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When Siffrin wakes up from his nap, he feels a familiar pulsing ache around his lower back, just by his tailbone.
Fantastic. Because that’s just what he needs as a side order to craft exhaustion.
He feels it throughout the whole day’s travel. Standing up hurts, walking hurts, his attempts to sit down again hurts. He makes it through the day unscathed, just with some more strain, and it looks like no one has noticed. Which is a little surprising, considering how vigilant they’ve been over Siffrin’s health ever since they left Dormont. They definitely would’ve pointed it out if they noticed.
Their family gathers by a fountain of the town they’re traveling through on the way to Bambouche. Everyone else sits down, either on the bench next to them or on the fountain’s generous ledge. Siffrin makes the attempt to sit down too, and successfully! With pain, sure, but hey, they’ll take what they can get.
“Siffrin?” Mira grabs their attention. She looks worried.
Nope, nevermind, someone noticed.
“You seem a little stiff. Are you feeling alright?”
The rest of their family’s attention is solely on them now. Siffrin appreciates how concerned they are for them, but they’re still getting used to having this many people worry about them at once.
“Uh…” Come on, be honest Siffrin, just say it—
They shrug.
“That’s not…” Isa trails off, still looking very concerned.
“That is not an answer, Siffrin.” Odile finishes. Isa nods in agreement.
“Yeah!!! You said all that stuff about talking to us now, so do it, Frin! Tell us!” Bonnie insists.
Siffrin wants to say it, he swears, but there are too many people looking at him waiting for an answer and he feels surrounded even if it’s by people he loves…and he tenses, shrinking into his cloak as far as he can go while still standing.
“mmmrngnfh.” Stupid, stupid, why can't they just say it????
“Stop hiding in your cloak!” Bonnie calls out. “We can’t hear you!”
Okay. okay maybe it’ll help if they just…don’t make eye contact. They stand a bit straighter and find a very fascinating pebble on the ground.
“…My back hurts.” FINALLY. THERE IT IS. THEY SAID IT.
Odile and Bonnie laugh.
“You're so old, Frin!!!”
“I suppose I should welcome you to the club, then. Earlier than I would have expected, but still, welcome.” Odile isn’t laughing anymore like Bonnie is, but she’s still smiling and her remark is full of mirth. She ruffles his hair.
“Oh, I know heat can help!” Mira suggests. “I can also try to heal you! It’s not so helpful with chronic pain, but it might give you a little bit of relief for a while.” Siffrin would absolutely not complain about that.
“You're right about heat, though!” Isa chimes in. “Hot water bottles helped me. I like to get massages too, but uh, I know you’re not—“
“YOU TOO, ‘ZA??!??”
“Yes, Bonnie, you’re surrounded by old people.” Siffrin snickers. “It must be..." He smirks and looks at Isa, whose expression lights up when he meets Siffrin's gaze. "...senior-ously annoying.”
“HA!!” Isa laughs.
“Not my best work, but I'll take it.” Siffrin says to Isa, smiling at him. He looks so happy. Siffrin’s pun made him laugh like that. They feel their heart lift. “Thanks.” They say, as sincerely as they can. Being honest is still hard, even when it comes to the good things.
Isa is blushing, and Siffrin can’t stop thinking about what he was saying about massages. He’s never gotten one himself, but he’s been curious about it…before he can say anything, Odile chimes in.
“Maybe it wouldn’t hurt if we found somewhere to settle for the day, then. I saw an inn just a moment ago.” Odile points out. Siffrin notices that it’s getting dark out—and everyone else must too, because everyone agrees.
—
Okay. Okay, sitting down. Siffrin is all set to go to sleep, he just needs to find a comfortable position. Much easier said than done, but possible. They lean down, carefully, to arrange their pillows. The impact of the mattress, uncomfortably firm, only sends a crawling web of pain through their back. They made an embarrassing noise. Everyone else was still getting ready for bed, except…
Mira perked up from her own spot on the bed next to them.
“Oh Siffrin, that sounds like it hurts…”
Oh—he made Mira worry again with his stupid pain! Yes he had told her about it, but didn’t want her to worry about it more than she had to.
“It’s alright, not as bad as earlier.“
But Mira was already getting up to sit next to Siffrin, placing a hand on his back and concentrating on her craft. She’s so gentle, and the familiar feeling of her healing washes over them. Oh, that feels way better. He feels like he can actually move now.
Bonnie's back now, and they’re holding a hot water bottle, holding it out to him and Mira.
“…For your old person back.” They murmur, not looking at either of them. Siffrin’s heart feels warm.
“Thanks, Bonnie.” He says as he takes the bottle, placing it against the pillow he’s been using to support his back.
They don’t respond, but that’s alright. Siffrin’s not surprised. The gesture said everything.
The door to their room opens, and Odile and Isa are back with several more pillows. Isa looks very flustered…what’s that about?
“Here, Siffrin.” Odile hands them the pillows that she’s holding.
“That's a lot of pillows.”
“Yeah, the moment that we went up to ask for more, they recognized us and insisted on giving us some extra ones. So…we’ve got pillows for days!”
