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bosspigeon · 10 months

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some strange kind of euphoria

Rating: M Words: 6230 Pairing: Amir x MC Warnings: references to past homophobia, bullying, and emotional abuse, panic attacks, implications of kink, general horny content Ko-Fi <3

Amir answers the door wearing nothing more than his gauzy dressing gown and a smile, which drops as soon as he sees the look on Jude’s face.

In Jude’s defense, seeing Amir at all brightens him up a bit, but even offering his own smile doesn’t quite feel right. He’s tense, slouching, and he knows his sour mood is broadcasting loud and clear in more than just his expression and posture.

His face feels brittle, but so does the rest of him. “Can I come in?” he asks, wincing at the way his voice cracks.

He shouldn’t have come at all. He should have just… called Amir and asked for a rain check, but Amir penciled out this time for him, when he’s always so busy, he couldn’t just bail. He’s starting to think he should have anyway to save them both the discomfort.

“I’m sorry,” he rasps, swallowing and backing away from the door while Amir stares him down, quietly assessing. “I shouldn’t have–”

“Did the doorman give you trouble?” Amir snaps, eyes blazing. Heat prickles along Jude’s skin, the temperature in the hall rising abruptly.

“Wh– No, he– Well–” He didn’t give him any trouble, per se, he knows Jude well enough by now as Amir’s guest that he didn’t say anything– just gave him the usual quietly critical once-over he does whenever Jude shows up on his own without Amir to shield him. It usually doesn’t bother him overmuch, but he’s… a bit more of a raw nerve than he usually is. Maybe more of an open wound.

“No,” Amir says slowly, calming down quickly as he examines the human. “Something happened.”

“Nothing serious,” Jude assures him, and he doesn’t resist as Amir tugs him inside. The hand curling around his wrist is soft and too-warm, and something in his body eases at the simple touch. “I just… had dinner with my family, is all.”

The door clicks shut behind him, and the silence that follows is tense and weighted.

“...It didn’t go well, I take it?” Amir offers, his voice carefully neutral, his fingers tightening briefly around Jude’s wrist and then relaxing.

Jude can’t help but laugh, a single sharp bark that he stifles as quickly as he can. “‘Bout as well as could be expected,” he mumbles. He’s not sure what else to say beyond that, there’s so much tangled up in his head, in his chest, his whole body is tense and heavy with it.

He wishes he’d thought to change before he showed up. The crisp button-down and pressed slacks are uncomfortably formal, fitting too closely around his shoulders, at his waist. He feels stiff and stifled and… not like himself.

He’s sure Amir notices. Amir notices everything.

He leads Jude to the sofa and urges him to sit. He sinks into it with a grateful sigh, releasing as much of the tension in his body he's able to without medical or chemical assistance. Amir settles in next to him, curling close, and immediately starts plucking at the buttons of his shirt.

Jude huffs out another weak little laugh, lolling his head back against the cushions and watching those long, graceful fingers work.

“Talk to me, darling,” Amir says, slipping his hand under the fabric to rest against Jude's chest. The heat of his hand is comforting in its familiarity, lighting up his skin and settling his nerves. There’s a silky weight pressing at the edge of his thoughts, a presence that he’s grown used to at this point, warm like a physical touch. He’s not sure Amir’s even doing it on purpose, but it doesn't really matter.

"Mom asked if I was seeing anyone." It hangs between them for a long moment, before he manages to eke out, "She… didn't mean to."

She's never asked. Not him, at least. She's asked his brothers, his cousins, the kids of friends of hers or Dad's, but never Jude. She knows better than to ask questions she doesn't want the answer to.

He tries to elaborate, but when he opens his mouth, nothing comes out, like the words are stuck behind a barrier, like there’s a big blinking roadblock between his brain and his mouth. He wants to laugh. He wants to cry.

He’s so tired of talking, and even if he doesn't really need to say much of anything out loud with Amir, he's just so frustrated, like he wasted all his words on people who didn’t even care to listen. He groans and covers his face with his hands.

Amir's slide over them, tugging them away so Jude can't hide from him. "That’s fine. You don’t need to talk." He smiles a sly little smile that always makes Jude's pulse race, kisses his knuckles, and slips off the couch, taking his warmth with him. "I'll make tea, you get comfortable."

It takes a few seconds for Jude to catch on, his head is such a mess, but he feels the familiar whisper of Amir's power twining through his thoughts. Oh.

They've done this before, more than once, when Amir's asked about fantasies of his and he was too embarrassed to say them aloud. It took some practice, but Amir has always been careful, never probed too deeply, and never without Jude's express permission.

He focuses on the pleasant background noise of Amir moving around his kitchen, the gentle thrum of his presence at the edge of his thoughts, and tries to put them in order.

Dinner was… awkward, to say the least, from the start. Jude isn't a talker, never really has been, so it was mostly him listening to his brothers ramble. Seth's youngest is starting middle school. Gabe got a promotion.

Seth asked what he’d been up to, not that he cared. Gabe snorted when he asked, which only proved the point. Jude just mumbled something about work and avoided eye contact. Played with his food. Wondered if his hometown had anything like the things he’d found out living in the city miles away. The conversation moved on without him, like it always did.

His brothers stopped picking on him about the same time he hit a growth spurt and outstripped both of them in height and not just weight. Well, they hadn’t stopped, exactly, just… didn’t push their luck like they used to. Like they did when they caught him sitting happily while their cousin, Lacey, put makeup on him as "practice" for cosmetology school. Like they did whenever his hair got long enough for them to to pull, before Dad got sick of him “looking like a girl” and shaved it off.

"I've got three boys, not two boys and whatever the hell you're tryin' to be."

And then Jude got bigger than him too, and he left him mostly to his own devices. Not without those snide comments here and there, but he was well used to it at that point.

His family is good at ignoring things that upset them–once they've stifled the offending party into silence, of course.

Jude came out when he was a teenager. His mother wept like someone had died. His father looked furious, but bit his tongue–though he spent the next few years making little digs about how lucky Jude was he didn't just kick him out to fend for himself. His brothers weren’t there, but they found out ;ater, and though they couldn't do anything to him physically at that point (head and shoulders taller and nearly twice as broad–and the Marlowe boys all took after their father in stature, Jude just took it further than that) they made sure he knew he was still their punching bag one way or another.

So when his mother asked him innocently, not thinking, hardly looking at him so much as smiling glibly at her family, and they both froze… well, it said more than if Jude had just out and told them he was getting railed by a demon on the regular.

At least he's not like those fairy boys. At least it's not in our faces. At least, at least, at least–

He hates that he still feels guilty. Guilty for ruining his mother's picture-perfect family. Guilty for being a consummate disappointment to his red-blooded American father. For taking his brothers' "friendly teasing" too personally. For missing the way he felt when Lacey put makeup on him and styled his hair and just let him want the things he could never admit to out loud.

For feeling bitter that she left him behind to pursue her own dreams while he was stuck cowering in the shadow cast by everything he was supposed to be.

