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“Jiang Cheng,” Wei Ying whines, sprawling out flat on his back on the mats, “My body hurts. I’m dying. Gymnastics is killing me.”
“Gymnastics is destroying your joints,” Jiang Cheng agrees, dangling a handful of almonds over Wei Ying’s face until he opens his mouth. “But probably not killing you, you giant fucking baby.”
Wei Ying chews the almond that Jiang Cheng tries to murder him with, squinting his eyes shut against the too-bright lights of gymnasium. “I feel like if my hamstrings get any tighter they’re actually going to snap.”
“That’s fucking disgusting,” Jiang Cheng notes uncharitably. “Take a day off.”
“I can’t do that,” Wei Ying says, which is what he always says. Jiang Cheng makes sure Wei Ying’s looking his way before he rolls his eyes. “Didi, c’mon! The Olympics are, like, right around the corner.”
“I’m gonna actually laugh in your stupid face if you lose a leg before you can compete at the Olympics,” Jiang Cheng says, like a liar. “And I’m gonna take all your medals.”
“Obviously,” Wei Ying says, feeling vaguely offended at the notion that someone would be winning medals in his stead if not Jiang Cheng. “But seriously, I need you to pull me upright so I can practice my vaults again.”
“You’re not gonna practice your vaults again if you can’t sit up,” Jiang Cheng disagrees, hauling Wei Ying upright and shoving another almond in his mouth in the same movement. Wei Ying nearly dies before he successfully engages his core so he can stand and chew at the same time. He gives Jiang Cheng wounded baby deer eyes, but Jiang Cheng just raises his eyebrows, as if Wei Ying wobbling around helplessly is only proving his point.
-- Well. Well!
“Alright,” Wei Ying mutters begrudgingly, “Okay. I’ll go see the stupid PT.”
“Do you need help walking?” Jiang Cheng’s voice is sarcastic, but it turns out the concern is real-- he gets a shoulder beneath Wei Ying’s arm before his knees can fully buckle.
“Nah,” Wei Ying wheezes, “I’m obviously killing the game.”
“Obviously,” Jiang Cheng says. Wei Ying can’t see from this angle whether Jiang Cheng’s rolling his eyes or not, but he’s willing to bet that he probably is.
The problem is that the PT is boring. Training is fun, even when it hurts, and as such Wei Ying’s more willing to make time for it. PT’s just-- shift here, do this. No joy of flight, no pushing his body to the limits of what it can physically do. Just bending his joints around and making vague noises of approval when a muscle releases.
Jiang Cheng props Wei Ying up against the wall and skedaddles before Wei Ying can knock, probably because he’s got a terrified crush on Wen Qing and he can’t be around her for longer than four seconds without making a fool of himself. Wei Ying, who’s a fool all the time, doesn’t have the same sort of weakness.
He’s confronted by a collarbone when he knocks and the door swings open, which strongly implies that this person is not Wen Qing. Wen Qing’s forehead is about eye-level for him, so being confronted by, uh, a very nice throat (Wei Ying is not a throat pervert, this has never happened to him before in his life) is not something that he'd prepared for. Emotionally.
Wei Ying drags his eyes up (and up, and up, hrk), and garbles out something that might be hi and might be I’m dying, put me out of my misery.
“Hello,” says the person Wei Ying’s praying is the PT, because you can’t just ask normal people to kill you. “Can I help you?”
“Please fix my legs,” Wei Ying says, not very helpfully, and sags against the doorframe in a way that is very cool and not at all helpless.
The physical therapist (he hopes) blinks at him slowly, like a cat. “Please come in,” He says, stepping back to let Wei Ying into the bright little office. “Describe your pain further. Ache, or sting, or stabbing?”
Wei Ying, who’s used to Wen Qing sort of crunching him around and calling it a day, struggles for the verbiage. “Uh,” He says, carefully testing his weight, “I s’pose a stabbing sort of ache. I probably just need to stretch, actually, I’ll just--”
“On the table,” The man says, waving Wei Ying over. “Don’t injure yourself further by stretching improperly.”
