his side, glaring at Wei Ying, and peels A-Yuan away from him. “What did I say about running?”

Still breathless, A-Yuan manages to smile, clutching Wei Ying’s hands with sticky determination. “Can— can—“

“Aiya, little radish.” Wei Ying gently picks him up, and plops him down on the couch. “Why don’t you catch your breath first? I can wait, you know!”

Dr. Lan joins them, the two of them slowly patting A-Yuan’s back as the wheezing subsides. Would Mo Xuanyu have done this with Lan Zhan, comes the stupid voice in Wei Ying’s head, if he had lived long enough for it?

When A-Yuan’s breathing finally steadies, he asks if Wei Ying can come see his room.

Classes can wait for a bit. They’re college kids. How could Wei Ying refuse A-Yuan anything?

———

Honestly, he half expected the kid’s room to be a miniature copy of the rest of the apartment: polished, cold, and painfully pristine, like it’s been staged for a magazine shoot. Something sterile, with exactly three picture books lined up by height and maybe a sad potted fern for “warmth.”

Instead, when A-Yuan drags him upstairs and throws open the door, Wei Ying stops short. The room is nothing like the sleek icebox outside. It’s cozy. Lived-in. The kind of space that actually feels like it belongs to a child. Plush dinosaurs and cars scattered across a fuzzy blue rug. Crayon drawings taped crookedly to the walls. The soft glow of a nightlight, even in the middle of the day.

“Look, look!” A-Yuan exclaims, grabbing Wei Ying’s hand and tugging him toward a pile of figurines. “This is my dinosaur corner. Baba says I have too many, but I don’t—because this one’s a T. rex and this one’s a spinosaurus and this one’s a velociraptor and they’re all best friends. Oh, and Baba reads me dinosaur facts before bed. He knows all of them, even the hard ones.”

Wei Ying raises a brow. Dr. Lan, dinosaur trivia expert? Honestly, why not? One of the country’s leading neurosurgeons could definitely remember whether Triceratops was from the Triassic or Jurassic era.

A-Yuan presses the T. rex into Wei Ying’s hand, already clutching a pterodactyl.

“They’re arch nemeses, so you have to make him roar really loud.”

Wei Ying kneels, and narrows his eyes dramatically at the plastic dinosaur. “Arch nemeses, huh? Do I look like someone who does weak roars?”

A-Yuan giggles. “Do it!”

So Wei Ying lets loose the most absurd, guttural bellow he can manage. A-Yuan shrieks with laughter, toppling onto his pile of plushies, wheezing but delighted. “Again, again! That was scarier than Baba’s roar!”

Wei Ying can’t help grinning, nudging the T. rex toward the pterodactyl. “Of course he’s going to be super scary. He’s the king of dinosaurs. Now fight me, little radish—RAWR!”

A-Yuan gamely throws his toy into battle, complete with explosion noises. The fighting continues, valiant and passionate. Sadly, T. rex loses the battle, fatally wounded by Pterodactyl’s mega bite.

Wei Ying sets the poor dinosaur down and reaches over to muss A-Yuan’s hair. “Aiya,” he groans dramatically, “T. rex did his best. But Pterodactyl is just too good, huh?”

“Yeah!” A-Yuan beams, cheeks flushed pink from laughing.

The brightness in his little face tugs at Wei Ying’s chest, though, because he can still remember the way it had crumpled last night. The way his tiny hands had trembled, clutching at his baba’s sleeve when the story ended.

Wei Ying softens, his voice slipping into something gentler. “Hey, Yuan-er… how are you feeling today? After your Baba told you that story last night.”

A-Yuan pauses mid-wiggle, toy car still in his hand. For a moment, the room feels quieter, like even the sunlight peeking through the windows has dimmed.

“I’m fine now… but I’m sorry for being rude to you,” he finally whispers.

Wel Ying blinks. “Rude?”

”I didn’t even say bye to you. That’s rude, isn’t it? Baba says it is.”

Wei Ying can’t help the tiny laugh that breaks out of him. He reaches out to pinch A-Yuan’s sullen cheek. “Your baba’s right—most of the time. But not with me.”

A-Yuan blinks up at him. “Why not?”

Wei Ying leans in, grinning. “Because friends don’t need to say sorry or thank you for every little thing. If you’re my friend, you don’t have to apologize.”

A-Yuan tilts his head, puzzled. Then the meaning sinks in, and his whole face lights up. With a laugh, he launches himself into Wei Ying’s arms, clinging tight.

God, Wei Ying loves this kid.

“You remind me of Jingyi,” he says, pulling back. “He’s my very best friend. He even gave me this plushie!”

A-Yuan dives onto his bed, rummaging around under his covers before presenting Wei Ying with a bunny stuffed animal. “I sleep with this one all the time, when Baba reads to me before bed. He falls asleep sometimes when he’s reading, though. He got through three whole chapters of Journey to the West once before he started snoring. I had to poke him.” He snickers, clearly delighted by the memory.

Surprisingly, Wei Ying can picture it vividly—Dr. Lan, upright posture finally giving out, book slipping in his lap, stubbornly reading until his circadian rhythm gets the best of him. His chest squeezes.

But A-Yuan is already rummaging through a toy box, pulling out a small red car with a lopsided wheel. “And this is the car he fixed for me when the wheel came off. Baba doesn’t even like cars, but he still fixed it! He can fix everything.”

Wei Ying’s throat feels tight. He doesn’t doubt it.

“Sometimes he plays the guqin for me when I can’t sleep,” A-Yuan adds suddenly, tone serious for the first time. Then he grins again, bouncing in place. “He plays this one song, and he said he’s only ever played it for A-Die. I think it helps me have good dreams.”

“Oh!” A-Yuan points proudly at a crooked crayon drawing taped to the wall. Two stick figures stand beneath a shaky blue sky. “That one’s me and Baba and Bobo at the ocean. When we went to Dalian to see the algae!”

Wei Ying’s heart shutters. “Dalian?”

A-Yuan nods. “We go there every year. Actually, we’re leaving tomorrow!”

