[exo] fic dump for the Yixing fic fest
Last year, I joined justgetlayd for their Bingo style fic fest dedicated to Lay. I ended up writing four fics and three of them are in this post since they're just short ones. Thank you to t-list for putting up with my whining and my babes especially airplanewishes, onyu and mapofwords who helped me push through this and flesh out ideas.
Texting by Dummies
Lay/Kris
739 words
Trope: secret relationships
Yixing has five new messages, all from the same person.
texting by dummies
The welcome jolt of cold air hits Yixing as he enters the hotel room. It’s been a long day, doing an outdoor shoot wearing two layers too many on a hot and muggy summer morning. He drops his bag on the floor and the studs snatch on the fabric of the bed right before he slides down to it.
Yixing rolls over and takes out his phone that’s poking from his back pocket. It has five new messages all from the same person - Jennifer, written on top of each message.
The first one came in about three hours ago. Yixing remembers that he was still posing in a random, blocked off back alley back then.
It reads: i’m bored.
The second one is, entertain me, followed by, are u busy, then a belated ?. The last message is blank, seemingly there just to be annoying.
Had a photoshoot, Yixing replies. He looks at the clock and counts the time backwards to Toronto. Kris is probably asleep right now.
He isn’t, though, because Yixing’s phone lights up as another message appears.
thought u were giving me the silent treatment
Kris only gets this annoying and clingy and honest when he’s had too much sugar or caffeine or alcohol. He votes for the last one.
i wasn’t. go to sleep, he types back. The reply is fast this time, can’t sleep. how’s thailand?
Yixing stretches his back and arms across the bed before he replies. Hotel beds always seem to have this intoxicating way of pulling him into relaxation. No matter how much Yixing tries to turn his bed into some kind of faux hotel bed, it never feels the same. And it’s not for lack of trying - he’s even changed his mattress and bought the same brand of bed sheets. Maybe it’s something in the air. Maybe he should check out hotel aromatherapy voodoo next.
The lull of the bed is pulling him in and if Kris can’t sleep, that doesn’t mean that Yixing can’t as well. It’s still afternoon, but naps are treasured in this industry. Yixing wants to type out, Kris. Capitalized with a period in the end, but he remembers the codename.
Jennifer, he types out instead, thailand is great. food is delicious. the people are very hospitable.
Jennifer is the name he had picked when he saved the number from a seemingly random text message he received a year ago, a week after Kris left the group in the midst of their first solo concert tour. Somehow, he instantly knew who it was even though he kept receiving other messages from their fans.
The message had been: are u mad?
Yixing didn’t respond. For some unknown reason, he had saved the number and put it as Jennifer because it was the first English name that came to his mind. He deleted Kris’s old number afterwards.
It took him three months before he replied without his fingers shaking. It was a simple, yes. Anger and bitterness are tiring and they take a toll over a person. It’s a running joke in EXO that Yixing’s already weighed down by the world on his shoulders even before that incident happened. Yixing’s already had enough of most of it and he thought he should take matters to his own hands. That was why, when Kris texted him again, he answered back and continued doing so.
He’s mostly okay about it now. It’s been over a year, and he thinks he’s been okay with it for a while already. Sometimes, the pain of being left behind, left without a clue, still aches but he’s coping better. Loyalty is important to Yixing, but so is friendship.
Yixing’s phone blinks and he’s pulled out of his thoughts. how are the others?
He thinks some of the others are getting there, too. Some more than the others, because he can still see the way Tao stiffens at the mention of his name or the way Sehun deflates. But that’s hardly a reaction now compared to how it was back then.
ask them yourself, Yixing responds then adds, i’m going to sleep. u should too.
Yixing flips his phone over the table so he doesn’t see its blinking lights and burrows himself further into the bed. The duvet is a warm, soft comfort around him, his cheek smushed against the memory foam pillow. When he dreams, it’s of friends and laughter and bright futures.
Till Death Do Us Part
Lay/Luhan
1399 words
Trope: fantasy AU
Yixing’s duty is to deliver great souls into heaven. Luhan’s job is to drag them to hell.
till death do us part
When the first living thing existed, I was there, waiting.
