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Zhan Yao’s experimenting on him.
After two and a half weeks of this, that’s the only explanation Yutong has, the only one that doesn’t sound completely insane. It’s all just—an elaborate psychological test to figure out how quickly he can give Yutong a mental breakdown. Or a heart attack.
He probably has journals somewhere. Cameras set up to record every time he manages to make Yutong choke on his own spit.
Because there’s no way—absolutely no way—Zhan Yao doesn’t know what he’s doing. Doctor Professor Zhan Yao. Master of psychology and expert in criminal profiling with more degrees and accolades than Yutong can count. Books worth of published material and one of the youngest leaders of the Psychological Profiling Team in HKPD history—
But then—
Then Zhan Yao looks at him with the most innocently blank expression, eyebrows raised that way he gets whenever Yutong’s doing something particularly ridiculous, and he remembers that in high school, Zhan Yao received romantic confessions from no less than ten different people—boys and girls—and still to this day hasn’t realized that’s what they were.
One girl sang him a love song in front of their entire class, and he smiled, told her she had talent as a singer, and asked if she was planning a career in the theatre.
Yutong thought it was just a kind rejection. But then it happened again with a different person. And again. And again. And when Yutong asked him why at the age of eighteen he’d never so much as gone on a date, he’d just tilted his head and said, “Who’d want to date me?”
So yeah, Yutong—Yutong isn’t sure. Yutong thinks he’s losing his mind.
And really, it’s much easier to blame it on Zhan Yao than accept the fact this is all his own fault. At the core of it. At the center. If he weren’t so pathetically, hopelessly, ridiculously infatuated with Zhan Yao, he wouldn’t have even noticed. If he hadn’t been admittedly pining over him since they were both teenagers, none of it would bother him at all.
Zhan Yao’s not doing anything. At least nothing Yutong can call him out on. Because Zhan Yao is Zhan Yao and he’s always been as oblivious as he is brilliant and honestly, nothing he’s doing is that strange.
But as Yutong’s fingers seize white-knuckled around his bottle, crushing the plastic and bursting a fountain of water down the front of his shirt, resulting in every eye in the SCI turning to witness his shame—
Well—
Zhan Yao blinks at him, eyebrows raised again in that perplexed, innocent disappointment. And Yutong kind of wants to kill him.
But at least he’s stopped sucking on his pen. That’s something.
The first time it happens, Yutong writes it off as a coincidence. A strange twist of bitter fate meant to rub salt in all Yutong’s wounds. A punch to the gut while his guard is down because he’d gotten too used to it, too acclimated to the ripples Zhan Yao causes across his careful self-control that he made the mistake of forgetting. So sure he was handling it, compartmentalizing—
So the first time it happens, he blames it on exhaustion and weakening mental barriers and a lack of focus. His own fault.
Or really, it’s the fault of the wannabe-gangsters who have taken far too much inspiration from bad movies.
The case was straightforward, open-and-shut arms trafficking. Finding the evidence, tracing the bodies, infiltrating a warehouse by the docks—Easy. Simple enough Yutong was busy trying to figure out if they needed to go to the grocery to pick up dinner after this or if he could scrape together something from the ramen packets and single onion in Zhan Yao’s kitchen.
Until it wasn’t simple anymore.
Until an enterprising young guard walked in and tripped an alarm before Yutong could knock him out.
Getting caught was one thing. Embarrassing maybe, but making arrests is far easier when all the criminals assemble themselves in front of him. So that didn’t really bother him. And these guys were barely more than thugs, unprepared enough that they were of little match for him, even if they were smart enough to try to use Zhan Yao as leverage. But he knows how to protect Zhan Yao. He’s good at that. Because leverage is really just another word for incentive and what assholes like them never seem to realize is that for Yutong, there’s no greater incentive for him to destroy their lives than touching Zhan Yao.
It should have been easy enough.
Until Yutong’s wrist was cuffed to Zhan Yao’s.
And Yutong’s ankle was cuffed to Zhan Yao’s.
And they were both shoved off the pier.
Dirty salt-water flooded his nose, a weight jerking at his arm and leg. But he was honestly more disappointed than anything. Not even low-level thugs—dumbasses was a better description. Because while they probably expected the awkwardness of the situation to drag them down to the bottom of the harbor, he and Zhan Yao knew each other too well for that. And it was barely a moment of reorienting before Zhan Yao tapped his chest, signaled Okay, and deferred to Yutong’s stronger swimming ability.
After that, it took no time at all to drag them both to the beach.
Dragging them out of the water though—That got a little more awkward.
Water clung to their clothes, pulling them down. And the change of weight stumbled them out of sync, cuffs tugging and yanking at their limbs—
He doesn’t know which of them fell first, but he blames Zhan Yao. Just because he always blames Zhan Yao. But he was still spitting saltwater out of his mouth when gravity wrenched his right side down, and the world spun for the second time in fifteen minutes.
A startled shout from Zhan Yao as Yutong’s palm slammed into sand, instinct catching himself on one arm, the other trapped between their bodies. Air knocked from his lungs. But while he at least managed not to crush Zhan Yao, Zhan Yao blinked up at him, gaze a bit dazed and unfocused—
Panic lurched through him, and suddenly, he wasn’t there anymore. He was on another beach at another time. Zhan Yao lying still and silent on the sand as he’d tried to force air back into his lungs. Dread suffocating him as he’d slammed his fists into Zhan Yao’s ribcage, begging it to rise again—
“Talk to me, Cat,” he ordered, reaching out to pinch Zhan Yao’s chin, tilting his head back and forth. Searching for any sign of injury. Because Yutong may have come out of it largely unscathed, if not for his pride, but Zhan Yao was suspiciously silent. So very quiet—and he should’ve been yelling at Yutong for getting them captured, for falling on him, for something—“Are you okay? Are you—“
“Yutong.”
Yutong blinked—
Zhan Yao stared back at him, and it was dark again. Not the fading sunset, not the empty beach. It was cars and sirens whirring in the distance and Zhan Yao’s pulse racing under his hand where he had it cupped around the side of his neck, thumb stroking back and forth over the line of his jaw. A chest rising and falling under his, breaths fanning over his chin.
Alive. Alive and okay and only a little dazed. And that’s all Yutong could hope for. That’s all that mattered—
Relief crashed over him, and his muscles gave just the slightest bit more, sinking him into his bones. Sinking him into Zhan Yao’s chest. And the breath he let out faded into a laugh—“I thought cats were supposed to avoid water.”
Zhan Yao swallowed thick enough his throat clicked. “It wasn’t my idea.” But his voice sounded strained, tight, and Yutong looked up again, gaze sliding over his face. Suddenly sure he was injured in some way he’s not telling him—
But he met unreadable dark eyes—dangerously close dark eyes—and that’s when he realized he was still pinning Zhan Yao to the ground. That he could feel the heat of his body in the nonexistent space between them, the fanning of his breaths against his chin. That’s when he noticed the drops of water clinging to his skin and the shine of his lips so very close—
And that’s when the panic really set in.
He scrambled to his feet, muttering an apology that felt a bit like a lie as he dragged Zhan Yao up with him. Brushing the sand from his shirt, ignoring the weight of Zhan Yao’s gaze on the side of his neck. Watching him, assessing like he was trying to figure something out. And Yutong ducked his chin to hide the flush burning his face, arguing with the desire to not look at Zhan Yao for the sake of his self-control and the impulse to look straight at him for fear avoiding it would let Dr. Psychology know exactly what was going on in his head—
A call of his name shattered the night, and he’d never been so relieved to hear Ma Han’s voice in his entire existence.
Falling back into professionalism was easy enough. Barking orders and sending his subordinates running and wrapping the case up fast enough the people responsible hadn’t even left the pier by the time the van showed up to haul them off. Slipping into his role as leader of the SCI and pretending nothing else existed.
But he was hyperaware of the brush of Zhan Yao’s forearm against his, a steady prickle of electricity under his skin he couldn’t fight away, buzzing in his ears. The rattle of those godforsaken cuffs keeping them right next to each other until the universe finally had mercy on his abused soul and someone showed up to cut them free.
Even so, it was so much harder to delete the sense memory than it should have been. Zhan Yao pressed against him, eyes wide and dazed. The snap-crackle at the back of his neck when he wondered if Zhan Yao’s lips were really as soft as they looked. And that moment he knows he must’ve imagined—must be a sign of his fracturing mental state—when he thought just for a second, Zhan Yao looked back.
Another thing he’ll compartmentalize. Ignore and forget if he has any hope of staying sane, of keeping up this professional, platonic working friendship they have going. Shove it into that box of all the reasons why living with Zhan Yao and working with Zhan Yao and generally existing around Zhan Yao is so impossible.
Just the universe hysterically laughing at him for being dumb enough to fall in love with his best friend. Nothing more than that.
The second time it happens, Yutong thinks it must be some kind of cosmic punishment. Payment finally come due for something awful he did in a past life. But at the same time, he supposes he’ll have to take some responsibility for this one. He kind of brought it on himself.
They’re all sitting in a circle in the bullpen. Case wrapped, drinks broken out. And while Yutong’s only on his first, the rest of the team, once they realized Yutong was paying for it, have had no such adherence to social niceties. Which means Bai Chi is unconscious on one of the tables, Zhao Fu and Ma Han are shouting back and forth which is a welcome break from their off-key singing, Wang Shao has built himself a fort out of food wrappers, Jiang Ling is dozing off again, and Qingtang and Gongsun are nowhere to be seen. Which is really not something Yutong wants to think about. Ever.
It’s not at all dignified. And if Yutong were in any worse of a mood, he would yell at them for it, order them to clean up the disaster they’ve created of their office and of themselves. But the last few weeks have been hell. Nightly stakeouts and undercover missions and knife fights and snipers and somehow, they all survived it. They survived it, so Yutong figures they’ve earned one night to forget.
He’ll rip them apart for the state of their office tomorrow.
But right now—Right now, Yutong is content to sit on the sidelines in the chair he rolled out of his office, nursing his drink as he watches the chaos unfold. He’s more than content. Because Zhan Yao, while certainly not any drunker than Yutong, has rolled himself into the center of whatever argument Ma Han and Zhao Fu are having. And he’s laughing, a bright, surprised sound that aches in Yutong’s chest, pulls the corners of his lips up.
When the SCI first started, Yutong never thought they’d make it this far. He never thought he’d get to see the day when cold, detached Zhan Yao did more than watch from the background, awkward and painfully out of place amongst a team that had worked together for years. And ever since he left for New York, Yutong didn’t think he’d get to see him this relaxed, this at ease ever again.
But Zhan Yao leans back in his chair, smiling, softened at all of his sharp edges. And a warmth spreads through Yutong that has nothing to do with the alcohol.
His team is now their team. Just as it should be, just as it always should be.
“But seriously,” Ma Han slurs, pouting as she waves her bottle at Zhan Yao. “You’re the psychologist. What would you’ve done?”
Zhao Fu barks a laugh—“Doctor Zhan would’ve just—“ He waves his hand at his head, like that explains anything. “Did you have to threaten to cut the guy’s—?“
“He deserved it,” she snaps. But she turns back to Zhan Yao, jabbing a finger in his face. “But it didn’t work at all. The first guy threw himself out a window.” And given Zhao Fu’s near-hysterical laughter, Yutong’s attention turns more fully into their conversation. Because whatever undercover mission Ma Han’s talking about, that bit definitely didn’t show up in any of the official reports. Which means—He doesn’t know what that means, but it’s probably blackmail material he can lord over her for a long time.
Which is only fair because she has more than enough on him.
Zhan Yao hums. “In theory, you weren’t wrong. As a means of extracting critical information, seduction is a proven method.” Yutong’s eyebrows shoot up, sitting upright in his chair. Suddenly no longer concerned with blackmail material but now more interested in the fact Zhan Yao is talking about seduction. And while he’s doing it with the cold detachment of academia, Yutong knows better than anyone that Zhan Yao is just about as repressed as they come. And Ma Han—leaves no survivors. Ever. Especially when she starts talking about sex. Which means there’s no way Zhan Yao is going to get out of this conversation with his dignity intact.
A tiny bit of sadistic glee pulls Yutong’s lips up, drags him out of his chair to wander toward this conversation. Because Zhan Yao also has a lifetime’s worth of blackmail material on him, and Yutong will not sacrifice any opportunity to watch Zhan Yao’s face flush pink with awkwardness and embarrassment.
“—the brain has reduced logical processing capabilities—“ Zhan Yao continues, mostly unaware that Ma Han and Zhao Fu aren’t doing more than nodding at the right times, eyes going dazed and unfocused. “Along with reduced inhibitions, if paired with alcohol—“
“Doctor Zhan, what the hell are you teaching your team?” Yutong sighs, resting his hand on the back of his chair. “Are you getting your psychology from bad spy movies now?”
Zhan Yao turns to look up at him, eyes narrowing. And while Yutong long ago conceded the value of psychology in their investigations, that doesn’t mean he’s completely taken in by it. Especially when Zhan Yao is posing theories he’s more likely to see in some male-power fantasy, women throwing their bodies at the protagonist in an attempt to trick him into giving away the plot—
“It’s not ineffective,” Zhan Yao returns, looking him up and down like he’s not sure when he got here. “There are many situations where it would be even more effective than physical torture.”
And that—Yutong’s suddenly suspicious that maybe Zhan Yao has had more to drink than he thought. Because he looks wholly and completely serious. Like seduction is a legitimate and acceptable interrogation technique and not the kind of pop psychology nonsense he’s ripped apart in every movie they’ve ever watched.
Yutong huffs, rolling his eyes. “It’s cheap,” he returns. “No person with the least bit of awareness wouldn’t see right through that.”
“You think so?” But there’s a note in his voice that makes Yutong look down at him, a flicker of something dangerous, but his expression is as easy and placid as ever. Unassuming. Considering. Just an overly dedicated psychology nerd working through a thought experiment.
But Ma Han makes a humming sound, leaning back in her chair. Gaze fixed on Zhan Yao in that way Yutong recognizes as the calm right before her storm. And she says, “How would you do it then? If it works?”
“It works,” a muffled voice comes from the desk across the room, and Yutong’s gaze flickers to Jiang Ling, a snort of laughter pulling from him. Because she sounds offended enough even around the pillow she’s hiding in. And Yutong suddenly remembers what she had to do to verify the integrity of Bao Sir’s phone.
He’s not sure how much of that was seduction and how much of it was just traumatizing for the both of them. But he suspects it’s more the latter.
“You’re a bad influence,” Yutong decides, tapping Zhan Yao’s shoulder. “If any of you resort to seduction to get information, don’t show your faces back here.” Pointing a warning finger at them as he turns around, drifting back toward his chair. Dismissing the conversation as ridiculous enough. Not that he really has to worry about anyone sacrificing their virtue in a desperate quest for information—Ma Han, Zhao Fu, and Wang Shao, none of whom have any left to spare, nor Bai Chi who is thankfully unconscious and snoring.
“It’s a fundamental motivator,” Zhan Yao snaps. “You just have to know how to use it.”
“How would you do it?” Ma Han repeats, a wicked glint in her eyes when Yutong turns back around. Suddenly aware of what kind of chaos she’s angling to create.
And sure enough, there it is. Zhan Yao shifting awkwardly in his chair. The reflexive twitching of his fingers around his bottle. And Yutong takes another drink from his own, waiting for Zhan Yao’s panicked escape attempt from Ma Han’s aggressive flirting—
Zhan Yao stands up, setting his bottle on the table. “That’s not exactly—I’m not very—“
“He’s good at it,” Jiang Ling calls, the slightest bit of disappointed bitterness in her voice, and Yutong stills at the silence that settles over the bullpen. A flicker of irrational and ridiculous jealousy sparking in his chest. Because he knows Zhan Yao told him he was going to get Jiang Ling to come into his office to hypnotize her. He knows what the look on her face meant when she saw Zhan Yao wasn’t alone—but that doesn’t mean he’d really thought about how that look ended up on her face.
He doesn’t like it.
He doesn’t like it at all.
“See?” Ma Han says. “Now you have to show us.” But Zhan Yao’s staring very hard at his bottle, chewing on his bottom lip again like he’s considering something. And despite everything, he hasn’t made any move to run. Almost like he’s thinking about it. Almost like he—
Yutong’s jaw clenches, rubbing his thumb through the condensation. And he snorts, “Go on, Cat. You started this.” Fighting to keep the resentment out of his voice. Fighting to keep it light, the joke it’s meant to be. A challenge in it that’s more habit than anything, only comforting himself with the fact there’s no way Zhan Yao will do it. He’s too professional, cares too much about his image and reputation. There’s no way—
But Zhan Yao looks up at him. He looks up at him, and Yutong feels pinned in place, frozen with the electric shock that crashes through him. And without a hint of the embarrassment or reluctance that should be there, Zhan Yao straightens the rest of the way. And he says, “Fine.”
A heavy push against Yutong’s chest is the only warning he gets before he stumbles backward, chair catching under his knees to knock him the rest of the way down. Rolling back just the slightest bit until it hits the edge of the table, stopping him, leaving him with no escape route—
And then Zhan Yao’s knee presses between his, and Yutong’s mind goes blank.
He has the awareness to shift back, shoving himself as far into the chair as possible. But it doesn’t roll away anymore, and all that does is give Zhan Yao the space to drop his knee onto the chair between his legs, kneeling over him, dangerously close to places he should never, ever be for the sake of Yutong’s sanity—
Sanity. That’s long gone now. Forget that.
A hand tugs at his loosened tie, another bracing on his shoulder, and Yutong’s hands come up without his permission. Instinct settling them on Zhan Yao’s waist, the sharp cut of his ribs under his palms. Heat burning through the thin fabric of his shirt—
“Like I said—“ Zhan Yao’s voice falls hushed, almost a purr, and Yutong feels it turn to static in his veins, feels his stomach tighten and his thoughts fracture, “—you just have to know what you’re doing.”
And Yutong would like to agree. Zhan Yao’s probably right. He always is. But he can’t remember what the hell they were talking about, much less figure out how he’s supposed to respond.
He also may have swallowed his tongue.
Fingers pinch his chin, forcing him to look up, and Yutong’s throat clicks, stings as he tries to swallow. But Zhan Yao is terrifyingly close, and Yutong needs him closer. He needs him closer but he also needs him to go far, far away, and his fingers flex against Zhan Yao’s waist, frozen between the impulse to shove him off and the louder, more damning voice that tells him to do the opposite—
Dedicating every fraction of crumbling willpower to remembering there are rules. There’s propriety and consequences to his actions, and—and the desire to drag Zhan Yao in the rest of the way, destroy the small space remaining between them is only getting stronger—
But Zhan Yao’s lips twitch up, eyes flashing dark as he leans forward. And he whispers, breath prickling over the shell of his ear, “See? Easy enough.”
His weight vanishes from Yutong’s chair, warmth disappearing in a blink, and Yutong’s breath crashes from his chest. Every muscle he held tense lets go at once. And dizziness, disorientation washes over him with a wave of cold where Zhan Yao just was—
“It’s a good distraction at the very least,” Zhan Yao says from his spot leaning against the table next to Ma Han. Easy and casual and completely unruffled. As though nothing happened. As though he didn’t just jump Yutong in front of their entire team. And as Yutong blinks at him, trying to catch up to how Zhan Yao even got over there so fast, trying to remember how to breathe again, he feels—a little wronged.
