Work Text:
“Cobalt!”
Lan Zhan hums to show he’s listening, forehead to his knees in a forward fold, yoga mat neatly tucked into the scant available space on the dressing room floor. This is a very normal place for him to be on a Thursday evening, though he’s sure his uncle would be surprised to learn that.
“You’re on in two songs.”
“Thank you, two,” Lan Zhan says, rising out of the stretch and giving Evelyn—one of his favorite managers, so he wants to stay on her good side—a nod. “How is the crowd?”
“Pretty good for seven,” Evelyn says, taking the opportunity to slink into the dressing room and sink onto a folding chair with a sigh. “A few solo guys at the rail who seem to know how to tip, a couple groups that aren’t too drunk yet, and a bachelorette party.”
“What kind of bachelorette party?” Mystery asks from above and behind Lan Zhan’s shoulder, sounding deeply suspicious. (Valid.)
“Lesbian,” Evelyn assures her. The five dancers in the dressing room all sigh in relief simultaneously as she continues, “They’re both here together.”
“Thank you Stripper Jesus,” Mystery says under her breath, making the sign of the cross, kissing her fingertips, and touching them to the rosary hanging from her mirror before she returns to blending foundation into her rich brown skin. “We had straight girls in here last week and they got nasty.”
“We do that,” Tanya says apologetically from the other corner of the dressing room, carefully putting another curl into her dyed-blonde hair. “Sorry.”
“We don’t hold you responsible for the actions of all other straight girls,” Ben says in his friendly rumble, working a shimmering body glitter into his abundant chest hair.
“I know, but I feel responsible,” Tanya says, releasing a perfect spiral of hair from the jaws of her curler. “Someone needs to apologize.”
“I’ll be out in just a moment,” Lan Zhan tells Evelyn, rolling out his shoulders, hips, and ankles experimentally. He has his warmup routine down to a science at this point, but all it takes is rushing one time to pull a muscle, and he has no intention of injuring himself on the pole.
“I never have to worry about you,” Evelyn says, levering herself out of the chair with a grunt. “Unlike Jason.”
“Was he late to his bar shift again?” Fancy Jack asks midway through waxing his mustache, sounding horrified.
“He has not been on time once since we hired him,” Evelyn confirms. “I want to be compassionate, but come on.”
Lan Zhan tunes out the rest of the conversation as he packs away his yoga mat, buckles on his heels, and does a final mirror check while he shrugs on his jacket. He’s in costume, his hair is impeccable, his eyeliner wings are sharp enough to slit a man’s throat, and he’s done stretching. Perfect.
The backstage hallways at Tiger Tiger are familiar, kept clear of tripping hazards by Evelyn and several other aggressively safety-conscious managers. It’s not where Lan Zhan thought he’d end up as a classically trained ballet danseur after he ended his brief professional career, exhausted by the constant travel and frustrated by the aggressively heterosexual rules and expectations still imposed on the ballet world. There’s a sharp irony in the way male dancers are all assumed to be gay, but male ballet roles carry almost the same expectation of chest-thumping masculinity as the average male athlete. Yes, Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake exists, but Lan Zhan didn’t want to have to play the Prince in Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty a dozen times to earn the right to do something he found actually beautiful.
Also, stripping pays much better than ballet ever did. That financial freedom is what allows him to teach queer ballet classes at the tiny nonprofit he runs with his former dance partner Luo Qingyang and to perform art he feels passionate about in shows he chooses to be a part of. It turns out he’s not the only one at Tiger Tiger for similar reasons—Tanya did ballet all through college but never got picked up by any professional companies, and Fancy Jack does aerial circus performance when he’s not dancing to pay his bills. Tiger Tiger is a good place to work, and Lan Zhan appreciates that about it—he knows not every club is as safe, welcoming, and enjoyable.
The music thumps in Lan Zhan’s ears as he gets closer to the stage, some kind of techno he knows the DJ likes to play between sets specifically because it makes it harder for the crowd to mark the passage of time. Lan Zhan appreciates the social engineering but finds the music itself somewhat boring.
Fortunately, he gets to dance to his own setlist. Gwen was up ahead of him to open this run of dancers, likely with three songs of classic rock so she could fling around her red hair and thrash on the stage. She has a brand. They all have a brand—the variety of dancers is one of Tiger Tiger’s hallmarks. There’s something for everyone. Gwen gets the bikers, with her tattoos and classic black pleather. Ben is for the bears, hairy and fat in cut-off denim shorts that barely contain half his ass when he does incredible work on the pole. Destiny can twerk in ways that constantly surprise Lan Zhan, and he went to school specifically to learn precise muscular control. Tanya does sugary-sweet pop music, blonde and pink and petite for people who want a girl-next-door. Fancy Jack wears sock garters and waistcoats, not quite steampunk but somewhere adjacent to it.
Lan Zhan?
He saunters to center stage, leans against a pole, and scans the customers at the rail; eyes narrowed, mouth flat, projecting that none of them are worth his time.
Lan Zhan’s stage name is Cobalt, and Cobalt’s a bitch.
The DJ starts his first song. Lan Zhan lingers, leaning against the pole for long enough for the crowd at the rail to go from excited to confused, and then from confused to entertained as they get the joke. When it’s just edging from entertained to confused again, Lan Zhan gives a barely-perceptible eye roll and pushes upright to sulkily walk a circle around the edge of the stage. It gives him a chance to get a good look at the audience, to pick out who’s going to be the best use of his time financially speaking, who’s going to tip just enough to be polite but is waiting for a female dancer, and who’s going to be the most fun to fuck with.
The white man in a t-shirt and bomber jacket on the far left avoids Lan Zhan’s eyes but throws a dollar onto the stage. Probably straight. Lan Zhan won’t waste time there. Next up are the lesbian bacherlorettes, who both cheer for him in slightly drunken unison. Lan Zhan decides to make sure they get a few good views of his ass—they probably won’t buy many dances later, but they’ll tip generously while he’s on stage as long as he puts on a good show and he bets he can sell them on at least one. He recognizes the next face as one of Mystery’s regulars, who smiles and throws a couple dollars at his feet. He’ll be good to go along with a bit if Lan Zhan decides he needs an audience plant. The last man at the rail—
Asian. Gorgeous. Slightly overdressed in a nicely fitted suit jacket, but no tie. Eyes wide with awe, smile bright and nervous. He drags his eyes from crotch level up to meet Lan Zhan’s bored gaze, looks shocked at having been caught staring, and flushes across both cheeks. It’s an intensely attractive flush, but that’s not what appeals.
This is a baby. A strip club infant. If this isn’t Gorgeous Newbie’s first strip club, Lan Zhan will go backstage and eat one of Ben’s cowboy hats.
Lan Zhan is going to have so much fun fucking with him.
He sways to a stop directly in front of Gorgeous Newbie and gives him a withering up-and-down once-over, then holds out a hand expectantly. Gorgeous Newbie blinks up at him, utterly bewildered. Lan Zhan waits another breath, then snaps his fingers imperiously, points down at the stack of bills on the counter, and holds out his hand again. Gorgeous Newbie blinks again and takes the bait, scrambling to shove a few bills at Lan Zhan.
Lan Zhan snatches them, immediately throws them on the stage, and grinds the toe of his shoe into one before turning his back dismissively to leap onto the nearest pole. He spins around it lazily, one knee and one hand keeping him stable, and as he comes back around he finds Gorgeous Newbie transitioning from shocked to amused. He throws his head back and laughs loud enough that Lan Zhan can hear it over the music, showing off a truly obscene amount of neck in the process, then throws more money on the stage. Lan Zhan genuinely could not have asked for a more perfect patsy.
The rest of Lan Zhan’s set goes smoothly, his costume removals and showy tricks hitting right when they need to for maximum impact. He clamps his legs around the pole and takes off his jacket while leaning away in a spin, rolling his eyes about it like it’s ridiculous to expect someone to strip in a strip club. He makes everyone cheer for him for a full thirty seconds and throw dollars at his feet before he takes off his mesh crop top. He does some writhing floor work, then rolls into a shoulder stand and clacks the platforms of his heels six inches away from Gorgeous Newbie’s face. He unsnaps the sides of his tear-away shorts one snap at a time while hanging upside down on the pole on thigh strength alone, making direct eye contact with Gorgeous Newbie the whole time just to watch him squirm, then transitions from a handstand down into a straddle split, the shorts falling away and leaving him in a white metallic thong. He goes back up into the handstand from the straddle split, which makes even the straight guy start clapping in awe, wraps his thighs around the pole again, and pushes into a slow spin. He’s coming to the last bars of his final song, so he hooks his thumbs into the front of his waistband and pushes his underwear down just far enough that the audience gets a nice peek at the shaft of his dick. Fancy Jack calls it “topcocking,” which is an objectively ridiculous word but unfortunately a very accurate description for the technique.
The set ends, and Lan Zhan scoops up his jacket on the way out, tossing it over his shoulder and rolling his eyes at the audience one more time before he makes it backstage. Evelyn scoots past him with a bucket to collect his tips, and he takes the chance to catch his breath. Lan Zhan makes what he does look easy. It’s his job to make it look easy.
It’s not fucking easy, though, so once he has his money and costume pieces, he stops off in the dressing room for a much-needed drink of water, blots off the sweat, and puts his costume pieces back on. He’s pretty sure he can sell a lap dance to the lesbian bachelorettes, even if it’s just for the novelty, so he’ll start there. Better to begin his floor shift with a success, plus if he looks like he’s in demand, more people will want to buy dances from him.
The bachelorettes are an even easier sell than Lan Zhan expected—he barely gets out onto the floor before the shorter one waves him over. They get a dual dance, which is always enjoyable—Lan Zhan has a trick where he planks across both laps and then does push-ups that absolutely kills—and the rest of the party rains dollar bills on all three of them, showering him with compliments about his set along with the money. It’s a very good financial start to the night, and he’s idly calculating tip-out to the club, the DJ, and security when Gorgeous Newbie practically sprints to meet him between tables.
“Hi,” Gorgeous Newbie says breathlessly like he’s been working himself up to it, looking up to meet Lan Zhan’s eyes.
Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow and waits expectantly for the rest of the request.
Gorgeous Newbie bites his lower lip, inhales, and blurts, “Is there somewhere we can talk more privately?”
Oh, there absolutely is. Lan Zhan is going to make so much money tonight, assuming... “Private performances start at one hundred fifty dollars for fifteen minutes, paid up front.”
“That’s fine,” Gorgeous Newbie says immediately, fidgeting from foot to foot as he digs out his wallet. “I want—if we go longer than that you can just tell me how much I owe you afterward, right?”
"You can pay as you go," Lan Zhan assures him, looking around the bar for... Ah, there's Jamal at the door. Lan Zhan catches his eye, points at the hallway, then at Gorgeous Newbie, then holds up one finger followed by five fingers. Jamal nods and gives him a thumbs-up, which means Lan Zhan can rest assured someone will come check on them in fifteen minutes. Club staff alerted, Lan Zhan turns back to Gorgeous Newbie and holds out his hand. Gorgeous Newbie drops two crisp hundred-dollar bills into it, which Lan Zhan immediately pockets without making change, then gestures at the hallway. Gorgeous Newbie makes an “after you” motion, following at Lan Zhan’s heels as he leads them both to the nearest open room. It’s one of the smaller ones, just a single booth couch with a low table in front of six-by-six stage with a pole in the center. Lan Zhan doesn’t know if Gorgeous Newbie is going to want pole stuff or couch stuff and likes to be prepared for any eventuality.
Gorgeous Newbie pauses once the door shuts behind him, eyes flicking around the room nervously. Maybe Gorgeous Newbie also doesn’t know if he wants pole stuff or couch stuff. In the interest of moving things along, Lan Zhan rests his fingertips on Gorgeous Newbie’s bicep and guides him to sit down on the couch. He sets one hand deliberately on the back of the couch on either side of Gorgeous Newbie’s shoulders and lean-looms over him in a way he happens to know makes him look very sexy and intimidating.
“What can I do for you?” he asks, voice low.
Gorgeous Newbie goggles up at him, eyes wide and jaw slack. It’s genuinely cute how out of his element he looks, which is probably why Lan Zhan doesn’t get impatient when it takes him almost a full thirty seconds to pull his brain back into his skull and answer.
“I—I wanted—I was hoping to—to get your feedback on something?” he says, having to take a few runs at the sentence to get it out.
Hm. Feedback. That could go a few different ways. He probably means he wants Lan Zhan to either do praise kink or humiliation kink. Lan Zhan can do either, but he needs a little more to go on, so he cocks his head and asks, “My feedback?”
Gorgeous Newbie nods and swallows, the knot in his lovely throat bobbing. “Yeah, you... You seemed like the meanest person out there.”
Humiliation kink, then. That’s fine. Lan Zhan offers that particular service in the private rooms fairly frequently. He has resting bitch face and actively cultivates it as Cobalt, which means that men who want to have their dicks insulted are drawn to him like moths to a flame. He’s made several customers cry, got at least one to come untouched in his pants, and generally walks away with a very large payday. This is a very welcome development.
“What exactly did you want my feedback on?” Lan Zhan asks, bending one knee to cock a hip and putting an arch in his back. He laces his voice with just a hint of innuendo. Cobalt is never too excited about anything, so it wouldn’t do to seem too eager or too horny.
Gorgeous Newbie inhales, squaring his shoulders, and blurts, “Would you watch my stand-up routine and tell me if it needs anything?”
Lan Zhan blinks. The music is loud in here, like it is everywhere in the club. Surely he misheard. “What?”
“I have a stand-up routine,” Gorgeous Newbie repeats, more confidently this time. “I would really appreciate it if you could watch it and give me feedback.”
Lan Zhan presses his lips together. “Is ‘stand-up routine’ a euphemism for watching you masturbate?” he asks bluntly, trying to make this make sense. It’s not a euphemism he’s heard before, but people come up with all kinds of ridiculous slang when they’re trying not to actually ask for something against club rules.
“No!” Gorgeous Newbie yelps, visibly scandalized. “No, no, absolutely not—wait, do people ask you for that?”
Lan Zhan shrugs noncommittally. (Yes, they absolutely do. It’s officially against the rules of Tiger Tiger, but unofficially the managers trust the dancers to enforce their own boundaries and all the private rooms have panic buttons to summon security. Lan Zhan will willingly watch someone jerk off for the appropriate price, but he has to stand in exactly the right place to block the security cameras, so it’s annoying.)
“Well, I’m not,” Gorgeous Newbie says with a stubborn set to his chin. “I really just need someone to watch my stand-up.”
Lan Zhan considers this. It’s actually not the weirdest private room request he’s heard about. Cinnamon once had a man pay her to watch his breakdancing routine, and Tanya regularly gets men who just want to cry out their sorrows in her lap while she pets their hair. There was the guy who paid him for the privilege of rubbing Lan Zhan’s feet for a while, and the couple who hired him and Gwen specifically so they’d have four for poker. Not even strip poker! Regular poker. Compared to that... Lan Zhan walks to the sound system and turns down the speakers so they don’t have to nearly shout, then settles on the couch a polite distance from Gorgeous Newbie and fixes him with a piercing look. “Explain.”
“Okay, so,” Gorgeous Newbie starts, then stops himself. “Cobalt?”
Lan Zhan nods.
“Nice to meet you,” Gorgeous Newbie says, holding out his hand. “I’m Wei Ying. It felt weird to not say that.”
Lan Zhan shakes his hand (it’s slightly clammy and cold with nerves, which he politely ignores). “A pleasure.”
Gorgeous Newbie Wei Ying relaxes slightly. “Okay. Good. Okay.” He runs his hands through his hair and gives Lan Zhan a pleading look. “I’m performing stand-up for the first time at an open mic on Saturday, and I really, really need to have someone watch it before then so I don’t get up there and completely choke.”
This is wise, and performance advice Lan Zhan would offer if asked. That said... “So you came here?”
Wei Ying sighs and flops against the back of the couch. “I know, I know it’s ridiculous, but I just moved here for work two months ago, and I don’t have any friends yet!”
“Coworkers?” Lan Zhan asks, not because he’s unwilling to be the audience but because he’s curious about the fascinating journey that must have led Wei Ying to Tiger Tiger, of all places.
“I work in tech,” Wei Ying admits. “A lot of my coworkers are, like... Ah, let’s just say I don’t trust them to have opinions about anything but video games and bro podcasts.” He sighs again, eyes a little distant. “I have my sister here, at least, so I’m not totally alone, but I can’t trust her to give me real feedback because she’ll just say everything’s great, and also I’ll wither into ash and blow away on the wind if she listens to my sex jokes.”
The picture is coming together for Lan Zhan, and he nods slowly. “So you came here,” he repeats, a statement this time and not a question.
Wei Ying sits toward him, a hopeful expression on his mobile face. “Yeah, I figured... I've read on the internet that, uh, exotic dancers are willing to offer... other services than dancing? So I thought I’d be guaranteed to find someone I could ask, and I could pay them for their time, you know?” He winces. “I sound pathetic, but I swear I’m trying to put myself out there! It’s why I signed up for the open mic! I don’t wanna be one of those tech guys who moves here and takes up all the housing but then never actually engages with the city.”
What an admirable goal. Lan Zhan approves of it greatly, and not just because it’s going to lead to a good payout for him personally. “All right,” he decides out loud.
Wei Ying’s entire face lights up, making the dim lighting in the room seem like a strange malfunction. “Really?”
“Are there any specific elements you want me to focus on?” Lan Zhan asks, gesturing at the stage while he settles himself more comfortably on the couch.
“Oh, wow, good question,” Wei Ying says, pushing upright (from this angle Lan Zhan can admire his long, lanky legs) and scrubbing his hands through his hair again. “I have absolutely no idea, so the whole thing?”
“Noted.” Lan Zhan fixes his attention on Wei Ying. “Proceed.”
It is not the most excruciating five minutes of Lan Zhan’s life, thankfully. He does have some immediate avenues for improvement, starting with, “Stop apologizing to me for being on stage.”
Wei Ying cocks his head, lips parted in surprise. (Fair. Lan Zhan barely let five seconds pass after he finished his set.) “I’m not?”
“Not with words,” Lan Zhan concedes, “but your entire body is telling me that you don’t want to be here and you’ll leave if I ask you to. Is that intentional?”
“No?” Wei Ying tries, apologetically, like he’ll leave if Lan Zhan asks him to.
“Then you need to stop doing it,” Lan Zhan informs him mercilessly. “The audience takes its cues from you. If you act like you don’t think you should be there, that’s how they’ll react.”
Wei Ying rubs his face and ends up covering his mouth with one hand, obviously a bit intimidated. “What about my jokes?”
“Your jokes were fine,” Lan Zhan says honestly, waving the question away. It’s true: Wei Ying’s comedy combined his Chinese-American queer experience with the strangeness of moving to a new city and the struggle of setting up a solo household with very little help in a clever, self-deprecating way that never fully crossed over into self-hating. Lan Zhan recognized many similar moments from his own life. The set itself is not the problem. “We need to work on your delivery.”
Wei Ying nods, hopping off the edge of the stage to give Lan Zhan his full attention. “How?”
This Lan Zhan could teach in his sleep after drilling it into class after class of ballet students. “Enter with confidence,” he starts, standing to demonstrate the posture. “Shoulders back. Chin up.”
Wei Ying mirrors him, and Lan Zhan runs him through his paces in the mood-lit privacy of a room where he’s normally doing the splits in people’s faces. When Wei Ying can walk like he wants to be there and meet Lan Zhan’s eyes without flinching, Lan Zhan makes him go through his set again.
“Don’t slouch.”
“Shoulders back.”
“Look me in the eyes, but then look out to the back of the room so everyone thinks you’re looking at them.”
“Again. Like you mean it.”
Evelyn comes to check in on them and Wei Ying happily buys another half hour of time. Cindy, one of the waitresses, stops by a little while after that, and Lan Zhan asks her to bring some water, which Wei Ying gladly downs half of when she comes back. He thanks and tips Cindy before she leaves, which Lan Zhan is pleased to see. He’s going to be paid for this, of course, but it’s nice that his effort isn’t being wasted on someone who’s shitty to service workers.
“This is hard,” Wei Ying says with a laugh as he reclines on the couch, miming wiping the sweat from his forehead. “Like, damn, I didn’t think you’d make me do breathing exercises.”
“You asked for my feedback,” Lan Zhan says drily, leaning back against the cushions and arching his neck in a way he knows works for him. (Just because Wei Ying didn’t hire him for a dance doesn’t mean he can break character.) “You’re getting it.”
“I’m not complaining!” Wei Ying says hastily, sitting up so quickly he almost spills his water. “No, seriously, Cobalt, this is great. I’m learning so much! I just... I thought you’d tell me if my jokes sucked, not send me to acting school.”
“Your jokes weren’t what needed work,” Lan Zhan says, and waves at the stage. “Again. Remember, the audience wants you to succeed. If you’re uncomfortable onstage, they’ll be uncomfortable on your behalf.”
“So I need to pretend to be comfortable even when I’m nervous,” Wei Ying finishes, setting down his glass and vaulting back onto the stage. Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow, and Wei Ying grins at him. “I’ve been paying attention!”
This time Lan Zhan lets Wei Ying get through the whole routine with no pauses or corrections. His delivery is smooth, his movements relaxed without seeming choreographed. The moments when he slouches forward to let Lan Zhan in on a specific joke work, because now they stand in contrast to a default posture that projects confidence and ease. We’re all here to have a good time, his body language says. Let’s have a good time together.
