Chapter Text
Tannoy systems and squeaking shoes. That is the sound of a hospital on a busy day. That is the sound of Lanling Central Hospital on a Wednesday morning before it’s even seven am. On early spring days like these when the sun hasn’t risen yet, the corridors are dazzlingly white from overhead lights and the bags under everyone’s eyes seem just that more pronounced. The place is a flurry of white coats and blue scrubs, well-organised chaos. Meng Yao walks through it with the confidence of a man who has applied the oil to this machine for many years and knows just how to make it purr.
“This is the nurse’s station.”
Meng Yao turns to the interns. All fifteen of them come to an abrupt halt. It gets very close to a full-on domino effect, and he watches with a serene smile whilst they brush themselves off and bite their nails and scuff their trainers against the floor. A symposium of newbies, an audience of amateurs. Their eyes dart about their new work environment, fidgety and flighty like little birds. The collective noun for a group of interns is a naivety.
“This is where me and my colleagues are typically based.” Meng Yao takes a file from the hand of a doctor who passes it to him without even a cursory smile. “If we aren’t here, we’re helping a patient. Or very occasionally, on a break. This is Nurse Su and this is Nurse Luo.”
Su She and MianMian don’t look up from their paperwork as they wave.
“We are naturally here to assist with any and all procedures you might need assistance with. We understand that the last thing you want to do is to page your Attending Doctor the first time you’re inserting a breathing tube. It’s a nerve-wracking experience, being an intern and being expected to take real responsibility for the first time. Unfortunately, we don’t have time to remind you of your med-school training and do those sorts of procedures for you if you find yourself paralysed with fear, so I recommend you do some revision and bite the bullet.”
Meng Yao smiles at the interns, turns on his heel and glides down the corridor. He can hear them jogging to catch up. One old patient rolling an IV with him wobbles towards them, and just as Meng Yao’s about to head over to him, Wen Ning pops out of the room looking a little harrowed.
“No no, Mr. Shen, your room is here. Please don’t get lost again, it took me so long last time to find you when you wound up in the store cupboard…”
Coming to a stop, the interns stumble behind him. Meng Yao extends his left arm like a flight-attendant, his smile just as perfunctory. “This is the break room. There is an on-call room on every floor in the event that you have to stay the night or do back-to-back shifts. This is not the place to take a nap, because in all likelihood, Doctor Wei will eventually turn up and disrupt any peaceful slumber with his shrill voice.
“Straight ahead is the second entrance to the A&E wing,” Meng Yao continues as he restarts his brisk pace. "Two days a month you will be required to do an A&E shift with the other on-call staff.”
“Oh!” One intern skips to his side, three pens tucked into the pocket of her shirt scrubs. “I’m actually doing that tomorrow, according to the schedule.”
He purses his lips and gives her a sweet smile. “A baptism by fire is often the best way to learn,” he says, with a hint of condolences.
The intern blinks, slows her pace until she’s walking behind him again.
“This is the elevator, which I do not advise that you use because it can take forever to arrive. The stairwell is there. You’ll be getting a lot of exercise during your time here.
“Over here is the cafeteria. Your name-tag acts as a top-up card, so you don’t need to bring cash. If you want to get fries for lunch, you need to arrive early. Before 11:30.
“And looping back around to the nurse’s station.”
The interns gaggle around him. It makes him feel like a mother-duck, in not a particularly good way. Interns are an irritation. They fuck up routine procedures out of nervousness or arrogance. The ones who don’t drop out have to have such things whipped out of them by the relentlessness of being a junior doctor. It means that every time Meng Yao wants to get gauze from the store cupboard, he has to walk in on a crying twenty-five-year-old on the phone to their mother because ‘it’s so much harder than I imagined’.
And, somehow, the nurses are the ones they think they can come crying to. The ones they can blame their mistakes on. The ones they think they can page because they’re too scared to put in the IV themselves for the first time and they can’t find the vein.
The doomed A&E intern raises her hand, before perhaps realising that that’s a silly thing to do. It might be Meng Yao’s patient smile that makes her reassess and hesitate. “Um. Just to say, thank you for showing us around when you’re so busy. It’s really—”
“We aren’t finished, yet.” Meng Yao makes for the nearest stairwell. “Let’s head upstairs. Keep up, please.”
The interns follow. He manages a shared side-glance with MianMian, who mimes shooting herself in the head. Meng Yao purses his lips and takes the stairs two at a time. He can hear them shuffling and panting.
“Why do we have to take the stairs again?”
Meng Yao stops at the top of the flight, looking at the lagging interns. The one who said this is frowning at him reproachfully. He has the hairstyle of a man who has a hefty trust-fund. The weak chin of a man who spent his youth eating his dinners at the end of a very long table whilst his parents were on a yacht elsewhere.
“Because you’ll be fired very quickly if you’re found to be waiting for the lift when you’ve been paged for an emergency. You’ll need to get used to it.”
He hears a tch when he turns his back to them and swings open the doors into the relatively quiet first floor.
“First floor has rheumatology, cardiology, and oncology. Surgery is across the bridge in the west wing, which I believe Dr Wen will be showing you tomorrow— she’s in surgery all day today, unfortunately.”
Gurneys pass through the corridor. Nurses jog past him with the occasional wave, which he reciprocates. The squeak of the interns’ hurried footsteps behind him urges him onwards.
