Work Text:
“Huaisang,” Jiang Cheng’s exasperated voice carried down the hallway, “what did I tell you about leaving your dirty laundry on the bathroom floor?”
A young man with dark brown shoulder length hair and side-swept bangs summarily poked his head out from his bedroom door. “Not to…?” he answered with an apologetic wince. “Sorry, I’ll clean it up right now.”
Jiang Cheng shook his head. “Never mind, I’m already here. Just be more careful in the future, alright?”
The other man acknowledged the request with a jaunty “Yessir!”
Jiang Cheng went about picking up Nie Huaisang’s dirty drawers and shorts, neatly placing them inside the hamper that was almost full. Unlike himself, Nie Huaisang was pretty careless when it came to keeping the apartment tidy; instances like these happened more often than not. Usually Jiang Cheng was able to overlook this kind of thing without much issue, but these days his patience had been running thin. Sometimes it felt like the apartment was a little too small, and a little too crowded.
When he returned to his bedroom after cleaning up the bathroom, he saw that Nie Huaisang had made himself right at home inside. The young man was spread out on Jiang Cheng’s bed, taking up all the space as he read a comic book. Jiang Cheng wordlessly eyed the scene for a moment. Sometimes it felt as though Nie Huaisang was constantly in here—couldn’t he ever hang out in his own room for once?
Feeling as though ants were crawling on his skin, Jiang Cheng trudged over to his desk and pulled out his studying materials. Then he popped in his earbuds and began reviewing his notes. Each time Nie Huaisang called out to him to talk, Jiang Cheng pretended he couldn’t hear the man over his music.
Nie Huaisang wrapped his arms around a set of broad shoulders, tucking his chin over one and looking down at the array of boring study materials neatly spread out onto a desk.
In a cloying voice, he urged, “ChengCheng, let’s go out tonight, okay?”
Jiang Cheng grumbled something inaudible under his breath as he attempted to shake Nie Huaisang off. However, Nie Huaisang kept his hold, leaning in closer to place a kiss just below his boyfriend’s ear. Jiang Cheng’s body slightly trembled beneath the kiss, but his gaze remained focused on his studies. Stubborn man.
With his lips curving in amusement, Nie Huaisang mischievously planted another three kisses against Jiang Cheng’s warm skin, delighting in the way it caused the other to twitch and tense up. His persuasion skills were always top notch; Jiang Cheng wouldn’t be able to resist him for long.
And yet—
Jiang Cheng suddenly placed one palm flat against his open textbook and turned to look at Nie Huaisang, a hint of a frown swimming within his eyes. “Huaisang, did you even finish that writing assignment you mentioned was due next week? And don’t forget it’s your turn to do the dishes today too.”
Nie Huaisang had to suppress an eye roll. Jiang Cheng could be such a nag sometimes. Like a wilting flower, he sagged forward and let his weight fall onto Jiang Cheng’s upper body, grumbling, “Ugh, I swear you’re starting to sound just like my brother. It’s so unsexy.”
He playfully curled a lock of Jiang Cheng’s dark hair around one finger, but the taller man shifted away so that his bangs fell out of reach.
“Answer the question.”
A harsh sigh escaped his lips as Nie Huaisang finally gave into the urge to throw his eyes to the ceiling. “I finished most of the assignment, alright? And I can do the dishes when we get back!”
Jiang Cheng clearly wasn’t satisfied with his answer, letting out a faint scoff and returning to his studies as he turned a page in his textbook. “Not going. Get out if you’re going to keep bothering me. I’m trying to work.”
Nie Huaisang clicked his tongue. “You never wanna do anything fun!”
After calling his boyfriend a boring studyholic while shaking his shoulders one too many times, he was summarily kicked out of Jiang Cheng’s bedroom. He heard the door being locked as he stood on its opposite side, and chewed at his lips with an ugly scowl.
Jiang Cheng was being such an ass lately, always in a shitty mood and never wanting to spend time together. Nie Huaisang trudged to his own bedroom to get changed before heading out. Whatever, who needed that grumpy louse anyways? He could have just as much fun even without Jiang Cheng tonight!
Jiang Cheng let out a curse and yanked aside a lotus patterned shower curtain before he poked his head out. “Damn it, Huaisang! Didn’t I tell you to stop letting all your hair go down the fucking shower drain?!”
His shouting didn’t receive an answer.
That’s right.
Nie Huaisang had gone out with some friends earlier this evening, and probably wouldn’t be back until much later tonight. Jiang Cheng had been invited along as well, but he hadn’t been in the mood to go out. Really, he didn’t want to do anything other than focus on schoolwork nowadays, something Nie Huaisang has been complaining about nonstop. The young man was always wanting to go partying, but now that midterms were approaching, Jiang Cheng knew his priorities needed to be elsewhere. He could only imagine the amount of lecturing he’d have to deal with from his mother if he didn’t score well on his exams.
With a groan, Jiang Cheng bent down to jam his fingers inside the drain and yank out a thick wad of dark brown hair covered in nasty sludge. Finally, the water that had built up in the bathtub began to drain properly. Though the problem was resolved, he still finished his shower with a permanent pinch to his brow.
Jiang Cheng stared mindlessly at his phone after ending what must have been an hour long conversation between himself and his mother. His mother called him every Saturday, but she never had anything positive to say to him. Her lectures were usually anxiety inducing and frustrating, but Jiang Cheng never dared to talk back to her. If he did, she’d probably take away his car and spending card.
From head to toe, his body felt numb after listening to her disparage him over his every minor flaw. As for his father, he couldn’t even remember the last time that man took the time out of his day to give him a call.
By the time he exited his bedroom in search of breakfast, his mood was in an abysmal state. The kitchenette was surprisingly occupied when he padded over, a young man with shoulder-length dark brown hair standing at the stove with a spatula in one hand and flour smeared on his cheeks.
Upon noticing his presence, Nie Huaisang asked with a smile, “Hungry? I’m making pancakes!”
It was a nice gesture, but Jiang Cheng really wasn’t in the mood for burnt food. Leaning against the wall, he rolled his eyes and scoffed without thinking, “Why bother? You suck at cooking.”
Nie Huaisang’s body went rigid where he stood. Jiang Cheng immediately felt guilt wash over him, causing his fingers to flex. He knew he should apologize for the mean comment, but his lips wouldn’t move an inch.
Wearing that same smile, Nie Huaisang turned towards him and laughed. “Haha, you’re right. I’d definitely just screw them up. Dumb idea.”
The mini stove was powered off, and the spatula was set aside. Finally, a sad looking, undercooked pancake was dumped into the garbage bin. The distinct sound of it hitting the bin’s bottom was loud in Jiang Cheng’s ears.
“Fuck…” A strained curse left Jiang Cheng’s lips, directed at the ceiling above. One of his hands was fisted in silky dark brown hair, the other clenching the fabric of pale green bedsheets.
“Mmm…” Nie Huaisang hummed around his heavy length, bobbing his head a few times before reverting back to rounding his lips and sucking hard at the tip.
Jiang Cheng tossed his head back and groaned, his hips bucking lightly and his breaths quickening. If fellatio were an Olympic sport, Nie Huaisang would have countless gold medals by now.
The warm and wet tongue repeatedly stroking at the underside of his shaft suddenly became too much for Jiang Cheng. He came inside his boyfriend’s velvety mouth with a soundless cry. Nie Huaisang meticulously sucked him clean, swallowing everything down and presenting a pretty pink tongue afterwards. With a besotted expression, he looked up at Jiang Cheng, his thick eyelashes damp, his lips swollen, and his skin flushed with color.
Unable to resist such a debauched sight, Jiang Cheng scooped Nie Huaisang into his arms and brought him onto the bed, kissing him fiercely regardless of the pungent bitter taste. The shorter man giggled and sighed with enthusiasm as Jiang Cheng had his rotten way with him then and there.
Nie Huaisang groaned as he expended tremendous effort to open each of his sleep-crusted eyes. The ceiling fan was spinning endlessly, its cycles slow and soothing. He rolled onto his side with his face pressed into the soft mattress, too comfortable to get up properly.
What time was it?
After rummaging through his duvet for a minute, he managed to find his phone. Fifteen past twelve. Nie Huaisang dropped his phone, and his droopy eyes fell shut once more. He might’ve gone a little overboard with his friends last night and stayed out too late, resulting in his lack of energy today. At least he wasn’t hungover though, since he’d promised Jiang Cheng he wouldn’t drink too much.
Wait.
One of Nie Huaisang’s eyebrows quirked sharply inwards. Fifteen past twelve.
Fifteen…past twelve?!
His back shot upright like a missile being launched into space. Fuck! He was late for his afternoon class!
Nie Huaisang scrambled out of bed and raided the nearby dresser for a fresh change of clothes. It took him another minute to realize the reason none of the shirts and pants he pulled out were his size was because he wasn’t even in his own room to begin with. This was Jiang Cheng’s room!
Speaking of Jiang Cheng, why didn’t he wake him up like he always did before his classes?! He knew Nie Huaisang had trouble getting up!
Cursing under his breath, Nie Huaisang sprinted into his own bedroom to quickly get himself ready. There was no time to shower or even brush his teeth—he simply put on whatever clean clothes he could find in his closet and ran out the door with messy hair, his book bag, and a barely charged phone.
As he waited for the elevator to open, he called the person who was partly responsible for his current situation. The line rang for a few seconds before connecting.
“Hello?”
Nie Huaisang yelled into the speaker, “Why didn’t you wake me up before you left for your next class?!”
Unlike himself, Jiang Cheng had early morning classes, but he always came home in between them to make sure Nie Huaisang was up in time for his first afternoon class. Nie Huaisang had no idea what would make his boyfriend neglect this daily routine so suddenly. He was pretty sure he had a quiz scheduled today as well!
Jiang Cheng’s deep voice immediately grew hostile at being shouted at. “I did wake you up!” he barked.
“Liar! I’m about to be late because of you!”
“It’s not my fucking job to be your personal alarm clock, Huaisang! Wake your damn self up from now on!”
The line cut off just as Nie Huaisang stepped onto the elevator. He glared at his phone that had even less battery than it did two minutes ago and swore. Jiang Cheng, that motherfucker! He was the one who said he enjoyed looking after him! You call this looking after?!
The moment the elevator reopened its doors after descending to the first floor, Nie Huaisang booked it out of the building, regretting his entire life. Jiang Cheng had totally sabotaged him, and for no good reason!
See if I ever suck your dick again, you asshole!
He cursed his boyfriend’s name the entire way towards campus.
“Mmm…” Wet smacking noises filtered throughout the room, occasionally accompanied by soft sighs. Nie Huaisang parted his lips wider for the purpose of slipping his tongue into Jiang Cheng’s warm mouth. He teasingly dragged it across the man’s molars, noting the familiar texture of a filling on one of them.
He was just about to crawl into Jiang Cheng’s lap when his shoulders were grasped and nudged away, breaking the two of them apart. Jiang Cheng’s thin lips were glossy with their shared saliva when he turned away and cleared his throat.
