Work Text:
Murdoc had volunteered to babysit 2D and his migraine as begrudgingly as he could muster without prompting anyone else to take his place. The migraine, alas, was real— the eye rolling and huffing on Murdoc’s part was not.
The hotel room is as dark as it could be with the midday sun trying to creep between the dark curtains. 2D squeezes his eyes shut, face-down in the pillows to try and further escape the light.
“Alright, honeybuns, Nurse Ratched is here with your pills,” Murdoc says, returning from the bathroom with a plastic cup of water and 2D’s orange pill bottle. Though the room isn’t quite dim enough to relieve 2D’s pain, it’s enough to make Murdoc stumble over a suitcase on the floor. 2D groans at the commotion.
“Didn’t even spill it,” Murdoc boasts. “Years of practice with my sea legs.” He sets the cup and pills on the side table. Switching his bedside manner, he places a hand on 2D’s back and softens his voice to a gentle rumble. “Can you sit up for me?”
2D grumbles in protest, but props himself up on his elbow anyway, squinting and scowling. His fine, blue hair sticks to his forehead from being smushed into the pillow.
“There’s our beautiful little angel,” Murdoc says, shaking out two pills into his palm. He places them in 2D’s hand, and before he can offer him the warm tap water, 2D pops them into his mouth and dry swallows them.
“No gag reflex,” Murdoc comments. “You do this often?”
“Sod off.”
2D flops back down. He’s still wearing his bomber jacket and boots, his feet dangling off the end of the bed.
“You can’t be comfortable in those layers.”
“You’re trying to undress me now?” 2D says, muffled through the pillow.
“Noooo. Not for my benefit, at least.”
Murdoc circles around to the end of the bed, unzipping 2D’s boots and yanking them off, letting them land with two thuds to the carpet. 2D pulls his legs to his chest and curls up on his side.
“Gimme your arm.”
2D obliges, limply holding out one long, slender arm as Murdoc pulls his sleeve, and 2D slides out.
“Other one.”
“You’re making me do so much,” 2D complains, but sits up and shakes his jacket off on his own. Murdoc takes it, tosses it aside, and 2D lays back down.
“I know, I’m so cruel.”
2D snakes his arm up and tugs on his earlobe— an early signifier that tells the rest of the band that a migraine is approaching before 2D even seems to know, despite the call coming from his own head.
2D feels the mattress sink as Murdoc sits on the edge, kicking his own boots off, and stretches out beside him. The extent of his legs reach nowhere near 2D’s.
At first, Murdoc just lays there, keeping a few inches of space between them, until he decides to bridge the gap with a hand on 2D’s shoulder blade.
“Better?”
2D hmphs in response. “The problems my ‘ead, not my shoes.”
If this had been some time earlier in knowing each other, Murdoc would have replied with a snappy “‘Course the problem’s your head, it’s the source of all your problems” but now he keeps quiet. The need to jab at him has dwindled since their time in New York— or at least, the jabs have softened to banter.
Their time apart after splitting up to “cool off” when things came to a head in LA had changed something within 2D. When Murdoc first extended a hand to help him off the asphalt about eight years earlier and sat him in front of a keyboard to see what he was capable of, 2D was (as his brother, Hannibal, might say), a “twerp.” He was an only-child and he reeked of it. Never washed his own underwear before, never had to make his own doctors appointments, never had to wait for the bathroom, never had to share food, never been told to shut up, and always the most special boy in the room. It was so easy to trick him into playing “52 pick-up” or convince him that jackalopes were real and to “keep looking” when they drove.
Well, perhaps not all of that has changed. He still doesn’t know how to share or do laundry. But he came back with a confidence beyond “naive.” At first, it was just the usual next stage for someone like that: cocky. And cockiness is still annoying. Yet there was also a jadedness about him that made him a little harder to push over. He bites back. And now in his late-twenties, his brow furrows and his mouth scowls in seriousness that no longer makes him look like he’s just pouting. He’s not just “cute” anymore. He deserves a less diminutive term.
