Chapter Text
Lan Yuan looked down at the casket that his father was in. The black umbrella shook in his weakened grasp; tears that settled in his eyes remained unshed as he looked down into the void from behind the black veil that covered his wounded face.
He was taken far too early and unfairly.
How could he be dead? Just a week ago, Lan Yuan and his dads were merrily living their lives, the family bathed in the warmth that was their home in Gusu.
Lan Yuan didn't understand. How could he? He was merely a boy. Why did it have to be him?
Why did it have to be his dad?
“Today we come together to mourn the passing of Wei Wuxian. Devoted husband of Lan Wangji and father to Lan Yuan.”
The pastor spoke monotonously from the black book in his palm; the black-clad boy looked around to the crowd, some upset, but most stone-faced and stoic, unmoved by the empty rehearsed words that fell from the pastor's lips. Lan Yuan didn't know these people, and he doubted Wei Wuxian did either.
His hands reached out, grasping Lan Wangji’s cold, tense hand. He had ignored how his father's fingers twitched and how he did not hold his hands back. Lan Yuan's mind was plagued with the thought that Wei Wuxian would've hated his own funeral. It wasn't heartfelt, nor was it honouring his father.
It was just strictly a half-assed farewell, a tragic affair.
The rain picked up, heavier and thicker with agony. Somewhere behind them, lightning had struck, but Lan Yuan stood still on his feet. He had watched as the casket was lowered six feet into the ground.
“Scripture tells us, ‘Sorrow not, for we do not walk alone."
And that was it.
And he didn't know what broke his heart first, between the crowd's immediate departure or the fact that his father took off without him.
———
“You look… dead?”
Lan Yuan ignored what his uncle, Lan Xichen, had said when he'd stepped into the open house that his father had bought. His uncle was already at the house when they had just arrived from their hour-long car journey.
He didn't understand why he would buy such a dingy place. It reeked of mould, the wallpaper peeled off when he'd run his finger along the curled edges, and there was something odd about its air.
It was vastly different from his home in Gusu, and in all honesty…
Lan Yuan loved it.
“Greet your Uncle properly, Lan Yuan.”
Lan Wangji appeared through the door, carrying an unopened box, before retreating out to grab more from the car.
“Hi, Uncle,” he had said, dusting off his black clothes when parts of the ceiling decided to collapse next to him.
“How've you been? You've all grown up!” Lan Xichen cooed, stepping around the debris and pinching his cheek roughly.
Lan Yuan restrained every part of him to keep his Uncle’s hands away from his precious flesh.
“I've been the same as always. Gloomy, depressed and in constant agony,” Lan Yuan deadpanned, freeing himself from his uncle's attacks when he'd halted in surprise at his nephew's response, his lip tightened in displeasure.
“Lan Yuan, is there nothing we can do to make you move on?” Lan Xichen innocently said, without thinking.
And it soured Lan Yuan's mood.
He was tired of people telling him to constantly move on, to not look back and keep his head high.
“No. And stop telling me to do that,” he’d snapped, ignoring the long look his uncle had given him when he’d turned away to sit down on an ancient stool that was lodged awkwardly into the corner.
“Lan Yuan, we all miss him. But it’s not healthy to continue… this way,” His uncle added, gesturing to his black attire.
Lan Yuan was not happy.
Missed him?
They had all left him in the sweltering thunderstorm when they’d begun to bury his casket. Nobody but him and the graveyard staff had stayed to watch his end all the way.
He alone had to bear with the stench of wet dirt, the cold digging through his skin and towards his heart. And he'd done that alone, and he still stood till this day alone.
Lan Xichen left with the crowd, along with his own father.
Lan Yuan felt his heart ridiculously pulse with anguish, and he opened his mouth to have a go at his Uncle but immediately shut it when Lan Wangji, alongside some workers, had entered the house once more.
“That should be the rest of it,” Lan Wangji said, turning towards the workers and missing the look Lan Xichen gave Lan Yuan, his body stepping forwards to the troubled boy but halted when Lan Wangji stepped forwards, his hands on his hips.
Lan Xichen opened his mouth and closed it, but then he spoke.
“I hope the travel wasn't too much,” he said.
Lan Yuan knew it wasn't what he was going to say originally; the quiet tone in his words spoke for him, but his dad always ignored it, oblivious and ignorant as always.
“The traffic wasn't too bad, nor was the weather. The motorway moved freely,” he'd boringly say. Lan Yuan turned away to look up at the dusty building and at the weirdly shaped architecture of the old house; its walls felt too elongated, whilst other corners were too sharp.
“Ahhh, explain why you're early then,” Lan Xichen said brightly, his hands patting the back of Lan Wangji.
“Mm.”
Lan Yuan moved further away, inspecting the black edges of the railings and the underlayer of drywall that the wallpaper had peeled away from.
His dead dad would've loved this house.
“The vans are just pulling in, so I guess the moving in shouldn't be too long,” Lan Xichen said.
