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Guo Chengyu likes to think he's pretty good at photography.
Chi Cheng describes his photos as so inherently him, like he's able to see little bits of his best friend's personality shining through the little imperfections, the occasional inconsistent lighting and some of the puzzling subjects he chooses.
For as long as Chengyu can remember, his camera is sacred and the photographs he keeps even closer to his heart. A few lucky lovers do get peeks at his collection when he's up for it, but the only person who's probably seen every single one he's snapped is Chi Cheng. After all, he's the only other person who has a key to his personal darkroom and the ability to snoop through his entire private collection without Chengyu batting an eye.
Well, that's because the only thing he's been sure of that's been as unwavering as his passion for photography, is his friendship with the man.
It begins nearly two decades ago, in the middle of those boring galas his family attended. A required theatre, for his parents to mingle with those of a similar tax bracket, all of them haughty, entitled sharks whose cold, circling scrutiny Guo Chengyu could never make sense of.
"Children are meant to be seen, not heard."
Until now, he still remembers the way his throat seizes in the car, the steely tone Father uses as a warning not to run his mouth, not to embarrass their family.
So, before Mother can introduce him, to whom he swears is the fifth Li-xian-sheng they've encountered today, he decides to risk punishment, cheekily sneaking away from her, wanting a respite from the rigid demands of his parents.
As soon as he's certain she's not paying attention, he slips into the crowd, diving under the nearest table, completely obstructed from view by the fitted cloth.
Chengyu savours the darkness that swallows him whole, the silence of what he now decides is his vacuum. It's something he learned about in science class, a place devoid of matter, of particles and sound. He's always been fascinated by outer space. He wonders what it would be like to live a day without the nagging of his mother and the terrifying, low rumble of his father's scoldings. He wonders if he will miss them.
He swivels his body, determined to make a full lap of his territory, only to discover that someone else has barged in, uninvited. Chengyu was ticked off at first, tempted to chase the audacious intruder out. But he stops in his tracks, a little intimidated.
The boy seems to be his age. His face is drawn in a permanent scowl as he glares meanly at Chengyu, defiant. Unfortunately, Chengyu's initial fear doesn't linger for long, when he notices the way the boy's fingers clutch a cute little snake plush so tightly that his knuckles turn white. It's a jarring contrast to the rest of his appearance, the red clashing with his miniature black suit.
"I like that," Chengyu blurts out, pointing at the plush. He watches as the boy visibly relaxes, the look in his eyes softening.
"Um, Sn—Snakes are pretty cool, aren't they?" He continues to ramble, stuttering slightly as he trips over his words, "I—I've always wanted one too!" He doesn't know why he's nervous. Must be a lingering effect of that warning he'd received from Father.
He doesn't know what he expects. Certainly not for the peal of snickers that erupted, the boy offering up the red snake for Chengyu to lay his hands on. They spend the rest of the time under that table, chatting about everything and playing random games Guo Chengyu makes up on the fly.
He discovers it's not so bad to share his vacuum after all.
Even after he'd left the party, poor six-year-old Guo Chengyu hadn't learnt the name of the boy he befriended, blissfully unaware of the lifetime commitment he'd involuntarily signed himself up for.
From then on, Chi Cheng claims him.
His parents are beyond delighted he now has the Young Master Chi as a friend, an opportunity they use to negotiate deals for Guo Conglomerate, Chengyu suspects, when he's a little older. They shower him with gifts and the freedom to play with Chi Cheng during those galas, no longer keeping him on a tight leash, just like he wanted.
Ironically, Chi Cheng starts out as Chengyu's saviour.
Obviously, over the years, he'd become more than that.
He'd become family, a brother from another mother. Not that Chengyu would admit that to his face.
They were near inseparable all the time in school and university. They grow up together, Chengyu's presence a steady anchor and Chi Cheng fiercely loyal to a fault, never leaving Chengyu's side.
Now adults, Chi Cheng's not as lucky as Chengyu, who has an elder brother to shoulder the burden of being the heir of a giant corporation, spending his days in the office hustling as one of the youngest CEOs in China. Chengyu just remains as he always has, a free spirit roaming the world with his trusty camera.
Even as the years passed, Chengyu's never really been able to reconcile the polished, intimidating professional that Father sings praises of with the miscreant who, at age thirteen, boldly lit a cigarette and lifted it to his lips to take a drag as Chengyu watched in awe.
The same one, who immediately began to cough his lungs out, tears formed at the sides of his eyes as he dropped the still glowing stick to the floor, where it started a small fire, triggering the shrill ring of the fire alarm.
