Work Text:
You want to kiss them there and feel their touch like a second skin. But there's something dangerous about it, don't you think? To kiss someone there. To kiss them, like the sun they are, and offer your body there, offer your body bare — it's dangerous to just be a meal for someone else. (...) It's dangerous to kiss the sun, but especially the sun you feed and spill into like wine, their mouth in your neck and your blood in their teeth. (...) You're only as good as when you're breaking, don't you understand? (...) So don't kiss someone there. Not like that. Don't kiss the sun and sink there like an offering.
✧
Guanheng lies awake in the middle of the night, his eyes burning into the window facing him. The window doesn't offer the privacy he'd prefer, and his walls aren't soundproofed, and not even the lamp at the foot of his bed offers any comfort to his loneliness. He finds himself drifting in and out of sleep, swimming to and away from consciousness, dreaming only of Dejun, the smell of Dejun fine and raw and thick in the air, like the smell of pine trees on a late night drive, or the salty, earthy smell of the water right before you dip your feet into it.
Dejun— is a recurring dream. Dejun is difficult to describe. He isn't real— or he shouldn't be. He couldn't be. To someone like Guanheng, he shouldn't exist. Dejun shouldn't be flitting into Guanheng's dreams and finding his way to Guanheng's room in the middle of the night like a fairy in the wrong story. To someone like Guanheng, Dejun is Peter Pan, and better than him, even. He's Peter Pan, just as unreal, and he climbs into Guanheng's window in the dark of the night, always an unexpected visitor. He never comes when he is expected, but he is always welcome, always welcome to come and bother Guanheng whenever he wishes. Always welcome as long as Guanheng could be with him, even for a moment. Guanheng loves to be surprised. To find Dejun's silhouette lurking in the dark of Guanheng's room, with his back flat to Guanheng's wall, his red eyes closed, inconspicuous, going unnoticed for once.
Dejun— is like a body of water. Guanheng wishes to dip his feet into him. To turn to him and wash himself clean, to wash his worries away with Dejun's surface. To drown in him. He is like the sun. Guanheng wants to orbit around him. He wants to swim through space and time, to orbit around Dejun restlessly, hopelessly, to follow his curved path to the stars, spinning all the way there like a fool.
Dejun— doesn't know that Guanheng could place all of his faith in him. Would place all of his faith in him. He doesn't know Guanheng would devote everything to him. Guanheng aches for him and he doesn't know, but he is here now, so it doesn't matter. Everything becomes a non-issue when Dejun is here.
Dejun— sweeps into the window, past the curtains. Guanheng jolts to a start, awakened now more than ever. The hair on Guanheng's arms stand up on end when Dejun creeps in close to him, closer and closer, but further away than he'd ever been before. He'd been here before, but every time he comes here, Guanheng swallows his own heart down his throat, feeling too stupid to even speak.
“What are you doing here?” Guanheng asks, almost afraid to look at Dejun, almost afraid to reach out and touch him. Dejun— is too far. He's preening near Guanheng's loveseat, and Guanheng almost keels over with longing for him. “I haven't seen you in days. In weeks.” It feels like months to Guanheng, but he knows it wouldn't have been that long. Dejun has to feed. It feels like years to Guanheng since, but he wouldn't have lasted that long with the rate of how much Dejun is taking away from him. Dejun has almost sucked him completely dry. Depleted Guanheng's resources like a country.
“I knooow,” Dejun whines, but it's not real. It's not anything to take seriously, because his teeth don't flash. His shoulders don't sag. “I've been busy.” He says it like it excuses anything. He says like it excuses him making Guanheng miss him stupid. “But I'm here now, aren't I?” he says, his body curling like a cat against Guanheng's loveseat, weighing heavy against the cushion. “I'm here now, and that's all that matters, isn't it?” Guanheng blinks at him, feeling starstruck and hot all over, and Dejun grins.
Guanheng's stomach twists and turns at the sight of it. It turns over. It beats like a heart and swells like one, too, and it's all because of Dejun. Dejun is still smiling. His smile is a mile wide, and it shows all of his even white teeth. All of his perfect even white teeth, and then the single fang. Guanheng counts all of them in his mind. And then Dejun raises a hand to his mouth and taps the fang, and Guanheng knows exactly what to do. His body moves in autopilot, because he's done all of this before.
