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When Jiang Cheng steps into their room, his eyes immediately fall onto the table. It is covered with a cloth, clearly hiding something underneath and Jiang Cheng turns towards Lan Xichen, who has clearly been waiting for him.
“I would ask if a feast was waiting for me, prepared by my loving husband, but I do remember that you have been banned from the kitchen,” he says and like always, the mention of Lan Xichen’s absolute inability in the kitchen makes him blush.
Jiang Cheng might mention it more often than it probably warrants, just to see the faint red spread so lovely over Lan Xichen’s face.
“It’s not a feast,” Lan Xichen admits and then gently steers Jiang Cheng towards the table. “It’s a gift.”
“A gift,” Jiang Cheng tonelessly repeats, because he still remembers the last time one of them gave a gift. Maybe Lan Xichen needs reminding. “You do remember the last time I gave you a gift? It ended with both of us crying.”
“Because you really shouldn’t have. I appreciate it, but Zidian is yours.”
“And it still is. You can just use it as well, if the need should ever arise,” Jiang Cheng reminds him and Lan Xichen sighs.
“How could I ever forget,” he says as he presses a kiss so Jiang Cheng’s cheek. “But it doesn’t change the fact that I have a gift for you as well.”
“And you think all that stuff you said isn’t true for me, too?” Jiang Cheng asks and leans further into Lan Xichen’s side. “You have already given me everything I could ever want and need.”
“You surprised me with something I didn’t know you still had left to give. Maybe it’s the same here?” Lan Xichen tries and now Jiang Cheng is intrigued.
“Fine. A gift then,” he agrees and Lan Xichen hides his smile in Jiang Cheng’s hair.
They both know that Jiang Cheng has always been more curious than Lan Xichen; Lan Xichen damn well knows that if he would now agree to take the gift back and never speak of it again, it would kill Jiang Cheng.
“Go on,” Lan Xichen gently says and gives Jiang Cheng a slight push. “Reveal it,” he urges him on and Jiang Cheng does so with one last curious look back at him.
When he takes the cloth away, revealing the gift underneath it, he simply stares at the guqin on the table before he turns betrayed eyes on Lan Xichen. Who clearly is trying not to laugh at him.
“You do remember that I don’t play, right?” Jiang Cheng wants to know and he shudders with the memory of Lan Xichen trying to teach Jiang Cheng how to play the guqin.
Jiang Cheng believes it was a very similar situation to when he tried to teach Lan Xichen in the kitchen. No matter what he did or how well he instructed him, the end result was always inedible.
Just like the noise he managed to wrangle out of Lan Xichen’s guqin, or his xiao for that matter, were torture on the ears. Jiang Cheng didn’t have a musical bone in his body, and they had both agreed that maybe it was best to let Lan Xichen do the playing. Just like Jiang Cheng did the cooking.
“By the gods, yes,” Lan Xichen says with a small smile and then comes closer to hug Jiang Cheng from behind, resting his chin on his shoulder and looking down on the guqin on the table.
“It’s more of a symbolic gift,” he belatedly tacks on and Jiang Cheng slaps Lan Xichen’s hands on his stomach.
“Maybe start with that first next time, instead of giving me a heart attack,” he chides and then leans fully back into Lan Xichen. “What’s symbolic about this?” he wants to know.
“It’s my father’s guqin,” Lan Xichen whispers, and Jiang Cheng immediately tenses in his arms.
Lan Xichen never talks about his father. Mentions of his mother are rare; Jiang Cheng knows just enough about her to piece together that she loved her sons, despite what their father had done to her.
He knows nothing about Lan Xichen’s father, expect that Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji saw him even more rarely than they did their mother.
“Okay?” Jiang Cheng softly gives back, now leaning into Lan Xichen to offer him some support if he needs it and Lan Xichen tightens his grip on him.
“It’s for me to play,” Lan Xichen says, and Jiang Cheng cannot quite follow him, but he lets him speak. “And for you to only hear.”
“I can do that,” Jiang Cheng agrees and tilts his head to press a kiss to Lan Xichen’s cheek. “Now tell me why.”
Lan Xichen takes a deep breath before he hides his face in Jiang Cheng’s neck.
“My father,” he says, voice all muffled, but Jiang Cheng can still hear how emotional he is, “he never played for my mother. And it’s not right, in a wedded pair. Music is a big part of who we are, as cultivators and people.”
Jiang Cheng nods encouragingly at that, because he has noticed that too. Every single Lan disciple he ever met could play at least one instrument, usually even two. They used it to fight, to communicate with spirits, but also to express themselves.
And Jiang Cheng knows that if Lan Xichen hasn’t played for a day, he gets restless, his fingers itching and his temper rising slightly. Usually not enough for outsiders to notice, but Jiang Cheng knows Lan Xichen like the back of his hands.