Consequently, they spend the next few months in detention for causing a school-wide evacuation, secretly passing notes and a game console they sneak in when they eventually realising the substitute teacher chaperoning isn't usually paid enough to care so long as they remain quiet.
On occasion, Chengyu returns to Beijing and they catch up over drinks, giving Chengyu to show off the pictures he's really proud of and for Chi Cheng to vent about the most incompetent bunch of employees that Chengyu knows he doesn't really have the heart to fire.
As for tonight, he's guffawing at the way Chengyu manages to effortlessly butcher every single photo he tried to take at Niagara Falls. To be fair, it had been really foggy and rained so hard that Chengyu had barely been able to see anything.
A comfortable silence settles, and Chengyu's serenely taking a sip of his whisky when Chi Cheng decides to drop a bombshell of information so suddenly that it sends the burning liquid down the wrong pipe.
When he's done choking his lungs out, a multitude of thoughts bombard his mind.
Chi Cheng got a boyfriend?
Was the world ending?
The same Chi Cheng who said he would sooner sell all his precious snakes than commit to a relationship?
The same Chi Cheng who had more one-night stands over the course of the last three years than Guo Chengyu his whole life?
The same Chi Cheng who—
Chengyu abruptly realises he's said everything out loud when Chi Cheng furrows his eyebrows, shooting him a sharp glare.
"Hey! I haven't slept with anyone else since I've met him!"
"And how long ago was that?"
"Ten months—"
"Precisely my point, you slut! And I bet your body count still doubles mine." Guo Chengyu cackles in Chi Cheng's face, narrowly avoiding the cushion Chi Cheng tosses his way in retaliation.
"Who is it?" Chengyu continues to question, wiggling his eyebrows, "Some poor employee at your company? A steamy workplace romance?"
"No."
Chengyu scratches his head. "A fellow snake enthusiast? That Wang Shuo fellow from university?"
"No, him." Chi Cheng gestures vaguely at Chengyu.
He's confused at first. Was Chi Cheng playing some kind of mind-boggling prank?
Chengyu points to himself, an incredulous look on his face.
"Behind you, you moron!" Chi Cheng barks, with no real venom, facepalming.
"Ohhh..." Chengyu says, his voice trailing off as he swivels his head around to take a peek at what's behind him.
It's one of those life-size advertisement standees of Weiwei, also known as Wu Suowei, currently one of the most popular idols in the world. There's a bright smile on his face as he holds a bottle of soju up invitingly.
Well, that simply can't be right.
Chengyu pivots his head in two other directions, there's literally no one and nothing else behind him.
"You sure he's not hiding or something?" Chengyu speaks optimistically, more than a little concerned for the man's mental health, seeing as he'd hallucinated his boyfriend being in this bar.
Chi Cheng groans, downing another shot of vodka in quick succession.
"Here," Chi Cheng shoves his phone into the hands of Guo Chengyu, just as confused as he'd been before.
"What are you—" Guo Chengyu's jaw drops in utter shock.
Chi Cheng's lock screen is a cute mirror selfie of him and Weiwei. His best friend has both hands on the other's waist, his dark eyes totally locked on the way the younger is grinning into the mirror while he snaps the picture. It's unmistakably, Wu Suowei.
"How on earth did you bag that?" Guo Chengyu's flabbergasted, hands twitching as he hands Chi Cheng's phone back to him.
"I have more pictures if you still think I'm lying—" Chi Cheng smirks.
"Yeah no, I'm good." Chengyu's quick to cut him off wearily, knowing all too well what Chi Cheng meant. The couple lock screen was cheesy enough, he really didn't want to find out what other kind of freaky shit they got up to.
He was way too sober for this.
Now, the first time Chi Cheng tells him about his boyfriend, Chengyu thinks they'll last, maximum, a year?
As a CEO, Chi Cheng didn't have an abundance of time to spend outside of work, and Chengyu highly doubts Suowei's schedule was any better. In fact, it was probably even worse than Chi Cheng's. Dates must've been a logistical nightmare.
What he doesn't expect, is for himself to be dragged into this passionate whirlwind romance they had going on. Chi Cheng's new relationship fundamentally unlocks something within the man that comes at the cost of Guo Chengyu's sanity.
Every single time they met for drinks, as soon as he'd gotten a little tipsy, Chi Cheng would start genuinely smiling (Guo Chengyu did a double take the first time it happened) and talking about his boyfriend and how great he was and how much he loved him even though they'd just barely made their relationship official and yadda yadda…Guo Chengyu fell asleep the first time.
To be clear, he doesn't blame his friend. If he were dating a celebrity like Weiwei, he would probably shout it from the rooftops every single opportunity he gets. He does feel happy that Chi Cheng's in such a loving relationship.