Before Wei Ying can fully process this, A-Yuan rushes outside, over to their fully covered glass-balcony. It’s an elaborate setup. Two rabbits, plump as dumplings, hop around. One black, one white. They’re enclosed on all sides, toys and cardboard boxes sprawled on the hay beneath them.

Wei Ying doesn’t recall the rabbits from the story, so Dr. Lan must have adopted them later. But the rabbits look almost full grown, and well-accustomed to A-Yuan, so how long after Mo Xuanyu…?

Wei Ying kneels down in an attempt to pick up the black rabbit. Instead, it wriggles out of his grasp, bolting away to gobble up some leftover pellets. His hands are left suspended in midair, and he begrudgingly drops them over his lap. “Aiya, Yuan-er. Your rabbits hate me. So spoiled.”

A-Yuan snickers, scooping one up protectively. “They are not spoiled! Baba says they’re healthy and happy. He even cuts carrots into little stars for them.”

Dr. Lan, stoic and terrifying in his pressed shirts, bent over a cutting board making decorative rabbit snacks? Maybe even playing with the bunnies as they munch away at his handiwork?

“No way.” Wei Ying squats down, wagging a finger at A-Yuan. “Your baba would scare all of them away. Just look at the man. How does he even—“

“The trick is to stop talking, once in a while.”

Wei Ying immediately straightens. “O-oh, Lan Zhan,” he chuckles weakly, grimacing as he slowly turns to meet his eyes. “You’re so quiet, aiya.”

Dr. Lan looms over him, the vaguely amused expression on his face somehow charming Wei Ying. His version of a smile, apparently, is the barest softening of his eyes, an almost imperceptible tilt of his lips.

He would have a wonderful laugh, Wei Ying thinks, suddenly. He knows that it’s true, he can feel it in the depths of his chest. But he doesn’t know why.

“What?” Wei Ying asks, mulishly. “Are you gonna kick me out? Fine, I’ll leave on my own, no need to see me out.”

“No. I came to ask if you wanted tea.”

“Oh.” Warmth blooms through Wei Ying’s chest, in spite of himself. “It’s fine,” he mumbles, rubbing his nose. “I have to get going soon.”

He gets to his feet, ignoring the familiar sting in his side. Wen Qing is a damn good doctor, but there are still some aches that never got to heal. He brushes invisible dust from his pants and half-turns toward the door.

“Wei Ying.”

The sound of his name freezes him. It isn’t sharp or cold this time—it’s… soft? Careful. He blinks, turning back.

Dr. Lan’s gaze flicks toward the rabbits on the balcony. “Do you… want to hold him?”

Wei Ying tilts his head. “Huh?”

“The black one,” Dr. Lan clarifies, almost looking shy.
“He prefers stillness.”

“Me?” Wei Ying points at himself. “You want me to hold your very important, very pampered rabbit? The same rabbit who ran away from me five minutes ago like I was holding him hostage?”

Dr. Lan huffs out a small laugh. He steps closer, close enough that Wei Ying can feel the faint warmth of his body. He guides the rabbit into Wei Ying’s arms with a gentleness that makes his brain short-circuit.

Always an action over words man, huh?

The two of them kneel in the hay, the bunnies resting in their laps. The one Wei Ying is holding settles easily against him, ears flicking, nose twitching. Meanwhile, he is acutely aware of Dr. Lan’s sleeve brushing his wrist, the way his long fingers adjust Wei Ying’s grip just so, the soft press of breath at the side of his neck.

“You have to support him here,” Dr. Lan murmurs, hand lingering over Wei Ying’s. His voice is low, deliberate, like he’s explaining a surgical technique instead of rabbit cuddling.

Wei Ying snorts. “Why do you sound disappointed in me? It’s not like I do this every day, doctor.”

The rabbit wiggles, nestling closer. Wei Ying’s heartbeat is so loud he’s afraid the rabbit might hear it. Or worse—that Dr. Lan might.

When Dr. Lan finally pulls back a fraction, Wei Ying almost stumbles from the sudden rush of air between them. He glares at the rabbit, somewhat content in his arms, like it’s betrayed him. But his fingers curl deeper into the rabbit’s soft fur.

And yet, as if it can tell that Dr. Lan has pulled away, the bunny begins wriggling and squirming, like it’s ready to bolt any second. Not surprised, Wei Ying lets go of the quivering creature in his arms. Embarrassingly quickly, it scampers across the balcony towards A-Yuan, who offers a few pellets in the palm of his hand. It nibbles at them without hesitation.

Dr. Lan raises an eyebrow, and gently picks up the other white bunny hopping around his knees. “He was fine when I was holding him.”

Wei Ying scoffs. “Not everyone is a little princess like you, Lan Zhan. Communicating with the creatures of the land and all that.”

Dr. Lan shoots him a funny look, and doesn’t say anything more. The joke wasn’t that bad, was it? What, does Dr. Lan have a grudge against fantasy royalty too?

“So,” Wei Ying begins, filling the silence as usual, “How long have you had the bunnies?”

“Three years.”

He hums, absently. “That makes sense. After everything that happened, it must’ve been nice—” he waves his free hand vaguely, “—to have something new. You know. To move on with.”

Like pressure before a storm, the warmth drains from the air, replaced with something brittle and heavy. Wei Ying realizes too late how horribly insensitive he sounds.

As if confirming his suspicions, Dr. Lan doesn’t answer at first. He adjusts the cuff of his sleeve like he hasn’t heard. His silence stretches so long Wei Ying starts to fill it with nervous chatter.

“Not that moving on is bad! It’s what people do. Life goes on, right? You can’t just—” he bites down on his tongue. “—you can’t just stop living.”

Finally, Dr. Lan turns to Wei Ying. It’s just the barest knit of his eyebrows, the slight clench of his jaw, but the look there makes Wei Ying’s chest lock up. His voice, when it comes, is quiet. Terribly quiet.

“Do you really think I moved on that quickly?” His gaze pierces into Wei Ying, demanding an answer. “Do you think I was capable of it?”

If this wound hasn’t scabbed over after five years, what made Wei Ying think it wasn’t gushing hot blood after less than two?

He blinks, the bright balcony suddenly feeling suffocating. “I didn’t—“ his eyes flit to A-Yuan, still happily petting the black rabbit. “It’s just… how could you rebuild your life to be so perfect if you never moved on?”