Dejun is the sun, Guanheng is sure of it. He's the sun, beautiful, but cruel and wicked, and Guanheng wants everything to do with it. He wants everything to do with him. Dejun keeps him captive. He could suck his breath through his teeth and make Dejun feel his heart seize in his chest. He could undergo cardiac arrest and still he would be bound to Dejun. He is in a permanent state of desire, a permanent state of arousal because of Dejun. Guanheng would be bound to Dejun, cruel, wicked Dejun, because Guanheng is Dejun's to feed on.
The beat of Guanheng's heart pauses. Dejun stares at him, impatient. Dejun would have jumped at the opportunity to tease him for being distracted, but Dejun doesn't notice. He doesn't know anything about Guanheng, not really, and Guanheng wants him even more.
Dejun takes a step forward and twirls a lock of Guanheng's hair around his pale finger. “Oh, but you love me, don't you, Guanheng?” he says, and Guanheng feels himself seep into Dejun. Guanheng feels Dejun seep into him like a second skin. To belong to someone like that is so intimate. To belong to someone, to feed someone and be their meal, is intimacy, gentle and pure, at its finest. “I have to feed.”
Guanheng could tell from how his muscles are pale and tight even in the sun. Oh, but he's better than the sun. Dejun has done more than the sun. He is like a god to Guanheng.
Guanheng's heartbeat resumes. If there is anything he knows better than anyone else, it's building a shrine and worshipping. If there is anything he does better than anyone else, it's building a shrine for a god like that and expecting something— anything in return.
“How do you want me?” Guanheng asks. He doesn't have to say it. He doesn't have to ask. He knows the answer. He's written the script. But Guanheng leans in close to Dejun to hear him say the words again. He leans in close to him to hear him whisper those words close to his neck to make sure he isn't only imagining it. He has to. He has to make sure he isn't going insane, not yet, not when everything is going so good, like a dream only he could have imagined, only he could have come up with. He has to make sure that Dejun isn't just a dream, that Dejun isn't just a run of the mill Peter Pan with nothing to do but haunt him. Dejun is special to Guanheng. He'd already given him so much. He only wishes he were something to him, too. Something so special.
“Here?” Guanheng says as he pats the space next to Dejun on the loveseat, eager now and uneasy. Dejun has his hand hooked on the armrest, and his eyes haven't left Guanheng's face since he'd come here. Guanheng leans in and finds his confidence overtake him. Feeling bold, Guanheng's hand creeps up. He pats Dejun's knee, only teasing him, really. Only teasing himself, because all it does is make him think of him sitting on Dejun's thigh, balancing on it, his arms wrapped around Dejun's neck in fear of falling, Dejun's arms curling around his waist and pressing him into the armrest. “Or here?” he says, grinning.
But Dejun doesn't respond the way Guanheng had expected him to. He doesn't follow the script they'd been rehearsing together for weeks, the outline Guanheng had written down in his head. Dejun wraps his strong arm around Guanheng's waist and pulls him to his lap. Guanheng startles a little. Dejun seems different this night. Impatient. Hungrier.
“What are you thinking?” Dejun asks, out of courtesy. Guanheng knows it's out of courtesy, and he should say something like the crops are growing and the moon is still hanging in the sky and the world is fine even when you left. Because it was. They were. Nothing bad happens in Guanheng's life when Dejun isn't there, but nothing good comes out of it either.
Dejun is dangerously close now. His lips are pressed together as he awaits Guanheng's answer. Guanheng wants to say, I want to know what your mouth tastes like. I want to know how your mouth will feel against mine.
But he can't say this, at least not out loud, so instead Guanheng shakes his head and tells Dejun, “Go ahead. Get it done fast. Get it over with before it begins to hurt.” Have any part of me that you would like. Guanheng leans into Dejun's chest. He leans forward into Dejun's gravitational pull, pushing down his collar and watches Dejun swallow as his white button shirt lifts to expose his neck. Dejun touches the slice of white flesh and Guanheng feels a shiver crawl through his spine. It's enough to make Guanheng's breath hitch, make him bite his lip. Have any part of me. Have any part.
