Chapter Text
When you finally get home, you have just enough energy left to collapse onto the couch instead of the floor. You lie there and stare into space for a long time without moving or thinking, all of you numb.
You must have fallen asleep. When you wake up, some of the lights are on, and there’s a long shadow moving in the kitchen. There’s the smell of food, the sound of oil hissing in the frying pan. You summon the energy to speak.
“What are you doing?” you croak. Barely louder than a whisper, but he hears you.
Feeding you.
The resonant voice that enters your head is low and laced with amusement. You shut your eyes as his answer seeps into you. The words seem to crackle and fizz at the edges, spreading a fuzz of low static through your thoughts like water washing over the sand in waves.
You fall asleep again, unsoundly, and wake when a plate is placed on the table in front of you. He made you a grilled cheese sandwich. You would laugh if you could. The sight and smell of it make your stomach clench with hunger, but you can’t make yourself sit up. You can’t even make your hand reach out and take it.
He stands beside the couch while you stare at the grilled cheese. From this angle he's just a long dark pair of legs interrupting your vision. When you don’t sit up, when you don’t do anything, he folds himself into the seat beside you. He picks up half of the sandwich and holds it close to where your hand is curled against your chest. This time you reach out and grasp it. You take the food from his long pale hand. Tears well up in your eyes unexpectedly. He leans closer to you, looming close above you as the tears spill over.
Shhhhhhhhhhh. His low voice washes through your thoughts, scattering them, leaving your head buzzing and empty of nothing but your gnawing hunger. You sink your teeth into the grilled cheese sandwich with tears still spilling down your cheeks.