![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Title: Retreat, Move Forward
Author: Evandar
Fandom: SVSSS
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Gen, Angst
Pairing: Pre-Shang Qinghua/Shen Yuan
Warnings: Self-esteem issues, AU - No Transmigration, References to Depression
Disclaimer: I do not own SVSSS and I am making no profit from this story.
Summary: It’s on a whim that he checks his email inbox afterwards; he usually throws himself into writing straight away, desperate to get his words out and his deadlines met, but he was unexpectedly prolific yesterday and he can afford the pause.
He deletes most of them without thinking. He reads a couple of newsletters to remind himself that he used to be part of a community once, then deletes those too. His mouse is hovering over the mass delete function when a subject line catches his eye: Paradise Hills Writers Retreat: Your Reservation.
AN: Written for the 2025 round of![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
iddyiddybangbang!
Part 1, Part 2
The room is bigger than his whole apartment.
The bed is bigger than his bedroom at home, and it’s covered in soft pillows and a massive comforter. He presses his hand against it, and it’s soft and smooth to the touch. The thread count is probably obscene. He tries to imagine what it’s going to feel like sleeping in it, but his mind draws a blank.
He ditches his backpack on the sofa – the sofa!!! – and crosses to the massive windows. There’s sliding doors leading out onto a balcony, and he can see the shadows of the mountains beyond looming black against the night sky. He closes the curtains decisively, blocking out the view of not-Beijing and, hopefully, the existential crisis that being in a place this remote and expensive is causing.
He scrubs a hand over his face and sighs. He needs a shower. He needs a shower and sleep and to not think too hard about what he’s doing here. But when he closes his eyes, he can still see the scandalised expression on that guy from the lobby’s face: some rich kid with floppy hair and glasses, who had no right to look that shocked by his appearance when he was sitting there in an anime t-shirt.
He crosses the room to where an open door leads into a bathroom with a sunken hot tub and a shower that looks like something out of a sci-fi movie. He stares at it for a second before backing out. Nope.
He doesn’t belong here, and the truth of that is like a constant itch under his skin.
He sighs again, braces himself, and re-enters the bathroom.
He keeps his shower as short and perfunctory as possible given the complexity of the shower settings. He does treat himself to using the conditioner provided by the hotel, though, combing the little luxury through his curls with his fingers. Afterwards, when he’s scrunching his curls dry, he marvels at the texture. He hasn’t used conditioner since he was kicked out; he’d forgotten how his hair could feel.
He'd forgotten how it could look, too. If the guy in the mirror didn’t have his exact pattern of acne scars and his too-familiar eyebags, he wouldn’t have recognised himself.
He flops onto the bed wearing only a towel, and an odd wheezing noise escapes him as he sinks into what is possibly the softest surface he’s ever touched. Has he ever had a bed this soft and cozy? He doubts it. It’s plush and clean and the closest he’ll ever come to being able to lie on a cloud.
He presses his face into the duvet cover and screams.
He gets up again once his voice gives out. He drags himself off the bed long enough to dress in a clean set of pyjama bottoms and an old t-shirt before flopping back onto it along with the brochure for the writing retreat.
It’s glossy. It’s all tucked into a folder that’s fucking embossed, and the timetable is, frankly, extravagant. Seminars on crafting dialogue, plot development, world building – even fucking poetry???
He double and triple checks the time for the registration and welcome event – holy fuck, there’s a closing ceremony; he hasn’t been to a ceremony since his graduation – before setting the alarm on his phone. He sets aside the brochure and turns out the lights, and he tucks himself into the blissfully soft bed only to find himself unable to settle.
It’s too soft.
It’s too dark – there are no city lights filtering in through the cracks in the curtains.
It’s too quiet – there’s no traffic or loud voices filtering up from outside.
He curls up on his side and closes his eyes and pretends that he can’t feel his eyes burning from unshed tears.
What is he doing here?
…
He hits snooze twice before he remembers that he needs to drag himself out of his wonderful, fluffy cloud and go and pretend he’s more than just the hack writer of a cheesy stallion-novel. His alarm goes off again before he dredges up enough courage to actually do that. He crawls out from under the duvet and pads across the floor to where he ditched his backpack unceremoniously on the sofa.
