Work Text:
I wonder if you know
How it feels to let you go?
Sometimes, Sizhui dreams.
They're often vague, of course, like most dreams are, jumbled thoughts and connections from his day. But sometimes, especially ever since Wei-Qianbei's return, they are memories. Mostly, that's wonderful. He knows so little of his family that he relishes in every crumb of information his dreams can provide. So when this one starts, Sizhui is delighted at first.
These feelings are soon drown in a thick sheen of dread.
"Baba? Where is everyone?", the voice is small, and it is his own. There are arms around him, warm and safe, but they are trembling. In none of his other dreams had he called someone Baba, but he knows immediately who it is and his heart aches.
"A-Yuan." the voice that answers is just as quiet, but the chest he's wrapped around vibrates with its baritone. He knows this voice, it's familiar to him by now as much as any other. Xian-gege, he thinks. Wei-Qianbei. The steps that Xian-gege takes are fast, hurried, and his breathing is labored. They reach an outside, and the air smells of dust and something that Sizhui now knows to be death. Rain pours down around them, hitting Xian-gege -Baba- but barely finding A-Yuan as he's wrapped in fabric so tightly, cocooned for protection from the elements -and far more sinister things. Far off, there are voices, and he hears a desperate sound from Xian-gege's throat. "They can't get to you, I won't let them, you hear me?"
"Okay", he answers, face buried deeper into baba's warmth as the voices get louder, accompanied by other sounds, the clashing of metal that he only now knows is the sound of fighting.
"Shit.", Xian-gege is cursing, and since he does not hide it, A-Yuan is even more worried. Normally, Auntie Qing says he shouldn't, she always hits him in the arm for it and tells him A-Yuan is going to have a filthy mouth. But instead of anyone hitting him, Xian-gege just pulls A-Yuan to himself tighter, wrapping his robes around and above him to shield from the rain and starting to pick up his pace.
He stops, suddenly, in front of a tree. It's bigger than the others around, and there's a small hollow inside. A-Yian can barely see, and Sizhui briefly thinks that that might have been intentional. That he catches glimpses of blood mixed into the rain.
"A-Yuan, baby. Listen to me", Xian-gege's voice is trembling now and A-Yuan is doing his best not to cry, because he's supposed to listen, right? Baba's voice is so serious, and it normally never is, and this is all very scary.
"Baba, I'm scared.", he says as much, knowing he should always say how he feels, that's what you're supposed to do, right? Xian-gege sets him onto the muddy ground carefully, and smiles, but it's accompanied by a shaky hand on his hair, smoothing out a bump in the mess, straightening out his robes. A-Yuan's hands fist in his sleeves, not wanting to lose contact completely, hating the cold drops of rain on his head instead of his baba's warmth.
"I know. I'm sorry. I just...we're playing hide and seek, okay? Like we always used to? I need you to be very still and quiet for a bit. Can you do that for your Baba, A-Yuan?" The shaking hand is now carefully stroking strands of hair behind his ear, and he looks at his Xian-gege's face. There's a smile, but it's so shaky, clearly read as fake, even to his little, inexperienced eyes. But A-Yuan is a brave boy, so he nods.
"Good, I'll be back as quick as I can, okay? Just a little bit." he makes a tiny gesture with his fingers, his hands lingering on A-Yuan's shoulders. He glances to the hollow in the tree, then back to A-Yuan, pressing his lips together and worrying at the bottom one as if in thought. Finally, he takes a deep breath and pulls A-Yuan back in, hugging him so tightly that it almost hurts. A-Yuan does not complain, because he wants to stay like that, he doesn't want baba to leave him behind.
"I love you so much, baby, I hope you know that. It'll be okay, yeah? I'll be right back." his voice is wet, somehow, and A-Yuan clings his little arms around his neck, because Xian-gege never says this stuff, he just shows it, and that's just making this all worse, because it doesn't feel temporary, and he doesn't want to say bye-bye, that's already happened so often...
There's a warm feeling to his back, a gentle red glow illuminating the misty, wet darkness around them. Sizhui knows it must be a talisman being activated, but A-Yuan is just puzzled at the sudden dizziness, and his inability to move.
"Xian-gege, don't go!" he hears himself mumble, almost incoherent now, and the arms around him tighten. "Baba!", he tries to cry out as loud as he can, but the noise is muffled by the effects of the talisman and the fabric he's now buried in. Xian-gege's voice is barely able to muffle an outright sob.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, A-Yuan." and the warmth around him loosens at the same time that the hollow of the tree moves above him, enclosing him in darkness.
