Archive of Our Own

Among the people who were placed in the right circumstances, it was commonly known that Fei Du was a flexible lover. This was no surprise; though he could be uncompromising and whimsical at times, he was at heart a generous and obliging soul, willing to both give and receive pleasure in all the manners it could be given and received, his own preferences mild and easily overridden with sufficient force in the right direction. 

Using one’s own body as a token of exchange was a disgraceful act to the moneyed classes, but they were quite willing to trade in the bodies of people who they did not deem on par with themselves. However, the right words could cleverly change the nature of the act: between ‘equals,’ it was not an exchange but a favor, thrown in to sweeten a deal, or a matter of curiosity and indulgence that would begin or intensify a relationship of mutual benefit. There was never anything as vulgar as money involved—no cash passed through their hands. Instead, one would lean against a pillow with the taste of rubber still cloying in the back of one’s mouth and murmur about the state of a foreign market, and one’s partner would casually say something along the lines of “oh, I heard so-and-so is trying a new venture over there, but in times like this who knows whether it will sink or float?” and a few hours later, some numbers on computers would change. It was all very dignified.

Fei Du was not, at this exact moment, feeling particularly dignified. 

Luo Wenzhou had fucked him so hard he had become briefly convinced that he might cry, kisses pressing against the tops of his shoulders and hands stroking ceaselessly over his sides, rendering him boneless and stunned and rather unable to do much except pant into a pillow. Fei Du was a generous lover, but Luo Wenzhou was monstrously selfish, and took miles for every inch given. It was enough to make one quite resentful. Fei Du had no room in his body for resentment. His cock was weeping steadily against the sheets, and Luo Wenzhou’s steady stream of filth was mixing with the white noise between Fei Du’s ears until he could only gasp a name over and over, shaken sweetly apart.

Afterwards, he was unceremoniously rolled over and jerked off; if he’d been capable of opening his eyes, he’d have seen as well as felt the heavy gaze Luo Wenzhou used to pin him down. As it was, he could only moan wretchedly and struggle without hope, oversensitive and exhausted. 

He didn’t even have the strength to issue a protest when he was cuddled afterwards, grateful for the barrier of Luo Wenzhou’s broad chest, where he could bury his face and pretend—something. He did not know what he was pretending either, but there had to be something. Fei Du’s honesties were few and far between, and it would not do to let Luo Wenzhou dwell on how many of those were only for him. The man’s head was swollen enough without such fuel.

He drifted between states, greatly soothed by the weight of Luo Wenzhou’s arm over his body. But lowering his guard around Luo Wenzhou was physiologically dangerous—his body trusted what his mind did not, and allowed his mouth to vomit up words he would rather have taken to his grave: “Shixiong, would you ever hurt me?”

“Huh? What kind of question is that?”

Fei Du’s brain caught up and shrilled mercilessly at the rest of him. “Just answer it, please,” he said briefly, then kicked himself for making it worse. The post-sex lassitude clung stubbornly to his limbs, making it difficult to retreat from Luo Wenzhou’s warmth, which meant his tenseness was very obvious. 

It made Luo Wenzhou careful. “Would you want me to hurt you?”

“No,” Fei Du lied, instinctively and smoothly.

The response was immediate. “Okay, then I won’t.”

“Just like that?” Fei Du said, in mild disbelief.

“Well,” Luo Wenzhou drawled. “If you don’t want me to do something to you, I won’t—unless you force my hand, in which case I will be very upset. But I can make you feel my anger without hurting you, can’t I? For example, by making you eat spinach for a week—”

“I would eat it,” Fei Du said. “That isn’t a punishment.”

“Then you can write a self-examination paper,” Luo Wenzhou said casually.

“I would make Miaomiao do that.”

“Without your phone.”

Fei Du shrugged, or tried to. “After writing enough papers, it still wouldn’t be too difficult.”

Luo Wenzhou sighed, then asked again, “Fei Du, would you want me to hurt you?”

There was no point, really, in denying it. Having clumsily led a chase, he had to give in when cornered. His voice emerged small, uncharacteristically timid. “Yes.”

“What kind of hurt are we talking about?” Luo Wenzhou readjusted quickly. “You can’t handle blood, and neither do you enjoy pain. Short of leaving you out in the rain and giving you a head cold, what do you propose?”

Fei Du could tell when Luo Wenzhou was backing him into a wall, forcing him to surrender before he was executed. There were a great many options that Luo Wenzhou had deliberately omitted, which meant it was Fei Du’s job to guide the conversation there, and also his prerogative not to. “I don’t enjoy pain,” Fei Du said softly, at last. “But I like it.”

Luo Wenzhou was silent. Fei Du went on. “Surely you have things like that, right? Things that don’t bring pleasure, but satisfaction?”

“Like my job,” Luo Wenzhou said lightly, then flicked Fei Du’s ear. “And you.” He sighed slowly. “What you’re talking about is duty, you understand?”

Fei Du’s stomach squeezed painfully around nothing. “Then can we consider this my duty?”

“Your duty is to be punished?” Luo Wenzhou was unrelenting. “I don’t know if I like that.”

It was time to switch gears. Fei Du sat up, casually resting a hand on Luo Wenzhou’s furred chest to keep him where he was. There was a brief thrill, chased by nausea: like this, he felt as though he were looking down at his prey. A pine marten had felled a lion—an indecisive victory. “But you do like it, shixiong,” he purred. “How often now have you cuffed me or twisted my arm, or threatened to spank me? You’re not the kind to make idle statements. Don’t I irritate you enough? Don’t you dream of correcting me?”

Luo Wenzhou reached up to grab Fei Du’s wrist, so tight that Fei Du’s heart tripped. “Are you done? Is it my turn?” He waited for Fei Du to nod, then went on. “You’re right, I do dream of correcting you. Is that what you want to hear? That I’m a danger to you?”

“No,” Fei Du said breathlessly, enjoying this perhaps a little too much. “I already know that.”

Something flickered in Luo Wenzhou’s eyes, affected. “I’ll let that slide,” he said gruffly. His big paw could wrap easily around Fei Du’s slender wrist; when he rubbed Fei Du’s forearm, the heat of it seemed to melt through the layers of skin. “So, you want to be corrected—no, you want me to correct you.”

Such an easy thing, and Fei Du had lived long without it. Luo Wenzhou had spoiled him: feeding a stray animal, he’d invited in a monster. The monster fed on his blood and felt safe. Healed from its mad hunger, it woke up to realize that if it drained its keeper, there would be no more food, and thus sought to mold itself into a new shape. There was no love in this sacrifice, for it only enabled the monster, allowing it to stay undetected longer. No disguise would change its internal anatomy, and one day it would reveal itself again, when its keeper had grown weak it would pounce and finish what it had started.

Then it would starve to death, curled protectively near what it had slain. 

“Good job, shixiong,” Fei Du said, lilting the words. “Would you like a treat for getting the answer right?”

“If you’re offering,” Luo Wenzhou said, with a hint of hunger under the dryness. “Far be it from me to refuse. You spout more nonsense than a faulty drain. You can consider this part of your ‘correction’ if you like.”

Fei Du obligingly put his mouth to better use, and afterwards when Luo Wenzhou made motions of returning the favor, he dodged skillfully. 

Mixed signals were a conditioner’s greatest enemy.

~

A week later, Fei Du discovered the gravity of his error.

He’d been on his best behavior for five days, trying to put Luo Wenzhou’s mind at ease. This leopard, after all, had two opposable thumbs and infinite access to paint, as well as a nearly-bottomless reserve of patience. Being good was its own reward—Luo Wenzhou made his favorite meals for two of five nights; he spent one evening being unmade with the gentle precision of a surgeon, then slept so soundly he didn’t have a single dream and awoke for once after Luo Wenzhou had already left. He’d left a note telling Fei Du to take the day off, but when he stood he discovered he couldn’t quite walk straight, and therefore absolutely had to limp into the Bureau office smirking to himself. Everyone noticed, but few caught on. Tao Ran put his head in his hands and did not meet either of their eyes until the lunch break. Luo Wenzhou, for his part, leaned back in his chair and surveyed him briefly, then shook his head and turned back to his work. 

“Was I too rough with you?” he asked later, in the car.

Fei Du gave him a radiant expression, swerving to avoid a rogue cyclist. “Shixiong can be as rough as he likes,” he said. “After all, your job is very stressful—it would be unbecoming of a dutiful wife to begrudge you some release at the end of a long day.”

Luo Wenzhou cuffed him harmlessly for his little speech, then broke into laughter. Fei Du wanted to keep his eyes on the road, but he couldn’t resist cutting a glance sideways, drinking in the crinkles at the corners of Luo Wenzhou’s eyes, the way he tilted his head back in mirth. It was all so blissful that Fei Du would happily have sat on a box of his worst instincts for another month to glut himself on Luo Wenzhou’s self-satisfied peace, but the weekend had other ideas. 

Zhang Donglai’s friend had a friend who was throwing a party, whose invitation arrived on Fei Du’s phone via transference. Later, the friend messaged him privately, requesting his aid with a ‘minor’ problem her cousin had run into, and suggested the party as a place they could chat. It was in the evening and Luo Wenzhou was working overtime late, so he agreed, driving to his apartment to change into a pale violet suit that would shimmer becomingly under the golden light. He sprayed on some cologne, shot Miaomiao a text to arrange pickup and takeout for Luo Wenzhou that night in case he ran late, and went off.

He had assumed that the problem would be a small deal, requiring no more than a few phone calls to resolve efficiently. Instead, it turned into a crisis faster than anyone could have anticipated: it so happened that the cousin was unmarried and pregnant. She couldn’t keep the child, but had dragged her heels stupidly about the abortion, and now she was nearing her due date and still hadn’t made arrangements for the child’s care.

Her water broke while Fei Du was still catching up on the sordid details of the situation. He drove with Lang Hua to the hospital. The delivery had complications, and Lang Li strenuously insisted between screaming that her parents should not be called. Fei Du therefore spoke to the doctors, sent away the father, and desperately tried to find someone who was willing to take in a baby.

He had only just found a suitable and trustworthy couple of lesbians when Lang Li held her baby for the first time, fell in love, and made the entire endeavor moot.

By the time he staggered back home it was past three. He let himself in, rushed to throw up in the sink out of habit, then passed out on the couch without even taking off his shoes.

He dreamed his mother had another child, and he was waiting in the lobby with his father. In the dream he wasn’t scared of blood, and went willingly into the delivery room. Nobody said anything. The murmur of machines filed away the glow in his chest, the happiness of having another—a little sibling, small and new and untainted. The baby was crying. His father was smiling. 

“Can I hold her?” Fei Du asked his mother, but she didn’t answer. When he looked at her more closely he realized she was dead, the rope still knotted around her neck. But the baby had been arranged in her arms, suckling at her breast. She had no milk to give. Blood trickled from a corner of the baby’s mouth.

Fei Du wrenched awake. Luo Yiguo must have been sleeping with his father; he was alone, a pale morning leaking through the gaps in the curtains. 

He threw up again, then finally took off his shoes and wandered the apartment, shivering under a layer of cold sweat. He wanted to go to Luo Wenzhou, but he didn’t want to wake him up. There was also a part of him that whispered that the sight of Luo Wenzhou would do nothing, could do nothing. At most he could hold Fei Du and whisper warmly to him. What was the point?

He sat on the floor in the west-facing balcony next to a potted plant, leaned against the glass and closed his eyes.

Fei Di woke up when the door was pushed open, upsetting him out of his position. Luo Wenzhou stepped out; Fei Du squinted blearily up at him, then gave up and leaned against Luo Wenzhou’s knees, wrapping one arm loosely around his calves. He would have liked to say something witty, but the only thing that emerged from his throat was a thin whine when Luo Wenzhou’s hand settled on his head.

“I thought you were dead, you shameless wretch,” he said casually. Fei Du rubbed his cheek against the soft night pants. “No calls, no texts. Your assistant only said that you might be late. Don’t crawl at my feet like a worm, I don’t pity you at all.”

Between everything last evening, Fei Du hadn’t had a second to spare a thought. He’d replied to Luo Wenzhou’s message regarding dinner with a terse busy, then muted his chat to focus. 

Under ordinary circumstances, Fei Du, who generally despised defending himself, would still have made an effort to set the record straight. He’d have said, I was helping a friend, her cousin was pregnant, and Luo Wenzhou would soften at once. Maybe he’d even make dumpling soup again for lunch. If he relayed the whole saga, he’d get his fill of being spoiled for another week. Add in the nightmare, and he could slack all month with not only no consequences, but many benefits.

Despite knowing this and having no sense of shame, he couldn’t find the voice to say a word.

“What do you have to say for yourself?” Luo Wenzhou said testily.

Fei Du lifted his head. “It was a great party. You should’ve been there.”

“What was that about correction?” Luo Wenzhou said, voice hard. Fei Du’s stomach turned. “Go shower first—you reek.”

He wasn’t so angry he didn’t pull Fei Du to his feet, but he did leave him there and go inside without turning back. In a disgustingly hopeful corner of his still-cloudy mind, he felt it still wasn’t too late to go tell Luo Wenzhou the truth. But there was a sharp and deceptive rationality wrapping around him; he had wronged Luo Wenzhou, so he deserved this. It was unbecoming to renege on an agreement.

He showered in cold water, spent some time carefully muzzling each stray thought. Then he presented himself to Luo Wenzhou, who was in the kitchen.

“Five minutes,” Luo Wenzhou said, distracted. “Go sit on the couch.”

Fei Du went. Luo Yiguo wrapped around his ankles, yowling plaintively. Fei Du picked him up, took him to the bedroom, and locked him inside. Then he returned to his place. There was a distant buzz in his ears. When he’d been young, he’d often waited just like this. Fei Chengyu knew how to turn emptiness into torture; his son, accordingly, was adept at enduring the misery of a long and uncertain wait. He did not work himself up preemptively by imagining possibilities. He counted the seconds. His head was full of cotton candy, and the cotton candy was full of razors. 

