Chapter 144 - My Costar Wakes Up

To say Yao Shen is shocked to learn he's been asleep for the past week is an understatement.

Tan Liansi's face is flushed with relief. "I thought I fucked up the dosage somehow and it affected you too."

Yao Shen smiles sheepishly, feeling somewhat guilty for having worried her. "Ah, no I managed to get into Xin Hulei's dreams, with uhm, my ghost king abilities."

Xin Hulei gets up from the bed as if he hasn't spent months laying on it. He stretches his shoulders and arms above his head like a cat. Yao Shen watches the play of muscles under his smooth skin with open want.

"Are Jincan and Heimao awake too?" Xin Hulei asks, scratching his lower abdomen and drawing Yao Shen's eyes towards the sharp v of his hipbones.

He swallows drily.. It's been a long time since they slept together. 

For the past two months Yao Shen has been running on auto-pilot, doing his best to take care of Xin Hulei, and Heimao and Jincan. His mind was too busy to even think about sex, but now Xin Hulei is awake and well, and the gears in Yao Shen's hindbrain are turning.

He's so distracted that he barely hears Tan Liansi's answer. "I checked on you guys first, so I don't know, maybe," she says, smiling at the possibility.

It becomes obvious once they walk into their bedroom that the two of them are still fast asleep.

Tan Liansi deflates, slumping against the wall with a mournful sigh. "What now?"

"I think the only reason I was able to wake up is because Yao Shen went to get me," Xin Hulei says, looking out at the bed where Jincan and Heimao are sleeping peacefully side-by-side.

Yao Shen agrees with him. "I'll try to slip into their dreams tonight," he says, even if it means he'll probably be asleep for two weeks.

---

Xin Hulei announces he wants to take a shower, and pulls Yao Shen in with him, who puts only the barest of coy resistances to it.

They don't do anything in the shower, out of respect for Tan Liansi who's still walking around the apartment, helping out.

It still feels like a luxury to wrap his arms around Xin Hulei's neck and feel his slick skin against his under the hot spray.

Yao Shen shivers each time Xin Hulei runs his hands down his hack, and hides a pleased laugh against his neck when one of his hands grows more adventures and grips one of his cheeks, squeezing softly.

"You've lost weight," he says, still kneading the skin. "Can't have that."

Yao Shen drops a kiss on Xin Hulei's jawbone that soon turns into a bite. "Well, it's because I've been worried about you, so you need to make it up to me now."

He pulls away to look into Xin Hulei's eyes and is surprised to find them overcast. "I'm sorry," Xin Hulei says, his voice low.

"No, I was just joking. It's not your fault, you have nothing to apologise for." Yao Shen wraps his arms around his neck tighter, eager to reassure him. 

He can't stand to see that guilty look on Xin Hulei's face.

Xin Hulei closes his eyes and returns Yao Shen's kisses. The water keeps beating down around them, and eventually Yao Shen grows self-conscious about how wasteful they're being.

They're almost finishing their shower when Xin Hulei wraps one hand around Yao Shen's waist and reels him in for one more kiss. "I'll make it up for you either way." He whispers the words against Yao Shen's lips, making a delicious shiver run down his spine.

His sultry voice leaves a lot of things up to Yao Shen's imagination -- and he has proven time and again just how creative he can be.

---

Xin Hulei cooks for them after their shower, and Tan Liansi breaks down crying at the dining table.

She's holding the chopsticks in one hand, and supporting her head with the other while gazing down at the bowl of piping hot lamian in front of her.

"This is so good," she manages to say, between sobs. "Yao Shen's cooking is so shitty, for a while there I was afraid his stupid ginger soup was more poisonous than the corpse blood."

"I resent that," Yao Shen says, although he is extremely grateful for the food too. Nothing beats Xin Hulei's cooking, and Yao Shen can even preen a little because he's the reason why he became so good at it. He thought he was doing it for Yan Shuyi, but Yao Shen will gracefully ignore that for now.

