Being reminded that his friend was gay wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Until when they started working out at the complex's gym together. Lan WangJi in a tight fitting, moisture wicking sleeveless top and knee length bike shorts turned heads of all ages and body types. The women sizing him up, eyes lingering on the bulge just below his waistline, was annoying, but at least they were in the 'you can look, but you won't ever get to touch' category.
The men, though? Sleazy buggers. Every single one of them. The obvious ones didn't merely try to size up what was hidden in his shorts or appreciate how his pecs pressed against his shirt, or the perfection that was his trapezoidal shaped back and narrow waist. They offered to spot him while he bench pressed a ridiculous amount of weight. While Wei WuXian was standing right there already spotting him. They offered to hold his feet while he did sit-ups, ignoring that Wei WuXian already had his hands on his ankles. Then there were the sly innuendos, cheesy pick-up lines, trying to hold a conversation while on the treadmill, complimenting his 'form' while he used the free-weights.
Alright, it was one sleazy dude; the rest kept their eyeballs in their heads and their tongues in their mouths. And Lan WangJi did his best ice king impression when the sleazeball tried to get too close. It was lovely to see the face grow still, eyes appearing to look down the nose, contempt written in every muscle group, and a quiet "go away, I'm trying to exercise here. Get out of my way." It was beautifully snobby, especially since it completely disappeared once the sleazeball huffed off, and all that was left of the ice king was a satisfied smirk.
~*~
Lan WangJi in his exercise clothing was a beautiful sight to see. Lan WangJi in a bathing suit was the Chinese version of Adonis or something. So far already, two people had tripped over the raised edges of the pool and fallen in just from looking (staring) at the tall, handsome man with ripped abs and lightly golden and glistening from sunscreen skin. And the pool had only been open for a week.
Wei WuXian had nearly given himself a hernia trying to keep his laughter contained after the second one fell in. "Gēge, you're too handsome for us mere mortals. Take pity on our poor hearts and wear a swim shirt?"
Lan WangJi had raked cold eyes up and down Wei WuXian's half naked body before responding. "Are you sure she didn't trip because of you?"
"She was staring at you." Wei WuXian knew exactly what he looked like: toned, slim, sleek, no overtly defined muscles. More rectangle shaped than trapezoidal. An otter-like creature. Lan WangJi answered by diving cleanly into the water and gliding to the shallow end. Wei WuXian shrugged and followed his friend. "Ah, Gēge. Be careful with our hearts. If the sight of you in dry trunks is enough to make us fall, what will the sight of you all wet do to us?" he teased.
"Do you like the way I look?" Lan WangJi asked quietly.
"I think you're extremely handsome. But you already knew that. Fishing for compliments?" Wei WuXian teased. Lan WangJi's eyes seemed to smolder. Which made Wei WuXian realize that his friend had light brown eyes, almost golden in color, instead of the darker brown/black ones typical of Chinese people. "I just noticed you have very pretty eyes," he blurted. "Color, I mean. Not shape. Shape pretty, too. Nice. Light. Good eyelashes. Long. Thick." Flustered, and not quite sure why, Wei WuXian dunked under the water, pushing off the wall to do the crawl, down the length of the pool. How fucking embarrassing.
~*~
[Is everything all right between us? You've been biking to work again. We haven't had dinner together in a week.]
Wei WuXian stared at the email. As he had been staring at it, on and off, for several hours now. He had no idea how to explain....
How do you explain that you literally just noticed your best friend's eye color after six years. And you liked it. Really liked it. Like, had dreamed about those eyes and how pretty they were. How do you explain that the existential crisis you narrowly avoided a couple years back, was stabbing you right in the chest?
He'd tried to ignore said crisis by inviting Jiang WanYin to Atlantic City for a weekend of playing in the ocean and gambling on the penny slot machines. They'd each put twenty bucks on their playing card and walked out with three dollars and twenty-five cents and a five dollar credit to one of the restaurants, so it was not a complete loss. It was easy to forget he might not be as straight as he'd always thought he was when in the air conditioned and overly oxygenated casino. It was a lot harder to ignore when relaxing on the beach and there were literally hundreds of nearly naked men in bathing trunks or bikini bottoms, all with varying degrees of hotness and, yes, he was idly cataloging their degrees of hotness and surreptitiously following, eyes hidden behind dark sunglasses, the ones who could almost challenge Lan Zhan for the position of 'hottest'.
Then on Saturday night, in the privacy of his hotel room, he'd opened an incognito web page and browsed to a porn site dedicated to men. As Lan Zhan had stated previously, it was... educational. After cleaning himself up, and throwing the dirty towels under the bathroom sink, he crawled completely under the sheets and yanked the pillow over his head for additional privacy. "I am so fucked."
