Chapter Text
They hadn’t really thought about it before, but her neck and shoulders really did hurt constantly. That made sense, they supposed.
This whole problem got started from ruffling her hair again. No, it started before that. They just couldn’t remember who’d broken the touch barrier again first. Or maybe they just couldn’t decide where the actual line was. Is it when you’ve slowly and carefully gotten as close as you can before actually touching, or is it when you briefly brush up against them accidentally because you weren’t trying not to?
Both of them had alternated those approaches for the past day. Or maybe that was their memories blurring together again. Or maybe now their actions were. Eventually they’d worked their way back together enough that she was dropping on top of them pretending to try and bother them and they’d thread their fingers in her hair and act like they were trying to bother her back.
They were sitting on the tiny 1.5 person bed getting some reading done when she came back from a walk. They tried not to think too hard about where. Probably somewhere insane like the roof. She flopped down on top of them and smashed the book against their face. They managed to extricate the book carefully enough to not damage it and readjusted. There, they could read again now, completely unbothered.
One of their upper arms was still trapped under her, so they reached up with that hand to ruffle her hair. When they gently rubbed her scalp at the base of her skull (where the tendons attach) she made… a noise. It was almost pained except her body didn’t tense, it relaxed. The next noise was somewhere between a chuckle and a sigh as she leaned forward and tucked the bridge of her nose into the bend of their neck and fully dropped her weight on top of them. Again, they did not have the upper body strength to handle this. They did manage to twist a little out from under her, so that she was more to the side than on top.
…they wanted to see if she’d make that noise again. Their hand worked its way back over her shoulder and up the back of her neck. Her neck muscles were oddly tense, they noticed, even when she was fully relaxed. Her shoulders were even tenser, as they worked their way down, and the next noise actually was pained. Oh. Well of course her back hurts–
–they pulled back at the same moment she grabbed them by the front of their shirt. Her mind at this point started rapidly blurring between the present and… what was probably a memory. They were still partially under her and not really sure how to get themselves out of this without just making the situation worse. They felt… something? –grab them by …their back. That didn’t make sense because it was like there was something tightening around their….? oh. It was the phantom sensation of… wings. Ow.
They could feel her panic seeping into them the same way as the pain of her missing wings–or maybe it was just their own realization that she was probably about to do something much worse. She was already physically pushing them away but they were still kind of under her so it was mostly just succeeding at making both of them uncomfortable. The whole situation was rapidly spinning out of control.
They carefully eased the tip of one short tentacle up under the heel of her palm where it was tangled in their shirt. Her face contorted in confusion for a second, then relaxed as she opened her fingers and slid her palm down around and up the length of it. As she worked her fingers fully around the base of the tentacle they realized it was a bad idea. They held carefully still and breathed slowly as her fingertips brushed the underside next to their mouth. They tried to gently tug her hand away but her grip subtly but suddenly tightened and they decided not to test it.
There was a long moment where they stared each other down. Somehow her thoughts were actually anchored in the fascinatingly novel, but present experience of playing with an appendage she didn’t personally have. They had the delayed realization that she was also feeling her own fingertips through their skin. Somehow the constant static prickle of her emotions had been, well, grounded.
Eventually they decided that if bad decision making had gotten them this far into this mess, it was at least worth finding out where it went. They moved their hand down instead, ran their fingertips over the inside of her wrist and traced their way back up her arm to her shoulder again. Moving slowly seemed least likely to break her focus on the present, and seemed to be working. They briefly rubbed over the soreness in her shoulder but waited until the less painful middle of the neck to really work their fingers into the muscle. Her eyes fell shut and she made that noise again, pained, but not.
Her eyes fluttered back open and she caught them staring. They accidentally dug their fingers in a little too much and quickly eased back.
“…what do you want from me?” she asked.
What does that have to do with anything? they replied.
She thought the answer was obvious: Everything?
They thought for a moment, trying to figure out what she wanted to hear but mostly found that, first of all, she didn’t know what she wanted to hear. Secondly, the things that did occur to her were mostly wrong answers.
…you fascinate me.
She was able to believe that for multiple reasons. One was that this was a logical and appropriately fitting explanation for their behavior. The other was the depth of sincerity they’d managed to convey. Another was, they noted absently, that apparently she’d figured out how to read their facial expressions at some point. The truth was funny like that.
It was a stupid reason, but satisfying enough, and she wanted the pressure back.
I just need to know you won’t try to hurt me.
She stared them down for what was probably seconds but felt like an hour before admitting that was… doable.
The distrust was somewhat mutual, so they didn’t immediately apply pressure to her neck again. Ruffling her hair had proven mostly safe. They let her feel the softness of her own hair between their fingers, and waited until she was fully relaxed to gently slide their fingers down to her neck again.
They were listening carefully for what she wanted next when something weird happened. It was like she took control of their hands, and she was doing too many interesting things with them for them to dare stop her.
Interestingly she went down to her hips first. She dug their fingertips into the muscles just around and above her tailbone where they spanned to the tops of her hip bones. It was like the pain in the center of her back had diffused both up and down along the spine. The one local injury had weakened the structure as a whole.
When she pulled the palm of their hand over the middle of her back it was almost impossible to resist taking back control. They wanted to explore with their fingertips but she knew it would stab with pain and somehow they mutually decided that the tension that would cause would be counterproductive. They did their best to separate out their desire to explore more from the intensity of the physical sensation. There was just so much information to be gained, even passively. It was really hard not to let her feel that emotion.
They could feel where the ligaments had met her spine and which of her back muscles had once braided into those of her wings. They tried not to flinch or dwell where they felt muscles that could never stretch properly because their bluntly cut fibers no longer connected to anything.
After a few minutes she sighed and sat up to stretch, savoring the newfound looseness in her back. She chuckled softly and moved to straddle them, then gently tugged at their face.
Weirdly, the first thing they collectively noticed was a sudden jump Xotchtil’s heart rate. There was a small flash of light like the glint off a freshly sharpened knife. Then Xotchtil suddenly started desperately struggling to get out from under her. At first she panicked and hit back at them about the same as they were slapping and clawing at her. After a few seconds it occurred to her to just get off of them, but the conflict had escalated enough that she tumbled to the floor trying. When she looked up they were crouched in the corner between the bed and intersecting walls, wheezing with the exertion.
She felt a sharp, searing pain in her lip and cheek. She tapped at it to feel if it was broken and / or bleeding but it felt intact and her hand came back clean. It took her a moment to associate the phantom sensation with the partially intact longer tentacle Xotchtil was cradling.
Well that was… new.
She didn’t want to get closer; they’d probably keep trying to hit her. But then, she didn’t actually need to get closer to touch something, did she?She pulled air in through the the open window and crashed it into their face as hard as she could. It sent chaotic little flurries of air all around the room and back into both of them. The book’s pages fluttered where it had fallen open on the floor.
This seemed to break their train of thought long enough to leave their mind blank, which she supposed was an improvement. They stayed frozen there for a long moment, and she wasn’t sure what to do.
After a while she tried,“Do you want to lie back down?”
They slowly nodded, then crawled forward and curled up on their side. There was another long pause.
“Do you know where you were in the book?”
They didn’t respond at first. She picked it up and flipped through it.
Somewhere near the end I think.
“Good because I don’t think I can read this.”
Another long silence.
“Do you want me to go away?”
No.
“Ok.”