Shang Qinghua is reasonably sure that his roommate is actually part of the mob.

It's not like his roommate looks particularly mob-ish. If anything, his roommate looks like he stepped off the cover of a swimsuit model magazine, the sort of magazine he would have secretly hidden under his bed in his formative teenage years. Mobei Jun looks as if he had been chiseled out of marble by the great Renaissance masters themselves and if Shang Qinghua had to put money on it, he bet those beautiful, luscious looking abs felt as hard as marble as well.

… Not that he ever thought about it, of course. At least no longer than a minute—okay, maybe no longer than an hour.

All things considered, Mobei Jun is kind of the perfect roommate. He's not the type to leave dirty dishes around, he's never late on rent, and sometimes, he even brings Shang Qinghua takeout on the days he has a deadline approaching and can't be bothered to shower himself let alone go outside of his room and get himself a meal.

Shang Qinghua knows that he could work on a couple of his own roommate etiquette skills a little more. He tends to leave clothes and plates lying around, and he isn't very good about taking out the trash when it's his turn. Surprisingly enough, Mobei Jun never complains about his absentmindedness and even does the dishes and takes out the trash without saying a word to Shang Qinghua. Honestly, he could not have asked for a better roommate.

Which leads him to his current problem.

He is most definitely in love with most-likely-a-mob-boss-but-the-perfect-roommate Mobei Jun.

And it's not like Shang Qinghua doesn't find any faults with Mobei Jun, and trust him, he has! Like how sometimes his roommate comes back in the middle of the night, looking a lot worse than when he went out, cuts and bruises dotting his skin like he had gone a couple rounds with a brick wall and won. And there are the times, when random shady people knock on their door while they're having dinner or watching tv, and Mobei Jun gets this look on his face like he's about to send whoever is behind their door to the bottom of the ocean with a pair of cement boots.

He is most definitely in love with his mob boss roommate.

But unfortunately, being in love doesn't excuse him from his deadlines for his next work, if the increasingly irate text messages from his editor are anything to go by.

Shang Qinghua spends most of his time writing trashy smut web novels and has become an internet sensation for his prolific writing speed and his gratuitous papapa scenes. His works are now being compiled into physical novels, lending him more notoriety, (to the horror of his editor/internet bro Shen Yuan) which means he needs to spend a ton of time actually researching the actual mechanics of his stories instead of relying on his fans to (immensely) suspend their disbelief.

He hated research when he was in university, and he hates it now.

Somewhere out there, Shen Yuan is cackling at him while writing disparaging comments about his writing style on some internet forum.

He groans as he stares at the blinking cursor on his laptop. He hasn't written anything in the last hour, writer's block crushing his soul, and forcing him to write and rewrite the same sentence over and over again just to feel like he has done something productive. He isn't good at long spiraling world building plots or convoluted mechanics. His works were more known for their focus on two characters and the papapa between them before he or the fans got bored and he switched them out for someone new and shiny.

But now, Shen Yuan is demanding actual content, and none of the fluff he had written before.

He thunks his head against the desk, hoping the pain will somehow inspire him to write something. To his disappointment, nothing comes out of it besides a dull ache between his eyes.

"What's the matter?"

Shang Qinghua shrieks and startles so badly he nearly falls out of his chair if Mobei Jun wasn't fast enough to catch him by the arm. It should have been embarrassing for his roommate to catch him in such a klutzy manner but all his can focus on is how big Mobei Jun's hand are as they wrap around the full circumference of his biceps.

"Mobei Jun!" Shang Qinghua yelps, trying to escape his hold but only unbalancing them both. Mobei Jun pulls him forward to right them, which ends up with Shang Qinghua's entire body encased in Mobei Jun's arm. Shang Qinghua's hands are braced on his savior's chest to avoid faceplanting into it as they stumble a few steps back. An undignified squeak bursts from Shang Qinghua's lips and he can feel his face trying to self-combust from how red it is.

Oh God, Mobei Jun's chest really is as firm as he thought it was. So firm and yet soft enough for Shang Qinghua to squish his face into comfortably like silk over steel… and now he was most definitely feeling his roommate up and he should really stop now.

"S-Sorry!" Shang Qinghua stammers, trying to untangle himself

"Careful," Mobei Jun's voice rumbles like an oncoming thunderstorm as he embraces Shang Qinghua tighter. Odes can be written about what that voice is doing to Shang Qinghua's soft, tender insides. "I don't want you falling again. You almost hit your head against the edge of the coffee table."

Then Mobei Jun bodily picks him up and deposits him on the couch in their living room. If Shang Qinghua was capable of forming words right now, he would comment on how sturdy Mobei Jun's hold is under his fat ass and how secure he feels in his arms, but he can't so he settles for schooling his face into something looking decently human and un-constipated.