“C’mon, focus,” he said, pulling over a textbook and some pens and highlighters. “Finish annotating this passage.”
Nie Huaisang pouted, but he relented and did as his boyfriend bade him by casting his eyes onto the textbook’s open page. He much preferred kissing over studying. After reading the passage, he made a halfhearted attempt at explaining its meaning in the margins of the textbook.
When he was done, Jiang Cheng looked it over, and his handsome face immediately soured. “Huaisang, if you’re not going to take this seriously, then don’t waste my time. I have assignments of my own to work on.”
“I am taking this seriously!” he insisted.
“No, you’re not! You’re just trying to make me do the work for you like always!”
Nie Huaisang’s eyes grew round. Admittedly, he wasn’t putting his best effort forth, but that was mostly because he was hoping to convince Jiang Cheng to offer him a motivational reward in the form of more kisses or a fun night out. His intentions certainly weren’t malicious; he might be lazy, but he would never try to trick Jiang Cheng like that!
The highlighter in his hand was thrown down onto the coffee table. “You’re always so quick to think the worst of me! Just forget it then!”
Jumping to his feet, Nie Huaisang stomped into his bedroom and slammed the door behind him. He didn’t give Jiang Cheng the privilege of seeing his face again until later that night when he slipped into the younger man’s bed in nothing but an oversized T-shirt.
Hot water cascaded over Jiang Cheng’s hands as he repeatedly scrubbed a sponge against dirty dishes he’d found under his boyfriend’s bed. After promising that he’d take care of them before he left for classes today, of course Nie Huaisang conveniently ‘forgot’ to do the dishes again. When Jiang Cheng had texted him a photo of the mountain of food encrusted dish-ware in the kitchen sink, he’d responded with a string of broken heart and crying face emojis along with a ‘i forgor’ with a skull. Even if the young man had actually remembered to do them, there was still a good chance Jiang Cheng would end up having to re-wash the dishes anyways considering how terrible a dishwasher Nie Huaisang was.
After the last freshly washed plate was placed onto the dish rack to dry, Jiang Cheng shut the water off and sighed. It was during times like these that he really wished he lived on his own.
Originally, Jiang Cheng had shared this apartment with his best friend Wei Ying, but once Wei Ying started seeing his current boyfriend Lan Zhan, it had quickly become clear to Jiang Cheng that he’d needed to find a new roommate sooner rather than later.
Cue Nie Huaisang.
Nie Huaisang was also attending the same university as them, and he still lived at home with his brother. Usually the two brothers were very close, but during that time they seemed to be at constant odds with each other, often arguing and getting into heated spats. So when Jiang Cheng approached the young man about taking up Wei Ying’s mantle of roommate, Nie Huaisang had all but jumped at the opportunity.
As soon as the lease ended, Wei Ying and Nie Huaisang did a metaphorical dos-à-dos dance where one moved out and the other moved in.
The first month was good. Jiang Cheng got to know Nie Huaisang a little better than he already had—you learn a lot about someone by sharing a living space with them—and there were plenty of new interesting things to learn about Nie Huaisang. Living with Wei Ying meant that Jiang Cheng was already used to cleaning up after others, so even though Nie Huaisang was also a bit of a slob, he didn’t mind overmuch.
The second month was great. The two of them became comfortable around each other and were getting along just fine. In fact, nearly all of their free time was spent together. Jiang Cheng found Nie Huaisang to be a little similar to Wei Ying, only much more laidback and amendable to following his lead. It was honestly nice having someone around that he didn’t feel compelled to compete or compare himself with.
The third and fourth months were hell. Jiang Cheng had entered a state of denial when he’d woken up in the middle of the night feeling a sticky substance all over the inside of his bottoms after having a fucked up dream about Nie Huaisang stripping himself bare and coyly getting into a warm bath with him already inside, grinding into his lap.
His mental state had only worsened when he’d accidentally overheard his roommate masturbating in the privacy of his bedroom some days later, and instead of hurrying away and pretending he hadn’t noticed anything like he should have, Jiang Cheng had swallowed thickly and strained his ears, memorizing each shaky breath, moan, whine, and whimper. With those indecent noises permanently etched into his psyche, he’d fled into his own bedroom and replayed them over and over inside his head, hastily jerking himself off in shameful silence.
The fifth month was torture. Jiang Cheng had finally come to terms with the fact that he had a serious crush on his roommate. But he didn’t know what to do with that information other than keep it to himself until it devoured his insides like writhing maggots. So that’s what he’d done. And that’s exactly how it had felt.
The sixth month started out just as torturous as its predecessor, until it suddenly wasn’t. Because Nie Huaisang randomly decided one late Saturday night to wrap his arms around Jiang Cheng’s shoulders and start making out with him on their sofa while a crappy rom-com flick played on their TV. He’d tasted like buttered microwave popcorn and those sugary Dayao soda pops that you can only get at the Asian market down the street. The next thing Jiang Cheng knew, he was no longer just ‘Jiang Cheng, Nie Huaisang’s roommate’. He was Jiang Cheng, Nie Huaisang’s boyfriend. And that had been the best thing to ever happen to him.
When the twelfth month finally rolled around, the two lovers hadn’t spared a second thought about whether or not they would be renewing their lease. Of course they would renew it—school was a pain but at least they could spend everyday commiserating about it together.
But then the thirteenth month happened where they had their first major fight that they never talked about afterwards—instead glossing over it with a heated tussle in bed—followed by the fourteenth month where they had their second major fight that they also swept under the rug with some good make-up sex.
Then they had managed to enjoy two and a half months of bliss until another argument had broken out between them that got blown way out of proportion and resulted in a mutual silent treatment that lasted for about a full week. Their spats and petty arguments never usually lasted longer than that, but somehow, the frequency seemed to be increasing without either of their knowing.
Admittedly, communication wasn’t one of Nie Huaisang’s strong suits despite him being a talker, and it certainly wasn’t Jiang Cheng’s either. So perhaps it was only natural that they relied heavily on sex to resolve their problems. Always patching things up with steamy romps under the sheets each time things went south wasn’t solving the underlying issue though.
The issue that even though they loved each other fiercely, that didn’t stop them from fighting just as fiercely.
That’s why the next time Jiang Cheng took a shower only for the tub to gradually fill up with water due to yet another clogged drain, he decided to take matters into his own hands.
Nie Huaisang stomped into the living room, one hand gripped around a hairbrush and the other clenched at his side. His shoulder-length hair was dripping wet, and the expression he wore looked absolutely livid. “What the fuck is this?”
Jiang Cheng looked up from the notes displayed on his tablet, and saw his boyfriend’s hairbrush that was full of nasty wet clumps of hair being shoved near his face. He drew away with some disgust, and answered blithely, “Looks like your hairbrush.”
“I know it’s my hairbrush, Jiang Cheng,” Nie Huaisang snapped, “I’m asking why it’s full of hair.”
Nie Huaisang rarely called Jiang Cheng by his full name—usually it was ‘A-Cheng’, ‘ChengCheng’, or ‘Jiang-xiong’ unless he was pissed off. Like right now.
“It’s a hairbrush, of course it’d be full of hair.”
“This isn’t just hair, this is disgusting sludge!”
“Disgusting sludge that came from your scalp,” Jiang Cheng clarified.
Nie Huaisang waved the hairbrush back and forth, causing droplets of nastiness to fly about. “Why the fuck would you do something like this?!”
Nie Huaisang didn’t raise his voice often, but when he did, it always immediately set Jiang Cheng off. Jiang Cheng jumped to his feet. At his height, Nie Huaisang was forced to tilt his head up to make proper eye contact, which caused a small burst of satisfaction to manifest within him.
“Why the fuck do you keep letting your fucking hair go down the fucking drain?!” he shouted.
Nie Huaisang rose onto his toes as he shouted back, “How do you even know it’s my fucking hair?! It could be yours too, ever think about that?!”
“Because! Mine’s darker than that! Plus, I actually make an effort not to let my hair go down the drain, unlike you!”
In all the time they’ve lived together, Nie Huaisang had never once made the same efforts around the apartment that Jiang Cheng always did. They were always half-assed, or barely passable. So this time, Jiang Cheng decided to do something about it. Maybe now his boyfriend would finally change his behavior and stop acting spoiled. Feeling overheated, he marched into the adjacent kitchenette to get a drink.
Nie Huaisang followed right after him, his hair still dripping and his eyes still tinged with rage. “If you have a problem with something I’ve done, you can just tell me instead of doing asshole-y things like this, you know!”
Jiang Cheng scoffed as he retrieved a bottled water from the fridge. “Haven’t I been telling you not to do dumb shit like that since the day you moved in here? You never listen!”
“People forget things, Jiang Cheng! It’s called being human!”
Jiang Cheng didn’t even feel the pain when he slammed his palm against the refrigerator door and it shook harshly for a moment. “Oh, fuck off Huaisang! It’s always ‘just a little mistake’ with you, but I’m the one constantly having to clean up after you! I’m so sick your shit!”
Nie Huaisang sneered right back, “That makes two of us then, because I’m sick of you and your shitty fucking attitude! You’re always such an asshole! Even when I haven’t done anything!”
Jiang Cheng snarled, “If you’re so sick of me then why don’t you just break up with me?!”
“Fine!” Nie Huaisang threw his hands in the air, “We’re broken up! Happy now?!”
“You’re not breaking up with me,” Jiang Cheng hissed, “I’m breaking up with you!”
Nie Huaisang only scoffed as he rolled his eyes irritably. “Whatever! Get your shit out of my room.” The young man turned and began stomping down the hallway.
Jiang Cheng hollered after him, “Get your shit out of my room!”
His ex-boyfriend’s voice shouted back, “What the hell do you think I’m doing right now?!”
Within the hour, Nie Huaisang had gathered up his belongings and returned them to his own bedroom. He hadn’t said one word to Jiang Cheng the entire time, and Jiang Cheng hadn’t said anything to him either.
They were officially done.
Although Jiang Cheng and Nie Huaisang were officially done with one another, they still had to live together.
Their lease wouldn’t expire until the semester ended, and breaking it was way too costly for either of them to even consider it. Nie Huaisang still wasn’t on speaking terms with his brother, and Jiang Cheng’s parents would never agree to shelling out the money when they had been against Jiang Cheng moving into the apartment in the first place.
So for the next four months, Nie Huaisang and Jiang Cheng would have to tolerate sharing the same living space as neither friends nor lovers, but as exes.
Jiang Cheng glanced at the chore chart pasted to the refrigerator. It hadn’t been updated in days. Though he had devised the chore chart’s structure and was responsible for updating it each week, Nie Huaisang had been the one to design, print, and laminate it. The cartoon drawings resembling the two of them featured on it were done by the young man himself, one frowning and the other crying because he hated chores. Jiang Cheng pulled his lips into a thin line. If Nie Huaisang had just done those stupid chores, then he wouldn’t be boyfriend-less right now.
Jiang Cheng finally looked away from the useless chart and opened the fridge in search of food. Now that he was single, he didn’t need to bother cooking enough for two anymore. Nie Huaisang always slept in late in the mornings, so it was easy to avoid him during breakfast. Dinner, however, was always a contentious issue.
