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There were seven clocks in the sitting room – dotting various shelves and perched on sturdy nails upon the beige walls – and all tick-fucking-tocking at different intervals so that there wasn’t a single goddamn second of quiet to be had. At least, that’s what it seemed like to the scrawny man currently perched in one of the immaculate, overstuffed armchairs. The irritation was only made worse by his cravings for nicotine, but he had dared not even smuggle a pack of cigarettes in his pocket lest his host refuse the services he desperately needed more than even a few quick puffs.
The pain had been intolerable lately – a bad pain that set his nerves on fire and kept him awake well after his body should have succumbed to drugs, runes, or fatigue. He had tried to ignore it… He had tried self-medicating more than usual, but in the end, nothing had worked, and so he had sought out the only man he knew who might have something for him.
From a room in the back of the house came a faint thumping noise – hard plastic against hard plastic – followed by the ‘schlock’ of a thick liquid splattering. Pursing his lips, Luce jostled his leg in impatience. Tibenoch – the poncey one – always seemed to drag this out and take his time, as though his guest wasn’t at all suffering. Truth be told, the blonde wasn’t sure Ples ever noticed. The man was ‘off’, and everyone knew it… His ‘bedside manner’ was certainly a cold one, but there was no better alchemist that the karadji knew of within his immediate vicinity. He could, at least, get things cheap since they’d come to their little understanding.
Grunting softly, he idly picked at the fraying end of the tape that held a length of dirty bandages around his left arm – eyeing the matching set on his right and attempting to take a few deep breaths before he lost his temper and demanded that the other man hurry his arse up. He was, in fact, so absorbed in himself that he was startled when Ples appeared before him – staring down with impassive green eyes as he held fast to an old mayonnaise jar whose contents were decidedly not mayonnaise.
“’Bout time. Thought ya’d forgot I were here…”
“You make yourself difficult to forget. This jar should last you a few months. If you require more, do call next time and I’ll bring some with me when I next visit your clinic. There really is no need to come all this way…” ‘Or invade my privacy any more than you usually do’ was heavily implied in his tone.
Curling his hands, Luce scrubbed at his face and shook his head. “It uh… It ain’t like that this time, Poncey,” he mumbled, then went quiet again to turn his focus on his own bouncing leg. At that moment, it was difficult to tell which hurt more – the physical pain or being forced to ask for help.
The elder man’s brow wrinkled a bit, and his mouth pulled into a tight frown. “Doctor, I do not appreciate having my time wasted and I will not play guessing games with you. What is it that you want? The answer had better not have anything to do with sodomy…”
Well, leave it to Poncey to start getting offended before anything had really been said yet. That, at least, was enough to put a tiny smile on the Australian’s lips. If he hadn’t been so close to screaming, he might have been tempted to tease the old man and give him a little Hell. Ples was shite at reading other people, so he often took things for face value and that had led to some interesting shenanigans in the past which were usually only forgiven after a few drinks and a horse tranquilizer.
“Christ, Poncey... Dun go jumpin’ down my throat,” he groused, flashing a weak glare upwards. “I ain’t after yer arse t’day… I jus’… It ain’t fer my patients… It’s fer me. An’ I can’t…” He nearly choked on that word, and forced himself to stop momentarily with a thick swallow – Adam’s apple bobbing nervously. “I can’t…do it m’self.”
There was a part of him that was grateful that the impassive expression on the Englishman’s face had hardly changed at the admission. Pity would have been worse, and he might have left altogether if he’d seen any. In fact, that expression only changed once the man asked where Luce’s afflicted area was, and it was relief that crept into the accountant’s features when the blonde held up his arms.
“I will retrieve some gloves, then. I suggest we move to the toilet, however; I would not care to subject my furniture, nor my carpet, to any stains this might cause.”
Biting back the urge to mention stains that he could cause, Luce nodded and rose to his feet – shuffling quietly down the hall to where he knew the man had at least one bathroom in the forsaken mausoleum Ples called a ‘home’.
There was only one clock in the room – a tiny piece that sat on the sink counter – however, it did not make a single sound. Reveling in the relative silence, he perched on the edge of the tub and continued to gently pick at the tape on his arms – not quite ready to properly unravel it for the further agony it would bring him. He didn’t have long to savor it, though. Soon enough, the other man entered the room – followed by his perpetual ticking.
The jar had been tucked carefully under one arm, and he’d already rolled up his sleeves and slipped on a pair of latex gloves. Settling down next to the Australian, he set the poultice aside and nodded down to the dingy bandages. “Do you require aid in taking them off?”
“Nuh-uh… Jus’ waitin’ fer ya was all.”
Snatching the tape off was the easy bit, really; the gauze was so thick that he barely felt it. The pressure around his arms waning as it was all unraveled, however, was another thing entirely. The ruddy brown and yellow bandages gave way to lighter shades until they revealed a stark white…followed by yellow again and a watery pink.
The sight and smell of the revealed appendages were enough to make Ples gag openly and avert his gaze for a moment with an automatic, muffled, “What happened?!”
Luce would have thought the elder man had better manners than to ask, but then again…it was Poncey, and one couldn’t exactly expect him to be tactful. Upon casting a sharp glare at the other man in answer, he ducked his head a bit in embarrassment.
The forearms in question were in horrifying shape – withered, inflamed, hairless, and wet with pus. They were thin without the bandages – muscle and veins stretched tight over bird-like bone. The sallow flesh varied from pink to fiery red; though, several areas sported jagged scar tissue in various shades of grey and black. The last thing Ples had smelled quite like that had been the bloated, rotting corpse of a raccoon he’d found in his shed, once, and it didn’t look as though Luce was far off from becoming one himself.
