Chapter Text
Xie Lian wasn’t… entirely sure when his ‘problem’ started. All he recalls is that one day he woke up and, as hard as it may be to believe, he could hear the thoughts of those whom he touched, or who touched him.
Most would think this is a blessing– a gift from the heavens above, but alas, with Xie Lian’s chronic bad luck and severe touch starvation – which is a whole other issue entirely – Xie Lian had, thus far, not managed to put his ‘gift’ to any good use. All it did was give him the fright of his life every now and again when he brushed up against strangers on the train. He had no idea that people’s thoughts, even in public, were so… Shameless! The first time it had happened, he’d truly been taken aback, to the point where he had to cover his own face in mortification, and get off three stops early just to escape the torturous scenario. The walk home in the cold did wonders for clearing his mind, though.
So, that was that. It didn’t particularly phase him these days– being a mind reader and all. That was until a certain person began to make his own thoughts drift enough to drown out those belonging to other people.
Hua Cheng had come into his life just over a year ago, and yet he’d forcefully carved himself a permanent – but nonetheless welcome – place in Xie Lian’s mind. Gege this and Gege that; his gentle voice echoed between his ears until it gave him a headache. Xie Lian knew he was hopelessly attracted to Hua Cheng; which was a feeling that not only scared him, but also made him feel unbearably guilty at the prospect of non consensually listening to his thoughts. Thus, no matter how much he wanted to, Xie Lian made it a rule to absolutely never touch Hua Cheng. He didn’t want to break the trust they’d built over the time they’d known each other.
So now, here he was, in Shi Qingxuan’s apartment, wallowing in his own misery for the eight hundredth time.
“Ugh!” Xie Lian flopped over onto the table’s surface with his face buried in his hands, and Shi Qingxuan, who was sitting at the other side of the table, visibly flinched, sloshing around the remaining jasmine tea in her cyan porcelain teacup.
“Gosh, you made me jump! Are you going to tell me what’s the matter now? And I swear, if you say it’s about that Hua Cheng of yours again, I will pour the rest of this,” She lifted her cup in the air and held it out over the table to emphasise her point, “Over your pretty little head.”
Xie Lian simply inclined his head slightly so that just his eyes would peek from behind his hands. “Why would you say that, when you know that it’s always about him?”
As embarrassing and, as Xie Lian always thought, absolutely pathetic as that was to admit aloud, Shi Qingxuan was already painfully aware of Xie Lian’s whole situation. When Xie Lian had first run to her in a panic, rambling about being able to hear people’s thoughts, she’d been entirely blindsided and thought he’d finally lost his marbles– She soon found herself apologising for the assumption, though, after thorough testing. (That so-called testing consisted of the two of them sitting on the floor for an hour, as Xie Lian managed to hold an entire conversation with her without her having spoken a word.)
“Look, you let me touch you all the time! Am I not allowed privacy too?” Shi Qingxuan pouted as she lifted the tea to her lips. “Surely it can’t be that bad, Hua Cheng’s thoughts are probably just like everybody else’s!”
“This situation is totally different!” Xie Lian exclaimed. “You know about the whole thing, plus you’re the one always touching me.”
“Then wouldn’t the solution be telling Hua Cheng about the whole–”
“No!” He quickly cut her off, “I can’t, you don’t… What if he never trusts me again? What if he never wants to touch me, or even go near me?” Xie Lian had had the exact same conversation over and over, whether it was with himself in his room, or with Shi Qingxuan. It always ended in the same conclusion. He absolutely, one hundred percent, could never tell Hua Cheng. “I can’t risk losing him,” He mumbled.
“Well, sweetheart, right now, you won’t let him touch you anyway. Isn’t that weird in itself?” She gave him a flat look, and Xie Lian nodded, defeated. She continued, “He’ll eventually realise something is strange if he hasn’t already– What kinda person flinches away from a friend’s touch as if they’ve been burned?”
“I know, I know, that’s… actually what I came here to talk to you about.” Xie Lian inhaled slightly. “I just saw him. San Lang.”
Shi Qingxuan’s eyes widened at this. She stood from her seat and hastily grasped a few bags of snacks from the cupboard, followed by the teapot from the counter top, before taking her seat back in front of Xie Lian once again. She met his unimpressed expression with a curious smile, and with her eyes sparkling in wonder. She’d called that particular cupboard the ‘Hua Cheng Emergency Cupboard' and labelled it as such with a sticky note. It didn’t remain stuck there for too long— as Xie Lian tore it down, scrunched it up and threw it away. But the damage was done, whilst the sticky note wasn’t stuck there anymore, the name certainly had stuck.
