It starts like this: Nie Mingjue isn't looking at him, and Nie Huaisang wants him to. That is the heft and the whole of the impulse. There is nothing more pressing in Qinghe, in this rare moment of transient peace and relative quiet, that has more need of Nie Mingjue than Nie Huaisang. And certainly nothing that has more want of him than Nie Huaisang.

And yet, despite this immutable truth and indisputable fact, Nie Mingjue is not looking at him. He is paying him heed, of course — it is impossible not to, with someone like Nie Huaisang, whose presence sprawls out across any room he swans into — it is just not— enough. His gaze is turned outward, instead, down to the way the room snatches in on itself at the threshold before it spills out into the hall. His hands are folded behind his back; his expression is folded in on itself.

It starts like this: Nie Mingjue isn't himself, and Nie Huaisang wants him to be. He's been— pensive, of late. His brother has always been thoughtful, but he's never been so turned inward, so bent over some sort of tangle rooted beneath his skin.

Nie Huaisang isn't sure what it is, and he's less sure in his ability to fix it. The times that he feels like— that he feels as if he makes the twist of frustrations in Nie Mingjue's gut draw taut and the brace of his burdens on his shoulders more cumbersome are happening with more and more frequency. He's starting to think that it's not something he does, anymore, so much as it is something he is.

It starts like this: there is a distance between them where there shouldn't be one, and Nie Huaisang doesn't know which of them put it there, or if it was either of them, at all. But he knows— not how to cross it, so much as he is sure he'll still be caught if he falls.

So he does what used to work, once before: he draws up to Nie Mingjue's side, and curves himself against his chest. Feels his brother's jagged tear of breath against his hair, the rise of his ribs against his shoulder blades. They don't fit together as neatly as they did, back then, when they were children: Nie Huaisang has to slope his shoulders, and dip his chin towards his clavicle. Has to turn his face, just a little, so his guan doesn’t scrape the underside of Nie Mingjue's jaw.

Nie Mingjue straightens, instinctively, his shoulders drawing back. Thar makes it better, but it doesn't make it enough. His hands remain where they are, and no words come; all Nie Huaisang feels is the work of his throat against his head as he swallows, hard, once.

Nie Huaisang curls his fingers in his robes and claws down, uncaring for how they will crease from the brunt of it. He closes his eyes; tries to stagger his breathing to the rise-fall of Nie Mingjue's chest to his back, slow his heartbeat to a steady thrum.

The wordless quiet yawns out, drags over him like the point of a knife, flaying him open. He sucks in a breath, shuddery; feels the hitch of Nie Mingjue's chest around his own in turn.

It really isn't a question of who will break, here: of the two of them, it is more often than not Nie Huaisang who goes to the floor. They are cut from the same cloth, but he's not threaded together to endure in the way Nie Mingjue is. The question is more— is Nie Mingjue going to let him stoop that low, before he builds him up again? Is that going to be what it takes to throw Nie Mingjue wide open, for Nie Huaisang to get his hands around him to find what's aching?

"Da-ge," he says, soft. He feels the sigh of Nie Mingjue's exhale, but does not earn the sound of his voice in the instant he wants it.

Nie Huaisang turns, impatience and clumsiness feeding into one another, making him stumble flush against his brother's frame as he whips around. Nie Mingjue reaches to catch him around the arms, as he always does, as Nie Huaisang knew he would, and he winds his arms around his brother's waist, in turn, using the break in his guard to his advantage enough to slide the blade of his body home.

Nie Mingjue's fingers tighten in his sleeves, across his flesh, but not enough to hurt, never enough to deter. Nie Huaisang pushes his cheek into his sternum, nudges his head until he's tucked back in beneath his chin.

He feels Nie Mingjue soften, so slight as to be imperceptible to anyone else but him, even up close. Like the coil of his tension has slackened.

Nie Huaisang lifts his face, and from where he is, it's impossible for his lips to not graze up the collar of his robes and the column of his throat; impossible for him to not feel the flinch in Nie Mingjue's fingers. And Nie Huaisang thinks— he does not think, a rarity among the other rarities unearthed today, of this moment and Nie Mingjue's malaise. He goes, instead, flows with what heat streaks beneath his skin, and presses his lips to Nie Mingjue's throat. He feels the breath Nie Mingjue takes, jagged and pained; feels him swallow. Feels the way his grip fists impossibly tighter in his robes, fraught.

"Huaisang," he rasps, the end of it shaking out of him with a breathless groan when Nie Huaisang mouths at his skin, scared but sure. He grasps his own forearm with one hand, thumbs blindly at the small of Nie Mingjue's spine with the other, beneath his belt where his robes ruck and crumple, where his back bleeds into the slope of his hip.

"Da-ge," he repeats, louder, weaker. Lets his teeth scrape against him as he sounds it out.

He feels the exact second his brother splinters, shatters, snaps— his wrists swivel, his stance shifts, and Nie Huaisang is lifted without struggle. Under the mercy of his brother's strength, he’s dragged from the doorway, from the prying eyes of any passersby. He’s pinned by the flat of his back to the wall, the trap of his brother's hands drawing shut, tight, around his shoulders, his thighs spread wide by the shove of Nie Mingjue’s knee through and between. Nie Huaisang's breath slams out of his mouth in a rush, and before he can chase it, Nie Mingjue's tongue slides past his parted teeth to fill the void of it, hot and wet.

If this is what it takes, he thinks, leaning up to press in and fall down deep into it, if this is what we need. If it keeps Nie Mingjue’s attention on him, keeps Nie Mingjue with him— well. It is not at all something terrible that must be endured for a greater good’s sake.