[Fic] Perennial - EXO - 1/3
Title: Perennial
Pairing: Kris/Yixing
Rating: PG-13 (this part)
Genre: AU, reincarnation, romance
Warnings: Past life death/angst
Summary: The perennial flower dies, or so it seems. But at its root, it lives. When the seasons change, the flower, the leaves, that come back are not the same. But somehow they are.
***
Yifan. He heard her voice.
“No.”
That was the first word that left him when he saw her.
She was still, so still. Pale. If he closed his eyes he could still see the fear in her eyes when he had left her. Fear that had meant she was alive. His hand shook when he touched her face, nearly jerking back when he felt how cold she was already. The warmth of life fleeing.
“How-“ he asked, and then he fully realized the blood. Rags, their blankets, cloth she had bought in preparation when he had given her every bit of money he could without starving her. All of it soaked in her blood. It was as though she had been slaughtered in their bed, and he looked up at the midwife.
“The child?”
She closed her eyes, head shaking side to side. “It was too early.”
That had been the fear he had seen. Not for herself, but their child. She had known, they had both known how early it had been. He had rationalized that they would have another, if the child didn’t survive. He would help her through it. It sounded cold, but as long as he had her, he had never thought-
The bundle was handed to him, so light. The bowl he ate his rice out of weighed more. But the child was perfect, like a tiny doll, with her mouth.
“We have a son. He looks like you,” he told her, touching her face again. “Did she know the baby had died?”
He asked the midwife his question, his voice almost unnaturally calm. He needed to know. Needed to know if she had died knowing their child had gone before her, or if she had chosen not to fight.
“I told her he lived, hoping…”
Hoping to give her a reason to live.
The midwife left him, the child still swaddled on the deathbed.
“You can’t leave me,” he said, half choking himself on the words. “You can’t. Yixing.”
The tears fell against her face, and he clutched her to him. Breathing against her hair, stroking it. They had been meant from their cradles. He didn’t remember one day of his life without her at his side. The day of their wedding. The day she had known she carried their child. The sweet oils she scented herself with, the softness of her against him.
He was hoarse with his denials by the time he was pulled from her. His father, his neighbors. Pity. They took him by force, his head turned to keep his eyes on her. As though she might take a breath. They could all be wrong.
***
He ate his meals at her grave, eating with her in death as they had in life.
He spoke to her, how he was doing in his furniture making. That the crops were good. That her sister had given birth, a healthy girl. Her third, following two sons. It was bitterness in his voice.
He talked to his son, the child he would have taught to cut and lathe and smooth. The child that would have looked up at him with Yixing’s smile.
He walked through his days until he could be with her, knowing only that when his days ended, he would be laid beside her. And that he would never leave her.
***
***
***
The first time Kris saw Yixing, Yixing had been laughing. Corners of his mouth turned up, eyes dancing as he talked to one of the men beside him in the store aisle. It was not an unusual face, but perhaps it had been the laugh that had drawn his eye.
He’d walked away with a smile, not really knowing why.
The second time, Yixing had been elbow-deep in what he hoped was potting soil. Though it looked quite a bit nastier than that.
Yixing looked up at him, name tag askew, question on his face. And when he smiled, a dimple peeked.
For a moment Kris’s vision blurred, and instead of a man in front him, a woman, her hair dark and windblown, smile free, with a flower he had just tucked above her ear. The same dimple, the same light in her eyes.
His foot fell back, steadying himself, and Yixing looked concerned, standing with his filthy hands.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Kris said, his voice tight with some unnameable emotion. He swallowed several times. “I guess I just got overwhelmed by the plant choices.”
And Yixing laughed.
***
Kris was in construction, not landscaping. He barely knew a rose from a begonia. But the job he was doing, adding a sunroom, required plants both inside and out. He knew the angles of rafters, could seam drywall, apply wallpaper. But of plants, he knew nothing. The nursery he’d visited several times, hoping he’d soak up some knowledge of colors or something. He’d even picked up a book, and had gotten frustrated somewhere between perennials and annuals, and autumn gardens.
He took the information much better from Yixing, who walked with him among the plants, pointing out different colors, and when they would bloom. For a garden that kept its color not only when there were flowers, but in the cold as well.
“You know a lot about this,” Kris said.
“I’ve loved gardens since I can remember,” Yixing said, using his foot to nudge a potted tree back into line. “My mother always told me I could keep the plants alive when she couldn’t.”
Kris glanced down at Yixing’s hands, and away just as quickly. Embarrassed at himself. He had no idea what had gotten into him.
“I think my mother complained I was a bit too much of a monster,” he said quickly, trying to cover his own thoughts.
“Aren’t we all as children? Come over here, I think you’ll like these pots for inside.”
Yixing touched his wrist, urging him. And Kris felt like his stomach had looped over, giddiness all but rising from his shoulders. And he didn’t understand.
***
Yixing assigned himself to help. It was good business, he said, smile a little bit sheepish and a little bit mercenary all at once. They sat, and Kris sketched out the room from memory, the plans still fresh in his head. Each wall, how it intersected with the current flower bed.
“My usual landscape artist was able to draw up plans, so the beds will swing around here, and I’m rocking in a small waterfall here. But he was only able to give me dimensions, not plants.”
He sketched out a side view so that Yixing knew where the windows began and ended.
“With as much room as you have, you’ll be able to add plenty of color. There are some trees and bushes that retain their color as well.” Yixing gnawed at his lower lip. “But without seeing the garden that’s there, I don’t know how to work new plants in. Do you think you could bring pictures?”
“Or you could see it yourself,” Kris offered. Yixing’s eyes widened and Kris squeezed his own thigh to the point of pain. “Actually, you probably don’t do on-site consults, do you? I’m sorry.”
“The only sites I see are on deliveries,” Yixing said, flexing one arm. A pale, soft arm that he could only imagine hefting bags of fertilizer. “But I have time after work today, if you wanted?”
“My clients are out of town, so that would work,” Kris said slowly. “But if that’s not something you usually do…”
His whole body seemed to sink, giving Yixing an out.
“You have me invested,” Yixing said, folding the paper and waggling his finger. “Don’t try to leave me out now.”
“Yifan,” she laughed against his cheek. “You can’t leave me out.”
“Okay,” Kris agreed.
***
The visit to the torn-up garden took fifteen minutes. He picked Yixing up at the nursery, offering to drop him at the nearest subway station to the job site after they were done. It took a little bit of vision to really see what the garden would look like. The actual building itself had just been constructed, with finishing left to do. The garden was starting to invade his dreams, needing concrete plans so it would be finished on schedule. Yixing walked the garden himself, taking pictures on his cell phone, and jotting notes in a binder where Kris’s sketches were.
“There has to be balance,” Yixing said, and stopped in front of the half-completed waterfall. “I like your landscaper’s plans. I think I can give you plants that will make your client happy.”
“Give?” Kris asked.
And Yixing smirked down at the paper. “In exchange for money, of course. But my time is free.”
As they drove up to the subway stop, Kris’s guilt jingled. Needing to say something also, something that might get Yixing to stay one more moment. The offer of dinner was half on his mind, and it terrified him, cold straight to the bone.
“Promise me you won’t do too much away from work? I don’t want-“
“Don’t worry so much,” Yixing scolded. “You’ll be by tomorrow? I’ll be there, if you are, but I’m off the next day.”
“I’ll come by. Tomorrow. Afternoon,” Kris clarified. The morning would be with his crew.
“Good. I’ll see you then.”
Yixing slammed the door behind himself, hopping effortlessly onto the curb and waving before disappearing down the steps.
Kris sat, foot on the brake of his aging compact and staring as though Yixing would appear again.
A honk from behind him had him sitting up straight, from where he’d half been leaning into the other seat.
Where Yixing had been.
***
His dreams were full of flowers. Fields of them, running streams. A forest, a house. There was a woman in his arms, kissing him, smiling at him. And he followed her to a pond, and beyond it, to a glen where three graves were marked.
“My son and I,” she said to him. “And the father of my son. We were together, and always will be. Who do you love?”
“Yixing. Only Yixing,” he told her. And for a moment, even as he looked at her, forgot her name.
She smiled at him. “I love only you. Do you remember us?”
He missed them. He missed her.
“I never forgot you.”
“Smile, Yifan. Yixing is waiting. You promised your love. Don’t make him wait, okay?”
And the sunlight streamed through the sunroom windows, lighting it as it was meant. Plants that decorated it, perfume light on the air and leaves almost as wide as he was waving in the breeze from the fan above. Yixing turned from the window, light slanting across him, and he smiled.
Kris woke with a gasp, shirt nearly soaked through in cold sweat. His air conditioner too high, the room was freezing, and he’d kicked away his blankets. He stripped his shirt, and considered it. Yixing would think him crazy if he knew what strange things had been invading his thoughts. Promising his love. It felt so real, he thought. But his dreams were of a woman. At least, they had been at first. But it took him a long time to fall back to sleep, Yixing and the plants, his hands covered in dirt, occupying his mind.
***
“You look tired,” Yixing said, joining Kris at the worktable in the nursery, and setting what looked like a stiff cup of tea in front of him.
“Thanks,” Kris said, to both. He knew he looked tired, and felt tired. Dreams that felt too real, and sleep that didn’t come as easily as it had.
“I worked on this some last night, but also some this morning” Yixing said, handing him both papers. “I wrote down some of what was in the rest of the garden, and they were good choices. But the ones near the sunroom will be able to be seen better. So…”
Kris stared as Yixing went down the numbered list of plants, pulling up pictures on his phone, and pointing to where they would go in the corresponding color-coded layout.
“A whole year of color,” Yixing finished, sighing.
“Are you sure you’re not a landscaper?” Kris asked. He was expecting something rudimentary at best, but not something as well-planned as what was in front of him, with a list of pricing down to the exact tax it would take. Planters, pots, soil. Everything.
And his guilt doubled that he wasn’t paying Yixing a thing. That Yixing had taken it on himself to help out. Perhaps a tip. A tip, under the table, wouldn’t be without warrant. And perhaps Yixing was expecting that anyway.
“I wish I’d been able to go to school for that,” Yixing admitted. “But I like working here with the plants as well. I’ve started setting aside pots for inside, if you want to see them?”
“I trust your judgement. Go ahead and order everything here on this invoice that you think is necessary. How soon can it be ready?”
Yixing lifted a finger to his mouth, chewing on the edge of his nail, a thoughtless habit as he considered.
“Since I’ve already started… Most of the trees we have in inventory, I know that. I may have to order in a couple of things, but everything should be ready, the day after tomorrow when I get back.”
“If I can’t come myself, the truck will come,” Kris said, standing. Yixing stood with him, quickly.
“Will you let me know when it’s done? Bring by pictures, or…”
Or take him to see it again.
“Sure,” Kris said absently, and frowned at the invoice in his hand.
“Is something wrong?” Yixing asked.
“This orchid, is it white?”
“Yes. That’s one of my favorites,” Yixing said. “Why?”
“No reason. Thanks. I really appreciate your help. I’ll- I’ll let you know.”
He left Yixing there, and walked away with his heart pounding. On the table beside Yixing in his dream, there had been a white orchid.
***
He dreamed of blood and tears, pale, still death, and a baby’s cry. And couldn’t remember what he had dreamed when he woke with swollen eyes.
“That is over,” she whispered. And the touch to his brow was loving. “Dream of him, now.”
He slept again, and dreamed of Yixing in his planting apron, coming to sit beside him and tucking one knee up against his chest as they looked over a pond. He put his hand on Yixing’s shoulder, and slid into dreamless sleep.
***
Kris could have gotten away, if he had decided to. There was a message on his phone from the nursery, saying his order was ready. Yixing’s voice professional and efficient. Delivery was more expensive than him sending their own truck, so he sent Sehun to do it, with payment instructions. Sehun would load the truck with Yixing, help him secure the load, and send him off.
It nagged at him the entire time, nearly getting snappy with one of his carpenters. But the knot in his stomach didn’t uncoil until the truck returned. And some strange thought, half hoping the passenger door would open and Yixing would get out. But all Kris got were receipts, tucked into an envelope.
“The guy who checked me out said to give those to you,” Sehun said, face bright with curiosity. “I think there’s more in there than receipts.”