There are many things that keep Meng Yao coming back to the hospital. One of those reasons is the friends he has made here, as unlikely as it seemed that he ever would. Another reason is his genuine passion for his job; he wants to help people, and more than that, he wants to be so astonishingly good at it that he intimidates anyone within a ten mile radius. And so, when he hears people whispering behind his back (more common than he would like), he takes it with a sunny smile. And a sunny, scorching heat in his stomach.
“… where does he get off bossing us round like this? He isn’t our attending, or even our resident.”
“He’s Head Nurse…”
“Yeah. Operative word being nurse. He’s just a nurse. He should be taking orders from us.”
“I don’t think that’s how—”
“And did you hear him patronise us before? About us messing up procedures our first time? I came top in my class. I’m not going to be calling for a nurse’s help with a catheter. Now, when a patient pukes up, then I’ll call the nurse.”
“I mean…”
“Isn’t he the son of one of the board members? Maybe the only reason he has a job here in the first place is—”
Meng Yao wheels round. A&E Intern comes to a well-practised halt, like a show-horse. Trust-Fund almost comes nose to nose with Meng Yao, stumbles back, brushes himself off. The others stare at the floor or the ceiling or anywhere but the Head Nurse, who clasps his hands behind his back and tips his head to the side with a dangerous smile.
“Doctor Duan.”
Trust-Fund frowns. It’s the look of a high-school boy who’s being addressed by the uncool kid— as if he’s waiting for the others to snicker along with him. “That’s me.”
Yes. He’d learned all their names previously. He just hasn’t deigned to use them yet. “Do you see what I’m wearing?”
Trust-Fund’s eyes skim up and down Meng Yao. “Nurse’s scrubs.”
“Yes. I’m wearing nurse’s scrubs. A very unfortunate yellow they are, too. And what are you wearing?”
“Doctor’s scrubs,” he says, gesturing to his blue shirt and trousers— not without some smugness.
“Very well spotted. I see how you came top of your class, Doctor Duan.” Meng Yao is so proficient in hiding insults with smiles, that it takes the intern a moment to realise that he has, in fact, been insulted. “Our coloured scrubs make it easier for us to find each other in times of emergency. When you need assistance, you can count on a few of us yellow scrubs running in. And when we need the doctor responsible for our patient, we will look for you. You are no longer in medical school, Doctor Duan. You are responsible for these people’s lives. And I have the very difficult job of for making sure you don’t fuck that up. Whether that means re-inserting an IV for you or warning you about the broken elevator.
“If you aren’t quite ready for the responsibility you’re about to take on, I suggest you turn around and leave. Otherwise, you can head to room 357, where Mrs Mao is suffering nausea and needs someone with a kind face and good bedside manner to clean her up. I’m sure you won’t need my help for that. After all, I am just a nurse.”
And this is why people whisper about him. He is, for all intents and purposes, a bit of a bastard. Largely, people love it. Unless they’re on the receiving end. The interns smother smirks and watch Trust-Fund from the corners of their eyes.
“Ah. Is this our new team of interns?”
Meng Yao blinks, feels his heart lurch. And that would be the other very significant reason why he likes working at this particular hospital.
Doctor Lan. Lan Xichen. And on very rare occasions, Lan Huan. Meng Yao looks at the floor with a knowing smile before he turns around and sees him, hands in his suit trouser pockets. He wears a shirt and tie under the white coat, which has his name embroidered beside the lapel. His smile is as knowing as Meng Yao’s, as if they’re sharing some inside joke. In a way, they are. Any experienced medical practitioner finds interns mildly amusing; Lan Xichen has just walked in on Meng Yao house-training the puppies.
“Nurse Meng. How are they doing?” he asks with that kind smile of his. It’s full of humour. “I advise that you all listen to any and every piece of advice Nurse Meng has to offer. He and his team are the ones who keep this hospital going.”
“They’re doing very well, Doctor Lan. Settling in quite nicely. Aren’t you?”
There’s a hesitant chorus of affirmatives.
“I was just giving Doctor Duan the first job of the day,” Meng Yao adds with great cheer. “He was top of his class, Doctor Lan, so I’ll be throwing him in the deep end at room 357.”
“Ah.” Lan Xichen suppresses a smile and fails. “Very impressive, Doctor Duan. Make sure you’re ready for Doctor Jiang— he’ll be the Resident taking your rounds today, I believe. He’s not particularly forgiving towards people who are late.”
Trust-Fund flounders for a moment. Clearly torn between deference towards his superior and arguing that the mean nurse is making him wipe up puke within his first fifteen minutes at the hospital, he nods to himself and turns, marching down the corridor.
A&E girl coughs through a laugh. “Nicely done, Nurse Meng.”
Hm. A brown-nose.
Alright, fine. He likes being sucked-up to. He accepts the compliment with a modest head-bow.
“Now,” he says. “Shall we continue on with our whistle-stop tour?”
The interns nod. Meng Yao passes a brow-raised smile towards Lan Xichen, who dips his head and closes his eyes. It’s like every look they share is a whole conversation. He doesn’t even know what they’re saying. He just knows that he likes it, and that Lan Xichen likes it, and that he wants Lan Xichen to keep on looking at him over his shoulder when he leaves.
“That’s Lan Xichen-- I’ve heard about him.” They whisper behind Meng Yao’s back. “He’s a legend. He’s the best oncologist in this country, practically.”
One of the interns chokes on his words. “That has to be one of the most attractive people I’ve literally ever seen in my life.”