But his attention sticks on the long lines of Zhan Yao’s legs when he shifts to cross them at the ankles, the bob of his throat as he takes another drink, and it’s really—really dry in here. He needs—
He throws back his bottle like it’s a shot, chugging down far more than he should in one go.
Ma Han makes a sound of agreement, but her grin is too wide, too knowing, too sober as she fixes it on Yutong. “I suppose it’s more effective on certain people than others.” And before Yutong even thinks about it, he raises his middle finger at her behind his bottle, out of Zhan Yao’s vision. Which only makes her laugh, bright and too delighted, and he wouldn’t be surprised if she’d planned it like this from the beginning.
Devil. She’s the devil.
Her and Zhan Yao. She’s the trainee devil and Zhan Yao is Satan.
“Xiao Zhan, are you torturing my brother?” A groan of frustration wells up in his throat, and his already frayed self-control is instantly redirected into not slamming his head against the table until he passes out.
Of course Qingtang had to pick this moment to come back. Of course she did. Just because he needed more witnesses to this moment. Of course—
Zhan Yao makes a questioning sound, raising his eyebrows as he glances over at Yutong. Blinking at him for a moment like he’s just remembered he’s here. Like he’d somehow managed to forget. But he purses his lips, tilts his head, and his stare turns assessing—“He’s drunk,” he decides. “He’s an easy target.”
He waves his hand, dismissing as he turns back around to greet Gongsun. And that—
Now Yutong feels really wronged. He isn’t drunk. Well—At least he wasn’t. But maybe there’s more alcohol in this than he thought because he certainly feels that way now. Light-headed and dizzy, unbalanced like he’s standing on a cliff edge—
“If he weren’t though, be aware that his reflexes would have kicked in faster and he could’ve reacted violently,” Zhan Yao says, turning back to Ma Han like they’re sitting in one of his seminars. Like this really is a learning exercise and he expects her to take notes. But Ma Han is still grinning, nodding along to everything he says while she’s probably too busy congratulating herself to hear any of it—“That’s why I say you have to know what you’re doing and understand all the situational factors. Otherwise, approaches like this can backfire.”
And if Yutong weren’t too busy trying to remember how to breathe, he would feel even more wronged at the suggestion he’d ever lash out violently against Zhan Yao for anything. But his sister’s eyes are sharp, stinging against his skin. And avoiding her is really a bigger priority than damning himself further.
“Doctor Zhan,” Gongsun says, stepping up to his shoulder. Already having determined that of everyone here, Zhan Yao is conscious and pretty much sober. “If you have time, can we discuss some of these files—“
And at this point, Yutong doesn’t even care what files they are. All that matters is that Zhan Yao in typical workaholic fashion nods in assent and shoves himself away from the table, following Gongsun out of the room. Thankfully leaving and taking his stupidly gorgeous legs with him.
Yutong chokes on the next breath he drags in, sliding down in his chair with more defeat and less restraint than is at all befitting of the leader of the SCI. But the only people around to witness it are his deeply drunk team members who, if the universe is at all kind, won’t remember this in the morning, and his sister.
And she’s too busy laughing to notice.
Scrubbing his face with his hand, he shoots a glare at her, full of every nasty word churning in the bottom of his heart. But she just claps her hands, says, “You’re not drunk at all.” Pointed. Accusing. And Yutong hates her. He really, really hates her. Somehow, he’s sure this is all her fault. And if Ma Han weren’t half-passed out on the table, he’d probably fire both of them for starting this.
Even if it is somewhat his fault. Even if he knows Zhan Yao’s competitive streak is lethal and challenging him like that couldn’t possibly end well. But—But how was he supposed to know Zhan Yao had completely abandoned his deeply ingrained sense of shame and embarrassment and was now capable of seducing people on command? How was he supposed to know Zhan Yao would forget years’ worth of repression in order to make a point? How was he supposed—Since when was Zhan Yao allowed to be—
Where did he learn that?
“Shut up,” Yutong grumbles, squeezing his eyes shut. “I’m in Hell.” But that just makes her laugh harder. Stronger. Because she knows better than anyone. She knows because she’d dragged him out of too many no-name bars at 3AM when Zhan Yao was in New York. Because he’d made the mistake, drunk and half-sick from missing him, of telling her everything.
Now she steps up to his side, staring out the door where Zhan Yao and Gongsun have just disappeared. And her laughter fades, turns a little more hollow—“Xiao Zhan’s certainly grown up, hasn’t he?”
It’s meant to be a joke, but it’s more wistful than that, more pained. Heavy with all the years she was missing, all the years he was. And Yutong’s throat tightens as he reaches for another bottle.
As the silence settles in the office again, broken by nothing but the snores of his teammates, he takes another drink and stares out the door. Waiting for Zhan Yao to come back. Waiting as he always does. And with the alcohol burning through his system, it’s somehow easier. Easier to bury it, easier to place it into the nothing where it belongs. Another memory shoved untouchable into the dark.
After that—After that things get confusing.
Zhan Yao’s suddenly—there. A lot. At first he thought it was his imagination. Just a hyperawareness of Zhan Yao’s presence after the recent incidents. Desperation and longing finally driving him to a well-deserved mental breakdown. He thought it was all in his head.
And sure, they work together and temporarily lived together so it makes sense he sees Zhan Yao a lot. More than most people. But it seems anymore that every time he comes back from a meeting with Bao Sir or Gongsun, it’s to find Zhan Yao camped out in his office, sitting on his couch or spreading his disastrous filing system all over Yutong’s desk. It’s to find that at some point over the last week, Zhan Yao has managed to move half of his office into Yutong’s without him noticing.
Which is—strange. Because Zhan Yao has a perfectly nice, perfectly identical office just next door. Literally three steps away.
Maybe it’s too cold. Maybe—Maybe he doesn’t like the view. Maybe a small rat family has made its home underneath the debris and squalor that coats Zhan Yao’s floor and now he’s decided to make a victim of Yutong’s.
He doesn’t know, but he hasn’t bothered to ask either. It makes consulting on their cases easier if he just has to look across the room to ask Zhan Yao what particular psychological illness could cause someone to bark like a dog at every passing police car or what would make someone want to cover their floor in dying rose petals. But at the same time, that means every time he looks up, Zhan Yao is there. He’s there with his jacket off and his sleeves pushed up to show his surprisingly muscular forearms, and once he’d had the top button of his collar undone, and Yutong—
Yutong’s officially losing it. Because Zhan Yao isn’t even doing anything. He’s in perfectly appropriate work clothing, as painfully professional as he always is. Unchanged. Which means Yutong has to be the one who’s changed. Which means, again, that he’s losing it.
Fifteen years he’s managed to keep this under control. Is that all he gets? Is this where his ability to contain his Zhan Yao obsession finally comes to an end?
It’s not fair.
A sigh slips from across his desk, the clap of a file dropped in front of him. “I better go help Bai Chi with his interviews,” Zhan Yao decides, rolling his wrist, flexing his hand from where it must’ve cramped up writing. And Yutong bites down hard on the impulse to take it between his own, pressing in between delicate bones to work the tension free—“Do you need anything while I’m out?”
Yutong clears his throat, waving his hand in dismissal. “Just make sure he doesn’t stutter himself into another panic attack.” Which—Zhan Yao can actually manage. Because of all the people on their team, Bai Chi attached himself to Zhan Yao with such devotion and loyalty that whenever Zhan Yao’s there, not only do the interrogations go better, but Bai Chi is significantly less likely to give himself a heart attack.
And while Yutong isn’t typically in favor of coddling his team members, this—Yutong allows. Because there’s a reason that for every year of Zhan Yao’s professorship at the university, the psychology department has gotten to boast record numbers of enrollments. More than his stupidly perfect face. And that’s for all Zhan Yao’s awkwardness with people, he’s a good teacher, kind and patient and more gentle than Yutong’s seen him at any other time. Strict demands and expectations but only ever understanding instead of ridicule if things don’t go quite right. The kind of teacher Bai Chi needs if he’s going to survive this job—the kind of teacher any of them could have used. And Yutong’s not about to begrudge him of it, especially not with how amazingly fast he’s improving. Especially not with the fact he’s improving at all when Yutong had initially written him off as completely hopeless.
An apology-ish. For dismissing him so quickly.
“Are you—“ Zhan Yao pauses, hesitates. “Is all of your stuff moved back?”
Yutong ignores the pang in his chest at that question, fights it down with the flipping of a page. Tracing over the lines of the file in front of him. Focusing on trying to read Gongsun’s horrific handwriting when his eyes are already swimming from Zhan Yao’s. And he forces himself to say, “Yeah, yeah. You get the bed all to yourself. Don’t be too excited.”
He’s moving out.
Or—Or rather, he’s moved out. Now. Today. Tonight is the first night he’ll spend in his own apartment alone in months, ever since the SCI first started. But Bao Sir had clapped his hands, delighted by his own cleverness when he’d announced that Yutong didn’t need to live with Zhan Yao anymore. The security on the dorm had been upgraded or something ridiculous like that so Yutong’s protection wasn’t necessary. And for the sake of Yutong’s rent bills, he should move back immediately.
Yutong—kind of hated him in that moment.
Finding an excuse to stay with Zhan Yao that wasn’t thinly veiled and obvious turned out to be impossible. Especially when Yutong still technically had a perfectly good apartment—a penthouse apartment his sister had bought for him that was infinitely nicer than Zhan Yao’s dorm. Especially as Bao Sir kept pointing out how deeply he’d inconvenienced Yutong by making him move in the first place. Emphasizing over and over again the sacrifice Yutong had made to follow his orders.
Like Yutong wouldn’t gladly sacrifice everything to stay with Zhan Yao.
But he’d made these remarks right in front of Zhan Yao. Which meant that Zhan Yao also became deeply concerned by this supposed inconvenience.
And so without pretty much any input from him, the few things he’d kept at Zhan Yao’s had been packed and sent back to his apartment. Along with the vast majority of his hopes and dreams.
He’d—liked living with Zhan Yao. More than he should’ve, more than was safe. He’d gotten too used to it. Until a part of him had settled into it so completely he’d forgotten it was always going to be temporary.
Coming home to him, falling asleep next to him, waking up with him there—Seeing him half-awake, sleep mussed, grumpy and out of it as his genius brain fought to boot itself up in the mornings. Watching him get clingier and more demanding the more exhausted he was, until Yutong could almost estimate the hours of sleep he’d had by the outlandishness of his meal requests—
Almost everything he wants. As close to it as he’d ever get. And losing that—
Sure, some part of him knew it wouldn’t last forever. He’d just never thought about what he’d do when it ended.
He’s trying desperately to ignore the ache in his chest as he hears Zhan Yao’s chair roll back, sees him climb to his feet. And as Yutong’s heart rate picks up a little more than is necessary, he has to admit though, that the timing is probably lucky.
After the last incident, Yutong’s ability to compartmentalize his feelings for Zhan Yao has only gotten worse. Some time spent apart should hopefully give him time to recalibrate. To remember that Zhan Yao is his coworker and his best friend and after a lifetime spent together, Yutong has no power to change that. Not without risking losing him. Not without the possibility of losing everything.
But it takes Yutong a second to realize Zhan Yao hasn’t left yet, that he’s still standing there. And he looks up—
Zhan Yao’s lips are pursed, something unreadable flickering behind his eyes as he stares back. And Yutong suddenly gets the impression there’s something he’s meant to say. Something he should be saying. But then Zhan Yao’s expression clears just as quickly as it came, flickers brighter than it should.
“I’ll report in later,” he says.
He reaches for the file under Yutong’s elbow, one Yutong isn’t even sure why he would need. But in the process, his fingers drag over Yutong’s wrist, tracing a line up his forearm—
“Make sure you finish your paperwork.”
And then he’s gone. He’s gone, and Yutong snatches his hand into his chest, staring after him in horror as he clutches at it like some—some blushing maiden. But his skin is pricking, and his eyes are wide, and Zhan Yao is wholly oblivious and gone, and Yutong—
Yutong really needs to move out.
He needs—He needs to control himself.
He fails.
Or rather, he fails to control himself well. With any dignity left intact.
One week after Yutong has moved out of Zhan Yao’s apartment, and his life has taken a nosedive into a boring, desperate pining, the likes of which he hasn’t known since he was a teenager who spent an unforgivable amount of time staring out his window and into Zhan Yao’s across the street, watching and waiting for him to come home from his afterschool study sessions.
It’s—pathetic. And not at all becoming of a man of his age or profession. But he’s bored. His apartment, while nice, is cold and empty and sterile. And empty. And very empty. And quiet.
Every night he spends in it is full of nothing but the hollow echoing of his footsteps and his own thoughts. Trying desperately not to think about what Zhan Yao is doing. Trying desperately not to think about what he would be doing if he were still living in Zhan Yao’s apartment—probably cooking dinner for the two of them, Zhan Yao sitting on the counter watching despite Yutong’s numerous complaints to get off his sanitary surfaces. Probably arguing with him about nothing at all just because he can with the low hum of some movie neither of them care about in the background. Probably sitting on the couch, work spread out in front of them until Zhan Yao inevitably passed out from his three all-nighters, sinking into Yutong’s side, head falling to his shoulder where Yutong would let him stay until he got up and dragged them both to bed—
He’s spent five out of his seven nights here cleaning. And re-cleaning. Just for something to do. Just for a distraction from the nothingness at his side where another person should be.
But he thinks—he thinks it’s getting better. He only flinched once when Zhan Yao touched the side of his neck today, and he only stared after him for nine minutes instead of eleven when he inexplicably left the office early so that’s an improvement. A few more days of this and he’ll be back under control. Back to denial and compartmentalization and complete detachment from everything resembling feelings.
Normal.
He prepares himself the entire elevator ride for another night of the same. Already trying to decide if he’ll start in the kitchen again or the bedroom, just to change things up. Too absorbed in his own exhaustion and the hollowness in his chest as he presses the code in on his door, shoving it open and kicking off his shoes—
He freezes with one shoe hanging off his toe, bag falling with a heavy thud to the floor.
The door clicks closed behind him.
Shoes.
His shoes. His slippers. And then—Someone else’s. A familiar pair sitting just inside his door like they belong there. And Yutong’s heart gives a violent, impossible lurch—
The low hum of a television flickers through his awareness. The shuffling of slippers across a tiled floor.
Yutong forgets about his bag, forgets how to think as he half-staggers to the end of the hallway. Confusion warring with denial as he turns the corner—
Zhan Yao freezes with his chopsticks hovering over a takeout container. Standing halfway between Yutong’s kitchen island and his couch. And he just raises his eyebrows at him, stares back like Yutong’s the one being weird. Like Zhan Yao hasn’t just walked in and made himself at home in someone else’s apartment when that person wasn’t even there. Like it’s normal for him to be in Yutong’s kitchen, eating something bright orange and terrifyingly unhealthy, wearing—
Wearing Yutong’s clothes.
Yutong’s brain dies. Nothing but ringing silence left. Numbness washing over him, and a strange static electricity bursting through his veins, and he thinks for a second this must be what a heart attack feels like.
A white button-down that hangs off his shoulders. Too big for his thinner frame, dipping dangerously to expose the line of his collarbone. Yutong’s sweatpants which, while too short for him, somehow still hang on his hips—
He’s wearing his clothes.
He’s wearing his clothes, and he’s in his apartment, and whatever control Yutong had desperately tried to piece together over the last few days of Zhan Yao-detox shatters into a thousand pieces.
Zhan Yao makes a sound of understanding, shoulders relaxing. And he gestures to himself with his chopsticks. “A waiter spilled wine on my shirt when I was picking up the food,” he says, like that’s a reasonable explanation. Like Yutong can even hear him over the pounding of blood in his ears.
But Yutong—wants to close the space. Wants to press him back against the counter, run his hands under his stolen clothes until he’s gasping against Yutong’s lips. Wants to forgo all the rules he’s made and do things to him that are neither safe nor sanitary to do in his kitchen—
And his traitorous mind floods with what it would be like to come home to this everyday. Permanent and forever and not the fleeting breath it’s always been. Real instead of layered with have-to’s and Bao Sir’s orders. Zhan Yao on the other side of the door, comfortable and gorgeous and his—
“Don’t worry,” Zhan Yao tells him, breaking through the illusion the same as he stabs at his orange concoction with his chopsticks. “I’ll have them dry-cleaned.”
And with that, he crosses the rest of the space and drops down on the couch. Ending the conversation. Ending it with far more questions than answers, and once Yutong remembers how to breathe, he’ll have to ask those questions. Once he remembers.
Turns out Zhan Yao’s apartment has had a power cut. A black out. Construction work conspiring to ruin Yutong’s life.
It means Zhan Yao is staying in his apartment for the foreseeable future.
It means Zhan Yao is sharing his bed again.
And while a part of Yutong is unreasonably delighted by this, he’s also well aware that it’s not at all good for his mental health.
“I can sleep on the couch,” Yutong tries, scratching at the back of his neck as he stares at the bed. It’s big. King-sized because Jie has never skimped on anything in her life. And given Yutong has never been a fan of loading his bed with pillows, there’s more than enough room for them both to lie down without touching. It’s big enough to leave a chasm between them.
But—But well, Yutong has spent many nights sleeping in Zhan Yao’s bed. And throughout that time, he’s developed a disturbing tendency to gravitate toward anywhere Zhan Yao chooses to be, no matter how far away Yutong starts. Which means he’s woken up quite a few times in positions that would require a lot of explaining were anyone to see them.
He’s extremely lucky Zhan Yao is a hard-sleeper. Even luckier he never wakes up until the crack of noon unless Yutong bodily drags him from the covers. Otherwise their relationship probably would have taken a turn for the awkward a long time ago.
Zhan Yao gives him an unimpressed look, shoving the pillow the rest of the way into its case. “I’m not kicking you out of your own bed,” he returns. “Besides, we’ve always shared.”
Which is true. Which means it’s probably only going to get more suspicious the longer Yutong tries to argue about this. And Zhan Yao is already staring at him like he’s growing another head. But—But he’s trying really hard here. He’s trying to be good, to keep things under control, but Zhan Yao—is not making it easy.
But then, when has Zhan Yao ever made things easy for him? Not once in their entire lives.
Yutong shifts on his feet, glaring at the bed like the torture device it seems set on becoming. “You were the one always complaining about it. I’m just trying to be a good host.”
“Are you saying I was a bad host?” Zhan Yao demands, eyebrows shooting up again as he drops the pillow onto his side of the bed. The right side. The same side he always slept on at his apartment and the one Yutong has instinctually left open since he moved back here.
Swallowing thick, Yutong shrugs, pulling back the steel gray comforter. “Are you saying you were a host?” he asks, reaching for old, familiar patterns. Sniping at each other. Poking and prodding at weak spots. “I thought I was your live-in bodyguard, there to save you from yourself.” And his frankly terrifying living habits.
Zhan Yao shoots a glare at him, reaching for the second pillow Yutong’s so graciously given him. As a favor. And not at all because Yutong’s considering building a wall between them with it. “I survived on my own perfectly fine before you moved in.”
“I don’t know how you didn’t have food poisoning all the time,” Yutong grumbles, which is true. He saw Zhan Yao’s refrigerator when he first moved in. Over fifty percent of it had expired—and not even recently.
Zhan Yao’s glare sharpens. “I can cook.” That’s a blatant, outright lie, and they both know it. Mostly because Zhan Yao has never in his life thought it worth the time and effort required to make anything that isn’t microwavable. But he gives an annoyed huff, throwing back his own side of the blanket. “How incompetent do you think I am?”