Luo Wenzhou took seven minutes in total. He tilted Fei Du’s head up by the chin, examining him closely. “I’m going to spank you. Any objections?”

“None,” Fei Du said, tranquil. “Should I count?”

“There’s no need.” He was positioned over Luo Wenzhou’s lap, sprawled without any dignity. He immediately went limp, like a dead snake. “If you want me to stop, say so.”

Fei Du’s head prickled oddly. He couldn’t answer. A moment later, a hand struck him. It didn’t hurt, but it surprised him, like an eggshell cracking. He stayed silent. The hand struck him again. Around the fifth or sixth one, Fei Du dimly noticed that it had started to hurt now, that each strike got a little further, layering heat into bruises that would ensure he couldn’t sit for days. He noticed other things: Luo Wenzhou held him steady with his other hand; the pain bloomed and took root; even as it steadied his mind it robbed him of other faculties. And Luo Wenzhou did not seem to tire. He kept going at an unrelenting pace until Fei Du’s mind snapped, the numbness fleeing him.

It was only twenty strikes. It felt like twice that. The truth wavered between states: only twenty could not account for the way Fei Du felt right now, as though the cotton candy had been balled up and stuffed in his throat, melting away and leaving him to swallow around sharp edges. 

When Luo Wenzhou dragged him upright, he didn’t have a chance to say a word before Fei Du tucked his head under Luo Wenzhou’s chin and burst into tears.

“Hey, there,” Luo Wenzhou said. He was none too careful that Fei Du’s ass still throbbed as he adjusted them. But then his arms were around Fei Du properly, holding him so hard that Fei Du forgot the first reason he’d started crying, and moved onto another. “Are you okay?”

No, Fei Du thought wildly. He didn’t know why this was happening; he’d endured pain far worse with less fuss. He knew his limits. This was not the plan. He couldn’t speak, not even to reassure Luo Wenzhou; he could only raise a hand weakly to grip the front of Luo Wenzhou’s shirt. Then soft lips pressed against his forehead, and for a moment the only sound was his own ragged, wet breathing.

His tears dried quickly. They’d only lasted so long because he’d wasted precious seconds being surprised at their very existence. “Am I forgiven?” he asked, voice even by dint of effort.

“You’re forgiven.” Luo Wenzhou tapped the back of his index finger under Fei Du’s chin, forcing him to look up. “You really did cry.”

“No,” Fei Du said balefully. “I didn’t.”

Luo Wenzhou’s mouth quirked up. “Alright,” he said magnanimously. “You didn’t.” He wiped the wet tracks, then held his thumb expectantly against Fei Du’s lips. 

“Gross,” Fei Du mumbled, but he was fragile, so he obediently licked Luo Wenzhou’s finger, tasting the fresh salt of his weakness. He felt sick and frail and very, very light, as though he’d been forgiven for sins he hadn’t even known he’d committed. This was impossible: Fei Du kept meticulous track of his errors and failings, and each of them was exactly where he’d left it. Nothing made sense. 

It was difficult to summon the appropriate concern. 

Luo Wenzhou held him until Fei Du had stopped shaking, then unloaded him onto the couch and went inside to serve two plates of lunch. And Fei Du got to stretch across the length of it while Luo Wenzhou sat on the floor by his head, gesturing with the chopsticks as he rambled about work yesterday.

They had a good day despite the rough start; going to bed early, and sleeping rather late. Fei Du woke up in the small hours of the morning, unease rooting through his subconscious mind.

Correction, he realized belatedly, was not supposed to feel so much like a reward. 

~

Despite what counted as positive reinforcement, Fei Du felt an appalling unwillingness to misbehave for the next few days. Disturbed and restless, he got rid of this inconvenient information via mental firing squad and spent some time examining his internal affairs. The results were inconclusive and largely fruitless, but two things stood out: firstly, he’d enjoyed being corrected; secondly, he’d hated the thought that Luo Wenzhou was upset with him.

These facts pointed him in opposite directions. Fei Du split the difference: contradictory by nature, he took his unwillingness to stray and turned it into disobedience—at the same time, he was determined to avoid punishment. 

Luo Wenzhou could make of that what he willed; maybe, if Fei Du was lucky, Luo Wenzhou would realize where he’d erred and make the corrections permanent.

“Can you pass me the pen?” Luo Wenzhou said. Fei Du leaned back in his chair and blew a bubble. “Also, don’t you have work to do?”

“Already done,” Fei Du said. The gum had long since lost flavor. 

“Don’t talk with your mouth full. Pen, Fei Du.”

“There’s one right beside you.”

“It isn’t working.”

“It was working fine for me this morning.”

“You don’t even use pens,” Luo Wenzhou was starting to frown. Fei Du was starting to wish he’d never started this argument. He wanted to smooth it over, give him the pen and take half a pile of reports, ease the workload so they could leave early and have dinner somewhere nice. But he threw a crumpled ball of paper at Luo Wenzhou’s head instead. 

He uncrumpled it and rolled his eyes. It was a nice sketch—Fei Du had spent a long time on something only to ruin it. When he looked up again, Fei Du was gone. 

Behind the office building, Fei Du leaned against a dirty wall and tried to quell the sick feeling in his chest. His hands were shaking. He didn’t like doing this, but it was necessary, like a vaccine. He’d fallen apart when Luo Wenzhou was just a little angry at him, and that wouldn’t do. He had to be able to take it. He had to.

By the time he went inside, his hands had stopped shaking and Luo Wenzhou had gotten the pen to work. For the rest of the day, Fei Du was quiet and unobjectionable. He didn’t have it in him to put on a repeat show.

The next day was a little better. Fei Du behaved himself reasonably but limited himself to a cup of coffee for breakfast and a milk carton for lunch. Luo Wenzhou was not so distracted he didn’t notice, but Fei Du squirmed out of questioning by claiming he had an upset stomach and was imposing a liquid diet—this should have failed to hold up, but Luo Wenzhou was busy, and he left Fei Du alone.

Not too alone. Tao Ran strolled casually into the office, glanced around, and said, “Let’s go eat something, I’m hungry.”

“I’m not,” Fei Du said, getting to his feet. “I had lunch, but I’ll come with you”

“What did you have?” Tao Ran asked.

“This and that,” Fei Du said vaguely, offering Tao Ran a genteel smile for his concern. He started talking about a paper on child psychology he’d read recently, and Tao Ran obligingly put up with this until they had found a table.

Ten minutes after they’d ordered, Tao Ran’s phone pinged. He picked it up before Fei Du could glance at the screen, responded to the message, and set it back face down. Five minutes later Luo Wenzhou slid into the third seat at the table, followed closely by Lang Qiao. Fei Du’s unflappable calm made a treacherous exit out of a nearby window. 

“Cold noodles for you?” Luo Wenzhou asked, flipping through the menu.

“I ate already,” Fei Du said. “I’m just keeping Tao Ran company. Now that you’re here, maybe I can get back to work…?”

“Oh, stay,” Lang Qiao said. “I have so many questions for you.”

Fei Du turned his head robotically in her direction. “I will do my best to answer them,” he said. “Anything for such a pretty—” Someone kicked him under the table; judging from the direction, it was Tao Ran “lady.”

Lang Qiao giggled. “Don’t flirt with me, you’re a taken man.”

He didn’t dare look back to see what face Luo Wenzhou was making; it would have been too obvious. Instead he tried to discern it from Tao Ran, who was staring fixedly in Luo Wenzhou’s direction. He didn’t look worried, just helpless and mildly beseeching.

“I wanted to ask,” Lang Qiao started. “What’s the Captain like at home?”

“Keep talking, and you’ll foot your own bill,” Luo Wenzhou said.

Lang Qiao was struck by inspiration. “Fei Du won’t let me pay for myself, of course.” 

Tao Ran looked like he wanted to follow the route Fei Du’s calm had taken. “Why don’t you two order already?”

“Not until the matter with the Eldest Princess is resolved.”

Fei Du swallowed down an entirely unwarranted surge of jealousy. Luo Wenzhou had called Lang Qiao that for far longer than their relationship had even existed—it was ridiculous to be envious now. But—princess, and the way Luo Wenzhou treated her with the same disaffected care he’d directed at Fei Du before they’d started dating, and how she really was very pretty even if Luo Wenzhou was very gay and she was very straight. Princess.

“I’ll foot the bill for everyone,” Fei Du said suddenly. “The illustrious servants of the Criminal Investigation Team deserve to eat well, after all.”

“With President Fei’s leave,” Luo Wenzhou drawled, then flagged over a waiter. “You sure you’re not hungry?”

Fei Du’s stomach was cold and hollow. “Very sure.”

Luo Wenzhou ordered too much, then got everything they didn’t eat packed up to go. He distributed them evenly between Lang Qiao and Tao Ran, but kept the bulk for himself, excusing the matter with a straightforward appeal to nepotism, since his lover’s money had paid for the food. 

Fei Du floated above it all, making light conversation when called upon to do so, and had drifted entirely off when he was brought back abruptly. “Tao Ran,” Luo Wenzhou said. “You’re headed to work, right? We’ll come with you. Fei Du, I bought some wet food for Luo Yiguo that needs to be refrigerated, so drive my car home and take all of this with you. If you’re done with your work you have no reason to stick around.”

“Okay, shixiong,” Fei Du said, and sailed down the stairs with his arms full of delicious smells. 

He managed to restrain himself for three kilometers, then parked at the side of the road with a curse and grabbed one of the paper boxes of cold noodles. Twenty minutes later he’d finished two boxes and was feeling quite heavy. He stared at the empty cartons blankly, then paid his parking ticket and drove the rest of the way.

He framed Luo Yiguo artfully, luring him in with the smell and arranging the box on its side, letting him claw desperately at it for a few minutes to mark the crime scene with his fingerprints, then snapped a photo and sent it to Luo Wenzhou. Your son got into them. Very sad.

Did he use chopsticks? Luo Wenzhou replied immediately.

Fei Du sat on the couch and put his head in his hands. Even when he won, he always lost. 

Luo Wenzhou fucked him that night, pressing his wrists into the bed with one hand, his other pressed lightly against the scar on Fei Du's torso. If he blinked slowly, he could cheat and close his eyes; if he kept them shut for too long, Luo Wenzhou made him look again, merciless. They moved slowly, together, Fei Du's heart beating wildly in his chest like a caged bird that could taste the spring.

Sometimes, when Luo Wenzhou touched him like this for long enough, Fei Du felt the overwhelming porousness of his skin. He was separated from his own blood by the thinnest of layers—sharp scissors could cut him, a door's edge could smash the membrane. It was unbearable. And Luo Wenzhou flayed him like a professional torturer, an adept of a uniquely sadistic art whose sole muse was currently writhing on the sheets, gasping brokenly between thrusts. 

As he came, Fei Du thought: if Luo Wenzhou ever shot him, he'd finally stop being afraid of blood. 

In the warm quiet afterwards, they heard a scratching at the door. “It's locked,” Fei Du said, low, twining their fingers together. “I've fed him already.”

“Greedy brat,” Luo Wenzhou grumbled.

Fei Du swiped his thumb over Luo Wenzhou's pulse, short back and forth brushes. “You raise them like that with your kindness.”

“Are you advising me to be more cruel?”

“They'll eat you out of house and home,” Fei Du whispered. “The only way is to set firm limits. That will teach them not to take you for granted.”

“Your advice is duly noted,” Luo Wenzhou said. “Any other words of wisdom?”

Fei Du reflected. “Don't let criminals into your life, even by accident. They will invariably drag you into their ways.”

“You think I'm that vulnerable to corruption?”

“The brightest hearts stain the fastest.”

Arms encircled him. Fei Du wondered if he had not been clear enough. He rested his head on Luo Wenzhou collarbone regardless; he was a parasite determined to crawl under Luo Wenzhou's skin and make his home inside. Locked doors wouldn't keep him out; he'd inch through the keyhole. Luo Wenzhou would have to try so hard to get rid of him.

Or, he could tell Fei Du to go, and he would.

“With your murderous tongue, I should probably call a hit on you,” Luo Wenzhou said softly. 

Fei Du curled into him, pliant and wanting. “I'll bribe the whole department with cakes and candy to stay far away.”

“You can't buy me that easily.”

“Oh, I know—it's only to ensure you're the one who catches me.”

“Fiend,” Luo Wenzhou said tenderly. “Go to sleep.”

The next day, Fei Du went to his own office, giving himself a break from his prescribed vaccinations. There was plenty to do no matter where he was. He spent seven hours reviewing reports, signing documents, and fielding phone calls, and in his free moments considered the tenuous nature of genius. It only took the right pressures to seriously dissolve his mental faculties. 

He ended up staying at work a little longer than he’d meant to, texted Luo Wenzhou to let him know. By the time he returned home there was a headache pounding between his ears. 

For some time, there was the lack of desire to do anything about this. When he’d lived by himself, he’d medicated on the basis of need, and a headache could be powered through without harm. The tedium of working through it, the annoyance of the pain, were inconsequential concerns. Now, he’d become accustomed to Luo Wenzhou fretting over every little scrape and sniffle he picked up. It made no difference to Fei Du either way, however. He liked it; he’d survive without it. 

He picked the lock to the liquor cabinet, poured two fingers of whiskey, and contemplated the brown liquid. The crime was simple to conceal, but he lay on the couch in easy view of the door, sipping lying down, chasing the cheap whiskey with the rich thrill of waiting to be caught.

Luo Wenzhou ran late, though. In customary fashion he did not inform Fei Du of this. Fei Du finished the glass very slowly and eventually fell asleep, one arm thrown over his eyes to block the light and the other trailing the floor, glass clutched loosely.

This was his error. Despite Luo Wenzhou’s disapproval for the debauched lifestyle Fei Du had once cultivated, he had a low tolerance for alcohol, and had never drunk more than he absolutely had to. Luo Yiguo had been distracted for a few hours—Fei Du, comfortably tipsy, had forgotten about him. 

The hand left vulnerable had a sparkling watch at the wrist and a glass that smelled enticing to the alcoholic cat. Fei Du woke up with a scream.