There isn’t a single person in this hospital who isn’t aware of how jaw-droppingly gorgeous Lan Xichen is, whether they’re attracted to him or not. The thing is, no matter how many members of staff and patients fling themselves at him, he shows absolutely no indication of wanting to date any of them. Even the cute ones.
Meng Yao has resigned himself to this fact.
“Yes. And not only is he your boss--” Meng Yao gives the intern a curt smile, “he is also very, very unavailable. Now, let’s move onto the pediatrics ward.”
***
His day does not take very good turns.
First, he has to run after one of the interns who almost feeds a bubble of air into the injection he’s giving one of the patients. Meng Yao has to grab him by the wrist to stop him from killing them. Then, he has to witness another of the interns have a meltdown when a patient goes into V-fib; apparently, she needed to take a moment to wring her hands and tear her hair out instead of giving him and the other nurses instruction. Meng Yao is fairly used to snatching responsibility from the baby ducklings, but this lot are leaving him positively haggard.
Meng Yao likes being Head Nurse. Sometimes, he wonders what he’d be like as a doctor. Would he be so feckless?
(No.)
After giving said interns a polite yet stern talking to (he finds the more he smiles the more he frightens them into competency), he heads over to Operating Room 2 to scrub-up for surgery. Or, rather, assisting. Meng Yao reckons he’d make an excellent surgeon, if only he had the training. Self-focused, pathologically ambitious, precise and undeterred by tragedy. Spurred on by it, in fact. Unfortunately, since he can’t afford to go to med school, he will be assisting today. As previously explained, he likes being a nurse.
And damn it, he’s fucking good at it.
“Hand me the retractor.”
He’s always been his right-hand man. He intends to stay that way, until he’s offered something better. Meng Yao passes the retractor to Nie Mingjue. Out of all of the surgeons, he is the most quick tempered and dauntless. He is also highly superstitious, which is why surgery is fifteen minutes late: he couldn’t find his lucky ACDC scrub-cap.
“She’s bleeding too much,” Meng Yao says. “Her O2 sats are dropping.”
Nie Mingjue won’t usually take advice, except from Meng Yao. His brow furrows as he peers down at his work. Meng Yao angles the overhead light so he can see what he’s seeing, and Nie Mingjue makes a half hum, half grunt.
“Push another dose of epi.”
Meng Yao turns and administers. In the corner of his eye, he notes a gaggle of interns and Residents in the gallery above, watching.
One of Nie Mingjue’s surgical interns seems to have lucked out today and been presented with the opportunity to observe an aortic valve repair under one of the top surgeons in the country. When Meng Yao returns to Nie Mingjue’s side, she’s peering over Su She’s shoulder making notes. Then she closes her eyes and seems to hold her breath. It’s the smell of surgery that tends to get to the newbies first. It’s gory. Meng Yao’s used to it.
“Suction.”
Su She complies. Nie Mingjue sighs heavily beside Meng Yao.
“Should I push more epi?”
“No.” His friend and colleague shakes his head and sighs again. “Damnit. Fuck.”
This surgery usually lasts for several hours. Today, unfortunately, it only takes two. By the end of it, they’re all flying about the OR trying to save her, but it would have been a miracle if they had. She was old. But, Nie Mingjue doesn’t like losing.
Nie Mingjue slam-dunks his gloves in the bin and smacks the wall on his way out. “DAMN it.”
Meng Yao goes about business tidying up. Su She and the other nurses join wordlessly. The intern stands in the middle of the OR, notepad in hand and face blanched.
“She was ready to go,” Meng Yao says, disinfecting the table. “She told me last night.”
The intern continues her thousand yard stare.
“They aren’t always ready,” he continues. “And you’ll need to be prepared for that.”
“It’s not like how they said it would be,” she replies, presumably talking about witnessing a patient die.
“It wasn’t painful. She wasn’t sad. Her family will be expecting it. This is the ideal way for you to learn how it feels.” And perhaps you’ll be able to handle the grief and frustration better than Nie Mingjue.
Meng Yao finishes up, walks past the intern.
“How can you say that?”
He looks over his shoulder. She’s taken off her mask and she’s staring at Meng Yao like he’s a monster.
“Say what?”
“How can you say that this is ideal?” Her voice breaks. “She just died. Even if she was ready, she still died. Will I have to be that cold to get ahead?”
Meng Yao lingers in the doorway and considers this. It’s been a long time since he’s been really, truly affected by a patient’s death. Sometimes, oftentimes, it’s sad. It makes him sad. But he’s learned to bounce back quickly. He supposes that does make him cold.
“Don’t they deserve our grief?”
At this, Meng Yao smiles behind his mask and shakes his head. “We can grieve and punch walls. But ultimately, if we’re going to do surgery again without having flashbacks of the last one that went wrong, we need to move on. Quickly. People process it differently. I’ve learned to skip four stages of grief and go straight to acceptance.”
The intern stares at the floor. Meng Yao washes his hands and leaves her to absorb.
Unsuccessful surgeries are daily. Someone is always dying. Usually, more people are saved. But today, it just feels like everything is falling apart at the seams. Perhaps it’s just that Meng Yao is juggling a gaggle of interns who seem set on killing their patients-- or perhaps it’s because when Nie Mingjue’s surgeries go wrong, his bad mood rubs off on everyone. Either way, Meng Yao does not have a spring in his step when he’s back on the floor, filling in charts and cooling feverish brows and searching for the lost Alzheimer’s patient.
He’s at the nurse’s desk on the phone when Nie Mingjue storms past in surgery green scrubs and slams some paperwork on the counter. People part like the Red Sea to let him through. An intern plasters herself to the wall like one of those sticky, rubber toys that cling to surfaces.