And where Zhan Yao is concerned, Yutong is a stupid, stupid man. He knows this, admits it about himself. But when he catches the edge in Zhan Yao’s voice, he can’t help the flicker of relief that washes over him. Because it’s easy to cover up his want to take care of Zhan Yao with barbs about how he can’t do it himself. Distract Zhan Yao by making it look like Zhan Yao needs him far more than he needs Zhan Yao which—is also a blatant, outright lie.
Zhan Yao survived New York perfectly fine without him.
Yutong—Yutong did not handle it as gracefully.
He snorts, dropping down onto his side of the bed, putting his back to Zhan Yao as he reaches to take off his socks. “You won’t even take your gun with you,” he sighs, a point he’s actually been nervous about since he moved out. Since he can’t stay glued to his side. “I don’t know how you’ve stayed alive this long.”
Zhan Yao stays quiet for a moment, and then a sigh comes from behind him, a tinge of defeat to it Yutong doesn’t quite understand. “I can take care of myself,” he says, and Yutong feels the mattress dip behind him, hears Zhan Yao shifting the pillows around. Because for all he says otherwise, Zhan Yao practically nests when he goes to sleep. Stealing all of the blankets, stealing Yutong’s pillow, stealing Yutong’s arm when he’s too out of it to know different—
Yutong—hates that he knows this. He hates it the same as he loves it, with the same exhausted longing.
Zhan Yao pulls the covers up over his chest, and Yutong lies down to match him, preemptively shifting some of his half in Zhan Yao’s direction. Just to make it easier for him to take it. But Yutong doesn’t mind the cold. He can stand it, while Zhan Yao always falls sick at the first hint of autumn air.
“I don’t need a keeper,” Zhan Yao says into the dark. Certain. Pointed.
And Yutong huffs a laugh, taking the opportunity to turn over on his left side and put his back to Zhan Yao. Hugging the edge of the mattress. “You’re a disaster, Cat,” he mutters, only half-thinking, muffling his voice into his pillow. “Your self-care ability is terrible.”
“Bite me,” Zhan Yao spits, annoyance flooding his voice, and Yutong hears him roll over, putting his own back to Yutong. And Yutong thinks it should be a victory. He thinks it should make him feel better because this way, not only is Zhan Yao completely oblivious to how badly Yutong wants to take care of him, he’s also gotten him to huddle up to his own side of the bed.
But Yutong stays tense, tightly coiled the whole night. Despite Zhan Yao being far enough away he might as well be in a different bed, Yutong stays hyperaware of him, his imagined warmth radiating across the space between them.
This is getting to be a problem.
He starts considering that Zhan Yao may be hypnotized when he walks into his office the next morning to find him sucking on a pen. Again.
Zhan Yao doesn’t say anything about Yutong’s stutter-step in the doorway, the way he almost backtracks to make sure he’s in the right office. He doesn’t remark on the way Yutong’s gaze keeps drifting to it, dragged back every couple of seconds before he forces himself away again. Like a tennis match. And he thankfully doesn’t seem to notice the way Yutong can’t make himself stop looking at his mouth.
It’s unsanitary. Chewing on a pen is gross and bad and the OCD part of his brain is screaming at him to take the damn thing away from him before he catches something. But that part of him is sufficiently weak and distracted and not at all powerful enough to make him do anything of the sort.
Zhan Yao has really nice lips. Lips that look extremely soft and he’s sure would turn beautifully red after he’s kissed them and—
He pinches himself hard enough on the arm his knee jerks up on reflex, slams into the underside of the desk. Pain ricocheting down his shin.
And that certainly attracts Zhan Yao’s attention. Startles him. But at least he stops being extremely inappropriate with the pen. So that’s a win.
If Zhan Yao hasn’t been hypnotized, he’s been body-swapped. Like some bad sci-fi horror movie. Some zombie creature who’s just waiting until Yutong has lowered his guard before he kills him and eats his brains.
If it is brains he’s after, it would make sense. Especially since he seems determined to make Yutong’s brains melt out his ears.
Probably trying to save himself an intermediary step.
But this body-swapping theory only becomes all the more likely that next Thursday.
Target Practice.
Yutong complains about going to the shooting range with Zhan Yao. He always has. Whining about it taking time from his exceptionally busy schedule. Whining about it being a waste of time since Zhan Yao’s marksmanship is still only just above passing, despite their weekly sessions. But it’s really just reflex now, born out of years of nagging at each other and irritating each other and doing everything possible to get under the other’s skin. Second nature. And Zhan Yao has had no problems firing back about how his marksmanship doesn’t improve because unlike some people, he has better things to do than poke holes in sheets of paper.
But regardless, marksmanship is one of the few areas in which Yutong is wholly and completely and inarguably superior to Zhan Yao. Which means it’s one of the few things he can lord over him.
So despite all of his words to the contrary, Yutong looks forward to their department-mandated training. Looks forward to exploiting the rare opportunity to show off and the even rarer opportunity to touch Zhan Yao without being immediately smacked away.
It’s innocent. It’s teaching. Correcting his form, guiding him. If he presses himself just the slightest bit closer than necessary, if he rests his hand on the sharp curve of Zhan Yao’s hip, it’s just to balance him. And if he spends far too much time staring at Zhan Yao’s profile instead of the target, it’s just to test his focus. Completely natural for a team leader to be so concerned about his shooting skills. He’s just looking out for public safety, making sure Zhan Yao doesn’t shoot himself or someone else in the foot.
“If you have better things to do, you could go do them,” Zhan Yao tells him, checking the weight of the gun in his hand. Still using the one Yutong gave him forever ago. “No one forced you to be here.”
Yutong snorts, leaning back against the wall as the steady crack fires from down the range. At this time of the morning, not many other people are here which makes it perfect for them. “And leave you unsupervised? I’m a cop, Zhan Yao. I can’t risk civilian safety like that.”
Zhan Yao fixes him with a glare that’s better aimed and more lethal than any bullet he could fire. And he snaps, shorter and sharper than usual, “Go bother Bai Chi.”
“Even Bai Chi scored better on the last practical than you,” Yutong sighs, taking the vitriol in stride. Ignoring it as he’s trained his entire life to do. And pointedly ignoring that they both know that practical came the day after Zhan Yao had been on an all-night stakeout which devolved into a chase through the back alleys of Hong Kong in which Zhan Yao, while the suspect had been captured, had managed to slice his right hand open on a rusted pipe. Which meant the test was taken left-handed.
Though Zhan Yao surprisingly doesn’t take the opportunity to remind him of that. Instead, he presses his lips together, lines pulling down at the corners. “I’m not helpless, Yutong.”
And of course Yutong knows that. He knows there’s no one more capable than Zhan Yao. Because chances are if Zhan Yao ever did manage to get himself in a situation where he needed a gun and Yutong wasn’t there, he could talk himself out of it with far less collateral damage.
But this is what they do. Yutong makes fun of Zhan Yao’s physical abilities; Zhan Yao makes fun of Yutong’s mental abilities. And they continue on.
So he snorts, nodding to the target at the other side of the field. “If you can hit the center without help, I’ll make you anything you want for dinner for an entire week.” A pointless bet. Because not only will Zhan Yao never hit it, but Yutong usually makes him what he wants anyway. And now that they’re living together again—albeit temporarily—Yutong cooks for him almost all the time.
Zhan Yao blinks at him, at the gun in his hand. And Yutong’s lips twitch up at the assessing look in his eyes. But he prepares himself instead for the inevitable poorly-aimed barrage of bullets, awaiting the brutal torture of a unwitting practice dummy as it’s turned into a sieve.
Zhan Yao hesitates another second. And with a resigned huff, he yanks back on the slide with a ka-chunk and hisses, “Fine.”
The first bullet cuts straight through the target’s heart.
Yutong freezes, his own heart stuttering to match. Jerking upright off the wall before he can catch himself. Shock crashing through him as he stares—
It has to be a trick of the light. A lucky shot. A fluke—
Bang—
Another right above it, barely a hair off.
Bang—
Straight through the target’s stomach.
Bang—
To the forehead.
Bang—
A lost nose and at that point, Yutong’s seen more than enough. He slides his hearing protection off, dropping it to the counter as he hits the button to bring the paper in. And sure enough, it just highlights what Yutong’s observational skills had already promised.
Every bullet hit. Every bullet hit right where it was meant to. And while it’s not perfect, it’s close enough that if Zhan Yao had been in his class at the police academy, his marksmanship would have put him in the top ten, if not the top five—
“Spaghetti parmesan for dinner,” Zhan Yao says, tossing his own ear protectors onto the counter with a clatter. “Breadsticks too.”
And Zhan Yao leaves the room with a squeak of door hinges.
Yutong lets out a breath, pinching the bridge of his nose as he stares down at the paper. Mind tripping between confusion and astonishment and not the slightest bit of fear. All underlined by the hysterical voice screeching that that’s the last time Yutong challenges Zhan Yao to anything.
Yutong’s been trying to teach him to hit a target for months now. How the hell did he—
That’s—
That’s new.
“You’re having Zhao Fu teach you?”
Zhan Yao raises his eyebrows at him, that expression back on his face, indulgent and just the slightest bit concerned. But that’s not fair. Because Zhan Yao is the one being weird. Zhan Yao is the one who’s developed shooting superpowers overnight. Zhan Yao is the one who—
Yutong glances down at where his palm rests on Zhan Yao’s desk. Staring blankly at a pile of files. An unreasonable level of horror shocking through him. But he knew something was wrong when he came in here. He knew it felt strange, but he’d been too distracted, too wrapped up in getting answers he didn’t notice—
“When did you clean?”
Zhan Yao blinks at him, a flash of indignant annoyance passing behind his eyes. “What’s wrong with you today?”
“When did you organize your files?” And Yutong may be screeching. He may be panicking the slightest bit. But Zhan Yao tugs one of the files out from under his hand—and dear lord, he thinks they may be alphabetized. If they’re alphabetized, Yutong’s going to drag Zhan Yao into Bao Sir’s office himself and demand he be tested for every form of hypnosis and mind control that has ever existed. Possibly get a DNA test done and a couple brain scans just to be safe—
Zhan Yao glares at him again, but he waves his hand, dismissing. “Zhao Fu’s helping me improve my marksmanship,” he says, words weighted with a sigh. Like Yutong’s exhausting him. But he pointedly doesn’t answer the question about the suddenly clean state of his office, and that’s just—“Why is that so weird to you?”
Another distressed sound tears from Yutong’s lips as he jerks upright, shoving his fingers through his hair. Sending it flying every direction, just like his thoughts—But he doesn’t like the sound of this. He doesn’t like the sound of this at all—“You told me shooting was a waste of time,” he reasons. “You said as long as one of us had a gun, it was fine.”
“To which you replied, ‘Don’t expect me to be able to watch you all the time,’” Zhan Yao returns. Which—admittedly, was not one of his proudest moments or smoothest lines. But he’d panicked, mind fizzling out at the thought of Zhan Yao trusting Yutong that much. Believing that as long as Yutong was next to him, he’d be safe. And he was right. Because as long as Yutong’s here, as long as he’s still breathing, Zhan Yao will be safe.
But Zhan Yao isn’t supposed to know that.
Though he’d never really considered that line coming back to bite him in the ass.
A choking sound pulls from him. Not at all subtle. Not at all under control. And before he can think about what it means, he snaps, “I’m a far better shot than Zhao Fu.”
Escaping before he can rein it back, before his mind works enough to tamp down on the obvious flood of jealousy. But there’s no way to write it off as anything else. Not when it’s strong enough he can practically taste it, feel it burning in his veins. But—But he is a better shot. And he’s dedicated months to trying to teach Zhan Yao to shoot and Zhan Yao has never once taken this amount of interest in it. He’s never bothered to try—
But Zhan Yao just hums, flipping open the file. Like he’s only half-paying attention. So very oblivious to the fact Yutong’s head is about to explode. And then Zhan Yao’s suspiciously clean office will be covered in brains and who’ll clean that up? “I’ve only had the time to spare at nights, and Zhao Fu’s on the night shift,” he explains. “Did you really want to waste your evenings at the shooting range with me?”
Yes. Anywhere with you. Words swallowed and forced away before they can be spoken, before he can breathe life into them.
But the silence stretches longer, and Yutong—doesn’t really know what else to say. All his words have dried up. Mind finally giving out on him. And Zhan Yao seems so horrifically unbothered by this whole situation that he’s not offering anything other than the scratching of his pencil.
He doesn’t like it.
Zhao Fu’s hand wrapped around Zhan Yao’s slender wrist, standing just behind him as he corrects his posture—
He really doesn’t like it.
But he can’t exactly tell Zhan Yao that. And Zhan Yao isn’t even looking at him, already dismissing the conversation, already back to whatever paperwork he’s meant to be doing. And Yutong—doesn’t really have anything else he can say.
He swallows down the bitterness on his tongue and pretends the crawling over his skin doesn’t stick with him the rest of the day.
The next day, Yutong walks into Zhan Yao’s office to find some disgusting-looking green concoction sitting in a cup on his desk. And at first, Yutong’s convinced it’s a science experiment gone wrong. But then Zhan Yao drinks it, and while every impulse tells him to rush him to the hospital for a stomach pump, Zhan Yao gives him that blank look again and Yutong has to reassess everything.
Zhan Yao is—drinking smoothies. Green smoothies. With vegetables. And that’s—
In all the years Yutong has known Zhan Yao, Zhan Yao has never taken the initiative to cook for himself. If it doesn’t get done in a microwave in fifteen and a half seconds, Zhan Yao doesn’t eat. If he’s out of food, he orders takeout and eats it straight out of the container with chopsticks that are dubiously clean. Zhan Yao doesn’t know how to take care of himself. Zhan Yao never—
“What—is that?” Yutong demands, eyeing the offending drink like it’s going to rise up and try to eat him. And from the way it’s bubbling, he wouldn’t be surprised.
Zhan Yao makes a questioning sound as he starts sorting through crime scene photos, distributing them into piles Yutong has no hope of understanding. “A smoothie?”
Flat. Easy. Like this is the most normal thing in the world.
“Where did you get it?”
Zhan Yao shoots him a look, eyebrows drawing together. “The store?” Like that’s obvious. Like that’s not the strangest answer he could have offered when Yutong was sure Zhan Yao didn’t even know what a vegetable was, let alone where to find one.
“Why—“ He stops himself, searching for the words. But they don’t come. And finally, he just settles on, “Why?”
“Health is important,” Zhan Yao returns, setting the last of the photographs down. “You drink them all the time.”
“Yes, but—“ But Yutong is a fitness freak who spends more time in the gym than he does at home and has an obsession with cleanliness that has transferred into an obsession with clean food. And Zhan Yao is his disaster-prone best friend who almost ate a two-week old, expired cup of yogurt the other day because Yutong hadn’t noticed it shoved to the back of his fridge the last time he’d cleaned.
He’s drinking a smoothie. A smoothie Yutong didn’t make for him, didn’t try to force-feed him or bribe him into drinking with promises of fried fish. He’s drinking it of his own volition, turning away from Yutong as he babbles about how the identical murders were actually committed by no less than three different people, sucking on the straw like this is fine.
And Yutong doesn’t know where his Zhan Yao went, but this just proves it.
This thing in front of him is not Zhan Yao. A robot, maybe. Probably. Brain hijacked by a criminal who—kills people by correcting their terrible living habits. Or something sick like that. Bastard.
Correction: this thing isn’t a robot.
This thing is a demon.
A demon living in his apartment, meant to drive him to an early grave. Because Zhan Yao—his Zhan Yao, who thinks wearing only one layer is too provocative and showing his wrists is too indecent—walks out of his bathroom in nothing but a towel.
A towel. Slung low enough Yutong’s gaze catches on the cut of his hipbones, the bow of his lower back—
Yutong chokes on his water, slamming the glass down onto the counter with far more force than necessary.
Zhan Yao looks up at the sound, raises his eyebrows, and Yutong is really starting to hate that look. Because it just makes him feel more insane. More and more certain that his years of hopeless pining have finally driven him to madness.
“Have you seen my sweater?” Zhan Yao asks. And that’s—No, Yutong hasn’t seen it. Though even if he had, he couldn’t possibly remember right now. Because he’s too busy tracing a drop of water that runs from Zhan Yao’s hairline down the side of his neck, drawing a track on the bare skin of his shoulder, and Yutong is only human. He’s only a pathetic, pathetic man ridiculously in love with his best friend and this is not fair—
His fingers prickle, every instinct shouting at him to close the space between them. To catch that drop of water with his tongue. To crowd him up against the wall and steal away that goddamn towel and make him take responsibility for these last two weeks of agonized frustration—
Zhan Yao doesn’t notice. Just as he never does. Rooting around in the dresser drawers, and he shifts to reach for the bottom row—
Yutong makes an undignified yelping sound and jumps forward, throwing himself between Zhan Yao and the dresser, kicking the drawer shut with a burst of pain across his ankle. “I’ll look!” he squeaks, letting the pain ground him. Letting it distract him. “I’ll look for you.”
Zhan Yao’s expression this time doesn’t even bother him because at least it means Zhan Yao is upright, staring at him. Decidedly not bending over to reach the drawers. And as far as miracles go, that’s all Yutong can hope for right now. As far as his sanity goes, that’s—that’s everything.
But after another second, Zhan Yao just shrugs as he turns away from him. “It’s fine. I’ll just borrow one of your t-shirts.”
Oh no. Oh, dear god, no. Yutong’s already been through that once. He can’t possibly—
But Zhan Yao disappears back into the bedroom before Yutong manages more than a strained whining sound. And it’s a good thing Zhan Yao doesn’t seem to hear it. Because it sounds too much like the pitiful weeping occurring in his soul.
Their next case doesn’t go as smoothly as it should.
Nothing major, nothing anyone should be that upset about. All the right people went to jail, no civilians were harmed, his team came out unscathed—everything was fine.
It was a complicated case to begin with. A crime of passion involving a man, the man’s girlfriend, the girlfriend’s boyfriend, the boyfriend’s wife, and the wife’s best friend. A tangled web that took Zhan Yao hours of sitting silently on his couch, legs folded, staring into the nothing. Hours of Yutong drifting around him, knowing full-well Zhan Yao couldn’t even see him. Hours of holding cups of water to his lips, trying to make sure he didn’t crystalize in front of him. Hours before Zhan Yao blinked himself awake and finally focused on him, announcing, “I’ve solved it. I’ve figured it out.”
He fell asleep almost immediately after he’d finished explaining it, collapsing into Yutong’s side. Exhaustion catching up with him. And Yutong hadn’t even bothered to wake him before he’d slid his arms under his legs and around his back and carried him into the bedroom.
It was the wife’s abusive, cheating husband. A drunken murder and a framed crime. And then it was the wife’s best friend. Silently, painfully in love with her. Figuring it out too quickly, the web of connections, and fixing it for himself.
He’d smiled. As Lan Chenglin tightened the cuffs around his wrists, the man had smiled, resigned and bittersweet. And the sight had stung far deeper than it should’ve.
Sitting in Gongsun’s office, Yutong focuses on the low ache in his wrist, the bruising in his ribs. So much easier that than the emotions swarming in his chest. Unnamed and twisted up. Easier that than the stony silence of Gongsun’s disapproval.