Wei Ying finishes, waving to an imaginary room with an imaginary audience in it, then walks to the back of the stage. He whips back around as soon as he gets close to the wall, his stage presence entirely absent and his face expectant.
Lan Zhan applauds. One person applauding almost always sounds sarcastic, regardless of intent, so he offers up a small smile to show his genuine approval.
“Well done,” he says, letting a hint of warmth enter his voice. “Much, much better than when we started. Good job, Wei Ying.”
Wei Ying blushes very fetchingly, avoiding Lan Zhan’s eyes and practically dragging the toe of his shoe across the floor. “Thanks,” he says bashfully.
“Stop apologizing to me for existing,” Lan Zhan reminds him. Wei Ying’s head snaps up, eyes narrowed and mouth open on a response, then he visibly recognizes Lan Zhan’s point, which makes him momentarily pout, and then he takes a deep breath and straightens his shoulders.
“Thank you,” he says with much less reticence. “This was incredibly helpful, Cobalt. I really appreciate it.”
“I’m glad I was able to assist,” Lan Zhan says, which is also true. Not only does he now have a great story to add to the “weird stuff that happened in the private room” rankings, working with Wei Ying was genuinely enjoyable. It’s not often that Lan Zhan is able to use his teaching skills at work; it was nice to get to flex a different professional muscle than the ones he uses for the pole. “Do you feel prepared for Saturday?”
Wei Ying shrug-smiles. “Maybe? I’m still nervous, but I feel a lot more prepared now than I did...” He pulls his phone out of his pocket, checks it, and goggles at the time. “An hour and fifteen minutes ago?!” He meets Lan Zhan’s eyes, stricken. “I kept you in here for so long! I’m sorry! I didn’t realize it’d been that long.”
“You’re paying me for my time,” Lan Zhan reminds him. He got to be paid to sit at work for over an hour instead of standing and dancing in ten inch platform heels. It’s every stripper’s dream.
Wei Ying blinks as though surprised by the reminder. “Right. Right.” He puts his phone away and pulls out his wallet instead. “How much more do I owe you?”
Lan Zhan makes some mental calculations, taking into account how long this session took, his own current financial needs, the club's cut, Wei Ying’s tech job (presumably well-paying), the fact Lan Zhan got to sit for most of their session, and that Wei Ying at no point got handsy, inappropriate, or even asked for anything sexual.
“Another two hundred,” he says evenly, expecting Wei Ying to negotiate since Lan Zhan is absolutely tacking on an extra personal fee above the club's room fees.
“Great!” Wei Ying says, pulling handing Lan Zhan two more ATM-fresh hundred-dollar bills with no haggling in spite of his evening costing him six hundred dollars. He’s either an absolute rube or a strip club angel, and Lan Zhan takes the money without bothering to try to figure out which.
“Thank you,” he says, tucking the cash into his underwear and standing.
“Thank you,” Wei Ying says fervently, trotting ahead of Lan Zhan to the door and holding it open for him. “Seriously, this was so helpful. You’re an absolute lifesaver, I appreciate it so much.”
“You’re welcome.” Lan Zhan leads Wei Ying back out into the club proper, where Fancy Jack is doing his stage set, and shakes his offered hand. “Break a leg Saturday.”
“I’ll try,” Wei Ying says seriously. He rolls his lower lip between his teeth, still holding Lan Zhan’s hand. “Could I... Would it be okay if I came back and told you how it went?”
Lan Zhan blinks, taken aback. It’s not that he doesn’t have some regulars, he just hadn’t considered this interaction might last further than tonight. “You may.” After a moment of consideration he adds, “I’m usually here on Thursdays.” Every stripper knows better than to just hand out their work schedule to a customer willy-nilly, but also if you want to get regulars, they need to know when to find you. It’s not like he’s giving Wei Ying his personal address.
“Great!” Wei Ying gives his hand one more pump, grin shining like a stage light. “I’ll see you some Thursday, then!” He disappears into the rather more crowded club audience, and Lan Zhan heads backstage to get a drink of water and check when he’s next expected onstage, already doing the math on how many dances he should try to sell to supplement the money from Wei Ying. It was a nice break in his usual shift.
Too bad it’ll never happen again.
★★★
Time passes. Lan Zhan dances at work. He teaches his students. He headlines a burlesque show as his second alter-ego Hanguang-Jun, which is a lot like dancing at work except it’s a performance art instead of a sales job, the costumes are far more elaborate, and he gets to do pointe. (He actually dances pointe at Tiger Tiger for special events, but it’s not something he does regularly.) Burlesque pays far less than club stripping, but it’s much more creatively rewarding, not in the least because he gets to do all his own choreography and costuming. Lan Zhan likes rhinestones and doesn’t apologize for it, though he tries to contain them to his burlesque costumes for practicality’s sake.
He doesn’t look for Wei Ying. Lots of people say they’ll come back and see him dance again. Ninety-nine percent of them don’t. It’s fine. Lan Zhan is well aware that he’s an expensive habit for someone to develop—he’s never cruel to people who only come to the club with forty dollars in ones to enjoy the view from the rail, but they’re also literally not worth his time off the stage if they can’t afford to buy a dance. Regulars at strip clubs have money to spend, or at least are able to pretend like they have money in front of their favorite dancers. Everyone knows it’s a business transaction, and Lan Zhan doesn’t expect every person to be interested in business transactions like that.
All of this is to say that Lan Zhan struts on stage a few Thursdays later, strikes a pose so he can give the audience a disappointed once-over, and is surprised by a familiar “WOOOOO!” audible over the music. Wei Ying is at the rail, clapping and cheering like his favorite sports team has just won.
He came back.
Huh.
Surprising!
Lan Zhan does his set. It’s not dissimilar to the set he did for Wei Ying last time—he has five or six three-song sets that he rotates through so none of them get stale, but Lan Zhan’s whole thing is being a big bitch and there’s only so many ways to do that. He does some good ponytail work, does a headstand straddle split with his toes on the ground and his ass in the air when he’s down to his g-string, and vindictively clacks his heels right in the face of the white guy who keeps trying not to look at him and refusing to tip. If you’re at the rail, you tip; it doesn’t matter if you’re not into the dancer on the stage.
Lan Zhan gets three steps onto the floor after his set before Wei Ying practically teleports into his path, flushed pink and smiling broadly.
“Cobalt!” he says, sounding absolutely delighted. “That was awesome! The handstand was just—” and he gestures in a way that means nothing while also effectively communicating his approval. “So cool.” He takes a deep breath, frowns, and adds, “I’m Wei Ying? You helped me with my stand-up a couple weeks ago?”
“I remember,” Lan Zhan says, suppressing an unfamiliar urge to smile.
Surprise overtakes Wei Ying’s expression, and his smile gets wider. “You do?”
Lan Zhan tips his head, letting his ponytail slither over his shoulder. “It was memorable,” he says drily.
Wei Ying snorts. “I’m the only weirdo who's ever booked you for a private dance and then asked you to critique my stand-up, you mean.”
Lan Zhan shrugs one shoulder. “Something like that.”
Wei Ying tosses his head back and laughs. Today he’s wearing a scoop-neck red t-shirt under a black blazer, so it shows off a lot of neck. “Point taken.” He waves at the hallway. “Are you up for it again tonight? I have another open mic on Saturday.”
Lan Zhan is so up for it he has to suppress his enthusiasm in order to stay in character as Cobalt. “I suppose I could make the time,” he allows, gesturing the booking to Evelyn near the bar and taking Wei Ying's cash before offering his elbow to Wei Ying for no reason he can even justify to himself. Wei Ying hooks his arm through the crook of Lan Zhan’s, which is very awkward with the height difference the heels create, and allows himself to be escorted into the same private room as last time.
“Did it go well?” Lan Zhan asks once they’re inside, turning down the music first thing so they don’t have to shout. Wei Ying squints questioningly at him, and Lan Zhan clarifies, “Your set in the last show.”
“Oh, yeah!” Wei Ying says, absolutely lighting up. “It was good! I got some really good reactions from the audience, and the organizers actually invited me back to perform again specifically, which is why I’m here.”
“Congratulations,” Lan Zhan says, surprisingly himself by meaning it. “That must be very affirming for you.”
“And nerve-wracking.” Wei Ying collapses on the couch and scrubs his hands back through his hair. “Like, they asked me. I need to be good, or they’ll know they made a mistake asking me and never invite me to perform again, and they’ll blacklist me from every other comedy open-mic in the city, and then I’ll never make friends or have any social life outside my job!” He looks at Lan Zhan with his hands pressed to his cheeks, faux-stricken. “I can’t let that happen, Cobalt!”
“That seems like an unrealistic escalation,” Lan Zhan points out, taking a much more elegant seat on the couch and crossing his legs at the knee. “They probably don’t control every comedy club.”
Wei Ying shakes his head, hands still pressed to his face. “I can’t risk it. I need to be perfect. Or at least not sucky.”
Lan Zhan presses his lips together, carefully hiding his amusement. “I can’t promise perfect, but I can promise not sucky,” he says solemnly. He waves a hand at the stage. “Show me.”
Wei Ying does. He proves to have remembered Lan Zhan’s tutelage; while he does occasionally start to hunch in on himself when he reaches a less-rehearsed part of the routine, he straightens his shoulders before Lan Zhan can begin to think about calling him on it. It’s clearly bravado (to Lan Zhan, anyway, who has a lot of experience identifying when someone’s projecting confidence in an attempt to cover a shaky understanding of choreography) but it’s enough to carry him through the set.
“It seems solid enough,” Lan Zhan says when Wei Ying has finished and staring at him with expectant, beseeching eyes. “Did you have specific questions?”
Wei Ying bites his lower lip. “Is it too personal? I can’t tell if the dating bit is TMI or not.”
Lan Zhan taps his fingers on the back of the couch as he considers “the dating bit,” which was a rambling, very funny confession about Wei Ying’s lack of experience dating and sleeping with men, in spite of repeated attempts to do just that, and is he really bi if he can’t even land a date? “I think that’s a question of your comfort level,” he says after a moment. “Cameron Esposito has an extended joke about menstruation that’s very graphic and arguably TMI, but that’s exactly why she tells it.” Lan Zhan knows this because Luo Qingyang sent it to him with a lot of laughing emojis and just the word “chunks.” Given that Luo Qingyang suffered from undiagnosed and untreated endometriosis through most of their training time, leaving her lightheaded, anemic, and (more than once) bleeding through her costume, Lan Zhan does not begrudge her for this one bit. (It’s also a very funny joke.)
Wei Ying takes a moment to regroup and absorb that. “Good point, and that is a great joke.” He steeples his fingers in front of his mouth, then sighs. “Okay, maybe I’m just being a weenie because last time I talked about being bi, and now I’m joking about how I keep failing to even touch a dick, like... What if people think I’m faking it for attention?”
“You’re already getting attention by doing stand-up comedy,” Lan Zhan points out drily. “Does the bisexuality really add much to the total?”
Wei Ying lets out one of his wonderful belly laughs again, and Lan Zhan tries not to be smug about it. “Also a good point! I knew I came to you for a reason.”
Lan Zhan allows himself to be a little smug about that, and brushes his hair over his shoulder while he basks. There’s a second thing he feels obligated to address, though, and it’s more serious. “Your bisexuality is real and valid even if not acted upon, and anyone who would say otherwise is likely either projecting their own issues on you or hates bisexual people as a group.” Wei Ying opens his mouth, probably to argue, and Lan Zhan barrels over him with, “Gay men don’t stop being gay when they’re not currently in a relationship with someone of the same sex. You don’t stop being bisexual if you’re not currently dating anyone, or if you’re dating a woman, either.”
Wei Ying shuts his mouth. He stares at Lan Zhan, then closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. He exhales until Lan Zhan can only assume he’s expelled all the air his lungs might have ever contained, inhales again, and nods to himself.
“Thanks,” he says, meeting Lan Zhan’s gaze seriously. “It’s been... Hard.” He slumps to a seat on the edge of the stage. “Most of my coworkers are straight so they couldn’t really tell me where to look, and the places I did find felt like...” A grimace. “I want to meet people, you know? Not jump straight into a bathroom stall after fifteen minutes of dancing—not that there’s anything wrong with that, obviously!”
“Obviously,” Lan Zhan echoes, recognizing the beginning of a very personal confession that Wei Ying’s clearly been struggling with. This is something many of the female dancers at Tiger Tiger experience with semi-regular timing, but it’s a first for Lan Zhan.
“And then some guys won’t give you the time of day if they find out you’re bi because they think you’ll leave them to marry a woman, and some girls won’t date you if they find out you’re bi because they think all bi men are secretly gay,” Wei Ying continues, less like he’s complaining and more like he’s simply exhausted. “I feel like I can only date other bi people but that shrinks the dating pool so much, and I’m already trying to find someone who’ll put up with me rambling about coding problems and Chinese art history! I’m a hard sell, Cobalt!” He pauses, rolls his eyes hugely, and finishes, “And now I’m unloading all this onto a complete stranger! I’m sorry, this wasn’t what you agreed to.”
“You’re paying for my time,” Lan Zhan reminds him. “If you want to pay me to listen, that’s perfectly acceptable.”
Wei Ying narrows his eyes. “Is it weird that that this being a business transaction actually makes me feel better?”
“Many people come here because they’re seeking a particular experience and a business transaction is the easiest and safest way to get it.” Lan Zhan would normally never be this blunt with a customer about the purpose of a strip club, but Wei Ying is already paying him for something outside of strip club norms. He doesn’t think Wei Ying will be shocked by the realization that strippers do the job because they want to get paid, not solely out of a selfless love of erotic dance as an art form.
Indeed, Wei Ying nods sagely. “Like me coming here to pay you to watch my stand-up, like an absolute weirdo.”
Better weird than handsy. Lan Zhan doesn’t think they need to interrogate Wei Ying’s weirdness when there are other outstanding issues. “Anyone who judges you as a dating partner based on your sexuality is someone you’re well rid of,” he informs Wei Ying in a tone that demads attention. “Someone immediately identifying themselves as biphobic is doing you a favor, because you know investing any more time in the relationship is a waste.”
Wei Ying frowns thoughtfully. “I didn’t think of it like that,” he admits.
Lan Zhan nods. “More to the original topic, you can’t make your art anticipating the reaction of someone who will read it in bad faith. There will always be people looking for a reason to hate your work; you have to make it for the people who will love it, otherwise what’s the point?”
Openly awed, Wei Ying stares at him for a long moment before he laughs. “Wow, that’s so smart! Like, shit, that’s exactly what I’m doing, isn’t it?” He shakes his head. “Do you do this professionally or something?”
“Something like that,” Lan Zhan admits, reasoning that it’s not unusual for a customer to know a dancer works other performance jobs. He jerks his chin at the stage proper. “Run it again like you mean it this time.”
Wei Ying leaps to his feet with a salute. “Aye-aye, Captain Cobalt,” he says, feigning a stereotypical pirate accent, then does as asked. There’s much less bravado this time—Wei Ying delivers his jokes without stumbling or flinching, which means they’re much funnier even though Lan Zhan has already heard them. He gets to his final punchline (about the time he leaned too far over reaching for a partner’s dick, overbalanced off the bed, and ended up with a sprained wrist and no orgasms for anyone) and ends with a flourish, waiting for the reaction of an imaginary audience with the obvious expectation that the reaction will be good. Lan Zhan would applaud even if he wasn’t practically obligated to.
“That felt good!” Wei Ying announces, jumping down off the stage and slinging himself onto the couch a polite distance from Lan Zhan. “It was good, right?”
“It was good,” Lan Zhan confirms. “A significant improvement in delivery, and very funny.”
Wei Ying beams. “Maybe one day I’ll actually make you laugh,” he says cheerfully. “Like, out loud and everything.”
It’s not mean, not the way Lan Zhan’s dancemates would cruelly mock his habitual deadpan when he was a child, and then just as cruelly mock the fake smile he had to paste on for performances. Wei Ying says it like he accepts Lan Zhan’s face the way it is and wants to actually earn a different expression. It’s surprisingly kind, and that surprise is probably why Lan Zhan says, “You can try,” with a raised eyebrow.
Wei Ying bursts into bright laughter, absolutely writhing against the couch cushions, and Lan Zhan realizes that this was the outcome he’d hoped for. “Oh, shit, you’re not gonna make it easy for me either, are you?” Wei Ying asks, way happier about the idea than he has any right to be. “I’m gonna be running stand up for you until my dying day and when I’m on my deathbed you’ll finally give me a pity laugh.”
That is unlikely for many reasons, none of which Lan Zhan particularly wants to address at the moment. (But just briefly: Why would Lan Zhan, a stripper, be at Wei Ying’s deathbed? Why would Lan Zhan still be dancing at Tiger Tiger at that age? Why are they joking about Wei Ying’s death, and why does that joke land so unpleasantly?) “I’m sure it won’t take you that long,” he says instead, examining his silver-painted nails dismissively and getting another laugh for it. “Did you have anything else you needed?”
“Nah.” Wei Ying blinks, then sits up. “Did you need to get back to...” gesturing at the door.
Not really, but Lan Zhan isn’t going to say that. “I wanted to be sure you got what you came for,” he says, putting just a little suggestive rumble in his voice.
“I did!” Wei Ying sounds a tiny bit strangled, and he swallows visibly before continuing, “You were super helpful again, thank you!”
“Anytime.” Lan Zhan is a little surprised to discover he means it, and he allows Wei Ying to escort him back into the club proper and gives him a goodbye handshake. Wei Ying escapes into the night while Lan Zhan scans the room to figure out where to focus his attention next. Ah. There. A knot of excitable young women look likely, and he struts in their direction with a roll in his hips and a swish of his ponytail.
He wonders if he’ll see Wei Ying again.
★★★
Lan Zhan sees him again. Wei Ying shows up three weeks later on a Thursday, beaming at Lan Zhan from the rail and showering him in dollar bills, then whisks him away to a private room for an update on how his standup hobby is going (“I can’t call it a career when I haven’t made any money yet, can I?”). He runs a new routine for Lan Zhan, which is just as good as his previous ones, and Lan Zhan gives him pointers on where he can clean up his delivery. At some point Wei Ying updates Lan Zhan on his personal life as well—dating has still been a disaster, but he’s made some actual friends and started taking bouldering classes for exercise and for fun. He pays Lan Zhan a frankly startling amount of money for an hour of sitting and chatting, and then heads out of the club without purchasing any of the normal experiences one comes to a strip club for. Lan Zhan finds himself once again pleased and bewildered, and then he gets back to work. He never expects it to keep happening.
It keeps happening.
After the fourth time Lan Zhan knows to expect it. After the fifth time he starts looking for Wei Ying on particular Thursdays. The sixth time Wei Ying makes a joke about a Chinese historical drama he’s obsessed with, and they end up comparing notes about various costume dramas they’ve enjoyed for a good half-hour before they even get to the part of the night where Lan Zhan offers Wei Ying feedback on his routine. It’s nice to have a regular customer, actually, nice to have a monthly cycle where he knows he can count on a good Thursday night payout and an easier shift than most. Lan Zhan finds himself watching standup during his leisure time in order to learn more about the art form so his critiques for Wei Ying can be more specific, and ends up encouraging Wei Ying to start wearing some form of actual costume after despairing at the number of short-sleeve button-ups over t-shirts he’s seen on white men in comedy specials.
“Oh, so like a persona?” Wei Ying asks avidly.
Lan Zhan nods. “Consider some stage makeup as well when you’re performing in larger venues. Your facial expressions are a large part of your delivery, and ensuring that the people in the back of the house can see said expressions will only improve how they land.”
Wei Yign leans forward, frowning intently. “Where do I get started learning to do stage makeup?” he asks, and then takes a lot of detailed notes on his phone during Lan Zhan’s subsequent lecture.
It doesn’t hurt that Wei Ying is both kind and very physically attractive. Lan Zhan doesn’t ascribe to any kind of fairy-tale belief that the way a person looks has anything to do with how good of a person they are (that kind of thing stems from eugenics when you dig deep enough into it), having had wonderful experiences with many customers who don’t fit conventional norms of attractiveness and terrible experiences with many other customers who did fit those norms, as well as the other way around. If Wei Ying were not long-legged and graceful, with high cheekbones and a beautiful mouth and hair that frames his face as it grows out... If Wei Ying didn’t look like that, Lan Zhan would still enjoy spending time with him on occasional Thursday nights.
He just also enjoys the view while he’s at it. He’s allowed. His job is to be a beautiful view for others to enjoy; he thinks it’s entirely fair if he gets to do the same occasionally.
The next time Lan Zhan sees Wei Ying, he’s sore from head to toe and forcing himself through his set by leaning into the lazy stripper archtype as hard he can. He and Luo Qingyang have a ballet show opening on Friday, and they’ve been rehearsing as much as they can between her production work, his time at the club, and the needs of her toddler. Lan Zhan would much prefer to be at home in a very hot bath, but dancing the show cuts into his dancing at work time, and therefore his pay. He needs this shift, and if he has to avoid the pole and take a full minute to peel off one stocking while lying on the floor and glaring at the audience, that’s what he’ll do.