He doesn't realize he's hyperventilating until Amir's hands, almost scalding hot against his clammy skin, are pressing against his cheeks, tipping his face upwards. He can’t figure out why the demon is so blurry, swimming before his eyes, when he’s too busy trying to remember how to get air into his lungs.

“Breathe, darling,” Amir urges him, firm but so gentle. Jude tries, and at first he only manages a few pathetic wheezes, but a low hum picks up at the base of his skull, a prickle like static skittering down his spine. For a split second, he’s paralyzed by a foreign surge of guilt, but it doesn’t feel heavy the way his own guilt does.

He sucks in a breath, one that makes his lungs burn, and grabs for Amir’s wrist with trembling fingers. “Not you,” he manages to strangle out, listing forward until he can bury his face in the crook of Amir’s neck. “Happens sometimes,” he mumbles in an effort to explain. Amir’s relief settles over him like a blanket, and he clings to it, to him, desperately, until he’s breathing again mostly normally.

He opens his mouth to apologize, but Amir cuts him off before he can even form the words.“None of that." Firm, brooking no argument, but still kindly tempered.

Obediently, Jude stays quiet, and Amir strokes his hair until the kettle chimes.

Rather than parting from him for even the short time it takes to prepare two cups of tea, Jude follows Amir to the kitchen, arms wrapped loosely around his waist, cheek pressed to his silky hair. His thoughts are staticky and nonlinear, feel like they're coming from somewhere beyond the boundaries of his skull. It's strangely peaceful, feeling like he's floating outside his body, like he's barely tethered to himself by just a few fragile threads.

Amir always smells so nice…

He's not sure when they wind up back on the sofa but he's holding a warm, delicate little cup in both hands. They share tea in easy silence, and if Jude's fingers are still trembling against his cup Amir doesn't mention it. Muzzily, he notes how fancy the cup is, and now that he's adjusted a bit to the staggering opulence of Amir's world, he finds the little things like that so endearing.

Jude is sluggish and heavy when Amir guides him to bed, and it doesn't take long at all for him to doze off, their positions from earlier reversed, with Amir curled around his back.

He's just awake enough to feel a little bit of that fire humming along his spine, the banked coals of Amir's temper pulsing between them, and he mumbles a half-hearted, "Please don't fight my family," into the luxuriously soft pillow smushed against his cheek.

There's a bit of a huff against his hair, something close to a laugh, but sleep finally pulls him under and blessedly quiets his overworked mind.

His dreams are washed over with a filter of wispy pink, but he doesn’t really remember much of them beyond that. Honestly, it's a bit of a relief. He wakes in Amir’s huge, soft bed, buried in plush pillows and blankets feeling surprisingly well-rested. Of course Amir is gone already, but Jude doesn’t take it personally. There’s a hurried little note on the nightstand on a scrap of sketchbook paper apologizing for his absence and assuring Jude they’ll meet again in the evening once he’s free of his responsibilities.

Jude tucks the note into his pocket as he dresses and leaves, feeling much lighter than he did when he arrived the night before.

~*~

He tried to get as much of the grime off his hands as he could before he left work, but Jude knows he looks like even more of a greasy schlub than he usually does when he comes ambling into Amir’s building. He brought his car this time, so he doesn’t have to go through the main entrance and deal with anybody grimacing at the state of his clothes, but he’s got a bag of fresh ones over his shoulder and he’s looking forward to a long, hot soak in Amir’s shower.

“I know, I reek,” he says sheepishly when he makes it to the door to Amir’s apartment.

Amir smiles indulgently at him, and gives him a kiss on the cheek regardless (even if he has to rise onto his toes a bit to do it, dressed down like he is) and only scrunches his nose a little. “Just a bit. I wouldn’t mind the sweat so much, but…”

“Engine oil and cheap cigarettes,” Jude laughs sheepishly. “Sorry, my boss likes menthols.” He gestures to the bathroom with his bag. “Mind if I…?”

Amir doesn’t hesitate to usher him down the hall as soon as he’s tugged off his boots at the door, and Jude plods along after him.

“I’d offer to wash your back,” Amir teases, watching Jude intently as he undresses, making a show of biting at his knuckle just to see him blush from his ears to his chest, “but I’ve got a few more things to take care of. Shouldn't take long, I'll be right outside.”

"Y-yeah, of course," Jude stutters, hands fumbling at his belt. Amir leaves him with another peck on the cheek and a sly parting smile, and while he was hoping for a nice hot shower after work, he's debating whether or not a cold one might be a better idea.

In the end, hot wins out. Amir's shower is like everything else in his orbit—spacious and ridiculously opulent to a degree that Jude's almost nervous interacting with it—but he's starting to enjoy the perks that come with drifting into that irresistible orbit himself. The water is just the right temperature, the pressure pounds down on his tight shoulders and back until he can finally feel them starting to un-knot themselves, and while he makes sure to get himself clean, he also spends a long while just standing under the spray with his head down and his hair hanging around his face like a wet curtain.

At some point, he hears the door click, some quiet rustling, but he doesn't pay it much attention. It's Amir's home, after all, he can come and go as he pleases.

Besides, it's not as if he hasn't seen Jude naked before, even if the thought still has heat crawling up his neck.

The door shuts again, and his mind goes blessedly quiet. The water doesn't go cold at any point (another thing that makes showering in his own too-small bathroom even more of a downgrade) but he knows he can't spend the whole night in here, however much he'd like to. He came for Amir, not his shower, though a little part of his brain does offer the helpful suggestion of trying to entice the succubus into joining him.

He snorts to himself as he slides open the frosted glass door, wringing out his hair. As if any attempt of his to be enticing towards someone like Amir, who drips easy sensuality in every breath he takes, would result in anything more than Jude falling all over himself like an idiot.

At least Amir finds it cute.

He reaches for a towel and steps out onto the plush bath mat, and stops short when he looks around the bathroom and doesn't see his bag.

Instead, sitting on the vanity in place of his ratty canvas backpack, is a shopping bag. What he can only assume is the name of the store is embossed on the sturdy, matte black paper in looping gold that matches the designs etched along the trim, but it's not a name he recognizes. Definitely someplace far outside the realm of a scruffy mechanic, that's for sure.

But there's something niggling at him, tickling at the edges of his thoughts, that suggests it's—

No, don't be stupid. Of course it isn't.

"Amir?" he calls out, eyes still glued on the bag as he awkwardly towels himself dry. Of course, Amir has the perfect timing to come swanning in when Jude's scrubbing at his hair, leaving the rest of him bare.

Amir does not hesitate to ogle, because he never does, and his smirk as his eyes take a luxurious stroll over every damp, hairy inch of human is nothing short of salacious. Jude's hair is still wet, but he can't resist the urge to drop the towel to cover himself a bit, which only makes Amir smirk wider.

"Yes, pet?"

It takes a moment for Jude to remember what he was even going to ask, because the casual little endearment never ceases to scramble his brain a bit.

(He's heard more than one person refer to him as Amir's pet, and he knows it's supposed to be an insult, but… he doesn't exactly hate it.)

He shakes his head to get it back on the right track, and winds the towel around his waist, eyes lowered. "Um, did you move my bag?"