However, as someone who's been single for close to two years now, listening to Chi Cheng go on and on about the love of his life inevitably starts to become the equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. Just a loud, annoying reminder of what he's missingg while gallivanting around the globe. The closest thing he had to a relationship in years was a brief friends-with-benefits situation he had going on in Germany. It's not something he thinks about often, a memory he long pushed deep into the recesses of his mind.
Chi Cheng's still wearing the same stupid grin by the end of the night, merrily regaling a story Chengyu swears he's told every single time for three weeks straight. He nods intermittently, not being sober enough to care for Chi Cheng's drunken babbling over the pounding of his own head and the way his stomach is threatening to empty itself on the couch.
So when he's done staring down the toilet bowl for the foreseeable future, Chi Cheng jokingly commissions Chengyu for pictures of Weiwei. He even throws a fifty-dollar bill on his lap, telling Chengyu to keep the change. Chengyu chuckles. Never being one to turn down free money, he stuffs it into his pocket hastily.
That's all he remembers when he wakes up the next morning, massively hungover. The rest of his memories after are a blur, his head feels like it's going to explode.
Surely, it must've been some kind of mistake. I'll just return the money another time.
He doesn't foresee the moment Chi Cheng turns up at his doorstep, refusing to move out of the way to let Chengyu out of the house.
"You've got to go help me take pictures of Weiwei tomorrow," he says, leaning comfortably on the frame of Chengyu's door.
"Says who dipshit? I've got a flight to the Maldives in twenty-four hours," Chengyu protests, abandoning his mission to stock up on an extra bottle of sunscreen.
It was about the money, wasn't it? All Chengyu had to do was dig out another fifty—
"Too late." Chi Cheng dangles a piece of paper in his face triumphantly, like he'd known Chengyu would try to worm out of the deal in any way he could. "You signed a contract."
"When?" Chengyu eyes widen, snatching the offending parchment from Chi Cheng's hands.
Clear as day, he's signed it, but the area where his signature usually sits is a massacre of red. Turns out, in his drunken stupor, he'd accidentally mispelled his own name twice, and a stroke from the last word of his final attempt at a legible signature stretched all the way to the other side of the sheet. Like he'd dozed off halfway through.
Chengyu grits his teeth as Chi Cheng pats him on the shoulder, moving to casually lounge on the sofa.
And it wasn't as if Chi Cheng needed these pictures either!
(One night, Chi Cheng confessed to dedicating a room in his apartment just for a merchandise collection of his boyfriend, scouring the internet for all the limited edition goods he could find. It eerily reminds Guo Chengyu of his obsessive habit of acquiring exotic snakes back in the day, though he doesn't really understand why Chi Cheng needed all that junk when he had the real thing just a text away.)
"Look, I'm sure the airline will refund your flight. I'll pay for your ride and all you have to do is just turn up and snap a few pics!" Chi Cheng reassures, devoid of sympathy.
Guo Chengyu lets out a sigh, a hand massaging his temples. Like if he pressed hard enough, the contract would magically disappear. It was a miracle he'd survived his teenage years with this conniving bastard.
"It's also cheaper than hiring an actual fansite to take high-quality photos," Chi Cheng mutters to himself, recalling the way Wu Suowei had just yelled at him for blowing too much money on a meal at a Michelin Star restaurant. His allowance had just been halved again.
"Hey! I heard that!"
Disgruntled, Guo Chengyu steps out of the cab. A hand clutching his camera, the other covers his eyes, trying to shield them from the blinding rays of the sun.
It was just like Chi Cheng to wake him up at ass o'clock to take fansite pictures of his own boyfriend.
To his dismay, it's not like the spot is quiet and relaxing either. Of course, Chi Cheng had to pick the top-tier of places to capture what was probably a five-second walk into Suowei's company building. He huffs, surveying the crowd of fangirls in his way, all holding the biggest, highest quality cameras he's ever seen.
He hovers awkwardly, feeling a little underprepared and out of place amidst all the excitement.
"Are you a fanboy?"
Guo Chengyu jumps.
There's a girl sitting in the tree, a makeshift tripod seemingly carved exactly for the hold of its branches to hold her comically huge camera. She beams down kindly, unperturbed by the striking height difference between them both.
Guo Chengyu's too sleep-deprived to care.
"Oh no, I'm doing this as a dare. My friend thinks it's funny."
The girl shoots him a vicious glare, her face turning red as she takes a deep breath.
"Funny? You think it's funny? Just take a look at yourself! You're nothing compared to Weiwei!"