Death (Sandman #20)
Yixing smells him first before he even sees him. He is bent over a body, human with eyes closed and head lulled to the side. Dead.
There’s black smoke coming out from the ventilation of the narrow room. Luhan smells of ozone, burning incense and decay.
“Come out,” Yixing says.
The smoke curls into itself and Luhan materializes in front of him, stepping out of the shadow.
“You can’t have him,” Yixing says before Luhan even voices out his intention.
Luhan tsks and circles around him like a predator to a prey. Yixing holds his ground, calm and unhurried. There is certainty in his demeanor.
“You can’t have him,” Yixing repeats. He eases the lifeless body on to his lap.
Yixing is the kind of angel that governs only on certain humans - special souls who are bound to change the world. Luhan is the demon that preys on them, the one that tempts them to tip the scale. One foolish move and they can turn the wheels of how the world will be.
Luhan eyes the boy lying on the ground.
“He is mine to take,” Luhan states. “I have seen what he’s done all of his life. Give him to me.” He extends his hand out, willing Yixing to hand over the boy.
Yixing tightens his grip on to the man’s - boy’s shoulder. He looks down and sees the faint lines of the harsh life this boy had been in. Eighteen going on thirty. The boy was born in the North of the country, taken away from his family and raised by the government to be their tool for this foolish war. He had killed men older than him and managed to come out physically alive.
He sacrificed his humanity to save his family and lost himself along the way.
Yixing shakes his head at Luhan. “You can’t have him,” he repeats for the third time. It must be riling up Luhan now. He can see the annoyance seep into Luhan’s features, into the grim set of his mouth.
“His soul has been rotting and has been set up for hell even before he died,” Luhan declares.
The boy’s last mission should have been easy enough for him: infiltrate the house of a high-ranking official in the South, gather their trust and seek out information. Kill them if his cover is found. But the boy had bonded with the son of the official, saw how the son would have been the same age as his younger brother that he had left behind. The boy had lost his family in the North, but he had found his humanity again in the South. When another group of mercenaries were sent over to finish his mission, he had helped the family escape. And that was how he ended up here, lying on a pool of his own blood.
Yixing doesn’t tell Luhan what the other already knows. That the Southerner’s son will end up to become the future leader of this country, that he will remember the Northerner who saved his family, and forge a legacy by uniting the North and the South.
Yixing smiles and shakes his head.
“Only one act of true penance is enough for Father’s forgiveness.”
Luhan bristles at that comment. He doesn’t say anything more, but leaves just as quietly as he came.
-
The next time they meet, Yixing is too late. Luhan’s already there, soul clutched between his fingers.
Luhan disappears with a smile before Yixing can even take a hold of him.
The man Luhan just took was a well-known and respected scientist that heralded the era of breakthrough discoveries of super antibiotics and vaccines. Only a few people knew that he had experimented on people - young and old alike. Some were kept holed up, sedated and drugged beyond what their minds could handle. Broken and adrift in their own minds.
Maybe it’s true that a genius is only a step away from insanity.
-
The next time after that, they meet in a forest and there are no dead bodies. There are three humans though, one hidden in the shadows, gun poised on his hand, finger wavering on the trigger. The safety lock is off.
There are several options that this will play out: he pulls the trigger, kills his target and he lives; he pulls the trigger, kills his target and he gets killed by the bodyguard; he pulls the trigger, misses his target and he escapes; he pulls the trigger, misses his target and he gets killed; or he doesn’t pull the trigger at all.
Yixing hopes it’s the last. Luhan’s fine with any of the options that involve someone dying.
They watch the scene play out. Yixing gives a silent prayer.
In the end, the man leaves and doesn’t pull the trigger.
Yixing turns to face Luhan, smiles at him in relief.
“Just one true act in the face of adversity is enough for a redemption.” Yixing adds that to his list. He stretches his hand out, palms up. Come back, his hand beckons Luhan.
