Chapter Text
Alyosha knew what it's like to go hungry some days. Knew what it's like to have an empty stomach for a week at a time because staying warm or feeding tugarin felt more important than feeding himself.
He didn't enjoy being on an empty stomach. At least, that's what he told himself.
Today was like any other morning, the four of them and tugarin having a nice time in mitya's apartment, enjoying breakfast while taking about their schedules or things that happened yesterday that someone forgot to mention. Usually, alyosha would simply listen while mitya and vondyanitsa chattered, Odette chiming in to make a comment or two, and today was just like that.
Tugarin pawed at the hunters leg from underneath the table, a silent beg of a sausage or bacon. It dragged alyosha out of his spacing out and he smiled slightly, taking one of the sausages and fed it to the husky, who happily consumed it before going over to Odettes legs to have her pet him.
This was nice, alyosha thought to himself, feeling safe in a way.
Until he brought his attention to his plate once more, which made his smile fall..
His plate was basically untouched save for where two sausages and a piece of bacon were, which he knew he himself didn't eat... He knew he was hungry, and knew very well that his favorite food second to non-perishables were vondyanitsa's pancakes, but his stomach felt slightly irritated the more he stared at his plate....
He stared at his plate a bit more before looking over at Odette, the calm lady scratching behind tugarin's ears as he also listened to mitya and vondyanitsa argue about something he himself couldn't pay attention to, for it was all on her plate.... It was mostly untouched, like his own, but he knew her eating habits very well.
He stared at her plate before looking back at his again, still feeling nauseous at the thought of eating... Were her eating habits rubbing off on him? It would be hypocritical of him, since he was the one who reminded her to eat most of the time. He searched his brain for any sort of idea where his nausea came from....
Was he just.... Always like this...?
It felt wrong thinking that way, terribly wrong... He was food insecure, he knew that well, he wasn't avoidant of the thing. And yet as he looked through the memories he could locate, he couldn't find a time he had a proper meal without feeding half of it to his dog and picking at the other half before shoving it into his face once he remembered that he hadn't eaten in days....
It made him feel horrible, especially now that he has a stable source of food given that all his partners were wealthy in his eyes... He wasn't food insecure anymore, but that habit of his didn't leave... He felt horrible for basically wasting the perfectly good meal that the water imp made, felt horrible for picking at Odettes eating habit when his own wasn't much better, felt horrible for basically wasting a seat at the table. If he wasn't going to talk or even eat, then what's the point of him staying for breakfast?
Alyosha took a breath, holding it for a moment before pushing himself away from the table and standing up.
"hey, 'yosha? Where are you going?" Mitya questioned, cutting off the bickering him and vondyanitsa were doing a second ago.
"I'm... Just heading to the bathroom. Take a small shower." Alyosha basically lied, it felt like bile in his throat but he felt like being in there presence was suffocating now for some reason.
"But didn't you just- oh, alright then." Vondyanitsa started, but the hunter was gone before she could even finish.
Alyosha closed the door hader than intended and hit the door with his back. The air felt heavy and thin at the same time somehow as he grasped at his sweatshirt... His breathing was unsteady and quickened as time ticked by, it was hard to keep air in his lungs at the moment...
What the hell was going on..? Why was he so out of breath and.... Freaked out at the moment? Did the idea of possibly having the thing odette has (eating disorder? He doesn't remember, can't remember. His brain is fogging up) make him that afraid..?
In a way, yes. The idea that he hated eating and couldn't keep food down wasn't something he enjoyed thinking, especially since he's well aware of what it's like to pass out from being so starved... He slides down the door and hits the floor as he continues to try and reason with himself, attempts to understand what the hell he's feeling as he curled up slightly... Archons, why was it so hard to breathe!?
He was basically gasping at this point before looking up at where the countertop would be. He only saw the mirror, but for some reason his mind zeroed in on it....
The mint-haired man pushed himself off the ground forcefully, putting his hands on the counter to stabilize himself since his knees felt both like concrete and gelatin... He stared at himself for a good while, taking in the details of his face he usually brushed off and didn't care for... The vague circles under his eyes from night "hunting", the cracked lips from the cold, the paleness of his skin, the tears threatening to well up as he kept fucking gasping for air.
He then looked at the counter. More specifically at someone's razor (one of the ladies, probably. mitya doesn't care for shaving unless it's visable or uncomfortable and alyosha doesn't really grow much body hair anyways). He stares at it for a good while, his breathing somehow leveling but his eyes glazing over and looking distant in a way. He looks down at his wrists, covered by his clothing but he still knows that it's there.
It's there. It's blank. It's devoid of scarring.
His eyes glance at different things. His wrist, the razor, his face in the mirror before going to turn the water of the shower on. He doesn't want any of them to worry. Doesn't want any of them to barge in.
Once he does that he opens one of the drawers and takes out a clean razor blade from its packaging, staring at it for a good while. Its sharp, very sharp. One could cut meat cleanly with it.
Before he could register, as if he was registering anything currently, he rolled his sleeve up and pressed the blade to the inside of his wrist. Not hard enough to bleed, not yet at least...
He could vaguely feel tears pricking his eyes before swiftly dragging the blade across his skin, breath hitching at the feeling and watched as blood beaded up from the thin line....
And then he did it again.
And again.
And again. Until his wrist was smeared with his own blood from trembling hands, until he basically fell down and had his back against the wall, until tears were actually streaming down his face while he tried not to sob or cough, not wanting to be louder than the running water...
He snapped up when he heard pawing and nails scratching at the door, tugarin was on the other side... He must've gotten bored of being with the others without his owner, or got worried, or somehow smelled the hunters blood...
Alyosha stared at the door for a good while before shakily putting the blade back onto the counter and opening the door, still on the ground as his legs didn't seem to work at the moment....
Tugarin shoved himself into the room and closed it himself by pushing against it, looking at his owner with a sort of pity-filled look, a look alyosha barely saw on the husky's face....
"H-hey, bud..." Alyosha spoke with a forced smile, now aware of how shaky and pathetic his voice sounded once he started to come back to the real world... "Came to check in on me...?"
The husky whined at the sight and smell of his owners blood before resting himself over alyosha's lap, looking up at the man...
"I know, I'm bleeding, I..." He paused for a moment, bringing his uncut hand to the dogs head, not petting but simply resting... "Freaked out, I guess.... I... Don't know why I did this...."
Tugarin whined again, getting up and shoving his snout into the cabinet to open it. He searched through it before grabbing onto the medical bag with his teeth, bringing it over to the cut up man....
.....
"Thanks...." Was all alyosha said as he took the bag from his companion, who went back to resting over his lap.... The hunter cleaned off his injury, hissing slightly as alcohol went over his cuts before pressing gauze over it and wrapping it in place...
The two stayed there in silence for a few moments, the pressure tugarin gave was grounding, one could say.... Comforting....
"Come on, let's get back to the others before they start to worry..." Alyosha said with a slight smile to his dog, who almost reluctantly removed himself from the man's lap once more....
.....
"This is.... A secret, between us...." He added on once he turned the water off, earning a noise from tugarin.. "until I want to be fretted over, okay? No need to think I'm taking this to my grave." He quipped back to the dog who hadn't spoken at all, throwing the blade into the trash... It was still sharp, but the idea of Odette of vondyanitsa shaving with the blade he cut himself open with felt wrong...
"And I'll eat something. At least a bite or two... I hope.." he said to mostly himself as he opened the door, letting tugarin leave first.
He still felt uncomfortably nauseous at the thought of eating.