Lan Yuan’s ear pricked up; a painful throb strummed through his nerves as he turned to face his uncle and father.
“Ahh, yes. It'll be-”
“Wait, move…?” Lan Yuan said.
The pair fell into an awkward silence. Lan Wangji turned to look at his son head-on, but Lan Xichen looked away through a dull, grimy window.
His father's shameless lies and his uncle's guilt spoke loudly without words.
“You didn't say anything about moving?” Lan Yuan said in disbelief.
He'd ignored the moving van workers who'd barged in and begun placing boxes down, his attention focused largely on the liar that was his dad.
Lan Wangji looked at Lan Xichen, who'd turned around and sighed.
“Kid…”
“No, uncle. I wanna hear it from my father,” Lan Yuan said, his eyes never leaving Lan Wangji.
The man didn't falter, and his posture didn't lean with confrontation. He'd stare at his son, his brain silently working away, for any horrible explanation for why he had made the pair move without telling him the truth, that they'd never see Gusu again.
“Yuan, we need to move on.”
And there it was.
“No.”
“Yuan…”
“I said no.” Lan Yuan firmly stood his ground, the anger seeping into the empty part of his heart that his dead dad had left.
They didn't understand; they never could. They had moved forward; they didn't lose a dad. Why could they see him? Why didn't they understand?
Those were the constant questions circling his head, like a never-ending roundabout with no junctions, stuck in a nightmare with no exit.
His hand fiddles with the sharp edges of the amulet that hangs too tightly around his throat, and his head shakes violently as he refuses to listen to the audacity that his father had just said.
What made it worse was the fact that his father should understand and be in the same boat as him; they both lost a piece of their soul the day that Wei Wuxian had left this earthly realm.
“You can't keep moping and wearing those grieving clothes,” Lan Wangji said, looking his boy up and down.
“After everything that has happened, isn't it nice to get fresher air?” Lan Xichen unhelpfully added, the pair watched as Lan Wangji strolled around the room to the piles of boxes, his hands rummaging through until he'd found what he was looking for.
“Besides, it's what he would've wanted,” Lan Wangji said.
“Is that what the dead dad wanted?”
“Don't call him that,” Lan Wangji calmly snapped, his head twisted towards Lan Yuan in quiet irritation, who had rolled his eyes in defiance.
“And what about everyone else? Did they know?” Lan Yuan had slipped over the unspoken anger, asking the more important questions.
“Yes.”
“And no one thought to tell me?” Lan Yuan scoffed in outrage, his arms crossing as he began to sulk.
“Yes, I told them not to. It's for your own good,” Lan Wangji falsely claimed, stepping towards his son and grasping one of his hands, the photo album he'd dug out from the box.
At first, he'd refused to take hold of it, the book almost falling to the floorboard, but the second time Lan Wangji had given him a stern look and placed it into his palm, he'd reluctantly taken the book and held it against his chest.
Lan Wangji hummed in approval and turned around to Lan Xichen.
“Now, uncle and the rest of the family will be here in a few days. Brother, you will help out with whatever is going on with Yuan.”
Lan Yuan shot his father with a nasty look behind his back.
“And we will tidy up this place,” the second jade had finalised and retreated through a door, Lan Xichen following close behind.
“Go out and get some air. You need it,” his uncle said.
The two disappeared once again.
Lan Yuan restrained every fibre of his being that wanted to release him from the suffering he was living.
So to compromise, he'd thrown himself onto the nearest sofa, screaming into the pillows until his lungs had given out and his throat had closed up.
Nothing made sense. The silent planning behind his back, moving houses and even the way his father had thought and demanded change. Lan Yuan didn't like this; he didn't like anything that was happening. It was as if everyone had changed their sense of reasoning since the untimely death of his dad.
Lan Yuan morbidly wished that maybe the perfectly picked fences would impale him through his brain and jog that last bit of sense he'd had in there somewhere.
Sighing to himself, he opened up the photo album.
They looked so happy. Lan Yuan was in the middle, wearing white; behind him were his dads. It was taken on his birthday, the last birthday with Wei Wuxian before his untimely death.
Lan Yuan smiled, flipping through the pages and through the years.
Lan Wangji looked so happy, lost in the world of his own family.
He never spoke his dead dad's name. Nor did he acknowledge him ever since the funeral. Lan Yuan didn't understand why. It was as if his love for Wei Wuxian was buried alongside his corpse in that grave, locked away and gone forever, not to be spoken about, not even to his own son.
He'd placed the photos down before his hands had accidentally crushed the priceless photos out of frustration. Nothing seemed to fit anymore; everything felt out of place, no matter how many times he'd tried to sew the pieces back once more or tried to make it work for himself.
It could never work. Not when he felt that his father, Wei Wuxuan, was somehow here again. And he wasn't going to give up.
He was going to make Lan Wangji say Wei Wuxian’s name once again.