Archive of Our Own ^beta

Of the many extracurriculars padding Lan Zhan’s Common-App college application, “Film Club” is easily his favorite. Calling it a club is frankly a stretch, as the only members are him (President, thank you very much), his best (only) friend Luo Qingyang (Vice President), and a sweet, sweet sophomore named Wen Sizhui (Treasurer) who will be saddled with the task of recruiting new members after Lan Zhan and Luo Qingyang graduate in the spring. Once a week, the three of them turn all the lights off in a classroom, watch a movie that they likely wouldn’t be able to see anywhere else, and maybe talk about it or share a few laughs, if they’re feeling particularly gregarious that day. 

When Lan Zhan founded Film Club in his sophomore year, the initial level of interest was much higher. Unfortunately, his choice of Fritz Lang’s M (1931) was considered “alienating,” and his leadership style was considered “off-putting,” “authoritative,” and “dictatorial,” so the only person who stuck around was Luo Qingyang, who was bound by the contract of friendship they’d signed in the 5th grade to withstand any amount of German Expressionist cinema he could throw at her. Unfortunately, school rules stipulate that all student organizations must have at least three (3) members to be considered legitimate, so every year they have to hoodwink an unsuspecting freshman into serving as the club’s treasurer/third warm body. Wen Sizhui had been a particularly lucky find the previous school year, and — outside of Lan Zhan and Luo Qingyang — is officially the longest-lasting club member.

Wen Sizhui also has unfathomable access to a trove of Soviet films — whenever anyone asks about it, he just mumbles something incoherent about his extended family having a lot of access to these kinds of things. For the final club meeting of the semester, he provided a copy of the seminal Soviet romcom The Irony of Fate (1976) in honor of the upcoming New Year. While a plot that relied on so many coincidences could certainly never be remade in the current day, it served as a lighthearted distraction from the pending college acceptance notifications that would come for him and Luo Qingyang in the coming months.

While Lan Zhan was far from “popular” or even “somewhat decently liked” due to his tenacity, stubborn nature, taciturn tendencies, and penchant for having an incredibly singular vision during group projects, he considered himself to be somewhat of a Renaissance man, and he had faith that the schools he applied to would see those qualities and enter a bidding war over him in terms of scholarship offers. While he applied for an early decision admission to his top choice, that doesn’t mean that it’s not possible to squeeze out more scholarship money.

In addition to being a member of the school’s Honor Roll, he packs his schedule with making his own experimental films in his free time and the film club, playing three instruments, writing music and prose, and serving as a member of the editorial board of the school’s literary magazine, Inquiry and Empathy. He likes to think that he keeps himself properly busy.

For as long as Lan Zhan could remember, storytelling has been a part of him, and he wants to work towards a fulfilling career that will allow him to tell the stories he wants to tell, whether that be as a filmmaker, author, or musician. In an ideal world, he would have been born David Lynch. Since this world wasn’t ideal, he simply would have to make do with double-majoring in Film and English, or “The Future Barista special,” as his Uncle likes to call it.

As he shuts down the projector to reset the classroom used for their club activities, the door to the room flies open. Usually, this sort of thing happens significantly earlier in the Film Club meeting, when some late student or other mixes up the numbers for the classroom they’re supposed to be in for detention or another club activity. This was particularly awkward when a student walked in during a viewing of Yorgos Lanthimos’ Dogtooth (2009), and the club had to assure the shaken student that no, they were not watching the most depressing-looking pornography of all time, and no, they were NOT perverts, but school administration didn’t shut the club down, so the student likely kept what they saw to themselves.

“Mianmian!” The interloper shouts, tossing a small stack of papers into the air. When Wen Sizhui turns the classroom lights back on, Lan Zhan frowns as he recognizes the student.

“Nie Huaisang, please refrain from littering.” Lan Zhan scolds, picking up the papers - fliers for a “NYE Blowout.”

Nie Huaisang is, regrettably, someone that Lan Zhan has been forced to tolerate for the majority of his life, as their older brothers are very close friends. For years Lan Zhan’s older brother, Lan Xichen, pushed and prodded Lan Zhan to try to get him to play nice with Nie Huaisang, but their sensibilities are deeply incompatible. Xichen and Nie Huaisang’s older brother, Nie Mingjue, don’t quite grasp the concept that just because two people have an appreciation for art and culture, that does not mean they show that appreciation in the same way or appreciate the same things, to begin with. Lan Zhan personally found Nie Huaisang’s collection of vintage Playboy Magazines to be quite crude, no matter how much the other boy protested that he “only collects them for the articles.” With their siblings off in college and no classes in common, they’re no longer forced into proximity together. 

“Whatever, Lan Zhan.” Nie Huaisang rolls his eyes and turns back to Luo Qingyang and Wen Sizhui. “Anywho, New Year's Eve rager at my house over break! You all have to be there! My brother’s got a fake ID and my parents are gonna be out of town, so our house is about to be like something out of MTV’s Spring Break coverage.”

“Soooo MTV’s ‘Winter Break,’ then?” Luo Qingyang raises an eyebrow at him. 

“Exactly!” Nie Huaisang snaps a finger and shoots a finger gun at her. “I can always count on you to see the vision, Mianmian. I’d love to stick around and chat, but I’ve got TONS of these to hand out, so I’ll catch y’all at my party!”

With another flourish of flyers in the air, Nie Huaisang flits out of the room. Lan Zhan follows him out, intending to tell him off for continuing to litter and cause a ruckus, when he steps into the hallway.

Wei Ying.

Lan Zhan loses the ability to breathe when he lays his eyes on the cheer team’s co-captain at the end of the hall. Glossy, long dark hair in a high ponytail swinging from side to side with every step he takes, Wei Ying walks down the hallway to the beat of whatever plays in his headphones. If Lan Zhan had to guess, it was probably “Baby One More Time,” or something equally capable of encapsulating Wei Ying’s awe-inspiring beauty.

Nie Huaisang hands Wei Ying one of his infernal flyers, and — god — Wei Ying smiles radiantly at him. Lan Zhan wouldn’t know what to do with himself if Wei Ying ever smiled at him like that. He’d probably think it was a dream.

“Thanks, Huaisang!”

Lan Zhan’s gaze follows along until Wei Ying turns down another hallway, and the moment he’s out of sight, his breath returns to him. The world instantly feels like a sadder place.

“Pick your jaw up off the floor, loverboy.” Luo Qingyang elbows him in the ribs. “You think you’ll ever talk to him one of these days?”

Lan Zhan closes his eyes, exasperated.

“He hardly even knows I exist.”

Wei Ying’s knowledge (or lack thereof) of Lan Zhan’s existence isn’t actually the biggest hurdle towards shooting his shot with him, however.

Wei Ying’s boyfriend is.

For the better part of the last two and a half years, Wei Ying has been — unfortunately — attached at the hip to Wen Xu, the football team’s captain. Wen Xu is far from the sharpest tool in the shed; even if the guy wasn’t terribly territorial of Wei Ying to a concerning degree, Lan Zhan would still despise him. He hadn’t forgiven Wen Xu for making Lan Zhan do all the work for the semester they were forced to be lab partners in chemistry during their sophomore year.

Wei Ying could do infinitely better.

“Well, pining over him from a distance definitely isn’t going to let him know you exist any time soon.” Luo Qingyang says. “I mean, he’ll definitely be at Nie Huaisang’s party. You could get a chance to hit him with some of that classic ‘Lan Zhan charm!’ I bet he’d break up with Wen Xu for you.”

“There’s no world where I attend that function.” Lan Zhan firmly states. 

“Lan Zhan…” Luo Qingyang gives him a stern look. “You seriously can’t spend the last New Year’s Eve of our high school careers cooped up in your basement cave watching obscure movies by yourself or practicing covers of Radiohead songs, again, by yourself.”

“I can, and I will.” Lan Zhan fires back. 

Frankly, it would require something earth-shattering to get Lan Zhan to willingly attend a party, even knowing Wei Ying would be there.

🎇🎇🎇

The winter break flew by in a flash, even though Lan Zhan didn’t get up to too much. New Year’s Eve arrived quicker than he’d even noticed. He spent most of his time in his room working out the kinks to a new song, much to his brother’s consternation. 

Ever since leaving for college, Xichen has been extra fretful regarding Lan Zhan’s social life, or lack thereof. Lan Zhan has one friend (Luo Qingyang) and one friendly acquaintance (Wen Sizhui), and that is perfectly sufficient for him. Thankfully, Lan Xichen left early to return to his college campus for New Year’s celebrations with his college friends, so he isn’t around to give Lan Zhan some well-intentioned but ultimately annoying lecture on “putting himself out there” and “the importance of building a strong support network and making memories.”

Lan Zhan feels perfectly supported, thank you very much.

A knock at his bedroom door disturbs his songwriting process; he quickly stows his notebook full of lyrics under his pillow.

“Come in.” He calls out.

His uncle sticks his head through the bedroom door.

“A-Zhan,” he says. “You have a visitor. Luo Qingyang is here to see you.”

“Ah.” Lan Zhan rises from his spot on his bed and heads down the stairs with his Uncle. 

Luo Qingyang stands in the foyer, dressed quite nicely. Lan Zhan clearly recognizes what she’s doing — her last-ditch effort to peer-pressure him into attending Nie Huaisang’s New Year’s Eve “rager” will not succeed, if he has anything to do with it.

“We need to talk.” She sternly says, grabbing him by the arm and yanking him towards his room, leaving his uncle in the dust.

“I’m not going to that party!” Lan Zhan protests. “I have absolutely no desire to spend the evening anywhere but here.”

“What if I tell you that Wei Ying is single?” Luo Qingyang crosses her arms and stares Lan Zhan down.

“What?!” Lan Zhan gasps. “Where on earth did you hear that?!”

“Well, I went to catch up over coffee with Jin Zixuan, who heard this from Jiang Yanli — they’re dating now, by the way!” Luo Qingyang plops down on Lan Zhan’s bed. If this came from Jiang Yanli, this intel was legitimate. “But anywho, Wei Ying went over to Jiang Yanli’s house in tears because he — and I quote! — ‘got dumped’ by Wen Xu for ‘not putting out for him,’ which, ew, but also… This is your chance!”

Gears start turning in Lan Zhan’s head as conflicted feelings sweep over him. On the one hand, he’s elated that Wei Ying will no longer be held down by that neanderthal, Wen Xu, but on the other, knowing that someone made Wei Ying cry makes him terribly angry. Additionally, there’s an undercurrent of guilt for his initial delight over Wei Ying’s newly single status.

“I don’t know…” Lan Zhan trails off. “I don’t know where to start. And, what if it’s just a rebound for Wei Ying? If the breakup is so fresh?”

Luo Qingyang sighs dramatically and flops onto her back, legs dangling over the edge of the bed.

“Don’t be an idiot, Lan Zhan!” She scolds. “This intel is currently on the ultra down-low; nobody knows about it. The moment that people do, don’t you think someone else’ll snatch Wei Ying up before you get the chance?”

“I don’t…” Lan Zhan trails off, whatever excuse he wants to pull out of thin air escaping him. Luo Qingyang quickly reaches under his pillow and, before he can stop her, pulls out his lyric booklet and throws it at him.

“I know for a fact that ninety-five percent of those lyrics in there are about him!” She yells as his ears redden in embarrassment. “Are you seriously going to miss an opportunity to take your feelings off the page for a change and let him slip through your fingers?!”

Lan Zhan squeezes his eyes shut. He knows she’s right. As daunting as the prospect is, if he doesn’t try to confess his feelings to Wei Ying tonight, he may never get the chance again. He is, without a doubt, the most desirable person in their school, and has been from the moment he transferred in halfway through their sophomore year. There is almost definitely a long line of boys and girls who would do almost anything to have a chance to date Wei Ying; if Lan Zhan lets this chance pass him by, he may never get a shot with Wei Ying again.

He has to go to that party, because he will regret it for the rest of his life if Wei Ying winds up with some other person because he stubbornly chose to spend his evening writing yet another song about the boy.

“You don’t have to be alone in this.” Luo Qingyang gives him a sympathetic look. She holds out a pinky towards him. “I’ll ask Wen Qing out tonight if you go for Wei Ying?”

Lan Zhan gulps, then returns her pinky-promise. She’s serious about this if she’s willing to confront her own long-time crush and open up about her feelings. 

“We both owe it to ourselves not to regret anything in our senior years, don’t you think?” Luo Qingyang quirks up an eyebrow. “Now, let’s get an outfit picked out for you. We’ve got babes to sweep off their feet!”

🎇🎇🎇

They arrive at the Nie’s house a little after 9pm — on a typical night, Lan Zhan would be either getting ready to fall asleep, reading a book, or, if he was feeling particularly restless, popping in a movie to watch. Unfortunately, tonight he would be putting himself through the most nerve-wracking experience fathomable by exposing his soft, vulnerable underbelly to someone he doubts knows of his existence.

The comfort and safety of home calls him, but Luo Qingyang is right — Wei Ying waits for no man.

The party looks like something out of a stereotypical teen movie with red Solo cups everywhere, music too loud, a handful of people in various stages of undress and/or with tongues down each other’s throats, property damage in the making, and a smattering of too-drunk teens puking in bushes, houseplants, et cetera. There are still three hours until midnight; how on earth can any of them have the stamina to keep partying so hard?!

The Nie’s house — really, “mansion” is a better word for it — is a sprawling estate built into the side of a steep hill with three floors, a massive finished basement, and a large wooden back porch that’s raised up on thick wooden beams. Having been before a few times with Xichen, he knows Mrs. Nie is particularly fond of hosting, and that the Nie family designed the house with entertaining in mind. Nevertheless, Lan Zhan does not think that this kind of “entertaining” was what the Nies had in mind.

Luo Qingyang and Lan Zhan do a lap together around the house, keeping an eye out for their respective objects of desire. While Lan Zhan does not find Wei Ying yet, Luo Qingyang freezes in place when she spies Wen Qing in the Nie’s less-populated “library” room, perusing the spines of their collection.

Wen Qing, while objectively beautiful, has always struck Lan Zhan as standoffish — not that he’s one to talk about that. Luo Qingyang, through the virtue of sharing several classes with her, has sung her praises for years, remarking on her quick wit, intelligence, and caring streak. Wen Qing is also one of the only people in the entire school willing and able to take Wen Xu down a peg, and Lan Zhan inherently respects her even more for that.

Luo Qingyang takes a deep breath.

“Wish me luck!” She straightens her posture and, holding her head high, strides confidently into the room and engages Wen Qing in conversation. Lan Zhan cannot hear them over the din of the party, but he sees Wen Qing’s eyebrows raise imperceptibly, and before he knows it, Wen Qing has Luo Qingyang pressed against the wall in a kiss.

Good for her!

Lan Zhan waits for the two to disengage, but as he stands there, he soon realizes that he’s lost his social crutch for the evening and is now on a solo mission. With a sigh, he walks off, continuing to wander the party in search of Wei Ying. He can’t be too mad at Luo Qingyang for ditching him; she kept up her end of their deal, after all.

After pacing around the party for another fifteen minutes without laying eyes on Wei Ying, Lan Zhan sidles up against a banister, looking down on the house’s foyer, and settles in for some people-watching. Worst-case scenario, this whole ordeal could give him inspiration for a future film, or perhaps a short story. 