“You know where to unload?”
Sehun did, and Kris stole off with the envelope clipped into his clipboard as though he was going to open it later. Tossing out an answer to one of the electricians, he found a corner and opened it up. His hands sweating, like he was some schoolboy with a note from a secret admirer.
There was a sticky note, affixed to the front page. “Good luck! ^^”
He could imagine Yixing saying it, the way he’d laugh if he knew what Kris had done to read it. The knowing smirk that would make him want to push Yixing’s shoulder.
He would drop by the nursery tomorrow. He owed that much to Yixing.
***
“Do you have a moment?” Kris asked, stopping beside Yixing in an aisle. It had only taken about ten minutes to find him, not wanting to ask anyone where he was because… There were no good reasons why.
Weed killer was pushed onto the shelf, and Yixing looked around Kris. “It’s time for me to water in the greenhouse. Walk with me?”
Yixing wore jeans, had always worn jeans, beneath the neatly printed nursery t-shirt. It was a pretty green, which made sense for a nursery. And it looked nice against Yixing’s skin. He noticed it, consciously, but tried not to calculate just exactly what that meant.
The greenhouse was warm, a short walk away, and Yixing let him inside.
“Did you get the plants in the ground?” Yixing asked, tinkering with the watering system.
“Part of them. Your instructions were clear. The others will go in tonight and tomorrow, and we’re doing what we can to prevent shock. The potted plants are inside now, in a corner so they won’t be damaged. Mostly planting and finishing is all we have left. It’s shaping up.”
“Good, I’m glad. I knew you were busy since you didn’t come for the plants.”
Right. No, he hadn’t come because seeing a man in a green shirt surrounded by plants was making it hard for him to concentrate on anything else.
“I wanted to thank you, again- Actually, I wondered if I could have your number. For the plants. If there are problems.”
Yixing laughed, head falling back a moment and Kris followed the movement with almost too much attention. “Will the plants call me for help, then? Or will you on their behalf?”
So Yixing could tease, he thought, swaying and trying to control his face.
“Your phone?” Yixing asked, and Kris handed it over. “You or the plants can call any time, that’s fine.”
And the laugh was still in Yixing’s voice. He watched as Yixing keyed in his name and number, hardly breathing. Yixing thought he wanted it for the plants, and he did. That was first. But the fact that he had Yixing’s number sparked a debate in the back of his head. Yixing handed the phone back, still in his mirth, and turned.
He let out a tiny screech, jerking to his right a little.
One of the pipes was sticking out, a lone piece of metal with an edge. He watched Yixing lift his arm to examine it.
It was a scrape on his forearm, it first looked like. And then there was blood beading along his skin.
Blood. So much blood. All over the bed, over skin. The smell of blood, and death-
He closed the gap between them in one stride, grasping Yixing’s arm at the elbow and wrist.
“Are you okay?”
It had brought them close, too close really as Yixing craned his head to the left to look up at Kris. It was not death he saw in Yixing’s face, but life. Laugh lines in the corner of his eyes, the faint damp of his lower lip. It was with a hum that Yixing broke his light grasp, using his thumb to blot at the blood, and Kris’s eyes went back to the wound.
“My blood doesn’t clot well, but this isn’t an emergency situation,” Yixing told him, voice wry.
Suddenly even the pruning sheers seemed like scythes and machetes. “Is this the best profession to be in?”
“I’m careful,” Yixing said, giving him a funny look. “And it’s not like it used to be, years ago. I have good medical care.”
“Good, that’s good. You have something to put on it?”
“There’s a first aid kit inside.”
“Okay.”
He knew he was being too much, knew by the way Yixing smiled at him, indulging him. Maybe thinking Kris was one who fainted at blood.
“Don’t worry. It’s just a little scrape,” Yixing said, patting Kris’s chest as he skirted him.
He grabbed Yixing’s hand. “Yixing.”
And Yixing’s eyebrows rose, a question. It made him shake his head.
“No. I’ll go and let you take care of that. I’m sorry. Thanks.”
He wasn’t sure what he was thanking Yixing for. For taking care of himself. He knew what he was sorry for, and that was for distracting Yixing to the point he had hurt himself.
***
”Are you all right?” Kris asked, running his hand down Yixing’s upper arm.
“I know you know I’m not made of glass,” Yixing told him, rapping Kris smartly on the forehead with his knuckles. “Because you didn’t treat me like that last night.”
No, he hadn’t. “Doesn’t mean I can’t be concerned.”
Remembering Yixing when he was flushed and panting made him smile. Yixing lifted the heavy plants daily, muscles strong. He wasn’t asking because he though Yixing was weak in any way.
“Then show me,” Yixing demanded. He tried for angelic but it didn’t work, as he smiled at Kris from under his eyelashes.
He gripped Yixing’s hip, pushing his shirt up.
***
Kris woke only moments after Yixing’s shirt was off. Not sure if his own voice had woken him, or if trapping his erection against the mattress had. Or both. It had put him in a foul mood that morning, especially when Yixing’s hair falling back against his forehead after his shirt had scraped by kept replaying itself. Thinking of Yixing’s hair, his neck, or any other part of him wasn’t conducive to work.
Nor was the nagging worry over a scrape. How still Yixing’s face had been, how confused he had been by Kris’s reaction.
Yixing was a man, not the pretty girl he’d seen overlaying him. A man, invading his dreams, his thoughts, even his fantasies. Half of his shower had been verging on cold, just to keep himself focused. It was not a tactic he could employ at work, where inattention could mean losing a finger or worse.
He stopped in the open doorway, watching Yixing with his lower lip caught between his teeth and bobbing his head to the time of an up-tempo song being piped into the store. Yixing was manning the register, and Yixing saw him within seconds, face sliding into a grin without stopping at embarrassment in between.
“Kris! How are the plants?”
“Doing well in the ground,” Kris said. And kept his eyes away from Yixing’s arm. He wasn’t going to ask. Even the thought of asking made the image of Yixing beside him in bed flash too bright. “The client is having a party tomorrow so we’re nearly finished, and right on schedule. If you’re free tonight, I can take you over to see it?”
“Oh, I’d love to see the finished product,” Yixing told him. “When did you-“
”Yifan,” Yixing chuckled, as he straddled Kris’s body.
Kris blinked, flushing as Yixing stared at him. “Sorry?”
“When did you want to go?”
“As soon as your shift ends,” Kris said. And it was only because of his racing heart, the thought that Yixing could tell what he was thinking, that he lost his control. “Did you- The snag in the greenhouse, did that get taken care of?”
“It did,” Yixing said. “My boss hates it when anyone gets hurt because of him.”
Kris’s mouth twisted, trying for a smile instead of wanting to retreat. “Yeah, I’m like that too.”
But Yixing tipped his head, considering Kris. “Would you have fixed it for me?”
Kris coughed, looking away and shaking his head. “I always have a file in my car.”
“For next time, maybe,” Yixing said, the laugh evident in his voice. But no mockery in it. “So, then tonight at the same time? Of course, if you need to buy something, you’re welcome to.”
No, he didn’t need anything, and left with acknowledgements that he’d be back. But it didn’t keep him from the ridiculous thought that had him slamming his hands on his steering wheel - Yixing wasn’t for sale.
***
Furniture had been placed in the sunroom already, the plants Yixing had picked out spread around inside. He took them in through the patio door that he still had keys to, the client knowing workers could still be in and out that evening.
“Wow, this is amazing,” Yixing said, stepping in and looking all around him. Yixing’s fingers traced down one of the windowsills, and Kris put both of his hands behind his back to resist temptation. Being there alone was too much already. But it gave him moments to note that his crew had done well, all tools were gone, and the space ready for the client to approve. “You did this?”
Kris shook his head. “Not all of it.”
“Tell me what you did?”
He could have taken Yixing pictures. Perhaps there would have been awe, but it wouldn’t have been the same. It was pride that had him standing straight, explaining how he had done blueprints, sketches, measurements, based on what the owners wanted. That the house had been cut into, to add the room, so carefully planned.
“That’s amazing.”
“This kind of project is simple,” Kris deflected.
“Not to me.”
“The hardest part was the flowers. They look good from in here.”
And they did, the garden starting inside and almost seeming to continue right on out. Beautiful to look at from inside, but also inviting anyone to go out into it. Part of that had been his own design, in the building itself. Part of it was because of the plants that Yixing had picked out. He stared at the white orchid on the table beside Yixing, and thought of his dream. A dream he’d made to come true, with the setting sun sending its light across Yixing’s body.
“Let’s look outside,” Kris suggested, and locked the doors behind them.
Yixing listed off plants, excited to see them in their place, and making Kris’s nose wrinkle as he tried to match plants to names.
“Ah,” Yixing said, crouching, and fondling a plant’s leaves. “This one is looking a little sad.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Planting shock, maybe. Do you have shears, or scissors? And water. I can try to help it.”
“Emergency plantectomy,” Kris kidded, and got a laugh in return.
He wandered, rather than watch too closely as Yixing snipped off part of the plant, carefully watering it. And Yixing was quiet, until he was satisfied.
“I think that should do it. But if it does die, can you let the owners know to call? It’s one we can replace.”
“I’ll put it in my notes,” Kris said.
The burble of the fountain, the flowers, and air cooling as the sun set. Alone together, among the flowers. Yixing with a pair of shears, still in his nursery shirt. Maybe there was a kind magic in it, healing flowers. It made him want to drag Yixing from garden to garden, to see his joy in them.
All he had done since meeting Yixing was ask for his help. And he had given Yixing nothing in return.
“I thought about paying you for your help,” Kris said.
“Oh, no!” Yixing protested. “I spent maybe an hour on things. I really enjoyed it.”
“And both trips here.”
“This isn’t work today,” Yixing said, apparently not caring that he still had shears in his hand. “Seeing it all together like this is worth more than money. Actually, it makes me think of things I could do in the future.”
That, he was glad for. But it still didn’t feel enough.
“Dinner, then,” Kris suggested. “As thanks.”
He didn’t want Yixing to think he was asking him out, when that wasn’t his intention. There was something dangerous, steady, uncontrollable, about the way Yixing walked, held his head, spoke. As though when he was close, he was too close to bear, but when he was far away, it left him hungry.
In Yixing’s eyes, he saw all his dreams. The quiet times together, hauling Yixing over his shoulder and laughing. Yixing showing Kris just how much he was wanted.
But those things were fantasy. The reality was, that Yixing was squinting at him, trying to ascertain if he could talk Kris out of his offer, how to refuse without sounding rude.
“You can tell me more about plants,” Kris offered, as though that were equal trade for sitting down to dinner with him.
“I shouldn’t tonight, but- That sounds really nice.”
It was something. He wouldn’t have to go to bed thinking he was shorting Yixing somehow. And it was another outing, almost without planning. If Yixing couldn’t tonight, then they would find a time.
“You have my number, so you don’t have to stop by the nursery,” Yixing said. “Though you’re welcome.”
Kris pulled out his phone, finding “Zhang Yixing” and pressing call.
A moment later, Yixing’s bag bubbled out a pop beat, before Kris pressed the end button.
“Now you have my number, too,” he said, and led them around the edge of the house.
Yixing looked over at him. “Dinner. You don’t know plants, so… Should I trust your choice in restaurants?”
He half chased Yixing to the car, walking sedately when he realized Yixing still was holding a sharp object. It just gave him more time to see Yixing leaning against the side of his car, smirking and patting the car. Taunting Kris for being slow. Kris pointed slowly as he went to his side, unlocking the car for them both.
***
Yixing wore white, a white hoodie with the hood down, and dark jeans. The jeans clung to his hips and legs, not skinny jeans, but just close enough to give a hint at what was beneath. The most casual he’d ever seen Yixing, he thought, and then Yixing was sliding into the car with a grin.
“I found you. Hi! What are we eating?”
Kris laughed, signaling and pulling back into traffic.
“Food on your mind. But soup. There’s a place I like nearby.”
“I like soup. Food is always on my mind. I’d snack at work all day if I could.”
Kris raised an eyebrow. “Some flowers are edible, right?”
“I’m not actually a rabbit, just because I work around garden stuff.”
“I said nothing.” But what he did say next had him kicking himself for drawing attention to it. “We’re making a habit of this.”
