Chapter Text
The universe is doing that cool vortex thing.
Zhao Yunlan tries to hate it, the way it seems like an airless void of swirling color, but honestly it is pretty cool. Like being on a galactic tilt-a-whirl.
Then again, maybe that's just his head. He’s had... a lot to drink. Again. His stomach is probably gonna hate him later.
(He’s absolutely going to hate himself.)
He’s staring through the ethanol haze at the blurred watercolor pictures on his mobile, thumb clumsily swishing and swiping across the screen as he looks into windows of happier times.
Those beautiful eyes glowing in candlelight at him over the cake at his birthday party. (The good one, not the one Zhao forgot because of a case.)
A shot Zhu Hong had taken of them through his office window, smiling at each other across his desk. (The hopelessly fond expressions they both wear physically hurt to witness.)
The sunset-lit kiss from their last vacation. (The good one, not the one with the dead body in the volcano. Even if they ended up solving that one together.)
A candid selfie with a sleeping head on his shoulder, bubblegum lips parted on a breath, Zhao looking up at the camera like a dope, all soft eyes and “I am the luckiest bastard on earth” grin. (He was. He knows he was.) It’s one of his favorites, despite the awkward composition.
He angles his neck trying to match it and his head just takes the initiative to land on the sticky bartop, suddenly too heavy to stay up. There’s a faint ringing in his ears, and then a sleepy voice sighing his name.
“Zhao Yunlan...” Hey. He knows that voice. He loves that voice. He can picture the stern little face, the inadvertent pucker when that pretty mouth is drawn into a pout. He always wants to kiss it away, make the smile come back so he can taste it. (He hates knowing he’s the cause of the dimming of that brilliant smile.)
“Ah-Wei,” he breathes contentedly, relishing this chat with a figment of his imagination. If he focuses hard enough, could he feel those fingers in his hair, the lulling drag of nails across his scalp? The press of lips near his temple, a surety of sweet dreams? “I miss you so much.”
“...I know.” There’s a stretch of silence while the world keeps spinning, a strange shuffling noise in the background like radio static. “Where are you this time?”
“Talking to you,” he answers around a frown. There’s a faint jingle, even though Christmas isn’t for months. “Is Santa coming?”
A sigh, deeply affecting and surprisingly substantial sounding for a memory. “No, but I am. If you will just tell me where you are.”
“Laying down, talkin' to you. Cuzzummissyu.” His words are mushing together, lips tangled on the screen of the phone he somehow hasn't dropped.
Someone shakes his shoulder, his arm gets moved from its service as pillow, held up and out like an isometric scarecrow, and there’s muffled talking. He just keeps chatting to the phantom Shen Wei, eyes closed until someone shakes his shoulder again. He blinks and the man himself is there, sideways but there, long coat over his pajamas, loafers on his feet instead of his fluffy slippers.
“Xiao Wei!” Zhao Yunlan sits up with fluid speed and no grace, nearly tumbling to the floor before those strong arms catch him. His head lands on that firm shoulder, so warm, smelling so good, so familiar, like home. There’s noise around him, some kind of conversation, but it doesn’t matter. His perch shifts, and something else happens, and then he’s walking. They’re walking, semi-synchronous steps carrying them into the night and a waiting minicab.
The instant the door closes, he snuggles into his lover’s side before being forcibly straightened. He lolls back down, again pushed to the side. Too tired to try again, he just slumps, a puppet with cut strings held up by the tension in the seatbelt.
There’s an indeterminate measure of time, a sigh, then a warm touch on his forehead, the upholstered bench against his back, that solid wonderful-smelling form under his cheek.
It’s the only point of contact, once the fingers on his brow are retracted, but it’s enough. He has his Shen Wei. His Shen Wei has him.
It's enough.