how much do harrison and aiden actually know about each other (their lives outside the wru, each others personalities, etc)? they spend so much time together that i’m wondering if it ever comes up in conversation
I had this in the drafts ever since Toothache as an immediate follow-up and it turned out to be perfect for filling this ask.
Masterlist
cw: noncon drugging, needle mention, restraints, harrison going too far
He falls asleep wondering what Harrison did with the time freed up by leaving early. With all the hours spent on his ‘extra-curriculars’, does he have to play catch up at work or does his flagrant disregard for rules mean he’d just go home? He has to be pulling his weight at his day job, he’d never risk his basement side hustle.
It’s difficult to picture Harrison anywhere else. In kindergarten, his class mailed around Flat Stanley over the summer. Everyone took pictures of the laminated cut-out at various summer destinations. Theme parks and campgrounds, stretches of sand on the coastline. His photo was from the end of his cul-de-sac.
Harrison feels almost the same. He can only picture him in his scrubs and lab coat, which just looks ridiculous superimposed into a grocery store. Pushing a cart full of…what? He’s never seen him eat. Coffee is the only certainty. Can’t picture him at a gas station pumping gas. What kind of car does he drive? He must have awful road rage. Does he keep his gloves on to pump gas? It all looks wrong. Beyond that, it gets even harder. How does he talk to other people? Can strangers tell there’s something off about him? Is Harrison’s apartment also sterile and impersonal? Is he just humanizing the monster that cuts him open every day?
For the first time in as long as he can remember, he wakes up on his own. And not just because he’s trying not to be caught off guard like in the beginning. No Harrison slapping him or accosting him with an exam in place of an alarm.
The head of the bed is still raised in a gentle recline. Harrison must have given him extra time to sleep, there’s no other explanation for how well-rested he feels. Harrison certainly has little, if any, life outside this place. That’s the only way he could hold down what must be a full-time job and manage to sneak down here for hours at a time. Did Harrison treat himself to a long breakfast? He can’t imagine Harrison sleeping in. Or sleeping at all for that matter. Is Harrison a perfunctory-only cook? He certainly has the precision to follow a recipe but there’s nothing creative about him. His Myers-Briggs is robot.
(He’s doing it again, humanizing him.)
There was only one other time, at least that he can remember, when Harrison left him alone for what must have been days at a time. He actually started to worry the saline would run out. No explanation when Harrison returned and he was too afraid to ask in case it was a punishment. For all he knows, Harrison leaves him sedated for days or weeks at a time. The heart monitor picks up its pace at the thought and his palms start to sweat.
By the time Harrison deigns to show up, he’s practically shaking. He pointedly ignores the opaque plastic bag Harrison drops between his bound ankles and tries to play his mounting nerves off as chills.
Harrison wastes no time pulling on a pair of gloves to stick a thermometer in his ear. “Finally,” he mutters, when it beeps that it’s finished without the added tones signaling a high temperature.
“What did you have for breakfast?” he blurts, if only to distract himself.
Harrison snorts. “What kind of question is that?”
His face heats but he tries to get off the back foot. “You don’t want to tell me?”
“Open.”
He swallows and obeys. Harrison clicks on his penlight and runs a gloved fingertip along his gumline until he finds the sore spot. It still hurts. The pressure makes him inhale sharply, but it’s not nearly as bad as yesterday.
Satisfied, Harrison releases him and pockets the light. “I don’t care,” Harrison says, stepping back, out of his line of sight. “Eggs.”
“Oh.” He’s not sure what he expects to get out of this. He eyes the bag at the foot of the bed and tries to hear what Harrison is preparing behind him. His heart starts to stutter. “What kind?”
Silence. Then, “What are you doing?”
“What? Nothing.” His panic makes him sound like he is guilty of something. He clears his throat. “You’re awfully defensive about your breakfast.”
“Do you hear how ridiculous you sound?”
“Right back at you.”
