Work Text:
In 2009 you could still advertise a certain kind of service on Craigslist. What if Jiang Cheng is in college and bored? His classes are too easy for him. Wei Wuxian got the entrée to fancy private school, because of course he did. Meanwhile Jiang Cheng is stuck at mickey mouse state school and bored to tears.
So he does it. He posts an ad on Craigslist. For five hundred roses, he writes, because why not aim high if you're gonna aim at all, you can have this. The photo is both artistic and filthy, Nie Huaisang is as talented as he's thirsty. Jiang Cheng sends the post into the ether and waits.
He waits exactly one minute and thirty-seven seconds before the emails start pouring in. They do his ego good, and his mean streak too: he does like an opportunity to judge and dismiss. But one message amid the flood gives him pause. "You're very beautiful," it reads. "Twenty times as beautiful as you seem to think you are, for the whole night: tonight. Meet me at the bar of the Ritz-Carlton at 8. You'll know me when you see me."
It doesn't take a genius to do the math. It doesn't take Jiang Cheng more than one more moment's pause to make the choice.
"I'll be there," he writes back. "I'll be the one in purple."
He doesn't need the money. What he needs is the excitement and the gratification.
So he threads a purple ribbon through his hair and times his arrival for 8 sharp.
The moment he steps in, he sees him.
It can be no one else.
So he steps up to him, to the vision in blue who's looking at him, smiling serenely.
"I'm the one you're waiting for," Jiang Cheng says. "I'm here."
"You are," the man says, tall and handsome and confident and radiant with so much goodness it hurts to look at him. "Your photo was lovely, but you're even lovelier in the flesh."
His eyes make Jiang Cheng feel so beautiful that he doesn't even blush. Instead, "I can see why you didn't send one in return," he says. "I wouldn't have believed it. I wouldn't have shown up."
"Well, I'm glad you did," the man says. "Now. What will you have to drink?"
Two drinks later the man's hand is in Jiang Cheng's hair. "May I?" he says.
"Yes," Jiang Cheng says, because this man can do anything he wants to him. What he wants, apparently, is to pull at the end of the purple ribbon. Jiang Cheng's french braid comes undone, his hair falls to frame his face.
"Lovely boy," the man says. "What's your name?"
"Jiang Cheng," Jiang Cheng says, stupidly and helplessly.
"Jiang Cheng," the man says, "I'm Lan Xichen," and lays a hand on Jiang Cheng's cheek. Jiang Cheng leans into it, stupidly and helplessly.
The man, this Lan Xichen, chuckles, and pulls away, and reaches into his jacket pocket. He draws out a cream envelope.
"This is for you," he says. "Your five hundred roses, and a gift besides. They're yours, you can take them and go. Or," he says, and leans in, and presses a kiss to Jiang Cheng's temple, and whispers in his ear, "you can join me in my room upstairs for the rest of what I promised you."
"Yes," Jiang Cheng gasps. “Yes.”
Lan Xichen laughs again. "Good," he says. "Good choice. Good boy."
He helps Jiang Cheng to his feet, then, and with a hand at the small of his back leads him out of the bar.
They're not alone in the elevator. Jiang Cheng's heart is in his throat, but Lan Xichen seems perfectly at ease. His room is on the 22nd floor, it must command a fine view of the city, but Jiang Cheng sees none of it because as soon as Lan Xichen closes the door behind them he's on Jiang Cheng as if he's been ravening for him all night.
"Fuck," he says, "you lovely boy," and puts his hands all over him.
Jiang Cheng acquiesces to everything Lan Xichen wants, everything he does, voicing his assent and ardor, the fire in his flesh.
Over the course of the night Lan Xichen takes him apart. On hotel sheets on the hotel bed he takes Jiang Cheng apart. He makes Jiang Cheng feel things he's never known the world could hold.
"How?" Jiang Cheng cries. "How can I feel this good and not die?"
"Oh, you'll die," Lan Xichen says, "the little death, time and time again, before I'm through with you. Now," he says, and strokes in. “Die for me.” And Jiang Cheng does. He dies the little death, he comes screaming his life out. His heart out. On hotel sheets on the hotel bed Jiang Cheng loses his heart.
"Take it," he sobs, "take me. Lan Xichen, please take me."
Lan Xichen laughs, lightly and wickedly.
"Lovely boy," he says. "What makes you think you're not already mine?"
"I'm yours," Jiang Cheng says, and dies again, and again.
He dies so many times he wakes up reborn.
He wakes up in Lan Xichen's arms a new creation, Lan Xichen's creation.
"I love you," he says, stupidly and helplessly.
Lan Xichen smiles.
"I lured you with ten thousand roses," he says, "and here you are luring me with love."
"Keep the roses," Jiang Cheng says. "Keep me."
"Yes," Lan Xichen says thoughtfully, "I think I will, lovely boy. I think I'll keep you forever."
And he does! And they live happily ever after! <3