Chapter Text
Lucas, honestly, doesn’t feel all that much pain. Which is a blessing, really, because Travis says painkillers wouldn’t work for him. Something about his weak blood circulation and dead nerves. Objectively, Lucas shouldn’t be able to feel pain in his right thigh, because he can’t feel anything else there.
But he does.
“Motherfucker!” Lucas hisses as his leg gives out from under him again.
He hits the hard wooden floor with a thud. Of course he has to hit the only part of the room that isn’t covered with a rug. With a grunt, he drags himself back to Jawn’s bed.
No, not Jawn’s bed. Their bed. The one they share every night now. And not just because Lucas has been unceremoniously kicked out of his old room. To be fair, he was a month dead at the time and the new guy is nice enough.
Geoff, his name is, although he never sounds too sure when he says it. More than once, Lucas has called Geoff’s name and received absolutely no response. Awsten says it, though, and it’s like you said walk to a puppy. Now that’s a relationship that will end in disaster. Lucas isn’t their dad, though, they can do whatever they want.
“You okay, baby?” Jawn shouts from the hallway. He doesn’t usually leave Lucas alone but he went to get them some water. When he doesn’t receive a response, because Lucas is too busy trying to drag himself up from the floor, he comes back in. “Oh, shit. Did you fall?”
“My knee gave out. I’m fine.” Lucas hauls himself up onto the bed, upper leg burning with pain.
It wasn’t his knee, it was more like his thigh, but trying to explain which part of his body is falling apart this time is too much effort, honestly. Most of the time, it’s his whole body that seems not to be working. None of it is severe, nothing imminently threatening to his life, but Christ, is it inconvenient.
Jawn comes to his side quickly, helping him sit down on their bed. He rests his chin on Lucas’ shoulder and wraps his arms around his waist. Sometimes being touched is too much for Lucas but right now Jawn’s skin against his is comforting. His hair is still wet and smells of limes, sticking to Lucas’ neck in cold tendrils.
They intertwine their fingers and Lucas squeezes as hard as he can without hurting Jawn. While Jawn is not exactly fragile, Lucas is still having issues with the grip strength with his hands, either too much or too little. He keeps breaking cups. Shattering them in his hand or dropping them to the ground. Otto bought him another set but it has been two days and Lucas has already broken one of them.
Lucas breathes deeply as he wills the pain in his leg to stop. If he were to touch where his muscle aches, he wouldn’t feel anything. He wonders if it’s just the nerves on the surface of his skin that are broken, and the ones inside are still intact. Perhaps that’s why he can feel the pain but not when Jawn touches him. Or when anyone touches him.
It’s just Jawn who he lets touch him the most.
“Do you want me to call Travis?” Jawn is already halfway to standing, voice high with concern, but Lucas tugs him back down again.
“No, honey, I’m fine. He doesn’t need to know, it was nothing.” Lucas insists. The pain is already starting to fade to a dull ache as he sits still. Really, if he never moved again he might be alright. Unfortunately life doesn’t work like that.
“Can I get you anything?” Jawn kisses Lucas on the jaw, right above where one of his worst scars sits.
It runs from behind his ear, under his chin and down his neck. Lucas doesn’t know what exactly caused it. His motorbike accident, of course, but he has no idea which part of the shattered bike cut him up like that. Maybe it was the asphalt beneath him. Maybe Travis did this to him, somehow.
He doesn’t like to think about it.
Lucas doesn’t remember anything between getting on his motorbike that cold September morning and waking up screaming in the backyard in December. And honestly, he doesn’t want to. He would much rather think about Jawn.
“No, no. Just stay with me.” Lucas brushes his lips against one of the smaller scars on Jawn’s cheek.
Like Lucas, Jawn has no idea where he got most of his scars. If he thought about it hard enough, he might remember the tearing tree branch or vicious hunter that did it to him. But he doesn’t, because then he would have to relive it. Lucas doesn’t make him. It really isn’t his business what Jawn did before they met. Even if it has had an obvious effect on him.
“Where else am I gonna go?” Jawn curls himself up at Lucas’ side. “This is my room after all.”
“Well, unfortunately, I left for six weeks and got fucking evicted-”
“You died! Forgive me for thinking you weren’t coming back.”
“I wouldn’t throw all your stuff out if you died.”
“We kept all of your stuff. The attic is full of it.” Jawn points to a pile of Lucas’ possessions that is still sitting in the corner because they haven’t figured out where they can put it all yet.
Jawn has one of the smallest rooms in the house. He chose it himself when he first moved in, but Awsten always jokes that it’s because Jawn is the youngest. The room is not big enough for two adult men to live comfortably, but neither of them is about to move out.
Geoff offered Lucas his room back, but Lucas took one look at him and decided not to take it. He seems… very lonely, like there’s not a single person outside of this house who cares about him. Lucas has been there. He’s still there, more than ever he supposes. But fuck it, whatever.
“Do you think… I don’t know how to ask this question without sounding weird and kinda manipulative?” Lucas frowns. He wraps an arm around Jawn and tries to ignore the ache in his shoulder as he does.
“You’d be a terrible manipulator. You can’t even lie to me without stuttering.”
Lucas tries not to be offended by that. “I could lie to you.”
“Don’t.”
“Alright.” Lucas snuggles into Jawn, trying to get comfortable through the pain. “If I get… really sick, like, about to die again sick- I mean, I know now isn’t ideal and you're still- but like, if I got worse - not that I’m a pessimist or anything, maybe I’ll get better-”
“Luke.” Jawn cuts him off gently, a hand on his still aching thigh. The nickname calms him down almost immediately. “A point to this stumbling rant would be nice.”
