Chapter Text
When Cheng Xiaoshi’s hair is down, it’s just long enough for Lu Guang to wrap his hand around it—slowly twisting until the strands are taut—and yank. Cheng Xiaoshi gives so freely, but watching him open himself to these moments makes Lu Guang feel like he could love this man to the point of ruin. With his head tilted back, Cheng Xiaoshi looks like a neoclassical sculpture, the lines of his body pointing to some significance that Lu Guang can only understand when they are pressed together.
“I love you,” he whispers, pulling Cheng Xiaoshi’s hair to one side so that his lips brush over his bare neck as he speaks. But when he opens his eyes, Cheng Xiaoshi’s form weakens, slipping through his fingers like sand. Lu Guang is alone, and the feeling of Cheng Xiaoshi’s hair clutched in his hand disappears until the very memory of him is draining away. Lu Guang is alone, and Cheng Xiaoshi is gone.
When Lu Guang wakes, he hates himself. He hates himself most days, ever aware of his own hypocrisy and stubborn nature, but it’s after dreams like this that he’s filled with such self loathing that his entire body aches. The Cheng Xiaoshi who comes to him in dreams isn’t the one of the present, the one who is his , who he will save. Yet this Cheng Xiaoshi used to be his, before he bled out on the forest floor with that horrible look of pity in his downturned eyes, that look that told Lu Guang that it wasn’t his own death he feared, but how Lu Guang would survive in a world without him. And he can’t. He won’t. So when his dreams remind him of this Cheng Xiaoshi who used to belong to him body and mind, he hates that he cannot accept his death. He hates the idea of what Cheng Xiaoshi would say if he knew; if he knew both what Lu Guang had done, and also what they had done together in a life long ago.
He hears Cheng Xiaoshi stir in the bunk below his, the starchy sheets crumpling under his body. In the summer, Cheng Xiaoshi can’t sleep if there’s anything more than a flimsy bedsheet on his bed. “It’s too hot!” he’d complain, “My whole body is sweaty.” Lu Guang could confirm that, always mesmerized by the sheen of dew across Cheng Xiaoshi’s bare chest. In the winter, though, that same sheet would be pushed to the end of the bed by his feet so all that touched his body was the plush comforter. “The texture is all wrong,” he’d say, “That sheet is fine by its own, but underneath a duvet it’s suffocating.” Such were the idiosyncrasies of Cheng Xiaoshi.
It’s summer now, months before autumn, but more specifically two months and five days before Lu Guang’s world stopped for the first time.
“Lu Guang?” comes a voice from below.
He doesn’t respond, listening to Cheng Xiaoshi squirm. He never stops moving, even in sleep, and the sound is a comforting one.
He feels a foot kick his mattress from below, one solid thump as Cheng Xiaoshi’s patience wears down. “I know you’re awake, you dummy.”
“Who’re you calling dumb,” Lu Guang mumbles.
“You.” Another kick. “Obviously.” The bed frame creaking is Lu Guang’s only warning before Cheng Xiaoshi’s head pops up next to him. He must be standing on the edge of his mattress to be as high over the railing as he is, and his suspicions are confirmed when Cheng Xiaoshi loses his balance and wobbles backward precariously. Lu Guang’s hand shoots out, latching onto Cheng Xiaoshi’s shoulder and pulling him back in.
Cheng Xiaoshi smiles goofily. “My savior,” he whispers, far too quiet considering it’s just the two of them. The intimacy of it burns, and Lu Guang yanks his hand back and turns over until his back faces Cheng Xiaoshi.
“What did you want?”
“So rude.” He can hear the pout in Cheng Xiaoshi’s voice. When Lu Guang doesn’t respond, he sighs and says, “I’m too cold in my bed.”
Lu Guang frowns. It’s the middle of summer, and even with the windows open it’s not particularly cool in the room. “So?” he says. “We do own more blankets, you know.”
“But they’re so high up in the closet!”
Lu Guang peeks over his shoulder with narrowed eyes. “As if you’re not the tallest person we know.”
“ Lu Guang ,” he whines in that tone that never fails to make Lu Guang roll his eyes. Wordlessly, he scootches closer to the wall, leaving a Cheng Xiaoshi-sized spot on the bed behind him. “Yippee!” Cheng Xiaoshi says, vaulting over the safety bar and snuggling up close to Lu Guang.