Back now in his own room, Lan Zhan's innocent question glared at him like an accusation. He wrote slowly, [Just in my head for a bit, I guess. Maybe I'm coming down with a summer head cold. I feel off. Like my skin is the wrong size.] He stopped typing, staring at the phone screen until it went black and he could see his reflection. He couldn't see it in the reflection, but he had odd eyes for a Chinese, too: gray irises bordering on silver if the light was at a good angle. He wondered if Lan Zhan had noticed his eye color. "Of course he did, you idiot," he whined. "He's just too polite to ask what manhua I stepped out of." He clicked his phone back on and hit 'send', before he was tempted to write anything incriminating.
Anything incriminating.... Like... I think I'm gay.
~*~
"Fuck this hurts!" Wei WuXian writhed in pain.
"Sir... please. We'll get you some pain medication, but first we need to know if there's anything broken. Please lie as still as possible." The doctor? Nurse? Someone wearing red scrubs was leaning over his face, trying to talk him into compliance. "I'm going to take the neck brace off so we can x-ray your neck and upper spine, but you need to lie very still. Can you do that for me?"
Wei WuXian wanted to nod, but, given the position he was forced into, answered verbally, "Yes."
There were a few clicks and whirs. "They look good to me, but the brace goes back on until the radiologist takes a peek. He's on his way now. I'm going to x-ray that wrist; I definitely think that's broken. This is going to hurt, but I need you to lie as still as possible after I position it, okay?"
"Okay," Wei WuXian agreed. Because there wasn't really an option there to disagree.... "Fuck!"
"You can yell and scream all you like in just a moment...." More clicks and the tech was back. "Good. Definitely broken. Clear as a whistle. I can't splint that up for you, but we can move it to a less painful position. Move slowly... there. Good. I'm gonna slide you over a bit... There. Right arm next, but you aren't screaming when I touch this side, so I think you're intact here." More clicks. "Sorry, gotta bother that left arm again. Gonna slide you back.... Hold off on crying until I... there. Stay just like that."
Wei WuXian grit his teeth through the pain. "What happened?"
"You were hit by a car, I think. But if I heard correctly, you saw he wasn't stopping and tried to swerve. That intersection of Elliot and Fourth has traffic cameras, so I'm sure it will be easy for the police to see what happened. That hill? Late afternoon sun? The city really needs to put one of those 'traffic light is red' early warning signs before you can't see that the light is red.
"Moving on to your legs now.... How's the wrist doing? Can I help you into a more comfortable position?"
"Fine. Just get this over with."
He drifted in the overwhelming pain, really understanding only the difference between 'it hurts so much' and 'please just shoot me!' as the doctors and nurses worked around him. He roused a bit when the scent of antiseptics overpowered his nose. "Hello there. I'm Dr. Greer," sounded far more pleasant than anyone had a right to be at the moment. "I'm going to ask you some questions to make sure you aren't concussed." She went through the standard 'what's your name', 'who's the president', 'what year is it' stuff, flashed bright lights into his eyes, and sat back on her stool. "No concussion and only a broken wrist which looks like you got from trying to brace yourself while falling, not from being hit by the car. There are a few scrapes for us to clean up, but nothing serious. No internal trauma. You are very lucky, Mr. Wei.
"Is there someone you'd like us to call for you? I'm about ready to give you some painkillers which are going to, hopefully, make you feel like you're floating in a cloud. Do you have family around? Girlfriend? Boyfriend? Best friend?"
"My parents live hours away. Gotta friend. My phone?" stringing together words into sentence fragments was difficult.
"I'm afraid your phone, like your bike, took the brunt of the accident."
"I don't know 'is pho-nummer. Email. He answers email."
"I'll send him an email, then." She dutifully typed an email out; within a minute, the room's phone rang.
"Wei WuXian? How is he?" was yelled loud enough that the man could hear the words plainly.
"I'm afraid I can't give you medical information over the phone. The patient requested we contact you, but he couldn't remember your phone number. Are you able to come by and pick him up?" She paused for a breath, "Come to the ER; someone will direct you. Please bring a change of loose clothing; his were cut off."
"You cut off my clothes?" Wei WuXian looked down to see he was wearing only a floral johnny.
"They're bagged up with the remnants of your phone if you want to take them home. They're pretty bloody, though, and ripped from where you went sliding across the pavement."
Another woman came in, perhaps a nurse, with a tray containing two paper cups. Dr. Greer smiled and handed the pill cup first, the water. "Bottoms up. You're going to take two of these now, and one every six hours as needed for no more than a week. They're pretty strong, so we will not be refilling them."
