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Jiang Cheng is sitting in Headmaster Lan Qiren’s office and he really wishes he could be anywhere else.
“Are you in pain?” Lan Qiren asks him and Jiang Cheng looks down at his bandaged wrists.
The nurse thinks it’s broken, so she recommended a trip to the hospital to get it checked out even though she already bandaged it and Jiang Cheng is just waiting for his parents to pick him up.
Or at least Lan Qiren is waiting for that.
Jiang Cheng knows better than to expect them to come for him.
“It’s okay,” Jiang Cheng says, even though it’s still throbbing painfully.
Lan Qiren seems to be able to look right through him, because he gets up and hands Jiang Cheng another cold compress. Jiang Cheng doesn’t even know where he got it from, but he gratefully takes it anyway.
“You should speak the truth if you are in discomfort or pain,” Lan Qiren chastises him as he sits back down and Jiang Cheng shrugs.
It’s not like people in his household usually care much if he’s hurt or not, his siblings not counting.
And speaking of siblings—
“Where’s Wei Wuxian?” Jiang Cheng asks and he thinks that he can see a vein throb on Lan Qiren’s temple.
“That hellion ran away after what he did,” Lan Qiren presses out and Jiang Cheng is just about to protest, because there was a whole gang of Jin’s after him, when Lan Qiren pinches the bridge of his nose. “And it was probably the smart thing to do as well,” he sighs. “Still, he’ll have to come in eventually and I’ll have to punish him for what he did.”
Jiang Cheng would protest that as well—Wei Wuxian was only defending him after all, and he was not the first one to throw a punch—but Jin Zixun has been kicked out of the school, so whatever punishment Wei Wuxian will get, it will probably be a lot better than that.
“Thank you for kicking Jin Zixun out,” Jiang Cheng mutters and Lan Qiren levels him with a look.
“He attacked three different students, was entirely disrespectful towards your sister and your brother, seriously injured you, threatened your family and broke so many rules that I won’t bother reciting them all now. Of course I wouldn’t tolerate that.”
“And Wei Wuxian—?” Jiang Cheng dares to ask, because Lan Qiren seems to be in a talkative mood at the moment.
“As much as I don’t like him and his insolvent behaviour I have to admit that it was good of him to stand up for you and Jiang Yanli. He certainly has the right values, unlike other people in this school,” Lan Qiren spits out and it’s no secret that he holds no love for the Wen or Jin heirs.
“He’ll have to copy the rules,” Lan Qiren says after a moment of deliberation and Jiang Cheng raises his eyebrow.
That seems like a very lenient punishment, especially coming from Lan Qiren.
“I guess Wangji will have to oversee it,” Lan Qiren goes on and suddenly Jiang Cheng’s eyes burn.
Everyone in this school knows that Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian are so very desperately in love with each other and it must have reached Lan Qiren’s ears as well.
This is no punishment at all. It’s a reward.
And since Lan Qiren holds no love for Wei Wuxian this must be a reward for Wei Wuxian because he came to Jiang Cheng’s defence.
It’s like an unspoken secret that Lan Qiren holds a soft spot for Jiang Cheng, even though Jiang Cheng himself could never figure out why the hell that would be the truth, but it seems like everyone else was right. Jiang Cheng never dared to believe it, even when Lan Qiren checks in him personally at least once a week, and when Jiang Cheng’s parents forgot to pick him up, Jiang Cheng got to do his homework in Lan Qiren’s office.
Still, Jiang Cheng always thought he was just being a decent person to a sad, lost boy, but it seems like everyone was in fact right when they say that Jiang Cheng is Lan Qiren’s favourite.
“Thank you,” Jiang Cheng whispers and Lan Qiren strokes his goatee, clearly uncomfortable with Jiang Cheng’s expression of gratitude.
“Where are your parents?” he asks instead of letting the moment turn more awkward than it already way, and every warm feeling flees Jiang Cheng’s body.