After what feels like an eternity, the moment he waited oh-so-patiently for arrives. When Wei Ying finally walks over the threshold looking like Rachel Leigh Cook coming down the stairs post-makeover in She’s All That (1999), it feels like the entire world stops to stare at him. Lan Zhan is helpless against the boy’s pull.

Every time Lan Zhan sees Wei Ying, he swears the other boy gets more and more beautiful, but tonight he’s seeing Wei Ying like he’s never seen him before. His long hair falls down to his waistline in loose waves, held back in part by a silky ruby-red ribbon. His legs seem to go on for miles in his high-waisted jeans, his delicate waist highlighted by a thick belt. His skintight black mock turtleneck highlights his elegant neck, and Lan Zhan needs to grip onto the bannister to keep himself from digging his fingernails into his palms; he’s beyond overcome. It’s such a simple outfit, but Wei Ying looks otherworldly in it. 

Their school uniform is — as a rule — universally unflattering. Wei Ying regularly makes his uniform look like the latest runway fashion, so Lan Zhan shouldn’t be so surprised that he looks so incredible in something actually stylish.

There’s only one thing off about Wei Ying’s appearance: his eyes lack their usual joy. Wei Ying is smiling, but Lan Zhan knows Wei Ying’s smile, and the plasticky one he’s sharing with everyone around him tonight doesn’t reach his eyes. 

Lan Zhan remembers the first time he saw Wei Ying smile. 

The two of them were in the same Honors English class, and he’d beamed for the entire class period on his first day; Wei Ying had just transferred to the school in the middle of the year after his parents moved to the area. Lan Zhan’s first impression of Wei Ying was that he was pretty and friendly, yes, but not much more than that.

In his first weeks at their school, Wei Ying flitted around from group to group like a bee buzzing from flower to flower, gathering friends up like pollen, cracking jokes and getting up to silly shenanigans in every class they shared. Lan Zhan had little patience for the boy’s antics and did his best to ignore the funny way his chest felt whenever he was around. 

One day, that all changed during a class discussion on the Romantic movement. Wei Ying was generally not the most active participant in class, despite the fact that he was rarely ever quiet in class. That day, he was particularly invested in the discussion, and had launched into a back-and-forth with the teacher about the merits of including Kahlil Gibran among the movement, despite the fact that he was not a contemporary to it.

“Tell me that ‘On Love’ doesn’t meet the parameters of the movement!” Wei Ying stood up and planted his palms on the desk in his heated debate. “Do the words ‘For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning. Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun, So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth,’ not express finding meaning in the poet’s interior life and form parallels to nature?! That’s freaking Romanticism, and to exclude it from that canon because it was published a century too late and not written by a white guy is reductive and short-sighted!”

“Mr. Wei, sit down!” The instructor hissed at him, clearly displeased with having his lecture hijacked by a fifteen-year-old with an axe to grind with his lesson plan that day. 

Lan Zhan had been entranced by the entire exchange, having never seen such fire come from any of his classmates before. The moment Wei Ying began his recitation, he was a goner.

Wei Ying held the teacher’s gaze as they stared one another down, until one of Wei Ying’s friends, Jiang Wanyin, butted in.

“Just sit down man!” The other boy huffed. “It’s not that deep! Sometimes the curtains are just fucking blue or whatever!”

As the teacher pivoted to scolding Jiang Wanyin for his harsh language, Lan Zhan saw the spark in Wei Ying’s eyes die in front of him as the boy returned to his seat.

“I’m sorry.” He said to the teacher, now sporting a smile that didn’t seem quite right on his face, not that anybody else seemed to notice or care. “I’m being silly…”

After that day, Wei Ying rarely participated in class discussions, but it was too late. Lan Zhan saw a glimpse behind the curtain, and he was intrigued. He started keeping an eye out for Wei Ying, looking for bits and pieces of what he saw in that classroom, and boy did he find it. 

Wei Ying was kind to everyone, making an effort to treat everyone he encountered with geniality and respect. He was often selfless, putting others' needs before his own. Beyond that, he was empathetic and sensitive; Lan Zhan frequently saw him giving other students a shoulder to cry on or a listening ear, no matter how close they were to the boy. 

Despite his kindness and intelligence, Wei Ying was holding himself back and Lan Zhan couldn’t understand why. Whenever he was in class with one of his “friends” like Jiang Wanyin, he tempered his answers, used simpler vocabulary, and goofed off more. It made no sense to Lan Zhan.

The biggest surprise of all, however, was when he discovered Wei Ying’s writing.

Inquiry and Empathy had a box for physical submissions to the magazine; it was locked, and only members of the editorial board had access to the keys. Oftentimes, other students pulled pranks by stuffing the box with crude drawings of penises and the like, but they received interesting pieces of both physical artwork and handwritten pieces to publish, so it was worth the practical jokes. 

In the middle of his 9th-period biology class, Lan Zhan took a rare mid-class bathroom break. When he was about to leave, he spotted Wei Ying clandestinely slipping a thick stack of papers into the submission box before speedily walking away, unseen. Lan Zhan deliberated for a moment before deciding that he could get away with grabbing the keys to the box to see what Wei Ying had submitted before returning to class — he had a hall pass, after all! He booked it to the locker reserved for Inquiry and Empathy’s supplies and fished out the keys, returning to the box as quickly as he could without catching any attention.

He unlocked the box, and while he did find a few more penis sketches (some more detailed than others), he found a trove of handwritten poems clipped together, submitted anonymously. A part of him twinged with guilt — Wei Ying clearly had gone to lengths to ensure that nobody knew he wrote these poems, but who on earth would Lan Zhan tell? It wasn’t like Luo Qingyang would care one way or another what Wei Ying did with his spare time. Still, he couldn’t resist the urge to page through and see what he could glean from the other boy’s words.

And wow. Wei Ying had a dark streak unlike anything Lan Zhan could have ever imagined. In his packet, he’d submitted a slew of poems covering a variety of themes — loneliness, loss, grief, desire — featuring haunting imagery on par with Edgar Allen Poe and Charles Baudelaire, gothic flair, and a taste for the savage and macabre. Lan Zhan knew that Wei Ying contained depths untold, but he’d never imagined this.

He quickly stowed the poems back in the box, locked it up, then returned to class. 

Wei Ying kept submitting anonymous poems, and Lan Zhan kept falling harder for him. Wei Ying was beautiful inside and out, and when he started dating Wen Xu, Lan Zhan initially couldn’t fathom how on earth such a boorish person with a mean streak a mile wide could ever win Wei Ying over. The epiphany eventually hit him like a truck:

Wei Ying, even when surrounded by so many people, felt deeply, acutely, alone, and was willing to put up with anything so long as it lessened that sensation.

🎇🎇🎇

Rousing up his courage now that his objective is in sight, Lan Zhan makes his way down the stairs, pushing his way past countless others. He’s not sure where in the house Wei Ying disappeared to, but he’s determined to find him. 

As he’s turning into the living room, a large, meaty hand clamps down on his shoulder.

“Lan Zhan!” Lan Zhan knows that voice anywhere, and a piece of him dies inside knowing that soon, his older brother will absolutely hear that he attended an event described on the invitation as a “big kegger bash.”

“Nie Mingjue.” Lan Zhan stiffly turns around and greets his brother’s oldest, dearest friend, who inexplicably has nothing better to do tonight than get drunk with high schoolers.

“How the hell are you, kid?” Nie Mingjue claps his hand down on his shoulder again, this time harder. By some miracle, Lan Zhan doesn’t buckle under the force. “God, I never could have imagined I’d see you at something like this!”

“I am well.” Lan Zhan replies. He hates this kind of small talk, and he hates it even more when the love of his life is wandering this party alone and surrounded by vultures who’d love nothing more than to be the boy’s rebound hook-up. Out of filial duty to his brother and NOTHING more, Lan Zhan entertains this farce he’s been dragged into.

“Cool, cool. How’s Xichen doing?” Nie Mingjue sways a little to the side. He’s always been a loud, boisterous young man (and the cause of many a headache for Lan Zhan while growing up), but this is something else on its own. From the smell of alcohol on his breath and the slightly glazed-over look in his eyes, it’s clear: Nie Mingjue is drunk, or at least well on his way to being there. 

“Dude, I’d kill to drink with Xichen, he tells me the craziest stories about what he gets up to at school!” He continues to prattle on, at an increasingly high volume. He wraps an arm around Lan Zhan and puts him in a headlock, an indignity Lan Zhan hasn’t been made to suffer since he was twelve. “But hey, if I can’t drink with one Lan, maybe I can drink with another? Wanna do a shot with me?”

“I do not drink.” Lan Zhan firmly declines him. 

“Fair enough.” Nie Mingjue says, releasing a small burp at the end of his sentence, like its own special piece of punctuation. “What about a round of beer pong?”

“I just said that I do not drink.” Lan Zhan frowns. 

“You don’t have to drink to play beer pong!” Nie Mingjue whines. “You can drink water instead of beer, plus, this is my house, so if anybody tries to bitch about it, I’ll kick them the hell out! In fact, I’ll bet you’ll make us win with your sobriety. I’m claiming your hand-eye coordination for just one round of pong, no ifs, ands, or buts about it, kid.”

Lan Zhan sighs, accepting that his task has been delayed, and lets Nie Mingjue guide him over to the party’s incredibly sticky beer pong setup in the dining room.

Seeing as he has no other option to escape this encounter and return to his task of tracking down Wei Ying, Lan Zhan locks in and learns the rules of the game; he needs to ensure a quick, decisive victory. 

In his first round, Lan Zhan does fine, only landing the ball in one cup. 

Nie Mingjue, however, does abysmally.

His first toss lands in a houseplant (thankfully not one that anybody has vomited into); the second bounces pitifully on the table before slowing to a stop and rolling off its surface. 

Were it not for the fact that he doesn’t want to give Xichen something to give him a “concerned” lecture about, Lan Zhan would have just walked away. Nie Mingjue is certainly drunk enough that Lan Zhan could probably evade him if he moves fast enough, or perhaps runs in a circle around him until he gets dizzy and falls over.

As the game progresses, Nie Mingjue continues drinking, and Lan Zhan keeps holding their “team” on his back in his determination to end. The damn. GAME. Eventually, the other “team” appears to have it in the bag, with only one cup to knock out. Unfortunately, Lan Zhan learns that the game can only end once both teammates land the ball in the final cup, and every round, at least one of them keeps missing. It’s torturous.

Nie Mingjue, having grown bored of their losing round of beer pong, peers around the party aimlessly. Eventually, he spies something that catches his eye and makes him stand up a little straighter.

“HEY!” Nie Mingjue hollers across the room to his target. “HEY! WEI YING!”

Lan Zhan’s gaze snaps over to Wei Ying; he looks like an angel, even with a Solo cup in his hands. His heart starts beating faster, and it feels like his soul is about to leave his body. 

“Hey, Da-ge!” Wei Ying shoots a friendly wave over in their table’s direction. If Lan Zhan squints a little, he can pretend the attention is just for him.

“WEI YING!” Nie Mingjue comes across as slap-happy, slurring his words. “You. Me. Seven minutes in heaven. Let’s go!”

Wei Ying gently laughs. “I’m sorry, Da-ge… I don’t really see you like that.”

The people surrounding them grow quiet, sensing there’s hot new gossip afoot.

“Damn, Wei Ying…” Nie Mingjue isn’t actually disappointed, his tone lightly teasing. “I thought after Wen Xu was out of the picture, one of us would actually have a chance…”

“Haha…” Wei Ying’s eyes pinch slightly as he winces. “Da-ge, dating you would be like dating a cousin…”

“A sexy cousin?” Nie Mingjue wiggles his eyebrows. “C’mon, how about a coffee date while I’m still in town?”

“Bye, Da-ge.” Wei Ying simply rolls his eyes and walks away, the eyes of everyone in the party trailing after him.

“Eh, you can’t blame a guy for trying.” Nie Mingjue shrugs and swigs down more of his beer. 

Lan Zhan tries to make a break for it to 1.) escape the beer pong game from Hell and 2.) not lose Wei Ying, but the news of Wei Ying’s new relationship status is travelling fast, and the clumps of partiers swarming together create new obstacles for him to maneuver around. People in every direction are whispering about the fact that “Wei Ying is back on the market,” who they think has a shot with him, if he will get back together with Wen Xu, and so on; it makes Lan Zhan feel sick to his stomach.

These people talk about Wei Ying like he’s an animal in a zoo, or some celebrity they have a parasocial relationship with and not like a person. 

🎇🎇🎇

Since Nie Mingjue’s initial attempt, nearly a dozen people have approached Wei Ying to either confess their feelings, or simply to make a disgusting pass at him in an incredibly vulgar way. One boy literally came up to him saying “roses are red, violets are blue, I’m not good at poetry, but I’d be good at fucking you,” and the fact that Wei Ying didn’t deck the guy should put him in the running for a Nobel Peace Prize. Word has gotten out to the point that people who either weren’t invited or hadn’t intended on coming show up in droves — bodies are packed in with hardly any room to move, and it’s horrendously overstimulating. Were it not for the fact that Lan Zhan knows that Wei Ying is worth the effort, he probably would have fled for home by now.

To make matters worse, Wen Xu, of all people, has arrived and is currently trying to give Wei Ying an earful in some perplexing attempt to win him back via negging.

“A-Ying, baby, you don’t have to run off on me like this!” Wen Xu pushes past bodies, attempting to follow Wei Ying deeper into the fray.

“You dumped me, remember?” Wei Ying spins around on his heels, an irate look on his face. “Those things are kinda final, don’t you think?! And don’t call me ‘baby,’ you lost ‘baby’ privileges when you fucking dumped me, you jerk!”

The crowd thins out slightly around the pair, giving them space. Everyone is watching with bated breath, and Lan Zhan’s heart is beating like mad from the suspense.

“A-Ying, you’re being unreasonable.” Wen Xu frowns. “Just… come outside with me, we don’t need to have this talk in front of all these people.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you! You brought this conversation to me when you crashed this party!” Wei Ying snaps back. “And don’t you dare call me ‘A-Ying.’ I’m not yours, and I’m not going to be yours.”

Nobody in the history of their school has ever seen Wei Ying so upset; “lashing out” has always seemed antithetical to his existence. For him to do it so publicly… It’s bound to cause a scandal. Lan Zhan is disappointed but not surprised by the sheer number of partygoers intruding on the former couple’s argument, and he feels a twinge of pity for Wei Ying. 

“Oh my god, you’re such a bitch…” Wen Xu groans loudly. Lan Zhan has no idea what logical pathway led the jock to believe that calling someone he ostensibly cares about/wants to like him perjorative words is a successful strategy, but Wei Ying’s face is clearly unimpressed. “I should’ve known you’d be frigid about this… You’re such a frigid little bitch, walking around like you own whatever room you step into, like you’re god’s gift to all of us, but I know better.”

Wen Xu marches up to Wei Ying and inserts himself into his personal space, poking a finger into the middle of his chest.

“You’re nothing.” He hisses. Wei Ying keeps slapping his finger away, but Wen Xu keeps poking and prodding into his chest, all while backing Wei Ying up against the back of a couch, trapping him. “You’ve always been nothing, and you will always be nothing. I shouldn’t have wasted all this time trying to fuck you.”

