#giving them pills or liquid medicine stresses them out but guess what? still gotta do it

[boy-above]

some people lose all critical thinking skills upon seeing an animal video

[windingdrabble]

     “Y’ look nice.”

     ‘Nice’ doesn’t exactly cut it. It works, sure-- Ruby’s crossed the ‘nice’ bar easily, it isn’t incorrect, but it isn’t enough. His fur looks nice when the light from the moon hits it. The nurses gave him pain medication, and it’s working well enough to where his smile is small but constant and there and soft and calm and nice. Ruby makes a joke at his eyes’ expense every time he gets the opportunity to, but he keeps fluttering them open and closed and the quick, delicate blinks are curtains to his foggy eyes that Sonic can’t bring himself to think aren’t nice still. Maybe he’s covered in bandages and bruises but he’s still nice, even if calling it ‘nice’ adds to the bubble of frustration and confusion in him. Nice isn’t quite right, but it’s the only thing he can bring himself to think of, and that’s already enough to make him break eye contact.

Ruby’s eyes open and stay open for longer this time, looking up at Sonic. There’s a bandage on his cheek, but Sonic grins a little stiffled grin when he bets to himself the blush could probably show through the gauze. 

“I look like shit,” the other deadpans, turning his head a little to the right on Sonic’s lap. The motion gets him a little closer to the hand Sonic has hovering over that side of his face. Sonic’s reluctant thumb tucks in closer to graze over Ruby’s nose, and after a few beats of serene (odd, misplaced, but not unwelcomed serene-- serene is a luxury to them both) silence, Ruby buries his muzzles into Sonic’s palm with a sigh. Sonic can’t help but not be able to stiffle the grin any longer, chest warm and cheeks red. He can’t tell yet if Ruby’s naturally this touchy or not-- he’s more often than not on some sort of pill or pain killer and SOnic knows from experience that definitely is a factor to consider-- but it’s-- also nice. Sometimes, when they both seem to gravitate towards sitting in the same spot and lean into eachother, it’s nice.

“How would you know?” Sonic replies, a little amusement in his voice. Ruby just... ending up half-asleep on his lap was already endearing (endearing-- endearing is nice, and it’s a little better than nice, but endearing doesn’t fill up the space in his heart Ruby has carved himself a home into) but hiding his face in his hand makes him smile crooked-- he can feel it.

“I just do,” Ruby replies, in his endless, stubborn wisdom. Sonic rolls his eyes, tracing the outline of Ruby’s eye with a stray thumb.

“Flawless logic, O’ Wise One. I’m the only one who can tell if y’ look like shit or not.”

He feels Ruby smile the smallest bit wider, and his heart skips a beat, and Ruby hides in his palm again and sunlight falls over Sonic’s back.  

“You are biased,” Ruby replies not-exactly-incorrectly (he still looks nice, still looks endearing wrapped up in all the bandages and casts), quiet and muffled. “You are the second least qualified to tell me if I look like shit or not.”

“Hey, I’m not second best at anything,” Sonic feigns insult, despite the smile in his voice. Ruby’s face isn’t as warm as it was when he was in the throughs of sickness weeks ago, but Sonic prefers it this way. If Ruby’s fever had come back that quickly that fast he would’ve been kicking down the doctor’s door forever ago. “If I gotta be unqualified I gotta be the most unqualified or no dice.”

Ruby opens his right eye to roll it, and Sonic huffs. Ruby complains that his eyes are useless now, but of course he doesn’t skip out of putting up a show of annoyance. 

“You make no sense,” he comments, closing his eye again when Sonic’s other hand gently brushes the fur near his ear. Sonic’s familiar with longing now, or familiar with it enough to at least recognize its pull at Ruby so easily giving in to the affection, at his still-relatively-peaceful smile under the moonlight still streaming in through the window, at the breath he feels dance over his hand as Ruby eases into him more. Sonic hasn’t made sense for a long time now, and for once, it isn’t daunting or scary or stressful.

“You don’t either,” Sonic shrugs, brushing over the pathways on the side fo Ruby’s face that are starting to become somewhat familiar, that are still drawing out that longing. 