His feet sink into the carpet as he walks. It’s ridiculous. How’s he supposed to go back to his tiny, miserable little flat after this?
He shakes out his least-offensive pair of jeans and partners them with a black t-shirt and a red button-down. He looks… not terrible. Nothing like an actual writer, but then, he’s barely that anyway. He shoves his remaining clothes into drawers and onto hangers (!!!) in the wardrobe (!!!), wrestles his curls into a ponytail and hoists his backpack – still with his laptop and his notebooks inside – onto his shoulder.
He feels like he’s going back to university. Just fancier. And to study something he actually wants to this time.
He remembers to grab his phone and his keycard before locking the door and heading in the direction of the complimentary breakfast.
If nothing else, he’s going to get actual vitamins for the next two weeks. No instant noodles for him!
There are people scattered over the breakfast room. He casts an eye over them as he makes his way to the buffet. There’s a non-zero chance that he’s going to be in seminars, sharing his work with some of them. Most of them are middle-aged – there’s a lady that looks like the librarian at his old primary school, and a guy who looks like an average salaryman is reading a newspaper while sipping coffee. He spots the guy from last night, too – the one in the anime t-shirt. He’s watching him with sharp, suspicious eyes, the same way he had last night, and he feels himself shrinking from that gaze.
He busies himself with food instead, grabbing rice and eggs and spicy tofu with vegetables. He pours himself a coffee before taking everything over to an empty table. He settles down, eying the spread before him. It’s more food than he normally eats – more than he’s eaten in one sitting since getting kicked out – and he’s absolutely overdone it.
But.
That first bite of warm rice brings tears to his eyes.
He ducks his head, focusing on eating slowly. Everything is delicious, which he probably should have expected, but he’d honestly forgotten how good food could be.
A shadow falls over his table. He looks up, cheek bulging with half-chewed rice and tofu. It’s Anime T-shirt Guy, leaning on a cane.
“You’re Airplane, right?” he asks.
He swallows. Nods. Glances at the t-shirt. Nods again, and nudges the chair opposite him out with his foot. “You can sit down if you want,” he says.
Anime T-shirt Guy makes a relieved sort of noise as he sits down. He props his cane against the arm of his chair and folds his hands on the table like he’s going to start interviewing him for a job.
He puts down his chopsticks and pushes away the last of his breakfast. He doesn’t feel like eating anymore. He pulls his coffee mug closer, though, cradling its warmth between his hands.
“Are you the guy that booked me onto this?” he asks. “The retreat, I mean.”
Anime T-shirt’s mouth curves up into a smile. He’s pretty. Intimidating, but pretty – he could have been an idol, really. “I did,” he says. “I’m glad you took it up.” He tilts his head ever so slightly. “I’m Peerless Cucumber, by the way.”
He remembers the scattered praise amongst vitriolic insults, and takes a sip of coffee. This guy looks like he’d be that sharp-tongued; he doesn’t look like he’d enjoy anything someone like him is able to produce. But he believes him. He’s pretty sure that only someone desperately, tragically online would know about Peerless Cucumber, let alone steal his identity.
“Thank you for your patronage,” he replies.
Cucumber-bro narrows his eyes, as if he suspects he’s being mocked.
“Seriously, you paid for my train ticket with all those extra chapter purchases,” he clarifies.
Cucumber-bro sniffs, looking away. “I don’t know why you waited so long to release them,” he says. “They’re some of your better work – definitely much better than that last arc. It was painful. And they explain so much!”
“Sex sells,” he says. “Even bad, unrealistic sex. Most of my followers pay more for the smut chapters.”
He doesn’t think that Cucumber-bro’s going to be impressed by that reasoning, and sure enough he wrinkles his nose.
“I’ve got to eat, dude,” he says. “Pay the bills. And if that means writing ten thousand words of porn a day, I’m going to do it.”
“You could still do better,” Cucumber-bro says huffily. He pauses, and then he leans forward slightly, eyes wide behind his glasses. “Do you have something to work on while you’re here?”