He had called them from the infirmary, but he hadn’t reached them. Jiang Cheng suspects that they chose to ignore him, rather than missed his call, because he called both his parent’s work phones.
“I don’t know,” he admits. “I couldn’t reach them.”
“Are they at home?” Lan Qiren demands to know and Jiang Cheng shrugs.
He hasn’t seen either of his parents for the past few days, but he’s not going to mention that to Lan Qiren now.
“I think they are at work. There is some big deal going down if I’m not mistaken,” Jiang Cheng finally says and Lan Qiren nods, though he seems anything but happy about it.
“I see,” he says and then reaches for the phone.
It’s enough to startle Jiang Cheng into motion, because if Lan Qiren calls them then his parents will think Jiang Cheng did something wrong and he doesn’t want to hear their reaction to that.
“Please, don’t,” he says, before Lan Qiren can dial a number and he freezes in his movement.
“What?” he asks.
“Don’t call them. I can just go home by bus, it’s no problem,” Jiang Cheng desperately tries.
“You’re supposed to go to the hospital, not home,” Lan Qiren sternly tells him and then simply dials the number.
“They won’t come,” Jiang Cheng mutters, and Lan Qiren’s eyes snap to him.
“Headmaster Lan, what did Wei Wuxian do now?” Madam Yu’s voice rings out from the speaker and Jiang Cheng tries his best to melt into the seat.
“This is about your son,” Lan Qiren says and there’s a beat of silence.
“What did he do?” Madam Yu asks and whereas she sounded annoyed the first time, there’s real anger in her voice now.
“He got hurt,” Lan Qiren says with a frown and Madam Yu sighs.
“Is he alright?” she asks, and Jiang Cheng’s hand clenches around the cold compress.
His wrist hurts, and with his luck it’s more damaged than just bruised, and his mother is not going to care beyond the fact that he can’t work at his intern job in the company.
“His wrist got injured. A trip to the hospital is advisable,” Lan Qiren tells her.
“If it’s only his wrist, he can take the bus. My son is not so weak that he needs to be coddled. He can take care of himself. He better got that by beating someone else up,” Madam Yu says and Jiang Cheng wishes she would stop talking.
“Madam Yu!” Lan Qiren says in outrage but Madam Yu doesn’t seem to care that much.
“Is he there?” she asks and Lan Qiren expectantly looks at Jiang Cheng.
“Yes, mother,” he dutifully says.
“What happened?” she asks and Jiang Cheng tries to hide his wince but going by the twitch in Lan Qiren’s brow he doesn’t know how successful he is.
“Jin Zixun said something mean to Yanli so I tried to make him stop,” he sums it up and Jiang Cheng goes cold at the answering silence.
“And?” Madam Yu icily asks after a moment.
“And then Jin Zixun almost broke my wrist,” Jiang Cheng goes on.
“Wei Wuxian?” Madam Yu wants to know and Jiang Cheng shrinks even more in on himself.
“Came to my help.”
“Is he hurt?”
“Not that I know of,” Jiang Cheng says and he knows what’s coming next.
“Then you are not, either. I expect you at work later this afternoon,” Madam Yu says and Jiang Cheng hangs his head.
“Yes, mother,” he agrees and Madam Yu hangs up without another word.
There’s only the beeping sound for a horrible long time and then Lan Qiren lets out a long, long breath.
“Does that mean she’s not coming?” he then asks, voice carefully controlled and Jiang Cheng nods miserably.
“Your father?” Lan Qiren asks then and Jiang Cheng is quick to shake his head.
“He will go looking for Wei Wuxian, claiming that it’s more important since we know that I am fine, but the same can’t be said about Wei Wuxian,” Jiang Cheng predicts and is very grateful when Lan Qiren doesn’t pick up the phone to verify.
“Is it always like that?” Lan Qiren carefully asks and Jiang Cheng is very ashamed when he bursts into tears.