Wei Ying stands tall in the face of Wen Xu’s verbal onslaught, and Lan Zhan can’t help but stare in awe at the boy. 

“I’m sorry that not letting you fuck me was so psychologically devastating, Wen Xu.” Wei Ying glares defiantly up at the boy who’s doing everything in his power to try to intimidate him. “But you’re wrong. I’m not ‘nothing,’ you are. You’re one of the most vapid, self-absorbed people on the continent — second only to your dipshit brother, of course — and I should have never wasted my time trying to get validation from you. I don’t need you, and I never needed you, so get the fuck away from me and don’t even think about talking to me again.”

“You’re a virgin who can’t drive!” Wen Xu shouts. “Good luck finding anybody who’d put up with you!”

(Just looking around the room, Lan Zhan can tell that there are actually quite a lot of people willing to “put up” with Wei Ying.)

“And you’re a wannabe ‘tough guy’ who will only get anywhere in life by using your daddy’s money!” Wei Ying yells back. “So I’m a virgin who can’t drive?! Who gives a shit?!”

Wei Ying grabs Wen Xu’s wrist and twists it into an angle, making the larger boy drop to his knees. It’s the most stunning thing Lan Zhan has ever seen. 

“Now get the fuck out of my friend’s party.”

Having completely lost his face, Wen Xu yanks his arm out of Wei Ying’s hold and scrambles away. Hopefully forever, Lan Zhan thinks uncharitably. 

As life returns to the party, so does a sea of whispers. Every piece of gossip and speculation falls along the same lines:

“Do you think it’s true that Wei Ying is a virgin?”

“Is that whole ‘not putting out’ thing just for Wen Xu or do you think he’d let someone else fuck him?”

“Do you think Wei Ying would let me pop his cherry?”

“Who do you think will actually manage to get Wei Ying to put out?”

It sends an unpleasant shiver down Lan Zhan’s spine; none of these slimy people are worth Wei Ying’s time, and none of them actually give a damn about who Wei Ying is as a person. They just want him for his body, or for the prestige of having held something that everyone in the school would envy, or simply so that nobody else could have him. They don’t see him as a human being, and that thought makes Lan Zhan sick.

🎇🎇🎇

As Lan Zhan could have guessed, Wei Ying’s confrontation with Wen Xu threw a massive wrench in his “confess his feelings to Wei Ying” plan. Word spread like wildfire around the party, and droves of young men and women swarmed Wei Ying, hitting him with pickup lines, confessions, and, frankly, sexual harassment. It’s physically impossible to pull the boy aside for a private conversation! Lan Zhan already knew, coming into the evening, that he would basically be doing the emotional equivalent of storming the beaches of Normandy on D-Day. Still, he anticipated being mowed down by Wei Ying himself, not by the slew of competition, before he could even step off the boat.

Beyond the sheer inundation of suitors to fight off, Lan Zhan would have to make a confession that would indubitably be cheapened by the actions of all his schoolmates who were shooting their shot first. Wei Ying doesn’t deserve a cheap confession; he deserves something honest, beautiful, and true. Knowing that anything he could possibly say to the boy would be tainted by the words and actions of all Wei Ying’s hopeful suitors is spinning Lan Zhan into despair.

If Lan Zhan deigned to drink, now would be the perfect time to start. 

He loves himself a bit too much for that, though, and instead settles for slumping in a lounge chair beside the Nie’s less-populated pool, miserable in the cold, and staring into the water, wishing it could swallow him whole. He isn’t sure if he regrets coming out tonight. While witnessing the relentless confessions to Wei Ying is tearing him up inside and out, he still got to see Wei Ying looking radiant, even if only for a moment.

At least Mianmian finally got her girl.

His attention gets sidetracked by a group of boys horsing around close to the edge of the pool. While the winter had been unseasonably warm, with hardly a bit of snow on the ground, it’s still cold outside. One of them could get hurt or seriously sick if they were to fall in.

“Be careful!” Lan Zhan calls out sternly, rising from his seat. “One of you could fall in.”

“Oh, piss off, dude!” One of them — Lan Zhan now realizes he’s encountered a swarm of lesser Jin cousins — shouts back. Great.

Jin Zixuan wasn’t so bad; he had been a Senior when Lan Zhan was a freshman tasked with “mentoring” Lan Zhan through the school’s Honors program, and had inspired him to form Film Club in the first place when he’d struggled to find a place for himself in the school’s social strata. Jin Zixuan’s cousins, however, thought they were collectively hot shit even though they’d never amounted to much of anything ever. The worst of the bunch was Jin Zixun, a loud-mouthed wrestling team member with a 0.5 GPA.

Lan Zhan had been, regrettably, roped into “tutoring” the nincompoop in English during their sophomore year, as Jin Zixun’s academic probation threatened the school’s chances of a wrestling state championship. He was one of an assortment of the school’s best and brightest who’d been drafted into keeping Jin Zixun from flunking, and the boy made all their lives hell. Without Jin Zixuan around to tell him he’s being an ass, Jin Zixun became a tyrant who threatened the group into completing his assignments for him. Lan Zhan refused to bend the knee, ultimately preventing the jerk from competing in his tournament, and Jin Zixun has made it his mission to be an ass to him at every given opportunity since. Luckily, their paths don’t cross that often due to Lan Zhan’s schedule full of higher-level classes.

Jin Zixun is apparently the ringleader of whatever shenanigans the gaggle of Jins are getting up to poolside, and doesn’t that just make Lan Zhan’s night even better?!

“Well, well, well…” Jin Zixun drawls. “If it isn’t Lan Zhan? Don’t you have a book you should be reading right now?”

“Don’t you have a remedial Spanish class assignment you should be doing right now?” Lan Zhan snaps back. “Or has CTE finally come for you at long last?”

“What’s CTE?” One of the Jin cousins whispers to Jin Zixun. 

“Chronic Twit Encephalopathy.” Lan Zhan drily responds. The cousin nods along, as though they understand, not realizing that Lan Zhan is joking. Jin Zixun smacks him upside the head, which certainly doesn’t help them avoid the familial CTE allegations.

“God, you’re such a fucking asshole…” Jin Zixun grumbles. “Dicking around at a party by yourself like some loser, staring out over the water like you’re that fucker from The Great Gabby—”

“—The Great Gatsby.” Lan Zhan interrupts. He can’t help it; the book is one of the things every high schooler in America is subjected to, and Jin Zixun’s failure to even name the title correctly is further evidence that his “wrestling scholarship” to Harvard is the result of his family donating enough money to build a new library wing. Lan Zhan generally can’t help but correct people when they’re wrong; it’s his biggest vice.

“Shut the fuck up!” Jin Zixun hollers, letting loose a spray of spittle that regrettably hits one of his cousins.  “God, this is why nobody fucking likes you, you’re such a fucking square!”

Two of the cousins pivot to stand on either side of Lan Zhan, boxing him in, and his stomach starts to sink. Lan Zhan is a strong guy; he takes care of his body, and were he alone, he’s confident he could take on any of the Jins if they tried to come at him, Jin Zixun’s wrestling trophies be damned.

A three-on-one fight, however? He wasn’t as optimistic about his chances of surviving the party without getting shoved into the pool. 

He really didn’t need public humiliation added onto his pile of miseries collected over the course of the evening.

On the bright side, if he gets tossed into the pool, at least his car isn’t parked that far away.

“I’ll tell you what, Lan Zhan.” Jin Zixun has a unique way of saying Lan Zhan’s name like it’s an insult, and Lan Zhan cannot wait until graduation so that this halfwit will never need to say his name ever again. The oaf pulls out a lone shot glass and a lighter from the pocket of his letterman jacket. “Hey, Jin Chan, pass the 151…”

The Jin cousin to Lan Zhan’s left — Jin Chan — reaches into the inside of his bottle and pulls out a bottle of rum that was probably stolen from one of their parents’ liquor cabinets. The peeling label on the bottle makes it look cheap, but knowing the Jins, it probably isn’t.

Jin Zixun snatches the bottle out of Jin Chan’s hand, cracks it open, and starts pouring some of the rum into the glass.

“If you do just one shot…” Jin Zixun holds the glass right in front of Lan Zhan’s face. His cousins close in on Lan Zhan, pressing into his shoulders. “We won’t push your ass in the pool.”

“No, thank you.” Lan Zhan gulps. His brother let him try one (1) sip of beer over the holiday to “help him build his tolerance” before going off to college. Little did Xichen know, there was no tolerance to build in the first place. After that lone sip, he was down for the count and woke up the next morning feeling like Guy Pearce in Memento (2000).

“Hmm, you sure, buddy?” Jin Zixun flicks his lighter alive before his eyes and holds it to the rum, setting it alight. The flames dancing in the glass highlight the impish gleam in his eyes — were it not for that, Lan Zhan would be certain the boy didn’t have a soul.

“I’m fine, thanks.” Lan Zhan manages to keep his voice from shaking. There isn’t a world where he gets out of this situation unscathed; either he’s getting tossed into the pool, drunk off his ass, or getting his hair singed off (or worse) if Jin Zixun tosses the shot in his face or pours it on top of his head. 

“You think you’re so much better than me just because you know what the hell The Grapes of Math is about—”

“—The Grapes of Wrath.”

Lan Zhan really needs to work on curbing that habit.

“YOU MOTHERFUCKER!” Jin Zixun spits out. Unfortunately, Lan Zhan and the two cousins get caught in his splash zone, and the three wince collectively. “Nobody fucking cares what the book’s called, it’s boring as shit anyways!”

Jin Zixun presses the flaming shot glass towards Lan Zhan’s face, and he flinches away.

“Drink up!” Jin Zixun jeers. “Don’t be such a pussy, dude…”

Lan Zhan wants nothing more in the world than to disappear, or maybe to spontaneously combust if it meant he could take out the pack of jackass Jins in the process. Instead, he squeezes his eyes shut and braces himself for whatever atrocious fate awaits him at their hands.

“HEY!”

Lan Zhan’s eyes fly open when a beautiful voice cuts through the fray.

Wei Ying is storming towards them; hair flying from his face and forming a halo around him, like some sort of avenging angel. The Jins freeze, and Lan Zhan is right there with them. Wei Ying looks furious.

“What the FUCK are you doing, Jin Xizun?!” He gets right up in Jin Zixun’s face, completely unafraid of the asshole. 

“Not my name!” Jin Zixun snaps back. “And this isn’t your fucking business! Lan Yawn over here thinks he can just come to a party and not drink, like he’s better than us or something, so we’re fixing it!”

Wei Ying glares at Jin Zixun.

“God, you’re such a dick.” He snatches the shot glass from Jin Zixun’s hand and tosses it back effortlessly, flames and all. He looks like an action movie star. Lan Zhan is too awestruck to name anyone specific. Just as abruptly as he took the shot, Wei Ying throws the shot glass into the Nie’s pool. Lan Zhan is putting all of his brainpower into keeping his jaw from falling to the ground. 

Fuck, Wei Ying is incredible.

“So!” Wei Ying claps his hands together. “Seeing as that’s all done, why don’t you leave Lan Zhan the fuck alone?”

The cousins, as if under a thrall, release Lan Zhan’s arms and step away from him, finally giving him space to breathe. 

“Are you gonna entertain me?” Jin Zixun leers at Wei Ying, looking him up and down with lasciviousness in his eyes. Lan Zhan’s fist clenches from sheer disgust; were it not for the fact that he and Wei Ying are outnumbered by the Jins and that he doesn’t want to put Wei Ying in a dangerous situation, he’d sock Jin Zixun right in his stupid nose. “I’ve heard you’re back on the market. Maybe a real man can show you how it’s done?”

“Ew! As if…” Wei Ying glowers at Jin Zixun. 

“You’d look a lot better on your knees.” Jin Zixun’s smarmy smile is making Lan Zhan nauseous. “I can give your mouth something better to do than talk shit about your ex all night.” 

“If my options were between you and a cactus, I’d fuck myself on the cactus.” Wei Ying glares at Jin Zixun. “Now leave him alone and go do something productive for a change, like taking a long walk off a short pier or castrating yourself.”

“God, you’re such a bitch…” Jin Zixun grumbles. “As if I’d wanna fuck you anyways…”

“YOU!—” Wei Ying shouts, then quickly regains his composure. “This conversation isn’t worth it. Good-fucking-bye.”

Wei Ying came in like a hurricane, and he leaves like a hurricane, sweeping away from the scene, leaving a sea of awe-struck partiers in his wake. Some were rendered dumb because they’ve never seen the boy so scary, others because — to be frank — Wei Ying is hot when he’s scary. 

“Do you think if I asked, he’d step on me?” Jin Chan broke the silence.

Lan Zhan grabs the bottle of rum from the boy, lobs it into the pool, and makes his escape, following in Wei Ying’s direction.

🎇🎇🎇

Back in the house, Lan Zhan searches high and low. He unfortunately lost Wei Ying in the bottleneck of bodies going from the deck back inside the house.

Over the past few years, Lan Zhan hasn’t had the opportunity to talk to Wei Ying one-on-one. His hopes were dwindling of it ever happening, up until Wei Ying came to his rescue; he now feels a renewed sense of optimism.

On the one hand, he knows that Wei Ying would do the same for anybody. Wei Ying — despite his questionable taste in men — never tolerated bullies. It was one of the many reasons everyone in school adored him. Lan Zhan isn’t any more special to Wei Ying than any other dork he’d rescued from the likes of Wen Chao’s lunch-money racket, but the fact that Wei Ying cares enough about him on a base human level to stand up for him in the face of hazing from the Jins means the world. Not everyone at their school is as brave.

All he wants now is to simply say thank you.

Of course, in order to thank Wei Ying, Lan Zhan needs to find him first. After hearing the filth that Jin Zixun had the audacity to say to Wei Ying’s face, he can’t imagine what other troglodyte classmates of theirs have said to Wei Ying in attempts at “seduction.” He cannot blame Wei Ying for seeking a quiet place to hide, or for simply trying to disappear for a little while.

Of course, Wei Ying is far too, well, Wei Ying to ever truly be invisible. Lan Zhan can still give him the space he craves, though.

With a sigh, Lan Zhan changes course and makes his way into the kitchen in search of water. Despite the chill in the air outside, the Nie’s house feels like a sauna from the sheer number of bodies — he’s parched.

While there, he runs into Luo Qingyang for the first time since she confessed to Wen Qing. The two look incredibly cozy, with Luo Qingyang perched on the countertop and Wen Qing holding her around the waist as they pass a red Solo cup full of who-knows-what back and forth, giggling all the while. Lan Zhan is happy for her, though he’s a little jealous that she’s actually been able to enjoy herself tonight while he’s endured psychological torment and the epic highs and lows of first love.

Luo Qingyang notices Lan Zhan across the room and waves him over, a huge smile on her face. Wen Qing watches him warily — there’s no need, it’s not like he’s going to try to steal Luo Qingyang from her (not that anybody could).

“So, how’s your mission?” Luo Qingyang asks. Before Lan Zhan can even answer, she sees something in his face that tells her all she needs to know. “Oof… that bad, huh?”

“Don’t tell me you’re also trying to get into Wei Ying’s pants tonight…” Wen Qing narrows her eyes at Lan Zhan. While that’s not necessarily the “goal” of the evening, he can’t deny that he hasn’t thought about it, or wondered about what it would be like to make love to Wei Ying, or had the particularly charged dream about the boy. He can feel his ears flushing darker and darker pink under her scrutiny and flounders.