“Uh,” Wei Ying says. This guy’s bedside manner is kind of shit, but-- well, Wei Ying goes, doesn’t he? So maybe it’s good enough. “Where’s Wen Qing?”
The doctor (he’s probably a doctor of something, right?) glances over at him, maybe evaluating his mental acuity. “She is out for the day. My name is Lan Zhan; I can assure you that you are in good hands.”
Wei Ying, who’d never felt like he was in bad hands, suddenly feels a touch of stress about the whole thing.
“Well, Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying curls his tongue around the syllables, just getting a feel for them. Lan Zhan looks at him with big dark eyes. “My name’s Wei Ying and I guess my life-- well, not life. Livelihood. Is in your hands! I haven’t seen you before.”
“No,” Lan Zhan admits, offering a hand up onto the bench that Wei Ying ignores. “I generally work elsewhere. This is a favor.”
“Wow,” Wei Ying says, “Wen Qing’s playing hooky. I hope she’s doing something fun.”
He jolts when Lan Zhan puts a hand over the muscles that connect his thigh to his knee. Wei Ying hadn’t known those could hurt, but God, they do. What are those?
“Vastus medialis,” Lan Zhan supplies, helpful boy that he is. “Tender?”
“Yeah,” Wei Ying admits, “Ow. Warm.”
“Sharp?”
“No,” Wei Ying says, and squawks his offense when Lan Zhan sort of tips him backwards and helps him stretch his legs out. It’s sort of like working with the pushiest masseuse in the world.
Lan Zhan pushes a thumb into the muscle above Wei Ying’s joint, not too hard, and says, “Here?” while Wei Ying fails to strangle back a-- listen, it’s not a moan. A noise. A sound.
Lan Zhan makes a vague sound of agreement, as if Wei Ying’s said something useful, and presses Wei Ying’s knee back towards his own chest with gentle, even pressure.
Wei Ying is flexible. He can put his foot over his head no problem. He hadn’t known that someone supporting him all the way through the stretch could feel-- like--
It hurts enough to make him whine, but it also feels sort of-- he feels kind of--
“Good,” Lan Zhan says, encouraging Wei Ying’s hands up to his own leg. “Just like that, good. Hold it.”
Wei Ying does what he’s told, holding his thigh to his chest while Lan Zhan does something agonizingly painful and also, fuck, ow, good, it feels really--
He maybe whimpers a little bit. One of those pained little whines that happen when he stretches too deep too fast, but it’s the kind of pain that’s accompanied by relief. He says, tiny, ow, and Lan Zhan says good, again, deep and even and quiet.
“A little longer,” Lan Zhan says, and Wei Ying deliriously thinks that he could probably do this forever, as long as Lan Zhan doesn’t stop talking to him. The world feels incredibly quiet, like Wei Ying’s got wool stuffed in his ears; even the sound of his breathing fades out. It’s Lan Zhan’s hands, the soft squeak of pleather, and pain.
Wei Ying says, “Mnfgh,” when Lan Zhan helps him lower his leg, supporting his hip flexor with a big, warm hand. He feels a little bit like he’s made of taffy on one side of his body, even though he’s still sort of throbbing and tender from having Lan Zhan’s fingers press hard into the meat of his thigh.
“Other side,” Lan Zhan says quietly, and Wei Ying wants to cry, a little, because it hurts, and he wants to die, a little, because it’s good, and he’s sort of-- he’s not hard, but he’s turned on in a blurry, absent way that makes him want to rub his face against Lan Zhan’s hipbone. He wants to sit at Lan Zhan’s feet and Lan Zhan can put his magic fingers into Wei Ying’s hair and Wei Ying can just hang out in this soft, quiet space forever. “Good. You’re doing well.”
Wei Ying whines and throws his arm across his eyes when Lan Zhan presses his thumb into a knot, squirming with-- Wei Ying’s body can’t decide if it’s pain or if he’s horny or if he’s going to cry. He kicks, just a little, and Lan Zhan pins him down hard, trapping him with a knee up and pain, pain, pain-- the kind that zings through his muscle and up the back of his knee and makes him feel blurry and-- ah--
The knot releases and Wei Ying heaves a wet gasp, feeling impossibly close to tears.