Yixing almost harrumphed at him, but was relaxed in his seat. “I like making habits of being taken out for food.”
Kris let all thoughts of that flee from his head. And when he realized Yixing was unfamiliar with the part of town they were in, he played tour guide on the drive. They’d come from totally different areas, and had different personal styles, but Yixing was still a comfortable presence in his car. Comfortable, not comforting. Some of Kris’s nerves settled down, just falling into the rhythm of conversation. He was still trying to define Yixing in his head. The man who hefted heavy pots, ran figures, laughed until he was breathless. A face in which he could see every trace of humor in the quirk of his lips.
So comfortable he didn’t mind opening up about where he’d lived, his family, schools. Almost missing a turn at one point because he was too caught up in reminiscing about sports teams. But they made it into the restaurant in one piece, Yixing holding the door for them as they went in.
It was one of those odd moments, thinking about it in real terms. There were no constructs by society about how he was supposed to treat a man. For a friend, he would have had held the door if he’d been there first. Had it been a date - and it was not - he wondered if Yixing would have found it rude if he’d insisted. As a person, as a man, he thought he’d have found it odd to be treated as the one being taken care of. It was a perplexing thought as they passed couples along the way to their tables. He’d grown up thinking his mother could have faced down a charging rhino, had she had to.
And his thoughts embarrassed him, knowing Yixing was having no such type of internal debate, just happy to be fed for his trouble. He seemed happy to accept, happy to be there, as they sat. And that was enough for right then. They got their menus, tea, and Kris looked up.
“Get anything you want,” Kris said, though it was more an order than anything else.
He was the one paying for the food, and he wasn’t getting any arguments on that front, either. And he tried not to glance up too many times as Yixing decided, he really did. The way Yixing chewed on the inside of his mouth, eyes sweeping side to side as he turned the middle page back and forth.
But the truth was, when their waiter came back Kris had to choose something at random that still looked good, because he’d been paying more attention to Yixing than he had to his own menu.
“Do you line up jobs to start one right after the other?” Yixing asked.
“Some go concurrently, depending on how big they are. We also do prep sites in advance, so it depends. Finishing the sunroom, it was nice to give my guys a few days off. We’re working on a roof starting first of next week. Stacking things up, since I’m moving soon.”
“Really? When?”
“I’m not sure the exact date. But this weekend. It’s just to an apartment on the same floor, because they’re doing renovations to the one I’m in now.”
“Lucky. But still moving is stressful. You have help?”
Kris nodded. “A couple of my guys. So I guess not as much time off as they’d hoped.”
Yixing seemed to hesitate. “I’d offer to help, but I’m not sure of my hours. Sometimes too many people is as bad as none. It’s hot in here!”
Kris had stuttered out an agreement, before Yixing had reached his zipper. The white material parted on a whine, revealing the dark blue tank top beneath it. And Kris was useless, a humanoid in a chair as Yixing shrugged the cloth off, leaving him with nothing but wide strips of blue cloth to break up the lines of his collarbones, and revealing sleek, pale arms.
He swallowed hard, nodding, trying to think of something to say that would distract from his total lack of social skills. And best, when it was Yixing, a man, stripping in front of him. Something that on the job happened often. But he was never rendered speechless by the baring of their skin.
Yixing planted both his hands on the table, hoodie situated, and looked up at Kris. “This is fun.”
The hysterical laugh that wanted to escape was covered up with the clearing of his throat, and keeping his eyes above Yixing’s chin.
“It is,” Kris agreed. “It’s nice to talk to someone about something that isn’t I-beams, or grout sometimes.”
“Grout, gross. I’m glad we’re having soup instead.”
“Grout is gross,” Kris said slowly, and they both burst out laughing just as their food arrived.
If he survived watching Yixing eat, he could survive anything.
“So yeah, work is generally not too exciting. The last two weeks have been the weirdest in a while.”
“Why do you say that?” Yixing said, before filling his mouth with noodles.
“Well, I met you,“ Kris said, trying to hide his grin. “Hey!”
Yixing had made a sound of indignation, reaching across to poke Kris in the shoulder.
“I needed help, and you volunteered,” Kris told him, to Yixing’s rolled eyes. “You’re some kind of garden fairy.”
Yixing snorted loud enough for tables around them to look, covering his mouth as he both coughed and laughed. His eyes were wet as he swigged water.
“Stop trying to kill me when I’m eating!”
“It’s true.”
“Not everyone at the nursery could plan a full bed, but some could have. It gave me some variety to my day. And you’re different than I thought you would be.”
“Oh?” Kris asked, hardly daring to guess. He knew what people generally thought, and he suspected that was the case. Some of his employees had been somewhat frightened of him at first.
“You looked angry, glaring around at the plants. Had they offended you?”
“No,” Kris argued.
“You did!”
“And you were covered in dirt,” Kris said. “You laughed at me.”
“You needed laughing at.”
He ran his hand through his hair. “I was frustrated. Then you fixed things.”
“We all have our areas of expertise. You can build things. I’d probably rip off a thumb.”
“Start small,” Kris suggested.
“A house made of cards, then. Only risk paper cuts.”
“Or I can make you wooden blocks, like toddlers have,” he said, grinning as Yixing scoffed at him.
“Are blocks how you knew you wanted to build things?”
Kris was content to tell him.
And when he was alone, images crept back into his mind. Yixing sliding back into his white hoodie, on the sidewalk almost spinning around to check out the stores around them.
He’d been saved from walking into a couple by Yixing’s quick hand, grabbing Kris’s upper arm and hauling him in.
They’d walked most of the way to the car like that, Yixing holding on as though he couldn’t be trusted to walk safely. But he hadn’t tried to pull away.
And then they’d sat in the car for fifteen minutes without even moving, first arguing about which way was the faster to go, and then complaining about the traffic and transportation system. The thought of Yixing being crushed into an overcrowded subway car, wriggling through bodies to get out.
“I’m a pro,” Yixing had said, flashing both hands in V’s, and then trying to look tough.
Kris had been glad he hadn’t been driving, resting his head against the window and unable to help the chuckle at Yixing’s expense.
It hadn’t been a date.
No matter what he’d felt like, when Yixing had flipped up his hood, waved, and darted out into the just-starting rain.
He fell asleep imagining sliding the sleeves off of Yixing’s arms, touching Yixing’s just-damp hair, and watching the smile spread over Yixing’s face. Just for him.
***
It was accident that Yixing ended up helping him move. Though Sehun called it fate, good timing, and had a distinct raised set of eyebrows to let Kris know just what he thought of that. Yixing’s call had been about nothing even remotely related, because he’d spoken to a woman at the nursery interested in having work done, and had thought of Kris. He listened to Yixing talk about raised bed, a garden shed, roof work, for a few minutes, kind of half intrigued and amused that Yixing was feeding him work now. He’d just finished his notes, when Sehun had arrived to start helping.
“Sorry,” he’d told Yixing. “Sehun is here, and we’re going to start moving my things to the other apartment.”
“Oh. Oh, do you need help? I could bring this information by. I have the afternoon off.”
“Well, there’s two guys helping me, so I think we’re okay?” And Kris frowned as Sehun mouthed Who is it? at him. “It’s Yixing. Sorry, Sehun wanted to know who it-“
“Come by!” Sehun said, butting his face in close so he could be heard. “Bring cookies.”
Kris made strangled sounds, and Yixing laughed.
“You don’t have to do either of those,” Kris said again, getting to a place of safety as Sehun got smug and started arranging things to be taken out.
“I know I don’t have to. But I’m offering, so I will if you want me to. If I can be of some use.”
It wasn’t like Kris had hours to decide, especially not as Zitao poked his head in, squawking and hugging Sehun and waving at Kris.
“You could help unpack things or something,” Kris allowed, feeling tired before he’d already even begun.
“Then tell me your address,” Yixing said.
Sehun had been smirking like the traitor he was when Kris had hung up. He was carrying the mattress, just for that. Sehun worked for him, but Zitao was a friend. Zitao, with a sweetness there that had Kris feeling like he was refusing a kitten a treat at times, but they were still good friends. He didn’t even mind when Kris went on building tangents in the middle of outings.
They did the heavy stuff first, the bed frame, mattress, couch, table, and desk. Dresser drawers were removed, and furniture hauled the hundred feet or so the other apartment. It was pretty much the same layout, just reversed. But there were at least empty spots by the time Yixing appeared, and was introduced to Zitao.
“He brought cookies,” Sehun said, zeroing in on the bag in Yixing’s hand. “I’m going to go work for him instead.”
“He’ll have you digging holes in the dirt,” Kris warned.
“I had them already I like to snack,” Yixing said.
His smile was wry at Kris, and he could almost feel himself being made fun of. Just in case Kris didn’t have anything to feed them with, Yixing had brought his own form of sustenance.
“Then you can help pack the kitchen,” Kris told him.
The kitchen, like the rest of the layout, was just reversed in the new apartment. He’d allotted a few boxes for each room beyond what he’d already packed. That way they could throw things in boxes, go over and unpack, and then repeat. He figured hauling over plates and boxes of cereal wouldn’t be too much to ask. Zitao and Sehun, he didn’t feel so bad asking them to haul bookcases and big book boxes.
But there were no complaints from anyone. All of it needed to be done, and they were a line of worker ants moving back and forth between the two apartments. Sehun was stacking books in shelves as he and Zitao packed more, skirting Yixing as he went out with boxes full of food and dishwares.
“How many dishes do you need for one person?” Yixing called as they followed each other through the doorway of his new apartment. Yixing with food, him with books.
They stared at each other for a moment, before Kris could let out the only truth he had. “As many as my mother gave me.”
It seemed like that delighted Yixing as much as he’d anticipated.
“This is almost the end of it, “ Yixing said, smile shining. “There’s one more box that- Oh, Zitao has it.”
Kris stepped aside to let Zitao pass, as he was already chanting, “Hey, the kitchen is done!”
One more bookcase, some furniture, and then his bedroom and bathroom to finish. So close.
“Ow!” Zitao yelped. “The box got me.”
Kris got closer to see how bad it was. Zitao’s finger was welling with blood, but no obvious gashes that warranted a trip to the hospital.
“There should be bandaids in the bottom drawer by the sink, and some antiseptic,” he said, gesturing toward the bathroom.
“Wow, so cool,” Yixing said as Zitao walked away.
Kris shrugged. “We see worse cuts than that on the job sometimes.”
“Did you expect him to act differently?” Sehun asked, approaching from behind them.
“I thought he was afraid of blood,” Yixing said, as Kris moved back to take books out of the box. He was trying to think of a way to derail the conversation short of ordering one of them to leave.
Sehun actually laughed at that. “Why?”
“He was with me when I hurt myself at the nursery. He grabbed at me like I’d cut my arm off, and mine was just a scrape,” Yixing told Sehun.
“There’s another box ready to go over there,” Kris said, hoping for attention. Attention away from a wound, and back on moving. Keeping Yixing’s attention from thinking any more about it. Since it hadn’t been the blood, or the wound, or the place. It had been that Yixing had gotten hurt. The dream of the bloody bed was fading, but he could not have predicted his reaction had it happened again. He had to focus on what they were doing, and not the possibility that Yixing could get hurt again.
“Could we have a drink now?” Zitao called. “And a fan. It’s hot!”
Sehun went to close the other door while they took a little break. He cranked the air up a little to help cool it off, and got out the glasses that Yixing had just put away.
Yixing laughed with the others, smiling at Sehun’s jokes as glasses and cookies were handed around. Seeing him with his friends, Yixing’s dimple flashing, and examining Zitao’s new bandaged finger. Smiling at Kris as he thanked him. It had nothing to do with the dreams, the ache in his chest. For a moment he considered ordering the others out, running his fingers down that sweaty neck, and seeing if Yixing’s lips tasted as sweet as the juice did.
Yixing lifted the edge of his collar, using it to wipe his neck, and Kris nearly missed the glass he was pouring into. What little sweat he had caught hadn’t helped, Yixing’s neck still wet.
But they all knew there was more to do, before they could relax.
“He’s nice,” Sehun said, after Yixing had left to get another box. “Gets along with us. You stare at him a lot.”
He tried not to let the alarm show, but Sehun was too quick on things like that.
