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It’s not all that comfortable living with a sword of the equivalent of Damocles hanging over their heads. They can try to ignore it, the quiet swish-swish sound of their fates cutting through the air. It still creeps in regardless of if they are in a comfortable silence or arguing animatedly. Skrimm feels it with an even keener awareness, one honed from x amount of years sleeping with one eye open, waiting for the hot breath to soak his neck in the night.
Skrimm thinks he must be the most cursed, most pathetic, most wretched man in the world.
He knows that he twitches in his sleep, when he can get it, and curses and jerks and wakes suddenly with choked off cries. None of his companions make too much of a fuss about it, not that they can really talk. People such as themselves don’t make it through life without waking up screaming every once and a while.
They do comfort each other. The horrors shouldn’t go unaddressed. And in the bitter cold, it was only logical that physical touch would be what they eventually drifted to. Cuddling in their underclothes when everything else is drying by the fire, which became a make out contest in which Jornir was inexplicably crowned winner even though Skrimm knows he has the perfect ratio of tongue to teeth, which became getting handsy in whatever shared sleeping area they happened to come by. Sometimes the bile rises in his throat at the thought of someone being subjected to his weird little body but then someone puts something in or on or around him and there’s no more space for worry.
Skrimm knows that he is the most grating, most annoying, most miserable man in the world.
He knows that he is too demanding for someone who doesn’t do any work. But he also knows that these people have stuck with him somewhere close to a year and they’ve barely complained about it. Barnabos will let him sit on his shoulders and then sit on the side of their fishing hole doing absolutely nothing for hours. Jornir carries him in the crook of his arm and tells him stories while they walk. Taishen serves him endless cups of tea and plays along with the stupid shit Skrimm ends up spewing. Queenie is the one who kicks his ass into gear, which he will gladly do for her. There’s no amount of gold in the world that would repay what they’ve done for him and for a while the shame made him bitter. For a while they would inch closer to him and he would just push away. But it’s hard to be distant when you’re huddled for warmth around a candle and passing a piece of jerky around. Now he just does his best for them. He extends a hand. He offers gentle touches. He makes them laugh. Well, most of them. Jornir rarely laughs.
Skrimm has started to suspect that he’s pretty lucky to have partners like this.
Coincidentally, one of the rare times they are able to get Jornir to laugh is also Skrimm’s breaking point. He keeps getting this weird fuzzy feeling in his chest these days and is considering improvised surgery to get it out. There’s something about keeping these madmen around that makes him feel like he’s floating. It’s unsettling and foreign; possibly a sign that he will die soon. (Everything these days is a sign that he’ll die soon.) They’re playing another stupid board game that Jornir has become obsessed with and Skrimm has been graciously allowing him to win for the past 7 rounds. Jornir has only just now caught on, some little pile of figures coming together in his head, and he rounds on Skrimm. Skrimm half expects him to be stern, or curt, or dry and witty. Instead, he has deep lines around his mouth and crinkles by his eyes, and he is releasing a baritone laugh that’s like the rumble of thunderclouds just a mile off. Everyone’s laughing now and giving Jornir playful shoves.
Wow, Skrimm thinks. Holy Hells, wow. And then, before he can stop himself, he says: “I want to make you laugh forever.”
The room quiets slowly as they settle into something warm that doesn’t need to be spoken. Nor should it be, when it’s this new and the world is this cruel. It can be enough just to ask how to brew tea, or to repair a blanket unasked, or to wake up early every day to prepare coffee 5 different ways to account for 5 different tastes.
Jornir leans over and bonks his forehead against Skrimm’s. Skrimm makes a big show of pretending it hurts and Jornir exhales through his nose with amusement. “I want you to keep letting me win forever.”
Skrimm grins even though “forever” has a lot of baggage that comes with it and he’s not even sure if he has until the end of spring. “That can be arranged.”