i'd like to offer to you the idea of zayne who stays in the bathroom to wash his hands a little longer than what's usual inside the confinement of one's home, the habit of scrubbing in staying with him even outside the walls of the hospital. one day after you two return home from an outing, you've long patted your hands dry, but he's still standing in front of the sink. thick foam of soap covering his dextrous fingers, spreading all the way up his forearms, ending slightly below his elbows. his moves are thorough and practiced. scrub the nails in a back-and-forth motion approximately 30 times. 10 strokes across the surface of the palm. divide your forearm into thirds, scrub each third 10 times. once you scrub an area do not go back, he recounts internally, the words of instruction replaying in his mind with enough familiarity that he doesn't really notice them anymore, nor the way that his hands are following them, even though the sink in front of him belongs to your bathroom, not to the hospital.
the fact that he never noticed this habit before only occurs to him when you mention it, leaning against the doorway, watching him as patiently as he washed his hands. "your hand soap certainly smells more pleasant than chlorhexidine," zayne notes in response as he passes by you on his way out, pressing an amused kiss to the crown of your head.