serefin "tranavia's greatest idiot" meleski (meleski) wrote in valloic, @ 2022-08-03 14:26:00
WHO: Jiang Cheng and Serefin Meleski WHAT: Unsolicited advice about living your life and being sad about losing people. Also, there's a dog cameo. WHEN: Monday, August 1 WARNINGS: None! STATUS: Complete!
The Weasleys' shop was a bit of a second home to Jiang Cheng after so long. Which probably made it fitting that it was a source of both good and terrible emotions. It was comforting one second and depressing the next. The memories there followed him from the moment he stepped inside. Tucked away in the office was the first place he'd kissed George. There, beside the portable swamps, was where George had nearly drowned.
That shelf, there, was the one he clipped an elbow on at least twice a day. Every time it happened, he watched dozens of magical fireworks look as if they were going to topple off and bury him. These were Weasley fireworks. He was reasonably sure half of them didn't even require fire to light. He should know, of course, but there was a lot of inventory jammed into this eccentric store and he hadn't yet had a chance to investigate it all. He took the opportunity to examine the little display placards now, as he moved items carefully onto a wheeled cart.
"I should really invest in more insurance for this place," he grumbled. Turning a tired gaze towards Serefin, he gestured towards the Pygmy Puffs near the front window. "I want to move some of the puffs here once it is cleared and moved away from the till. It would not be an improvement to hit the shelf and tip puffs out onto the floor."
Retail was not something that Serefin thought he would ever excel in. He wasn't the best employee, and not quite dutiful about the cleaning and dusting, but he could generally coax a sale out of someone, or talk their ear off until they gave in just to get away. Serefin had no intentions of ever going back to Tranavia, but if he was stuck with the absolute misfortune, he could make it as a merchant, he supposed. Shirk the kingly duties all together.
The idea sounded pleasant, as long as he didn't have a perpetually ruffled boss. There was no mistaking that Jiang Cheng's mood was not his standard tightly-wound personality, but something nagging deeper. Serefin wondered if he had thought more about the dog park thing, even if he probably wouldn't admit it to Serefin.
With his own cart, leaning heavily on the basket, he eyed the puffs, the shelf, and then back to Jiang Cheng. "I think the puffs might enjoy having a chaotic tumble. Better than the fireworks. You do not want to put those by the window do you? I imagine a strong ray of sun might set them all off and then you won't have a window at all," Serefin said casually as he began to grab the fireworks and dump them, somewhat carelessly, into the basket to move.
"No, no, not the window," Jiang Cheng quickly growled. "I pulled an old rack out of the storage room to put in that corner over there." He blindly pointed over his shoulder. He was still staring down the puffs. They were harmless creatures. Eerie but cute. He'd thought putting them by the till would encourage purchase. Now he started imagining them tumbling to the floor while customers were about.
"You have me reconsidering this plan now," he sighed. Stepping back, he glared at the shelf like it would suddenly speak up and tell him the best plan. If he were sensible, he'd have taken classes for this sort of thing the moment George left this place in his lap.
"This was never meant to be my life." He hadn't meant to say that out loud but it wasn't a lie - or all that shocking - so he didn't regret it very much. "I know, none of this was meant to be any of our lives, but that's besides the point."
"Do not let me distract you from your organization efforts. You are the boss," Serefin said, wiggling a firework in his hand. He paused only momentarily to spot the shelf that had been dragged out, the train of thought that had come across Jiang Cheng's mind when he wanted to move it. The whole thing seemed like busy work, something to keep changing for the fear of becoming stagnant, and not just in sales.
Serefin seemed to perk up at the blip of honesty. He didn't get cheeky, just shrugged and was more careful with his deshelving into the basket, nodding in agreement. "Ah, I know what you mean."
He may have seemed obtuse at the best times, but he could be observant, and he could feel the undercurrent of loss in Jiang Cheng's mood. Serefin had become more aware of strangeness ever since his own lack of attention had brought upon the near deaths of several people he cared about. He had almost destroyed this store, too.
"You inherited a place that was not yours to begin with. This is not your dream or your business, but you are now taking care of it by proxy. I can't imagine you would have planned that," Serefin said, and then gave a curious look to Jiang Cheng. "And now you're keeping it running because—why do you?"
Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes at Serefin's snark. It was old news at this point and easy to sweep under the rug. Or the shelf as it were. He moved another stack of fireworks over to the rolling cart.
"Why do you think?" He stopped working and squinted at Serefin, more curious than suspicious. Admittedly, despite working together for some time, he hadn't allowed himself to get to know Serefin all that well. Serefin would always have the face of the man who had tried to kill him and George, even if he had been possessed at the time. It was a difficult hurdle for Jiang Cheng, a man who had watched a magical artifact of chaos cause a fellow cultivator to murder his sister.
"You love Jacob, don't you?" he asked. "If he left tomorrow and his will was to leave the club to you, would you abandon it?"