He mumbled something about being worried, wanting everyone to be safe.
“He seems strong enough to me. It’s good. You can always use more friends.”
Friends. If that was what Sehun really thought, he’d have been surprised. But he let pretending that carry him through Yixing walking back in with a stack of dresser drawers. Topmost, full of his underwear.
His life.
***
They took ten minutes out to squabble over what was being ordered in to eat, Kris’s promise to them that he would feed them. By the time the food had arrived, his old apartment had been wiped down and vacuumed, and checked for anything left.
He was just going to have to settle up with the building manager, but that would be done the next day. And best of all, he had a day left to recover before diving into their next work project. And at least there was a table, even though Kris pulled up a box to sit on because he didn’t have enough chairs. And he mostly listened as everyone talked movies, shopping. He put in occasionally, having been dragged out with two of the men at the table. But mostly he was content to listen. Zitao, when he got excited, could roll the conversation forward without pause, and Yixing was keeping up. It was something to watch, Yixing getting more animated, talking more as the meal went on.
And Kris had positioned himself, on purpose, between Sehun and Zitao. But it put him across from Yixing,
It meant he had Yixing meeting his eyes as he laughed, accepting boxes of food from him. Passing drinks around.
“Well, Zitao is taking me home, and he needs to leave now, so we should go,” Sehun said, after everyone had finished.
“But-“ Zitao started.
Sehun stared Zitao down, and there wasn’t any arguing from there.
“You smell, so shower, hm?” Sehun suggested, voice pitched so only they could hear. And he didn’t think he mistook Sehun’s glance at Yixing. We’re clearing out so maybe shower together, hm? was all but dripping out of Sehun’s words.
“Have a good night,” Sehun told Yixing.
“Thanks for your help, and it was really nice meeting you,” Zitao called to Yixing, before Sehun could get him out the door.
And the apartment, which was the same size as it had been in the old one, but with the door closed and Yixing behind him, it suddenly felt far smaller. Smaller than the car had, or the restaurant, or the nursery. But he had to push past that.
Just looking around made him feel tired. Everything was generally where it should’ve been, but there were boxes, and things out of place. It was a mess, as he’d expected it to be.
“Are you doing much more tonight?” Yixing asked.
“Probably not. I’ll probably make my bed, and relax. Tackle some of the straightening another day.”
He really wanted to stretch out his back.
“I’ll clean this up,” Yixing offered. “If you want to work on that.”
“You don’t have to.”
And Kris actually stepped forward, before Yixing held up his hands. “I can handle throwing away a few boxes and washing the glasses. Go. Go!”
Ordered in his own home.
He didn’t exactly grumble as he turned away, but almost. He had a terrifying moment wondering where his sheets were, before he’d found them. Groaning a little as he bent, and got the fitted sheet in place. By the time the blanket had been spread, he was feeling like his back was in six pieces. The pillows were plopped on, still in the pillowcases from before.
And he figured he’d just sneak onto it. His clothes were a little dirty, but not enough to matter on top of the blanket. Yixing had to be nearly done, so him lying still for a moment wasn’t going to hurt. Or, it was only going to hurt him. He groaned into the pillow, face first, as muscles gave, and ached, and screamed as he relaxed. He smelled something, like almost from a dream. Some familiar smell. Like the curse of Yixing’s neck. Something popped, and he moaned again, turning his head, and letting himself settle into the mattress like a lump of dirty laundry. He vaguely heard footsteps, the soft clinking of dishes being put away. He was absolutely going to move.
“You asleep?” he heard through the fog that was his brain. Almost. He’d almost been asleep. Or rather, had been right there and going under.
“I’m awake,” he grunted, and would have moved to try and get up when he felt the bed sag beside him. Yixing had sat down.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to get up. I was going to see if you needed anything else, but it looks like you need to rest more. So I’ll go.”
Yixing’s hand rested on his back, and Kris couldn’t help almost moving into it. The sound he made was going to embarrass him later, low in his throat at nothing more than a touch.
“Your back hurts?” Yixing asked, rubbing slightly where he’d touched.
“Yeah. I’ll just…” His words trailed off as Yixing moved.
“Does this feel okay?”
Okay? Okay was a tiny patch of sunlight. Yixing’s thumbs digging into his back was far from okay. It was sunbursts, and his toes curling, mingled pain and relief. He brought his hand up to his face, to rest against it, or to smother himself if any other sounds wanted to come.
“That feels amazing,” he finally said, getting his brain back together. When he wasn’t feeling his entire spine lengthen and give under Yixing’s hands. “I should be doing that for you.”
“You did more heavy lifting than I did. Moving is stressful, and you have a lot to clean up still.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
But the jest was halfhearted, and Kris focused on not moving, not making any sounds, hardly breathing. He didn’t want Yixing to stop, but he didn’t know if he could survive Yixing continuing. Still the guilt nagged. Maybe Yixing hadn’t done as much lifting, but he’d done enough.
“Tell me if it’s hurting you,” Yixing said, as he moved along Kris’s back.
It wasn’t so much that it hurt. Okay, it did hurt, a band of muscle around his shoulder blade. The sound he made felt inhuman, and Yixing clucked, but didn’t stop, fingers smoothing. Until the ache, the tension, finally gave, and he felt pliant as clay under Yixing’s hands.
“You do this often?” Kris asked, trying not to drool onto his hand.
“Not really. I just know what feels good to me. Nice thing about having a roommate.”
Kris just sighed, his whole brain feeling like it had been covered in molten chocolate as Yixing squeezed and smoothed his shoulders.
“Probably should’ve done this after you’d showered, so you could’ve just rested.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll get up,” Kris told him. In a decade perhaps.
“I believe you. I’ll go so you can get some rest, then. I’ll talk to you later. Goodnight, Kris.”
“Mm, ‘Night.”
The bed moved slightly as Yixing got up and he caught only a momentary glimpse of the back of Yixing’s jeans.
“And thank you!” he remembered, twisting his neck just in time to see Yixing flapping a hand back at him. A minute later, the sound of the outer door closing.
And a minute after that, he was asleep.
***
Kris woke at two in the morning, stiff even where Yixing had worked on his back. He also felt gross, still in his clothes. It took only a minute debate before he was stripping, showering. He figured he would get clean, and then go back to bed. Just the hot water helped him to relax, when Yixing’s voice, the memory of his hands along Kris’s back, caused his thoughts to consider something far from sleep.
Yixing at the table, face serious and then cracking up. Yixing in his bedroom, in his kitchen, at his bookshelves.
As he dried his hair, towel rubbing fast, he wasn’t sure how many cracks there were left for Yixing to fill. Aside from the obvious, and it could not be that.
But the shower, and the remaining hours of sleep refreshed him. But he ignored Sehun’s speculative look as they all assembled.
And Sehun hadn’t caught him until lunchtime. “Did Yixing help out more after we left?”
“He helped clean up the kitchen, but he left right after.”
And Kris shoved the remainder of his sandwich into his mouth to ward off any further questions. It made him feel strange. Not quite like a parent probing his activity, but almost. There had been nothing to be ashamed about. But the fact that Yixing had stayed, the time on his bed. Even if he’d felt half asleep, he’d still been all too aware of Yixing’s presence. That was what made him uncomfortable, not the questioning, or anything else.
“Hey, Sehun,” Kris said, jogging to come alongside him. And then, mid-thought, he changed his mind, and asked Sehun about how the lumber was stacked.
He had a lot of questions. What he was feeling, what he was supposed to do.
There were too many questions that garnered a positive answer when it came to Yixing. The thought of taking a step and admitting it to himself - asking Sehun to give input at all was one of those steps.
But when he got home from work, the feeling of Yixing beside him on the bed haunted him through his dinner, and after he’d stretched out on the couch. He ran his thumb over his phone, and half thought of texting Yixing to see if he was free.
And fell asleep.
He arranged the pot with its border of tiny dragons on the side table, taking a seat so that Yixing could join him. And smiling, as Yixing straddled him. A better gift than the orchid, to be sure.
“Did you know they were named for moths?” Yixing asked, running fingertips down both sides of his face. “Because of the shape of the petals. Another genus of orchid is where we get vanilla from.”
“Yum,” he said, trying not to shiver because of Yixing’s touch.
“Yum,” Yixing agreed against the corner of his mouth.
Kris startled awake by the chime of his doorbell, half reaching to steady Yixing before realizing he was alone. Slicking his hair down from whatever mess it had become, he stumbled to the door, only to find Yixing looking back at him.
“Hi, I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time?”
“No,” Kris said, flabbergasted. “I was just-“
Yixing held an orchid.
“Oh. It’s a housewarming gift! I remember you asking about the one for your client, so I thought…”
Yixing smiled, and shrugged, holding out the pot to Kris.
“Thank you,” he said, and stared at the white petals. “They’re named after moths, right?”
“Wow. You looked it up?”
No, you told me, his brain supplied, trying not to see the surprise and pleasure in Yixing’s face. In a dream.
“Maybe someone told me,” he muttered. “So you’re giving me moths on a stick.”
Yixing laughed, nose scrunching. “They’re not as flashy as butterflies, I guess. Especially this white. But sometimes simple things are beautiful. I put a paper on how to care for it in there, too?”
He couldn’t help but laugh at Yixing’s expression, something about the way he moved his face endearing and comical all at once. And then realized they were still in the doorway.
“Can you stay?”
Yixing hesitated for a moment.
“I shouldn’t for very long,” Yixing said. “I need go in early tomorrow, but…”
Kris stepped back, letting Yixing in, and all but shoving the orchid onto the table. He regretted it immediately, as it left his hands free. He felt enough like a gigantic elephant in a tiny room. And there was no reason Yixing’s presence should make his apartment feel so small, like any way he moved, or breathed, Yixing was so close.
“Did you want something to drink?” he asked, at least trying to remember to be a host.
“Just water is fine,” Yixing said. “Oh wow, it looks really different in here.”
It had definitely gotten neater. Once he’d recovered from the move, and gotten home from work, he’d straightened up as much as he could, and put pictures and things back on the wall. It looked a little less like a disaster, but there was still a ways to go. It had started feeling a bit more like home, and less like a temporary dwelling.
He filled a glass with a pitcher from the fridge, handing it to Yixing. And staying carefully back.
“Thank you. Your back feeling okay?”
Oh. His back, after the move. Yixing’s hands on him. “Yeah, I’m fine. You helped a lot. On everything.”
Yixing waved the appreciation away, causing Kris to get momentarily distracted by the watch on his bare forearm. “I’m glad I could.”
“And the flower will look good here, so, yeah.” And it was possibly the most awkward sentence that had ever left his mouth.
“I get great discounts,” Yixing teased. “I think my friends are resigned to the fact that they’ll get flowers at times. But this one I couldn’t pass up.”
Friends. It made Kris’s stomach tighten, as he twirled his own glass of water in his hand. They weren’t five and on some playground, declaring they should be friends forever.
He swallowed hard, nearly licking his own lips as Yixing drained his glass, tongue peeking out to clean his lips.
“So you said you had an early day?”
Yixing nodded, head bobbing up so he could meet Kris’s eyes. “Delivery! The earlier the better, really, before things get really hot. As it is, we end up spraying ourselves down with the hoses and changing clothes, or else no one would want to buy from us.”
Wet Yixing. Wet Yixing with a hose, laughing, and shuddering from the cold. It made him want a vacation at the beach, to haul Yixing up over his shoulder and make him shriek.
And he was hiding his laugh in a cough, before Yixing could call him out on his strange reaction.
“I should probably go,” Yixing said, putting his glass near the sink. “I wish I could stay, but I didn’t want to interrupt your evening, either.”
“You aren’t interrupting, don’t worry. No one bringing gifts is ever an interruption.”
Yixing’s look back was amused as he wiggled his feet back into his white-toed sneakers.
“I hope you enjoy the orchid.”
“I will. Thanks again.”
It was with disappointment that he closed his door. Just seeing the orchid, picking it up to move it to a better spot, had the dream swing back heavy on his mind, and he made his way to the side table. It wasn’t as though Yixing would truly have come to sit on his lap, and it wasn’t as though he actually wanted him to. Expected him to, actually, was more correct.
He didn’t even have time to call himself a liar as he took his hands from the pot. The dream- The little dragons dancing around the rim took his breath away.
