Well, he's not wrong. Huaisang makes a noise that's closer to a vague huff of air than a laugh, even a dry one - he's got nothing in him for proper responses after all of that. It almost feels like he's still suffering the things that happened that day; the burns on his hands, the sore throat he'd given himself from screaming— mmph. He settles for giving Shen Yuan a brief look of gratitude, if a little sunken about it. Yes, the proper time to drop an F-bomb, thanks...
He looks at the bones of the fan he'd been plucking at again and then tosses them away with a jerk, like they'll catch fire and burn him just like everything else if he holds onto them any longer. Then reflexively he reaches for his usual fan, on his hip, and then folds his hands in his lap with a noise of disgust.
Silence sits heavy for a moment, enough to hunch his shoulders forward in quiet contemplation. Is he angry? He feels angry. He feels sad, too, like a great chasm of despair has opened up in his chest and if he moves too quickly he'll topple into it.
Give him a moment.
Eventually, "Well, Shen-ge, I think I'm going to need a break."
"Of course," Shen Yuan says, standing up with something like a close cousin to relief. "Why don't we go inside? I'll make a-Sang some tea." That will give him something to do, an outlet for his nervous (read: anxious) energy and a way to maybe, hopefully help Huaisang feel better that doesn't require much eye contact. He'd be mortified, in Huaisang's place. He is mortified, on Huaisang's behalf. At least when he went on that damned vision quest with Viktor, he knew it was going to happen and had a little time to brace himself, instead of...this.
He doesn't feel any shyness about entering Jin Guangyao's kitchen and using his things; he'll leave him a note later over omni, letting him know what they used and why, and most likely Jin Guangyao will simply thank him for looking after Huaisang.
Mortified isn't the word Huaisang would choose. He murmurs a nondescript kind of affirmative, abandoning the art project to stand and follow Shen-ge into the house, where he promptly finds a spot to sit heavily and stare up at the ceiling. There's a part of him that doesn't want any fucking tea, still too possessed by the anger he'd felt in that memory, on that day, to pay attention to niceties and efforts to cheer him up, but - well.
Something something, Shen-ge is trying. Huaisang's anger is directionless and stunted, besides; he'll drink some tea, if nothing else than to put his focus on something else. His eyes hurt; he keeps forgetting to blink, he feels like. He waits for the tea.
"You don't have to pretend you didn't see anything," he says after a moment, not bothering to coat his words in fussy politeness. Who cares! Who cares. "I know how these things go, already. And it will take more than that to embarrass me, so don't worry."
Shen Yuan makes himself stop and take a deep breath before he allows himself to speak. He can feel Huaisang's tension; his own is feeding on it, and the last thing he needs is to forget himself and snap at the poor kid. Man. Kid? God, how old is Huaisang really? Because he looked so fucking young in that vision, and it's leaking into the way Shen Yuan sees him now. How recently did that happen? How fresh is this wound?
"I don't want to make things worse," he finally admits, not looking up from the kettle in its spot on the stove. "Huaisang has already had too endure so much -- too much," he amends. "But I'm not good at...this. Being comforting. I don't want to say the wrong thing and add to that burden."
Huaisang looks at the back of Shen Yuan's head for a long moment in silence, wondering: does it seem like he wants to be comforted? Genuinely, he doesn't know— he knows the behavior he adopts when he's doing it on purpose, but he's yet to fall weeping into Shen Yuan's general vicinity, so what is this? To have someone want to make him feel better, earnestly, without his having to force his way to the forefront is so...
Well, he must look miserable, he supposes. Most of the time no one is interested in what he says or thinks about anything. He doesn't know how to behave when the despair is genuine; he looks back up at the ceiling.
"Are you going to set my collections on fire?" Mild, but it's not the question so much as the implication: no, of course Shen Yuan wouldn't do that, so of course he can't make it worse. Huaisang sighs. "I don't know— I don't know, if I could tell myself the right things, Shen-ge wouldn't need to make any tea. As you've heard, I'm a good-for-nothing."
