#hence the fic being set in the 70's and now LWJ's pose

[eleanorfenyxwrites]

The Sculptor

Chapter 7 - Strictly Professional

[Masterpost] [AO3]

-/-

“I want to lick him,” Wei Wuxian whines into the protective shield of his hands cupped over his face. He’s met with shockingly little sympathy from his companions, but then again they’ve had to hear about every passing crush he’s gotten for the last ten plus years so he supposes that’s only fair. They don’t know yet that Lan Wangji is different, they don’t understand that he’s a fucking god!

“A-Ying,” Xiao Xingchen tuts softly, amused at his expense though he’d never say so, and Wei Wuxian parts his fingers enough to glare at the man who’s basically become his Uncle over the years. Everyone in their social circle’s Uncle, really.

“Haven’t you or Uncle Zichen seen him coming into the studio?? You should know what I mean!”

“He’s very handsome, yes,” Xiao Xingchen comforts and pats him on the head. “He is also, as you’ve told us, married and seemingly happy enough about that fact. You’re not a homewrecker, A-Ying.”

“I know,” he wails, “But that doesn’t mean I can’t still want to see what he’s capable of!”

“Hey, you never know - they might be swingers,” Nie Huaisang pipes up from the kitchen where he’s making some sort of alcoholic concoction that’ll probably knock even Wei Wuxian flat on his ass. “Apparently plenty of people are trying it now, not just the usual crew.” The ‘usual crew’ being roughly a quarter of the queer community between their town and the neighboring one, from what Wei Wuxian has heard. He’s never gotten a straight answer on whether or not Nie Huaisang is included in that group, but he certainly knows a lot about them either way.

“I think for swinging to work two sets of partners must be willing to trade for the evening, A-Sang,” Xiao Xingchen reminds him kindly. “And poor A-Ying is all alone-”

“Okay enough, give me a drink,” Wei Wuxian says around an aggrieved laugh, launching himself off the sofa between his ‘uncles’ to join Nie Huaisang in the kitchen and slam back whatever’s in the glass his friend holds out to him. He doesn’t want to think about Lan Wangji swinging, he doesn’t want to think of him being married, he doesn’t want to think about his own tragically small dating pool or trying to fly under the radar in a town that’s still mostly ‘normal’ couples who, for all their claimed open-mindedness, still apparently struggle with having a queer network fucking around somewhat visibly right under their noses.

He’s spent the week watching Lan Wangji gradually become more and more comfortable with getting half-naked for him as he works on a mixture of compositions for the commission and portraits of Lan Wangji in various useful poses when he just can’t bear not to draw him, and it’s been driving him up the wall.

He’s seen plenty of nude models - men, women, it doesn’t matter. It’s always business, it’s always professional. It’s hard to get turned on by a naked body when in a room full of other students all drawing the same figure, or when the model is someone who’s barely dragged themself out of an alcohol- or drug-induced coma to come pose for him for whatever bit of cash he can spare.

But Lan Wangji is different. Wei Wuxian likes him, genuinely, truly, as a person first and a business partner (of sorts) second. It’s charming to watch him face his own deeply-held modesty and reticence and slowly, carefully shed it for Wei Wuxian’s sake. Of course it’s for his own sake as well - he’d said on day one that he needs the money - but if it wasn’t something he wanted to do then Wei Wuxian knows that he’s more than qualified to go into town and find something else to do for some spare cash. Lan Wangji doesn’t have to pose for him, and yet he does. He does, and Wei Wuxian is going to die before the end of this commission. 

“Hmm I don’t know about that, love,” Xiao Xingchen hums and Wei Wuxian glances over his shoulder to watch Song Zichen signing to his partner. 

“Absolutely not!” Wei Wuxian yelps when he sees the direction this is going. “No way, I’m not inviting him over! He’s a really nice man and all but I don’t know if he’s okay with..”

“Us,” Nie Huaisang mutters in a way that encompasses far more people than just the four of them in Xiao Xingchen and Song Zichen’s tiny apartment.

“Yeah. That,” Wei Wuxian sighs, deflating a little.

“Do what you feel is best, A-Ying,” Song Zichen tells him, his expression as grave as it typically is, hands moving steadily - he’s always good like that, calm and matter-of-fact. The perfect balance to Xiao Xingchen’s teasing nature. “I think we’re all curious to meet him and help you figure this out, but keep yourself safe above anything else.”

“Thanks Uncle Zichen,” Wei Ying sighs. They move on to lighter topics then, but Wei Wuxian’s heart isn’t really in it tonight. He’s too distracted with thoughts of his extremely unavailable, completely wonderful Lan Zhan, and he heads home early instead of staying the night like he usually would.

Wei Wuxian isn’t a man of many vices. He likes sweets more than is strictly healthy, and alcohol is always a ‘yes’. He smokes weed with Xiao Xingchen and Song Zichen in their side of the studio every so often when he really needs to relax. He likes attractive men and he’s picked up a decent few of them from the gay bar on the edge of town over the years with ah..mixed results.