It shouldn’t be too long before the hospital discharges Ruby. He’s getting his casts removed... in a few weeks (Sonic tries to keep track of all the dates, but for the life of him everything is still so liquid and runny and it blends together a lot), he’s been face mask free for a while now, he’s allowed to be carried outside and to hobble around more and more with Sonic to keep an eye on things. He won’t need to be tied down to a bed pretty soon, he won’t have to take as many medicines, he won’t have to move so little. He won’t have to get pain meds and curl up like this and joke in a quiet voice, the only voice in the room, and the only voice in the world Sonic wants to listen to at the moment. He won’t need distractions from the hospital at night, he won’t need conversations at four am (it was four last time he checked, before climbing on the bed), he won’t need Sonic to brush his quills absentmindedly (he isn’t absentminded-- he’s very present and very aware and very invested in where Ruby moves, what he says, how his fur moves against Sonic’s fingers, how his lips move against Sonic’s palm, how he looks so okay for once in forever and Sonic wants him to be okay forever), he won’t need Sonic to ‘accidentally’ have to stay where he is for the rest of the night, back to propped up pillows and hands gently discovering where he can scratch to get Ruby to be less grumpy.

The longing tugs, familiar anxiety seeping into the calm atmosphere. 

Where would Ruby go after this? Sonic may be working on the whole Chaos Control... Control thing, but he can’t manage as much back and forth as he does from the hospital to anywhere else in his world. That’s his world, where everything is a five minute run away at most. Ruby’s home is in his corner of the multiverse, and Sonic shifts uncomfortably at the thought of leaving Ruby (stubborn, way too godamn stubborn Ruby) to his own devices with a hole in his chest, alone in a world Mephiles likes to frequent. Sonic hasn’t been able to track down that thing since the whole mess went down-- his Super Sonic memories have always been a little... dreamlike. 

Ruby could want him to stay away, now that he won’t need as much care. Sonic is the emergency contact for a whole host of reasons, but half fo them are for the safety of everyone around Ruby. Sonic woudl be hard-pressed to find someone as explosive during a panic attack as Ruby is, and when you’re a ticking time Chaos Energy time bomb who was made to sock people’s jaws in his sleep, only someone with the same jaw-socking dayjob can keep you at bay. Ruby would still need someone to keep him from hurting /himself/, yeah, but... Ruby’s stuck here, one way or another. When he bails out fo the hospital, he won’t be stuck anymore-- stuck with the hopsital, or stuck with Sonic. 

“Hey, uh-- you,” he licks his lips, twirling a few strands of Ruby’s fur. “You.. going to stay.. at your place when they let you outta here?”

“You mean I am not here for the rest of my endless life?” Ruby laughs, and this time the skip in Sonic’s heart is bittersweet. There’s something about hearing Ruby laugh and it being the only sound in the room. 

His eye opens again, and he shifts in Sonic’s lap. “I... no.” Something taints the peace that had blanketed Ruby for most of the night, something shadows over his face and knits his brows. “No, I... I will look for somewhere to stay here, I guess.”

They’ve talked about a lot of things in Ruby’s hospital stay. Guilt, anger, hurt, regret, mistakes, apparently mutual feelings (though they haven’t said they’re anything other than friends, which Sonic doesn’t complain about), but Sonic doesn’t think it’s ever going to be a comfortable subject to bring up. Given what he knows now about Ruby’s history, he doesn’t blame Ruby for skipping out on home visits. Sonic runs his fingers down Ruby’s face, trying to draw the tension from his expression and shoulders again, somehow. 

“I-- You--” he stutters, never a good thing to be unable to keep back. Sonic the Hedgehog is witty and fast-talking and confident, and when Sonic the Hedgehog isn’t witty and fast-talking and confident the red flag it raises sticks out like a sore thumb. “You-- Y’know, I don’t... I don’t know if..”

“Spirit, relax.” Ruby’s head tilts, away from Sonic’s hand to attempt to make eye contact. Sonic bites on the inside of his cheek, ears flicking like an anxious beat pacer. Ruby’s hand lifts from the messy blankets all around them, enough telegraphing to tell Sonic to meet him halfway. Blind, and all. Sonic rolls his shoulders, holding onto Ruby’s outstretched hand, which squeezes when they made contact. 

“Stuttering does not sound like you,” Ruby continues, softly enough to where Sonic doesn’t start thinking the same thing, to his own detriment. He stutters rarely, although if he does it’s usually around Ruby. “What is it?”

Sonic blinks down at him, at the glassy eyes he hasn’t come to appreciate any less, at the genuine emotion in them despite their lack of eyesight, at Ruby’s slight head tilt, concerned and curious and nice and endearing and cute. Cute also doesn’t occupy the space he needs it to occupy, but it slots in a little better. A more snug fit, even if the longing is making it cold and Sonic involuntarily holds Ruby’s hand tighter. Ruby rubs his knuckles with his thumb, still inquisitive. Still allowing Sonic his own pace.

