[ what he fishes for is not cain's shame, nor his ire, but confirmation enough that he acknowledges whatever is between him and abel. wei wuxian likes the navigator enough, he's an emotional tenderling, but only because his heart is in all the right places; he'd seen him cry over cain, "his fighter", so more than anything - he just wants to see. not a why, not a how - he just wants to see it between them, because maybe it will answer the own questions brewing in his belly. the ones he doesn't even know how to voice. ]

It sounds like it's difficult on you.

[ gut instinct, as always. one can't be an effective detective, or a senior cultivator, without being able to cold read someone. he imagines that it can't be easy to play pretend all the time, event though he is a man who does nearly the same thing on behalf of his own loved ones. ]

Honestly, I didn't know that was... how someone could take this. At least, someone who's not a woman. We don't overtly -- flirt, not between men. It's not wrong, mind you. It's just a quiet affair. And yes, that's my name. My real name, not the name of... [ quietly, he touches his fingers together - guides them to his body's forearms in thought, reflective and grieving - for "himself", yet not himself ] The person I'm trying to do right by.

[ he can give cain that, there's no harm in it ]

Pass that here. I'll pay you back, I promise.

[ and he holds a hand out, for the item that the other man has been huffing on outside ]