Fortunately, everyone at the rail thinks that “lazy stripper” is the funniest thing they’ve ever seen, so Lan Zhan makes some good tips. Even more fortunately, Wei Ying catches him as soon as he comes offstage, so Lan Zhan doesn’t even have to try to sell any lap dances or—worse—perform them. An hour of sitting. Thank all his ancestors, the celestial heavens, and Mystery’s Stripper Jesus for good measure. Lan Zhan needs this.
Other than Lan Zhan’s soreness, nothing about the evening makes him think it will be in any way revelatory. Wei Ying runs through his set, which is a combination of his best bits from previous sets. The organizers of the open mic have invited some independent event producers—the kind who put on cabarets and variety shows in neighborhood bars—to watch for free, so it’s kind of like an audition, but with an actual audience there to laugh and cheer instead of a silent panel of judges. Lan Zhan has been to plenty of auditions like the latter. He thinks the former sounds less nerve-wracking—it’s much easier to put on a good performance with audience energy to feed upon.
Wei Ying does look especially good tonight. It’s clear he took Lan Zhan’s advice to heart, because he’s wearing competently applied eyeliner in red and black and has obviously contoured with a subtle dark blush to emphasize his cheekbones. His button-up is red with a lovely sheen to it, and even in the dim lighting of the club Lan Zhan can pick out the black-on-black geometric embroidery on his jacket.
“I kinda have a trash goth thing going on most of the time,” Wei Ying tells him cheerfully, doing a little twirl. “I figured I could lean into that, class it up a little.”
“It’s good,” Lan Zhan assures him, shifting on the couch and smothering a wince when his left hip informs him that it’s very displeased with how he’s spent his time recently. “Distinctive, and easy to add variation to while staying within a similar visual style.” It’s the technique Lan Zhan uses for his work clothes, and honestly for a lot of his burlesque costuming: If you mostly stick to a core color scheme, you can mix-and-match your costume pieces to create new looks without having to create or purchase entirely new items. (Lan Zhan’s colors are white, blue, and silver as opposed to Wei Ying’s red, black, and gray, but that’s the beauty of it: It works with any color scheme.)
“Thank you,” Wei Ying says with endearing sincerity, clasping his hands together with a half-bow. “I really want to—to show that I take this seriously, you know?” He grins and cocks his head. “Which feels like an oxymoron, taking comedy seriously, but... It’s not like I think this is gonna be a career, but there are so many people making good art in this city, and I want to be part of that.”
Lan Zhan empathizes deeply with that feeling. Lan Zhan is one of the people making good art in the city, which his quads are complaining about vociferously. “It’s a noble goal,” he says, which he’s pretty sure are words never spoken before in the private room of a strip club. (Or very rarely spoken, at least.) “The work you put in will reflect well on you.”
Wei Ying ducks his chin, a smile and a blush spreading simultaneously across his face. “Thank you,” he says again, more quietly this time. “I know I pay you to tell me stuff like that, but I really appreciate all the help you’ve been.”
“You pay me for my time,” Lan Zhan reminds him gently. “You don’t pay me for flattery.” It could be argued that Wei Ying pays him for the opposite of flattery, frankly. Lan Zhan isn’t a flatterer, which is something some of his more abrasive dance classmates learned the hard way.
“Good point.” Wei Ying sits up straight, reaching for his wallet. “How much more do I owe you? The usual?”
Lan Zhan intends to answer with actual words, but he opens his mouth as he levers himself off the couch, and what comes out instead is a pained hiss. His joints feel like they should be audibly creaking with rust, and the less said about his muscles, the better.
“Cobalt?” Wei Ying appears at his side, hands hovering politely (and uselessly) in the air before he apparently decides that the elbow is a safe place to touch on a nearly naked man and gently helping Lan Zhan the rest of the way up by the arm. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Lan Zhan says with no small amount of mortification. There’s a concept in professional wrestling called “kayfabe,” which basically states that a performer should never break character where they can be observed by an audience member. Lan Zhan applies the same concept to stripping and burlesque, and he can count on one hand the number of times he’s ever revealed a personal vulnerability in front of a customer. One time he noticed a man at the rail taking creepshots with his cell phone camera (absolutely banned by club rules) and he snatched the phone out of the man’s hands and threw it to security without missing a beat in his routine. He’s not supposed to have personal vulnerabilities—he’s supposed to sell a fantasy.
“If you’re hurt...” Wei Ying starts, trailing off as though he doesn’t know where to take the sentence. “If you’re hurt you probably shouldn’t keep dancing tonight?” he tries, clearly unsure how much advice Lan Zhan would be willing to hear.
“I’m fine,” Lan Zhan repeats, rolling his hips side to side subtly and not entirely able to conceal his wince. Wei Ying opens his mouth to argue, and Lan Zhan talks over him with, “I’m sore, and my warmup wore off while we spoke. That’s all.”
Wei Ying thinks that over, still regarding him with a combination of concern and suspicion. “Sore? I didn’t think your” —he waves in the vague direction of the main stage— “tonight seemed super challenging.” He blinks and hastens to add, “Not that it wasn’t great, obviously, your routines are always great—”
“I’m not sore from work,” Lan Zhan clarifies, and then for reasons he can’t even justify to himself: “I do professional dance, and I have a show opening soon. I’m sore from rehearsing for that.”
Wei Ying’s mouth shapes itself into a perfect, surprised O. “That’s really cool!” he says after a moment. “What kind of dance? Are you playing a specific part? Do you dance at, like, the big fancy theaters?” He’s enthusiastic and excited; Lan Zhan hates to have to let him down, but...
“I can’t tell you any of that,” he explains, doing his best to soften his voice so the rejection doesn’t land as sharply. Wei Ying frowns a question at him, and Lan Zhan wishes he didn’t have to say, “We don’t share personal details with customers.”
“Oh,” Wei Ying says, and then as horrified realization dawns on his face, “Oh, yeah, no, I get it. You must get some people...”
“Boundaries are important,” Lan Zhan says serenely, ignoring the pain in his feet and simultaneously wishing he wasn’t wearing enormous heels, even well-fitted ones that are as ergonomic as possible.
Wei Ying nods wildly like a bobblehead going over a rough road. “I’m sure! Yeah!” A pause. “I wasn’t—I know you have no reason to believe me, but I wasn’t trying to be weird or anything.”
Lan Zhan inclines his head, which makes his neck sore, because why wouldn’t it. It’s not entirely true that the dancers don’t share personal details with customers—he knows a few give out an alternate phone number to their regulars so they can encourage said regulars to come in on nights when they dance. (He also knows a few offer additional full-service sex work outside the club, and necessarily need to make sure those customers can reach them.) Lan Zhan doesn’t, though, both because it doesn’t fit his image and because he doesn’t like marketing. Dance shows require enough of that; for work he just wants to show up and do the job.
“Thank you for understanding,” he says aloud, attempts to take a step toward the door, and hisses in pain again as even that movement causes a large amount of his body to revolt. Shit. Dammit. Why this?
“I understand you apparently feel like you’ve had the shit kicked out of you,” Wei Ying says, matching Lan Zhan’s pace with his warm hand still cupped under one elbow for balance. “Are you sure you’re good to keep working?”
“I’ll be fine,” Lan Zhan says, willing it to be so. “I just need to warm up again.” And take a few ibuprofen, along with a full meal, and soak in a hot bath for a while, and roll around on his physio balls (which will also be excruciating but he’ll feel better afterward).
“Cool,” Wei Ying says, taking a step back and magnanimously waving at the room. “Feel free!”
Lan Zhan frowns at him. “Pardon?”
“Warm up in here!” Wei Ying tells him brightly. “Otherwise you’ll have to limp backstage and hope no one sees you and needs anything on the way, right? Might as well remove that problem.”
That is a good point, but... “I prefer to warm up in privacy,” Lan Zhan says, waiting for the moment Wei Ying stops being understanding and starts being annoyed at all the rejection in the last five minutes.
“Okay,” Wei Ying says easily, turning his back to face the door. “Carry on.”
This keeps not going the way Lan Zhan expects it to, and he’s not sure if he’s happy about it or not. “It’s fine—”
Wei Ying sighs hugely and turns around, arms crossed and rolling his eyes with a broad smile. “Cobalt,” he says with cheerful determination, “please stop being self-sacrificing about this. You’re literally limping. I would take it as a great personal favor if you weren’t still literally limping when we leave this room together.” Some argument must show on Lan Zhan’s face, because Wei Ying adds, “I will pay you an extra hundred dollars if you warm up in here before we leave.” The offer hangs in the air. “Please.”
“All right,” Lan Zhan concedes. Wei Ying has a point about the limping, and his wallet certainly wants another hundred dollars. He gestures for Wei Ying to turn back around. “If you’d be so kind?”
Still cheerful to a fault, Wei Ying turns his back to Lan Zhan again and sits on the edge of the stage facing the door. “Is it fine with you if I look at my phone?” he asks the general direction of the other side of the room. “I can probably get in a round or two of Marvel Snap.”
“That’s fine,” Lan Zhan says, lowering himself carefully to his side of the stage (it’s the cleanest place in the room) and unbuckling his heels. He sighs, rolling out his ankles once his feet are free and feeling it ping up the entire back of his leg. He still would prefer to do this backstage, but Wei Ying was right; he needed to do this now.
Lan Zhan runs through an abbreviated, brutal warmup he’s designed for precisely this kind of situation. It starts with two full minutes lying on his back and aggressively wiggling, which he thinks goes a long way to explaining why he doesn’t care to be observed while he does it. (Extended full-body wiggling is one of the most efficient ways to warm up all his muscles at once, but he doesn’t have to like how deeply undignified it is.) After the wiggling he moves into active stretches, shifting back and forth between two different poses to reawaken his muscles and remind them they’re capable of things other than “clenching.” He does deep lunges and butterfly stretches to open up his hips in every direction; forward folds and bridges to stretch out his spine and chest. He warms up his shoulders and neck; performs a series of elaborate ankle movements to stretch out his feet properly before he has to cram them back into his heels. It’s all excruciating, and he knows that he makes more than one pained noise as part of the process in spite of trying to keep quiet.
Wei Ying doesn’t seem to mind. Or notice. He doesn’t even seem to react, happily messing with something on his phone and pretending Lan Zhan doesn’t exist. He doesn’t try to secretly take creepshots over his shoulder (Lan Zhan was watching for it) or comment on any of the sounds Lan Zhan makes. He doesn’t turn around to get an eyeful. He just sits there while Lan Zhan does some very necessary body maintenance, and then continues to sit there while Lan Zhan puts his heels back on, adjusts his costume, and finally walks over to tap his shoulder.
“Hm?” he asks, looking up from some kind of mobile game involving color gradients. “Oh, are you done?”
Lan Zhan nods, and now his neck doesn’t try to kill him for moving.
“Feeling better?” Wei Ying asks, cocking his head slightly. “You look like you’re standing less stiffly.”
“I am much improved,” Lan Zhan confirms, enjoying how his hips are only mildly cranky instead of enraged with his every movement.
“Great!” Wei Ying beams up at him, putting his phone away and pulling out his wallet. “So it’s seven hundred with the extra stretching money, right?”
It is. Lan Zhan takes the money, mildly embarrassed to accept so much. He’s never been paid to stretch before, and for some reason it feels weirder than being paid to sit and watch Wei Ying’s standup. He needs it, though, and there’s no virtue in demanding to be paid less.
“Thank you,” he says politely, tucking his fingers into Wei Ying’s offered elbow. They sort of mutually escort each other back out into the much louder club, and Wei Ying puts his hand over Lan Zhan’s and squeezes it with a smile.
“See you again soon,” he says warmly. “Good luck on your show!”
“Break a leg,” Lan Zhan corrects automatically, and when Wei Ying frowns a question, clarifies, “It’s bad luck to wish someone good luck in a performance, so we say, ‘Break a leg.’”
“Ooooh, like curse reverse psychology,” Wei Ying agrees, nodding along. He pats Lan Zhan’s hand again. “Well, then: Break a leg at your show, Cobalt!”
It takes Lan Zhan two lap dances and another stage set to figure out why he feels so discombobulated and off-balance, neither of which seem to have a physical component. He can’t stop thinking about Wei Ying, about how he noticed Lan Zhan’s pain, found out what would fix it, and then made sure Lan Zhan had a chance to enact said fix. He accepted Lan Zhan’s refusal to share information about his personal performance life with the same ease that he accepts Lan Zhan’s critiques of his standup. He didn’t even seem tempted to peek while Lan Zhan stretched, and Lan Zhan thinks it’s simply because he asked him not to, and Wei Ying was respecting that.
Wei Ying is handsome, funny, receptive to feedback, capable of learning from feedback (not everyone is, Lan Zhan knows from experience), financially generous, and—devastatingly— kind. He respects Lan Zhan’s boundaries while clearly finding him attractive. He takes performance direction in a specific way Lan Zhan is certain would apply in the bedroom, which happens to be one of Lan Zhan’s particular sexual interests. He’s a new transplant to the city who could very easily have holed himself up in his ivory tech towers, but he’s instead throwing himself into the art scene specifically from a desire to be part of the community.
Wei Ying is, in short, exactly Lan Zhan’s type.
Lan Zhan likes him. Not in a customer-service kind of way, or a polite-friends kind of way; Lan Zhan likes him likes him. Lan Zhan looks forward to their monthly Thursdays with more enthusiasm than he’s ever had for a regular customer; Lan Zhan would love it if Wei Ying starting coming to Tiger Tiger more frequently.
Lan Zhan fully and completely has a crush on a customer.
It’s an absolute fucking disaster.
★★★
“Lan Zhan, heart of my dance world; my partner in all things but romance and sex; my absolute platonic dearest,” Luo Qingyang says, her arms wrapped around Lan Zhan’s neck in a deep dip. “If you don’t stop almost dropping me I am going to straight-up let you fall on your ass the next time I dip you so you can see how you like it.”
“My apologies,” Lan Zhan says sincerely, suppressing a wince of embarrassment as he lifts her safely out of the dip and back to her feet. “I’m very sorry.” He is. They put their lives in each others’ hands multiple times over the course of this number as they trade the lead and follow, to say nothing of the lifts, and Lan Zhan should be treating that as the incredible responsibility it is. “I am...”
“A thousand miles away?” Luo Qingyang finishes for him, trotting over to pause the music. “Extremely distracted? Less focused than MianMian at a petting zoo?”
“Something like that,” Lan Zhan has to admit, taking the opportunity to find his water bottle and wipe his face with his designated sweat towel. It’s been a week since his revelation about Wei Ying, and he got through he and Luo Qingyang’s opening weekend of shows by hyperfocusing on performing. Now they’re back to their regular schedule of rehearsing in the mid-week lull between show runs, which means Lan Zhan’s brain has much more time to fixate on his predicament.
“Is it the kind of thing where if you tell me about it, you’ll stop being so distracted, and we can do the dips without giving me a heart attack when I drop an inch further than I think I should before you catch me?” Luo Qingyang stretches her arms above her head, giving him an expectant look.
“Are you trying to actually help, or are you just trying to pry to satisfy your own curiosity?” Lan Zhan asks, avoiding her gaze by taking another sip of water.
“Both,” Luo Qingyang says shamelessly. “You know it’s both, Lan Zhan.” She narrows her eyes, scanning him intently from his toes up to his head. “I have ways of getting you to answer, you know.”
Lan Zhan inclines his head, conceding the point. “Shall we mark it from the beginning?” he says, meaning it as an agreement to tell her. After their long years of friendship Luo Qingyang understands his tone and hits play on the music. She skips happily across the room into his arms, assuming their opening position with a grace and elegance that stands in stark contrast to her nosy expression.
“So!” They transition into the first section of the choreography. “What’s the problem?
Lan Zhan resists the urge to sigh as they bound gently through the first jump. “Have I told you about my new regular customer?”
“The comedian,” Luo Qingyang agrees, popping up onto pointe so Lan Zhan can turn her. “Did something happen with him?” She meets his eyes in the mirror, suddenly murderous. “Did he do something creepy?”
Lan Zhan shakes his head, drawing Luo Qingyang out of her pointe releve and using the subsequent twirl to switch into the follow, allowing her to promenade him around the studio. “The opposite.” They mark another jump. “I seem to have developed a crush on him.”
“Oh.” Luo Qingyang steps behind him, hands cupped under his shoulder blades, and they mark the lift (which always gets an incredible crowd reaction—people never think she’s strong enough for it and are shocked to learn she can, in fact, lift him over her head) in silence before moving on to the next sequence. “And he’s a customer.” She twirls him. “At the club.”
Lan Zhan nods, grateful beyond measure that Luo Qingyang also spent a few years dancing at Tiger Tiger while saving up to start her own production company. He hates having to explain the complicated system of boundaries one has to navigate while stripping, the way it’s possible to have genuine affection for some customers while never wanting to associate with them outside of work, the anti-sex-work soup everyone in society marinates in all the time that means people will happily watch a stripper, but if they date a stripper they’re likely to get jealous and weird about it. Tanya had a boyfriend a year or so back who seemed like he was fine with her dancing, but as their relationship progressed he got more and more uncomfortable with other men looking at his girlfriend and started pressuring her to quit.
Fortunately for Tanya (and everyone at Tiger Tiger) she quit that shitty relationship instead, and security has banned her ex-boyfriend from the club. It’s one example of many, though, and one of the reasons Lan Zhan has such strict rules for what he shares with customers. Said rules were all proactive, since it’s never been an issue for him before.
Deep in his heart of hearts he can admit he’d assumed he was too jaded by years of professional dance to fall into the same trap; too used to dealing with men who wanted him for his body but found his personality cold and boring to be tricked into liking someone from work . Surely he was above such embarrassing missteps as wanting to date a customer from the club.
Lan Zhan is not above it, as it turns out. It’s infuriating to have to admit as much, but here he is, pining over a man who pays him to critique standup once a month in a strip club private room. Humiliating.
“Do you think he’s been, like... Putting on a performance?” Luo Qingyang asks right before they separate for wide, curved runs around the edges of the room. “On his best behavior?” she asks when they meet back up in the middle.
“No,” Lan Zhan says, considering it while he dips her (while making sure he actually pays attention and dips her safely and predictably according to the choreography). “Or, at least, not in a dishonest way. He seems focused on respect.” Of the rules of the space, hence Wei Ying cheering from the rail and throwing dollars on the stage; of Lan Zhan’s time, hence his generous compensation; of Lan Zhan’s boundaries, never pushing for more when Lan Zhan gives him a clear no.
Wow, Lan Zhan is down bad. He hates this. How dare he feel this way.
“But that’s only at work,” Luo Qingyang observes, head tipped back toward the ground and one leg pointed to the ceiling.
“And at work I’m Cobalt,” Lan Zhan finishes, raising her out of the dip and staring deeply into her eyes for the count of four. “He hasn’t met Lan Zhan.”
“Do you want him to meet Lan Zhan?” Luo Qingyang asks knowingly, putting her hands on his waist and physically pushing him into the next section of choreography right on cue.
Lan Zhan hums noncommittally. It’s a complicated question. His libido certainly wants Wei Ying to meet Lan Zhan, as that seems like the most efficient path to confirming whether Wei Ying’s obedient streak carries through to the bedroom. (Lan Zhan is pretty sure it would.) He also genuinely enjoys conversing with Wei Ying, and it would be nice to do so in a venue that is less loud. Perhaps during daytime hours. Perhaps where Lan Zhan gets to wear a cozy sweater and normal shoes.
That, of course, leads into the actual problem: Does Wei Ying want to meet Lan Zhan? Would Wei Ying be interested in talking with Lan Zhan during daytime hours? Would Wei Ying see Lan Zhan in a cozy sweater and still find him alluring, or is he only interested in Cobalt? And how would he react when he learned Lan Zhan intends to continue dancing at Tiger Tiger, regardless of if or who he’s dating? Would it be Tanya’s shitty boyfriend all over again?
“It would be one thing if we were to meet socially by coincidence,” he decides, leaning gracefully back to drape himself over Luo Qingyang’s shoulder, allowing her to keep him safely upright.
“Right, so you can see how he acts outside the club,” she agrees, wrapping her arms around his rib cage and backing away at speed, dragging his pointed toes along the floor. “But you can’t be the one to invite him to do that or it sets a bad precedent and risks ruining the vibe.”
“Exactly.” It’s frustrating, but better for Lan Zhan to simply ride this out and wait for his feelings to fade than to lose out on a sure financial benefit and an easy shift to look forward to once a month.
“So you’re just going to pretend nothing has changed and pine about him from afar, which is fine, as long as you stop almost dropping me on my ass,” Luo Qingyang finishes, bracing her hands under his shoulder blades and pushing him back upright.
“Exactly,” Lan Zhan says again, allowing himself to artistically lose his balance forward so he has the momentum to glide into a run. His feet feel lighter, his brain less crowded. Talking about it actually helped! How annoying. “Thank you for listening.”
“I wish I had any advice for you,” Luo Qingyang says apologetically, chasing him across the floor and then leaping bodily into his arms to wrap all her limbs around him. “If you do decide to fuck him, wear a condom.”
“Good advice, applicable to every situation,” Lan Zhan observes, slowly collapsing to the ground under Luo Qingyang’s weight in a very controlled and dramatic manner. “I will take it under advisement.”
“You better,” she says threateningly, rising onto all fours to loom over him in a disjointed, creepy bit of dance. It’s how this part is choreographed, but it also makes her statement more intimidating. She probably planned it that way. “Lan Zhan?”
Lan Zhan hums, prepping to push up into a bridge.