Guanheng sits fully in Dejun's lap, his body pulled taut, even when it's not bent over yet. He lets Dejun feed on him. He lets Dejun pull his face up by the chin and press his lips to his jaw, his breath blowing hot and cold on his bare neck. And he feels every second of it. He feels Dejun running a long slender finger down his spine, slow and teasing. Guanheng feels naked then, stripped bare to his core. He feels Dejun pushing him back against the wall and grinning into his neck. He feels Dejun lick the site where he is meant to be bitten before he opens his mouth and kisses him on the throat.
And then Dejun's fangs sink into Guanheng's flesh, and his fangs cut through Guanheng's skin like the blunt end of a knife. Guanheng holds his breath as Dejun kisses the skin of his neck. Dejun's fangs cut into Guanheng's skin, the crescent white nails of his fingers snagging into the skin of the nape of Guanheng's neck, and Guanheng cries only when Dejun's teeth rip through the skin, the inside of his flesh hanging on Dejun's fangs and tearing then.
Guanheng's breaths come out in pants, hot and fast and from the throat. He squirms as Dejun rubs his mouth over where he'd bitten him, and his hips buck and he ruts desperately against Dejun's thigh, the hot wet tears still leaking out of the corners of his eyes. It's like a tooth had been pulled out of him. It's like a tooth had just been yanked out of Guanheng's mouth, and now his blood is spilling crimson there for someone else to take in their mouth, and every breath has no single hint of regret.
Guanheng breaks away, but the hand Dejun has on his waist lingers for a while. His fingers curl into the skin, pressing harder. Guanheng rocks into the touch, slow and languid, his whole body reclining into Dejun's grasp, his eyes closing with it. Dejun takes away the hand on the back of Guanheng's neck first, and then the hand on the small of Guanheng's back, and then his teeth splitting the fruit of Guanheng's skin. They break away completely then, two halves separated, but the heat of their touch lingers. The heat of their bodies touching never melts away completely.
“Tell me what I taste like,” Guanheng asks once he's recovered. Dejun looks at him, a smirk curling on his lips. He still has his blood in his mouth, and it embarrasses Guanheng to no end. Like, look at me. I have your blood in my mouth. You've let me feed on you, take you into my mouth. You've let me take all of the finest parts of you into my mouth. “I'm curious! You have to tell me,” he whines, and he immediately regrets it. He hates how needy it makes him sound. He hates how needy he makes himself sound. “I'm doing this for you, and you won't even tell me this one thing.”
“Fine. I'll give you this in exchange for the favor.” Dejun crosses his arms and looks straight into Guanheng's eyes. Guanheng backs away, swallows, and feels the back of his neck flush pink again, like Dejun hadn't just sucked the blood out of it. Out of him. His eyes set on the vein, Dejun licks his lips at the blood that had rushed to Guanheng's neck. Guanheng lifts his hand to cover his nape, his body tingling all over with Dejun's heavy gaze.
“You taste like... strawberries.” Dejun feigns thinking for a moment, his finger tapping his chin rapidly— abnormal to outsiders, but just normal to Guanheng. Just perfectly ordinary. “And kiwis. And water from the springs.”
“Really?” Guanheng asks, eager like a puppy dog. Any moment now he would have wagged his tail and tilted his head to the side like a blind follower of Dejun's. Oh, to follow Dejun.
Dejun laughs. “Seriously? No,” he says, a little in awe that Guanheng would fall for something like it. Guanheng's face crushes a little at this. “Your taste... is exceptionally sweet,” he says. “You're sweeter than most humans I've tried. You even taste... sweeter than usual today.”
Guanheng perks up at this. “You know I taste sweet for you,” he says, and it's almost a confession. It feels rough all over in his mouth and tastes like... oranges, maybe, and pixie dust. Like shame, and doubt. “I try,” he says desperate now to try and make Dejun stay. “I try to taste sweet for you. To taste better.”
Dejun reaches up and runs his fingers through Guanheng's hair. “I love the idea of that. You trying to make a better meal out of yourself.” His nails snag in the dark of Guanheng's hair, and he goes quiet. “But you don't think I'm using you, do you? I'm not trying to. But you make it seem like I'm only out for your blood.”
Guanheng is still stinging from the bite. He doesn't answer. He couldn't. Saying yes would be admitting to having hope. To hoping for something. Saying no would be a confession of a lack of trust. Anything Guanheng says would be an admission of anything — something.
Dejun sighs. His hand falls back on the nape of Guanheng's neck, and he falls asleep on the loveseat, leaving Guanheng awake and aching, like Wendy Darling waiting at her window.