It’s most certainly too warm with two nearly six feet tall grown men in a twin bed, but all the tension leaves Lu Guang’s body as Cheng Xiaoshi slings an arm over his waist and presses his forehead against the back of his head. He smooths down Lu Guang’s hair with his free hand, tucking a strand behind his ear and whispering, “So soft,” beneath his breath.
“Shut up,” Lu Guang mumbles.
Cheng Xiaoshi nestles in closer until his nose is pressing against Lu Guang’s neck. “No can do, Guang-Guang.”
But Lu Guang needs him to stop, or else he’s going to make a fool out of himself and he’ll ruin the timeline and Cheng Xiaoshi will never forgive him and how can he live if he doesn’t have Cheng Xiaoshi—
His mind quiets as the arm around his waist adjusts, Cheng Xiaoshi’s hand sneaking under the hem of his sleep shirt and staking a claim on Lu Guang’s lower belly. He doesn’t say a word, fearful that a single sound could break the spell they’re under.
He feels Cheng Xiaoshi’s lips flutter against his neck when he whispers, “Sleep tight,” and with Lu Guang’s eyes shut he can almost imagine it’s a kiss.
There’s a certain terror that strikes when you know your fate—not just a fate like Cheng Xiaoshi’s, bleeding out on a lonely night, but the tenuous fate that connects the two of them. Lu Guang knows what they can be, what they have been, and what they will be. In every timeline, they revolve around each other like derailed comets.
The terror comes in when Lu Guang thinks about the fact that Cheng Xiaoshi likely has feelings for him in this timeline, but how can he be sure? He knows it will come, but has it come yet? And if he is too hasty, what if he ruins it all? Or what if his hesitance delays their inevitable union until it’s too late?
Lu Guang knows both too much and too little. He envies the man he used to be, awestruck and running on sheer instinct. This knowledge is a curse to an overthinker like him.
But with Cheng Xiaoshi holding him, his body warmth leaking into him until he feels sweaty and sticky, his mind calms and he feels as if he’s back in his first life before it all went wrong. Eventually he drifts back off to sleep, lulled by Cheng Xiaoshi’s light snores rumbling against his back.
He’s dreaming again, but now he feels as if he had dove back into a photo and was reliving someone else’s past. The distance is enough so that when he sees Cheng Xiaoshi in front of him— his Cheng Xiaoshi, through and through—it doesn’t hurt as much as it usually does.
Cheng Xiaoshi is in the bath, hair down and snarly, and he peeks over at Lu Guang through hooded eyes heavy with fatigue. Lu Guang hates when he looks so worn down, so obvious when he hasn’t taken care of himself properly.
That’s why he needs me, Lu Guang thinks. That’s why I won’t ever leave him—and why I won’t ever let him leave me.
He kneels next to the tub, leaning on his arm and gazing at Cheng Xiaoshi. They sit in silence for a moment, before Lu Guang says, “What do you need?”
“Join me?”
It takes little convincing before he slips out of his trousers and t-shirt and steps in. He sucks in a breath at the temperature of the water. “Fuck, it’s cold. How long have you been in here?” He reaches to turn on the water and crank the dial to hot, but boney fingers dig into his hips and pull him down before he can adjust it. He lands on Cheng Xiaoshi’s lap, water sloshing around them. “Let me turn the water on,” he says, unamused.
Cheng Xiaoshi leans in and plants a kiss on his collarbone, hands moving from his hips up to the small of his waist and squeezing. “Don’t wanna.”
Lu Guang rolls his eyes, but the words he was about to say are forgotten as Cheng Xiaoshi kisses him. He melts in his arms. There’s no one else that Lu Guang feels so at home with.
The sensation of water fades into something amorphous, as if Lu Guang has lost where he is in space outside of his place in Cheng Xiaoshi’s arms. He feels floaty, and even the feeling of Cheng Xiaoshi’s grip becomes hazy. His gut sinks at the loss, and he calls out, “Cheng Xiaoshi?” He’s surrounded by black and feels smothered in panic.
A voice is whispering in his ear, and he feels fingers rubbing circles into the back of his neck. He pries his eyes open and is met by golden eyes, downturned in worry. He’s awake. It was a dream, again. But the relief he feels is so overwhelming that the usual post-dream self hatred is less intense. He’s in Cheng Xiaoshi’s arms—where he belongs—and he’s alive. He can feel Cheng Xiaoshi’s breathing as his chest rises and falls against Lu Guang’s.
Lu Guang sits up until he’s leaning over Cheng Xiaoshi, lifting his hands and holding them to Cheng Xiaoshi’s cheeks. He squishes them a bit to ground himself, and the look of Cheng Xiaoshi’s lips pursed like a fish is enough for Lu Guang to smile just a little.
