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It started like this…
“So, um, hi! I’m Wei Ying, or Wuxian if you prefer that whole courtesy name thing, human disaster extraordinaire!”
Lan Wangji blinked, unexpectedly dazzled by the blindingly bright grin shining up at him from his brother’s phone screen.
“Me and my kid live in a two-bed flat that is the total opposite of organised. I work from home so it’s just an office and a living space and a play area and craft zone and everything else all rolled into one.”
The image spun so quickly from that grinning face to an absolute mess of a room that Lan Wangji felt a little motion sick just watching it.
“Oh and did I mention I have ADHD? Like so much ADHD, like I can’t find a pen that’s right in front of me because I looked away from it for two seconds kind of ADHD. And, I just, I need help? Oh hey Radish, you wanna say something on the video?”
The camera swung once again, focusing on an adorable little boy calmly lining up his crayons into colour order on an otherwise chaotic coffee table.
…at least Lan Wangji thought it was a coffee table under all the boxes and wires and paper.
“Hello! I’m a-Yuan and I’m four! Please help my Baba. I love him very much, but he is very messy.”
“The slander! But I love you very much too, Radish.”
The short video finally ended, leaving the frozen image of father and son pressed cheek to cheek, matching smiles bright and happy, eyes curved into crescent moons.
Lan Wangji felt the oddest urge to trace that smile with his finger.
“So? What do you think?” Lan Xichen eventually broke the lingering silence, taking a sip of fragrant tea, knowing eyes watching his brother over the cup's rim.
He didn't trust the glint in those eyes, nor the suspicious silence from his brother’s partners, but he wouldn't lie to himself.
He wanted to help that little boy and his father.
He wanted to see that smile in person.
It went like this…
“Gege!”
They'd barely uttered the basic greetings when the excited squeal of a young child echoed from the home. Lan Wangji swayed at the sudden weight that thudded into and attached itself to his leg.
“I'm so sorry!” Wei Wuxian started forward, cheeks pinking. “He's your biggest fan and we're still working on the concept of personal boundaries.”
Looking down at the new weight on his leg, Lan Wangji was faced with the brightest smile he’d ever had sent his way.
“You have to come see my room!”
“Aiyah, a-Yuan, they've not even made it through the front door yet!” Fond exasperation clear in his voice, Wei Wuxian tried and failed to retrieve his wayward child. “And how is he supposed to move with you glomped onto his leg?”
That seemed to bring the child up short.
He could see the wheels turning before the little face brightened once more.
Scrambling off of his leg, a-Yuan proceeded to reach up and wrap his little hand around two of Lan Wangji’s fingers.
“Come on, gege.”
There was little he could do other than follow where he was tugged.
“a-Yuan, maybe ask before dragging your poor gege somewhere?”
Lan Wangji stoically ignored the blooming warmth in his ears from the amusement filled voice calling him ‘gege’, and his own brother's knowing gaze, as he hovered uncertainly in the doorway.
Huffing the sigh of the long-suffering, a-Yuan turned to him, unconsciously swinging their hands between them. “Gege, will you come see my room with me?”
A pointed cough came from Wei Wuxian.
“Please?” a-Yuan quickly added.
And who was Lan Wangji to say no to such an earnest face?
“Mn,” he nodded.
a-Yuan grinned, free hand flapping happily.
Navigating their way through the cluttered home was an experience Lan Wangji was itching to improve, but they quickly reached a door that a-Yuan opened with as much flourish as a four-year-old could.
The room within was spotless.
A bubble of tranquil calm within the sea of chaos.
“Come on, gege.”
The interior, on closer inspection, took Wangji by surprise.
The systems.
The shelving and baskets.
The light, breezy white and blue colour scheme.
They were all miniature replicas of things he had in his own home that had been posted on their social media accounts.
“Very impressive.”
a-Yuan positively beamed at the praise, and Wangji felt his heart melt for the studious little organiser.
-x-
Wangji glared at Meng Yao from his seat next to Wei Wuxian.
He didn't always notice when his brother's more scheming partner manoeuvred him in directions he wouldn't normally go, but this?