Luhan takes a step back and puts his hands behind his back. There’s nothing in his features that betrays his fear except Yixing knows the other too well. They grew up together after all, were together right before Luhan Sinned and Fell from Grace.
“Ask and you shall receive,” Yixing murmurs, voice so soft and tender. Several supernatural beings have said that Yixing’s voice can make even the coldest human hearts warm with Grace. But Yixing knows that back then, that title didn’t belong to him. He looks back at Luhan to see his reply.
Luhan takes another step and responds with, “Father can’t forgive me if I am not sincere.”
Yixing knows Luhan’s Sin. He was there when Luhan was casted out of Heaven.
“Don’t be greedy, Luhan.”
The other barks out a laugh. “How come humans can have it and I can’t?” Luhan’s eyes have turned on a manic glint before it fades, voice turning soft. “We can’t?”
“But there are things that we have that they don’t,” Yixing replies, his wings fluttering loose behind him.
Luhan tilts his head and meets Yixing’s gaze. For a moment, Yixing is filled with unbearable sorrow as they stare at each other.
“I’d give up my wings for love,” Luhan whispers, broken.
“I know.” Yixing shakes his head and drops his hand. “You already did.”
Yixing is the first to leave this time. He remembers the last words Luhan had said to him right before his wings were torn off from him.
If I can’t meet you in Heaven or Hell then I’ll meet you in Earth. I should have loved you sooner, then maybe we could have been together longer.
In Another Lifetime
Lay/Luhan
1396 words
Trope: soulmates AU
Yixing’s life always begins and ends with death.
Note: The idea for this fic came from 25 lives by tongari.
in another lifetime
The drizzle picks up as Yixing jogs over to the nearest café. It’s the tail end of spring, but the news says that summer’s coming in late this year and the spring showers don’t seem like they’re ending soon. He doesn’t mind; he’s always preferred the coolness of spring compared to the sweltering heat of summer. There are raindrops on his jacket and he shakes them off as he enters the café. The bell chimes at his arrival.
There’s a man behind the counter, back turned to him and seemingly busy. Yixing stops what he’s doing.
The man turns and greets him. “Good morning!” He’s smiling and, for a moment, Yixing is speechless. His eyes wander to the nametag pinned by his breast. It reads, in a simple and neat font, “Luhan.”
“Are you ready to order?” Luhan asks. “Or do you need more time?”
Yixing knows that voice. Heard it in his dreams. The headache that he’s been harboring for months stops, but he feels a different ache somewhere behind his rib cage.
“I’d like to have a few minutes,” Yixing replies. He grabs a menu just as Luhan is reaching for it and their hands brush against each other. Yixing feels the world rearrange around them, brighter and painful at the same time. He picks a table by the window and mindlessly flips through the menu, eyes never leaving Luhan’s shadow.
-
When Yixing was twelve he finished the last notebook, a part of a stack, where he logged a semi-detailed report of his past lives. This is his 31st life in the past half of a millennium. For Yixing, life always begins and ends with death.
The first memory he remembered upon opening his small eyes as a baby, trying to adjust under the fluorescent lights of a Beijing hospital, was how he’d died in his previous 30th life: car crash - instant and brilliant.
Over the course of the years, he had slowly recollected pieces of his lives in dreams and waking moments and organized that information in his collection of notes. He appreciated that fate had kept him in China. The smoggy and busy environment is a familiar place to him.
Yixing’s most memorable lives were the ones where he and Luhan were lovers. The ones where they met, fell in mutual love and experienced life together. The sad part was that those lives never seem to last too long. The longest time he had with Luhan as his husband - lover, was only ten years before Yixing had succumbed to pneumonia. It was during World War II and antibiotics weren’t as potent as they are now.
There were a handful of times where Yixing had been too late. In those lifetimes, Luhan had other lovers. Yixing doesn’t keep log of their names and faces because he doesn’t want to remember the hurt and betrayal he felt and pass it on to their reincarnations. He told himself - brainwashed - that he’d have to be content being in the same plane and universe as the other.