At first, Nie Huaisang seemed to be eating out every night, but he must’ve ran out of money by now because Jiang Cheng’s been having a few run-ins with him in the kitchen these days. It’s always unbearably awkward. The unexpected sound of the front door opening and closing distracted Jiang Cheng from his thoughts. Moments later, a young man with dark brown hair and a book bag slung over one shoulder came shuffling into his line of sight.
Speak of the devil, and he will appear.
“……” Jiang Cheng wordlessly eyed Nie Huaisang as he made his way over. The young man looked a little unkempt, like he hadn’t been taking proper care of himself lately. It made Jiang Cheng’s insides feel somewhat sour. When Nie Huaisang finally noticed him standing before the fridge, his expression immediately turned complicated and guarded.
Neither of them had spoken to each other since they broke up, and right now, Jiang Cheng had no intention of altering this fact. As far as he was concerned, Nie Huaisang was the reason they weren’t together anymore, so he should be the reason they reconcile. Jiang Cheng wasn’t going to spoil him anymore; he was tired of letting Nie Huaisang constantly get away with his spoiled behavior.
Nie Huaisang whipped his head to the side and headed straight into his bedroom, ignoring him completely. Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes. Then the refrigerator began obnoxiously beeping, indicating that he needed to hurry the hell up and grab whatever he needed. He decided on whipping up something simple, and grabbed a carton of eggs along with a medium sized tomato. Most everything inside the fridge belonged to him; if Nie Huaisang wasn’t planning on ordering takeout tonight, then his options for a meal were pretty limited considering he couldn’t cook for shit.
Not that Jiang Cheng cared. Whatever his ex-boyfriend did or didn’t eat for dinner wasn’t his problem.
His inner emotions sizzled just like the heated oil in the pan he fried up the beaten eggs in. Jiang Cheng forcibly pushed all thoughts of Nie Huaisang out of his mind. By the time he finished cooking, he realized he’d inadvertently made too much for one person.
He stored it away for tomorrow’s lunch.
Nie Huaisang was still managing to find things that belonged to Jiang Cheng weeks after they’d broken up. Previously, the both of them had their things carelessly strewn about in the other’s rooms, tucked into corners and cracks between mattresses; momentarily stored in drawers or closets before being forgotten about and left thereafter; or buried under desks, pillows, and piles of clothes. It hadn’t mattered, because Nie Huaisang’s things were Jiang Cheng’s things, and Jiang Cheng’s things were Nie Huaisang’s things.
But that wasn’t the case anymore.
Nie Huaisang pursed his lips as he fiddled with a pen between his fingers. This was one of Jiang Cheng’s favorite pens to write notes with; he was probably wondering where it’d gone.
Should he return it?
A small part of him wanted to, just for the sake of becoming on speaking terms with his ex-boyfriend again, but a larger part of him was still feeling bitter about the way Jiang Cheng had treated him. Now that weeks had gone by, he wasn’t as angry as he’d initially been during and after their fight. But he was still hurt. If Jiang Cheng would just get over himself and apologize for what he’d said and done, Nie Huaisang would easily forgive him. Then they could go back to how things were.
After all, Jiang Cheng was the one with the shitty attitude, so he should be the one to apologize first. Nie Huaisang pursed his lips and furrowed his brows resolutely, storing the pen inside the drawer of his barely used desk.
If Jiang Cheng wanted his pen back, then he needed to come and get it.
“Fuck!”
Jiang Cheng winced as a sharp pain skittered through the tip of his index finger. After retracting his hand from the space between his bedroom wall and his bed frame where he’d accidentally dropped one of his earbuds, he saw that a bead of blood had formed on his fingertip. He carefully searched through the sliver of space using his other hand, and eventually found the source of his minor injury.
Jiang Cheng silently gazed down at a gilded hairpin that twinkled slightly in the palm of his hand. He remembered the day he bought this thing, remembered the elated look on Nie Huaisang’s face as the young man unwrapped the gift box it had been in and peered inside. When it’d randomly gone missing some time ago, Nie Huaisang had been extremely upset.
Jiang Cheng instinctively clenched his hand around the accessory and got up from his bed, intending to return it to its rightful owner. However, his bare feet came to a halt in place at his doorway.
…If he gave the hairpin back now, would Nie Huaisang even want it? Would he throw it out right in front of Jiang Cheng’s face with a sneer?
All of the gifts Nie Huaisang had made and bought for Jiang Cheng were still sitting in a box inside his closet. No matter what had happened between them, Jiang Cheng just couldn’t bring himself to discard anything given to him by his ex.
In the end, the pretty hairpin was gently placed inside that tiny box hidden in his closet.
Thud!
Wei Ying carelessly tossed his book bag onto the sofa the moment he entered the living room. He plopped down onto the plush piece of furniture and stretched his back with a groan. “Alright, I’ll help you with your studies for a bit but after that you’d better keep your promise about helping me get concert tickets.”
Jiang Cheng set his own bag down onto the coffee table, and began unpacking it of his textbooks and notebooks. He’d been having trouble understanding the recent materials handed out by his professor, and reluctantly asked for Wei Ying’s help after making zero headway in resolving the issue himself. Wei Ying never needed extra help when it came to his studies—his mind just seemed to grasp things on a higher level than everyone else. Jiang Cheng would be lying if he said his best friend’s natural aptitude towards everything didn’t infuriate him at times.
Wei Ying’s eyes suddenly lit up. “Hey, is Nie-xiong home? He has a Ticketmaster account too, right?”
Jiang Cheng hissed at his friend not to bring Nie Huaisang into the equation. The last thing he wanted was to deal with his ex-boyfriend.
“Ugh, this is why I told you not to date him—now the three of us can’t even hang out together anymore!”
Jiang Cheng swatted at Wei Ying and growled at him to fuck off. He was already in a foul mood from the breakup—he didn’t need Wei Ying rubbing it in his face as well.
The two bickering young men situated themselves around the coffee table, about to get to work. However—
“Ah fuck, my phone’s about to die.” Wei Ying looked up at Jiang Cheng and waved the dying device in his hand. “Where’s your charger?”
“In my room,” Jiang Cheng answered tonelessly.
His best friend immediately hopped up and strode down the hallway towards Jiang Cheng’s bedroom. Moments later, his surprised voice resounded through the hall.
“Woah! What the hell? This place’s a total pigsty!”
Jiang Cheng kept his gaze locked onto his spread out textbooks, uninterested in Wei Ying’s yelling. So he may not have been keeping up with his cleaning habits as much as he normally did—so what? He still knew where everything was. Mostly. With midterms coming up, he didn’t have the time to pay attention to his usual routines. Besides, when Wei Ying lived here, his bedroom had been far, far worse.
His ponytailed friend came back over with a concerned look on his face, and both his hands were notably charger-less. “Jiang Cheng, are you okay? This isn’t like you.”
“I’m fine,” Jiang Cheng groused. “Hurry up and charge your phone so we can start.”
Wei Ying clicked his tongue, “I couldn’t find the charger in all that mess, you need to get it for me!”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” Jiang Cheng abruptly stood, causing the coffee table and the materials on it to clatter. He marched into his room to locate the godforsaken charger so he could get Wei Ying to shut up already.
Wei Ying watched him go with a frown. “Are you gonna be like this forever now?” he called after him. “If you’re so miserable, just make up with Nie-xiong already! Knowing you, it was probably your fault anyways!”
Jiang Cheng shouted for Wei Ying to fuck off for the second time as he struggled to locate his phone charger.
A vibration in his back pocket caused Nie Huaisang to stop what he was doing and reach for his phone.
The spare apartment key’s under the potted plant instead of the you’re not welcome mat now.
A text from Jiang Cheng. They rarely texted each other now unless it was absolutely unavoidable. Nie Huaisang realized he still hadn’t changed Jiang Cheng’s contact details. The nickname ‘⚡️💜Laogong💜⚡️’ at the top of his screen taunted him.
He let out a laugh, but there was no amusement to it. What laogong? Jiang Cheng wouldn’t even look at him anymore, and if he did, it was always with a glare or sneer. Some laogong he was. Nie Huaisang tapped the edit button before he began typing on his phone’s keyboard. When he finished, the new contact name read ‘Asshole’.
The sooner their stupid lease was up and he could get out of this hellhole apartment, the better.
Bzzt! Bzzt!
Jiang Cheng distractedly answered his phone one handed, and pressed the device up against his ear with his shoulder as he attempted to retrieve his house key from his backpack.
“Hello?”
A voice he hadn’t heard in a very long while sounded in his ear, “A-Cheng, shame on you! You haven’t called your jie in so long—Are classes going well?”
Jiang Cheng was pleasantly surprised to hear from his older sister. He apologized for not calling her in so long while he unlocked the front door to the apartment and let himself inside. As he set his things aside and wandered to his bedroom, Jiang Yanli teased him a bit more before letting him know how she and her fiancé were doing, even updating him on how their parents were since she’d recently visited them. Jiang Cheng pointedly avoided talking to his mom or dad as much as possible, so he was grateful for the updates.
The two siblings chatted over this and that for some time until the topic of hobbies came up. A couple months ago, Jiang Yanli had gotten into baking desserts. Apparently the peacock she was engaged to was suffering from a toothache after being stuffed with sweets everyday, so Jiang Yanli was always on the search for other taste testers for her creations. Since Jiang Cheng’s apartment wasn’t too far out of the way, she’d sometimes visit with a cake or two every so often.
“I just tried my hand at a soufflé—Is A-Sang there? I might stop by and drop them off for him to try. You won’t like this one, it has too much sugar.”
Jiang Cheng went silent. Jiang Yanli was very fond of Nie Huaisang, treating him the same way she treated Jiang Cheng and Wei Ying—like a little brother. Nie Huaisang had a big sweet tooth as well; he was always willing to try whatever Jiang Yanli baked with a bright smile. She’d definitely be disappointed to hear that she might be losing her favorite taste tester now that they weren’t together anymore.
“Hm? A-Cheng? What’s wrong?”
“Huaisang…We…” Jiang Cheng began, licking at his lips. “…We broke up.”
He bit down on his lip at the way his sister released an unintentional gasp through the phone.
“Oh no! I’m so sorry, A-Cheng…! What happened? Were you not getting along anymore?”
Jiang Cheng wanted to respond, but his throat constricted to the point where not a sound could escape its way out. Up until now, he’d been repressing his inner emotions and throwing himself into his schoolwork to keep his mind off of Nie Huaisang. But hearing his sister’s gentle voice for a few seconds dismantled whatever it was that had allowed him to bottle everything up, leaving him feeling vulnerable and bare.
With reddened eyes, he could only breathe slow and measured breaths as he forced his tears away. As much as wanted to insist he was fine, deep down he was miserable without Nie Huaisang.
Jiang Yanli was someone who understood him better than anyone else. She clicked her tongue sympathetically, cooing out a few words of comfort and telling him he didn’t need to talk about it if he didn’t want to. Her soothing voice felt almost like a warm embrace despite the fact that they were physically separated.
