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There’s a song Hua Cheng sings sometimes, when he’s chopping down wood, cooking or doing the dishes, anything really. It’s not really a song, and he doesn’t sing it either, it’s more of a humming and a sweet melody, a soothing lullaby or a tender tune.
Hua Cheng hums a lot of things when he’s with Xie Lian, but this one melody sticks like honey to skin, clinging to the deep shape of his voice. It’s simple and repetitive, with only a few notes following each other, but peaceful. Gentle. Warm like a hug, like a smile.
Xie Lian didn’t ask about it at first. What was there to ask? Hua Cheng hummed and Xie Lian listened. Both actions as natural as any other thing between them, like holding and being held, loving and being loved.
He didn’t ask, only smiling softly when Hua Cheng caught his gaze as he hummed and Xie Lian listened. Xie Lian would stretch out a hand towards him as if in a dream, trying to reach the sound that charmed his ears. Like the sun would kiss his face Hua Cheng would kiss his fingertips, pressing them softly to his lips as he’d keep humming against his skin, and the vibrations would course through his bones like the healing purrs of a content house cat.
Xie Lian listened when Hua Cheng was chopping down wood, cooking or doing the dishes, anything really. He also listened when Hua Cheng was trying to comfort him, wiping his tears from yet another nightmare, hugging him tight against his chest. Rocking them both together. Humming with overpowering love, trying to push the dark thoughts away, to hold on for another night. Another day. Another century in this broken body.
Xie Lian didn’t ask, only blinking softly when Hua Cheng tucked his chin over his shoulder as he hummed the soft tune until Xie Lian dozed off in his arms. He protected him from the night. Hua Cheng kissed his temples, his forehead, the spot between his brows. He sent the song into his dreams to act as a painkiller and protector, to keep him safe from the haunting. The deads that never stop living.
It was like this for a while. A long time maybe. A few changes of seasons, a lot of words exchanged, a permanent state of trust and love. Just enough time to settle into this new life, almost new skin—how the wind feels different when it brushes against you and for once you feel alive, a warm hand in yours and the sun in your eyes.
Just enough time to be at peace again after many lives of unrest.
It was like this for a while until one night, Xie Lian did not wake up from a nightmare but from the humming next to him. Something was wrong. Xie Lian could feel it in the air, in the darkness of the room, in the tremors of the voice. The silver butterflies that usually fluttered around their bed were gone, and the dark hugged Xie Lian close, like a hand around his throat.
“San Lang?” he whispered, and the humming stopped.
He wasn’t more worried about the dark rather than the reason why it was dark. He knew Hua Cheng was there, somewhere next to him, the energy of his corporeal form noticeable in the way it was… strange. Unusual.
Xie Lian twisted on the bed and stretched his hand out blindly in hope to reach for skin, or hair, or anything Hua Cheng to hold onto. A hand found his first and clasped it, muscles tight around his knuckles as if he was the one being held onto. Xie Lian squeezed it lightly in response and brushed his thumb over the cold skin. Cold, freezing skin.
“San Lang.” He lied back down into the covers, now aware of where his husband was. “Are you alright?”
A simple word in response. Yes. Flat and soft and terribly fragile—anything but a yes. Anything but the assurance Hua Cheng wields with ease during the day. Xie Lian’s heart ached and he shuffled closer, to bring warmth and chase the cold away. He found Hua Cheng’s bony shoulder, draped in a light robe he knew to be washed-off red. He listened to the absent heart-beat and absent breaths of his husband, to the silence and the darkness. All so unusual and worrying in their reason to be.
“Then, why are the butterflies gone?” He asked the question gently, to understand. He wanted Hua Cheng to explain, not apologize. But old habits die hard.
“Sorry.” With this one word uttered, one butterfly took form, single and lonely in its nature of apology. Its silver wings flapped slowly a few times, as if struggling to move through the frost, until it perched itself onto the wooden bed frame.
With the little light the butterfly produced, Xie Lian could make out shapes in the dark—Hua Cheng was facing away from him, his neck turned to the other side of the bed in a way that was, again, entirely unusual. It didn’t scare Xie Lian, didn’t bother him, only worried him. He untangled his fingers from Hua Cheng own delicately to glide them on the inside of his wrist, his arm and elbow, until he reached his shoulder and pulled it towards him.
“San Lang, look at me.”
It’s cheating, maybe, to give orders to someone who cannot disobey them. Selfish to ask for precious things when they should be given out of trust. However, when Hua Cheng turned to him, painfully slowly, the way a criminal on death row would walk to the scaffold, there was no place for guilt in Xie Lian’s heart. His chest tightened when he caught sight of the shine in Hua Cheng’s eye, a single streak reflecting the silver light on his sharp cheek, and the hand on his shoulder left to cup his face, trembling slightly when his husband leaned into it.
“I’m sorry,” came a whisper, so quiet and small Xie Lian almost missed it. He shushed his husband, stroked his hair and face, murmured sweet comforts to him. There’s nothing to apologize for. Don’t be afraid. I’m here. A hand over his jaw. I’m there. A hand over his chest where an unbeating heart rests. I love you. I love you. I love you. Tell me the weight that’s crushing you and I’ll help you carry it through.
More tears fell out of the corner of Hua Cheng’s eye, trickling down like waterfalls tinted silver by the light. Silver tears, Xie Lian thought in half-awe and half-sorrow, my husband cries silver too. He wiped the drops the way one swipes their finger in the morning dew, tasting with skin the taste of nature after being reminded all things are alive in this world and so are you.
Without thinking, Xie Lian started humming, that same light tune Hua Cheng was humming when he woke him. It was a bit off-key, lacking confidence, and wet by the empathy lacing his throat, but steady and loving. Hua Cheng swallowed, lashes fluttering in the silver light, and he hugged Xie Lian close. Close. Close. Fitting their bodies together, he tucked his chin on his shoulder and slotted one leg between his. His arms wrapped around Xie Lian’s chest and he pressed close, close, close, breathing in the music in Xie Lian’s throat.
It went on for a while. Xie Lian hummed the soft tune until Hua Cheng dozed off in his arms. He protected him from the cold. Xie Lian kissed the crown of his hair, his widow's peak, the spot under his right eye. He sent the song into his dreams to act as a painkiller and protector, to keep him safe from the freezing. The dread that haunts the living things.
After that night, Xie Lian asked about it. About the cold, the tune, what linked them together and which came first. His questions were answered half-willingly, muttered between self-conscious flickers of lashes and hesitating glances, and the answers were met with endless support and acceptance from Xie Lian, who blew over the frostbite in Hua Cheng’s heart with warm breath.
The tune, Hua Cheng told him, is a song his mother used to sing him. An old tune, older than Xianle, older than memories, originally in a long-lost language now belonging to grass-covered ruins and forgotten worships. Even his unfailing memory couldn’t cling to the lyrics, his child self not old enough to remember the shape of the words in his mouth. The taste stayed, though, and it spreads through and around him when he hums it day and night. It keeps the cold at bay, the darkness away. It warms him up with memories of long-gone parental love and those of a more fresh and recent one.
There’s a song Hua Cheng sings sometimes, when he’s chopping down wood, cooking or doing the dishes, anything really. It’s not really a song, and he doesn’t sing it either, it’s more of a talisman against the cold, a souvenir of love, a lighthouse in the dark.
It’s love.