His first instinct was to get away from his aggressor. He startled upright, then smelled the blood and immediately felt faint. The glass slipped from his numb fingers and broke on the floor. Luo Yiguo shrieked and fled the scene, probably afraid of being framed yet again for a crime he hadn’t committed. Fei Du, addled by the scent, made the fatal mistake of trying to stand up, desperate for something to stanch the bleeding, and promptly stepped on about half a dozen pieces of broken glass.

He sucked in a desperate breath and choked.

Some time later, he gathered enough of himself to pick up his phone and text, shakily, shixiong, I don’t mean to worry you, but there’s been a minor accident.

Coming, Luo Wenzhou texted back immediately. Stay put.

Fei Du stared at the drops of blood until the nauseating ring in his ears swallowed every thought, sane and insane alike. His fingers twitched. He stayed so still that the pain in his foot and wrist crawled into his brain and pried open doors that should’ve stayed shut forever.

Afraid of pain? No. There really was, he felt, between gasping uneven breaths, nothing like it.

He didn’t throw up because he hadn’t eaten that day. By the time Luo Wenzhou walked in, he’d twisted himself to press his nose against the back of the couch, trying to block the smell via gentle suffocation. But it wasn’t only the smell that he hated—the wetness, the warm sticky drip, the agonizing awareness of the fragility of it all. He’d known since he was young that the world was made of paper, easily burned, but a splash of liquid was just as jarring a surprise.

“Darling, what did you get up to?”

Luo Wenzhou scooped him up before he could try to respond, easily wrangling his limp, uncooperative body and his errant limbs. Glass crunched under his shoes. He didn’t seem to care. His survey of the scene, though brief, had given him all the relevant facts.

“I’m taking you to the emergency room.”

“No,” Fei Du was dimly frightened. “Please.”

“Shut up,” Luo Wenzhou said concisely.

A couple of years ago, Tao Ran had told him when Luo Wenzhou’s birthday was. Fei Du had already known, having found a way to snoop through Luo Wenzhou’s personal information, but being told by a friend meant that it behooved one to do something about it. In the end, he’d had a bottle of cologne sent via Tao Ran, a ridiculously expensive liquid redolent of pine and vetiver and something faintly spicy. He’d meant it as a dig, a covert you stink, but combined with the natural scent of Luo Wenzhou’s body, it was powerful—cloyingly manly, terribly appropriate. 

It went right to Fei Du’s chest, allowing him to breathe. He buried his nose in Luo Wenzhou’s collar and sniffed, taking in lungfuls of that almost-hedonistically masculine smell, nosing aside a fold of cloth to get closer to the source.

“You nearly fainted, and now you want to lick me?” Luo Wenzhou reproved. He was deposited firmly into the passenger seat of a car a moment later, buckled in.

It was a cold night, but Luo Wenzhou considerately rolled down both windows. The kindness of this action was, on the whole, rather debatable—Luo Wenzhou was dressed for the weather, and Fei Du wore only a thin shirt and neither socks nor shoes. The sharp wind skimmed over Fei Du’s aching eyelids, drying his lips. He shivered.

Luo Wenzhou drove fast, and the hospital was not that far, but the ride lulled Fei Du into a stupor. When the car parked and he heard the driver’s door open, he obligingly opened his own and moved to get up.

Sharp pains knocked him flat in rapid succession. First, his injured wrist made contact with the retreating buckle of the seatbelt. Second, his injured foot stepped on the icy asphalt. Already in motion, he had no way of stopping now, and awkwardly grit his teeth and staggered upright, the pieces of glass stuck in his foot stabbing pain through his nerves.

“Are you stupid, President Fei?” Luo Wenzhou said courteously. “What are you doing?”

Fei Du could only barely make out what was going on. Like an oil painting that hadn’t dried, each attempted action ruined the picture. 

He was picked up again, this time over Luo Wenzhou’s back, arms around his neck. He was much too tall for this maneuver to go easy, but Luo Wenzhou needed his hands, so Fei Du tried and failed to make himself smaller, realized distantly that no one had picked him up like this in living memory, and rested his head against Luo Wenzhou’s, murmuring, “I’m very sorry.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Luo Wenzhou said. “What are you sorry for?”

“Everything,” Fei Du said sincerely. In his heart, he wanted to apologize even for the winter air against Luo Wenzhou’s exposed neck. His ears were cold against Fei Du’s cheek. 

A deep sigh. “Save your breath.” 

Amenable without rancor, Fei Du stayed quiet as they went into the hospital’s emergency room. Almost at once, he smelled more blood, clear despite the thick smells of rubber and floor cleaner and spirit. He emitted a miserable sound and tried to put his face in Luo Wenzhou’s collar, but it was too late. He was shaking again, only tangentially aware of Luo Wenzhou talking to this person and that person, setting him down somewhere. He panicked when he couldn’t tell, for a moment, who was touching him, before a strong familiar hand slipped around his and squeezed. 

“They’re taking out the glass,” Luo Wenzhou narrated in a low voice. “Then they’ll dress it and look at your hand. What happened to it?”

“I think Luo Yiguo attacked me.”

“You think?”

“I was asleep,” Fei Du explained. “Either he smelled what was in the glass I was holding, or pounced at the watch…”

“What was in the glass?”

Fei Du felt dirty under Luo Wenzhou’s scorching attention. “Whiskey.”

“...”

“On an empty stomach,” Fei Du added, demonstrating his lack of attachment to his life.

The silence took on a distinctly violent undertone. Fei Du exhaled sharply as the last piece of glass exited his flesh and then, carefully, brought Luo Wenzhou’s hand to his lips and pressed them against his rough, scraped knuckles. 

“Thank you for coming when I called,” he said.

“Don’t try that on me. I’m still angry with you.”

Fei Du nodded understandingly. Luo Wenzhou, of course, had every right to be angry, furthermore to enact a punishment accordingly. The crime was known; the consequence was blank. He would find out when he was meant to find out. But his wandering, exhausted imagination faltered at this step—he could not conceive of a suitable form of correction that would ensure Fei Du did not repeat his error. The things Luo Wenzhou would do and the things Fei Du wanted him to do were a nearly perfect overlapping circle.

His hand was dressed, a tetanus shot administered for safety’s sake. He left on his feet, albeit limping and relying heavily on Luo Wenzhou for support.

“You can drop me off before the highway,” he said, after they were in the car.

“Drop you off where? Don’t tell me you still have plans after this, it’s nearly eleven.”

“I can take a cab to my apartment,” Fei Du said briefly. “I’ve made enough trouble for you tonight. I can take care of myself for a while.”

“For a while—you really are something.” Luo Wenzhou sighed, heartfelt. “I’ve no intention of letting you stay by yourself in this state. You’re coming home, and I’ll make you some congee and soup. It won’t be much, but you won’t fall asleep at all if you’re hungry.”

After a while, Fei Du said, “Thank you.” He didn’t know what else to say.

The traffic had dissipated. They got home faster than they’d gotten to the hospital, or perhaps it only felt that way. There was a sick haze clouding his mind. 

True to his word, Luo Wenzhou heated soup and made congee, briskly interspersed with cleaning the floor. Luo Yiguo had unexpectedly got himself stuck in a drawer, and avoided becoming another casualty of the broken glass. He was freed in due course. Fei Du’s attempts to help were cut short; he was deposited at the table to wait for his dinner. Numb and lost, he did not have the strength to protest. 

When Luo Wenzhou returned, he put his hand on the back of Fei Du’s head, heavy but not pushing. Fei Du dropped anyway, pressing the side of his face against the table, spectacles cutting into his temples. They were eased off his nose, folded and put down. 

“Ready to eat?” Luo Wenzhou asked. 

Fei Du didn’t move. With a grumble, Luo Wenzhou sat down on the next chair, stroking his hair. Though he was not, by nature, a patient man, he had proven himself ready to wait an inordinately long time for Fei Du’s difficult mind to settle. Sometimes, his very presence was enough to soothe that parasite in him. Other times, it was only a temptation, a call to violence. 

The worst was when Fei Du could not tell the difference, and mistook one for the other. 

“Yes,” Fei Du said at last. 

With his dominant hand out of order, he had to be fed. Despite his teasing, Luo Wenzhou didn’t seem to resent this. Each bite filled Fei Du with a nameless, inchoate feeling. 

In all his years growing up, he had never associated food with satisfaction. He’d never truly gone hungry, of course, so the visceral, basic nourishment of a hot meal was foreign to him. Even fresh food in his childhood house had been oddly hard and tasteless, like eating pebbles, and they sat in his stomach like river stones piled up to bury his hunger.

This, and now—each bite he took contained the heat and flavor of all the ones missed prior—like Luo Wenzhou’s touch alone could transform any meal he served into one that tasted like home. 

The monster carried its starving like an indelible sin; it was a beast of its own, capable of turning its host inside out, bleeding teeth to eat what wasn’t meant for it. But when it was fed it was docile, easily tamed, all its cunning swept away by the desperation for another moment like this, and another, any little pocket of warmth it could worm its way into and hide inside, pretending to belong for as long as it could.

How had Fei Du imagined he could do this alone? The worst punishment he could imagine was being exiled from Luo Wenzhou’s circle of light, kneeling on the outside looking in. 

When the last bite was swallowed, Luo Wenzhou kissed his forehead. “Good boy,” he said, burningly tender. Fei Du turned his head away, scalded. “Why did you sleep on the couch? I would’ve caught you the moment I stepped in, if it wasn’t for your accident.”

“You did catch me,” Fei Du said vaguely. “The accident wasn’t part of the plan.”

“I should hope not. So, what was the plan?”

“For you to…” Fei Du faltered. The world outside Luo Wenzhou’s home suddenly seemed impossibly dark and vast, shadowed by ghouls that trailed blood across ice-wet roads. Only here was he safe. The irrationality of his own thoughts caught him off-guard, but he hadn’t the energy to spare to bring it under control. He struggled silently against the conviction of his own doom. “For you to be angry with me.”

The expression in Luo Wenzhou’s eyes could have leveled mountains. Fei Du’s defenses, made of paltry silver foil, crumpled at once. The moment was inescapable, as was Luo Wenzhou’s response—he caught both of Fei Du’s wrists, one bandaged and faintly hurting and another only suffering from long hours spent typing, and held them loosely in Fei Du’s lap. His breath caught. The sight of his slender, delicate hands in Luo Wenzhou’s broad, capable ones was strangely satisfying. 

“Keep talking.”

Fei Du shifted, contriving pressure against his injury. Luo Wenzhou raised an eyebrow, got what he wanted to do, and obliged, tightening his grip. The deep pain was terribly comforting. Fei Du’s anxieties blurred and faded. He drooped forwards like a wilted flower.

“You really do like pain,” Luo Wenzhou marveled. Something in his tone made Fei Du flush. “I’m not complaining, darling, but you’re a real…” He laughed silently. “A real piece of work.” He dug his fingers in, and Fei Du moaned. “My spoiled princeling, you’re not going to avoid talking so easily. Unless you want to spend a night in the stocks, you better start explaining.”

“Shixiong, you’re very unfair. You play with my feelings and then blame me for being misled.”

“You’re a victim of gravest injustice,” Luo Wenzhou was still laughing. “We’ll call an investigation.”

“It’s no good. The police are all corrupt,” he leaned forward earnestly, conspiratorial. “Why, the one who ruined me is a Captain himself—tell me, under such circumstances, how am I supposed to trust the law? Only you can help me, shixiong.”

He was rewarded for his dramatics with a deep, searching kiss. When Luo Wenzhou was done he felt like a clear crystal bell, every shiver laid bare for the sun to skim through. 

Thus soothed, he said, quite simply, “I hate it when you’re angry at me.”

“Because you hate it, you keep doing things to cause it. Makes perfect sense.”

Fei Du nodded guilelessly. “I love being scared of you.”

“You love… are you like one of those bats that make such high-pitched noises they have to block their own cries in order to not deafen themselves? Is that what’s going on with you? 

“Shixiong,” Fei Du whispered. “You’re like a roller coaster. I never understood the point of them until I met you. No matter how terrified I am, you put me down so gently that I keep coming back.”

“Watch your words, Fei Du,” Luo Wenzhou said roughly. “Or I might just ruin you again.” 

He lifted his free hand and pressed the pad of his thumb to Fei Du’s lower lip. Fei Du didn’t move. “Anything you want.”

Luo Wenzhou hummed. “Would that be a punishment to you?”

A frightening question. Fei Du couldn’t have withheld his answer if he’d tried; he was caught like an insect in a sticky web, entangling itself in its effort to get free. His own resentment was delicious to him. “What you do to me is whatever you say it is,” he said, turning his head to trail his lips down the side of Luo Wenzhou’s hand. “If you want to punish me, I’ll repent. If you don’t, I’ll thank you for your mercy. Is that alright?”

“Is that alright, he asks,” Luo Wenzhou said, heated and raw. “I think you’ve been punished enough tonight, so this has nothing to do with what you did. As for my methods…you can complain, but I won’t change my mind.”

“Okay,” Fei Du said. Then, making good on his words, “Thank you.”

“Not just yet.” Luo Wenzhou tilted Fei Du’s chin up. “And call me sir.”

“Sir,” Fei Du repeated, warm and agreeable. 

Satisfied, Luo Wenzhou let go of him and unzipped his pants. Fei Du slipped off the chair and sank to his knees, the picture of a penitent sinner. Luo Wenzhou stroked his cheek as he slipped his cock between Fei Du’s lips. He’d always been a natural at this, scared of choking and desperate for what he feared, but Luo Wenzhou wasn’t interested in Fei Du’s initiative; a heavy, careful hand settled on his head, gripping his hair to fuck his mouth in easy strokes. Fei Du pressed his palms against the silk-blend fabric of his pants, studiously ignoring his own desire.

His wrist hurt, his foot hurt, the piece of dead meat he called a heart hurt. It all tangled up inside him, knotted and held, unbearably heavy and sweeter still for that.