“Shh,” Lan Zhan says, maybe. Wei Ying’s woozy with endorphins and he can’t really think about-- about anything, really, but it sounds like Lan Zhan says, soft, “Good boy.”
Wei Ying chooses not to examine that, even while Lan Zhan wrings high little whines and whimpers out of Wei Ying’s throat. He’s choosing to believe that it’s totally normal and fine that Wei Ying’s knees buckle when Lan Zhan helps him slide off the table. No problem at all that Wei Ying genuinely doesn’t remember anything but Lan Zhan’s hands braced against his biceps to keep him from stumbling on the way to the locker room.
Nothing strange going on here, Wei Ying thinks while Lan Zhan chivvies him into sipping a sports drink before leaving him staring at his knees and trying to be less jello.
“Man, what the fuck,” Jiang Cheng says an indeterminate amount of time later, presumably after Lan Zhan’s left since Wei Ying’s alone and still knocked on his ass by pointedly not-thinking-about-it. “Are you having a crisis right now?”
Wei Ying blinks at the ground between his shoes. “-- Yes,” he decides, “I think I’m having a break with reality.”
“Oh, good, so nothing new,” Jiang Cheng says, kicking at the toe of one of Wei Ying’s very expensive sneakers. Wei Ying makes a vague noise of protest, finally looking up into Jiang Cheng’s vaguely concerned frown.
“Man,” Wei Ying says after a moment of uncomfortably zoned-out eye contact, “Your face is gonna get stuck that way.”
“You look high,” Jiang Cheng says bluntly. “Your pupils are fucking huge. I’m gonna rat you out for taking magic mushrooms two months before the Olympics.”
Wei Ying wrinkles his nose. “Are those illegal in the Olympics?”
“What the fuck,” Jiang Cheng sputters, waving a hand in front of Wei Ying’s eyes, “Have you lost your mind? No shit they’re illegal.”
“I don’t think they are,” Wei Ying disagrees. Arguing with Jiang Cheng is sort of helping him anchor his brain back to this reality, which is a blessing and a curse. “I feel like they’re not actually performance-enhancing.”
“Neither is weed, but we know how that goes,” Jiang Cheng says, and Wei Ying’s forced to concede the point.
As an act of kindness (and definitely not because he can’t stand on his own), Wei Ying lets Jiang Cheng haul him upright and steady him when he wobbles. Jiang Cheng only looks more concerned, but Wei Ying’s more or less mobile, so whatever. It’s fine. He hasn’t had a life-altering experience or anything.
⦾⦿⦾⦿⦾
So maybe Wei Ying sort of had a life-altering experience. He thinks about it more than he should, considering he’s got really big stuff in his life to focus on right now. Training. Sponsorships. The fucking Olympics. But no, obviously he can’t think about any of that shit for more than two minutes at a time without the memory of Lan Zhan’s big hands creeping up on him like a fucking sleep paralysis demon.
-- That makes them sound horrifying. Tragically and confusingly, the memory of Lan Zhan’s hands is not at all horrifying . Wei Ying’s had way more self-reflection than he’s comfortable with in the past few days; he’s rapidly had to come to terms with the fact that most people don’t, like, jerk off while they press their bruises. Whatever! It’s fine.
“You look pathetic,” Wen Qing informs Wei Ying cheerfully when he drags himself back into her office, which is the office where he thought really hard about getting on his knees for a virtual stranger.
Wei Ying surrounds himself with the nicest people. He is the best judge of character. “Do I look pathetic enough for you to do me a favor?” he asks hopefully. He tries to look as sad and droopy as possible. Look at me, he tries to communicate with his brain alone, I could never win a medal for the honor of my country like this.
Wen Qing does not look super impressed. “Jiang Cheng told me you might ask me for drugs,” she tells him. Jiang Cheng is a fucking traitor. “I can’t even assign medications like that, that’s not the kind of doctor I am.”
“I don’t want drugs!” Wei Ying protests, feeling deeply maligned. “I just wanna know-- listen, don’t tell anyone, okay? But you know Lan Zhan?”