There were other lives, too, where they had been enemies, battling for different countries, beliefs or purpose. He almost always died on Luhan’s hands during those times, usually too distracted in seeing him that he would let his guard down.
Yixing wasn’t always the one who died first. Sometimes it was Luhan.
His worst luck though were the ones where he had never met Luhan. Those were his loneliest and the years seemed to stretch too long before death took him. Sometimes, it was insanity that came first.
Those were the times where he had yearned for the throbbing pain of his headache that hints that he’s about to meet the other. Unnatural headaches that increase in intensity as fate draws him to the other man more and more and finally stop when they meet. But the headache is usually replaced almost immediately of a specific dream. He had learned, over the span of half a millennium, that the dream signals his death.
It starts out innocent enough: just following a little girl running in eternal whiteness holding a balloon with bells inside. He understood that the closer he got to her, the closer he was to his death. But no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t help himself from chasing after her.
On his 8th life, he realized the trigger to his dream was Luhan. Or rather, anything that involved expressing his love to the man or pursuing him. Yixing thinks he’s worth it though. Luhan and their multiple lifetimes are worth it, even if they all end in death and heartbreak as long he sees him. Even for a moment.
By his 30th life on Earth, he decided to test out his theory about Luhan.
On Yixing’s previous life, he was a boy that was born and grew up in Changsha, China who somehow ended up in Korea in pursuit of his dreams. Korea was where he met Luhan and they had been two-twelfths of an idol boy group. Their life together had extended way past the expiration date of their band and transitioned into a lifetime of brotherhood.
That was his longest life with Luhan, but they hadn’t been anything but platonic.
That was his favorite lifetime.
It was during the tail end of their 35th anniversary of meeting each other in the SM building that Yixing died in a car crash. There was no warning sign, no strange dreams. His only regret was that he never managed to love Luhan as freely and as much as he could have. He wished he could have changed that.
When Yixing woke up for his 31st life, it was in a hospital in Beijing with his new mother carrying him in her arms.
-
Luhan steps out of the counter and makes his way towards him. Yixing lowers his eyes and scans the menu briefly just as Luhan asks, “Ready to order?”
He gets a simple sandwich and a tall glass of wintermelon tea. When Luhan comes back a few minutes after, Yixing engages him in a conversation. It’s a slow day so Luhan indulges him, talks about the new town he’d just wandered in. After ten minutes of talking, Luhan unconsciously sits down in front of Yixing, their conversation flowing seamlessly.
Yixing notices the minute differences of this Luhan from all his predecessors. This Luhan’s nose slopes differently, a rounder jaw but, oddly enough, he also has the same scar on his lip from his previous lifetime. He’s still beautiful though. Time and time again.
Luhan seems to notice where he’s looking and rubs his lip absently.
“I got this when I fell and landed on broken shards of glass,” Luhan offers him the information and grins. “Hurt like no other. But it’s a souvenir. A reminder to be more careful.”
Yixing’s mind turns distant and asks, “Did you fall off the second floor of a building?”
“What?” Luhan blurts, laughing. “I would have died if I did! I just tripped on something when I fell. I know, so stupid.”
You wouldn’t die, Yixing wants to say. It’s been tried and tested. But Yixing won’t risk testing that theory either.
He must have been still staring at Luhan’s lips because the silence becomes awkward. Luhan licks his lip nervously. Yixing resists the urge to lean in so instead - “Do you want to have lunch tomorrow?”
He sees Luhan swallow, watches as his Adam’s apple bob fast on his throat.
“I-” Luhan begins then smiles apologetically. “I have work tomorrow.”
“I see.” Yixing deflates a bit internally, but his gaze doesn’t waver.
“I get off at five though…” Luhan trails off, ducking his head and standing up. Yixing catches the way Luhan’s mouth tugged at the corners.
“Dinner then.” Yixing gives Luhan one of his dimpled smiles. The one that makes old women pinch his cheeks. “I can drop by here at five thirty.”
“I’ll think about it,” is Luhan’s reply.
After Yixing finishes his meal, just as the café gets more customers, Luhan drops him his bill on a small tray. Underneath is a tissue paper with a phone number and a message:
Pick me up at six and we’ll call it a date.