He moaned as Luo Wenzhou came down his throat, at a loss when his cock slipped softly out of Fei Du’s lips. He chased it, empty and confused, and was held back. “That’s enough.”

“But,” Fei Du whined.

“Hush, darling.”

“You said I could complain,” Fei Du put all his petulance into the words. Luo Wenzhou only pulled him gently to his feet, shamelessly amused by his belligerent attitude.

He was half-carried to the bedroom, laid out on the bed, taken apart like some intricate vintage watch Luo Wenzhou had stumbled upon. There was a dislocation that came over Fei Du when things were difficult, separating his rational mind from his body. Now, that gap was inverted: Luo Wenzhou unmade him and stretched him thin, but the force holding his various pieces together was clear and thick, a spiderweb sticking him to himself the more he twisted..

He was brought to the threshold of release time after time, only to be denied that last step. Perversely blissful, to be dissolved to thin edges—the pleasure that Luo Wenzhou eked out of his body was, by comparison, holy torture.

The twofold assault annihilated Fei Du. Afterwards he clung anxiously to Luo Wenzhou, all his delight hopelessly fragile. 

“You poor thing,” Luo Wenzhou said kindly. “Was that too much?”

Fei Du shook his head. Never. Nearly. He ached all over, but it was a sweet ache, bruises and hickeys and being fucked too hard and deep. “Shixiong, go easy on your disciple,” he said ruefully. “I can take it now, but who knows whether I’ll be able to move tomorrow?”

“I’ll drive you,” Luo Wenzhou said.

“I have an early meeting,” Fei Du yawned. “Don’t worry yourself about it.”

“Are you going to be alright?” 

Fei Du didn’t respond. He’d passed out. Luo Wenzhou sighed and switched off the bedside lamp, stroking Fei Du’s sharp shoulder blades until long after he himself should have fallen asleep.

~

The next morning, Fei Du extracted himself from bed in the early hours, his body immediately making its protests known. He hadn’t complained about anything last night, hadn’t wanted to, devastated by Luo Wenzhou’s laser focus. Now, in the watery light, he sat on the edge of the bed and looked at Luo Wenzhou—when he was asleep, his expression was not as carefree as it was during the day. He had the faint beginnings of frown lines to go with his laugh lines. Some of those creases, Fei Du had put there himself.

Contrite, he leaned down and kissed Luo Wenzhou’s forehead. “Bye,” he murmured.

“Remember to eat,” Luo Wenzhou said, cracking one eye open like a dragon. Fei Du laughed, startled. He kissed Luo Wenzhou’s temple, this time, and got up to twitch the curtains closed. “Can’t you stay?”

Of course, he would rather have stayed in bed with Luo Wenzhou. But there were 8:00 AM meetings with foreign investors: being a few floors above the average wage slave did not free him of the obligation to attend to the concerns of old men with more money, even, than he himself did. “Darling,” he adopted the tone Luo Wenzhou used on him, to half the effect. “I have to put food on the table somehow.”

Luo Wenzhou snorted. “Get out.”

Fei Du slid his watch and tie pins into his pocket, picked up his coat, and left. He hurt dully all over, not enough to hamper him or slow him down but enough that he moved carefully. As he drove to work he sought to bring the pain under control, to shift it to the bottom layer of his awareness where he could be soothed by it without being distracted.

His stomach lurched as he remembered what Luo Wenzhou had said: this has nothing to do with what you did. Which meant that debt was still outstanding, which meant…

Did he even deserve this comfort? Luo Wenzhou had given it to him, but what he gave and what Fei Du had earned rarely matched up. He did not argue, though, with anything that Luo Wenzhou wanted. It brought him little joy to contradict until he had to, and Luo Wenzhou was accustomed to having his way and enjoyed it. Every time Fei Du went against him, it was with unease shadowing his actions. 

Well, why did it matter that he had yet to be punished? Prior to asking Luo Wenzhou, Fei Du had managed his affairs himself—with shock treatment and hunger, showers that were too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. He could hurt himself without anyone the wiser. Even now, if he so chose, he could easily have devised a way of inconveniencing himself that Luo Wenzhou wouldn’t have been able to figure out, but the thought was obscurely upsetting. 

He was not used to being so visible to another person, and the vulnerability that entailed was frequently bewilderingly outside the range of his usual emotions and actions. He persevered—to make Luo Wenzhou happy, and by consequence himself. Besides, Fei Du knew that hiding things from Luo Wenzhou wasn’t that simple. He wasn’t a stranger, and he saw more than Fei Du wanted him to see. He could lie until his defenses unraveled, and then Luo Wenzhou would see him for the gruesome creature he was, and…

Again, the question of why it mattered at all—either way, he was pretending. So what if some lies were more tangible than others? Fei Du’s monstrosities were hardly abstract either.

If Luo Wenzhou didn’t want the responsibility of shaping him, then Fei Du would simply do it himself—as he’d always done. He could not rightfully ask the person he loved to make sure that Fei Du was worth keeping. He would mold himself.

After work, he had a dinner appointment with an American venture capitalist. The man flirted shamelessly with Fei Du, despite Fei Du’s subtle indications that he was taken. 

“How good can that guy be?” he said, in thickly-accented Chinese, lightly touching Fei Du’s injured hand. “I promise I’m more gentle.”

Anger flashed through him, cold and bitter. “Then, I’m afraid you couldn’t satisfy me,” he said, putting his hand under the table.

The man raised an eyebrow, surprised. He muttered something in English, too low for Fei Du to catch, then said, “I’m pretty flexible.”

“I’m sure,” Fei Du said. “If you’re looking for company during your stay, I can arrange matters.”

“I’m not just interested in any company,” the man said meaningfully.

Fei Du was starting to feel rather hounded. “My time can’t be bought.”

“Can’t it? Name your price, President Fei.” 

“It already belongs to someone else.” He wondered if anyone had ever hit on Luo Wenzhou so relentlessly, but somehow he couldn’t imagine Luo Wenzhou tolerating that kind of thing a second longer than he wanted to. 

“I can negotiate with him instead.”

“He negotiates with a gun in hand,” Fei Du said softly. “It wouldn’t end well for you.”

Of course, it was only an idle threat. But in the dark, cloying air of the upscale restaurant, the words took on a shadowy meaning that reminded Fei Du of other times, other lies. There was something darkly entrancing about Luo Wenzhou killing for him—the kind of love that sent men to hell.

But then he thought of Luo Wenzhou being arrested, interrogated, trying to defend himself. The fantasy grew uncomfortably realistic uncomfortably fast, and with it came a roar of directionless rage, hate for himself and for the whole world. If he ever drove Luo Wenzhou to that edge, he’d pull no stop making sure he was unhurt in the aftermath. No matter what it meant, no matter what it took. He didn’t have it in him to see Luo Wenzhou suffer.

There was something wrong with him, he thought. There was love and affection, and then there was this ferocious hate at the very idea of Luo Wenzhou being harmed. When Fei Du had put himself between Luo Wenzhou and an explosion, he’d thought he’d done it because he didn’t have a choice. Now, he realized, he’d make the same decision over and over again, simply to make sure Luo Wenzhou never hurt more than he had to.

“Darling, you seem a little distracted,” the man said. 

Fei Du’s temper nearly broke. Only his inhuman self-control kept him from stabbing his chopsticks into the man’s dick. “It’s nothing,” Fei Du said smoothly. “Now, we were talking about the Binhai project, weren’t we?” 

Hints were entirely lost on the man. Ever more cutting let-downs only spurred him on. Fei Du felt positively dirty by the time he exited the restaurant, having stayed back to settle the bill and finish his cocktail. He’d drunk far more than he’d wanted to, unwilling to endure this sober. His skin crawled with the residue of greedy eyes trailing over him. 

The guilt crushed in heavily. He laid down a five hundred yuan tip and walked to the parking lot.

When he returned, Luo Wenzhou was reading in bed. He looked up curiously as Fei Du undressed, then hummed sympathetically. “Long day, huh.”

Fei Du nodded. His tie pins and cufflinks clattered into the little bowl on the dressing table one after the other. He stripped briskly, then headed into the bathroom.

“Are you showering now?” Luo Wenzhou asked. “Unless you were mucking out a pig sty, what’s the need? Come to bed.”

“Not sleepy,” Fei Du said tersely. 

“Your constitution is not strong enough for such activities.” Luo Wenzhou’s tone did not leave much room for argument. “You’ll get a cold and I’ll have to change your bandages.”

“I’ll change them myself.” He had to step out again to pick up clothes and an extra towel, and in doing so walked into Luo Wenzhou. He skittered back, shocked. “Can I go?”

“No,” Luo Wenzhou said. “Not until you tell me what’s going on.”

All at once, Fei Du couldn’t take this. The emotion surged up from nowhere, shattering the ice-numb surface and making him explode in an entirely unwarranted way. “No, I won’t,” he snapped. “I need to shower and then I need to review reports, and if I allow you to make me talk about my feelings every time you arbitrarily decide I need that without consulting me on whether I want to disclose it to you then I’ll—”

“Fei Du—” Luo Wenzhou reached out as he spoke, as he always did when Fei Du was in a mood. As though he could bridge the gap with his touch when their words weren’t ready to cooperate. But Fei Du didn’t want to be touched. He backed away, unavoidably caught the hurt and frustration that flashed through Luo Wenzhou’s eyes. 

“Sit down,” Fei Du said frigidly. “I’m going to shower.”

Luo Wenzhou, to the astonishment of all of heaven but not Fei Du himself, did as asked. He got his clothes while pretending he didn’t notice or care that Luo Wenzhou was staring holes into his back, then locked himself in the bathroom and turned on the shower to drown out his panic attack.

What was wrong with him? His lack of concern for himself was one thing, but to hurt Luo Wenzhou—so soon after the realization that Fei Du would do anything to not hurt him—what was happening?

Was this how it started? First the guilt, then the justification, then the ankle monitors and brainwashing. How long did he have before he turned into his father?

The water was icy when he stepped in. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to bear it, to look closely at the cuts on his wrist—they wouldn’t bleed again, but the sight of them still turned his stomach. He could have made himself throw up, use the vile sick spasm in his stomach for punishment, but he didn’t want Luo Wenzhou to worry.

And he didn’t feel less dirty after he stepped out of the shower, he only felt cold. He dressed himself and dressed his injuries with shaking hands, wondering miserably if this was punishment enough. Realistically, it did not even cover a quarter of his debt—doubled in the last hour by his misdirected ire. He’d only been angry at himself, angry with whatever it was about him that had made a man assume he was only saying he had a boyfriend to play hard-to-get.

The truth was, no matter how filthy that man had made Fei Du feel, he’d once have felt nothing at all about sleeping with him simply to secure the funding and maintain goodwill. He was an inveterate opportunist who had found, in Luo Wenzhou, something far more rare than money, and immediately rushed to stake a claim over it.

Luo Wenzhou wasn’t stupid, so why did he allow Fei Du to stay? Didn’t he know what kind of snake he’d allowed into his life, into his bed?”

One of them was going to destroy the other. Fei Du could pray that he’d be the first to go, so Luo Wenzhou would be safe from whatever darkness Fei Du carried everywhere with him, but prayer was useless. He liked his limits more immediate and sharp, his boundaries drawn in barbed wire and shock collars, hostile and unforgiving. He didn’t trust himself enough to allow better.

When he came out, Luo Wenzhou was pretending to be asleep. Fei Du quietly left the bedroom and grabbed his laptop to work at the kitchen table until he could no longer keep his eyes open, then slept on the couch. He dreamed and did not remember what he dreamed.

In the morning he went out to buy breakfast for Luo Wenzhou, left it on the counter, fed Luo Yiguo, and went to the university before Luo Wenzhou even stirred.

In the evening he came back late, ate the dinner left covered for him, and worked until after Luo Wenzhou had fallen asleep. He told himself he deserved this, that his shaking hands and the agonized scrabble of his heart meant his chosen punishment was working, that Luo Wenzhou could do with some time without Fei Du’s teeth sunk into his neck like an emotional vampire.

Fei Du had a honed talent for invisibility. He kept up the pattern of avoidance for nearly three days, buying groceries and stocking the first aid kit to replace the bandages he was using and never, ever staying long enough to exchange more than a word or two. The worst part was that Luo Wenzhou allowed it. His misery was an oppressive force, like sharing a house with a stormy sea, but Fei Du was used to breathing in lightning, living in the interstices between thunder. 

No matter how small he made himself, he couldn’t shrink the bleak guilt that had taken up residence in the back of his mind. He rested poorly, and had nightmares, always waking up in the middle of the night on the sofa and wishing he could count Luo Wenzhou’s breaths to lull himself back to sleep. 

This was the punishment, wasn’t it? The most effective one he could administer, better than being deprived of air or food. It was working. He ate and didn’t taste a single bite, breathed and felt it poison his cells, the guilt sluicing out. 

That morning Tao Ran messaged him and suggested getting lunch together.

Can you find that much time off work? Fei Du texted back, already looking up good places near the City Bureau.

I can make it.

Please don’t spring shixiong on me again, I’m booking a table for two.

No surprises, Tao Ran sent. Wait, booking? How fancy is this place?

It was very fancy. Fei Du ordered for both of them, because Tao Ran looked at a menu card with no prices on it and quickly went pale. 

Fei Du was just about to start in on an amusing anecdote of something Luo Yiguo had done when Tao Ran said, unsubtly, “Are you and Luo Wenzhou fighting?”

“I wouldn’t call it a fight. Can I get you something to drink?”

“No. You’re not getting anything either. What are you calling it, if not a fight?”

“It’s not a fight,” Fei Du worked around the words carefully, “Because there’s no disagreement. He’s angry at me and I’m wrong.”

“Then, what’s the problem?” Tao Ran asked. “Apologize and finish it off. He’s taking it out on all of us, you know.”

“Is he?” Fei Du said jealously. “What’s he doing?”

Tao Ran sighed. “Is this like the handcuffs? Don’t tell me, I need a drink.”