Wen Qing eyes him over suspiciously, looking a lot like she’s thinking about pretending she’s never heard of anyone by that name in her entire life. “I do,” She says slowly. “What about him?”
“I need to know his phone number,” Wei Ying says, trying to look even more pathetic so Wen Qing will be tempted to give up her professionalism to help him out. He does his best to look so small and sad.
“Absolutely not,” Wen Qing says, completely dashing Wei Ying’s hopes like a little rowboat tossed against a cliff face. Wei Ying’s face must do something tragic and complicated, because she raises her eyebrows judgmentally at him. “You have to understand that giving out personal information is so against the code of ethics it’s not even worth considering, right?”
“Right, but,” Wei Ying can’t finish that sentence with but be cool, because Wen Qing will bend him into a pretzel. He scuffs the toe of his shoe against the tile.
“But nothing,” she says firmly. “He’s a very private person. It’s better to forget about it-- there are plenty of people who will fuck Olympians.”
It’s not just about sex, Wei Ying wants to protest. It’s barely even a little bit about sex. It’s-- how’s he supposed to tell her about the pain and Lan Zhan’s voice and his strong hands and the way he’d made Wei Ying’s brain go empty, empty, empty?
Impossible. He would obviously self-combust first.
“Okay,” Wei Ying says, trying to recalculate his plans. Maybe someone else might know Lan Zhan--
“I mean it, Wei Ying,” Wen Qing says sternly, putting her hands on her hips. “Don’t give him any trouble.”
He raises his hands defensively, even though he’s definitely planning on making trouble. “Okay, okay. I won’t make any trouble.”
“You better not,” she does not sound convinced, which is fair. Wei Ying is a troublesome sort of person.
She doesn’t exactly chase him out of her office, but she makes it pretty clear that she’s ignoring him, which is clear enough in its own right. He’s not crazy enough to actually try and get injured on purpose so he has an excuse to stick around and try to pry more information out of her, so-- so!
Plan B.
Plan B is objectively not a good plan. It just involves him wandering around being tragic until someone takes pity on him and either helps him or puts him out of his misery. He only regularly goes, like, four places total-- someone he knows is going to be around and available to either give him a hint or kill him on sight.
“Wow, Wei-xiong!” Nie Huaisang says cheerfully. Wei Ying has his head down on the table at the coffee shop he’s busy sulking in, but he’d recognize that voice anywhere. “You look--”
“Say pathetic,” Wei Ying grumbles. “Just do it, I have a box to check.”
“I was going to say ‘lovelorn’,” Nie Huaisang drops himself into the chair across from Wei Ying, incidentally-but-probably-on-purpose kicking him in both shins, somehow. “But if you want pathetic, pathetic it shall be. What are you sulking about?”
“First of all, I don’t look love-anything,” Wei Ying puts a finger up to illustrate his point, waving it vaguely in the direction that he’s pretty sure Nie Huaisang is sitting.
“Right,” Huaisang agrees, “You look pathetic, like you said.”
“Correct,” Wei Ying says, “With that in mind, I need you to do something for me.”
“That’s why I’m here,” Nie Huaisang sounds very smug, which is incredibly suspicious. Wei Ying cracks an eye open to look him over. Nie Huaisang doesn’t actually have an evil little kitty mouth, but he has the energy.
“Okay,” Wei Ying says cautiously. “Hit me.”
“A little birdy told me that you were looking for a certain someone’s phone number,” Nie Huaisang leans in closer. He’s got a little sparkle in his eye that’s probably charming to people who don’t know him. “Rhymes with ‘Lan Zhan’.”
“That’s-- you can’t rhyme things with the words themselves--”
“You don’t know shit about poetry, Wei-xiong,” Nie Huaisang says serenely. “So do you want his number or not?”
Wei Ying genuinely has no idea who might have told Nie Huaisang that he was looking for Lan Zhan. He goes through a series of mental triangles trying to figure out who he might have even mentioned it to-- maybe Nie Huaisang had overheard him with Wen Qing, somehow. Maybe he’d overheard him with Lan Zhan (the idea of it literally elicits a cold shiver down Wei Ying’s spine). Either way--
Well. Here it is.