“You should call Doctor Zhan,” Gongsun says for the fifth time, a warning as he packs up his medical equipment. He’s given Yutong a clean bill of health—if a slightly beat up one. Lucky, given the fact Yutong had been shoved out a window. Lucky, given a fall like that could’ve ended a lot worse. “It’ll be better if he hears it from you.”
Rather than through the grapevine. Because if Zhan Yao catches word of what happened, especially the uncensored, heavily dramatized versions that love to circulate through the locker rooms, Zhan Yao will probably try to kill him himself. But then—then, calling Zhan Yao means facing Zhan Yao and Yutong’s—not ready for that.
Going out in the field without Zhan Yao was bad enough. A crime that’ll take weeks of groveling and probably homemade tiramisu before he even considers forgiving him. But Zhan Yao had worked himself into a stupor solving the case, cramming university work into the early mornings after nights spent scanning crime scene photos, and when Yutong had woken up this morning, it was to find Zhan Yao had stolen all the covers—and was still shivering.
Sick. He was sick. And while his fever wasn’t that bad, Yutong certainly wasn’t going to let him out of bed with it. And he definitely wasn’t about to let him out into the field.
It took more arguing with himself than it should’ve not to call in sick as well, not to just to stay home and watch over Zhan Yao. Just to make sure he didn’t dehydrate himself or overheat or something during the day. And if not for the time-sensitivity of the case and the fact it was almost wrapped up, he probably would have said screw it and done it anyway. But despite the weight in his stomach as Zhan Yao had curled deeper into his nest of blankets and pillows, a red flush and cold sweat turning his face even paler, the best he could do was set water and medicine next to him and order him to stay—and leave express instructions with Qingtang to go check on him at lunch.
He hasn’t gone home yet.
He should go home.
“It’s better he never hears it at all,” Yutong sighs, picking at the edge of one of the gauze pads Gongsun’s stuck to his chest. Fraying already. It won’t last more than a few hours. “He’ll never let me live it down.”
Gongsun’s disapproval turns heavier, almost palpable. “Doctor Zhan wouldn’t use an injury against you.”
And Yutong knows that. He knows despite the antagonism built into their relationship, Zhan Yao would never try to weaponize anything actually serious. Anything real. They poke at each other’s weak spots but it’s always because those are the spots the other covers, shields and protects. Yutong’s weaknesses have always been Zhan Yao’s strengths and vice versa. He knows Zhan Yao would never make fun of him for being hurt.
That isn’t what he’s worried about.
Sighing, Yutong pinches the bridge of his nose, gaze sliding down the purple and green staining his skin.
He wants to go home.
He wants to—He wants to see for himself that Zhan Yao is okay. He wants to check his temperature and make sure he’s drinking and cook that bone-broth soup he always wants when he’s sick, that he claims no one else can cook right. The same soup Yutong learned to make for him when he was sixteen, spoon-fed him after Zhan Yao had passed out from exhaustion at school. Sitting on Zhan Yao’s bed with his back against Yutong’s chest as Yutong had held him up and coaxed him just one more bite until he’d finally gotten him to eat it all—
Zhan Yao’s father nowhere to be seen. Leaving Zhan Yao alone in that big, empty house, just as he did far too often. Leaving Zhan Yao to forget to eat and forget to sleep and—
Zhan Yao clinging to him, weak and sick and vulnerable and still so afraid to ask Yutong to stay.
“Do you think he was selfish?”
Yutong jolts, gaze snapping around at the shock of Gongsun’s voice. The weight in it. Quiet and considering and laced with more emotion than Yutong has ever heard from him. And even though he keeps his back to Yutong, like he couldn’t make himself ask otherwise, Yutong can read the tension in his shoulders, the curling of his fingers where he leans over his desk.
The silence pulls tighter.
“For not telling her,” Gongsun clarifies, voice distant. Lost. “Do you—Do you think he was cruel for loving her but making her think—“ He stops himself, head dropping between his shoulders. Uncomfortable. Pained. And Yutong feels it tighten in his chest, a hand squeezing something so vital—“Could she have lived?”
It’s not a question they’re meant to be asking. Not as cops. Not as people who’ve seen and known as much death as they have. Could have been’s and should have been’s are only likely to drive them insane, but—
But would it have changed anything?
A life lived lonely like hers. Nothing but pain and fear and no end in sight, no one she trusted to tell, no one she trusted to help—
Five people died to cover up her murder. A murder that had only come after years of bruises, of broken bones. Silently hurting and wasting away while her supposed best friend watched and accepted every promise she was fine and hid away his feelings because it was safer—
If she’d known someone out there loved her more than anything—would it have mattered?
Yutong lets out a breath, swallowing around the lump in his throat. But his head is a mess and it feels like someone has pulled apart his ribs and jumbled up his insides and he wants—
He doesn’t have an answer. He doesn’t know. But he wants—
He wants to go home.
Gongsun looks up at him, meeting his gaze, and something like understanding passes between them. For the first time since they started working together, Yutong thinks he understands him better than he ever wanted to.
Gongsun shrugs, blank mask falling into place. Professional and cold as he reaches for his briefcase. “Maybe prison is too kind a fate for him.”
Yutong doesn’t manage to unravel the knot in his chest by the time he makes it to his building. And it only tightens with every step he takes toward the door, every inch he closes.
He doesn’t know what he’s going to say when he sees Zhan Yao. He doesn’t know what he’ll do. But right now—Right now, all that matters is making sure he’s okay. Seeing him and knowing for sure he’s safe. Everything else—He can figure the rest out later.
He presses the familiar number into the keypad, a small bit of tension slipping from him as he steps through the door into the dark apartment. Letting it fall closed again, shutting off the outside world. So that for a second, he can pretend it doesn’t exist. For a second, he can pretend there’s nothing else—
That’s when the first whisper slips through his mind.
He stills, hairs raising on the back of his neck, prickling under his skin as he tries to sort through what’s set him off. Triggered his instincts. But it’s—quiet. Quiet and silent and still—not a breath of movement. And the wrong of it twists with a sharp burst of electricity.
It’s too quiet.
It shouldn’t be this quiet.
He drops his bag with a heavy thud, denial slamming hard into his chest. But his thoughts are in such a mess already that he doesn’t even know what he’s thinking. He doesn’t know what possibly could have happened, but Zhan Yao was sick, and Yutong’s been gone too long, and this apartment is too quiet—
His feet carry him down the hallway, blood pounding in his head, and he crashes through the bedroom door—
He freezes.
Relief floods through him, nearly knocks the strength from his legs. And he braces himself on the doorframe to stay upright, dragging in a breath that shakes too much. But Zhan Yao is here. Zhan Yao is here, and he’s awake, and that’s all that matters. More than Yutong’s frayed nerves and the instincts firing haywire, the paranoia and the fear that settled in his bones years ago—More than anything, Zhan Yao is here—
Sitting on the edge of the bed.
That relief drains slow and steady, replaced with an ice that crystalizes in his veins.
Zhan Yao sitting with his back to him, shoulders pulled in a tense line. And even from here, Yutong can see the white flushing his knuckles, the death grip he has on the steel gray comforter—
Yutong’s stomach twists. “Zhan Yao.”
Zhan Yao doesn’t answer him. He doesn’t even acknowledge he’s heard him, and if not for the compulsive twitch of his index finger, Yutong would wonder if he’s even conscious at all.
Swallowing around the lump building in his throat, Yutong forces himself into the room, footsteps more hesitant than he should allow. But he doesn’t know what’s happening. He doesn’t understand anything aside from the churning in his gut, drowning out the aching of his ribs, cutting through the stinging pain of the cuts marring his body—
“Zhan Yao,” he breathes, more pleading than the order he means it to be. But he’s not thinking clearly. He’s not thinking at all, and all he knows is that he needs Zhan Yao to be okay. He needs him to be—
He drops to a crouch in front of him, ducking to try to catch his eyes. Grateful for the numbness granted by Gongsun’s painkillers. But Zhan Yao’s face is still too pale, lips drained of blood, a slightly green cast to his skin Yutong doesn’t like at all. And his eyes are unfocused, locked so very far away—
He shouldn’t have left this morning. He knew he shouldn’t have—He should’ve stayed with him, damn the consequences. Because Zhan Yao didn’t look this bad this morning. It was just a cold. He shouldn’t be—
Hospital. He’s going to have to—He starts running through the routes in his head, trying to decide whether he’ll be able to carry Zhan Yao to his car if he passes out—And he almost laughs to himself at the thought. Of course he’ll carry him. He’s dosed up on enough painkillers—He can carry him—
Swallowing around the dryness in his throat, shoving down the anxiety building in his chest, he reaches up for Zhan Yao’s forehead—“Has your fever broken—“
A flash of movement, and Yutong’s hand is slapped away, a sharp cracking sound snapping through the silence. And it doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t hurt, but pain spikes in his chest anyway, tinged with shock, tinged with horror—
And when he looks up, it’s to find Zhan Yao staring back at him. Razor-sharp focus locked with such force it slices straight under his skin, carving into bone. A stake driven through his sternum to keep him in place. And Zhan Yao’s eyes, still fever bright, flash-burn with a fire Yutong hasn’t seen since they were both kids.
And through his startled haze, through the panic that hasn’t yet receded, the thought stumbles over itself:
Zhan Yao’s angry.
He’s—He’s really, really angry.
“What are you doing?” Zhan Yao demands, gaze scalding as it runs over him. Like he hadn’t realized until just now where Yutong was, that he’d even come into the room—“Get up, Rat. Before you break yourself more.”
And Yutong—would. Probably. If his mind were working. If he could sort out what’s happening. But he’s still not thinking clearly and all he knows is that Zhan Yao looks about a breath away from murdering him.
Hopefully he makes it quick. Yutong’s never been one for torture.
Zhan Yao’s eyes flash again. “Get up,” he orders, and this time, it’s accompanied by a pawing at his arm, weaker than it should be. And that’s enough to kick start Yutong’s brain. That’s enough to remind him that for all the rage rolling off of him, Zhan Yao is clearly still sick.
He can deal with a sick Zhan Yao. He knows how to handle a sick Zhan Yao far better than an enraged one.
Shoving himself up, he ignores the protesting of his ribs, reaching for the thermometer at the bedside table—
But a strong tug on his wrist knocks him off balance. And he stumbles into the edge of the bed, knee catching against it—A twist of his arm, and a foot to his right hip, and his back hits the bed with a woosh of air—
He blinks up at the ceiling, blinks through the dizziness and the spinning of shadows above him, the only light that falling through the open window. And he’s not quite sure whether he should be impressed or embarrassed.
He taught Zhan Yao that. Once. A long time ago. Back when the SCI first started and he decided giving him self-defense lessons was a great idea. Having it used against him like this—Well, it’s a bit his fault for having his guard down, but Zhan Yao is sick. His physical strength is barely existent. He shouldn’t be trying to fight anyone, let alone Yutong—
Zhan Yao’s palm presses flat against his sternum, holding him down. Carefully not pushing, but a reminder all the same. And he hisses, steel in his voice, “Stay there.”
“I thought you wanted me to get up,” Yutong returns, petulant. But that just makes Zhan Yao’s glare sharpen, the shadows of his eyes deepen as his nostrils flare, and suddenly Yutong is very aware that Zhan Yao may actually murder him. For what, he’s not sure. But that look on his face is more murder-y than he’s comfortable with.
“Bai Yutong,” he says, dragging out each syllable. Voice a rough scratch, probably because the damn cat hasn’t been drinking enough, probably because he’s let himself get dehydrated—“How was work?”
Deceptively normal. Easy and casual. Or rather, as casual as it can sound with the low edge of a threat in his voice, the palm burning a handprint into Yutong’s ribcage. Zhan Yao little more than a vague outline in the dark of the room. And Yutong’s mouth goes dry with something more than anxiety.
There’s something wrong with him. There’s something very, very wrong with him.
Clearing his throat, he isn’t stupid enough to try to move, despite every impulse screaming at him to run. But he does turn his gaze away, searching for the words that will make this go away, that will put an end to it before his mind runs off in dangerous directions—“Um—“ He coughs. “It was—We wrapped the case up. I gave everyone the rest of the night off, and then we’ll start the paperwork tomorrow—“
Zhan Yao shifts, resting a bit more of his weight on his hand—and Yutong cuts off just as silently directed. Obviously the wrong answer then. Obviously not the one Zhan Yao was after. And Yutong isn’t sure what that means but from the heavy sigh that slips through the room, he thinks he may be in trouble.
“Bai. Yu. Tong,” he growls, and Yutong decidedly does not shiver at that. “I already know what happened today, so the only question remaining is how do you want me to finish the job? This window is certainly high enough.”
Yutong goes cold, swallowing thick enough it sounds like a gulp. But Zhan Yao’s eyes are burning even in the darkness, and Yutong feels the snap-crack of guilt sharp against his skin.
Zhan Yao wasn’t supposed to know.
He wasn’t supposed to find out.
“Cat—“
“Don’t call me that,” he snaps, frustration running under his voice, and that more than anything proves it. Proves that Zhan Yao is not only angry, he’s furious. And he’s furious in a way that’s far harsher, far more violent than the situation demands. Because sure, Yutong kind of fell out a window, but he’s barely banged up. He shouldn’t be this upset—“People who lie to me don’t get to call me that.”
Yutong tenses, heart sinking, stomach lurching at the hurt in Zhan Yao’s voice. Unrestrained and uncontrolled and so very lethal. “It isn’t that bad,” he reassures, hoping that’s enough. Reaching for the right words. “Gongsun said I was fine—“
“Gongsun already called to remind you to take your painkillers.”
That goddamn—Yutong’s nose wrinkles, bitter betrayal on the back of his tongue. But he figures it’s payback. Payback for dumping his sister on him so much. Or for not giving him back that stupid decanter fast enough. Or something—“I didn’t lie to you. I just—“
“Left out the truth,” Zhan Yao spits. “Left out you could’ve died today.”
“I could die almost any day,” Yutong returns, brain giving up on finding anything more reasonable to say. But it’s true at least. There’s no point getting so upset about today’s incident when Yutong has had many other incidents that were far worse. He’s been far closer to dying before. “And this wasn’t that bad. I just—“
“You promised we’d always go into the field together,” Zhan Yao spits, venom turning to acid. And Yutong’s breath catches at the sharp sting that brings with it, the brightness of Zhan Yao’s eyes as they lock on him. “You said so when we started this. You swore we always had to go together, you rat.”
And Yutong remembers that conversation. He remembers it coming out of sheer panic, the horrible realization that Zhan Yao was going to be leaving his relatively safe position as a consultant behind a desk to go out in the field. To have guns pointed at him and knives waved around and bombs thrown. He’d realized that meant Zhan Yao was going to be in the same position as all fully trained officers who put their lives on the line for this job. And suddenly he’d understood his mother, sitting up until six in the morning when his father was working the nightshift, just waiting for him to come through the door again. Suddenly he’d understood why sometimes, when his father got trapped under a caseload that seemed to keep him away from home for days on end, she’d jump every time the phone rang.
And for as much as he trusts his team with his life, there’s no one he trusts with Zhan Yao’s. If they always went out in the field together, Yutong could at least protect him.
“I’m a cop, Zhan Yao,” Yutong breathes, trying to sort through Zhan Yao’s reasoning. And he understands Zhan Yao’s angry he didn’t tell him that he went into the field without him. But he couldn’t have stopped this even if he’d been there. “I’m trained for this. You being there wouldn’t have helped anything—“
“But if you die, I’m the one who’ll have to identify your body,” he snaps, voice tighter and rougher than it should be. More than Yutong can blame on the illness burning out of him. “Do you understand?”
Yutong’s heart thuds, slams painful against his ribcage. And through the slow haze in his mind, the coiled chaos that’s all he’s known since he closed this case, awareness prickles through his mind. “Zhan Yao—“ He stops himself, horror pressing heavy on his ribcage. “Zhan Yao, how did you find out?”
Zhan Yao doesn’t answer. And that only makes the twisting in his chest worse, the nausea churning in his stomach. But he hadn’t thought about it. He’d just assumed Gongsun sold him out, but Gongsun would never scare Zhan Yao like this. He’d never—“Did you hear it from dispatch?” The only thing that makes sense, the only possibility. Someone from dispatch talking about an SCI member who’d been injured in the field, maybe even giving his name specifically. Someone highlighting all the worst parts for the drama of it and never giving the conclusion—
“I had to call Gongsun to—“ Zhan Yao stops himself, but Yutong can fill in the blank, can read it in the fingers curling in his shirt. And Zhan Yao’s voice slips on a breath, “Why do you always do this?” Empty, hollow. Pained. And Yutong hates that he made him that way. He hates it, but as Zhan Yao’s hand loosens in his shirt, thumb instead stroking a mindless arc over his sternum, the thought solidifies in the dragging silence.
He scared him.
He scared him—
“Kitten—“ Zhan Yao’s breath hitches, and Yutong doesn’t think too much on why. Too tired, too focused on the guilt eating through him to bother. But he reaches up to cover Zhan Yao’s hand with his own, shifting his fingers to lie in between Zhan Yao’s. And distantly, he thinks he was right that day in his office. Zhan Yao’s hand looks so much more delicate than his, soft and gentle against Yutong’s rough edges. “Kitten, I’m okay.”
Zhan Yao doesn’t answer. He just stares at their laced hands, distant and unfocused, probably falling back into his fever. A cold clamminess to his skin. But even so, he doesn’t seem convinced by Yutong’s coaxing. He barely seems to hear it.
Sighing, Yutong tugs on Zhan Yao’s hand, leading it to his right side. Right in the middle of his ribcage where the bruising was the worst. And he twists Zhan Yao’s hand to curl around his ribs, holding him in place—“Check if you want,” he says, hyperaware of the heat burning through his thin work shirt, the weight of his hand on him. “I’m going to be okay.”
Still Zhan Yao doesn’t move. Still he just leaves his hand there. And Yutong swallows thick, shifts his hand to cradle Zhan Yao’s better. And he guides his fingers across the ridges of his ribs, the spaces in between. Ignoring the electricity sparking under his skin as Zhan Yao just lets him—“See?” Yutong says. “Nothing’s even broken.”
Zhan Yao’s breath hitches again. And he seems to blink awake, hand wrested out of Yutong’s. But instead of pulling away, flinching like Yutong expects, he just takes over control. Fingers pressing in just the slightest bit more, tracing over bone as he searches for any sign of breaks or fractures—
Yutong lets his hand fall back to the bed, surrenders to letting Zhan Yao do what he has to in order to reassure himself. And like this, Zhan Yao won’t notice him staring at him. He won’t notice him tracing the sharp shadows of his face, watching him in a way he’s never able to anymore, taking in as much as he can before this moment’s lost. And like this, he won’t notice the war waging behind his eyes.
Was he selfish? Not telling her?
If Yutong had died today, would he have died more selfish having never told him or having told him and then leaving him alone?
He doesn’t know how long this goes on, how long the question stays unanswered before he finds himself reaching up, cupping his hand around Zhan Yao’s cheek. Skin clammy and cold and Yutong knows his fever must be coming back again. He’ll need to rest soon. But Zhan Yao sighs, and Yutong knows he really must be feeling sick when instead of pushing him away, Zhan Yao turns to press his face into his palm.
“Your hand’s cold,” Zhan Yao whispers, nuzzling against him like the cat he always denies being. “Feels good.”
