" Not a single breath can ever part me from you, your arms; your love. "
A strained smiled graced his features as he half-heartedly greeted another customer, sharpie poised between his fingers, ready to jot down the next order as quickly as possible. This was supposed to be Luhan’s day off. The day he’d been planning on using to take Leon out for dinner to sort of make up for the fact that they hadn’t been able to spend the older male’s birthday together. Instead, he was stuck behind the cashier as yet another woman leaned obscenely low while looking at the display case with the different desserts they offered, giving him a good look at her generous cleavage, because several of his coworkers had fallen victims to the flu virus going around, not even performing the job for which he was actually employed. Her breasts were nice, really nice at least. And he was sure that they would be very well appreciated by someone who was interested in girls. Instead, the man wrote down her order and rang her up, speeding her on her way to a table and away from the counter. The frequency with which he had to deal with situations like that made him wonder if he should invest in a small pin with the words ‘hello, I’m gay’ written neatly across it. It seemed like it would save him a lot of trouble.
Golden eyes travelled to the wall opposite to where the shifter was standing, taking in the time that was displayed on the surface of the clock. Only two more hours of work and then he could go home. Or well, the vampire’s apartment seeing as he’d spent far more time there than in his own since the day the being had left for his trip to Moscow. Now that he was back, Luhan had taken to clinging to his side more often. Lost somewhere between his own thoughts and taking down orders, the time passed by, making the Chinese man increasingly impatient to get out of the small coffee shop. When someone finally came to tap him on the shoulder and tell him he could go home, it took more effort than he was willing to admit to refrain from cheering out loud. The last thing he needed was to make his boss think that he hated coming in to work. Normally he loved it, it was just that today he’d had other plans n how he wanted to spend the day. Wrapping his coat tightly around himself to protect him from the chilly air, the brown haired male made his way out to the street to get a taxi, his lover’s apartment too far away for him to walk there.
Placing his own set of keys down on the small table near the front door, Luhan breathed in a sigh of relief as he slipped off his shoes, the familiar smell of roses and cinnamon meeting his sensitive nose, accompanied by small hints of his own scent. He would never admit it out loud, but it made him secretly glad that little by little, the other’s apartment was starting to feel and look like it was his own home. Deciding to take a quick shower before Leon got home, the shifter made his way down the hall, humming a soft tune he’d heard on the radio along the way. Warm water running down his soft skin, Luhan relaxed underneath the spray, enjoying the opportunity to unwind from his day at the café. Rinsing the soap off his body, he almost doesn’t hear as the door is opened and closed once more, alerting him to the arrival of the man he’d been wanting to see all day. Turning off the water, the younger of the two grabbed a fluffy towel and dried himself off quickly before wrapping the fabric around his waist and hurrying his way out of the bathroom, unconcerned with his state of undressed.
Almost as soon as he opened the door, the stench of blood assaulted him, making him stagger. If it was strong enough to permeate the air like that it meant that there is a lot of it and it made the shifter gag, bracing himself against the nearest wall. For all that he is a natural predator, Luhan would rather not have to watch something or someone bleed unless it is absolutely necessary. Momentarily thrown off by the cloying scent, it took a moment for the implications of it to fully register in his mind and when they did, he was all but sprinting down the hallway.
“Leon!” he practically shrieked when he saw the man collapsed by the entrance, dropping to his knees by his side. “Leon..Leon..Asce..!” The younger man repeated the names as he reached out for the vampire and pulling him into his lap, appalled by the amount of blood that covers him. “What happened to you?” Luhan demanded as he took his towel and pressed it against the gaping wound, gently prying a cold hand away from the injury.
He had no idea how much time that had passed between him closing his eyes and then opening them again and it was infuriating. It could have been a second or an hour and he couldn’t tell. Every part of his body ached, every muscle feeling as if it had been torn into tiny little pieces and then put together in an improper way, for fun, leaving cracks everywhere. His fingers left his neck for a moment, wiggling stiffly, sticky with blood still as he glanced at them through layers of long eyelashes and a heap of red strands. Everything was spinning, one second he was flying and the other he was falling. This had him squeamish, curling up on the flooring as if he had to watch out for a gaping hole somewhere in the flooring, crawling further away from the door before he stopped moving again, breaths strained as they were drawn once again, coughing repeatedly, causing his chest to feel as if it was about to implode due to the instant adding of pressure.
The sound of footsteps didn’t cease, rather the opposite and it had him confused. Bare feet upon wooden flooring, it made no sense. He was supposed to be alone, no one was supposed to dwell within his home, not as far as he could remember. They sounded hurried, another thing not making any sense and in the end he decided to discard the thought. Imagining rescue is dumb. He told himself, restless mind soon soothing itself. He was sure, he wasn’t going to make it through this. The loss of blood, the cracked bones. How was he supposed to get anything out of this? There was no way he’d be able to hunt like this, and no way he’d be able to get into his own kitchen, to reach for the few stacked bags of blood he actually had manage to acquire. Beaten by the devil, isn’t a too bad way to go I suppose. If it weren’t for the fact that he stole my pride. Bastard. A small grin curled at his lips for a moment, vanishing when the footsteps sounded as if they were only a few feet away from his head, causing him to flinch as they stopped. Heartbeat and breaths, there was indeed someone there, but he was too weary to rise his head and have a peek.
No use. At first he thought it was the man again, that he had followed him all the way back here to finish it, and of course he didn’t mind. Leon never minded anything. Easily adapting to a situation, no matter what it concerned, raised to do so and of course performing according to it. Behaving like he had been told each and every day. Humdrum and habituated. Tiring and fruitless of course, but there was nothing else he could do, nothing more he knew how to do. It wasn’t until his ears caught the shrieking that he realized he had been wrong, golden eyes almost shooting open when he realized exactly who it was. Oh no. His lips parted, he wanted to shout at him to go away, leave and never return but his words hitched in his throat, only thing leaving him being a wheezing sound and another cough, causing him to grimace.
He barely reacted when he was moved onto the younger male’s lap, looking up at him with weary yet vivid orbs, expression plain seeing as keeping something, wether it was a smile or a pout, for more than five seconds sent immense flashes of pain through his head. He wanted to speak, wanted to tell, but he just couldn’t bring himself to do it, knowing there would be nothing more than desperate wheezing as he parted his lips. Instead, he forced himself to raise one of his hands, the one not sticky with blood but only stained a fair bit, cupping his cheek as he gave him a stern stare, trying to express with his eyes what he could not say. Leave. he protested by squirming when his hand was moved and then replaced by the towel, shaking his head as much as he could manage, grimace after grimace twisting his features. “Go home." He then managed to hiss in the heat of the moment, glad he had managed to say something yet concerned only a moment later. And so he stilled, pausing for several seconds, close to terrified, not knowing what would happen next. Out of control.