“Come here, handsome,” Murdoc says, trying to keep it teasing. He pats his chest as if summoning a pet. 2D, not-so-begrudgingly, rolls over and buries his face in Murdoc’s bicep. Murdoc tries to sneak his arm underneath 2D and shift him onto his chest, but 2D understands the signal and picks himself up, straddles Murdoc, and thumps back down on top of him like a puppet with its strings cut. He closes his eyes and lets out a long breath, settling down as if Murdoc is just part of the bed.
Murdoc places one hand on the back of 2D’s neck and another on his back under his shirt, running his fingers up and down his bony spine. 2D’s pills tend to make him nauseous. For that, Murdoc can’t be blamed. 2D’s mother fretted over her precious boy feeling an ounce of pain and did everything but dress him in bubble-wrap to shield him from it, and inadvertently did the opposite. Even if Murdoc had never entered the picture, 2D would have been struck down by constant headaches and the cycle of benzos to combat them.
It’s a ridiculous fantasy to protect 2D from pain forever. One day he would have had to leave the house, experience heartbreak, make friends with hooligans, fall down, get back up, find cheap thrills, or get struck by lightning. At the very least, he got to do all those things just short of getting struck by lightning and have a bigger life than he could have ever imagined if he just settled down with the first girl he knocked up and taught piano lessons for a living.
Maybe that version of 2D— or, Stu, in that case, would have been perfectly happy with that, but that possibility is long gone. He’d never be satisfied with that life now that he has a taste for this one. It’d be like telling him the migraines he’s been treating with benzodiazepines could just as easily be treated with some piddly little ibuprofen. Take two, they’re small.
Murdoc can easily feel 2D’s ribs just below the surface of his skin, his frame light and hollow like that of a bird. Laying on him can feel like being jabbed with sticks and the fear of breaking him makes it hard to comfortably put the full weight of one’s head on him. But having him on top is pleasant— just enough pressure to be grounded.With 2D’s body heat concentrated against him, his warmth radiates like a glow. His neck smells faintly of cologne as if it’s a ghost of when he applied it the day before, his skin slightly salty. With his neck so close. Murdoc feels tempted to kiss him, but pauses, his lips parted and resting against his flesh. It’s not quite right to break that seal right now. Instead, he slides his hand down 2D’s back to the waistband of his underwear and pulls on it—
Thwap.
“Mmph.”
2D squirms a little, adjusting his position. He reaches his arms above his head, pressing his palms against the headboard and stretching with a soft moan. He settles back down with his arms raised, and Murdoc brushes his hands up 2D’s sides and cups them around his head, stroking his temples with his thumbs. He scratches his nails against 2D’s scalp, and 2D lets out another quiet sigh. He likes having his head scratched, and Murdoc’s talons are happy to oblige.
Murdoc presses his cheek to 2D’s and keeps scratching, running his fingers through his hair, slightly greasy, but still soft and fine like cornsilk. He traces around his ears, around the nape of his neck, around the crown of his head, until Murdoc’s fingers catch on an interruption in the shape of 2D’s scalp— a ridge, subtle enough that you can’t catch it by looking at him. But it’s there, along with a second one around the left side: The two dents that gave him his name.
Murdoc’s heart sinks like a stone. He slowly continues his fingers’ grazing so as not to draw 2D’s attention.
He was always going to be this way. He was the one who whacked his head on the ground the first time, and his mother who handed him the pills. The only difference is that his life would have been more boring. When Murdoc claims he saved 2D’s life, he wasn’t completely lying, not really. He saved him from a life of wasting his potential.
Things aren’t like they were before. They’re equals now. He can bite at 2D and 2D bites back. They settled things in New York, and everything is okay now. They bicker to keep up appearances, but 2D knows he doesn’t mean it. 2D currently has him pinned, after all, he wouldn’t let just anyone see him in such a position.
If there’s any hard feelings, he’s making it up to him now. He turns his head and plants a gentle kiss on 2D’s ear.
Maybe one day, if he lets 2D get enough blows in, he’ll have atoned for it all.