His sister tactfully shifted the topic of conversation, allowing Jiang Cheng to regain his bearings and a modicum of his dashed pride. When the phone call finally ended, Jiang Cheng was left feeling mixed emotions, both bitter and sweet.
Waking up alone wasn’t uncommon for Nie Huaisang. Jiang Cheng was an early riser, and Nie Huaisang the opposite. Outside of the weekends where neither of them had classes, he was used to rousing in an empty bed in the early afternoon. Going to bed alone, however, was a different matter.
Nie Huaisang never realized just how large his bed was when he was the only person climbing in it. Clutching at a stuffed bird plushie that he couldn’t bring himself to discard despite its ex-related origins, he mindlessly stared up at his bedroom ceiling. Minutes passed, where sleep continued to evade him despite his best efforts to count sheep and ignore the gnawing sensation writhing in his guts. In the end, falling asleep with his arms wrapped around a warm body or a warm body wrapped around his had become his normal. Though it was soft and squeezable, a stuffed bird just wasn’t the same.
Going to bed alone sucked, so if he could escape this knifelike loneliness by bringing home a decently faced underclassman every now and then, then he decided that that’s what he would do.
Jiang Cheng felt a vibrating sensation against his thigh and instinctively reached into one of his pant leg’s large pockets for his cellphone.
Pulling it out, he saw the banner notification of a text message. A twinge of ache struck deep inside of his chest as the contact name ‘🐣💚Xiao Tianxin Baobei💚🐣’ flickered at the top of his phone’s screen, the previewed text hedging itself after a moment.
…He still hadn’t gotten around to changing that name.
Or rather, he just didn’t want to change it. Because then it would be officially over, wouldn’t it? Even more over than it already was. As much as it hurt to admit it, Jiang Cheng still loved Nie Huaisang. Because Nie Huaisang understood him in a way no one else did.
Even if he purposefully leaned into a good-for-nothing persona, he still knew what it was like to constantly live in the shadow of someone else, knew how it felt to be compared to others, or deemed as never good enough.
He could always tell when Jiang Cheng was having a shitty day, and always knew how to cheer him up without making a big deal out of it or making him feel embarrassed. He wrote silly love notes in the margins of Jiang Cheng’s planner, distracted him with cute videos of puppies whenever Jiang Cheng got off the phone with his mom or dad, and intentionally or not…he made Jiang Cheng feel wanted and needed.
But Nie Huaisang didn’t do those things anymore now that it was over.
Jiang Cheng didn’t get to fall asleep with the shorter man’s fingers idly running through his hair, he didn’t get to listen to Nie Huaisang’s off-key singing when they took showers together, and he didn’t get to roll his eyes at his terrible jokes either.
Jiang Cheng opened the notification to see that Nie Huaisang had sent him a payment for this month’s rent. In a few more months, he wouldn’t receive these notifications anymore either, because the two of them would permanently go their separate ways once the lease expired.
Storing his phone away, Jiang Cheng swiped his tongue over his top row of teeth and stubbornly ignored the stinging sensation in his nose. A conversation he’d once had played inside his head as he trudged along the withered grass on the grounds of his university.
“—Wei-xiong mentioned that MianMian and her boyfriend broke up. How sad—I thought they were really cute together.”
“People break up for all kinds of reasons.”
“I know, but it’s still sad when it happens.”
“That’s life. Who’s to say it won’t happen to us one day.”
“Psh. Yeah, right. There’s no one else for me. There’s only you and your grumpy eyebrows.”
As he neared the student parking lot, Jiang Cheng lifted his head, only to be met with a shocking sight.
Nie Huaisang.
Nie Huaisang and…another guy he didn’t recognize. He was long-legged, broad-shouldered, and sharp-eyed—basically a downgraded or upgraded version of himself depending on his personality. Jiang Cheng stared at the pair, completely motionless. That should be him walking by Nie Huaisang’s side. He should be the one carrying Nie Huaisang’s things. It should be his bicep Nie Huaisang was clinging to, and his wisecracks Nie Huaisang was laughing at.
Jiang Cheng tasted the bitterness of vinegar pooling in his mouth. To have stumbled upon this scene, the universe must really despise him. And now he was watching his ex-boyfriend loop his arms around another man’s shoulders, rising onto his toes and leaning in close to—
He turned and stalked away before he could witness anything more.
Jiang Cheng burst through the apartment’s front door like a whirlwind. He stomped into his bedroom, pulled out his phone, and changed his roommate’s contact name to ‘Fucking Liar’. Then he threw the phone onto his bed and marched into the bathroom to take a steaming hot shower. The incessant stream of water that poured from the shower head down onto his head masked the tears he angrily shed against his will.
Jiang Cheng was a fucking asshole.
Nie Huaisang chanted this inside his head as he stubbornly hauled a large box full of ceramics he’d crafted himself on campus through the cramped doorway of his and his ex’s apartment. He’d just spent the past twenty or so minutes climbing up three flights of stairs with the cursed box in his arms, and was on the verge of keeling over as he puffed on air. Apparently, their stupid complex’s elevator went down again this afternoon, forcing residents to use the stairwells for the time being. Since the rent here was pretty cheap, repairs were always a low priority for management.
Anyways, because his piece of shit ex-boyfriend who was definitely already aware of the elevator situation pettily chose not to inform him of this important fact, Nie Huaisang had no choice but to lug his things all on his own once he’d gotten back after classes to see an ‘Under Maintenance’ sign plastered on the elevator door.
Sweat poured down Nie Huaisang’s forehead as he finally managed to place the heavy box down in the apartment’s foyer with a loud thud. Now that he was boyfriend-less, he had to carry everything himself. Had he known beforehand that the elevator was down, he would have tried getting one of the guys he’d been messing around with lately to lend some help. Although, pretty much all of them were only interested in sex, and probably wouldn’t have been willing anyways. Not even a good lay was worth the trouble of lugging around half a ton of pottery clay up three flights of stairs.
Before, Jiang Cheng would always carry Nie Huaisang’s things without a word of complaint all the other times the elevator went down. In fact, Jiang Cheng had done a lot of things for him without Nie Huaisang ever asking him to. Things that Nie Huaisang hadn’t even realized he was doing until he’d stopped doing them. Things like putting extra money in his schoolbag in case Nie Huaisang misplaced his wallet or phone again so he could still get something to eat on campus between classes, or organizing his printouts and reading materials each week since Nie Huaisang was always just shoving them into random binders or folders and forgetting about them.
There were no more prepared meals waiting for him in the fridge when he woke up or got home late, no more surprise gifts to look forward to after he completed a tough assignment, and no one to help him with said tough assignments.
A noticeable wetness began to slip down the sides of his face. Nie Huaisang sniffed and rubbed at the corners of his eyes until they were red and raw, stubbornly continuing his task and pushing the box towards his bedroom.
Jiang Cheng was an asshole.
And Nie Huaisang still loved him.
Jiang Cheng knew that Nie Huaisang was seeing other people now. He knew that, but that didn’t make it any easier when he’d come home and see those people hanging out with Nie Huaisang in their shared apartment. People that looked a lot like him, with long toned legs, dark hair, and a lean and athletic frame. People that would sit on the sofa he’d purchased with his money and cuddle up with his ex-boyfriend. People that would later head into Nie Huaisang’s bedroom with the young man and stay in there for the rest of the night with the door shut, filling the hallway with faint suggestive noises and needy whines.
Each time it happened Jiang Cheng would blast music into a pair of corded earbuds to drown out the noise until the drivers burst, rendering them useless, and then he would sandwich his head between two pillows and pretend that the wetness spilling from his eyes wasn’t tears, but sweat.
Lying on his side with his body hidden beneath his duvet, Nie Huaisang stared at his phone’s screen expressionlessly. It was nearing seven pm, and he hadn’t eaten dinner yet. He had no money left on his spending card managed by his older brother, and none of the guys he’d met on campus were responding to his texts anymore now that he’d stopped sleeping with them. At this point, he was likely going to have to resort to contacting Lan Huan for some money, and though it would probably still get back to his brother, it was better than talking to the man directly.
After scrolling instagram for an unknown amount of time to take his mind off of his cavernous stomach, he’d ended up on his own page, looking through all the photos he’d posted. Birds he’d seen on campus, art pieces he’d crafted by hand, and of course, himself and Jiang Cheng.
In almost every posted selfie, Jiang Cheng looked either constipated or incredibly awkward next to him. He never was very good in front of cameras. Still, the man always had his arm or something around Nie Huaisang, and though he grumbled each time, he’d eventually relent into going along with whatever Nie Huaisang was trying to corral him into doing. He’d always let Nie Huaisang have his way in the end.
Nie Huaisang’s bottom lip began to tremble once he began unadvisedly looking through his phone’s camera roll. The last photo of the two of them was taken here, at home. Jiang Cheng had fallen asleep in bed next to him while they were watching a decent costume drama. On Friday nights, they sometimes held pajama parties where they wore embarrassing animal onesies and gorged themselves on junk food. Nie Huaisang had snapped a picture with himself cozied up next to a fast asleep Jiang Cheng, making a kissy face.
The next morning, he’d shown the picture to his boyfriend and laughed at the way his face had turned a pretty shade of pink.
…He missed Jiang Cheng.
He missed the way Jiang Cheng would coax him out of bed on Sunday mornings with fresh soy milk and donuts. He missed the feeling of being the big spoon and cuddling up with Jiang Cheng at night. He missed the wry smiles, eye-rolls, and sarcastic laughs Jiang Cheng used to give him when he was being silly.
He wanted things back to how they were.
He wanted Jiang Cheng back.
Nie Huaisang didn’t bother wiping away the fat tears that rolled down his cheeks. They would only be replaced with more.
The sound of the front door slamming woke Jiang Cheng up with a start. Muttering a curse to himself, he blindly reached for his cellphone on his nightstand and checked the time. Fucking three-fifteen in the fucking morning. And he was scheduled to have a quiz first thing for his eight am class.
Jiang Cheng tossed the phone back to its original spot and pulled his coverlet over himself as he stubbornly pressed his face into his pillow. Fucking Nie Huaisang. He probably brought another piece of shit underclassman over here again. Jiang Cheng gritted his teeth and futilely tried to force himself back to sleep.
However, instead of the giggling and whispering noises Jiang Cheng had expected to be unwillingly subjected to as his former lover turned estranged roommate headed down the hallway, all he actually heard was a strange sniffling noise. Then he heard his bedroom door being opened. The ceiling fan’s light turned on overhead, causing the room to go from pitch black to blindingly bright in the blink of an eye.
Irritated, Jiang Cheng lifted his head with squinting eyes. “What the fuck are you—”
Nie Huaisang, his ex-boyfriend, was standing in the doorway. He looked an absolute mess, with his hair swept up and dried tear tracks staining his cheeks.
“…Huaisang?”
Nie Huaisang stumbled over before plopping face first onto Jiang Cheng’s bed with a grunt. “They’re not you…why can’t they be you?” Spoken into the duvet, the young man’s words came out muffled.