Phone pressed between his ear and his shoulder, Meng Yao takes the paperwork without so much as a sigh and casts his eyes over it. Filling in paperwork is Nie Mingjue’s least favourite thing in the world, particularly when it concerns a deceased patient. “Yes. We ordered the new stock yesterday and it was due to arrive this morning but it isn’t here. Yes. The order number is 078352GYZ. Yes.”
A shadow falls over the paperwork whilst he’s double checking it. Meng Yao peers up and gives a cursory smile to Trust-Fund, who drums his fingers against the counter like he’s waiting in the queue at the bank. Meng Yao flips through the folder in front of him, takes pleasure in ignoring him in favour of the pharmaceutical company on the other end of the phone. “Yes. I see.”
MianMian has noted Trust-Fund and asks in her most uninterested voice, “Yes?”
“I need you to put Mrs Long on antibiotics for her pneumonia.”
Meng Yao watches with increasing irritation and amusement (a combination that only an intern can inspire in him-- and, perhaps, Wei Wuxian) as MianMian takes Mrs Long’s chart and flips through it. “It… looks like… Are you sure it’s pneumonia?”
Trust-Fund blinks. There’s a split second of hesitation. That split will turn into a cavern one day, when it really matters. Meng Yao wants to be the one to see his confidence shatter when that earth-quake happens. “I’m sorry, but-- are you really supposed to be questioning me right now? Isn’t the point of you to be helpful and useful? To listen to doctors, rather than argue with them? You know, you might have been doing this longer than me, but I’m still more qualified than you.”
“Of course, Doctor.” MianMian flips the chart closed and gives Meng Yao a look, which he reciprocates.
“Hey!”
Trust-Fund physically jumps. Meng Yao purses his lips and the other nurses share refrained titters. Because, turning the corner and pinning Trust-Fund with his fiercest glare, is Jiang Cheng.
“Ah-- Doctor Jiang-- I was just telling this nurse to administer Mrs Long with--”
“Did I just hear you giving Nurse Luo shit? I swear to god if I hear a pipsqueak like you chatting bullcrap like that again as if you have any fucking authority, then I’ll break your fucking legs.”
“I…” Trust-Fund flounders and scoffs. “Doctor Jiang--”
Meng Yao listens to the hold music on the phone and considers sketching this moment on the back of Nie Mingjue’s paperwork for posterity’s purpose. Jiang Cheng is by no means taller than his intern, but he is certainly more threatening. He expands to fill the space he’s in, chest out and eyes wide. It’s never done much to intimidate Meng Yao, but then, that’s because he knows just how much of a baby the man is. Even more so than Nie Mingjue.
“Are you seriously,” Jiang Cheng say slowly, “trying to answer back to me? I’m your Resident. I outrank you. I’m also fucking better than you at everything. So shut the fuck up and go do your rounds.”
Excellent. He’s never seen a man scamper before, but he has now. The nurses lean to watch Trust-Fund dart round the corner, and they laugh. Patients stare in both horror and amusement. Meng Yao gets to finish his call and witness the nurses attempt to flirt with Jiang Cheng, who is about as observant as a spoon.
And because time rolls on relentlessly in a hospital as it does nowhere else, Meng Yao looks up at the clock and realises that it’s well past his lunch break. He’s been running up and down the corridor fixing the interns’ mistakes and doing errands for the Residents and Attendings. He purses his lips and sighs, straightening the stethoscope around his neck and returning to the nurse’s desk where he, unfortunately, has a thousand appointments to book and paperwork to fill.
“I’m so BORED--”
Nie Huaisang appears out of nowhere and slumps theatrically across the counter, limp like a doll. His cheek is pressed against Meng Yao’s paperwork. Tucking the pen back into his breast pocket, Meng Yao walks away and busies himself elsewhere. “I’m busy, Huaisang.”
“You’re always busy.”
“I am indeed,” Meng Yao says. “I like being busy.”
“Because you’re weird and creepy.”
He doesn’t look up as he sorts out out-going patient files. “Capable.”
“Creepily capable.” Nie Huaisang slides along the desk. “I’m bored. It’s boring down there.”
“Boring is better than stressful. Isn’t that what you said?” he replies simply and sweetly.
“Everyone down there is dead. I can’t talk to anyone. And old-man Ouyang is weird.”
“And creepy?”
“Yes!” he exclaims. “Genuinely, actually creepy. Although, I like that I get to daydream and listen to music and take little naps and--”
Meng Yao finally turns to his friend, hands bracing his arms. “I’m very busy, Huaisang.”
“Exactly. Like, at least I’m not busy anymore. Ugh.”
Nie Huaisang’s recent transfer to the mortuary is surprising but logical. It became clear from the get-go that, despite his dizzying intellect and clinical approach, Nie Huaisang is far too lazy and lackadaisical to be a doctor. Now, he has a much slower pace to life. Dead-slow, in fact. Meng Yao doesn’t have to listen to him whine as he answers a page and drags his feet down the corridor. On top of that, apparently post-mortems are now solving more medical mysteries than they ever had before. If anyone can figure out what’s happened to a patient, it’s Nie Huaisang. Just don’t ask him to save their life.
Now, he picks up a patient folder and fans himself with it. “Hey, Su She. How’re you?”
“Fine-- how’s downstairs?”
“Boring. Cold. It’s so cold down there! And quiet. I’m pretty sure I can hear things moving around sometimes. Like something’s going to… you know…” He widens his eyes and looks around. “Pop-out.”