***
Pairing: Kris/Yixing
Rating: PG-13 (this part)
Genre: AU, reincarnation, romance
Warnings: Past life death/angst
Summary: The perennial flower dies, or so it seems. But at its root, it lives. When the seasons change, the flower, the leaves, that come back are not the same. But somehow they are.
***
Yifan. He heard her voice.
“No.”
That was the first word that left him when he saw her.
She was still, so still. Pale. If he closed his eyes he could still see the fear in her eyes when he had left her. Fear that had meant she was alive. His hand shook when he touched her face, nearly jerking back when he felt how cold she was already. The warmth of life fleeing.
“How-“ he asked, and then he fully realized the blood. Rags, their blankets, cloth she had bought in preparation when he had given her every bit of money he could without starving her. All of it soaked in her blood. It was as though she had been slaughtered in their bed, and he looked up at the midwife.
“The child?”
She closed her eyes, head shaking side to side. “It was too early.”
That had been the fear he had seen. Not for herself, but their child. She had known, they had both known how early it had been. He had rationalized that they would have another, if the child didn’t survive. He would help her through it. It sounded cold, but as long as he had her, he had never thought-
The bundle was handed to him, so light. The bowl he ate his rice out of weighed more. But the child was perfect, like a tiny doll, with her mouth.
“We have a son. He looks like you,” he told her, touching her face again. “Did she know the baby had died?”
He asked the midwife his question, his voice almost unnaturally calm. He needed to know. Needed to know if she had died knowing their child had gone before her, or if she had chosen not to fight.
“I told her he lived, hoping…”
Hoping to give her a reason to live.
The midwife left him, the child still swaddled on the deathbed.
“You can’t leave me,” he said, half choking himself on the words. “You can’t. Yixing.”
The tears fell against her face, and he clutched her to him. Breathing against her hair, stroking it. They had been meant from their cradles. He didn’t remember one day of his life without her at his side. The day of their wedding. The day she had known she carried their child. The sweet oils she scented herself with, the softness of her against him.
He was hoarse with his denials by the time he was pulled from her. His father, his neighbors. Pity. They took him by force, his head turned to keep his eyes on her. As though she might take a breath. They could all be wrong.
***
He ate his meals at her grave, eating with her in death as they had in life.
He spoke to her, how he was doing in his furniture making. That the crops were good. That her sister had given birth, a healthy girl. Her third, following two sons. It was bitterness in his voice.
He talked to his son, the child he would have taught to cut and lathe and smooth. The child that would have looked up at him with Yixing’s smile.
He walked through his days until he could be with her, knowing only that when his days ended, he would be laid beside her. And that he would never leave her.
***
***
***
The first time Kris saw Yixing, Yixing had been laughing. Corners of his mouth turned up, eyes dancing as he talked to one of the men beside him in the store aisle. It was not an unusual face, but perhaps it had been the laugh that had drawn his eye.
He’d walked away with a smile, not really knowing why.
The second time, Yixing had been elbow-deep in what he hoped was potting soil. Though it looked quite a bit nastier than that.
Yixing looked up at him, name tag askew, question on his face. And when he smiled, a dimple peeked.
For a moment Kris’s vision blurred, and instead of a man in front him, a woman, her hair dark and windblown, smile free, with a flower he had just tucked above her ear. The same dimple, the same light in her eyes.
His foot fell back, steadying himself, and Yixing looked concerned, standing with his filthy hands.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes,” Kris said, his voice tight with some unnameable emotion. He swallowed several times. “I guess I just got overwhelmed by the plant choices.”
And Yixing laughed.
***
Kris was in construction, not landscaping. He barely knew a rose from a begonia. But the job he was doing, adding a sunroom, required plants both inside and out. He knew the angles of rafters, could seam drywall, apply wallpaper. But of plants, he knew nothing. The nursery he’d visited several times, hoping he’d soak up some knowledge of colors or something. He’d even picked up a book, and had gotten frustrated somewhere between perennials and annuals, and autumn gardens.
He took the information much better from Yixing, who walked with him among the plants, pointing out different colors, and when they would bloom. For a garden that kept its color not only when there were flowers, but in the cold as well.
“You know a lot about this,” Kris said.
“I’ve loved gardens since I can remember,” Yixing said, using his foot to nudge a potted tree back into line. “My mother always told me I could keep the plants alive when she couldn’t.”
Kris glanced down at Yixing’s hands, and away just as quickly. Embarrassed at himself. He had no idea what had gotten into him.
“I think my mother complained I was a bit too much of a monster,” he said quickly, trying to cover his own thoughts.
“Aren’t we all as children? Come over here, I think you’ll like these pots for inside.”
Yixing touched his wrist, urging him. And Kris felt like his stomach had looped over, giddiness all but rising from his shoulders. And he didn’t understand.
***
Yixing assigned himself to help. It was good business, he said, smile a little bit sheepish and a little bit mercenary all at once. They sat, and Kris sketched out the room from memory, the plans still fresh in his head. Each wall, how it intersected with the current flower bed.
“My usual landscape artist was able to draw up plans, so the beds will swing around here, and I’m rocking in a small waterfall here. But he was only able to give me dimensions, not plants.”
He sketched out a side view so that Yixing knew where the windows began and ended.
“With as much room as you have, you’ll be able to add plenty of color. There are some trees and bushes that retain their color as well.” Yixing gnawed at his lower lip. “But without seeing the garden that’s there, I don’t know how to work new plants in. Do you think you could bring pictures?”
“Or you could see it yourself,” Kris offered. Yixing’s eyes widened and Kris squeezed his own thigh to the point of pain. “Actually, you probably don’t do on-site consults, do you? I’m sorry.”
“The only sites I see are on deliveries,” Yixing said, flexing one arm. A pale, soft arm that he could only imagine hefting bags of fertilizer. “But I have time after work today, if you wanted?”
“My clients are out of town, so that would work,” Kris said slowly. “But if that’s not something you usually do…”
His whole body seemed to sink, giving Yixing an out.
“You have me invested,” Yixing said, folding the paper and waggling his finger. “Don’t try to leave me out now.”
“Yifan,” she laughed against his cheek. “You can’t leave me out.”
“Okay,” Kris agreed.
***
The visit to the torn-up garden took fifteen minutes. He picked Yixing up at the nursery, offering to drop him at the nearest subway station to the job site after they were done. It took a little bit of vision to really see what the garden would look like. The actual building itself had just been constructed, with finishing left to do. The garden was starting to invade his dreams, needing concrete plans so it would be finished on schedule. Yixing walked the garden himself, taking pictures on his cell phone, and jotting notes in a binder where Kris’s sketches were.
“There has to be balance,” Yixing said, and stopped in front of the half-completed waterfall. “I like your landscaper’s plans. I think I can give you plants that will make your client happy.”
“Give?” Kris asked.
And Yixing smirked down at the paper. “In exchange for money, of course. But my time is free.”
As they drove up to the subway stop, Kris’s guilt jingled. Needing to say something also, something that might get Yixing to stay one more moment. The offer of dinner was half on his mind, and it terrified him, cold straight to the bone.
“Promise me you won’t do too much away from work? I don’t want-“
“Don’t worry so much,” Yixing scolded. “You’ll be by tomorrow? I’ll be there, if you are, but I’m off the next day.”
“I’ll come by. Tomorrow. Afternoon,” Kris clarified. The morning would be with his crew.
“Good. I’ll see you then.”
Yixing slammed the door behind himself, hopping effortlessly onto the curb and waving before disappearing down the steps.
Kris sat, foot on the brake of his aging compact and staring as though Yixing would appear again.
A honk from behind him had him sitting up straight, from where he’d half been leaning into the other seat.
Where Yixing had been.
***
His dreams were full of flowers. Fields of them, running streams. A forest, a house. There was a woman in his arms, kissing him, smiling at him. And he followed her to a pond, and beyond it, to a glen where three graves were marked.
“My son and I,” she said to him. “And the father of my son. We were together, and always will be. Who do you love?”
“Yixing. Only Yixing,” he told her. And for a moment, even as he looked at her, forgot her name.
She smiled at him. “I love only you. Do you remember us?”
He missed them. He missed her.
“I never forgot you.”
“Smile, Yifan. Yixing is waiting. You promised your love. Don’t make him wait, okay?”
And the sunlight streamed through the sunroom windows, lighting it as it was meant. Plants that decorated it, perfume light on the air and leaves almost as wide as he was waving in the breeze from the fan above. Yixing turned from the window, light slanting across him, and he smiled.
Kris woke with a gasp, shirt nearly soaked through in cold sweat. His air conditioner too high, the room was freezing, and he’d kicked away his blankets. He stripped his shirt, and considered it. Yixing would think him crazy if he knew what strange things had been invading his thoughts. Promising his love. It felt so real, he thought. But his dreams were of a woman. At least, they had been at first. But it took him a long time to fall back to sleep, Yixing and the plants, his hands covered in dirt, occupying his mind.
***
“You look tired,” Yixing said, joining Kris at the worktable in the nursery, and setting what looked like a stiff cup of tea in front of him.
“Thanks,” Kris said, to both. He knew he looked tired, and felt tired. Dreams that felt too real, and sleep that didn’t come as easily as it had.
“I worked on this some last night, but also some this morning” Yixing said, handing him both papers. “I wrote down some of what was in the rest of the garden, and they were good choices. But the ones near the sunroom will be able to be seen better. So…”
Kris stared as Yixing went down the numbered list of plants, pulling up pictures on his phone, and pointing to where they would go in the corresponding color-coded layout.
“A whole year of color,” Yixing finished, sighing.
“Are you sure you’re not a landscaper?” Kris asked. He was expecting something rudimentary at best, but not something as well-planned as what was in front of him, with a list of pricing down to the exact tax it would take. Planters, pots, soil. Everything.
And his guilt doubled that he wasn’t paying Yixing a thing. That Yixing had taken it on himself to help out. Perhaps a tip. A tip, under the table, wouldn’t be without warrant. And perhaps Yixing was expecting that anyway.
“I wish I’d been able to go to school for that,” Yixing admitted. “But I like working here with the plants as well. I’ve started setting aside pots for inside, if you want to see them?”
“I trust your judgement. Go ahead and order everything here on this invoice that you think is necessary. How soon can it be ready?”
Yixing lifted a finger to his mouth, chewing on the edge of his nail, a thoughtless habit as he considered.
“Since I’ve already started… Most of the trees we have in inventory, I know that. I may have to order in a couple of things, but everything should be ready, the day after tomorrow when I get back.”
“If I can’t come myself, the truck will come,” Kris said, standing. Yixing stood with him, quickly.
“Will you let me know when it’s done? Bring by pictures, or…”
Or take him to see it again.
“Sure,” Kris said absently, and frowned at the invoice in his hand.
“Is something wrong?” Yixing asked.
“This orchid, is it white?”
“Yes. That’s one of my favorites,” Yixing said. “Why?”
“No reason. Thanks. I really appreciate your help. I’ll- I’ll let you know.”
He left Yixing there, and walked away with his heart pounding. On the table beside Yixing in his dream, there had been a white orchid.
***
He dreamed of blood and tears, pale, still death, and a baby’s cry. And couldn’t remember what he had dreamed when he woke with swollen eyes.
“That is over,” she whispered. And the touch to his brow was loving. “Dream of him, now.”
He slept again, and dreamed of Yixing in his planting apron, coming to sit beside him and tucking one knee up against his chest as they looked over a pond. He put his hand on Yixing’s shoulder, and slid into dreamless sleep.
***
Kris could have gotten away, if he had decided to. There was a message on his phone from the nursery, saying his order was ready. Yixing’s voice professional and efficient. Delivery was more expensive than him sending their own truck, so he sent Sehun to do it, with payment instructions. Sehun would load the truck with Yixing, help him secure the load, and send him off.
It nagged at him the entire time, nearly getting snappy with one of his carpenters. But the knot in his stomach didn’t uncoil until the truck returned. And some strange thought, half hoping the passenger door would open and Yixing would get out. But all Kris got were receipts, tucked into an envelope.
“The guy who checked me out said to give those to you,” Sehun said, face bright with curiosity. “I think there’s more in there than receipts.”
“You know where to unload?”