“Tails’ house,” Sonic manages, blinking down and then away from Ruby at the door of the pale white room. “I.. have a room. In Tails’ house. He could... I think I can cash in a few favors, and you could.. crash there, for a bit.”

Sonic laughs without intending to. “If you aren’t tired of having me around so much.”

Ruby shifts again, a little more than the last few times. He’s still frowning, but still inquisitive-- curious if anything. Curious, confused. “Why would I be tired of that?” 

Sonic blinks, scrambling through the logic in his thought process for an explanation. He laughs again, nervously. “Well, I dunno. If you’re just.. making due with what ya’ got here, I mean. It isn’t like you sleep much at all-- or if I sleep much at all, either-- and if you’re stuck in the hospital and not moving, and I’m not moving to make sure you don’t run away, then you- might as well.. do this, I guess.”

He shrugs again, ear twitching. “I dunno if this is your-- first choice for spending the night. I’m just a free pillow and conversation.”

Ruby shakes his head, taking back his hand to blindly hover over where he probably imagined Spirit’s cheek to be, and when he makes contact, he finds his way to Sonic’s chin to tilt it enough to get Sonic’s runaway eyes.

“Making due? Spirit, did you miss out on that whole conversation we had where we both said we were hypocrites and liked eachother?”

The question and the hand at his chin make Sonic run a blush. “No, ‘course not, but.. it ain’t like I know how this works, and you don’t either, and we’re both not exactly the ‘let’s immediately get married immediately and never leave until we get sick of eachother’ kind people, y’know?”

With his hands free, Sonic tugs on the cuff of his glove. “We both need our space, we already talked about that, and I don’t.. I don’t know how much y’re doing this cause you’re bedridden?”

“No, I know, but why would I be tired of you? I... like spending time with you, I told you that. You make staying here bearable...”

Sonic shifts again, opposite ear twitching. “Just a hunch.”

He looks away again, despite Ruby’s eye contact being mostly for show. His stomach twists into familiar anxiety. “A few months ago I barely figured out if I woudl throw up if you held my hand or not, dude. I ‘unno where your line is drawn.. If you’re just here right now cause it’s convenient or...”

He twitches, not exactly discreetly. “You know I’m bad at this.”

“I know,” Ruby replies, a little fond and a little concerned and a little in thought. His ears swivel towards Sonic. “...You think this is going to stop.”

Sonic tilts his head, a ‘so-so’ kind of thing. “Hell if I know.”

And he doesn’t really know, not clearly. It isn’t a clear cut deal, sorting through his thoughts when they get tangled up in the mess that is emotions. It’s-- a lot, a lot of overwhelming, anxious stuff and things and Sonic can’t even differentiate the stuff from the things, but it sounds close enough, it sounds resonant enough, it sounds familiar and sort of... close. He didn’t think Jules was going to stop. He didn’t think Bernie was going to stop. 

“It... at least sounds like it,” Ruby sighs, cupping Sonic’s cheek, to which Sonic replies by nuzzling into his palm like Ruby had done earlier with him. 

“...I worry about that, too,” he says, vaguely like a confession. “That this will stop. That you will change your mind.”

Sonic blinks, leaning into Ruby’s hand. Smiles a little, a little sad. “That it’s temporary, yeah?”

As if he can detect it, Ruby returns the sad, empathetic smile a little. “Yeah.”

Sonic sighs in the quiet of the night, slipping his fingers inbetween the ones Ruby has on his cheek. They hold eachother’s remaining hands. “Do you.. think it’ll stop?”

Ruby shakes his head, bringing their held hands closer. “Why would I say no to a free pillow and conversation? You are annoying, but not that annoying.”

Sonic laughs, louder and more genuine than his nervous, awkward laughs. He fully tangles his fingers with the hand Ruby keeps on his cheek, pulling it down. His head falls, his nose bumps against Ruby’s where he closes his eyes and breathes through the insecurity clouding his head. Ruby worries about the same thing. He opens his eyes again, and inhales a little relief when Ruby smiles.

“The.. line. The 'this isn’t my thing’ or ‘I got bored, I guess’ line. D’you know where you draw it yet?”

Ruby’s eyes are close and Sonic can see him thinking, ears twitching, blushing. It’s... cute. “Do you?”

“Well-- doing this isn’t the end of the world,” Sonic says, somewhat playfully, and more relief filters in when he recognizes his own playfulness. “I think it’s... a mood-dependant thing, but.. you?”

Ruby leans up a little, enough to nuzzle their noses together, and Sonic snorts as he answers. “I think I can make do.”