Amir's heaves a dramatic, put-upon sigh. "I am begging you to let me replace that thing.” He is pointedly not looking at the bag on the counter.

"It still works just fine," Jude protests, smiling to himself. It’s something they’ve argued about before, if it can even be called an argument. It’s sweet, how Amir likes to spoil him. He shrugs a bit, ducking his head and letting his damp hair hide his face. “It’s sturdy. Dependable.” He's had it so long, it's almost like an old friend.

“Ugly as sin," Amir adds helpfully, rolling his eyes. But there's a smile playing around the edges of his lips. "You're lucky I think that sentimentality of yours is cute."

Jude's ears burn and he stays hidden behind his hair, but he's smiling too. Cute. Nobody but Amir's ever called him that (not since he was a chubby kid, at least) and he does it so freely and so often, Jude's starting to believe he honestly means it, even if he doesn't see it himself.

He feels Amir slinking closer more than he sees or hears him, bare feet nearly silent on the glossy tile compared to those staggering heels of his, and his breath hitches. He peeks from underneath his hair and is met with those stunning golden eyes and that playful, slightly predatory smile. “I… My clothes were in there, Amir,” he protests weakly, shuddering when soft, warm hands slip around his hips, fingers wiggling under the edge of his loosely wrapped towel, sharp nails pricking at his skin.

“Mmhm,” Amir hums. “Don’t worry, I haven’t thrown them out. I just figured you wouldn’t need them for a while yet.”

A quick, shuddery breath rattles out of him, at the end of it, a tremulous, "O-oh? Oh."

Amir chuckles and pokes Jude’s nose playfully. “Mind out of the gutter, darling. Since you’re playing coy, I’ll just come out and say it–I’ve gotten you a little gift, and the suspense of waiting for you to try it on is killing me.”

“I’m not… playing coy,” Jude protests weakly, but his eyes flick away from Amir for a split second, over his shoulder to the bag on the vanity, and like an eagle spotting a blissfully unaware rabbit, Amir zeroes in on the shift and leers at him, teeth bared like he wants to sink them into Jude's skin to taste the blood rushing to its surface, like the sweetest of threats.

"You're a terrible liar, but it's so precious that you tried," he purrs, smooth and dangerous. With a flick of his nimble fingers, the towel still clinging desperately to Jude's waist drops to the floor, and sharp nails dig into the meat of his hips just hard enough to make him whimper. "I think you've kept me waiting long enough, pet. Don't you?"

Amir doesn’t wait for him to respond (not that he’d be capable of it in the first place, mouth suddenly dry and tongue like lead) and simply herds him towards the vanity, and the gift on top of it. He swallows hard as he reaches out, glancing back as if to ask for permission before he even touches it. It’s given in the form of a silky chuckle and a not-quite-gentle pat to his bare backside.

The bag feels just as unspeakably high-end as it looks, the paper heavy and textured, and he didn’t notice before that the handles are gold silk ribbons to match the embossed letters. The name on the bag still isn’t ringing any bells, and he can't even imagine what might be inside, but with the way Amir is watching him, those gold eyes so sharp and intense he can feel the heat of their stare pricking at his skin, he's clearly eager for Jude to find out.

He parts the shimmery metallic tissue paper as delicately as he can with his heavy, callused hands, and finds a long flat box lying underneath. His heart is in his throat as he lifts it out of the bag, turning it over carefully in an effort to guess what it might be without damaging its contents.

Amir sighs behind him, and if Jude’s entire body weren’t thrumming with nerves, he’d look back to see if he’s checking a watch he isn’t actually wearing to drive home the point that his patience is wearing thin.

He opens the box. He almost can't parse what's inside at first.

Lace. Lots of lace. Pale, dusky pink lace edged along sheer fabric and adorned with delicate ribbons and thin gold chains.

Jude's no stranger to fancy lingerie—Amir wears it often enough, and he likes to model it for Jude, even if he's just as clueless about luxury fashion as he is about fine art. Jude's never once complained—in fact, he's found he really likes it, the textures and colors and cuts, the way the airy fabrics cling to the striking angles of Amir's body, the way he always chooses colors that compliment him so well…

Jude's mouth is suddenly very dry, the weight of Amir's expectant gaze pressing down on him, because he's seen the succubus in enough lacy underthings, and removed them enough, to have a rough understanding of the sizes he wears.

The pretty pink garments in the box are much too big to be meant for Amir.

He looks up, and Amir meets his eyes with a sly curl to his mouth. "Well?" he asks, stepping closer, watching Jude’s face, picking apart his reactions with an almost surgical precision. "What do you think?"

He’s not sure he can think anything right now, all of his thoughts a messy jumble of confusion and curiosity and (a bit shamefully) desire. He knows he shouldn’t be ashamed for what he feels, what he wants, but there’s a lifetime’s worth of it built around everything he’s wanted that wasn’t in line with what he was supposed to be, and he’s still digging his way through that.

He wets his lips with his tongue and stares into the velvet-lined box, still trying to make sense of everything he’s feeling. "Is it… are they… for me?"

It’s a stupid question, but there’s a part of him that still can’t believe it, is still scared this is either a dream or some sort of joke.

Amir laughs, low and sultry, reaching out to curl his ring-laden fingers around Jude's bicep. The touch is so simple, so soft, but it still spreads warmth through Jude's body. "Of course. Not really my color, is it?"

It isn't, Jude knows. Amir prefers bolder colors, stark contrasts, shimmer and shine to draw the eye. He tries to say as much, but what comes out of his mouth is a fumbling, "Y-you look good in everything."

That laugh again, a smoky, rich thing that sinks beneath his skin, curls in his gut and leaves him aching to hear it again and again and again. "You're so sweet," Amir says, scratching affectionately at his scruffy chin with his free hand. He squeezes the other around Jude’s arm, the tips of his nails a tantalizing pressure that makes his chest feel tight, makes his breath quicken. “Why don’t you go try them on, make sure I got the sizing right.”

He did. Of course he did, Jude couldn’t doubt for a second he would. There’s no way the set isn’t entirely bespoke, too, considering there’s no tags in sight to indicate sizing. There’s a bit of embroidery on the inside of each piece (panties, garters, belt, a frilly top that he struggles to identify) that he assumes is a brand signature or something like it.

Amir ushers him back into the bathroom, smiling playfully as he closes the door, and Jude is left to stare at the box in his hands and try to sort through his thoughts.

It’s easier, with Amir there to distract him, when he can’t focus so much on his nerves, or what his family would think of him, or what he thinks of himself.

He keeps his eyes down, away from the mirror, as he carefully takes each piece of the set out of the box. There’s enough room on the vanity for him to lay them out one by one, and he tries to think of it the same way he thinks of disassembling an engine. You have to go into it with a plan, you have to know how the parts fit together, and in what order. He arranges them in the way he thinks (hopes) they’ll need to go on his body, and takes a slow, deep breath.