"Why didn't you cook, then?" Xin Hulei asks, always happy to add oil to the fire.

Tan Liansi waves her chopsticks around and makes a series of noncommittal noises while chewing. "My delicate womanly hands might have broken under the strain."

"Of adding noodles to boiling water?"

Tan Liansi's eyes widen while she points at Yao Shen with her chopsticks. "You see, ge, that's why his food sucks, he thinks that's all it takes! Where's the seasoning, where's the spice?"

Yao Shen rolls his eyes at her, but inside he feels light as a cloud. For the past months the two of them have been having their meals in funeral silence. Xin Hulei's presence alone is enough to make the apartment feel like a home again.

---

That night, Yao Shen goes to sleep next to Jincan and Heimao, which is incredibly uncomfortable, due to how narrow the bed is. Tan Liansi leaves as soon as she feeds both of them the weird medicine. Giving Yao Shen and Xin Hulei some privacy.

"Don't sleep too long," Xin Hulei tells him, brushing the hair away from his forehead and dropping a kiss between his eyebrows. "Or else I'll be the one losing weight, this time."

Yao Shen pulls him down for one last kiss and then shoos him out of the room. He hopes this is one of those things where he gets better with practice, because he doesn't want to sleep for weeks again.

Then again, maybe part of him lingered subconsciously in Xin Hulei's dream. He certainly won't do that now.

He doesn't know if he'll end up in Heimao or Jincan's dream first, but he doubts he'll be welcome in either of them.

---

A bright red glare wakes Yao Shen up. He squints for a long time before his surroundings come into full focus.

He's standing in the middle of a brilliantly decked red hall. There are gold good fortune ornaments stuck to every pillar, and red streamers attached from the ceiling. 

It looks like a child's interpretation of an extravagant traditional wedding ceremony. It's obvious everything about the ostentatious decor is meant to be lavish, but it only manages to come across as gaudy.

The mixture of modern and traditional styles is incongruous. Even more so when one of the guest, whose face can only be described as 'vague', gets up from his seat on the floor behind a low table and walks up to a stage to announce the entrance of the two grooms.

A curtain opens and Jincan walks out hand-in-hand with Xin Hulei. 

He's wearing a brocade wedding robe, surprisingly understated considering the terrible decor. His curling golden hair is left unadorned with the exception of two clips pinning back his bangs and making his butterfly wing ears stand out starkly.

Xin Hulei is walking beside him, a wide smile on his usually stoic face. The smile is so uncanny that it sends a shiver of wrongness down Yao Shen's spine. He's sure Xin Hulei's face would crack if he ever smiled that widely in real life.

Jincan waves at his enraptured guests and walks up to the front of the stage to address them.

"Thank you all for coming to my wedding. I'm sure it's the best you've ever been to."

Several guests raise their glasses in a toast to his words, while Yao Shen struggles to muffle his laughter into the crook of his elbow.

Jincan links his arm with Xin Hulei's and pulls him forward to the front of the stage. Disturbingly, the frozen smile remains in place. Yao Shen doesn't think Xin Hulei has blinked once ever since walking out with Yao Shen.

"Master loves me deeply, as you can see by how much he's smiling." Jincan sighs. "Master was confused for a moment, and seduced by the vulgar charms of a common streetwalker he had the misfortune of meeting."

Yao Shen assumes that's him, judging by Jincan's penchant to come up with synonyms for 'whore' to describe him.

"Obviously, Master realised that I was the one he truly loved, on account of my loyalty, bravery, incredible beauty, and superior intelligence." He nudges Xin Hulei on the side. "Isn't that right, Master?"

"I only love Jincan," Xin Hulei says, his voice oddly robotic.

Yao Shen can't help it any longer and finally lets out the bubble of laughter he's been trying to suppress.

The noise attracts Jincan, who frowns the moment his eyes land on Yao Shen. "What are you doing here?"