Work Text:
"When the world splits into two people, which one will you be?"
He Tian is afraid of the dark. He found that he was often in its company, even if he wasn’t alone. It lay in every fake smile, every conversation of half ass interest, every point of empty eye contact with yet another unfamiliar face that seemed to want to claw its way into him. He doesn’t hate the attention, nor the doe-eyed naivety of the girls that seemed to swarm him, he just wasn’t interested, and they did little to keep the darkness away.
And then, he met him.
Mo Guan Shan is a beacon of solar flares. What He Tian had seen beyond the anger in his sharp features was more intuitive than substantial, unfamiliar and mysterious, something that called to He Tian like a moth to a flame; a question that begged to be answered. At first, it was what He Tian wanted: the answer. That was before spending time with Mo Guan Shan made him forget everything else, and his cigarettes would go stale in the pocket of his school bag. At some point, he’d forgotten all about the answer he was looking for. He made the darkness go away. He made the nightmares stop.
‘There are things I admire about you. You aren’t sneaky and you don’t cheat. And you’re also.. Not afraid of darkness.’
Mo Guan Shan had looked up at him from the bottom of the stairwell like he’d said something stupid, ‘So?’
‘So.. don’t abandon me.’
Mo Guan Shan had become his light. From spring to autumn to winter, the warmth of his fire seeped into He Tian’s bones, and he didn’t realize he was addicted until he was standing in that humid alleyway, his broken promise branded in blood around Mo’s neck.
‘There’s a pen mark on your face, did you just wake up?’
Tian should’ve seen it that day, but he was too distracted by the way the bright autumn rays of sunshine reflected off the pale red locks of Guan Shan’s tousled hair and the lethargic but frightened liquid amber of his eyes. He was too enraptured to see the subtle lines of his nightmare traced along his restless eyelids.
‘You’re so cute, little Mo. Did you have a nightmare?’
No, he had seen it, but that day Guan Shan had let him cradle his face without protest, and he’d selfishly clung to the singularity of that moment, the way he seemed to reluctantly melt into He Tian’s touch. He let the thought of asking slip from his mind.
‘Don’t be afraid.’
‘I won’t let anything happen to you.’
What stupid, careless words.
Mo Guan Shan is broken now. Darkness was seeping out of the cracks in his body, threatening to swallow him whole and take him somewhere He Tian would never find. He Tian couldn’t think of a single thing to say as he stared in horror at the state of his battered and bruised body. He could only feel the millions of terrifying emotions stabbing through him like sharpened knives.
Fear in his throat. Regret in his stomach. Rage spread like fire across his skin. But even more than that, it was the painful, sickening realization that all of this could’ve been avoided if he’d just stopped being so fucking selfish.
But how could he possibly do that? He doesn’t know how. He couldn’t help it. The more he sought Mo Guan Shan out the more he slipped away. It was like wanting to come home for the first time. It was like discovering what it felt like to be grounded to earth. There were far more valuable things hidden under Guan Shan’s skin, treasures buried deep in his bones that were worth more than anything in the entirety of He Tian’s estate. He couldn’t understand why .
Why did Mo Guan Shan fight so hard to make it on his own? When He Tian was ready to crumble at his feet, to give anything, be anything he asked?
But the way Mo Guan Shan was looking at him now.. the bloodshot streaks on the bottoms of his eyes told He Tian he was the last person Mo wanted to see, but there was also relief, a human, innate relief that a lonely wounded animal feels when it’s found.
He Tian finds his body again,
“Tell me.. What happened.”
Mo turns away from him to hide his humiliation. “You.. what are you doing here?”
The flashbacks come to him violently, like spilling gasoline on a low flame. Mo Guanshan holds his head to fight them back. She Li’s silhouette in front of the fire as he holds a chain to it, the links glowing red as the fire seeps into them. The rough hands of his men holding Mo down, wrapping around his face and pulling back painfully to expose his neck. She Li’s footsteps in the sand coming closer, the heat of the chain was the only warning he got before he felt it brand into his skin. His mouth held shut to keep him from screaming.
Mo can’t help the sob that wrecks through his body, nothing could keep the flashbacks away.
He feels strong, gentle arms encircle his waist, and a warm chest press onto his back. Somehow, the feeling of He Tian against him grounds him enough to stop the flow of his flashbacks, and he finds the strength to form words again, to wallow helplessly in the despair he could never escape.
“Life seems so easy for others. Why is it so difficult for me? I just want to disconnect from everything...restart..”
He Tian tightens his hold on him, and Mo notices his breaths are coming in short, getting stuck in his throat and making his chest spasm. Their heartbeats are out of rhythm, Tian’s heart beats loud and hard, as though it were trying to rip out of his chest. Mo’s is unsteady and lethargic, having run out of adrenaline and only left to fight to stay beating. This intimate proximity is something Mo Guan Shan isn’t used to, a reflexive discomfort forcing him to push He Tian away. He was used to doing things alone, it was the only thing he felt he could do right.
“It’s my own problem.. I can solve it.”
He Tian grabs his shirt. It’s different this time, it lacked the domineering force he would usually use to overpower Mo. He wasn’t trying to stifle him, no, this time.. the muted, gentle grip of his hand was begging Mo to stay.
‘What does your bullshit happiness have to do with me?!’
Everything. He Tian had wanted to say, but he was too scared to admit it even to himself.
Tears form in the bottoms of Mo’s amber eyes as he turns to He Tian. He realizes, suddenly, the way a man underwater realizes he’s drowning, that he doesn’t want to be alone. And he doesn’t know if it’s for better or for worse, but he needed desperately to be with Tian in this moment. He doesn’t want to run from him anymore, but he’s afraid too. He’s afraid of losing the only thing he has left now. He’s afraid He Tian will take it from him too.
I need you, so let me do this on my own.
“You.. will you believe in me?”
He Tian’s tears had fallen first, a broken, tragic expression on his face. Guan Shan had a funny way of teaching him how life works. The unfairness of it, the reality that money isn’t as important as he first thought, it can only take away the physical troubles that Mo faced, it had no way of fixing what was broken inside him, what She Li had broken. Mo Guan Shan’s emotions have been permanently carved into He Tian. In the months of their constant bickering, despite the polarity of their differences, their individual existences began to intertwine like two vines growing side by side. They learned each other’s habits and fell into a steady rhythm of push and pull, until they could read each other's minds with ease.
Now, they both realize they need each other in ways that are so goddamn hard . How can He Tian stay idle in Mo’s suffering, and how can Mo accept the help he’s ingrained into his very soul to reject? Change is the hardest concept of human nature, but He Tian will be dead before he gives up.
The desperation is honest and loud in Mo Guan Shan’s voice, and in that moment He Tian knew like he’d never known anything in his life.
For the first time, Mo Guan Shan was calling to him.
He moves carefully to cradle Mo’s face in his hand, like being at the most delicate part of shaping pottery, his thumb on Mo’s chin and his long fingers only ghosting on his jaw and neck, careful to avoid the burn branded into his neck.
He presses his lips tenderly to the corner of Mo’s mouth, catching a tear that had escaped. Whether it’s from exhaustion or relief, Mo melts into him like snow into spring, with a hesitant gratitude. It’s only then, in the safety of his touch, that Mo’s tears spill freely.
“I can’t go home.” He says, and the pain in his voice has He Tian planning She Li’s funeral. It was a question disguised in an unwilling conclusion.
“I know.” He Tian says. It’s an olive branch for them both, like the first shy touch of their fingertips.
It's a greeting.