“I do,” Wei Ying says cautiously, suddenly feeling sort of struck with guilt. What if Lan Zhan really doesn’t want to see him. What if Wen Qing had been right and Wei Ying’s just being greedy? “-- Or, I mean--”
“You do,” Nie Huaisang says firmly, “I promise you do. No take-backs.”
“I mean, you haven’t told me, so probably still take-backs--”
“No take-backs!” Nie Huaisang says, raising his voice to speak over Wei Ying because apparently he wasn’t raised to not yell in public, the cretin.
“God, okay,” Wei Ying puts his hand out for Nie Huaisang to put a phone number in it. Or-- something. He forgets that cell phones exist for a second in his panic, whatever. He doesn’t know what he’s expecting, exactly.
It’s not Nie Huaisang slapping him a low-five, singing, “Good luck, Wei-xiong!” and swanning away. It’s definitely not Nie Huaisang putting his hand on the wrist of a tall man at the counter, who’s probably just trying to order coffee, and pivoting him to face Wei Ying’s table.
Wei Ying’s gotta admit! Nie Huaisang is always a bundle of surprises. Sometimes it’s birds in the dorm room, sometimes it’s Lan Zhan’s startled face looking at Wei Ying from across the room, holding a paper cup of coffee and a buttery croissant.
This is-- in many ways, both better and worse than the bird. Less poop. More potent fear.
“Oh, God,” Wei Ying wheezes. “ Huaisang. ”
“Thank me later,” Nie Huaisang calls over his shoulder, and then he just leaves.
Wei Ying stares after him, genuinely dumbfounded. The audacity of that bitch.
Lan Zhan sits across from him and pushes the croissant over. Wei Ying doesn’t know what to do with his hands so he takes it and immediately gets flaky crumbs all over his fingers. This croissant is absolutely not in his diet plan.
“Hello,” Lan Zhan says seriously, “Eat that.”
Wei Ying tears off a bite and puts it in his mouth without even thinking about it. Doctor’s orders, or whatever, and he’s absolutely not willing to hear about how Lan Zhan’s not that kind of doctor.
There’s a beat of silence in which Wei Ying chews and Lan Zhan presses his thumb into the cardboard sleeve on his cup so hard it dents. The tension’s way too thick-- Wei Ying blurts, “I’m so sorry,” at the exact same time that Lan Zhan says, “I owe you an apology.” and then they’re both left staring at each other, just as awkward and twice as confused.
“What’re you--”
“I believe I-”
Wei Ying shuts up and clears his throat. “You first,” he says. “But I really don’t think you owe me an apology.”
Lan Zhan looks conflicted, twisting the sleeve around his cup. His conflicted face is more a little rumple between his eyebrows than anything dire; it’s really cute, actually. Wei Ying despairs of himself for his inability to focus on important shit.
“I should not have spoken to you that way,” Lan Zhan says after a moment, “It was inappropriate and I was being-- presumptuous.”
Wei Ying mouths presumptuous to himself. “It-- I mean, I kind of tried to stalk you after, so I feel like it’s, uh-- I mean. Not a big deal.”
Lan Zhan blinks at him owlishly. So cute. “-- Did you?”
Wei Ying grimaces. “Wen Qing gave me such a stern talking to, and-- I dunno, I just wanted-- I mean--”
Lan Zhan smiles. Kind of. His eyes crinkle a little bit. “She is very protective.”
Wei Ying stares at him, a little starry-eyed, and is forced to cover his face. “Please don’t make that face, I’m trying to be kind of professional, and, like-- apologize. For being weird.”
“I would actually prefer to be unprofessional,” Lan Zhan says, sounding very earnest. Wei Ying shoves the rest of the croissant into his own mouth to keep from saying something he’ll probably regret.
He has to swallow twice to keep himself from choking, because apparently he’s helpless like a baby when faced by someone as beautiful as Lan Zhan. Lan Zhan waits patiently while Wei Ying struggles (mostly emotionally), and then-- very, very gently-- takes his hand.