Harrison returns, pulling the instrument tray along with him. He cranes the millimeter of leeway he has to check that all it holds is a surgical basin and the nozzled water bottle. “We’re not doing this,” Harrison says flatly.
“Doing what? I just asked how you eat your eggs.”
“You cannot possibly be that bored.”
“Try me.”
Harrison rolls his eyes and lowers the head of the bed so he’s lying flat. He reaches for the plastic bag. “This should entertain you plenty.” He pulls out a brand new toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste.
“You’re kidding.”
Harrison tears open the toothbrush.
“No. No way.” He wishes he could shake his head, turn away. He balls his hands into fists and pulls at the restraints out of habit.
“I promise I’ll be gentle,” Harrison mocks, unscrewing the toothpaste.
His stomach twists. “Harrison.”
“You’re acting like I’m trying to put a scalpel in your mouth. Look—” He turns the tube of toothpaste so he can see. “I even got mint for you.”
“What? That’s the most universal flavor. Everyone uses mint.”
“Exactly, I could have gotten you something disgusting, like children’s blue raspberry that’s safe to swallow, but I decided to be nice.”
“Your sainthood must be in the mail.”
Harrison snorts a laugh. “Alright, stop stalling.” He squeezes a line of green paste onto the pristine white brush.
“Wait, wait.” The heart monitor blares and he pulls uselessly against the restraints.
“Jesus,” Harrison says, eyes flicking to the screen. “There’s no way it still hurts that much and this is more for your other teeth anyway. Pretend you’re at the dentist.”
“It doesn’t,” he agrees frantically. “Please, it’s just—”
He sits back on the stool. At least he’s not standing over him. “What?”
“Please?” Tears well in his eyes.
Harrison raises his eyebrows.
He doesn’t say anything. He feels hot and sticky, his heart still racing. He wants to squirm, wrap his arms around himself, hold a hand out in defense.
Time’s up. Harrison stands and reaches for his chin.
“Please, I don’t—I can’t—” Harrison pauses above him, gloved hand midair. He swallows a sob, forces himself to take a deep breath. “Please, Harrison. Please let me do this by myself.”
“Seriously?”
He wishes he could nod instead of having to speak. “Yeah.” His voice cracks.
“Why this?”
“It’s just—” His mind unhelpfully recalls the sponge bath debacle. The heart monitor ticks up again. “I don’t know.”
Harrison clicks his tongue. “Well try because I already don’t give a shit.”
He bites his lip. It’s a risk but he’s pretty sure his chances of changing his fate are scalpel-thin anyway. “I don’t think that’s true at all.”
Harrison does not look amused.
“Just admit it,” he rushes to say before Harrison tries to garrote him with the toothbrush.
“I’m not the focus here,” Harrison says flatly.
“You were worried yesterday. Genuinely worried.”
“Only about losing someone who can actually handle this.” Harrison keeps his tone level but he shifts his weight between his feet.
He stifles a smirk. “It’s more than that, you could sedate me way more than you do.”
“It’s not about your personality.”
“Prove it,” he challenges, maybe a little too confidently.
Harrison thinks for a minute, a crease appearing between his blond brows. He wants to slap the smug look off his face the minute Harrison starts grinning. “I never named you.”
He feels it like a sucker punch but scrambles to recover. “Yeah but you know all my names.”
“That doesn’t count. Those are past lives. I know those people as well as any other stranger on the street.”
He can’t quite fill his lungs.
Harrison waits a minute to see if he’s done. “Honestly, I give it a B minus for effort. You’re capable of more.” Harrison pulls the overhead light into position and clicks it on. “Open up.”
He swallows, blinking through tears. Even though he’s mostly just blinded, he tries to plead with his eyes.
“God, you’re being so dramatic.”
Harrison brushes one tooth at a time. Top, inside, outside, moving methodically from back to front.