Fei Du started to flag down a waiter. Tao Ran pulled his hand down, meaningfully saying nothing at all when Fei Du instinctively flinched back from even that unassuming touch.

Their food arrived. For a few minutes, they only ate and did not talk. Fei Du did not dare to think the conversation was over, however. He was planning his escape when the next volley began, in Tao Ran’s characteristically gentle tone. “What did you do wrong?”

“You know me, Tao-ge,” Fei Du said, smiling a little. “I’m always doing things to make fine, upstanding citizens very angry.”

“Luo Wenzhou is as far as one can get from a fine and upstanding citizen without moving countries,” Tao Ran said, without missing a beat. “If you pissed him off, you must have really done something.”

“Is it not enough to be myself?” Fei Du smiled wider. “That worked for many years.”

“If it still worked, we wouldn’t be here right now,” Tao Ran said. “Please don’t talk circles around me, it makes my head hurt.” He was silent for a moment. “I’m going to ask you something, Fei Du. Whatever you did, was it really so bad that you can’t even say sorry?”

Fei Du let the smile go. The problem with being a known problem case was that no one ever played fair with him.

“He thinks he’s the one who did something,” Tao Ran continued. 

“Oh,” Fei Du frowned. The disquiet was peculiar, painful. He’d thought, unreasonably, that Luo Wenzhou would know to blame Fei Du alone. He poked his lunch again and gave it up as futile. “Did he say that?”

“I know when he’s feeling guilty.” 

“I’ll talk to him,” Fei Du said at last. “He shouldn’t think this is his fault when I’m the one who… Thank you, Tao-ge. Are you sure you don’t want something to drink?”

“Nice try, but no.” He smiled wistfully. “You care about him a lot, don’t you?”

“...Why do you say it like that?”

“No reason,” Tao Ran said delicately. “Once, you told me that you didn’t know how to love, but I think you’d just never had a chance to find out how much you knew.”

Fei Du couldn’t meet Tao Ran’s gaze. The softness of it was more sharp than any butcher’s knife. “That’s,” he coughed. “Thank you.” 

He went back to work and very carefully did not think about what he’d done. There was a dark certainty brewing at the back of his mind that if he did contemplate his error for too long he’d end up buried in a basement with electrodes still hooked to his skin, and that would be the only thing worse than this. Neither did he particularly feel like imagining the look on Luo Wenzhou’s face upon learning that Fei Du had to be checked into an institution because he’d snapped and tried to torture himself to death.

Sanity was a precarious negotiation between the skeletons in the backyard and the skeletons in the closet. Fei Du brokered a tentative ceasefire and bought moth orchids on his way home.

At home, he fed Luo Yiguo and waited for Luo Wenzhou to return. And waited. And waited. He’d talked himself in and out of three separate drastic measures when he glanced at his watch and realized it had only been fifteen minutes. He couldn’t keep this up, couldn’t be patient. He took a deep breath and looked around himself, spotted a used mug, and swung into motion.

He’d cleaned up the entire house and was painstakingly cutting vegetables when he heard the front door click and nearly sliced his finger open.

Nearly. He snatched up the flowers and entirely forgot the carefully-ordered sequence of events he’d laid out over the course of the past two hours.

“Fei Du?” Luo Wenzhou said, putting his bag down and surveying the living room, with its changed curtains and dusted shelves. Then he turned. “Haven’t I told you about using the knife unsupervised?”

“I got you flowers,” Fei Du held them out, feeling like a schoolgirl. In the clean light, Luo Wenzhou looked deeply tired, in a way that Fei Du had only seen in the midst of their worst cases. His heart lurched. “Shixiong, I—”

“Where am I supposed to put these?” Luo Wenzhou interrupted. “We have a cat, you know. He knocks things over.”

Fei Du froze. “You can put them in the trash,” he said emptily. “It’s not important.”

“But you went through the trouble of getting them for me. Why would you do that if you didn’t think it mattered one way or another?”

A dry and cold piece of Fei Du’s mind, locked from the rest behind iron bars, noted that both Luo Wenzhou and Fei Chengyu shared the ability to use common words to make Fei Du feel utterly inadequate and atrociously stupid. Every other part of him was locked in ringing stasis.

“I’m sure you had an explanation prepared,” Luo Wenzhou said after a moment. “So go ahead and say it.”

“I don’t…”

“You don’t have an explanation? It’s not like you to act without a script. Was three days not enough time to think—should I give you more?”

“Shixiong, are you mad at me?” Fei Du asked childishly. It was an idiotic question with an obvious answer, but it was the only thing he could think of, a crawl of rancid terror like insects swarming out from his rotten bones, all of them desperate to maintain their paper-thin skin. Being set on fire, on the whole, would have hurt less. Act without a script echoed in his head.

Luo Wenzhou stared at him in confounded disbelief. “Yes,” he said cuttingly. “I am. I won’t be mad forever, but I’m very angry right now.” 

Fei Du deflated, the buzzing in his head receding to a background murmur. 

“It better be a good explanation,” Luo Wenzhou warned.

“It's not,” Fei Du didn't know what to do with his hands, or with any part of himself really. Flirtation came with no manual on conducting more serious relationships. “It's not good, and I think I'm going crazy.”

“Luckily, I knew you already were,” Luo Wenzhou said dryly. Fei Du bent his head. He'd walked into that one. “Sit down. I'll be there in a minute.”

He took the flowers, sprinkled them with water, and put them in the fridge. Fei Du thought suddenly of his own mother arranging flowers, her precise elaboration a far cry from Luo Wenzhou's practicality. He clenched his fists in his lap.

Organizing the facts in his head, they felt insufficient to explain the intensity of his reactions. There had been a time when he’d responded more harshly to less, but back then he hadn’t been answerable to anyone. It was easy to sell himself the logic of hours of torture following a brief fantasy of driving his car over a stray animal. It was difficult to explain that logic to anyone else, especially Luo Wenzhou, who was so resistant to Fei Du’s manipulations.

“Let’s go to the balcony,” Luo Wenzhou said. “I need to smoke.”

They went to the balcony. The night was cold, but Fei Du hunched his shoulders against it and leaned against the railings. 

“You know,” Luo Wenzhou said in a tone that could easily have slipped under the faint rustle of the breeze through branches. “Someone once told me you hate the smell of cigarettes.”

“I don’t mind when you smoke,” Fei Du replied, without looking at him. “But I worry about you.”

A moment later he heard the click of the lighter, the whisper of something catching on fire. An inhale and an exhale, and the stinging smell of tobacco wafted over to him, a warm secondhand comfort. 

“Where should I start?” he asked. 

“Wherever you like,” Luo Wenzhou answered unhelpfully. “Put that genius brain to use.”

Fei Du’s cheeks and ears burned. The rest of him was numb. 

“That was like kicking a kitten,” Luo Wenzhou muttered. 

He was in the corner of Fei Du’s vision, his back to the night so he could hold his free hand out to Fei Du, wriggling his fingers impatiently. As the offending party, Fei Du obediently surrendered a hand, only to have his fingers squeezed reassuringly. A knot in his chest unraveled slightly, but a different panic animated him at once. “I’m sorry for trying to bribe you,” Fei Du started, ticking off on his other hand. “I’m sorry for ignoring you, and drinking and coming home drunk and yelling at you, and—”

“Stop,” Luo Wenzhou said. “Fei Du, ah… What am I going to do with you?”

Put me in the basement, Fei Du thought wildly. But he couldn’t say that: Luo Wenzhou would be able to hear the longing soaking through every word. “You can do whatever you want,” he said instead, though it wasn’t much better. He didn’t have it in him to snark right now, to flirt his way out of trouble; he needed Luo Wenzhou to—

“When you say it like that, a man might believe you.”

“What would you do if you believed me?” Nauseating hunger cracked open inside Fei Du, a desire with teeth. He let go of Luo Wenzhou’s hand and turned to him, some manic impulse causing him to reach out and pull the cigarette from between Luo Wenzhou’s fingers and put it in his mouth, taking in a drag.

“Since when do you smoke?” Luo Wenzhou said. “Maybe I don’t want to hurt you.”

Fei Du ignored him, filling his lungs with black smoke until his head cleared and he no longer had to struggle to keep his hands from shaking. “Forget about hurting me. Don’t I already do that to myself? Face it, anything you do is better—that’s why I had to take matters into my own hands, right?” He tapped the cigarette off on the railing and stubbed it out. “Also, one can hardly lead a convincingly dissipated life without smoking once in a while, but this really isn’t my preference.”

“You should guard your confessions better, Master Fei.” There was a familiar abyss in the darkness of Luo Wenzhou’s eyes. “You give up so quickly.”

“I never intended to hold out,” Fei Du said, dry and tragic. Sensing an advantage, he bent his head like he was submitting to the chopping block and glanced up through his eyelashes. “Now that you have your prisoner and his testimony, what will you do with him, Captain?”

“I have some ideas. But first,” he didn’t quite grasp what happened until later, when he could examine the moment at leisure—Luo Wenzhou grabbed one wrist and used it to turn him around, neat and swift, handcuffs looping around the railing and clicking around his wrists in the same second. The entire series of actions was so fluid that Fei Du didn’t even have time to predict its consequences, and was caught entirely unguarded when Luo Wenzhou crowded him backwards, A delicious shiver arched through him, lightning to an earthing pole. “Precautionary measure. Now, what were you thinking, Fei Du?”

“What?” Fei Du said, bemused, his minute advantage flickering away.

“You said you had to take matters into your own hands,” Luo Wenzhou slid his hand under Fei Du’s shirt, spreading his fingers over Fei Du’s soft vulnerable stomach, “Are you going to tell me what you did, or do I have to torture it out of you?”

“I didn’t go to the basement—ah, shixiong, that’s not fair, please don’t tickle me—” 

“No one said anything about fair,” Luo Wenzhou kept stroking Fei Du’s stomach, making his breath hitch in the back of his throat. Generously, he didn’t tickle, but pressed his touch as he felt Fei Du up. He’d almost managed to trust it when his nipple was tweaked viciously. Fei Du’s whimpered. There had been a time when it was easy to leave his body unattended and responsive to Luo Wenzhou’s ministrations while his mind spun off in its own direction, but at some point, without any conscious effort on Fei Du’s part, that gap had closed. It was a gift to have his thoughts drowned out by unfiltered sensation—it was also very dangerous. It left him wonderfully vulnerable. “Keep talking.”

“I ignored you to punish myself,” Fei Du offered, then bit back a soft cry as the torture escalated. “I couldn’t imagine anything worse than being away from you.”

Luo Wenzhou kissed him ruthlessly; his greed and unfiltered desire sparked in Fei Du’s chest, lighting everything up. “What did you even do to deserve that?” he murmured into Fei Du’s mouth.

“I hurt you, didn’t I?” 

“I see.” Luo Wenzhou stepped back, suddenly, leaving Fei Du panting and aroused. He looked up, trying to collect himself, and noticed that the sky was a deep purple-red with rain clouds. They blanketed low and heavy over the buildings. And then he looked down and met Luo Wenzhou’s eyes by accident. They were inscrutable and just as heavy as the sky above. “Didn’t it occur to talk to me about any of this?”

“Why?” Fei Du felt like he was being hunted in a pen, like he could only run himself to exhaustion, never with the hope of escape—unless his predator decided to have mercy. “What if you decided I hadn’t done anything wrong?

“If I’m to punish you, I should get to decide what counts as a crime.”

Fei Du wished he could give up so much. “If I’m guilty, I’m guilty,” he countered. “You can ask me to live with the guilt, but absolution can’t be painless.”

“Who put all these ideas into your head?”

“Me,” Fei Du said wryly. “Failsafes.”

There was a pause. “That’s terrifying,” Luo Wenzhou scolded.

He’d never quite known what to do back then. He could plan and plan, but the human mind was a fragile and vulnerable thing—even one as irradiated as his own. Perhaps especially his own. All the conditioning in the world could disappear so easily in the right circumstances, by accident—he’d struggled to learn to drive, convinced he’d crash the car and shatter all his self-inflicted lessons in one fell swoop.

Punishment was easy. He’d understood consequences, but he hadn’t accounted for a world where he didn’t have to inject agony to medicate hypotheticals. It was as much of a concession as he could allow himself that Luo Wenzhou had cut under his defenses, silenced the voice that said no sin could ever be cured.

“I’m sorry,” Fei Du said softly. “When I practiced these lessons, I didn’t intend to forget them. It’s hard to change my mind.”

Given enough time, perhaps he could. But it would be slow and miserable; he’d drawn new fault lines to break himself along in order to avoid the ones his father had created. He wanted some shelter from his fractured nature, even if it was selfish to ask Luo Wenzhou to pretend for Fei Du’s sake that this was normal. He didn’t have another option that didn’t require him to consign himself to a few months of isolated brainwashing, allergic as he was to distance and derision and all the other poisons he’d been weaned on as a child.

There was a strange expression on Luo Wenzhou’s face. It prompted Fei Du to ask, “What are you thinking?”

He received a hand sliding under his neck, raising it to press their foreheads together briefly. “You try very hard to be good,” Luo Wenzhou said. “I was just thinking, I’d rather have you be alright.”

Fei Du laughed, crazy and wet. “Don’t say that. I want my work to be worth something. If you can’t bring yourself to find this bearable, at least let me salvage it in my own time. I won’t bother you with it.”

“There you go again,” Luo Wenzhou sighed. “You’re not doing this on your own. As for what I can bear—let’s just say, you have no idea.”

“Unfair,” Fei Du said at once. “Please tell me. Don’t I tell you everything?”

“Do you?”

“Eventually.”

Luo Wenzhou shook his head, the picture of paternal exasperation. “When you asked me to punish you, I wanted to,” he admitted gruffly. “Of course I wanted to. You want it so badly, and out of all the people who’ve hurt you, I’m the best, right?”

“The best I’ve ever had,” Fei Du said, reverent.

“There,” Luo Wenzhou tugged at his collar, exposing Fei Du’s throat to the cold air. “If someone has to do it, it should be me.”