"If Jacob left without his sister, it would go to her," Serefin said, in an attempt to cheekily stall. He had thought about Jacob leaving very little, mostly because the thought brought a sour taste to his mouth and caused anxiety he didn't have room to spare. He could not go back to being alone when his life was so intrinsically tied to another person that he loved deeply. His attempt at commiseration with Jiang Cheng was slowly backfiring.
"But—" And Serefin said this gently as if he was testing its durability on his tongue."If Jacob left me the club in his absence, of course, I would not abandon it because I do love him. I would handle the day-to-day tasks, keep it running, make certain that it doesn't fall into disrepair on the chance he could return." He gave a pointed look to Jiang Cheng, feeling as though this was a stalemate, a purgatory, waiting endlessly for George to come back or some finality that he wasn't.
He reached over the cart and grabbed for Jiang Cheng's wrist, to give him pause from his task for just a second. He let it go just as quickly, so as to not lose his own hand in the process. "I also know that Jacob would feel like, ah what would he say, a right twat, if doing so was only hurting me in the process."
It was near thing that Jiang Cheng didn't snap at Serefin, with his deliberate obtuseness. He did sneer, but that was hardly all that different than his resting face. It allowed enough time for Serefin to say but, at which point Jiang Cheng watched him like a hawk studying its dinner.
Somehow, Serefin's words found a crack in Jiang Cheng's despair and deflated most of his anger.
"It's not…It doesn't only hurt. There are good feelings here. And a sense of pride. If I had anyone else take over…I think I would be here always anyway, constantly fearful that they would do something I wouldn't approve of or that would make George unhappy." He sighed and twisted the ring of Zidian on his finger absentmindedly. "I suppose I just grow weary of a life that involves protecting another's legacy. What I would have done happily and willingly if he were here and I chose it for myself feels like a burden with him gone."
It was more than he intended to say and he grimaced petulantly at the realization.
Serefin hummed in understanding. Or somewhat in understanding. He could never fully empathize because he was not in Jiang Cheng's shoes, but he supposed he would find some kind of moral obligation to preserve something that his boyfriend had built here. He would not want to let him down, in whatever world he would have been whisked back to.
"So then give it up," Serefin said, flippant, callous, purposely attempting to get a reaction out of Jiang Cheng. Despite popular belief, that was not what Serefin tried to do all the time, but he was curious what would happen if he simply said the alternative solution outloud. "Find someone to take over the shop, and come be a little buzzing fly on the wall and annoy the new person you put in charge. I feel as though George would find amusement in that."
Serefin poked Jiang Cheng in the shoulder with one of the fireworks. "Relieve some of the burden you feel. You are never going to please everyone, including the people you love and who love you. It's impossible." Serefin knew this, with a surprising amount of pragmatism. He had spent too much of his life attempting to not be a fuck up, like a fish swimming upstream.
"There's a chance that George left it to you to see if you would go through with it and is unhappy that you have played along in this ruse for so long."
"George is not the type to play such games with someone he loves," Jiang Cheng scowled. He'd vaguely considered the possibility already and pushed it aside. Prankster or not, George knew him too well to think he wouldn't take care of this place. It was entirely more likely that George simply wanted someone he trusted here, and that maybe he thought it might help Jiang Cheng weather his loss. Maybe it would. In time.
"Is that what you would do? Look for a way out of the problem instead of standing tall and being responsible for something other than yourself?" he squinted, poking Serefin right back with a finger in his ribs. "Just because I am uncomfortable doesn't mean I am not devoted enough to see this through. Do not mistake me venting my frustrations for weakness."
Serefin did not like Jiang Cheng turning the whole situation back on him. He was full of hypotheticals and Serefin was not someone who enjoyed planning for what ifs. He didn't like it when he was forced to lead a Tranavian army, and he didn't quite like it right now. He excelled at being reactionary, deciding in the moment rather than trying to figure out every possibility into neat little boxes.
He huffed, because he knew that Jiang Cheng would not allow him to get off easy in the conversation when he wasn't conceding the same sort of emotional honesty. "It was never about devotion," Serefin said, a little petulantly. "But when the problem is my own well-being, then what is the point of keeping a place together for someone else, only for them to return to a version of you that is resentful. Or in constant turmoil. Heartbroken."
It may have been childish to keep this poking revenge up, but Serefin did it again anyway. "George is not the type to play games, but I do not think he would approve of you giving up your future just to make certain he had one when he came back." Serefin arched a brow, almost like a challenge, then added, "And what if the roles were reversed, hm?"
"I would be heartbroken with or without the shop," Jiang Cheng mumbled. "And resentful is too strong a word. It implies I blame him for entrusting me with this place." He didn't blame anyone but Vallo's terrible whim and his own cursed luck. It was enough that he'd had more time with his sister here, and a chance to repair his relationship with Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. Anything more was asking too much of a life that had been very unkind to him, time and time again.