The next morning, he picks up smoking again - his most accessible vice by far. It’s something he’s done off and on since he was still a young teenager bumming off the Jiangs, though the habits became a much more casual flirtation after his disowning. The casual flirtations when he has the money for it - and annoying withdrawals for a while when the money runs out, though he’s always fine again eventually. He doesn’t really bother worrying about the whys and wherefores of it, most of the time. If he finds his fingers itching for a cigarette and he’s got the cash he’ll buy as many packs as he feels like and work his way through them at whatever pace is comfortable, no emotional reflection necessary.

The point being - something about all this Lan Wangji business makes him want something more to do with his hands than fiddle around in the studio, so he picks up a few packs on Saturday morning and he’s got one of them sticking out of the chest pocket of his overalls when Lan Wangji gets to the studio on Monday morning. Wei Wuxian is half wondering if he’ll say something about it when he spots it, but if he notices he doesn’t say anything at all. Instead he just greets Wei Wuxian the same as ever and, as has now become routine over the past week, starts stripping.

Wei Wuxian can’t help but watch. It’s torture - it’s unprofessional, probably slightly creepy torture - but Lan Wangji practically turns it into a striptease without even seeming to realize it. He follows the same procedure he had that first day: Shoes off. Socks, neatly folded. Belt open. Trousers open. Shirt. Undershirt. Friday had been the first day Lan Wangji had left his trousers open even after hanging everything up, and apparently that’s the next step of this process because he does it again now, the button and the placket for it on the other side hanging open just a bit as Lan Wangji turns back to face him. He doesn’t unzip, but he doesn’t have to. Wei Wuxian is still fantasizing about doing it for him with his teeth.

“Progress,” Wei Wuxian grins when he can say something that isn’t some form of ‘dear god please bite me on the ass’. Lan Wangji seems shyly pleased by that, ducking his head a bit in a nod with his trusty, “Mn.” Wei Wuxian wonders if he’s going to survive the day Lan Wangji works up to getting naked, but that’s a worry for future Wei Wuxian. For now, he has work to do.

He’s settled on a composition over the weekend, finally, and he heads over to sit next to Lan Wangji on the couch to show it to him and explain what he thinks they’ll need for the pose. He’s sketched it out a few times from a couple of different angles with notes scribbled around the margins of the pages, and he can’t help but laugh when Lan Wangji does his best not to frown at it as he attempts to decode it.

“It’s a jumbled disaster, I know,” he soothes. “You don’t have to say it, I can see it on your face. Don’t worry, I’ll help you get into position and I’ll tell you if I need you to do something different. Are your trousers going to have enough give for this?”

“Likely not,” Lan Wangji says with genuine regret in his voice and a definite frown on his face now - frustration at himself? That won’t do.

“Ah that’s fine! We’ll just see how far we can get like this for now. You’ll have to work up to holding this anyway, I don’t expect perfection now. Or ever, really, no one can be perfect.”

“Mn.” Wei Wuxian glances at his friend again to find him looking mollified, and that’s better than nothing. Of course now comes Wei Wuxian’s second major test of self-control of the day - and it’s not even 10am yet, for god’s sake! He stands up off the couch again to return the sketches to the easel. He snags the bucket he’d sat on that first day and turns it over again, the bottom of it a few inches lower than the cushions on the divan, and he sets it down in front of one side of the sofa. A pillow from his stash is tossed on top, and then Wei Wuxian makes a little ‘ta-da’ gesture at it that Lan Wangji looks thoroughly unimpressed by.

“For your shoulders,” Wei Wuxian explains. “Did you think I was going to make you hang your whole torso off the couch and hold yourself up by your abs alone?”

“It crossed my mind,” Lan Wangji says, because Wei Wuxian knows that he doesn’t ever lie. He snorts at that and very pointedly doesn’t think about how nicely that would make Lan Wangji’s already well-defined abs stand out even further.

“Nah, that’s never going to be sustainable, and I’d prefer to do this with as little damage to you as possible. Wen Qing probably won’t thank me if you go home with a sore back every day for the rest of the summer.”

“Mn.” As always, Wei Wuxian can’t get a solid read on Lan Wangji’s thoughts when he mentions his wife, but on the bright side they’ve both mentioned her in passing so much that casual conversation about her doesn’t make him despair for his sanity. Just his heart, which, honestly, has been broken so many times in his life that he hardly feels it anymore no matter how much he whines to his very understanding little found family.

“Mhm. Ready to use a sofa in a way that would give your uncle a heart attack?” Wei Wuxian snickers and pointedly ignores the intensity of Lan Wangji’s glare at the side of his head in favor of crossing behind the sofa to tap the top of with both palms. “Come on, give me your feet. Time to get started!”

Lan Wangji sighs but does as he asks, turning around as primly as he can while bare-chested with his trousers unbuttoned, and then he’s slinging his legs up over the back of the couch into Wei Wuxian’s waiting hands.