The most daunting piece, it seems, will have to be the one that goes first. He picks up the panties, wincing when the calluses on his palms snag at the lace. He frantically checks for damage, his heart pounding, and sighs with relief when nothing seems to be out of place.

He looks over his shoulder, towards the door. Amir is quietly waiting on the other side, probably keeping himself busy with organizing his ever-crowded schedule while Jude has a quiet panic spiral about underwear in his bathroom. But he’s been waiting long enough, and though he teased, he’s been endlessly patient with Jude, and kind enough to get him not just a gift, but an expensive, custom gift he literally plucked from the human’s deepest, most secret desires.

Jude takes another grounding breath, and meticulously, cautiously, pulls the underwear on.

He knows he’s in trouble when a shudder works its way through him at the way the lace feels sliding up his legs, softer than he expected. He’s achingly aware of it whispering up his calves, stretching around his thighs, and nestle over his hips. It takes a bit of… adjustment in certain areas, but given that they were made specifically for his body (and that’s still something he can barely wrap his head around) everything, uh, settles in with surprising ease. It’s oddly comfortable and, more than that, it feels right.

He swallows so hard his throat clicks, and keeps his eyes steadfastly away from the mirror as he reaches for the next pieces–the stockings– with trembling hands.

Amir’s bathroom is practically the size of a studio apartment on its own, and thankfully there’s a seat near the vanity in the form of a plushy padded stool. He sits down and feels the panties shift and stretch around his hips and ass, and gently scrunches the first stocking. He tries to remember how people in movies put them on, and goes from there, bunching it and then pulling it slowly up his leg. It shouldn’t feel so sultry to basically be putting on socks, but the opaque material edged with more of that soft pink lace scraping gently against his skin is thrilling him beyond words. The second stocking doesn't fluster him any less, and he spends a moment or two just staring down at his legs, trying to make sense of what he's seeing, and what it might be awakening in him.

The belt and garters come next, and those at least are fairly simple. The belt is broad and subtly patterned, nipping his waist in a bit without being too restrictive. He spends what feels like an age just running his hands over the smooth, satiny panels before he clips the garters with their tiny bows to it and attaches them to the stockings.

The final piece is the top, with its spidersilk-thin gold chains attached a smooth satin ribbon, and sheer ruffled fabric flowing down from the bust. There’s a touch of fear that it won’t fit him, that he’ll move wrong and tear it while trying to put it on, but it really was made to fit his body, and the way the hem floats around his (doughy, hairy, and sort of pale) belly does a lot to hide some of his insecurities. It does emphasize his chest in a way he’s not sure he likes, clinging and translucent, but when he carefully fastens the ribbon around his neck and makes sure the chains attached to it aren’t tangled, he forgets his stalemate with the mirror and looks up.

For a moment, he forgets how to breathe.

He looks like himself, still big, broad, and heavyset, with dense muscle padded with a layer of fat and dusted with dark hair, but the contrast of the dusky, pale lace against sun-browned skin and muted tattoos is something that leaves him feeling things he’s not sure he can name.

As if on cue, there’s a dainty little rap on the door, and he jolts, fingers twisting together. Amir is still waiting, and he has no clue how long he’s been in the bathroom—it feels like hours.

He turns and stands at the door, hand hovering over the handle, and feels his stomach beginning to tie itself into knots.

Amir sees something in him that he doesn’t see for himself, and he knows that logically, but his brain isn’t always the most logical place, especially right now. There’s a sense of impending dread taking root in his chest, leaving it crowded and too-small, like his lungs hardly have the room to expand. He imagines, a bit panicky, Amir taking one look at him and bursting out laughing, or the more likely outcome of feigning interest, telling Jude he looks nice, then hurrying him to change back into his normal clothes and never speaking of this little venture again.

As if Amir senses the direction his thoughts are going, the door swings open, making Jude flinch and—pulse pounding in his ears, heart jumping into his throat—wanting to scramble for cover. But he’s frozen, a deer in the headlights, as the succubus drinks him in.

"Oh, look at you…" he croons, beckoning him out of the doorway (and, of course, he follows without thinking) so he can circle him like he's sizing him up, like he’s taking in every inch of him before he pounces. "So pretty."

Jude couldn't feel more bare if he were actually naked, especially with the way the succubus is pulling him apart with just his molten gold eyes. But he can't get too caught up in that when he's left reeling over one simple word.

Pretty.

Nobody's ever called him pretty before.

Something slots into place in his chest, settles in and unfurls, a shuddering realization of a desire he never knew he held being fulfilled.

He never knew he wanted to be pretty, but it… it makes sense. And it feels good.

“I’ll admit, I took a bit of a risk,” Amir says, and there’s no teasing to his tone this time, just quiet consideration, a tenderness that makes Jude feel just as weak and helpless as his bold innuendo and sultry purring. “It was just a little hint of something I saw after…”

His expression shifts, brows furrowing, mouth curling. There's the faintest hint of that simmering anger he works so hard to hide. He doesn’t have to say anything, and Jude is grateful that he doesn’t. His thoughts were all over the place the night he had dinner with his family, he’s not surprised Amir managed to find the things he didn’t let himself think about, things he’d been struggling to bury for a good two decades, when all his old hurts were bubbling to the surface and he didn’t have the strength to push them down again.

“It was a guess,” Amir continues, easing closer, looking up with his head tilted, hair spilling over his shoulder in a glossy fall that Jude wants to hide in, bend himself practically in half so he can tuck away somewhere he actually feels safe, but he’s rooted to the spot feeling more exposed than he’s ever felt in his life. At least here, out in the open, he gets to see the way a slow smile starts to curl Amir’s lips again, softly smug. “But I think it’s safe to say it was a good one.”

Amir is so close, the heat of his body is almost enough to have Jude sweating, scantily clad as he is.

That could just as easily be nerves, or rather, anticipation.

Without his heels, Amir's a good six inches shorter than Jude, but it doesn't matter much with a presence like his. He effortlessly fills any room he struts into, and Jude's been helplessly drawn to him since the beginning. The demon stares at him with smoldering eyes, a gaze that clings to his skin like honey, thick and molten and saccharine, dripping from the ribbon at his throat, the slender chains connecting it to the top, and lingering at the bust for a long breathless moment before sliding down to the belt, the garters–

Jude shifts on the spot, shivers at the alien sensation of the stockings rubbing against the carpet, and tries to be subtle when he drops his hands to cover himself a bit. Unfortunately, it's not really possible for a man his size to be subtle in anything.

And then there's a swirl of mild disorientation, the sensation of breath against his ear, and a whisper in his mind that sends a shudder through his body.

No hiding, darling. I want to look at you.

Amir's lips don't move, but his eyes are so intent it feels like a physical touch. He takes his sweet time looking Jude over, admires him from every angle. Jude holds still obediently, doesn't try to hide, and he’s rewarded for his good behavior when Amir finally, finally touches him again, fingertips tracing along where the lace clings to his skin, where the softness of his hip spills out over the waistband of the panties, the lines the garters draw down his thick, hairy thighs to connect to the stockings and back up to slip under the floaty hem of the top and prickle his nails along the band that’s doing its best to support his ample chest.