“I… I—” Lan Zhan attempts to form a sentence in his defense and fails.

“That’s what I thought.” Wen Qing rolls her eyes. “Everybody thinks that because he’s a pretty cheerleader, that he’s some shallow fuck-toy who’ll gladly take whatever shit they’ll give him. Just use him as they please, and then forget about him once they’ve gotten their rocks off.”

Lan Zhan is horrified at the thought. “I don’t—”

“Spare me.” Wen Qing grumbles. “There’s more to Wei Ying than anybody thinks, and there’s nobody in the world who’s even close to being worthy of him.”

“Oh, stop it!” Luo Qingyang scolds Wen Qing. “He knows just how special Wei Ying is, okay?! Lan Zhan’s been carrying a torch for Wei Ying for ages; his feelings aren’t shallow. Believe me, I’ve borne witness to it since sophomore year.”

Wen Qing still looks at Lan Zhan suspiciously.

“Ignore her shame-mongering, bud. She’s very protective of Wei Ying since he’s defended her little brother from assholes who-knows-how-many times.” Luo Qingyang says to him. She turns back to Wen Qing and makes the other girl look her in the eyes. “I get why you want to defend Wei Ying’s honor, but lay off the shovel talk, okay? Lan Zhan’s my best friend, and I want you guys to get along with each other.”

“...Fine.” Wen Qing at least looks moderately chagrined by Luo Qingyang’s chastisement. She kisses Luo Qingyang on the palm before turning back to face Lan Zhan. “You’d better give it your all, then. And if I hear anything about you hurting Wei Ying, just know your days on this earth will be numbered.”

Lan Zhan solemnly nods. “I would deserve nothing less.”

“Good.” She says. Lan Zhan wouldn’t go so far as to call the look in Wen Qing’s eyes “approval,” but her expression gives him reason to believe that her opinion of him is slowly rising.

“How are the two of you enjoying your evening?” Lan Zhan asks, changing the topic.

“Great!” Luo Qingyang smiles brightly, wrapping her arms around Wen Qing. “If I knew getting a girlfriend could be so easy I’d have done it years ago! We’re already making plans for a—”

“—Oh my gosh, are you okay?! I’m so sorry!” A shout from outside the room interrupts their conversation. Lan Zhan knows that voice, and it sends a chill down his spine in a bad way. 

He didn’t realize that he would be out tonight, but perhaps he should have known better than to assume that Xue Yang would miss out on an opportunity for teenage hedonism.

“Come with me, let’s get you cleaned up…” Xue Yang enters the kitchen, dragging along a soaked-head-to-toe Wei Ying. If Wei Ying’s top were any color but black, it would have turned translucent from the sheer amount of vodka spilled over his front side. Lan Zhan’s throat goes a little drier at the sight of how the shirt clings to the boy’s skin. He’s serious about Wei Ying, but he’s not made of stone!

Xue Yang manhandles Wei Ying until he’s seated on the countertop in a mirror image of Luo Qingyang and Wen Qing’s position. It’s incredibly cozy, and the dish towel dabbing from Xue Yang should not involve so much of his hands on Wei Ying’s thighs. 

From the moment Lan Zhan first saw Xue Yang in their freshman year, he knew he was looking into the eyes of the embodiment of evil incarnate. Not exactly Damien in The Exorcist (1973) where he’s the literal spawn of Satan, but more J.D. in Heathers (1988). His initial impression on the student body was that the guy was just a “hot” “bad-boy” type. Lan Zhan could always sense that there was something unsettling about him. Much like J.D., his bad-boy exterior belied something much darker and crueler. 

As Xue Yang tormented the more vulnerable members of the student body, his sadistic streak became apparent — particularly when he ripped out a chunk of another student’s scalp in a fight over a cookie. After that, everyone was utterly terrified of Xue Yang. Lan Zhan knew he was right to have trusted his gut about the guy.

One time, Xue Yang left a dead baby squirrel in the Inquiry and Empathy submission box. He left a note attached, which included a terrifying letter about how he wished to kidnap and torture the then-editor, Xiao Xingchen, to “get himself off.” It was horrid, and trying to help Xiao Xingchen discuss the incident with the school administration, whose hands were tied since Xiao Xingchen hadn’t technically been harmed, was the first and only time that Lan Zhan shed a tear on school property. The injustice of Xiao Xingchen just having to hope Xue Yang wouldn’t make good on his threats deeply upset Lan Zhan.

Thankfully, Xiao Xingchen graduated a few months later and ended up at a college way out of Xue Yang’s reach.

Lan Zhan’s held a grudge against the boy ever since, and watching him forcefully pushing Wei Ying’s legs apart while ostensibly “cleaning him up” sets off alarm bells in Lan Zhan’s head. While Wei Ying is perfectly capable of handling more oafish assailants like Wen Xu and Jin Zixun, Xue Yang is not built like them. Xue Yang is scrappy, unpredictable, and he fights dirty. Xue Yang was someone who could and would hurt Wei Ying, and he’d probably love it.

“Gosh, I’m usually not so clumsy, haha…” Xue Yang trails the towel up Wei Ying’s torso, brushing up against what must be a nipple, based on the way Wei Ying attempts to curl his body away from the boy. Lan Zhan’s heart is in his throat, seeing Wei Ying subjected to such discomfort and feeling powerless to stop it.

Wei Ying had been able to stand up for him so easily with the Jins. Why the hell can’t he find the spine in him to intervene when Wei Ying needs his help?

“I think I’ve got it, thanks…” Wei Ying attempts to take the towel from Xue Yang, who simply pulls it away and tuts at him.

“Aht-aht-aht!” Xue Yang smiles like a shark smelling blood. “It was my mistake, I really insist…”

“No, thank you.” Wei Ying more firmly refuses, going for the towel again. This time, Xue Yang snatches Wei Ying’s wrist and pins it against the cupboard behind them with a slam, startling everyone in the kitchen. 

“Hey!” Wen Qing shouts as Xue Yang presses in closer and closer to Wei Ying.

“Get OFF!” Wei Ying yells, elbowing Xue Yang in the windpipe and freeing himself. 

As he jumps off the countertop, Wen Qing stomps over and knees Xue Yang in the balls; it’s no less than he deserves. Lan Zhan feels a combination of relief that Wei Ying is out of the disturbed boy’s clutches, gratitude for Wen Qing, and acute shame over his own inaction throughout the situation. 

“You’re SUCH a fucking creep, Xue Yang!” Wei Ying’s eyes are on fire as he storms out of the room. Lan Zhan trails after him, concerned to leave him alone in this state but also feeling as if he doesn’t deserve to be in his presence due to his failure to protect Wei Ying the way Wei Ying protected him. His worry outweighs his inadequacy, though, so he follows along dutifully, Luo QingYang and Wen Qing bringing up the rear.

The crowds part before Wei Ying like he’s Moses parting the Red Sea in The Ten Commandments (1956). He climbs on top of the beer pong table mid-game, snatching the ball out of the air and chucking it onto the floor. 

“NEWSFLASH, ASSHOLES!” Wei Ying screams at the top of his lungs, kicking away the stack of cups at his feet. The party goes tense and silent; the music turns off so fast that if this were a movie, there would have been a record scratch sound effect. 

“I’M NOT TRYING TO FUCK. I’M NOT INTERESTED IN IT. STOP ASKING ME OUT. STOP TRYING TO GET IN MY PANTS. NONE OF YOU EVEN KNOW ME, SO LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE AND LET ME ENJOY MY NIGHT, DAMMIT!”

Lan Zhan’s jaw drops, though he would be hard-pressed to find a single person in the room more composed. 

…They broke Wei Ying. They all collectively broke Wei Ying.

“You don’t want me; none of you actually want me.” Wei Ying hisses. “You just want the idea of me!”

Wei Ying scrubs his hand down his face, then carefully gets down from the table. Somewhere in the party, somebody presses “play” on the stereo, and a Backstreet Boys song bursts out, washing away the awkwardness that hung in the air after Wei Ying’s declaration of independence. 

Lan Zhan’s eyes haven’t peeled away from Wei Ying yet. He watches as the boy grabs his coat from Nie Huaisang, who gives him a remorseful look. Wei Ying makes his exit out the back door, shoulders shaking ever-so-slightly.

Lan Zhan’s heart breaks a little bit, seeing him like this.

“Lan Zhan!” Wen Qing snaps him into focus. “What are you doing?”

“Go after him, you dingus!” Luo Qingyang thwacks him in the shoulder.

“But he just—” Lan Zhan doesn’t want to encroach on Wei Ying’s boundaries; he won’t disregard his request to be left to enjoy his evening as he sees fit.

“Lan Zhan!” Wen Qing grabs him by the shoulders, her nails digging in painfully. “Is he, or is he not, worth fighting for?!”

“Of course he is!” Lan Zhan gapes back at her.

“Then why the fuck are you not fighting for him?!” Wen Qing shakes Lan Zhan with each word she says. For someone so small, she’s very effective. “You gave me reason to think that you’re the type of person who wants to do right by Wei Ying, so go and do-fucking-right!”

“I—”

“Don’t just stand there!” Luo Qingyang shouts. She and Wen Wing give him a stern look, Wen Qing releasing her death grip at last. 

“GO!” They yell in unison. 

It’s like Lan Zhan has been struck by lightning. He bolts off, chasing after Wei Ying. He hardly feels the cold air against his skin when he flies out the door. He’s uncharacteristically frantic in his chase, forgetting all semblance of himself as he focuses on what he needs to do: let Wei Ying know that someone in this godforsaken party does care about him, and that same person really, genuinely wants to know him inside and out and brighten his days. Wei Ying doesn’t deserve to ring in the New Year in tears, at the very least. 

Lan Zhan doesn’t know if he’s able to make Wei Ying as rapturously happy as he would like to; he’s perhaps too stiff, too dull for someone as radiant as Wei Ying. Still, he will do anything in his power to make sure that Wei Ying at least is okay. 

“WEI YING!” Lan Zhan raises his voice — something he never does — as he crashes into the bannister that lines that Nie’s raised deck. Their home is built on the side of a hill, and while it’s not terrible steep, many guests elected to park at the bottom of the hill, which the Nie’s have a path leading through their backyard to a gate. Wei Ying is about halfway down the hill when he hears Lan Zhan call his name. His body freezes up.

“Wei Ying!” Lan Zhan yells again. “Please, wait!”

“Wei Ying…” Lan Zhan’s voice softens. “I’m in love with you.”

Wei Ying is trembling as he turns around to face him. While his face is only illuminated by the faint light of the moon and the remnants of the Nie’s holiday lights, it’s clear from the shimmering trails down his cheeks that he’s in tears.

“What the hell, Lan Zhan?!” Wei Ying chokes out a sob. “Did you not just— fuck… I really thought that you were better than to try to get in my pants with pretty words.”

Oh no. Oh NO. Lan Zhan’s tongue twists itself into knots as he tries to express the innermost feelings he’s held inside from the moment he first saw Wei Ying clearly. He can’t get the words out; he’s failing Wei Ying.

“I honestly expected this sort of thing from a lot of the neanderthals in our school,” Wei Ying scrubs harshly at his face, wiping away his tears. “But I didn’t expect it from you.”

Lan Zhan’s world is getting darker.

“Get lost!” Wei Ying hiccups out another sob as he turns to walk away.

Words may be failing Lan Zhan, but he hears Wen Qing’s voice in his head screaming at him to “do-fucking-right” by Wei Ying. His body takes over, and he vaults over the railing, landing on one of the Nie’s bushes with a crunch.

The noise startles Wei Ying, who, likely against his better judgement, immediately comes running to Lan Zhan’s aid. He really is just that good of a person.

“What the fuck?! Are you okay?!” Wei Ying looks down on him with concern in his eyes. The moonlight seems to radiate from him, from where Lan Zhan is laying. “Lan Zhan, I didn’t think you’d been drinking, but are you drunk?”

Lan Zhan gapes at Wei Ying for a moment, just drinking his presence in. This might be the first time that they had a conversation this close to one another. Slowly, he shakes his head “no.”

“Do you think you can stand, or walk? Does anything feel broken?” Wei Ying nibbles on his bottom lip as he worries; Lan Zhan is spellbound. “Oh god, I should probably grab Wen Qing or something…”

“When love beckons to you, follow him.” 

Wei Ying’s eyes fly wide in recognition of the lines from the Khalil Gibran poem he so vehemently debated with their sophomore year English instructor on.

“Though his ways are hard and steep.” Lan Zhan continues to recite for all that he’s worth, channeling every ounce of feeling he’s ever had for the boy in front of him into his delivery. “And when his wings unfold you yield to him, though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.”

Wei Ying’s eyes well up with tears again, and he looks at Lan Zhan like he’s seeing him for the first time. Perhaps he is, Lan Zhan can’t help but wonder.

Lan Zhan sits up slightly. His back feels like he’s going to wake up with a hell of a bruise tomorrow, but he ignores the ache and gently takes Wei Ying’s hand in his.

“And when he speaks to you, believe in him,” Lan Zhan’s voice goes raspy; his heart feels fit to burst. “Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden.”

“For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you…” Wei Ying gently squeezes Lan Zhan’s hand as he trails off, deep in thought. The fact that he hasn’t let go, even though Lan Zhan’s hand is sweatier than it’s ever been in his life, seems promising to him.

“Wei Ying…” Lan Zhan takes a deep breath; he’s finally found the words he needs. “I know there is more to you than meets the eye. So much more.”

Wei Ying gasps softly, and while it’s difficult to tell in the low night glow, Lan Zhan thinks he’s blushing.

“While I do not know you as well as I would like to, I would really like to have the chance to get to know you.” Lan Zhan says with more confidence. “Everything that I’ve seen has been amazing, so far.”

Wei Ying gives him an assessing look, as though he’s searching Lan Zhan’s face for a lie. Wei Ying is the one who is too good to be true here — he has no need to fear duplicity from Lan Zhan.

After seeing what he needs to see in Lan Zhan, Wei Ying offers Lan Zhan a hand and helps him out of the bush.

“Can you take me home, Lan Zhan?” Wei Ying looks up at him through his eyelashes as he asks. It’s a minor miracle Lan Zhan doesn’t combust on the spot.

“Mn.” Lan Zhan’s words have abandoned him for the time being, but Wei Ying seems to take it in stride, smiling properly for the first time that Lan Zhan has seen all night.

Wei Ying threads his arm through the crook of Lan Zhan’s elbow, as they quietly begin to make the trek to Lan Zhan’s car side by side. It’s a companionable silence, but Lan Zhan is still a little scared that perhaps he’s making Wei Ying feel awkward with his taciturn nature.

When they pass the threshold of the Nies' backyard gate, Wei Ying breaks the silence.

“You know, I never really thought that someone like you would ever be into someone like me.” His voice is slightly teasing when he says it, but there’s a thin vein of insecurity popping through in his words. “You’re so… smart, and serious, and — I’ve read your writing before, so I know this is true — deep. You’ve got this mystique about you; this aura that feels so cool and untouchable. I just can’t imagine someone like you ever looking at some silly cheerleader-type like me and actually taking me seriously.”

