[PRP] Definitely not a cat (Oliver & Horace)

[The Semblance of Unity]

Horace looked at Oliver. Even thought his own face was paling a bit (glass cuts always did ******** hurt), he was concerned with how near-panic Oliver looked. He glanced down at his hand.

"And... yeah, but I'll be-" He grimaced. "-fine. I didn't get any tendons or anything, I think. This is just kinda hard to do one handed, so..." So maybe we should go. And then he could get someone to wrap it up properly. He was pretty sure there wasn't any glass in it. Pretty sure.

melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

"Oh my god," His voice got hoarse, "Did you cut yourself? You totally cut yourself—" He was back to slinking forward again, slowly, deliberately. "Your hands are so important!" He chastised, "You need to be careful with them, <********, oh my god." Even if it wasn't that bad of a gash, Oliver got worked up easily over hand injuries. There was a reason why his own were so goddamn pristine all the time. It was from fixation, habit, fear...

The worst part was the fact that he wanted to help, but the idea of fabric rubbing up against his finger tips again...

He shuddered and hated himself for it.

"Okay..." He was not happy about this at all. "Okay. Okay fine, no, if you're hurt—" He huffed, "Do you have peroxide with all of those bandages? Let me help, it'll be quick." He was trying desperately to reason with the situation. Like what if it got infected and then they had to amputate it, or what if it did slice something important and he'd lose control of half of his fingers, or—

"O-Or at least let me look at it later." He wobbled slightly.

The Semblance of Unity

a noodle

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"It's... it's fine. My hands aren't that big a deal." But his hand had started shaking a bit, even though he was pressing on it with the other. Horace tried to laugh a little.

"Think I have peroxide in my bag, but you shouldn't be, uh, touching stuff. I'll be fine." He swore that it hurt more with each passing moment and the idea of pouring peroxide on it was unbearable. "Are you okay?"

melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

Oliver took a deep breath for the first time in like, four minutes. It felt nice, calmed him down a little bit. He opened his mouth to argue, but—"I will be, it's fine." His posture relaxed slightly. "I'm fine. Touching s**t isn't going to kill me, even though I have weird raccoon hands." It was something he'd have to get used to, less he let himself be incapacitated for a week out of the month. He wasn't keen on the idea of letting people wait on him got any length of time; the thought was unbearable, actually.

He slowly side stepped by Horace towards the doorway. "Fine. Let's just like—I don't know, go back to your place. Or my place. Or whoever's place is closest when we get out." He was adamant about this, but still shaken. Just don't think about the blood and the cut and the sensation of skin sliding together and—ugh.

He gave Horace a hard look before vanishing through the doorway.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

Horace frowned a lot, but ducked through the door after Oliver. "You don't have weird hands," he pointed out after stepping through. It seemed to have worked, as they were on the corner of somewhere and somewhat and not near his house at all.

"I don't wanna make you do anything that feels shitty, okay."

melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

Fortunately, Oliver knew exactly where they were, and he took his simple godsend with proverbial open arms. It was starting to get later too, which meant not as many people out on the sidewalks. Let them keep to their cars.

He pulled his jacket hood up over his ears. The tail was weird but at least there were people who ran around with fake ones so if he got questioned he could bite his dignity and get away with it. "The fact you hurt yourself makes me feel shitty," he snapped back at him, but it was anger in a concerned sort of way. "We could've found another door. It isn't like you had to whip out a tonfa." Which he really wanted to question, but he didnt. Another time maybe.

"Here, my house is actually a few blocks away." He looked over at the hand, "Are you sure it's not deep? It's not going to need stitches?" His brow furrowed as he started to walk, motioning for Horace to follow.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

Oliver snapped at him and he sucked in his breath. "It's not a big deal, though. I thought you wanted to go home and that was the easiest..." He wasn't sure why Oliver was so mad, but it made him feel uneasy, like he'd ******** everything up. Wouldn't be the first time.

"I, uh, don't know? I kind of just wrapped it up." Horace hadn't really looked at his hand too much other than to make sure there wasn't a huge shard of glass sticking out of it. Oh, ugh, what if there were tiny shards?