Far in the future and far away in Cloud Recess, Sizhui bolts upright with the next clap of thunder.
And before you
I had nowhere to run to
Nothing to hold on to
I came so close to giving it up.
It's past midnight and there's a knock on the Jingshi door.
Barely audible over the thunder outside, Wei Wuxian almost doesn’t hear it. But it comes again, and then the door slides open. Lan Zhan's sleep is light, but Wei Wuxian has already been awake, tossing and turning with the thunder in his ears. It still happens sometimes, and thunderstorms always remind him of Yunmeng.
So he untangles himself from his husband's arms as gently as possible and tightens the sleep robe around him. The door slides shut behind whoever has entered with a quiet thud just as the next thunder roars.
Wei Wuxian steps into the entrance, around the screen, just to see none other than Sizhui standing there in the next flash of lightning, wet to the bone and still in his own sleeping robe.
"Sizhui?", he asks, because the boy looks like he's seen a ghost as he's almost as white as his dripping robes. But when Wei Wuxian says his name, he looks up and meets his eyes, and takes a sudden, shuddering breath.
"Baba", the sound his voice makes then can't be described as anything else than a whimper, and Wei Wuxian doesn't even have to think before he's already moving forward to catch Sizhui -A-Yuan!- before he falls, as he struggles to stumble towards him in turn. Their arms close around each other and A-Yuan clings to him like his life depends on it, his face immediately buried into his night robes. Wei Wuxian doesn't even care that he's soon to be soaked, he just slides down to the wooden floor with his child in his arms and gently strokes his back, swallowing down his own confusion to make soothing shushing noises. Because in his mind, A-Yuan still is and always was, his. Ever since his return, they struggled towards deeper familiarity. Wei Wuxian thinks it a pretty smooth transition, with how sweet A-Yuan is, but he still calls him Wei-Quanbei, most of the time. Never was it Xian-gege , or Baba , as he had started to call him shortly before Jin Ling had been born. So the familiarity of the word stikes him, of course, but he does not say anything.
"Shhhh, it's alright, A-Yuan. Everything is alright.", he whispers into his hair as he drives his fingers through it, the other still drawing circles on the boy's back.
"Wei Ying? Is that-" Lan Zhan's voice comes from behind him and Wei Wuxian carefully turns with Sizhui still in his arms, gesturing for Lan Zhan to be quiet. But Sizhui suddenly looks up, and there are tears on his face, his eyes are swollen and red. Wei Wuxian wants to punch whoever made this happen.
"A-Die-" he swallows thickly. Damn, Wei Wuxian hasn't heard him actually address Lan Zhan that way in a while. "A-Die when you found me in the Burial Mounds, was I hidden in a tree?"
The world freezes and Wei Wuxian with it.
His memories of the siege are hazy at best and nonexistent at other points. But that moment, the point where he knew that he had to hide A-Yuan so long as he still could, so at least his precious little baby could survive all that... that would never leave his memory. He stood by that tree for several minutes, forcing down the misery and the tears, telling himself that somehow, he would make it back. Somehow, A-Yuan had to get out of there.
His husband's voice pulls him back to the present.
"Yes. You were sleeping in a hollow tree. There was a t-"
"Talisman on my back. Oh no." a shaky breath wrecks through him and he clings back to Wei Wuxian, his fingers digging into his red night robes. "I just dreamed about that. About you putting me in there. I-" a choked sob silences his voice and Wei Wuxian feels himself draw him closer, stroking through the long, wet strands of hair.
"Oh, A-Yuan." he feels his brows draw together while he thinks about what to say. Lan Zhan's hand, appearing like a warm anchor on his lower back, grounds him momentarily, and he tries to draw strength from it. He has never spoken of this day, not even to Lan Zhan, and especially not of this moment. His heart is squeezing tightly in his chest. It seems necessary, now, to explain at least a little bit. So he swallows down his unease, all the pain and nostalgia, and tries to focus just on A-Yuan, because he is still here, somehow, miraculously, alive and well, but right now shaking.
"We tried to keep you away in the cave, but they were starting to close in. I couldn't let them-" his voice dies, and he took a deep breath to calm it again. "You hid in there sometimes, when we played hide and seek. I figured at least one of them would get out, run away, and find you. Or that even if things turned bad, I could-" he presses his lips together, not able to go on. Another soothing motion, and he kisses A-Yuan's hair, taking in the smell of rain from outside and trying to ignore the ache in his stomach at the realization that after all these years, he still smells the same.