"'Kay." Wei WuXian nodded, feeling that nod painfully stretch almost every muscle in his body. "How soon before I start floating?"
"Twenty to thirty minutes at most. Rest until your friend gets here; I'll start your discharge paperwork."
He was... not in pain. There was something nibbling at his consciousness saying he should not be feeling like this, that something was wrong, but he didn't really care. He was also vaguely aware that Lan Zhan's accent, which was usually a mix of 'English is my first language but not my only first language', had become very clipped, curt, and cutting. As if he was the one pretending he wasn't in pain. "Hey, Lan Zhannnn. Don' pou'. U'm fine. U'm gonna be fine." He screwed his facial muscles into something that was supposed to be angry. "Don' do drugs! Zhis is nah good." he slumped back into the pillow. "Doyouknow? I got no clothes on. Zhey took my clothes."
"Wei Ying... How are you feeling?"
"U'm high. Don' do drugs. Juss say no."
"I will. I promise. The doctor says you can go home." The angry voice was back. "I thought you'd be admitted for observation, but they say the only major thing wrong with you is your wrist. I brought clothes, but I'm not sure how to get them on you."
A disembodied male voice answered. "I can show you how we dress patients without exposing them, if you'd like."
"Please."
He was pushed and prodded but eventually, he was wearing a basketball shirt at least two sizes too big and a pair of cotton shorts. "I'm going to help you sit up now, and get you into a wheelchair. I don't trust you walking just yet."
"'Kay." Wei WuXian whooped at being picked up and plunked into a chair. "Doit 'gain!"
"No. Hold onto the discharge papers."
He floated some more, vaguely aware of being placed into the car, of a warm body leaning over him, buckling him in. He was more aware of the road bumps, crying softly when he jostled his wrist.
"Wei Ying... wake up. I need you to walk a bit. I can't carry you with your wrist like that. That's it... a few more steps. Lean on me; I've got you. I won't let you fall."
"You never lemme fall," Wei WuXian whispered into the neck conveniently supporting his head. "You shud lemme fall or I migh' fall in love wi' you."
"It's alright if you fall in love with me. You'll fall back out of love as soon as you're back on your feet. We're at my floor. I need you to walk again." They walked to a bed which was far more comfortable than the hospital bed had been. "Sleep. Just yell a bit when you wake up, and I'll come in."
"G'nigh' Gēge."
When the pain pills started to wear off, Wei WuXian really didn't remember where he was or why he was in pain. The room was unfamiliar, the shadows strange. His left hand... in the limited ambient light, the red cast looked black. His right hand... he couldn't move it at all. So instead he moved his head to see Lan Zhan lying/sitting in a chair next to the bed, head pillowed on one arm, the other holding tightly to his own hand. The events of the afternoon trickled into his head, memories of the accident interspersed with memories from the hospital, the car ride, the elevator ride. "Gēge," he whispered, tugging at his hand. "Gēge, you can go to your bed."
Lan Zhan lifted his head, still groggy with sleep. "Wei Ying..." sounded like a prayer. "How are you feeling?" He grabbed his phone and turned the screen clock on. "It's almost time for your next pill. Do you need something to drink? Do you need to use the bathroom? Do you think you can eat? I ordered a bunch of invalid foods earlier."
"Water would be good." Wei WuXian disallowed help getting himself into a seated position. "Sorry. I... I wasn't lucid or I would have insisted on going to my room."
"You can't shower with that hand. You won't be able to care for your scrapes properly by yourself. Staying here is the better option."
"I've dirtied your sheets," Wei WuXian whined. Even in the dim light, he could see blotches on the white sheets where he bled through his bandages.
"Sheets are washable. Or you can buy me new ones, if you feel that guilty. Wait here. I'll heat up some soup and get you your pill."
Wei WuXian rolled enough to turn on a bedside lamp. It wasn't a high powered light, so he only had to blink a couple of times to adjust. It was enough light to see Lan Zhan's eyes were red-rimmed and swollen. "Lan Zhan... are you alright? Your eyes?"
"It's late. Past my bedtime." The tone was supposed to be jovial; it sounded heavier than a lead balloon. Lan Zhan placed a bed tray over Wei WuXian's lap. "Can you eat by yourself or do I need to feed you?"
Wei WuXian lifted his right hand to wipe away something glistening on his friend's cheek. "Were you crying?" There was another something wet getting larger in the corner of the eye. He wiped that away, too. "You are crying? Why are you crying?"