He locks every muscle, pulls against each restraint, grounding himself with anything other than the feeling of Harrison’s gloved finger holding his cheek to the side and…brushing his fucking teeth for him. He tries not to think about how few things he has left that make him feel like a person.
“Are you going to cry the entire time?” Harrison groans. “Is it because of your unrequited dream to hold a toothbrush again or are you still upset about being nameless?”
Harrison doesn’t stop brushing his teeth, so he must not expect an answer.
“Don’t waste your tears on the last one, it’s not like we’re on a first-name basis anyway.”
He forgets about the light and opens his eyes but of course he can’t see shit. He bites the toothbrush.
“Hey, watch it,” Harrison warns.
“What do you mean,” he grits through his locked jaw.
Harrison pulls at the toothbrush. “Open your mouth.”
He doesn’t like defying him when he can’t see his face but he does it anyway. “Answer the question.”
Harrison sighs long-sufferingly. “I’m a doctor,” he says, like it answers everything.
He doesn’t let go of the brush .
“Dr. Harrison.” He clicks his tongue, irritated. “Harrison is my last name. I’m not going around introducing myself like some fucking pediatrician or Dr. Phil.”
Dr. Harrison.
“Can we finish this now?”
Harrison grips the toothbrush again and he lets him have it, jaw a little slack anyway as he tries to wrap his head around the fact that he really doesn’t know the first thing about him.
“Spit.”
“What?”
Harrison taps the basin against his chin. “Spit.”
He’s sitting up again. He does as he’s told. Harrison gives him a mouthful of water from the nozzle of the bottle, has him swish it around and spit again. Harrison disappears, the sound of the sink following. He doesn’t even care that he didn’t get an actual drink of water.
He waits for the sink to shut off. “I can’t believe you’ve been lying to me this whole time, even after all your pious bullshit.”
Harrison sighs behind him. “I’m not.”
“Fine, lying by omission. Whatever.”
Harrison rolls into view on the stool, pocketing his phone. “Are you going to be like this all day?”
“Fuck you.”
Harrison rolls his eyes. “Why do you care so much about my name? It’s not like we’re fucking, as you incessantly remind me.”
The back of his neck prickles hotly. “Yeah, you’re just cutting me open and rearranging my nerves.”
“Exactly. It’s completely different.”
“Oh, get fucked.” He looks up, blinking away angry tears.
“What?” Harrison asks, with all the trimmings of someone writing an AITA? post.
“You’ve had your hands inside my skull.”
“So?” Harrison matches his volume. “That doesn’t entitle you to anything. This isn’t a partnership. I owe you nothing.”
“Fuck you.” He’s crying now but he pushes on anyway. “This is a two way street and you know it. You rely on me not to croak just as much as I rely on you not to fucking kill me.”
“And?”
“Unbelieveable.”
Harrison fiddles with the collar of his lab coat. “This is just work. You’re confused if you think my investment in not having to start from scratch has anything to do with you personally.”
He laughs bitterly. “You’re blinded by your God complex.”
Harrison seethes. For a split second he feels afraid. “And you clearly haven’t overcome all of your brainwashing if you’ve…imprinted on me like this.”
“Do you even hear yourself?” He scoffs. “How ridiculous you sound?”
“Hey—”
“You refuse to see it. You’re not just lying to me, you’re lying to yourself.”
“I’m leaving.” Harrison spins on his heel.
“Yeah, run away. That’ll prove me wrong.”
Harrison keeps walking.
“Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”
“You’re impossible,” Harrison mutters.
“You’re a fucking liar,” he shouts.
“Enough.” He turns back and halves the distance between them in a blink, gloved finger raised in warning.
He tries to catch his breath, searching Harrison’s face. Harrison waits, unblinking, his own chest rising and falling faster than usual.
Maybe it’s knowing Harrison could have killed him yesterday and didn’t that spurs him on. Or maybe he has a death wish afterall.
“Or. What.”