-
When Yixing sleeps that night he dreams of a little girl and wakes up to the sound of ringing bells.
Texting by Dummies
Lay/Kris
739 words
Trope: secret relationships
Yixing has five new messages, all from the same person.
texting by dummies
The welcome jolt of cold air hits Yixing as he enters the hotel room. It’s been a long day, doing an outdoor shoot wearing two layers too many on a hot and muggy summer morning. He drops his bag on the floor and the studs snatch on the fabric of the bed right before he slides down to it.
Yixing rolls over and takes out his phone that’s poking from his back pocket. It has five new messages all from the same person - Jennifer, written on top of each message.
The first one came in about three hours ago. Yixing remembers that he was still posing in a random, blocked off back alley back then.
It reads: i’m bored.
The second one is, entertain me, followed by, are u busy, then a belated ?. The last message is blank, seemingly there just to be annoying.
Had a photoshoot, Yixing replies. He looks at the clock and counts the time backwards to Toronto. Kris is probably asleep right now.
He isn’t, though, because Yixing’s phone lights up as another message appears.
thought u were giving me the silent treatment
Kris only gets this annoying and clingy and honest when he’s had too much sugar or caffeine or alcohol. He votes for the last one.
i wasn’t. go to sleep, he types back. The reply is fast this time, can’t sleep. how’s thailand?
Yixing stretches his back and arms across the bed before he replies. Hotel beds always seem to have this intoxicating way of pulling him into relaxation. No matter how much Yixing tries to turn his bed into some kind of faux hotel bed, it never feels the same. And it’s not for lack of trying - he’s even changed his mattress and bought the same brand of bed sheets. Maybe it’s something in the air. Maybe he should check out hotel aromatherapy voodoo next.
The lull of the bed is pulling him in and if Kris can’t sleep, that doesn’t mean that Yixing can’t as well. It’s still afternoon, but naps are treasured in this industry. Yixing wants to type out, Kris. Capitalized with a period in the end, but he remembers the codename.
Jennifer, he types out instead, thailand is great. food is delicious. the people are very hospitable.
Jennifer is the name he had picked when he saved the number from a seemingly random text message he received a year ago, a week after Kris left the group in the midst of their first solo concert tour. Somehow, he instantly knew who it was even though he kept receiving other messages from their fans.
The message had been: are u mad?
Yixing didn’t respond. For some unknown reason, he had saved the number and put it as Jennifer because it was the first English name that came to his mind. He deleted Kris’s old number afterwards.
It took him three months before he replied without his fingers shaking. It was a simple, yes. Anger and bitterness are tiring and they take a toll over a person. It’s a running joke in EXO that Yixing’s already weighed down by the world on his shoulders even before that incident happened. Yixing’s already had enough of most of it and he thought he should take matters to his own hands. That was why, when Kris texted him again, he answered back and continued doing so.
He’s mostly okay about it now. It’s been over a year, and he thinks he’s been okay with it for a while already. Sometimes, the pain of being left behind, left without a clue, still aches but he’s coping better. Loyalty is important to Yixing, but so is friendship.
Yixing’s phone blinks and he’s pulled out of his thoughts. how are the others?
He thinks some of the others are getting there, too. Some more than the others, because he can still see the way Tao stiffens at the mention of his name or the way Sehun deflates. But that’s hardly a reaction now compared to how it was back then.
ask them yourself, Yixing responds then adds, i’m going to sleep. u should too.
Yixing flips his phone over the table so he doesn’t see its blinking lights and burrows himself further into the bed. The duvet is a warm, soft comfort around him, his cheek smushed against the memory foam pillow. When he dreams, it’s of friends and laughter and bright futures.
Till Death Do Us Part
Lay/Luhan
1399 words
Trope: fantasy AU
Yixing’s duty is to deliver great souls into heaven. Luhan’s job is to drag them to hell.
till death do us part
When the first living thing existed, I was there, waiting.
Death (Sandman #20)
Yixing smells him first before he even sees him. He is bent over a body, human with eyes closed and head lulled to the side. Dead.