Sehun did, and Kris stole off with the envelope clipped into his clipboard as though he was going to open it later. Tossing out an answer to one of the electricians, he found a corner and opened it up. His hands sweating, like he was some schoolboy with a note from a secret admirer.
There was a sticky note, affixed to the front page. “Good luck! ^^”
He could imagine Yixing saying it, the way he’d laugh if he knew what Kris had done to read it. The knowing smirk that would make him want to push Yixing’s shoulder.
He would drop by the nursery tomorrow. He owed that much to Yixing.
***
“Do you have a moment?” Kris asked, stopping beside Yixing in an aisle. It had only taken about ten minutes to find him, not wanting to ask anyone where he was because… There were no good reasons why.
Weed killer was pushed onto the shelf, and Yixing looked around Kris. “It’s time for me to water in the greenhouse. Walk with me?”
Yixing wore jeans, had always worn jeans, beneath the neatly printed nursery t-shirt. It was a pretty green, which made sense for a nursery. And it looked nice against Yixing’s skin. He noticed it, consciously, but tried not to calculate just exactly what that meant.
The greenhouse was warm, a short walk away, and Yixing let him inside.
“Did you get the plants in the ground?” Yixing asked, tinkering with the watering system.
“Part of them. Your instructions were clear. The others will go in tonight and tomorrow, and we’re doing what we can to prevent shock. The potted plants are inside now, in a corner so they won’t be damaged. Mostly planting and finishing is all we have left. It’s shaping up.”
“Good, I’m glad. I knew you were busy since you didn’t come for the plants.”
Right. No, he hadn’t come because seeing a man in a green shirt surrounded by plants was making it hard for him to concentrate on anything else.
“I wanted to thank you, again- Actually, I wondered if I could have your number. For the plants. If there are problems.”
Yixing laughed, head falling back a moment and Kris followed the movement with almost too much attention. “Will the plants call me for help, then? Or will you on their behalf?”
So Yixing could tease, he thought, swaying and trying to control his face.
“Your phone?” Yixing asked, and Kris handed it over. “You or the plants can call any time, that’s fine.”
And the laugh was still in Yixing’s voice. He watched as Yixing keyed in his name and number, hardly breathing. Yixing thought he wanted it for the plants, and he did. That was first. But the fact that he had Yixing’s number sparked a debate in the back of his head. Yixing handed the phone back, still in his mirth, and turned.
He let out a tiny screech, jerking to his right a little.
One of the pipes was sticking out, a lone piece of metal with an edge. He watched Yixing lift his arm to examine it.
It was a scrape on his forearm, it first looked like. And then there was blood beading along his skin.
Blood. So much blood. All over the bed, over skin. The smell of blood, and death-
He closed the gap between them in one stride, grasping Yixing’s arm at the elbow and wrist.
“Are you okay?”
It had brought them close, too close really as Yixing craned his head to the left to look up at Kris. It was not death he saw in Yixing’s face, but life. Laugh lines in the corner of his eyes, the faint damp of his lower lip. It was with a hum that Yixing broke his light grasp, using his thumb to blot at the blood, and Kris’s eyes went back to the wound.
“My blood doesn’t clot well, but this isn’t an emergency situation,” Yixing told him, voice wry.
Suddenly even the pruning sheers seemed like scythes and machetes. “Is this the best profession to be in?”
“I’m careful,” Yixing said, giving him a funny look. “And it’s not like it used to be, years ago. I have good medical care.”
“Good, that’s good. You have something to put on it?”
“There’s a first aid kit inside.”
“Okay.”
He knew he was being too much, knew by the way Yixing smiled at him, indulging him. Maybe thinking Kris was one who fainted at blood.
“Don’t worry. It’s just a little scrape,” Yixing said, patting Kris’s chest as he skirted him.
He grabbed Yixing’s hand. “Yixing.”
And Yixing’s eyebrows rose, a question. It made him shake his head.
“No. I’ll go and let you take care of that. I’m sorry. Thanks.”
He wasn’t sure what he was thanking Yixing for. For taking care of himself. He knew what he was sorry for, and that was for distracting Yixing to the point he had hurt himself.
***
”Are you all right?” Kris asked, running his hand down Yixing’s upper arm.
“I know you know I’m not made of glass,” Yixing told him, rapping Kris smartly on the forehead with his knuckles. “Because you didn’t treat me like that last night.”
No, he hadn’t. “Doesn’t mean I can’t be concerned.”
Remembering Yixing when he was flushed and panting made him smile. Yixing lifted the heavy plants daily, muscles strong. He wasn’t asking because he though Yixing was weak in any way.
“Then show me,” Yixing demanded. He tried for angelic but it didn’t work, as he smiled at Kris from under his eyelashes.
He gripped Yixing’s hip, pushing his shirt up.
***
Kris woke only moments after Yixing’s shirt was off. Not sure if his own voice had woken him, or if trapping his erection against the mattress had. Or both. It had put him in a foul mood that morning, especially when Yixing’s hair falling back against his forehead after his shirt had scraped by kept replaying itself. Thinking of Yixing’s hair, his neck, or any other part of him wasn’t conducive to work.
Nor was the nagging worry over a scrape. How still Yixing’s face had been, how confused he had been by Kris’s reaction.
Yixing was a man, not the pretty girl he’d seen overlaying him. A man, invading his dreams, his thoughts, even his fantasies. Half of his shower had been verging on cold, just to keep himself focused. It was not a tactic he could employ at work, where inattention could mean losing a finger or worse.
He stopped in the open doorway, watching Yixing with his lower lip caught between his teeth and bobbing his head to the time of an up-tempo song being piped into the store. Yixing was manning the register, and Yixing saw him within seconds, face sliding into a grin without stopping at embarrassment in between.
“Kris! How are the plants?”
“Doing well in the ground,” Kris said. And kept his eyes away from Yixing’s arm. He wasn’t going to ask. Even the thought of asking made the image of Yixing beside him in bed flash too bright. “The client is having a party tomorrow so we’re nearly finished, and right on schedule. If you’re free tonight, I can take you over to see it?”
“Oh, I’d love to see the finished product,” Yixing told him. “When did you-“
”Yifan,” Yixing chuckled, as he straddled Kris’s body.
Kris blinked, flushing as Yixing stared at him. “Sorry?”
“When did you want to go?”
“As soon as your shift ends,” Kris said. And it was only because of his racing heart, the thought that Yixing could tell what he was thinking, that he lost his control. “Did you- The snag in the greenhouse, did that get taken care of?”
“It did,” Yixing said. “My boss hates it when anyone gets hurt because of him.”
Kris’s mouth twisted, trying for a smile instead of wanting to retreat. “Yeah, I’m like that too.”
But Yixing tipped his head, considering Kris. “Would you have fixed it for me?”
Kris coughed, looking away and shaking his head. “I always have a file in my car.”
“For next time, maybe,” Yixing said, the laugh evident in his voice. But no mockery in it. “So, then tonight at the same time? Of course, if you need to buy something, you’re welcome to.”
No, he didn’t need anything, and left with acknowledgements that he’d be back. But it didn’t keep him from the ridiculous thought that had him slamming his hands on his steering wheel - Yixing wasn’t for sale.
***
Furniture had been placed in the sunroom already, the plants Yixing had picked out spread around inside. He took them in through the patio door that he still had keys to, the client knowing workers could still be in and out that evening.
“Wow, this is amazing,” Yixing said, stepping in and looking all around him. Yixing’s fingers traced down one of the windowsills, and Kris put both of his hands behind his back to resist temptation. Being there alone was too much already. But it gave him moments to note that his crew had done well, all tools were gone, and the space ready for the client to approve. “You did this?”
Kris shook his head. “Not all of it.”
“Tell me what you did?”
He could have taken Yixing pictures. Perhaps there would have been awe, but it wouldn’t have been the same. It was pride that had him standing straight, explaining how he had done blueprints, sketches, measurements, based on what the owners wanted. That the house had been cut into, to add the room, so carefully planned.
“That’s amazing.”
“This kind of project is simple,” Kris deflected.
“Not to me.”
“The hardest part was the flowers. They look good from in here.”
And they did, the garden starting inside and almost seeming to continue right on out. Beautiful to look at from inside, but also inviting anyone to go out into it. Part of that had been his own design, in the building itself. Part of it was because of the plants that Yixing had picked out. He stared at the white orchid on the table beside Yixing, and thought of his dream. A dream he’d made to come true, with the setting sun sending its light across Yixing’s body.
“Let’s look outside,” Kris suggested, and locked the doors behind them.
Yixing listed off plants, excited to see them in their place, and making Kris’s nose wrinkle as he tried to match plants to names.
“Ah,” Yixing said, crouching, and fondling a plant’s leaves. “This one is looking a little sad.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Planting shock, maybe. Do you have shears, or scissors? And water. I can try to help it.”
“Emergency plantectomy,” Kris kidded, and got a laugh in return.
He wandered, rather than watch too closely as Yixing snipped off part of the plant, carefully watering it. And Yixing was quiet, until he was satisfied.
“I think that should do it. But if it does die, can you let the owners know to call? It’s one we can replace.”
“I’ll put it in my notes,” Kris said.
The burble of the fountain, the flowers, and air cooling as the sun set. Alone together, among the flowers. Yixing with a pair of shears, still in his nursery shirt. Maybe there was a kind magic in it, healing flowers. It made him want to drag Yixing from garden to garden, to see his joy in them.
All he had done since meeting Yixing was ask for his help. And he had given Yixing nothing in return.
“I thought about paying you for your help,” Kris said.
“Oh, no!” Yixing protested. “I spent maybe an hour on things. I really enjoyed it.”
“And both trips here.”
“This isn’t work today,” Yixing said, apparently not caring that he still had shears in his hand. “Seeing it all together like this is worth more than money. Actually, it makes me think of things I could do in the future.”
That, he was glad for. But it still didn’t feel enough.
“Dinner, then,” Kris suggested. “As thanks.”
He didn’t want Yixing to think he was asking him out, when that wasn’t his intention. There was something dangerous, steady, uncontrollable, about the way Yixing walked, held his head, spoke. As though when he was close, he was too close to bear, but when he was far away, it left him hungry.
In Yixing’s eyes, he saw all his dreams. The quiet times together, hauling Yixing over his shoulder and laughing. Yixing showing Kris just how much he was wanted.
But those things were fantasy. The reality was, that Yixing was squinting at him, trying to ascertain if he could talk Kris out of his offer, how to refuse without sounding rude.
“You can tell me more about plants,” Kris offered, as though that were equal trade for sitting down to dinner with him.
“I shouldn’t tonight, but- That sounds really nice.”
It was something. He wouldn’t have to go to bed thinking he was shorting Yixing somehow. And it was another outing, almost without planning. If Yixing couldn’t tonight, then they would find a time.
“You have my number, so you don’t have to stop by the nursery,” Yixing said. “Though you’re welcome.”
Kris pulled out his phone, finding “Zhang Yixing” and pressing call.
A moment later, Yixing’s bag bubbled out a pop beat, before Kris pressed the end button.
“Now you have my number, too,” he said, and led them around the edge of the house.
Yixing looked over at him. “Dinner. You don’t know plants, so… Should I trust your choice in restaurants?”
He half chased Yixing to the car, walking sedately when he realized Yixing still was holding a sharp object. It just gave him more time to see Yixing leaning against the side of his car, smirking and patting the car. Taunting Kris for being slow. Kris pointed slowly as he went to his side, unlocking the car for them both.
***
Yixing wore white, a white hoodie with the hood down, and dark jeans. The jeans clung to his hips and legs, not skinny jeans, but just close enough to give a hint at what was beneath. The most casual he’d ever seen Yixing, he thought, and then Yixing was sliding into the car with a grin.
“I found you. Hi! What are we eating?”
Kris laughed, signaling and pulling back into traffic.
“Food on your mind. But soup. There’s a place I like nearby.”
“I like soup. Food is always on my mind. I’d snack at work all day if I could.”
Kris raised an eyebrow. “Some flowers are edible, right?”
“I’m not actually a rabbit, just because I work around garden stuff.”
“I said nothing.” But what he did say next had him kicking himself for drawing attention to it. “We’re making a habit of this.”