“...you are possibly the first and only person who has ever used the word ‘cool’ to describe me.” Lan Zhan’s brain can’t help but latch onto that; the knowledge that Wei Ying thinks he’s cool makes him feel like he’s somehow gotten away with the heist of the century.

“You are, though!” Wei Ying laughs lightly at that. “You’re like, the ‘strong, silent’ type. It’s hot, you know?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t know how to respond; he’s floored, frankly.

“I always thought that I would be far too dull to ever be of interest to someone like you, Wei Ying.” Lan Zhan replies. Before Wei Ying can protest, he continues. “You are incredibly bright. You’re kind, brave, funny… In addition to being a remarkable poet, yourself.

“You’ve read my writing?!” Wei Ying gasps in disbelief.

“Someone had to, in order to publish it in Inquiry and Empathy.” Lan Zhan has the slightest bit of a mischievous glint in his eyes. Nobody in the world has ever brought this side out of him; he had not even realized he has a playful side until the time came to tease Wei Ying. “Seriously, it blew me away.”

“I don’t know how you figured out it was me.” Wei Ying blushes slightly.

“I saw you submit, one time. After that, I could recognize your handwriting pretty well.” Lan Zhan smiles ever so subtly, and Wei Ying returns a grin of his own in his direction. As they approach Lan Zhan’s car, he realizes that this conversation allots him a golden opportunity to have many of his Wei Ying questions answered by the source directly. “You are beautiful, Wei Ying, but you are so much more intelligent than you let anybody give you credit for. Why is that?”

“Ah, that?” Wei Ying’s grin twists into a slight grimace. He shrugs. “People tend to see what they want to see when they look at me. When the reality of who I am doesn’t quite match up with what they see on the outside, it causes problems that I don’t want to have to deal with.”

“So you hold yourself back instead?” Lan Zhan can’t help the rush of rage he feels towards the various members of the “popular crowd” that make Wei Ying contain his radiance in this way.

“It’s just easier that way.” Wei Ying’s expression is resigned as he leans against the side of Lan Zhan’s steadfast Honda CRV. “They can keep me in whatever box they want for now, but when I head off to college, I’ll be damned if I let anyone try to fit me into whatever cookie-cutter idea of personhood they have for me based on my appearance alone.”

“Wei Ying, I promise you now that I will never box you in.” Lan Zhan’s eyes are beseeching Wei Ying; his sincerity knocking the wind out of the boy’s sails. “I want you to be yourself around me, your fullest self.”

Wei Ying’s eyes go wide and flick over Lan Zhan’s face, as though searching for the tiniest hint of perfidy in his expression. He won’t find it, because Lan Zhan has never been more sincere about anything in his life. He means it; he just wants Wei Ying to be the person that he is, to the fullest extent, and nothing more or less than that. He hopes that Wei Ying can sense that honesty as he takes in Lan Zhan’s serious expression. 

He has a feeling that it could take some time for Wei Ying to trust that Lan Zhan really means what he says, but that’s okay. Lan Zhan will prove that he is a man of his word, one day at a time, for however long Wei Ying will let him.

“You really mean that, huh?” Wei Ying blinks, surprised. 

“Mn, of course.” Lan Zhan nods.

Wei Ying nibbles at his bottom lip; it’s terribly hypnotizing. 

“Lan Zhan…” Wei Ying is terribly adorable when he’s nervous. “...what if I told you that I don’t want to go home right now? At least… not yet?”

Lan Zhan stands a little taller when a shiver makes its way down his spine. 

“I would suggest we perhaps find a place where we can sit and talk?” Lan Zhan’s pulse races with excitement. This sort of thing only happens to characters in John Hughes movies, not to cinephile dweebs like him. Well… he may be a cinephile dweeb, but Wei Ying at least thinks he’s a cool cinephile dweeb, so that has to count for something. “Perhaps a diner?”

Wei Ying’s face melts into a gentle smile, and he looks thrilled. 

“Are we making this a date?” Wei Ying’s eyes seem to sparkle when he speaks; Lan Zhan is helpless against his charms.

“I would like that, yes.” He says. “I would like to be able to continue getting to know you better.”

“Me too,” Wei Ying’s words come out like a sigh. “I’d really, really like that.”

As Lan Zhan pulls out his keys to unlock his car door, he and Wei Ying are startled by a sudden BOOM coming from the sky. Instinctively, he pulls Wei Ying close, protectively tucking him into his chest and turning around to block whatever the danger could be. Wei Ying is pressed between him and the car, and his breath quickens rapidly. 

He feels like a real nincompoop when he realizes that it’s just fireworks.

While initially startled, Wei Ying takes it in good faith and starts laughing voraciously. He’s not laughing at Lan Zhan, though, and that knowledge helps ease his embarrassment. 

“I’m sorry…” Lan Zhan mumbles. “I don’t know what I—”

“Hey,” Wei Ying presses a finger against his lips. “This means the new year is finally here, right?”

Lan Zhan nods wordlessly. He’s so scared that if he speaks, he’ll say something stupid. Wei Ying is so close to him, it’s terrifying. The fireworks going off around them wash Wei Ying in an array of colors, only adding to his beauty.

“You should really kiss me, Lan Zhan.” Wei Ying’s tone is teasing, but his face is serious. He looks up at Lan Zhan with want clear in his eyes. “It’s bad luck to not kiss at midnight on New Year’s, you know.”

Lan Zhan is nothing if not an impeccable listener.

He closes the distance between his and Wei Ying’s lips and presses in. He’s so eager to taste Wei Ying, to show him the depth of his feelings, that he completely forgets to be nervous about the fact that this is his first kiss. Ever. It’s probably for the best that he had no time to prepare, otherwise he would have certainly worked himself into a ball of nerves over it all.

Wei Ying feels so perfect against him, in his arms. His hands find their way to the nape of Lan Zhan’s neck, one squeezing his shoulder and his fingers on the other latch into his hair. The sparks in Lan Zhan’s stomach far outshine the fireworks display above them. Lan Zhan has no idea what he’s doing, but he’s seen enough movies to have some idea. A line from Gone with the Wind (1939) comes to mind.

Wei Ying should be kissed, and often, by someone who knows how; Lan Zhan will be damned if that “someone” is anybody but him.

Wei Ying opens his mouth just the slightest bit, and Lan Zhan takes the invitation readily, sliding his tongue between Wei Ying’s lips with a confidence he normally doesn’t feel. Were it not for the fact that most of his blood isn’t flowing to his brain, he probably would be an anxious wreck right now, fumbling through this encounter.

Lan Zhan isn’t exactly sure what to do with his tongue, now that he’s gotten here. Instinctively, he runs it along the room of Wei Ying’s mouth. This coaxes a delicate noise from Wei Ying, and Lan Zhan instantly feels an addiction forming. Wei Ying tugs lightly at his hair, tilting his head and allowing him to deepen the kiss, to come further into the sacristy that Wei Ying is granting him entrance to.

Emboldened, Lan Zhan allows himself a moment to explore. His hands had settled on Wei Ying’s waist when their kiss began, but now, they are wandering. He runs one up and down Wei Ying’s spine, feeling the notches under the boy’s skin and committing each one to memory. The other travels to Wei Ying’s hip, pulling him in closer. Lan Zhan can hardly tell which way is up; all he knows is that he needs to be closer to Wei Ying. 

When Wei Ying makes a particularly delicious sound, something in Lan Zhan snaps. In a flash, he lifts Wei Ying up into the air with his hands gripping undert he boy’s thighs, pressing him into the side of the car for support. His CRV is sturdy; it can handle it.

Wei Ying gasps in surprise, breaking the kiss. Lan Zhan cannot help himself; he dives back in, kissing the crook of Wei Ying’s long, elegant neck. Wei Ying’s chest is heaving, his breathing heavy against Lan Zhan’s relentless affection. There is nothing that Lan Zhan wants more than for this to feel as incredible for Wei Ying as it does for him.

“AH!” Wei Ying cries out when Lan Zhan sinks his teeth into his neck. “Wait, wait a sec—”

Lan Zhan freezes, suddenly terrified that he took too many liberties, that he shook Wei Ying’s trust. He moves as though to set Wei Ying down, but Wei Ying clamps his legs tighter around his waist.

“Wait, I didn’t mean to stop!” Wei Ying says. The roiling sea in Lan Zhan’s stomach calms ever so slightly. “I just… um…”

Lan Zhan carefully observes Wei Ying’s face; he’s once again biting at his lips — Lan Zhan makes a mental note that this is a (very endearing) nervous tic —  and despite the darkness of the night, his face is clearly flushed.

“Could we maybe… take this to your backseat?” Wei Ying meets Lan Zhan’s careful gaze. 

How on earth could Lan Zhan ever say “no” to him?

Lan Zhan quickly nods his head, his brain going haywire as he unlocks the car door and holds it open for Wei Ying. He’s still a gentleman, even with a half-chub that he’s becoming more and more aware of by the second. When he catches a glimpse of Wei Ying’s backside as he crawls into the backseat, he curses himself. He doesn’t want Wei Ying to think that he only wants him for his body, especially after everything Wei Ying had been put through by the assortment of horndogs back at the party, but to paraphrase Al Pacino in Heat (1995), Wei Ying has a GREAT ass.

He takes a little too long, perhaps, trying to kill his boner with his mind.

“You coming?” Wei Ying asks. Lan Zhan snaps into action, hopping into the backseat and shutting the door behind him. The glow from the car’s interior lights — normally gentle — feels like a spotlight. In the light, Lan Zhan can see a faint bruise in the shape of his mouth forming on Wei Ying’s neck. He feels a complex mix of embarrassment and pride.

The two sit in silence until well after the lights automatically turn off. All the nerves Lan Zhan had avoided earlier hit him at once — how on earth is he supposed to do this? What should he be doing with his hands?!

Everything came so naturally when he and Wei Wuxan kissed; it was just a matter of getting to the kissing that is throwing Lan Zhan for a loop. 

As if he has a sixth sense for Lan Zhan’s cluelessness, Wei Ying surprises him by taking charge of the situation. He tosses a leg over Lan Zhan, straddling him and pulling him into another passionate kiss. Anxiety still has Lan Zhan in a chokehold, and he doesn’t react quickly enough.

“I’m sorry,” Wei Ying pulls away. “Is this… too much?”

“No!” Lan Zhan is incredibly quick with his answer, accidentally jostling Wei Ying in his lap. The whole situation has him feeling like a character straight out of the American Pie series; something that he never wants to emulate. It’s too late for that now, so he may as well just own his own incompetence and hope that perhaps it won’t send Wei Ying running for the hills. “No, it’s not. I promise.”

“Are you sure?” Wei Ying probes further.

“I’m sure.” Lan Zhan says. “I… I do not know what I’m doing.”

“Wait, really?!” Wei Ying is surprised. “I just… It’s that… Well, you’re HOT! I’m honestly really surprised. I thought you and that Mianmian girl had been dating for years since y’all go to like, every formal together until I saw her macking with Wen Qing in a corner tonight.”

“Luo Qingyang is a longtime friend, we have a contract in place with clauses for dances in the event she is unable to find a date!” Lan Zhan wishes that they weren’t having this conversation with Wei Ying in his lap, but alas. “I am not attracted to women. I do want to kiss you again; To say that I am somewhat nervous right now is an understandment.”

“I’m nervous too,” Wei Ying’s face squinches up in sympathy. “But I think that if you kiss me and keep kissing me, we’ll be able to figure it out.”

Lan Zhan stares back at him wide-eyed. He can do that. 

“Okay,” He says, somewhat breathlessly. “Okay.”

Wei Ying barely gets the chance to smile properly before Lan Zhan kisses the smile off his lip. Having Wei Ying in his lap is the most exquisite form of torture; for years Lan Zhan has wondered what it would be like to hold Wei Ying, to kiss him, to be as close to him as two people can dream of being. The reality far exceeds his expectations. 

Within moments, Wei Ying is once again making those intoxicating noises and they are off to the races. Lan Zhan can hardly think straight, his hands trailing up and down Wei Ying’s body; running up and down his strong thighs, sculpted by hours and hours of cheerleading and gymnastics practice. What he would give to feel Wei Ying’s skin beneath his hands right now…

Wei Ying’s hands are equally exploratory, clever fingers brushing against skin in sensitive spots that Lan Zhan didn’t know he had. A touch just behind the ear where his jaw meets his neck nearly makes him buck up his hips; a hand brushing his stomach underneath his shirt elicits an involuntary groan.

Whenever they eventually make it to Denny’s, or Taco Bell, or whatever late-night establishment will allow them to sit and talk until the sun rises, he’s just going to have to deal with having blue balls the entire time. It’s absolutely worth it though, just to be able to share this moment with Wei Ying.

As Wei Ying pulls Lan Zhan’s shirt up higher and higher, Lan Zhan gets bolder as well. His hands find their way to the small of his back, one slipping underneath Wei Ying’s shirt, pushing him down, pressing him directly onto Lan Zhan’s raging erection, and the other finding its home right on the swell of Wei Ying’s ass. Lan Zhan palms at it firmly for a moment as his hips press up against Wei Ying.

Then, at last, he gives a squeeze. The floodgates open.

Wei Ying moans — MOANS — right in his ear, and he’s a goner. Lan Zhan pulls at the neck of Wei Ying’s mock-neck shirt, exposing more soft, smooth skin, and goes to town administering bruising, biting kisses, occasionally pausing to lick at the most painful bites. No turtleneck will be able to disguise what they’ve done, regardless of how far they take things tonight.

Wei Ying becomes more and more wanton with each kiss Lan Zhan presses into his skin, undulating his hips back and forth, giving Lan Zhan the most delicious friction right where he craves it the most. It feels otherworldly, and Lan Zhan just wants more, and more, and more. He’s never been so hard in his life; not even his most elaborate of wet dreams can compare to how turned on he feels in this moment.

At the same time, he’s petrified of potentially pushing too far, asking for too much. Wei Ying had been abundantly clear at the party that he was quite fine with being a virgin and that he very much did not want anybody there to come onto him with intentions of changing that; Lan Zhan is desperate to prove that he’s worthy of Wei Ying’s attention and that he respects his boundaries. 

The reminder that Wei Ying hasn’t “gone all the way” with anybody else sends even more blood down south with a zing; it’s very hard to be chivalrous when the sexiest creature on the face of the earth is writhing in your lap.

Still, the mind is conflicted where the penis is not, and Lan Zhan’s efforts to reign himself and his urges in are repeatedly thwarted by Wei Ying trying to tug Lan Zhan’s shirt over his head. Lan Zhan is helpless against the storm, taking it off completely and tossing it into the driver’s seat.

“Oh my god!” Wei Ying exhales sharply when he takes a glimpse at Lan Zhan’s body. The look in his eyes makes Lan Zhan feel incredibly powerful; like he could take on anything in the world. “FUCK, you’re so hot… How did you get this hot, you don’t do any sports?!”

“Team sports are not the only way to maintain one’s health and physique.” Lan Zhan says, like an idiot, instead of taking the compliment like any sane and normal person would in his position. It’s not his fault — all his higher-level thinking skills are out of office until Wei Ying inevitably gets off his lap, which hopefully won’t be any time soon. 

Instead of being put off though, Wei Ying erupts into giggles like he’d made some sort of attempt at a joke. 

“Yeah, that seems reasonable.” Wei Ying settles down, looking at Lan Zhan hungrily. “Is it weird that I wanna like, lick your abs?”