Jiang Cheng lightly shoved at Nie Huaisang’s shoulder, not at all in the mood for this. “Huaisang, get out. You’re in the wrong room.”
Nie Huaisang groaned, lifting his body some but not quite managing to fully get up. Jiang Cheng decided to help himself by helping his ex get out of here. He reached over and slipped his hands beneath Nie Huaisang’s armpits, pulling him into an upright position.
That was when pair of lips urgently pressed against his, causing a strangled noise of surprise to rise from the back of Jiang Cheng’s throat. He inhaled sharply, and the bitter taste of alcohol flooded his senses. Nie Huaisang reeked of booze.
The smaller man continued his advances, pushing Jiang Cheng down onto the mattress where he began climbing on top of him. Jiang Cheng almost choked once Nie Huaisang started grinding himself against his pelvis with intention.
He gripped his ex by the shoulders and resolutely pushed him away. “S-Stop! What the hell are you—”
The words Jiang Cheng wanted to say died in his throat once he saw Nie Huaisang’s crying face.
“T-Take me back,” he sobbed softly. “Say you still love me. Say it.”
A pair of hands clumsily came up to cup Jiang Cheng by either side of his face. Nie Huaisang’s voice came out desperate and anguished. “I won’t make you angry anymore. I-I won’t act spoiled anymore. S-So just take me back, okay? A-Cheng.”
Jiang Cheng was dumbstruck. Words wouldn’t even form within his throat. Nie Huaisang was saying all sorts of sensitive things—but there was no telling if he actually meant his words or if he would even remember this in the morning. He was wasted out of his mind.
“I…” There was no question that Jiang Cheng still loved his ex-boyfriend. But he couldn’t bring himself to lie about getting back together or say what Nie Huaisang wanted to hear just to placate him because he was drunk and crying. It wouldn’t feel right.
“…I’ll always care about you,” he awkwardly said instead.
That only seemed to make his ex cry harder though. “How do I make you l-love me again?” he wept. “Tell me and I’ll do it. I’ll…I’ll do anything…please, A-Cheng…”
Jiang Cheng’s fingers flexed. “Huaisang…”
He so badly wanted to pull this young man into his arms and make him his again. But he knew it would be wrong.
Nie Huaisang grasped at Jiang Cheng’s shirt, peering up at him with watery eyes. “I-I’ll let you fuck me. Whenever you want. You don’t even have to use a condom…”
Jiang Cheng’s eyes flashed. He gripped Nie Huaisang firmly by the wrists. “Huaisang. Stop talking. You’re drunk.”
Nie Huaisang only shook his head miserably, causing more tears to spill down his cheeks. “I don’t wanna live anymore, I don’t wanna live anymore!” he wailed. “If you don’t love me anymore then wh-what’s the point of living? I’ll kill myself, I’ll really kill myself…!”
The words only caused Jiang Cheng’s anger to multiply by tenfold.
“Don’t say things like that! I’m serious, Huaisa—”
Nie Huaisang suddenly began to jerk violently, his chest heaving. Before Jiang Cheng could even figure out what was wrong, Nie Huaisang lifted his head and emptied his guts all over the side of the bed. After overcoming his initial shock, Jiang Cheng rubbed at the young man’s back as he retched until there was nothing left in his stomach to expel. As soon as he was done, Nie Huaisang groaned and fell unconscious.
“……”
With a resigned sigh, Jiang Cheng gathered Nie Huaisang into his arms and carried him to his bedroom where he deposited the smaller man onto his unmade bed. Jiang Cheng put him on his side and made sure he was breathing properly before he returned to his own room to clean up the vomit. Once that was done with he went back into Nie Huaisang’s room to watch over him until he was certain the kid would be okay. It was around four-thirty in the morning by the time he fell asleep in his own bed.
Nie Huaisang woke up feeling like a used dirty rag. Cracking an eye open, he instantly recognized his pale green bedsheets and matching comforter, though he didn’t remember climbing into his bed at all last night. In fact, he didn’t remember much of anything about the night before. He knew he had gone out clubbing and ended up messing around in the bathroom with a guy who had bought him some drinks. But after that…he wasn’t sure how he’d gotten home after that.
Groaning and wincing as both the joints and muscles in his body as well as the fuddled brain inside his skull protested at any movements, Nie Huaisang slowly managed to lift his head. The rarely used alarm clock on his nightstand read eleven-forty-two am. Next to the clock, there was an unopened water bottle beside two pills of Tylenol.
Only one person could have done this.
Even when they weren’t together anymore, Jiang Cheng was still looking after him.
Bitter resentment bubbled inside Nie Huaisang’s already sick stomach.
If you don’t love me anymore then stop being nice to me. Stop making me think I have a chance. Don’t you know I’m still in love with you? Asshole.
Nie Huaisang never brought up the little drunken escapade he’d gone on the other night, so Jiang Cheng never mentioned it either. In all likelihood, Nie Huaisang probably just didn’t remember anything of what he’d done. Typical of him.
Wreaking havoc and then leaving the mess for Jiang Cheng to clean up. It was no wonder he and Wei Ying became friends.
Asshole.
Jiang Cheng just tried to force the memory out of his mind. It had only been the alcohol talking. If Nie Huaisang really still loved him and wanted to get back together, then he wouldn’t be going out every night with different guys. He would have just climbed into bed with Jiang Cheng maybe a week or two after their fight without any alcohol in his system and rubbed up against him until they were both naked and sweating and exhausted. And then they would have pretended that the argument that sparked their breakup never happened in the first place.
If Nie Huaisang still loved him, he wouldn’t be avoiding all contact with Jiang Cheng like he was now. So, by all accounts, there was no reason to dwell on it any further. This is what Jiang Cheng repeatedly told himself to preserve his own sanity.
Otherwise, he’d drive himself crazy thinking about that fucked up kiss that’d tasted like heaven and vodka.
Nie Huaisang scribbled yet another doodle of a soaring bird on his tablet as his professor droned on and on about things he wouldn’t even need to remember years from now.
He’d already stopped note-taking at this point, no longer capable of focusing on the lecture. If he failed art history then he failed art history. In the meantime, birds were a nice distraction. But as Nie Huaisang made repeated delicate strokes to form the crown of a magpie’s head that led into its beak, something strange happened.
In the back of his mind, images of an unknown place at an unknown time were faintly surfacing. He saw a comforter with lotus patterns on its fabric.
...Jiang Cheng’s bed had that same design.
Next to the bed was a nightstand with a lamp shaped like a flower perched on its surface.
Jiang Cheng had a lamp just like that. Nie Huaisang bought it for him from a vintage furniture shop.
This…was Jiang Cheng’s room.
Nie Huaisang lowered his smart pen while a look of utter horror slowly swept across his face.
No. No way.
The hazy, missing pieces of the events that had occurred the other night when he’d gotten wasted began to piece themselves together, gradually forming into a coherent string of memories. It was as if a privacy filter used in movies and television had finally been lifted.
The reason he didn’t remember getting into his own bed that night was because Jiang Cheng had been the one to put him there.
Nie Huaisang swallowed a groan of dismay as the memories all came flooding back. He saw the look of irritation Jiang Cheng had directed his way as his drunken past self climbed into his bed, uninvited. He saw Jiang Cheng push him away after he’d forced a kiss onto him. He even saw the pool of vomit on the wooden floor after he’d puked his guts up.
All the embarrassing things he’d said played loud and clear inside his head as well. Begging for Jiang Cheng to take him back, confessing his love like a pathetic loser, and admitting he’d rather be dead than be without his ex. Nie Huaisang told himself off inside his head for doing something so stupid, regretting the day he was ever born.
Nie Huaisang, what the hell is wrong with you?!
A headache was beginning to manifest behind his temples, but rubbing at them did nothing to relieve the developing ache. It was fine if he had just gone and puked onto Jiang Cheng’s bedroom floor like an idiot, but he had to go and say all of that embarrassing stuff too, and now Jiang Cheng knew that he still loved him.
But…
Why hadn’t Jiang Cheng said anything about it afterwards? Why hadn’t he confronted him?
Nie Huaisang rested his head in his crossed arms against the auditorium desk, too immersed in his own drama to care about other students that were subtly casting him strange looks.
Jiang Cheng hadn’t shown any difference in the way he was acting since then.
Did that mean he really didn’t care about him romantically anymore? But if he didn’t care, then why would he take care of him by tucking him into bed and leaving him pain killers and water? Was that really just something he’d do for any roommate?
Nie Huaisang wanted answers, but it wasn’t like he could just walk up to his ex and ask: “Hey, remember that time I told you I still loved you and then immediately puked on your bedroom floor? What’d you think about that by the way? The still loving you part, not the vomiting part.”
At this point, he couldn’t resist letting out an audible groan. He and Jiang Cheng still weren’t even on proper speaking terms yet. How was he supposed to approach this?
“Pleeeeease?”
Wei Ying grumbled over the bag of Takis Nie Huaisang had given to him, shoving his arm down its opening and pulling out a generous handful.
“I told you I don’t wanna be involved in any relationship drama,” he said as he ate.
Nie Huaisang tugged at the hem of his friend’s T-shirt. He was willing to get down on his knees and hug Wei Ying’s thighs if necessary. “I just need you to find out if he’s still angry with me! Like, just ask him how things have been around the apartment.”
Wei Ying chewed at his spicy tortilla chips with a grimace, clearly uninterested in fulfilling Nie Huaisang’s wishes. But he was Nie Huaisang’s only hope at figuring out Jiang Cheng’s current feelings towards him, so he had to do this no matter what! Nie Huaisang relentlessly harried his friend, almost on the verge of tears.
“Fine,” Wei Ying finally sighed as he licked spicy red powder off his fingertips, “But I’m only gonna do this once, for our friendship. Never again after that.”
Nie Huaisang thanked him repeatedly, and promised to do whatever his friend asked of him later on.
Jiang Cheng accepted his change from the cashier at a food truck, shoving it into the back pocket of his jeans. In a monotonous voice, he thanked the worker and took up his iced coffee, heading back to the seating area where a young man with a long and high ponytail with several piercings was sat.
Wei Ying’s dark eyebrows drew together when he saw that Jiang Cheng was only carrying one drink. “Where’s mine?”
“Buy your own,” Jiang Cheng replied.
“Tch, stingy bastard. Then I’m not sharing my pork belly with you.” Wei Ying used two fingers to drag the clamshell foam container full of fresh sweet and sour pork closer to him.
Jiang Cheng reached for it anyways. “I fucking paid for that, idiot.” He scarfed down a few pieces with a pair of disposable chopsticks, chewing and swallowing harshly.
Wei Ying evaded his attempts at thwarting him away from his meal and managed to steal some for himself. “Sheesh, you’re nastier than a junkyard dog now. Remind me why I even invited you out here?”
“Because you don’t have a car and you need me to drive you to your statue boyfriend’s place after this,” Jiang Cheng answered flatly.
“Oh, yeah. Hey, speaking of boyfriends—”
Jiang Cheng’s body instantly tensed up. Whatever Wei Ying was about to ask him, he knew he wasn’t going to like it.