Meng Yao takes the file from his hand and puts it into the out-going patient tray. “They’re dead, Huaisang.”
“Yeah, but like… it’s scary.”
“OK.”
“Anyway, I haven’t eaten yet. Have you eaten yet?”
“I don’t have time,” Meng Yao says.
“Come on. Please? Please please please? I need company. I’m literally sat there sewing up a dead guy and I don’t even get to make any off-colour jokes about it to anyone.”
“Whilst that does sound like a shame, I’ll have to pass.”
“You need to eat, A-Yao--”
“I need to finish filing these,” he replies. He gives his friend a look, who gives him the puppy-dog eyes that he taught him. “Go find Wei Wuxian. Bully him instead.”
Nie Huaisang tuts and kicks the floor. “He’s just as stubborn as you.”
“Yes, he is.”
“Whatever. I’m going now.”
“Ok. Bye, A-Sang.”
Nie Huaisang gives a hefty sigh and trapses back down the corridor. Meng Yao is allowed to get on with a bit more paperwork before he’s called in for a code blue. He’s on the phone to the pharmaceutical company again when Jin Zixun storms up to the desk with the face of a man who’s had his day ruined and plans to ruin it for everyone else, too.
“Can I help you?” He doesn’t like calling him or Jin Zixuan ‘Doctor Jin’. It makes him taste bile in his mouth. The angry kind.
In another universe, he’s the one who’s called Doctor Jin.
“It’s your fault.”
Jin Zixun jabs Meng Yao in the shoulder with an index finger. Patients are watching. Doctors are watching. Su She and MianMian flank him like praetorian guards.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Meng Yao says calmly and politely. “Can you elaborate, and maybe I’ll be able to fix my error?”
MianMian tuts. “I’ll bet the mortgage on my flat that Meng Yao didn’t do whatever you think he did.”
Jin Zixun is unpleasantly angry. He’s ugly when he’s angry. Meng Yao looks at him and tries to keep the calm surety that he holds with him whenever a doctor treats him like shit. When those doctors are his family and can tattle on his father, it’s harder to keep that calm.
His cousin points at him. “My patient died today. He was recovering. I told you to push ten ccs and an hour later he goes into V-fib. You must have given him the wrong meds. You fucked up.”
“There must be some mistake,” Meng Yao smiles. “I don’t fuck up.”
“You picked up the meds, thought it said 10ccs, it’s 100, the patient--”
“How dare you!” Su She retorts. “Not only is that a very serious allegation, it’s also totally unbelievable. Meng Yao wouldn’t mix up such different doses, even in the heat of the moment.”
“HE’S the one who fucked up!”
“I suppose we’ll just have to see what Nie Huaisang’s results say.”
It’s as if Jin Zixun’s voice has caused Meng Yao’s friends to assemble. Lan Xichen turns the corner, Wei Wuxian in tow. Jin Zixun glowers at them.
Wei Wuxian smacks Jin Zixun round the back of the head. “Wassup, dickface?”
MianMian barks a laugh.
Jin Zixun makes a pug-faced glare at Wei Wuxian. “This incompetent bastard killed my patient. He gave them the wrong meds.”
“Mm. Seems unlikely.” Wei Wuxian leans an elbow against the nurse’s station and blows a lock of hair out of his face. There’s evidence of green crayon marks down the lapel of his white coat. Such is the life of being a pediatrics doctor.
Lan Xichen stands on Jin Zixun’s other side and looks down at him, hands in his coat pockets. It’s then that Meng Yao’s cousin realises that he’s outranked and outnumbered. He turns his snarl towards him. “You know I’ll tell your father about this.”
“And then my father will tell your father to stop being a prick, and so will his uncle,” Wei Wuxian gestures to Lan Xichen, who looks at the floor with a restrained smile. “You’re not the only one with family on the board.”
Meng Yao watches this interaction with a growing sense of… something. It might be affection. It might be pride. It’s a pleasant feeling, and it makes him smile at Jin Zixun a little pityingly. With a fist slamming against the desk, Jin Zixun whirls on the spot and marches off down the corridor again, white coat billowing.
Wei Wuxian sucks on his teeth. “That guy’s gonna get the shit beaten out of him one day if he doesn’t learn not to be a dickhead.”
Lan Xichen nods soberly at this wisdom. Meng Yao tries to smile. It’s emotionally draining, being hated.
“Anyway, Nie Huaisang said you haven’t eaten yet, and I ran into da-ge so we’re going to drag Lan Zhan for lunch as well. Cafeteria’s still doing lunch.”
“I’m too busy.”
“You need to eat,” MianMian says. “Come on. Just a few minutes.”
“I’ve eaten an orange.”
Su She looks very serious when he lays a hand on Meng Yao’s arm and says, “That isn’t enough.”
Lan Xichen opens the dropdoor in the desk for Meng Yao to step out. He raises his brows and smiles at him.
Meng Yao tips his head to the side and gives Lan Xichen a pleading look. “Er-ge.”
“You can take a break. Come on.”
He looks at the floor and rolls his head, grinning despite the display of reluctance he’s putting on. “I couldn’t possibly.”
But really, how can he say no to Lan Xichen smiling at him? Lan Xichen smiling at him makes him smile, and it makes him warm and wiggly and happy. So he really is about to join them when he sees the ambulances line up one after the other outside the glass walls. The first ambulance has barely stopped when the doors fly open and the first gurney rolls out. Nurses and doctors are already running over to help the paramedics. And then more ambulances. And more. There must have been some kind of accident. Usually a road traffic accident.
