Romeo sighed, dropping the puzzle book, and relaxing all his tensed up muscles with a huff.
He checked his hand again.It burned like it was on fire and his wrist and his fingers felt tight and stiff.No tendon had been cut.The blade had sliced through muscle.Thanks to Romeo’s sharp knives it was a clean wound, or it had been until he’d ended up in the mud.Romeo’s hand trembled wildly as he tried to assess the damage.It was his right hand.His preferred hand for both pleasure and murder.He studied his palm as he held it out in front of him, fingers and thumb curled to receive a throat.
Chad’s throat.
As soon as he flexed, pain burned through his hand.
His head snapped up at the knock on the door.
Chad stepped inside with another tray.He kneeled down before sliding it within Romeo’s reach.He squinted at the toast.Romeo could see both butter and marmite on the two slices.Chad couldn’t remember much, but apparently, he could remember how Romeo liked his toast.He wondered whether it was memory or instinct when he’d been faced with a cupboard full of toppings.Chad preferred the sweet—the jam, the honey, but Romeo preferred savory.
“Does it hurt?”Chad asked.
It took a few moments for Romeo’s brain to boot up again, then he looked down at his hand.“Yes.”His fingers twitched.“It needs stitches.”
Chad snorted softly.“I can get you a needle and thread, but you’ll have to do it yourself.”
“You won’t help me?”
“I won’t put myself within your reach,” Chad said with a sad smile, “Not when you’ve made it clear you want to kill me.”
“Fine.I’ll take your needle and thread.It’s not like I haven’t stitched myself up before.”
Chad cocked his head.“When have you stitched yourself up?”
Romeo refused to answer.He had stitched his bicep after it got ripped open from a spray of shotgun pellets, but this Chad didn’t need to know that.That wound had been easy to stitch, only needing Romeo to pass the innocent looking needle through his skin four times, but this was much bigger, and in a more delicate area for sure, but the longer it was left, the worse it would heal.
Chad sighed, then got up and left.
Romeo slipped off the bench seat and crouched on the ground to eat his toast.
It was perfect.The perfect crunch.The perfect ratio of butter and marmite.
It made him hate this Chad even more.
Chad returned with a Tupperware box full of threads and a bottle of gin.He slid the box over.
“I sterilized the needle.And there’s a wad of kitchen towel in there, soaked in salt water for you to clean the wound.”
“I assumed the gin was for the wound?”
Chad shrugged.“I thought you might want to drink it.You know ...for the pain.”
Romeo didn’t reply.
“Ally will be here soon.They don’t like to leave me alone for too long.”
“Can you blame them?”
Chad bowed his head.“She’s taking me to my therapy session.I told her I can take myself but she’s adamant she drives me.I’ll be gone a few hours, possibly more if we go back to her place.”
Romeo didn’t verbally react, but he nodded, once.
He’d witnessed Chad like this before whenever he was going to work.He’d kiss Romeo goodbye, but crouch down and offer up Mercutio an explanation on why he was leaving and give an estimated time frame of when he’d be back.Romeo had always thought it odd considering Mercutio didn’t have a clue what Chad was on about, but he was grateful for it now.
“Can you change my bucket first?”Romeo asked, tilting his head towards it.
Chad recoiled.“Um.Yeah.Sure.”
