Work Text:
Feng Xin has started acting weird.
His first visits were expertly placed at the time when Mu Qing was working to deliver small presents and trinkets. At first, it was small, pretty things, like jeweled flowers and the like. Mu Qing found them extremely gaudy and told him so, but he couldn’t shove them back into his hands- Feng Xin refused, saying that was improper gift etiquette, so the best thing Mu Qing could do was send him away with a lashing of the tongue, and if he was lucky, a shove in the right direction.
When he caught on to Mu Qing’s distaste for overtly glamorous objects, he started bringing flowers that caught his eye on the battlefield- soft-fragrant white canna lilies and the like. Mu Qing gave him the eyebrow, but regardless, put them in a vase on windowsills where their gentle scent could waft through the Xuan Zhen Palace.
As he stared at those flowers, his stomach churned with anxiety. At first, he had thought this excessive gifting was an odd side effect of this “friendship” Feng Xin had forced upon them, but it had taken a sharp turn in a different direction. Even with Feng Xin’s best pals in the Immortal Realm, like Pei Ming and Xie Lian, - and Mu Qing made sure of this, he observed them himself- Feng Xin never acted so… close with them. Feng Xin never gave Pei Ming anything except a piece of his mind (on how to treat women better- as if he’d know anything about that), and even before Xie Lian had a jealous demon stalker, Feng Xin didn’t give him any gift, except the treasure of his unrelenting loyalty.
Mu Qing… couldn’t help but feel as though he was being ladened with heaps of cheap gifts as though he was a lady getting spoiled in court. With dim horror, he wondered if Feng Xin acted the same way to Jian Lan when she first caught his affection.
Seriously… seriously, he felt bad for her.
No, who was Mu Qing kidding? He felt bad for himself- he was the victim here! Feng Xin was giving him all these shitty gifts- all his good secret storage compartments were going to be useless at this rate!
Then, one cool heavenly day, when Mu Qing was finishing up some reports with a brush, Feng Xin approached him, hands shaking, with some scrolls.
With a single glance, Mu Qing could vouch for their quality. The parchment was thick and smoothed, as if kneaded for an entire year. Faint ink was spun on the outskirts of its surface, dark and blue, painting rolling waves and churning clouds. It was the type of parchment that could hold up for another thousand years, absorb any amount of ink that splashed on it.
It was horrible, horribly… considerate.
He couldn’t stand the puppy-dog look in his eyes.
Usually, when a man wishes to court a lady with a gift, he often does so with tact and shyness, bending to his knees and gracefully extending his arms, so that his lady could admire and grab his given treasure, tilting it gently in her hands. Historically, Mu Qing thought all romantic practices were pathetic- no treasure could stop the inevitable rifts of an incompatible or ignorant pair, that was achieved by character and emotion alone- but he could at least appreciate the quality of a man who could take care of his woman in that way.
Feng Xin, of course, couldn’t even lower himself to the standard of a mortal man.
Feng Xin does not bow. He doesn’t hold Mu Qing's palm gently nor does he press a smooth kiss to the back of his hand.
(Not that… Mu Qing would ever want that).
No.
He marched right up to Mu Qing with a tense jawline and glowering eyes and dumped the scrolls in front of him. His careless actions nearly knocked over the ink vial Mu Qing was using to write. Mu Qing hissed, cursing him under his breath as he lunged to salvage both his ink and those (pretty good quality!) scrolls before he glowered at the, frankly, uninvited God.
He slammed his palms into the table and shot up, his movements jostling the table as much, if not more, than Feng Xin had.
“What is up with you?!” He snarled.
Feng Xin crossed his arms, a similar scowl erupting his face. “What, isn’t it obvious? I brought you a present.”
Seriously, this was getting ridiculous! A… A present? Why the hell does Feng Xin think Mu Qing needs presents?! For what purpose, other than… than….
“Why?”
Feng Xin tensed his jaw even harder, straightening up. They were the same height now, standing off as though they were about to slash each other’s arms off.
“Because I love you.”
Mu Qing snorted.
That’s the kind of unwilling expression you give to someone you love? Yeah, right-
Wait.
“What?”
A slow brush had creeper its way to Feng Xin’s neck and he scratched it sheeply. “Yeah, I, uh… love you, Mu Qing.”
Woe is his heart.
Gone is his heart.
Mu Qing was furious, flabbergasted, disbelieving, shocked, mind-numbed…
“You-.you- don’t march into my Palace and… what the fuck was that delivery you- fucking- around with the gifts you- don’t don’t stare at me like that!”
