Chapter Text
Xiao Zhan stopped at the corner of the street, just outside the hotel where he had been staying the past couple of days.
It was impossible to go to his apartment. Impossible to go back to Chongqing. Impossible to move.
Sometimes, it felt hard enough to breathe.
Kept close to his body, he felt more then heard as the phone vibrated again, his Weibo notifications flooded once more with angry messages and threats and voices – so many voices.
Xiao Zhan was tired.
Everything was supposed to have already blown down at this point. There was a new virus killing left and right. There were people mourning and the world was crumbling to pieces (his world had crumbled to pieces).
It was hard to breathe. So hard.
So, so, so hard.
'It's all your fault.'
'Why don't you go die?!’
'No-one needs someone like you.'
Waste of space.
Sighing, Xiao Zhan let his head fall back and closed his eyes against the cold night air, concentrating all his attention on the feeling of the red scarf around his neck, the piece of clothing moving softly as vehicles sped on the large avenue right in front him. By his left, on the deserted sidewalk, the lamp post flickered on and off at irregular intervals, its warm, pale yellow light making the crosswalk even emptier somehow.
On a lonely night, just another lonely soul.
Nobody.
It was at moments like this that he missed Yibo the most.
That he missed talking and smiling and laughing with him.
Missed the heat of his body settling over him, the fresh smell of shampoo that permeated their pillows and all the shoes his boyfriend left astray around the room. How Xiao Zhan would sometimes stumble over pieces of his Legos when getting up too early in the morning, with bleary eyes and little to no balance.
He missed breathing him in, with him, against him. He–
The sudden ringing of his phone sounded so loud on the empty street that Xiao Zhan almost jumped out of his skin, scrambling to pick the device out of his deep pockets with cold finger. Looking down, he could see the three characters flashing back and forth on the screen.
The actor turned his gaze away, pain burning on his heart and against his eyes as Yibo's name appeared over an old picture of the two of them squished on his favorite – if ridiculously unfashionable – armchair during a movie night with Xuan Lu.
It wasn't their most impressive adventure, or anything out of the ordinary, really – but for some reason, that one memory had always felt particularly dear to him. It had been a good, uneventful night. A fun one, he remembered with a quiet smile. Lulu had wanted to watch 'The Haunt of Hill Mansion' for some odd reason or other, and Yibo spent the best part of a half-hour almost screaming her ears off about how 'Over the Moon' had just been released and why his was a much superior choice when compared to hers.
(Of course, in the end, they ended up going with Lulu's original proposition, much to Xiao Zhan's eternal amusement as he watched Yibo fret over keeping the apartment brightly lit at all times).
They had eaten noodles later, with Lu-Jie's favorite tea – she insisted, and Xiao Zhan couldn't say no. He made a point to refrain from using too much spice, but Yibo had still pulled his pitiful, wronged face, complaining that his Zhan-ge wanted to melt his tongue off.
It had been almost a year ago, now.
With a deep exhale, Xiao Zhan blinked away the sudden fog gathering over his vision, forcing the sweet memories away.
On his hand, the phone was still ringing. As he watched, the ringtone played over and over, until it finally went silent.
Three calls. Nine sequences of tones for each.
A voicemail icon brightened the dark screen immediately after the last one.
The actor felt his throat close.
He couldn't… He couldn't hear his voice. Not now – not like this, not when everything hurt. Not after...
" And what else do you want Zhan-Ge?! For me to tell you that I'm fucking sorry?! Because I am! I am so sorry this shit is happening to you! But can't you see that I'm hurting too?! "
Xiao zhan closed his eyes against the stinging ache, remembering his own loud, empty laugh as he bit out an answer.
" You're hurt? Do you even know what is happening, Wang Yibo? Do you know what it feels to be HATED, to have hundreds of thousands of people wishing you were DEAD? This is not some fucking birghtday live gone wrong, so grow the fuck up! "
There had been a loud, heavy silence between them after that.