Yixing almost harrumphed at him, but was relaxed in his seat. “I like making habits of being taken out for food.”
Kris let all thoughts of that flee from his head. And when he realized Yixing was unfamiliar with the part of town they were in, he played tour guide on the drive. They’d come from totally different areas, and had different personal styles, but Yixing was still a comfortable presence in his car. Comfortable, not comforting. Some of Kris’s nerves settled down, just falling into the rhythm of conversation. He was still trying to define Yixing in his head. The man who hefted heavy pots, ran figures, laughed until he was breathless. A face in which he could see every trace of humor in the quirk of his lips.
So comfortable he didn’t mind opening up about where he’d lived, his family, schools. Almost missing a turn at one point because he was too caught up in reminiscing about sports teams. But they made it into the restaurant in one piece, Yixing holding the door for them as they went in.
It was one of those odd moments, thinking about it in real terms. There were no constructs by society about how he was supposed to treat a man. For a friend, he would have had held the door if he’d been there first. Had it been a date - and it was not - he wondered if Yixing would have found it rude if he’d insisted. As a person, as a man, he thought he’d have found it odd to be treated as the one being taken care of. It was a perplexing thought as they passed couples along the way to their tables. He’d grown up thinking his mother could have faced down a charging rhino, had she had to.
And his thoughts embarrassed him, knowing Yixing was having no such type of internal debate, just happy to be fed for his trouble. He seemed happy to accept, happy to be there, as they sat. And that was enough for right then. They got their menus, tea, and Kris looked up.
“Get anything you want,” Kris said, though it was more an order than anything else.
He was the one paying for the food, and he wasn’t getting any arguments on that front, either. And he tried not to glance up too many times as Yixing decided, he really did. The way Yixing chewed on the inside of his mouth, eyes sweeping side to side as he turned the middle page back and forth.
But the truth was, when their waiter came back Kris had to choose something at random that still looked good, because he’d been paying more attention to Yixing than he had to his own menu.
“Do you line up jobs to start one right after the other?” Yixing asked.
“Some go concurrently, depending on how big they are. We also do prep sites in advance, so it depends. Finishing the sunroom, it was nice to give my guys a few days off. We’re working on a roof starting first of next week. Stacking things up, since I’m moving soon.”
“Really? When?”
“I’m not sure the exact date. But this weekend. It’s just to an apartment on the same floor, because they’re doing renovations to the one I’m in now.”
“Lucky. But still moving is stressful. You have help?”
Kris nodded. “A couple of my guys. So I guess not as much time off as they’d hoped.”
Yixing seemed to hesitate. “I’d offer to help, but I’m not sure of my hours. Sometimes too many people is as bad as none. It’s hot in here!”
Kris had stuttered out an agreement, before Yixing had reached his zipper. The white material parted on a whine, revealing the dark blue tank top beneath it. And Kris was useless, a humanoid in a chair as Yixing shrugged the cloth off, leaving him with nothing but wide strips of blue cloth to break up the lines of his collarbones, and revealing sleek, pale arms.
He swallowed hard, nodding, trying to think of something to say that would distract from his total lack of social skills. And best, when it was Yixing, a man, stripping in front of him. Something that on the job happened often. But he was never rendered speechless by the baring of their skin.
Yixing planted both his hands on the table, hoodie situated, and looked up at Kris. “This is fun.”
The hysterical laugh that wanted to escape was covered up with the clearing of his throat, and keeping his eyes above Yixing’s chin.
“It is,” Kris agreed. “It’s nice to talk to someone about something that isn’t I-beams, or grout sometimes.”
“Grout, gross. I’m glad we’re having soup instead.”
“Grout is gross,” Kris said slowly, and they both burst out laughing just as their food arrived.
If he survived watching Yixing eat, he could survive anything.
“So yeah, work is generally not too exciting. The last two weeks have been the weirdest in a while.”
“Why do you say that?” Yixing said, before filling his mouth with noodles.
“Well, I met you,“ Kris said, trying to hide his grin. “Hey!”
Yixing had made a sound of indignation, reaching across to poke Kris in the shoulder.
“I needed help, and you volunteered,” Kris told him, to Yixing’s rolled eyes. “You’re some kind of garden fairy.”
Yixing snorted loud enough for tables around them to look, covering his mouth as he both coughed and laughed. His eyes were wet as he swigged water.
“Stop trying to kill me when I’m eating!”
“It’s true.”
“Not everyone at the nursery could plan a full bed, but some could have. It gave me some variety to my day. And you’re different than I thought you would be.”
“Oh?” Kris asked, hardly daring to guess. He knew what people generally thought, and he suspected that was the case. Some of his employees had been somewhat frightened of him at first.
“You looked angry, glaring around at the plants. Had they offended you?”
“No,” Kris argued.
“You did!”
“And you were covered in dirt,” Kris said. “You laughed at me.”
“You needed laughing at.”
He ran his hand through his hair. “I was frustrated. Then you fixed things.”
“We all have our areas of expertise. You can build things. I’d probably rip off a thumb.”
“Start small,” Kris suggested.
“A house made of cards, then. Only risk paper cuts.”
“Or I can make you wooden blocks, like toddlers have,” he said, grinning as Yixing scoffed at him.
“Are blocks how you knew you wanted to build things?”
Kris was content to tell him.
And when he was alone, images crept back into his mind. Yixing sliding back into his white hoodie, on the sidewalk almost spinning around to check out the stores around them.
He’d been saved from walking into a couple by Yixing’s quick hand, grabbing Kris’s upper arm and hauling him in.
They’d walked most of the way to the car like that, Yixing holding on as though he couldn’t be trusted to walk safely. But he hadn’t tried to pull away.
And then they’d sat in the car for fifteen minutes without even moving, first arguing about which way was the faster to go, and then complaining about the traffic and transportation system. The thought of Yixing being crushed into an overcrowded subway car, wriggling through bodies to get out.
“I’m a pro,” Yixing had said, flashing both hands in V’s, and then trying to look tough.
Kris had been glad he hadn’t been driving, resting his head against the window and unable to help the chuckle at Yixing’s expense.
It hadn’t been a date.
No matter what he’d felt like, when Yixing had flipped up his hood, waved, and darted out into the just-starting rain.
He fell asleep imagining sliding the sleeves off of Yixing’s arms, touching Yixing’s just-damp hair, and watching the smile spread over Yixing’s face. Just for him.
***
It was accident that Yixing ended up helping him move. Though Sehun called it fate, good timing, and had a distinct raised set of eyebrows to let Kris know just what he thought of that. Yixing’s call had been about nothing even remotely related, because he’d spoken to a woman at the nursery interested in having work done, and had thought of Kris. He listened to Yixing talk about raised bed, a garden shed, roof work, for a few minutes, kind of half intrigued and amused that Yixing was feeding him work now. He’d just finished his notes, when Sehun had arrived to start helping.
“Sorry,” he’d told Yixing. “Sehun is here, and we’re going to start moving my things to the other apartment.”
“Oh. Oh, do you need help? I could bring this information by. I have the afternoon off.”
“Well, there’s two guys helping me, so I think we’re okay?” And Kris frowned as Sehun mouthed Who is it? at him. “It’s Yixing. Sorry, Sehun wanted to know who it-“
“Come by!” Sehun said, butting his face in close so he could be heard. “Bring cookies.”
Kris made strangled sounds, and Yixing laughed.
“You don’t have to do either of those,” Kris said again, getting to a place of safety as Sehun got smug and started arranging things to be taken out.
“I know I don’t have to. But I’m offering, so I will if you want me to. If I can be of some use.”
It wasn’t like Kris had hours to decide, especially not as Zitao poked his head in, squawking and hugging Sehun and waving at Kris.
“You could help unpack things or something,” Kris allowed, feeling tired before he’d already even begun.
“Then tell me your address,” Yixing said.
Sehun had been smirking like the traitor he was when Kris had hung up. He was carrying the mattress, just for that. Sehun worked for him, but Zitao was a friend. Zitao, with a sweetness there that had Kris feeling like he was refusing a kitten a treat at times, but they were still good friends. He didn’t even mind when Kris went on building tangents in the middle of outings.
They did the heavy stuff first, the bed frame, mattress, couch, table, and desk. Dresser drawers were removed, and furniture hauled the hundred feet or so the other apartment. It was pretty much the same layout, just reversed. But there were at least empty spots by the time Yixing appeared, and was introduced to Zitao.
“He brought cookies,” Sehun said, zeroing in on the bag in Yixing’s hand. “I’m going to go work for him instead.”
“He’ll have you digging holes in the dirt,” Kris warned.
“I had them already I like to snack,” Yixing said.
His smile was wry at Kris, and he could almost feel himself being made fun of. Just in case Kris didn’t have anything to feed them with, Yixing had brought his own form of sustenance.
“Then you can help pack the kitchen,” Kris told him.
The kitchen, like the rest of the layout, was just reversed in the new apartment. He’d allotted a few boxes for each room beyond what he’d already packed. That way they could throw things in boxes, go over and unpack, and then repeat. He figured hauling over plates and boxes of cereal wouldn’t be too much to ask. Zitao and Sehun, he didn’t feel so bad asking them to haul bookcases and big book boxes.
But there were no complaints from anyone. All of it needed to be done, and they were a line of worker ants moving back and forth between the two apartments. Sehun was stacking books in shelves as he and Zitao packed more, skirting Yixing as he went out with boxes full of food and dishwares.
“How many dishes do you need for one person?” Yixing called as they followed each other through the doorway of his new apartment. Yixing with food, him with books.
They stared at each other for a moment, before Kris could let out the only truth he had. “As many as my mother gave me.”
It seemed like that delighted Yixing as much as he’d anticipated.
“This is almost the end of it, “ Yixing said, smile shining. “There’s one more box that- Oh, Zitao has it.”
Kris stepped aside to let Zitao pass, as he was already chanting, “Hey, the kitchen is done!”
One more bookcase, some furniture, and then his bedroom and bathroom to finish. So close.
“Ow!” Zitao yelped. “The box got me.”
Kris got closer to see how bad it was. Zitao’s finger was welling with blood, but no obvious gashes that warranted a trip to the hospital.
“There should be bandaids in the bottom drawer by the sink, and some antiseptic,” he said, gesturing toward the bathroom.
“Wow, so cool,” Yixing said as Zitao walked away.
Kris shrugged. “We see worse cuts than that on the job sometimes.”
“Did you expect him to act differently?” Sehun asked, approaching from behind them.
“I thought he was afraid of blood,” Yixing said, as Kris moved back to take books out of the box. He was trying to think of a way to derail the conversation short of ordering one of them to leave.
Sehun actually laughed at that. “Why?”
“He was with me when I hurt myself at the nursery. He grabbed at me like I’d cut my arm off, and mine was just a scrape,” Yixing told Sehun.
“There’s another box ready to go over there,” Kris said, hoping for attention. Attention away from a wound, and back on moving. Keeping Yixing’s attention from thinking any more about it. Since it hadn’t been the blood, or the wound, or the place. It had been that Yixing had gotten hurt. The dream of the bloody bed was fading, but he could not have predicted his reaction had it happened again. He had to focus on what they were doing, and not the possibility that Yixing could get hurt again.
“Could we have a drink now?” Zitao called. “And a fan. It’s hot!”
Sehun went to close the other door while they took a little break. He cranked the air up a little to help cool it off, and got out the glasses that Yixing had just put away.
Yixing laughed with the others, smiling at Sehun’s jokes as glasses and cookies were handed around. Seeing him with his friends, Yixing’s dimple flashing, and examining Zitao’s new bandaged finger. Smiling at Kris as he thanked him. It had nothing to do with the dreams, the ache in his chest. For a moment he considered ordering the others out, running his fingers down that sweaty neck, and seeing if Yixing’s lips tasted as sweet as the juice did.
Yixing lifted the edge of his collar, using it to wipe his neck, and Kris nearly missed the glass he was pouring into. What little sweat he had caught hadn’t helped, Yixing’s neck still wet.
But they all knew there was more to do, before they could relax.
“He’s nice,” Sehun said, after Yixing had left to get another box. “Gets along with us. You stare at him a lot.”
He tried not to let the alarm show, but Sehun was too quick on things like that.
He mumbled something about being worried, wanting everyone to be safe.