If Lan Zhan’s dick were capable of getting up any further, it would jump clean off his body and chase after Wei Ying for the rest of its days. Lan Zhan would completely understand.

“It is… not weird.” Lan Zhan eventually manages to rub together enough brain cells to form a simple sentence. “You may.”

“Maybe later,” Wei Ying leans in closer, practically purring in his ears. “I just want to feel you first.”

When Wei Ying’s hand trails down to his crotch and grabs at the bulge in Lan Zhan’s jeans, pulling out an embarrassing “hrk” noise that Lan Zhan didn’t know he could make. Lan Zhan thinks that perhaps he must have died when the Jins tried to give him that flaming shot and made his way to heaven. He should have written out his final will and testament before heading out for the night: he would like Sizhui to have the vast majority of his Criterion Collection boxed sets, though Luo Qingyang would at least get his Agnes Varda and Wes Anderson ones.

“Lan Zhan…” Wei Ying is nibbling lightly at his earlobe, and Lan Zhan thinks he’ll come in his pants at any moment. “...I want you to fuck me.”

A combination of the Kill Bill sirens and the Hallelujah Chorus sounds off in Lan Zhan’s mind, and he gently pulls Wei Ying away so he can look into his eyes. 

“Please,” Wei Ying emphatically begs, his eyes wild. “Will you please fuck me, Lan Zhan?”

“I—”

“Whatever you want, please…”

As Lan Zhan struggles to articulate his desire to give Wei Ying what he wants competing with his desire to be mindful of Wei Ying’s previously stated boundaries, worry seeps into Wei Ying’s expression.

“Unless… you don’t want… me?” Wei Ying minutely shifts away from Lan Zhan.

“I want you!” Lan Zhan blurts out. “I do, you have no idea how much I want you.” He gently caresses Wei Ying’s arms as he finds his words. “I just don’t want to pressure you into anything that you are not certain about, and I don’t want you to think that I do not have an interest in you beyond a physical relationship.”

Wei Ying bites at his kiss-bruised lip. “...I’m certain.”

“You did devote a portion of your evening to declaring that you wouldn’t put out for anyone, in a very public way.” Lan Zhan reminds him gently. He catches a glimpse at his watch. “It has been only a little over a half-hour since that happened…”

Wei Ying groans — not in the sexy way — and leans his head down on Lan Zhan’s shoulder.

“Can I tell you something?” He shyly asks.

“Anything.” Lan Zhan rests his cheek against Wei Ying’s head, his hair soft against his face. He gently rubs Wei Ying’s back, hoping to make the other boy feel as comfortable and safe as possible.

“Wen Xu and I didn’t get very far past kissing and like… hand stuff.” Wei Ying mumbles. “But he kept on trying to push me further, and harder, and into stuff that I didn’t like. And he was so mean about it; the way he’d talk to me whenever we’d do anything physical was honestly kinda fucked-up. I think subconsciously, I never felt safe enough with him to be certain that I’d want to let him have me in that way. I wanted to save my first time for when I felt sure.”

Lan Zhan hums in acknowledgement, hearing the unspoken words in Wei Ying’s story: Wei Ying feels safe enough with Lan Zhan, even after such a short time of interacting with each other, that he feels certain. Lan Zhan is internally preening, and were it not incredibly unbecoming, he would probably fist pump and scream with joy.

“I know it’s kinda insane to feel this way so quickly, but I really do want this, and I want this with you, specifically.” Wei Ying sits up and looks deep into Lan Zhan’s eyes. “It has to be you.”

“I haven’t done this before,” Lan Zhan is in a trance as he gazes back into Wei Ying’s eyes. “But I want it, too. I feel it, too. And I need to make this good for you.”

Wei Ying dives back into kissing him with gusto at that, and Lan Zhan hardly has time to prepare himself for the onslaught of Wei Ying’s lips trailing down his torso as the boy slides onto the floor. The image of Wei Ying on his knees for him nearly makes Lan Zhan shoot off prematurely; god Wei Ying is far too sexy for his own good.

Lan Zhan hardly manages to catch his breath when Wei Ying pops open the button of his jeans and starts undoing Lan Zhan’s zipper. As much as his body is screaming with want, he’d meant it when he said that he wanted to make this good for Wei Ying. Beyond making Wei Ying feel good, Lan Zhan wants to treat him well, and that means being mindful of both their safety.

Lan Zhan takes Wei Ying’s wrists in his hands and pulls him up off the floor. He whines a little in protest, but Lan Zhan drowns it out with a quick — but sweet — kiss on his lips.

“If you want me to fuck you, you need to let me do right by you.” Lan Zhan murmurs, dragging Wei Ying’s hands close to gently kiss his wrists. He relishes the small gasp that escapes Wei Ying’s lips in the process. “Sit in the front seat. We will find the supplies we need, and then I will find a place for us to start.”

Wei Ying’s speed in moving up to the front seat is incredibly endearing; Lan Zhan truly can’t believe his luck. He could only pray that he would be lucky enough to find lube and condoms somewhere at one o’clock in the morning.

🎇🎇🎇

After driving about aimlessly for half an hour, unable to find a convenience store or pharmacy open so late, Lan Zhan finally pulls into a gas station and prays to any god that’s out there that they carry XL condoms. 

The fluorescent lights are unforgiving and disorienting, coming from the dreamlike daze they’d found themselves in in Lan Zhan’s backseat. They also highlight how incredibly dissheveled the two of them are — Wei Ying’s hair is barely clinging to its original style, and Lan Zhan is certain that his has been thoroughly mussed as well. Wei Ying’s lips are bruised and bitten, and his neck is in an even worse state. While on the one hand, it’s a little bit embarrassing to be in such a state in public, a primal part of Lan Zhan is roaring at the thrill of being able to show off that those marks are painted onto a beautiful creature like Wei Ying because of him.

Wei Ying sticks by his side as they meander through the brightly-lit store, occasionally picking up packages with snacks here and there. Every time he sets one down, Lan Zhan picks it back up and places it in his arms; Wei Ying’s ensuing smile is so soft every time. Lan Zhan wants to be the cause of that sort of smile as long as he lives.

Eventually, they find the small section of the store dedicated to first aid, health, hygiene, and wellness. It’s incredibly picked-over, but Lan Zhan is at least able to find at least four different brands of sketchy “male enhancement” pills. 

Wei Ying picks up one of the packages.

“What do you think?” He winks playfully. “Do you think you’ll need a dose of ‘Rhino’ to give it to me all night?”

Lan Zhan gives him a dark look. Wei Ying has no idea how many times Lan Zhan has fantasized about being in this exact scenario together. He reaches out and holds Wei Ying’s chin between his fingers, making sure that Wei Ying has to look him in the eyes.

“I will keep you satisfied.” Lan Zhan is firm in his assertion. Wei Ying’s eyes go a little hazy. Lan Wangi releases his chin and gently pats his face before resuming his hunt.

Eventually, they manage to find some lube hidden between small containers of Carmex lip ointment and shoe polish. They cannot find condoms anywhere, and Lan Zhan is struggling to maintain hope that he’ll be able to fuck Wei Ying properly before morning comes.

“...I think they’re out of condoms.” He glumly admits to Wei Ying. “I’m sorry.”

“Well! Uh…” Wei Ying, once again, is chewing on his beautiful bottom lip, likely formulating some plan, or contemplating alternative locations where they could potentially find one (1) condom available for purchase. Whatever he is internally deliberating, he must come to a consensus on, raising his head with more confidence and meeting Lan Zhan’s gaze with his beautiful, big doe eyes.

“I’ve been thinking a bit while we walked around here, and…” Wei Ying sighs briefly, as though bracing himself. “I think that maybe we don’t need a condom this time?”

Lan Zhan’s dick jumps in his pants at that. Wei Ying is truly going to be the end of him, possibly before he even manages to have sex with him.

“Bwuh…” Lan Zhan does not know what word his brain was trying to form; his brain is being hit with endless images of taking Wei Ying raw and he is barely holding onto his sanity.

“I mean… we’re both virgins, so it’s not like either of us have anything to transmit to one another,” Wei Ying has no idea the degree of psychological torture he’s putting Lan Zhan through. “Plus it’s not like I can get pregnant!”

Oh no. Oh no. Lan Zhan needs Wei Ying to stop talking before he jumps his bones in a gas station bathroom. They both deserve significantly better for their first time.

“Are… are you sure?” Lan Zhan chokes out.

“I’m sure!” Wei Ying smiles, eyes sparkling. “Besides, I want to really feel you…”

With this, Lan Zhan knows that Wei Ying is fully aware of the effect he has over him, but he can’t deny that he desperately wants to feel Wei Ying, too.

With lube in one hand and Wei Ying’s wrist in the other, Lan Zhan marches off towards the cash register to pay for their supplies. The sooner they get out of there, the sooner he gets into Wei Ying.

🎇🎇🎇

After a little more driving, brainstorming all the while, Lan Zhan pulls into the parking lot of a local nature preserve. At this time of night, there’s not a soul around. Nonetheless, he parks in the furthest spot possible from the entrance, out of the direct light of any lampposts. 

Lan Zhan has a fairly generous allowance, but he certainly doesn’t have the money to throw at getting a motel room, and there’s absolutely no way he can make love to Wei Ying with his uncle sleeping lightly down the hallway. The thought of sneaking into Wei Ying’s house is also concerning; it’d be a terrible impression to make on his parents. Like “yes, hello, my name is Lan Zhan and I’m here to ravage your son. It’s a pleasure to meet you!”

So, in the backseat in an empty, secluded parking lot it is.

He tells Wei Ying to sit in the passenger seat for a few more moments while he takes steps to make the back of the car as comfortable as possible. While he can only do so much about their setting — what he would give to have a bed, or even a couch right now… — he still wants to make it pleasant for Wei Ying. 

First, he puts the seats down, giving them a much larger flat surface to work off of. While he doesn’t want to think of his uncle during a time of impending virginity loss, he cannot help but mentally thank the man for insisting he keep blankets and towels in the car for “wintertime emergencies” and “post-car wash drying,” respectively. These are not the uses his uncle had in mind when preparing Lan Zhan for unpredictable factors on the road as a young driver, but nonetheless… He would have to do something kind for his uncle soon, as thanks.

He spreads a quilt over the back of the car, covering up the scratchy fabric that lines the back of the seats and the trunk. In his trunk, he had a bag filled with several folded-up reusable grocery bags, and while it isn’t much, it’s certainly serviceable as a pillow for Wei Ying’s head. He lays out one towel above the quilt, keeping another nearby for cleanup, then piles his other, softer blanket near the makeshift pillow. 

“Okay,” Lan Zhan says. “It’s ready.”

“Okay!” Wei Ying gives him a giddy smile before hopping out of the car. He turns back to Lan Zhan before closing the door. “Now close your eyes and don’t peek.”

Lan Zhan closes his eyes, but not quickly enough, and catches a glimpse as Wei Ying hastily — and somewhat gracelessly — tugs off his shirt, then shimmies out of his pants before climbing back into the car. He can’t tell exactly what Wei Ying is doing now that his eyes are shut, but hears the rustle of fabric as Wei Ying settles into the trunk. 

“Okay… open your eyes now…” Wei Ying’s voice is soft, hardly more than a whisper. At his command, Lan Zhan’s eyes fly open and he’s hit with a tsunami of desire as he drinks in the gorgeous creature laid out before him. 

Wei Ying looks like he stepped out of a painting. Bathed in the soft golden glow of the distant incandescent street lights and clothed only in love bites from Lan Zhan and a pair of tight boxer briefs, he’s the most erotic thing that Lan Zhan has ever seen. That’s saying something, because he’s seen both Don’t Look Now (1973) and Secretary (2002) at least three times each at a very formative age.

“So… do you wanna get a little more naked too?” Wei Ying looks up at Lan Zhan with those big, gorgeous eyes of his. Lan Zhan doesn’t think he’s capable of speech, so he simply nods and starts taking off his clothes as quickly as he can. He folds them up carefully.

“Lift your head for just a moment.” Lan Zhan requests, coaxing Wei Ying to sit up just the slightest bit while adding his clothing to the “pillow” and gently easing him back down. Hopefully that extra bit of cushioning is even more comfortable. The trunk space — even with the seats turned down — is quite tight, though it’s miles better than attempting to have sex outside in the middle of winter, or in a more cramped backseat. When he’s settled back in, Wei Ying grins up at Lan Zhan without a hint of nervousness on his face.

“You’re quite the gentleman, you know.” He teases; Lan Zhan can feel his ears burning and hopes that Wei Ying won’t clock it. 

“I’m not sure where to start.” Lan Zhan admits. He’s settled on his knees, sitting back on his heels. “I just want this to be good for you.”

“Just because of that, I know it will be.” Something behind Wei Ying’s eyes melts. “Come here and kiss me, okay? We’ll be able to figure it out from there.”

Lan Zhan won’t pretend that he hasn’t watched his fair share of pornographic films. He had found a collection of remarkably tasteful pornos from the 1970s after he saw Boogie Nights (1997) for the first time, having developed an intense curiosity about the San Fernando Valley porn industry as a result. His brother had given him not one, but two sex talks (one before Lan Zhan came out to him, another after). He’s often applied that knowledge to picturing Wei Ying in a wide variety of lewd situations, even though nearly every single fantasy made him feel like a filthy pervert afterwards. He is deeply aware of the mechanics, he knows about the necessity of foreplay and preparation, he’s imagined it with Wei Ying, he knows! 

Still, no amount of studying can prepare you for when you come face to face with your biggest fantasy and need to meet it head-on.

Wei Ying is right; if they just start, they’ll be able to figure it out. Their bodies know what to do; it’s written into them as innately as the color of their eyes.

Lan Zhan hovers over Wei Ying’s body, before finally closing the gap and kissing him. Pressing Wei Ying into the trunk of the car feels so right, and feeling the way Wei Ying fidgets and shifts in his hold — while still held close and safe — is giving Lan Zhan something like a high. 

His hands wander all over Wei Ying’s body, caressing his soft, delicate skin. Lan Zhan longs to put more marks, bites, and bruises anywhere he can reach, so he does just that.

He trails down Wei Ying’s body, kissing, licking, touching, gripping every bit of skin that he can, stopping just above the waistline of his underwear. The lower he goes, the more Wei Ying gasps and moans; Lan Zhan wants to drive him wild. Lan Zhan is straining at the seams of his own boxer-briefs, and seeing the damp spot forming on Wei Ying’s unleashes something desperately hungry in him. 

He pauses for a moment, stealing a glance at Wei Ying’s face. He’s looking Lan Zhan right in the eyes. 

Lan Zhan slides his thumbs along the elastic waistline of Wei Ying’s underwear.

“May I?” He asks, not tearing his eyes off of Wei Ying as he hooks his thumbs under the elastic, rubbing gently at the jut of his hipbones. 

“Please…” Wei Ying is breathing heavily; it’s music to Lan Zhan’s ears. “Please, oh my god, please!”

A shiver runs down Lan Zhan’s back when he’s hit with the mental image of Wei Ying, legs spread wide, begging him just as desperately for his cock. He wants it so badly that it hurts.

Wei Ying raises his hips into the air, showing off his flexibility and inviting Lan Zhan to tug the boxers off himself. Lan Zhan supports his lower back with one hand and tugs his underwear down with the other, baring Wei Ying fully.