This was a little too obvious.
Everywhere he tried to sit was suddenly occupied until the only space left was next to Wei Wuxian.
The steering of a-Yuan to sit on Wangji's lap, the boy now happily playing with his fingers while the adults talked.
The looks between his brother and Meng Yao were half-heartedly hidden behind Meng Yao’s tablet.
The less than subtle nods at him towards Wei Wuxian.
In a word, Lan Wangji was not amused.
Yes, he was aware that Wei Wuxian was attractive.
Yes, he was aware that Wei Yuan was adorable.
And yes, he wouldn't mind being a part of this little family.
That didn't mean he appreciated their, quite frankly, embarrassing interventions.
-x-
Even the interiors of the kitchen cabinets were a mess.
He couldn't stop his nose from wrinkling at an expiry date from two years ago.
“We'll start with reorganising the insides first, before moving to the countertops,” he said to both Nie Mingjue, who was attempting to fix a broken cabinet on the opposite side of the small kitchen, and Wei Wuxian, presently splayed against the counter, chin propped up on his palm.
“I’d let you reorganise my insides,” came the sighed response to his words that weren't expecting a reply.
Wangji froze.
He blinked, once, slowly, as his brain processed what it had heard, but still…
“Pardon?”
Wei Wuxian stared at him with wide eyes. A bright red flush stained his cheeks and the bridge of his nose, steadily creeping down his throat where Wangji could see it below the hand Wei Wuxian had slapped over his own mouth.
A muffled, high pitched “Huh?!” escaped Wei Wuxian before he scurried off, disappearing behind the door which presumably led to his bedroom.
Lan Wangji proceeded to turn a glare on Nie Mingjue, who's shaking shoulders suggested the man was forcibly holding back laughter.
“Quiet.”
Mingjue turned to face him, palms up in a pointless gesture of surrender, “I didn't say a word.”
“You were thinking it,” he huffed, turning back to sort through expired tins and packets.
He pointedly ignored the snort of laughter.
His brother's partners were both horrible, horrible people.
-x-
Lan Wangji was procrastinating, and he knew it.
It had taken nearly a week to wrangle Wei Wuxian’s chaos into something neater, cleaner, and hopefully easier for his ADHD-addled brain to maintain.
And now Wangji was hovering, straightening things that had already been straightened, all because he was reluctant to leave this bright little family.
The others had already gone, and Wangji would happily admit to being pleased at their departure. No longer subject to the meddling of the three embarrassing older brothers he'd had the misfortune of acquiring.
He smiled as a-Yuan copied him, straightening already straight cushions with an adorably serious face.
“Um.” Wangji looked up, taking in the twitchy form, the anxious hand rubbing the back of a tanned neck. “Would you, um, would you like to stay for dinner?”
“Would you like to stay forever?” a-Yuan piped up before Lan Wangji could say a word.
Wei Wuxian's mouth dropped open, that tantalising flush blooming on his cheeks once more.
“Radish, I swear, we are never watching Mulan again,” he grumbled.
It ended like this…
Lan Wangji turned the wedding photo just so, admiring the couple with their son held between them, pressed cheek to cheek and matching smiles aimed at the camera.
It was a beautiful picture.
He looked up at the sound of a key in the lock, followed by the general shuffle of bags, coats, and shoes.
“a-Die!”
He crouched down, arms open and waiting for the warm bundle of five-year-old to crash into him.
“How was school?” he asked, standing to prop his son on his hip, even though he was starting to get a little too big for it.
“Someone is apparently going to follow in his a-Die’s footsteps and organise spaces for a living.”
Opening his free arm once more, Wangji gathered his husband close.
“At least he gets his sense of organisation from me,” he said, just to watch the blush bloom on his husband's cheeks.
“Lan Zhan! So mean to me. I can be organised!”
Wangji nodded solemnly, “Wei Ying is very capable, and we love him very much, but…”
“Baba is very messy!” a-Yuan chimed in on cue.
“Slander!” Wei Wuxian cried. “Though I love you both very much too.”
And what could Lan Wangji do, but kiss that smiling mouth, and bask in the glow of his family.