Guo Chengyu's brain feels like it's melting from lethargy. He chuckles once, until he realises that no one else is laughing. Every single pair of eyes in the vicinity stare at him, a mix of curiosity and outrage if they happened to hear what he said. If looks could kill, Chengyu is sure he would've died twenty times over.
To his absolute horror, her tirade doesn't end there.
"You should be worshipping the ground he walks on! You should be praying to his posters daily! How dare you!" The girl's expression twists menacingly, like she's contemplating pouncing off the tree to give him a piece of her mind.
"Uh—" Chengyu says intelligently, floundering as he mentally calculates roughly how fast he needs to be to outrun a group of about forty rabid fans ready to jump him at a moment's notice.
He's ready to book it, photos be damned, when one of the girls inexplicably dissipates the tension, shrieking and squealing out of the blue. Like a troop of trained combat militants, the group springs into action, their attention diverted to the road ahead, where a van pulls up.
The windows are tinted, he can't really get a clear view of the person inside. But he's certain it's Wu Suowei when a dozen flashes and clicks go off at once. He scrambles with his camera, lining his lens to the entrance of the building, bewildered when he realises the guy hadn't even left his car yet.
Instead, he sees a the figure of a shorter man clamber out of the car. He's back facing Chengyu, an anxious head of curly hair as he signals another person inside the car that it's time to get out.
"Manager Jiang!" The group calls in unison, like it was a fanchant they'd practised together.
Chengyu watches as his blush extends from his neck up to his ears.
Cute.
It's not until Suowei climbs out a few seconds later, that Guo Chengyu is able to catch a glimpse of the mysterious man's face.
Time stops. Chengyu swears he stops breathing at one point.
The girls start to scream their greetings at the popstar but the rest of Chengyu's senses fail him as he shamelessly ogles the mousy manager standing by Suowei's side.
A petite face framed by a pair of brown-rimmed glasses, a cute button nose and the most endearing blush stubbornly blooming on those rosy cheeks, seemingly still mortified by how quickly he'd been recognised by Suowei's fanclub.
Man, if Chengyu had known Suowei had such a pretty manager, he doesn't think he could've held himself back from yelling the man's name together with the rest of the girls.
The guy gives the eager fans a shy nod of acknowledgement, gaze sweeping over the crowd till it lands solely on Guo Chengyu. His breath hitches, offering up the most enthusiastic smile he can, his heart beating so fast it thunders in his ribcage.
Those soft brown eyes are to die for, even the plain white shirt he's wearing seems to add to the perfect picture of elegance Chengyu conjures up in his head. Oh god, every single thing about him was perfect. How was that even possible?
Before he knows it, his hands move instinctively, snapping as many pictures as he can to capture what he's sure is the most beautiful man he's ever had the honour of laying his eyes on. He's sure to take his sweet time to perfectly document this angel to the best of his abilities. After all, Chi Cheng had to know this Manager Jiang. He could probably get his contact eventually.
Chi Cheng!
Shit!
Guo Chengyu winces, half-heartedly turning his lens away to his intended target, impassively clicking the shutter button a few times. He hopes the pictures will turn out good enough to satisfy his best friend, whose connections he definitely needed to exploit right this instant.
Chengyu saunters into Chi Cheng's office with Gang Zi in tow, secretly gloating when he observes the huge pile of work Gang Zi plops on his desk. He's never been more glad to not be bound to the endless grueling drivel that is corporate life.
Chi Cheng's still fully focused on his work, his glare at the computer screen so harsh it could probably make a grown man cower. It's true, Chengyu has witnessed it in real time, in this very office too.
To make his presence known, he pretends to wipe non-existent tears, stepping into the centre of the room just to announce with all the flair of a Shakespearean actor, "I think I'm in love!"
It doesn't exactly stir quite the reaction he wants.
Chi Cheng, insouciant about the ruckus he's causing, starts calmly, "What happened to 'Hello', 'How are you?', 'Good Morning'?"
Frankly, Guo Chengyu only starts to get a little offended when he tosses his bundle of photos of Manager Jiang and his best friend doesn't even spare them a look, his eyes still thoroughly fixated on the screen.
"So who is it? Some poor employee at your company? A steamy workplace romance?" Chi Cheng mocks, a pale imitation of Chengyu's words just a few months ago. Chengyu's eye twitches in agitation.
"Oh yeah! That's right! You don't even have a jo—"
Chengyu's heart soars when Chi Cheng's expression drops as soon as he pulls away from the desktop to take a cursory glance at the photographs strewn at the side. The number of times he's rendered Chi Cheng speechless were so rare they could be counted on one hand. He can't believe he's made the man eat his own words!