He followed, feeling a little subdued. "Are your cats home?"

melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

"I did want to go home, it's just—" He sighed, "Never mind. You're missing the point..."

He looked towards him again before glancing away. "Of course they're home." He said plainly, "You can meet them if you want. Real sweethearts." Most of the anger had subsided. Now he seemed a touch pensive, but nothing overt. The panic had mostly passed too.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, though he wasn't sure what he'd done wrong. Horace wasn't afraid of Oliver, so that made the fact that he'd ******** up somehow a little better. His hand really hurt; peeling the scarf off of the wound would be excruciating.

He frowned, remembering something. "Won't your roommate be made you brought home a bleeding guy?"

melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

"I'm just saying..." He huffed quietly, trying one last time to explain himself, "I'm upset because you got hurt." His voice was tense. He obviously didn't like explaining himself or his emotions. "Because you punched in a glass window. That's dangerous."

He sighed, heavy with resignation. "Finding a different way would have been okay. We could've taken all the time in the world." But what was done was done; he shook his head. "Elliot isn't home. He has yoga on Wednesday nights. Either way it'd be fine..."

Probably.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"Oh." He hadn't thought of that. In fact, Horace had been moderately proud of finding a solution that didn't take forever. "I guess I'm better at fast than smart," he said lightly, trying to joke. "Plus maybe I've been wanting to use my tonfa for forever." He tried leveling a silly smile at Oliver.

Elliot wouldn't be home. "Is he your bf or something? And doesn't he have a kickass dog?"

melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

"He's not my boyfriend." He said a little too quickly, a little too hasty. Sure, he'd had a crush on the son of a b***h for a while, but that was also the old Elliot from his time. "Just my roommate..." You know, the same roommate that followed him back to Ashdown all the way from San Francisco. It made it awkward because the Eli from this time had made that choice out of friendship and solidarity. The one from before did it because he was an impulsive dickass and it sounded like fun.

He still needed to talk to him about that. The whole "yeah I just have amnesia" thing made him feel guilty as ********, especially when he learned new things about this world.

Back to Horace, who was also frustrating the hell out of him. It was funny because he actually reminded him a little of Shiloh, who'd come home on more than one occasion with his mouth curved into a big a** smile and his face smeared in road rashes, like he was proud that he ate total s**t off of his bike.

"But he does have a nice dog, yeah. You can meet Pascal too while you're there." The roads were coming back into familiarity. Not too long ago they were driving down these same streets, screaming and almost crashing into pedestrians. "Why do you even have a tonfa anyway? Same convenience as the first aid crap?" He grumbled a little.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"Do you want him to be, though?" That sort of quickness meant either Oliver was straight (and usually straight people just flat out said), or that he maybe, might have conflicted feelings. It made Horace feel kind of odd... Wistful, maybe? Or something else; he couldn't decide.

He looked around. "Oh hey, I know this road. I thought you were gonna have a heart attack in the car." Horace smiled at the memory. Hitting that speed bump had been mean, but... "Not really for convenience. It's complicated." The tonfa was there because it was a symbol of protection for all the times he couldn't protect himself before. And that sounded damn stupid in his head, and would sound stupider said out loud, so he did not say it. It was a charm against highschool, against Darren, against Lawr.

"I just never get to use it." He shrugged.

melancholies

u must be a lvl 7 friend to unlock more backstory

 

[Melancholies]

Ollie was silent.

"...No." He said after a while. "I don't know." And then, "It's awkward because he's not my Elliot, he's this world's... it's...— I don't wanna talk about it."

His demeanor got a little frosty for a second, a little icy. Cold. Standoffish. He sighed as he walked, letting the conversation drop on both accounts. "It's this complex over here." He pointed out the familiar building before rifling around in his pocket for the key.

The Semblance of Unity

you need more expression to advance his social link

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

"Is he enough of your Elliot that it could work? Or you can treat him as like... your Elliot's odd brother whom you don't really know or-" He cut himself off. Oliver didn't want to talk about it. Sometimes, he gave off the impression that he was closed off, really an alien walking in a new world and not happy about it. Horace supposed he couldn't blame him, really.

He looked at the complex. "I remember - though I dunno which place is yours. You'll have to continue being my fearless leader, Oliver."

melancholies