“Oh my god,” Wei Ying says, staring down at Lan Zhan’s fingers wrapped around his wrist. Wei Ying’s never really thought of himself as particularly delicate before; he’s strong enough to hold his own bodyweight upside down in some rings for a whole routine. He barely even shakes. He’s feeling a little shaky now, though. And small, with Lan Zhan’s fingertips overlapping across his wrist bone.
“Alright?” Lan Zhan asks, sounding awfully serious.
“Yeah,” Wei Ying strangles out. “Extremely.”
“Good,” Lan Zhan says, deep and even. It makes Wei Ying feel fizzy at the tips of his fingers, a sharp sort of awareness gathering at the joints of his elbows and behind his knees. It’s the same kind of anticipation that he feels right before he goes to compete, like everyone in the room is holding their breath.
Something of it must show on his face, because Lan Zhan’s expression, just for a second, looks…
Like he wants , maybe. Like he’d like to put his teeth in Wei Ying just to see him squirm. Wei Ying can feel the weight of his eyes and it’s sort of-- he kind of--
“God,” Wei Ying says, feeling a little giddy and a little insane, “I’m pretty sure I’d get in really deep shit if I tongue kissed you in public.”
“Perhaps,” Lan Zhan acknowledges, and stands up. He doesn’t let go of Wei Ying’s wrist which-- ah. Hm. Alright.
⦾⦿⦾⦿⦾
Wei Ying holds Lan Zhan’s hand on the way to Lan Zhan’s car, and then over the gear shift on the way to Lan Zhan’s house. He feels illicit and slutty and dangerous, hooking up with someone he hasn’t even known for a full day, but he’s pretty sure that Wen Qing wouldn’t be hyper-defensive of a terrible person and, anyway, he’s allowed to be slutty if he wants to.
He tries to hold onto that feeling, like he’s sliding into someone else’s skin so he can be all daring and shameless and not, uh, a virgin who doesn’t have time to hook up because he’s too busy training. It’s hard when Lan Zhan crowds him up against the front door, caging him in with his body, and harder still when Lan Zhan bends to slot their mouths together.
It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, Wei Ying thinks, because otherwise he’s going to babble something ridiculous. People hook up all the time. It doesn’t have to mean anything.
Lan Zhan puts his teeth into Wei Ying’s bottom lip, just sharp enough to send sparkles up Wei Ying’s spine. Wei Ying has the insane urge to say I’m in love with you, or please break me in half with your hands. Neither of those are rational or acceptable so Wei Ying doesn’t say anything at all. He fumbles to untuck Lan Zhan’s shirt instead, ignoring the doorknob pressing into his kidney and the fact that they’re within barely-obscured view of the street.
They kiss up against the door until a car goes past, which makes Wei Ying go startled-stiff up against Lan Zhan’s front and shrink back to be as small as possible. He doesn’t have a lot of media obligations-- even Olympic gold medalists aren’t exactly celebrities-- but he’d get in deep, deep shit if he got caught kissing some guy like he was planning on fucking him right there in the street.
“Inside,” Lan Zhan says, and unlocks the door so they can stumble into the cool dark of the house.
It’s weird. It’s-- Wei Ying thinks it’s weird, anyway. He’s kissed people in clubs before, where flashing lights and fog machines and a crowd were close enough to anonymity to count, but he’s never gone to someone’s house to have sex with them. Or-- or kiss them, or get a massage from them, or whatever they’re going to do.
They haven’t talked about it. Maybe that’s the weird part, the not-talking part; Wei Ying has no idea if they’re on the same page or not, except that all the pages in his brain are taken up by the memory of Lan Zhan’s tongue in his mouth.
Lan Zhan, who’s looking at him with his pretty gold eyes, eyelashes limned in the setting sunlight coming in through the big window. He looks a little worried at Wei Ying’s silence.
“I’ve never done this,” Wei Ying blurts, which-- he doesn’t know why he thinks that’s going to ease the tension. He’d been so ready to go on absolutely not admitting any sort of potential inexperience.
“Alright,” Lan Zhan says, “Would you like something to drink?”
“Wh- no, I don’t want-- I just, Lan Zhan, I’ve never done this.”