He can tell when he’s unsettled. Usually, a pointed look at the guqin is enough to remind him to take a few minutes for himself, play something to calm down again.
“It’s how we express our love, too,” Lan Xichen goes on and Jiang Cheng smiles, because he knows that as well.
Lan Xichen is never shy about telling Jiang Cheng that he loves him, not like Jiang Cheng still is sometimes, but whenever he plays for Jiang Cheng, he can feel that Lan Xichen loves him. It’s in every note he coaxes out of the instrument.
And Jiang Cheng still remembers the song Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian play together all the time now. Lan Xichen told him that Lan Wangji wrote it for them, a love song tailored perfectly to them, and it makes sense, with how the Lan’s express themselves.
“I know you love me,” Jiang Cheng softly tells Lan Xichen who huffs into his skin.
“I know that,” Lan Xichen replies and he lifts his head again, to look at the instrument once more. “But my mother never knew if my father loved her, because he didn’t play for her. Not once. I want to do better than my father. I want you to know, always, that I love you.”
Jiang Cheng turns around in Lan Xichen’s arms to hug him properly, and he isn’t surprised when Lan Xichen clings to him.
“We really are good with the emotional gifts, aren’t we?” Jiang Cheng mutters into Lan Xichen’s chest, and feels him laugh, more than he hears him.
“It’s just fair, for me to give something to you too, isn’t it?”
“That’s not why I did it and you know it,” Jiang Cheng immediately says and Lan Xichen presses a kiss to his hair.
“It’s not why I did this either,” Lan Xichen reassures him and then sighs. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while, to be honest. And it was your bravery in giving me Zidian, that convinced me to finally do this,” he admits and Jiang Cheng pulls him into a kiss.
“There’s actually a second part to this,” Lan Xichen pants when they part again and Jiang Cheng puts a bit of distance between them.
“Xichen!”
“You didn’t let me finish,” Lan Xichen shrugs and then tugs Jiang Cheng over to the table, pushing him down, before he takes a seat himself. “Let me play for you,” he then says.
Jiang Cheng leans against his side; they have long ago found a position that works for both of them. It allows Lan Xichen to play freely, and Jiang Cheng to be close to his husband, and it’s easy, now, for Jiang Cheng to slide into that position.
Lan Xichen gives him a small smile before he splays his hands over the instrument.
When he plucks the first few notes out of it, Jiang Cheng immediately knows that it’s not a song he heard before. Lan Xichen plays for him regularly enough that Jiang Cheng is sure he knows all his songs by now.
Jiang Cheng closes his eyes as he rests his head on Lan Xichen’s shoulder, listening intently to the song that Lan Xichen’s clever finger weave around them. It’s a beautiful piece, and Jiang Cheng doesn’t wipe away the tears it brings out.
He knows what this is.
It isn’t until the last note fades that he quickly slides into Lan Xichen’s lap, only to find his husband crying, too.
“You wrote a song for us,” Jiang Cheng mutters as he frames Lan Xichen’s face in his hands, kissing away the tears that continue to fall.
“Because I love you,” Lan Xichen replies and catches Jiang Cheng’s wrists in his. “And I want the world to know.”
“No,” Jiang Cheng decisively says and Lan Xichen stares in confusion at him.
“No?”
“No,” Jiang Cheng repeats. “The world knows that you love me; they saw it during our marriage and they see it every day you spend by my side. This, this is just for me.”
Lan Xichen laughs at that, and he nuzzles Jiang Cheng’s face, peppers kisses down the side of his cheek.
“Alright, if you say so.”
“I do,” Jiang Cheng decides and then slides out of Lan Xichen’s lap. “Play it again for me?”
“Always, my heart,” Lan Xichen says and immediately puts his hands back on the guqin.
Jiang Cheng wishes he could hold Lan Xichen’s hand during this, but he has to content himself with pressing closer into his side and playing with his hair. This time he doesn’t close his eyes, instead he watches Lan Xichen play it, and it makes the whole experience that much more intense.
“Again,” he demands when Lan Xichen finishes it and Lan Xichen laughs, before he turns towards Jiang Cheng.
“You’re insatiable, aren’t you?”
“You wrote me a love song, a song about us, and you expect me to be content after just listening to it twice?”
“I will play it for you for the rest of our lives, my heart,” Lan Xichen reassures him and brushes a soft kiss over Jiang Cheng’s lips. “Every day.”
“You better mean that,” Jiang Cheng threatens him. “Every day.”
“How could I not tell you I love you every day?” Lan Xichen wants to know and Jiang Cheng pulls him into another kiss.
Jiang Cheng doesn’t let him play it again, that day, too busy showing Lan Xichen just how much he loves him in return, but the promise isn’t forgotten.
And it’s also never broken.