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Zishu watches idly, thoughts afloat in his mind – struggling to condense into one comprehensive stream – as his eyes trace Kexing putter about the kitchen. An afterthought of elegance chasing his every move, even as he hurries to move steaming water from one pot to another. The wine gourd in his hand feels heavy though Zishu knows there isn’t much left. He briefly considers refilling it.
“A-Xu,” Lao Wen calls and his lips quirk to the same symphony of his heart, hearing the familiarity with which his name rolls off his zhiji’s lips. “Where’s that disciple of yours? I ask him to prepare the chicken for me and he disappears, taking our meal with him!”
A bubble of mirth swells up under his ribs at the reminder of the chaos that took place not so long ago and Zishu chuckles.
“Your child, you mean,” he teases, getting to his feet. The wine gourd abandoned. “Didn’t you claim him as your child, Lao Wen? Or am I forgetting something?”
A huff and Wen Kexing points a spoon in his direction, without looking away from the boiling pot, “You! Don’t think you’re so slick, I know your arm is fine, you bastard.”
Which? True.
His arm does hurt but not to the point of having it in a sling, doesn’t mean he’s about to admit that out loud though. Zishu grins, stepping closer to the other man.
“Lao Wen, last time I tried to help you banished me from the kitchen,” he kindly informs his zhiji because he’s nice like that.
“A-Xu,” Zishu bites down at the amusement that threatens to spring to the surface at the dry tone his Lao Wen adopts. “Last time you ‘helped’ you nearly burned down the kitchen.”
“Exactly!” Zishu chims. “Aren’t I nice?”
Wen Kexing curbs the smirk that blooms at his lips instinctively, “Oh are you now? Perhaps we should call A-Xu, Philanthropist Zhou from now on, eh?”
He sets the knife down and makes to turn around, to see his A-Xu and the scrunch of his nose that's surely adorning his face. Before he could though, warm arms wrap around his waist and Wen Kexing’s entire self stutters to a stop. His hand falls to grapple at the table, for something – for anything – to center his world knocked off its axis. Apparently Gods do not like him because his world just gets knocked over more and more until it’s just tumbling across the universe like some blue and green ball.
Goddammit.
A-Xu leans forward to prop his chin against his shoulder, the entire warmth of his being pressing against him – a pleasant weight. An anchor to his self the world refused him. It’s so… strangely familiar. As though his blood and his mind and his soul were created for the mere purpose of holding and being held by this man. His entire self, born to cherish this man and to be cherished in return. It feels like an absurd thought. It certainly is one.
With hysteria running rivers through his veins and only curbed by the presence of his A-Xu , Wen Kexing exhales. Tension bleeds out of his body, without a single trace. A-Xu clutches him closer, how he manages to do so, Wen Kexing has no clue. He doesn’t have any complaints, how could he? When this is the same man who knows him. Who willingly chose him.
(Besides, he’d take any chance to get held by his A-Xu regardless.)
“Mhmm,” A-Xu hums, the low timbre of his voice reverberating against his neck. “I’m always nice to you.”
“So you’ve said,” Wen Kexing chuckles, indulgent. He reaches forward to stir the soup and instead of letting go, A-Xu follows him – clinging on. “Clingy, clingy,” he says, bemused.
Zishu doesn’t protest. There’s no point denying the truth, is there? He realized as much after the first two times he tried to leave his Lao Wen. He may be able to pretend that his Lao Wen’s existence itself isn’t a magnet for his soul to follow, that Zishu isn't the moon always revolving around the Tellus that is Lao Wen. He may be able to pretend but he’d always end up coming back. End up willingly falling into his ocean with a smile. He wants nothing more.
“Just giving you a taste of your own medicine, Philanthropist Wen,” he says out-loud.
“When was I ever clingy, A-Xu?” his shidi pouts, indignant colouring his tone. “I’ve been so respectful, you know? And yet you accuse me of such a crime. Shame, A-Xu, shame. ”
This big baby.
Gods, what Zishu wouldn’t give to spend eternity with him?
“Respectful?” He tilts his head to catch the look on his zhiji’s face. “Why, Philanthropist Wen, won’t you show this ignorant one what clingy actually means?”
Perhaps for the first time in the life he has led, Zhou Zishu feels the Four Seasons Manor and it’s beautiful plum blossoms, orchids, lotuses, chrysanthemums fade into inferiority, it’s beauty no longer unparalleled – usurped by Wen Kexing.
“ A-Xu! ” his zhiji exclaims, a faint pink blush dusting over his cheeks and delightfully enhancing the subtle birthmark under his left eye. “Shameless!”
Look who’s talking , Zishu rolls his eyes – endeared despite himself, such a hypocrite you are, my zhiji.