His skin is burning now, between the hearthfire heat Amir radiates and his own blood rushing, and he’s starting to feel the shift in the atmosphere from an almost artistic appreciation to something a little more focused.

He’s not sure he can take much more of that focus, but thankfully Amir is very good at distracting him when he’s starting to feel overwhelmed. It just so happens that, in the current case, that distraction comes in the form of crowding him back into the nearest wall and pawing at him.

"W…wait," he whines out, helplessly squirming against the wall. He’s been able to restrain himself up to this point, to manage the low thrum of arousal building up in his gut since he starting pulling on all the satin and lace, but he can already feel himself straining against the delicate panties with Amir grabbing two big handfuls of his ass and squeezing. "I don't… I don't want to… mess these up."

There were no price tags, but he knows this has to be one of Amir's more expensive gifts. He's heard enough women in his life complain that just the mass-produced stuff is pricey, much less bespoke luxury lingerie. He can't even begin to guess how much Amir spent on what he's wearing, and he's honestly afraid to think about it too hard.

Amir laughs, something low and throaty that echoes sweetly in Jude's ribcage, settles heavy in his belly, and he tugs the human down to his level by the slip of ribbon around his throat. "Oh, darling," he coos indulgently, honey-sweet and just a touch condescending in that way Jude has gotten a little addicted to, "do you really think I only got you one set?"

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seventh-fantasy · 6 months

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li xiangyi, yin, and femininity

we all know that li xiangyi is a character of fractured identities. and li lianhua is an unreliable narrator to his own story. these make him not the most straightforward character to study. but I've believed in treating li lianhua as a part of li xiangyi, rather than separates. and there must be a common thread that ties all of him together. thus, I offer what I have found to be the most useful lens to use to view him as a cohesive whole, regardless as li xiangyi, li lianhua, or any other identity he may reinvent into: his 阴 yin qualities. (yin of yinyang)

this framework suggested by the drama's text itself has helped clarify to me his strengths, weaknesses, motivations, and struggles. by identifying this constant, too, makes it so much easier talking about what has changed in him.

[to the, hopefully growing, boli lhl hivemind @markiafc @ananeiah]

there are some notes on the concept of yinyang and chinese conceptualisation of gender I have to preface with.

[disclaimer: of course, I'm not even trying to cover a tip of what experts have extensively studied and debated in a depth it deserves. all I'm doing is try to parse the broad, fundamental ideas that are needed to explain my blorbos through my own spotty brain filter. so there bound to be nuances I've overlooked or some degree of my own interpretation. pretentious but needs to be done.]

阴 yin and 阳 yang are concepts characterised by passiveness, darkness, gentleness, femininity etc, and proactivity, light, toughness, masculinity etc respectively. a very key and handy concept to have in mind is their relationship to each other - which I'll not attempt at explaining better than literal scholars have:

Yin and yang exist only in relation to one another internally as the way warmth-coldness only exist relative to one another. Furthermore, when using yin-yang as an organizational schema, achieving balancing harmony is always the goal, not domination nor subordination of one to the other. [x]

while yin and yang can be symbols of femininity and masculinity, it doesn't mean all female are yin and all male are yang. it's certainly not a strict 1-to-1 equation. the concept of gender in chinese context is more social than biological. this suggests room for fluidity, and shaping of identities, often through social rituals as one journeys through life. it also means that there can be femininity in the masculine, and vice versa - in fact, that's only healthy because you need a good balance of the two worlds. no one part is better than the other. if you think of the two components as relative to each other, they are always interacting and affecting each other, rather than being strict and inert binaries. simply put, it needs to be kept in mind that there are greater nuances in applying yin and yang to the definitions of gender, and to avoid at all cost a simplification of this framework into a binary.

sure, the show has implied that lxy's powers and energy are yin-coded. but femininity is only one of the multiple attributes of yin. so how are we extending lxy's yin to femininity specifically? it's in the text that substantiates and qualifies lxy as feminine. dead women being used as proxies to his character. being literally dressed as a woman in order to put himself into their shoes and feel what they've felt. adopting a name that happens to be very, very feminine - 莲花 lianhua (lit. lotus flower) (it must be caveated that chinese names are NOT gendered. but there are just some names that are more feminine than others.) him coming to lead a life revolving around traditionally feminine, domestic things as li lianhua. him having interactions with the women around him like he's in his own element - no pressure and tension at all, unlike with all the other men.

as such, I'm more willing to use yin and femininity interchangeably in discussing lxy (while it's not necessarily applicable to every point that will be mentioned albeit there being some degree of implied association). and it's for the sake of elucidating what I feel is an intention or very plausible reading of the canon text in parsing feminine experiences in lxy's character. and thus, his queerness.

one last note is that taoism is going be mentioned quite a bit as well because of how much it as a philosophy honours the yin quality. its key tenets include valuing passiveness and inaction as a form of action, and submitting to the nature of things. and we will see how those come up in lxy's life too. (though I'm not gonna attempt to deep dive into it here beyond broad strokes of it.)

a huge part of li xiangyi's yin actually manifests in him being a passive person. this applies not just to li lianhua, but also li xiangyi. I know. ok wait hear me out. the idea of yinyang is after all components that can change and are relational to each other: thus, there were points in li xiangyi's life when he was less passive than other points, but they ultimately don't match up to the degree of aggression displayed by other men around him. so relative to their display of proactivity and aggression, he can be considered as passive. the best example is that of shan gudao proposing to launch an offensive on jinyuan alliance, while lxy - as much as he was arrogant about it - was standing his ground on not taking action in favour of peace.

it has already showed up in his childhood as well. he wasn't a particularly competitive child: 从来都没有谁要和你争 nobody has ever thought of competing with you over anything, he told sgd as he recalled of their times growing up. it was in fact sgd who was desperate to control and override lxy's presence. baby lxy did not hesitate at all over giving up on winning in favour of protecting his only rare few close relationships left in the world (given how hard-earned relationships are when they're non-familial !!!!). as much as I resent the one-dimensional writing of sgd, he has served as a very strong marker to highlight on lxy's yin.

I've harped on it several times before but this is the time I finally get to explain it proper: my own theory is that li xiangyi became an unparalleled swordsmaster because of his yin/feminine quality, not in spite of it. an interesting point that had been out in the open unclaimed until it was brought up in our friend group is that, li xiangyi does not actually fit anybody's conventional image of a 武林盟主 wulin mengzhu (ie. ruler of wulin). it would most likely have been some burly, muscular, ultra-masculine dude. even if they don't look like the demonic monk, it should be someone more like di feisheng. but. it's li xiangyi, the boyish, delicate-looking kid, who came to the top. (no wonder people - mostly men - love or love to bully hate him like weak men hate powerful women??)