"I'm tired, Wei Ying," was a lie. Capital letters, underscored, bolded, italicized, obvious to anyone, including those who didn't speak English, lie. "It's hours past my bedtime."
"Lan Zhan... Gēge... you don't have to cry over me. I'm fine. Just a little bit broken. I'll be good as new in, what? Six weeks?" He wiped away a new tear trickling down the edge of the nose. "Don't cry. Please don't cry."
"You could have died."
"But I didn't."
"You. Could. Have. Died." Lan WangJi enunciated slowly. "Am I supposed to be... nonchalant about that? I passed by the accident scene on the way to the hospital. Your bike was still there.... You must have, I don't know, you must have tried to jump off it or something if all you have is road rash and a broken wrist. Your bike is mangled." Lan WangJi's chest heaved as he struggled to breathe properly. "If you'd been on it? If he'd been just that much faster? Or you, slower? You.... He would have killed you, Wei Ying. I... I... I can't... I don't know how.... I'm supposed to process that my best friend almost fucking died tonight in the five hours you've been asleep? I... I don't know how you can be so... so... so... blasé. I can't.
"I care about you, Wei Ying. I care if you're happy or sad or... or sick. Or hurt." He swallowed harshly. "I care that I almost lost my best friend tonight. I care that you... you decided you'd rather take that fucking bike to work than carpool with me, and I don't even know what I did to make you choose that."
"You didn't do anything." Wei WuXian stated. "You're perfect. You're always perfect. It's me. I'm the fuck-up. I'm the one whose head is screwed on wrong this summer, and I was trying to work it out on my own.
"Can you... can you take the tray away? And..." he wiggled until he was lying down again. "Lie with me, Gēge? Let me hold you."
"You're hurt."
"I think you're hurting worse. My pain can be handled by drugs."
"Oh yes. Pill." Lan WangJi held it out and helped his friend swallow it down with a sip of water. Then he crawled into the bed, into the space made just for him in Wei WuXian's arms.
"Gēge, Gēge, you can cry now. I'm here. Can you hear my heartbeat? It's nice and strong. What could have happened, didn't. I'm safe. You're safe. We're okay." It was awkward moving his less injured hand to attempt to give his friend a soothing back rub. It was easier to slide his hand up to caress the back of his head, to play a bit with the silky hair. "I promise.... I won't buy another bike for work. Only so we can go cycling together on proper bike paths.
"I promise I'll work through my shit without letting you feel like you did anything wrong. I promise that, when I start to process almost being hit by that car, I will let you be there to do whatever you need to get as I work through that."
"Can you tell me what you... can you tell me why you started biking again?"
Wei WuXian winced, and hoped his friend didn't feel it. "Existential crisis. Rearranging my world view. My entire sense of self.
"Change of subject. Can you help me up? I need to pee."
Bladders emptied, more water drank, the young men settled back into the bed. "Can I sleep with you?" Lan Zhan whispered from his place curled up under his friend's less-hurt arm. "Would you mind?"
"I don't mind, but are you sure? I've dirtied your sheets...."
"The sheets are washable. So am I." He paused for several heartbeats. "Can I have a goodnight kiss?" came out even quieter.
"Lan Zhan..." Wei Ying smiled through the pain of trying to not laugh. "I'm not stingy with my goodnight kisses. You can have as many as you like, whether I'm sober, drunk, or drugged. Under one condition tonight."
"And what is that?"
"It hurts too much to move my head enough to get at your forehead right now. You'll have to come up to me." Lan Zhan carefully moved up to hover his forehead over his friend's lips. "Good boy," Wei Ying whispered and placed a soft kiss. "Did you like that? Or do you like the loud smacking ones?"
"Soft is good." The forehead moved up a little, and then hovered.
"You really are greedy tonight, aren't you?" Wei Ying smiled and placed a second kiss between Lan Zhan's eyebrows. "Enough? Or do you need more?" In response, the head moved up, again just slightly. Another kiss was pressed at the end of the nose. And another halfway down the bridge. And another at the tip. If you keep moving... is this what you want? Do you want me to kiss you? "Gēge, I'm not necessarily opposed, but I do need to know... do you want me to kiss you? Like a proper kiss?"
Lan Zhan raised his head high enough to look into Wei Ying's eyes. "Wei Ying... I...."
"It's alright with me if this is what you need right now.... But is it comforting in general and I'm here so you want to kiss me? Or is it that, right now, just in this moment, you need to kiss me?"
"Is there a difference?"
"Yeah. One is taking comfort from the closest person, and I happen to be it. The other is... more specific.... You need it to be me."
"I need it to be you. Right now. Just you, no one else."