"Of course I'm not --" he starts to snap, shocked and a little offended by the suggestion, but when he turns around and sees the look on Huaisang's face he...He just can't stay mad about it anymore. If for no other reason than because he oversaw the education of teenagers for three years, and even though everyone on Qing Jing was appropriately in awe of him they were still kids, sometimes they acted out regardless. Sometimes everything feels like it's all too much, and you try to hurt the people around you just to prove that you can. That you're not completely helpless.
Who knows if that's what's actually going through Huaisang's head right now, but it's how Shen Yuan's choosing to interpret his actions.
"I won't be doing that," he says again, and then he looks Huaisang right in the eyes and adds, "And he shouldn't have done it, either."
He could go on, comment on how it never sounds like Huaisang's joking when he calls himself good for nothing, and talk about things like self-esteem and abuse and many other things beside, and if he'd gotten even a hint from Huaisang that they'd land right, he'd do it. But he hasn't. And he doesn't want to push too far, when Huaisang already looks so brittle.
Huaisang shrugs, slumping down a little further in his seat and sighing. He's tired; he's exhausted, and he has no energy left for propriety or the plucky cheer people have come to expect of him. He feels drained. He doesn't feel like explaining himself. Like, of course Shen Yuan isn't burning his things; that's a nonissue. It's fine.
He blinks up at the ceiling, when Shen Yuan speaks of Mingjue. And not even by name! Not, of course, that there could be anyone else meant by that 'he,' but still. Da-ge deserves to be dragged through the mud by name, every so often. He thinks.
"I know," he says, after a moment. "I told you back then that da-ge died from a qi deviation. I know he was... wrong, before that." It's not an excuse; there's no 'he wasn't always like this' in it, no defense, just the simple fact: something was wrong with Nie Mingjue, and for that, Huaisang does not blame himself.
He turns his head to look at Shen Yuan properly, although he's still slouched pretty ridiculously, so "properly" is a stretch. "My brother is dead, and I loved him, but I'm never going to miss his fits about fucking saber practice."
"Honestly? I think that's more than fair." Shen Yuan sighs and leaves the kettle alone to do his thing, coming over to sit next to Nie Huaisang. "The whole thing was just fucked up from beginning to end," he says frankly. "That's no way to each anyone anything, for starters. If I'd caught any of the elders treating a disciple like that while I was still peak lord, I'd have thrown them off the damn mountain."
Seriously! Not even the teachers at Bai Zhan were that bad at their jobs! Shen Yuan takes a moment to imagine how Liu Qingge would handle it if he discovered a Bai Zhan disciple's personal things had been destroyed as punishment and can only conclude that blood would have been shed. Not that any Bai Zhan disciple would have had such a large collection of objets d'art in the first place, but...surely even they would have agreed with Shen Qingqiu (the second one) on the principle of the thing.
"The fact that he was your brother on top of that..." Shen Yuan takes his head, lips tightly pressed together. He feels so strongly about how wrong it all was that it's a struggle to get the words out without shouting. "Family shouldn't treat each other so poorly," he finally says flatly.
Huaisang hums his assent, although he doesn't quite care about the... proper ways to teach disciples things. Frankly, he's never considered himself a disciple; he is simply the second Nie son, and everyone should have left him the fuck alone if they were going to be so disappointed in his lack of enthusiasm for killing monsters with sabers. Honestly.
But still. There's a point there, surely. Teachers shouldn't teach so poorly; brothers shouldn't call their brothers good-for-nothings. He's not denying either of those things, certainly. It feels strange, to hear Shen Yuan so soundly sum up the issue, "Family shouldn't treat each other so poorly," like it's simple, like someone who has never lived a day in their family can make that call. Objective truth and the way it chafes against all of Huaisang's insides war briefly in his chest, although he merely frowns sitting there with Shen Yuan.
He finds he isn't angry, to hear Shen Yuan criticize Mingjue's treatment of him. Perhaps he would feel differently if it were some other thing about his brother's character, or if he hadn't just had his nerves rubbed raw by the flash of memory— but even back then, Huaisang had resented da-ge's fits of "discipline."
Where does that leave him, then, he wonders. Sat here in someone else's house, wondering if he should be more upset. If it would be allowed, by the ancestors and the heavens and whoever else, if he were more upset. He doesn't know.
"I suppose," he says, eventually. "He was my only brother. He kept me alive, you know, protected me. But, ah... I don't know. He was never going to accept me the way I am."