Everything about Wei Ying is gorgeous; of course his cock is, too. Lan Zhan feels a feral rush in his brain, a voice in his head telling him to suck it, touch it, jerk Wei Ying off until he’s coming all over the back of the car. As virulently as Lan Zhan craves that, he wants Wei Ying to come while he’s inside of him significantly more. 

“Oh my god, Lan Zhan, please…” Wei Ying whimpers as Lan Zhan caresses the fragile skin between his hips and his crotch. “Please don’t tease me, I don’t think I can take it!”

Lan Zhan presses a kiss onto Wei Ying’s hipbone, then forms a trail of kisses closer and closer to the boy’s cock. When he’s almost where Wei Ying wants his mouth, he pulls away.

“You can take it.” He says nonplussed as he lifts Wei Ying’s thighs over his shoulders and raises him up higher. Wei Ying lets out a squeak.

“Wait, what are you doing?!” He gasps. “Don’t get me wrong, it’s really sexy, I just wanna have an idea!”

Lan Zhan bites sharply into the inside of Wei Ying’s thighs. He wonders if the mark would be visible when Wei Ying is in his cheer uniform. In the event that it isn’t, he bites a few more times to be safe. Now that he has Wei Ying in his arms like this, he doesn’t want anybody getting any ideas.

“Trust me.” Lan Zhan murmurs into Wei Ying’s skin. “...Can you spread your legs a bit wider for me?”

Wei Ying opens his legs wider instantly, showing off his flexibility instinctively — Lan Zhan is strong enough to hold the legs open himself, though appreciates how Wei Ying is keeping his core engaged. That hungry, dirty part of him wants to see exactly how much Wei Ying’s limber, beautiful body is capable of taking, but he knows that he would much rather have a proper bedroom available when exploring those possibilities.

Lan Zhan immediately buries his face in between Wei Ying’s legs and licks at him from taint to hole, kissing right between his cheeks to finish.

Now, Lan Zhan has only seen this move a couple of times in porn, but that doesn’t mean that he hasn’t thought extensively about what it would be like to experience with Wei Ying. Still, it couldn’t have possible prepared him for the scream Wei Ying lets out the moment the tip of his tongue prods against his hole, or the way that Wei Ying’s thighs clamp down on Lan Zhan’s head from overwhelming sensation that he feels. 

For one moment, Lan Zhan thinks that there’s no better way to die than to suffocate between Wei Ying’s thighs, eating his ass. In the next though, he’s testing his own strength as he spreads Wei Ying’s legs wide once again. 

Wei Ying has a lot of strength as a cheerleader — it’s necessary for lifting flyers and being able to execute difficult stunts — but Lan Zhan still has an advantage here. While Wei Ying whimpers in ecstasy, Lan Zhan lifts the boy’s legs and presses them backwards, holding them down. He wraps Wei Ying’s hands around the inside of his knees, making him hold himself open for Lan Zhan.

“Stay like this for me, okay?” It is not a request, and Wei Ying seems to know this. With his legs now out of the way, Lan Zhan continues working his tongue into Wei Ying’s hole, soaking up his moans, heavy breaths, and the occasional swearing outburst.

When Wei Ying’s noises reach a crescendo, Lan Zhan pauses and takes stock of the situation. It seems as good a time as any to move on to the next phase. 

He sits back on his heels once more, reluctantly tearing himself away from the spot between Wei Ying’s legs.

“Wait, why’d you stop?” Wei Ying’s voice has gone high-pitched and reedy, need reverbarating from his tone.

“I need to do more to prepare you.” Lan Zhan says solemnly. He stretches out his legs, fully sitting down on the quilt. He gestures to his lap. “Lay down here, for me.”

Wei Ying pouts, though it’s clear from the way he stretches out like a satisfied cat and drapes himself over Lan Zhan’s lap that he isn’t anywhere remotely close to being disappointed by Lan Zhan’s procedure. He keeps his hips raised, ass in the air. The meager friction on Lan Zhan’s barely-clothed cock toes the edge of being too much for him; it feels heavenly when Wei Ying’s dick brushes against him. He’s supporting himself on his forearms, arching his back suggestively, ass right where Lan Zhan wants it.

“Is this good?” Wei Ying looks up at him through his eyelashes; he knows it is, but Lan Zhan know’s he’s asking for the sake of provoking him.

Lan Zhan doesn’t know what instinct takes over, but he quickly swats his open palm down on Wei Ying’s ass, making the boy yelp.

Lan Zhan freezes; did he go too far?! He truly doesn’t want to hurt Wei Ying… There’s truly nothing separating him from the rest of the scum who sexually harrassed Wei Ying all night at the party if he just… takes these liberties with the boy.

“Do it again.” Wei Ying murmurs before Lan Zhan can apologize.

“What?!”

“Do. It. Again.” Wei Ying is gritting his teeth, his face bright red. “Please.”

Cautiously, Lan Zhan winds his hand back, bringing it back down on the thickest part of Wei Ying’s ass somewhat reluctantly.

“Harder.” Wei Ying looks up at him. “I mean it, Lan Zhan. I want it.”

Without thinking about it twice, Lan Zhan spanks him again. And again. And again. Each time his hand comes down on Wei Ying, the boy lets out a thrilled gasp. Lan Zhan could get lost in it; seeing his bright red handprints on Wei Ying’s ass makes him want to roar and pound his chest. He’d never dreamed that he would get to do this with Wei Ying.

Eventually, he calms himself down, remembering the reason he got Wei Ying into this position in the first place. He rests his hand on the swell of Wei Ying’s ass gently caressing his raw, red skin.

“Spread your legs for me, just a little bit?” He asks gently. Wei Ying immediately acquiesces, opening them up just a couple of inches. “Good, that’s perfect.”

Wei Ying lets out another tiny, involuntary gasp at the praise, and Lan Zhan makes a mental note to explore that further. He takes the small bottle of lube from the cupholder in the door, popping open the cap and drizzling some into his hands. He rubs his hands together slightly, warming it up just the slightest bit. He takes a deep breath; with one hand, he pulls one of Wei Ying’s cheeks to the side, exposing him fully. With the other, he carefully traces the tip of his finger around Wei Ying’s hole.

This is one of the parts of sex that scares him the most, frankly (outside of the “main event,” so to speak). There’s so much room for error, so many ways in which he can potentially hurt Wei Ying. He could scratch him with his nails, or go too hard and rupture something! Probably. Possibly. Actually, he wasn’t 100% sure about that one, but it sounded like a potential hazard of anal fingering. 

Still, in order to give Wei Ying what he wants, he’s going to need to prepare him thoroughly.

“Just breathe…” He gently encourages Wei Ying, and Wei Ying’s hole relaxes accordingly. Working it with his tongue had been an excellent start, already making Wei Ying incredibly relaxed and open.

As Wei Ying gets more comfortable (and noisy), Lan Zhan grows more confident (and hard). It gets easier and easier to slide his finger in and out of Wei Ying’s hole. Feeling more comfortable, he works in a second finger, making Wei Ying gasp.

“Lan Zhan…” Wei Ying shudders as Lan Zhan relentlessly thrusts his fingers. He melts under Lan Zhan’s touch, boneless in the back of the car. “It’s so… whoa…”

When Lan Zhan hits a particular spot, the noise Wei Ying is unlike any other sound Lan Zhan has heard that night. Lan Zhan adjust the angle of his hand and slips in a third, aiming for that same spot. Wei Ying lets out a scream that makes Lan Zhan incredibly grateful that there’s not a soul within hearing distance of them. There’s no way that they’d be able to get as far as they have in the Lan’s basement; not with his uncle’s inhumanly excellent hearing.

He pulls out his hand, then manhandles Wei Ying so that he’s on his stomach, laying on the floor. After re-inserting his fingers and finding that sweet spot again, Lan Zhan drags his lips up Wei Ying’s back, his hot breath tickling at his spine. Lan Zhan can’t believe the noises the other boy makes are real.

“I want to make you scream like this when I’m inside of you.” Lan Zhan murmurs into Wei Ying’s ear, nipping gently at the lobe. He’s draped over Wei Ying’s body, pressing his chest to Wei Ying’s back as he kisses and bites at the back of his neck. “I want to make you feel so good, Wei Ying…”

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian breathily gasps. “Can you—? Can..”

“Can I what, Wei Ying?” Lan Zhan feels a little smug to have this effect on Wei Ying; he never imagined that he could have this much swagger in the bedroom, but something about Wei Ying just brings it out of him. He twists his fingers, nailing Wei Ying’s sweet spot perfectly. “Use your words, Wei Ying.”

Wei Ying simply whines, unable to form a sentence and sending Lan Zhan on the ego trip of a lifetime. HE made Wei Ying feel so incredible that he lost all knowledge of language in a matter of minutes; nobody else can ever take that away from him.

Through all of this, he’s been holding himself back, denying himself his own pleasure — or as much of it as he can in the wake of Wei Ying’s enthusiastic reciprocation. He hasn’t even taken out his dick, yet.

God, Lan Zhan really wants to do that. He feels overcome with the need to tease Wei Ying into oblivion, but he knows in his gut that he should save that for another time. Tonight is about making Wei Ying feel amazing; he can tease him more next time. 

Lan Zhan briefly peels himself off Wei Ying, just long enough to finally pull off his own underwear. He thanks his lucky stars that his uncle made him start doing his own laundry that year after Xichen managed to break one of the washers in his dorm’s laundry room the first time he attempted to do laundry at college. Lan Zhan quickly forces away all thoughts of his family and focuses his attention back to Wei Ying.

Now that he’s just as naked as Wei Ying, he’s a little terrified of how the other boy will see him. How will he measure up to any expectations in Wei Ying’s mind? While he knows that Wei Ying and Wen Xu hadn’t escalated to anything oral or penetrative in their intimacy, a very petty, juvenile part of his brain is praying that his dick is bigger and better than Wen Xu’s. Lan Zhan hadn’t realized that he was “packing,” so to speak, until he saw Mark Wahlberg’s prosthetic penis in Boogie Nights (1997) and realized that it looked a lot like his. 

“Wow…” Wei Ying interrupts his train of thought, taking a moment to look over his shoulder at Lan Zhan, presumably to figure out why he took a break from fingering him.

“...Yeah?” Lan Zhan is doing everything in his power to not come across as vain right now, but he’s preening internally over Wei Ying’s starry-eyed stare directed right at his cock. Wei Ying’s mouth drops open ever so slightly.

“Yeah…” Wei Ying whimpers. “I need it so bad…”

Wei Ying looks like he’s in a trance; to tease him, Lan Wangji takes his dick in hand and slowly strokes it. He keeps his hold loose, not wanting to get carried away and losing his composure completely before he can even get inside of Wei Ying, but just enough to make Wei Ying wish that he was the one stroking it for him.

“Lan Zhan… please?” Wei Ying rolls onto his back and spreads his legs as wide as the trunk of the car will allow. “Please take me?”

Wordlessly, Lan Zhan nods. He squirts a dollop of lube into his palms, warms it up, then strokes himself just enough to get ready to take Wei Ying. He lowers himself onto his forearms, then grabs his cock with one hand, directing it where it needs to go. He gasps involuntarily when the tip hits the rim of Wei Ying’s hole, and Wei Ying is just as impacted, letting out a tiny whine.

“If this hurts too much, or you want me to stop, please tell me.” Lan Zhan whispers into Wei Ying’s ear. He lays a tender kiss on the shell of the ear. “I just want to make you feel good.”

“I will, Lan Zhan, I promise.” Wei Ying wraps his arms around Lan Zhan’s waist, his hands periodically rubbing at his back.

With those promises made, Lan Zhan slowly, surely, and with several stops to breathe along the way, slides home.

Wei Ying is absurdly tight around him; for a while, Lan Zhan fears that even with all their preparation, it wasn’t enough for Wei Ying to take all of him. With Wei Ying’s encouragement to keep going, however, he slowly, surely, worked his way in one inch at a time. When Lan Wangji’s hips meet the swell of Wei Ying’s ass and he finally bottoms out, he feels like Cary Grant during Grace Kelly’s firework-tinted seduction in To Catch a Thief (1955).

There is no greater feeling in the world than the way Wei Ying feels underneath him, around him, surrounding him. Seeing Wei Ying’s gorgeous face as he’s falling apart on Lan Zhan’s cock takes the sensation to another level. It’s too good; Lan Zhan feels about ready to come, and he’s hardly started to fuck Wei Ying properly. He squeezes his eyes shut and lets out a shuddery exhale.

“Is this… alright?” Lan Zhan grunts out.

“It’s so good, Lan Zhan…” Wei Ying’s voice is strained. “Fuck; I feel so full!”

“Mn. Good.” Lan Zhan begins to slowly drag himself out, and good god the sensation around his cock as he pulls out is otherworldly. The way Wei Ying’s insides cling to him makes him feel like Wei Ying is trying to pull him back in.

“Ohh…” Wei Ying moans loudly. “Oh god, Lan Zhan…”

His name sounds so spectacular on Wei Ying’s lips, laced with all the pleasure that he’s giving Wei Ying. With only the tip remaining inside, Lan Zhan gives a quick experimental thrust back in, going as hard and deep as he can.

“Lan ZHAN!” Wei Ying lets out a punched-out scream. “YES!”

With that, Lan Zhan kicks things off with a bang. There’s absolutely no technique to what he’s doing; he chases what makes him feel good, and when Wei Ying makes a good noise, he does it again, but harder. Soon enough, Wei Ying picks up and shifts his hips in tandem with Lan Zhan, and it’s excellent. The slide in and out of Wei Ying gets easier and easier with every thrust, and soon enough, whatever mental block that kept Lan Zhan from being able to articulate thoughts in the presence of Wei Ying crumbles, and the floodgates open.

“You’re so fucking gorgeous, taking my cock.” Lan Zhan pants out. “You’re so tight, so perfect, fuck…”

Wei Ying looks up at him with wide eyes; he looks like he’s tearing up a little, but from what Lan Zhan can tell, it’s from ecstasy and not pain.

“I’ve wanted this for so long…” Lan Zhan groans as he hammers at Wei Ying. “As soon as I knew what it meant to have a fantasy, my fantasy was Wei Ying…”

“Am I — fuck —” Wei Ying gasps. “— as good as you wanted me to be?”

“Better.” Lan Zhan punctuates the answer by angling his hips in an effort to chase Wei Ying’s sweet spot. “The real you is better than anything. Fuck!”

Wei Ying cries out, his face scrunched up in overwhelming stimulation. Suddenly, he places a hand on Lan Zhan’s chest and starts to push him away. For a moment, Lan Zhan fears he may have hurt Wei Ying, but when he sees the hungry look in the other boy’s eyes, that worry fades away in an instant.

“Lan Zhan, can I ride you?” Wei Wuxian’s eyes are blown wide. “Please? I wanna make you feel good, too.”

Under Wei Ying’s spell, Lan Zhan is helpless in the face of anything the other boy could ever ask him. Wei Ying could ask him to set his entire physical media collection on fire and he would; lying on his back and letting Wei Ying give him everything he has is the easiest request to fulfill in the world. 