Dr. Lan sighs, the ice over his face slowly subsiding. He goes silent again, but this time, his mouth does a strange thing. Like he’s chewing on words, on answers— trying to figure out what tastes right.

“I tried to rebuild my life in his memory,” Dr. Lan says, finally. “I was twenty-five. Six months left of my accelerated track, with no partner. And I was trying to adopt a child with a chronic condition. They told me the foster system would find a ‘more stable environment.’ That he would be better off elsewhere.” He absently scratches between the ears of the bunny in his lap. “I didn’t listen. It took months—reapplications, evaluations, interviews. Most doors closed. My family name was the only reason any opened again.”

Of course. The Lan family, the face of Chinese medical philanthropy. Placing unbearably heavy expectations through every generation, in the name of the nation’s healthcare. Wei Ying swallows, throat tight. He wants to say something—anything—but Dr. Lan continues, voice level.

“I did not choose to raise A-Yuan because I thought I was capable of doing it well. I did it because I would have never forgiven myself if I left him to the system. And because I knew that Mo Xuanyu wouldn’t have forgiven me either. So I reached out for help. Filled out the paperwork. Received my certification.”

“You saved A-Yuan’s life,” Wei Ying whispers in awe. “You’re the reason he’s in this beautiful house, playing with these bunnies that basically grew up with him.”

“I did not save A-Yuan, Wei Ying.” Dr. Lan’s dark lashes flit over his face, glancing the lens of his glasses. “A-Yuan saved me.”

They’re not Wei Ying’s memories— he knows this. They’re inventions, cruel ones, and they flood into his mind: Dr. Lan pacing around in the middle of the night, A-Yuan sobbing in his arms. A-Yuan’s first day of school. First lost tooth. First finished book. Every scraped knee, every fight he won against his drowning lungs. The first time he called him Baba, with the full meaning of the word.

Packing boxes, hiding away photos, clocking in for work pretending nothing is wrong. And no one would question it either, would they? Who could possibly see past that jade mask?

All of it, lived without him. All of it, endured alone.

Wei Ying’s fists curl into his t-shirt. It isn’t fucking fair. Why does shit like this always happen to good people?

He watches the rabbit in Dr. Lan’s lap, its small, steady breaths practically making fun of how unsteady his own feel. He wishes he could change the subject, but for once, he doesn’t even know what to say. His tongue feels useless, heavy in his mouth.

Like the blessing that he is, A-Yuan meanders towards the two of them, the bunny in his arms quietly twitching. “Baba, it’s wiggle vest time. And can we have scallion pancakes for breakfast? Please?”

Dr. Lan hums. “I will meet you downstairs. Wash your hands.”

A-Yuan grins, his two gummy gaps on full display. He sets the rabbit down with more gentleness than Wei Ying would have expected out of a seven-year-old. But he’s Dr. Lan’s kid— of course he’s kind and responsible and perfect.

A-Yuan gives it a flying kiss, and scurries back into the house. Warmth blooms in Wei Ying’s chest, and it’s the same kind of warmth that his sister’s lotus rib and pork soup fills him with. It’s a contented feeling of home.

Wei Ying reaches towards the white bunny in Dr. Lan’s lap, gently smoothing its fur. “Aiya, Lan Zhan,” he snickers, “are you really giving the kid deep fried food first thing in the morning?”

“It is an indulgence,” Dr. Lan says, not unkindly. “He took the highest score in the class on his last exam.”

Wei Ying’s eyebrows shoot up his forehead. “Oh wow! Next three-good student of the Lan family, huh? You should be proud!”

“I am.”

Wei Ying chortles, hoisting the bunny out of Dr. Lan’s lap and plopping it down into his own. The morning sun’s rays filter through the glass, and Wei Ying tilts his head up, trying to catch the light. It reflects through Lan Zhan’s glasses too, thawing his icy eyes. Mo Xuanyu was right— they really do look like molten amber.

He pets the bunny’s fur softly, knowing that what he wants to say right now will probably mean nothing, coming from him. Yet he feels the undeniable need to say it anyway.

Wei Ying blows a strand of hair out of his face. “Mo Xuanyu would be just as proud of him, Lan Zhan. You know that. But… I think he would be proud of you too.”

Dr. Lan blinks, turning towards him. For a second, he looks completely unguarded, like the air has been sucked from his lungs. His face goes slack-jawed, his lips are slightly parted. He gazes at Wei Ying, his eyes shimmering. And Wei Ying’s heart aches.

“I mean it,” he reassures him. “Really. You— you think I would say something like that if I didn’t mean it?”

Dr. Lan swallows, jerkily rising to his feet. His head is bowed, his silky bangs falling like a curtain to hide his expression. And yet, Wei Ying can see that his face is pale.

“You should go,” Dr. Lan says, and his voice is a rasp in his throat before he turns back inside the house.

Wei Ying stares behind him, gaping, with no clue how Dr. Lan became upset over that. Is everything a minefield with this man? Every single thing that comes out of his mouth seems to hurt Dr. Lan. It’s either fire or ice with him. A barely stifled explosion, or a shut-down implosion.

It’s grief.

He was the same way, when he woke up after the accident. When he was learning how to live with five entire years of his life taken from him. Anger at the world for letting this happen to him, at that fucking driver for running that red light. Sadness that he didn’t remember his sister’s wedding, the birth of his nephew, his college graduation. And overwhelming frustration, because everyone somehow expected him to.

After five years, he managed to claw himself out of that dark headspace. But, Dr. Lan is still drowning in it.

He may worship his Mo Xuanyu. May be blind to his many faults, blind with devotion, blind because he’s dead. But Wei Ying can see it, clear as day: Mo Xuanyu broke the man he loved, and left him a lonely, haunted martyr.

Wei Ying knows not to speak ill of the dead, but he’s beginning to find himself resenting a ghost.

———

“Are you going to tell me what on Earth that was, didi? How did you—“ Lan Huan glances back at A-Yuan in the back seat, making dinosaur noises as he plays with his figurines. He drops his voice to a whisper. “He looked so sad when he left. What did you even say to him? Did you—“

“I did not—” Lan Zhan exhales through his nose, sharp and audible. “I did not say anything to him. I am being careful.”