"Then you can kiss me." He raised his head a bit to press lips against lips. He had no idea what he was doing. Just understood that those lips weren't passive; they were pushing back, pressing and releasing, sliding a bit to press in a new place. It was good; it was weird. Their noses were pressed alongside each other, partially blocking a nostril making breathing a bit more challenging. He tilted his head a smidgen to separate them. Better.
His first reciprocated kiss, ever, and he was concentrating so hard on not screwing it up that he couldn't really enjoy it. This was for Lan Zhan... to make him feel better, to remind him they were both alive and going to stay that way? It wasn't romantic; it couldn't be romantic. It was like in those war novels where people nearly died in a battle and just had to fuck someone afterwards to remind themselves they survived?
Well, fucking was out of the question. Wei Ying was pretty sure he was gay, or at least bi, but probably.... He wasn't ready to have sex, regardless of which gender he admired. Did it matter anyway? Lan Zhan already had someone he was interested in.... Wei WuXian had fucked up enough things in the last few weeks; he wasn't about to interfere in someone else's quasi relationship more than he was doing right now.
Which he wouldn't be doing right now if Lan Zhan had answered the opposite, if he'd really needed his person of interest and only Wei WuXian was available. 'I need my lover, but you're here so you'll do as a substitute' was disgusting, actually.
"Stop thinking," Lan Zhan growled, and lightly nipped Wei Ying's upper lip.
"I'm trying... I've just never...."
"Kissed a man before?"
"Yeah." It was a truth, if not the whole truth, right?
"Do I..." Lan Zhan lifted his head. "Does this make you feel... grossed out?"
"No. I just want it to be good for you. I don't know how to do that."
"If you're enjoying it, it's good for me." Lan Zhan pressed a lingering kiss. "Can I kiss you? Properly?"
"Those weren't proper kisses?" Wei Ying teased.
"No. Those were teenagers on their first date kisses. Or warm up kisses. Or 'I need to breathe' kisses. I need..." Lan Zhan was so still above him... like he should be vibrating, but the vibrations were so fast he wasn't moving? Like in that Robin Williams movie?
"Take what you need, Gēge. Show me how to make you...." Anything else he was going to say was eliminated by lips suddenly nipping, pressing, nudging his apart, a tongue tracing the seam of his lips, then his front teeth when he parted them slightly.
It was weird.... Tongue on teeth? He hadn't brushed his teeth since before work.... It must taste so gross.... He opened his mouth wider, to allow access, and now the tongue was... playing? Sliding around the tip of his own tongue? Is this really how french kissing is done? Lan Zhan's lips pressed his wider, wider, sealing them together. Wei Ying copied his friend's movements, sliding his tongue out, curling it. He felt his friend's body get tauter, felt the hand on his shoulder grip tighter; there were going to be finger shaped bruises there in the morning.
And now the pain pill was noticeably kicking in. Wei Ying felt more and more like he was weightless, anchored to the bed only by his friend's weight and hand. Kept down from the ceiling by the lips and tongue exploring him so intimately. He relaxed into his own mind, relaxed into the kiss. Allowed himself to feel what he was doing, what was being done to him. Allowed his anxiety over making the kiss perfect for Lan Zhan fade into obscurity and simply enjoyed....
The extra tongue retreated from his mouth, making him whimper lightly from its loss. Lips caressed, pressed, parted, slid across. A nose bumped his on its journey to the other side of his face. He gulped saliva, not wishing to drool, not having the ability to swallow properly, his breathing was getting deeper, shallower, harder, faster. And then the tongue was sliding against his lips again, asking for access, sliding deep when he granted it.
He could feel it... everywhere. Each slide of tongue against tongue, lips against lips, noses brushing, cheeks squishing... He could feel it making the skin over his collar bones tight, feel it curling up against his nipples, dipping into his belly button, lower.... He could feel himself getting thicker and longer. Feel his bum muscles tightening, his legs shifting restless, needing... needy.... Felt the silky basketball shirt turn rough against his skin. Felt sweat helping their skin to alternately glide against each other or become tacky and stick to each other. His hands clenched against so many sensations, and he cried out in pain.
"I hurt you. I'm sorry," Lan Zhan backed up and away, making Wei Ying want to cry again for the loss.
"No. I moved my wrist. You didn't do anything. It was me."
"We should stop. It's really late and you should be resting. Sleep, and I'll be here when you wake up."
Sleep came easy, drug-assisted as it was. Even though the rest of the bed was empty. Even though the only sounds in the room were his. Even though Lan Zhan had asked to sleep with him but was now in the master bedroom.