He thinks of the notebook in his backpack, the story that he’d been reluctant to keep planning once his plans for PIDW had gone to hell.
“You do,” Cucumber-bro says. He sounds satisfied, as if a gift has been dropped into his lap. The smile spreading across his face has distinct cat-got-the-canary vibes. It’s offensively attractive. “Tell me about it?”
It’s less of a request and more of a demand, really. Cucumber-bro doesn’t exactly strike him as the type of person who has to actually ask for things very often. He sips his coffee, mulling over past insults and hidden praise; looks at the genuine interest writ-large over Cucumber-bro’s pale face. He shifts in his seat, lowering his mug and leaning forward.
He can do this, he thinks as he takes a breath.
He can talk about this story without having to justify himself. He can make something of it.
He can, maybe, become a proper writer.
And maybe, just maybe, the interest on Cucumber-bro’s face as he explains his ideas can become something more one day.
Epilogue
A-Yuan’s apartment is a lot nicer than his old one. It has more than once room, for a start, and those rooms have actual furniture in them. It has a shit-ton of merch, too, and he tries not to be too creeped out by the amount of unofficial (like anyone would actually license PIDW) merch on display in A-Yuan’s room.
And yes, it is creepy to have your fictional creation on your boyfriend’s bedroom walls when all the art features a rough approximation of your own face. Not that he can complain to A-Yuan about it: the one time he did, he got a lecture on why self-inserts were the worst literary trope imaginable.
Cartoon-versions of himself watching them fuck aside, meeting A-Yuan has been the best thing that’s happened to him, like, ever.
He watches Shen Yuan’s lashes flutter against his pale cheeks. He runs the tip of his finger down the length of Shen Yuan’s nose, and he grins at the resulting half-hearted grumble. A-Yuan snuggles further into him, smooshing his face into Luo Binghe’s shoulder, and Binghe shifts to cradle him close.
A-Yuan doesn’t know it yet, but the sale of his novel – the one he’d took a chance on developing at the retreat – has earned him enough to buy a ring.
Author: Evandar
Fandom: SVSSS
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Gen, Angst
Pairing: Pre-Shang Qinghua/Shen Yuan
Warnings: Self-esteem issues, AU - No Transmigration, References to Depression
Disclaimer: I do not own SVSSS and I am making no profit from this story.
Summary: It’s on a whim that he checks his email inbox afterwards; he usually throws himself into writing straight away, desperate to get his words out and his deadlines met, but he was unexpectedly prolific yesterday and he can afford the pause.
He deletes most of them without thinking. He reads a couple of newsletters to remind himself that he used to be part of a community once, then deletes those too. His mouse is hovering over the mass delete function when a subject line catches his eye: Paradise Hills Writers Retreat: Your Reservation.
AN: Written for the 2025 round of
iddyiddybangbang!Part 1, Part 2
The room is bigger than his whole apartment.
The bed is bigger than his bedroom at home, and it’s covered in soft pillows and a massive comforter. He presses his hand against it, and it’s soft and smooth to the touch. The thread count is probably obscene. He tries to imagine what it’s going to feel like sleeping in it, but his mind draws a blank.
He ditches his backpack on the sofa – the sofa!!! – and crosses to the massive windows. There’s sliding doors leading out onto a balcony, and he can see the shadows of the mountains beyond looming black against the night sky. He closes the curtains decisively, blocking out the view of not-Beijing and, hopefully, the existential crisis that being in a place this remote and expensive is causing.
He scrubs a hand over his face and sighs. He needs a shower. He needs a shower and sleep and to not think too hard about what he’s doing here. But when he closes his eyes, he can still see the scandalised expression on that guy from the lobby’s face: some rich kid with floppy hair and glasses, who had no right to look that shocked by his appearance when he was sitting there in an anime t-shirt.
He crosses the room to where an open door leads into a bathroom with a sunken hot tub and a shower that looks like something out of a sci-fi movie. He stares at it for a second before backing out. Nope.
He doesn’t belong here, and the truth of that is like a constant itch under his skin.