"I wish...I try not to regret things, you know. It just...it just leads down a dark path and I can't change anything from the past anyway. But most of all, I just wish I could have been here for you-"
"Wei Ying."
"Baba, no. That's not-" A-Yuan tears himself away, but his fists are still full of Wei Wuxian's night robes. It'll take some time to get used to that name again, he knows, but he would never, ever complain, because it fills his heart with such warmth that he is barely able to contain it. A stark contrast to the heartache from thinking back on this. "I know, Baba. I know you didn't want to leave me there. I just ... seeing you there, I can't- I was happy here, with A-Die and bobo and everyone.'' The assurance is welcome, but Wei Wuxian knows that his eyes are still filled with tears. Lan Zhan's hand is squeezing his back slightly and his warm presence is still there, not coming closer as to not infringe on their moment. He appreciates the lanterns that Lan Zhan turned on, so at least they don’t rely on the lightning flashes any longer. "But I still knew, deep down, that something was missing. I just... you were so desperate, and little me knew something was wrong. I wanted you to stay so badly." the last part is murmured again, his eyes not meeting Wei Wuxian's. He can't help but laugh, and it's a little airy, while he strokes A-Yuan's unruly hairs behind his ears,
"Believe me, I wanted nothing more, my little radish. Of course I couldn't hide anything from you, huh. So perceptive." he feels himself smiling, and it's not even that shaky now as he nudges a knuckle into A-Yuan's little nose. Of course, it isn't as small as it used to be, but it is still the same shape, and his eyes gave the same little amused twinkle as an answer, and that is good enough for him. Sizhui shifts on his feet, shivering just a tiny bit, then looking up at Lan Zhan, then back at him.
"I know it's late, I'm sorry to have woken you.", he finally says, lips pressed together and eyebrows creased in worry.
"It is no problem.", Lan Zhan says immediately, and Wei Wuxian nods enthusiastically.
"A-Yuaaaan. Of course you can wake us, that must have been so distressing. I'm glad you came here instead of hiding away, mh." he smiles again and combs a few fingers through his son's -his son's!!!- hair. "We're your parents, right? You can tell us anything you wish." he chuckles, a grin spreading on his face. "Of course, on some topics I understand if you don't want to." The wiggle of his eyebrows earns him a small chuckle from A-Yuan and a quiet huff from Lan Zhan. But they're both smiling now, too, so it is definitely worth it.
"Baba!" Sizhui hides his head in his hands for a second, trying to hide the blush that starts to creep up. Now it just sounds like he's saying it to test it out on his tongue more and less like it's out of the dream, and he just took it over. Maybe he is waiting for one of them to stop him, but that will never happen. As soon as A-Yuan calms down however, he hesitates, right back to treading from foot to foot carefully. "Can....can I...stay here tonight? I know I'm supposed to be in the dorms, but-"
"Of course. Your room is still as it was.", this time, Lan Zhan ignores the rule against interrupting. Good, because Wei Wuxian would have done it if he hadn't. As if their son has to feel bad about wanting to stay in the Jingshi for the night. If anyone tries to give them shit about that, he would personally make sure they stay quiet about it in the future.
"Come on, let's get you some dry robes, mh?" Wei Wuxian slings his arm around him and guides him further inside. "I think mine should almost fit you by now! You've gotten so big, aaah, you make me feel old, you know?"
He does not miss the fond smile Lan Zhan shoots them both, or the way he excuses himself to make them tea before they all sit together to talk. Sleep is far from their mind, that night. After Sizhui is bathed and in fresh robes, Wei Wuxian tells him stories about his childhood freely, leaning against Lan Zhan's warm side, so the nostalgia doesn't swallow him whole.
'Cause all my life I've felt this way
But I could never find the words to say
Stay, stay.
It's wonderful, Sizhui thinks. He holds his Baba's hand all night, until he finally does fall asleep, because he feels somehow exhausted. Even then, as his eyelids drift shut, a gentle thumb runs over his skin while a familiar melody is hanging in the air.
It has been strange, he thinks, finding out about this whole other part of his life. But this, this he does not mind. Somehow, despite everything, he can not find it in himself to feel bitter. He has never been left behind, not truly.
The loss stings, the more he finds out, the more he wants to grieve for all the family he never really knew. But he has his baba and uncle Ning to fill him in, and they are both in his life now, both said they would stay.
That is more than enough, he thinks.
So change your mind
And say you're mine.
Don't leave tonight
Stay.