TIAN GUAN CI FU Fan fic stories

A LOVE THAT'S MEANT FOR ME

Xie Lian sits in the director's office at his art gallery job, and wonders if perhaps he has finally cracked and taken things too far.

He's not done anything wrong, no. He's not here for a disciplinary, or for any inappropriate behaviour at work, no, he's just going through the perfectly normal process of having his vacation days signed off.

Completely normal.

"Are you going anywhere nice, Xie Lian?" She asks, inputting his days into the system as he sits in the chair and tries not to look incredibly suspicious. She pulls up Hua Cheng's calendar right after, and inputs the same days.

"Ah, we haven't booked it yet. It's a surprise, so please don't mention it to him." She doesn't notice how his smile is tight and a little guilty, and her own smile is gentle when she hands him back his request form.

"A romantic getaway then? What a lovely plan for Christmas."

Yes, Xie Lian thinks, a lovely romantic getaway that he plans to spring upon his best friend and his roommate, who everyone thinks he's dating. A misconception, of course, because only in his greatest fantasies is he dating Hua Cheng, but he's not above using that misconception if it scores him points when he's trying to get them both approved for vacation days.

After all, I'm taking my boyfriend on a surprise trip for Christmas sounds a lot more romantic than I want to take my best friend away for a week and see if I can finally seduce him whilst we're there.

She hands him the form that Xie Lian filled out for Hua Cheng as well, both of them signed off with her signature, and Xie Lian tucks them into his laptop case with a smile. She waves him away with a comment on how they're so cute and she hopes they have a lovely Christmas, and Xie Lian shuts the door behind him with a guilty exhale, his heart pounding in his chest.

Now he's got a rural cabin to book, and ruse to come up with to convince Hua Cheng to go with him on a Christmas break.

How did he get here?

Well.

They've known each other for years now, since Xie Lian first got his job at the art gallery, and Hua Cheng was interning there before he went to college. Xie Lian had been twenty-three, Hua Cheng eighteen, but they'd clicked instantly, and have been joined at the hip ever since.

They'd moved in together when Hua Cheng finished college three years later, after Xie Lian's landlord had evicted him and he'd had no other place to go, and Hua Cheng had offered to sublet him the spare bedroom in his apartment. They'd somehow managed to become even closer then, especially when Hua Cheng became the official artist-in-residence for the art gallery, meaning they could commute into work together, and often finished at similar times too.

They rarely see each other at work, but that is simply a side effect of being in two completely separate departments. Xie Lian is the art and sculpture conservator, whilst Hua Cheng has his own private studio on the other end of the site.

And this is what helps Xie Lian understand.

See, years ago, when Hua Cheng had left college and Xie Lian had moved in, Xie Lian had asked Hua Cheng if he'd had any significant other who would be put out by Xie Lian's presence in the apartment. Hua Cheng had confidently told him that his beloved wouldn't mind, and, well.

Xie Lian has spent years agonising over that ever since.

Because it only took a few weeks of living together for him to realise that he was totally, utterly, head over heels in love with Hua Cheng.