"why didn't they cast someone who looks more like a wulin mengzhu (read: traditionally manly)?" no, no that's precisely the point. nobody said wulin mengzhu have to look manly. and also who is to define the manliness required to be in a place of authority? (or in my other meta, we would ask, who is to define anybody gets to have the authority over anyone else at all?)

by taoist ideal, gentleness is the most refined form of strength. li xiangyi has been haunting and distracting me in my chinese calligraphy practices lately because I'm thinking about how this must be the closest to what it felt like lxy becoming the best swordsman in jianghu. (so pretentiously brainrotten of me, I know, BUT IT'S REAL and I'm suffering.) mastering a chinese art is essentially about mastering a delicate balance between force and gentleness; being able to draw force from softness 柔中带刚 and an ability to maintain this balance. a beginner will instinctively hold a brush for the first time with brute, unrefined force. some fairly reputable contemporary calligraphers, according to my teacher, can be seen as being either too soft or too forceful - but are still able to pass off as good enough. it's then, the master of masters who will have the sophistication of a firm yet flexible control of the brush with the appropriate use of gentleness/laxness that produces a harmony of strokes. this idea extends to any other sort of chinese craft or practice including traditional chinese medicine, and I believe, swordsmanship too. I'm taking a fucking leap of faith here to say this because I practise NO sort of (chinese) martial arts, I must caveat. (someone who does may want to say something...) but theoretically that should be how it works.

it is not for no rhyme or reason, or *handwaves* that lxy emerged to the top AND is almost undefeatable. among a competitive, forceful (ie. yang) wulin, li xiangyi stood out with a power and energy defined by yin (ie. gentleness and stability) that led him to create his signature 扬州慢 yangzhouman. it is characterised by 慢 slowness (my calligraphy teacher says to us all the time to take it slow), and also described by dfs as 中正绵长 - which I would best describe by painting a picture of a steady and stable stream. these precisely speak of the essence of a mastery of gentleness as strength to me.

conversely, dfs's way in mastering power is very largely premised on taking action because he literally had no other choice in the environment he grew up in. both of them develop in opposite ways. it was the case of gentleness for lxy clearly because he grew up in a safe, nurturing environment that had allowed him to be slow and steady at his own pace, drawing on his natural gifts.

now top of the wulin world at 17, li xiangyi founds sigu sect. li xiangyi, the boy before becoming menzhu and li xiangyi the leader of sigu sect are not the same.

how then did a (relatively) passive boy like lxy end up founding sigu sect. this lxy is the one who was fostered into competition - though not in an abusive, twisted way. in fact he was raised in a rather taoist way by his shifu: to be honest with yourself and respect your opponent. so he honoured whatever powers he had been bestowed with by nature. he gives into it. even so, at another level, I just have a sense that shifu and shiniang's competitive marital spat had an insidious effect on the boys...though the detrimental effect was more on sgd than lxy. baby lxy feels like a sweet-natured kid who was just in his own zone, you know - some (aka sgd) would say, too much of him even, to have not realised what was wrong at all with his shixiong for years.

that's not all of course. I've always gotten the vibes that his attitude behind forming sigu sect felt more like, this is what all the good men of jianghu do and I will have to do it now especially that I'm the best. it didn't feel particularly personal to me, but rather what would have been expected of him by the social climate of wulin jianghu (eg. lxy saying to 光耀师门 bring honour to his teacher). it's definitely not an expectation from his shifu, who explicitly told him that he was never expected to become a noble figure of any sort, but just to be alive and contented. as concluded by the man himself as li lianhua: "有些人入了江湖是为了立心，而有的人入江湖为的是立命。我却不知道自己真正想要的是什么。some people enter jianghu for the cultivation of the mind, others for a cultivation of a meaningful life. but I never knew what I truly wanted." he was ultimately, unwittingly a passive player in his own story of becoming the great sigu sect leader.

(at this point, as a side note, I do wonder if there were any other similar sects or alliances that function the same as sigu sect that came before it. because I'm damn well sure there must be something, as likely as there must have been generations of wulin legends who came before lxy. but of course, this is not what the story is concerned with at all and I'm ok with that.)

it's crucial to point out that, even despite this being the phase of his yang in the display of taking action and enacting firmness, lxy had still done sigu sect with the sole purpose and manner of upkeeping peace and order (in the way of the pro-universal love, anti-aggression mohist 侠 xia leader of the people). he's still very characterised by yin in my books, especially when vis-à-vis to sgd.

a li xiangyi full of himself and made himself too useful to the people was only bound for a great asteroidal fall, in the concept of 物极必反 - or in taoist lexicon 反者道之动 (ie. anything that has reached its limit will only start developing in the opposite direction). if you think you're above all, you can only go down.

this manifests during the next time he took action - and it was one so forceful that it overpowered even his opponent, dfs who ended up being the passive, receiving party in this case - was in initiating the battle at donghai 10 years ago... and gee oh boy. it didn't end well - for both of them, but even more so for lxy. (dfs was like 'tis but a scratch (shrugs)' as compared to him being ripped off his tendons by jiao liqiao like nezha did to the dragon prince. truth is he had to go into a 10-year healing retreat served by his entourage. :p) ok, I digress.

xiao zijin was quick to attribute sigu sect's fall to lxy's arrogance - in turn setting the stage for lxy's 10 years of self-hatred and the framing of lxy as a villain? irresponsible figure? by jianghu. (god forbid girls do anything! ok for legal reasons, this a joke.) lxy lost his mind in ways I believe he never had in his life there and then upon seeing his shixiong dead. so, you could say he led the jianghu world to ruins out of love (using this term loosely). but it feels inaccurate to say it's due to arrogance. he did not do that out of self-importance or ego, especially when the revenge for sgd was a collective decision made by sigu sect as we know from the flashback. so when llh pinned all fault on himself for being arrogant in the past, it is with caution to take his words because that's the unreliable narrator in him speaking.

anyway, it's precisely li xiangyi that is capable of bouncing back from such a fatal crisis, equipped with his yin and a mastery that gave him the power of flexibility.

it's extremely vital to re-establish that literally the only thing that was keeping li xiangyi alive, physically, as li lianhua is yangzhouman. (monk wuliao literally said that to lxy even though he did facilitate in saving him.) it's the yangzhouman that was drawn from lxy's mastery of yin. without yangzhouman, li xiangyi would not even have the chance to become li lianhua and undergo any needed process of transformation. without li xiangyi, there would have been no yangzhouman. no li xiangyi, no li lianhua, get it?

the point is not to deny the change li xiangyi wants to make and has made. but to acknowledge that change isn't about complete erasure and destruction. something from you survives. something in you had kept you alive to have you come so far, regardless of all the bad bits that you want to denounce of. you've always been worth it.

bringing back the thing about his new name: the distinction must be made that he did not pick it because it was feminine but it just so happened a feminine name had resonated with him. (read: he didn't necessarily identify as a woman but identified with femininity. at least within the parameters of canon text.)

he also made an interesting choice to retain his surname for someone who was desperate to sever ties from his past. hmm. or maybe he wasn't that desperate? when li lianhua says li xiangyi is dead, I believe it meant that li xiangyi the sigumen menzhu is dead rather than li xiangyi as an entirety. li lianhua is a returning to the path lxy could have gone if he did not establish sigu sect, the path that shifu wanted him to take. when he walked to the doors of sigu sect in the aftermath, nothing was actually stopping him from going back (people were still around and alive, instead of all dead people, you know)... except for himself. taking that action would have been too much for him. so he went with the flow of life giving him a chance at rebirth and walked away. there, inaction as a form of action.

