Xue Yang manages to keep Xiao Xingchen from dying (barely). So…that was bad. But surely now that it’s over things can go back to normal, right? Xiao Xingchen’s a little angry and upset but he’ll calm down and get over it.
Right?
(Or: the fix-it that’s sort of a fix-it and also sort of not that at all.)
Notes:
I started writing this fic initially for the 2021 MXTX Big Bang challenge, and about five pages in went “oh this isn’t going to be long enough, better write something else” and then I came back to it and…well, it’s not 100,000 words but I guess it ended up being pretty long, huh.
The moment this fic really clicked for me was the moment I realized that I’d been trying to write a happy ending, or at least not a miserable one, but that wasn’t the story I was actually telling. So…yeah, heads up that this is not a fic where everyone ends up okay. The biggest specific warning I’d put here is that this fic deals pretty heavily with very severe depression and suicidality.
My gratitude always to my full-time fic editor @ameliarating, and a number of people who helped talk me through sticky spots, particularly @paradife-loft.
