Stuck in a Rut (Challenge #64, Rinse and Repeat; Gojyo and Gonou; PG-13)
Title: Stuck in a Rut
Author: opalmatrix
Warnings: lots of possibly mildly squicky sickroom details
Pairing(s): pre-585
Spoilers: Mild for "Be There" arc
Notes: written for saiyuki_time, Challenge #64, Rinse and Repeat; time allowed: 60 minutes; time taken: 55 minutes. Sorry this is late!!
Summary: It's surprising what can become routine.
By now, the patient knew the routine. On bed bath day, Gojyo stoked the boiler to produce vast amounts of hot water, which he tirelessly carried in installments to his patient's bedside, using a battered tin basin scrubbed to a shiny level of cleanliness that was all the more shocking in view of the cluttered, dirty room beyond.
First, Gojyo delicately washed the invalid's face, first using the flannel without soap to wash around his eyes, then just a bit of soap on the rest of his face. The patient appreciated the gentleness of his keeper's touch, even though Gojyo's awkwardness at the task made the patient wonder whether a finger would at some point end up in his eye. Then Gojyo patted the injured man's face carefully dry with worn but clean towel, and gently rolled down the sheet and blanket to repeat the process with the patient's chest. After that, Gojyo took away the basin and poured the dirty water down the kitchen sink and returned with another basinful of clean water, and then the process began again with one of the patient's arms.
Wash, rinse, repeat. Swish and gurgle of the water down the drain, gurgle and swish out of sight somewhere as the basin was refilled. The only moment of drama would come when all the extremities and the patient's back (and backside) were clean and carefully tucked in again under the blankets. "Feel up to washin' your own junk?" Gojyo would inquire, with a cheery callousness that somehow made the whole thing bearable, and brace one arm under the patient's shoulders, to give him a fighting chance. And the patient would gather all his strength and and try to reach his own crotch for more than a second.
And fail, over and over again. And then Gojyo would do it, calmly and impersonally kind and gentle and still slightly awkward, even after half a dozen times.
On non-bed bath days, Gojyo rubbed the patient's back and brushed his hair through with dry shampoo. He hadn't even known such a thing existed. "Some chick I know brought it over after I told her about you. She came by to say they were missin' me down at the bar."
It was hardly surprising that Gojyo was a habitué of bars. As the patient began to spend more time awake, he became aware of the cases of beer and of empty bottles stacked haphazardly by the door. Gojyo was surprisingly conscientious about his drinking at the moment, consuming only one beer each evening. "I need to make 'em last," he'd say as he popped its cap off, but his eyes would stray to the stack of carefully washed sickroom paraphernalia laid on a clean but ragged sheet over the battered table, and the patient was warmed and embarrassed to think that he was the cause of his keeper's current relative rectitude.
Then, one afternoon, the patient was actually able to accomplish his own intimate washing. Gojyo gave a raucous cheer, as though he had scored a goal in some outdoor game, and discreetly turned his eyes away until the patient leaned back against his sturdy arm again, feeling as though he'd run a mile. But there was something exhilarating about being able to do even such a simple task.
"Gojyo, what would you normally be doing at this time of day?"
Gojyo looked up from pouring boiling water over the trusty tin basin. "Heh? Oh, maybe gettin' ready to go out for the evening."
It was, perhaps, four o'clock in the afternoon. "Your workday ends early, then."
Gojyo chuckled. "Nope. It starts late. I play cards for a living."
"Oh. That's ... interesting."
"Eh, not as much as you might think. And even less, if my luck doesn't run so good."
The patient shifted cautiously, wary of his stitches. "So ... if you don't win, you can't eat?"
"It ain't always that bad. I can hold out for a few weeks, if I've had a hot run. For three nights running, just before I found you, f'rinstance - that was pretty sweet."
"But luck doesn't always run that way. So what do you do then?"
Gojyo dried his hands and came over, twitching the chair near the bed around backward and straddling it so he could rest his folded arms on the back. "Well ... if I'm really broke, one of the girls at my regular bar'll usually stand me a few meals, 'specially if I go home with her." He gave the patient an engaging, roguish grin, but it didn't quite reach his eyes.
"Oh ... really? You mean, you really ... ."
"Well, I tried bein' a gentleman about it, a couple times, but that didn't actually work so hot. One of 'em started cryin' - 'You don't think I'm pretty?' And once another one got nasty, 'Oh, not good enough for you, huh?'"
The patient closed his eyes for a moment. "You sound... but you enjoyed yourself?"
"Sure, it's sex, ain't it? But it ain't ... heh. I mean, when I'm winning and I'm happy and they're happy, it's one thing. But ... ."
"I think I see."
"Anyway, so that's it. That's how it is. Same old, same old."
"Oh," said the patient weakly. "And here I thought perhaps you would be eager to get back to your work, by now."
Gojyo grinned: "Naah - actually, I needed the break."