The flare of affection that whispers through him is enough Yutong’s heart trips over itself, warmth slipping through his veins. And he huffs a laugh, murmurs, “You’re such a cat.”
Zhan Yao blinks at him again, something unreadable flickering behind his eyes as he sits back on his heels. Hands leaving Yutong’s body. And Yutong fights down the disappointment that comes with that when he notes the exhaustion clinging to Zhan Yao’s shoulders.
“I’m still mad at you,” Zhan Yao whispers, but it’s more out of habit than anything. Lacking all the bite it should have.
Yutong hums in acknowledgement. “I’ll make you more soup in a bit.”
“You have to let me change the dressings.” And Yutong should refuse him. If only for the sake of his sanity. But he nods anyway, letting his hand slip from Zhan Yao’s skin, conceding this much.
In honesty, it’s not a sacrifice.
“Whatever you want,” he says, and it’s more true than Zhan Yao could ever know. More than he could ever understand. “But only if you go back to sleep.” Because he doesn’t know how much sleep Zhan Yao’s gotten today, but he doubts it’s as much as he should’ve.
And that thought is only reinforced when Zhan Yao, fever still building under his skin, shakes his head. “You need to sleep; I’ve slept enough. I should go—“
Yutong surges up, and Zhan Yao’s squawk of shock rings in his ear as he topples them both over onto the pillows. He wraps his arms around him, curling against his back. And Yutong knows he should move away. He should because this is closer than he’s allowed himself in weeks. But Zhan Yao’s body is fever warm and soft and like this, he can feel his heartbeat echoing through his ribcage. Like this, he can count his every breath and know for now, they’re both safe.
“’m tired, Kitten,” he grumbles, pressing his forehead to the back of his neck. “Just stay with me for a bit.” Like they don’t both know what he’s doing. Like he’s not bribing Zhan Yao to stay in bed with him with the promise he’ll also stay, that he’ll rest like Zhan Yao wants. “I won’t rest if I’m worried about your fever.”
And that at least is true, even if it is a thin excuse. Because Yutong doesn’t need to be pressed into his back to check his temperature. He doesn’t need his arms wrapped around his middle, and their legs tangled together. But well—they’ve slept like this before. Even if they rarely started the night this way, there have been numerous times Yutong’s woken up with Zhan Yao in his arms like this. And doing so now, the knot that’s built in his chest since this case started finally unravels.
“You’re going to be sore,” Zhan Yao mumbles. “You can’t be comfortable sleeping like this.”
“You’re cold enough you’re practically an icepack,” Yutong returns. Even if Zhan Yao’s body burns off a fever heat, prickling and stinging, Yutong knows he must feel like he’s freezing. He knows from the bumps across his skin, the shivers he thinks he’s hiding. He knows he must feel so cold.
Zhan Yao hates the cold.
Zhan Yao sighs, mumbles something under his breath. But he doesn’t fight him. He doesn’t argue it. He just lets Yutong hold him.
Selfish. Maybe he is selfish. But he doesn’t have an answer, and as Zhan Yao’s hands come up to wrap around his wrists, as Zhan Yao sinks back against him, Yutong swallows down the words so close to breaking free.
Maybe he’s a coward.
But tonight—tonight at least he has this.
The quiet stretches, and Yutong feels the haze of darkness start to slip over him, his own exhaustion finally catching up. Breathing in Zhan Yao’s familiar warmth, more relaxed than he’s been in months—
“Never do that again.” Zhan Yao’s voice comes with more strength than he should be capable of. A demand in it Yutong wouldn’t even consider refusing. As though he’s ever been able to refuse Zhan Yao anything. “Don’t go without me.”
Yutong knows he means into the field. Just as he promised before. But Yutong shifts closer, holds him tighter, lets him feel the echo of his heartbeat through his back. And he whispers, barely thinking, lost somewhere between sleeping and waking, “Don’t worry, Kitten. I’m here. I’ll keep you warm.”
A few days later, they’re back to old habits.
Yutong falling asleep on his side of the bed, waking up wrapped around Zhan Yao in a way that isn’t at all normal even for the closest of friends. But Zhan Yao hasn’t mentioned it, and Yutong feels like he’s not completely responsible for what his body does while he’s asleep. So they’ve fallen into a strange limbo. Both of them climbing into bed silent, a strange kind of tension sparking between them, and waking up to Yutong scrambling out of bed with far less dignity than when he went in.
It’s a problem. One Yutong figured would happen after he started it that night, after Zhan Yao’s fever broke and Yutong no longer had an excuse to lie half on top of him anymore.
It’s getting to be a big problem.
But whatever sacred tenant exists between them of not speaking before they fall asleep, huddling on their individual sides of the bed and refusing to acknowledge anything happening, shatters with the low rumble of Zhan Yao’s, “Yutong?”
And, well—for self-preservation’s sake, Yutong should really just ignore him and pretend he’s asleep. But Yutong has always been awful at ignoring Zhan Yao and Zhan Yao is way too perceptive which means he definitely knows he’s awake and ignoring him would just be rude—So instead, he makes a noncommittal hum of acknowledgement.
That seems to be permission enough because he hears the sheets rustle as Zhan Yao rolls over to face him.
Zhan Yao facing him. Watching him. Turned his direction. And if Yutong were to turn over right now, they’d practically be nose to nose and that’s just dangerous—
“Da-jie’s party.”
Silence follows. No further explanation. Like Yutong should know what that means or why it matters. Like Yutong even cares about it at all aside from the fact Qingtang had stormed into the SCI office in a cloud of rage and chaos and ordered everyone to come. Some charity banquet with a lot of important people there. Or something.
And Yutong wants to tell Zhan Yao he doesn’t have to go. He knows how Zhan Yao feels about parties. He knows how much he hates them. And really, Qingtang’s repeated attempts to make Zhan Yao socialize only ever end in trauma for both of them. But convincing Qingtang of that is almost impossible, and while Yutong would do anything for Zhan Yao, he figures there’ll be a much better time for him to die for him than right now at Qingtang’s enraged hands.
Zhan Yao lets out a quiet sound. “Do you—Do you—“ Shifting against the pillow, the scratching of nails across fabric. And Yutong is very glad he was smart enough to sleep with his back to him because with the way things are going, if he had to look Zhan Yao in the eye, he’s not sure what he’d do. He’s not sure, but it would probably make all of their recent transgressions through the hard-set rules of male friendship look like nothing.
“Are we going together?”
The question settles in the silence, but all Yutong knows is the weight of his gaze on the back of his neck, the prickling over his skin. Strange for a question as benign as that. But at the same time, it prickles a warning at the back of Yutong’s mind. Because Zhan Yao hates parties. He should not be asking to go; he should be begging Yutong to give him an excuse to not. Searching frantically for cases critical enough to free him from Qingtang’s wrath—
Yutong hums. “I won’t be your human shield against Jie.”
Zhan Yao stays quiet for another second, and Yutong wonders if he’s fallen asleep. But then he says, “We could go to dinner after.”
“Jie’s parties always have food,” he mumbles, tugging his pillow closer. “If you’re still hungry after, I can cook something.”
Zhan Yao lets out a frustrated sound, exhausted and annoyed. “Never mind. Forget I said anything.”
Yutong was planning to anyway, but he hears Zhan Yao turn over again, turn away. And the breath of relief is almost as strong as the sense of loss. But the thought flickers at the back of his mind, the question of why Zhan Yao bothered to ask—
“You can’t drive,” Yutong notes. “Of course we’re going together. Who else would you go with?” And he can’t help the tinge of panic in his voice, afraid he’s going to tell him that his nighttime shooting range excursions with Zhao Fu have extended to nighttime outings with Zhao Fu and he swears if Zhan Yao takes his chauffeur position from him too, he may scream.
But Zhan Yao lets out another annoyed, borderline murderous sound. “I can have someone else take me if it bothers you that much,” he snaps.
“But—who?”
A pillow smacks him over the head. And Zhan Yao snaps, “I have friends, Dead Mouse. I’m not as ostracized as you seem to think.”
Disappointment biting the questions back. Not the answer he wanted or needed. And he presses his lips together, curling tighter on his side and tugging his pillow closer. Holding it and pretending it’s enough. Pretending he doesn’t desperately want to reach back and tuck Zhan Yao into his chest, press his nose to the back of his neck, breathe in the familiar whisper of mint and the warmth of his skin. Hold him and know that he’s allowed. And he mumbles, “I’ll take you, Kitten.”
But he’s done this before. He can do it again. Probably.
The second they step through the gate to the torch lit swimming pool hosting Qingtang’s party, Zhan Yao detaches himself from his side. Which is—weird in and of itself. And disconcerting. Because Zhan Yao hates parties. He hates everything about them. The only times he’s ever gone before are times when Yutong’s dragged him kicking and screaming. And even then, he’d spend the entire night glued to Yutong’s side, expressing unsubtly and repeatedly how displeased he was at the fact he was there at all.
And demanding Yutong make him some disgustingly sweet dessert as payment for his presence. Which Yutong always would. Because though Yutong would never admit it, though it should’ve been more than obvious by the fact Yutong kept taking him, Yutong liked having Zhan Yao there.
Which means when Zhan Yao vanishes into the swarm of black ties and sparkling dresses, Yutong tries not to feel too much like he’s lost a limb.
It’s an hour later, and Yutong’s been trying to navigate himself through the crowd, performing all the social niceties expected of the brother of Bai Enterprises’ CEO. Humoring the women trying every wile in the book to get on his good side and the men throwing promises of contacts and exclusive, pre-release sports cars at him like he has any influence on what contracts Qingtang takes. Like it’s at all appropriate to be trying to bribe a police officer.
Like Yutong has any idea what the hell his sister’s company even does.
He still hasn’t spotted Zhan Yao. And a part of him is getting concerned he may have been eaten. Or kidnapped as leverage in whatever bizarre game Qingtang has dragged them both into.
He’s going to kill her. Once he finds her. But he hasn’t so much managed a glimpse of her yet either and he can’t help but think that’s strategic.
He’s in the middle of a painfully boring conversation about skin care products with a woman in an uncomfortably low-cut dress when his Zhan Yao radar finally goes off. And he whips around at the relief that floods him, fully intending to grab him by the arm and drag them both out of this dystopian hell-scape before any more of his moral integrity can be eroded by sheer proximity to these people. And Zhan Yao will at least be happy about it. Grateful, even. Because Zhan Yao hates parties. And Zhan Yao hates people. And Zhan Yao—
Is currently getting hit on at the open bar.
It takes Yutong a second of numb blinking to figure out what he’s looking at, to figure out what he’s seeing and what the hell it means. But sure enough, Zhan Yao is leaning back against the counter, long legs crossed at the ankles, drink he hasn’t touched cradled in his hands as he tilts his head at something the other man is saying. And that just lengthens the line of his neck, exposing far more than should be possible given the height of his collar—
He looks—His hair is tousled in a way it wasn’t when they got here. Like he’s run his fingers through it too many times. And for a second, Yutong revels in the pure denial that washes over him, reassuring him that Zhan Yao’s always been horrifically oblivious to his own charms. That whatever’s happening there, it isn’t intentional and this guy will soon go away, crushed and disappointed—
But this man—wavy hair that hangs just over his ears and broad shoulders and a smile so bleached it blinds Yutong even from halfway across the pool—shifts closer, hand falling to Zhan Yao’s bicep—
And instead of smacking him away and recoiling like he should, Zhan Yao reaches up, brushes an imaginary piece of lint off the guy’s shoulder, and Yutong’s thoughts fracture under a haze of red.
He’s thrown back to that night in the bullpen. Zhan Yao leaning over him, electricity saturating the air to burn his skin—Far more attractive than he has any right to be. Far better at seduction than anyone supposedly without practical experience should be—A look in his eyes then so similar to the one he sees now—
And Yutong doesn’t know what he’s doing. But his vision has narrowed to nothing but the smile that spreads across Zhan Yao’s face, brighter and more open than it should be. He doesn’t know what he’s doing, but his mind is empty of everything except the pure, basic instinct to chop every single one of this guy’s fingers off—And as he shoves himself away from the conversation, not even bothering to excuse himself, he doesn’t know what he’s going to when he gets there, but this cannot continue. It can’t—
He’s wrenched off-course by a hand seizing around his arm, a startled shout dragging him out of the throng of people and shattering through his tunnel vision. And when he blinks, he finds himself in a somewhat darkened corner behind a cabana, staring down at his sister.
Qingtang. This is all her fault.
“Where do you think you’re going?” she asks, a tinge of amusement coloring the concern in her voice. And the snarl that pulls from him is almost as fractured and out of control as he feels—
“To rescue Zhan Yao,” he snaps. Because that should be more than obvious. Because Qingtang should know that after she’s subjected them both to this hell—“We’re leaving.”
He goes to turn away, goes to run—
But sharp nails long enough to be classified as dangerous weapons bite into his wrist, dragging him back into the shadows—“That is the head of Jiu Ge Corporations,” Qingtang hisses at him. Like that means anything. Like he knows what that is or cares even the slightest bit—“Do not insult him.”
He whips around, a flash of betrayal washing over him as he looks at her. Decked out in a silver dress that shines like diamonds, even in the shadows. Eyes just as hard. And something in him withers, red receding, swallowed by the uncomfortable twisting in his chest—“He’s cornered Zhan Yao.”
“Does Xiao Zhan look bothered to you?” she snaps, gesturing toward the bar. And even through the throng of people, his eyes find Zhan Yao immediately. A flash of darkness cut through the warm light of the torches, simple and pure midnight against the gaudy flashing of rubies and diamonds and sapphires. And he’s still in that same place. He’s still smiling at that man who’s encroached much too far into his personal space, and even from here, Yutong can read the lack of tension in his shoulders, the easiness of his movements—“I mean it, Yutong,” she continues. “This guy has refused every contract from every company thrown his way. Do not interfere.”
And as that registers, the horror that bursts through him is enough to distract from the uncomfortable whispering at the back of his mind—“You can’t pimp Zhan Yao out,” he gasps, scandalized. But she can’t just—She can’t use Zhan Yao and his stupidly beautiful face to get contracts. That’s unfair. That’s unethical. That’s—
Fingers snap in front of his nose, refocusing him on the bright red blood painting Qingtang’s lips—“Zhan Yao is an adult and if you hadn’t noticed, a psychological genius,” she returns. “I think he’s more than capable of getting out of this situation himself if he wants.”
And that’s—Yutong wants to tell her she’s wrong. Because for as brilliant as Zhan Yao is, he’s never understood basic human interaction. He’s never known how to deal with people’s intentions toward him, has never been good at recognizing them, which is why he’s always managed to be painfully oblivious to Yutong’s. Zhan Yao just doesn’t—he doesn’t get it. Which is why for all of his genius, for all of his ability to read everyone and everything, he’s never so much as considered Yutong as a possibility—
The discomforting feeling tightens in his chest, a steel band around his ribs.
“It’s not like this is new to him. People aren’t blind,” Qingtang sighs. “Have you seen Xiao Zhan recently?”
Of course he has. He knows Zhan Yao’s attractive. He knows that better than anyone. Because Zhan Yao—Zhan Yao’s gorgeous right now, devastating in his perfection like something lifted off a magazine cover. But Yutong also knows what he looks like when he’s dazed and half-asleep and stumbling into doors because his brain has a far longer boot-up time than it should. And when he’s sick and by all accounts disgusting because he hasn’t showered, but so painfully adorable when his nose wrinkles at the medicine Yutong tries to feed him. And when he’s passed out and drooling and kicking Yutong under the covers—
Because the Zhan Yao everyone sees is so different than the one Yutong gets to, fractures in the professional, untouchable, perfect veneer he wears like a second skin. Because Yutong knows what he looks like when he’s human. And Yutong may be pathetically besotted and hopelessly in love but there isn’t a version of Zhan Yao he hasn’t found beautiful.
Zhan Yao shifts, offers something held between his fingers to the man. And even from this distance, Yutong knows what it is.
Zhan Yao’s business card. With his phone number on it. Basically written permission to contact him and continue this pursuit or whatever the hell this is—
Yutong’s heart gives a sad little kick.
A quiet sound drifts from Qingtang’s shadow, pained, a bit exhausted. And when he looks at her, her lips have pulled into a sad smile. “Yutong-ah,” she says, dragging it out. The same way she used to call for him when he was a child, indulgent and so terribly compassionate. “You didn’t really expect him to wait forever, did you?”
He doesn’t want to think too much about what that means. About the hollowness spreading to overtake his chest. But her long nails scratch over his skin as she pats his cheek. And when she turns away, disappearing back into the crowd to leave him alone, something turns heavy and sour in his stomach.
He doesn’t know how long he stands there before he becomes aware of the footsteps approaching. And it’s only the fading instincts, barely firing, that give him warning—
“Yutong?” Zhan Yao calls. “Are you okay?”
His voice welcome and warm under the rush of cold in his veins. Dark eyes staring at him—just at him with a flicker of concern that shouldn’t make his heart thud in his chest. And Yutong—Yutong’s not okay. He’s not. He hasn’t been for a long time now. Not since he was fifteen, lying next to his best friend on the floor of his room, and realized he would be happy spending a lifetime just like that. Just in that moment.
Zhan Yao so very close. Close enough he could close the gap between them, reach out and touch him
He didn’t then.
He didn’t.
And now—Zhan Yao is dark hair against moon-soaked skin. Sharp eyes that thaw to a liquid warmth only in the rarest of circumstances. A smile that could bring nations to their knees, has rendered better men than Yutong weak and stuttering.
Close. So very close. Close enough he could reach out, take Zhan Yao’s hand in his and pull him away from this place. Try to make him understand how desperately, painfully he’s already loved. Try to make him understand that he doesn’t need anyone else. Not really. Yutong will love him enough, does love him more than anyone else could hope to. And if he’d just give him a chance, he’d spend every single second of their remaining lives proving that.
But his fingers prickle at his sides, and he doesn’t.
He doesn’t.
“Fine,” he says, coughing around the dryness in his throat. “I’m fine.”
Zhan Yao tilts his head, worry only deepening. “I didn’t get you sick, did I? You look pale—“
“I’m fine.” Sharp. Cutting him off. An obvious interruption, a deflection it wouldn’t take the smartest criminal psychologist in the world to see through. But Zhan Yao just goes silent as Yutong turns away, stealing a flute of champagne from a passing waiter. A distant hope that will be enough to numb the ache building in his chest. “That guy you were talking to is an important client. Don’t scare him off.”
Zhan Yao stills, eyes burning into Yutong’s skin. And after another second, laughter huffs over his lips, but it doesn’t sound amused. It doesn’t sound anything like the bright sound that guy pulled from him. Empty and forced and it—it hurts. Because Yutong’s getting it wrong. He always gets it wrong with Zhan Yao.
He smiled so easily just moments ago. Why does being near Yutong always hurt him?
But he just sighs, whispers, “All right.” Nothing else. A quiet acceptance. And when Yutong turns back around, reaching for something else to say, Zhan Yao’s gone. He’s gone, and Yutong doesn’t see him again until it’s time to go home. At which point Yutong is drunk enough Qingtang has to take them both home anyway.
Yutong is spared the torture of having to share a bed with Zhan Yao by virtue of spending the rest of the night puking his guts up in the bathroom.
Lessons learned: champagne numbs nothing. It just throws oil on the fire.
Things—get worse after that.