He sighs again, braces himself, and re-enters the bathroom.
He keeps his shower as short and perfunctory as possible given the complexity of the shower settings. He does treat himself to using the conditioner provided by the hotel, though, combing the little luxury through his curls with his fingers. Afterwards, when he’s scrunching his curls dry, he marvels at the texture. He hasn’t used conditioner since he was kicked out; he’d forgotten how his hair could feel.
He'd forgotten how it could look, too. If the guy in the mirror didn’t have his exact pattern of acne scars and his too-familiar eyebags, he wouldn’t have recognised himself.
He flops onto the bed wearing only a towel, and an odd wheezing noise escapes him as he sinks into what is possibly the softest surface he’s ever touched. Has he ever had a bed this soft and cozy? He doubts it. It’s plush and clean and the closest he’ll ever come to being able to lie on a cloud.
He presses his face into the duvet cover and screams.
He gets up again once his voice gives out. He drags himself off the bed long enough to dress in a clean set of pyjama bottoms and an old t-shirt before flopping back onto it along with the brochure for the writing retreat.
It’s glossy. It’s all tucked into a folder that’s fucking embossed, and the timetable is, frankly, extravagant. Seminars on crafting dialogue, plot development, world building – even fucking poetry???
He double and triple checks the time for the registration and welcome event – holy fuck, there’s a closing ceremony; he hasn’t been to a ceremony since his graduation – before setting the alarm on his phone. He sets aside the brochure and turns out the lights, and he tucks himself into the blissfully soft bed only to find himself unable to settle.
It’s too soft.
It’s too dark – there are no city lights filtering in through the cracks in the curtains.
It’s too quiet – there’s no traffic or loud voices filtering up from outside.
He curls up on his side and closes his eyes and pretends that he can’t feel his eyes burning from unshed tears.
What is he doing here?
…
He hits snooze twice before he remembers that he needs to drag himself out of his wonderful, fluffy cloud and go and pretend he’s more than just the hack writer of a cheesy stallion-novel. His alarm goes off again before he dredges up enough courage to actually do that. He crawls out from under the duvet and pads across the floor to where he ditched his backpack unceremoniously on the sofa.
His feet sink into the carpet as he walks. It’s ridiculous. How’s he supposed to go back to his tiny, miserable little flat after this?
He shakes out his least-offensive pair of jeans and partners them with a black t-shirt and a red button-down. He looks… not terrible. Nothing like an actual writer, but then, he’s barely that anyway. He shoves his remaining clothes into drawers and onto hangers (!!!) in the wardrobe (!!!), wrestles his curls into a ponytail and hoists his backpack – still with his laptop and his notebooks inside – onto his shoulder.
He feels like he’s going back to university. Just fancier. And to study something he actually wants to this time.
He remembers to grab his phone and his keycard before locking the door and heading in the direction of the complimentary breakfast.
If nothing else, he’s going to get actual vitamins for the next two weeks. No instant noodles for him!
There are people scattered over the breakfast room. He casts an eye over them as he makes his way to the buffet. There’s a non-zero chance that he’s going to be in seminars, sharing his work with some of them. Most of them are middle-aged – there’s a lady that looks like the librarian at his old primary school, and a guy who looks like an average salaryman is reading a newspaper while sipping coffee. He spots the guy from last night, too – the one in the anime t-shirt. He’s watching him with sharp, suspicious eyes, the same way he had last night, and he feels himself shrinking from that gaze.
He busies himself with food instead, grabbing rice and eggs and spicy tofu with vegetables. He pours himself a coffee before taking everything over to an empty table. He settles down, eying the spread before him. It’s more food than he normally eats – more than he’s eaten in one sitting since getting kicked out – and he’s absolutely overdone it.
But.
That first bite of warm rice brings tears to his eyes.
He ducks his head, focusing on eating slowly. Everything is delicious, which he probably should have expected, but he’d honestly forgotten how good food could be.
A shadow falls over his table. He looks up, cheek bulging with half-chewed rice and tofu. It’s Anime T-shirt Guy, leaning on a cane.
“You’re Airplane, right?” he asks.
