I follow Nate into the bathroom all but ten minutes later. Like all the other windows of the house, the little window above the toilet and the one opposite, in the shower, are boarded up; only the one above the toilet is missing glass. And just like the entire house, this room is dark, with next to no light getting in naturally. Almost every single tile is cracked, chunks of the mirror are missing, and it looks like someone thought the shower rose was valuable. Huh.
Nate dumps his bag by the toilet and turns to face me. "I'm fine," he says. He barely contains a wince, and favours his left side. "I've done this plenty of times."
I toss my bag onto the floor next to his. "I don't care. I'm helping."
He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, chest expanding. Then he shuts the door – no, he shoves it into place, the bottom of the wood scraping along the floor – closing the two of us into this tiny room.
Nate turns back to me, and I can now see the circles under his eyes, the bruises, the cuts, all underneath the blood he hasn't been bothered to wipe away. "You want to help?" he says gruffly. He sits on the toilet and leans back against the cistern. "There's a needle and thread in my pack."
I feel his eyes on me as I kneel beside him and search through my stuff, then through his. I come back with the needle and thread and my near-full bottle of vodka. I twist the cap and toss it to the floor.
"Don't waste it on me," Nate says. From the corner of my eye I see the side of his mouth turn upward. "I'd rather drink it."
"Tough luck," I reply.
Nate huffs a laugh and closes his eyes. "Sounds like a plan." He truly looks exhausted, battered. But he deserved every single one of them bar the gunshot wound.
I clear my throat and realise I'm staring. Thank god his eyes are closed – but they crack open an inch at the sound of my voice. "Shirt off," I demand.
Nate drags himself forward, his body like jelly, not made up of muscle, tissue, bone, and blood. "Whatever the lady says." He moves to shrug off his jacket, but the material clings to him, the blood seeping from his shoulder acting as a glue.
"Oh, definitely."
He gets his right arm through the sleeve, and unfortunately can't get the other off without grunting and wincing. So I put the bottle of vodka on the floor and lean forward until all my weight is on my knees. I grab the collar and the sleeve just below the shoulder, just beneath the wound, and slowly peel back the jacket. Nate swears something colourful as the jacket finally comes off, and I toss it away.
Next it's his shirt, which clings to him like a second skin – perhaps one size too small, as the short sleeves are so tight around his biceps they look like they're about to explode out of it.
The knife I usually hide in my boot is in my pack, courtesy of Nate. I lean back against my heels beside him, beside the toilet. "I'm going to have to cut," I say.
He drags his gaze away from his shoulder to look at me. "Fine."
I grab the knife from my pack, and take a moment to think of how to approach what I need to do next. Obviously it's a moment too short, because as I shove the blade under the sleeve, it's right by the wound. I slice the blade upward.
I think he means to strike me so I jerk back, but all he does is grab his shoulder, blood seeping through his fingers from where the material gave way. He looks up at me then, chest heaving, and damn, could looks kill. "What the fuck?" he growls. He glares at me. "Jesus fucking Christ."
It's bad enough that he didn't ask me to be here in the first place, so I think it'll only make things worse if I admit I made a mistake and misjudged the whole thing. So I stay quiet and pull at the remains of his shirt, and tug it over his head before he can protest or say another word. His necklace – consisting of two silver rings – sits heavy against his skin.
"I can do this myself," Nate says, hair ruffled as I wedge his shirt under my arm and put the knife in my boot. He holds out his good hand, palm up, and rests it on his knee.
His left arm hangs, drooping slightly from the shoulder, and he cradles it in his lap. I try not to look at him properly, at the big picture right in front of me. I try to keep my gaze focussed on his face, away from the man who sits half-naked inches away from me. But despite being an ass, I can appreciate him being a beautiful specimen to look at.
"You are a shitty patient," I say, closing his hand. It stays closed for maybe half a second before his fingers wrap around my wrist and force me to stop moving.