“Good luck.” It’s said with devastating sincerity, right before she rolls off him to the side and into four eight-counts of what can best be described as “artistic, contemporary thrashing.”
“Thank you,” Lan Zhan says from his bridge, which he has to hold during all of Luo Qingyang’s thrashing. At least dance is still familiar, even when it’s being very strange. Lan Zhan needs that familiarity right now.
★★★
Lan Zhan finishes the run of his show with Luo Qingyang—which was well-reviewed in a few local arts publications, which means Lan Zhan can send the reviews to his uncle to assure him he hasn’t gone entirely feral since dropping from the professional ballet world—and takes a weekend off work at Tiger Tiger, both to celebrate and to recover. He spends a lot of time in epsom salt baths, eats as many noodles and dumplings as his body can handle, and does long, luxurious stretching routines. It’s exactly what he needs, and when he returns to dancing at Tiger Tiger, it’s with a refreshed body and a clear mind.
He has a crush on Wei Ying. It’s not the worst thing to ever happen, in spite of how he felt about it two weeks prior. Plenty of dancers and sex workers have caught feelings for a customer. Some of them manage to have a successful relationship with said former customer based on mutual respect and affection. Some of them don’t. There are no guarantees!
Lan Zhan is under no obligation to act on his feelings, either. He can simply continue to enjoy Wei Ying’s company once a month for however long it lasts, enforce his own boundaries, and never make a move to turn it into anything else. Maybe he’ll start trying to date again, even. It’s been ages since the last time he even had energy to negotiate a hookup; developing a crush on Wei Ying may be his mind’s way of telling him he’s ready to put himself out there.
(When he thinks about trying to date again he doesn’t find it a particularly appealing proposition, but that doesn’t mean he’s not potentially ready to try.)
Truly, Lan Zhan is feeling fairly sanguine about it the next time he struts out to the stage on a Thursday and sees Wei Ying at the rail. Yes, his heart goes thump-thump in a way that shouldn’t be allowed and Wei Ying’s smile is so bright the FAA has probably banned it from coming anywhere near planes during takeoff and landing, but that’s fine. It’s nothing to worry about, and nothing he needs to fixate on.
“Cobalt!” Wei Ying says, meeting Lan Zhan exactly two steps onto the club floor after his set and bouncing on his toes in excitement. “Are we good to—?” He gestures at their usual room, which every other dancer now knows to leave empty on Thursdays.
“We are,” Lan Zhan says evenly even while Wei Ying’s obvious excitement tries to infect him, which is the only acceptable explanation for why his pulse has started racing. He meets eyes with Jamal at the door—who at this point just nods and waves him off with a thumbs-up—and hooks his arm through Wei Ying’s in an increasingly familiar movement that’s just to direct his energy and not because Lan Zhan wants to touch him in a way that would demonstrate extremely poor boundaries for other customers.
(Lan Zhan is aware he’s lying to himself, but he’s also just trying to get through work while wanting to put both hands into Wei Ying’s hair and make fists. He allows himself the lie. He’s being gracious.)
“Cobalt!” Wei Ying exclaims again as soon as they’re alone. “Guess what?” Lan Zhan doesn’t even manage to get his mouth open to respond when Wei Ying continues, “I got a gig! A real one! Paid!”
“Congratulations,” Lan Zhan’s mouth says for him.
“Thanks!” Wei Ying gives Lan Zhan a stabilizing hand down onto the couch (Lan Zhan is good at sitting down elegantly while wearing heels that put him a good eight to ten inches above normal couch-sitting proportions, but it’s nice to have some support for it) and is then free to pace the floor in front of him. “It’s not much, obviously, like—it’s a variety show-type thing? I don’t think the theater is super huge, and they’re taking a chance on me since I’m still pretty new, but!” He pauses and spreads his arms wide, beaming. “They booked me! I saw the application and sent in my reel—thanks for the advice on that, by the way—and it happened! They’re paying me a whole seventy-five dollars! Someone is giving me money for my comedy! It’s not like ten dollars from the shared tip pool!” Wei Ying poses like he’s the subject of a dignified political portrait. “I’m a professional stand-up comedian now.”
“Technically you need to wait until after you’ve received your pay to call yourself a professional, by that standard,” Lan Zhan points out reasonably. Wei Ying cracks up laughing immediately, collapsing onto the couch in a cushion-shaking pile of limbs.
“Good point,” he says when he’s recovered, peeking between the fingers of one hand. “After I do the show I will technically be a professional comedian.”
“Congratulations,” Lan Zhan says again, as sincerely as he can. “That’s a big step, and one you’ve worked very hard for.” He politely decides not to mention that Wei Ying is going to need to land a lot of seventy-five dollar gigs in order to make back the amount of money he’s spent on getting performance feedback in a strip club. Lan Zhan had to do a lot of dancing in order to earn back the amount of money spent on his dance education, after all. It’s not dissimilar.
“I couldn’t have done it without you,” Wei Ying says with a nearly uncomfortable level of gratitude, sitting up and offering Lan Zhan a little bow. “I really can’t thank you enough.”
Lan Zhan wants to do unspeakable things to him. “You’re very welcome,” he says, instead of enacting any of them. “Did you want to run your set?”
“Oh, right!” Wei Ying leaps to his feet, suddenly reminded of his actual purpose in coming to the club this evening. “Yeah, let’s do that.” He bounds onto the stage, legs looking illegally long in his slim-fit black trousers, and gives himself a full body shake. “Let me just...” He turns his back toward Lan Zhan (a scene-setting technique Lan Zhan, in fact, taught him) and takes a deep breath that visibly lifts his shoulders, not that Lan Zhan is watching extremely closely.
The set is good. Most of Wei Ying’s sets are good enough now that Lan Zhan has started to feel almost superfluous to the process; a barely-dressed decoration who occasionally says, “Lift your chin.” He suggests rearranging a particular rambling joke so the punchline hits harder and asks a couple of clarifying questions about the intent of another so he can fine-tune his feedback about Wei Ying’s delivery, but it doesn’t take long before even that avenue is exhausted.
“You’re sure I shouldn’t run it again?” Wei Ying asks after Lan Zhan suggests they’re done for the night, fidgeting with the lapels of his jacket.
“It will be worse if you over-rehearse,” Lan Zhan assures him, patting the couch pointedly until Wei Ying gets the message, flinging himself upon it like a dropped marionette. “Your delivery is very conversational; you don’t want it to sound rehearsed.”
“You’re right,” Wei Ying says, tipping his head back against the couch cushions and with a sigh. He does this quite a bit, face to the ceiling, eyes usually closed, and it means Lan Zhan has the opportunity to ogle the beautiful, tempting line it makes of his neck. Lan Zhan does so now, and idly imagines what it would be like to have Wei Ying’s skin between his teeth. “It just feels like I should be doing more.”
“When is your show?” Lan Zhan asks, mostly to prevent himself from spending the next five minutes in a silent, biting-related fantasy.
“Saturday,” Wei Ying tells the ceiling, eyes still closed.
“Oh,” Lan Zhan says, surprised, and then when Wei Ying cracks open an eyelid to peer at him, “I also have a show on Saturday.” Why does he keep telling Wei Ying these things?
“Oh!” Wei Ying echoes, snapping upright. “Cool! What kind of—” He cuts himself off, frowns, and tries, “What can you tell me about it?” He so clearly wants to know everything about Lan Zhan’s show and is just as clearly doing his best not to overstep Lan Zhan’s stated boundaries. It’s quite possibly the sexiest possible thing a man could do. Lan Zhan would eat him alive for it if it weren’t for the specifically stated boundaries, alas.
“I’m performing two dance pieces I choreographed myself,” Lan Zhan says, deeming that a safe enough thing to share. It’s nothing Wei Ying couldn’t have guessed on his own, frankly. He refrains from adding that the dance pieces are burlesque numbers, and that he did all of his own costuming, and that one of them involves pointe, and where the show is, and that the show is a cabaret involving burlesque as well as live music and variety acts, and how Wei Ying could buy tickets. Discreet. He’s being very discreet.
“Cool!” Wei Ying’s eyes gleam with enthusiasm even in the dim club lighting. “If it’s anything like you do here, the audience won’t know what hit them.” He pauses. “I mean, I assume it’s more dance-y than what you do here, but what you do here is super impressive—do you do pole stuff when you perform other places? Because the pole stuff you do is, like...” He kisses his fingers and tosses them out into the air. “Wow.”
“I do pole sometimes,” Lan Zhan allows, deciding that’s also a safe enough thing to share. “Not in this show, though.”
Wei Ying nods thoughtfully. “Can’t do pole if you don’t have a pole,” he says solemnly, then extends a hand for Lan Zhan to shake. “Break a leg,” he says over their clasped hands. “I’ll be rooting for you to have a good show from backstage at mine.”
“Break a leg,” Lan Zhan echoes, ignoring the twitterpated thumping of his heart. “I’m sure the audience will love your set.”
“It’s all thanks to you,” Wei Ying tells him warmly, squeezing his hand. “Do I owe you the usual?”
“Please,” Lan Zhan says demurely, and leaves the private room with a thicker wallet, a sway to his hips, and just a hint of disappointment.
★★★
Lan Zhan is a professional in many ways: as a formally trained dancer, as a stripper, and just generally in demeanor. He replies promptly to emails. He arrives on time. He makes sure he’s ready to perform well ahead of the stage manager’s call. He doesn’t take up unnecessary amounts of room backstage, he doesn’t talk shit about other performers behind their backs, and he makes it a point to learn and remember the names of the stagehands and techs, and to tip them out after the show (if it’s a tipping show). He once arrived to a venue to discover the dressing room had flooded with raw sewage thanks to a pipe breaking and the new dressing room was an approximately six foot by six foot office that was seventy-five percent desk, and he still managed to have his face on, his hair done, and to be warmed up in full costume while sharing with eight other performers.
All this is to say: Lan Zhan is unflappable. He has never once in his life been flapped, a fact for which he finds himself intensely grateful when he rolls his costume suitcase through the dressing room door on Saturday night and immediately spots Wei Ying on the far side of the green room, perched on the arm of a couch and obviously doing his best to stay out of everyone else’s way. Wei Ying? Here? In Lan Zhan’s dressing room? For his Saturday night show?
Lan Zhan remembers, distantly, the email with the set list he received earlier that day, and the “Yiling Laozu - Comedy” entry upon it. He remembers a feeling of polite excitement at the idea of being in a show with another Chinese performer, especially one performing under a Mandarin stage name, but promptly forgot about it in the rush of packing. Yiling Laozu must be Wei Ying’s stage name. Lan Zhan remembers suggesting he craft a stage persona, but Wei Ying never told him the name.
Wei Ying, perhaps sensing Lan Zhan’s intense gaze, glances up. Their eyes meet, and Lan Zhan watches with interest as Wei Ying very clearly goes on an emotional journey. He recognizes Lan Zhan; gets excited about recognizing him; opens his mouth and raises one hand to greet him; realizes the only name he knows for Lan Zhan is from Tiger Tiger; realizes he only knows Lan Zhan from Tiger Tiger; remembers that Lan Zhan might not want anyone else in the room to know he dances at Tiger Tiger; subsequently realizes he has no idea how to handle the etiquette of meeting the stripper he regularly hires to critique his stand-up outside of the context of the club; and finally realizes he’s been frozen with his mouth open and his hand half-raised for an awkwardly long time.
Lan Zhan, for his part, realizes he’s stopped just inside the doorway and takes command of his own body and the situation: He gives Wei Ying a polite nod of greeting, then wheels his suitcase toward the opposite end of the couch, where there’s a nook he can tuck it into to get it out of the way. He’s here early enough to stake out one of the good spots in this particular dressing room, and he makes sure it’s very obvious that his spot is claimed before he goes to check in with the producer and the stage manager.
When he returns Wei Ying is chatting with another newly arrived performer, helpfully carrying one end of an upholstered bench while the woman carries the other.
“So you bring this with you every time you do this act?” he asks, somewhere between interested and concerned.
“Only when it’s a stage where they won’t see my floorwork otherwise,” the woman says, shaking out her hands after they stow it against a wall. “Thank you so much. If anyone asks, I’ll be right back with my suitcase.”
“I’ll be sure to relay the message,” Wei Ying says, and his eyes follow the woman back to the door, then snag on Lan Zhan where he tucked himself just inside it to observe. Wei Ying stares at him for a second, eyes flicking up and down Lan Zhan’s soft royal blue terry fleece jumpsuit (it looks good after the show and is very comfortable—the perfect backstage outfit), then he rolls his shoulders back and approaches.
“Hi,” he says a little shyly when he reaches Lan Zhan, rocking up onto his toes and back down to his heels. A pause. Wei Ying presses his lips together. “I have no idea how I’m supposed to do this?”
Lan Zhan does not laugh at him, but it’s a near thing. (His tone was so plaintive. ) “My stage name here is Hanguang-jun,” he says, extending his hand and giving Wei Ying a comforting squeeze when they shake. “We’ve met when you’ve seen me perform elsewhere.” Lan Zhan loves an obfuscating truth. “I do not hide my other work in this context, but I also don’t advertise it. Treat me as an acquaintance and fellow performer.”
Wei Ying slumps in relief, giving Lan Zhan’s hand a returning squeeze of gratitude before he drops it. “Thank you,” he whispers fervently. “Thank you. I’m—you know this was a big deal for me, and I don’t want to mess it up by making someone uncomfortable backstage right away.” He perks up suddenly. “Oh, does this mean I get to actually watch your numbers? Is that okay with you?”
“It is,” Lan Zhan confirms. “Has anyone shown you the secret way around to watch from back of house yet?” Lan Zhan will be using it to enter through the audience for one of his acts later, but it’s also extremely useful for getting to watch the rest of the show, and one of his favorite features of this venue.
“There’s a secret tunnel?” Wei Ying sounds delighted by the prospect.
“It’s not quite that exciting,” Lan Zhan warns him, and dutifully shows him the bare-bones hallway that leads around the outside of the theater space, past the tech booth, and then into the theater proper. Once the show has begun Lan Zhan fully expects to see half the cast lurking against the black velvet drapes, but for now it’s empty except for the two of them. Lan Zhan briefly considers dragging Wei Ying behind one of the black velvet drapes and pinning him to the wall, then immediately rejects the idea. He’s professional. He’s being professional.
“This is actually a little bigger than I expected,” Wei Ying muses, wandering down the aisle and up onto the stage, looking around at everything with wide eyes. “It’s a legit little theater! I love this old wallpaper.”
“It was a speakeasy during prohibition,” Lan Zhan volunteers. “The wallpaper and molding is original.” The old wallpaper is one of Lan Zhan’s other favorite things about this particular venue, so he thinks it says good things about Wei Ying’s taste that he likes it.
“It’s that old?” Wei Ying asks, delighted.
Lan Zhan nods. “Some people report that the basement is haunted, as well.”
Wei Ying’s jaw drops. “Can we go to the haunted basement?”
“Maybe later,” Lan Zhan says, suppressing a smile. “I need to sweep the stage and warm up.”
Wei Ying nods, then frowns. “Sweep the stage? Is that a saying or something, like ‘Break a leg’?”
“It’s a meditative technique to prepare for performing.” Lan Zhan pokes around in the corners behind the stage curtains, looking for a broom. “Sweeping centers me in the space, familiarizes me with the stage on which I’m dancing, and also ensures that the surface is as clean as possible.” That last part is a favor he’s doing as much for himself as for everyone else in the cast—this venue hosts live music along with burlesque shows and fringe theater, and Lan Zhan has found broken bits of guitar string and the occasional shard of shattered glass when he sweeps. (At least it doesn’t look like anyone has spilled their entire drink on the stage recently—sometimes Lan Zhan ends up mopping along with sweeping, solely out of self-defense.)
“Oh,” Wei Ying says, figuring out what he’s doing and helping to look for the broom. “I’ve never heard of that, but I like it a lot. Seems like it would help keep you humble.” He emerges from behind one of the curtain legs, wincing. “Not that I think you’re, like, not humble—”
“It is very easy to get an overinflated belief in your own standing in the dance world if you don’t actively take steps to stay grounded,” Lan Zhan says, cutting off an apology certain to be both rambling (Wei Ying is talkative) and unnecessary (Lan Zhan isn’t offended). “It is important to remember that we all have to dance the same stage.” Ah, there’s the broom! Lan Zhan retrieves it at the same time that Wei Ying makes a triumphant sound and turns around holding one of those freestanding dustpans.
“Well, I’m not dancing,” Wei Ying says cheerfully, handing the dustpan over to Lan Zhan with a smile. “But I get it.” He bites his lower lip and glances around at the empty theater. “I’ll leave you to it?”
Lan Zhan inclines his head. “If anyone is looking for me backstage, feel free to send them out here.”
“You got it!” Wei Ying gives him a little salute with two fingers while backing toward the stage exit, then turns around and trots down the stairs. Lan Zhan had feared, for a moment, that he was going to try to navigate them backward, and is relieved to have been proven wrong.
Alone in the theater, Lan Zhan takes a deep breath, fingers flexing on the broom handle. Wei Ying is here. They have met socially, outside of the club. Wei Ying has continued to be polite and respectful. This opens up some... options.
None of those options are applicable at the moment, though, so Lan Zhan takes another deep breath and pushes his distraction aside. He needs to sweep. He needs to finish warming up. He needs to get in costume. He needs to perform.
After that, though...
Lan Zhan walks far downstage right and starts sweeping, letting the shhhf of the bristles against the floor do their job. The stage is filthy enough that this process is both satisfying and deeply necessary—the pile of dirt Lan Zhan has amassed at the end of his work makes him shudder to think about dancing in it. Stage and mind both clear, he makes his way backstage to unpack his costumes.
Knowing to expect Wei Ying makes seeing him less of a shock, but he’s no less eyecatching. Lan Zhan takes him in out of the corner of his eyes as he unzips his suitcase, taking in details he was too discombobulated to notice earlier. Wei Ying has stage makeup on; nothing elaborate, but his skin is noticeably matte, his cheekbones have been contoured, and his red and black eyeliner brings a sexy level of goth mystery to his black embroidered blazer and red dress shirt. The shirt is unbuttoned down to his sternum to show off a silver pendant necklace of a bird skull, and he’s wearing a black choker snug against the neck Lan Zhan might be mildly obsessed with. It’s a good look, and one that shows Wei Ying has put thought and effort into his stage presentation in a way many cis male comedians don’t. Lan Zhan approves professionally. (His libido approves much less professionally.)
Performers continue to trickle in as showtime approaches, demonstrating varying levels of timeliness and varying levels of apology about their timeliness or lack thereof. That’s not Lan Zhan’s business, so he adjourns to the stage with a yoga mat for a short but intense warmup and stretching routine to supplement his at-home warmup, takes his turn running through his cues and music once the tech makes it to the booth, and generally has an uneventful pre-show experience as he touches up his makeup, puts on his hairpiece, and tapes his pasties. This allows him to quietly observe Wei Ying, and not just for his personal enjoyment. Lan Zhan has been backstage with plenty of men who wasted no time in demonstrating why they should never be allowed into a vulnerable, half-dressed backstage environment ever again. If Wei Ying turns out to be one of those men...
Well, at least Lan Zhan would know. It’s always better to know.
It’s a pleasant and welcome surprise to learn that Wei Ying is as respectful of the other performers as he always has been of Lan Zhan at the club. He’s eager to help when someone needs a hand, but stays holed up in his little nook at the end of the couch to stay out of the way otherwise. He very carefully doesn’t look at anyone when the other burlesque performers start undressing, zips up a dress when asked without touching skin, and is generally a polite, unobtrusive presence. Once again, Lan Zhan finds himself suffused with professional approval and a much less professional desire.
“Five to doors,” the stage manager calls.
“Thank you, five,” Lan Zhan choruses along with most of the room. It’s officially time to make one last bathroom trip (Lan Zhan does not have a particularly nervous bladder, but better safe than sorry) and to change into his first costume.
“Oh, wow,” Wei Ying says quietly from the opposite side of the couch as Lan Zhan adjusts the straps of his rhinestoned body harness. He looks up to catch Wei Ying obviously staring at his body—no, the costume piece. Wei Ying tears his eyes away, realizes Lan Zhan caught him staring, and goes very red. “Sorry, it’s just... That’s really pretty, C—Hanguang-jun.” He pauses, then adds delicately, “It’s different from the other costumes I’ve seen you perform in.”
“It serves a different purpose,” Lan Zhan says honestly, snapping on the ombre-dyed panel skirt pieces, a process which looks not unlike he’s assembling a flower out of individual petals. “The costumes you usually see me in have not generally been created to serve a specific artistic vision.”
Wei Ying nods thoughtfully. “Right. They’re more... practical. For certain things.” He watches Lan Zhan do up the busk on a underbust corset with absolute fascination. “Do they come that sparkly when you buy them?”
“I make all my own costumes,” Lan Zhan says somewhat absently, making a decision that is both very sensible and selfish. He turns his back to Wei Ying, pulling his voluminous clip-in ponytail over his shoulder. “Will you lace me up?”
“Sure!” Wei Ying steps closer, then pauses. When Lan Zhan glances back at him, he has his hands hovering about six inches away from Lan Zhan’s corset laces, which he regards with suspicion. “I’ve never done this before. I assume I don’t just, like... yank.”
