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Xichen looks graceful from where Wanyin can see him. How anyone can manage to look graceful curled up on a couch and on their phone is beyond him, but Xichen could probably make falling down a flight of stairs look graceful if he’s being honest. There’s a rush of affection tingling just under Wanyin’s skin, it gnaws at his nerves and he isn’t wholly sure if it’s annoying or not. They’ve been together for 6 months now, 7 in a weeks’ time, but 6 solid months of affection and understanding. It’s sickening, thinks Wanyin. Sickening in a way that riles him up if he thinks too hard. Who gave this man the right to walk into his life and try to understand his trauma, to waltz in and make a home in Wanyin’s chest with his horribly endless patience and warm smiles.
Its so good. Wanyin could cry with how good it is (has in fact, but that’s no ones business but his own). Once again though, he’s not sure if he hates it or not. Well no, he knows he doesn’t hate it or he wouldn’t allow it, but its… well its so good, too good. Its been even better since Xichen had said those horrible words.
“I know it’s a bit soon, or perhaps it isn’t” Xichen had said 4 months into their relationship. “But I feel you deserve to know how I feel” and Wanyin had in about a millisecond geared himself for a break-up. “I love you”.
Ew. Disgusting. ‘Say it again’ Wanyin had thought but not said. If he had said that it may have been less mortifying considering what he’d actually said. “That’s fucking gay”. And Xichen, with the disposition of a god had simply laughed and kissed his forehead.
He hadn’t stopped saying it though. Even though Wanyin hadn’t said it back, even though he always reacted the same way by becoming a blushing mess and muttering some form of ‘that’s really gay’. Now that he thought about it a bit more, maybe that’s why he kept saying it. Wanyin wasn’t about to tell him to stop though. It was easy coming from Xichen, who never used the phrase to ask for something like Wei Wuxian, never to calm him down like his sister, never to guilt him like his parents. He said it to say it. When he walked into a room, when he left a room, when they fell asleep together, when they didn’t. So easy and so good.
It was a month after that, that Wanyin had started doing something that upon it first happening Xichen had made this adorably disgusting surprised face and Wanyin had never stopped, especially when it had started earning him little kisses, soft and sweet. (it also took the place of the extremely grown up response of ‘that’s gay’)
And looking at Xichen now, gracefully curled up on his sofa, phone in hand, Wanyin felt the easy urge to do it again. To earn his kisses and possibly a bone crushing ‘I love you’ in the sweetest tone known to man.
Wanyin slid off the barstool and padded his way the couch before near falling into Xichen’s side. “Hello sweetheart” was his acknowledgment, but before he could shift to hook an arm around Wanyin’s shoulders, Wanyin bit his arm.
Not hard, not even a bite really, more like Wanyin just resting his teeth around Xichen’s currently soft bicep. A second or two passes of him just breathing into the sweater basically in his mouth before he pulls back to nuzzle at Xichen’s arm. Then he waits for the best part.
It pays off when Wanyin is moved under Xichen’s arm and pulled close, a warm kiss then plastered to the top of his head, then his temple, and when the arm curled around him curls further and makes Wanyin look at his boyfriend, he is kissed on the lips. Chaste and sweet and easy. When Xichen pulls back he gently knocks their foreheads together. “I love you very much you know” but Wanyin doesn’t speak a reply, instead he twists himself to teeth at Xichen’s arm again. It earns him a light chuckle. “It’s true, very yes indeed” Xichen spills nonsense like this all the time like Wanyin is a child that needs to be coddled. If he ever stops Wanyin will kill him.
He does press his teeth down ever so slightly harder though which gets a kiss to his head and another chuckle in turn. Xichen sits up after that and Wanyin lets go to situate himself better in his boyfriends space. They settle briefly, Wanyin happily snuggled up against Xichen’s warm flank, before Xichen speaks. “You know, I read somewhere” he starts before being interrupted playfully. “Oh no, this can’t be good”. Xichen just kisses the top of his head and continues. “That people have love languages, like services, or words, or touch” he lets the information sit and Wanyin hums in acknowledgment. “And when I read further it said that some people that struggle with speaking about their love have a tendency to…well…bite”.
Wanyin sucks in a breath, holds it for 4 and releases. It makes sense he supposes. He is after all very much aware of the fact that he had DECIDED to start biting Xichen in response to ‘I love you’. Well, decided the 4th or 5th time, the first times were just sort of muted instinct or something. Bite make lizard brain yes. But he had LET it continue. It had become the normal response. It had become his own form of ‘I hear and appreciate you saying that’, which really was such a small step from ‘I love you too’ wasn’t it. Well maybe not, but like, for Wanyin, yes.
Xichen is looking at him, there’s something on his face, and expression Wanyin isn’t 100% sure doesn’t mean ‘Oh God have I ruined everything’ because he’s never seen it on Xichen’s face. But he knows the feeling well. So Wanyin does the only thing he really knows how to do and bites.
Its awkward at the angle he’s in, he’s also aware that his teeth are gently sinking into Xichen’s sinfully soft pec, but like, that’s okay. It’s even better when Xichen kisses his head again and murmurs “I love you too” into his hair.