Obediently, Lan Wangji settles into place, his dick standing tall and proud as Wei Ying straddles over his lap. Wei Ying has to tilt his neck awkwardly to keep his head from hitting the roof of the car, but he looks like a dream-come-true all the same. He takes Lan Zhan’s cock in hand, then eases himself onto it slowly but surely.

Being inside Wei Ying at this angle feels like a revelation; he will never be able to see the world the same way as he does now, not after having experienced this glimpse of true joy, true beauty, true elation.

“You’re so beautiful…” Lan Wangji groans as Wei Ying’s hips roll. In his trance, Lan Zhan slowly raises his hands and runs them all over Wei Ying’s body, focusing especially on the region from flank to hip. “So perfect, Wei Ying…”

At the praise, Wei Ying tosses his head back and sighs; he starts lifting his hips to bounce on Lan Wangji’s cock with purpose. If he were watching from the outside, Lan Zhan is certain he would see the two of them rocking the car with every movement.

Somehow, Wei Ying feels even tighter at this angle, and the fact that Lan Zhan can only lie there and take it drives him utterly insane. He desperately wants to flip Wei Ying back over, to take control and pound into Wei Ying until the two of them are completely insensate. At the same time, he never wants to see anything other than the sight before him — Wei Ying lit from within with pleasure, bouncing wantonly on Lan Zhan’s cock as he chases his high, shimmering under a sheen of sweat — again.

“Fuck… Wei YING…” Lan Zhan moans when Wei Ying clenches down even tighter around him; he’s not going to be able to take this much longer. Lan Zhan’s breathing grows more rapid every time Wei Ying’s plush ass meets his hipbones. It’s so good, too good. “Wei Ying, please… I’m not going to last…”

“Lan Zhan…” Wei Ying sobs as Lan Zhan, against his own will, bucks up into Wei Ying. “I’m— I’m not sure how much more I can take. Fuck!”

In a frenzy, Wei Ying folds over onto Lan Zhan’s chest, kissing and biting at Lan Zhan’s neck, pulling off most of the way in the process. Lan Zhan’s hips chase after Wei Ying, desperately ramming in as deep as he can; it’s not enough. The pressure keeps building and building in his gut; Lan Zhan can’t take it anymore.

With all his strength, Lan Zhan wraps his arms tightly around WeI Ying, protecting his head when he flips their positions around, pressing Wei Ying back into the quilt. Lan Zhan sits back on his heels, dragging Wei Ying’s hips with him. Shifting into a kneeling position, he holds Wei Ying’s hips in the air and drives in again, and again, and again while Wei Ying’s screams echo around the car.

The new range of motion makes it so easy to just take, take, take what he wants, and Wei Ying is so pliant for him in his arms. Lan Zhan wishes he could stay in a stasis like this, just fucking Wei Ying, forever.

“I’m— I’m so close, Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying wails. Lan Zhan feels the familiar pressure building up in his gut again, the change in position only a temporary abatement of the inevitable. 

“Me too…” Lan Zhan pounds relentlessly; Wei Ying’s body feels like home; he never wants to leave. “So close…”

“I want you to come,” Wei Ying whines, tears streaming down his face beautifully. “I want you to come so bad…”

“I want to make you come…” Lan Zhan pants desperately. We Ying lets out a high-pitched noise that Lan Zhan will hear in every dream he has for the rest of his life.

“I’ll come when you come.” Wei Ying gives Lan Zhan a dark, determined look. “Don’t stop until you come, come in me, fuck! Come in me!”

At Wei Ying’s command, Lan Zhan releases any last scrap of restraint he has and hammers into Wei Ying with everything that he has. He thrusts nonstop into that sweet, tight heat until his soul leaves his body, coming inside Wei Ying in a gush that feels endless. When Lan Zhan comes, Wei Ying finds his release as well, his come spurting all over both their stomachs. 

With deep, panting breaths, Lan Zhan collapses on top of Wei Ying, fencing the other boy’s body in between his arms. With his chest pressed against Wei Ying’s, he can feel both their hearts beating rabbit-quick. 

“I hope you know that I’m never going to let you go, Lan Zhan.” Wei Ying murmurs into his ear.

It’s almost too good to be real, but as Wei Ying gently rubs Lan Zhan’s sweaty back, Lan Zhan knows that it’s real, and that he’s going to do everything he can to hold onto it for the rest of his life.

“Neither will I, Wei Ying.” Lan Zhan closes his eyes, breathing Wei Ying in.

🎇🎇🎇

For a while, the two of them just lay there, basking in post-orgasm bliss together; Lan Zhan pressing soft kisses onto Wei Ying’s neck while Wei Ying traced shapes onto his back. Eventually, they started feeling cold and sticky, and needed to remedy that as soon as possible. 

After getting cleaned up, Lan Zhan and Wei Ying bust out the 7/11 snacks, wrap themselves up in the extra blankets, and cuddle in the trunk. Wei Ying is tucked under Lan Zhan’s arm, one of his long legs thrown carelessly across Lan Zhan’s body. With his free hand, Lan Zhan reaches into a bag of Takis and feeds one to Wei Ying.

Spicy snacks have never been his thing — he would lick a bus seat before he’d put a Flaming Hot Cheeto in his mouth — but Lan Zhan doesn’t mind as much when it means that Wei Ying licks the artificially-flavored dust off his fingertips. There’s no reason for it to be so erotic when Wei Ying delicately suckles on Lan Zhan’s fingers for Taki dust, and yet…

It makes Lan Zhan’s dick perk up with enthusiasm, to say the least.

With his leg strewn across Lan Zhan’s lap, Wei Ying feels the minute twitch and laughs.

“Lan Zhan, I think if we try to go again tonight, I’ll never be able to walk again.” Wei Ying huffs out a laugh, his breath tickling the skin on Lan Zhan’s chest in little puffs. Lan Zhan throws his arm around Wei Ying, pulling him in tight to his chest and squeezing him closer.

“Mn. Next time.” He says, peeking down to catch a glimpse of Wei Ying’s precious face. Wei Ying flushes the prettiest shade of pink; Lan Zhan is eager to discover what he thought about to earn such a reaction, and then to make it a reality the next chance they have to be intimate.

The CRV’s windows are irrevocably fogged up; it looks like it came straight out of Titanic (1997). Since coming down from their orgasm, Lan Zhan and Wei Ying settled into a content sense of quiet, only exchanging a handful of words at a time. Were it not for the fact that they’d surely get caught (and also the late-night winter chill), Lan Zhan would be tempted to sleep in the trunk with Wei Ying wrapped up in his embrace.

“Lan Zhan?” Wei Ying’s voice is soft, careful. “What are you hoping to do for like, college and stuff?”

“I applied for an early decision admission to Chapman University, out in California.” Lan Zhan’s heart skips slightly. His stomach lurches when it occurs to him that Wei Ying may wind up on the other side of the country from him in a few months. It terrifies him to think that as soon as he’s connected with Wei Ying, he could lose him. “If I am accepted, that is where I’ll be.”

“Wait, I’m trying to go to Chapman, too!” Wei Ying perks up. “I’m planning on majoring in Creative Writing, and I’m hoping to double-minor in Business of Entertainment and Creative and Cultural Industries! It’s like, my number one pick.”

The anxiety Lan Zhan felt is quickly replaced with glee. “I plan on double-majoring. Film and Television Production along with English.”

“Are we going to be a pair of baristas in Los Angeles after we graduate?” Wei Ying’s eyes twinkle with mirth. “Putting the ‘B.A.’ in ‘barista?’”

“My uncle would likely think so.” Lan Zhan can’t stop himself from smiling. He pulls Wei Ying fully on top of him. “Wei Ying will have an entertainment business degree though, so at least one of us can probably get a job with health insurance benefits.”

Wei Ying squeals at his teasing; Lan Zhan rarely feels playful, but with his skin pressed to Wei Ying’s, the urge to be Wei Ying’s personal jester is overwhelming. Lan Zhan’s hands wander over Wei Ying’s torso.

“Are you ticklish, Wei Ying?” Lan Zhan breathes into Wei Ying’s ear, making him shudder.

Wei Ying tries to escape his hold, rolling off Lan Zhan. Lan Zhan takes that for a “yes,” and begins tickling all over Wei Ying’s torso, seeking out the most sensitive spots. Right at Wei Ying’s waistline, he finds what seems to be the most ticklish place and unleashes a barrage of attention to it, making Wei Ying shriek and contort into different shapes, trying to free himself through a fit of giggles. 

Eventually, Wei Ying whips Lan Zhan in the face with his hair and manages to distract him long enough to turn the tables. Lan Zhan quickly finds himself flipped onto his back, his wrists held down in Wei Ying’s hands, Wei Ying’s thighs squeezing him tightly. Even though more and more layers of Wei Ying have been peeled away throught the course of the night, his beauty still catches Lan Zhan off guard at times. Looking up at Wei Ying, straddling his lap, he wants nothing more than to slide back into Wei Ying and start all over again.

Wei Ying must see the hungry look in his eyes; he begins to shake with laughter.

“Lan Zhan, you animal!” He giggles, generously freeing Lan Zhan’s hands so he can caress Wei Ying’s body some more. “If I had it in me to ride you all the way to next week, I would.”

“Mnn…” Lan Zhan closes his eyes and sighs deeply when he squeezes Wei Ying’s perfect ass. He wishes that it was humanly possible for him to just… fuck Wei Ying forever. But alas, food, drink, hygiene, employment, SLEEP, and so on necessitated breaks. Maybe one day they’d both have the stamina for that. He pulls Wei Ying in close, coaxing the other boy to relax on top of Lan Wangji.

Lan Zhan gently runs his fingers through Wei Ying’s silky hair, ruminating on all the plans that revealed themselves to him the moment Wei Ying returned his feelings. He has a stack of mix CDs he burned sitting in his bedroom for Wei Ying that he was perpetually too cowardly to give him that he’ll have to parcel out over the coming months, for one. Should he do the Radiohead-heavy mix first, or go all-in on giving Wei Ying the Cranberries-heavy mix first? Much to think about.

There are so many movies he would love to watch with Wei Ying, too — ACTUALLY watch, not just throw on in the background while they make out or have sex. He wants to see all of Wei Ying’s favorites; even if they’re garbage, he’ll give them a chance to try to see them how Wei Ying sees them. That said, there are a lot of movies he wouldn’t mind having on in the background while having sex with Wei Ying, but he still wants to understand Wei Ying’s tastes, and be understood in return.

Then, he has quite the litany of songs written for and about Wei Ying. While the thought of vulnerably showing off his most treasured artistic work is terrifying, he wants Wei Ying to hear the music that he elicited from Lan Zhan with a fierce desperation.

And they’d have prom in a few months! Lan Zhan had zero intention of going, unless Luo Qingyang were to invoke the “it’s formal season and I have no bitches” clause in their friendship contract. The thought of sitting on the sidelines and watching Wei Ying dance with someone else to terrible pop music was torturous, but it has now been relegated to the slot of a nightmare that will never come to pass in Lan Zhan’s psyche. Lan Xichen will be thrilled; he’s been dropping not-so-subtle hints about how attending one’s senior prom is a “milestone” that Lan Zhan would “regret missing when he’s older.” Xichen is going to lose his shit when he finds out that Lan Zhan found a boyfriend…

…Would a promise ring be too gauche?

“Aw, Lan Zhan… are you sleepy?” Wei Ying nuzzles into the crook of his neck. Lan Zhan was so caught up in his thoughts of the coming months, he didn’t notice that he’s been drifting off.

“Not sleepy.” Lan Zhan replies (sleepily). He can’t really open his eyes, but he doesn’t want this night to end.

“I don’t imagine you’re usually up this late, huh?” Wei Ying asks.

“...No…” In Lan Zhan’s sleepiness, the answer comes out sounding a little childish. “I don’t want to go home. Want to stay with Wei Ying.”

“Aw, Lan Zhan!” Lan Zhan can hear Wei Ying’s smile from his voice alone. “You’re really precious, you know. I always thought that the whole ‘strong, silent, brooding type’ thing that you have going on was hot, but I really like how cute you can get.”

Lan Zhan struggles to open his eyes. He knows that they cannot fall asleep in the nature preserve’s parking lot. Wei Ying seems to see his struggle to wake up as something terribly entertaining, and he cracks up with laughter.

“I’m sorry, Lan Zhan!” He wheezes. “You’re just… You look so grumpy. Like the whole world is responsible for the fact that you can’t be asleep in bed right now.”

Lan Zhan’s eyebrow quirks up in response.

“Who would you say is responsible for that, then?” He asks.

Wei Ying smacks a quick kiss on his lips.

“You, for ravishing me for god-knows how long,” He smirks. “So, will you take responsibility, Lan Zhan?”

“I will.” Lan Zhan leans in and kisses him tenderly on the lips. “Of course I will.”

The smile that greets him when he pulls away is blinding; weeks ago, Lan Zhan had wondered what it would be like to receive one of Wei Ying’s stunning smiles. Now, he never has to wonder again; he’s getting the greatest smiles Wei Ying has to give.

As much as they both want to stay in this golden moment forever, the chill of the night is starting to get to them, and they both know that they have to go home eventually. 

With great reluctance, Lan Zhan pulls on his underwear and starts to get dressed. Wei Ying follows suit, and without a word, they head to the front seats and get the car started. As Lan Zhan cranks the defroster, Wei Ying walks him through the directions to get to his home.

Eventually, they pull out of the nature preserve and hit the road.

“Would you maybe… want to sleep over?” Wei Ying asks him gently. “I mean… it’s really late, I know I’d feel bad keeping you out on the road at such a late hour…”

Lan Zhan’s ears flush pink. He’s accepted that he’ll never have any sort of defense from Wei Ying’s charms.

“If your parents would be okay with that, I would love to.” He says diplomatically. The ravenous, greedy part of him wants to snatch up the opportunity and shake it like a dog with a new toy. The measured, forward-thinking side of him is desperately reminding that other side that the first impression Wei Ying’s family will receive of him will be of him coming out of Wei Ying’s room, with their son covered in hickeys. He doesn’t regret giving Wei Ying so many hickeys, but he does regret not considering that perhaps he’d be meeting his future in-laws so soon after giving them.

“My dad might try to kill you.” Wei Ying sighs. “But my mom is gonna love you…”

“Perhaps your father and my uncle can team up and take turns killing me.” Lan Zhan says, making Wei Ying bark out a laugh. “My uncle will be furious with me for staying out so late.”

“Are you sure that you should stay over, then?” Wei Ying’s expression grows grim. “I’d hate to cause trouble for you with your family.”

Lan Zhan reaches over and takes one of Wei Ying’s hands, giving it a squeeze. It’s remarkable how quickly they’ve adjusted to being able to express affection with each other.

“Don’t worry about that, Wei Ying.” Lan Zhan strokes his thumb against Wei Ying’s knuckles to reassure him. “I’m long overdue for a little trouble. I think he will be relieved, after the initial worry is gone.”

Wei Ying’s smile quickly returns, anxiety completely washed away.

“Okay.” He says. “Come to bed with me, Lan Zhan.”

“Mn.” Lan Zhan effortlessly agrees. He would go anywhere with Wei Ying, even if he won’t say it out loud just yet.

As they drive off into the night, a sense of calm permeates the atmosphere. Both their lives changed drastically in the span of a few hours, and the future they’re staring down is as bright as Wei Ying’s best smiles.