Gowns and Green Jello
Y’all I wrote this in maybe ten minutes right after I woke up. The words wrote themselves. Was just gonna be a dialogue prompt.
Cw: recovery, hospital, bad caretaker, emotional trauma from both sides, past torture, descriptions of scars/permanent injuries/healed gore, infection
“Dunno why they call this a gown,” Whumpee grumbled, their frail hand raising to tug at their other sleeve, fixing the thin fabric from where it had begun to fall off their shoulder again. “I don’t feel fuckin’ fancy.”
“Whumpee,” Caretaker chided, giving them a moment to fumble on their own before reaching over and fixing the small tie on the back of Whumpee’s hospital gown that they wouldn’t have been able to reach on their own.
Whumpee huffed, swatting Caretaker’s hand away when they didn’t immediately pull back after retying the strings.
Caretaker looked back at their friend—their best friend. The one they had promised to themself that they would protect. A promise they’d now broken for the second time. The first when they’d let Whumper take them, a crime stained across Caretaker’s sleepless nights and Whumpee’s broken body. You shouldn’t blame yourself, Caretaker’s therapist advised them every time they brought the topic up. You couldn’t have known. You weren’t home.
Whumpee was right, though, the gown certainly was not the most flattering thing in the fashion industry. As thin as paper, made of white fabric with some awful blue and green polka dot and stripe pattern, caretaker doubted it would look good on anyone. Certainly not… not on Whumpee. Not with their too-thin body or their twisted limbs, evidence of broken bones never properly healed laying just below the skin. Their scarred, burned, flayed skin which was now the evidence of caretaker’s second failure, the ugly, red infection creeping out from a wound on Whumpee’s thigh, now concealed by bandages and the hospital’s sheets. Their hair, cut shorter than Caretaker’s ever seen it, falling awkwardly and unevenly as if it had been cut with kitchen scissors—which Caretaker wouldn’t doubt.
Their face was worst of all. Whumper seemed to have targeted every ounce of brutality there, and the rest of their body was just in the danger zone of the attacks. Sometimes, Caretaker couldn’t bare to look. Their throat would close up and the guilt would swell to impossible amounts, and Caretaker would have to quickly excuse themself from Whumpee’s presence. They were sure their friend has seen it. That their forlorn, self-conscious expression was undoubtedly of Caretaker’s doing. They tried to make up for it in any and every way they possibly could.
“You look just as beautiful as ever,” Caretaker took Whumpee’s hand, the one that had just smacked them, using that as a bit of leverage so Caretaker could lean forwards out of the plasticky armchair to press a kiss to Whumpee’s temple. Something in their chest twisted as Whumpee complained and pushed them back, but they couldn’t conceal the flicker of emotion behind Whumpee’s gaze, the weight to their movements. God, how long has it been since they’d kissed Whumpee? Affection was a thing Caretaker used to dish out by the dozen, and they still did. Just… not to Whumpee. Not like they used to. Caretaker tried but, honestly, it felt weird. Wrong. And they hated themself for feeling that way, they tried to make up for it, but half the time their so called casual displays of admirable would come out feeling strained and forced, which they knew Whumpee could feel.
They could see the tug in Whumpee’s expression before they turned away, the heartbrokenness just swimming behind their remaining eye. The atmosphere in the small hospital room faded into something heavy, and Caretaker was tempted to reach for Whumpee’s hand again, but the way they were angled now limited Caretaker’s access from their right hand, their good hand.
Their left rested inches away, just over the bed rail. Mangled fingers and flesh that barely resembled a hand resting on top of the pillow propped in Whumpee’s lap. Two and a half fingers remaining, scarred flesh raised like veins. The back of their palm layered with so much they couldn’t tell on mark from the next, burns from stabs from breaks.
Caretaker let their own hands fall back to their sides. Both Whumpee and then knew just was a lie rested between them.
“I’ll go see if the nurse can sneak us some jello,” Caretaker said after a moment of tension, slapping their palms against their knees with a newfound purpose as they stood up. “I saw someone with a green cup earlier, I know it’s your favorite. Be right back,” they promised, quickly moving towards and out the door.
“Bye,” Whumpee mumbled, looking over their shoulder as Caretaker practically ran out of the room. Only once they were alone, Whumpee raised a palm to their eyes, scrubbing away the tears before they could fall.