Waking up meant a return to pain and another pill. It meant changing into a bathing suit, so he could sit on a folding chair in the shower stall with his cast wrapped in a plastic bag while Lan WangJi gave him a sponge bath and oh, so carefully, washed his hair. His scrapes and cuts were given fresh antibiotic ointment and new bandages. While he carefully changed from the swimsuit back into loose street-wearable clothing, Lan WangJi removed the dirty sheets from the bed and started soaking them to get rid of the bloodstains and dirt.
"I can go back to my apartment, if you want," he offered from the couch. He might have been hungry; the pain meds were depressing his stomach pains, too.
"You're taking narcotics; you should stay with someone until you're off them." Lan WangJi was cooking something in the kitchen. Whatever it was smelled delicious. "You should probably call your parents. I'm sure they'll want to know what happened and that you're recovering."
"I'll call later. I need to figure out a phone first. Do you think the data is recoverable? I can download contacts and apps, but I have photos on there."
Lan WangJi's shoulders moved in what may have been a shrug. "After we eat, I'll take you to a store. Hopefully, someone there will know."
"I hate to be a burden."
Lan WangJi swirled around. "You are not a burden. Stop thinking like that."
"Then why are you acting all weird today? Like I ran over your cat or something."
Lan WangJi's eyes went wide with shock. "Acting all weird? Wei Ying... do you remember anything about last night? What I did to you? What I made you do?"
"I remember you getting pissed at me for trying to get myself killed. I remember how scared you were, how upset you were. I remember you crying because I could have died. I remember you asking for a goodnight kiss. I remember kissing you." I remember getting aroused. "I don't remember being forced to do anything I didn't want to do. Yeah, it was slightly inappropriate kissing you when I know you have a crush on someone else.... But since you haven't said you're in a relationship with him.... Or are you? Did I fuck up your relationship? I did, didn't I. Fuck! I'm sorry.... I should have asked, but I wasn't exactly in my right mind last night. I'm sorry."
Lan Zhan breathed in and out a few times. "I have a crush on someone else? Who?" Another harsh breath, and he seemed less confused. "Oh, him. Yeah. I said I was interested in him. But he's not interested in me."
"How do you know? Did you confess your affections?"
"No. And I probably won't. Stop talking about him." The older man turned back to his food. "Are you hungry? I made a peanut curry with tofu and rice."
The trip to the store for a new phone was completed; the tech was able to help them get data off the old phone into the new one. "Keep the receipt, and charge it to that guy's insurance."
"Why?"
"Because he ran a red light and hit you? His insurance is going to pay for everything resulting from this accident. New bike, new phone, clothes, hospital, pain meds, all the other supplies. If you need rehab for the wrist. Lost wages because you can't be in a lab with that wrist? Check with HR for safety requirements. Pain and suffering, too."
Wei WuXian spent most of the car ride zoning out, pain meds pleasantly fogging his brain, wrist pulsing in just noticeable pain. Then... "You took the long way home?"
Lan WangJi's hands tightened on the steering wheel. "I thought maybe you'd want to avoid Elliot for a while?"
"Yeah... good thinking." His head felt weird. His stomach felt... "Pull over? I'm gonna puke." The car hadn't even slid to a complete stop and Wei WuXian was fumbling, wrong handed, with his seat belt. "Off, damn you," he complained at it. Then he bolted out the door and knelt in the dirt, too weak to stand, and vomited. "Oh, fuck... I can't...." It hurt. Everything hurt. Every scrape was throbbing, every muscle shaking. Tears streaked down his face and plopped in the brown remains of his breakfast. "Fuck, I can't.... Hurts. Help me. I can't move...." He was holding himself up with both hands....
A soft voice and gentle hands reached him through the haze of pain sweeping over his body. "I've got you.... Let me... lean on me, let me help you. Are you going to be sick again? No? Good, lean back.... That's it. Good boy. I've got you." They sat for a while, letting Wei WuXian cry. "Can you tell me what happened?"
"He was going to... I had a green light, so I just kept peddling. I saw him, sunlight reflecting off his car. He wasn't stopping for the light. He was going to hit me. I... something. Skidded across the road. Crunching noise. He didn't even... no brakes squealing noise? He was going to.... If I hadn't?" He curled up small and vulnerable in his friend's arms, snot running down over his lips. He wiped it away, "That's disgusting," came out as if from someone else's mouth.
"You'll wash. Cry A'Xian.... I've got you."
Wei WuXian cried, shivered, shook, buried his wet face in his friend's shirt, as his body mind tried to process what had happened. "He was going to kill me. I almost died," he was finally coherent enough to be understood.