When Siffrin goes to sleep that night, surrounded by a fort of pillows and friends, he thinks about how quickly they jumped to help him the moment he said he was hurting. He wasn’t even able to get a word in until all of them had said something to make him laugh, or try and help him.
He feels safe and warm. He loves them.
—
Siffrin wakes up in pain.
Okay, yeah, maybe the pain from sleeping would’ve been worse without all of these pillows and this water bottle and Mira’s healing…but stars did it hurt so much more than he expected.
Siffrin tries to adjust their position to get up, but is only met with sparks of pain. He groans, breath hitching as he tries to keep quiet, and flops back down.
“Sif?” Isa's voice. Siffrin looks to his side, and everyone else is up early for the day but Isa is here, wide awake, sitting up in the bed and looking at him worried. At least Siffrin is reassured by the fact that he didn’t wake him up, but…why is he still here? Isa is the earliest riser of the group, right next to Mira.
“It. It hurts.” Siffrin says.
“Oh, buddy. I'm sorry, I wish there’s something more I could do…”
Isa’s hands are reaching out towards Siffrin tentatively, but he holds them back. Hm.
“…There is something you could do.”
Isa perks up at the statement, looking at him curiously. “What is it??”
“You, uh…” Oh stars, this is embarrassing, why did Siffrin even open their mouth, should they even ask...? They...really should, they already said it and Isa seems so happy so he’d be upset if Siffrin took it back. And the last thing Siffrin wants to do is make him upset again.
“You mentioned that…massages can help?”
Isa freezes. His face gets dark.
“I-Isa?” Siffrin waves his hand in front of Isa’s face. “Isa? You there?”
“Uh-yeah-I- did you mean- do you want me to…” Siffrin nods, feeling their face get warmer and warmer.
Oh no, are they making him uncomfortable? “If-if you’re okay with it!” They quickly amend their question. Does he not actually want to touch them? They would understand why—
“YES!” Isa yells, cutting off those thoughts with an undeniable expression of how much he loves them, then he startles at the volume of his own voice. “Sorry. I'm more than okay with it! I'm really…really happy that you asked me.” Isa smiles, all warm and soft, and oh stars, Siffrin is gonna melt into a puddle at this rate.
…
Isa was right. It really does help.
Siffrin, even though he’s been wanting touch for so long, wasn’t sure how he would feel being massaged. It’s more intimate than holding hands or hugging, and Siffrin wasn’t totally sure how he felt about it before. But it was comforting. Somehow, it felt familiar.
"How're you feeling, Sif?” Isa asks as he works at a knot in Siffrin’s back.
“mmmfrngh.”
“Comfy, then?” He presses his hands down a little more firmly, and they feel a wave of relief wash through their back.
“mmm.” Siffrin smushes his face into the pillow, letting go of any tension remaining in their upper body.
This feeling, having hands work on his back while he laid looking at the floor… the floor? No, he was lying on the inn room’s bed, he was just looking at his pillow right now—
And…the inn’s floor doesn’t look like the one he pictured. This… was this the first time he’s had a…
No. Someone, once…
He was looking at the floor and there was a voice talking to him. They sound familiar. They have a soft voice, saying something about— they said—no, they asked, they were asking Siffrin something, they asked– they—THEY-
A rush of stabbing pain made Siffrin recoil, leaning away from the pillow and grasping at the bedsheets–something real, anything real—feeling their vision come back but their pain gets worse as that thought is blocked off. The migraine comes on quickly, starting at their forehead, and Siffrin remembers this feeling, how the searing pain started to travel down his head, splitting it in two, coursing through their body, it’s all gone, all over, they feel a tug on their—
And there’s no pressure on his back anymore.
”Sif-SIFFRIN!”
They blink. Their eyes had screwed shut. They hadn’t even noticed that they were sitting upright now, Isa grasping their hands tightly.
“Sif, are you okay? It looked like you…did I…hurt you? I'm so sorry!”
Oh no, no, he thinks it’s his fault, he looks like he’s about to cry, say something you idiot—
“No! You didn’t hurt me. It felt… really, really good actually.” Siffrin says. Isa’s blush gives him a little bit of reprieve from what had just happened, and he takes a moment to just look at him. But…as much as Siffrin doesn't want to admit it, he's also stalling. He should still tell Isa what happened.
“I just… it was familiar.”
“Familiar?”
“It wasn’t…or… it must not have been the first time that I, uh…”
Siffrin can see the realization dawn on Isa's face, as his eyebrows draw together and he squeezes their hands. They’re relieved that they don’t have to finish that sentence.
“Oh, Sif…”
They want to cry. They feel the tears welling up behind their eyes, they feel their throat tighten.
“Do you want a hug?” Isa asks.
“Please.” Siffrin’s voice cracked. He was enveloped in Isa’s arms just in time to let out a shuddering sob into his shoulder.
…
…
Ha. Haha.
Even now, Siffrin feels one of Isa's hands at his back, just above his tailbone, where the pain always comes from. Still trying to soothe him.
They hug him a little more tightly.