“‘Whatever’? That’s all he said?”
Wei Ying spread his hands with a shrug. “I asked him about you and he basically said he didn’t care, and then when I pressed him for more details he told me to fuck off and threatened to punch me.”
Nie Huaisang’s face fell. All of his worst fears were being confirmed. Jiang Cheng really was over him after all.
After getting this information, his first instinct was to do something drastic like getting shitfaced until he couldn’t remember his own name let alone his ex. However, that was what had led him to drunkenly crashing into Jiang Cheng’s bedroom that one night, so drowning his sorrows in alcohol probably wasn’t the wisest course of action right now.
Seeing his miserable face, Wei Ying offered him a sympathetic look, patting him on the back a few times. The young man was much closer with Jiang Cheng than with him, so it was nice that he was still willing to associate with Nie Huaisang despite the breakup.
“Want me to cancel my plans with Lan Zhan and stay with you? We could play Smash or something.”
Though he was grateful for the offer, Nie Huaisang shook his head, forcing a smile. He’d rather be alone right now. However, Wei Ying mentioning Lan Zhan caused him to think of something. When Wei Ying left, Nie Huaisang pulled out his cellphone and called someone he hadn’t spoken to in a while.
Nie Huaisang stared rigidly at the tall figure seated at a round table located in the outside patio of the cafe he’d been invited to. The man wore a stern expression, sturdy arms crossed over his broad chest while one of his feet restlessly tapped against the stone paved ground.
This wasn’t Lan Huan.
His first impulse was to turn and run, but the moment he spun on his heel, he was met with a pair of dark brown eyes and a smiling face.
“A-Sang, you made it!” The force of which Lan Huan used to grasp him by the elbow was shockingly strong. Nie Huaisang couldn’t escape, and was dragged over to where Nie Mingjue was sitting against his will.
“Look who came to join us!”
Nie Mingjue lifted his head from staring at the menu and locked eyes with Nie Huaisang. Surprise filled his golden irises initially, but they quickly turned guarded and uncertain. Nie Huaisang averted his gaze and grudgingly sat down directly across from his brother, while Lan Huan took the available seat in between them.
Nie Mingjue shot Lan Huan an irritated look, which was smoothly ignored by the deceitful man as Lan Huan helpfully handed Nie Huaisang a copy of the menu.
Nie Huaisang accepted it and kept his eyes firmly on its contents, refusing to be the first to acknowledge the elephant in the room. It was only when Lan Huan excused himself to use the restroom indoors that the silent showdown between the two brothers would meet its end.
“Your bank card’s empty,” Nie Mingjue’s familiar gruff voice entered Nie Huaisang’s ears. He hadn’t spoken to his brother in months, it felt a little strange hearing his voice again.
He nodded stiffly, bracing himself for a lecture. Surprisingly, his brother’s next words weren’t ones of disparagement.
“I’ll replenish it after this.”
Nie Huaisang sharply raised his head, the action almost causing him to wince. “…Really?”
Nie Mingjue readjusted his crossed arms, muttering, “I can’t have you starving while going to school; your studies will suffer.”
A waiter came by to take their orders and deliver them water. Lan Huan was taking his sweet time in the restroom. In the end, Nie Mingjue ordered for him, knowing his preferences by heart. Meanwhile, Nie Huaisang was finding it difficult to sit still, nervously rocking back and forth in his seat.
“How’s school.”
Bad. I’m failing at least two classes, and struggling in the rest.
Without Jiang Cheng helping him with his studies like he used to, his scores had plummeted rapidly.
Nie Huaisang’s mouth was dry like cotton when he lied, “Okay.”
He downed his glass of water to remedy the issue, maybe a little too hastily. One of Nie Mingjue’s thick eyebrows drew inward scrutinizingly.
Please don’t ask about Jiang Cheng.
“And the boyfriend?”
Fuck.
Clearing his throat, he shifted in place and responded tonelessly, “…Just a roommate now. He dumped me.”
Nie Huaisang clenched his teeth at the way his brother’s eyes momentarily widened with alarm.
Go ahead. Say ‘I told you so’.
“…Sorry. You like him a lot, didn’t you?”
Eyes getting hot, Nie Huaisang shook his head listlessly. “You were right,” he murmured. “I need to grow up. No one wants to date someone who acts like a child.”
“That’s what he said?”
“Pretty much.”
“So that’s it then?”
Nie Huaisang’s eyes flickered up.
“If that Jiang kid is angry with you, then fix it. Own up to your mistakes and make it right. That kid has a good head on his shoulders; you’re not going to find another one like him easily.”
Nie Huaisang looked down at his lap. Easy for you to say. You’re braver than I am.
As if reading his thoughts, Nie Mingjue offered him a flat look. “Huaisang, you’re one of the most stubborn, willful people I know,” he groused. “When you want something, I’ve never seen you let anything get in the way of you having it.”
All true things that Nie Huaisang was aware of. But it didn’t change the fact that he was scared.
“You love this guy, don’t you? Are you really just going to give him up without even putting up a fight?”
“…It’s not that simple.” Nie Huaisang couldn’t believe his older brother of all people was actually giving him a pep talk about his relationship. What did he know about patching up relationships when his boyfriend was always so calm and understanding?
The older man scoffed. “You think I haven’t put my foot in my mouth and pissed Lan Huan off to no end? If Jiang Cheng thinks you’re immature, prove him wrong. Make him realize he made a mistake by breaking up with you.”
Nie Huaisang suddenly had the urge to laugh. His brother always turned everything into some sort of weird challenge or competition. But maybe he was right. Maybe it wasn’t too late to change, and change Jiang Cheng’s mind about him. He just had to try.
Nie Mingjue reached out to tousle his hair, the same way he used to when Nie Huaisang was small.
“Sha haizi.”
By the time Lan Huan finally came back from the ‘restroom’, he was greeted with the sight of the two Nie siblings tucking into their meals with gusto, one of them occasionally letting out small sniffles. When he sat down, Nie Mingjue placed a few fried greens from his own meal onto his plate.
Lan Huan smiled warmly at the gesture, and directed his attention towards the younger of the Nies. “How is it?”
Nie Huaisang nodded to him, already eager to finish eating and head back home.
When Jiang Cheng answered the door to his apartment, he wasn’t expecting to see his older sister’s smiling face on the other side.
“Jie? What are you doing here?”
Jiang Yanli’s radiant smile widened as she presumptuously nudged her way past him, a plastic bag slung over one of her forearms. The woman placed the bag onto the kitchenette’s counter and spoke over her shoulder, “I came to deliver some treats. Don’t worry, they’re not too sweet.”
“Ah…” Jiang Cheng watched his sister go about unpacking the desserts she’d made. Although she didn’t live here, she treated the place like a second home, casually opening up cupboards and retrieving the tableware she needed.
Not long after, the two siblings were seated at the sofa with fresh cups of tea and an assortment of baked desserts set out. Jiang Cheng quietly nibbled on a piece of tart with a lotus paste filling, both his mind and his gaze unfocused.
“How is it?”
Jiang Yanli’s baking skills were always top notch, but right now Jiang Cheng could hardly taste anything on his tongue. Still, he forced himself to offer a few words of sincere praise.
Jiang Yanli flashed him a smile and looked around with a curious expression. “Is A-Sang home? He ought to try some as well.”
It was fine, good even, that Jiang Yanli wasn’t hesitant to continue associating with Nie Huaisang. All of the anger Jiang Cheng had felt towards his ex had long since dissipated by now anyways, replaced with a gnawing ache. Jiang Cheng shook his head, answering that he hadn’t seen Nie Huaisang in a few days. He was probably sleeping over at one of his many flings’ places. The thought of it made his stomach lurch.
Noticing his low spirits, Jiang Yanli asked, “Are the two of you still not speaking to each other?”
His silence was as good an answer as any.
“It’s not good to keep going on like this, A-Cheng,” she tutted with a frown. “Even if you’re not friends anymore, as roommates sharing the same living space, you should be able to at least talk to each other.”
Jiang Cheng knew this, but knowing something and doing something were two different things. He hadn’t talked to Nie Huaisang because he dreaded confirmation of his worst fear: that Nie Huaisang had fully moved on from what they had together.
This all happened because he couldn’t control his temper. Nie Huaisang was spoiled, sure, but Jiang Cheng was the asshole who blew up at him over nothing. But Nie Huaisang’s constant negligence could be aggravating as hell at times.
“Does the pea—” Jiang Cheng caught himself mid-sentence and amended, “I mean, does Jin Zixuan ever make you angry?”
“All the time,” Jiang Yanli cut into a dark chocolate soufflé cake using a knife before offering him a slice. “Our relationship isn’t perfect either; we bicker probably just as much as you and A-Sang do.”
Jiang Cheng never expected to hear this from his sister, who he always saw in a perfect, untainted light.
“How do you fix it?” he asked. “When things get out of hand?”
“A lot of it has to do with managing your emotions. But if you slip up, there’s no shame in taking a step back and apologizing. You know A-Sang better than I, but he’s not the type to hold things over your head is he?”
Jiang Cheng shook his head. Nie Huaisang could definitely hold grudges towards others, but he was never that way with him. Even if Jiang Cheng snapped at him a little too harshly over something insignificant or a minor accident, he usually let it slide and didn’t bring it up later. Maybe Jiang Cheng took that aspect of his ex for granted.
Jiang Yanli placed her hand on his knee, rubbing her thumb against the fabric there. “It’s alright to get angry,” she said gently. “It’s what you do with that anger that matters.”
“……” Jiang Cheng’s eyes flickered down to Jiang Yanli’s hand.
After Jiang Yanli left, Jiang Cheng sat in his thoughts, reflecting on everything she’d said. Even though Nie Huaisang certainly had his share of blame for their breakup, he couldn’t be considered the sole root of the problems they’d struggled with.
Jiang Cheng stood. He had to see Nie Huaisang. He’d tell him he was sorry, ask him for another chance, and make everything right between them. Even if they couldn’t go back to being lovers, Nie Huaisang’s friendship still meant the world to him. He wasn’t willing to let it go for good.
His feet carried him to the foyer in the blink of an eye, and then he was hastily shoving his feet into a pair of sneakers. He wasn’t exactly sure where Nie Huaisang was right now, but that wouldn’t stop him from trying to find the young man. He’d start by asking around campus, and if that didn’t work, he’d look around Nie Huaisang’s favorite hangout spots.
When he grasped the doorknob, the door swung open a lot faster than he anticipated, almost as if—
“…Huaisang!”
A young man with shoulder-length hair and side-swept bangs was standing on the opposite side of the door, one hand wrapped around its other doorknob. Nie Huaisang stared up at Jiang Cheng with his jaw partially hanging open.
Jiang Cheng also stared back, and by the time he managed to regain his voice, he ended up blurting out the first thing on his mind.
“I’m sorry—”
“It was my fault—”
Both men’s words came out in a rush, overlapping yet distinctly clear to each receiving party. They gazed at one another, wide eyed and dumbfounded. Jiang Cheng wasn’t expecting to receive an apology, and clearly Nie Huaisang wasn’t either.