There’s black smoke coming out from the ventilation of the narrow room. Luhan smells of ozone, burning incense and decay.
“Come out,” Yixing says.
The smoke curls into itself and Luhan materializes in front of him, stepping out of the shadow.
“You can’t have him,” Yixing says before Luhan even voices out his intention.
Luhan tsks and circles around him like a predator to a prey. Yixing holds his ground, calm and unhurried. There is certainty in his demeanor.
“You can’t have him,” Yixing repeats. He eases the lifeless body on to his lap.
Yixing is the kind of angel that governs only on certain humans - special souls who are bound to change the world. Luhan is the demon that preys on them, the one that tempts them to tip the scale. One foolish move and they can turn the wheels of how the world will be.
Luhan eyes the boy lying on the ground.
“He is mine to take,” Luhan states. “I have seen what he’s done all of his life. Give him to me.” He extends his hand out, willing Yixing to hand over the boy.
Yixing tightens his grip on to the man’s - boy’s shoulder. He looks down and sees the faint lines of the harsh life this boy had been in. Eighteen going on thirty. The boy was born in the North of the country, taken away from his family and raised by the government to be their tool for this foolish war. He had killed men older than him and managed to come out physically alive.
He sacrificed his humanity to save his family and lost himself along the way.
Yixing shakes his head at Luhan. “You can’t have him,” he repeats for the third time. It must be riling up Luhan now. He can see the annoyance seep into Luhan’s features, into the grim set of his mouth.
“His soul has been rotting and has been set up for hell even before he died,” Luhan declares.
The boy’s last mission should have been easy enough for him: infiltrate the house of a high-ranking official in the South, gather their trust and seek out information. Kill them if his cover is found. But the boy had bonded with the son of the official, saw how the son would have been the same age as his younger brother that he had left behind. The boy had lost his family in the North, but he had found his humanity again in the South. When another group of mercenaries were sent over to finish his mission, he had helped the family escape. And that was how he ended up here, lying on a pool of his own blood.
Yixing doesn’t tell Luhan what the other already knows. That the Southerner’s son will end up to become the future leader of this country, that he will remember the Northerner who saved his family, and forge a legacy by uniting the North and the South.
Yixing smiles and shakes his head.
“Only one act of true penance is enough for Father’s forgiveness.”
Luhan bristles at that comment. He doesn’t say anything more, but leaves just as quietly as he came.
-
The next time they meet, Yixing is too late. Luhan’s already there, soul clutched between his fingers.
Luhan disappears with a smile before Yixing can even take a hold of him.
The man Luhan just took was a well-known and respected scientist that heralded the era of breakthrough discoveries of super antibiotics and vaccines. Only a few people knew that he had experimented on people - young and old alike. Some were kept holed up, sedated and drugged beyond what their minds could handle. Broken and adrift in their own minds.
Maybe it’s true that a genius is only a step away from insanity.
-
The next time after that, they meet in a forest and there are no dead bodies. There are three humans though, one hidden in the shadows, gun poised on his hand, finger wavering on the trigger. The safety lock is off.
There are several options that this will play out: he pulls the trigger, kills his target and he lives; he pulls the trigger, kills his target and he gets killed by the bodyguard; he pulls the trigger, misses his target and he escapes; he pulls the trigger, misses his target and he gets killed; or he doesn’t pull the trigger at all.
Yixing hopes it’s the last. Luhan’s fine with any of the options that involve someone dying.
They watch the scene play out. Yixing gives a silent prayer.
In the end, the man leaves and doesn’t pull the trigger.
Yixing turns to face Luhan, smiles at him in relief.
“Just one true act in the face of adversity is enough for a redemption.” Yixing adds that to his list. He stretches his hand out, palms up. Come back, his hand beckons Luhan.
Luhan takes a step back and puts his hands behind his back. There’s nothing in his features that betrays his fear except Yixing knows the other too well. They grew up together after all, were together right before Luhan Sinned and Fell from Grace.
