Work Text:
“Oh my god,” says Xia Fei, as soon as he opens the door. It doesn’t erase Liu Xiao’s stupid smile from his doorway, even and unblinking even when he moves to slam the door in his face.
“You’re so rude,” says Liu Xiao through his door, voice muffled and bright. “You’re supposed to welcome guests, aren’t you?”
“It’s five am, why are you here,” says Xia Fei, too exhausted from three hours of sleep over the past two days to even attempt to be polite. Maybe Vein will scold him or something about literally slamming the door in Liu Xiao’s face tomorrow - or later today - but he’ll probably just laugh, and anyway, Xia Fei’s doorknob is kind of blurring beneath his palm and that’s probably more concerning right now.
“Can’t I visit my friend?” Liu Xiao asks him, still way too cheerful for five am in the fucking morning. Xia Fei wonders if he’s doing it on purpose, and then decides, probably.
“We’re not friends,” says Xia Fei, leaning against his door to massage where the front of his mind is pounding like a gong in his skull, dull and constant. The wood is smooth and cool beneath his cheek, and when he lets go of his doorknob, the metal is warmed from his hold.
“Of course we are,” says Liu Xiao, “you’re even on my spreadsheet.”
…what the fuck.
“Huh,” says Xia Fei, intelligently. What does a spreadsheet have to do with anything?
“My spreadsheet,” says Liu Xiao. Even through the doorway Xia Fei can imagine that calm, unchanging smile on his face. “It’s very useful.”
“Please leave,” says Xia Fei, too tired to even think about this right now.
“Oh, so soon?” Liu Xiao clicks his tongue. “That’s so disappointing. Would you like to see my itinerary?”
“Why do you have that,” asks Xia Fei, after a few seconds. If he just stops talking, is Liu Xiao going to leave? Or is he just going to stand at Xia Fei’s door until he breaks?
“It’s always important to plan the day properly. For example, first on the list is coffee. Shall we go?”
For a half second, Xia Fei genuinely considers it. Caffeine sounds fucking heavenly right now when his eyeballs feel like they’re about to drop out of his skull and his head might as well be a gym weight. He’s praying to god no press or fans see him like this, because three layers of concealer had been needed to cover up his eyebags at the start of the photoshoot he’s just gotten back from and he’s pretty sure they’ve only gotten worse since then. He does remember being this exhausted as a physics student, too, but he had significantly less going on in his life to think about then as well.
“Are you buying?”
“Of course,” says Liu Xiao, “one category on the spreadsheet in which I rank highly is monetary compensation.”
Xia Fei wonders, not for the first time, if he did something in his past life and now god hates him. He wonders if he fucked something up and now Vein hates him, so had decided to send his… whatever the hell he and Liu Xiao are to each other, to annoy him to an early grave.
His apartment would fit for a burial site. He’d been too tired to bother turning the lights on when he got home a couple of hours ago, and so it remains shadowed, the couch technically comfortable but just looking very sad where it sits in his living room, left in the dark without even the dawn sun to light it. His bedrooms floors and shelves are all dusty because the only part of it he uses is his bed, which he’s as of late been collapsing into without even getting beneath the blankets. Xia Fei cranes his neck, winces at how it hurts his head, to try and see if he has anything in his kitchen that’s not either too old to be edible or too healthy to stomach right now.
“A category in which you have previously ranked highly is quick response times,” says Liu Xiao, and Xia Fei damn near jumps out of his skin when he remembers he’s, for some reason, still there. “I will be reducing your ranking there.”
“You’re buying me coffee,” Xia Fei restates, just to be sure.
Even through the doorway, Liu Xiao sounds cheshire and smug when he speaks. “I could hardly say no when you asked so nicely.”
Liu Xiao’s car is extremely comfortable, even if the company almost cancels it out. The soft leather of the seats is so much nicer than the stiff material of Xia Fei’s car and for a second it feels just about heavenly.
“Did you know that McDonalds is having a sale?” Liu Xiao asks, and promptly ruins it. His fingers drum along the steering wheel and the beat aches against Xia Fei’s temple; he grimaces and looks away, trying to ignore it. From the way Liu Xiao’s smirk widens in the background, he doesn’t think he manages.
“You’re getting coffee from McDonalds? Aren’t you rich?”
“Oh, yes, but I quite like McDonalds. Their fries become all soggy and limp after they cool, did you know that? No retention or taste at all.”
“I did know that,” Xia Fei mumbles. The scenery outside has yet to slip into sunrise; grey clouds drift along the black sky like ash. Streetlights glint, unsuccessfully trying to warm up the frigid streets and sidewalks; Liu Xiao’s car is sleek and red, probably a sports car, and it stands out like blood against skin. “Most people know that. It’s fast food for a reason.”
“What a shame,” says Liu Xiao, “Do you think I should propose starting our own fast food brand?”
“I don’t care,” says Xia Fei, honestly, pressing his forehead against the cool glass of the window and closing his eyes. It feels nice against his headache, until Liu Xiao decides to ruin that, too, when the car jolts and his head slams against the window twice.
“Ow, fuck.”
“My apologies,” says Liu Xiao, not sounding sorry at all, “perhaps you can now better appreciate the scenery outside. You can almost see...”
“There’s nothing here but buildings and cars,” Xia Fei snaps, and Liu Xiao just smiles at him.
Xia Fei wonders, not for the first time, what he’s doing with his life.