Yutong didn’t think they could. He thought he had hit rock bottom when he walked into his apartment and found Zhan Yao wearing nothing but a towel. But it turns out the only torture worse than having Zhan Yao in front of him all the time and not being allowed to reach out for him is not having Zhan Yao in front of him all the time.
Sure, they’re still working together. Sure, Zhan Yao is still staying in his apartment. But if they’re in the office, every opportunity Zhan Yao can find to not be in his presence is seized the second it makes itself known. And at home, Zhan Yao is quiet and removed, ignoring all of Yutong’s coaxing for him to go to bed in favor of some paper deadline he has coming up, sending him away with little more than a mumble and a wave of his hand.
And Yutong goes. He goes and he stays up waiting until Zhan Yao finally climbs into the other side of the bed at ungodly hours of the morning. And he pretends he’s asleep and Zhan Yao pretends he doesn’t know he isn’t and the void between them stretches wider and wider until Yutong’s sure it’s going to swallow them both.
It’s—strange. Very strange. But Yutong, despite all Zhan Yao’s comments to the contrary, isn’t dumb enough to not know he’s screwed up. He isn’t oblivious enough to think this isn’t his fault. But—But he doesn’t know why, exactly. He gets Zhan Yao is upset with him. He gets he’s angry. But he doesn’t know which of the many mistakes he’s made in his life has set him off this time.
And he really doesn’t know what to do about it.
So he’s as relieved as he is concerned when six days after Qingtang’s disastrous party, Zhan Yao walks into his office unprompted.
And he wants to think nothing’s wrong. He wants to think this is just a normal case update. But—But they have no cases going on right now, just an obnoxious amount of paperwork Yutong keeps pretending he doesn’t have to do and delegating to Bai Chi. And Zhan Yao’s lips are pressed into a thin line, chin raised and eyes narrowed in that way he gets when he’s trying to figure something out. Like staring too hard down a microscope—
Yutong isn’t quite sure why he’s been stuck on the slide, but he knows he doesn’t want to be there. He’s spent a large portion of his life attempting to ignore Zhan Yao’s psychoanalysis. Now, with his fraying control and the sizzling bitterness of an emotion he absolutely refuses to acknowledge as jealousy simmering under his skin—now is certainly not the time.
“Yutong—“
Zhan Yao stops, shifts, crosses his arms over his chest. And that just draws Yutong’s attention to where his sleeves are pushed up to his elbows, dress shirt pulled tight around his shoulders, tucked into pants that really are far too tight to be practical. Emphasizing long legs and thighs far stronger than should belong to a professor—
“Yutong.”
He jumps, flinches sharp enough his knee slams into the underside of his desk. Wincing as his gaze darts away from Zhan Yao’s increasingly disapproving stare—
Punishment. Well-deserved punishment because what the hell is he doing?
“You didn’t hear anything I just said, did you?” Zhan Yao sounds put-upon, tinged with an exhaustion Yutong doesn’t quite understand. But he tilts his head, waiting for Yutong to answer him, and Yutong—is usually very good at these games. Lying. He had almost 93% accuracy answering in class, no matter how asleep he’d been before the teacher called him out. But now—Now Yutong’s brain buzzes, a nervous shameful energy prickling under his skin, and he doesn’t even know how to begin to pretend. He just knows Zhan Yao needs to leave this room. He needs to leave and Yutong needs to get his head on straight—
“I—“ Yutong stutters, throat tightening as Zhan Yao raises his eyebrows. “I um—“
Zhan Yao’s jaw jumps—“Yutong—“
A shrill ringing slices through the air—and Yutong hates himself a bit for the relief that washes over him, sinking back in his chair, skin stinging with a ridiculous cold sweat. But Zhan Yao shoots him a look as he reaches into his pocket, pulling out the cell phone that saved Yutong’s sanity.
It takes Yutong a moment to realize Zhan Yao hasn’t answered it yet, that he’s just staring at the offending device with his lips twisted up. Like he’s not quite sure what to do with the caller-id staring back at him. And that makes something pull in Yutong’s stomach, straightening up in his chair—
He should understand what that means at the very least. He thinks—He thinks at one point, he always knew what was going on in Zhan Yao’s head.
The ringing cuts off—“Chu-ge, I was just about to call—“
Whoever’s on the other end interrupts, babbling too fast and too loud, but all Yutong knows is the low ringing that starts up in his ears, the slamming of his heart against the inside of his ribcage—
Chu-ge.
Who—Yutong knows all of Zhan Yao’s colleagues. At least—At least he thought he did. How did he manage to get close enough to anyone without Yutong noticing to use that familiar of language with him?
Ge. Zhan Yao doesn’t call people ge. He doesn’t—
“—can meet you before the lecture. There’s a coffee place nearby.”
Zhan Yao doesn’t drink coffee. He doesn’t drink coffee and he doesn’t know anyone named Chu-ge and the room is spinning. The room is spinning way too much and Yutong doesn’t know what this tightness is in his chest but he thinks it may be panic.
Zhan Yao mumbles an agreement, says he’ll see him later with more warmth than should be allowed. And when he shoves his phone back into his pocket, all Yutong knows is a deafening silence.
“Who was that?”
Zhan Yao startles, blinks at him, a little wide-eyed. Like he’s just remembered Yutong’s in the room. But he shakes himself, says, “Someone I met at Da-jie’s party.”
Da-jie’s party. And now—Now Yutong thinks he actually will be sick. He thinks it’s a good thing he keeps a trashcan near his desk because his mind flashes back to Zhan Yao at the bar, to that rich businessman who kept leaning too far into his space, the person Zhan Yao must be talking about—
You didn’t expect him to wait forever, did you?
Cold. Cold and sick and Yutong feels something crack in his chest, sharp and jagged as he stares at him. Washed out under the fluorescent lights but somehow still so beautiful. Still the most beautiful thing Yutong has ever seen in his life—And it kicks him hard in the stomach how long he’s been leaning into the certainty that Zhan Yao didn’t get it, that he didn’t understand. Because if that were the case—If Zhan Yao were oblivious and uninterested, well—Every time Yutong swallowed the words down, every time he didn’t say it, it was okay. It was okay—They still had time. He still had time to make it to the right time—
He thought they’d have time. He thought—he’d have time.
But as he watches Zhan Yao now, he realizes his time’s been running out for awhile now. Long before that stupid party, long before Yutong even realized what it meant—probably before New York. Because it was a small miracle Zhan Yao came back without a significant other. It was a small miracle their timer reset.
It was okay, he thought. It was—Zhan Yao didn’t have to know yet. He could—He could tell him later. He could—
“I’m going to a conference in Beijing next week.”
The words fall heavy, damning in the silence. And all Yutong knows is the tightening in his throat, the horrible, twisting monster in his chest that screams at him to close the space between them. To press him back against the wall and wrap himself around him and hide him away. To crush their lips together and make him understand with actions in all the ways he’s always failed with words—To kiss him until he understands that he’s Yutong’s. That he’s always been Yutong’s—
A lie. Another lie. Because he’s never been Yutong’s. Zhan Yao—Zhan Yao has been making choices all along, and Zhan Yao—didn’t choose him.
“I’ll approve the time off,” Yutong returns, and his voice sounds flat, dead even to him. But it’s better that than whatever this horrible feeling is welling up in his throat, suffocating pain wrapped with a violent red—“We have things under control here. Don’t worry about it.”
Zhan Yao blinks at him again, something flickering behind his eyes. And Yutong—doesn’t know what that’s about. If Zhan Yao really expected he’d deny him this. Because Yutong may be petty and a bit of a workaholic in his own right but Zhan Yao’s life is his life and he has a whole career outside of the SCI. Yutong knows that; Yutong’s always known that—
“Right.” Zhan Yao swallows, ducking his chin to his chest. “I probably won’t be in much the next couple days. I’ll have to prepare for my presentation and sort out substitutes at the university.”
Yutong bites down on the flicker of pain that promises, the certainty that he’s going to see even less of Zhan Yao. The realization that one day—he’s not going to have any of Zhan Yao. That he may continue working at SCI as long as Bao Sir lets them but one day, that’ll be all that’s left of them.
His hands tighten around the edges of his desk—“Do what you need to do.”
Zhan Yao grits his teeth, reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose. A sign of a building headache—the kind he only gets when he’s been spending too many nights working out a problem with no answer. Frustration and tension burning off of him—“My case files aren’t—“
“Zhan Yao.” Exasperated, trying to force some humor into his voice, but it comes out too sharp, brittle—“One week without you isn’t going to destroy the SCI. Just go.”
He freezes, words echoing, ringing in his ears. Reverberating through time as they bounce off the walls—
Just go, Zhan Yao.
It’s just New York, not Mars.
There’s no reason for you to stay here.
Why would you stay here?
Just go.
For a second, he thinks Zhan Yao might not remember, may not hold that conversation in the same place at the front of his mind. Bathed in acid and preserved with a pain he’s never stopped worrying at. But Zhan Yao’s face falls blank. Cold, detached, professional—
Yutong’s heart jolts, stomach wrenching. Nausea welling up with an apology he doesn’t understand. Because even at their worst—even at their most awkward and most broken—Zhan Yao’s never looked at him like that.
“My power’s back on,” Zhan Yao states. Empty. Robotic. “I’ll be out of your apartment tonight.”
“Zhan Yao—“ But before he can even figure out how to word the question, Zhan Yao is gone. Door clicking shut instead of slamming. And somehow—Somehow it’s all the more damning.
Zhan Yao doesn’t come in the next day. Or the next. Every time he shows up to work, it’s to a message sitting on his desk claiming Zhan Yao has this and that and something else to do at the university and to call him if there’s a disaster.
The fifth day he doesn’t come to work, Yutong accepts that maybe he’s not been handling his Zhan Yao-problem as well as he thought.
Sure, Zhan Yao always being there, stupidly beautiful and perfect and oblivious, was about to drive him to a mental breakdown. But he’d rather him be here than not. He’d sacrifice his mental state a thousand times over if it meant keeping Zhan Yao close.
And this—the empty office next to his, the empty silence of his apartment, the empty cold of his bed—It all feels a little too much like it did ten years ago. Wandering Hong Kong with Zhan Yao half a world away from him, so distantly, painfully out of reach.
He’s within reach now. So close Yutong could reach out and take his hand and ask him to dinner with the words he’s been rehearsing, running over and over in his mind since he was fifteen.
He could.
But Zhan Yao’s office stays dark and empty and Yutong’s apartment stays the same and he wonders how it’s possible that despite Zhan Yao being closer than ever, Yutong misses him the same as he did then.
Another day brings with it Yutong’s worst nightmare.
He doesn’t know what happened. He doesn’t know how it happened. Because he’d only left him alone for a few days, and really, no one should be that danger prone. The universe shouldn’t allow it. But then—the universe seems to have a sick sense of humor where Yutong’s concerned, and it seemed interested in throwing it in his face every chance it got—
“Let them work, Yutong.” Bao Sir. An order. But it sounds so far away, tinny and distant. A hollow echo in his ears. And all Yutong sees is the bank three blocks from Zhan Yao’s dorm bathed in red and blue lights. All he hears is shouting and the whirr of sirens and the cold detached whispering of “experts” trying to figure out what to do.
I’m the one who’ll have to identify your body.
A hand on his arm—too many people crying. All the people Zhan Yao managed to get out in exchange for himself, convincing the criminal to let them go but never considering—Never thinking for one second that maybe someone cared just as much whether he walked out with them. Saving so many families from grief, and yet—
He jerks his arm free, throwing himself across a police line he has no authorization to cross. And he knows he shouldn’t be thinking like this. He knows. They’re cops. They put their lives on the line for a living. This is what they do. But Zhan Yao is hidden away from him behind barred doors and his life is in the hands of too many people who are just doing their jobs.
“Yutong.”
Bao Sir again. Another hand on his shoulder, this time strong enough to drag him backward, to stop him. And Yutong grits his teeth against the impulse to lash out, against the ugly burning in his stomach that screams he’s wasting time. That he’s already wasted far too much—
“I’m going in,” he breathes. “It’s been over an hour.”
An hour of silence from inside. An hour of pacing back and forth while the hostage negotiators tried to convince the man to surrender—but none of them are Zhan Yao. And the fact Zhan Yao is still in there, that he hasn’t managed to talk himself out—well, that says he can’t. And if he can’t—
“I’m going,” he repeats. Closer to begging than he should allow, a frantic edge he barely recognizes. But all he knows is his own voice ringing in his ears, the sharp cracking of something vital—Just go.
Bao Sir forces out a breath, regret carving lines across his forehead, around the corners of his mouth. Resigned. “You know you can’t. You’re too emotionally invested—“
“It’s Zhan Yao.” Shattering. The horrifying splintering sound of his chest finally breaking apart, echoing loud enough some of the recruits glance over at them. And Yutong knows he can’t talk to his superior like this. He’ll be lucky if Bao Sir doesn’t fire him on the spot. But his heartbeat slams against the inside of his ribcage, catches on fractured bone, and he breathes, “Please.”
The only thing he has left to say, not even sure if it’s meant for him or just the universe in general. Please let him go in. Please let him save him. Please let Zhan Yao be okay—Pleasepleaseplease—
Bao Sir presses his lips together, watching him. But something seems to thaw behind his eyes, and Yutong’s thrown back to when they were kids, to when he was just their uncle who taught them to pickpocket candies from their parents. The same uncle who picked him up from school the first time he’d punched someone for breaking Zhan Yao’s finger—the uncle who looked at his bruised and bloodied knuckles and just sighed, said, “Learn to protect him better.”
And maybe this isn’t what he meant. Maybe he never meant learn to throw a punch so it doesn’t hurt. Maybe he never meant learn how to do it and not get caught. And maybe he never meant get stronger and better so that no one would dare even think about hurting him again.
Maybe he never meant learn how to die for him.
But Yutong has spent a lifetime standing between Zhan Yao and anything that would hurt him. He intends to end his life doing the same. And this—this moment is just proof that for as strong as he’s gotten, for his flawless arrest record and his ranking at the academy and everything he’s ever been—Bao Sir’s still right.
This never should’ve happened.
Forcing out a breath, Bao Sir squeezes his shoulder, nods his head—“Do what you have to do.” Just that. No hollow platitudes or forced promises. And a wave of dizzy relief washes over him as he turns away, forcing his expression blank and his stride even.
“Zhao Fu and Ma Han, you’re with me. We’re going in,” he says, gaze fixed on the front door as they rush off to find equipment, ignoring the glare he gets from the man previously in charge. And at that moment, Yutong doesn’t care who he is or what credentials are next to his name. The best officers in Hong Kong swarming this building—but none of them are him. And there’s no one—no one better at protecting Zhan Yao.
A vest waves in front of him, and he blinks, gaze focusing in—
Bai Chi.
He gives a small smile, unsteady, wavering—“B-bring him back?” And when Yutong nods, it blooms full and bright and certain. Like there’s no alternative. Like just because Yutong said it, it’s enough.
Pulling the vest over his head, he rolls his shoulders down, mind slipping into a familiar silence. And he breathes, “All right, Kitten. Just a little longer.”
It isn’t hard.
Smoke fills the air, chaos swarming the empty atrium of the bank. But the man falls just as anyone would with a bullet to the chest.
Pulling the trigger isn’t hard.
He thinks maybe it should’ve been.
But all he knows is the empty silence as the smoke clears. All he knows is the stampeding of footsteps and the nothing where he expected to find Zhan Yao. And while blood pours red across the icy tile floor, shouts pouring from the man’s accomplices, all he knows is Zhan Yao isn’t here.
He isn’t here.
His finger twitches around the trigger of his gun, cold nothingness flooding his body. The same he’s trained on too many combat missions, calculating and lethal and so detached the world around him turns to streaks of movement and sound. Mind aware of too much and not enough, drowned out with an empty ringing—
“Bai Sir.”
Ma Han.
His gaze flicks up at the clicking of her shoes, static fraying under his skin as she slows—“We found him.”
It doesn’t register. Too slow. Slower than the bullet would be to end each of these miserable lives—
“We found him. He’s okay.”
Okay.
He’s—
Numbness washes through him strong enough he nearly drops his gun, only just managing to shove it in its holster as he trips after her. Following the swish of her ponytail as she disappears down the stairs, jumping off the bottom three steps as he skids around the corner.
The vault door standing open, medics lurking around. Someone calling for oxygen, low muttering filling the hall—
Zhan Yao.
Zhan Yao sitting on the ground, knees pulled into his chest as medics fuss around him. Pale, dark circles stained under his eyes, a bruise splotching his right forearm. But he looks up. He looks up and his gaze locks on Yutong with all the force of a fist to the chest—
His lips quirk up. “You’re late, Mouse.”
Yutong blinks at him once—twice—And he closes the space, knees slamming into the ground at his side as he pulls Zhan Yao into his chest. Ignoring his startled squeak, the officers and medics staring at them. But it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter because Zhan Yao is here. He’s alive and he’s breathing and that’s enough. That’s—
Hands seize in the back of his shirt, twisting in the fabric to drag Yutong closer. Like he needs this as badly as Yutong does. Like he needs the reassurance. A small tremor running through his body he’s trying so hard to hide—
Pulling back, Yutong cups his hands around his neck just to feel his heartbeat thrumming under his skin. Just to prove it to himself. And Zhan Yao sighs, eyes slipping closed as he leans into him. A little more of the tension slipping away.
“Are you hurt?” he asks, scanning over his face for obvious injuries. But as Zhan Yao shakes his head, hands tightening around Yutong’s wrists like he doesn’t want him to move, Yutong wishes he had followed through and just shot them all. Because Zhan Yao may be physically okay, but he’s more shaken up than he’d ever admit.
“What were you thinking?” Zhan Yao whispers, thumbs swiping over the backs of Yutong’s hands. “How could you come in here?” More to himself than to Yutong. Exhausted even as it rings with something warm, soft. The same voice he used patching up Yutong’s split knuckles, his bloodied lip.
And swallowing thick, he breathes, “How could I not?”
Zhan Yao’s eyes flicker open, something vulnerable, raw swirling just out of reach. And Yutong thinks he should know what that means. He should. But his mind catches on the warmth of skin against his, breath fanning over his chin—
Zhan Yao could’ve died.
His breath hitches, panic welling up in his throat as he leans forward to press his forehead to Zhan Yao’s.
Was he selfish? For not telling her?
“Kitten—“ Not even sure what he’s going to say, not even sure where he’s going with that. But there’s something terrifying bubbling up in his chest. Something right on the edge of everything and Zhan Yao is so close and Gongsun’s voice keeps echoing in his ears—“Kitten—I—“
A hand lands on his back, and Yutong tenses, cold searing through his veins as Zhan Yao pulls away from him. An irrational, kneejerk reaction to drag him close again. Like Zhan Yao being an inch away would put him in danger again. Like it’s too far—
A sigh. “Go home. Both of you.” A welcome order for the first time since this nightmare began. And then Bao Sir pats his shoulder, squeezes—“You did well.”
Reassurance. A promise gentling the burning under his skin. But it tastes like a lie, rings hollow. And as Zhan Yao shoves himself to his feet, wavering only the slightest bit with the change, Yutong thinks maybe that’s been the problem all along.
Maybe prison was too kind a fate for him.