"I didn't ask you to be here," he retorts, voice low.
I pry his fingers one by one from my skin and return his hand to his lap. "Maybe I want to be," I reply. I pick up the bottle of vodka, remove the shirt from under my arm, and pour a small amount onto it. And before Nate can even brace himself, I reach up and wipe the shirt over his face, and he closes his eyes so I don't accidentally get alcohol in them.
I wipe at his chin, at his cheeks, gentle in my ministrations. He hisses when I press the material to his bruised cheek, and that's when I pull away.
"Enough," he manages. His voice is hoarse. He touches his cheek and instantly regrets the decision.
I blow a stray bit of hair from my face and lean back on my heels. "Fine."
Nate slouches on the toilet and rests his head against the cistern. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, probably to ready himself for what I'm about to do – and because he now knows from experience that I'm probably not that good at what I'm about to do.
With his attention off me for the moment – thank god – I lean forward and take a good look at his injury. Or I try to, until my hair falls over my shoulder and I scoop it up and over the other shoulder before Nate can notice. Blood seeps from his wound, oozes out, and flows down his body, over his chest, moving south. But the injury itself is clean; the bullet passed straight through.
I push myself to my feet and take the vodka with me. I drop the bloody shirt onto Nate's lap and in response, he cracks his eyes open. "Some party we're having," I say. I walk over to the sink and turn one of the taps, listening as water moves through the pipes within the walls. Brown water suddenly bursts into the sink, and when it finally runs clear, I scrub away at the blood that cakes my hand with both water and alcohol.
Nate snorts. "If you can even call it that," he says. He groans, and in the mirror I see him try to straighten his body on the toilet – without much luck. He presses his hand to his shoulder again and winces. "I've had worse," he says to my reflection.
I wipe my hands on my shirt. "I can only imagine," I reply.
He smirks at this. "And I've fixed myself plenty of times."
"By yourself?" I ask. "Without any help?"
He shrugs his shoulders and bites down on a groan. "More or less."
I turn to him now. "Let's do it before it has the chance to get worse," I say. "Do you want me to dab it on with your shirt or do you want me to pour it right over you?"
Nate leans forward, which only causes more blood to fall past his fingers. He never takes his eyes off me, even when it gets to the point of staring. "Either or," he says finally. "It's painful regardless."
He would know. And I do, too. The amount of times I've hurt myself and then had to sterilise the wound ... I don't envy him at all.
"Touché," I say finally. I return to Nate's side, vodka at the ready. I kneel down on the floor beside him again, and with my free hand I reach for him and push against his chest, ignoring the heat that sears through my palm.
He's strong enough to push me away, he's strong enough to stop me, but he allows me to control the situation, and he lets me touch him and manipulate his movements. He lets me push his chest until he leans back, almost reclining on the toilet.
I lean forward again, right over him, to get another – better – look at his injury, though I have to pry his fingers away to do so. Thankfully I don't faint at the sight of blood, or the smell of it. It hangs in the air, a cloying smell, and it's so sharp I'm surprised it hasn't yet given me a headache.
Though I pulled his hand from his injury, I realise I haven't let go of him – or vice versa. He toys with my fingers, and his free hand pushes my hair behind my ear. "Are you usually this friendly?" Nate asks quietly, and I'm so close to him that his words tickle my skin.
"Depends on the person, I suppose," I reply.
Okay, dangerous territory. Half-naked hot guy sitting before me and I'm practically straddling him? Time to tread carefully. I pull back, breaking his hold on my hand, and his fingers flitter against the skin of my ear. Sitting again on my heels, I'm barely able to contain the shiver that runs down my body from his touch. "Okay. Are you ready?"
Nate closes his eyes, releases a sigh, then opens them again. Then he looks at me, blue eyes bright and keen. "Do it."
So I do.
Every profanity known to man spills from Nate's mouth, and his body bucks under me, under my hold, under the steady stream of vodka. He closes his eyes again, screws them shut, and grits his teeth to stifle his groans.
