Canât remember where I was going with that, but A-Yuanâs pov on his early days in the Cloud Recesses
His name was a-Yuan, and he had been very, very sick. He did not understand all the words, but he understood fever. He also understood lucky, but when the nice man said it, it sounded like it meant something more than just about being sick.
The nice man was very nice. His name was Lan Xichen and he always tried to explain things to a-Yuan with words that he understood. He said that bad things had happened to a-Yuanâs old home, and now he had to live in this new place. He said no, a-Yuan would not be able to go back there when the bad things were over. He said, we will take care of you, and he smiled, and a-Yuan was glad for the nice man, even if he felt a little sad. Because of the fever, it was hard to think about home. Each day made it a little harder, but for now he still remembered that home had a lot of nice people. He missed them. But the people of the new place were nice too.
One of these people was the sad uncle. At first, when he was having the fever, a-Yuan always stayed with the sad uncle, because he was also very sick. His presence had been a comfort at the time. Now, a-Yuan was well again. The sad uncle wasnât. He wouldnât be well for a long, long, long time, the nice man said, and when he said that, he looked as sad as the sad uncle. For him too, people used words like fever and lucky, but they also used other ones that were more difficult, like punished and deserved and guilty and broken.
Because a-Yuan was well and the sad uncle wasnât, he had been told that he should let him rest. That was a very, very difficult order to follow, because the sad uncle and the nice man were the only people he knew. Everyone else looked at him funny, like they were a little angry. a-Yuan didnât know why they were angry, and he didnât like it. So he did what he always did at home, before the fever, and went to find someone to protect him. Since the nice man was very, very busy, that was usually the sad uncle. A-Yuan wasnât allowed to be there, but if he made himself very small and very quiet, nobody noticed.
Sometimes, if a-Yuan was very lucky, the sad uncle would let him climb in bed and take a nap. It wasnât allowed. They had both been scolded for it, but if the sad uncle saw him, he always held out a hand to invite a-Yuan to join him.
A-Yuan was always, always careful when they did this. The sad uncle (Lan Wangji, he was told, and he liked him so he made sure to know the name) was very, very unwell. Something had happened to his back. Something bad. Something that couldnât be said in front of a-Yuan, and couldnât be shown to him either.
