"Circus Days" Lay/Luhan

Summary: Luhan joins a respected circus troupe expecting to make friends; Yixing just wants to hang him up on the nearest trapeze

Paring: Layhan, obviously

Genre: Circus!au, Comedy, or rather.. bad comedy? Badass!Lay

Rating: .... still up in the air for this one... lol

Length: Chaptered, possibly? Maybe just something short

Warnings: Rope burn(?)

Character List:

• Yixing - a firebreather, contortionist - famous trapeze artist known for his double-joints and fluidly moving body; acts sweet on stage and is a hellion in real life, hates untalented people
• Luhan - dog trainer, comedian, mug juggler - mediocre vaudeville show person, hired to 'spice up' the pre-show entertainment; He doesn't know he's there because his bad acting skills are actually intended for comic relief

Side Characters: 

• Tao - fiery retired lion tamer, now twirls flaming devil sticks, isn't quite as good at it as he was with lions
• Xiumin - fairy-esque gymnist, Yixing's partner on the trapeze, the only person who's nice to Luhan
• Chen - MC of the whole show, has a thing for Tao
• Yifan - works in the pyrotechnics booth, also has a thing for Tao, and Yixing, but he can't make up his mind and so he gets neither
• Suho - a mime with sad-face makeup

Scene 4

Luhan never knew this day could turn out so bad; he'd made a total idiot of himself on stage with his singing and dancing, the audience had laughed at him - at him, not even with him! He'd always thought he was a good comedian, but apparently he needed to rethink this crap because nobody had ever bothered to tell him he was so very bad. He wanted to cry. This was result of having so many friends back in school and thinking he was popular. Those people had actually liked him. They liked whatever Luhan did because to them, Luhan was a friend and apparently it didn't matter there.

Here it was different. Here he was alone, even though Xiumin seemed like a nice and personable guy - as in, he said 'Hello' to Luhan every time they met and smiled and actually bothered to ask him a polite 'How's the day going?' - Xiumin wasn't anything like the rest of this troupe. The rest of the guys here were complete s, and it pissed Luhan off immensely that they felt they had license to make fun of him. It pissed him off even more that despite their atrocious face-to-face people skills, they were actually really good at what they did. Well, except for Tao, but then the fire twirler didn't always fling his tools of the trade into people's faces. Usually he was pretty good at them... Luhan wondered perhaps if this was the reason Tao always kept his hair cropped short, in case he ever accidentally got the flames too close to his head.

Luhan put his head down, palms caressing his cheeks with his elbows on his knees. It was quieter back in his dressing room. Chen was still out in the arena doing his halftime-show thing. Suho had finished the last of his makeup already and left the room. Luhan needed some downtime while he second-guessed himself and his whole career. It was clear now he was here to be the comic relief. He wondered if that was written somewhere in super fine print on his contract. It . 

He tossed his dancing cane across the floor. It bounced once and rolled away, and he flung his top hat after it. He hissed madly at his striped red and white jacket, and pulled his bow tie fretfully. Bow ties... he scoffed at his own reflection. Whoever said bow ties were cool. 

The door to the hallway opened, and Luhan looked up. Yixing was there scowling, or rather smirking down at him. 

"So, now. How was Day 1 in the circus?" Yixing taunted. 

Luhan didn't want to answer. He knew he didn't even need to. Yixing was just here to torment him further. He'd made that very clear already, from the moment Luhan first arrived. 

It was a >>billion times unfair that Yixing was drop-dead gorgeous, or that he had a smile to make women weep, and many did just that. Luhan had already heard whispers about certain ladies of the audience being snuck in after a show. The sound of girlish giggles and heavy panting coming out of his room while the pyrotechnics guy staunchly kept watch, to keep anyone else out (or from finding out that the circus's star performer was a ladies' man and a heart breaker). Yifan had a thankless double job. 

Perhaps Luhan thought it more unfair because Yixing was hot, and if only Yixing had a better personality, Luhan would totally be into that.

"You look disappointed," Yixing was saying now. And suddenly Luhan couldn't remember what he was thinking about before. 

"D-Disappointed?" he stuttered.

"In your performance?" Yixing supplied with an evil smile. 

Disappointed in you, Luhan thought to himself. 

Apparently though he made the mistake of saying that out loud. Luhan was a stage actor, but a bad one - and that translated to saying the wrong things at the wrong time. No wonder he at his job. 

Yixing cocked his head curiously. "In me?" he repeated.

"Uhhhhhh," Luhan whined, backtracking furiously in his head. 

"Why in me?" Yixing took several steps forward. 

Because you're hot, but you're a . Luhan mercifully managed to keep that thought inside his head. "I didn't... I didn't say anything. I mean, nothing."

"Were you... thinking about me just now?" 

"What?" Luhan jumped backwards. His rolling chair bumped against the makeup counter, however. He was trapped. "No way! I wansn't! I wasn't...!"

"I don't really believe you," said Yixing, and was it just Luhan's imagination or did his voice suddenly drop a half octave? 

"You know what I think?" Yixing continued.

"No." It wasn't really the correct response but Yixing didn't seem like he cared.

"I think you were thinking about me." His eyes narrowed and he leaned over. From this angle he had the advantage on Luhan, even though Luhan was technically taller. He seemed to shrink the closer Yixing got to his face. "I think... you were sitting here all alone, imagining things... about me... and you... perhaps strung up to a trapeze, completely immobile?" 

The room was growing hot. Luhan's face was completely flushed. He didn't even need to look in a mirror to confirm that. 

A heartbeat before it happened Luhan realized that Yixing intended to kiss him, here and now. He closed his eyes and held his breath, not entirely sure if this was unwanted. From the way Yixing was asserting himself over him, he expected to be completely attacked. He saw the way one of those girls from last night had left his room, lips swollen and bruised. It was going to be him now... He just knew it. And he kind of dreaded it, but perhaps the flip-side was getting to taste Yixing?

It didn't happen. Or at least not the way Luhan imagined it. Yixing had his arms braced on the counter top either side of Luhan's chair, and just his head came into contact with Luhan's. And only his lips - his terribly soft lips - touched his. It was light, airy, cushy. Luhan gasped at how sweet it was, but even with his mouth partly open Yixing didn't take advantage of that. Instead he pulled back, and Luhan opened his eyes. Yixing was staring down at him... almost fondly? 

"So how was that?" he asked.

And then the sweetness was gone in a poof of smirks. Luhan fumed. He couldn't respond, didn't even realize Yixing was talking to him again.

"Sorry, I'd stay for more," he was saying. "But I got a date tonight. Guy named Kai. I'm sure you'd like him." Then he winked and was gone as well.

Luhan inhaled finally, choked for a moment and then cleared his head. Did that... did that mean that perhaps Yixing wasn't an exclusive womanizer? Luhan... could work with that.