Work Text:
Historians will call them anything but.
A short flutter of an airy sound drifted passed his ear, ticklish with a tiny jingle – his bell giving him a slight shock in the sudden source of sound. Boya perked his ears in concentration, eyes drifting to stare at the tinkling machinery, the golden object trickling with amusement. “Qingming,” he whispered, noticing that the shuffles from the bell had eased its presence, notably softer and if not headed. A hum of a tune played into his ears; noise quiet yet loud. “Boya,” came a response, tone soft and his voice travelling through the air. “Are you still awake?”
Night was seeping into the lightest shades of dawn, specks of light trailing the horizon that was hidden behind blinds and curtains of rooms. Boya had been awake, pacing with a slight agitation he was not entirely sure of why, and his mind had not been able to cease its endless trails of thought. “I am,” he answered truthfully, tiredness weighing thick in his slurred accent. The soft breathing murmurs were resonating in within the shell of the golden chime, filling in the silence of the awkward night and the cricketing colours of insects trampling out of bed. “Then you should sleep,” said Qingming, “or else in the morning you will be tired and in a sour mood.”
“I feel better when I hear you,” Boya insisted. An eye talisman he had placed by the wall of his bedroom was glowing slightly, and he did not miss that of the attempt Qingming was trying to see exactly how fatigue he was. “When will you return to the city?”
Qingming was quiet for a while, silent thinking replacing the content humming. “Most likely in a few days, Boya,” came the reply, remorse soaking the words ‘a few days’. “I promise that I would be there in most a week.”
“You do not have to promise me anything, Qingming,” said Boya, “I am already content with knowing you have plans to come here.” He missed him, body, soul, mind, voice, the entirety of his being. The presence that would make him feel whole, a completed recipient of his guarding – he was meant to protect him, yet he could not go to where he was needed. “I owe you that.”
“You do not owe me anything, Boya.”
His heart was racing in his chest, peace of rest overwhelmed with the gentleness and care he searched from in within his place, feelings overcoming his senses in a daze. His lips were dry, tongue slipping out to moisturise, tears threatening to spill. He would have, given he was in his own room, locked away in the depths of the bare morning. Yet Qingming was watching him, and so he forced himself to hide his droplets of water, prickling by his eyes. “You can cry, Boya,” said a voice of understanding, reassuring that he would not lose anything if he showed his emotions. “You can cry.”
Boya let himself release his tears of exhaustion, tears of fear that had piled up with his insecurities and disappointing thoughts. “I miss you, Qingming,” said Boya, throat raw as his sound was, tears slipping with lubricated exposure. “I miss you so much.”
“I miss you, Boya,” said Qingming, “I miss you so much.”
The glowing pattern of the intricate talisman glimmered at him almost as if in thought, a singular golden streak of ink falling from its place – like a tear that Qingming shed. Crying for him. Wind carried their silence, brushing aimlessly in their ears with a cry of understanding.
“I love you much.”
But history hates lovers.