Chapter Text
Prologue
There is no amount of coffee that can get him through the rest of his day.
He’s been on his feet for ten hours, walking the floor, refolding piles of discarded shirts, fetching clothes for entitled teenagers brandishing their parents’ credit cards. The ache in his feet is familiar, as is the dull throb of fatigue behind his eyes.
He pulls himself into his apartment, flipping on the overhead light and vaguely noting, as he always does, that he should really try to clean up.
He tosses his shoes in a pile by the door, his overshirt following, and collapses face first onto the sofa with a groan.
90 minutes. He has 90 minutes before he has to leave for his night classes. That means he has enough time to order some food, eat, and maybe shower, if he’s feeling ambitious.
He is not. He uses his precious shower time to lay face down on his scratchy, threadbare couch a little longer.
Eventually, he peels himself up and orders dinner from whatever restaurant shows the quickest delivery time. He’s not even entirely sure what he orders, just that it’s food, and it should be there in 20 minutes.
Sustenance secured, he walks into the kitchen -- a big word for what is really just a fridge, a hotplate, and a sink tucked into the corner of his studio apartment -- and brews a pot of coffee, which he intends to finish before he leaves for classes.
This is his life. It’s not that bad, he thinks. He’s managed for 8 months now. Wen Qing keeps lecturing him about the negative health impacts of his diet and sleep habits, but he feels fine, really. He’s young. This is what it’s supposed to be like when you’re 19: burning the candle at both ends, pulling all-nighters, surviving off of caffeine, booze, and pizza. Given, that lifestyle is supposed to involve a lot more fun and partying, and a lot less bone-grinding weariness. But, the point is, Wei Ying isn’t too worried about his health. He can handle it.
Besides, it’s not as though he has a choice. He hadn’t chosen to get disowned by the Jiangs on his 18th birthday. It had just … kind of happened. He certainly hadn’t looked at the future and decided that working full-time retail to pay for night school and a dingy studio apartment with nothing but a dumpster-dived couch and a cheap coffeemaker was his dream.
This is all just temporary. He just needs to get through the next year and a half. Get his associate’s degree in … whatever, and then find a real job -- one with benefits and regular hours. Then he can sleep.
The intercom buzzes, and Wei Ying shoves his feet into his slippers and plods his way down the stairs.
He opens the door, the muggy August air smacking him in the face, but there’s no one there.
At least, there’s no one at eye level.
There is definitely someone there, he realizes, as he looks down and sees a battered car seat, from which a very tiny baby is blinking up at him.
Wei Ying stares at it. It stares back. There is a piece of paper pinned to its shirt, and he realizes, with the same detached interest he might feel in a dream, that his name is scrawled on it.
He reaches out and tugs the paper from the baby’s shirt, unfolding it and reading.
“Wei Wuxian,
Meet your cousin, Yuan.
Please take care of him.”
His cousin. His cousin? His cousin?
Wei Ying doesn’t have any family. He doesn’t have cousins. This has to be a mistake.
Except. The note is clearly addressed to him. The baby is very much on his doorstep.
Yuan makes a wet, burbling sound. It cuts to Wei Ying’s core. This is an honest-to-god baby. Tiny hands, tiny feet, tiny everything. Helpless, with a note asking Wei Ying to look after him.
Wei Ying picks up the car seat, and the bag of greasy takeout he’s just noticed sitting next to it. “Alright, Yuan-er,” he says to the baby. “Come on in. We’ve got some things to figure out.”