“To be honest,” Cheng Xiaoshi says, a slight lisp to his speech from the pressure. “At first I sort of thought you were having a really good dream, if you know what I’m saying.”
Lu Guang flushes bright red and releases his cheeks, feeling the overwhelming desire to hide. He snuggles his face into Cheng Xiaoshi’s collarbone, digging in like a cat sneaking under a blanket.
Cheng Xiaoshi chuckles, his fingers tugging on the ends of Lu Guang’s hair. The slight pinch as he pulls a strand too taut sends a shiver down his spine. “Why so shy, Guang-Guang? No need to be embarrassed over a nightmare.”
“Was only a nightmare at the end…” Lu Guang mumbles.
Cheng Xiaoshi’s fingers pause, and Lu Guang feels his breath stutter. “Oh?” His voice has that tone of faux nonchalance that Cheng Xiaoshi thinks he’s incredibly skilled at. The word is pitched higher than usual, and he’s clearly holding himself back from asking more. Cheng Xiaoshi on an average day never shies away from prying; it’s like a highly honed skill of his. So when he lets the silence between them build, Cheng Xiaoshi might as well be holding up a flashing neon sign that says, “I really want to know what you’re talking about but I also really don’t want you to know that!”
Lu Guang isn’t one to answer a question that hasn’t been asked, though, and he holds the silence. He glances up from his hiding spot in Cheng Xiaoshi’s clavicle, looking up through his lashes to meet his intent stare. He flicks his gaze away from Lu Guang as soon as he realizes, but the scarlet budding on the tips of his ears tells on him. Lu Guang reaches up and tucks Cheng Xiaoshi’s bangs behind his ear, touch lingering on the skin. He can feel the heat from it, and Cheng Xiaoshi’s shoulders flinch up as if to hold off an attack.
Insecurity starts to rear its ugly head in Lu Guang’s gut as a voice in his mind says, You’re taking advantage of him. Lu Guang knows Cheng Xiaoshi in every way, down to every mole on his body and the scars that litter his thighs and the way they feel under his lips. He knows that if he kisses the smudgy birthmark on Cheng Xiaoshi’s hip bone, he can’t control the sounds he makes. He knows that Cheng Xiaoshi has never slept with anyone before. His familiarity with Cheng Xiaoshi’s inexperience is bone-deep, while the Cheng Xiaoshi in front of him has no idea that he knows any of it.
Cheng Xiaoshi used to tell him that he’d lost his virginity to a neighbor girl— “Not Qiao Ling, oh my god! Don’t even let that thought cross your mind!”— and it wasn’t until he was about to take Lu Guang into his mouth that he said, all smiles, “I’m actually a virgin, you know.” The Cheng Xiaoshi lying under him has no idea about the visions that flash across Lu Guang’s mind at night. He doesn’t know that his roommate thinks about jerking him off until the only thing that crosses his lips is Lu Guang’s own name.
Lu Guang can feel his own self destructive tendencies punching away at his self control, and he knows he’s going to regret it as soon as the words leave his mouth: “So what if it was a really, really good dream?”
Cheng Xiaoshi’s lips part, releasing a slow breath. “Well, I guess I would say that it can’t be helped. We’re both healthy young men, it’s only natural.” He meets Lu Guang’s gaze for a moment before glancing down.
Lu Guang hums, propping his cheek against Cheng Xiaoshi’s shoulder. “Doesn’t it make you uncomfortable? Your roommate, a fellow healthy young man , having a wet dream while laying in bed with you?” He can feel that they’ve crossed some sort of threshold, their eyes locked as something unspoken lies between them.
“Were you?” Cheng Xiaoshi asks. “Having a wet dream?” His voice is monotone, as if the answer has no consequence.
Lu Guang just stares at him. He’s been treading the boundary between saying too much and saying too little this whole time, but he still can’t get himself to admit it.
His silence seems to be taken as its own answer, though, as Cheng Xiaoshi launches himself through the threshold they’d been stuck in. His hands that were previously at Lu Guang’s neck now slide down to his wrists, clasping firmly and using the claiming hold to shove Lu Guang onto his back. For a moment, Lu Guang thinks that he’s been pushed off in disgust, that he’s gone too far and ruined the timeline.
But then Cheng Xiaoshi is hovering over him, pinning down his hands in a pose far too reminiscent of moments that Lu Guang had thought were lost to time. “You see, Lu Guang,” he says. “There’s just something that I can’t quite wrap my head around.”