“I understand,” Lan Zhan just keeps looking at him. “If you’d rather not, we don’t have to do anything at all. Your discomfort is not my goal.”
The problem, Wei Ying thinks, is that the discomfort is kind of his personal goal. The-- he has trouble even thinking the word, because it’s embarrassing and weird to say you hurting me turned me on. He doesn’t know how to put his thought of you fucked me up so much my brother thought I was high into words.
“I’m.” He says uselessly, and then, “Uh.”
“I’ll get you a drink,” Lan Zhan decides, shifting like he’s going to walk past Wei Ying on his way to what’s presumably the kitchen.
Wei Ying doesn’t let him get that far; he pinches the cuff of Lan Zhan’s sleeve to keep him in place, instead. “I liked-- what we did before.”
“The kissing?” Lan Zhan asks. He sounds genuinely curious. He’s such a good boy.
“No,” Wei Ying says, and then quickly amends, “Well, yes, obviously, but-- the, uh. When we-- or, I mean, when you-- “
“Ah,” Lan Zhan says, and puts his hands on Wei Ying’s waist.
Aw, Wei Ying thinks. That’s nice.
Lan Zhan curls his fingers into the meat of Wei Ying’s sides, where his obliques are tender and tight like they always are. When Wei Ying inhales sharply, Lan Zhan doesn’t let go; he smooths his thumbs up to chase the ache, like he’s trying to press it further in.
“Does it hurt?” Lan Zhan asks. His tone hasn’t changed, but somehow that just makes it-- better. Worse. Hotter. Like it’s a curiosity that Wei Ying’s breath is hitching and he’s trying to press his hips up against Lan Zhan’s thigh, just like that.
“Yes,” Wei Ying says, and Lan Zhan leans to kiss just beneath his ear.
“Good,” he says, and presses his smile against Wei Ying’s jaw.
⦾⦿⦾⦿⦾
They don’t get all the way undressed, but Wei Ying thinks that most of the way is undressed enough to count. Lan Zhan lays Wei Ying out facedown on the bed and presses his fingers into the knots beside Wei Ying’s spine, where he’s all twisted up from training and everything hurts. It shouldn’t feel good, Wei Ying thinks, but it really does. It’s better that he can hide his face in Lan Zhan’s crisp sheets, fingers twisting into the pillows, because he doesn’t have to be as embarrassed about the noises that he makes.
Wei Ying is getting the sense that maybe Lan Zhan is looking for that reaction, anyway, the stupid little whimpers that eke out of Wei Ying’s throat when he can’t stop them. The thought of it makes him feel simultaneously embarrassed and wanted, like he’s somehow earning the attention.
What it really shouldn’t be is sexy, but Lan Zhan’s touching Wei Ying like he’s an instrument and it’s-- it’s not impersonal, but it’s something on the edge of it that’s driving Wei Ying a little bit crazy.
“Please,” Wei Ying says into the mattress, where he can pretend that someone else is saying it, and Lan Zhan bends over him to press a smile to the wing of his shoulder blade. With Lan Zhan’s weight hovering over him, it doesn’t feel impersonal at all-- Wei Ying has never felt so anchored to his body in his entire life.
It feels like a natural continuation when Lan Zhan skims a hand down Wei Ying’s belly to cup him through his underwear, where he’s very hard and damp and sort of embarrassingly turned on. He hadn’t really noticed getting that turned on, too lost in fuzzy endorphins, but oh, boy.
Wei Ying doesn’t know what he wants to ask for-- words feel too big in his mouth and his brain is blurry at the edges. It’s so much easier to just feel everything that Lan Zhan’s doing, the dull throb of his muscles unlocking and the raw pleasure of Lan Zhan touching his dick and the comfort of Lan Zhan’s warmth all against the line of his back.
It feels good. He doesn’t want Lan Zhan to stop, and it feels-- it feels good. Lan Zhan murmurs something against Wei Ying’s shoulder blade, something that Wei Ying’s too fucked to parse, and he abruptly wants--
“Kiss me,” Wei Ying says, not quite begging, and Lan Zhan does; he turns Wei Ying over and presses him into the mattress and kisses him glancingly across his bottom lip, the corner of his mouth, the edge of his cheekbone. When Wei Ying can’t help but laugh and close his eyes, pleased and embarrassed about it, Lan Zhan ghosts kisses across his eyelids, too.
