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Sharp Edges and a Mouthful of Glass
“I do not remember asking the emotionally-stunted Gunslinger his opinion of the matter! Keep your unsolicited advice to yourself, John Henry!”
If there was an award for stupidity on a cosmic scale, he’s pretty sure he just won it the moment the last word leaves his mouth and it has nothing to do with the reactions of anyone else except the man he just dressed down. The same one staring at him in a mix of shock and hurt that does more than he was prepared for.
And never having been at all good with conflict resolution or dealing with things of this magnitude, he does the one thing he can think of and retreats right out of Shorty’s. The entire way back all he can think of is how much of a prick he’d just been to the one person who was starting to see something in him and how it would be his fault if this was the breaking point.
He’d deserve being told off for that display of aggressive stupidity.
Bobo doesn’t sleep. Not that night and not the next but he also doesn’t leave the trailer or turn his phone on. Tucked between the bed and the wall on the floor, he can’t seem to get himself out of his own head so he just tucks himself into a ball.
And is sure he’s lost himself the best person who has ever tried to love him.
Four more days pass and his exhaustion is falling finally and his eyelids are heavy but he still can’t seem to get himself past all the tension and the shame to actually sleep. He just can’t cry anymore either. And he wishes he had the strength to get his phone and try to text some sort of an apology but he doubts anything he had to say would help.
He’s still trying to rest when he hears his trailer door open before closing and locking. He tightens up sure it can only be one person and he was pretty sure he’d only be here long enough to let him know how unimpressed he was and return the key. And the thing was, Bobo doesn’t blame him in the least.
“Robert?” Doc’s voice is soft, kinder than he expects and it makes that ache in him hurt worse. But he just tightens himself more tightly. Footsteps approach and he knows the other will find him pretty easily as it was probably hard to miss the curled six-foot demon on the floor between the bed and wall in a small bedroom. “Oh, Robert,” comes the soft sigh before he hears the sound of someone climbing atop the bed before he feels hands lightly on his side making him flinch. “Robert Svane,” comes his gentle tone, “You are more of a fool than I thought if you think it takes one bout of wrath to make me run.”
“T-to be fair, you should have come to realize by now that I am too broken to handle, John Henry.”
“You are not,” is the immediate defense before he’d be urged upwards and onto the bed, “But it’s been a week and you have clearly not slept. We can talk when you do. Let’s get you out of these clothes and to bed, Robert.”
“Henry…”
“Robert, I am not going to have this conversation while you are exhausted and half-way lucid,” he responds as he gently but firmly works him out of his clothing and under the blankets before surprising him as he disrobes as well and slides in against his side, an arm curling around him before he gently nuzzles against a shoulder. “Sleep, you insufferable man. I will be here when you wake up.”
So he sleeps and finds some comfort at the realization that he is not alone in the bed upon waking, that John Henry was indeed still there with him. “Morning, sleepy-head,” comes the amused remark telling him he’d slept entirely too long and his bedmate had been holding and watching him for some time.
“H-how long have you been awake?”
“Haven’t really paid attention as I was too busy enjoying the feeling of holding you which I have dearly missed in the last week.”
He closes his eyes a moment before slowly shifting so he can look at him. “I didn’t mean it. None of it. I was angry but not at you. I didn’t…”
Fingers cup his face and he finds himself kissed before he can get anything else out; soft and sweet but with clear intent that he needed to not say anything else, that Doc knew the truth of the matter and he was making more of it than he needed to.
As seemed to happen all too often.
When it’s broken, Doc murmurs, “We’re gonna fight, no way ‘round that but I’ve told you that I’m not goin’ to give up on you.”
“Sometimes, I’m pretty sure you should.”
“And since when,” he asks voice light but clearly serious as well, “have I ever done what I should, hmm?”
Bobo rests his forehead against the others lightly. “Don’t ever change.”
“Not planning on it, Robert. You’re stuck with me.”