Ah yes, his outsider status. It's certainly weighing heavily on Shen Yuan's mind, making him question whether he has a right to even comment on this kind of thing at all. But still. The idea of just leaving it there, leaving Huaisang alone to wrestle with how his own brother treated him, is much worse. Shen Yuan would rather get yelled at for overstepping than that.
So instead he says, sympathetically, "It's no bad thing that he looked after you. But...it also seems to me," he says carefully, picking over his words like trying to walk through a field of sharp stones, "That that's the bare minimum of what he was supposed to do, as an elder brother. That he would and should have done those things for anyone who happened to share a father with him. But in terms of being a good brother of Huaisang specifically..." He shakes his head. "It seems like he fell pretty far short."
He opens his mouth to respond and closes it again, at a loss. Instinctively he wants to say, Well, no one has ever been a very good brother to me specifically, but that's petulant at best, and he has no real interest in reviewing all the ways people have disappointed him over the years. Da-ge is, in fact, bad enough on his own.
So he's quiet, and a bit sulky, even physically; just kind drooping lower and lower on this sofa in his misery.
"Our father died," he says, eventually. "I don't think anyone ever taught da-ge how to handle a whole sect before that happened." And so it was only logical that he, the spoiled second son, could be comfortably set aside while Mingjue attempted to wrangle the rest of his life. But that sounds like another excuse, so, "I don't really have the energy to wonder why he was the way he was anymore, Shen-ge. I'm exhausted, I don't want to- to carry him around all the time."
"You shouldn't have to," Shen Yuan says quietly. "I'm not sure -- I don't --" He sighs in exasperation, rubbing his own face. "I don't know anything about this," he finally confesses. "If my brothers were here they'd probably tell you I've never let go of anything in my entire life." That's a self-deprecating joke; Huaisang is welcome to take part or to ignore it as he likes.
"But it seems to me that Huaisang has carried this burden long enough. If he's tired from it, he should...he should be allowed to put it down."
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He looks at the bones of the fan he'd been plucking at again and then tosses them away with a jerk, like they'll catch fire and burn him just like everything else if he holds onto them any longer. Then reflexively he reaches for his usual fan, on his hip, and then folds his hands in his lap with a noise of disgust.
Silence sits heavy for a moment, enough to hunch his shoulders forward in quiet contemplation. Is he angry? He feels angry. He feels sad, too, like a great chasm of despair has opened up in his chest and if he moves too quickly he'll topple into it.
Give him a moment.
Eventually, "Well, Shen-ge, I think I'm going to need a break."
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He doesn't feel any shyness about entering Jin Guangyao's kitchen and using his things; he'll leave him a note later over omni, letting him know what they used and why, and most likely Jin Guangyao will simply thank him for looking after Huaisang.
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Something something, Shen-ge is trying. Huaisang's anger is directionless and stunted, besides; he'll drink some tea, if nothing else than to put his focus on something else. His eyes hurt; he keeps forgetting to blink, he feels like. He waits for the tea.
"You don't have to pretend you didn't see anything," he says after a moment, not bothering to coat his words in fussy politeness. Who cares! Who cares. "I know how these things go, already. And it will take more than that to embarrass me, so don't worry."
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"I don't want to make things worse," he finally admits, not looking up from the kettle in its spot on the stove. "Huaisang has already had too endure so much -- too much," he amends. "But I'm not good at...this. Being comforting. I don't want to say the wrong thing and add to that burden."
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Well, he must look miserable, he supposes. Most of the time no one is interested in what he says or thinks about anything. He doesn't know how to behave when the despair is genuine; he looks back up at the ceiling.
"Are you going to set my collections on fire?" Mild, but it's not the question so much as the implication: no, of course Shen Yuan wouldn't do that, so of course he can't make it worse. Huaisang sighs. "I don't know— I don't know, if I could tell myself the right things, Shen-ge wouldn't need to make any tea. As you've heard, I'm a good-for-nothing."
A beat. "I'm kidding, of course."
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Who knows if that's what's actually going through Huaisang's head right now, but it's how Shen Yuan's choosing to interpret his actions.