Yes, it happened so often that Shi Qingxuan had named and filled a cupboard with snacks that came out exclusively when they talked about Xie Lian’s love life, and yes, it had already needed to be fully restocked three times.
“Well, I… I accidentally heard one of his thoughts.” Xie Lian admitted. His face twisted with guilt, but high on his pale cheekbones, a light colour had blossomed. “And– I… It– It was an acciden–”
“That’s usually what accidentally means.” Shi Qingxuan couldn’t help but chime in cheekily. That’s usually how these conversations went, after all. “Lian, you don’t have to beat yourself up about it every time yo–”
“That wasn’t the problem. I’m not beating myself up about it. This time is different.”
Qingxuan quickly clamped her mouth shut, as she realised that the conversation may have been more serious than she’d originally thought.
• ━━━━━ ••●•• ━━━━━ •
Xie Lian had been standing on the train facing the doors– Just his luck, once again, he’d managed to get caught in rush hour– meaning everyone was squished into the small train car, and therefore pressed against each other. This was the worst kind of place to be for someone who was able to hear people’s thoughts just by touch– It was like being in a horrifically crowded room in which every person in it was talking over each other. However, Xie Lian had long since learned to tune out the sound, it was practically white noise to him now. What he hadn’t expected was to suddenly run into Hua Cheng.
Well, not run into per se, be pressed against would be a more fitting description.
Xie Lian hadn’t recognised his voice at first. The funny thing about hearing people’s thoughts, is that voices sound slightly different when they’re not spoken aloud. When he explained it to Qingxuan, Xie Lian had likened it to how your own voice sounds in your head, as opposed to how it sounds when you hear it back from a recording or a video.
“ God,” A forlorn voice stood out from the rest, “I miss him. I wonder what he’s doing right now…” The voice had said. Xie Lian paid it no mind, at least, at first. He was used to hearing people thinking about their loved ones, so this was nothing new.
“Fuck, the last time I saw him, he looked so–” Before Xie Lian could hear the rest, the train conveniently braked sharply, causing whoever it was behind him to lose his balance and press further against him. That was when he heard a voice he recognised. The very same voice that he’d agonised over for the past year.
“Sorry.” He had said. One word was all it took. Xie Lian didn’t turn around. He was mortified. …San Lang? Just now, all of that had been…?! Who was he thinking abo– His own thoughts were cut off as the voice, Hua Cheng’s real voice, spoke from behind him again.
“Gege…?”
When Xie Lian turned, his face beet red, Hua Cheng’s expression matched his quite similarly. Uncharacteristically so. Hua Cheng’s expression was almost always controlled, always painted with a soft smile when looking at Xie Lian, or with his eyebrow arched when he was in the mood to tease. This expression was something Xie Lian had never seen– He must have really been caught off guard. It was almost cute. He didn’t really spend long dwelling on it, though, as he very quickly started panicking as the realisation dawned on him that he had, in fact, read Hua Cheng’s thoughts.
The one thing he would never knowingly let himself do.
“Gege, I–” The train doors opened. Xie Lian jumped at the idea of an escape.
“Ah, this is my stop, San Lang, I’m sorry– See you later!”
And with that, Xie Lian had left without so much as glancing back. It was not, in fact, his stop. Hua Cheng knew that too. Xie Lian didn’t head home– he made a beeline for Shi Qingxuan’s apartment.
• ━━━━━ ••●•• ━━━━━ •
“Oh.” Qingxuan said. Her mouth opened and closed a few times. “This certainly is…” She laughed awkwardly.
“It’s bad, isn’t it? Was he thinking about his beloved? His beloved is a he?” Xie Lian’s voice was muffled by his sleeves, “That means I could have had a chance, right? But– he has a beloved… and, oh, he’s never come out to me, or to you. Oh god– did I just out San Lang–”
“Honey, I’m pretty sure everyone who knows Hua Cheng knows that he isn’t exactly the straightest tool in the shed, or whatever the saying is.” She held out her hand and pointedly bent it at the wrist, “The way he looks at you, Lian, are you sure you aren’t his beloved?” Shi Qingxuan never failed to make Xie Lian laugh, even when in the depths of despair, but as she finished her sentence, his laugh tapered off into a wistful sigh.
“Hahaha, there’s no way that’s true…”
He then sat silently, using his arms as a pillow, as Qingxuan gently rested a hand on his head. It’ll all be okay, she thought.