Zhan Yao’s dorm is quiet. A tense sort of quiet that stands Yutong’s hair on end. But he’s sitting on the couch, hands laced behind his neck as he listens to Zhan Yao rustle around in his bedroom. Changing his clothes, probably taking a second to breathe. But Yutong hasn’t been able to focus on anything but the twisting in his chest since they left the crime scene and his head is spinning and—
Zhan Yao could’ve died.
He could’ve—And while Yutong would protect him from anything and everything—He was wrong to think that made them invulnerable. That he’d have time. That he’d always have time. He was so wrong to think that meant Zhan Yao couldn’t ever be taken away from him.
And he thinks—he thinks he has his answer. Finally. After an entire lifetime. He thinks—He thinks he finally understands what he’s always gotten wrong.
The door creaks open, the padding of slippers across the floor. So painfully familiar. And when Yutong looks up, Zhan Yao’s wearing the cat sweater he’d gotten him as a joke when they were eighteen, fraying at the edges, stretched out and hanging loose over his bony frame. He’s wearing the sweatpants with the broken drawstring, and those ridiculous cat slippers he loves way more than is healthy—
He looks—comfortable. And a bit of a mess. And—And like Zhan Yao. The Zhan Yao who slept on his bedroom floor and climbed through his window in the dead of night. The Zhan Yao he knows better than anyone.
He’s really—He’s really beautiful.
Zhan Yao stops in front of him, sleeves hanging too long and floppy over his hands. Shifting a bit on his feet. And Yutong thinks he should say something. He thinks—He thinks he has a lot to say, that he should say. And all he manages is, “I made you tea.”
Zhan Yao glances to the end table behind him, the chrysanthemum concoction Yutong maintains tastes like grass. And though Zhan Yao’s lips quirk up at the corners, he seems—tense. Agitated. A nervous twitch to his fingers as he waits—
Yutong swallows around the lump in his throat, glances around the disaster of Zhan Yao’s house. The takeout containers stacked on the table and the papers strewn over the couch and his fingers twitch with the need to scrape it all back together again. And he wishes he could fix them just as easily. He wishes—“Zhan Yao—“
“I’m sorry.”
He freezes, blinking as the words echo in the silence of Zhan Yao’s apartment. Trying to figure out how they were stolen out of his mouth. But Zhan Yao’s still not looking at him. And that’s—“What are you sorry for?”
“I shouldn’t have—“ He forces out a breath, crosses his arms over his chest. “I should’ve been more careful.” Yutong catches the tightening of his lips, the flicker of his eyes away before they come back to him. Only for a breath, just a second. But it’s a tell he’s never managed to train away—
“I’m—“ Zhan Yao shifts on his feet, fingers tightening at the end of his sleeves. “Thank you. For saving me.”
And Zhan Yao may be an expert in psychology but Yutong is an expert in Zhan Yao. He’s spent almost his entire lifetime watching him, memorizing him, knowing him. And he knows what it looks like when he’s in pain. He knows, has had to learn because Zhan Yao has always hidden it so well.
Reaching out, he circles his fingers around Zhan Yao’s wrist, letting out a breath as he presses his fingers into his pulse point. Letting his heartbeat drown out the noise in his head. Letting himself focus on that and nothing else—
“I’ll always save you,” he promises. So much less than what he wants to say but somehow still so damning in the quiet of the apartment. Yutong has never been good with words. And he always seems to get worse whenever Zhan Yao’s around, crumbling into silence because he knows they’re important—
But Zhan Yao blinks at him, so beautiful and so familiar and Yutong breathes, “Kitten, you’ve always been my best friend.” Before anything else, before everything else. The foundation of everything they are. Zhan Yao is his best friend, and if that’s all they’ll ever be, Yutong will still fight and bleed and die for him.
Zhan Yao’s lips twitch up, but it’s almost—pained. Not the bright smile Yutong wants or the huffy, embarrassed snort he expects. Instead, he looks—sad.
“Okay,” he whispers. But nothing more than that. Just watching Yutong, like he’s understanding something Yutong doesn’t, and that—
Swallowing, Yutong lets his fingers fall away, fighting away the prickling that starts back up under his skin. The impulse to press his hands to Zhan Yao’s heartbeat and never let him leave again. But though it’s thin, forced, he smiles, says, “What about you? Supposedly you have a closet full of friends you aren’t telling me about. Who’s your best friend?”
Zhan Yao rolls his eyes, huffs a laugh that makes Yutong feel a little too proud. “What closet? What friends? You know as well as I do people don’t like me.”
And that—Yutong lets out a pained sound. Opens his mouth to correct him—
“But even if I did, you’d still be my best friend.” Yutong freezes, fingers twitching numb at his sides. But Zhan Yao’s staring at the ground, face shadowed that way he always gets when he’s saying something he doesn’t want Yutong to know, saying something that means something. And Yutong’s heart trips over itself—“I don’t—I don’t need other friends.”
Zhan Yao looks up at him, more vulnerable than Yutong’s seen him in years. Like a part of him is terrified to say it. And Yutong feels the knot in his chest release, smile softening.
He thinks—He thinks that’s good enough. This beautiful, brilliant, perfect man choosing him as his best friend—That’s—That’s pretty amazing. It may not be what he wants, but—but it’s good all the same.
It’s enough.
Nodding, Yutong’s gaze darts away, not able to hold Zhan Yao’s with all the emotions swirling in his chest. Everything he’s sure Zhan Yao can read in his eyes. Instead scanning over the piles of clothes Zhan Yao has dumped next to his open suitcases. Stacks of books on the floor he couldn’t possibly be planning to stuff in a carry-on. A mess too similar to the one of ten years ago, sitting on Zhan Yao’s bed and pretending he wasn’t pouting as he watched him wander the room, gathering his things, refusing to help him. So very aware that every piece of clothing dropped in that suitcase meant another day he’d be without him. And it hits him all over again that Zhan Yao—is leaving.
He’s leaving and if Yutong doesn’t say something, one day he’s going to leave for good. He’ll lose him, and that’ll be his fault. That’ll be—
He forces out a breath, nausea building in his throat as he says, “Zhan Yao—“
He freezes.
At first, he doesn’t understand why it matters. At first he doesn’t understand what the red haze is that settles at the edges of his vision, drowning out the questioning noise Zhan Yao makes. But Yutong pushes to his feet, closes the space to the counter—
Zhan Yao’s passport. His ID for the conference. His boarding passes—
Passes.
Two.
The nausea flips, sharpens underneath the wave of cold. Irrational and impossible and unfair. But sure enough, there are two tickets sitting in front of him. An 8AM flight to Beijing. First class seats right next to each other and that’s—
“So—“ He swallows, a lump building in his throat. “So that guy.” Another questioning sound, and this time when Yutong looks at him, that empty confusion is back in Zhan Yao’s eyes. Like he’s getting more and more concerned for Yutong’s mental state. And that’s—fair. Because Yutong’s mental state has been in flames since the second Zhan Yao walked back into his life, and it doesn’t show any signs of improving. “The one from the party.”
And still Zhan Yao stares at him. Assessing. Watching. And Yutong feels the anxiety coil tighter in his stomach, but it’s flickering into something sharper, that low simmering he felt when that guy dared to put his hand on Zhan Yao’s waist. Dared to touch him—“Is he—going with you?”
Two tickets. Two tickets and Yutong feels sick. He’s—He’s going to throw up on Zhan Yao’s floor. Because if he really—if he’s really going to go to Beijing with this guy, that means they’ll share a hotel room. That means they’re serious already, and if he starts showing up at the SCI, if he has to listen to Zhan Yao talk about him and watch him go home with him and see him kiss him—
Oh dear god, if they move in together—
Yutong isn’t sure he’ll survive it. He isn’t sure—He isn’t sure he or Mr. Businessman will because that impulse to break the guy’s hand for touching Zhan Yao the first time was intense enough they were both lucky he didn’t do it.
He doesn’t know how long it takes before he becomes aware of Zhan Yao staring at him, the tense, heavy, suffocating silence. And when he looks up, he nearly flinches at the burst of fire behind Zhan Yao’s eyes.
Unguarded, unrestrained rage. “I can’t tell if you’re being purposefully oblivious,” Zhan Yao starts, gritting his teeth, “or if you’re really this stupid.”
And that’s—not fair. It was a simple question, even if it feels like something far more. Even if it feels like life or death to him. But it shouldn’t matter to Zhan Yao. It’s just a question about his relationship status. It shouldn’t—
And Yutong knows he shouldn’t have this conversation now. Not like this. He knows that. But his blood is burning from nearly losing Zhan Yao once already permanently, and he can’t help the frustrated petulance in his voice, razor sharp and laced with every fraction of the bitter jealousy churning in his gut—“I’ve never seen you flirt with anyone ever,” he returns. “As your best friend, am I not allowed to ask?”
Zhan Yao’s lips part, something else, something new flickering behind his eyes. And for a second, there’s just silence—“You are an idiot.”
And before Yutong can do more than make a sound of protest, Zhan Yao moves—
Lips crash against his with enough force Yutong gasps, staggers back with the change in weight. Mind stuttering empty and blank and silent. Useless as his arms hang broken at his sides. Nothing but soft lips against his and warm hands burning his skin and the frantic thrumming where his heartbeat is supposed to be—
And it’s over as quickly as it starts.
Zhan Yao jerks away, flinches back just far enough Yutong watches his eyes go wide—horrified. Like he’s as shocked it happened as Yutong. Like he isn’t quite sure how it did. But he presses the back of his hand to his lips, and Yutong’s tongue swipes over his own on instinct, tingling with the ghost of him, and Yutong’s not sure either of them are breathing.
“I didn’t mean to do that.” A waver in his voice. An edge of panic Yutong’s never heard from him before. But Yutong’s blood is pounding in his ears and he feels dizzy and lightheaded and Zhan Yao—
Kissed him. Doctor-Professor Zhan Yao. Love-of-his-life, his-reason-for-living Zhan Yao who has always stood untouchable and unreachable and so incredibly far away. Always an impossible dream.
He kissed him.
“I shouldn’t’ve—“ Zhan Yao inches backward, mask crashing down, horror vanishing into icy cold. Sharp as a slap across Yutong’s face. Because that isn’t right. That’s not—Zhan Yao shouldn’t be afraid of him, and he really needs to remember how to move—“I shouldn’t’ve done that.”
Zhan Yao draws back another step, gesturing to the door—“I’ll—Um—“ A tensing of muscles, the moment he’s going to make a run for it—and that kick-starts something in Yutong’s brain, instinct shattering the haze—
Zhan Yao turns for the bedroom door—
Yutong’s hand seizes around his wrist, spinning him around and pushing him back—
The door slams shut with a crack, but he barely hears it. It doesn’t register beneath the sudden awareness he has Zhan Yao trapped against it, one wrist held in his hand. Mind stuttering and breaking and Zhan Yao is staring at him, eyes wide like a caged animal. But even still, Yutong feels the heat pouring off of him, smells the bite of mint, and all he knows is Zhan Yao kissed him. He kissed him, and Yutong can’t breathe, let alone think—
“Yutong—“ Zhan Yao swallows, throat bobbing. And Yutong is suddenly hyperaware of the tension building between them, suddenly hyperaware of the actual fear flickering behind Zhan Yao’s eyes, turning something sour and sick in his stomach.
Zhan Yao shouldn’t be afraid. Not of him. Not ever.
“You kissed me.” The words trip out of him anyway, hazy and wavering and so painfully confused. Searching for confirmation he didn’t just imagine it. Searching for confirmation it was real—
Zhan Yao freezes, grits his teeth as he looks away. “I apologized already.” Like that’s what Yutong wants. Like that’s enough of an explanation. But his gaze stays locked over Yutong’s shoulder, a thousand miles away, like he thinks disassociating is enough to get him out of this situation. “Let me go.”
“You kissed me.”
“Yes, Yutong,” he snaps. “I did. But it was only once. We should instead focus on all the times I didn’t when I wanted to and you’ll find my rate of error is negligible.” And that—Yutong doesn’t even understand what that means aside from the fact Zhan Yao is trying to convince him of something he really doesn’t want or need to be convinced of. As defensive as it is damning. That Zhan Yao—
Zhan Yao wanted to kiss him before. Zhan Yao—Zhan Yao’s wanted to kiss him a lot before. And he thinks—“Yutong, let go.” Sharper this time, an order cutting with the full force of his glare. But Yutong has spent a lifetime building up a tolerance to Zhan Yao’s attacks, and he’s never been so glad for it than in this moment—“Please.”
So broken. So desperate. And something wrenches in Yutong’s chest, shatters the rest of his self-restraint—
He lets go of Zhan Yao’s wrist, instead cupping his hand around his jaw. Shaking more than he’ll ever admit. But Zhan Yao won’t look at him. He won’t—
“Kitten.”
And that name is all it takes to make Zhan Yao still against him, eyes falling shut as he sinks back against the door. Defeated. Hopelessly resigned, like he’s surrendering himself to whatever comes next. And that’s—
Zhan Yao kissed him. Zhan Yao wanted to kiss him. And Yutong doesn’t understand what that means, how it’s possible, but all he knows is Zhan Yao is hurting and upset and he has to take that look off his face. He has to make it stop—
Ducking forward, he presses their lips together.
He thought he was prepared this time. He thought—He thought he knew what he was doing. But Zhan Yao gasps against him, a shocked sound that stabs through Yutong’s heart, and his mind devolves to static. Fire sharpening and rolling through his veins as he presses closer. Aware of nothing but the heat under his hands, the taste of mint on his tongue. Burning away all sense of reality and right and wrong and every fraction of self-control he’s spent years building because Zhan Yao—Zhan Yao is kissing him back—
He breaks away, dragging in a breath as he presses their foreheads together. Focusing on the loose fabric under his hands, the slope of Zhan Yao’s ribs, trying to memorize everything he can before Zhan Yao comes to his senses and shoves him away again. Breath fanning over his lips, heartbeat in his ears, and his voice breaks on a whisper of “Kitten.”
Zhan Yao’s throat clicks as he swallows, but Yutong’s gaze locks on his lips, trying to burn the memory into his mind. But Zhan Yao’s fingers clench at his shoulders, and Yutong feels something reorient, pieces clicking into place that feel too impossible, too delusional to be real—
“Yutong.” His name, rough and full of something too close to desperation, and it rushes all the way through his body, shivers under his skin. And maybe this is a fever dream but it doesn’t matter. Nothing else matters. “Yutong, I—“
And Yutong can’t help it.
He surges forward, catches the rest of his explanation against his lips, swallows it down. And Zhan Yao’s words shatter apart into a quiet, helpless moan as he sinks the rest of the way against him.
Arms wrap around his neck, fingers sliding into his hair. Zhan Yao’s body against his, lips parting under his. Zhan Yao surrendering so beautifully, a wild and uncontrolled thing sure to destroy everything in its path And his mind still hasn’t quite caught up to reality, but his hands slide to Zhan Yao’s lower back, pinning him completely between his body and the door—
Breaking away, his heart jumps at Zhan Yao’s whine of protest, the way he tries to follow him. But—“Kitten, you have to—“ Mind stuttering with every circle Zhan Yao’s fingers draw over the back of his neck, his own hands glued to Zhan Yao’s hips, and the space between them is rapidly disappearing again—“Do you like me?”
It comes out too fast, too desperate—tinged with an almost childish innocence that sounds extra ridiculous given Zhan Yao’s lips are already flushing red. But he can’t find any better way to ask. Nothing more than the pathetic question that’s echoed in his head since he was fifteen, never better with words than that. Never thinking he’d ever get the chance or the reason to be—
Sitting on the floor of his room, Zhan Yao’s nose in a book, Yutong watching him instead of the algebra textbook he was meant to be studying—
Do you?
Do you like me too?
Could you? Someday?
Zhan Yao blinks at him, and for a second, he looks so shocked and horrified Yutong wants to take it back. But then he chokes, “What kind of a question is that, you narcissist? Do you have to hear me say it?”
And Yutong thinks he should be offended, but he catches the pink tingeing Zhan Yao’s ears. The awkward shifting, his refusal to meet Yutong’s gaze. And it feels like more of a victory than any declaration possibly could.
The smile that splits his face is completely uncontrolled, matching the thickness in his throat. And all he knows is that Zhan Yao—somehow, impossibly, Zhan Yao likes him. And it sounds like a lie. It feels like one, but it’s Zhan Yao and Zhan Yao doesn’t lie. Zhan Yao kissed him and Zhan Yao likes him and Yutong—
“I like you.”
The words fall from Yutong’s lips too quickly, like if he doesn’t say them in a single breath, he won’t get the chance. But something in him releases, relief settling through him as they ring in his ears. Words he’s held, kept, hidden since he was a teenager. Words always right there, right on the tip of his tongue. And until they’re said, he didn’t realize how hard it’s been to not say them. And the aching pressure in his chest fades away into something light and bright—“God, Kitten—“ Happy laughter tingeing his voice, “—I like you so much.”
It’s less than what he wants to say, but so close to everything. And he feels fifteen again. He feels like that awkward teenager who looked at his best friend and thought he was beautiful and fell so hard so fast he’d never be able to get up again. He feels like—like he’s giving him his voice back, strangled and silenced as it’s been.
But Zhan Yao blinks at him. And his palm flattens against the center of Yutong’s chest, stopping him. Pushing him back, and Yutong doesn’t catch the disappointed sound before it slips over his lips, a wave of cold where Zhan Yao’s heat just was—“Yutong, I’ve asked you out at least seven different times. What the hell do you mean you like me?”
“You—“ And now it’s his turn for the blank confusion, drawing back a step, Zhan Yao’s hand slipping from his chest—“You asked me out? What? When?” Because Yutong’s suddenly very sure Zhan Yao is the one who’s lost his mind. Because if Zhan Yao had ever asked him out, Yutong would have thrown himself at that opportunity so fast Zhan Yao wouldn’t have known what hit him until years later, after he’d already married Yutong and had their lives so closely entwined he couldn’t take it back without a hell of a headache—
Zhan Yao narrows his eyes at him. “You can’t be that stupid.” Like he’s suddenly worried, like he’s trying to convince himself of its impossibility.
“I’m stupid,” Yutong disagrees. “I’m really, really stupid. You know that. You’re my psychologist.”
“But—“ His voice shrinks, goes unsure and a tinge hysterical. “Yutong, you—My power wasn’t even out last week,” he says, like that makes any sense. Like Yutong should understand what the hell that means. “You’re a cop. How could you be that oblivious?”
And Yutong—would like to answer that. He’d like to explain. But the insanity of the situation bubbles laughter in his chest, definitely hysterical as he sinks down on the edge of Zhan Yao’s couch, legs a little weak and everything else a little fuzzy. Adrenaline draining from his veins as he reaches out—
And his chest softens, liquid warmth flowing between all the cracks in his ribcage when Zhan Yao steps in between his legs, letting Yutong guide his palm to his heartbeat. Rushing too fast, too unsteady. Letting him feel every dizzying beat of it. And he rubs at the back of Zhan Yao’s hand, his wrist—“What about you, Doctor Zhan?” he breathes. “You’re supposed to be good at reading people.”
Zhan Yao makes a hissing sound, tries to jerk his hand free. But Yutong holds tighter, and though his heart trips over itself, a flicker of nervousness under his skin, he presses his lips to the inside of his wrist. And this time, the hitch of Zhan Yao’s breath is soothing, washing away the uncertainty, the hesitation—“I think we need to take away your PhD.”