zhan yunfei and qiao wanmian have said to li lianhua, oh that doesn't sound like li xiangyi at all. but has it been considered that, maybe it was sigu sect's lxy who wasn't the real lxy? sigu sect lxy was one big performance of the values of masculinity and heteronormativity that llh had came to an awareness of, and eventually struggle with again and resist against in the final year of his life. there had only been some glimpses of his true nature allowed (validated by fang duobing talking about lxy at his altar).

imho, most flashbacks of lxy during that period felt impersonal and more like a template of a hero expected to marry his girl at 18. going through all the motions and steps of a normative life even before he was old enough to grasp and explore his own identity and what it meant in the world. no wonder he denounced so much of what he had done as lxy including liking girls. walking away then also meant a walk away from those duties and expectations. li lianhua is li xiangyi liberated from masculine duties and heteronormative performance.

in doing that, he had the opportunity for the first time in his life to explore what he truly wanted, at least within the parameters of what he could afford to do at that point. he could go on to build a domestic, feminine life within the space of jianghu (as I've established here). it's a kind of feminine lifestyle that doesn't quite exist in mainstream society - being a woman there meant to stay put in a domestic space without much room to move socially. nor did it exist in wulin jianghu because even the women there like shi-guniang and jlq were expected to be masculine, aggressive, competitive. so building a mobile home in the space of jianghu is his way of defining the life he wants and can have. li lianhua is the extension of femininity in li xiangyi - and one that can be free.

it's also worth talking about in my opinion what is one of the most important and a favourite dihua moment: when dfs said to lxy that his greatest weakness was to like being a hero. and a swordsman should be without weaknesses. I'm forever wrapped up in how many layers this can be read in. was he mad at lxy for liking to be a hero or having weaknesses, or both? if the former, it was dfs criticising, based on lxy's public reputation, lxy's oversized illusions about being a hero - a figure of masculinity with an unrealistic sense to uphold noble goals eg. saving the world etc. that is actually perfectly logical coming from dfs, the straightforward, no-nonsense, morally neutral guy with no illusions about heroism (in this case, he feels more like a yin). but at the same time, we should understand that lxy's motivations behind the donghai battle are more personal than noble. if any, it was actually the opposite of noble - it was like he was acting out of the role of a caretaker of his family, and at a cost of the peace and order of jianghu he was set on guarding(!!) dfs also knew that lxy was there just for his shixiong. and so, dfs, who happens to be the epitome of yang, can be read as a symbol of masculinity disapproving of lxy for being sentimental and emotional; for having the "feminine" desires to simply want to defend his family (not saying those are exclusively feminine traits but they have been conventionally associated as feminine). I think both layers of reading are correct and should work together to contribute to the complexity of their characters. (we can see how it contributes to lxy and dfs being the perfect yinyang halves to each other, which I will come back to briefly touch on later.)

for 10 years he lived a life of seclusion and staying-in-his-own-lane a taoist would be proud of. he knew he was dying and has always been ok with dying, as he claimed. but did he want to die? to think of it, it was the opposite. because in those 10 years when he could have 100% just taken action to take his own life, he didn't. in fact, he lived on and took care of himself in the way shifu wanted him to. he had simply preferred letting nature run its course. if bicha didn't take him, he wasn't gonna do anything. but if he died one day very soon, he would be ok with it too. sure, he was maybe banking on a lead to sgd's whereabouts to appear during his last years alive but that clearly wasn't the only thing on his mind for NINE years because he didn't actively go out seeking for that either. this is basically him telling dfs that he would just lie in the sun and wait for the sweet release of death, if dfs were to force him to fight. not even the mortal threat from dfs was enough to move him into action of fighting back or killing himself.

time and again, lxy as llh was dragged into fdb's cases but not only that, he also maintained an impersonal distance with them. it's starkly different from the usual (wuxia) hero archetypes (for eg. fdb) who would be more impassioned and personally invested in the plight of the victims- or unlike most seemingly aloof protagonists who would somehow grow emotionally invested over time. one of the many things I love about llh is that he never tries a second time to persuade people out of their decisions he finds unwise (eg. him just wanting to move on in response to the girls in 女宅 insisting on staying behind with their slave master at first.) he will not interfere in other people's choices made in their own lives. it's not his business. he didn't even want to be there, to be honest.

however as the story progresses, more and more people - especially men, his past, and the leads to the truth came back to demand and taunt him into doing something. they vary from well-meaning people without any harm intended such as fdb intruding upon his private space completely uninvited and qwm wanting him back; to dfs merely seeking him as a mean to an end initially (eg. I only need him to live long enough to have one last fight); and finally, on the other end of the spectrum, outright aggressive and hostile people like sgd and xzj who wanted him to die. under all this pressure, he tried his best to deflect, but he does waver especially when it comes to matters concerning the people he cares about aka his obsession wish of 10 years of looking for sgd's remains that had lied low until fdb entered his life, and then later on taking revenge for his shifu.

looking for sgd became his final bid at taking action. he was operating on a slim chance of getting some emotional closure from finding out his shixiong is dead for real, yes. what a good plan. but objectively unnecessary. or surprise! uhhh...finding out his beloved shixiong is actually alive and would strangle him for one corn chip? AND OH NO IT GOT WORSE- uncovering a devastating truth about his shifu's death that he could have totally gone on with life fine without knowing if he had continued not caring.

but it is sometimes just impossible not to care - it is only human to care. and he is human, not an icon in the image of a hero. so he took a chance, once more, and it killed him in unprecedented ways. it's donghai all over again. things in life don't go as planned. you fuck around and it fucks you back. finding out the truth behind his shifu's death and his family background from the past did nothing for him as li lianhua living in the present.

it's no wonder that this lxy decisively relinquishes the desire to take action in the end. he goes back to letting nature run its course. and this time, stands firmly to it despite everyone begging him otherwise. wangchuan flower could only give him a recovery (or survival?) rate of 30%. there's a 70% chance of failure and even in the 30% he was not sure what he was to become. in comparison, dfs took a 10% chance game of survival in a heartbeat, and it pushed him to new heights. that's how they differ: he thrives by taking risks and action while lxy the other way round. so, something like that has happened before and he wants none of it again.

he leaves lotus tower, only taking his horse and a sack - relinquishing almost every other material belonging he had - and sets off on a journey. before xzj interrupted...where to was he going?? I wonder. we don't know for sure, I think? and are we allowed to know? that makes the scene he had with xzj an understated inflection point in the very last part of his journey. yes, he was already on his way to...maybe die? but not necessarily. you don't have to travel distances with your belongings for that, right? or speak to dfs personally about not wanting to fight? (borrowing one of @ananeiah's takes.) regardless, he was definitely leaving behind jianghu - not only wulin jianghu (he already did that 10 years ago), but also the jianghu space he had carved out in the last 10 years.