“It looks like none of us have a choice,” Meng Yao remarks, picking up the intercom. “All available doctors to the ER-- all available doctors to the ER.”
***
When there’s this much adrenaline going through your body, six hours can feel like one. Meng Yao stitches up ten deep gashes, helps to remove shrapnel, holds hands through the pain, reunites family members, and at one point has to straddle a patient as they roll in the gurney just so he can apply enough pressure to stop him from losing blood. One of them is delirious and tries to wrestle himself out of his bed and rip out the IV drip, so Meng Yao and Lan Xichen have to physically restrain him. The only thing that makes Accident and Emergency bearable is Jiang Yanli. She runs it smoothly, calmly, firmly, and kindly.
A&E intern is covered in blood, but there’s a glint in her eye that tells Meng Yao that she’ll be one of the keepers.
Eight hours and thirty-five patients later, Meng Yao showers. His day clothes hang over the cubicle door and he scrubs the various bodily fluids from his arms and under his nails (and somehow, on his shin). The steam makes it hard to breathe. It makes him dizzy. Or maybe it’s just that he’s tired and hungry. He didn’t realise he was hungry until now.
The cubicle door judders and there’s the sound of wet feet. “YaoYao! We’re going for drinks tonight. Everyone’s off-duty tonight. Well, not everyone, but like, everyone we hang out with. Once in a blue moon opportunity.”
Meng Yao keeps his back turned to Wei Wuxian. He’s fairly used to his friend barging in and looking over the edge when he’s showering, since he has no scruples. “You really must stop trying to see me naked. It’s getting irritating.”
That makes him laugh. “Pfft. Please. I’m not trying to see you naked, I’m just keeping you company, my dude. I don’t care whether I see ya ding-dong. I don’t care if you see mine.”
“I don’t want to see yours. And I seriously hope you don’t actually call it that.”
“No, no, I call it a penis like any self respecting doctor.” The wet splat of feet hitting puddles as Wei Wuxian drops from the door. “So,” he calls, voice echoing, “you’re coming, right?”
“I have a lot of work to do tomorrow,” Meng Yao replies, dipping his head under the water.
“Laaaaaame. I have a bunch to do tomorrow as well, but I figured I need to burn off the stress from today. What a shit-storm. Besides, when do we ever get the chance to go out as a group?”
“We went for drinks last Friday.”
“Not with everyone, though! Like, it’ll be me, Lan Zhan, da-ge, Nie Huaisang, Nie Mingjue, MianMian, Su She, Wen Qing, didi, shijie…”
That really is everyone. And it doesn’t happen a lot. The fact that Lan Xichen and Lan Zhan are going is not totally uncommon, but notable.
“Maybe,” Meng Yao says.
“WOO!”
“I need to eat something first.”
“Fuck bro, yeah, you do. It’s fine, we’ll get you some good drunk food. They do good drunk food there.”
They do. Meng Yao smiles a little to himself as he runs his soapy fingers through his hair.
When he steps out, he’s in his jeans and towel drying his hair half-naked. By the time he reaches his locker and looks up, he sees Lan Xichen. Similarly half naked and wearing it much better than him. He’s changing his white shirt for another clean one. His shoulders shine with slight damp, as if he’s just been showering too. And the idea that they were in different cubicles and showering makes heat prickle under his skin, a heat that mingles with the steam that lingers.
“Er-ge.”
Lan Xichen turns and looks at him. “A-Yao.” His eyes flutter up and down as he takes in Meng Yao’s current state. Meng Yao looks away and tries not to do the same. They’ve run into each other like this plenty of times, of course, but that doesn’t mean he’s used to it. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t think about wrapping his arms around his neck and his legs around those skinny hips.
Meng Yao throws the towel in the laundry basket, pulls his shirt and sweatshirt over his head and searches for his wallet and phone in his locker.
Lan Xichen takes a breath before he speaks. “So, you’re coming tonight?”
Oh. So he’d been there for that conversation. Wonderful. “Yes, I think so. Just a few drinks, though.”
Lan Xichen nods. He buttons his shirt to the clavicle and leaves his tie in his locker. It’s a look that’s positively indecent for Lan Xichen. “Let’s head there together, shall we?”
Meng Yao finds himself often looking up at Lan Xichen through his lashes. ‘Finds himself’ implies that he doesn’t mean to, because he does-- he does it more often than he thinks he should, though. He loves the way Lan Xichen looks back at him when he does. He can’t help it if he likes being looked at like he’s lovely.
They walk through the chaos of the hospital at ten pm. Most of the patients are sleeping, but some of them are keeping the on-call doctors up. The interns will probably be taking a nap somewhere right now. Their first twenty-four hour shift. Never fun.
“I’m sorry about the way Jin Zixun talked to you today.”
Meng Yao smiles, looks at the floor as they walk. “I’m fairly used to it.”
They’ve had this conversation before. You shouldn’t have to be. I know, but this is the way things are, and I’ve had worse. It isn’t fair-- I wish I could help. Instead of repeating it, they walk in quiet. Meng Yao bumps arms with him. “My mother’s doing better. Thank you for the advice.”
“Ah, I’m so glad to hear that.”
