[FIN] Picking up the Pieces

[BlackFireKitsune]

"Yeah," Abel agreed with a soft sigh, his colorful eyes slowly tracing the familiar lines of Zev's face, the curve of his jaw -- and the jarring, foreign tube that disappeared down his throat. "He's done a lot for both of us. He's done more for me than I can probably even say at this point, I... I know how you feel." As he spoke he gingerly reached a hand out first to gently squeeze his boyfriend's shoulder, then lifted to carefully, tenderly smooth over his cheek. "It sucks, doesn't it? We both want to help him so bad but I don't really know what we can even do for him except to just.. come visit him as much as we can, so he knows we're here with him and that he's not alone. I feel bad too that I'm fine and he's..." Not. Not at all. But he was alive, at the very least, and Abel was doing his very best to convince himself that he would stay alive, and would get better. If he forced himself to think it enough, eventually he'd believe it.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Yeah, it really sucks." Taavi sighed and reached up to pull his pendant out from underneath his shirt, closing his hand around it made him feel not exactly better but perhaps a bit more grounded. "It'll get better though. He'll get better. In a few months all this will just be scars and bad memories... And I know he'd be glad that you're not hurt- or at least not a lot." Abel had been lucky, even luckier than Zev probably. If that bullet had been just a bit to the side.... Taavi squeezed his pendant tighter and swallowed.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"Yeah..." He would get better and all that would be left would be the scars and the bad memories... Probably terrible memories. Would these scars be the worst memory? His burn scars had seemed like his least favorite, but would these outweigh those? Would he want to cover those with a tattoo as well -- the bullet wounds and the surgical scars, or maybe just one or the other? Abel's gaze drifted from his face down to Zevran's upper arm where the mark of his house was, still altered with marker. It did look much better like that. He'd always felt sort of indifferent to that particular tattoo - he liked it about as much as he liked all of Zev's other tattoos, at least - but now that he knew more about it he liked the new version much better.

"He'll get better," he agreed after a few thoughtful, quiet moments, "and then it'll just be bad memories, yeah." A moment or two later he opened his mouth to add something, thought better of it, shut his mouth again, then tried again with a different topic. "I wonder how soon after he gets out he could go to a tattoo parlor? I feel like he'd probably need to wait a few weeks, at least, but realistically I don't know much if anything about tattoos and how getting one affects a person."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Uh?" Taavi turned his head to look at Abel in baffled surprise. "A tattoo parlour? Um. That's..." Random. "I have no idea. A while I guess? Why?" As he asked this Taavi looked down at Zev again; more specifically he looked at his tattoos again, really focusing this time instead of just letting his eyes drift over them. Had the one on his left arm always been like that? And come to that it wasn't a uniform colour. Taavi looked up at Abel again with a puzzled frown. "All I know is you can't give blood for a while after getting ones, it says it on the info cards at clinics, but I don't know about getting one." He'd kind of thought of getting one while he'd been with Sasha, he'd felt like Sasha would think it was cool.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Taavi's confusion wasn't lost on him, and Abel turned a brief, sheepish smile towards his best friend. "Sorry, that was kind of random. But he mentioned yesterday that he wanted to get one of them altered," he explained as he let go of Zev's hand for the moment to lightly trace the new lines with his fingertips. "I was curious how long he'd have to wait before he could get it fixed.. Mmh, I can ask Dith sometime. I'm gonna guess it'll probably be at least a month or something, but," he shrugged to finish the sentence. In a month Zevran would be awake, recovered enough and surely out of the hospital -- and preferably staying with him at his apartment, because he'd be better by then. He would get better, he would.  

[TawnyAngel]

Altered?

Taavi's eyes lingered on the tattoo that didn't look quite right, and yes Abel's fingers were tracing it. "Um... Yeah." Why all of a sudden? And was that marker on his arm? It was right? He'd changed a tattoo on his arm in the morning or the afternoon and then got shot in the evening. They were probably unrelated, right? But then again....

Taavi gaze Abel another puzzled, now slightly worried look and added; "Good to have a man on the inside right? I mean Dith, with the knowledge and stuff. Um.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Something in Taavi's tone made the blond look up to search his face; he didn't need to search long at all though to see that something was bothering. "Ah, sorry," he said almost on reflex, as though something he'd said had upset him, and his fingers slipped away from Zev's tattoo. "Should I not've brought that up..?"  

[TawnyAngel]

"Oh! No. I just..." Taavi inhaled deeply, regretted it for the antiseptic stink of the air, and let it out again slowly. "I know there's a lot you're not telling me. About this, about... about other things, with Patty you know? I'm not stupid- I... If you can't tell me I can respect that but you can't think I don't know things are going on, you know?" Maybe he shouldn't have said that, maybe Abel would get mad at him but he couldn't just pretend he thought nothing was happening, that all of this was just some random bad luck.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

Take heart, insert knife. Repeat.

"Ah, no, that's not..." Abel turned a guilty, shame-faced expression to Zev but couldn't hold it there; his gaze promptly dropped to the railing on the side of the bed as his hands curled around it. "You're not stupid. I don't think you're stupid Taavi, I just... I don't like talking about that sort of stuff, I... I'm sorry. I know you realize things and I... just... I don't know, I just," he lifted one hand to gesture vaguely as if that would get his point across, "hope that we can just... pretend nothing happened and just sweep it under the rug and not really talk about it again. It's not fair to you though; I'm sorry." Abel fell silent for a few moments as he stared down at his hands curled around the bed rail again before repeating himself a little softer, "I'm sorry." Way to go Abel, real A+ friendship there; just hope your best friend won't ask questions about the s**t that keeps happening. Good job.  

[TawnyAngel]

Oh well done Taavi, great, you made him feel worse- worse than he already did with his boyfriend who he loved nearly dead right in front of him. Great job.

Taavi let of of his pendant and wrapped his arms tightly around Abel again. "It's okay, and it doesn't matter at all right now. What matters to me right now is the two of you being okay, okay? Because I love you, and you don't deserve to feel like you're feeling, and life's unfair and I want to try to balance it a bit. Whatever that means; fetching stuff, not asking questions, taking your mind off stuff, I'll do it." Arceus, he'd give almost anything to make Abel stop hurting right now but he couldn't do that unless he could magically fix Zev as well. Ultimately he couldn't do either.  

[BlackFireKitsune]

I love you.

There was only one person he wanted to hear that phrase from at the moment and he was unconscious, he would be for days and he might not even wake up at all, he--

Abel drew in a deep, slightly wavering breath and after a moment he turned to return the embrace just as tightly. After floundering around trying to think of something to say he came up with nothing, and he simply dropped his head onto his best friend's shoulder instead. Why did things have to be this way...?  

[TawnyAngel]

Why had this had to happen?

Taavi held Abel a little tighter. "It's going to be okay. He's going to be okay, but until he is I... I'm going to look after you, so that you can look after him. Teamwork, right?"  

[BlackFireKitsune]

If Zevran didn't make it, he... really didn't know what he'd do. He really didn't. Both were terrifying thoughts and Abel could feel the fear squeeze his heart painfully in its cold, vice-like grip. "I... yes. Yes, he will. ...thank you. I... just... Thanks."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Hey, what's... what's family for right?" Could he say that? "Um, and you're welcome."  

[BlackFireKitsune]

"I... Right. That's right." Taavi was his best friend, so much so he was practically his brother. At this point he was, even if not by blood. Abel hugged him tighter for a moment or two. "I.. I really appreciate it. I appreciate you."