“But—“ Wavering. And Yutong sees the fracturing of his shields, the breaking apart of whatever world he’d convinced himself existed. And Yutong’s heart shatters apart when he whispers, “Why would you like me?”
And there’s his answer. The one he’s known, tasted on the back of his tongue since they left the bank. Since he stood outside and felt every second of their time slipping away. Selfish. So damn selfish for never telling him—because Zhan Yao—for all his arrogance when it comes to his work, has always had cripplingly low self-worth. Painful and sometimes outright terrifying. For all his confidence in his abilities, at some point, he convinced himself that was the only part of him worth noting, worth anything.
And Yutong—he hates it. He hates the fact that all this time, and Zhan Yao still finds the thought of anyone loving him so impossible.
“Zhan Yao—“ He swallows around the lump in his throat. “How could I ever want anyone else?”
“I’m a workaholic,” Zhan Yao spits, too fast. “Sometimes I forget to leave my office.”
“I know. I’m the one who sits outside until you remember.”
“I’m—arrogant.”
“I know,” Yutong huffs. “But you’re a genius so you have a right to be.”
“I’m competitive. I never let things go.”
“I know. And I started half of those food fights when we were kids.”
“I’m boring.”
“Kitten, you’re the least boring person I know,” Yutong sighs.
“I can’t cook,” Zhan Yao announces, babbling now. “I forget to do my laundry, and sometimes I don’t sleep for days at a time, and I can’t be around crowds, and—“ His breath hitches. “Yutong, I’m a mess.”
Yutong stills, but the huff that slips from him is helpless, aching as he fits his fingers through Zhan Yao’s, locking them together. But well—Zhan Yao’s hand is really soft. Devoid of the calluses that coat Yutong’s. Fingers long and elegant where Yutong’s are rough and graceless. And Yutong can’t help but run his thumb over his palm, tracing the lines with his fingers just because he can—
“I know you. I know you better than anyone,” Yutong breathes. “And I know—I know all I want—all I’ve ever wanted—is to be the one to cook for you and make sure you go to bed on time and keep you healthy and happy and safe—“ He swallows around the lump in his throat, watching the ripple of emotion behind Zhan Yao’s eyes. Painted with so many colors, burning with something so vulnerable it stings to look at. And as Yutong reaches up, cupping his hand around his cheek, hesitant and wavering, he knows he must look the same. “Kitten, it’s only ever been you.”
Zhan Yao presses his face into his palm, eyes falling closed, and Yutong feels the pressure swell in his chest. Suffocating with the weight of it. And even if it breaks him, even if he has to rip his own heart out to say it, the words slip from his throat—“I love you.”
Zhan Yao’s eyes flash open, flickering surprised, but the words echo back through time. Through years and years of swallowing them down, silencing them, shoving them away like they were something dangerous and shameful. Ringing a thousand times in chorus—
“Kitten, I really—really love you.”
Zhan Yao’s breath catches, and the last of his wall shatters apart, breaks down, smile glowing as bright as his eyes—And he whispers, “Damn you, Mouse. You weren’t supposed to say it first.” But his fingers slide into Yutong’s hair, and he leans down, pressing their foreheads together, holding Yutong against him like he never wants to be anywhere else.
And his palm presses over Yutong heart. “I love you too, you know?” A flicker of pink high on his cheeks, even as his gaze locks on Yutong’s jaw. Careful not to look him straight in the eye. And Yutong’s lips twitch up, endeared that for all his boldness before, Zhan Yao is so painfully shy when it actually matters—“I have. For—forever.”
And he thinks they’re going to have to talk about what that means eventually. He thinks—after fifteen years of being so sure that this was impossible, it’s probably going to take awhile for either of them to believe it. But right now—Right now, the too familiar ache in Yutong’s ribcage sharpens, burns with the echo of Zhan Yao’s confession—
Zhan Yao loves him. Zhan Yao—
He catches Zhan Yao’s lips, arm snaking around his waist as Zhan Yao’s fingers tighten in his hair. Sparks bursting under his skin as the world narrows, fades away. Something solid and certain rushing through it. Forever and permanent and theirs. Burnt through with every moment he’s loved him, with the certainty that after a lifetime of this, he always will.
“To be fair—“ Minutes—maybe hours later. Zhan Yao sitting in his lap, gasping as Yutong nips under his jaw. Voice breathless and broken, and Yutong—likes him like this. Distracted. Likes knowing that’s because of him—Likes the weight of him in his lap and the noises he makes when Yutong sucks just below his ear—“To be fair, I still kissed you first.”
Yutong pauses, pulling back to blink up at him. Tracing over swollen lips and flushed skin. And Yutong—he’s lost the train of this conversation completely. Not sure what Zhan Yao is talking about, much less why he’s talking at all when there are much better things to be doing—
But Zhan Yao’s lips twitch up, familiar and infuriating—“That means we’re even.”
Brain stuttering. The slow click of gears slotting into place.
Laughter startles from his chest, bright and warmer than he’s felt in years. And for the first time in his life, as Zhan Yao leans in to kiss him again, he concedes: “All right. We’re even.”
After that—Yutong’s half-sure Zhan Yao hypnotized him. It’s the only explanation. Some subconscious manipulation with his stupidly gorgeous face and disgustingly attractive body that’s made Yutong stupid. Because it’s later, pressed against Zhan Yao’s bare back, nosing at his hairline that his brain-to-mouth filter breaks completely. Words spilling ridiculous and uncontrollable over his lips. Every thought he’s ever hidden from him, every thing he’s always wanted to tell him—
Hypnotism.
Zhan Yao’s smile has only gotten more indulgent and amused the longer this has gone on—and Yutong refuses to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, he just wants that to continue.
His hand slides up and down Zhan Yao’s arm, pressing his lips to the slope of his shoulder. Zhan Yao pliant and relaxed against him—
“Go to dinner with me,” Yutong mutters, demanding and almost petulant. “Come to my stupid cousin’s wedding with me. Go to Jie’s fundraiser with me so I can keep that asshole’s hands off you. Stay with me, and date me, and—“
“Come to Beijing with me.”
Yutong stills, hand tightening around Zhan Yao’s arm, heart thudding against his ribcage. And it’s strained, choked when he breathes, “What?”
Silence drowns the room. Tight and tense. And Zhan Yao shifts, breaking Yutong’s death-grip. Yutong’s stomach lurching as he rolls over—
His smile is soft, just as indulgent, just as amused. But so gentle Yutong’s heart quiets, settles in his chest. And Zhan Yao huffs a laugh, reaching up to pinch his chin. “You’re too stupid,” he decides. “That ticket’s for you.”
Yutong’s gaze flicks to the table, mind tripping over itself. A sharp kick to his sternum, knocking him back into that dumb eighteen-year-old standing alone at the airport. Watching Zhan Yao’s plane take off, letting him go. And he doesn’t know what to do with the flare of emotion in his chest, throat tightening as he watches Zhan Yao’s gorgeous face soften even further, too knowing for his own good.
“Bai Yutong—“ Drawing it out, clear and deliberate and pointed. And then he whispers, “Come with me?”
Fingers stroke his jaw, down the side of his neck. And reality sinks slow and devastating through his skin, settling in his bones—
And when Yutong kisses him, it’s every answer he’s never been able to say. Every promise that’s always lived under his skin.
Yes.
Yes, anywhere. Wherever you go.
Yes.
Zhan Yao smiles against him, holding him close, and it feels like forever.
It feels like home.
Epilogue
A week later, they’re back in Zhan Yao’s apartment, and Yutong is left to face the reality of Zhan Yao’s horrendous living habits.
They’d left in such a rush given Yutong hadn’t even packed that Yutong hadn’t had time to help Zhan Yao clean anything before they left. Hadn’t had time to do more than call in a week of more than earned vacation time for them both before he’d been at the airport.
Now though—
He stares into the radioactive wasteland Zhan Yao’s calling a refrigerator and Yutong really wishes he had brought a hazmat suit. Or at the very least plastic gloves.
He’s still staring at it, trying to figure out where the hell to start, when Zhan Yao’s grumbling registers from the bedroom.
“Bai Yutong, you better know how to sew buttons,” Zhan Yao calls. “Though I suppose that’s too much to hope for from a caveman.”
Blinking, he thinks he should be insulted. He would be if he knew what the hell Zhan Yao was talking about. “I can sew a button,” he mutters, reaching out to poke at a container holding a strange, neon-orange substance. And really, Yutong only left him here for a week. He doesn’t know how he managed this that quickly. “Bring it here.”
A creak of a door, and his gaze snaps up—
A stack of dress shirts cradled in Zhan Yao’s arms, a disapproving eyebrow where he leans against his bedroom doorframe. And Yutong’s caught between a flush of embarrassment and smug pride at the sheer number of destroyed shirts staring back at him.
But really, it wasn’t Yutong’s fault. Not entirely. Because he’d be minding his own business, reading up on case files in their hotel room, and then Zhan Yao would walk in wearing some stupidly gorgeous tailored suit, too many buttons open to be at all decent, and Yutong’s mind would fizzle out of rational thought. But honestly, what was he supposed to do? Let him keep wearing it? It was a public safety hazard. And Yutong is a very responsible police officer.
Zhan Yao sighs, tossing a light blue one at his face—“You actually managed to rip this one.” Yutong turns it over, pursing his lips. And sure enough, there’s a tear where there must have once been a button attached, and if not for the glare Zhan Yao’s leveling at him for ruining his work clothes, Yutong would almost be impressed with himself. If not for the annoyed crossing of Zhan Yao’s arms, Yutong would settle into that particular memory—
But he just shrugs, throwing it over his shoulder. He’ll have to try to patch it up later as an apology. Though chances are better he’ll have to throw it out and just buy Zhan Yao another one. “It’s your fault for wearing so many buttons.”
Zhan Yao narrows his eyes at him. But he sighs, lowering his guard as he turns back to the pile of shirts. “We need to work on your patience.”
“I didn’t hear you complaining,” Yutong returns. And he takes the opportunity to crowd up behind him, lips brushing the shell of his ear—“I specifically remember you complaining I was going too slow—“
Zhan Yao smacks him, that red flush Yutong loves back on his neck. “Rat,” he grumbles, sliding out from between him and the table. “Self-control is a signifier of a developed brain. Which explains why you don’t have it.” And then he’s gone, taking off to hide in the bedroom.
Yutong huffs, allowing himself a pleased hum when he notes Zhan Yao’s unpacking his clothes as well. Moving him back into his apartment instinctually despite not having even discussed it yet.
He’d worried what would happen when they got off the plane from Beijing. If this would shatter apart like the insane fever dream this last week has been. If things would change, if he’d know what the hell to do next. But it all settles into a quiet hum at the back of his mind. Calm and comforting and familiar. Like this is where they’ve always been.
Turning back to the refrigerator, his gaze catches on something sitting at the back of the shelf, glowing green in the dim light. And his head tilts with a flicker of confusion—
To be honest, everything happened so fast, he hasn’t bothered to think about what led to this. But Zhan Yao’s green smoothie from hell stares back at him, turning brown at the edges, and those weeks roll through his head too sharp and vibrant.
Zhan Yao’s “My power wasn’t even out; how could you not know?” Zhan Yao’s disgusting green smoothies, learning how to shoot, his disturbingly organized office that looked like something out of a horror movie—Wearing Yutong’s clothes, wearing that godforsaken towel—
“You did it on purpose!”
A thud echoes through the bedroom wall, a curse, and Yutong would be concerned if his brain could focus on anything other than the dawning realization that’s come about a month too slow—
“What the hell, Yutong?” Muffled by the closet, maybe by whatever just fell on him.
But a dangerous amount of glee leaps through him, coating his voice as he calls, “Zhan Yao.” Excited enough Zhan Yao appears in the doorframe a moment later, eyes narrowed and wary as he watches him, body tensed in warning. And Yutong should probably pay attention to that. Given how new and tentative his boyfriend privileges are, he should be concerned about having them revoked. But his chest is bubbling and his smile is so wide his cheeks hurt and Zhan Yao’s expression deepens into concern—
“Doctor Zhan,” he says, schooling his expression as serious as he can manage, “you were trying to seduce me.”
Silence. Zhan Yao’s face blanches white, floods red again—And then, with a sharp sound caught in his throat, he flips on his heel—“Stop talking.”
And that’s all the confirmation Yutong needs, laughter bursting from his chest that’s so bright it’s almost giddy. “Green smoothies? What were you even—“
“I know how to get rid of a body.” Sharp and definitive where it cuts through the door. “And I can kill you without moving.”
And that’s—true. Very true. And—not at all hot. Nope. Not in the least—“What were you trying to do?” he asks, laughter heavy in his voice as he drags the container out. “How old is this?”
“Throw it away and take yourself with it,” Zhan Yao returns. “You’re both nauseating.”
Petulance, claws bared razor-sharp and Yutong bites down on his lip, trying to strangle away the smile. “Kitten, what were you planning to do with this?”
A resigned sigh from the bedroom, an aggravated grumble. And then, “I wasn’t—I thought you might respond better if I—The people you’ve liked in the past’ve been—“ He doesn’t finish that, but Yutong’s brain freezes, stuttering over the diverting trails of thought that creates. One part of him is impressed and somewhat flattered by the amount of obvious attention Zhan Yao put into this. A second part is concerned. And a third—mostly just confused.
“Who—“ The only sound he can figure out how to make. Because Yutong’s ability to notice anyone else when Zhan Yao’s present is nonexistent. Embarrassingly so. How he could’ve observed anything he has no idea—“Who are you even—“
Another thud. “Are we talking about this now?” In a voice that makes it sound like this is probably something they should’ve talked about a week ago. But Yutong’s head is spinning a little bit and he’s not quite sure he should’ve let Zhan Yao get away with calling him the dumb one—
“Who are you talking about?”
Zhan Yao sighs, but he doesn’t appear. Hiding in his room still like he can pretend this conversation isn’t happening that way. And Yutong thinks the distance may not be a bad thing depending on what comes out of his mouth next.
“That girl in Singapore. The guy with the nose ring in New Zealand. Feng Jie could—“
“You think I liked Feng Jie?” The green sludge slips from his hand, crashing to the floor. Sending probably toxic slime all over the tiles which he’ll probably have to fumigate—But the horror crashing over him, the disgust burning on his tongue floods his brain with mental images that will inevitably turn into nightmares.
Footsteps across the carpet, but Yutong’s too busy bracing himself on the fridge, sucking in breaths through his nose—“I’m taking away your PhD,” he announces, certain. Even if he may be rocking back and forth a bit more than normal. “It’s going through the paper shredder. I’m calling your university—“
He looks up—
Zhan Yao sitting on the counter, watching him with a raised eyebrow. But—
“You’re wearing my shirt.” He chokes on the words, whiplash knocking him dizzy for a second. But Zhan Yao’s wearing his shirt and suddenly he’s back walking through the door to his apartment to find Zhan Yao wearing his clothes—
Zhan Yao hums, tilting his head. “It worked, didn’t it?” Too proud of himself, like Yutong’s proving his point somehow. But if anything, Zhan Yao’s just proving his point—
“You’re wearing my shirt.”
Zhan Yao tilts his head, the wide-eyed, innocent confusion back on his face. “You keep ruining mine,” he returns. “Maybe you’ll be more careful if they’re yours.”
“You bastard.”
Zhan Yao hums. “I thought this had gotten to you.” Tilting his head to expose more of his collarbone and that’s just—not fair. But Zhan Yao has always been a competitive little bastard in all things and Yutong’s comment was likely just a declaration of war he had never intended—though one he’s more than happy to fight. “You seemed really distracted that night.”
“Distract—“ He huffs a disbelieving laugh. “Come here, Kitten, and I’ll show you—“ He steps forward—
A foot braces against his chest. And that just leaves Yutong to stare up a long, bare leg, and his brain fizzles, short-circuits—
“Operant conditioning,” Zhan Yao says, raising his eyebrows. “Positive reinforcement for good behavior. Until you learn self-control.”
Yutong smirks, catching Zhan Yao’s ankle. His fingers ghost across bare skin, shifting to press his thumbs into the arch of his foot. And Zhan Yao’s eyes narrow, suspicious—
He squawks as Yutong’s fingers brush light over his foot, tickling him. And his other foot lashes out to shove Yutong away—
But then it’s so easy to catch his hands under his thighs, dragging Zhan Yao to the edge of the counter as he steps forward between his legs, holding him in place. So much bare skin under his hands.
He reaches up, slides the top button of Zhan Yao’s shirt free. Gazes locked as he shifts to the next. And though Zhan Yao makes absolutely no move to help him, the challenge pours off of him, eyes darkening as Yutong inches closer—
“Kitten,” he sighs, dragging his fingers over the sharp edge of his collarbone, hovering over a pink splotch he left there the night before. Stomach tightening, a bit too satisfied at the sight of it. “Wearing my clothes, flirting with other people, always standing so close—You know manipulation isn’t very nice?”
“I wouldn’t call it manipulation,” Zhan Yao corrects, but his foot brushes Yutong’s calf, sending prickles up the back of his leg. “More like incentive.” He tilts his head, baring more of his neck, letting Yutong’s shirt slip further from his shoulder—“I told you it’s a fundamental motivator.”
Yutong huffs, mind flashing back to that conversation that somehow managed to start all of this. And he thinks he really was stupid. Because there isn’t much he wouldn’t do to have Zhan Yao like this. But he hums, shifting back a step, watching a dark cloud fall over Zhan Yao’s face. “You’re right,” he sighs. “Self-control is important. I wouldn’t want to ruin any more shirts—“
Another step back—
A leg hooks around his knee, hitting at a weak spot Zhan Yao memorized when they were kids to force it to give—And Zhan Yao’s hand locks behind his neck to drag him down against him, crushing their lips together—
Yutong smiles against him, too wide, too bright, if Zhan Yao’s muttered, Shut up, means anything. But he’s smiling too, and Yutong—Yutong’s happy. He’s so painfully happy.
“You know,” he offers, thumbing along Zhan Yao’s jaw—“It wouldn’t have mattered.” Zhan Yao hums a question, gaze flicking down to his lips. “You’ve never had to do anything to make me want you.” He brushes his nose against the side of his neck, feels him shiver against him. “I’ve always wanted you.”
Zhan Yao’s gaze flicks to his, fingers sliding through his hair, thumb stroking behind his ear. And he breathes soft and honest, “You’ve always had me.”
His heart kicks against his ribcage, chest so tight it’s strangling. Because loving Zhan Yao—It’s a burning under his skin and a slow slide into insanity. It’s losing his mind at every turn and knowing he’d do it again and again just for a chance at this.
It’s knowing there’ll never be anyone else.
“What do you think though?” Zhan Yao asks. And at Yutong’s questioning noise, his smile turns blinding. “Am I good at seducing people?”
Yutong jerks back, blinking once—twice—But Zhan Yao just smiles, easy and placid, and Yutong knows he’s being played. Again. He knows but a low grumble rolls from his throat at how easily it works—
And as he ducks to pull Zhan Yao over his shoulder, ignoring his squawk of surprise that devolves too quickly into laughter despite his repeated mutterings of Neanderthal, the bubbling in his chest turns warm and comfortable and everything—
And as he drops Zhan Yao onto their bed, his smile brighter and freer than Yutong has seen since before New York—Yutong notes distantly that Zhan Yao from a month ago, answering Ma Han’s drunken challenge—He won.
Well, obviously there’s only one way to make up for this.
He’ll just have to marry him.