She’s not been well for a while. Cancer’s a bitch. Fortunately, his best friend is the top oncologist in the country, so she’s being looked after very well after some pulled strings. He occasionally comes to visit her and does some routine check-ups, talks about doses with the doctors at her hospital. Sometimes, Meng Yao wonders why Lan Xichen would want to work in a specialty so demoralising and heartbreaking, until he remembers that Lan Xichen is the strongest, kindest, most optimistic person in the world. He’s the kind of man to want to fix everyone, and has enough energy to try to help even the lost-causes.
“She asked after you,” Meng Yao says. “She said she loved when you read to her.”
Lan Xichen laughs. “I’m pleased to hear it. I’m not nearly as good at it as you.”
“That isn’t true at all. I think I keep her entertained, but you relax her.”
“Are you going to see her this weekend?”
“Yes,” he replies. Meng Yao clasps his hands behind his back and watches the floor. “Would you like to join me?”
“I’d love to.”
They’re friends, Lan Xichen and his mother. He couldn’t quite believe it when he’d said he wanted to join Meng Yao for another visit after the first time. The two of them talk like family whilst Meng Yao pours a polystyrene cup of tea from the other side of the room.
And that’s what makes it impossible for Meng Yao not to be in love with him.
“Ah-- Meng Yao.”
It makes him come to an abrupt halt, hands still held behind him as he turns and views his father. Jin Guangshan stands in the doorway of his office. Even though it’s been years since he’s practised any real medicine, he wears his white coat. Embroidered beside the lapel: Jin Guangshan M.D. Plastic Surgeon and ENT Specialist.
Meng Yao finds his voice as well as his smile. It mirrors his father’s. “Yes.”
“A word.”
With a perfunctory widening of his smile, Jin Guangshan steps back into his office and leaves the door open. Meng Yao takes a very brief moment to evaluate this moment-- this moment that feels like walking through a forest filled with hidden bear traps.
“I can wait for you here.”
He views Lan Xichen, who is looking down with the beginnings of a crease between his brows. “You don’t have to. I couldn’t ask you to wait when the others…”
“I’ll wait.”
Lan Xichen rests a hand on Meng Yao’s upper arm. It’s hard not to lean into it.
Meng Yao feels the resolve in him fray, the edges fluttering and flaking like paint. And so he turns away and steps into Jin Guangshan’s office.
He is sitting at his desk. Jin Zixun is standing behind him with the biggest shit-eating grin he’s ever seen on his cousin. Jin Guangshan’s fingers are steepled in front of his face. “Please. Do take a seat.”
Meng Yao obeys. After all these years, he still doesn’t know how not to.
“This will only take a moment, I imagine.” Jin Guangshan clears his throat and leans back in his leather chair, folds one leg over the other. “You’re the best head nurse this hospital has seen in a long time, Meng Yao.”
The words filter through, but have no impact. It’s always been his biggest frustration, not to be able to actually feel his father’s praise. Part of him wants to hang up banners and uncork champagne, the rest of him is frozen on the spot, waiting for the punchline.
A moment later: “Thank you. I’m honoured to hear it.”
A flickering smile that makes Meng Yao wonder if it was there to start with. He turns his gaze to Jin Zixun, who still leers over Jin Guangshan’s shoulder with his arms folded triumphantly. The sun has set and the orange street lamps outside leave an eerie glow across his cousin’s face.
“Yes,” Jin Guangshan continues. “You’ve impressed us all on the board. How could you not, with the way that you’ve reorganised the surgery schedules, given new life to the walk-in clinic, and made the triage system so much more efficient. The chief of surgery is very pleased, and has even mentioned raising your salary to match your increase in responsibilities.”
At this, Jin Guangshan pauses. He sighs, looks over his shoulder at Jin Zixun, then fixes his gaze on the bookshelves as if he’s losing interest. “It would therefore be a great shame if you were to ruin the reputation you’ve worked so hard to build due to a few silly -- but life-threatening -- mistakes.” He examines his manicured hands. “A shame if the family of Jin Zixun’s deceased patient were to discover that their brother died because of a nurse’s error in checking the dosage.”
Meng Yao has been sitting with perfect posture, hands clasped in his lap. He continues to hold position. He doesn’t let anything break. He opens his mouth to reply. Jin Guangshan stops him with a single index finger.
“Suffice to say that the board won’t be pleased,” he continues. “I am not, Meng Yao. I am not pleased at all. And for you to so brazenly deny it when Jin Zixun attempted to address the issue with you like a proper man. If you had simply admitted your mistake--”
“There was no mistake.”
And Meng Yao can’t believe he’s interrupted his father. He can’t believe he’s arguing back when he’s spent so long polishing the floor Jin Guangshan walks on.
Jin Guangshan can’t believe it either. He stares at him with widening eyes. “A mistake was made. Who do you think they’ll believe it was? The Resident with eight years of medical training and a sparkling record, or the nurse who dropped out of university?”
His mother was sick. He didn’t have the money or the time to-- “Yes. I understand.”
A snort from Jin Zixun. He’s loving this. Meng Yao can’t understand why-- why he would care so much about making Meng Yao fail when he’s already got Jin Guangshan’s favour.
No. Who’s he kidding? Of course he understands. He’d do the same to Jin Zixun.
Meng Yao bows his head and looks at his hands.
“A great shame,” Jin Guangshan says again. There’s no whimsical sigh this time. His voice is steel. “That payrise doesn’t seem so likely now.”
There is nothing Meng Yao can say or do. Nothing. Jin Guangshan has a particular way of dulling his senses, disorienting him like a trapped animal. Meng Yao thrashes and whimpers on the inside. His face is cast porcelain as his father lets this sink in, the room totally silent.