Harrison’s expression darkens.
Every muscle in his body tenses as Harrison steps closer. He holds his breath and bites his tongue to stop himself from taking it back. But Harrison passes to the cabinets behind him. He hears the snap of a glass bottle being set down on the metal countertop and his heart stops.
When he sees the needle, the tears come on their own but he still doesn’t back down. Second chances don’t exist in Harrison’s world anyway.
Harrison injects it into his neck because he knows exactly how much he hates it.
Because it is personal.
He meets Harrison’s glare and waits for something, anything. Pain, hallucinations, hives all over his body until his throat closes, hours of vomiting. There’s no way Harrison would pick the euphoria one again but he wouldn’t put anything past him.
It’s a sedative.
The sound of the heart monitor grows distant, as does his awareness of his breath. He thinks a sob slips from his lips but he can’t hear it.
Harrison doesn’t blink, doesn’t yield.
“You’re still running away,” he slurs.
Everything goes black.
***
He’s face down on the table when he comes to. Of course he is. The awareness of how he secured his most recent medically-induced coma hits him like a train.
“Can you read that?” Harrison sticks his phone into his eyeline. It’s the lock screen, the time and date over an abstract swirl of colors. “October 12th. I put you out three days ago.” Harrison pulls his phone back and sticks another needle into his neck.
“You’re proving me right.” He’s not sure it comes out as words at all.
Back to darkness.
***
Face down, again. Or still. His head aches but he remembers. Unfortunately.
Harrison holds out his phone for him to see. “October 17th,” he reads.
His heart stutters.
“That’s five more days, in case you can’t do the math.”
“Is that the stock background?” he grits, his throat dry. “A liar and a psycho.”
Pinch.
Gone.
***
The phone is blurred by his tears the third time.
“October 26th.” Harrison’s voice sounds far away. “Nine more days.” Harrison pauses, clears his throat. “Seventeen in total.”
He doesn’t want this, he wants to apologize.
Harrison doesn’t give him the chance.
The darkness chokes him into silence. He didn’t even feel it this time.
***
Something is different.
He’s on his back and the head of the bed is raised. There are scans on the light box that weren’t there before.
“We’re testing a new set of electrodes today,” Harrison says quietly, looking down as he types something on the tablet.
He can’t see Harrison’s face to know how to respond. He doesn’t have it in him to keep fighting, not if it means being exiled into a coma again. If Harrison’s still furious, silence might be better than an apology. He waits.
A handful of minutes pass. Harrison puts away the tablet and comes to stand at his side. He just looks tired. From his expression to his eyes and the way he carries himself, hands hanging limp at his sides.
“Okay?” Harrison asks softly.
He tries to nod until the restraint reminds him he can’t. He swallows. “Okay.” It comes out a whisper. Fitting for how precarious and fragile everything feels.
Harrison wouldn’t lie about it again, he thinks.
He doesn’t bring it up.
Masterlist
@octopus-reactivated @maracujatangerine @nick-pascal @whumpy-writings @cracked-porcelain-princess
@meetmeinhellcroutons @thingsthatgo-whump-inthenight @jo-doe-seeking-inspo @neuro-whump
@wolfeyedwitch @skyhawkwolf @haro-whumps @onlybadendings
@peachy-panic @fillthedarkvoid @rabass @crystalquartzwhump @dont-touch-my-soup
@mylifeisonthebookshelf @hold-him-down @guachipongo @creetchure @leyswhumpdump
@aseasonwithclarasblog @catawhumpus @magziemakeswhatever @pigeonwhumps @batfacedliar-yetagain
@whumpinthepot @dustypinetree @whump-in-progress @light-me-on-pyre @whumps-and-bumps
@i-eat-worlds @hellodecisionparalysis @heartfullofhoney @alternateminds @taterswhump
@handsinmotion @arobear @dj-subwoofer @deluxewhump @wildliferehabstudent
