@curaetive I can’t find the original (was it an ask or a answered meme oops) but have a thing:
A frown mars her brow and lips purse, hand reaching up to cup his cheek for half a moment’s time. “I mean it, Lou boo… you keep showing up here all banged up and it’s starting to make me worry. I can fix you. Trust me.” Blue eyes wide with sincerity, katie takes his hand in her own, covering his bloodied knuckles with her palm.
Taking a deep breath, she lets her eyes fall shut, wincing ever so slightly as a tingly sort of warmth seems to flow between them. Looking closely would reveal her own knuckles looking worse for wear, but only for a moment. The skin knits itself back together, and when she finally lets his hand go, there’s not even a trace of his cuts and scrapes. “See,” Katie murmurs, “Let me help you…”
He grins at her words, leaning into her touch. “Don’t worry so much, baby. I’m tougher than I look.” Which was saying something considering his usual state of being. But then she’s taking his hand, and his skin tingles beneath hers. He watches their hands, watches his own injuries claw their way out of her own knuckles and his hand tenses under hers, trying to pull away but she’s holding onto his hand tightly.
Finally she releases him and he doesn’t look at his own hand first, he grasps hers, studying it worriedly. He knows the marks on his skin as intimately as a lover; always cataloguing his injuries, always taking stock of what hurts, what doesn’t, what’s ready to hurt again. He knows these marks, these marks are his- but they’re not anymore? They’re hers… or they were, moments ago. The wounds vanish and he drops her hand, taking an almost nervous step away from her, cracking his knuckles and feeling the unfamiliar sensation of… nothing. No pain, no twinges of ache, no anything.
“Don’t do that again, kate, okay?” Flustered blue eyes meet hers, still a pace away from her, watching her warily, like he expects her to jump him and take the rest of his wounds away, the rest of the lingering aches he’s given to his body since teenhood. “Don’t fix me, don’t take the pain, please.” There’s a desperate lilt to his voice, “You can’t do that, okay?” Already there’s an itch to go back to the Pit, to regain his blood and bruises, to regain that visible badge of brawling honor. What if he forgot what the pain felt like? What if he couldn’t take it again next time? What if the monster notices he’s not in pain, how quickly will he lose control on himself? What happens then?
He doesn’t know. He hasn’t been uninjured since he was fifteen. It’s the only way to keep himself balanced.
