Work Text:
Nie Huaisang hums a small tune to himself as he fills two glasses half-full with wine, dark red catching the kitchen light warmly. He expertly balances both of them in one hand as he grabs the wine bottle with the other, making his way to the living room, where his boyfriend—no, fiancé—is waiting.
The thought makes him giddy, but his mood immediately sours when he catches sight of Jiang Wanyin, hunched over on the couch in a posture that can not be good for him, typing away at his laptop furiously.
Nie Huaisang sets the glasses and bottle down on the coffee table to pick up his paper fan. Flicking it open, he sighs. “Wanyin,” he says in a scolding tone, exasperated. “It’s Friday night.”
“I know, I know, I’m sorry,” Jiang Wanyin replies absentmindedly, glancing at him apologetically before turning his attention back to the screen. “This is important, I promise I’ll put it away as soon as I reply.”
“You say that every time,” Nie Huaisang pouts, but he resigns himself to sipping at the red wine to express his displeasure. There is no arguing with his workaholic partner; he’s learned from experience that complaining won’t make Jiang Wanyin finish his work any quicker.
Surprisingly, Jiang Wanyin does stop typing after a few minutes, hitting send with an extremely resigned sigh. Still, he makes a point to show Nie Huaisang that he’s powering down his laptop, before picking up the other glass and downing it in one breath.
“Wow, and I thought I was stressed,” Nie Huaisang laughs, shifting on the couch so he can curl up against Jiang Wanyin’s side. Instinctively, Jiang Wanyin wraps an arm around his shoulder, pulling him close.
“Final negotiations for the deal I was telling you about,” Jiang Wanyin explains. “People can’t read sometimes, apparently, and by sometimes I mean all the time.”
Nie Huaisang hums thoughtfully. “Can’t you just get your secretary or someone to go through the correspondence, first? Surely you don’t have to do all the work by yourself.”
“I don’t trust anyone else,” Jiang Wanyin says predictably. “If we secured the deal, we’d attract more investors in the third quarter, not to mention…” He trails off, but Nie Huaisang already knows the end of that sentence.
Not to mention, it would make my father proud.
But Nie Huaisang has long since learned to not comment on the delicate matter that is Jiang Wanyin’s family. Instead, he tilts his head up to press a kiss against Jiang Wanyin’s cheek. “It’s done now, right? That’s what matters. I’m so proud of you, Wanyin. God, you’re sexy when you start speaking in business terms I don’t understand.”
Jiang Wanyin laughs, but there’s a light blush that dusts his cheeks at the praise. “Yeah, it’s done now. And don’t even pretend, we literally had the same business classes in university.”
Nie Huaisang groans dramatically. The days before his brother finally accepted that he wouldn’t take over the family business had not been pleasant. “Don’t remind me. That didn’t happen. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Right, of course,” Jiang Cheng says in an indulging tone, rolling his eyes. “What’s got you so stressed? Is your project not going well?”
At the mention of his paintings, Nie Huaisang lowers his fan and refills his glass. Looking straight at Jiang Wanyin with a deadpan expression, he drinks the entire glass in one shot.
Jiang Wanyin raises an eyebrow. “I’ll take that as a no.”
Nie Huaisang sets the glass down on the table so he doesn’t accidentally snap the stem in his frustration. Out of habit, he begins fluttering his fan back and forth, hiding most of his face behind flowers that are blurring into a mess of colours. He thinks back to the canvases propped up against the wall of his studio, a series of paintings associating someone he knows with an element. The one for water stands out among the rest in his mind, but as soon as he has the thought, he’s tempted to yell and maybe commit violence with his fan.
“It, it’s not going poorly,” Nie Huaisang begins, uncharacteristically at a loss for words. “I’m mostly done, there’s just this one painting I can’t quite get right—it’s missing something—but I can’t tell what. At this point, I might just go crazy from staring at it.”
