Work Text:
Following the return to Rogers' home, there is an internal readjustment of acceptable parameters: injuries beyond bruises and shallow abrasions require attention regardless of significance of damage, or Rogers' reaction is an intense, incomprehensible distress.
Distress. Not anger, not . . .disappointment.
Only distress.
He has no parameters for distress. No required action. Rogers delineates none. Rogers delineates no consequences for the lack. Rogers delineates nothing. There are no instructions. Only questions. Absence of certainty pulls at his head like tightening wire and it's . . . better, if the issue simply doesn't . . . happen.
Attending the damage himself achieves that result, more or less. More than anything else.
The adjustment is more difficult than it should be. Requires more effort, like running in loose sand, through deep snow. He doesn't know why. Simple: if, then. If blood, then treatment. Materials available. And yet. And yet. Difficult. He . . . forgets, thought doesn't stay in his head, the stimulus fails to trigger the desired response. More often than not it isn't until Rogers says something - quietly, always quietly and why - that he recalls.
And even then, the required act is . . . difficult. Old parameters resume: where damage will repair regardless of treatment, ignore. Except, except - except beyond old parameters.
(There is no purpose to repair. Damage measured relative to purpose: no purpose. No need to repair.)
And it doesn't matter that the new parameters don't apply this time, that this laceration would require repair regardless of Rogers' response or lack thereof. It is still . . . difficult.
(No purpose, no reason to expend - )
He still sits on the edge of the tub in the bathroom until Rogers notices his absence, comes to the door. Stops, as Rogers always does. Never entering a room he occupies without pause, if not outright request for right of entry. Unknown purpose: so far, some variation on affirmative has at least not been the wrong response.
It's your home. (Concept unfamiliar, word understood. English is . . .difficult, also. Words fill his head, overfill his head now, that he has no . . . use for, no relevance, but won't go - )
From where Rogers stands, the damage to his right arm is immediately apparent. Rogers' kit is adequately stocked. Finding what was necessary had not been hard, and the sutures are by his leg on the porcelain of the bathtub. Friction poses little difficulty: medical tape wound around the tips of left second finger and thumb give enough grip to complete the task. There are always missions where self-repair is required. The movements are familiar and well-known.
And he is still sitting, doing nothing, gauze pad keeping the blood off the floor.
He doesn't know why. Most things, he doesn't know why. Never had to know why, all answers were one, and now, now there is only why and no answers. None.
Rogers' inhale is deep and abrupt. No query follows. Not immediately. Not before Rogers steps from door to crouch beside the open medical kit, hands moving to find items that seem . . . superfluous. Disinfectant. Needle driver. Topical anaesthetic. Rogers stands, runs the tap: he can hear the noise but doesn't look.
Then Rogers sits. Presses cotton to the open disinfectant top and upends the bottle briefly. Gestures with it to the damaged arm and echoes days before, in the other room. Says, "Can I?"
He still doesn't -
He can't -
The question remains noise without meaning, redundant. He lifts the arm from its resting place on his leg, removes the gauze, to allow Rogers a better hold.
Rogers' grip is careful, skin callused. Warm. It is -
Memory -
Experience stutters. Rogers stops, one hand under his arm and the other drawing disinfectant-soaked cotton down the laceration. For a moment Rogers watches his face. This time doesn't ask the constant rattling question, doesn't add another - okay, you okay, that okay, vowel-consonant-vowel noise what are you looking for?
After a moment says, "It's easier to use the edge of the tub as a surface if you sit down here on the floor. More stable, I can get a better angle. Less chance of a slip." Rogers shrugs, looks at him with head tilted and says, "Up to you."
He slides down to the floor. It's a guess.
After Rogers' palm the porcelain is cool on the back of his arm. Rogers picks up the topical anaesthetic, looks at him, shrugs. Says, "Works for about ten minutes on me. Here." And sensation mix: ointment, cool; skin, warm. He watches Rogers use a towel to deal with any excess, watches Rogers inhale slowly before resting one hand on his wrist below the laceration and taking the curved needle in the other. Glancing at him, Rogers says, "Lemme know if something's wrong."
More meaningless, more - no parameters, no meaning in wrong, wrong relates to desired outcome, desired outcome is . . . ?
He doesn't know. Rogers doesn't say.
There is distance to the feeling of steel under skin, through tissue, nylon following. Suturing is negligible, irrelevant, but now it's even further away, less bright. The nylon fills the space the steel leaves behind so the blood is minimal. Rogers finishes the last knot, sets the needle aside, lets one hand fall to rest on his wrist again. Does not seem aware. Uses the other to find tape and gauze in the kit.
Rogers covers the sutures with a square of gauze taped down. (To prevent blood staining other things?) Says, "There. Probably take them out in a couple days. Which, uh." A smile, odd-off-brief. "You probably know."
After a beat he says, "Yes," because the silence is . . .demanding.
Rogers gets up, extends a hand; he unfolds himself to standing without touching it. "I, um Made lunch," Rogers says. "Coming?"
Question. Always question. Why.
He follows Rogers to the kitchen.