" You didn't mean that… You didn't… I'm gonna go now, Han-ge is calling to go back to shooting. I know you are hurting because of everything, so I'm gonna stop now and we will talk later. Stay safe, ge. "
But later came too soon. Xiao Zhan wasn't ready for later yet. Not when everything hurt so. Fucking. Much .
When he still could hear the silent tears on Yibo's voice as he finished the call. When he could still feel his frustration and pain for not being able to help, for not being close enough to touch.
Please, make the pain stop .
Please help me.
I'm drowning .
How many times had Xiao Zhan written those words, just to erase the messages again a couple seconds later? How many times did he start dialing his number in the middle of the day – just to hear his voice, hear his breath against the speaker assuring Xiao Zhan that Yibo still existed somewhere in the world.
It had been his choice not to put that weight on his boyfriend's shoulder. To keep all that darkness away from him and his loved ones. He could hold that all by himself. Could keep himself smiling as the world crashed and burned around him.
Until the first wall cracked.
Until he couldn't anymore.
Lulu had been the first to reach him when the threats became louder, when his agency didn't do shit to preserve him. When people started crowding around his building to scream and throw insults at him.
The harsher measures for countenance of the Pandemic helped – but it wasn't enough.
No-one could completely silence the internet, after all.
Taking a deep breath, Xiao Zhan lifted his phone and clicked on the voice message icon. One breath. Two.
Yibo's voice was like a hammer striking right over his chest.
" Tell them I'll go, okay? I just need to finish this first… Yes, it's fucking important, so tell them I'll go in a sec! "
Mumbled voices on the back, and then:
" Zhan-Ge… Zhan-Ge, are you alright? Why aren't you answering me? Lu-Jie just messaged me about today… Ge, I’m, I’m so sorry. Why didn't you tell me they leaked your number? I– "
Voices once more, this time, Xiao Zhan could almost hear the irritation and rising tension on the other side.
" Ge, I have to go… But don't worry. Just turn off your phone for now. I'm… I'm going back, okay? I'm going back and we will figure this shit out – we can sue the pants out of those fuckers for all I care, just… Use Lu-Jie's phone for now. Wait for me. "
" See you soon, Ge. "
Didi Ai ni.
Xiao Zhan closed his eyes, silent tears slowly drifting down his face as the message ended, those last, whispered words almost too soft for even him to listen.
Yibo was coming back. He was coming back in the middle of a project because Xiao Zhan wasn't strong enough. Because he couldn't deal with a few haters spamming his inbox for a couple days.
Weak.
Useless.
Waste.
Xiao Zhan let his hand fall, the phone crashing on the hard ground as he started walking slowly, his feet barely registering when he left the sidewalk and entered the large avenue.
He had ruined everything. He had destroyed his career, destroyed so many people's lives… And now.
Now he would bring Yibo down with him. He would break him too.
There was the sudden scream of a horn, the glare of flashlights burning on his eyes.
Xiao Zhan saw the car coming near.
He didn't try to avoid the crash.
The room was… Spacious.
Somewhat.
There was a large, glass-topped center table amidst a few sofas and soft, comfortable looking armchairs.
The walls were bare, but the dark-petrol color felt soothing somehow, almost like a respite after all the light and screaming still happening on the back of his mind.
When Xiao Zhan blinked his eyes open, he wondered if everything had been a dream. If maybe he had finally gone crazy, or–
"Who are you?"
Xiao Zhan looked up, surprised at the familiar voice.
And then he saw him.
His eyes widened in shock.
"Y-You–"
"You look like me" Wei Wuxian commented, sitting against the wall and twirling a black flute between his fingers "Maybe you are me? Or I am you?" he chuckled, the sound cold, empty "It's not like it matters anyway..."
Xiao Zhan frowned, getting up slowly from the white, fluffy rug that seemed to cover the entirety of the flow. All the while, his movements felt almost hesitant, careful, as if not to scare the man with a tall ponytail and tattered black clothes.
"Why doesn't it matter anymore?"
Wei Wuxian simply looked at him, empty eyes staring deep into his soul as the side of his lips tipped into a mirthless smirk.
"Didn't you notice, yet? We are dead."