"You're okay," Lan WangJi soothed, "You're alive. It's alright. I've got you. Can we... can you get up with help? I'd rather not be sitting on the side of the road any longer than we need to. Are you able to hold yourself together long enough to get home? You can do whatever you need to do there much better than here."
"Yeah... I can get up." His legs were still trembling, and didn't really want to support his weight.
Back in the apartment, he was forced back into his damp bathing suit and re-washed to get the roadside dirt and crud off his body. Then he was wrapped in a soft blanket and cuddled on the couch while he tried to process. Sometimes that meant crying, clinging to the man holding him so carefully. Sometimes it meant lying near in a near catatonic state: staring blindly, mind blank. Sometimes it meant talking: of nothing, of everything, of superficialities, of important topics. Sometimes it meant lying in a near dose while Lan WangJi just held him.
When he roused, wrist throbbing unignorable, Lan WangJi fed him some toast and tea for lunch, handed him his painkiller, and tucked him back into bed. "Sleep, Wei Ying."
"You called me A'Xian before," Wei Ying whined. "Gēge... stay with me? I don't want to wake up and be alone...."
"Whatever you need," he was promised.
"Be careful of making such blanket statements, Gēge," Wei Wuxian wanted to tease, but it came out far more serious than intended. "I might take you up on that."
Lan WangJi was in the process of smoothing the covers down. "There isn't much you can ask of me that I would say 'no' to. But that's because you ask for so little, I have no worries you would ever abuse it. Sleep now."
Wei Ying whined low in his chest. "Gēge... stay with me."
"I was planning on it. Or do you mean... stay in bed with you?"
"Yeah.... Please?" he felt like crying again.... Between the throbbing wrist and the scrapes burning or starting to itch as they healed, and being a bit woozy from the narcotics, and his brain still trying to process his near death experience? He was a mess.... "You ground me... please stay."
"Whatever you need," Lan Zhan restated his promise. And crawled under the covers to snuggle close. "Sleep, A'Xian. I'll be here when you wake."
Wei WuXian woke slowly, the room's light dull from the afternoon's sunlight hitting the other side of the building, aware of being... of feeling protected. He was sleeping on his right side, a warm body spooning him from behind, an arm cradled over his waist. There was a pillow under his cast. It was all too easy to pretend, for half a second, that he was in bed with his lover. Stop treating me so nice, Lan Zhan.... I might fall in love with you and then where would we be?
"Did you sleep well?" The low, soft voice was right at his ear... warm breath ghosting over the fine hairs there. "You kept making noises like you were in pain, so I put the pillow under your arm. Did it help? You seemed to sleep easier after?"
Wei WuXian twisted around as much as he was allowed, given that he still had a heavy body pressed, unmoving, against his back. "I slept fine. It hurts a bit less than I expect it to."
"I'll get you a sling, then. I'm surprised the hospital didn't give you one. Are you thirsty? Hungry? It's not yet time for another pill."
"Thirsty... I need to brush my teeth again. It's not fair to get morning breath in the afternoon." He needed to move, to get away. Being in this position? Embraced on all sides? Faces so close it wouldn't take much to close the distance.
Like they had the previous night. He forced himself to turn his head back. Away from temptation.
Kissing, in hindsight, was probably a bad idea.... Now that he knew what it felt like? Now that he knew exactly how pleasure nerves connected his lips to everywhere in his body? He was greedy for more.... Greedy for someone to be holding him like this every night....
~*~
The phone call to his parents went about as well as one could expect, even glossing over exactly how bad it was. He was able to keep them from jumping in the car and driving the five hours to take care of him only because Lan WangJi promised to take good care of him for them.
But then his mom demanded that Lan WangJi call her some variation of 'Mom' instead of Āyí. That had Lan WangJi smirking like he'd won a pickup game or something. It was aggravating. Irking. Annoying.
And then his parents showed up the next afternoon anyway, insisting that he continue to stay in Lan WangJi's apartment and they'd stay in his. Having one person hovering over him was understandable. Having three was unbearable.
Especially since he really wanted Lan Zhan to hold him again while he slept, make sure his cast was on the pillow properly, and his parents shooed them to separate bedrooms before relaxing in the living room for a couple hours, only heading down to Wei WuXian's apartment somewhere around midnight. Long after Lan WangJi was sound asleep anyway.
It was annoying as Hell.
Parents suck.
No they didn't.
(Yes, they did.)
~*~
After his parents left, Wei WuXian and Lan WangJi settled into a routine of some independence and some inter-dependence. Wei WuXian learned how to give himself a sponge bath and use dry shampoo on his hair. Then every third night he would head up, in his bathing suit, to the tenth floor for a proper wash and shampoo.