“Please no yanking,” Lan Zhan confirms, and valiantly doesn’t mention that yanking might be nice in other, sexier contexts. He talks Wei Ying through how to properly lace a corset and braces against the tugging as Wei Ying does his best to obey, his one hand occasionally brushing Lan Zhan’s skin just above the fabric, or resting on his waist for support while Wei Ying tightens the laces with the other. It is a very enjoyable way to have his corset laced, one that Lan Zhan cannot allow himself to dwell on for too long because he’s wearing very small underwear that he nevertheless engineered specifically to keep his dick strapped in through any and all acrobatic feats he might perform.
“Just a bow?” Wei Ying asks, obviously keeping the laces taut while he waits for Lan Zhan’s answer.
“Yes, please.” Lan Zhan takes the ends of the laces from Wei Ying once it’s tied and carefully tucks them under the bottom hem of the corset, where he’ll be able to reach them onstage without them flopping all over while he dances. “Thank you,” he says, turning around to find a blushing Wei Ying in the middle of dragging his attention away from Lan Zhan’s waist.
“You’re welcome,” Wei Ying says, swallowing visibly. “Glad I could help.”
Cute. Eager. Obedient. Respectful. Wei Ying could not be more Lan Zhan’s type if he was created in a lab. Lan Zhan cannot do anything about it right now because the show is about to start, and he’s still forcing himself to be sensible before he decides if he’s going to do anything about it; there remains the unfortunate possibility that Wei Ying will reveal some kind of terrible personality flaw that renders him entirely unfuckable.
Lan Zhan is technically headlining this show, though it’s not a large enough gig for that to mean a lot in terms of splashing his face all over the advertising to try to draw a crowd. He’s being paid a bit above average, and—more relevantly—is scheduled to close both halves. That means he’s safe to put a robe on over his costume and take the secret hallway once the show starts. Lan Zhan slips into the theater and tucks himself against the back wall to watch. Wei Ying isn’t on until the second half, so it’s not much of a surprise to see the entrance door open and a black-clad person sneak inside. Wei Ying glances around in the reflected stage lights and posts up next to Lan Zhan, clapping along with the audience as the first performer is announced.
It’s a good show. Lan Zhan didn’t really expect otherwise—he’s worked with this producer before, and trusts her professional judgment—but it’s always nice to be in a show where he doesn’t feel like easily the best performer in the room, even when he’s ostensibly headlining. The first burlesque performer does a comedic act where her bra turns into puppets; she’s followed by a woman who does a juggling striptease that Lan Zhan finds mind-boggling. He can’t juggle in general, let alone keep three balls in the air with one hand while pulling a glove off his other hand with his teeth.
Wei Ying is similarly blown away, cheering, clapping, and literally yelling, “HOW?!” at particularly excellent parts of the act. He’s as generous with his verbal encouragement here as he is at Tiger Tiger. Lan Zhan is aware he’s actively looking for green flags at this point, but after suffering through a non-zero number of uncomfortable cis men refusing to clap for burlesque lest their (almost always enthusiastically cheering) female dates think they’re attracted to the performers, he appreciates a man who knows how to respectfully hoot and holler.
A live music set follows the juggler, and then another burlesque act, this one a stirring Wonder Woman tribute. Lan Zhan lingers for as long as he can, but once Wonder Woman leaves the stage he heads for the exit. He respects stage managers too much to make one come and get him.
“Break a leg!” Wei Ying whispers as he passes, offering him two thumbs up and a smile that gleams even in the dim house lighting. Lan Zhan’s heart does an embarrassing flopping thing, and he escapes into the backstage hallway with hot ears and a warm burn deep in his belly.
Fortunately both have faded by the time he takes his opening pose behind the curtain, arms above his head in a graceful curve, back arched, eyes down toward the stage. His music starts as the curtain sweeps open, the lighting casting him in a backlit silhouette for a moment before the spotlight comes on, flinging reflections from the rhinestones on his costume like a disco ball. Lan Zhan hears several gasps from the audience, a whispered, “Oh, wow!” and Wei Ying’s clear, vibrant, “Woooooo!” from the back of the theater. Lan Zhan has to struggle against the unfamiliar urge to smile, which isn’t part of his facial choreography at this juncture, thank you.
Lan Zhan frequently goes into something of a fugue state when he dances, his attention focusing down to his choreography, the music, and the space in which he combines them. That happens now, in that any worries he has about money or rehearsing or what tomorrow will bring all fade away to nothing. He’s present in his body and in the moment, absorbing the energy from the audience through his skin and synthesizing it into his movements, building a circuit where they both give something and receive something.
He is, at the same time, hyper-aware of Wei Ying’s presence, and not just because Wei Ying is the loudest person in the room. Lan Zhan can’t see him through the glare of the stage lights, but he imagines he can feel the prickle of Wei Ying’s eyes on each inch of newly-bared skin, can hear him swallow the way he does when he’s nervous and horny when Lan Zhan peels out of his corset. He definitely hears Wei Ying cheer when he turns a cartwheel, panel skirts whirling around his legs and giving the audience a saucy peek at his ass before he comes back upright. Every piece of choreography feels new and fresh, each movement infused with a sizzle. Lan Zhan picks off his panel skirts one by one, giving the back of the theater a sultry look each time. The point of looking at the back of the theater is that it makes everyone in the audience think he’s looking straight at them.
That’s not why he’s doing it now.
Lan Zhan hits his final pose to the ear-splitting screams of a crowd that doesn’t know what to do with themselves, his chest heaving and his skin hot. It’s one of the best performances he’s done lately, and the stomping and screaming confirms that he’s not the only one who thinks so. He offers the audience a sweeping bow before disappearing back behind the curtain, and heads for the green room and a desperately needed sip of water.
“Hanguang-jun!” Wei Ying whisper-yells, bursting through the green room door after him, red-faced and practically frantic. “Holy shit,” he continues, weaving single-mindedly through performers in various stages of undress to almost skid to a stop next to Lan Zhan’s end of the couch. “That was fucking incredible, like, I’m mad at you for how good that was.”
“Thank you,” Lan Zhan says, still breathing a bit heavily. Wei Ying’s eyes drop to his chest, and then get wrenched back up to his face.
“I knew you were a good dancer from—uh—the other shows I’ve seen you do,” Wei Ying blurts earnestly, almost vibrating with pent-up energy, “but that was something else. You don’t get to dance like that at—places—and the costume!” He claws at his face, putting odd lines in his contour. “That was capital a Art, god, I’m so glad we ended up in the same show so I could see it.”
Lan Zhan is used to compliments—he was, in fact, a principal danseur for a small period of time—but he finds himself flustered by Wei Ying’s praise to an extent that surprises him. Maybe it’s Wei Ying’s unpracticed honesty, his lack of knowledge about exactly how to compliment a dancer making his stumbling explanations seem more genuine. More likely, it’s because Lan Zhan wants very badly to fuck him.
“I’m looking forward to seeing you perform, as well,” Lan Zhan says truthfully, and then—out of solidarity and professional obligation—adds, “You may want to touch up your makeup.”
Wei Ying frowns at Lan Zhan, touches his face, and then looks down at his hands, which are obviously smeared with contour. “Oh no,” he complains plaintively. “I’m still not used to having stuff on my face.”
“Practice helps,” Lan Zhan advises, and Wei Ying scuttles back to the opposite end of the couch to dig in a messenger bag. The stage kitten drops off all the pieces of Lan Zhan’s costume at this point, and he busies himself with packing it back away and changing into his second number. This one he performs on pointe, and he spends part of intermission re-warming up his feet before slipping into his pointe shoes. He unfortunately misses the opening burlesque act, but he makes it to the back of the theater in time to catch Wei Ying’s set.
Lan Zhan has, of course, seen this set before; he critiqued it not two days prior, and it’s comprised of Wei Ying’s best jokes from previous sets. Seeing it alone in a dimly lit strip club private room is nothing like seeing it live in front of an audience, though.
Wei Ying glows. He soaks in the laughter like it’s sunlight, synthesizing it not into chlorophyll, but into radiance that he then shares with the audience. He takes their glee and reflects it back at them, inviting them to join him in the joke, to take a little joy into their lives. Lan Zhan finds himself laughing along with some of the punchlines—punchlines that he already knows!—just because the energy is so infectious.
It’s an unmitigated success. Lan Zhan feels like he just watched one of his dance students perform in a professional ballet for the first time, only it wouldn’t be appropriate to think about a student the way he thinks about Wei Ying. As Wei Ying starts his final thank-yous, Lan Zhan slips out of the theater, wanting to be backstage to meet Wei Ying when he comes offstage.
He was right to do so, because as soon as Wei Ying steps into the green room he looks for Lan Zhan, their eyes locking across the crowded space.
“Did you—” Wei Ying starts, politely circling to the side around a musician hauling their guitar toward the door.
“Impeccable,” Lan Zhan tells him. “That was flawless. Fantastic work.”
Wei Ying beams, cheeks so curved up his eyes almost disappear. “Really?”
“Really. The timing, your stage presence, the delivery... I have nothing but praise.” Lan Zhan isn’t even exaggerating—it was that good.
Wei Ying’s jaw drops. “But you always have critique for me!”
“Not today.” Lan Zhan sets a hand on Wei Ying’s shoulder, warm with adrenaline even through his suit jacket, and squeezes. “You did very well, Yiling Laozu. You should be proud of yourself.”
Wei Ying blushes very red, ducking his head to avoid Lan Zhan’s gaze. “You don’t have to call me that,” he half mumbles, fidgeting with nerves. “It’s fine if you just call me Wei Ying.”
There’s a lecture waiting on the tip of Lan Zhan’s tongue about the importance of respecting pseudonyms in a backstage environment, for both politeness and kayfabe reasons, but he actively decides to skip it just this once. “Then you did very well, Wei Ying.”
Wei Ying bites his lower lip, muffling a teakettle noise. “You’re really intense, you know that?” he asks, peeking up at Lan Zhan out of the corner of his eyes, then doing a double take down to his feet and back up. “Are those—are you a ballerina, Hanguang-jun?”
“The technical term is danseur,” Lan Zhan says, wanting to roll his eyes at the pretension of it. “But yes. I am classically trained.”
Wei Ying gapes at him. “Okay, that explains some things,” he says, not quite under his breath. “Wow. Cool. Oh, man, I can’t wait to see your second act.”
Lan Zhan inclines his head and checks the setlist. “Speaking of, I need to finish changing.”
Wei Ying steps back immediately. “I’ll let you get to it!”
Lan Zhan actually does have most of his costume on already—a carnivale-inspired strapless gown on over another specially-made harness witha bra and a series of progressively smaller skirts—but the main showpiece of the number is the two ostrich-feather fans that clip into a custom holder on his back, framing his head and shoulders in a fluttery halo before he removes them partway through the act to use them as actual burlesque fans. The fans are a pain in the ass to get into position, though, and once he has them on he has to wait against a wall in the hallway outside to keep out of the way.
While he waits in the hallway, periodically wiggling and popping up onto pointe to keep his legs warm, Lan Zhan considers his next move. He’s going to make a pass at Wei Ying; that much is certain. Wei Ying is clearly attracted to him and making a point to spend time with him backstage; Wei Ying has also been an exemplary member of the green room community. Lan Zhan is willing to risk finding out about a terrible personality deficiency in a more... intimate environment.
Lan Zhan has not quite decided exactly how he wants to make his pass by the time he’s called to the stage, and performing wipes his mind clean of all other anxieties. He drinks in the audience energy, pirouetting on pointe and dancing complicated footwork, removing the gown to cheers and then ripping the fans off his back to delighted, startled screaming. He allows himself to be a little smug about that reveal—seasoned burlesque audiences clock the fans almost immediately, but fresh eyes always react like he just did a magic trick. The rest of the act is a sultry tease, the audience getting glimpses of his rhinestoned bra, underwear, and body harness through strategic fan choreography while he flexes his hard-earned ballet training. He switches both fans to one hand to rip off the tear-away underwear, then extends his hand through the feathers to let the audience know exactly what happened.
The screaming reaches a fever pitch by the time Lan Zhan’s bra comes off, and he ends the act on pointe, arms up and bent at the elbows behind his head so he can frame his face and torso with the fans while he tassel twirls. It is—again—always a reveal that kills, and he’s still buzzing with triumph after curtain call.
“Hanguang-jun!” Wei Ying follows him back into the green room, bouncing with each step. “I feel like I’m running out of ways to say how fucking incredible you are! That was so good I want to bite something!”
“Thank you,” Lan Zhan says, instead of, “That can be arranged in very short order.”
“Totally cool if you’re not down for it,” Wei Ying continues, hands hovering awkwardly as Lan Zhan starts packing away his costume, like he wants to help but isn’t sure if he should, “but most of the cast is gonna go grab something to eat once we’re packed up? There’s a Mexican place a few blocks away that’s open late, and it’s supposed to be pretty good.” He rocks up onto his toes for a moment, his face screaming a naked, glowing hope so openly Lan Zhan almost feels secondhand embarrassed about it.
How wonderful for Wei Ying to save Lan Zhan the effort of deciding on an opening salvo. “I would love to come,” Lan Zhan says, and only barely makes it an innuendo.
Wei Ying’s face splits into one of those megawatt grins that always leaves Lan Zhan blinking spots out of his vision. “Great! I’ll just—” and he jerks his thumb at his little corner and its messenger bag.
“I’ll be ready soon,” Lan Zhan promises, and goes back to packing with a barely-contained simmer under his skin.
★★★
Wei Ying apologizes multiple times on the way to the Mexican restaurant for making Lan Zhan go so far out of his way. As the detours are caused by Wei Ying insisting on walking several female performers safely back to their cars, Lan Zhan assures him that he doesn’t mind while inwardly planning the ways he intends to sexually destroy and reward this man for his consideration later. (The sexual destruction is the reward, to be clear.)
Lan Zhan has actually been to this particular taco place before—it’s common for the cast to end up here after shows at the nearby venue, which is how he knows to go for the booths immediately to the right of the entrance. There are two of them taking up one entire wall facing each other, and it’s the easiest, best place to try to fit ten to twelve burlesque performers who aren’t ready to let the night end just yet. He also knows exactly how to maneuver so Wei Ying ends up at his side, Lan Zhan at the end of the booth bench and Wei Ying gently trapped between him and one of the musicians. Their thighs press together in spite of the booth not quite being small enough to require that.
It’s a pleasant time—the restaurant is quiet enough at this time of night that they don’t have to yell to be heard over the other customers, but still offering brisk enough business that Lan Zhan doesn’t feel bad about their group ordering a late-night communal meal. It’s also trendy enough to have multiple vegan and vegetarian options, and Lan Zhan gets a plate of vegan hearts of palm al pastor tacos he knows from previous experience are good.
“So do you do this kind of dancing a lot?” Wei Ying asks, happily crunching through a plate of nachos after a trip to the salsa bar to “jazz it up,” where he chose something so violently red it’s making Lan Zhan’s mouth burn just looking at it. “Burlesque?” He pauses. “Is it okay for me to ask that kind of thing now?”
“We’ve met socially in a professional context where we were both performing,” Lan Zhan says when he’s done with his bite of taco. “The context is different than me sharing personal information at the club.” He takes a sip of his hibiscus aqua fresca and adds, “Yes, I perform burlesque regularly, but I also choreograph and produce contemporary dance shows with my performing partner.”
Wei Ying’s mouth makes a perfect O of realization. “Was that the show that wrecked your body that one time?”
Lan Zhan nods, as he’s working on another bite of taco and it would be uncouth to speak with his mouth full.
“Neat!” Wei Ying eats a few more nachos thoughtfully. “Is that... Would it be okay for you to tell me about it the next time you put one on?”
“I wouldn’t tell you at the club, but yes.” Lan Zhan doesn’t sigh, but he thinks about sighing. “I’ve found it’s better to keep things... separate at work.”
Wei Ying grimaces. “I didn’t tell anyone at work I was doing this show,” he confesses. “I know it’s not the same thing because I’m not the one doing cool naked art, but I just don’t know if I could trust some of those guys to see a pair of real live boobs and not lose their mind.” He crunches on a nacho and revises, “Or to not be super weird about it at work, I guess.”
“Boundaries are important,” Lan Zhan agrees, finishing off his last taco. He could actually have eaten a couple more, especially after the exertion of performing, but he has plans for the rest of the night and they don’t involve a food coma. A few of the other performers have paid their tabs and are making their goodbyes, and Lan Zhan slides out of the booth to let Wei Ying receive hugs from their fellow cast members. The booth is less crowded when they both climb back in, but that doesn’t stop Lan Zhan from sitting with his thigh once again pressed against Wei Ying’s.
“Do you need to get out of here soon?” Wei Ying asks, eyeing Lan Zhan’s empty plate while polishing off the rest of the nachos.
“I don’t need to go home just yet,” Lan Zhan says steadily, putting just a hint of a seductive curve into his neck and shoulders. Wei Ying’s eyes drop to his collarbones, then drag back up to his face.
“Cool.” Wei Ying swallows, wiping his hands on a napkin. “Did you want to hit up a bar?”
Lan Zhan meets Wei Ying’s gaze. “I thought we could go back to your place.”
Wei Ying appears to choke on his own tongue, and has to scramble for a glass of water. “What?” he asks at a squeak, and then, “Really?”
Lan Zhan sets his hand on Wei Ying’s thigh under the table, pinkie approximately five inches down from his crotch seam. “Call us a car,” he orders, voice low. Wei Ying stares at him in shocked silence, a blush spreading across his cheeks with the speed of ink in water. Lan Zhan cocks his head slightly to the side and squeezes Wei Ying’s thigh.
“Holy shit,” Wei Ying whispers to himself, flailing slightly as he tries to locate his phone. “Holy shit, okay, yeah, whatever you say, Hanguang-jun.”
Lan Zhan makes a possibly unwise, definitely horny choice. “Lan Zhan.”
Wei Ying freezes, phone held upside-down. “Lan Zhan?” he repeats, and at Lan Zhan’s nod, a slow, thrilled smile overtakes his face. “Lan Zhan,” he says again, more firmly this time, and he unlocks his phone.
★★★
The ride to Wei Ying’s apartment doesn’t take long—Lan Zhan assumed, based on previous conversations, that he probably lived somewhere near the tech core and is proven correct—and Wei Ying spends the entire ten minute drive periodically glancing at Lan Zhan with an expression like he can’t believe this is happening and drumming his fingertips against the seat. He insists on taking Lan Zhan’s luggage out of the trunk for him and ushers him into the lobby with a slightly sheepish expression at all the faux-marble and chrome.
“It’s really stereotypical tech bro, I know,” he apologizes while they wait for the elevator, “but there’s a great garden courtyard on the roof and I can walk to work.”
Lan Zhan understands the appeal of being able to walk to work, and has definitely lived in his share of unpleasant apartments in order to be able to do so. Generally they were unpleasant in the “not enough money” kind of way, but he still gets it.
Wei Ying falls silent during the brief elevator ride, clearly trying not to fidget and just as clearly failing to at it, then guides Lan Zhan down a series of identical hallways to stop at a door that looks exactly the same as all the other doors except for a red and black doormat that reads, “THIS IS NOT A PLACE OF HONOR,” in a large block font. Lan Zhan smiles to himself, recognizing the reference as Wei Ying fumbles with his keys to unlock the door.
“Can I get you anything?” he asks, flipping on the light to reveal a modern open-concept kitchen/living room with gray faux wood floors, dark granite countertops, and gray cabinets. Lan Zhan recognizes the style not because he’s been here before, but from the background of any number of “influencer” videos the dancers share backstage at Tiger Tiger. “A drink?” Wei Ying continues, setting down his messenger bag and then hovering near Lan Zhan awkwardly. “Tea? I have some decent tea—”
Lan Zhan grabs Wei Ying by the chin and silences him with a firm kiss; no tongue yet, but a very straightforward declaration of how he intends for them to spend the rest of their evening. Wei Ying melts into it with a sigh, his hands tentatively creeping around Lan Zhan’s waist to pull him closer. Lan Zhan lets his mouth soften a little, the hot press of lips lingering long enough that Wei Ying has to catch his breath when they part. He looks dazed already. Perfect.
“I need to avail myself of your shower,” Lan Zhan says bluntly. Wei Ying’s eyebrows go up, his interest piqued, and Lan Zhan clarifies, “This is not a sexy shower and you are not invited to join me.” Wei Ying’s expression shifts into something curious, and Lan Zhan explains, “I am wearing a lot of body makeup I need to remove, for both our sakes’ and the sake of your sheets.” He runs a thumb over Wei Ying’s lower lip, then holds it up to display the smear of lipstick. “As well as the rest of my makeup.”
Wei Ying nods in realization, his hands still gently pressed to Lan Zhan’s lower back. “Yeah, of course.” He starts to pull away, presumably to lead Lan Zhan to his bathroom, and Lan Zhan stops him with a hand on the elbow. Wei Ying blinks, and Lan Zhan looks pointedly down at their shoes, then back up at Wei Ying.
“Right!” Wei Ying shakes himself and turns in a circle until he spots his shoe shelf, adorably flustered and blushing from one closed-mouth kiss. “Slippers?”
Lan Zhan avails himself of a pair of guest slippers and pauses to retrieve a travel toiletry bag and his backstage robe from his luggage before following Wei Ying down the hall. He spots a set of folding doors that probably hide an in-unit washer and dryer, an open door into a hall bathroom, and a half-closed door into what Lan Zhan assumes is likely a home office or guest bedroom.