“It won’t be easy. I’m not easy, shixiong.” Even so, he felt dizzy and thunderstruck, devastated by the ease with which he’d been given everything he wanted when he’d been preparing himself to starve instead. 

“Don’t make me say this too,” Luo Wenzhou murmured. Fei Du opened his mouth to beg, and Luo Wenzhou covered it with one hand. “Fine, my darling princeling. You’re so fragile that it’s difficult to keep you safe. It’s a relief to do the opposite sometimes.”

Fei Du gave in to the urge to drop himself into Luo Wenzhou’s arms. He was shaking very badly, but on the inside he was gloriously scoured clean, rendered incandescent with a joy he’d never once thought himself capable of—it didn’t feel real that he could be loved despite what he was, let alone, in some measure, because of it. “You’ve caught me, now you have to take responsibility and take me to bed.”

“Shouldn’t I punish you first?” Luo Wenzhou argued, his arms coming up to steady Fei Du. 

“Can that wait?” Fei Du couldn’t bring himself to mind his own hypocrisy. “I’ve missed you.”

“Oh, have you? Are you going to show me just how much?”

“Yes,” Fei Du said eagerly.

Luo Wenzhou clicked the handcuffs open. 

Drunk on night air and happiness, it was easy to abandon himself to the greater gravity of Luo Wenzhou’s desire. Fei Du rode his cock until his thighs burned deliciously, swallowing the honey-sweet humiliation of Luo Wenzhou teasing him for his poor endurance because he wasn’t willing to give up, determined to prove himself—rewarded thousandfold when Luo Wenzhou’s impatience cracked and he grabbed Fei Du’s hips, more than strong enough to fuck Fei Du to keening insensibility. Rewarded again when Luo Wenzhou made him jerk himself off, when he was overtaxed past the point where shame made any difference. He came with a dull cry and collapsed, gasping for breath. 

Exhaustion melted Luo Wenzhou’s unrelenting dominance, but it didn’t save Fei Du from bursting into tears when his thighs were fucked, minutes later or hours later. He hurt too much to make it good but it still felt good to him, burning up and dying sweetly for the privilege of trying to give Luo Wenzhou half as much as he’d been given.

“Look at you, pretty thing,” Luo Wenzhou said, later still, his fingers in Fei Du’s mouth so he couldn’t respond in kind or at all. “I’ll eat you up one day.”

Fei Du’s heart soared. 

~

The next day, Fei Du felt oddly clingy.

It took him a while to realize what it was. When he opened his eyes in the morning, his body ached familiarly and there was no four-armed octopus entrapping him. He winced and groped around for his phone to check the time—Luo Wenzhou had turned his alarm off and it was past ten. He put it back down and tried to catch another snatch of sleep, but something kept niggling in his head.

Finally he got to his feet, grabbed a shirt, and stumbled through the house. There was breakfast and coffee on the table. He lifted the cover, considered it, then left it alone and kept searching.

He found Luo Wenzhou in the basement, working out, and made a beeline for him. His eyes darkened when he spotted the too-large shirt Fei Du was wearing, but Fei Du didn’t exploit this weakness. The itch subsided instantly when Luo Wenzhou stepped off the treadmill and wrapped his arms around Fei Du, nosing lightly at his hair.

“What got into you?” 

“Nothing,” Fei Du said swiftly. A few months into their relationship he’d discovered that he was exactly the kind of person who liked sniffing his boyfriend’s sweat, and he couldn’t even bring himself to be ashamed. Luo Wenzhou always smelled good. Then, somewhat accusingly, he added, “You were gone when I woke up.”

“Missing me so quickly, Young Master?”

“...Yes.”

The arms around him tightened comfortingly. “Let me finish up here, and then we can talk.”

Embarrassment flushed through Fei Du. “We don’t have to,” he said. “I can handle it. I have to go to the office, and—”

“You’ve handled enough,” Luo Wenzhou said, his dry tone adding an unspoken and fucked it up. “Give me fifteen minutes.” 

Fei Du obediently drifted away for fifteen minutes, too short a span of time for him to work out what to do with himself. He was still zoning out sleepily in the hallway, considering going back to the basement to savor the sight of Luo Wenzhou’s workout, when Luo Wenzhou himself emerged and dragged Fei Du to bed, where he lay down at once like a maiden dying of some rare wasting disease, wiggling so his hair splayed artfully against the pillow.

Luo Wenzhou leaned over him. “Tell me what you want.”

“I don’t know,” Fei Du said, practicing doe-eyed innocence. Still, it was true. Sometimes he couldn’t know what he wanted because no part of him could truly believe he’d have it, so it was better to not know what he was lacking.

“Oh, really,” Luo Wenzhou started to undo the buttons Fei Du had barely done prior to setting out on his search. A sweet shiver coursed through him. 

“Couldn’t you decide?” Fei Du said coyly, arching up into Luo Wenzhou’s ministrations. 

“Insufferable minx, you don’t have to try to seduce me. I’m already in your bed.” He bent down and silenced Fei Du’s protest with a ruthless kiss. Fei Du whined, open-mouthed and needy. “And no, I’m not deciding. Whatever I choose, you seem hellbent on going behind my back and doing something else. I don’t trust you, and I don’t trust myself to decide correctly. So you’ll tell me what you like.”

It was all so futile, Fei Du reflected. And yet, it was oddly delicious to find his escapes cut off. He sifted through the feelings, weighing what he could bear against the cost, and found himself admitting, “I like it when you’re cruel.” Luo Wenzhou’s eyes darkened. “I like it when you corner me, and humiliate me for letting it happen,” he licked his lips, suddenly nervous. “You look like you’re going to eat me.”

Luo Wenzhou smirked. “Wouldn’t you like that too?”

Fei Du’s head spun. “Yes,” he said, raw. “I like it when you don’t let me get away with things, but I also like it when you do. I like not knowing what exactly I’ll be allowed to do.” 

He paused, uncomfortably hot all over. The words pouring out of his mouth shocked him a little bit, but then again they didn’t. He’d always had a shameless streak, a self-annihilating need to stand naked in front of Luo Wenzhou and draw dotted lines all over his body, allow himself to be gutted safe in the satisfaction that he’d left no pain to chance. He’d never thought he could have precisely that.

“And I like it when you’re unkind. Do you understand? It’s not only the pain, it’s also the—little things, stupid things.”

“Give me an example,” Luo Wenzhou commanded.

Fei Du sucked in a breath. There was a palpable tension in the air, sparks sizzling and waiting for tinder. “Like if you made me wear heels, but also made fun of me for being clumsy, or—when you drove me to the hospital, and rolled the windows down.”

“I didn’t want you to smell the blood.”

“I was so cold that whole drive,” Fei Du said. “I liked knowing that you wanted me to feel that way.”

“You silly child,” Luo Wenzhou murmured. “You’ll run with anything, won’t you?”

“Yes,” Fei Du moaned. “Anything you do, shixiong. Should I keep going?” He was so hard, his cock desperate for friction, but in this moment he could have gone forever without any of the things he wanted if he got to keep feeling this, this intoxicating lapse into a self-made doom. 

“Oh, please,” Luo Wenzhou didn’t disguise his amusement, intolerable against all the weaknesses Fei Du had exposed. And there was a hunger on his face that Fei Du couldn’t get enough of, wanted to offer himself up to it until he couldn’t anymore; prey longed for hunters with sharp knives and predators with long teeth and anchors tied themselves to boats for some connection to daylight and Fei Du wanted—

“I like it when you hurt me, but you knew that already. I like it when you’re condescending about the pain, like I’m stupid for getting hurt, for being slow afterwards.”

“You like high standards, and you like to fail,” Luo Wenzhou surmised. His voice could have sanded a mountain to plains. “You’re fucked up, you know?”

“I am,” Fei Du said ruefully. The way Luo Wenzhou said it didn’t make him any less hard.

“Enough of what you like,” Luo Wenzhou decided. “If I keep hearing you say it, I’ll lose my mind. Tell me what you want me to do. Small words, Fei Du, and pick three things.”

Fei Du blinked, the haze clouding his mind receding just enough for him to focus. “I want you to slap me,” he blurted out. “I want you to make me work for it, all of it. And,” he closed his eyes. He couldn’t say this last thing. All the filth he’d unleashed without a care for his skin, and it was this at last that made him feel shame so keenly it was almost no longer pleasant.

Almost. He tired of bravery, suddenly, and turned his head to the side to avoid the intensity of Luo Wenzhou’s scrutiny. “I want you to call me a good boy,” he mumbled. “You can do anything else you want, as long as…”

“I tell you you’re good?” Luo Wenzhou’s voice was painfully tender, warm with understanding.

“Even if I’m not,” Fei Du whispered. “Just lie to me, and I’ll believe you.”

“Look at how much power you give me,” Luo Wenzhou said. “Aren’t you afraid?”

“So afraid.”

“Why do you do it?”

“I want you to destroy me as you see fit.”

There was a hand on his throat, suddenly. “Look at me.” His voice pulled at Fei Du, left him no recourse. He raised his own hand, trembling, and wrapped his fingers around Luo Wenzhou’s wrist. For a moment they were locked in stalemate: Fei Du caught like a sinful creature that knew the attention of a higher power, Luo Wenzhou angry and imperious and devastatingly pure in his judgment. 

Fei Du tilted his head back invitingly. Luo Wenzhou responded at once, applying pressure, watching for the moment when it became too much. But it wouldn’t. Fei Du loved the cut-off, the suffocation, the way panic gathered under his skin and dared not translate into movement. He loved the enveloping calm of old pain, the way it kept him steady in surrender, his grip light even as Luo Wenzhou bore down so hard that Fei Du couldn’t have inhaled if he tried. He was incandescently aware of each sensation, each electric feeling—the way his neglected cock wept openly against his stomach, the lack of air, the knowledge of Fei Du’s weaknesses all laid out and waiting to be crushed. It was glorious. He wanted to burn away in this moment.

Everything went black. His mind, every thought, all the loops of consideration and action—erased. He couldn’t have moaned, hadn’t the breath, but his untouched cock spent itself, ignored for too long and still overwhelmed. 

It took him a while to catch his breath, afterwards. His cock still ached, a sensitive frustration, but more than that—he was sure his throat bore bruises, and was transparently delighted.

When he had the voice to speak, he murmured, “Will you fuck me?” 

“Are you sure?”

“Wenzhou,” Fei Du whined.

He rarely used Luo Wenzhou’s name, not in bed. But it felt good to say it, a reaffirmation of a deeper bond. And he liked that Luo Wenzhou fucked him afterwards like he wanted to break Fei Du in half, horrible and wonderful and so brutal with the strength of his feeling that Fei Du couldn’t imagine that anyone who looked at him after this would fail to see the way he’d been used. He wanted them to see, wanted them to look at him and know that he was just this, just a piece of meat for Luo Wenzhou to abuse for his own satisfaction. 

Afterwards he threw his arms around Luo Wenzhou’s neck and refused to move, no matter how much he was coaxed with the prospect of lunch, until Luo Wenzhou gave up and cuddled him, sucking dark hickeys into his neck and shoulders.

~

They still had to talk about it again. Luo Wenzhou interrogated him on a number of charges, forcing Fei Du to confess to an aversion to blindfolds, being kicked, and vibrators. He’d have rather kept all of those things to himself, but that option wasn’t made available.

Luo Wenzhou asked, “Why the vibrators?” He was making notes. Fei Du felt like a lab rat. 

“Electricity,” he said, trying to be light. “It’s not a pleasant association.”

He’d dressed again for this, in his own clothes. Luo Wenzhou would look up from the pad occasionally, drinking in the sight of Fei Du in a plain t-shirt and pajamas. Fei Du tried to milk the allure, mysterious though it was to him, but whether Luo Wenzhou would be swayed by such tactics on any given day was entirely up to the alignment of the stars, and Fei Du was failing. 

Luo Wenzhou himself was shirtless, which Fei Du felt was rather unfair, because he was not nearly as immune to him as he was to Fei Du.

Silently, he marveled again at the fact that he was the desperate one. 

Luo Wenzhou hummed in response. He didn’t make a big deal out of it. How was anyone supposed to not crave him with violent fervor? 

“What else?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Fei Du said. “Beyond the obvious.”

Luo Wenzhou nodded. He hardly had to be reminded that Fei Du would go woozy and useless at the sight of blood or injured animals. Fei Du felt somewhat tired, however. He wanted, in some inescapable way, to be a little more palatable to Luo Wenzhou than he currently was. It was odd that he’d never once thought about such things before Luo Wenzhou, and now would have twisted himself into any shape that would serve to keep Luo Wenzhou close to him.

“You’re thinking,” Luo Wenzhou stated, pulling Fei Du’s injured hand close to him and stroking rough fingers over the backs of his hands. Fei Du was shaken by the sensation, the nearness and intensity of it. 

Fei Du slipped out of the chair on an impulse, sinking fluidly to his knees in front of Luo Wenzhou. He wanted the simple, inchoate comfort of feeling small, of laying his head on Luo Wenzhou’s lap and pretending it wasn’t full of razors and poison. That hand settled in his hair, stroking gently, rubbing the back of his neck. Something about it almost made him believe that he wouldn’t have to change, that whatever was wrong with him could be lived with. 

“Still thinking.”

“Shixiong, can you hear it? Because that must be annoying.”

“I can’t sleep, yes. It’s like having the radio on all night.” He pulled Fei Du’s hair playfully.

“Then I’m afraid I’ll drive both of us crazy.” He pressed his cheek against Luo Wenzhou’s thigh. “But I’m not sure what I’ll ever do if you leave me alone with it.”

“No,” Luo Wenzhou said, tone perfectly serious for once. “I wouldn’t. That would be cruel.” 

Cruelty to monsters didn’t count, Fei Du thought, but he was glad for the consideration. His selfish, bruised heart wanted tenderness, and it was too hard to decide whether it was deserved or not. “When you control me, it’s easier to bear.”

“That’s only a case for having me tell you what to do all the time.”