It’s too intimate for a hookup, too weird and too much and it’s kind of exactly what Wei Ying wants, because apparently he wants Lan Zhan to pepper him with kisses like they’re in a rom-com.
“Careful,” Wei Ying says, cracking an eye open. Lan Zhan is very close to his face, a little smile across his mouth. “I’m going to think you like me.”
Lan Zhan pulls back, just a little bit- just enough to look Wei Ying in the eye.
“Yes,” he says, “You should think that.”
Wei Ying blinks at him. He feels obligated to point out that Lan Zhan doesn’t know him, really, except that he doesn’t really know Lan Zhan either and he likes him anyway.
“Okay,” he says instead, and pulls Lan Zhan down so he can cling close. It brings them together but also, um, brings them together-- Wei Ying’s still wearing underwear and Lan Zhan’s still wearing pants but oh, god, it’s still-- that’s a dick! Those are dicks!
“Alright?” Lan Zhan asks, and Wei Ying nods rapidly and then they’re kissing again, Lan Zhan’s fingers pressing into Wei Ying’s sides and Wei Ying’s heels crossed at the small of Lan Zhan’s back.
It’s easy to hide this way, for Wei Ying to muffle his embarrassing noises against Lan Zhan’s mouth and close his eyes. This way, Wei Ying can pretend that getting off with nothing more than the sting of pain from Lan Zhan pressing knots absently out of his hips and schoolboy friction isn’t embarrassing at all. Totally normal, he thinks hysterically.
“Beautiful,” Lan Zhan says, and Wei Ying hiccups a pretty pathetic sound and comes. It’s very sticky and horrible and frankly sort of the best thing that’s ever happened, maybe excluding winning gold.
Wei Ying’s body tries to curl up like a pill bug and turn into ooze at the same time, which isn’t conducive to his alternate goal of trying to touch every inch of Lan Zhan’s naked skin. Lan Zhan’s still hard up against Wei Ying’s hip, and We Ying’s brain is very convinced that he’s definitely still a virgin until he sees Lan Zhan have an orgasm.
“Please,” Wei Ying says, entirely unsure about what he’s begging for but really, really meaning it. Lan Zhan huffs a sharp breath and bites Wei Ying’s jaw hard enough to sting, shoving his hips into Wei Ying’s thigh and then going still.
Wei Ying drapes his arms around Lan Zhan’s neck. He wonders what people say after having sex. Good game? Nice job?
“Thanks,” Wei Ying decides, and pats Lan Zhan’s shoulder. Lan Zhan trembles with a laugh he can’t quite stifle, which is so fucking cute that Wei Ying could actually die. He, unfortunately, likes Lan Zhan a lot. He wants to know things about him, like his favorite food and his favorite animal and what he does to get such nice shoulders.
Wei Ying is sticky and uncomfortable and he can feel a wet patch in Lan Zhan’s sweatpants, which means that Lan Zhan is also sticky. Is it possible to casually segue the not-conversation in a direction where Wei Ying gets to use the probably-nice shower in Lan Zhan’s probably-nice bathroom and then sort of just insinuate himself into Lan Zhan’s life and stay forever?
Probably not casually, Wei Ying decides somewhat mournfully. That’s a pretty uncasual thing to say.
“Lan Zhan-” Wei Ying starts, and hurries when Lan Zhan starts getting up, “Lan Zhan, did you mean it when you implied you liked me? Do you like me enough to let me use your shower? Gege, you can’t send me home like this, think of the tabloid coverage.”
“I like you enough,” Lan Zhan agrees, and offers Wei Ying a hand up. “I like you enough for most things.”
“You’re just saying that,” Wei Ying says, because wow, what a line.
“Hmm,” Lan Zhan says, but he’s smiling and Wei Ying thinks-- he thinks maybe Lan Zhan’s not just saying that.