Lan Huan blinks at him. “Careful? A-Yuan was ready to parade him upstairs and introduce him to every stuffed animal in his collection. And you—” his mouth tightens. “The bunnies? Really? You’re lucky he had somewhere to be. Did he finally settle down with an office job or—?”

“Professor.”

“What?”

“He is a professor. At Tsinghua. Computer engineering.”

Lan Huan gapes. There’s silence, save for A-Yuan’s roar of victory when the pterodactyl defeats the T. rex. He recalls that they are arch-nemeses in A-Yuan’s story.

“You kept tabs on him?” Lan Huan hisses. “Did you know he was engaged too?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t even attempt to defend himself. He just stares straight ahead, and flicks the radio on. Rapid-fire chatter fills the car as he increases the volume, effectively ending all further attempts for a conversation.

The patience his brother usually extends to him is very visibly fraying. Lan Zhan can’t find it in himself to care. He watches him subtly roll his eyes and open his phone.

“Baba? Baba! Can you turn it down? I need to ask you something!”

Oh, A-Yuan. Lan Zhan’s beautiful son, with his diabolical timing.

Lan Huan hides a laugh behind a cough, and presses his lips together. He turns the knob, switching the audio off. “What is it, A-Yuan?”

“Bobo, where are we going?”

“We’re picking up some last minute items before our trip.”

“Okay!” A-Yuan chirps, returning his attention to smashing his dinosaur into the window and declaring victory in a tiny roar.

“Well?” Lan Huan prompts, still whispering. “You saw the ring.”

Lan Zhan sighs. “It is enough that I know he is well.”

For someone so sociable, Wei Ying had never been particularly active on social media. His phone was destroyed in the crash, and Lan Zhan assumed Jiang Cheng got rid of any incriminating photos that were left.

Every update he had ever received—every glimpse of Wei Ying’s life after him—came secondhand through Jiang Yanli. She, who had every right to hate him just like her brother, had chosen mercy instead. She had cared for A-Yuan when Lan Zhan’s body was too battered to even lift his head up from his pillow. And she never left. He accepted her kindness the way a starving man takes crumbs.

Lan Zhan wasn’t surprised that his brilliant Wei Ying would have wound up at Tsinghua again. Teaching, sharing his knowledge, doing what he loved.

What he hadn’t realized was that Wei Ying was fine with marrying a woman. More than fine, really. Her name, Wen Qing, was said with fondness, so she clearly wasn’t a stranger. Even Jiang Yanli spoke highly of her.

Lan Zhan had certainly entertained the idea on occasion, when he really felt like torturing himself. Wei Ying with a wife as bright and lively as him. Kids with gray eyes running around the house, if Lan Zhan wanted to make himself extra miserable.

He never expected it to become a reality. But perhaps he shouldn’t be surprised.

Wei Ying had never called himself anything. Never needed to. Love seemed as easy for him as breathing, fluid and unconfined. Lan Zhan had envied him for it once. Now he cursed him for it. Because it meant this—watching him promise himself to someone else, as if what they had could be so easily rewritten.

Lan Huan presses his lips together, then mutters, “If you want to know about his life, fine. But stop lying to yourself about why you can’t let him go. You’ve already lied enough—for both of you.”

Lan Zhan doesn’t answer. His gaze fixes on the blur of traffic lights outside the window, steady and unblinking, as if looking away would undo him. The hum of the car fills the silence, until—

“Baba?”

Lan Zhan glances into the rearview mirror. A-Yuan is leaning forward in his booster seat, eyes wide and hopeful. “What is it, A-Yuan?”

“What if Ying-gege came to Dalian with us?” A-Yuan blurts.

Lan Huan freezes in the passenger seat, shooting his brother a sharp look, but wisely says nothing.

“A-Yuan.” Lan Zhan’s tone is even, but the fatigue frays at the edges. “What are you even saying?”

He fidgets with the tail of the T. rex in his lap. “I don’t think he’s ever seen the algae before. I can show him my favorite corner at the beach, and—and you both can spend time together. He’s really fun, Baba. I promise. And… and maybe if you spent more time with him, maybe you would like him more.”

Who is teaching him this?

“You have known him for less than two days.” Lan Zhan exhales slowly through his nose, trying to maintain his composure. “We are not bringing him with us.”

“But—”

“No,” he snaps. It comes clipped, firmer than usual, and Lan Zhan silently winces.

He chances another look into the rearview mirror, and sees A-Yuan’s shoulders slump. His arms are crossed, and he’s scowling slightly. He sinks back against the seat, muttering something under his breath that might be dinosaur fight dialogue, might be sulking. His A-Die might never have gotten to raise him, but Lan Zhan often marvels at the amount of Wei Ying that managed to weasel its way into his personality anyway.

Sometimes it inspires fond remembrance, like when he rubs his nose awkwardly or holds his pen in that strange way. Exasperation, when he insists on doing something and refuses to let it go.

But the rest of the time, it hurts more than anything.

Lan Huan angles his face toward the window, trying to hide the pity in his expression. Lan Zhan does not miss it.

He keeps driving. His hands are steady on the wheel, but his knuckles are bloodless white.

Chapter Text

Dalian.

Of course that asshole Wen Chao would have picked somewhere on the other side of the country for this stupid wedding. Of course Dr. Lan and his son are going to be there at the exact same time.

It’s a large town, right? There’s way more than one resort. He probably won’t even run into them.

And if he does, by some fucked up coincidence, Wei Ying can chalk it up to his perpetual bad luck.

This shouldn’t be a problem, really. Why should Wei Ying care about this random man (who narrated his entire tragic love story to Wei Ying and let him hold his pet bunnies, but stranger nonetheless) being in the background of his wedding, going about his life?

Why is the idea making him so anxious?

He doesn’t want Dr. Lan to watch his wedding. He wants him to be—

Wei Ying stuffs the last of his pants into the suitcase—nearly filled to bursting by now—and slams the lid shut. He slaps a copy of his class’ textbook over the top to keep it closed and zips around the edges, barely managing to keep all his clothes inside.