But it’s just all too much; the whole day has been a rollercoaster of emotions starting with the anger towards Jin Zixun and the adrenalin and then he got hurt and Wei Wuxian came to his rescue and now this whole mess.
Jiang Cheng doesn’t know how to handle any of this at all.
He startles badly when someone awkwardly pats his shoulder but when he realizes that it’s just Lan Qiren he almost leans into him. Jiang Cheng wonders which one of them feels more awkward about this, but he can’t bring himself to care, at least not right now.
“Jiang Wanyin, is it always like that?” Lan Qiren asks again and this time Jiang Cheng nods.
“I haven’t seen either of them for a couple of days. I know they are home sometimes, but mother goes to talk to Yanli and father goes to talk to Wei Wuxian and then there’s simply no time for me. Father would drop everything to search the whole town for Wei Wuxian but driving me to the hospital would be a chore. Caring for me is an obligation neither of them know how to handle, and by now I am not expecting anything anymore,” it bursts out of Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Cheng doesn’t get much for his position as an intern, but what he gets he saves. When he turns eighteen he’ll be out of his family home immediately and he doesn’t think his parents will notice for at least a week.
It’s a thought Jiang Cheng tries to push very far away.
Lan Qiren is very quiet at his side and Jiang Cheng is afraid to even look at him, too scared to see what his reaction is to that, so when Lan Qiren puts his hand more firmly on his shoulder, Jiang Cheng is startled.
“Get up, we’re driving to the hospital,” Lan Qiren says and Jiang Cheng is left staring after him, because immediately after his declaration Lan Qiren left the office, talking to his secretary.
Jiang Cheng isn’t entirely sure how he ended up in Lan Qiren’s car, but he’s there before he can gather a coherent thought.
“I wouldn’t want to impose,” Jiang Cheng says as Lan Qiren already starts the car and Lan Qiren silences him with a look.
That does nothing to Jiang Cheng. Madam Yu is his mother, he’s used to much worse.
“Really, you must be busy. There must be other things you need to do,” Jiang Cheng insists, but Lan Qiren shakes his head.
“There is nothing more important than making sure that you are alright, do you understand me?” he wants to know and Jiang Cheng has nothing else to say to that, so they spent the rest of the drive to the hospital in a tense silence.
Lan Qiren stays by his side through the whole examination and when the doctor asks Jiang Cheng if it’s okay to tell him the results in front of Lan Qiren who is neither a parent nor a guardian, Jiang Cheng simply nods.
Lan Qiren feels very much like both of these things in the moment and Jiang Cheng is not at all sure how to deal with that.
“Your wrist is broken,” the doctor tells him then and Jiang Cheng slumps, because of course it is.
Nothing can ever be easy for him.
They put a cast on his arm and then Jiang Cheng is back in Lan Qiren’s car, when Jiang Cheng’s phone rings.
He accepts the call when he sees that it’s Wei Wuxian.
“Where are you?” is the first thing Wei Wuxian asks him and Jiang Cheng snorts much to Lan Qiren’s dislike it seems.
“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” Jiang Cheng gives back but Wei Wuxian sounds worried and Jiang Cheng is not liking it.
“Listen, I managed to run away from the Jins but I had an encounter with Wen Chao,” Wei Wuxian says and Jiang Cheng winces.
Wen Chao is nothing more than a slimy bastard, but he always has Wen Zhuliu around and he’s a real piece of work.
“Are you alright?” Jiang Cheng asks, because of course Wei Wuxian would go straight from the fire into the frying pan.
“A little roughed up. Got a nice shiner. Do you think Lan Zhan will kiss it better?” Wei Wuxian asks and Jiang Cheng wonders if Lan Qiren will pop a vein with how angry he seems at hearing that.
“What do I care?” Jiang Cheng gives back, but if Wei Wuxian is hurt, he can guess where this is going.
“A-Cheng, I don’t think you should be coming home today,” Wei Wuxian says just on cue and of course.