Before Chi Cheng can spew another insult to cover his embarrassment, Chengyu's quick to probe, a devilish smile on his face, "So when are you gonna introduce me to this Manager Jiang?"
To his credit, the pictures are breathtaking. Chi Cheng can feel the way Chengyu was probably salivating with each click, capturing every intricate detail in that unique way of his. He browses through the stack, stopping at one where Jiang Xiaoshuai is looking straight into the camera, his eyebrows raised, like the picture was taken in the midst of something else.
Chengyu sighs dreamily, using his finger to circle Chi Cheng's office table as he giggled.
Chi Cheng can't help but shoot the man a look of disgust, flicking Chengyu's finger off his precious table.
"Did you see? He looked at me! He noticed me!" Chengyu doesn't react, fingering at the picture before beginning to pray fervently, like he was thanking the heavens. He sounds alarmingly similar to some of the tweets Chi Cheng saw after Suowei's concerts, often attached with a split-second clip of the popstar's gaze casually scanning his audience, sometimes not even having the slightest bit of direct eye contact.
"He looks like he's squinting at a scientific experiment gone wrong," is what Chi Cheng settles with, disturbed when Chengyu barely listens to a word he says. He's still grinning to himself, pawing at his own pictures as he waxes poetic about his Manager Jiang's cheekbones.
"Where did you put my commission?" Chi Cheng demands, determined to break him out of the hypnotic trance his boyfriend's manager has induced in his best friend.
Chengyu doesn't bear to tear his eyes from his magnificent muse, jabbing a finger in some random direction. Chi Cheng sighs, picking up the brown envelope he assumes Chengyu was supposed to point at. He's glad that his own photos are packaged neatly, looking forward to poring over them at home alone. If all the photos of Jiang Xiaoshuai were that splendid, he simply can't wait to see the ones Chengyu took of his Suowei.
It takes approximately thirty seconds of self-restraint for the dam to break.
Also, because he doesn't want to listen to Chengyu coo for another minute.
Chi Cheng shoves all his pending work aside, nothing stood between him and anything involving his boyfriend.
He plants the envelope in the middle of his table before slicing it open with precision, gingerly handling the photographs with care. He'd already begin to imagine framing them in his apartment or making one of them his new desktop wallpaper, on display in his office. The possibilities were simply endless!
He takes them out, laying them on the table facedown, practically trembling with anticipation. It reminds him of those unboxing videos he used to laugh at, the way the fans were just as excited to see the photocards they pulled, even when they already knew it would be one of Weiwei.
As someone now in their shoes, he finally understands. The agonising patience of having to wait, the torturous build-up, the exhilaration of finally flipping one over.
Lo and behold, Chi Cheng's now looking at one of the worst pictures he's seen Chengyu produce in his life. That's counting the time he'd accidentally snapped a shot of dried manure on the ground, claiming it to be some profound work of art that Chi Cheng lacked the ability to understand even after discovering it was cow shit.
It's blurry and uncentred, Suowei's face barely in the frame. Slowly, Chi Cheng examines the blasphemy Chengyu has committed. Maybe it's just one picture, no problem, even his best friend had his off-days sometimes.
Nope. For once in his life, he's dead wrong.
Out of his four photographs, only one of them was clear. His head was visible but the rest of Suowei's entire torso had unfortunately been covered by some random truck driving past.
"Guo Chengyu! What the fuck is this?" Chi Cheng screeches at the top of his lungs, prepared to throttle the man.
Welp, it's time to leave.
Guo Chengyu darts out the office at lightning speed, ignoring the look of confusion Gang Zi shoots him as he makes his escape to the emergency stairwell, for the sake of his safety.
He doesn't imagine the next time he sees that gorgeous specimen of a man, prepared to introduce himself with the photos in hand, he's met with an unreasonably vehement anger. Or so he thinks.
"I swear I've had enough of you privacy-invading parasites! Get out now!" The shorter man glowers beneath his glasses, grabbing Chengyu forcefully by the forearm and shoving him towards the door.
Me? A parasite?
Chengyu's rooted the spot, dread coursing through his veins.
There's no way the love of his life just mistook him for a stalker! Even worse, a fan of Suowei's! Chi Cheng that possessive piece of shit, would sooner wring him by the neck! Again!
"If you don't leave right now, I'm going to break that!" He huffs, throwing a menacing glare at the camera dangling from Chengyu's neck.
Now, under no circumstances did Chengyu usually find someone threatening violence towards his beloved camera adorable, but he supposes he could make an exception for this.
He's a little too far gone to care.