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Hua Cheng stirred quietly from his nap on the straw mat, evening sunlight streaming through a hole in the roof. That'll need to be fixed, he noted to himself, as stretched out his muscles, when he heard a BANG! Looking over into the kitchen Hua Cheng sees a not so pleased Xie Lian covered in goodness knows what kind of stew.
-Around and hour and half an hour ago-
Xie Lian and Hua Cheng had just gotten back to the cottage after a day of buying wood, food, and other scraps, to fix up the old cottage once again. It'd been a month since they'd last been there, as it was the most popular time of the year for ghost city to get busy. They both wanted nothing more than to come back to the quiet country and get some time alone to be themselves again. This is when things turned...
Xie lian finished unpacking the last of the carrots when he felt a pair of arms wrap around his back and a heavy weight fall on his shoulder. “GeGe I’m so pleased we are finally able to be alone again.” Hua Cheng mumbled and sounded exhausted. Xie Lian’s ears turned a light shade of pink at this, and he replied quietly trying not to stumble over his words “Why Don’t I cook some dinner, and make some tea for us while you take a nap.” He said with a peaceful smile. He turned around in Hua Cheng’s arms to face him. Lightly placing his own hand on Hua Cheng’s arm he looked up slightly into his eyes and said. “You look exhausted, and it’s been an awfully busy month in ghost city, you’ve barely been able to sleep.”
Hua Cheng smiled slightly and weighed up his options, on one hand he could take a well needed nap, and be able to stay up later with Xie Lian tonight. On the other hand if he went to bed now he wouldn’t be able to help Xie Lian cook, and would miss out on some precious time he couldn’t make up for later. Xie Lian could see he was thinking about this and spoke with a soft tone of voice “It’s okay San Lang, you can rest, it’s not the end of the world, I swear I’ll be careful to cook things perfectly if that’s what you’re worried about.” By the end of his sentence he sounded unconfident and Hua Cheng chuckled at this. “If that is what GeGe wishes me to do I shall” he said with a smile.
-Time skip half an hour later-
Xie Lian stared quietly as San Lang was now sound asleep, curled up like a cat on his side of the mat. As Xie Lian kept stared his face started to get redder realising what he was doing. He lightly slapped his face and said to himself “Snap out of it, we need to get cooking before San Lang wakes up and eats me instead.” At that comment he went an even darker shade of red realising what he’d said, he couldn’t believe himself.
He started by filling the pot with water and boiling it over an open flame while he was waiting for the water to heat up he started cutting the vegetables slowly. After half an hour the water finally started to boil so Xie Lian added the ingredients, everything was going well so far. He then went to cut some of the meat into thin slices and add it into the boiling broth too. He tried tasting it after five minutes but it felt too watery . He decided to wait for a bit and see if it would thicken without adding anything. After giving it a while he tried again, still tasting watery, so he added something to thicken the broth. This was his mistake. The mixture suddenly bubbled up and turned an unsettling colour of purple before exploding everywhere. The hot broth wasn’t the problem right now, the problem was Xie Lian had woken up San Lang, and was now covered in some ungodly mixture of food.
“Gege, are you alright, are you hurt anywhere?” a distressed voice sounded. Xie Lian could barely hear it though to focus on how he’d just messed up again for the millionth time, tears were pricking at his eyes as he was so fed up with never being able to cook. “San Lang I’m sorry for waking you up, are you okay” his voice quivered. “Gege what’s wrong why are you crying, San Lang is fine, what about you” Xie Lian looked up to meet Hua Cheng's eye’s tears threatening to spill. Hua Cheng quietly moved over to him and said once more “Is Gege okay, what’s wrong” Xie Lian finally cracked at this voice shaky feeling the self-hatred, and guilt, hitting him harder as he spoke “ I’m tired, San Lang, whenever I try to cook it fails, I can’t even cut a carrot without putting all my focus into it let alone making a stew. Even if I succeed it never tastes edible ” Tears started to fall, and Hua Cheng wrapped him up in his arms while speaking “Your highness listen here please, your cooking is amazing, even if nobody says so San Lang will love it, it’s okay your highness we all have things we aren’t great at, I can’t write well whereas your handwriting is beautiful. It doesn’t mean that it’s unreadable, but if I don’t focus it will come out a mess.” Xie Lian’s breathing eased at this, seeming to calm down. “Plus even if nobody else ever does I will always Love your cooking Gege.”
Xie Lian’s breathing completely calmed, and he wrapped his arms around San Lang relaxing into the comfort and warmth. “Come on, let's eat what’s left Gege, and go to bed,” San Lang said calmingly. Xie Lian smiled into San Lang's shoulder and said “that would be great San Lang.”