"Wait here," Mobei Jun says as he walks into their kitchen.

Mobei Jun hands him a warm cup of water mixed with an obscene amount of citron honey, exactly how he likes it. The warmth of the mug is comforting, and he is distracted by the thought that Mobei Jun knows exactly how sweet he likes his citron tea. But maybe his roommate had extrapolated from the amount of sweets he has in the cupboards? Nah, he would never pay that much attention to little old Shang Qinghua.

"Tell me what's going on," Mobei Jun says but the tone of his voice makes it sound more like a command. Shang Qinghua flinches a little, spilling some of the tea on his shirt. Mobei Jun immediately goes to bring him a napkin and dabs the front of his damp shirt. Shang Qinghua can feel steam coming out of his ears, but he doesn't want to make anymore sudden movements, and make things worse.

"It's nothing," Shang Qinghua mutters in embarrassment at having been caught out by his hot as hell roommate with his smutty porn writing. He takes another sip of tea to cover his reddened face.

"It didn't look like nothing," Mobei Jun raises an eyebrow. "You were hitting your head on the desk."

"I was… umm, writing," Shang Qinghua winces inelegantly. It's weird talking with normal people about the stuff he writes. He highly doubts anyone of Mobei Jun's caliber would be interested in hearing about the vagaries of his rambling papapa novels.

To his shock, Mobei Jun nods, "I know."

"You know I write like, porn right?"

Mobei Jun looks unfazed.

"Vaguely."

"What?"

"You yell… a lot," Mobei Jun explains, "With this Cucumber Bro person."

"Oh my God," Shang Qinghua covers his face with his hands in utter embarrassment. While he knows he isn't really the quietest person in the world when he's in a rant with Shen Yuan, he tries to take calls when he knows Mobei Jun isn't home. But as he had just proved when startling Shang Qinghua, Mobei Jun is also a ninja slipping in and out of their apartment without a sound.

He must have heard one of the many, many diatribes and rants he's had with Shen Yuan about his latest piece. Shang Qinghua frantically tries to remember if he said anything incriminating or X-rated in his last couple of rants, and he knows he most likely has because ninety-nine percent of his work is incriminating or X-rated.

This is it.

This is how he dies.

On this couch, in front of the hottest man alive. He's going to melt into the floor and be reduced to nothingness.

"It's fine," Mobei Jun says calmly. "You are doing what you like."

"I mean, I wouldn't say I like it—"

"You are very passionate about it," Mobei Jun amends. "I like how animated you get when you're talking about your work."

Whatever Shang Qinghua is going to say next gets swallowed to the back of his throat as his cheeks grow even rosier and his ears ring in time with the thumping of his heart. Did Mobei Jun just admit he liked something about him? Today is just getting weirder and weirder.

No one should be allowed to deliver lines that smoothly. It's borderline illegal and Shang Qinghua would like to make a complaint to the relevant authorities before he melts into a pile of goo on the floor.

"W-Well, i-if you must know, I'm having trouble figuring out if this murder scene would be plausible," Shang Qinghua murmurs into his tea and jabs a finger at his word document.

Mobei Jun scans his work and tilts his head thoughtfully. Shang Qinghua watches as his roommate seems to be actually reading his work carefully, instead of faking it to humor him. He really won the roommate lottery, didn't he?

He had never known anyone in real life who had cared enough to read his work. His parents certainly hadn't, despite the fact that he was making enough now to live comfortably. And Shen Yuan only cared enough about his work to rip it apart on the internet like the bloodthirsty black powder fan he was.

"Does it need to be?"

Mobei Jun pages through his manuscript with laser eyed focus. His hand comes up to cup his chin and Shang Qinghua follows the movement with as much focus as Mobei Jun gives his manuscript. God, how does one person make such a simple movement so effortlessly sexy?

"What do you mean?"

"You write fiction for a living," points out Mobei Jun, "This murder doesn't need to be plausible."

"Normally I'd agree with you, but Cucumber Bro completely slammed me for my plot line last time and how it was completely impossible for the villain to commit a murder like that," Shang Qinghua snorted.

Mobei Jun straightens and turns to Shang Qinghua with an intense gaze. Shang Qinghua can feel his belly grow warm under his stare. He wonders what else he can do or say so Mobei Jun can keep staring at him like that.

"Would you like me to find this Cucumber Bro for you?"

Shang Qinghua freezes and warily side eyes Mobei Jun. Did… Did Mobei Jun just offer to-?

"What, why?"

"For giving a bad review on your story."

Oh hell, Shang Qinghua's thirst had almost lulled him into forgetting what his roommate actually did for his living.

"… I'm almost afraid to ask, but what are you going to do to Cucumber Bro once you find him?"

Mobei Jun quirks an eyebrow.