The clear liquid pours down his skin, over his muscles and tattoos, but turns pink as it mixes with his blood.
His chest heaves when I pull back the bottle and cut off the stream of vodka. "Maybe we should've done on the count of three," he rasps, voice hoarse. His eyes are hooded. He leans further back against the toilet, the cistern no doubt a steady anchor.
"I find it better to do it quickly, like a Band-Aid," I say, and he looks at me then, indignation stark across his face.
"You didn't get shot," he snaps.
"No, I didn't," I say. "But it's much easier if I do help you, and because I am helping you, we do it my way."
Nate growls, our seemingly intimate moment of before all but forgotten. "I should've left you on the side of the road," he murmurs as he leans forward. He leans his elbows on his knees, his back exposed, and more blood falls from his injury down his front. But he doesn't care. He winces again at the discomfort, of the stretching of the wound, but he knows this is the only way.
Last night – last night which feels like years ago – I only saw his front. Now I get a view of his back, which is covered in one huge tattoo. Completely separate to the one that runs over his shoulder and down his arm and over a small section of his neck, but done in a very similar style. Great black, swirling wings are inked on him, and they move every time the muscles in his back move.
I ignore the blood stain on the cistern as I pour more alcohol on him. His list of responding profanities are even more colourful than before, and he tries his best not to twist out of the way. A pink river flows down his back, tracking all the way to his jeans and then to the floor.
Once it's done, I pull away and gently grab his shoulder to move him into the position I want – as close to having his back as straight as possible, though he does slouch forward slightly – and then pass him the vodka.
"Phase one complete," I say to him, and he wordlessly accepts the bottle. He takes a long swig, which surprises me, seeing as it is straight vodka.
"Okay," Nate says finally. "Do your worst."
Grabbing the needle and thread, I push our belongings aside to make more room – which isn't much because the bathroom is tiny. Nate's body covered in sweat, his hair is plastered to his head, and I resist every urge to push it away.
"You can drink all you want," I say as I pluck the vodka from his hand, ignoring yet another look of indignation as I put the open bottle on the floor beside him, "but I need some left so I can sterilise the stitches when I'm done – which I think you would prefer as opposed to potentially getting drunk."
"Getting drunk seems to be pretty reasonable right now," Nate replies, and despite being sweaty and pale, a ghost of a smirk flitters across his lips. He looks so damn tired, the bags under his eyes a stark contrast against his skin.
Thread and needle in hand, I change positions and move between his legs, providing me with a better angle for stitching. My kneeling on the ground brings me level with his chest, which in turn makes it easier to access his injury. But it also brings my face close to Nate's, and he doesn't help the matter when he drops his head; he all but needs to lean forward just slightly and he could rest his forehead on my shoulder.
I can't shove him away because I'm already threading the needle, careful not to poke my eye out or poke his skin – which maybe I should do to remind him that I'm only doing this to help him, not for some other reason.
Nate inhales, and I feel it, feel his breath against my neck, getting past my shirt collar. And then he does lean forward, and I feel his nose brush my jaw, then his lips on my neck.
Dangerous, dangerous territory. And I'm powerless against it. Well, not really, considering it actually feels good, but also, I could move away. But then, I'm also the one with the needle. And I can do shit with a needle.
"Careful," I whisper, and I make sure to keep my attention focussed on the task at hand. Speaking of hands ...
He's smart enough to keep his hands resting on his thighs, which are on either side of me. But they could be on me within seconds, and I don't know if I'm pleased or disappointed that they don't go anywhere.
I really need to get my mind out of the gutter.
"You want it," Nate murmurs, lips as soft as butterfly wings against my skin. I become hyper aware of him, of how he sits, how close we are, his lips on my skin.
I need to get out of this situation, I need to put some distant between me and this drunk. So I pull back slightly to break the contact, and ask him a question that would sober anyone up. "Where were you when the bombs dropped?"