“I have extra makeup remover if you need it,” Wei Ying says, flipping on an overhead light to illuminate a bedroom with more gray flooring, sad white walls, and a lot of red and black clothes scattered on the floor near—but notably not in—a laundry hamper. The decor is... Lan Zhan has to take a moment to figure out exactly why it strikes him as strange, but then it clicks: The furniture all looks like Wei Ying ordered it as a set from the same page of a catalog; modern black and chrome finishes that go with the design of the apartment, decent quality if a bit boring and sterile. The decor looks like it was collected piecemeal from anywhere Wei Ying found something he liked; there’s a faux-neon red bat hanging on the wall (probably a Halloween decoration originally) next to a painting of an abstracted gothic castle that looks like something out of Dracula. The bedframe has very little visual interest, but the duvet cover is a rich black with what Lan Zhan thinks is some kind of spiderweb design embroidered on it in more black, set off by burgundy sheets and a crocheted throw blanket slipping off the foot in a variegated red, gray and black yarn. (Lan Zhan can easily see the color of the sheets since the bed is rumpled and unmade.) It looks like Wei Ying ordered his furniture as quickly as possible just to fill his needs, and has since been making the apartment his, likely by visiting local craft and art markets.
Lan Zhan is not too proud to admit that he finds men who actually decorate their apartments based on personal preferences and aesthetics extremely sexy, even if their personal preferences and aesthetics don’t match his. He has been asked to fuck too many men in too many blank, featureless rooms in his life; he fully intends to fuck this man in the light of his Halloween bat neon sign.
“Bathroom,” Wei Ying says, opening another door and flicking on a light. “Use anything you need. I’ll, uh...” He swallows and offers up a smile. “I’ll be out here when you’re done?”
Lan Zhan leans in to kiss him again, less firm this time but still a promise. “I won’t be long,” he tells Wei Ying’s delighted, distracted face, then ducks into the bathroom while he’s still reeling.
The bathroom is very gray. The towels are bright purple, and the bathmat is purple with a witchy botanical print. Lan Zhan knew Wei Ying leaned in a goth direction with his personal style, and is mildly amused to have it so thoroughly confirmed that he’s goth in all his style. (He’s also intensely grateful to see more than one bath towel on the rack—the number of men he’s met who only own a single towel simply does not bear thinking about.)
Wei Ying said to use anything he needed, so after Lan Zhan does a first pass at makeup removal with the jojoba oil in his bag (which has a wonderfully horrifying “melted clown” effect as his eyeshadow, eyeliner, and lipstick smears messily all over his face), he avails himself of the bottle of micellar water sitting on the side of the counter, as well as the cotton rounds. It’s the brand Lan Zhan recommended back when he first suggested Wei Ying experiment with stage makeup to make his expressions more visible, which leaves Lan Zhan both flattered and smug. He brushes the tangles out of his hairsprayed hair, wincing through the process, and strips out of his post-show jumpsuit.
The shower is large and luxurious enough that Lan Zhan briefly regrets not asking Wei Ying to join him in it, but the post-show shower is truly one of necessity, not luxury. Lan Zhan sniffs Wei Ying’s shampoo and conditioner, pleased to find it an inoffensive coconut scent, then scrubs the product out of his hair with practiced efficiency. He washes off the remnants of makeup and jojoba oil with his own travel bottle of face wash, then helps himself to Wei Ying’s coconut body wash, scrubbing his sudsy hands over his skin as the water carries his body shimmer down the drain. When he no longer feels slimy with makeup he shuts off the water and dries off, feeling sleep trying to drag at his heels.
We’re not going to sleep yet, he tells himself firmly, pulling his moisturizer out of his toiletry bag and rubbing it into his skin. We have better things to do. (Not that Wei Ying is a thing, of course.) Does Wei Ying have a blow dryer? Unclear. Does Lan Zhan want to waste the time blow-drying his hair? No. He pulls it back into a loose braid and brushes his teeth, thanking his past self for having enough of a slut phase that he knows to pack overnight toiletries in his gig bag, just in case.
Lan Zhan regards himself in the mirror, bare-faced and pink-flushed from the shower. Wei Ying is about to see him fully naked in every way possible, and he’ll admit that nerves have crept into his gut to twine around with the anticipation. Wei Ying has literally never seen him without makeup—even backstage tonight Lan Zhan arrived with his face already done. Lan Zhan knows he looks good naturally, but he’s well aware that many men who try to date strippers don’t always react well when they realize their partners don’t perform high glamour one hundred percent of the time.
Well. If Wei Ying has a problem with that, it’s a Wei Ying problem, not a Lan Zhan problem. Lan Zhan would be disappointed, but he’d survive. He puts on his backstage robe and leaves it mostly open down the chest when he ties it at the waist—striptease habits die hard—before opening the door to the bedroom.
Wei Ying looks up from where he sits the edge of the bed—the bed which shows signs of being hastily remade—side-lit in a pinkish gold from his bedside lamp. He’s changed into a pair of red sweatpants and a black tank top, and Lan Zhan can tell from here he’s taken off most of his makeup, but there are telltale black smudges at the corners of his eyes that say he was in a hurry to do it. He looks almost surprised to see Lan Zhan again, like Lan Zhan might have snuck out the nonexistent bathroom window in a fit of sex regret.
“Oh,” he says quietly, eyes dropping to the V of Lan Zhan’s bare chest and widening. His gaze flicks back up to Lan Zhan’s face, and he offers a hesitant smile. “Hi.”
Lan Zhan crosses the room swiftly, not bothering to sashay or roll his hips or add even a touch of sexiness to his steps. He climbs directly onto Wei Ying’s lap, inspiring a shocked little, “Oh!,” cups Wei Ying’s face in his hands, and kisses him properly, no longer trying to preserve their makeup. Wei Ying stiffens in surprise and melts immediately after, his mouth opening at Lan Zhan’s silent urging like he’s been thinking of nothing else for weeks. He moans in the back of his throat at the first brush of their tongues, and Lan Zhan feels a shiver roll all the way down Wei Ying’s spine. When Lan Zhan lets him up for air he finds Wei Ying’s hands clenched into fists in the duvet cover on either side of Lan Zhan’s thighs. Why would he...
Oh. Lan Zhan almost laughs, leaning back far enough to untie the sash of his robe and shove it off his shoulders. “We’re not at the club,” he tells a boggled Wei Ying, running his hands down Wei Ying’s bare arms to encircle his wrists. “You are not only allowed, but actively encouraged to touch me.” He suits actions to words, setting Wei Ying’s hands firmly on his waist, then caressing back up the warm skin of his arms to get his fingers into Wei Ying’s hair and tug lightly.
“Noted,” Wei Ying says, fingers flexing against Lan Zhan’s skin, his eyes half-lidded and hazy already. He bites his lower lip, glancing down at Lan Zhan’s naked chest, then away to the nightstand, then back to his face. “Hey, uh, my jokes are—they are actually, like, autobiographical.” A swallow. “I really haven’t done this with, uh, with a man before.” Wei Ying smiles sheepishly. “Not for lack of trying!”
“Mn.” Lan Zhan tugs on his hair again, enjoying Wei Ying’s answering shudder and the way his eyes flutter briefly closed. “A deficiency in your life experiences I intend to make up for tonight.” Wei Ying still looks nervous—while also gratifyingly horny—and Lan Zhan considers what would reassure him. “I plan to tell you what to do, and then you will do it, and I will provide feedback on how you can improve if needed.”
Wei Ying relaxes so thoroughly Lan Zhan is amazed he still has any bones left. “Oh, thank god,” he whispers to himself, and then, louder, “Yes, please, let’s do—let’s do that.”
“With pleasure,” Lan Zhan promises, and captures Wei Ying’s mouth again. Wei Ying is beautifully responsive to kissing, so Lan Zhan spends more time just on the play of their mouths than he’d necessarily planned. How can he not, when Wei Ying shivers at the touch of his tongue, when he moans at the scrape of Lan Zhan’s teeth over his lower lip and the distracting mole just under it than Lan Zhan tries not to stare at when he’s at work, when every time they break apart for air he looks at Lan Zhan like he expects to wake up from a dream? Lan Zhan leans back enough to tug at the hem of Wei Ying’s shirt, and Wei Ying strips out of the tank top so fast he almost elbows Lan Zhan in the face. There’s a tattoo on his chest that Lan Zhan runs his fingers over thoughtfully. It’s some kind of spiral... No, a sun?
“Oh, no,” Wei Ying complains, covering Lan Zhan’s hand with his and therefore the tattoo as well. “Please, don’t.” Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow, and Wei Ying huffs something like a laugh. “It’s a ‘tribal’ sun I got when I was eighteen because I thought it made me look badass, and now it just makes me look like I have terrible taste.”
Lan Zhan presses his lips together. “I’m surprised it hasn’t come up in your comedy,” he admits honestly, given Wei Ying’s general predilection for self-directed roasts.
“Some things are too embarrassing to use even for that,” Wei Ying says, cringing good-naturedly. “Maybe once I get a cover-up, but all the artists I like in this city are booking a whole year out.”
Lan Zhan hums sympathetically. He doesn’t have any tattoos, but Luo Qingyang has amassed quite a collection since quitting classical ballet, and he’s familiar with her complaints on the subject. He doesn’t really have anything else to add to a conversation about tattoos, though, so he slides his hand slightly lower on Wei Ying’s chest and experimentally runs his thumb in a circle around Wei Ying’s nipple. Wei Ying gasps and arches into the touch, his hand clenching on Lan Zhan’s and his hips involuntarily rolling up into Lan Zhan’s ass, making it extremely clear that his dick is present, accounted for, and eager to join the proceedings. Excellent.
Lan Zhan took the time while they were making out to make a mental roadmap for where he wants the rest of the evening to go. He pauses the enacting of said plan long enough to give Wei Ying’s lap a few utterly filthy grinds, the kind he doesn’t do at work because he doesn’t offer lap dances with that much body contact. Wei Ying’s eyes slam shut, an, “Uh-uh-uh,” sound muffled deep in the back of his throat, and Lan Zhan gives him a quick kiss in reward before climbing off his lap.
“Do you have condoms?” he asks matter-of-factly, crossing to the other side of the bed and climbing between the sheets. They’re a nice quality, smooth and cool against his skin, and Lan Zhan swishes his legs side-to-side to enjoy it.
“Hah?” Wei Ying says, dragging his eyes from Lan Zhan’s erection (he made sure to leave the blankets around his thighs for maximum seductive potential, thank you) up to his face.
“Condoms?” Lan Zhan repeats, doing a very good job of not laughing at Wei Ying’s flabbergasted expression.
Wei Ying blinks twice, then goes scrambling for a bedside drawer. “What else do we need?” he asks breathlessly, throwing at least five random condom packets onto the bedspread. “Lube? Gloves? A” —he squints at the thing in his hand— “hand-drawn porno zine I bought at an art fair and thought I’d lost! I wondered where that went.”
“Lube,” Lan Zhan decides. Probably best to have it close at hand. “Then you should take off your pants and come over here.”
Wei Ying obeys at speed and without grace, his erection obviously tenting the front of his black briefs as he crawls across the bed to hover over Lan Zhan, one hand on either side of his shoulders and his knees next to Lan Zhan’s hip. “What now?” he asks eagerly, and then, more politely, “I mean, what should I do for you next?”
Lan Zhan cups a hand behind the back of Wei Ying’s neck and draws him down for a deep, wet, filthy kiss. “I thought I could teach you how to suck cock,” he says against Wei Ying’s lips, voice low. “And if you do it well enough, I’ll let you come on my chest afterward.”
Wei Ying’s breath catches, and he’s nodding even before he manages to say, “Yes, please, yes—” pressing desperate kisses to Lan Zhan’s lips and jaw between words. “You’ll tell me how to do it?” he asks, eyes wide and searching.
“I will,” Lan Zhan says, going for both firm and reassuring. Wei Ying sighs happily, so he must have gotten the tone right. Lan Zhan kisses him one more time (how is this man such a delight to kiss?) and gives his shoulders a gentle downward shove. “Between my legs.”
Wei Ying climbs under the sheets to kneel between Lan Zhan’s legs, hands obediently on his thighs. He watches avidly as Lan Zhan selects and rolls on a condom, like he’s trying to memorize both the technique and the view. (His facial expressions alone are going to supply hours of enjoyment for Lan Zhan’s solo erotic time.)
“Have you received oral sex before?” Lan Zhan asks, idly wrapping a hand around himself and giving a lazy pump.
Wei Ying nods, eyes glued to Lan Zhan’s cock. “Yeah, I—girlfriends.” He swallows and tries to look studious. “I know what I like, at least.”
“A good start.” Lan Zhan is doing the feedback voice he uses on Wei Ying at the club, and Wei Ying is just as into it in a bedroom context as he’d hoped. “Hand.”
Wei Ying gamely puts his hand in Lan Zhan’s outstretched one and allows him to wrap it around the base of his dick. He immediately (and probably reflexively) squeezes, then visibly gets himself back under control and looks up at Lan Zhan’s face for further instruction. Lan Zhan takes a brief moment to thank the universe for creating a man so precisely tailored to his personal tastes, and then for sending said man to Tiger Tiger, and thirdly for making him not an asshole.
“Keep your lips pulled in to cover your teeth,” Lan Zhan instructs, pretending not to notice Wei Ying’s second startled little squeeze when he starts talking. “Tongue just below the head is good. Sucking is also good. I’ll let you know if I want more or less of anything.” He pauses and gives Wei Ying a stern look. “Do not attempt to deepthroat me. If I hear gagging I will be extremely displeased.” Lan Zhan finds gagging a near instant turn-off, something several of his past partners had to learn for themselves when they found his abruptly soft dick in their mouths instead of just fucking trusting that he knew his own desires.
“No deepthroating, got it,” Wei Ying says with a solemn nod. He gives Lan Zhan’s dick another nervous/horny look and takes a deep breath. “I’m—I guess I’ll—” and he finally leans down and licks a tentative stripe over the head of Lan Zhan’s cock. He makes a little yuck face, presumably at the taste of the condom—“condom” is not Lan Zhan’s favorite flavor, either, but needs must—before going immediately back in for another, longer swipe of his tongue. He carefully fits his mouth around the head, getting a feel for Lan Zhan’s size, and gives a couple careful bobs. It’s all very clearly exploration, so Lan Zhan leaves him to it, which he thinks is very generous of him considering how much as he wants to take Wei Ying by the hair and fuck up into his hot mouth.
Wei Ying pulls off long enough to say, “Okay, I’m gonna try not to gag, but I want to see...” right before he goes back in, this time deeper than his previous explorations. Lan Zhan holds still, primed for a bad reaction or a vile sound, but he recognizes Wei Ying’s right to learn his own bodily limits.
Wei Ying, thankfully, does not choke himself or make any unpleasant sounds. He takes Lan Zhan into his mouth slowly, a thoughtful look on his face, and when he reaches a depth that makes him tense up, he pulls back just as slowly, adding some suction on the way.
“Good,” Lan Zhan tells him, his dick so relieved at the lack of gagging that it immediately tips over into burning arousal. “Like that.”
Wei Ying smiles proudly at him around the dick in his mouth, which is a vision Lan Zhan immediately commits to memory, and repeats the motion, this time with tongue. Lan Zhan’s breath catches and he flexes his hands against the sheets, hips jerking up a few millimeters before he gets control of them again. Wei Ying draws back up Lan Zhan’s cock like he’s trying to eat a melting popsicle without making a mess, slipping free with an audible pop.
“You can pull my hair,” he says breathlessly. “Please?” Wei Ying frowns slightly. “Do I get to ask for things, or are you the only one who gets to?”
“You’re allowed,” Lan Zhan says, letting the corner of his mouth tick up the way it wants to. He slips a hand into Wei Ying’s hair, scritches against his scalp for a few slow seconds, then makes a fist. He tugs lightly, just enough that Wei Ying should really feel it. “Good?”
“Perfect,” Wei Ying breathes, his eyes slipping shut, and he returns to his first blowjob (performed) with an expression of sheer bliss. They both seem more settled into it now, Wei Ying a bit more confident after his earlier experimentation, Lan Zhan able to relax now that he trusts Wei Ying not to try to push his limits. It’s easier to let the heat take over, to let the arousal in his belly kindle out into his fingers and toes and up the nerves of his spine. Wei Ying sucks and bobs his head and tries out various things with his tongue; Lan Zhan says, “Faster,” or, “Slower,” or, “Suck harder,” as needed, occasionally rewarding Wei Ying for an especially good bit of technique with a tug to his hair. Wei Ying starts making sounds when Lan Zhan pulls his hair, groans of approval that vibrate the inside of his mouth, which means Lan Zhan pulls his hair tighter, which means Wei Ying groans, and it turns into a kind of horny feedback loop that drags Lan Zhan closer to the edge with a surprising speed.
“Good,” he tells Wei Ying, voice rough, his hand clenched in Wei Ying’s hair. “Good boy, Wei Ying—don’t stop, just like that.”
Wei Ying hums acknowledgment, his lips against the ring of his fist, doing one of the tongue things Lan Zhan rewarded him for as he bobs his head back up. His eyes keep slipping shut in blissful arousal before he drags them back open. Lan Zhan thinks Wei Ying wants to watch him come, which is such a turn-on that he instinctively holds Wei Ying still with the hand in his hair, fucks his mouth three times, and does so.
Lan Zhan is not usually particularly loud in bed, but he makes sure he moans as he comes, thighs shaking and his dick pulsing in Wei Ying’s willing mouth. Wei Ying worked hard; he should have the reward of knowing his work was effective. Also, it’s a legitimately good orgasm. Lan Zhan’s been pent up since he walked into the dressing room and saw Wei Ying hours earlier, and it’s been ages since his last hook-up. He shudders and shivers while the inside of his head turns into fireworks, tense through his entire body, and finally collapses when his exhausted muscles give out. Wow. He needed that.
Lan Zhan realizes after an indistinct little interlude that he still has his hand in Wei Ying’s hair—fine—and his dick in Wei Ying’s mouth—soon to be not fine. He uses the former to remedy the latter, guiding Wei Ying to rest his head on one thigh and then fingercombing out his tangled hair. They need to address the soiled condom at some point soon, but they have the time for this.
“I liked that,” Wei Ying says, eyes drifting shut like a sleepy kitten under Lan Zhan’s scritches. “I mean, I thought I would, but... Yeah.” He cracks an eye and smiles up at Lan Zhan. “I guess I really am bi, huh?”
“You were bi before you sucked me off,” Lan Zhan points out insistently, “but yes, dicksucking is a useful data point.” He tugs a lock of Wei Ying’s hair. “Let me clean up and then you can have your reward.”
Wei Ying’s eyes snap back open. “Oh, shit, my reward!” He clambers shakily up to his hands and knees, looking wildly around the bedroom. “What do you need?
Lan Zhan needs tissues. Wei Ying does not have tissues, so he makes a detour to the bathroom for a wad of toilet paper, which Lan Zhan uses to address the condom situation. He then sends Wei Ying back to the bathroom with the now-soiled wad of toilet paper, and makes him bring back a handful for future purposes.
“Underwear off,” Lan Zhan orders when he has all his supplies at hand, relaxed supine against Wei Ying’s pillows and doing his best to stay awake long enough to reciprocate the orgasm. Wei Ying yanks off his briefs and flings them in the direction of the hamper, crawling clumsily onto the bed. Lan Zhan pats his own hips in silent direction, and Wei Ying settles across them in a straddle, cock hard, bobbing, and an angry red color.
“Do you want to come immediately, or would you like to wait until I give you permission?” he asks, squirting some of Wei Ying’s lube into his hand and politely letting it warm up.
“Do you have magic sex powers? Or telepathy? Or something?” Wei Ying asks after a moment, blushing and curious. Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow. “You know, like, exactly what I’m into, and it’s a little freaky.”
Lan Zhan wraps his wet hand around Wei Ying’s cock and gives it a slow pump, enjoying the velvet hardness and the heat. “I do not have magic sex powers,” he says solemnly. “You are...”
Wei Ying covers his face with both hands. “Really obvious about it?” he complains into his palms. “Is that what you’re about to say?”
Lan Zhan hums noncommittally and gives Wei Ying a squeeze. “I asked you a question first.”
Wei Ying peeks out from behind his fingers. “You already know what I’m gonna say, though.”
“Nevertheless.” Is Lan Zhan doing this just to make Wei Ying say it? He’ll never tell.
He does give Wei Ying’s cock another slow pump, twisting his fist on the upstroke. Wei Ying shivers and drops his hands to Lan Zhan’s shoulders, hitching his hips into the touch.
“Edge me,” he says, biting his lower lip. “Not too much? But some.”
Lan Zhan smirks. “Good boy. Thank you for telling me.”
Wei Ying shivers again, his breath catching and his hands clenching on Lan Zhan’s shoulders. “Sex magic,” he mutters under his breath, which is the last coherent thing he says for a while as Lan Zhan starts jerking him off in earnest.
It’s a delight to learn that Wei Ying is everything Lan Zhan’s fantasies wanted him to be: Pliant, sincere, responsive, and loud. He makes sounds every time Lan Zhan does something he likes, whether that’s a twisting upstroke, pausing to rub his thumb in circles just under the head of his cock, making his hand arguably too tight to the point that it should be uncomfortable, making it arguably too loose so Wei Ying has to fight to get any friction... Wei Ying is an open, sexy book. Lan Zhan has had previous partners whose actual spoken communication was less clear than Wei Ying’s wordless sounds. It’s so appealing that Lan Zhan forgets his own sleepiness and spends rather more time edging Wei Ying than he’d intended.