“Ask and you shall receive,” Yixing murmurs, voice so soft and tender. Several supernatural beings have said that Yixing’s voice can make even the coldest human hearts warm with Grace. But Yixing knows that back then, that title didn’t belong to him. He looks back at Luhan to see his reply.
Luhan takes another step and responds with, “Father can’t forgive me if I am not sincere.”
Yixing knows Luhan’s Sin. He was there when Luhan was casted out of Heaven.
“Don’t be greedy, Luhan.”
The other barks out a laugh. “How come humans can have it and I can’t?” Luhan’s eyes have turned on a manic glint before it fades, voice turning soft. “We can’t?”
“But there are things that we have that they don’t,” Yixing replies, his wings fluttering loose behind him.
Luhan tilts his head and meets Yixing’s gaze. For a moment, Yixing is filled with unbearable sorrow as they stare at each other.
“I’d give up my wings for love,” Luhan whispers, broken.
“I know.” Yixing shakes his head and drops his hand. “You already did.”
Yixing is the first to leave this time. He remembers the last words Luhan had said to him right before his wings were torn off from him.
If I can’t meet you in Heaven or Hell then I’ll meet you in Earth. I should have loved you sooner, then maybe we could have been together longer.
In Another Lifetime
Lay/Luhan
1396 words
Trope: soulmates AU
Yixing’s life always begins and ends with death.
Note: The idea for this fic came from 25 lives by tongari.
in another lifetime
The drizzle picks up as Yixing jogs over to the nearest café. It’s the tail end of spring, but the news says that summer’s coming in late this year and the spring showers don’t seem like they’re ending soon. He doesn’t mind; he’s always preferred the coolness of spring compared to the sweltering heat of summer. There are raindrops on his jacket and he shakes them off as he enters the café. The bell chimes at his arrival.
There’s a man behind the counter, back turned to him and seemingly busy. Yixing stops what he’s doing.
The man turns and greets him. “Good morning!” He’s smiling and, for a moment, Yixing is speechless. His eyes wander to the nametag pinned by his breast. It reads, in a simple and neat font, “Luhan.”
“Are you ready to order?” Luhan asks. “Or do you need more time?”
Yixing knows that voice. Heard it in his dreams. The headache that he’s been harboring for months stops, but he feels a different ache somewhere behind his rib cage.
“I’d like to have a few minutes,” Yixing replies. He grabs a menu just as Luhan is reaching for it and their hands brush against each other. Yixing feels the world rearrange around them, brighter and painful at the same time. He picks a table by the window and mindlessly flips through the menu, eyes never leaving Luhan’s shadow.
-
When Yixing was twelve he finished the last notebook, a part of a stack, where he logged a semi-detailed report of his past lives. This is his 31st life in the past half of a millennium. For Yixing, life always begins and ends with death.
The first memory he remembered upon opening his small eyes as a baby, trying to adjust under the fluorescent lights of a Beijing hospital, was how he’d died in his previous 30th life: car crash - instant and brilliant.
Over the course of the years, he had slowly recollected pieces of his lives in dreams and waking moments and organized that information in his collection of notes. He appreciated that fate had kept him in China. The smoggy and busy environment is a familiar place to him.
Yixing’s most memorable lives were the ones where he and Luhan were lovers. The ones where they met, fell in mutual love and experienced life together. The sad part was that those lives never seem to last too long. The longest time he had with Luhan as his husband - lover, was only ten years before Yixing had succumbed to pneumonia. It was during World War II and antibiotics weren’t as potent as they are now.
There were a handful of times where Yixing had been too late. In those lifetimes, Luhan had other lovers. Yixing doesn’t keep log of their names and faces because he doesn’t want to remember the hurt and betrayal he felt and pass it on to their reincarnations. He told himself - brainwashed - that he’d have to be content being in the same plane and universe as the other.
There were other lives, too, where they had been enemies, battling for different countries, beliefs or purpose. He almost always died on Luhan’s hands during those times, usually too distracted in seeing him that he would let his guard down.
Yixing wasn’t always the one who died first. Sometimes it was Luhan.