He swallows. Nods. Glances at the t-shirt. Nods again, and nudges the chair opposite him out with his foot. “You can sit down if you want,” he says.
Anime T-shirt Guy makes a relieved sort of noise as he sits down. He props his cane against the arm of his chair and folds his hands on the table like he’s going to start interviewing him for a job.
He puts down his chopsticks and pushes away the last of his breakfast. He doesn’t feel like eating anymore. He pulls his coffee mug closer, though, cradling its warmth between his hands.
“Are you the guy that booked me onto this?” he asks. “The retreat, I mean.”
Anime T-shirt’s mouth curves up into a smile. He’s pretty. Intimidating, but pretty – he could have been an idol, really. “I did,” he says. “I’m glad you took it up.” He tilts his head ever so slightly. “I’m Peerless Cucumber, by the way.”
He remembers the scattered praise amongst vitriolic insults, and takes a sip of coffee. This guy looks like he’d be that sharp-tongued; he doesn’t look like he’d enjoy anything someone like him is able to produce. But he believes him. He’s pretty sure that only someone desperately, tragically online would know about Peerless Cucumber, let alone steal his identity.
“Thank you for your patronage,” he replies.
Cucumber-bro narrows his eyes, as if he suspects he’s being mocked.
“Seriously, you paid for my train ticket with all those extra chapter purchases,” he clarifies.
Cucumber-bro sniffs, looking away. “I don’t know why you waited so long to release them,” he says. “They’re some of your better work – definitely much better than that last arc. It was painful. And they explain so much!”
“Sex sells,” he says. “Even bad, unrealistic sex. Most of my followers pay more for the smut chapters.”
He doesn’t think that Cucumber-bro’s going to be impressed by that reasoning, and sure enough he wrinkles his nose.
“I’ve got to eat, dude,” he says. “Pay the bills. And if that means writing ten thousand words of porn a day, I’m going to do it.”
“You could still do better,” Cucumber-bro says huffily. He pauses, and then he leans forward slightly, eyes wide behind his glasses. “Do you have something to work on while you’re here?”
He thinks of the notebook in his backpack, the story that he’d been reluctant to keep planning once his plans for PIDW had gone to hell.
“You do,” Cucumber-bro says. He sounds satisfied, as if a gift has been dropped into his lap. The smile spreading across his face has distinct cat-got-the-canary vibes. It’s offensively attractive. “Tell me about it?”
It’s less of a request and more of a demand, really. Cucumber-bro doesn’t exactly strike him as the type of person who has to actually ask for things very often. He sips his coffee, mulling over past insults and hidden praise; looks at the genuine interest writ-large over Cucumber-bro’s pale face. He shifts in his seat, lowering his mug and leaning forward.
He can do this, he thinks as he takes a breath.
He can talk about this story without having to justify himself. He can make something of it.
He can, maybe, become a proper writer.
And maybe, just maybe, the interest on Cucumber-bro’s face as he explains his ideas can become something more one day.
Epilogue
A-Yuan’s apartment is a lot nicer than his old one. It has more than once room, for a start, and those rooms have actual furniture in them. It has a shit-ton of merch, too, and he tries not to be too creeped out by the amount of unofficial (like anyone would actually license PIDW) merch on display in A-Yuan’s room.
And yes, it is creepy to have your fictional creation on your boyfriend’s bedroom walls when all the art features a rough approximation of your own face. Not that he can complain to A-Yuan about it: the one time he did, he got a lecture on why self-inserts were the worst literary trope imaginable.
Cartoon-versions of himself watching them fuck aside, meeting A-Yuan has been the best thing that’s happened to him, like, ever.
He watches Shen Yuan’s lashes flutter against his pale cheeks. He runs the tip of his finger down the length of Shen Yuan’s nose, and he grins at the resulting half-hearted grumble. A-Yuan snuggles further into him, smooshing his face into Luo Binghe’s shoulder, and Binghe shifts to cradle him close.
A-Yuan doesn’t know it yet, but the sale of his novel – the one he’d took a chance on developing at the retreat – has earned him enough to buy a ring.