His father thinks it’s Jiang Cheng’s fault Wei Wuxian got hurt, and his mother thinks the opposite, so they are fighting again.
“Bad?” Jiang Cheng wants to know even though he damn well knows the answer.
“I’m going to stay with Wen Qing tonight, and shijie is with Jin Zixuan, so—,” Wei Wuxian trails off and that means it’s more than bad.
“Fine, I’ll find a place to stay,” Jiang Cheng sighs, even though dread curls in his gut.
He’s not quite as lucky as Wei Wuxian or Jiang Yanli with his friends. His only real friend is Nie Huaisang and he and his brother are out of town at the moment.
Jiang Cheng guesses he could beg Jin Zixuan to let him take the couch but he doesn’t want to ruin his sister’s evening and Jiang Cheng would rather sleep on the streets than room with Wen Qing and Wei Wuxian.
“Take care,” Wei Wuxian says and then simply hangs up on him.
“What was that?” Lan Qiren demands to know and Jiang Cheng startles, because over his own dilemma he almost forgot that they are in his car.
“The usual,” Jiang Cheng tries, but Lan Qiren levels him with a look and Jiang Cheng deflates.
“My father thinks Wei Wuxian’s injury is my fault because I started it, so he is mad at me. My mother can’t stand it when he is mad at me instead of Wei Wuxian, so she gets in these really vicious fights with him and if that happens it’s really best if none of us are home,” Jiang Cheng says with a shrug.
“Where will you stay?” Lan Qiren asks and Jiang Cheng admires him for everything that he so clearly wanted to say and still swallowed.
There’s no way that was his first thought to this.
“Don’t know yet,” Jiang Cheng gets out with a desperate smile. “I’m gonna find a place.”
Lan Qiren looks at him as if he can tell exactly that Jiang Cheng is most likely not going to find a place and then he sighs.
“You’re coming with me,” Lan Qiren decides and Jiang Cheng gapes at him.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“You’re not going to sleep on the streets or whatever you are thinking,” Lan Qiren almost snaps at him as if he’s offended even thinking about it. “I have a guest room and you’re going to use it.”
Jiang Cheng opens his mouth to argue, but then he realizes that there isn’t much he can argue against. It will most likely be awkward as hell, but Jiang Cheng is out of options, so really, what is he going to say to that.
Jiang Cheng tries not to gape when they come to stop in front of a huge house, because this neighbourhood is even nicer than Jiang Cheng’s own, and he only drags his eyes away from the house when Lan Qiren turns towards him.
“Jiang Wanyin,” he starts and Jiang Cheng dreads whatever comes out of his mouth next. “I have a spare key and you’re going to take it,” Lan Qiren tells him then and before Jiang Cheng can protests, a key is being pressed into his uninjured hand.
“What?” Jiang Cheng very dumbly asks but he doesn’t understand what’s happening right now.
“If that is a regular occurrence, I never want you to fret over where you’ll stay,” Lan Qiren says with vehemence. “If you can’t stay at friends of yours, then you’ll come here. I have a spare room and no one who uses it and if I hear you’re sleeping on the streets or something equally outrageous then I’m going to drag you here by your ear.”
Jiang Cheng has to blink very fast at that, because his vision gets blurry and he thinks bursting into tears right now is only going to make Lan Qiren retract his offer.
“And if you ever need a place just to get away from your parents, even for just an hour, you also come here,” Lan Qiren goes on and Jiang Cheng is quick to nod, because if he already accepted, Lan Qiren can’t take it back anymore.
“Alright,” Lan Qiren says and squeezes his shoulder once before he gets out of the car.
He gives Jiang Cheng some time to compose himself, but when he finally follows Lan Qiren into the house and has to use the key to enter, Jiang Cheng bursts into tears again, because a very small part of him thought that maybe Lan Qiren was just fucking with him.
It’s almost not at all awkward when Lan Qiren hugs him, and even if it was, Jiang Cheng wouldn’t mention it.
It’s really nice to be held.