He knows he’s going to be in relatively traditional attire for the main ceremonies, but who knows what horrors Jiang Cheng has picked out for him? Wei Ying shudders at the very thought. Jiang Cheng may be in possession of surprisingly tasteful fashion choices, but this wedding is a show, before anything else. It’s going to be big and glossy and extravagant. Framed as the union of two great business moguls and shared values, among other nonsense. Hell, the Wens have rented out half the luxury resort for a week just for this.

“Oi, Wei Ying! Can you help me tie the back of this?”

Wen Qing hands the two ribbons on the back of her qipao to Wei Ying, and turns around. He does his best to make the ribbon look as nice as possible, and pats her on the shoulder when he’s done.

“Oh wow,” Wei Ying breathes, when she turns to face him. Her qipao is red, with elegant golden vines embroidered throughout. The bottom flares out, making her look almost sculpted, and the silk is luxurious. This is what she’s going to be wearing on their wedding day.

Wei Ying has never actually felt anything for a woman, even for all his flirting. But this is his best friend. Fiancée to the world, but who gives a shit? She looks stunning. Breathtakingly gorgeous.

“Aiya, still no makeup?” Wei Ying drawls instead, crossing his arms. “Mianmian’s going to get scared off if she sees you in this terrifying getup and your under eye bags.”

“Shut up,” Wen Qing mumbles, punching Wei Ying’s arm with much more force than necessary as he snickers. “I was just trying it on!”

Wei Ying flops backward onto the bed, arms splayed, suitcase fighting for its life on the floor beside him. “Well, Mrs. Wen,” he declares, “I suppose this is it. Our glamorous, fairytale beginning.”

“Don’t call me that,” Wen Qing mutters, though the tips of her ears are pink. She grabs her phone from the nightstand, scrolling like she hasn’t just been fitted into a qipao worth more than her entire medical degree.

“Why not? Has a nice ring to it. Very business-card chic.” He props himself up on his elbows and grins. “Mrs. Wen, lady of the sect. Mrs. Wen, mother of dragons.”

“Mrs. Wen, who will strangle you in your sleep,” she supplies, deadpan. “Dr. Wen, who will begrudgingly resuscitate you.”

“Hey, hey! Who said we were going to be sharing a bed?”

“That won’t stop me if you keep this up.”

She crosses her arms, trying and failing to rearrange her face into something resembling annoyance. Wei Ying laughs, tipping his head back. It’s easy, with her—like breathing. Always has been.

But then his gaze drifts toward the mirror across the room, catching their reflection: her standing sharp and composed in red silk, him rumpled and scarred and grinning like an idiot. The Xiehe surgeon and the Tsinghua professor. The amnesia case and the doctor who saved his life. A perfect little manufactured love story. Together, they almost look convincing. Almost.

And almost, he knows, is all it will ever be.

Wen Ruohan had to be aware that his two sons were idiots, and would drive the family company to ruin if he let them take the reins after he retired. So he had kept his cousin’s brilliant daughter close, letting her pursue medicine even if he secretly planned for her to succeed him someday. Keeping her happy was key to keeping her loyal.

And perhaps that’s why he hadn’t objected when she’d dragged Wei Ying home one day, and announced that she wanted to marry him in front of every single member of the Wen family. There had been murmurs and whispered complaints from everyone else, but nothing out of Wen Ruohan.

Wei Ying knows how lucky he is. That Wen Qing is, well, Wen Qing. It hadn’t been hard, wanting to marry her. Wanting to live with her, to share a life with her, even if it was never going to be in the traditional sense. She made this whole thing feel less like a cage and more like something they’d chosen, together.

And if proposing to her with a balloon arc, fifteen bouquets, and a cheek kiss on a Michelin-starred restaurant’s terrace meant saving her from being married off to the Wens’ little henchman, who was Wei Ying to hesitate?

No one would have guessed they spent the night with different people after that spectacle, but at least they got some cute photos out of it.

The Wens’ first choice for Wen Qing, Zhao Zhuliu, was loyal, efficient, and ruthless. The kind of man the Wens kept around for the things they didn’t want in print. Wei Ying doesn’t get the appeal of selling your morals and values for some validation and cash, but Zhao Zhuliu was good at what he did. God knows what blood debt that man owes to the Wens.

Wei Ying, on the other hand, was the Jiangs’ little charity case— picked up from some decrepit orphanage in the middle of Hubei after bouncing around between laborer foster families, before being whisked away to high-rise Beijing. He’d gone his own way, apparently he’d done some program in the US immediately after graduating college, according to Jiang Cheng.

Not that he remembers any of it. To add insult to injury, the file with all his trip photos and documents had gotten corrupted. It was an unfortunate coincidence, really, that the only proof of this trip’s existence was now completely unreachable.

He’d returned to China, nearly five years later, and promptly gotten his memories wiped. He spent those first few months after the incident half-asleep, half-starved, addicted to painkillers and resenting other people’s pity.

Then he got his PhD.

Overall, he’d generally tried to distance himself from the bureaucracy. That was a department better left to the actual heir, Jiang Cheng. But at the end of the day, he was still part of Jiang Enterprises and the immediate family. So his and Wen Qing’s “relationship” was eventually accepted.

But if either family, Wen or Jiang, were to find out the actual circumstances of this marriage— that it was nothing more than a carefully staged performance—then everything would collapse.

Wei Ying swallows down the thought before it curdles. He can’t afford to dwell. Not when all of it depends on the both of them keeping their faces straight.

“C’mon,” Wen Qing sighs, slipping her phone into her clutch. “The tailor is waiting downstairs.”

Wei Ying pushes himself off the bed, forcing a smile as he offers her his arm with an exaggerated flourish. “Alright then, laopo. Make sure you ask the tailor to alter the qipao so you can actually eat at the wedding. Ough, I heard they’re serving chili sauce grilled fish! I can’t wait!”

“Yes,” she deadpans. “Surely that is the most important part of this ceremony.”

“Yup!” Wei Ying chirps. “Aiya, don’t leave me hanging.”

Wen Qing rolls her eyes, but she takes his arm. Her fingers are cool, but her grip is iron. Wei Ying gives her hand a reassuring squeeze.