Choking back another retch, the Englishman turned and forced himself to inspect the damage closely. After a quiet moment, he cleared his throat. “They need cleaning.”
“I scrubbed ‘em a couple’a days ago. Jus’ put the fuckin’ poultice on ‘em an’ re-wrap ‘em, Poncey. They’re fine…” More like a week ago, really. He knew he ought to take better care of them, but until they began hurting like this, there didn’t seem to be much of a point and they were always in the way. It was much easier to let them go for a while, slap some poultice on them, and forget about it again.
“You’re a doctor and you should know better. I won’t put it on until they’re cleaned. The poultice would heal them more effectively without having to diffuse through all that muck.”
Clenching his jaw, the blonde shook his head. “I already said ‘no’, Fancy. It ain’t happenin’.”
“You asked for my help. If you wish to receive it, then you will follow my instructions. Now, they will either be washed, or you will leave empty-handed.”
Christ, the old man was stubborn as a fucking mule, and it didn’t look as though he’d bow out of their little ‘debate’ any time soon. Sighing in defeat, the karadji shrugged and rolled his eyes. “Fine. Jus’ get it over with quick.”
That seemed to satisfy Ples, and he rose to his feet to ready the sink. Whether the younger man would like it or not, the water was going to have to be warm – the warmer the better, really. He’d been able to make out where large patches of dead skin were ready to slough off, and the raw flesh beneath would need to be kept sterile lest it turn into the same sort of mess again.
It twisted Luce’s gut to see steam begin rising from the porcelain bowl, and a cold chill crept over his body – prickling the hairs at the nape of his neck. If Ples wasn’t the only provider of his poultice, and more than half of the drugs he gave his patients, he might have bolted and not bothered to come back.
“The water’s ready. Let’s get this done, now…”
He shuffled to the counter like a man walking down death row – allowing the Englishman to stand behind him and effectively pin him where he stood. He didn’t dare look up at the mirror – unable to stomach how pathetic he must have looked while the nursey tart loomed over him like some damn nanny forcing her ward to scrub behind his ears before bed. Except that it was going to be Ples doing the scrubbing as well; the tremors in Luce’s hands made it all but impossible to do the job himself.
One of the corpse-like appendages was jerked away several times before he managed to clench his jaw and force himself to let the man clean him proper. He couldn’t be sure whether Ples was even attempting to be gentle or not anymore. Each swipe of the cloth elicited a white hot explosion of excruciating pain behind his eyes, as if there was no skin at all and only bundles of raw nerve endings to be scrubbed. Gnashing his teeth, he attempted to swallow what would have been howls – instead only releasing heavy panting broken by the occasional groan. Bad pain was not something he encountered often anymore thanks to the numerous drugs he pumped through his veins, but there was nothing to dampen this.
By the time the Englishman had finished the first arm and moved on to the second, Luce’s face and neck were covered in a fine sheen of sweat. Using the hand of his now-clean-arm to brace against the counter, he trembled violently as the man behind him attempted to finish the other appendage.
Without warning, the blonde felt his knees give way, and he might have crumpled to the floor if Ples had not caught him from behind with his free arm. The shock of near-collapse found his gaze darting to the mirror for a brief moment, only to find a pair of raised brows and an otherwise exceptionally placid expression on the accountant’s face.
“Nearly done,” came a strained assurance; though, the blonde’s ears were roaring so loudly that he could barely comprehend what was said.
Red in face and body desperately pumping adrenaline, he could not feel a few reflexive tears roll down his burning, already-damp cheeks. Wrenching his eyes shut, he took a few shuddering breaths as the other man resumed his ministrations.
What was only another two or three minutes felt like hours of consistent torture (especially once a dry cloth was taken to pat down the raw, fresh skin), and Luce was reaching his breaking point when he found himself being gently tugged back from the sink. His legs still protested vehemently, and after a moment, he felt himself sinking. His posture stiffened – bracing himself for a fall that did not come. Instead, he found his weight supported as he was lowered to the cool tile floor and nestled between a pair of long legs.
The arm around his chest loosened its grip; though, the one that had lowered to support his waist remained rigidly where it had been placed for a time before it too released its hold. Ples had grabbed the jar from where it sat on the floor and was currently twisting it open. The smell that bombarded them was far more pleasant than the gut-wrenching stench Luce’s arms had emanated; it was sweeter – like fresh-cut grass and mint.
The relief was instant once applied to the bright pink and grey swaths of flesh – a familiar numbness that the blonde knew would last for a few hours before more needed to be applied. He didn’t bother to hold his arms out any longer and, uncaring about the mess they would smear on his own clothes, allowed them to fall limply in his lap once Ples had finished rubbing them down.
From behind him, he felt the other man recline against the side of the tub – allowing Luce to fall back further against his chest. Turning his head, the karadji focused on catching his breath – each inhale and exhale slowly falling in time with the rhythmic tick-tock of the Englishman’s mysterious innards. He didn’t have the energy to complain about the noise this time. If he was honest with himself – which he rarely was – he might have admitted that it was soothing in this context.
Cracking his eyes open, he glanced up for an eyeful of the other man’s subtly-bewildered expression – something one might see on a cat who had just discovered a particularly interesting piece of string. “Dun worry, Poncey. I’ll be outta yer hair in a mo’,” he mumbled.
“You should rest…”
It was not a demand to keep him company – something that Fancy usually blurted when he was too stubborn to admit that he was lonely. No… Those three words were the closest thing to an invitation to stay that the blonde had ever been offered by Ples, and he couldn’t find it in himself to turn the man down.
Lowering his head, he closed his eyes again and released another heavy sigh – entirely unable to feel the presence of a gloved hand resting against one of his arms.