His worst luck though were the ones where he had never met Luhan. Those were his loneliest and the years seemed to stretch too long before death took him. Sometimes, it was insanity that came first.
Those were the times where he had yearned for the throbbing pain of his headache that hints that he’s about to meet the other. Unnatural headaches that increase in intensity as fate draws him to the other man more and more and finally stop when they meet. But the headache is usually replaced almost immediately of a specific dream. He had learned, over the span of half a millennium, that the dream signals his death.
It starts out innocent enough: just following a little girl running in eternal whiteness holding a balloon with bells inside. He understood that the closer he got to her, the closer he was to his death. But no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t help himself from chasing after her.
On his 8th life, he realized the trigger to his dream was Luhan. Or rather, anything that involved expressing his love to the man or pursuing him. Yixing thinks he’s worth it though. Luhan and their multiple lifetimes are worth it, even if they all end in death and heartbreak as long he sees him. Even for a moment.
By his 30th life on Earth, he decided to test out his theory about Luhan.
On Yixing’s previous life, he was a boy that was born and grew up in Changsha, China who somehow ended up in Korea in pursuit of his dreams. Korea was where he met Luhan and they had been two-twelfths of an idol boy group. Their life together had extended way past the expiration date of their band and transitioned into a lifetime of brotherhood.
That was his longest life with Luhan, but they hadn’t been anything but platonic.
That was his favorite lifetime.
It was during the tail end of their 35th anniversary of meeting each other in the SM building that Yixing died in a car crash. There was no warning sign, no strange dreams. His only regret was that he never managed to love Luhan as freely and as much as he could have. He wished he could have changed that.
When Yixing woke up for his 31st life, it was in a hospital in Beijing with his new mother carrying him in her arms.
-
Luhan steps out of the counter and makes his way towards him. Yixing lowers his eyes and scans the menu briefly just as Luhan asks, “Ready to order?”
He gets a simple sandwich and a tall glass of wintermelon tea. When Luhan comes back a few minutes after, Yixing engages him in a conversation. It’s a slow day so Luhan indulges him, talks about the new town he’d just wandered in. After ten minutes of talking, Luhan unconsciously sits down in front of Yixing, their conversation flowing seamlessly.
Yixing notices the minute differences of this Luhan from all his predecessors. This Luhan’s nose slopes differently, a rounder jaw but, oddly enough, he also has the same scar on his lip from his previous lifetime. He’s still beautiful though. Time and time again.
Luhan seems to notice where he’s looking and rubs his lip absently.
“I got this when I fell and landed on broken shards of glass,” Luhan offers him the information and grins. “Hurt like no other. But it’s a souvenir. A reminder to be more careful.”
Yixing’s mind turns distant and asks, “Did you fall off the second floor of a building?”
“What?” Luhan blurts, laughing. “I would have died if I did! I just tripped on something when I fell. I know, so stupid.”
You wouldn’t die, Yixing wants to say. It’s been tried and tested. But Yixing won’t risk testing that theory either.
He must have been still staring at Luhan’s lips because the silence becomes awkward. Luhan licks his lip nervously. Yixing resists the urge to lean in so instead - “Do you want to have lunch tomorrow?”
He sees Luhan swallow, watches as his Adam’s apple bob fast on his throat.
“I-” Luhan begins then smiles apologetically. “I have work tomorrow.”
“I see.” Yixing deflates a bit internally, but his gaze doesn’t waver.
“I get off at five though…” Luhan trails off, ducking his head and standing up. Yixing catches the way Luhan’s mouth tugged at the corners.
“Dinner then.” Yixing gives Luhan one of his dimpled smiles. The one that makes old women pinch his cheeks. “I can drop by here at five thirty.”
“I’ll think about it,” is Luhan’s reply.
After Yixing finishes his meal, just as the café gets more customers, Luhan drops him his bill on a small tray. Underneath is a tissue paper with a phone number and a message:
Pick me up at six and we’ll call it a date.
-
When Yixing sleeps that night he dreams of a little girl and wakes up to the sound of ringing bells.