Chapter Text
Feng Xin had just sat down, only to stand suddenly and begin to pace the apartment again.
“You’re going to wear a hole into the floor,” Mu Qing scowled.
“I just found out I’m a father!” Feng Xin whirled on him.
“No. You found out a kid shares your genetics.”
“You knew! This whole time you knew!”
Mu Qing looked away. “I didn’t think she kept it.”
“You didn’t think I deserved to know?!”
Mu Qing crossed his arms, looking up at him again with no remorse. “It wasn’t my business to tell.”
“Thirteen fucking years, Mu Qing! Thirteen fucking years I’ve been an absent father!”
“Feng Xin…” Xie Lian stood to move between them. “There’s nothing that can be done now.”
“Like hell there isn’t! I’ll figure out where she is, I’m going and I’m meeting my kid!”
“So years after she dumps you you think it’s a good idea to hunt her down and demand to see her kid?” Mu Qing sneered.
“He’s my kid!”
Xie Lian kept two hands firmly planted on Feng Xin’s shoulders to keep him from jumping Mu Qing.
Mu Qing clearly wasn’t worried about the possibility though. “If she wanted you in his life she would’ve told you.”
“You fucking—“
“Feng Xin! I’ll go with you,” Xie Lian forced him to sit down.
Feng Xin’s attention whipped up at him. “What?”
“If you find out where she is, I’ll go with you and we can talk to her together. For moral support.”
“I’m not encouraging this.” Mu Qing made clear.
“No one fucking asked you to—“
“Feng Xin. Mu Qing is right, it wasn’t his place to tell you. And he didn’t think she went through with the pregnancy anyways so…” Xie Lian sighed. “There’s a possibility she won’t want you in his life.”
Feng Xin finally calmed under his hands, looking down at his lap in defeat. “He’s thirteen years old. He looked just like me in that photo, I- fuck. I don’t even know his name.”
“You can ask.” Xie Lian squeezed his shoulders reassuringly.
After a minute Feng Xin nodded. “Yeah. Yeah. My coworker said their kid goes to the same school with him so I’ll—“
Mu Qing glared. “Do not show up to the fucking school like some—“
“I’m not going to! Do you think I’m an idiot?!” Feng Xin yelled, moving to get up to start a proper fight, only to be forced back into his seat by Xie Lian.
Though he understood why Feng Xin was upset, Xie Lian knew their friend had a point. “Just remember you can’t make her do anything. She has custody of him. You two aren’t married.”
Feng Xin ran a hand through his hair, clearly frustrated.
“Just let me know when you’re going to confront her and we can go together. For now you need to sleep on this. It’s a lot to take in.”
Begrudgingly, Feng Xin nodded, lightly pushing Xie Lian’s arms away. “Thank you.”
“Of course.”
***
Thirteen years ago. Xie Lian thought back as he blew on his hands to warm them on his walked home. Thirteen years ago Feng Xin had apparently become a father to a baby boy. Thirteen years ago Xie Lian had just forced everyone who loved him away, a self destructive force of nature barreling straight for disaster. His hand unconsciously came up to clasp the shitty charm he’d gotten in the habit of wearing. A pressed flower he’d laminated and strung on a plain cord. It wasn’t even a proper necklace really.
“San Lang,” the name was said almost involuntarily. Though Xie Lian wore the charm to remember him, he honestly tried not to think back to that time most days. But with Feng Xin seeing a photo of Jian Lan and a little boy who couldn’t be anything but his in a class photo a coworker had been showing off, it seemed that thinking of the past was inevitable.
The past showed up in nightmares still sometimes. The constant shadow that no one else seemed to see. The swaying bodies of his parents. The stubborn stranger— who’d found him so drunk he could barely stand and had given him a place to stay, believed his insane ramblings— bleeding out on the floor as that very real shadow stood over them both.
Some nights the nightmares were twisted beyond normal limits, utterly surreal. Most times they weren’t. They didn’t have to be. The truth was horrifying enough.
Xie Lian pushed away the thoughts, clutching at the charm until the sharp edges cut into his hand. Just little paper cuts, they didn’t hurt, but it reminded him to be gentle with it.
Mu Qing and Feng Xin didn’t know the details of what had happened after he pushed them away and he didn’t intend for them to. This wasn’t about him. This was about Feng Xin and the relationship he’d apparently had while Xie Lian was falling apart and dragging everyone down with him. This was about showing them they could all be part of each other’s lives again and talk about the past without it being weird. It was going to be fine.