Fei Du stiffened. “Shixiong—”

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said—”

“Shixiong,” Fei Du repeated, more urgently. “Please refrain from mentioning such things, it’s too much of a temptation.”

Luo Wenzhou was so quiet for a moment that Fei Du feared disgust, and cravenly kept his eyes lowered. But then he said, “Temptation.”

Fei Du did not respond.

“You… Would you really let me?”

“It’s not about letting you,” Fei Du felt a little sulky. “I’d let you do anything. But I’m not easy to control, and I wouldn’t be able to be obedient for very long.”

“How long, then?”

“A day.” Fei Du threw an estimate out hurriedly. 

Luo Wenzhou said, very slowly and almost shyly, “I’d like that.”

“I’m very contrary.”

“Oh, I know. That doesn’t make me want it less.”

“Alright,” Fei Du said. There was something wildly hopeful in his chest, and he couldn’t really stand it. He wanted to crawl into Luo Wenzhou’s skin, feed himself to Luo Wenzhou in pieces, be crushed under his heel. “You’re very good to me.”

“I could say the same for you.”

There was a mesmerizing dark quality to his tone, an assurance of danger. Fei Du suddenly smiled to himself. 

~

They chose a Sunday, for the least likelihood of being interrupted. When Fei Du woke up, his clothes for the day had already been laid out for him, along with a note. Don't wear them until I wake up.

The sight of them made an odd, ugly thing flutter in his chest. Fei Du relished it.

He took a shower anyway, and then read a book until Luo Wenzhou got up and found him. 

“Of course you'd be so literal,” Luo Wenzhou said dryly. 

Fei Du said, without inflection, “I’m cold.”

“It’s your fault.”

This was true, and Fei Du didn’t mind. He followed Luo Wenzhou to the bedroom and put on each article of clothing under his gaze, feeling pleasantly like an object. 

Luo Wenzhou continued, “I have rules for you: don’t speak unless you really have to, and telling me what you did and didn't do, what you deserve, that stuff doesn't count. You'll do what I tell you to do, and if you play games with what I mean, you can expect to be punished. You can come, and you can touch me, but don't touch yourself.”

Fei Du nodded. Luo Wenzhou’s authoritative voice, the way he assumed control of Fei Du, was pulling his thoughts under and muzzling his resistance.

Somewhat unfortunately, the further down he slipped the more it felt like that dark creature inside him got closer to the surface. It was not his own impulse that led him to pick up Luo Wenzhou's hand and lift it, pressing his cheek to the palm. 

“All in due time,” Luo Wenzhou said roughly. 

They ate breakfast together, in measured quantities that Luo Wenzhou served. Usually, Fei Du’s mind drifted whenever it was given a chance, but now—still cold from being naked for over an hour, wearing clothes Luo Wenzhou had decided on and eating food at his pace—it was all an anchor, keeping him in place, muting the world outside. 

Of course, Luo Wenzhou didn’t intend to let him take it that easy. “I have to buy groceries,” he said. “Come with me.”

Fei Du made a pitiful sound. It wasn’t that he wanted to stay home, necessarily, but he didn’t feel like he could take the noise and stimulation of a store. 

“Alright,” Luo Wenzhou said, after a moment. “You have two options.”

“The easier one,” Fei Du said.

Luo Wenzhou’s expression hardened. “There’s no easy one. If you wait for me here, I’m going to cuff your hands and put a plug in you until I’m back.”

Fei Du thought about this, then shuffled forward to rest himself in Luo Wenzhou’s arms. “Why are you being so mean to me?” he asked, even though he knew. Luo Wenzhou stroked his head the way he would any cat, and Fei Du lost any semblance of dignity, going boneless and limp.

“You can have a reward when I’m back,” Luo Wenzhou said. “If you’re good.”

It was nearly impossible to make decisions in this state. He wavered for a long moment, then gave up. “Come back soon.” 

Luo Wenzhou shook his head, his paternalistic disappointment plucking sharply at Fei Du’s heart. It was difficult to be good all the time when Luo Wenzhou’s irritation and anger felt so delicious, scalding caramel on his tongue. He would’ve done far worse every day if he wasn’t also afraid of Luo Wenzhou leaving—but it was a medicine that was more efficient in measured doses.

He stripped to let Luo Wenzhou finger him open, elbows resting against the wall, shivering slightly. It felt wonderful, difficult already, as Luo Wenzhou slid the plug into his hole, working it in until it pressed against his prostate. He whined through his teeth, full and lost to relief, allowing Luo Wenzhou to bully him into putting his hands behind his back and cuffing them together. 

Luo Wenzhou had to carry him to bed. Fei Du’s knees were watery and non-functional. The moment he was put down, he scrambled to lean forward, pressing his cheek to Luo Wenzhou’s stomach. “You’re hard. Let me…”

“You’d like that too much,” Luo Wenzhou said, which wasn’t a no. Nor did he move back.

“Why should you suffer just because I do?” He glanced up coyly. “Use my mouth.”

Luo Wenzhou laughed, then shook his head. “Turn over,” he said, rubbing his hand fondly over Fei Du’s sides. “I’m going to fuck your thighs.”

It was uncomfortable, without his hands for support—his weight on his shoulders, spine arched, with no leverage or defense if he lost his balance. But Fei Du’s mouth was dry with lust, his head spinning sweetly as Luo Wenzhou’s cock dragged between the tight clutch of his thighs. It was so obviously, inescapably a pleasure meant not for him, something taken from his body without giving anything in return but the wet velvety-hot slide of Luo Wenzhou’s cock agonizingly close to his hole, the inadequacy of it lighting Fei Du up inside. 

His cock ached, hard and pathetic. He felt deeply pleased about that too. 

Luo Wenzhou cleaned him up after he’d come, rearranging his body on the bed and kissing him on the cheek. “It won't take more than an hour.”

Fei Du hummed. He wanted to come so badly it was difficult to think of anything else. Luo Wenzhou kissed him on his forehead as well and paused in the doorway as he was leaving to look at him as though drinking in the sight. Fei Du instinctively tried to look abjectly winsome, a creature too adorable to be so cruelly left behind, but Luo Wenzhou had no mercy and left without turning back again. 

Acute arousal wound down into a drowsiness that pulsated with the awareness of his current condition. If anyone broke in—they wouldn’t, Fei Du had invested a lot in security—but if they did they’d see him here helpless and prone, desperately hard, unprotesting. 

He wished he had something in his mouth, something to suck on and play with. Luo Wenzhou had been right when he’d said that Fei Du would enjoy it too much; the lack of it was embarrassingly unbearable. He chewed on his lips between soft, airless panting. 

When he’d been younger, much younger, he’d often jerked off while sucking his fingers—a little older, and he’d learned that a cock in his mouth felt better; the weight and girth of it, the way men pulled roughly at his hair when they wanted him to take more, how some of them didn’t care that he couldn’t breathe and came harder if they were choking him.

The first time he’d sucked Luo Wenzhou’s cock, he’d been so determined to show off that Luo Wenzhou had been worried he’d die. He’d pulled Fei Du off and scolded him for trying to take too much. As with everything Luo Wenzhou did to him, it was terribly shameful and Fei Du would never recover from that moment—on his knees in the bedroom with Luo Wenzhou’s hard cock inches from his face, being lectured like he was an errant schoolboy.

Luo Wenzhou had very generously let him try again, and Fei Du got by on his second attempt with kitten-licks and shallow sucks, and he came so hard he blacked out the moment Luo Wenzhou touched his cock.

Later, Luo Wenzhou figured out that his concern was misplaced. Fei Du hadn’t fully recovered from that either.

He’d dozed right off by the time Luo Wenzhou returned, and woke up to the sound of Luo Yiguo meowing insistently. A few minutes later, Luo Wenzhou came to the room and sat down on the bed. Fei Du blinked sleepily at him, then scrambled upright and pressed himself into Luo Wenzhou’s body again.

He got his hug immediately. “Did you make any trouble?”

Fei Du squirmed. “No.”

“And you’d never lie to me.” 

Luo Wenzhou’s tone was light, but Fei Du lifted his head, a little injured. “I don’t.”

“You don’t,” Luo Wenzhou acknowledged. “If I ignore all the times you have, that is.”

That was fair, but still hurt. Fei Du didn’t know if he wanted to be rewarded anymore; it didn’t feel like he deserved it. Luo Wenzhou kissed his forehead. “I want to be good,” Fei Du whispered. There was a ball of ice in his stomach, “I want to be good for you.”

“You,” Luo Wenzhou exhaled. He slid his hands through Fei Du’s hair, pulling lightly. “You’re going to give your old man heartburn, darling. No, don’t say anything. Let me feed you.”

Luo Wenzhou took him to the living room, setting him down on the couch. Fei Du’s surroundings were distant from him, strangely muted. He was still a little hard and it didn’t feel like it mattered, as long as he could be near Luo Wenzhou and have his touch, as long as he wasn’t alone again.

He didn’t know when coming had stopped feeling urgent. There was a delicious terror to being controlled like this. Convinced to give up his pleasures for no cause. He would have let Luo Wenzhou take more, he thought, starved to sit at Luo Wenzhou’s feet and watch him eat. 

“I’m going to take this off,” Luo Wenzhou said. He didn’t wait for Fei Du to respond before undoing the cuffs and easing the plug out of him. Fei Du squirmed, bereft and wanting to protest in some manner. Upon failing to find an outlet for his grievance, he resorted to sulking, grabbing a cushion and hugging it to his chest and refusing to look at Luo Wenzhou. 

“Poor slut,” Luo Wenzhou said sympathetically. Fei Du curled up tighter, somewhat mollified when Luo Wenzhou squeezed the back of his neck before going to the kitchen.

He returned with light, fresh sandwiches, cut into bite sized pieces. Fei Du ate from his hands. The generosity of it still caught him off-guard, as though despite his best efforts he could not become accustomed to it, could not be certain it would come again. Luo Wenzhou’s reliability dissolved Fei Du’s resistance, though. He allowed himself to be pulled into Luo Wenzhou’s lap afterwards as well, submitting to plundering kisses that made him feel as though his insides were being scooped out of his chest, like he needed to press himself and all his open empty wounds to Luo Wenzhou to borrow his heat and wholeness. He sank so far into his own head that everything became uncertain. Dim. Reality assured only by Luo Wenzhou’s stable presence. 

He drifted. His cheek was pressed against Luo Wenzhou’s shoulder, a hand on his heart, anchoring himself to the strong wet pulse. Every other sensation fell out of notice, hovering near the edge of his consciousness without intruding. It may have been a long time or only a handful of minutes like that, guarded from himself and sure of his safety.

Distantly, he heard Luo Wenzhou murmur, “Where’d you go?” 

Hands drew his wrists between their bodies, bringing him back to feeling. He became aware of the dryness in his mouth, the throbbing ache in his cock, the button digging into his side. Twitched away from it, wanting to return to that peace.

But the arms that encircled him held him very tightly. Necessary, secret. He never concerned himself with such trivialities; in the ordinary course of their relationship there was never a time where Fei Du wanted to break the moment and say, I don’t think I’ve ever been hugged so much. I didn’t know what it felt like. As with so many things, Fei Du had been content to live hungry. 

In some dreadfully cold corner of his mind he’d maintained that there could be no touch as intimate as shock, electricity singing through the infinitesimal gaps between his nerves and teaching him pain from the inside out. How could anything on the surface compare?

But there was nothing impermeable about him to Luo Wenzhou. He made Fei Du feel porous, like a sponge, wringing out old poison and soaking in love. It poured through cracks even the pain hadn’t wormed into. Sometimes when Luo Wenzhou was good to him it hurt more than all the alternatives Fei Du could imagine; he was a dog with a bloody rag in its mouth, not understanding that the door was open.

Even as a monster, he slept in a cage. It was his home. 

It was a long time before he managed to look up and meet Luo Wenzhou’s blurry eyes.

He said, “You were pretty out of it,” raising his hand to wipe tears from Fei Du’s cheeks. “This stuff always makes you cry, doesn’t it?”

“Not this stuff,” Fei Du said thickly. “You do that to me.” He was too tired to ease the heavy accusation out of his words.

Luo Wenzhou curled his hand around the back of Fei Du’s head. “Do I, now?”

Fei Du dropped his head back down. “Yes. It’s very embarrassing.” It was worse than embarrassing. He hadn’t cried so much in all the years before Luo Wenzhou. It was shameful, to be so spited by his own weaknesses. And he liked it. He liked the way Luo Wenzhou studied his tears as though he could force meaning out of them. The awful vulnerability he couldn’t flee from. “I love you, shixiong.”

“Are you just saying that to distract me?” Luo Wenzhou sounded amused.

“I’d never try anything so underhanded,” Fei Du answered. “But if I’ve given shixiong cause to suspect me, he’s free to punish me.”

“Aren’t you a smooth talker? You’ll have to drink water first. Get up.”

Fei Du whined piteously. 

He was set aside anyway. Luo Wenzhou got him a glass of water and stood over him while he drank. When he took his seat again, Fei Du immediately crawled over him like an eager, needy spider. 

“Should I be worried about you?” Luo Wenzhou asked. “You haven’t done anything wrong, princess, you don’t need correction.”

“Do you need a reason?”

“If there’s no reason, it’s just sadism.” 

“I’m not opposed to that,” Fei Du mumbled. 

“If you just want to be hurt, why does it have to be called a punishment?”

“Because,” Fei Du started, then rapidly thought better of it. “I’ll tell you afterwards, if you punish me.”

Luo Wenzhou slapped him. Fei Du reeled, astonished and turned on. “That wasn’t a punishment,” Luo Wenzhou said grimly. “That was for the silly trick you just tried to pull. Now answer me.”

Fei Du picked up Luo Wenzhou’s hand and pressed his lips to the warm palm. His cheek smarted deliciously. “I like it when you correct me,” Fei Du whispered, lips moving against skin. “I like that you care so much you’d hurt me to make sure I’m worth keeping.”