"I don't blame him. Or this place." He looked around the shop with a measure of reluctant fondness and then carefully turned back to the work of emptying the shelf. "I admit I don't know if I would have left Lotus Pier to him, even if I would have trusted him to take care of it." That hardly mattered at this point. And it didn't help his mood to think of leaving behind his family anyway.
He sighed and put the last of the fireworks onto the cart. "I suppose…I am not ready to let go of this place anymore than I am ready to let go of him."
Serefin seemed to grow weary, like the mood of sadness was contagious and that all of Jiang Cheng's held back feelings on the shop, George, and them permeated like a tangible force. He had stopped pulling fireworks off the shelf a while ago and simply watched his reluctant boss go through the motions. For once, Serefin wished there was something he could do that wasn't just being a conduit to throw ire at. He could take it, in fact reveled in it, but somehow it hadn't changed how Jiang Cheng felt.
"I suppose you do not have to let him or the shop go any time soon. No one is telling you or setting time frames. But don't let it consume you," Serefin said, dropping his last firework into the cart. "Then you are living for someone else, someone who isn't even here to see your efforts or give you the recognition you deserve."
While Serefin had never experienced a loss like this, his loss in Tranavia had left him morose for months, sitting in dark chamber rooms, becoming a royal hermit. All the while, the rest of the world moved on and fell apart without him. When he finally pulled himself out of that deep depression, he had missed so much. He did not want similar things to happen to other people who he considered friends—even if they didn't.
He nudged Jiang Cheng with the cart. "And is that really an existence at all?"
Jiang Cheng stayed quiet for a moment and then eventually met Serefin's gaze and nodded. It might not have been the most enthusiastic of agreements, but it was something. He wasn't ungrateful for the advice, even if he hadn't asked for it. It wasn't long ago that he would've been entirely belligerent about such an offering. But now he was just somber and tired.
"I am doing my best to not let it consume me," he said. Nudging Serefin to the side, he started pushing the cart around the till counter. "I will not make the mistake of dwelling in anger and grief for another sixteen years. Life is too short." He parked the cart by an empty shelf and gave it a critical once over. "But that will not stop me from doing what I think is right. And what I can live with. Now…" His expression softened noticeably, particularly for him. Even if his words were comically bossy still. "...You made me second guess my strategy for these stupid shelves so we're taking a break."
As if it was his cue, Fairy trotted down from the office and sniffed at Jiang Cheng's legs before sitting obediently next to his feet. "Nice of you to join us," he said to the dog, who grin-panted up at him in response. "Did you hear me say break and decide you needed something?"
Fairy barked cheerfully.
"Life is too short," Serefin said, perking up considerably, and following leisurely behind Jiang Cheng. "I would know. I've lived three of them, each of them shorter than the last." Not an accomplishment he should be proud of, and one that would certainly make Jacob and his friends frown at. But what did Serefin excel at, if not inappropriate dark humor at inconvenient times?
Leaning his elbows on the counter, he started to aimlessly adjust products at the till. "You are doing a good job, I do not want you to think I'm only here to tell you what a waste of time I think it is for you to keep the shop going. Besides, what if whoever you hired to handle the day-to-day didn't like me—" Serefin's pointed look was testing to see if Jiang Cheng would refute it, say that he didn't like Serefin, but he had a suspicious feeling that his presence wasn't so much of a bother as Jiang Cheng let on. Unsolicited advice and all. "—then I would be out of a job, and I would spend much more time bothering you outside of shop hours."
On seeing Fairy, Serefin's expression went from pleasant to downright conspiratorial. "That is the bark of a dog who wishes to hang around other dogs. Perhaps a break outside where we can touch some grass," Serefin said this to Fairy, then to Jiang Cheng, "and you can come too. Mull over the shelf strategy."
Jiang Cheng grimaced at the dark joke; it was no wonder that Serefin and Wei Wuxian got along. But if he’d learned anything from his brother, it was the art of ignoring comments that would become more prolific if he complained. He focused instead on the work discussion. His commentary there was just as likely to inspire taunting later, but it needed to be said.
“I would not allow a stand-in to mistreat you. Or anyone else who works here,” he made sure to clarify. “And all staffing will remain my decision. Otherwise the possibility of my own brother being fired becomes a concern,” he noted with an edge of amusement. He was still looking at Fairy as he spoke, mulling over the pros and cons of taking the dog for a walk at the moment when he realized Serefin intended to come along. Whether he would be more of a pro than a con was debatable.
But Jiang Cheng was feeling strangely unresistant. Maybe he was just tired.
“Fine. I will think about the shelves and hold the leash.” He reached behind the till and grabbed a roll of little trash bags to toss at Serefin. His tone was as mischievous as Serefin’s face. “You can touch the grass and keep it free of Fairy’s presents.”