It is perhaps the fifth time that he’s brought Wei Ying to the knife’s edge of orgasm that Wei Ying finds real words again, “Please please please Lan Zhan seriously I can’t take it you gotta let me come please Lan Zhan,” all of it coming out as one breath. Lan Zhan considers him; tense, trembling, red-faced, wet-eyed and sweating all the way down his chest. He’s leaked so much over Lan Zhan’s hand that they haven’t even needed another application of lube. Wei Ying is extremely pretty like this, but...
“You’ve been very good,” Lan Zhan tells him, petting one sweaty thigh soothingly while he finally speeds up his hand. “Come.”
“Thank you,” Wei Ying gasp-moans and does. Immediately. Wei Ying’s o-face is a thing of beauty, agony and ecstasy inescapably intertwined, eyes scrunched shut and mouth open. Lan Zhan jerks him through it, hot pulses of come landing on his chest and dripping down his knuckles. Some of it gets almost to Lan Zhan’s collarbone, and he allows himself to be incurably smug about how thoroughly he worked Wei Ying up.
Eventually Wei Ying stops shuddering, and Lan Zhan keeps gentle hold of his softening cock while he pants. It takes almost a full minute before Wei Ying finally lifts his head and offers up a wide, dopey smile.
“Sex with dudes,” he says, still half-slurring. “’s good.” Wei Ying peels one hand off Lan Zhan’s shoulder with obvious difficulty and gives a thumbs-up. “Incredible work, liked it a lot, wanna do it again.” He yawns, covering his mouth with his thumbs-up hand, which remains in thumbs-up formation the whole time. “Wanna do it again later,” he clarifies.
Wei Ying’s yawn is contagious, and Lan Zhan covers his mouth with his clean hand while it rolls through him. “Later,” he agrees. “Tissue?”
Wei Ying retrieves the backup wad of toilet paper from elsewhere on the bed and they address any imminent dripping issues, after which Lan Zhan finds it extremely tempting to simply pull up the covers and fall asleep. Wei Ying flops off him to the side on his back and sighs hugely, one arm flung up above his head to brush the headboard. They breathe quietly together for a moment. It’s peaceful, not awkward. Lan Zhan likes it.
“Are you gonna stay the night?” Wei Ying asks, turning his head to peek at Lan Zhan over the curve of the pillow. He has that hopeful look on his face, at least on the sliver of it Lan Zhan can easily see.
“Yes,” Lan Zhan says decisively, making the heroic effort to sit upright instead of sinking further into Wei Ying’s bed. “Let me finish cleaning up?”
“I still gotta brush my teeeeeeth,” Wei Ying whines, joining Lan Zhan in a begrudging clamber out of the bed. “I’m being so responsible. Do you want something to sleep in?”
Lan Zhan accepts a tank top and pair of cotton shorts, escaping to the hall bath with his robe and toiletry kit so as to not kick Wei Ying out of his own bathroom. He applies a warm washcloth to all of the places that would benefit from it, uses the toilet, and quickly re-brushes his own teeth solely because the minty flavor helps signal his mind that it’s time for bed. He returns to an empty bedroom with the bathroom door still shut and makes the executive decision to retake the same side of the bed. Wei Ying can tell him to move if he wants to.
The bathroom door opens as Lan Zhan is debating whether to turn off the bedside lamp. “I should probably warn you,” Wei Ying says as though continuing a conversation from earlier, now wearing a pair of red pajama pants and no shirt, “I’m apparently an octopus sleeper, so if you don’t like cuddles I apologize in advance.”
Lan Zhan is not normally much of a cuddler, but then, Lan Zhan doesn’t normally stay the night with his hookups. (Can he really say what he normally does when it’s been over a year since the last time it happened?) He considers Wei Ying for a moment, then rolls over toward him, lifting the blankets with his arm in clear invitation. “Come here.”
Wei Ying scrambles into the bed, knocking his knee into the side of the mattress in his haste. It’s truly endearing, and Lan Zhan doesn’t bother trying to suppress his smile. It takes them a moment to figure out a comfortable position, but Lan Zhan ends up as the big spoon, curled tightly around Wei Ying’s back and holding him close. He inhales the faded coconut scent of Wei Ying’s shampoo and sighs. Yes. Good.
Wei Ying does a long reach and clicks off the light on his nightstand, plunging them into the always-slightly-twilit darkness of a city night. Lan Zhan, already up somewhat past his normal bedtime and having recently had an excellent orgasm, finds himself plunging toward sleep at a dangerous speed.
“Goodnight, Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying whispers, finding Lan Zhan’s hand with his and squeezing.
“Goodnight, Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan murmurs, already halfway to dreaming. He falls asleep with Wei Ying’s scent in his nose and his warmth in his arms. His dreams are wonderful.
★★★
Lan Zhan drifts awake in a bed he knows immediately is not his, with a man in his arms that his body recognizes as Wei Ying before his brain does. He’s rolled over onto his back in the night, and Wei Ying is now sprawled halfway across his chest. Lan Zhan thinks he may have drooled on his pec a little bit, and is somewhat disappointed to discover that he finds that endearing instead of disgusting. A few months ago he thought he was immune to falling for a customer at the club, and here he is in Wei Ying’s bed, fantasizing not just about more sex but about going on dates with him, about having lazy Sundays in bed followed by making breakfast together. He wants to get domestic.
Lan Zhan shrugs minutely at himself. So it goes.
It’s too early to actually get up—Lan Zhan knows this without looking at a clock, because no matter how late he has to work at Tiger Tiger, his body insists that he remain a morning person—so Lan Zhan stays where he is, drifting in something between a meditative state and a daydream. He falls back asleep a couple of times, which he only recognizes after he wakes up from dreams too surreal to be something from his waking mind. Wei Ying occasionally squirms or makes a snuffling sound in his sleep, and it’s altogether a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours.
Lan Zhan’s bladder eventually gets the better of him and forces him into true consciousness. Fortunately Wei Ying chooses almost exactly that moment to roll over and curl into a ball facing the opposite direction, giving Lan Zhan the freedom to slip out of bed. He pads to the bathroom, body reminding him of yesterday’s dancing and his toes wanting to curl away from the chilly faux-wood floor. The bathmat is a welcome respite for his cold feet, and Lan Zhan zones out while he uses the toilet, staring at the wall without seeing it.
He could just… slip out and go home. Again, it’s something his past self would have done. His current self doesn’t want to, though. His current self flushes, washes his hands, then decides to brush his teeth and rinse the sleep crud off his face. His current self brushes out his hair and re-braids it so it looks like slightly less of a disaster. His current self takes off his tank top, then climbs back into bed and presses up against Wei Ying’s back in a reprise of their cuddle from the night before, mouth open against the back of Wei Ying’s neck as he slowly drops kisses on the sensitive skin there. It takes a few tries before Wei Ying responds, but by the time Lan Zhan’s mouth reaches the spot right below his ear, Wei Ying has squirmed tighter into Lan Zhan’s hold, his neck arched to offer more room to work.
“G’ mornin’?” Wei Ying mumble-asks, patting around to find Lan Zhan’s forearm and squeezing it as Lan Zhan nips at his earlobe.
“Good morning,” Lan Zhan says in a low rumble, kissing under his ear again.
“Mmm.” Wei Ying wiggles his ass into the cradle of Lan Zhan’s hips, where Lan Zhan’s dick is making its interest politely known. “Guess so.”
Lan Zhan smiles and bites his neck lightly. “If you go brush your teeth I’ll let you fuck me,” he offers like he’s telling a secret.
Wei Ying freezes, then rolls onto his back to fix Lan Zhan with an incredulous expression. “Really?”
Lan Zhan kisses his surprised mouth. “Really.” He squeezes Wei Ying’s hip, where his hip landed when Wei Ying rolled over. “Go brush your teeth.”
Wei Ying scooches out of bed with the same urgency he showed last night, and Lan Zhan secretly does a few hip stretches while the bathroom door is safely shut. He wants to fuck for sure and Wei Ying has thus far shown nothing but enthusiasm for Lan Zhan in a non-club atmosphere, but that doesn’t mean Lan Zhan is ready for Wei Ying to hear the sounds his joints make when he’s not warmed up. Alarming hip noises are a third-date intimacy at least.
When Wei Ying emerges from the bathroom, he’s a bit damp around the edges of his hairline as though he also rinsed off the sleep crud. He’s also carrying a fresh roll of toilet paper, showing an admirable amount of forward-thinking about sex cleanup for a man who doesn’t own a box of tissues. Wei Ying drops the toilet paper on his nightstand and practically jumps back onto the bed, landing on his knees with a bounce that jostles them both. “So. You wanted me to… Really?”
Lan Zhan stretches, putting just a little bit of performance into it, and looks at Wei Ying from under his lashes. “Yes, I want you fuck me.” He smirks when Wei Ying shivers and crooks a finger. “Come kiss me first.”
Wei Ying climbs on top of Lan Zhan, and Lan Zhan wraps his arms around his neck, pulling him down until Wei Ying gets the message and drapes himself over Lan Zhan like a blanket. Wei Ying kisses Lan Zhan first this time, his mouth tasting of mint and feeling much more self-assured than the night before. Wei Ying seems to understand his kisses are welcome, now, and his focus is instead on making sure Lan Zhan is thoroughly kissed. Lan Zhan is in favor of this agenda, and they drift together in the hazy morning warmth, tongues twining lazily as they share air.
Wei Ying’s mouth breaks away from Lan Zhan’s eventually, his lips kiss-red and his eyes full of heated wonder. That kiss-red mouth travels over Lan Zhan’s jaw to his ear, a sting of teeth on the lobe that sings down to Lan Zhan’s cock. Wei Ying presses hot, open-mouthed kisses down Lan Zhan’s neck, across his collarbone, then up his neck to the other ear, where he repeats the gentle biting. By the time he makes it back to Lan Zhan’s mouth Lan Zhan is entirely hard, and he can feel Wei Ying’s erection pressing against the outside of his hip. He slips a leg to the side and curls his calf over the back of Wei Ying’s thigh pointedly, adding just a little thrust to the point to try to make his point clear. Wei Ying smiles against his mouth, huffing a laugh that Lan Zhan feels more than he hears.
“Do you want me to get you ready?” he asks, pulling away to offer Lan Zhan a sheepish grin. “I want to be clear, I’m good at fingering in general—according to former girlfriends—but the only ass I’ve ever fingered is my own, so…”
“I believe the mechanics are largely similar,” Lan Zhan says, having had a few very frank conversations with Luo Qingyang on the subject over the years. “If I have any issues I will let you know.”
“I believe it,” Wei Ying says cheerfully, pushing up to a kneel and leaning over for the nightstand. “You good where you are?”
Lan Zhan nods, rolling his hips up and down to stretch out his obliques, then slipping off his borrowed shorts while Wei Ying retrieves the lube. “For now.”
“Great.” Wei Ying wiggles his hand into a glove, which Lan Zhan finds surprising. It must show on his face because Wei Ying turns to him, cocks his head, and then glances at the glove. “Ah.” He holds it up and wiggles his fingers. “College me and college me’s first girlfriend learned some uncomfortable lessons about fingernails very early on, and then I told a lesbian friend and she slapped me upside the head and asked why straight people don’t use sex gloves, which was a great point and changed me for the better.”
Why don’t more straight people use sex gloves? Lan Zhan shares this question, but would prefer not to get into a long discussion about it right at the moment. “She did you a great favor,” he says instead.
“I don’t think either of us saw this coming way back then, but I’m glad to be prepared.” Wei Ying settles back over his heels and squirts lube on his fingers. “What do you like?”
“Start with one, but you should be able to move up fairly quickly.” It’s been a while, but Lan Zhan has excellent bodily control from years of dance training, which somewhat hilariously applies in this situation as well. (Some of his teachers would be scandalized. Others he’s fairly sure share some of his same experiences.) “I prefer a more slow and steady approach.”
“Got it.” Wei Ying sets his clean hand on Lan Zhan’s thigh, encouraging him to lift his leg further toward his chest. “Let me know how this goes?”
Lan Zhan hums assent, then hums again in pleasure as Wei Ying massages his rim. It’s a muscle that’s tight because it has to be, but as a lifetime tight-muscle haver, Lan Zhan enjoys a massage no matter what muscle is being worked on. He relaxes, the lazy heat left over from their kissing kindling into a hearthfire blaze; it warms him through and leaves him thrumming with arousal, but there’s still nothing urgent about it. Lan Zhan greatly enjoys slow morning sex, and it has simply been a criminal amount of time since he had anyone in his life worth having slow morning sex with.
Wei Ying presses inside and Lan Zhan’s mouth opens on a gasp. It’s not that he’s surprised, but it’s always a bit startling even with warning. He clenches reflexively, shivers, and deliberately relaxes again, the strokes of Wei Ying’s finger transforming from intrusion to stimulation much more rapidly than the actual movements themselves. Wei Ying fingerfucks him for a little while longer before asking, “Should I—”
“Two, please,” Lan Zhan confirms, cracking an eyelid (when did he close his eyes?) to find Wei Ying staring intently at his hand. He looks both horny and determined, which is so endearing Lan Zhan wants to pat him on the head. He resists the urge, and then Wei Ying pushes in with two fingers and Lan Zhan has to carefully breathe through it again. Yes. Yes. Oh, this was truly an incredible idea.
Wei Ying frowns in concentration and starts... doing things with his fingers. Lan Zhan isn’t sure what he’s doing at first, only it’s definitely not fucking his ass with them. He’s sort of twisting them, maybe? It’s hard to tell exactly what’s happening by feel—
“Okay, am I just bad at this, or is it actually hard to find someone else’s prostate?” Wei Ying asks after a few more tries, exasperated. “It’s supposed to be obvious when I do, right?”
Ah. Of course. “Curl your fingers up,” Lan Zhan instructs. “If you move them in and out while you have them curled uuu uuuuh—”
“Oh!” Wei Ying sounds absolutely delighted about his new discovery, and he repeats the thing with his fingers that forced that sound out of Lan Zhan’s mouth. “There it is!”
“Good work,” Lan Zhan says, rolling his hips up into Wei Ying’s hand experimentally. “Give me a third and then I’ll be ready for you to fuck me.”
Wei Ying bites his lower lip and obeys. Lan Zhan actually makes Wei Ying fuck him with three fingers a bit longer than strictly necessary, just because Wei Ying makes the most wonderful faces when Lan Zhan tells him what to do. When he’s leaked a puddle onto his abs he decides they’ve both had enough and says, “Condom,” in a sex-roughened voice. While Wei Ying peels the glove off, followed by his pajama pants and goes hunting for supplies, Lan Zhan rolls over onto his side, reflecting that if he was polite he’d try to find a towel.
Well. They aren’t his sheets.
“Like this?” Wei Ying asks over the crinkle of the condom wrapper, the mattress shifting under his weight.
“Like this,” Lan Zhan confirms, peering over his shoulder so he can confirm Wei Ying puts on the condom correctly, and also to enjoy the view. “I want you close.” It’s true, but Lan Zhan also doesn’t want to fuck in any position that requires significant hip stretching. It’s too early and he’s too post-show sore for that.
“Your wish, my command, etcetera,” Wei Ying says promptly, flopping down onto his side and scooching into big spoon position. He lubes up his cock with efficient movements, and Lan Zhan helpfully rolls slightly onto his stomach, hitching his top leg up to make access easier. Wei Ying leans forward to press a kiss to Lan Zhan’s shoulder blade, which somehow feels more intimate than what they’re about to do, and he pushes his dick...
Well, he sort of skips it off Lan Zhan’s rim on the first try, then aims too high and smears lube into Lan Zhan’s asscrack, and then rubs it against his perineum. Lan Zhan bites his lower lip and asks delicately, “Would you like some assistance?”
“The angle is different for the ass,” Wei Ying huffs with no small amount of embarrassment. Lan Zhan hears him take a deep breath, and this time when he pushes in, he’s in the right place. Lan Zhan keeps himself deliberately relaxed, and when Wei Ying’s cockhead finally pops into his hole, they let out synchronized sighs, Lan Zhan in pleasure and Wei Ying in relief. “There we go,” Wei Ying mutters under his breath, and then louder, “You good?”
“Good,” Lan Zhan confirms, resisting the urge to roll his hips out of fear that Wei Ying will slip out and they’ll be right back where they started. “You can go deeper.”
Wei Ying hums, sounding distracted, and thrusts in. He doesn’t stop this time until his hips hit Lan Zhan’s ass, and Lan Zhan sighs again at the hot feeling of fullness. He knows perfectly well how to get himself off, but sex with someone he actually likes? It’s no contest.
“How—” Wei Ying starts, his voice cracking when Lan Zhan experimentally rocks back on him. He swallows audibly, pressing his forehead to the back of Lan Zhan’s neck. “How do you want it?”
“Slow and lazy,” Lan Zhan instructs, patting around to find Wei Ying’s still slightly lube-y hand and wrapping it around his own leaking cock. “Make me come first. Then you can come whenever you want.”
Wei Ying’s dick kicks inside of him, and the hot air of his laugh brushes Lan Zhan’s skin. “It is unfairly hot when you boss me around,” he complains, rolling his hips in a tentative thrust.
“You enjoying it doesn’t make me less likely to do it,” Lan Zhan points out, arching into Wei Ying’s next thrust for encouragement.
“I didn’t say stop,” Wei Ying points out, tightening the arm he has wrapped around Lan Zhan’s waist to pull him tighter into the spoon, then carefully starting to jerk him off to the increasingly-steady rhythm of his thrusts. Wei Ying may not have fucked a man or had anal before, but he’s clearly used to multitasking in the bedroom. This is incredible news for Lan Zhan, who can simply lie there in the early morning dimness and take what Wei Ying has to give.
It’s a slow, perfect build to an inevitable climax; Lan Zhan breathes and thinks about nothing, listening to the small, needy sounds Wei Ying makes behind him and the increasingly wet sounds their bodies make together. He doesn’t seek his orgasm with urgency, but nor does he try to hold it off. When he feels close, he grips the firm muscle of Wei Ying’s glute and whispers, “A little faster,” and Wei Ying presses his mouth to Lan Zhan’s spine to smother a moan while he complies. Lan Zhan only tenses and clenches down when he’s a hairsbreadth from coming, and the shuddering pleasure of it tumbles over him like a waterfall. It’s an orgasm that relaxes, that demands the use of his body but only to wring him out and leave him panting and boneless. He has just enough clarity of mind to cup his hand under the head of his dick as he empties himself over Wei Ying’s fingers, politely sparing the sheets the worst of the mess.
“Oh,” Wei Ying says thickly behind him, his wet hand now clenched on Lan Zhan’s hip, hips stuttering as his breath catches. “Oh, ah, I—” He bites Lan Zhan’s shoulder in a sharp little surprise, gives a handful of short, frantic thrusts, and comes. Lan Zhan finds the motivation to rock back into it and clench a few times, trying to make it as good for Wei Ying as he can. From the muffled sounds Wei Ying keeps making into his skin, it works.
Wei Ying sighs finally, flopping against Lan Zhan like he’s also lost all of his bones. He makes a contented sound, which Lan Zhan echoes, patting Wei Ying on the outside of the ass encouragingly. Good sex. Good cuddle. Good company. Lan Zhan has made excellent choices in the last twenty-four hours.
It is unfortunate that practical considerations force them out of the cuddle too soon. Wei Ying pulls out carefully and does the necessary condom-related cleanup, then hands wads of toilet paper to Lan Zhan so he can wipe off his hand and his cock. Once that chore is complete, though, Wei Ying hopefully opens up one arm, and Lan Zhan quite happily crawls back into his embrace for a new, different cuddle. Excellent.
“Any performance feedback for me?” Wei Ying asks after a few minutes of quiet. It’s exactly the tone he uses at the club after performing standup, and it’s so unexpected that Lan Zhan actually laughs into the curve of Wei Ying’s pec. “Was that a laugh?” Wei Ying asks, bewildered and delighted. “Did you actually just laugh, Lan Zhan?”
“You’re very funny,” Lan Zhan tells him, deadpan, then kisses him to interrupt his response. “You were very good,” he says, voice low. “As a reward, next time I’ll let you ride me.”
Wei Ying’s face goes through at least five facial expressions in under a second. “Really?” he asks, having apparently settled on “eager,” and then, “Wait, next time?”
Lan Zhan nods placidly, smug, pleased, and just a little nervous about the possibility of rejection. (He thinks it’s a low possibility, but low isn’t zero.)
Wei Ying blinks at him twice. “How are you real?” he asks, as though marveling over a stunning natural landscape. “Did I hit my head backstage last night and this has all been a concussion fever dream since then?”
“If this was a dream, I suspect we would be less sticky,” Lan Zhan points out, sweat and other fluids drying on his skin and leaving him somewhat itchy.
Wei Ying laughs and scrubs a hand over his face. “Good point,” he concedes with a smile. “Do you want to use my shower again?”
Lan Zhan nods, sitting upright out of Wei Ying’s arms with some reluctance. He stretches, arching his back and reaching his hands toward the ceiling, then peers down at Wei Ying in what he knows is a pose that really works for him. “This time it is going to be a sexy shower, and you are invited to join me.”
