Chapter Text
His first thought is that Lan Zhan looks different.
His second thought is that Lan Zhan looks the same.
Wei Wuxian is frozen where he stands and the world is fading away around him. He should be moving. He should be gathering his shit but it’s been years and Lan Zhan is just right there. Wei Wuxian feels like the weight of the world has settled on his chest. He can’t breathe. Ice shards of fear are collecting in his lungs and he can’t fucking breathe because he wasn’t supposed to see Lan Zhan. There was some sort of plan he thinks. He had a plan but…god for the life of him, Wei Wuxian can’t think of a single thing right now.
Well that’s a lie. His treacherous brain is thinking of a lot of things.
Warm hands holding him around the waist. The rise and fall of a chest pressed tight against his own. His face buried in the crook of his beloved’s neck as the sound of a deep chuckle resonates against his ear. Two bodies; quietly swaying, breathing together in a shared sigh of relief.
Wei Wuxian’s words coming out breathy and light, “What’s so funny?”
The feeling of running his fingers through silky strands as he strokes his beloved’s hair. His left hand coming up to gather the perfect locks that smell like a forest after rain.
A moment that is quiet and full. Then; “I am just very happy.”
Hands pulling tighter around his waist. A kiss pressing against his temple, then his eyebrow, down to his eye –
It was never going to work.
Wei Wuxian knows this now. He’s had years to think about it. How it all went wrong. See, it was that kind of love. It was that kind of gooey, puppy love that makes onlookers turn up their chins in disgust and old couples sigh in wistfulness. A blazing first love. The kind where you don’t know where you end and the other person begins. The kind where every breath they take is a breath you take. Where their triumphs are your dazzling victories and their sadness completely destroys you. The kind of love that people have been setting to song for as long as humans have existed. It wasn’t realistic. It wasn’t sustainable. It wasn’t particularly healthy, but god…god…he loved him. He fucking loved him with everything he had and then it ended and Wei Wuxian still hurts.
A part of him is still angry, roiling from the hurt. Still trying to find blame, to find fault. Accusations rise in his mind. An old rage that dances to the tune of how could you and you bastard, you said you’d never leave me. Most of him is just exhausted and afraid.
Wei Wuxian knows better. He knows he shouldn’t engage. That the part of his life he gave to Lan Zhan is over now. He should have looked away immediately. He shouldn’t be staring at a stranger he used to love.
But, well…Wei Wuxian isn’t exactly known for making the best decisions and he knows something else too.
He knows that somewhere deep down, somewhere so very far down in the deep ocean of his consciousness; there is part of him that still longs. That part is abused, nearly extinguished by the force of Wei Wuxian’s resolve. But that part is also much too loud. Shouting at him. Telling him to run to Lan Zhan. To see if – even after all this time – Lan Zhan would still drop everything to catch him.
It’s exhausting. It’s a nightmare. Wei Wuxian needs to get away right fucking now before he does something irrevocably stupid like actually approach Lan Zhan to see if his hair still smells like a forest in the rain. Fucking brilliant Wei Wuxian, he thinks. Go up to the man and ask “hey we haven’t talked in some four odd years, but do you still use that shampoo that makes your hair smell like damp pine trees?”
He kind of feels like crying which is just…absolutely ridiculous. Lan Zhan isn’t doing anything but looking right back at him. The urge to say something is growing like an itch and Wei Wuxian feels trapped. He grasps around in his limited awareness for anything. Any distraction. He uses every ounce of his resolve and tries to break through his stupor. He’s meant to be doing something. There’s a reason he’s here.
Right. Fuck. The concert. The bell.
Wei Wuxian looks away first. A small, exceedingly petty part of him that he is not at all proud of claims this as a personal victory. He feels off-balance. Disoriented in the way he imagines coming down from a high must feel like.
He looks down at the flute in his hands. He looks down at the white-knuckle death grip he is currently exerting over said flute. His wills his hands into relaxing. This is insane, he thinks. But it’s nothing I can’t handle.
With new resolve Wei Wuxian turns around, closes his case and grabs his flute and music. He makes his feet carry him to the stage left entrance where he’s greeted with the sound of nearly a hundred musicians playing through passages. He lets out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding.
He begins to make his way to his seat. He avoids the cello section altogether, somehow maneuvering to the center of the orchestra without bumping against too many chairs and stands. Finally, he arrives at the head of the flute section, a hand-written placard declaring his seat. He shakes himself. This is an opportunity that comes once in a lifetime. He will not squander it because someone he used to know is sitting seventeen seats down stage and to the right. He is a professional musician who showed up to play a concert. Tonight, he is Wei Fucking Wuxian, Principal Flutist of Gusu Symphony Orchestra. He is a self-made musician who traveled across Europe to make a name for himself. He is older and wiser and a better performer than he has ever been. He is a credit to young, dumb Asians everywhere who dream of making it in the music world. He is…
…an absolute fucking idiot who forgot his water bottle backstage.
Shit.
He could go without it. As far as symphonies go Tchaikovsky’s 5th is on the shorter side. He could try and make it through but…the second movement is literally just woodwinds and he’s meant to be carrying his section tonight. He looks around. There are still plenty of empty seats and numerous stragglers stepping carefully in between ill-placed stands. If he hurries, he could make it backstage and back to his seat in time, but he has to leave right now.
