[When he spots him - from far away, far sooner than anyone should be able to - the familiarity hits him with a pang. His heart feels suspended in his chest, breath caught just the same and his eyes wide, face showing so many and so much emotion in the span of a few seconds that anyone who watched him would know that here is a man who can't process how he feels.
It can't be real, Xue Yang tells himself, his lips actually moving with those words, as he repeats them like a mantra.
When he's close enough that he knows that this isn't just him mistaking someone - how could it be, when he's studied the man's every movement for so long, when he's become this familiar with it that it resonates so deeply in his memory? - he slows down. Blinks. Walks more deliberately, quietly, to close the distance unheard, a trick he's practised well in those days, just to startle him sometimes.
Finally he crouches down, looks at him, head in his hand as he takes it in. He does not know where he is. How he ended up here. He is supposed to be dead, so it's been hard to get himself to care all that much.
But now? Whatever this place is, it has given him what he's longed for.
It feels fragile, still, unreal. He's had plenty of dreams not unlike this. So he's silent for a while longer, although he almost feels as if he must hear his heart beating so fast.
He doesn't want to break the spell. Doesn't want to risk him being gone again. Doesn't want to face consequences either. What would happen, if he spoke? Would he lose all over again? Be despised. Lose him.
It does scare him, but he's never been good at fear. Not an emotion that sticks to him long before he bypasses it. And so, not belying the emotional turmoil he's just gone through, the apprehension that he's only repressed for a moment, his voice merely sounds a little teasing.]
You cooked? Ah, daozhang, haven't these poor people been through enough?
2. new friends? why do you need any friends other than what you have?
It can't be real, Xue Yang tells himself, his lips actually moving with those words, as he repeats them like a mantra.
When he's close enough that he knows that this isn't just him mistaking someone - how could it be, when he's studied the man's every movement for so long, when he's become this familiar with it that it resonates so deeply in his memory? - he slows down. Blinks. Walks more deliberately, quietly, to close the distance unheard, a trick he's practised well in those days, just to startle him sometimes.
Finally he crouches down, looks at him, head in his hand as he takes it in. He does not know where he is. How he ended up here. He is supposed to be dead, so it's been hard to get himself to care all that much.
But now? Whatever this place is, it has given him what he's longed for.
It feels fragile, still, unreal. He's had plenty of dreams not unlike this. So he's silent for a while longer, although he almost feels as if he must hear his heart beating so fast.
He doesn't want to break the spell. Doesn't want to risk him being gone again. Doesn't want to face consequences either. What would happen, if he spoke? Would he lose all over again? Be despised. Lose him.
It does scare him, but he's never been good at fear. Not an emotion that sticks to him long before he bypasses it. And so, not belying the emotional turmoil he's just gone through, the apprehension that he's only repressed for a moment, his voice merely sounds a little teasing.]
You cooked? Ah, daozhang, haven't these poor people been through enough?