“Worth keeping—you’re a real threat to my heart, Fei Du.” He stared at Fei Du for a few seconds, considering, then beckoned him closer to murmur in his ear.

Fei Du blinked, stirred by the thought. “I’ll go get it,” he said, dry and hurried.

“Can you stand?” Luo Wenzhou asked, helping him to his feet and watching him carefully to ensure he was steady before letting him go. Fei Du went to their bedroom, trailing his fingers along the wall, and returned just as quickly.

“Here,” he said.

“Good boy,” Luo Wenzhou was warm, eyes glittering with amusement at Fei Du’s obvious eagerness. “Over my lap, princess.”

It was one thing for Luo Wenzhou to put him there, another to move himself. The last time this had happened, Fei Du hadn’t had to face the responsibility of directly depositing himself at Luo Wenzhou’s mercy. It was thrilling, humiliating, to feel the sharp scrutiny of Luo Wenzhou’s eyes on him as he lay down. Bit his lip as his hard cock rubbed against the fabric of Luo Wenzhou’s jeans. He shifted slightly. There was a dull, intensely sweet ache in the base of his spine and his cock and balls, the weight of arousal gathered up and left to simmer.

The first cool touch of Luo Wenzhou’s lubed-up fingers made Fei Du hiss softly, but it didn’t last long—his body was relaxed, accommodating, and Luo Wenzhou only spread it in him perfunctorily before pressing the plug inside him.

It wasn’t as big as Luo Wenzhou’s cock, wasn’t even the biggest thing he’d put inside himself, but he liked this one. He liked the way the tip worked insistently at his prostate when he was laid out pretty and useless, pleasure burning into something impossible and ugly the longer it went unfulfilled.

Whether sweet or torturous, there was a moment, always—a little flicker, a gasp of surrender, as his mind failed to comprehend and categorize the feeling. He lived for that, the moment where he knew he would fall and still tried to cling to his control, even knowing it would slip from him soon enough; the abyss below that indifferent and devastating and pure.

The first strike hurt, plainly, jostling the plug and making him gasp. The second one hurt too, his cock throbbing vainly against Luo Wenzhou’s thigh. He tried to shift to bring it some relief, but the sliver he achieved only worsened his agony.

At the third one, he moaned, “Please…”

“What do you want?”

Fei Du whimpered. 

“Do you want me to stop?”

“No!”

“Then beg all you like,” Luo Wenzhou said calmly. “You’ll still have to take your punishment.”

“All of it?”

“No concessions.” Luo Wenzhou thumbed at the corner of Fei Du’s eye. “If you’re good, you can come afterwards.”

Fei Du nodded, but he couldn’t hold back his pained moans. They seemed to encourage Luo Wenzhou; he hit Fei Du harder when he moaned, and harder still when he squirmed or cried. And Fei Du couldn’t seem to keep quiet, didn’t want to try, hurting and shameless about it. 

Fifteen blows. It went on forever and not nearly long enough. He took refuge in Luo Wenzhou’s enjoyment of his misery, unable to unravel that tendency in himself, blurry-eyed and shaky when Luo Wenzhou dragged him upright and cupped his face. 

“There,” Luo Wenzhou said softly. “Still here?”

“Yeah,” Fei Du breathed. He was; present in his own body and surprised by how comfortable it felt despite pain and arousal that scraped at the edges of his endurance, a hot and hungry tide that wore down the corners of his resistance. He wanted to fold and give in, wanted something to close its teeth around him and make resistance futile, but he felt somewhat fragile. Absurdly hopeful. “Are you gonna fuck me now?”

“Insatiable, awful creature,” Luo Wenzhou said, in a voice that said yes and I’m going to make you regret asking.

Fei Du, who wanted nothing more, put his hand deliberately on the obvious tent in Luo Wenzhou’s pants. With his other hand he picked up Luo Wenzhou’s wrist, his palm still hot and red from beating Fei Du, and kissed his fingers. “Come on. You’ve worked hard too.”

“Do I need you to tell me that?” 

“No,” Fei Du said virtuously. “Can’t I say it anyway?”

“Brat. You’re talking an awful lot for someone who just got punished.”

Fei Du licked the tips of Luo Wenzhou’s fingers. “I like it when you punish me. I’m here for you to mold as you see fit.”

“You’re not here at all,” Luo Wenzhou said, taking his hand away and using it to grip Fei Du’s hair, pulling him down. “I’ll fuck you, my ceramic doll, but you’ll come on my cock or you won’t come at all. Understand?”

Fei Du understood all the wrong things, secretly thrilled by the idea of lying next to a satiated Luo Wenzhou while he himself hadn’t earned the right to that basic pleasure. Knowing all night that he could get himself off, his unbound hands straying to his cock and going so far as to touch, to stroke, and then stopping before he came because he’d been told he didn’t deserve it. Because he didn’t, if his shixiong’s cock was insufficient for him then he needn’t feel good at all. 

“Yes,” he said thickly. There was something wrong with him; the desire to be crushed and ignored and used came too easily to him, as though it had always been lurking under everything he did. But he knew it hadn’t been there; he’d checked, he’d made sure he gave nothing away, kept that door and all the grotesque creatures behind it safely sealed until Luo Wenzhou had ever-so-simply drawn them out. 

They were still inside him. He felt as though nothing would put them to rest. Right now, he didn’t even care—they wanted all the same things. 

He was repositioned again, under Luo Wenzhou this time, the plug taken out of him without regard for how empty he felt afterwards. Caught between the thick, sweltering pulse of hours of near-constant arousal and Luo Wenzhou’s hard, familiar body, the smell of him, Fei Du wondered if he’d last at all. He felt like he’d spill the moment Luo Wenzhou brushed against him. 

Then Luo Wenzhou grabbed his wrists and twisted them behind his back, used his other hand to roughly yank Fei Du up by the hair and kiss him, deep and firm. Fei Du could taste his desperation; Luo Wenzhou had been waiting as just long to fuck Fei Du. “Wasn’t I good for you?” Fei Du breathed. “Wasn’t I what you wanted?”

“You fucking minx,” Luo Wenzhou said, control breaking. He let go of Fei Du’s hair and shoved him down, awkwardly, on his knees and shoulders and bracketed between Luo Wenzhou’s powerful thighs. He didn’t care, breathless with anticipation and a shockingly tight eagerness.

Luo Wenzhou didn’t ease him into it the way he usually did; there was none of the gracious concern Fei Du was accustomed to. He slammed into Fei Du without thought or mercy, proprietary and hungry and concerned only with his own pleasure, and Fei Du thought he’d die from how good it felt, like his whole world had narrowed down to Luo Wenzhou and nothing else mattered, not the sticky burning pit of arousal in his stomach or even how much he loved being stuffed full of cock—nothing but the fact of Luo Wenzhou taking what he owed from Fei Du.

“That’s it,” he said drunkenly, without checking the words at the gate before they took off, “Use me, just use me, that’s all I’m here for, and I’ll thank you for it. I’ll be so grateful, Wenzhou, I want you and you, you own me. Do anything you want but don’t leave me, okay?” He was running his mouth, didn’t care what spilled out, but he stumbled at the end, aware that he was too vulnerable to retreat.

Warm lips pressed against the sweat-damp dips of his spine. “Quiet, darling, I have you. Should I tell you that you’re the best thing I’ve ever felt? That you were made for me, how could I let you go?”

Fei Du made a sound like a frightened animal. Luo Wenzhou redoubled his efforts, fucking Fei Du at a pace which took the air from his lungs until he could only pant, weak and wet and needy, his poor cock dripping relentlessly and so flushed it hurt and yet distant, not quite his own, not to touch. He could only watch it, mesmerized and out of his mind on a hazy cocktail of pleasure and sweet surrender. 

He was glad to be used, to be of use. Kissed and fucked and manhandled like he was made to give in, undone and blissed-out and satisfied with denial and pain. It hurt to be fucked, Luo Wenzhou gripping the meat of Fei Du’s thighs and ass and hips as he slammed into him, forcefully enough that Fei Du felt it in his throat and tears leaked from the corners of his eyes. On the merciless edge of an orgasm that couldn’t quite find him. 

Luo Wenzhou slowed down abruptly, his cock seated all the way inside Fei Du and his fingers still pressing into Fei Du’s bruises. “Princess.”

“Ye-yeah?” Fei Du slurred.

“I’ve got you,” Luo Wenzhou said, harsh and comforting. “You can come.”

“Can’t,” Fei Du mumbled. 

“You can, you poor broken creature. Come for me.”

Fei Du shook his head. He didn’t have the words to explain that the command couldn’t cross the crucial line between himself and his cock, that he wasn’t his own anymore. “Make me,” he pleaded, the shell of his voice cracked open to desire.. 

A kiss to his neck, his shoulder, the top of his spine, before he was lowered and adjusted, holding himself up on his forearms with his cheek against the arm of the couch. He swallowed, muzzy and free of expectation or anticipation, but it was lovely when Luo Wenzhou started fucking him again. It was all so lovely, and Luo Wenzhou’s cock was the best thing that had ever happened to him, and he didn’t remember why he did anything except worship it all day long, warm it with his mouth and hole, forge himself into a creature that served nothing else. Wouldn’t it have been perfect like that? 

Luo Wenzhou fucked him until Fei Du’s knees felt like jelly, until the drag of his cock against Fei Du’s prostate felt more like a punishment than anything, not that Fei Du cared. He’d have been happy with anything. He didn’t need anything, except for Luo Wenzhou to want him.

Any kind of wanting would have done. He could have told Fei Du that he wanted him broken and Fei Du would have tasered himself until he died of ecstasy.

He said nothing of the sort. He just fucked Fei Du, and spoke to him, soft and comforting and oddly familiar, and touched his trembling thighs and his trembling stomach and the monstrous bloodsoaked rag of his heart over his chest and he said “You’re mine. Come for me.”

Fei Du felt it, bliss spread over bliss, spilling in a long endless sprawling daze of heat and spangled sugar.

He thought Luo Wenzhou came too. He had no idea.

There was a dim awareness of certain things; of being gathered up and taken inside, still aching and gross and too checked out to care. He remembered mouthing at Luo Wenzhou’s cock, sloppy and desperate to be filled, and getting slapped for his troubles. Smaller things, too: being told how good he was, how sweet and perfect, as though it mattered; the way Luo Wenzhou’s hands felt on his waist, or pressing on his bruises. He thought he cried.

He didn’t care. 

When he finally fell asleep, it was in Luo Wenzhou’s arms, the beast in his ribcage glutted and finally at ease.

~ Coda ~

“How do you like this one?” Fei Du asked.

One of Luo Wenzhou’s most cherished possessions was a watch he’d been gifted on the occasion of his first promotion. A month ago, it had been retired from active service after being grievously injured in the line of duty—that is to say, Luo Yiguo had climbed on the dressing table, managed to prise the drawer open, and regifted himself that watch as a toy.

Fei Du’s own watch was doing just fine. Luo Wenzhou had scrubbed off the dried blood and it was good as new, the glass face unscratched, but Fei Du had kicked up a fuss about how it was tainted by the memory of blood as an excuse to drag Luo Wenzhou to one of the fanciest emporiums in the city to buy him a new watch.

He suspected Luo Wenzhou had seen through him, but he hadn’t said anything yet. 

“It’s very blue,” he said now, critically.

Fei Du replied, “Blue is your color. Let’s look at something else.”

Lamentably, despite Luo Wenzhou’s irredeemable vanity, he was prone to losing patience when he was shopping and acceding to the nearest available choice. He was also, charmingly, uncomfortable spending Fei Du’s money like water.

Since Fei Du himself had no such compunctions, he waited until Luo Wenzhou had given up on finding himself a watch and then said, “I also wanted to buy one.”

Luo Wenzhou was happy to indulge him. Fei Du didn’t care about the watch. He wanted to stand next to Luo Wenzhou, a little too close for public propriety, and stare at the sharp line of his jaw, his shoulders, his bare wrist. 

Somehow, they both walked out with new watches. Luo Wenzhou set his mind on a stunningly delicate, almost excessively feminine piece for Fei Du; Fei Du prevailed on the blue one for Luo Wenzhou. Mutually satisfied with their respective victories, they had lunch from a streetside shop and drove home in comfortable silence.

On the doorstep, there was a gift basket. Luo Wenzhou, reaching first, picked it up. “‘To Fei Du,’” he read. “‘Thank you for your help~ Please come to the celebration next month!’” He raised an eyebrow at Fei Du, who flushed darkly.

He had forgotten entirely about Lang Li.

“Let’s go inside,” he said.

“Don’t think for a second you’re going to slip out of explaining this,” Luo Wenzhou said.

Fei Du switched seamlessly to a different plan. “You wound me with your accusations, shixiong.”

“Who is this?” Luo Wenzhou had opened the card. “There’s a photo of a baby.”

With some difficulty, Fei Du gave him a rundown of events as they had transpired that night. Luo Wenzhou listened in silence, but at some point he put the gift basket down and placed his hands on Fei Du’s shoulders. The full-body squeeze of agonizing relief when he dug his thumbs into a particularly problematic knot almost made up for the excruciating humiliation of the conversation.

In the taffy-sweet stillness after he’d finished speaking, he pulled the wisps of his courage together and asked, “Will you punish me again, for lying to you?”

Luo Wenzhou slid a hand around his neck, tipping Fei Du’s head back by applying pressure under his chin. “You,” he said, with unwelcome tenderness. “You are such a needlessly complicated creature, my darling. You’re like one of those snakes that are very colorful to look poisonous when they hardly even bite.”

“That,” Fei Du murmured. “Could not be further from the truth.” He snapped at what he could reach of Luo Wenzhou’s arm. “Please hit me, Wenzhou.”

Luo Wenzhou dragged that hand up Fei Du’s face, rough and warm, covering his eyes. Then he bent, so that Fei Du felt his presence as a nearby heat. Felt the stamp of his lips against the back of his own palm. “You little minx,” he said, with infinite patience. “I know better than to reward you for lying to me.”

Fei Du, startled, laughed.