“That’s all, Meng Yao.”
“Thank you.”
Meng Yao rises and steps out of the room. Meng Yao closes the door behind him.
Lan Xichen is talking to an intern, signing off a patient chart. Meng Yao walks right past him towards the elevator.
“Yes-- thank you. Excuse me-- A-Yao?”
Meng Yao doesn’t stop and he doesn’t acknowledge him. His throat is tight and his jaw hurts. The elevator doors open for him and he enters, facing the wall. His arms hang by his sides. The collar of his shirt feels itchy against his skin. His hair is damp and he wants to jump off something.
The sound of footsteps slowing from a jog. The elevator doors pinging, closing, then pushed open again. Footsteps again and the smell of Lan Xichen’s cologne.
The elevator doors closing. The swoop in his stomach as it descends.
“A-Yao.”
Meng Yao blinks at the HOW TO QUIT SMOKING poster in the elevator. His vision swims. He swallows.
And then the elevator judders and halts. They both look up at the arrow indicating downwards, flickering on and off. This is what this elevator does; it’s why Meng Yao always warns the interns not to use it if you’re in a rush somewhere. The stupidity of it makes him furious. He doesn’t understand how he could forget that the lift is broken. He doesn’t understand how he can let himself walk into silly mistakes, how he can let himself walk into his father’s office and expect anything other than disdain and threats and insult and--
Meng Yao smiles miserably at the floor.
Lan Xichen steps carefully towards him. He feels his hand on his arm.
“I don’t want to talk about it.” I don’t like you seeing me like this.
“Alright.”
“I’m not usually like this.” I don’t want you to see me any differently.
“It’s OK. It’s only me.”
“No, it isn’t.” You aren’t ‘only’ anything.
A quiet exhale. “A-Yao.”
Meng Yao purses his lips. When he blinks, a tear trips from his eye, and it makes him turn his face away. And when Lan Xichen’s hand pulls him gently towards him, Meng Yao, miraculously, doesn’t resist. He finds he’s too tired for that. He finds that all he really wants right now is er-ge, holding him and telling him it’ll all be OK, even if they know it won’t be, even if they know that things are rarely OK, even if Meng Yao’s struggling to admit right now that the person he’s been chasing his whole life is about as far away from him as the moon.
He fits neatly beneath Lan Xichen’s chin. His coat smells like him. Meng Yao links his arms around his waist and holds on. Lan Xichen’s cheek rests against the top of his head. He can feel his hands, flat against his back. He can feel his breath tickling his hair when he speaks.
“Whatever he’s said or done to make you feel like this,” Lan Xichen whispers, “you don’t deserve it.”
“Don’t I?” Meng Yao huffs a wry laugh. It makes his face warm where it’s pressed against Lan Xichen’s shoulder. “I knew what I was getting into, trying to please him. I should know better. I never know better.”
“No.”
Meng Yao exhales another silent laugh.
“I don’t believe that you deserve this. I don’t think you should have to work this hard to be appreciated.”
He smells like sandalwood and home. Meng Yao takes a fistful of Lan Xichen’s coat and he hums. “I want to be appreciated.”
“You are.” Lan Xichen’s throat clicks with a swallow. “I appreciate you.”
His arms are warm, his hands rubbing circles between his shoulders. His smell is heady. His words seep through like syrup. Meng Yao sniffs and blinks the tears away. He lifts his head and their cheeks almost touch. Meng Yao can feel his breath on his skin.
Lan Xichen doesn’t turn away.
And he does, doesn’t he? Appreciate him. Lan Xichen doesn’t just say please and thank you while other doctors simply take what they need-- he also sees him. He notices his hard work. He comes to speak to him during lunch breaks and he laughs at his dry jokes and he notices when he’s stressed and he drives Meng Yao home when he’s finished a forty eight hour shift. Lan Xichen appreciates him and Meng Yao doesn’t know how to feel it.
But he can feel this. He can feel the closeness of their lips and the tear streaks making his face itchy. He can feel the way that Lan Xichen is holding him by the upper arms. Warm. Loose but firm. He can feel the way Lan Xichen is looking down at him, hazy and stricken.
Meng Yao gazes at him through wet lashes. He closes his eyes and he feels it.
Their lips graze. Then they kiss once, tentatively, and it is as natural as breathing.
And Meng Yao feels it. He feels himself being seen and held and it makes him sink. It makes him sink into Lan Xichen with arms wrapped around him. A thumb stroking Meng Yao’s cheek, hand cradling his jaw; a kiss that whispers I’m here I’m here I’m here. Meng Yao’s breath stutters. Lan Xichen’s lips brush lightly at the corner of his mouth.
The elevator shifts and whirs to life. Meng Yao opens his eyes and sees Lan Xichen’s lips-- the perfect arch and pout of those lips--
He sucks in a sharp breath. He backs away with hands on Lan Xichen’s chest. He closes his eyes and swallows.
No. No, no, no.
This cannot be happening.
“I’m sorry,” Meng Yao manages. His eyes are closed but he still smiles. “I shouldn’t have… I’m sorry. I can’t ruin you-- I mean this. I’m sorry.”
“A-Yao...”
The elevator doors open.
“Excuse me.”
“A-Yao--”
He steps out of the lift with a chin tucked to his chest and arms wrapped around himself, heart hammering so hard it hurts when he breathes. The breeze pours through the hospital doors and he walks out into the night, ignoring the feeling of Lan Xichen’s gaze, seeing him.