Wei Ying’s face lights up. “The concussion dream continues!” he announces, punching the air in triumph. “Lead the way.”
★★★
They make out lazily under the spray in the shower for a little while before Wei Ying pulls away. “I really do need to wash my hair,” he says with a laugh, reaching past Lan Zhan for the shampoo and filling the stall with the warm scent of coconut. Lan Zhan does not need to wash his hair, but he gives it a rinse so it can dry straight this time and avails himself of the body wash. They don’t have sex again (while Lan Zhan has a high libido, two good orgasms within the last twelve hours is plenty) but there’s enough groping, kissing, and shared sudsing of each other’s bodies that Lan Zhan thinks it lives up to his promise of it being a sexy shower nevertheless.
After they dry off Wei Ying lends Lan Zhan some more appropriate morning loungewear than the tank top and shorts he slept in—namely a pair of cozy black sweatpants and a black t-shirt with either the logo of a metal band on it or an illustration of a pile of sticks—and leads him out into the living area, making a sweep through the room to grab several abandoned mugs from various pieces of furniture and pile some books by the couch into a slightly neater stack.
“I wasn’t expecting company or I’d have cleaned better,” he says apologetically, clanking an armful of mugs into the sink.
“I appreciate you hosting me,” Lan Zhan says honestly, pulling up one of the barstools at the counter. The place isn’t dirty by any means, just full of the detritus of a life being lived by someone who doesn’t value exacting organization in the same way Lan Zhan does. Men have taken him back to much worse places. Sometimes Lan Zhan even fucked them there. “Do you have tea?”
“Yes!” Wei Ying gets the kettle going before pulling a basket out of a cupboard and offering it to Lan Zhan, who selects a nice roasted oolong. “Eggs okay?” Wei Ying asks over the almost-musical sound of rice waterfalling against the metal insert of a rice cooker.
“Eggs sound lovely.” Lan Zhan watches idly as Wei Ying turns the rice cooker on and brews their tea, then takes his mug and wanders over to the living room area for a good polite snooping session. This, like the bedroom, has the feeling of the furniture being picked hastily just to fill the space, with the decorations softening the almost clinical feel of the gray floors, pale walls, and black wood shelves. The walls don’t have a lot of art hung—Lan Zhan spots a collection of framed pieces leaned up against each other in a corner, clearly awaiting a burst of motivation—but what Wei Ying has put up is all obviously from individual artists, nothing mass-produced. The most eyecatching thing in the room is a bookshelf full of horror and fantasy paperbacks in various states of tatter, interspersed with a collection of animal skulls in assorted materials. Lan Zhan finds the skulls fascinating and peers closely at some kind of bird skull delicately mounted on metal vines inside of a glass cloche.
“That’s a raven,” Wei Ying volunteers, watching Lan Zhan from the kitchen area and leaning against the counter. “It’s real. Roadkill.”
“It’s very well done,” Lan Zhan says, now crouching to look at what simply must be a reproduction, given that it’s a T-Rex skull approximately the size of his hand. “Is there a theme other than skulls?”
Wei Ying laughs. “Not really.” He pads over, slippered feet sinking into the blood-red shag area rug in front of his couch. “I just... I was an edgy Goth teenager for a while there but I wasn’t allowed to decorate my room how I wanted, so I vowed that when I had my own place I’d get whatever I wanted! Skulls! A coffin coffee table! A full suit of armor!”
Lan Zhan looks around. “You don’t seem to have acquired a suit of armor,” he observes, sipping his tea.
Wei Ying bites his lower lip on a smile. “Yeah, I realized when I moved here that a full suit of armor is one of those things you need to be really dedicated to. Same with the coffin coffee table. Skulls, though?” He waves at the bookshelf, pride in his expression. “Those I can do.”
“Where do you get them?” Lan Zhan asks, and happily listens to Wei Ying’s rambling, excited explanations of the various queer art shows, curiosity shops, and craft bazaars he visits. Apparently he’s subscribed to a variety of mailing lists about them, which is something Lan Zhan didn’t even realize existed. He’s mid-story about the cat skull—cast porcelain by a ceramic artist who also does tattoos, which explains the intricate painted patterns on the translucent surface—when the rice cooker beeps in the kitchen and reminds both of them of its existence.
“Eggs!” Wei Ying remembers aloud, and he scampers back to the kitchen with Lan Zhan following at a more sedate pace. “One or two? Do you like a runny yolk?”
“Two, please.” Lan Zhan settles at the counter again while Wei Ying rummages in the fridge. “Runny is fine.” He’s actually curious what Wei Ying’s go-to egg cooking method is. Uncle Qiren’s standard was poached, and Lan Zhan was fifteen years old before he learned that scrambled was the more common option for most people. It had literally never occurred to him before then.
Wei Ying does a version that involves high heat and a lot of oil. Lan Zhan thinks there’s some basting of the yolks with the hot oil? He can’t entirely tell, since Wei Ying has to face away to do the cooking. Regardless, Wei Ying eventually turns around with a bowl in each hand, fluffy white rice topped with two crispy-edged fried eggs each, and slides one in front of Lan Zhan. He then offers Lan Zhan a basket of sauces, most of which look designed to burn off his tongue. There’s a soy-ginger sauce in among them, though, and Lan Zhan drizzles some on his eggs before dragging his chopsticks through the yolks to watch it drip onto the rice. Perfect.
Lan Zhan compliments the eggs after the first bite, which leads to a rambling explanation from Wei Ying about how in college he set out on a journey to eat every egg preparation possible so he could decide objectively which one was the best.
“You might think, ‘Wow, it sounds like this guy didn’t know how to cook anything but eggs in college,’” Wei Ying says with a self-deprecating smile. “You would be right, but that wasn’t the point.”
“What was the point?” Lan Zhan asks, yes-anding the conversation like a good improv partner, an art for he understands even if he doesn’t enjoy it himself.
“Science!” Wei Ying announces, gesturing expansively with his chopsticks. “What if there was a perfect egg and I never got to eat it because I didn’t know, Lan Zhan! Couldn’t risk it.” He scoops up a mouthful of rice and egg so red-tinted with chile sauce it makes Lan Zhan cringe internally, chews with evident happiness, and swallows. “After a lot of exhaustive testing and spreadsheet entries, crispy egg was the winner.” He makes a face. “At least for me. My brother still insists gooey scrambled eggs are the best, even though that is clearly the worst possible egg texture.”
“It feels as though they simply didn’t finish cooking it,” Lan Zhan agrees.
“You get me,” Wei Ying says emphatically around another mouthful of rice and egg. Heavens help him, Lan Zhan even finds it cute when he speaks with his mouth full. He eats some more egg and resolves to never, ever mention that out loud.
Breakfast, while delicious, is finite. Lan Zhan finishes his bowl and relinquishes it to Wei Ying’s care. His offers to help with the dishes are firmly turned down, so he sips at the remains of his tea, then dutifully hands over his empty mug so Wei Ying can put it in the dishwasher along with the rest of his many, many dirty mugs. The air thickens with awkwardness when Wei Ying shuts the dishwasher door, shifting from foot to foot in something not quite a fidget.
“Do you need to head home right away?” Wei Ying asks, leaning on the counter in what Lan Zhan thinks is supposed to be a casual pose, but with his hands pressed so hard against the stone his fingertips blanch.
“I should get back,” Lan Zhan admits with some reluctance. “It’s best if I air my costumes as soon as possible after performing.” Also, it’s one of his days off both from Tiger Tiger and from dance in general, so he has a hot date with a foam roller and a good book. He likes Wei Ying and has very much liked the time they’ve spent together, but Lan Zhan knows his own needs, and he needs most of a day to not speak to anyone so he can recover his energy for the upcoming week.
Wei Ying nods. “That makes sense,” he agrees quietly. He takes a breath, pauses, and exhales. There are words waiting in the back of his throat, Lan Zhan can tell, but he can’t quite seem to say any of them.
Fortunately for both of them, while Lan Zhan doesn’t speak nearly as much, when he does, he’s direct. He gets up and walks around the counter, meeting Wei Ying in the middle of the kitchen with his hand extended. “Give me your phone.”
Wei Ying fishes it out of his pocket, unlocks it, and hands it over. Lan Zhan navigates to the contacts, adds himself, and then sends himself a text. His own phone buzzes in the pocket of his borrowed sweatpants, and after he returns Wei Ying’s phone, he responds to the text with, “This is Lan Zhan.”
“Lan Zhan...” Wei Ying half whispers, staring at his phone—or, to be more accurate, probably staring at Lan Zhan’s contact information, which he entered as “Lan Zhan (boyfriend)” in the interest of making his intentions clear.
“I am difficult to date,” Lan Zhan says frankly. “My work shifts are during the time most people want to have dinner dates, and when I’m not dancing at the club, I’m frequently rehearsing for shows.”
Wei Ying rips his eyes away from his phone and nods. “Lunch and brunch dates, then,” he says breathlessly.
“I have no intention of quitting Tiger Tiger,” Lan Zhan warns him. “If that will be a problem for you then you shouldn’t try dating a stripper.”
Wei Ying’s eyebrows scrunch up and his mouth turns down. “Who has problems with dating a stripper they met in a strip club—oh no I thought about it for a second and yeah, that probably happens a lot, huh?” He frowns emphatically, then shakes the expression away to hold three fingers next to his forehead. “I, Wei Ying, promise that I won’t get weird about you being a stripper, and if I do, you have absolute permission to break up with me, which I would absolutely deserve.” He frowns again, this time thoughtful. “Am I allowed to still come see you at the club now that we’re dating? Are there, like... rules about that?”
“I will not have sex with you on the clock,” Lan Zhan says bluntly.
Wei Ying chokes, eyes wide, then laughs, then rubs his face with both hands. “Wow, you have some stories, don’t you?” he asks, still laughing.
“It’s an unusual job,” Lan Zhan admits. “It is not... easy. To find someone who is interested in you at the club and also outside of the club.”
Wei Ying’s expression softens, and he tentatively reaches for Lan Zhan’s hand, then just as tentatively pulls him into an embrace. “I’m interested in all of you, Lan Zhan,” he says, voice low and his cheeks flushed. “I want to know everything about you and see you do your weird queer ballet and fry eggs for you and find out what books you like to read.”
“Epic fantasy romance,” Lan Zhan says, trying not to be disgustingly overcome by the rest of that confession and failing.
“Hell yeah,” Wei Ying whispers, a sunrise smile breaking across his face. “Anyway, I want that if you want that, and I’ll try to get the rest of it right.”
“I want that,” Lan Zhan echoes. “We can figure out the rest as we go.”
Wei Ying’s mouth, when Lan Zhan kisses him, is warm and welcoming and a little spicy from breakfast. Lan Zhan thinks he’s probably going to have to get used to chile-flavored kisses if this works out.
He’s okay with that.
★★★
Lan Zhan steps out onto the stage and doesn’t let the little flutter of excitement he feels at seeing Wei Ying—his boyfriend—sitting at the rail show on his face. After several months of Wei Ying consistently being at the rail one Thursday a month pre-dating and six more months of Wei Ying—his boyfriend —consistently being at the rail one Thursday a month, Lan Zhan has a lot of practice not letting it affect his performance. He also thinks that after six months of dating, maybe he shouldn’t still be quite so excited to see his boyfriend? Shouldn’t it start feeling like old hat at some point?
Maybe it won’t, with Wei Ying. Maybe Lan Zhan will always look at Wei Ying like he lights up the room every time they’re together. Lan Zhan is fine with that. He’s more than fine with that. Dating Wei Ying has been everything Lan Zhan imagined and more; he doesn’t blame himself for looking at Wei Ying like he hung the moon, and won’t blame himself for it if he still feels that way next year, or five years in the future.
(Is Lan Zhan getting ahead of himself? Quite possibly, but as long as he does so in the privacy of his own head, he doesn’t see an issue with that, either.)
Lan Zhan finishes his set, collects his tips, and saunters out onto the floor, heading for the private room before Wei Ying even trots up to join him. Miguel, the new bartender, waves at them from across the bar. Wei Ying waves back, then hands a five to Gwen as they pass her heading back out from a private dance. Wei Ying’s rapport with Lan Zhan’s coworkers is one of the many reasons Lan Zhan adores him. He’s proven to be an excellent partner, eager to learn about how best to support his sex worker boyfriend and then put what he learned into practice. Lan Zhan used to try to trip him up by relating work stories that for many people would cross the lines of monogamy, not as a manipulation tactic but rather to make it clear exactly what his job entailed. Wei Ying just listened to Lan Zhan explaining how, for example, he humiliated a customer about his dick size until he came untouched in his pants and then said, “Wow, you must be good at that. Did he pay extra?” Lan Zhan can complain about the occasional handsy customer without being told he should quit his job if he didn’t want to be nonconsensually groped at work, as though working a retail job would protect him from that. He can say, “Foot Rub Guy came in today,” and Wei Ying will be happy that he got a one-hour foot massage and a good payday. It’s an incredible freedom.
“How’s it been so far tonight?” Wei Ying asks once they’re in the private room—the one Lan Zhan privately thinks of as their private room—taking off his jacket and slinging it on the edge of the couch. “Anyone wild?”
“Not yet,” Lan Zhan says, turning down the music and accepting Wei Ying’s hand for balance as he sits down. “Apparently there’s a roller derby bout nearby so we’ll probably get some of them in after it ends.”
“Oooh, nice,” Wei Ying enthuses, jumping up onto the stage. “Are they good customers?”
“Mostly.” The derby girls tend to be very good tippers, but sometimes when they get too drunk their enthusiasm crosses the line from gratifying to annoying. Only time will tell what tonight holds. “What set are you running tonight?”
Wei Ying gives Lan Zhan something between a smile and a smirk. “It’s new.”
Lan Zhan raises an eyebrow. New? That’s a bit unusual, actually. Wei Ying has insisted on continuing their feedback routine since they started dating, even though Lan Zhan has pointed out on multiple occasions that there are many places he could critique Wei Ying’s standup that weren’t work.
(“It’s good luck now,” Wei Ying had argued stubbornly. “If I don’t have you yell at me to roll my shoulders back in a dark strip club room two days before a show, I’ll forget all my jokes and choke and fail, Lan Zhan! This is the only way I know how to practice! I can’t risk not doing it.” Lan Zhan eventually shrugged and went along with it, though it took a bit more arguing for him to accept Wei Ying’s continued payment for the time. Wei Ying pointed out that a) if he wanted Lan Zhan to make a costume for him, he’d expect to pay for it, and performance coaching is also a professional service, b) he was taking up at least an hour of Lan Zhan’s work time on Thursdays, which meant he couldn’t earn money selling dances to other customers, and c) he wasn’t about to leave his boyfriend in the lurch for several hundred dollars a month that had become a regular part of his income. Lan Zhan capitulated, and barely even feels weird about it anymore.)
Lan Zhan’s raised eyebrow hasn’t made Wei Ying confess anything else about his new routine, so Lan Zhan leans back against the couch, arms spread wide along the time, and crosses one long leg deliberately over the other. Wei Ying follows the movement with his eyes like a cat watching a spinning rotisserie chicken in a window. Lan Zhan smirks. “Proceed,” Lan Zhan orders lazily.
“You got it, babe,” Wei Ying says with a little salute. He turns to face the back of the room, takes a deep breath that raises his shoulders, and exhales slowly.
“Hi!” Wei Ying says as he turns to Lan Zhan, face bright and open, smiling what Lan Zhan now recognizes as his “performance smile,” as opposed to the many other Wei Ying smiles that Lan Zhan has exhaustively cataloged and admired. “Thanks for coming out tonight! They call me the Yiling Laozu, and by ‘they’ I mean ‘people I’ve specifically instructed to do so when I turn in my tech information for shows’!” From there he launches into an opening spiel that Lan Zhan has heard before and still enjoys—Wei Ying calls it the “getting to know me“ part of the set, “So I can scare off the conservatives before I get to the real comedy!”—and from there into...
Into five minutes of gushing about Lan Zhan.
Lan Zhan works as a stripper and as a burlesque performer. He trained in an art form that required him to handle constant critique and feedback, both positive and negative. He has had customers offer to become his sugar daddy while making it clear the offer is primarily based on his looks.
He has never, never, blushed so hard or been more flustered than now, sitting in a strip club private room listening to his boyfriend make jokes about how incredibly happy he is that they’re dating. It’s not that Wei Ying doesn’t make that clear to Lan Zhan directly on a near-daily basis, but knowing that Wei Ying specifically wrote and rehearsed this in order to perform it for him? Lan Zhan barely knows where to look. He wants, very uncharacteristically, to hide his face, possibly by taking off his white leather jacket and putting it over his head. He can tell that Wei Ying can tell that he’s flustered, and is actively enjoying it. This is probably fair, but Lan Zhan starts plotting sexual revenge for later.
“And that’s why I recommend dating the coolest, most interesting person in the world, who happens to be a stripper!” Wei Ying finishes with a big salute. “It worked out great for me!” He bows deeply, then comes back up with a grin that can only be describe as shit-eating. A silent beat passes, and then Wei Ying’s tone is entirely innocent when he asks, “So, what did you think?”
Lan Zhan finds his voice after a moment. “You are not performing that.” It’s somewhere between a question and a statement—Wei Ying has asked permission to make jokes about their relationship, but he wouldn’t share that much personal information with strangers.
Wei Ying laughs and jumps down off the stage. “Of course not,” he agrees, and then waggles a hand. “Well, some of it’s in my set. The bit about the wool socks under the sexy stripper boots is too good not to tell.”
Lan Zhan inclines his head to concede the point. Good comfortable socks under platform high-heel boots are an absolute necessity, and somehow no one considers that when fantasizing about the sexy boots. It is a funny joke.
“You wrote that for me,” he says as Wei Ying saunters closer. This time it is a statement, and it comes out more confidently.
Wei Ying bites his lower lip as he smiles, some of his smug energy going bashful. “I did,” he confirms, sitting down on the couch next to Lan Zhan and knocking their knees together gently. “I thought, ‘Damn, Lan Zhan listens to me talk about all kinds of other shit all the time. He should get to hear me say nice things about him, too.’”
“You constantly tell me nice things about myself,” Lan Zhan points out, letting Wei Ying take his hand and interlace their fingers. “You told me nice things about myself earlier today.”
The eye roll this engenders is expressive. “That’s different,” Wei Ying says, longsuffering. “That’s different and you know it.” He raises Lan Zhan’s hand to his mouth and kisses his knuckles. “Can’t a dude want to make it a little special when he tells his boyfriend he loves him for the first time?”
Lan Zhan blinks. He reviews his memory. He cocks his head. “Say it, then.” How is his voice is so even when his heart is racing like he just finished a ten minute dance solo?
Wei Ying swallows, the knot in his throat bobbing. If it was brighter in here, Lan Zhan is sure he’d be able to see Wei Ying’s pulse rabbiting in his throat. “I love you,” he says, his voice squeaking a little on the last word. He laughs, shakes his head, and says in his normal voice this time, “Hey. Lan Zhan. Sweetheart. Babe. I love you.”
Lan Zhan is not going to melt. He’s just going to imagine melting. It’s different. He takes a deep breath. “You’re telling me this at work?”
Wei Ying cackles, head flung back and his whole body shaking. “It’s where we met!” he manages between breaths. “It made the most sense!”
Lan Zhan shuts his eyes briefly. “You are not allowed to propose to me in a strip club private room,” he says darkly, opening his eyes so he can reinforce it with a glare. “And that is not a hint to get you to propose, or an assumption that you will propose. It is a warning.”
Wei Ying nods, still visibly smothering laughter. “Noted.” He manages a breath without immediately breaking into giggles and squeezes Lan Zhan’s hand. “Anything else you’d like to say?”
Lan Zhan presses his lips together. He can’t believe this. “I love you,” he says, tasting the truth of it on his tongue. “You ridiculous man,” he can’t help adding, because really.
Wei Ying beams at him, the megawatt smile Lan Zhan adores. “That’s me! The ridiculous man you love.”
Lan Zhan does. He’s so full of love he can’t seem to find any additional words, so in lieu of saying anything, he leans forward and captures Wei Ying’s smiling mouth with his. He doesn’t usually kiss Wei Ying at work—boundaries are boundaries—but he’s willing to make an exception in this one case.
Wei Ying hums into the kiss and sways closer, his free hand coming up to cup the side of Lan Zhan’s face, thumb gently skimming under his jaw in a line of warmth that shivers all the way down to his toes. Lan Zhan keeps the kiss shallow out of respect for his lipstick, but tries to pour as much into it as he can.
They separate on a shared breath, and Wei Ying smiles at Lan Zhan dreamily. “You love me.”
Lan Zhan nods, carefully scrubbing a trace of lipstick away from under Wei Ying’s lip. “I love you.”
Wei Ying smiles wider, his eyes dreamier. “I love you, too.”
Lan Zhan takes a deep breath, the corners of his mouth curling up without his permission. “I know.” He leans forward and drops one more quick kiss on Wei Ying’s lips. “Show me your actual set for Saturday now.”
Wei Ying barks one delighted laugh. “Anything for you, babe,” he says, squeezing Lan Zhan’s hand once more before trotting to the stage. Lan Zhan settles back against the couch to watch, inwardly glowing, outwardly studious.
He has a new entry in the “weirdest thing to happen in the private room” contest, and he’s pretty sure he’s going to be the all-time winner.
Good.