After getting a proper look, Jiang Cheng realized Nie Huaisang was panting, the front of his shirt soaked through. He must’ve been running or something, which was unusual considering he was known for absolutely despising all forms of exercise. Concern surged through him.
“Are you okay? What happened to you?”
Nie Huaisang took a couple more steadying breaths before answering, “I’m fine, I just—hah—ran all the way up the stairs. The stupid elevator’s still down.” He swiped his forearm across his forehead, and it came back covered in sweat.
“Why?”
“I wanted…phew…to talk to you.”
Jiang Cheng wanted to talk too, but Nie Huaisang looked like he was about to keel over from exhaustion any second. For now, he had his roommate come inside and fixed him a glass of iced water. Nie Huaisang gulped it down at that kitchenette’s counter, finishing the whole thing in under a minute. It was only once Nie Huaisang had gotten his breathing under control and his face returned to a normal peachy color that Jiang Cheng felt comfortable engaging in conversation.
With his gaze trained onto the specks of crumbs he hadn’t bothered to clean off the counter yet, he asked, “…What did you want to talk about?”
Nie Huaisang’s expression turned serious. After pushing his empty glass away, he took a deep breath and folded his hands together. “I owe you a big apology,” he said. “It was all my fault we broke up. I’m sorry.”
Jiang Cheng never thought Nie Huaisang would be the first to take ownership of his role in the breakup between them. A mix of emotions flowed through him; appreciation, remorse, and a distinct hopefulness.
He licked at his lips. “…I’m sorry too. What I did to your hairbrush was fucked up and childish. I should’ve just talked to you like an adult.”
At his words, Nie Huaisang also looked hopeful. His posture straightened up, and his golden eyes brightened. “I get why you got so fed up with me always slacking on stuff around the house. I think I got too comfortable relying on you for everything,” he said. “You started being less of a boyfriend and more of a second da-ge, which wasn’t fair to you.”
It felt great hearing Nie Huaisang acknowledge his part in their issues. Jiang Cheng didn’t know what spurred his ex into doing this so suddenly, but he was glad for the chance to finally air everything out between them. Overcoming the problems that led to their breakup didn’t seem so impossible and intimidating in that moment.
Clearing his throat, he looked Nie Huaisang in the eyes and spoke his true feelings without holding anything back. “It wasn’t just your fault. And even when you were in the wrong, it wasn’t right for me to yell and snap at you the way I always did. Sometimes I yelled at you for stuff that wasn’t even in your control. When I was mad at my parents, or Wei Ying, or whatever…there were a lot of times I took that anger out on you. That was wrong. I’m sorry.”
Nie Huaisang tentatively reached out to cover one of Jiang Cheng’s hands. “I forgive you. Do you forgive me?”
Jiang Cheng nodded. This might be the first time they’ve ever apologized to each other like this—like adults.
“Are we friends again?”
Jiang Cheng was about to nod once more, but hesitated at the last moment. Nie Huaisang must’ve noticed this, because his expression shuttered, unmistakable sadness pooling in his irises.
Jiang Cheng quickly turned his hand over and squeezed Nie Huaisang’s. “Of course we’re friends, but…I’d prefer to be more than just friends,” he admitted, heat creeping onto his cheeks and neck.
He met Nie Huaisang’s gaze unwaveringly when he said the next part. “Can we try dating again? I know I fucked it up last time, but—”
Jiang Cheng was still mid-sentence when Nie Huaisang sidestepped the counter and practically tackled him full force. His embrace was startlingly strong, squeezing the air right out of Jiang Cheng’s lungs. His heart trembling, Jiang Cheng wrapped his arms around Nie Huaisang’s back, returning the hug.
This person fit so nicely inside his arms; he didn’t know how he ever managed to go so long without being able to hold Nie Huaisang like this.
“Can I take this as a ‘yes’?”
Nie Huaisang nodded against his chest, tightening his arms even more. When he finally looked up, his elated smile instantly eradicated any of the doubts still lingering in the depths of Jiang Cheng’s heart.
“F-From now on, I’ll do whatever you say. I don’t wanna fight anymore.”
Releasing a sigh, Jiang Cheng shook his head. “We’re always going to disagree or argue over stupid shit—there’s no such thing as a couple that doesn’t. You get on my nerves sometimes, Huaisang—you wouldn’t be you if you didn’t.”
He wetted his lips and continued, “And I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t drive you up the wall with my grouchiness.”
Jiang Cheng recalled all the things his sister had told him earlier today. “We just need to work on communicating better. Talking things out properly, not letting our arguments escalate into shouting matches, and finding a middle ground when we disagree.”
All easier said than done, but Jiang Cheng didn’t think it was impossible. He wanted to try. He couldn’t see a future without Nie Huaisang in it.
“Okay,” Nie Huaisang agreed. “I promise I’ll really try.”
The two of them stayed in place, neither willing to release their hold on the other.
“I was miserable without you, you know.” Nie Huaisang’s soft confession caused Jiang Cheng’s heart to swell with affection.
He buried his nose in the smaller man’s hair, unbothered by the slight odor of mildew caused by sleeping with damp hair. “Me too.”
Before he knew it, Nie Huaisang was coaxing him into a sweet kiss. However, the kiss quickly turned heated. It couldn’t be helped when it had been so long since they’d last done this.
Nie Huaisang shamelessly prodded the seam of Jiang Cheng’s lips with his tongue, delving inside the moment Jiang Cheng parted them wide enough. Inhaling sharply, Jiang Cheng followed the other’s lead, falling into a natural rhythm that had long since been etched deep into his soul. Even without words, they didn’t have any trouble understanding each other’s thoughts and intentions, easily falling into a synchronized dance of sorts. Nie Huaisang’s familiar taste and touch was addicting—no matter how many times Jiang Cheng experienced it, he could never have enough. Their lips moved together urgently, almost as though they were attempting to devour the other.
When they broke apart, Nie Huaisang gazed up at him, his eyes heated and lips slightly ruddy as he panted for breath. “C-Can we…?”
Uncertainty had caused him to trail off, but Jiang Cheng understood what had been left unsaid loud and clear. Nodding vigorously, he gripped his boyfriend by the hand and marched straight towards his bedroom.
The first thing Nie Huaisang noticed when he was led by the hand into Jiang Cheng’s room was how haphazard the younger man’s usually tidy bed was. He hadn’t been in this room since the time he’d barged in here and vomited, but he’d been pretty wasted that night so he naturally hadn’t gotten a good look at the space. Looking at it now…
It resembled nothing short of a war zone. Piles of papers, books, clothes, and empty cartons of food littered the floor, making it nearly impossible to walk around. This may as well have been a potential hoarder’s room—the mess put even Nie Huaisang, the king of slovenliness himself to shame!
Before Nie Huaisang could comment on the incredible state of Jiang Cheng’s room, he was picked up and promptly placed onto the bed. The bedsheets’ aroma was noticeably a little off, but that didn’t bother him. It only made Nie Huaisang feel more eager.
Jiang Cheng shoved the nearby accumulated piles of books and laundered clothes off the bed to make more room, and Nie Huaisang felt like he’d entered another dimension. Was this really Jiang Cheng? He’d never seen his boyfriend treat his belongings so carelessly. Clearly the breakup had just as much impact on Jiang Cheng for him to allow his personal space to wind up this neglected.
When Nie Huaisang asked him about cleaning up the mess, Jiang Cheng’s response was disinterested.
“Later,” he said, his focus set on something else entirely. That something was unbuttoning Nie Huaisang’s trousers and shimmying them off his hips and legs. He kissed at Nie Huaisang’s neck as he did so, causing Nie Huaisang’s brain to short-circuit a few times.
Well. If Jiang Cheng didn’t care then Nie Huaisang certainly wasn’t going to harp on it either—especially not when they were about to do what they were about to do.
Stripped to just his underwear, he bit at his lips as he watched Jiang Cheng sit up and remove his own shirt, revealing his bare torso that already bore a thin sheen of sweat. While he was excited, he was also just as nervous. This was already a lot different than the rough make-up sex they were used to having. Now, instead of mindlessly sweating off unresolved tension, they were carefully rekindling something delicate yet powerful.
In only a pair of unbuttoned jeans with a noticeable bulge down the center, Jiang Cheng crawled over him, his sharp eyes filled with lust and love. He dipped his hands beneath Nie Huaisang’s shirt, brushing up against a pair of budded, sensitive nubs. The action caused Nie Huaisang to let out an involuntary whimper. It’d been a while since he’d done this, and for Jiang Cheng to be the one to finally end his streak of celibacy…It was a lot.
Noticing his unusual reaction, Jiang Cheng whispered in concern: “What’s wrong?”
Nie Huaisang took a few calming breaths. “I haven’t…” he mumbled, twitching all over, “w-with anyone since…”
Jiang Cheng’s steely eyes snapped to attention, looking dead serious as his pupils shrank. “Since when?”
Nie Huaisang swallowed, feeling similarly to a bug under a microscope. “Since…since before that night I came home plastered and threw up by your bed.”
When they’d first broken up, Nie Huaisang had hopelessly tried to replace Jiang Cheng with random guys from campus that had similar physicalities and styles. It worked initially, but after a while the placebo effect wore off, and he couldn’t bring himself to sleep with anyone else at all. Even his toys saw minimal use. He hadn’t wanted sex, he’d just wanted Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng pressed a bruising kiss onto Nie Huaisang’s lips. At the same time, he roughly tugged off the final piece of clothing keeping him from Nie Huaisang’s most intimate parts. The burst of cold air against his bare skin caused Nie Huaisang to gasp.
He pulled away just enough so that they were nose to nose. “Good,” he said, voice impossibly husky. “It just means I need to break you in again.”
…Fuck.
Nie Huaisang bit his lip and glanced up at the ceiling, his head spinning. It wasn’t often Jiang Cheng said things like that, but when he did, it was always extremely effective at sending Nie Huaisang’s blood rushing straight to his dick.
He spread his legs and whined when Jiang Cheng immediately dove between them and—God. Though Jiang Cheng had been inexperienced when they’d first started dating, this was certainly no longer the case. Now, he knew exactly what to do to make Nie Huaisang melt into the bedsheets. He knew what Nie Huaisang liked and what he didn’t like, knew how much pressure to use and what pace to set. Nie Huaisang was a textbook that Jiang Cheng had thoroughly studied and mastered. Honestly, it seemed like Jiang Cheng knew Nie Huaisang’s body better than Nie Huaisang knew it himself at times.
“Hah…Hahh…” One of Jiang Cheng’s large hands was tightly wrapped around the base of Nie Huaisang’s cock, the flat of his tongue repeatedly stroking the head, sometimes delving inside the narrow and sticky slit in a teasing manner. He definitely learned that trick from Nie Huaisang.
“F-Fuck…! A-Cheng!”
Nie Huaisang’s toes curled. It took no time at all before he was helplessly crying out his lover’s name as his entire body shook. He rode out the intense tremors, vaguely aware of the large hands comfortingly massaging his thighs as he spent himself to completion. Jiang Cheng raised his head, his chin dripping with saliva and other fluids, before he spat out the bitter contents in his mouth over the side of the bed, directly onto some scrap papers. This careless, uncharacteristic action only made Nie Huaisang stiffen between his legs all over again.