Feng Xin hadn’t even done anything- he just stood there, with his arms crossed, except, staring at Mu Qing’s furiously red face, he pressed his lips together to try to keep his expression neutral. Now, he just looked so offensively casual- and, and ridiculous-
Mu Qing couldn’t take it. “You- love me? What the fuck, Feng Xin?”
(Xie Lian was right. He really had begun to adopt Feng Xin’s language. But when he was dealing with him, you really couldn’t blame him).
“What? It’s a confession.” Feng Xin was trying really, really hard to take this seriously, but he was failing miserably- his face had the consistency of a melting moon cake, and it pissed him off- scratch that, everything about him pissed Mu Qing off. He gestured up and about, pointing vaguely at the scrolls and at Feng Xin’s chest.
“This is a stupid way to confess to someone!”
“Well I’m sorry! I didn’t know there was a better way to do it!”
“Don’t do it at all!” Mu Qing hissed, his hands bending from the desire to strangle him. “What the hell prompted you to go out and say something like that?”
“What?! You asked! What was I supposed to do, lie about it?”
“Yes!” Mu Qing threw his hands up in the air. “Obviously lie about it! I don’t care how obvious you are about your feelings, to do anything else is pure stupidity!”
Feng Xin crossed his arms and shook his head solemnly. “I could never lie to you, Mu Qing.”
Mu Qing made a noise suspiciously close to a tea kettle.
What the fuck.??? What the actual-??? ??? Why was he talking to him as though he were some busky smooth talker- what the hell was wrong with him?
Feng Xin snapped his eyes open. “And what the hell is wrong with that, anyways? I was bound to tell you eventually! I can’t keep this sort of shit inside!”
That was certainly true. When Feng Xin felt something, whether it be his dedication to someone or…. in this unfortunate case… his… feelings… well, he wasn’t gifted enough to manipulate the way he projected his emotions. No, with Feng Xin… whatever you got from him, was what he truly felt for you. It’s all he can give you.
So, that was done with. Feng Xin really loved Mu Qing, no god knows why. There was really no turning back from this.
Mu Qing knotted the space between his eyebrows and made a mournful noise at the back of his throat. “Seriously, what do I do with you…”
Feng Xin frowned. “As if this is easy for me either! What kind of cruel person watches someone spill their heart off and then just insults them the rest of the time?!”
Mu Qing grabbed his collar.
“Well? What did you expect?! What do you want me to say?!”
Feng Xin opened his mouth to shoot back a retort, but to Mu Qing’s utter mortification, nothing came out.
(He had wanted to say, ‘for you to say you love me’, or even ‘to say what you feel’, or ‘anything at all, you emotionally constipated asshole!’ But of course, Mu Qing wouldn’t say how he felt, he was the type to dig his feelings into his grave (as Feng Xin found out to his exasperation, 800 years too late). And Feng Xin wasn’t particularly in the mood to insult him right now).
His mouth was still open when Mu Qing released him, turning his head away in second-hand embarrassment. “Never mind, don’t finish that.”
When Mu Qing turned his head, he saw the scrolls that Feng Xin had shamelessly dumped on his table.
“….”
“….
…Thanks for the scrolls, though. You’re getting better with the gifts,” Mu Qing said. His voice didn’t feel attached to his body.
“…”
He didn’t turn his head to see the look on Feng Xin’s face. There was an equal chance that it was gratified, or angry, or both- and, just, either way, Mu Qing didn’t want to see it.
They stood like that for a few heavy, horrible heartbeats. Mu Qing kept expecting Feng Xin to just roll his eyes, walk away, and call it a day. He’d gone and done what he wanted, hadn’t he? What else did he want…?
Thinking about it made his gut roil with anxiety. Mu Qing hadn’t been an anxious person in years- Eight Hundred Years, but ever since Xie Lian ascended for the first time, his life and emotions were thrown into a turbulent blender. And this… he didn’t help.
It just got worse, standing there- and eventually, Mu Qing couldn’t take it anymore.
“Aren’t you…” he cleared his throat, and peeked shyly at the man behind him. “Aren’t you going to ask me what my answer is?”
Feng Xin tilted his head in consideration. “Well, I was going to. But then, I figured, it’s probably easier to think over your reaction than try to get the answer out of you directly.”
A huge blush erupted over all of Mu Qing- his face, shoulders, even his stomach- such a horrible case of rash had never wrecked his features like this before.
Then, Feng Xin flipped his head the other way, admiring the pleasant, angry flush of the man in front of him.
“But thanks, though…”
He smiled.
“I think I got my answer anyway.”