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Bandaging the bite on his hand is more complicated than Jon would have expected.
“I can’t believe you never learnt how to do first aid,” Daisy comments, watching him with quiet amusement. “With how much you get injured, I’d have thought you’d be an expert by now.”
“Funnily enough—” Jon hisses as his fingers slip and a wave of pain makes his hand twitch, “—my academic lifestyle never gave me much reason to learn.”
“Yeah, but since you became the Head Archivist here.”
“I’ve, uh, I’ve been a bit busy.”
Daisy looks to the ceiling, as though sending a prayer to whatever god will listen. She shakes her head as she looks back at him. Jon didn’t know anyone could roll their eyes so pointedly.
“You’re hopeless, is what you are.”
“Yes, thank you, Daisy.” Despite the sarcasm, Jon offers her a small smile. It flickers into a wince almost instantly.
“This is painful to watch. Look, give it here.”
Raising her brows, Daisy stares at him until he relents and places his bleeding hand in hers. The skin of her hand is rough, but the firm pressure of her grip helps Jon’s breathing to ease.
With her free hand, she rummages in the first aid kit that sits on the table next to them. She produces a fresh dressing and a tube of unidentifiable cream. Jon thinks he spots the word ‘antiseptic’ written on its side. Yes, that would have been a good idea, wouldn’t it?”
Daisy peers at the bite. The sharpness of her gaze reminds Jon uncomfortably of a predator looking at a wounded animal and licking its lips. Then the moment passes, and he exhales.
“It doesn’t look that deep,” she informs him. “I figure with your magic healing, it should be fine in a couple of days.”
Daisy begins applying the ointment, and Jon’s half-laugh becomes an abrupt inhale. Ow.
They both fall silent, except for occasional hitches in Jon’s breath. For once, it feels like a natural lull in their conversation. Jon doesn’t want to distract Daisy, and she wouldn’t want to be distracted.
She’s dressing his wound with a meticulous precision, and he finds himself observing her movements, though. He tries to memorise every action she takes. Chances are that he’ll get himself injured again soon, and he needs to know how to do this himself. It’s unfair to rely on Daisy’s pity like this.
Her eyes flicker up to his face, and she huffs.
“We stop chatting for three minutes and you start brooding?”
Jon laughs, the sound dry and dusty even to his own ears.
“Ah, I’m— I’m sorry. It’s been a long day.”
“I kind of guessed. Where’d you pick this up, anyway? Rabid dog?” Her tone is airy, almost flippant. There’s something hidden in its depths, but he can’t begin to pick it out.
“No, it was a— wolf man.” Jon knows how stupid that sounds even before he says it. Daisy snorts.
“You’re serious?”
“I know. Statement of Laurence Mortimer, I believe. Attacked by a wolf man while on a hunting trip in Virginia. Apparently they aren’t only an American phenomenon.”
“Either that, or you’re just lucky. How many scars are you up to now?”
“Too many,” he sighs. “It’s always the hands, as well.”
Daisy pauses, looking him over with an assessing eye.
“It actually went for your hand?” Her tone betrays more confusion than she’d probably prefer.
“Ah, no, I suppose not. It went for my throat. My hand was— well, I blocked it. More or less.” Jon demonstrates, pulling his hand from her grip to shield his neck. She tugs it back, her lips pressed together in annoyance, but nods.
“Sloppy, but it did the job,” she judges. Jon opens his mouth to object, but she continues, her gaze focused on the bite. “Let me guess, Basira shot it enough that you could get away.”
Even though she seems to be finished, Daisy’s grasp is tight around his fingers. Her hair falls in front of her face, obscuring her expression. When she runs her other hand through it, tucking loose strands behind her ear, it falls right back down again.
She’s unhappy, clearly. Jon doesn’t really know what about. Not about him being injured - she’s been gently mocking him for that since she found him. Basira being in danger, maybe? Or maybe she’s angry that she isn’t out there, hunting monsters like she used to.
“Uh, no, not exactly. I don’t even think gunshots are that effective against—” Jon cuts his nervous rambling off. Daisy looks up, though, curiosity gleaming, forest-dark, in the depths of her eyes. “Well, I— I was on my own. Aside from the wolf man, I mean.”
Daisy’s eyebrows raise.
“I, uh— I looked at it, and it ran away.”
When her expression remains expectant, Jon sighs, motioning to a set of pages sitting on the table. A tape recorder whirs beside them. The paper is faintly blood-spattered; the writing is scratchy and unfamiliar, though he wrote it with his own hand.
She falls silent again. Her lips are pressed together again, and she stares at him with a well of some emotion Jon can’t name. Pity for the monster, maybe.
“I’d only done it once before, but— It was my only chance.” He’s not sure if he’s trying to convince her or himself. Either way, it sounds like a transparent rationalisation to his ears. Daisy tightens her grip on his hand.
“Is that why you were unconscious on the floor?”
“I— Yes. It takes a lot out of me. Even more than a regular statement.”
Daisy tilts her head. She glances across at the papers, but she doesn’t move to read them. She doesn’t even shift to switch the tape recorder off, which is… more of a relief than it should be, if Jon’s honest.
“All that blood on the paper. Not exactly sanitary, is it?”
“I’ll redo it onto fresh paper later,” Jon says, knowing that he won’t. If he copied it, he’d lose the soul of it. It would just be paper and ink, written in his own neat handwriting. Utterly worthless.
(Now there’s a neurosis for him to psychoanalyse when he gets a moment alone.)
Daisy nods. Jon feels a rush of guilt about the lie immediately, and there’s something like nausea rising in his chest. The truth demands to be spoken. He tries to ignore the pressure — it isn’t as though she’ll go looking for the statement to check he’s rewritten it.
If she notices this particular inner turmoil — and she almost certainly does — she doesn’t comment on it. She just looks at him, expression gaining the distance of contemplation.
“A bite from a wolf man, huh? I suppose I should keep an eye on you next full moon.”
Jon forces a laugh, but it feels more natural than he’d expected. Her hand is warm and solid against his, and slowly, he lets himself relax again.
“Yes, I suppose so.”