"I won't be doing that," he says again, and then he looks Huaisang right in the eyes and adds, "And he shouldn't have done it, either."
He could go on, comment on how it never sounds like Huaisang's joking when he calls himself good for nothing, and talk about things like self-esteem and abuse and many other things beside, and if he'd gotten even a hint from Huaisang that they'd land right, he'd do it. But he hasn't. And he doesn't want to push too far, when Huaisang already looks so brittle.
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He blinks up at the ceiling, when Shen Yuan speaks of Mingjue. And not even by name! Not, of course, that there could be anyone else meant by that 'he,' but still. Da-ge deserves to be dragged through the mud by name, every so often. He thinks.
"I know," he says, after a moment. "I told you back then that da-ge died from a qi deviation. I know he was... wrong, before that." It's not an excuse; there's no 'he wasn't always like this' in it, no defense, just the simple fact: something was wrong with Nie Mingjue, and for that, Huaisang does not blame himself.
He turns his head to look at Shen Yuan properly, although he's still slouched pretty ridiculously, so "properly" is a stretch. "My brother is dead, and I loved him, but I'm never going to miss his fits about fucking saber practice."
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Seriously! Not even the teachers at Bai Zhan were that bad at their jobs! Shen Yuan takes a moment to imagine how Liu Qingge would handle it if he discovered a Bai Zhan disciple's personal things had been destroyed as punishment and can only conclude that blood would have been shed. Not that any Bai Zhan disciple would have had such a large collection of objets d'art in the first place, but...surely even they would have agreed with Shen Qingqiu (the second one) on the principle of the thing.
"The fact that he was your brother on top of that..." Shen Yuan takes his head, lips tightly pressed together. He feels so strongly about how wrong it all was that it's a struggle to get the words out without shouting. "Family shouldn't treat each other so poorly," he finally says flatly.
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But still. There's a point there, surely. Teachers shouldn't teach so poorly; brothers shouldn't call their brothers good-for-nothings. He's not denying either of those things, certainly. It feels strange, to hear Shen Yuan so soundly sum up the issue, "Family shouldn't treat each other so poorly," like it's simple, like someone who has never lived a day in their family can make that call. Objective truth and the way it chafes against all of Huaisang's insides war briefly in his chest, although he merely frowns sitting there with Shen Yuan.
He finds he isn't angry, to hear Shen Yuan criticize Mingjue's treatment of him. Perhaps he would feel differently if it were some other thing about his brother's character, or if he hadn't just had his nerves rubbed raw by the flash of memory— but even back then, Huaisang had resented da-ge's fits of "discipline."
Where does that leave him, then, he wonders. Sat here in someone else's house, wondering if he should be more upset. If it would be allowed, by the ancestors and the heavens and whoever else, if he were more upset. He doesn't know.
"I suppose," he says, eventually. "He was my only brother. He kept me alive, you know, protected me. But, ah... I don't know. He was never going to accept me the way I am."
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So instead he says, sympathetically, "It's no bad thing that he looked after you. But...it also seems to me," he says carefully, picking over his words like trying to walk through a field of sharp stones, "That that's the bare minimum of what he was supposed to do, as an elder brother. That he would and should have done those things for anyone who happened to share a father with him. But in terms of being a good brother of Huaisang specifically..." He shakes his head. "It seems like he fell pretty far short."
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He opens his mouth to respond and closes it again, at a loss. Instinctively he wants to say, Well, no one has ever been a very good brother to me specifically, but that's petulant at best, and he has no real interest in reviewing all the ways people have disappointed him over the years. Da-ge is, in fact, bad enough on his own.
So he's quiet, and a bit sulky, even physically; just kind drooping lower and lower on this sofa in his misery.
"Our father died," he says, eventually. "I don't think anyone ever taught da-ge how to handle a whole sect before that happened." And so it was only logical that he, the spoiled second son, could be comfortably set aside while Mingjue attempted to wrangle the rest of his life. But that sounds like another excuse, so, "I don't really have the energy to wonder why he was the way he was anymore, Shen-ge. I'm exhausted, I don't want to- to carry him around all the time."
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"But it seems to me that Huaisang has carried this burden long enough. If he's tired from it, he should...he should be allowed to put it down."