[ficlets] days in between - wenzhou & gen - parts 2-4

[peachpai]

days in between (part 2)
Characters & Relationships: Wen Kexing/Zhou Zishu
Rating & Warnings: Teen and Up; cw terminal illness
Word Count: 514
Summary: Zhou Zishu on the days in between. SHL canon; a themed ficlet series, but each can be read alone.

Wen Kexing isn’t in his bed on the other side of the room. On the table there is some tea that has long gone cold, and Zhou Zishu is unsettled by the knowledge he hadn’t noticed the sounds of Wen Kexing going in and out of the room. Likely, he’d quietly gone to breakfast letting Zhou Zishu sleep in without trying to insist on his company—a small mercy while the Nails continue to itch at him in a way that makes it hard to think about anything else.

(part 3)
Characters & Relationships: Zhou Zishu & Zhang Chengling
Word Count: 586
Notes: Extra warning for past minor character death, grief, and trauma.

Somewhere in his deepest memories, he could perhaps unearth a self that knew instinctively how to comfort a child ripped apart by loss. Before the Nails, scraping him raw by increments, night after night. Before Window of Heaven. Before...before...

(part 4)
Characters & Relationships: Zhou Zishu
Word Count: 440
Notes: This one is set pretty soon after Zhou Zishu leaves the Window of Heaven. Extra warning for vomit and a little bit of medical horror.

The angle of the sun’s glare suggests the time must be about noon; the shopkeeper had done him a kindness by not rolling him out into the street. Regardless, Zhou Zishu wants to tell him to go fuck himself, but all that comes out is a rusty wheeze.