On some of those nights, Wei WuXian would stay over, sleeping in the spare room.
And on some of those nights, he would whine that his wrist hurt really badly, and Lan WangJi would spoon up behind him and make sure his cast lay on its pillow.
He was lying.
He suspected Lan WangJi knew he was lying.
~*~
By October, the cast was off, and his wrist was almost back to full strength. Wei WuXian decided it was time he grew up a bit and dealt with his existential crisis instead of avoiding it.
So when Janelle, the barista at the coffee shop down the street from his office, asked him (for the umpteenth time), if he'd like to grab dinner some night, he said 'yes'.
Pizza and beer on a Thursday night didn't have the same expectations as a Friday or Saturday night dinner would. Plus the restaurant was less crowded, so they could talk at a normal volume and still hear each other.
It turned out, she was an artist specializing in portraits, oil on canvas. "Like, I really admire DaVinci and the Renaissance artists," she mentioned as he scrolled through her website pictures. "I will do sittings, but most people don't want to do that. So I'll use a photo instead and work from that."
"Do you get a lot of work?" Wei WuXian looked at a picture of a elderly man seated in a rocking chair. It was so life-like, it could have been a photo. Lan WangJi would make an excellent model. I wonder if he'd like it if I.... No. Why would Lan Zhan want an oil painting of himself? That's weird. I'll give him the website address, see if he and his brother want to have a portrait of the two of them to give to their parents.
"I get a lot of interest," Janelle half laughed. "Then they start squabbling over prices. Why would I charge a thousand dollars for something that will only take a few hours. And they know it only takes a few hours because they've seen Bob Ross on TV."
Wei WuXian looked puzzled. "But they're not paying you for the time you invest in their piece, are they? They're paying for the investment you made in going to school and perfecting your art. Plus your time and supplies."
"Oh my god. You actually get it? Can I use that line next time?"
"Of course," Wei WuXian paused, scrolling when he saw a picture of a family. "I want to commission a portrait. My sister, Jiang YanLi, alright, so she's not actually my sister, she's my childhood best friend's sister, but we called each other brothers, so I became her brother, too. Anyways, my sister has a six month old." He changed apps to find one her husband, Jin ZiXuan, had texted him a few days prior. "Something like this? But smiling, maybe?" In the photo, Jiang YanLi was leaning back in her nursing rocker, the baby snuggled up against her chest. And both were sleeping. It was a beautiful picture, but she looked exhausted. (Which she probably was.)
"Can you get me a copy of the original? As uncompressed as possible. As well as a picture of her smiling? Do you want her smiling in her sleep or awake and looking out at you?"
"Eyes closed, slightly smiling. Like happy dreaming. Content. The way new mothers should be, I suppose. If we lived in an ideal world where everyone got enough sleep, teething didn't hurt, and it was easy to figure out why the baby was crying."
Janelle nodded. "Absolutely. If you can get a picture of her smiling, preferably with eyes closed, I can superimpose the facial features and blend them together so it looks completely natural."
"I'll do that as soon as I can. Is there a contract?"
"Yup. I'll send you one once you get the pictures. Prices, expected time to completion, all that. Half to start, payment in full at the end. But if you don't like it, I'll cut the canvas in half, diagonally, and you can choose which half you want. No refunds on the down payment."
"Diagonally?"
"Yeah. I used to cut horizontally, but then found one sleazeball simply framed the half he got. So... Not making that mistake again."
It ended up being a great evening, and one he would like to repeat. She was fun to talk to, her art was interesting.
He had absolutely no desire to.... Well, more like no desire.
~*~
His next experiment occurred the night before his birthday. Paul was blond haired, green eyed, and had the compact body of a runner. Paul sidled up to him at a bar, and asked to buy him a drink. "I thought, since you weren't buying for the pretty ladies who tried to seduce you, that you might... be interested in something different."
"I'm considering something different," Wei WuXian admitted. And accepted the drink. He also accepted the suggestion that they move to a table, so they could hear each other better. He could feel the way Paul looked at him, the brief stares at his lips that he could feel right below his belly button. The longer, more lingering looks, that traveled up and down his torso, and left tingles in their wake. He appreciated the way Paul's polo shirt exposed a triangle of chest hair, the way his legs looked firm, and the way his ass looked even firmer when he walked off to the bathroom, with a questioning glance over his shoulder.
It was an offer to do... something together.
Wei WuXian was not horny enough to have any sort of sexual encounter in a public restroom. Instead, he left the bar.
~*~
Wei WuXian stared at himself in the bathroom mirror. "Hi. My name is Wei Ying, courtesy Wei WuXian. I am twenty-four years old today. And I'm gay."