Chapter Text
“It’s fine,” Richard croaks out as soon as he regains consciousness.
Richard is obviously not fine.
His throat’s burning and he’s sure his heart’s trying to escape his body. It feels awful, like his entire body is fighting against him. He hopes it succeeds.
“I was certain it would just give you a high, not…” He hears Nathan say somewhere to the left of him. He wants to open his eyes, but that would hurt him even more. The pounding continues.
“I said it’s fine.”
“You don’t look fine. ” If he looks half as bad as he feels, he must look awful.
Richard groans.
Nathan’s shadow grows increasingly frantic above him.
“I’m going to have to take off what’s remaining of your clothes and wash it with soap. Also wash where the liquid touched you. ”
A beat. Richard opens his eyes to look at Nathan.
“Shut the fucking door.”
Nathan goes to shut the door.
“I thought you’d die.” He admits. Tears are brimming in Nathan’s eyes, and a part of Richard admits he feels kind of sorry.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you. Sick bastard.”
“I wouldn’t. Why do you always say things like that…”
“I wished I’d die.”
“Richa–”
“That’s a joke. A fucking joke.”
“You’re getting mad at the wrong person.”
“...And you still have a raging hard-on. Gross.”
“Richard.” Nathan warns.
“Fuck off.”
“Your heart’s beating fast,” Nathan notes breathily as his hand brushes against Richard’s chest.
“Because you Chloroformed me.” Richard wonders if the warmth spreading in him is because of the Chloroform. The shortness of breath definitely is. He feels dizzy.
“You asked for it.”
“Shut the fuck up.”
Richard pulls Nathan into his bed. He lands weirdly on Richard’s body with a loud thud that makes both boys wince. Nathan awkwardly squirms off of Richard.
“What.”
Richard kisses Nathan, and Nathan lets out a whimper in surprise.
Everything tastes slightly sweet, like the liquid he had almost succumbed to.
Nathan blinks owlishly.
“Sharing the pain.”
“I’m immune to chloroform,” Nathan tells him, so innocently it's laughable. Like he hadn't almost drugged Richard.
“Eat shit.” Richard replies.
What remains of me that isn’t touched by you? Richard wants to ask. What haven’t you altered of me?
Like a taxidermied bird, Nathan has taken all that was inside of him and stuffed him with cotton. Stuffed with fuzzy feelings that make him itch at a spot that he never truly can place– but content, sickeningly content, to the point where he feels disgusted. He's a treasured doll in a collector’s museum of unloveable trinkets. Finally somewhere he belongs, a traitorous part of his brain says.
The yellow handkerchief soaked with chloroform is dotted with Nathan’s tears, and he’s sure it’s going to fuck him over someday, but Richard might love Nathan a little.
Every hero has their Achilles heel, and every anti-hero has their Nathan-fucking-Leopold.
Laying there, the lukewarm summer heat a constant opioid muddling his already addled brain, Richard feels real for the first time in what feels like forever.
“You know, I diluted this a lot. I don’t know why you–.”
“You probably messed up. It was very potent, you know.”
“Potent enough to knock out the superman.”
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you? ”
“I was seriously worried.”
“Why?”
“That’s…”
“Because the superman I know is the kind of guy who doesn’t know when to stop. I was worried.”
“That’s so fucked.”
“You’re fucked.”
"You fucked me."
"Well, you did too."