The next morning Lan Wangji woke up alone in his room and he chuckled. He thought that it was so cute that Wei Wuxian was still mad at him because he gave him money. Lots of it. 

Well, it's actually the loan shark's money, which he took from Wei Wuxian originally, plus interests. A lot of interests. He hoped it would make the man happy, especially after he realized and confessed his feelings to him. Yes, he, Lan Wangji, loved Wei Wuxian. It might have sounded unbelievable, but he truly loved him. Maybe even ever since five years ago.

Then he stood up and walked to the balcony for his daily yoga. He would let the lovely chef steam a bit first before he would coax him and maybe shower him with gifts and sweep him away for a bit of another weekend romance. Those tricks never failed him before, and he definitely would take care of Wei Wuxian.

He then dressed up for the office–a bespoke black shirt, dark grey pants and suit, and an ivory white tie–and walked to the kitchen where he usually found Wei Wuxian preparing something while humming some silly love songs. He could get used to that. The feeling of… domesticity. He felt his heart swell with the thought of that. 

Domesticity. 

It used to be a foreign concept to him, to live together with another person in his space. He liked his space too much, he didn't want to share it with anyone, until Wei Wuxian. That beautiful man changed him so much for the better, he couldn't even think of anyone else except for him, the beautiful chef with princess-like hair.

But when he entered the kitchen, Wei Wuxian was not there. He frowned. Then he went into his room, to find it empty, and no one inside the ensuite nor the balcony.

Lan Wangji started to have these uncomfortable feelings in his stomach. He walked to the corner and he opened the closet where Wei Wuxian put his clothes in, and found it empty.

He froze for a second then he went back to his room, in case he was there. But no one was there.

Lan Wangji tried not to panic, instead he went to his office, in case Wei Wuxian was already there. If he was this pissed, he should do something grand to coax him. When he arrived at his office, he went straight to the kitchen, but he only saw Jiang Yanli and no Wei Wuxian.

"Yanli, did you see Wei Ying?"  He asked Jiang Yanli, who was in the middle of cutting vegetables. She jumped a little when she heard Lan Wangji, then she looked very uncomfortable.

"Uh, he told me that he… resigned?"

"...what did you say?" Lan Wangji could not believe his ears.

"Xian–I mean, Wei Wuxian called me this morning and told me that he resigned because he has an emergency family situation, and then he gave me the menu and the recipe for your special diet. You can ask Mr. Hua Cheng, because he also talked to him." She hadn't finished her words when Lan Wangji stormed out and went to Hua Cheng's office.

He opened the office door with a bang, and found Hua Cheng inside with Liu Qingge, talking about something. When Hua Cheng saw him, he signaled Liu Qingge to go out and shut the door.

"Where is he?" Lan Wangji asked without any preamble.

Hua Cheng did not say anything, but he took out a piece of paper and gave it to Lan Wangji, who grabbed it and read it.

"Termination of contract? What do you mean?"

"It means what it means. What else does it mean?" Hua Cheng shrugged as Lan Wangji dropped himself on the couch in front of him. "This early morning, Wei Wuxian dropped by my office and gave me the folder with the papers from the loan shark. He asked me for a termination of contract due to a family emergency and he also returned the black card you gave him. He will pay the penalty through his lawyer–who happened to be my boyfriend–so I assume he didn't want anything to do with you. Am I correct?"

Lan Wangji didn't say anything, instead, he leaned back and covered his eyes with his left arm.

"I thought you two were getting along very well, but I guess not." Hua Cheng poured Lan Wangji a shot of single malt whiskey, which he downed in one gulp.

"Well, yeah, I thought so too, until I found out last night that Alice Renaud approached him when we were in Paris." He slumped deeper into the couch. "And she told him that she's my fiance."

"Oh shit, did you clear the misunderstanding? I hope you did. Do you want to issue another restraining order?"

"You know," Lan Wangji sighed heavily, ignoring Hua Cheng's question, "I thought I act like a perfect boyfriend already. I gave him my black card to shop back in Paris, I gave him his money back plus a lot of interests, from the loan shark. I don't even sleep around anymore, I just want him to be by my side where I could pamper him and take care of him. So why did he run away like this?"

Hua Cheng looked at his best friend incredulously. He knew that Lan Wangji was never in a relationship that required him to do more than throw some money around and buying things like branded bags, clothes, jewellery and so on. The people around him were just a variety of vultures, who would be happy if he did that, and they would become his slave to do his every whim. But apparently not Wei Wuxian. He liked the man more and more, since he dared to stand up to this childish behaviour of this forever bachelor–if he didn't get his act together–who didn't know that he just let a diamond out of his grasp. But then again, he was so clueless it pained him to see his best friend like this.

"Do you want me to find him again? I can always ask my boyfriend."

"No need to rub it on my face that you have a boyfriend. And yes, please find him for me, I want to know why he left, at least. I thought we were in love, and we're so compatible in bed, and…"

"Wait, back up… he confessed his love to you? And what did you do?" Hua Cheng hoped that his idiotic friend did not screw that confession up with some stupid remarks about giving the chef huge allowance or raise his salary. Or worse, telling him to quit his job and become his fulltime boyfriend.

"What do you think? I confessed my love too! That's why I'm confused, why did he leave me then?"

Now Hua Cheng was bewildered. True, the black card thing and the loan shark thing were too much, especially for a man like Wei Wuxian who worked his ass off without anyone's help. And this clueless moron just handed him all that he lost with a flick of a finger, when he didn't even ask for his help. Imagine that. But that didn't warrant this kind of extreme response, especially since they could talk about it. True Lan Wangji was dense, but he was also smart and should be willing enough to negotiate any terms instead of… this.

"I'll ask around. Maybe you should ask Binghe about this, his boyfriend is Wei Wuxian's best friend since childhood."

Lan Wangji's ears perked at the new information, and he jumped out the couch.

"Why didn't you tell me about this?" He walked out of the door fast to find Luo Binghe. He knew that today was supposed to be his training day, so he must be at the gym already.

"Well, you never asked?"