He still wanted more. He could never have enough of Jiang Cheng. More than anything, he just wanted to feel Jiang Cheng inside of him again. It’d been so terribly long. Too long.
As eager as he was, it would be a little while before he’d be ready down there. As if understanding Nie Huaisang’s deepest desires, Jiang Cheng opened the drawer to his nightstand, retrieving a tube that was well mostly full. Loosened up from his recent orgasm, Nie Huaisang hardly felt any resistance when Jiang Cheng inserted a warm and slick finger inside him. He took his time, being thorough and gentle as he stretched Nie Huaisang’s hole with practiced movements. He mouthed at Nie Huaisang’s lips all the while, sometimes passionately and sometimes sweetly.
After plenty of teasing, Nie Huaisang was barely managing to contain himself, panting harshly and squeezing at any part of Jiang Cheng he could get ahold of. He begged and whined for the real thing, unaware of what his words were doing to Jiang Cheng, who was also hanging on by a mere thread.
“H-Huaisang…”
Nie Huaisang was vaguely aware of being pulled into Jiang Cheng’s lap. It was only a few short agonizing moments more before he finally sighed in relief when Jiang Cheng slowly entered him. His body sank downward, tightly wrapping around Jiang Cheng’s hardened length until he was filled completely. He let out a satisfied moan, basking in pure bliss. There was nothing better than this kind of closeness.
“A-Cheng,” his slender fingers squeezed at Jiang Cheng’s toned biceps. With his head resting against the younger man’s shoulder, Nie Huaisang murmured, “I missed you. So much.”
He never thought he’d be here in this position again. Never thought Jiang Cheng would want him in this way again.
Jiang Cheng’s response was in the form of a sweet kiss to his temple. It was a side of him that no one else experienced other than Nie Huaisang. And that was something that Nie Huaisang treasured most, something he never wanted to lose ever again.
Jiang Cheng began rocking his hips, sending Nie Huaisang lightly bouncing up and down. He was stuffed full, full of the person he loved most.
It felt amazing. Because it was Jiang Cheng, the boy he loved who loved him right back. A congested, tight feeling rose inside Nie Huaisang’s chest, causing his nose to sting.
“…Huaisang? Fuck.” Noticing his emotional state, Jiang Cheng immediately halted his movements and cupped him by the cheeks, peering up into his eyes. “Does it hurt?”
His calloused thumb pads from playing basketball brushed beneath the rims of Nie Huaisang’s eyes, wiping away the tears that had spilt from them.
Sniffling, Nie Huaisang shook his head and offered a wobbly smile. “It doesn’t hurt,” he said. “I’m just happy.”
Happy to be back where he belonged.
Their mouths drew close, resulting in a kiss that was full of emotion and warmth. Just like before, it grew heated in only a few seconds. Their breaths sped up, and saliva dripped from their chins. As if matching the intensity of their kisses, Jiang Cheng gradually ramped up the power and speed of his thrusts, quickly turning the both of them into panting messes.
Nie Huaisang threw his head back, releasing a loud and drawn out moan that would definitely be heard by the next-door neighbors. He never paid any mind to his volume during sex, and now certainly wasn’t any different. Jiang Cheng mouthed at his exposed throat, biting and sucking to leave bright red marks there that Nie Huaisang would proudly exhibit during classes the following day because he knew no such thing as shame.
All Nie Huaisang knew was Jiang Cheng.
“A-Cheng!” His heart burned madly inside his chest, feeling like it was fit to burst with affection. “I love you…I love you…!”
Jiang Cheng squeezed at Nie Huaisang’s body, groaning into his ear, “Fuck, I love you too. A-Sang…”
Even though he rarely said it even before they’d broken up, Nie Huaisang knew Jiang Cheng’s feelings without him needing to voice them aloud. But it still felt like flying to hear him say those three special words aloud.
Nie Huaisang clenched down there with intention, relishing in the way it caused his lover to whine. He saw Jiang Cheng’s body tense up, felt his heartbeat quicken, and heard his short, guttural moans as he finally tipped over the edge, releasing everything inside. They hadn’t used a condom, and Nie Huaisang didn’t care. He wholeheartedly welcomed the mess and the hassle he’d be dealing with later on.
The two of them caught their breaths, nosing at one another and gazing into each other’s eyes with mutual infatuation. Finally, Jiang Cheng made to move, but Nie Huaisang crossed his legs around his waist where he sat.
“Stay,” he murmured into the warm dampened skin at the juncture of his boyfriend’s perspiring neck. “Don’t go.”
Jiang Cheng tightened his arms around him and smiled into his hair, murmuring back, “Not going,” before he fell backwards into the bedding, taking Nie Huaisang with him.
Like that, he stayed nice and snug inside Nie Huaisang for the remainder of the night.
“Why is my number under the name ‘Asshole’ in your phone.”
Nie Huaisang lifted his head from the pillow he was resting against. “Ugh, fuck. I forgot to change it back. Give it here.” He groaned as he reached over to pluck his cellphone from Jiang Cheng’s hands and immediately went about changing the contact name back to ‘Laogong’ with purple hearts and lightning.
As an apology, he offered up three sweet kisses against Jiang Cheng’s downturned mouth. “You’re not an asshole, I’m the asshole.”
His laogong shook his head before kissing him back. It was languid but full of affection. Afterwards, Nie Huaisang re-situated himself against Jiang Cheng’s sturdier form, his mind idly mulling over things in this comfortable position.
“You changed my contact name too didn’t you?” he asked after a while.
Instead of answering, Jiang Cheng rolled onto his side so that his back was facing him. Then he muttered, “I already changed it back.”
Nie Huaisang’s lips curved upwards at the corners. “Back to what though? You never even let me see what it was before we broke up.”
“Huaisang.”
“Yes?”
“No, that’s the contact name,” Jiang Cheng clarified. “Huaisang.”
A meaningful jab to the nape of Jiang Cheng’s neck caused the taller man to flinch. “Lies. Don’t think I won’t resort to tickling the information out of you.”
Jiang Cheng’s voice seemed to get more and more suspicious sounding. “I’m telling you it’s Huaisang!”
Nie Huaisang spoke to the cellphone resting on the nightstand on Jiang Cheng’s side of the bed. “Siri, call Huaisang.”
A robotic voice subsequently rang out: Sorry, there’s no one by that name listed in your contacts.
“Laogong,” Nie Huaisang spoke in a sickly sweet tone, “You should be honest with your husband. I promise I won’t laugh if you tell me~”
His warm breath fanned against Jiang Cheng’s nape, causing the other to flinch once again. Jiang Cheng still didn’t speak, but his body language told Nie Huaisang that he was heavily debating on whether or not to spill the beans.
Stretching out his neck, Nie Huaisang leaned closer to hover his ear above his boyfriend’s tightly closed lips. Eventually, Jiang Cheng parted those thin lips of his and reluctantly revealed an embarrassing truth.
True to his word, Nie Huaisang did not laugh. He only bowed his head and wrapped his arms tightly around Jiang Cheng’s torso, squeezing with all his might. Biting his lip, he internally pouted. He should have expected such an adorable pet name from someone like Jiang Cheng. It just wasn’t fair. Jiang Cheng was too perfect.
Nie Huaisang loved him so much.
When he said so, the younger man rolled back over to return his embrace and grunted in acknowledgement, gaze still averted to the side in embarrassment as a heavy blush filled his complexion. But his strong grip on Nie Huaisang tightened, and the steady heartbeat beneath his chest quickened. Nie Huaisang rested his forehead against his boyfriend’s and gently shut his eyes.
It was warm and comfortable in Jiang Cheng’s arms; the only place he ever wanted to be.
The two of them fell asleep like that, and when they woke, they found themselves still in that same intimate position. When Nie Huaisang sleepily raised his eyes and saw a pair of steely ones gazing back at him, he inched closer on instinct. In response, Jiang Cheng lowered his head to kiss him on the mouth, morning breath be damned.
Nie Huaisang chewed another mouthful of braised beef before he set aside his disposable chopsticks and reached for the drink belonging to the man seated next to him. The alcohol dueled with the residual spicy flavor of the meat, eliciting a tickling sensation to skitter across his tongue. It was somewhat crowded within the bar tonight; many voices intermingled throughout the establishment and drowned out the ambient music playing from a retro jukebox.
“A-Cheng…Remember that time we broke up?”
Jiang Cheng didn’t avert his eyes that were trained up at the widescreen TV across the bar, intently watching the basketball game playing. Nie Huaisang didn’t care at all about basketball, but he cared about Jiang Cheng, so he’d graciously allowed the man to watch it uninterrupted for a while. But now he was very bored.
He stubbornly nudged the other by the shoulder in a prompting manner for a response to his question. The lighting of the bar was dim, but Jiang Cheng’s jawline was still visible in his profile, sharp and defined. He looked very handsome in this setting.
His lover finally glanced over and snatched his drink back, finishing it in one heavy gulp. With a gruff exhale, he answered, “Why are you bringing that up.”
He reached for Nie Huaisang’s chopsticks too, but belatedly realized that their food was already all gone. At his request, the bartender served them another plate of the dry braised beef along with some spicy edamame.
Nie Huaisang tried to take a bite of the freshly served meat dish. Sadly, he was quickly thwarted away. It wasn’t until Jiang Cheng had taken a good portion for himself that he finally allowed access to his greedy partner.
“I was just thinking about it,” Nie Huaisang said. Lately, he’d been thinking about how far they’ve come in their relationship. And how much further they still had to go.
“Well don’t think about it.” Jiang Cheng turned his head to continue watching the game, occasionally clicking his tongue and muttering things about how the team he was rooting for didn’t know how to play defense.
The man was obviously still strung up over the ‘dinner’ they’d just attended at his parents’ house. Stopping off here to get a couple drinks and watch tall people throw balls into netted hoops had helped his nerves settle by a small amount though.
Nie Huaisang looked down and silently twisted the engagement band around his finger.
It hadn’t actually been his idea—he’d told Jiang Cheng that he’s fine with waiting. But Jiang Cheng had said that he wasn’t, and so here they were, shrugging off the berating and skeptical comments that had been hurled at them by the older generation for their naïveté.
On the drive home, Jiang Cheng will probably go over the plan again as if Nie Huaisang didn’t already have it permanently etched into his memory by now. But that was fine. Nie Huaisang would listen, nod his head, and mumble positive affirmations when needed, all for the sake of Jiang Cheng being able to maintain his sanity in the wake of all this.
Nie Huaisang reached out to hook his pinky finger around Jiang Cheng’s that was resting on the bar’s countertop next to their food. His lips twitched when Jiang Cheng’s hand instinctively shifted to interlace the rest of their fingers, squeezing lightly. Despite their differences in appearance and size, these two hands looked very right together, snug and comfortable.
His chest feeling very full, Nie Huaisang finally looked up to the television screen and asked, “Who’s winning?”