———

They descend the staircase hand in hand, just for fun, but the weight of it hits him all at once. The wedding isn’t even taking place here, and yet the marble lobby of the Wen mansion is still buzzing with Wen relatives, assistants, and decorators, each of them planning and moving with military precision under the chandelier’s sterile glow. A dozen pairs of eyes flick toward him and Wen Qing the moment they appear, smiles curving sharp and expectant, like knives sheathed in silk.

Wei Ying straightens his posture automatically, his poker face slotting into place like a well-worn mask. It’s surprisingly second nature— the way his voice turns level, calm, almost flat. Wei Ying, dutiful fiancé. The perfect addition to the Wen family’s glossy portrait.

For someone so outwardly arrogant, he is used to making himself small and quiet. Used to scraping away his entire personality until there is nothing left but ash-gray eyes and a begging smile. It’s what he spent his entire childhood trying and failing to do, because he didn’t want to be left behind, dumped in that excuse of a welfare home all over again.

That threat doesn’t exist anymore, of course. But he’s still gotten good at it.

“Dr. Wen! Professor Wei!” a woman with a headset breaks away from the cluster, flashing them a rehearsed smile. She has a clipboard in one hand, her nails lacquered Wen-red. “The tailor is waiting upstairs for the final fitting. We’ll need confirmation on both sets of attire tonight, before we send everything to Dalian with the advance party.”

Advance party? It’s a wedding, not a war. He’s sure Wen Chao prefers to treat them the same, though.

Wen Qing’s hand tightens almost imperceptibly on his own, a silent warning. His face has always been far too expressive, no matter what he does. Perfect complement to someone else he knows. Wei Ying swallows the rest of his disdain, raising his free hand in mock surrender. “Fine, fine. Lead the way.”

They’re ushered toward the elevators, every eye in the lobby tracking their movements as if the show has already begun. Wei Ying forces his shoulders back, flashes his most dazzling smile. The one that never meets his eyes.

People like pleasant faces. If he smiles at them, they’ll toss him more of their scraps. And he will take them, because it is all he will ever get.

When the doors part, they’re greeted by a hallway that smells faintly of starch and new fabric. Two tailors are already waiting, pins tucked between their fingers, assistants hauling garment bags like prized artifacts.

“Dr. Wen. Professor Wei.” One bows slightly. “Your fittings. Please stand still.”

Wen Qing hides her laugh behind a cough, because she already knows what’s coming.

It takes less than two minutes for Wei Ying to realize that standing still is, in fact, a fate worse than death. They prod his shoulders, tug at his sleeves, mutter about hem lengths and embroidery weight. When someone whips out a measuring tape, Wei Ying yelps, “Careful, careful, I’m ticklish!” and earns himself three exasperated sighs in unison.

Wen Qing, meanwhile, is the picture of composure, red silk falling over her frame like it was spun just for her. She tilts her chin this way and that as they adjust her collar, and if not for the slight twitch at the corner of her mouth, she could have been carved from marble.

Not jade.

Wei Ying glances sideways at her, stage-whispering. “If I faint from all this pin-pricking, you’ll catch me, right?”

“I would let you hit the floor,” she whispers back.

He snorts so loudly that one of the tailors almost stabs him with a pin.

By the time they’re finally released, Wen staff are already hovering with suitcases and timetables, rattling off departure slots for tomorrow’s flight. The Wen entourage is a machine, all polished gears and perfect choreography, and Wei Ying still feels like a bright, jangly screw someone forgot to tighten.

But when Wen Qing threads her fingers through his and they walk out together, heads high, he thinks maybe they’re pulling it off after all.

The moment they step out into the lobby, Wei Ying spots a familiar figure by the glass doors: arms crossed, expression thunderous even in the gold-tinged evening light.

“Ah, Jiang Cheng in the flesh,” Wei Ying sing-songs, dragging out the words like he’s announcing royalty. “Here to scold me once more before we leave? You really do love me, didi.”

“Shut up,” Jiang Cheng snaps, though his ears tint red. His sharp eyes flick over the two of them, taking in Wen Qing’s pristine qipao, Wei Ying’s now-crumpled shirt, the way their hands are still linked. His jaw tightens.

“You’d better understand,” he says, voice low and cutting, “that this isn’t a joke, Wei Ying. The Wens will be watching everything you do in Dalian. If either of you do something stupid, it’s not just your asses on the line.”

Wen Qing answers with a simple nod, calm as ever. Wei Ying just smirks. “Aiya, relax, xiao-didi. You think I don’t know how to act at my own wedding? You think I can’t be chivalrous? I’ll even carry her luggage tomorrow if it makes you feel better.”

“Don’t push it. And don’t call me that.”

Jiang Cheng’s disbelieving gaze lingers on Wei Ying for a moment too long—on the scar at his cheek, the messy hair he tried and failed to tame, the faint shadows under his eyes. Wei Ying looks away first, whistling under his breath.

His siblings had found out about his sexuality when he was sixteen— not that he’d ever planned to tell them. He hadn’t put a name to it himself yet, didn’t have the language for it. And it’s not like they would’ve cared to ask.

He was late coming from school one afternoon. The three of them had planned to meet by the front gates before cram school, as usual. His siblings, worried, had searched for him—and found Wei Ying in the back stairwell of the teaching building with one of his classmates. Found him pinned against the wall, cheeks flushed, shirt half-unbuttoned. And another boy’s face, buried in the side of his neck.

Wei Ying had met Jiang Yanli’s eyes, widened in vague horror, and immediately wanted to slam his head into the wall and die.

It doesn’t really matter that Jiang Cheng thinks he’s easy because of it, when that couldn’t be further from the truth. Sure, he is reckless, impulsive, and careless, but never when it comes to this. It was just an ill-timed moment of experimentation. He hadn’t even kissed the other boy.

Wei Ying also never saw him again.

Within a week, the other boy’s parents had quietly arranged for his transfer. Probably to keep him away from any more of Wei Ying’s “bad influences.”

