At first Shen Wei had been amused by Yunlan’s team bringing another box of his belongings to Yunlan’s apartment every time one of them visited, as though he might not notice them moving him in if they just did it gradually enough. The fact was, though, that despite not accumulating a great many things, Shen Wei owned too much to fit easily into the apartment of a man who had turned his bedroom into a workout space. So it was only a few weeks after they’d returned from the Lamp that he said, on the drive in to work, “Either I need to re-acquire my old apartment, or we need to think about moving.”

Yunlan laughed. “What, you don’t think cardboard is the hot new material for book cases?”

“It does clash a bit with your decorating scheme,” Shen Wei noted dryly Cardboard would never hold the weight of Yunlan’s collection of alcohol, for one thing.

“I think Da Qing is the only one who really approves of those boxes.” Yunlan gunned the engine through a light about to change, and Shen Wei braced himself with the habit that a year disembodied had done nothing to blunt. “Our building doesn’t have any larger units, though.”

“Which is why you need to think about where else you might like to live,” Shen Wei pointed out as Yunlan pulled in to the front drive of the biosciences building. "We can find an agent once you decide that." Yunlan set a hand on his arm as he went to open the passenger door, staying him.

“What about where you’d like to live?” he asked, quietly.

Warmth curled through Shen Wei at that ready thoughtfulness. “Yunlan, I’ve lived in and around this city since it was first built. Every district in it has places that I’ve enjoyed spending my time.” Yunlan settled back at that, with a faintly rueful smile. Shen Wei thought he still let the knowledge slip away, sometimes, that Shen Wei really was that old. The crooked line of Yunlan’s smile didn’t feel like quite the right way to start the day off, though, so he added, as he swung down from the Jeep, “Besides, what makes you think I don’t have a list of requirements already written up?”

That made Yunlan laugh again.

When Shen Wei thought about it, he felt he should have expected the problems they ran into. After all, he’d noticed Yunlan’s taste in vehicles, in clothing, even in liquor. The style might be casual but the substance was both choosy and expensive. The moment they’d started looking for new apartments, that taste had surfaced with a vengeance.

The high-rise downtown hadn’t been sufficiently insulated. The re-zoned and renovated block of modern apartments by the park had security that was too intrusive. The second-story apartment on the edge of the university district had appliances that were too old, despite the fact that Yunlan would not be the one using most of them.

Their agent was starting to look like she regretted her choice of career, or at least of clients.

“This is the last one on my list,” she said as the door was unlocked. “It’s at the top end of the price range you wanted, but it’s been recently upgraded…”

Shen Wei followed Yunlan inside and stepped into light. Broad windows on two sides of the large, open room caught the late afternoon sun, and it glowed back from white plaster and honey-colored wood around the frames and across the floor. The faint creak under his feet suggested it was fairly old wood, but the light gleamed off clean, new steel and dark blue tile to the left, where the kitchen had a wide window of its own, over the sink. Shen Wei went to glance down the short hallway beyond, which opened into three more rooms, two of them almost as bright as the living room, and a generous bathroom.

It wasn’t until he was running his fingers over the tall shelves of the living room that he realized Yunlan hadn’t said a thing, yet. “Yunlan?” he asked, a bit curious about such restraint, turning to see his lover smiling at him.

“We’ll take it,” Yunlan told their agent.

Shen Wei felt a strong need to adjust his glasses. Their agent looked even more stunned. Yunlan merely shrugged, as if his reasons should be obvious.

“None of the rest of them made you smile like that.”

It took Shen Wei most of the way home to regain his composure.

He did not succeed in talking Yunlan out of getting the apartment that made Shen Wei most at ease. After a week of arguing, however—a week that Da Qing spectated like they were a particularly entertaining tennis match—he did manage to insist that Yunlan arrange and decorate the place as he pleased. That resulted in a day of Yunlan wandering about looking thoughtful, and then a shopping spree that produced heavy, dark curtains in the living room, half a dozen inconspicuous lamps that Yunlan put on the floor and pointed at the corners, and a few gallons of paint that turned their bedroom a deep, underwater green. The second bedroom acquired two walls of bookshelves and a lavish new desk, with Shen Wei’s brush sets arranged on it. The far corner of the living room gained a corner table for Da Qing’s bed, and his swing was hung next to it, looking out one window past the houseplants. The wine shelf was installed by the kitchen. The windowless bedroom turned out to fit all of Yunlan’s workout equipment, even the weight bench, and started to look rather like a shrine to violent physical fitness. Yunlan’s wealth of small tables, stools, and shelves clustered around the living room furniture and were quickly populated with a mixed collection of statuary, lamps, wood work, and Da Qing’s goldfish.

And Shen Wei finally relaxed a little.

“You’re really that unused to anyone at all taking care of you, aren’t you?” Yunlan asked, winding his arms around Shen Wei from behind and gathering him back against Yunlan’s body. Shen Wei leaned against him, looking around the airy lightness of the living room, which was only heightened by the contrast of the dark curtains framing each window.

“It’s not that.” Yunlan made a disbelieving sound, and a faint smile tugged at his mouth. “Well. That too, perhaps, but… I don’t want you getting lost in me.”

Yunlan smiled against his neck. “You don’t need to worry about that, xiao-Wei.”

The reminder that Zhao Yunlan had the memory of a whole other life worth of stubbornness, now, did relax him, he had to admit. “All right,” he agreed, quietly, resting a hand over Yunlan’s. And then his breath caught as Yunlan pressed an open-mouthed kiss just under his ear.

“So. Want to try out the new bed?” Yunlan murmured against his skin, and Shen Wei had to laugh.

“All right,” he agreed again, with far more of a purr in it this time.

Maybe there really was no need to worry, after all.

End