Good god, he thinks. The concert hasn’t even started and I'm already a mess. What a night.
He stands, the woman seated next to him gives him a curious look that he ignores as he ambles his way back to the stage entrance. He’s careful but quick. He is rushing slightly. In hindsight, he should have seen this coming. He’s clumsy on a good day and right now he’s a little out of his mind. He’s trying to avoid crashing into the nearest harp player when he steps directly onto someone’s outstretched foot.
He gives a yelp and suddenly he’s falling forwards. He’s lost all footing and his front is about to meet the floor. He flails his arms out in a desperate attempt to catch himself and try not to take all the surrounding stands with him. He braces himself. He hopes the ground below actually swallows him up this time. He’s falling and falling until suddenly, he’s not.
Actually, he isn’t anywhere close to the ground when he is stopped. Somewhere during this ordeal his eyes closed and when he opens them now, he sees a pressed black shirt tucked into pristine black slacks. The whole outfit looks like it’s just been ironed. Wei Wuxian wants to laugh because who the fuck irons their concert attire. He feels a hand just under his armpit supporting him. He’s about to thank his heroic savior when he smells it.
The smell of a forest after rainfall.
Wei Wuxian is going to die.
The gears of Wei Wuxian’s brain come to a grinding halt. This cannot be happening. These things don’t just happen. Wei Wuxian wonders what the hell he did in his past life to deserve this. It’s really funny actually. The world’s cruelest joke. To be mere inches away from Lan Zhan like the past four years haven’t happened. Like Lan Zhan isn’t the reason he hasn’t been able to date since they parted. Like if they had never broken up, him tripping could have easily been an excuse to land himself right into Lan Zhan’s arms.
Wei Wuxian knows that the tiny-stupid-loud part of his mind is screaming at him. Screeching that he wished for this. That if he really looked, he might-have-just-maybe wanted this to happen. Lucky for him, he’s had years of practice at ignoring that part.
While Wei Wuxian’s brain has been stuck in a stand-still, Lan Zhan’s hand has been steady in its grip of his upper arm. When the realization that Lan Zhan is not only three inches away from him, but actually touching him, he struggles to stand up properly.
Too many words lodge in his throat. Dumb things rise to his mind like it’s you and how have you been and do you ever still think about me. He somehow hadn’t noticed before but Lan Zhan’s black attire is indeed pressed and ironed. Matching blacks that serve to accentuate his skinny torso and long legs. Wei Wuxian has always thought Lan Zhan looked good in black. Even if the other man had preferred softer hues. Now, Wei Wuxian thinks that Lan Zhan looks good. Really good. Beautiful, his stupid-too loud-mind supplies.
He should say something. He opens his mouth.
“Ah…s..sorry.”
Eloquent. Nice job Wei Wuxian. The first time he talks to this man in four years and he sounds like an idiot. He pours his nervous energy into making his mouth work better.
He coughs. “Yeah, sorry about that. Thanks. I should have been looking where I was going but you know, pre-concert jitters and everything, ha! They say bananas help with that. If you ask me, if admin really cared about us mere musicians, they ought to provide bananas on every seat instead of nametags because you know it’s more um…a-peeling. Um.” Shit. Fuck. Did he just make a fucking pun about a banana?!?
He takes a breath. He does the equivalent of a mental slap and he tries again. “Sorry. I need to get something backstage. Excuse me.” He hasn’t quite been able to meet Lan Zhan’s eyes during this admittedly awkward exchange. He makes to dislodge himself. To move around Lan Zhan and escape to the darkness of the backstage area.
He takes a step, but the hand around his arm doesn’t budge. Um. What? Did Lan Zhan forget he’s still holding on to me?
He finally looks up. He meets golden eyes for the second time that night. Oh boy.
Lan Zhan is looking back at him like that. In that way that conveys nothing. Like how Wei Wuxian remembers Lan Zhan looks at other people. The way he looks at strangers.
Wei Wuxian gulps. His gut feels like it’s on fire. He’s about to say something like please let me go now, when Lan Zhan actually speaks.
“For you.” The words are accompanied by his other hand bringing something into view.
It’s a black cylinder, faded and scratched along the edges. There’s an ancient sticker that reads “the flutes of your labor” on the front. On the side, written in silver sharpie, the words “Property of Wei Wuxian” jump out of him. It’s his water bottle.
Lan Zhan has brought him his water bottle. The water bottle he left offstage in his haste to get away from Lan Zhan.
Wei Wuxian is confused.
“Oh. Um…well. Okay. Wow.” Wei Wuxian feels like gravity has reversed itself. Is he floating right now? Lan Zhan, his ex-boyfriend who he hasn’t talked to in years – who basically just prevented him from becoming a six-foot long stain on the stage floor – was actually already on his way to him with his forgotten water bottle.
A thousand questions are firing like paintball pellets in his brain. It’s actually mostly just one question; what the absolute fuck is happening right now?
Wei Wuxian had a plan for tonight. It seems that Lan Zhan also had a plan for tonight. It also seems that Lan Zhan’s plan might just be the exact opposite of his plan.Wei Wuxian is starting to feel like tonight might actually not go well at all.