“I have no idea what you’re going on about, Lao Wen,” Zishu murmurs, deliberately letting his lips drag across the expanse of his Lao Wen’s neck. It draws a stilted shudder and Zishu smugly notes the way his shidi’s hand clutches at the ladle handle like a lifeline. Then, as beats pass and Lao Wen exhales, he presses a kiss. Fleeting as the brush of a butterfly, against his zhiji’s pulse.
“ A-Xu! ” Wen Kexing jolts, the threads of his heart strung tight and let loose in an instant. The ladle clatters into the soup. The tail of a bright laugh greets him as he whirls around, his zhiji having already evaded him.
“Jerk,” he huffs, his charade at annoyance breaking apart in pieces before it even begins to set. He ducks his head, hands once again finding something to occupy themselves, a shy secretive smile blooming on his lips. Wonder taking root in his chest, twining and spreading and reaching everywhere. Mind replaying the playful light to A-Xu’s eyes, the warmth that cocooned him with home, the gold threaded laugh eliciting joy and endearment and awe.
He’s never seen his zhiji move so freely, as though the rusted chains weighing down his soul evaporated overnight. Maybe they have. A bird set free, he muses a half jokingly, that circles a poisoned fox. Maybe not, he snorts at that thought. Perhaps he’s far in over his head this time, A-Xu seems to always think that when he makes presumptuous claims. His A-Xu certainly isn’t a bird for one, for all his flight-like movements and keen eye for danger.
“A wolf certainly,” he says aloud. “He’s got the characteristics down for sure.”
“Who’s a wolf, shishu? ”
And here’s A-Xu’s recusant disciple.
“Well well well,” he drawls, purposefully letting his words drag and linger in the tip of his tongue. “Who do we have here?”
“ Shishu! ” the boy whines and oh for gods’ sake, Wen Kexing sighs. What’s the point of subduing an entire valley of outcasts and madmen if a child could boulder through his resolve like it’s made out of wet paper?
“Little idiot,” he replies in kind and looks. Chengling beams at him, uneasily holding a platter of chicken meat – gutted and cleaned – to him. He instantly knows it’s not the little idiot who did him the favour. The only other option is…
“Don’t tell me you suddenly found the courage to prepare a chicken,” he pokes fun at his child, clearing a side of the kitchen counter to put down the platter.
“ Shifu did, Shishu ,” Chengling says, nose wrinkling at the meat and Kexing huffs, amused. “I’m sorry but you can’t pay me to even touch a chicken, shishu. ”
“Little brat, you realize your shifu is going to make you do that just because you said this, don’t you?”
Chengling pales, the blood rushing away from his face quickly and he takes a few steps back, “I didn’t say anything! I didn’t say anything!”
Wen Kexing laughs.
~
Later, after Chengling runs off to play in the snow and the fireworks enrich the night sky, Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu sit. Side by side, knees knocking against one another every few seconds with the spirit of mischief.
“A-Xu,” Wen Kexing begins, already regretting his decision to breach this topic with A-Xu again. “You’re so shameless these days.”
He steals a glance at his shixiong and the knowing smirk that slowly appears on his lips lets Wen Kexing know that the man sees through Kexing’s act of nonchalance. It’s damning and simultaneously liberating to be seen and known . He curses inwardly, a bit pathetically, with the thought that his heart may not survive Zhou Zishu.
“Is that so, Lao Wen?”
Wen Kexing hums, his mouth suddenly dry. He reaches for his cup, hoping for the wine to wash away the sand coating his tongue and regain his infamous silver-tongue. (Privately a small part of his mind snorts at him in mockery).
“ Shidi ,” Zishu calls and Wen Kexing warily looks up at him, heart dropping to some unknown abyss at the pout on his A-Xu’s lips.
Why is he so pretty? He despairs.
“Yes, A-Xu?” he manages to sound normal, he truly thinks so. He deserves an award, one coated silver and bejeweled with diamonds-
“ Shidi ,” and oh gods, he pouts even more. “My arm hurts-”
He is weak.
Wet paper.
“-feed me?”
Wen Kexing chokes.
This must be a dream. A highly ridiculous dream. Or an alternate reality, that must be it.
“A-Xu,” Wen Kexing closes his eyes and opens them. His zhiji stares back at him expectantly. Oh gods. “ A-Xu. ”
“Lao Wen,” Zhou Zishu says in return, indulgently.
“A-Xu,” Exasperation draws patterns on his voice as he repeats his zhiji’s name.
“Yes, that’s my name, Lao Wen.”
Wen Kexing huffs, flicking his sleeve and stabs at a piece of chicken. He holds it out before A-Xu’s mouth and shoves it in (gently) when the other parts his lips. Laughter crinkles Zishu’s the corners of his eyes. Stars dance in his eyes. And Wen Kexing despairs.
“My heart isn’t going to survive you, Zhou Zishu.”