After another block Xie Lian felt a wave of nausea threatening to overtake him. Steeling himself, he broke out into a sprint, trying to burn off the anxiety and paranoia threatening to creep up. There was no more shadow now. He was safe. The fucked up stalker who’d murdered San Lang and tried to murder Xie Lian was safely behind bars now. He knew that.
He still ran in twisting circles like he was trying to lose someone before finally heading home. It eased the paranoia a bit.
Walking up the stairs to his apartment again he felt grounded. Whole. Mostly safe even.
Maybe it was because the past was on his mind, but Xie Lian found himself headed straight for Ruoye’s tank, quickly rinsing his hands so he could take the snake out.
He’d screamed the first time he’d seen the little snake. Ruoye, just a baby at the time, had been exploring San Lang’s shoulders and Xie Lian, not fully sober and constantly verging on a panic attack back then had only seen white. White ribbons around necks. Bodies suspended.
Xie Lian reached out in a panic, grabbing at the pure white ribbon around the throat of his host, only to be stopped by warm and very much living hands.
”Gege, you can’t grab him like that, let me put him away, okay?”
But Xie Lian wasn’t listening. Or, he was, but he wasn’t there fully, trembling and unfocused. The warm hands left and the bodies had been so cold and the food had been so cold and he was all alone except for that white shadow and—
A warm body pulled him in and Xie Lian screamed, struggling to get away from the dead weight until he felt warm hands cup his cheek and clear eyes meet his. One red. One black.
”Breathe.”
Xie Lian did. “He was here, he got you,” Xie Lian muttered, nearly incomprehensible and words a bit slurred with some awful mix of sleep deprived and hysterical.
”Where did gege see him?”
”I don’t… I don’t…”
San Lang waited, letting Xie Lian take his time to work it out. To parse out past from present. ”I’m okay gege. I’m safe.”
Xie Lian nodded, reaching out to feel San Lang’s neck. It didn’t feel broken. A pulse hummed under his touch.
”Does gege not like snakes?”
”…Snakes?”
San Lang nodded, patient with him. “Ruoye is a snake. That’s what gege tried to get off me.”
Xie Lian shook his head. “I thought… I thought it was a… I thought it was a noose.”
San Lang shook his head. “Does gege want to see him again? To check?”
Xie Lian took a moment before nodding. And then slowly San Lang had led him over to the tank to see the pure white snake curled up in the water bowl.
”Is that okay?” San Lang asked after a few minutes of Xie Lian staring at the snake in silence.
Xie Lian nodded. “I’m okay. San Lang is okay.”
”San Lang is okay,” San Lang repeated, reassuring and comforting.
Xie Lian held Ruoye close to his chest, watching the now adult piebald curl contently into a ball in his hands, tongue poking out to smell his surroundings.
Ruoye wasn’t a noose. Ruoye didn’t bring death. Xie Lian pet along the snake’s back, careful to follow the flow of the scales.
“You did a good job shedding, you’re very bright,” He complimented, smiling as Ruoye tilted his head as if he could understand.
“Yes, you’re very pretty, you’re growing up very healthy.”
Ruoye settled back down, lazy and happy to just feed off of his warmth. Ruoye had been in his life long enough now that the snake had plenty of associations for him besides the previous owner. But… tonight San Lang was one of the safer places his thoughts could drift if he had to think back to that time.
“I don’t think I’ll sleep tonight,” he told the snake, not quite cheerful but not regretful either. Simply informing him like he could understand and keep track of Xie Lian’s sleep schedule.
Ruoye, being a snake, did not respond.
“Do you want to watch a movie?”
A curious tongue flicked out, which Xie Lian, well versed in making up conversations with his pet, took as a clear yes.
“I’ll try to pick one you’ll like.” Xie Lian was quite sure Ruoye’s eyesight wasn’t good enough to see the television, so he put on something he liked without too much thought despite his promise. A comfort film he often watched during bad nights. The film was overly long, lasting three hours with the most dreadfully boring plot and terrible dialogue. But the fight scenes were exquisite and overly drawn out. The reviews were awful and Xie Lian adored it.
“I think you fell asleep last time we watched this one, Ruoye. You have to pay attention this time,” he joked as he settled into the couch and pressed play.
Ruoye didn’t move, but Xie Lian knew that was a resounding yes.