what sparked the decision to jump off the cliff in him was dfs's words from the night of their wedding 10th donghai anniversary: 横扫天下容易，断相夷太剑不易 conquering the world is easy, breaking xiangyi sword is not. in the original context, dfs was talking about defeating lxy being harder than conquering the world. but when it came to this scene, it was to lxy about forsaking the very last worldly possessions he had after already giving up on lotus tower and hulijing (including releasing his horse), especially his only connection left to swordsman lxy.

perhaps it had dawned on him that, wanting things at all was bad for him. in the last 10 years, he lived a life of seclusion, wanting very little. but he had still wanted things. there were still things he couldn't let go of that had led him to this state. despite having lived on an identity inspired by a buddhist teaching for 10 years, maybe it was only at this point that he was finally the closest to reaching an understanding of it. (I wish I was knowledgeable enough right now to dive into the possible buddhist reading here but alas. I'll leave it to our resident expert @markiafc)

it doesn't quite matter in the end where he was going after all. what mattered was that he literally went where the water took him and we're not supposed to know where it ends. I'm not seeing this in a bad and pessimistic way though. I think the relief in all this is that he had tried his best to within his abilities. also it's a form of enlightenment in relinquishing a desire, an obsession, a need to take any more action in order to live well. thus his ending felt to me relatively tender, empowering, and kind - albeit bittersweet and heartaching - than other possible kinds of ending, in a story where it was very possible for him to have died under the knives of his opponents or bicha at any moment, outside of his control.

if you've come so far in this post, congratulations! but also a reveal is that... you're not immune to the dihua propaganda threaded throughout this post. :P

as mentioned, other men like sgd and xzj in lxy's life were incredibly hostile to him. their yang nature overwhelmingly powers his yin. but dfs is different. dfs is the yang counterpart that fits perfectly to his yin.

dfs's yang is one that contains yin, that mirrors lxy's balance of yang in yin. it was suggested in text they are yinyang-coded meant to complement each other, given that whenever wangchuan flower's yin vs yang properties were discussed, the two men were always spoken about in the same breath. more importantly, as with the above few analyses of dfs's words playing a big role in shaping of lxy's choices with multiple meanings - as well as their day-to-day interactions - we can see that they constantly play off each other.

dfs's yang energy has been used to help lxy prolong his life (though not saving him entirely), while lxy has used his yin energy to save dfs and subsequently helped him attain his breakthrough. dfs has also helped lxy in his breakthrough of yin but not in the same way as dfs's cultivation of his combative powers, and rather, it's for lxy an understanding of his own path to take in life - a cultivation of the mind (both times 10 years before and after). given how significant dfs is in the shaping of lxy's realisation of the yin path - alike his shifu has, it's no wonder that they were the only two people lxy had imagined in his last sword dance of a farewell to jianghu.

with each of them coming together to form the perfect yin-yang model, they're a harmony of yin and yang representing the cosmos. what I also love is that they didn't start out as a perfect fit, but only towards the end of the story was the harmonisation completed, which makes sense for two components that are always in a flux influencing each other. the fact that they were number 1 and 2 of wulin, and being the only ones capable of understanding each other in a level nobody else could... it all reinforces the cosmic sense of their relationship. they're the halves to a whole, fitting in a specific way nobody else can.

(I mean. technically this is going into the space of extrapolation based on a tangential interpretation of canon text, so do take it with a pinch of salt. but of course this pinch of salt can do wonders for a shipper's feast... :P and this certainly could have been a meta of its own expanding on dfs's side of the analysis, but this is it for now in this context.)

to think of it, li xiangyi has actually died more than that one time that turned him into li lianhua. first was a death of him as a nanyin royalty - I resent having to bring up nanyin like it should hold any weight to the narrative as far as I'm concerned, but the point being that he had a completely different (familial-based) life before that still stands. then he had a rebirth as li xiangyi, disciple and swordsman to his shifu and shiniang, and later died again when li xiangyi the sigu sect leader took over. lxy the sigu sect leader died at sea in the battle 10 years ago and came back as li lianhua. (just like nezha, died after battling at east sea and rebirthed from the lotus) li lianhua then dies by the end of the drama.

there can be a myriad of interpretations as to what exactly happened to him, including the possibility that he's still alive. regardless, we can agree that li lianhua as an identity has ran its course, and he had to evolve again. but into what form?

in the line of thought of yin and femininity, and how his transformation has been in an increasing degree of presentation of femininity - even way back when I was watching the show, I had the idea of him living socially as a woman post-li lianhua. I don't know what he would be realistically doing or what could be practical for him in such an identity. but conceptually it was sensible and compelling to me before diving deeper into the details. (I have more elaboration to do on this that I won't be talking about here publicly but it is in the same strain of idea as this other comparative meta I wrote.)

I think the next possible identity lxy can assume - alive in the material realm or not - is one that will be beyond a material being. a nameless entity. once you've gone through the phases of life - from not knowing to knowing, and perfecting knowledge, then to the surpassing of knowledge - you surpass all worldly existence, and become one with the cosmos.

I end this off with an excerpt from Tao Te Ching's Chapter 41 (I'm not pretending to have read the whole book ok but I couldn't resist including this):

明道若昧，进道若退，夷道若纇 [...] 道隐无名 The bright path seems dim; Going forward seems like retreat; The easy way seems hard [...] The Tao is hidden and without name. (x)

the character translated into "easy" is the same 夷 yi of li xiangyi's name. somehow this seems to encapsulate the journey of his life: one that seems blessed and smooth-sailing but ending up to be rocky and turbulent. but at the end of the day, after all that he had been through, he will become hidden and without name.

#莲花楼 #mysterious lotus casebook #lhl #lhlmeta #my posts #a big win for the inaction fandom. lxy would have been patron saint #this inevitably turned into a 'lhl is a taoist and buddhist story if not a very chinese story' meta hbhjbjhbhjjb #the last thing i do before going to sleep is write this meta. the first thing i do after waking up is write this meta.#i feel so insane writing this. it kept growing like a monster. do you think this is a joke it's like my part-time job now #but it's one of the few times in my life i have confidence in my insanity. so.#crazier thing is. this meta is approaching 6k words yet i still think there must be things i haven't covered.#the last section is so nuts idk how i even wrote it guys i think i was possessed #it's also like the most pretentious way to put that he's dead in this world ok hjbjhbhjbhjbjbh #to be clear iirc the drama didn't say LXY'S POWER/ENERGY IS YIN in the same way it literally said dfs's energy is yang #but it's definitely implied by the explanation of the flower's healing properties for both of them. on top of yangzhouman #also fuck. another reason he didn't choose to save himself was so dfs could have the yang flower which he believed was what dfs wanted #thank u frens mark and ana for indulging my brain in the first time i brought the lxy as woman thing up. for it to have come this far #ofc disclaimer is that a lot of this is my own reading. it doesnt have to be agreed by everyone #i would be very happy though if any part of it resonated with anybody #also a good part of the analysis is based on my memory of the show. though i did revisit parts selectively to verify. sooooo. yeah.

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