“He seems strong enough to me. It’s good. You can always use more friends.”
Friends. If that was what Sehun really thought, he’d have been surprised. But he let pretending that carry him through Yixing walking back in with a stack of dresser drawers. Topmost, full of his underwear.
His life.
***
They took ten minutes out to squabble over what was being ordered in to eat, Kris’s promise to them that he would feed them. By the time the food had arrived, his old apartment had been wiped down and vacuumed, and checked for anything left.
He was just going to have to settle up with the building manager, but that would be done the next day. And best of all, he had a day left to recover before diving into their next work project. And at least there was a table, even though Kris pulled up a box to sit on because he didn’t have enough chairs. And he mostly listened as everyone talked movies, shopping. He put in occasionally, having been dragged out with two of the men at the table. But mostly he was content to listen. Zitao, when he got excited, could roll the conversation forward without pause, and Yixing was keeping up. It was something to watch, Yixing getting more animated, talking more as the meal went on.
And Kris had positioned himself, on purpose, between Sehun and Zitao. But it put him across from Yixing,
It meant he had Yixing meeting his eyes as he laughed, accepting boxes of food from him. Passing drinks around.
“Well, Zitao is taking me home, and he needs to leave now, so we should go,” Sehun said, after everyone had finished.
“But-“ Zitao started.
Sehun stared Zitao down, and there wasn’t any arguing from there.
“You smell, so shower, hm?” Sehun suggested, voice pitched so only they could hear. And he didn’t think he mistook Sehun’s glance at Yixing. We’re clearing out so maybe shower together, hm? was all but dripping out of Sehun’s words.
“Have a good night,” Sehun told Yixing.
“Thanks for your help, and it was really nice meeting you,” Zitao called to Yixing, before Sehun could get him out the door.
And the apartment, which was the same size as it had been in the old one, but with the door closed and Yixing behind him, it suddenly felt far smaller. Smaller than the car had, or the restaurant, or the nursery. But he had to push past that.
Just looking around made him feel tired. Everything was generally where it should’ve been, but there were boxes, and things out of place. It was a mess, as he’d expected it to be.
“Are you doing much more tonight?” Yixing asked.
“Probably not. I’ll probably make my bed, and relax. Tackle some of the straightening another day.”
He really wanted to stretch out his back.
“I’ll clean this up,” Yixing offered. “If you want to work on that.”
“You don’t have to.”
And Kris actually stepped forward, before Yixing held up his hands. “I can handle throwing away a few boxes and washing the glasses. Go. Go!”
Ordered in his own home.
He didn’t exactly grumble as he turned away, but almost. He had a terrifying moment wondering where his sheets were, before he’d found them. Groaning a little as he bent, and got the fitted sheet in place. By the time the blanket had been spread, he was feeling like his back was in six pieces. The pillows were plopped on, still in the pillowcases from before.
And he figured he’d just sneak onto it. His clothes were a little dirty, but not enough to matter on top of the blanket. Yixing had to be nearly done, so him lying still for a moment wasn’t going to hurt. Or, it was only going to hurt him. He groaned into the pillow, face first, as muscles gave, and ached, and screamed as he relaxed. He smelled something, like almost from a dream. Some familiar smell. Like the curse of Yixing’s neck. Something popped, and he moaned again, turning his head, and letting himself settle into the mattress like a lump of dirty laundry. He vaguely heard footsteps, the soft clinking of dishes being put away. He was absolutely going to move.
“You asleep?” he heard through the fog that was his brain. Almost. He’d almost been asleep. Or rather, had been right there and going under.
“I’m awake,” he grunted, and would have moved to try and get up when he felt the bed sag beside him. Yixing had sat down.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to get up. I was going to see if you needed anything else, but it looks like you need to rest more. So I’ll go.”
Yixing’s hand rested on his back, and Kris couldn’t help almost moving into it. The sound he made was going to embarrass him later, low in his throat at nothing more than a touch.
“Your back hurts?” Yixing asked, rubbing slightly where he’d touched.
“Yeah. I’ll just…” His words trailed off as Yixing moved.
“Does this feel okay?”
Okay? Okay was a tiny patch of sunlight. Yixing’s thumbs digging into his back was far from okay. It was sunbursts, and his toes curling, mingled pain and relief. He brought his hand up to his face, to rest against it, or to smother himself if any other sounds wanted to come.
“That feels amazing,” he finally said, getting his brain back together. When he wasn’t feeling his entire spine lengthen and give under Yixing’s hands. “I should be doing that for you.”
“You did more heavy lifting than I did. Moving is stressful, and you have a lot to clean up still.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
But the jest was halfhearted, and Kris focused on not moving, not making any sounds, hardly breathing. He didn’t want Yixing to stop, but he didn’t know if he could survive Yixing continuing. Still the guilt nagged. Maybe Yixing hadn’t done as much lifting, but he’d done enough.
“Tell me if it’s hurting you,” Yixing said, as he moved along Kris’s back.
It wasn’t so much that it hurt. Okay, it did hurt, a band of muscle around his shoulder blade. The sound he made felt inhuman, and Yixing clucked, but didn’t stop, fingers smoothing. Until the ache, the tension, finally gave, and he felt pliant as clay under Yixing’s hands.
“You do this often?” Kris asked, trying not to drool onto his hand.
“Not really. I just know what feels good to me. Nice thing about having a roommate.”
Kris just sighed, his whole brain feeling like it had been covered in molten chocolate as Yixing squeezed and smoothed his shoulders.
“Probably should’ve done this after you’d showered, so you could’ve just rested.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll get up,” Kris told him. In a decade perhaps.
“I believe you. I’ll go so you can get some rest, then. I’ll talk to you later. Goodnight, Kris.”
“Mm, ‘Night.”
The bed moved slightly as Yixing got up and he caught only a momentary glimpse of the back of Yixing’s jeans.
“And thank you!” he remembered, twisting his neck just in time to see Yixing flapping a hand back at him. A minute later, the sound of the outer door closing.
And a minute after that, he was asleep.
***
Kris woke at two in the morning, stiff even where Yixing had worked on his back. He also felt gross, still in his clothes. It took only a minute debate before he was stripping, showering. He figured he would get clean, and then go back to bed. Just the hot water helped him to relax, when Yixing’s voice, the memory of his hands along Kris’s back, caused his thoughts to consider something far from sleep.
Yixing at the table, face serious and then cracking up. Yixing in his bedroom, in his kitchen, at his bookshelves.
As he dried his hair, towel rubbing fast, he wasn’t sure how many cracks there were left for Yixing to fill. Aside from the obvious, and it could not be that.
But the shower, and the remaining hours of sleep refreshed him. But he ignored Sehun’s speculative look as they all assembled.
And Sehun hadn’t caught him until lunchtime. “Did Yixing help out more after we left?”
“He helped clean up the kitchen, but he left right after.”
And Kris shoved the remainder of his sandwich into his mouth to ward off any further questions. It made him feel strange. Not quite like a parent probing his activity, but almost. There had been nothing to be ashamed about. But the fact that Yixing had stayed, the time on his bed. Even if he’d felt half asleep, he’d still been all too aware of Yixing’s presence. That was what made him uncomfortable, not the questioning, or anything else.
“Hey, Sehun,” Kris said, jogging to come alongside him. And then, mid-thought, he changed his mind, and asked Sehun about how the lumber was stacked.
He had a lot of questions. What he was feeling, what he was supposed to do.
There were too many questions that garnered a positive answer when it came to Yixing. The thought of taking a step and admitting it to himself - asking Sehun to give input at all was one of those steps.
But when he got home from work, the feeling of Yixing beside him on the bed haunted him through his dinner, and after he’d stretched out on the couch. He ran his thumb over his phone, and half thought of texting Yixing to see if he was free.
And fell asleep.
He arranged the pot with its border of tiny dragons on the side table, taking a seat so that Yixing could join him. And smiling, as Yixing straddled him. A better gift than the orchid, to be sure.
“Did you know they were named for moths?” Yixing asked, running fingertips down both sides of his face. “Because of the shape of the petals. Another genus of orchid is where we get vanilla from.”
“Yum,” he said, trying not to shiver because of Yixing’s touch.
“Yum,” Yixing agreed against the corner of his mouth.
Kris startled awake by the chime of his doorbell, half reaching to steady Yixing before realizing he was alone. Slicking his hair down from whatever mess it had become, he stumbled to the door, only to find Yixing looking back at him.
“Hi, I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time?”
“No,” Kris said, flabbergasted. “I was just-“
Yixing held an orchid.
“Oh. It’s a housewarming gift! I remember you asking about the one for your client, so I thought…”
Yixing smiled, and shrugged, holding out the pot to Kris.
“Thank you,” he said, and stared at the white petals. “They’re named after moths, right?”
“Wow. You looked it up?”
No, you told me, his brain supplied, trying not to see the surprise and pleasure in Yixing’s face. In a dream.
“Maybe someone told me,” he muttered. “So you’re giving me moths on a stick.”
Yixing laughed, nose scrunching. “They’re not as flashy as butterflies, I guess. Especially this white. But sometimes simple things are beautiful. I put a paper on how to care for it in there, too?”
He couldn’t help but laugh at Yixing’s expression, something about the way he moved his face endearing and comical all at once. And then realized they were still in the doorway.
“Can you stay?”
Yixing hesitated for a moment.
“I shouldn’t for very long,” Yixing said. “I need go in early tomorrow, but…”
Kris stepped back, letting Yixing in, and all but shoving the orchid onto the table. He regretted it immediately, as it left his hands free. He felt enough like a gigantic elephant in a tiny room. And there was no reason Yixing’s presence should make his apartment feel so small, like any way he moved, or breathed, Yixing was so close.
“Did you want something to drink?” he asked, at least trying to remember to be a host.
“Just water is fine,” Yixing said. “Oh wow, it looks really different in here.”
It had definitely gotten neater. Once he’d recovered from the move, and gotten home from work, he’d straightened up as much as he could, and put pictures and things back on the wall. It looked a little less like a disaster, but there was still a ways to go. It had started feeling a bit more like home, and less like a temporary dwelling.
He filled a glass with a pitcher from the fridge, handing it to Yixing. And staying carefully back.
“Thank you. Your back feeling okay?”
Oh. His back, after the move. Yixing’s hands on him. “Yeah, I’m fine. You helped a lot. On everything.”
Yixing waved the appreciation away, causing Kris to get momentarily distracted by the watch on his bare forearm. “I’m glad I could.”
“And the flower will look good here, so, yeah.” And it was possibly the most awkward sentence that had ever left his mouth.
“I get great discounts,” Yixing teased. “I think my friends are resigned to the fact that they’ll get flowers at times. But this one I couldn’t pass up.”
Friends. It made Kris’s stomach tighten, as he twirled his own glass of water in his hand. They weren’t five and on some playground, declaring they should be friends forever.
He swallowed hard, nearly licking his own lips as Yixing drained his glass, tongue peeking out to clean his lips.
“So you said you had an early day?”
Yixing nodded, head bobbing up so he could meet Kris’s eyes. “Delivery! The earlier the better, really, before things get really hot. As it is, we end up spraying ourselves down with the hoses and changing clothes, or else no one would want to buy from us.”
Wet Yixing. Wet Yixing with a hose, laughing, and shuddering from the cold. It made him want a vacation at the beach, to haul Yixing up over his shoulder and make him shriek.
And he was hiding his laugh in a cough, before Yixing could call him out on his strange reaction.
“I should probably go,” Yixing said, putting his glass near the sink. “I wish I could stay, but I didn’t want to interrupt your evening, either.”
“You aren’t interrupting, don’t worry. No one bringing gifts is ever an interruption.”
Yixing’s look back was amused as he wiggled his feet back into his white-toed sneakers.
“I hope you enjoy the orchid.”
“I will. Thanks again.”
It was with disappointment that he closed his door. Just seeing the orchid, picking it up to move it to a better spot, had the dream swing back heavy on his mind, and he made his way to the side table. It wasn’t as though Yixing would truly have come to sit on his lap, and it wasn’t as though he actually wanted him to. Expected him to, actually, was more correct.
He didn’t even have time to call himself a liar as he took his hands from the pot. The dream- The little dragons dancing around the rim took his breath away.
***