Chapter Text
The first time Adrien broke a bone… he can’t even remember. He was too young. Maybe barely a year. But his mother had kept his cast and showed it to him like just another baby book when Father wasn’t looking.
He wonders if he had screamed back then, with his tiny baby lungs. If that’s the reason he can’t scream now.
The pain is nearly blinding: bright white behind his tight shut eyelids. He knows what he’ll see if he opens them. The jagged points of his own broken framework. Red rivulets running down his skin like tributaries, flowing to a yet unseen ocean.
Something tastes of salt. There’s salt on the air, on his lips, in his throat. Enough to dry out his mouth and burn stinging welts to the inside of his nostrils. He tries to summon the spit on his tongue, wet his palette— anything to clear the gross, gritty feeling— but to no avail. He’s all dried out.
His arm is another story. He can feel the slick warmth dripping down his skin, beading over the end of his bent elbow. If he moves, another flash of pain lights up every nerve ending.
He’s an idiot.