He still feels guilty about it. About the transfer, the panic, the way he had violently shoved him away when they got caught, just in time to see the hurt and confusion flood over the boy’s face. He doesn’t know who told the boy’s parents, but thankfully neither Madam Yu or Jiang shushu ever found out. The scandal would have ruined them much more than it would have ruined Wei Ying.

He is also unimaginably lucky that his siblings had accepted him at the end of it all. Fifteen years ago, few would have. Jiang Yanli understood almost immediately. It took a year for Jiang Cheng to come around, but when he did, it was wholeheartedly.

Wei Ying pretended not to notice the way Jiang Cheng started looking out for him after that.

But he knows they still think he could be attracted to women. That he could be content with a perfect nuclear family.

He won’t correct them, not in this life.

“Anyway,” Jiang Cheng mutters, half to Wen Qing now, “the car will pick you up at six tomorrow morning. Don’t be late. The last thing we need is for the Wens to think you can’t handle a schedule.”

He turns on his heel, stalking toward the exit without another word.

———

Wei Ying hasn’t seen the ocean since he was a kid.

There are photos—him, sunburned and grinning, clutching a pair of sunglasses in one hand and his father’s fingers in the other. His mother must have taken it, on the old camera that now lives in his nightstand drawer. The memory itself is foggy now. Not just because of how young he was, but because his mind no longer separates the horrors of his early childhood from the moments of joy his parents left behind.

But his body still remembers the smell: salt, sunscreen, sandalwood.

The air in Dalian carries the same scent, and for a split second, it feels like standing inside that photograph, in a happier world.

He blinks, and the spell breaks.

The private limo from the airport jolts over a bump, throwing him half off-balance. Wen Qing is seated beside him, one earbud in, scrolling through her notes on the ceremony schedule. Outside the window, the city gives way to coastline— sleek resorts perched over cliffs, the occasional fishing boat glinting like a moving star against the pale water.

He groans and presses his forehead lightly against the glass, wishing he could figure out whether the pit in his stomach is dread or carsickness.

Or maybe it’s the secret third option: indigestion from that godawful porridge he had on the flight. So much for first class.

“You’re quiet,” Wen Qing says without looking up.

“God forbid I enjoy the view,” he grumbles. “This beats Beijing any day.”

She hums. “Right. Do that without sending seismic vibrations through the seat, please.”

Confused, he glances down, and realizes his leg is shaking uncontrollably. Who knows how long it’s been? He hadn’t even realized.

He really needs to get out of here.

He drums his fingers against the seatbelt, like maybe rhythm could drown out nerves.

Fat chance.

He tells himself, again, that it doesn’t matter. The odds are small. A resort city this size, multiple venues, thousands of strangers. He probably won’t even see them.

And on the off chance that fate decides to make Wei Ying’s life a lot harder— then fine. He can deal with it. He’ll smile. He’ll be polite. He’ll keep his distance, no matter what malfunctioning red thread keeps dragging him towards Dr. Lan and A-Yuan.

Wei Ying will be whoever he has to be.

The limo slows as they reach the resort entrance. A gate opens to reveal manicured gardens, palm trees lit from beneath by golden lights, a fountain throwing up arcs of water that shimmer like molten glass. The whole place smells faintly of jasmine and money.

Two chauffeurs immediately move to greet them, opening the limo’s front door with a flourish. He and Wen Qing are accompanied into the lobby, and she immediately falls into conversation with one of the coordinators. There’s a dull ringing in Wei Ying’s ears that he chalks up to the flight. And he lags behind, squinting up at the ornate interior— white stone, carved wood, the distant thrum of waves.

It is really fucking bright in here.

Not in a bad way—just in the way that everything here seems to be: polished to within an inch of its life, staff with uniforms so crisp they look starched onto their skin. And the marble floor is so shiny it might as well be water. He catches his own reflection on it—slightly distorted, smaller, like a ripple—and looks away quickly. Wen Chao’s money has bought the kind of perfection that feels faintly obscene.

Wei Ying sidles up to Wen Qing as she checks in, fingers drumming against the counter.

“Mr. Wei?” the concierge says brightly. She has thin glasses and a bun slicked to perfection. “You’ll be in the south wing with Dr. Wen. 33rd floor. The elevators are just down the hallway. And oh!” She squints at her screen, clicking her mouse a few times before looking back up. “It looks like you have the ocean view suite.”

Wei Ying immediately perks up. Ocean view? That’s one thing he can look forward to, at least.

He grins, thanking the concierge who congratulates the two of them, and takes the room keys from her. Wei Ying hoops them around his fingers, spinning them and making obnoxious clinking noises as Wen Qing rolls her eyes. They’ve almost reached the elevators, when a child’s voice suddenly rings across the lobby.

“Owww!” the voice wails. “Baba, it hurts so much!”

The sound slices clean through the air. Clear, high, unguarded. Wei Ying freezes before his mind even catches up, and he turns, slowly.

A-Yuan is standing under the front desk, as his bobo speaks to the concierge, occasionally glancing back at him with concern. One of A-Yuan’s hands is smacking his left ear, and the other hand is fisted into his shirt, clutching it so tight that the fabric is completely rumpled. And kneeling beside him, fishing out something from his backpack—

Fuck.

The world goes muffled, like someone just dunked Wei Ying’s head underwater.

Dr. Lan looks… different? He’s not the immaculate, exhausted doctor in crisp whites anymore, but softer, almost sunlit—pale blue shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbows, collar slightly undone. His hair is a little messy, his glasses off-kilter. And his lips are pursed, his fingers swipe hot tears from his son’s face, and there are tissues spilling out of his back pocket.

He looks painfully human.

Maybe this is the Lan Zhan he fell in love with all those years ago.

He, as in Mo Xuanyu, of course. Wei Ying’s chest tightens, every nerve in his body screaming at him to stop fucking staring. He promised himself he would leave the man alone, right? For his sake and Dr. Lan’s.

Wei Ying swallows hard, rips his eyes away, and forces his lips into something vaguely resembling a smile. “Small world,” he murmurs to no one in particular, voice just slightly too high.

Wen Qing turns to him, eyebrows knitting in confusion, her mouth twisting. Her gaze darts from Wei Ying to the father and son across the lobby. ”You know them?”

“Uh, yes?”

