Work Text:
The three men stood side by side as they assessed the room. Taking note of everything. Tonight had to be perfect ; they'd see to it themselves that it was. Sizhui had always been there for all of them; long before they'd even gotten together, he was there ready with a kind word, a smile and more often not a word of advice and a solution to whatever problem you were having. He'd always gone above and beyond for them, so now they wanted to return the favor. The question was how .
Sizhui was notoriously difficult to offer gifts to, if only because he accepted everything graciously. Not that he treated anything as less than, he just quite literally appreciated everything they gave him and they wanted this to be special damn it. It had to be. Jin Ling was the one to find the solution to their problem, shockingly. He'd messaged the other two and went into detail about how Sizhui uses their love languages to take care of them, so naturally they should do something like that. Anyone who'd ever met him could tell that Sizhui's live language was 'acts of service', so they decided that treating to a relaxing day home was the best bet. It was just their luck that his birthday was next week; and so, 'Operation Pamper our Boyfriend' was a go.
+=+=+
Sizhui was out with his dads, who promised to keep him occupied until it was time, they'd double, triple and quadruple checked everything they needed for tonight. The living room was prepped and ready; they had the comfiest pillows and blankets in the apartment set up for fort building and Sizhui's favorite movies. In the bathroom they had Sizhui's favourite bath salts, candles and oils ready and the bedroom itself was the pièce de résistance, they could proudly say that they'd outdone themselves.
With the entire apartment cleaned and organized, there was only one thing left to tackle: dinner. Now, they could have gone out to dinner, but that would ruin the 'homey, wind down' mood and they could also order in, but that would ruin the point of this entire thing. This left them with one option. They were going to have to cook. And not just any old meal, they were going to prepare all of Sizhui's favorites. Did they have to sell their souls to get half of these recipes? Yes, but it would all be worth it.
Three near fires, two separate breakdowns and -miraculously- only one broken plate later, they were done. Just in time too. They had just -carefully, so, so carefully- set the last dish down when Jin Ling's phone rang. He put it on speaker as he answered, before slumping down next to Zizhen.
"Hello?"
"Ah, LingLing~ what're you boys up to, eh? You sound flushed." Jingyi and Zizhen simultaneously choked on air, while predictably, Jin Ling flushed several shades of red before indignantly sputtering.
"Wei- You- What the hell is wrong with you?!" Jingyi recovered first and immediately laughed at the irate face Jin Ling had been giving his phone. Most likely imaging Wei Wuxian's face, such a grouchy young miss. He quickly stifled his laughter when Jin Ling turned that same irate gaze on him. Wei Wuxian's laughter could still be heard through the speaker and Jin Ling was none the calmer for it.
Before their stare down could turn physical, Zizhen piped up, "Mr. Wei, please don't tease A-Ling. We just finished cooking and it was nowhere near as easy as we thought it would be."
"Ah~ That's right. You made all of A-Yuan's favorites! Oh, dessert must've been fun." At that all three men groaned and fell back against the kitchen cabinets. Dessert had been...an experience. Macarons, cheesecake, chocolate tart and lemon meringue pie; a bit overboard maybe, but they still believe it was worth it. They just weren't expecting it to be so, time consuming. Plus the littlest mistake meant you had to start all over again.
"Ah, I did have a reason for calling, though. We're pretty much done here, so Lan Zhan and I'll be dropping A-Yuan off soon. You've got...maybe twenty minutes. Bye!"
"Fuck!"
+=+=+
If cleaning was an Olympic event they'd have taken the team gold. They had the kitchen completely spotless in less than ten minutes, the table set in five and were showered, dressed and ready by the twenty minute mark. They'd had just enough time to check over the other surprises and dim the lights when they heard the sound of the door unlocking.
As Sizhui rounded the corner to the living room, he was greeted by a wonderful sight. They'd somehow had enough time to place fairy lights all around the room, with the dimmed lighting it creating a soft, homey atmosphere. Sizhui could feel his eyes getting hot as one by one his boyfriends stepped into the open and wished him a happy birthday.
"Thank you! I don't know what else to say-", he cut himself off with a choked laugh as he once again surveyed the room, not wanting to miss a single detail. "I love it."
"Oh, this isn't even half of it." At Sizhui's stunned look, they chuckled. Zizhen gently grabbed his hands in between his and led him to the bathroom. "Just you wait til you see what we've got planned for you."
"Yeah, you're gonna love it." Jingyi piped in as he and Jin Ling followed close behind them.
Love it he did. He'd been thoroughly rubbed and scrubbed down in the bath, then they let him soak as they worked the tension from his shoulders and neck. Throughout it all they kept up a steady stream of low chatter, discussing this and that, sharing funny anecdotes of their week. As someone -Jin Ling, those were Jin Ling's hands- washed his hair, they took care to massage all the tension they could from his head.
After the bath, they ushered him into the bedroom and told him to meet them in the kitchen. When he'd gotten dressed and met them there he was pleasantly surprised to find the table laden with his favorite foods. He knew those recipes personally, and knew that some of them weren't the easiest things to make, so he incredibly moved that they'd even attempt making them for him, much less prepare them to near perfection. It would have taken a lot of time- hell, this entire gesture thus far would have taken a lot of prep and planning. He honestly felt like the luckiest man alive. After dinner they took him back to the living room where they built a pillow for and binged his favorite series, it was the most relaxed Sizhui'd felt in weeks.
As the credits rolled he fluffed up the pillows and blankets around him, preparing to go sleep right there and then, when he was stopped by a hand on his arm.
"Silly, there's one more surprise." Zizhen said.
"Eh? Another one?"
"Yep!" They chorused. "It's the last one, promise." Zizhen said, having noticed the weariness on his face. With a (fake) woeful sigh and distraught glance at the 'nest' he'd made he allowed them to lead him to the bedroom. There he noticed that the bed had been stripped of its duvet and blankets and there was an old sheet over the bedsheets. Before he could voice his confusion however, Jingyi pulled a little table next to the bed and began organizing bottles of oils and creams on it. That's when it clicked, those were the massage oils he'd mentioned wanting to try weeks ago. Just when he thought that he couldn't love his boyfriends anymore than he already did. After that, he wanted no tinder getting situated on the bed and let them work their magic.
+=+=+
The next morning as he woke up, he thought about last night. It had been amazing, and something he really needed. He felt so lucky to have such wonderful, loving partners. As he watched the shadows in the room brighten with the morning sun he decided to indulge just a little longer, and did something he hadn't done since 5th grade. He snuggled back into Jingyi's arms and promptly fell asleep, much to Jingyi's amusement. Soon enough, he too joined his partners in sleep. It would be fine, they all had the day off from work and school and absolutely no plans otherwise, a few extra winks wouldn't hurt. Tomorrow they'd be back out, constantly on the move again, but today, today they could have all to themselves.