“Yeah?” Lu Guang says, breathless in shock. He flexes his hands, but the grip around his wrists is firm enough that any wriggling is futile. Cheng Xiaoshi has him right where he wants him, and there’s no escaping.
There’s a hint of the smug smile that Cheng Xiaoshi always gets when he knows he’s going to win on his face, lips just barely parted and quirking up. “I’m not shocked you had that sort of dream, no matter what icy persona you pretend to have. What’s shocking to me is what you happened to say while having said dream.”
Lu Guang freezes, and he feels like he’s fallen right into a trap.
Cheng Xiaoshi lowers himself a bit until their chests are pressing together. “Do you know the noises you make—just how sinful they are? To think that I had a gasping and whimpering Guang-Guang in my unsuspecting arms.”
“What did I say?” Lu Guang asks, voice raw.
“Do I really need to tell you? You were there too,” Cheng Xiaoshi says. And Lu Guang can feel the playfulness in his voice. He feels like he’s being tossed back and forth, and each sentence makes him think he’s either ruined everything or that he perhaps has some sort of chance. “Lu Guang,” he sing-songs. “What do you think you said? Why don’t you try saying it, loud and clear.”
Lu Guang’s ears are ringing. The high-pitched buzzing has been his companion ever since his first dive back, perhaps some type of side-effect that Lu Guang would look into if he wasn’t far more concerned about why he went back. He feels like he’s standing on a precipice now, and the ringing is a voice in his ear telling him to jump, jump, jump.
“Cheng Xiaoshi,” he says, the name that is engraved into his bones, the name that he could draw blind.
“That’s a good boy,” Cheng Xiaoshi says, and before Lu Guang can flush with shame, he feels Cheng Xiaoshi pressed fully against him, including his interest. He releases Lu Guang’s wrist, and it’s a clear opportunity for rejection. He’s telling Lu Guang, You can say no.
Instead, Lu Guang reaches to the back of Cheng Xiaoshi’s head, pulls out the hair tie that sometimes seems like it’s glued to him, and tugs on his loose hair. He twists his wrist around once, twice, until Cheng Xiaoshi’s freed ponytail is firmly in his grasp; Cheng Xiaoshi groans at the yank, his pupils blown wide. Lu Guang can’t take it anymore, and he guides him down until they’re kissing.
Sometimes Lu Guang is afraid of his own desire, how it turns into an obsession. He’s always been too much : too involved, too quiet, too intense, too possessive. But Cheng Xiaoshi is someone who craves attention—not in a self-absorbed way, but in the way that a neglected child can never get enough love. Lu Guang has endless focus for those he loves, and Cheng Xiaoshi is willing to receive it all. He loves Cheng Xiaoshi so much, and he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to articulate the extent of it. But when Cheng Xiaoshi kisses him, he doesn’t think he needs to.
Lu Guang takes Cheng Xiaoshi’s bottom lip between his teeth and bites down just enough for Cheng Xiaoshi to hiss from the sting. “Lu Guang!” he exclaims. “What are you, a rabid animal?”
“Mn,” Lu Guang murmurs in agreement. He yanks on Cheng Xiaoshi’s hair to tell him to get back to what they were doing, and Cheng Xiaoshi laughs and obliges.
It’s far too warm under the blankets, and his bed is still too small for two adult men, but Lu Guang pays no mind and just focuses on the feeling of Cheng Xiaoshi kissing him. They lounge like that for who knows how long, kissing and holding one another.
“I guess we’re not opening the shop today,” Cheng Xiaoshi says as Lu Guang is sucking on his neck, nibbling on the bit of skin he takes between his teeth. Cheng Xiaoshi smacks him lightly on the back of the head. “Who knew you were such a biter, Guang-Guang.” In response, Lu Guang bites down harder. “Agh! Okay, okay, do what you want, I guess.” He hums in contentment, returning his focus to the small patch of skin under Cheng Xiaoshi’s jaw.
Lu Guang wants to spend the rest of their lives like this—late mornings and hands searching under loose sleep shirts, bodies touching so closely that they’d feel incomplete if they separated. His Cheng Xiaoshi, his first one, was deprived of that. But the ugly desire that Lu Guang nurses inside him has learned that it won’t take no for an answer. He will get this future, and Cheng Xiaoshi will live to wake up every day in his lover’s arms.
For now, though, Lu Guang will take every second he can get.