It’s the first time he’s touched Lan Wangji directly, he realizes the moment his hands wrap firmly around the knobby bones of his ankles. It almost makes him jump, the warmth of skin on skin and the soft rasp of Lan Wangji’s sparse leg hair against his fingertips, but if Lan Wangji is similarly startled it’s hidden by the way he’s shifting to try to redistribute his weight evenly while unable to fully relax his legs. Wei Wuxian holds him steady and waits for him to find the makeshift prop with his shoulders, and then it’s just waiting through the slow process of him readjusting in small increments until he’s settled.

Wei Wuxian waits again for his hum before he lets go, and then he crosses back around to the front of the sofa to lean down at the waist and tip his head a bit to the side, mischievous smile already pulling at the corners of his lips.

“Comfy?” he teases a semi-upside-down Lan Wangji, who still somehow manages to give him a decent glare with no real heat behind it.

“Not particularly. I will manage.”

“You’ll get there, don’t worry. We’ll work on the legs some other day, but for now can I reposition your arms where I need them?”

“Mn.”

Wei Wuxian is suddenly distinctly glad that he’d touched Lan Wangji’s ankles first and got that initial shock out of the way, since he’s pretty sure if he’d gotten to touch his hands first he might have actually died. As it is, he settles on his knees behind Lan Wangji’s head - careful not to kneel on his hair - and reaches down the length of him to take his wrists in his hands, coaxing them carefully away from where he’s holding them loosely crossed over his stomach.

“Relax your shoulders,” he encourages, his voice quieter than usual as he gently, reverently manipulates Lan Wangji’s arms where he wants. Lan Wangji takes a deep breath in and lets it out slowly, his entire body shifting with it the way he’s spread out like this, stomach and chest rising smoothly and then back down again when he exhales. “Good,” Wei Wuxian praises without thinking, and he feels it under his fingertips on the inside of his wrist when Lan Wangji’s heartbeat skitters, sees his fingers twitch before he relaxes again. 

Lan Wangji stays relaxed for him though, and so Wei Wuxian makes relatively short work of getting him where he needs him, his right arm straight up and then bent at the elbow to frame the top of his head, left arm flung out to the side helplessly. By the time he’s finished Lan Wangji looks utterly debauched, his hair splayed out on the floor beneath him and arms akimbo, as if he’d fallen over the sofa and simply stayed where he landed, boneless and exhausted. Wei Wuxian can’t quite resist pressing his palm against Lan Wangji’s stomach when he’s finished, his fingers splayed over the soft give of his diaphragm just beneath his sternum. Lan Wangji doesn’t even twitch.

“How do you feel?”

Lan Wangji is quiet for long enough that Wei Wuxian takes his hand off him and leans back, putting more weight on where he’s sitting on his heels to better meet Lan Wangji’s eyes despite the fact that he’s upside down.

“Lan Zhan?”

“I feel fine,” he says, quite a few beats too late for Wei Wuxian’s peace of mind. “You are correct that I will not be able to hold it for too long, but it is not offensively uncomfortable.”

“That’s alright, just so long as you can hold it for long enough today for me to block out where you are,” Wei Wuxian soothes, and then he forces himself to stand up and take a few steps back to double check his positioning. He walks a slow circle around the set-up to make sure he likes it from every angle (unfortunately it’s much harder to be unbiased when he’s looking at Lan Wangji from every angle, but he perseveres, he’s very brave), and when he’s satisfied he crosses over to his cabinet of supplies to rummage around for a large stick of white chalk.

When he finds it and returns to Lan Wangji it’s to find the man’s eyes shut and his breathing deep as if in meditation, or maybe just sleeping. Wei Wuxian moves carefully around him, quietly tracing out the artificially clumsy fall of his arms and drawing a circle around the rim of the bucket beneath him so he’ll know precisely where to place it again should he need to move it. He carefully gathers up Lan Wangji’s hair in his free hand and holds it up out of the way so he can finish lining his shoulders, and when he glances at his face his eyes are open again, silently watching.

Wei Wuxian blushes a little and goes back to what he’s doing, but now that he knows Lan Wangji is watching, his gaze is like a physical weight on his shoulders, the warm heavy press of hands, thumbs massaging circles into the perpetually-tight muscles at the back of his neck. He wonders if Lan Wangji does that for Wen Qing after hours spent at her desk - she’s a professor too, after all, he has to imagine they both get all knotted up from sitting all day long. He knows he does if he spends too long at the easel, and he’s frequently wished over the years that he had someone around just to rub his shoulders if absolutely nothing else.

Lan Wangji seems like the kind of husband who would do that.

“All done,” Wei Wuxian announces when he’s released Lan Wangji’s hair and finished carefully outlining the knuckles of his outstretched hand, his fingers curled loosely towards his palm. “Do you need to get up and stretch for a moment before I get to work?”

“No, I am fine.”

“Alright. Just speak up the moment you want to take a break, okay?”

“Mn.”

Wei Wuxian stands and takes a deep breath in. He gives himself one more moment to ‘check’ Lan Wangji’s positioning (read: blatantly ogle) and then he retreats safely behind his easel to get to work.