"Umm… Please don't," Shang Qinghua says meekly, trying his best to save his internet friend from being buried somewhere in the desert. "Cucumber Bro seems like a prickly porcupine on the outside but he's actually right. My work is getting more popular which means I need to put more effort into my work. I just need to write something so accurate, it will knock his socks off."

"Let me take another look at this murder scene," Mobei Jun scrutinizes his manuscript again and can a man be any more perfect, Shang Qinghua thinks, because no normal human can do a second read of his work without going off on him on the wild inaccuracies of bodily gymnastics happening in the sex scenes or the sheer lack of mechanics happening in any of his other scenes. But Mobei Jun seems to be doing just that.

After sitting in silence for another five minutes, Mobei Jun narrows his eyes, and stands up abruptly.

"I'll be right back," Mobei Jun announces before grabbing his jacket and his keys off the rack. Shang Qinghua blinks at the non-sequitur.

"W-What?" Shang Qinghua nervously gets up and goes to the door, "W-Where are you going?"

Mobei Jun doesn't answer him, slipping on his dress shoes.

His work couldn't have been that bad. His roommate wasn't going to up and leave him, and find somewhere else to live now that he knew the depths of Shang Qinghua's depravity, right? Shang Qinghua did not have enough in his bank account to pay the other half of the rent if Mobei Jun decided Shang Qinghua's thirsty ass was too much to deal with.

The door closes in front of his face, and he stares at the wooden grain with confusion. Well, that was the weirdest afternoon Shang Qinghua has ever had with his elusive roommate.

It's getting close to bedtime and Shang Qinghua is shuffling back to his room from the steamed up bathroom in his comfiest pajamas when the sound of the lock startles him out of his sleepy daze.

Mobei Jun has his jacket slung over his back as he casually toes off his dress shoes at the entry way. He looks slightly ruffled but it just gives him that air of having come back from a long day of work. Shang Qinghua tries not to put himself as the wife waiting at home for her husband in that scenario, because there lay dark thirsty thoughts.

"Where have you been?" Shang Qinghua questions before his brain finally catches up with him and he actually looks at the slight splatters on Mobei Jun's shirt, "And are you covered in blood? Is that your blood?! Holy hell, are you hurt?"

Shang Qinghua races over his roommate, hands fluttering uselessly around the bloody spots on Mobei Jun's shirt. They need a first aid kit. Did they even have a first aid kit? It should have come with the apartment. Shang Qinghua vaguely remembers something about a first aid kit hiding somewhere in their cupboards when they first moved in together.

"It's plausible."

Shang Qinghua looks up at Mobei Jun.

"W-What?"

"It's plausible," Mobei repeats patiently, "Your murder plot. Also, this is not my blood."

Well, that doesn't sound ominous at all. But, Shang Qinghua doesn't feel reassured at all after that statement. In fact, it makes the situation even worse because now Shang Qinghua is wondering whose blood it is then.

"Ummm, how would you know this?" Shang Qinghua asks before Mobei Jun quirks an eyebrow at him again like he did this afternoon. Shang Qinghua quickly backtracks. "Actually you know what? Never tell me how you know this. I need the plausible deniability. Just… go shower. I put the leftovers in the fridge."

And then Mobei Jun's lips curl up in a smile. Shang Qinghua is momentarily stunned because if Mobei Jun was handsome before, he is now absolutely stunning, and Shang Qinghua can't help but continue to stare with widened eyes. His heart tries to make a valiant run for it out of his body through his open mouth. Mobei Jun doesn't seem to know how drop dead gorgeous he is or how dangerous he is for Shang Qinghua's heart, because all he does is ruffle Shang Qinghua's hair affectionately and walk past him.

Shang Qinghua stands there gaping at him at the doorway as Mobei Jun pulls off his bloodied shirt in one smooth movement in the hallway on his way to the bathroom. His smooth back muscles are littered with an array of small scars and nicks that do nothing to mar the beauty of the sexy tattoo on spanning across his broad shoulders. Mobei Jun looks over his shoulder just as he is about to enter the bathroom, and smirks at him.

And then he very clearly proceeds to leave the bathroom door ajar like an invitation.

He's doing this on purpose now, Shang Qinghua huffs. He is onto him, and his game. He is definitely going back to his room and ignoring the hot piece of ass showering right across the hall. He is definitely not going to cave like a deck of cards and run into the bathroom like the thirsty ass hoe that he is.

The sound of water being turned on shocks him out of his internal beratement. Oh hell, who is he kidding?

Shang Qinghua races into the bathroom.

And thus begins his collaboration with possible mob boss Mobei Jun.

Shen Yuan better appreciate the sacrifices he's making for his craft.

Love it? Like it? Let me know by dropping a comment! I might write more for this pairing and this story idea if people want me to! I actually do have some more bits for this story idea floating around in my brain.