She frowns, voice strangely cautious. “…How?”

“Well, first of all, you never shut up about him.” Wei Ying snorts, trying and failing to sound somewhat casual.

“I do not!”

“Yes you do!”

She has mentioned him exactly twice in five years. It’s not Wei Ying’s fault that she hardly ever gives him bullying material. Sometimes he needs to take what he can get, because desperate times call for desperate measures. Truly, he leads such a difficult life.

He puts his hands on his hips. “Anyway, I got stuck babysitting his kid a couple days ago. All thanks to you and Mianmian. You two have got to get better at planning, okay? I mean, who sets up a date—“

“Shut up!” she hisses, smacking a hand over his mouth. “He’s looking at us.”

She’s right. Dr. Lan is upright now, A-Yuan in his arms, and his imperceptibly wider-than-usual eyes catch the light—still that impossible shade between gold and gray. They meet Wei Ying’s for one heartbeat too long before he blinks, unreadable, and turns his attention back to his son.

Even from here, Wei Ying can see how A-Yuan’s face is blotchy red and scrunched up. His mouth is a tight line, and he looks like he’s ready to cry. He’s holding his nose and squeezing his eyes shut, probably trying to pop his ears manually. Wei Ying knows from personal experience how absolutely painful it is, even as an adult.

“Baba,” A-Yuan sobs pitifully, dropping his hand from his nose and burying his face into Dr. Lan’s shoulder. “It’s not working.”

His father gently pats his head. “Try one more time, baobao.”

Wei Ying can’t watch this anymore. Not when the kid’s little hands are shaking with the effort of trying not to cry. It’s just this one time, and after that, he will leave them alone for good.

“Hang on,” Wei Ying blurts. Wen Qing shouts his name behind him, the ding of the elevator echoing. But his feet are already moving, power walking across the lobby. He digs through his pocket, fishing out a half-crumpled pack of gum—the cheap kind from the airport vending machine— and presents it to A-Yuan.

“Here, here, don’t cry, kid. chew this,” he says, uncurling A-Yuan’s fist and gently placing the pack in his hand. “It’s mint flavor. It’ll help your ears if you keep chewing, okay?”

“Ying-gege?” His voice tilts up at the end, almost breathless, like he’s in complete disbelief. Of course, it’s a warranted reaction— why would A-Yuan expect to see the weird man who babysat him in Beijing three days ago at a resort on the other side of the country?

Wei Ying rubs his nose, chuckling weakly. “Yes, little radish! I, um, I hope your ears feel better, and I don’t want to keep you and your baba for too long—“

“Wei Ying.”

“Ai, Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying whirls around to face him, clasping his hands in mock delight. He can feel the forced grin threatening to split his face. “What a crazy coincidence, right? My fiancée is waiting for me, I really should go, okay? It was nice seeing you!”

Dr. Lan’s eyebrow twitches. “Wei Ying.”

“Aiya, really, Lan Zhan! She’ll bite my head off if I don’t get back. Enjoy your trip! I’ll—“

As he turns to leave, Dr. Lan suddenly grabs his wrist, in a motion that would have been incredibly rude if it weren’t for the pleading expression in his eyes.

“The Wen and Jiang procession outside,” Dr. Lan whispers, grip tightening ever so slightly. “Is that for you?”

“I—“ Wei Ying blinks, completely bewildered. His heart pounds, so violently he thinks it might break free from his chest and spill out on the marble floor. “Ah… yeah?” he manages.

“You are getting married this week.”

Dr. Lan’s voice is quiet, but it carries. And something about the way he says it— not like a question, but an accusation— makes Wei Ying’s throat go dry. It’s the tone patients use when they already know the diagnosis but ask anyway, desperately clinging on to the stupid hope that maybe, just maybe— they’ll be wrong.

“Yes,” Wei Ying says, slowly. “Friday. Can you—” he tugs his wrist gently— “can you let go of me?”

Dr. Lan immediately complies, dropping his wrist like it’s on fire. He looks almost shocked, like he hadn’t even realized he was still holding onto Wei Ying. He wrings it out, muttering, “Aiya, what a grip. Do you, like, work out or something?”

“I apologize,” Dr. Lan says, sounding genuinely regretful. His gaze flicks to A-Yuan in his arms, who’s looking up at the both of them with round, confused eyes, slowly munching away at the gum. The lobby hums around them— suitcases rolling, guests chattering, the fountain outside still spilling crystalline water.

“You’re fine,” Wei Ying chortles, patting A-Yuan’s head. “You seemed stressed. Anyway, I hope Yuan-er feels better. Chew slowly, okay? I don’t want you choking on my goodwill and freaking your baba out again.”

Behind him, Wen Qing calls his name, her voice loud but somehow professional, even if Wei Ying can tell she is exactly five seconds away from marching over here herself and dragging him away by the scruff of his neck. He turns towards her automatically, feeling very grateful for the out.

“I think that’s my cue to leave. I’ll see you both around?”

“Wei Ying.”

What does he want now?

“Yes?”

“Are you…” Dr. Lan starts, stops, swallows. “Are you happy?”

“What?”

“Are you happy?”

No one has cared to ask Wei Ying that in years.

The area over his ribs on Wei Ying’s left side still hurts all the fucking time. When he gets up in the morning, it feels like a scalding knife stabbing into him over and over again, and it has been like this for five years. He still keeps the painkillers in his nightstand drawer, and scrambles for them like a rabid creature in the middle of the night when his insides start to burn.

He was dumped again, last week, for a completely different reason than his last two exes. His mind is a different age than his body. He’s signing his life away to the most corrupt business empire in China, all for the sake of his best friend. He’s tired and miserable and stressed and haunted.

Are you happy?

He flashes Dr. Lan a big smile, because what the fuck else is he supposed to do?

“I am happy,” he whispers. “Thank you.”

Wei Ying gives the two of them one last wave, before steps back towards the elevators. His reflection slides over the polished floor, thinner and thinner, until it’s gone.

A-Yuan waves in return, the gum bulging his cheek. “Bye, Ying-gege!”

“See you, little radish!”

And then the elevator doors close with a quiet sigh, separating them for real, this time.