“Right, yeah. Got a bit like you there.” Lucas teases. Jawn rolls his eyes, like he isn’t the one who goes off on anxious tangents all the time. “If I got… worse, like really, really sick. If I couldn't do anything like a normal person anymore, walk or talk or… would you… stay? Would you put up with it?”
Jawn stares at Lucas for a second, then turns his gaze out of the window. For a silent moment Lucas thinks he’s fucked up, that Jawn is going to realise that he doesn’t want to put up with his bullshit. It’s not exactly fun, sharing a bed with someone whose organs could come up their throat at any time. Whose limbs keep falling off and hair comes out in clumps.
Lucas wouldn’t even blame him. He loves Jawn more than anyone, but it’s not fair to expect him to handle this. It wasn’t what Jawn signed up for when they started seeing each other. When Lucas was a living, breathing person with a job and a sick motorbike. Despite everything, he does miss his bike.
“You wouldn’t say that about me.” Jawn mumbles. Lucas cocks his head at him, dragged out of his thoughts. “You wouldn’t… Even before we started dating, you stuck with me through every full moon. You still do now, even when you’re just as sick as me. It’s like… you wouldn’t even question it for a second, taking care of me. I think you have to assume the same goes for me or you’ll run yourself in circles.”
Jawn’s right, of course. It happens sometimes, rarely, that he says something that makes sense. Lucas has never once felt the need to complain about Jawn’s illness. Is it really that different from what’s wrong with Lucas?
One got their issues at birth and the other through death. Neither is more or less valid than the other.
“So… you will. Stay with me, I mean?” Lucas picks at the scar tissue on his wrist. That bone broke during the crash, he knows, because it still hurts when it rains. Other than that, though, Travis did a pretty good job on that one. He has pretty much full range of motion with it.
“Do you really think you could get rid of me after all of this?” Jawn nudges him in the side affectionately. “I’d like to see you try. You can get as sick as you like, I’m going fuckin’ nowhere.”
“Even if I… die again?” Lucas can’t deny that he has thought about it.
Is it really life if his body won’t remain in one piece? Living like this is not a walk in the park. Sometimes it feels like his skin is burning off. Travis has his ways of making things better, but it doesn’t always work. It doesn’t always get rid of the pain.
Is it worth it?
For Jawn. Yeah, it is.
Jawn scoffs. “Well, yeah. We’re all gonna die, babe. That doesn’t stop people from staying together. You know those old couples that die within a week of each other ‘cause they’re so lonely without the other? We can be like that.”
“Please do not die within a week of me. Travis would not like that.” Lucas kisses Jawn on the nose. “I am so lucky to have you, honey.”
“Not as lucky as I am.” Jawn giggles, nuzzling into Lucas. “Honestly, you would think-”
Out of nowhere, Lucas doubles over with a groan, a searing pain coursing through his ribs. He wraps his arms around his middle as if he expects them to come tumbling out of his stomach. Tears prick in his eyes, blurring his vision as he tries not to fall off the bed.
“Shit, baby-” Jawn puts his hand on Lucas’ back. “What was that?”
“Uhh…” Lucas says, coughing a little when he can finally move again. “I think my ribs just shifted? Like, in a way they’re not supposed to.”
“Is there a way they are supposed to shift?” Jawn asks as he grabs his phone off the nightstand. He sends a text to Travis, who is, as usual, at work but likes to be kept updated on any changes to Lucas… condition.
“They move a little when you breathe.” Lucas mumbles, slowly straightening up as the sudden pain passes.
“Do they?” Jawn asks, horrified. “Why?”
“So your lungs- wait, seriously?” Lucas feels confusion through the pain. “Did you not do high school biology?”
“No? I dropped out of high school and I was barely there before that.” Jawn shrugs. “Do, like, a lot of your bones move?”
Lucas puts his head in his hands. “Oh my god. I’m entrusting my health and my love to a complete fucking idiot.”
“Hey, don’t talk about Travis like that.” Jawn giggles.
“I don’t love Travis. Not like I do you.” Lucas collapses against Jawn with a sigh as the pain dulls to a simple ache in his chest like the one in his leg. “You know I love you, right? Even through all the bullshit.”
“I love you too.” Jawn wraps himself around Lucas and kisses his face. “I actually love you because of the bullshit.”
“So if I un-died, you wouldn’t be interested in me anymore?”
“Would you still be hot?”
“I’d probably be hotter without all the rot.”
“Well… hm. Actually, not saying anything about that. Awsten is gonna accuse me of being a necrophile again. Hypocrite.” Jawn mutters.
Lucas does not encourage this topic of conversation. He really doesn’t not want to listen to Jawn and Awsten discuss whether he counts as alive or not again. It’s unnerving enough being reanimated without everyone bringing it up. Otto doesn’t seem to mind so much, but he’s had over seven hundred years to get used to it.
“I don’t think I can walk on this leg.” Lucas pokes at his thigh gingerly. He can’t feel the touch and it unnerves him. “If I stood on it, I think it would give out again.”
“Then don’t. Let Travis deal with it when he gets home.” Jawn grabs his game controller and turns on their TV. “It also means you cannot escape watching me play Crash Bandicoot.”
“Oh, Christ.” Lucas bitches, but he doesn’t mean it. He likes to complain but honestly he kind of likes watching Jawn fail at the same childish game over and over again. It’s strangely comforting.
“Change your mind about me staying forever yet?” Jawn asks.
“Absolutely not.” Lucas kisses him on the cheek and settles in beside him. “Still stuck with me.”
“Good.”