Like a hive of angry wasps, his words flood out once he starts. “The director of the gallery wants me to finish the series by next week, but it doesn’t work like that, you know? You can’t rush art. And I think it’s the lighting, right, but I’ve been looking at it and it looks, fine? I don’t hate the colour palette either…”
And at this point, he feels like if he keeps layering paint on paint for contrast or detail, it would ruin the peacefully minimalistic effect he is going for, which is also why he doesn’t want to outline the figures in bolder strokes, because that would make the shapes too prominent when he wants the foreground to blend slightly with the background, and—
He doesn’t realize he’s trailed off, lost in though, until Jiang Wanyin cups his face and presses a firm kiss to his forehead. The pressure grounds him, cutting off his stream of consciousness and bringing him back to the present. “How about you let me take a look? I don’t know much about art, but…”
“You know I don’t like letting you see my unfinished works,” Nie Huaisang grumbles, but he gets to his feet anyway. At this point, anything is worth a shot.
He drags his way to his art studio, where he has been pretty much living in for the past few weeks, Jiang Wanyin following behind. The inside of his studio is a veritable disaster, with paint-splattered plastic sheets spread over the floor and against the walls to protect the room from his creative frenzies. His paints and brushes are laid across a table at the far end of the room, with an empty easel and stool making up the depressing centerpiece of his workspace.
Against one wall are five canvases, all covered with paint-stained cloths that might have once been white.
Taking a deep breath, Nie Huaisang walks over to the canvas in the centre and lifts off the covering gingerly. Watching Jiang Wanyin’s reaction apprehensively as he steps to the side, he reveals the painting slowly.
Jiang Wanyin’s expression morphs from one of appreciation to one of shock the longer he looks at the painting. He opens and closes his mouth a few times, but no sound comes out. When he finally manages to find his voice again, he says, “That’s me.”
Nie Huaisang lets out a laugh that’s just barely on the sane side of hysterical. “Who else did you think would be water?”
He doesn’t have to look at the painting to know what it looks like—he’s been staring at it nonstop for the past few days, after all.
The painting depicts a man floating in a nondescript body of water, strands of his hair trailing around him like they’ve been caught by a breeze. Hues of azure and teal dominate the piece, giving the illusion of being suspended in a pond or a lake, though the barely-visible surface of the water is a striking sky blue. The man’s back is bare, and he is only visible from the waist up. Even without seeing his face, anyone who knows them would know who the inspiration is.
While Nie Huaisang is busy reconstructing the painting in his mind’s eye, Jiang Wanyin’s ears have gone an alarming shade of red.
“…embarrassing…” Jiang Wanyin mumbles, but he continues looking at the painting anyway.
Nie Huaisang prances up to him, hooking an arm through Jiang Wanyin’s. “Then stop being so pretty all the time, or else I’ll keep wanting to paint you,” he says coquettishly, peering up through his long lashes.
Jiang Wanyin pushes him off with a mock-scoff as he turns back to study the painting, trying to find fault in the piece in order to give constructive feedback even though art is certainly not his area of expertise. Nie Huaisang loves him so much.
Eventually, he comments. “It looks like I’m in the sky, that top part. Are all of them supposed to look angelic?”
Instinctively, Nie Huaisang replies with a cheeky grin. “Jealous? You’re the only angel in my heart—” He cuts himself off abruptly, an idea clicking in his mind. “Oh my god, wings, that’s it! You’re a genius!”
He stands on his tiptoes to pull Jiang Wanyin into an excited kiss, leaving his fiancé spluttering.
“I’m in the water! Why would I have wings?!” he asks, too flustered to say much else.
“It’s an artistic interpretation,” Nie Huaisang says airily, waving away his concern as he makes his way to his work table.
“Nope,” Jiang Wanyin says, grabbing him by the arm and dragging him out of his studio. “No work on weekends, your rules.”
“I can’t help when inspiration strikes!” Nie Huaisang complains, though he makes no move to free himself.
“Uh huh,” Jiang Wanyin replies heartlessly. “When I’m working, I’m neglecting my boyfriend, but when you’re working, it’s because ‘inspiration struck’.”
“We’re engaged,” is the only objection that slips out, a smile tugging at Nie Huaisang’s lips. “Besides, not everything needs to stick to a schedule, you know. Go with the flow sometimes.”
Jiang Wanyin levels him a look of mock-contemplation. “Hm. Nope. You said it yourself.”
And when he presses Nie Huaisang onto the couch, claiming his lips in a deep kiss, Nie Huaisang can’t find it in himself to protest, after all.