“I don’t want to look outside,” he says, staring down at the palms of his hands splayed atop his lap instead. The grey sweatpants he’s wearing blend right into the rest of the monochrome atmosphere, everything so easy to ignore together. “I just want to do my job and then sleep.” And not be harassed by rich, asshole business students.
“Don’t you have any curiosity? Don’t you want to… well…” Liu Xiao’s eyes are bright in the darkness of the car. He’s not looking at Xia Fei, and thank god.
“Why does it matter to you,” Xia Fei huffs, curling his hands into fists atop his thighs. His sweatpants are soft beneath him. “I’m still in this damned car with you, aren’t I? You got what you wanted.”
The traffic light at the intersection in front of them flicks from yellow to red, blinking in and out. Liu Xiao stops his car just at the edge of the road, just about to spill over into the middle where they’re not supposed to go - far enough in that if someone was going fast enough from one of the other streets, if they didn’t stop, they’d probably hit them.
“Someone might hit us,” says Xia Fei, after a few seconds. Liu Xiao’s expression is mild, a slight upturn to his lips that doesn’t match at all the way his eyes burn, just for a second, when he turns to face him.
“They might,” he says, quite cheerfully, “or they might just clip us when running a red light. Or perhaps they’ll miss us all together - just barely brush the front of the car.”
Xia Fei almost asks, then, what the hell is your point, but he doesn’t bother. He’s not going to get a straight answer, and anyway, he doesn’t want to know, either. Cars are slowly lining up against the edges of the other roads, stopping far enough that it doesn’t look as if anything will hit them, so it isn’t like it matters.
The light turns green. Liu Xiao doesn’t move first; he lets the people opposite to him go, eyes scanning them, and then moves forward himself, the engine a deep hum in the background. Xia Fei closes his eyes again, sighing into Liu Xiao’s rich boy carseats, and turns away from him.
“I don’t see why you’re so opposed to keeping your eyes open,” says Liu Xiao, “Vein will be meeting us there, anyway.”
That gets Xia Fei’s attention. His eyes snap open, and he turns to Liu Xiao before he can fully glance at the way his smile widens, just a bit, before returning to its normal, thin fixture on his mask of a face.
“Vein? Is this-”
“Oh, nothing like that,” says Liu Xiao, “he simply recommended to me the cafe we’ll be getting coffee at, and I said we ought to make it a date.”
“And he agreed?”
“He’s very friendly,” says Liu Xiao, smiling, and Xia Fei wonders if calling his bullshit is even worth it. Liu Xiao turns as the light just a few streets away from them switches to yellow; this new street is smaller, less packed with the husks of buildings lining it and the outlines of unfortunate people like Xia Fei starting their days.
At least it’s not McDonalds.
“Does Vein know I’m coming?” Xia Fei asks, after a few seconds It’s odd, then, that he hadn’t contacted him about it himself - at all.
“Of course,” says Liu Xiao, “Even if I hadn’t told him beforehand, he would have found out somehow.”
He probably would have. Xia Fei is the only one who would have had to be told while being driven to the cafe in the car, depending on who picked him up, and depending on if they decided to tell him.
Liu Xiao’s car slows; the streets turn a bit brighter, the streetlights amber instead of sickly yellow, rows of tarps covering outdoor seating and black signs with white chalk closed scrawled across them.
“Did Vein tell you to get me?” Xia Fei asks. Liu Xiao laughs; light and practiced and choreographed.
“Do you think he did?”
I don’t know, Xia Fei thinks, thinks that’s why I asked, and doesn’t bother to say it out loud. Liu Xiao’s expression is just as peaceful as it’s been the entire car ride as he pulls into the parking lot by a small brick building that doesn’t need a sign to be open; the windows are clear and clean and inside Xia Fei can see suited waiters and waitresses talking behind their hands to one another, despite the hour. One of them looks through the window just as Liu Xiao is parking, one of the only cars in the lot, and makes eye contact with Xia Fei; he understands very deeply the sheer exhaustion in her face.
“That was fun,” says Liu Xiao, cheerfully. His eyes scan over Xia Fei, cool enough to be assessing, and it’s only enough exposure to people like him and Vein that doesn’t make it more uncomfortable than it is.
“For you,” Xia Fei mumbles, staring at a sky that has yet to even welcome the birds chirping and wondering what he’s doing here.
“It’s not so early,” says Liu Xiao, “it’s quite peaceful on the roads with fewer people there to block you.”
“That’s not why you woke me up so early,” Xia Fei grumbles, shaking his head to stave off the way his eyes are fluttering shut. After this- whatever, he’s going to go back home and take a very long nap. Provided Vein doesn’t need anything from him, that is.
“Oh? You think I enjoy the competition?” Liu Xiao’s smile doesn’t really look threatening at all. It doesn’t really mean much. “This place makes a lovely french press coffee, if you’re curious. I’m afraid they don’t have matcha, but I’m sure you can find a substitute, no?”
“How do you even know I like matcha?” Xia Fei’s mouth moves before he can remember there’s no real point to asking him, and he’s too tired to care much.
Liu Xiao tilts his head, hums, and turns his car off.
The engine dies down quickly, the humming exhaling to nothing, and he clicks the car door open, stepping out of the passenger’s seat without looking at the driver. Behind him, he can hear the soft huff of Liu Xiao’s laughter.
When Xia Fei turns around, just once, Liu Xiao is still staring at him. His eyes are almost contemplative.