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The key is for emergencies.
For the kids. For the time Jiang Cheng got appendicitis. For when A-Ling grew out of his rainboots and cried all the way to Lan Wangji's house so they could get one of A-Yuan's old pairs. For when Jiang Cheng needed someone to feed his fish.
Emergencies.
This is not an emergency.
He lets himself in anyway, before he can talk himself out of it. Locks the door behind him. It would be great if Lan Wangji was robbed, but only out of principle. He doesn't want A-Yuan to deal with it. Or A-Ling if his things get stolen, too.
He stomps inside. Throws his shoes off on the way. Almost throws up. Leans against the wall with one hand and wonders what would happen if he did throw up. Clutches his abdomen, snakes his fingers under his waistband and kneads at his skin as he cramps. Fucking cramps. Fucking—he swallows angrily, thinking of his sister sitting with him, brushing his hair, getting him a heating pad, feeding him soup, thinking of how many years have passed, of A-Ling asking him this morning if he was alright, he didn't look good, thinking of his brother saying the same thing so many years ago—fuck everything. If he throws up, Lan Wangji will clean it up. Would glare the whole time. Would say Take care of yourself and make Jiang Cheng feel about three years old.
He shakes his head. Straightens. Blinks spots out of his eyes. Shuffles his feet into his slippers and stomps on.
Stops in the kitchen and drinks. Leans against the low counter and considers passing the fuck out. He's bleeding, he deserves to be dramatic. If he plans it out right, he can bleed onto Lan Wangji's floor. But that would mean bleeding through his pants, and he has no desire to deal with that. He already bleeds through his clothes every few months, no matter that it's been years since he's been dealing with this. Fuck it all, honestly. It's stupid.
He leaves the glass on the counter—all the better if it leaves a ring—and stands up too fast. He wants to scream.
Lan Wangji is in his room. In bed, book in his hands, surprised because it's noon and the children are in school; blinking, frowning, working up to ask a question that Jiang Cheng has no intention of hearing.
"Wangji," he says.
It's the only greeting he intends to provide. All that Lan Wangji deserves, and Jiang Cheng does not even say it to his face, but to the bedcovers as he climbs on, kneels, and bends his body blissfully in half, toes moving in his socks as he tries to get comfortable, ass up in the air, and his face—finally—buried in Wangji's thighs.
Book pages rustle over his head.
"Wanyin—"
He is not listening. He closes his eyes.
Lan Wangji's thighs. So soft. He smashes his face deeper. Maybe the pressure will travel up to his brain and he'll have that aneurysm everyone's been talking about. Or it'll go down his throat into his ovaries and squish them to death and he'll never have to deal with this again.
He sighs in pleasure now, savoring the fantasy until he cramps worse, and bites the nearest available thing—
He should say sorry now. He licks Lan Wangji's thigh instead, almost a kiss. An apology.
There's an intake of breath over his head, maybe a laugh.
"Shut up," he says. He doesn't know how much feeling Lan Wangji has in his legs anyway. He should, after all these years, but there's so much they haven't said to each other. So much they have. "You bite, too." And then: "Sorry."
And then: a hand settling on his head. Carding through his hair. Like his sister, the book set aside, like his sister, but not saying anything, not her kind words or good cooking or smile—
He bites again. A different pain now. Hoping that if Wangji can feel the wetness, he thinks it's spit, not tears. That's better. Less embarrassing that way. Less pathetic. Less open.
He wants to stay like this forever. Never move, never anything. Maybe to pick up the kids from school, then nothing else, nothing, just him and these thighs, and maybe Lan Wangji's hand can stay, too, his soft touch, and somewhere along the way they can loose Jiang Cheng's entire reproductive system, and he'll never have to feel this way again.
Wangji's other hand settles on his lower back. A perfect amount of pressure. Both warm and cold on the gap between his sweatpants and sweatshirt. Ridiculous to wear them outside. He hasn't dressed this way since surgery recovery—not the appendix, the one before, when his brother gave him half his organs and fucked off for months—
Wangji's hand brushes over the scar. It doesn't hurt. Jiang Cheng knows the ones on his back hurt, not that they've shared stories. This thing, it's not like that, it's not—it doesn't hurt, is the thing. Not physically, not the touch. And yet he keeps crying. Not even from pain anymore, though the pain's still there. Stupid fucking everything.
"Ice-cream," Wangji says. Was probably getting his head together to say it the entire time Jiang Cheng was hiding in his thighs making clear that real problems wouldn't exist anymore. "When the kids get home."
Jiang Cheng nods. Rubs his face more into Lan Wangji's soft, warm, wonderful thighs. Not that he'll tell him that.
"Your thighs are stupid." He just needs to get it out there. As a fact.
Lan Wangji hums above him.
Jiang Cheng's stomach cramps and he bites his own lip this time. All he knows is that Lan Wangji can't walk anymore. Since his siblings have been gone. Since they got their children. Who will be getting ice-cream today. For no reason. Other than the fact that Jiang Cheng feels bad, that he wants to claw out his insides and shove them under Wangji's bed out of spite, or under his sink, or somewhere he can reach them without getting out of his wheelchair, so maybe on his bookshelf or in his dresser. Just because.
It's too much.
Carelessly, Lan Wangji's hand bumps against his earlobe, where a hole sits empty. A drunken teenage mistake, not even a mistake but just a dumb choice, him and his siblings and their friends. Jiang Cheng does not wear earrings but he doesn't let it close. Lan Wangji wasn't with them, then. Maybe things would have changed, and maybe they wouldn't have, if he'd always been there, if just one more person had a chance to make things right, but things went bad so fast, and now it's them and the kids and Jiang Cheng's stupid body and Lan Wangji's stupid clean home, and the worst Jiang Cheng's done to it is track mud inside. The one plate be broke he did outside, and called someone to clean up.
There will be ice-cream, though. And lactose pills. What a life.
Lan Wangji doesn't say something stupid like You should have some painkillers, because Jiang Cheng already did and they didn't work. Or something like This is too bad to be normal. Or maybe something like I hate you, get the fuck off my legs, and also out of my life. He's too cool for that. He'd throw Jiang Cheng out himself. Maybe run him over first with that fancy expensive powerchair. That would hurt less than this.
He turns his head to the side, so perfectly smothered by Lan Wangji's thighs that he's actually started to have trouble breathing.
"Ow," he says pathetically. As he is.
He's suddenly so tired. It was stupid to drive here. Stupid to like Wangji's hands on his head and back.
"Ow," he says again.
Tired, again. A blanket covers him. It's weighted. The one he brought to Lan Wangji's house when he learned Wangji didn't own one. What an idiot. He will get too hot soon. Lan Wangji will remove it. It's not their first time with this song and dance, but maybe it is a little: Jiang Cheng has not come like this before. The key is for emergencies, and he is not an emergency.
There's a tug on his hair.
Lan Wangji doesn't say something stupid like Stop thinking that. Or Sleep. Although that would maybe be nice.
He says, "The kids will be home in three hours."
And that's enough.