singularity

「　Let Go ・・・

Changmin's lips curled into a lazy grin that, had he had the energy, would have been a quiet chuckle - the complaint about having his uninjured hand harmed had been a slight attempt at humor, perhaps because of some sense of normalcy returning to his mind even as it drifted...or because some vestige of his high was kicking back in. Key's goal behind ignoring Changmin's inquiry was to do little good as the housepet was all but gone entirely now, though there was no doubt that later, Changmin's ever curious mind would bring the topic up again. "Mhm...." he murmured vaguely at the others insistence, his voice another register lower, his mind so very heavy in the most welcoming sense, but just before Changmin let it take over entirely and place him into what could easily have been sleep or unconsciousness, he had time for one last remark as a brief recollection came to him of the last time they had both been in the same room and Changmin had been ready to rest: "Not leaving this time...."

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「　Let Go ・・・

With a somewhat exaggerated hiss and withdraw of his hand, along with a slight scowl, Changmin directed a sharp look toward the other. "I'm an injured victim here - don't do that" "...I was only curious anyways..." he went on to add, wondering if Key would again rebuff or else ignore him, or perhaps actually give him an answer to his unasked question. As the housemaster leaned into the couch he sat upon, Changmin sank lower into the one he occupied, injured arm resting across his flat stomach and his head turning to face into the sofa as he closed his eyes restfully. "Y'don't need t'get me an'thing," he answered in a slight slur, already drifting, exhausted not only from the evening's events, but the substance that had left his system far too soon. Changmin had forgotten entirely that he was not to be out past a curfew that was almost upon him and couldn't have found the energy to care even if he did. He was so very tired and this sofa, in spite of being a little too small for his height, was so very comfortable.

「　Let Go ・・・

If he could have, Changmin would have withdrawn enough that Dr. Lee would not have been able to see the vestiges of scarring his body was marked with, but the man was firm in such a gentle manner - determined to look him over entirely - that he hadn't been able to. There was also the plain and simple fact that Changmin was virtually cornered on a couch he didn't think he could move from just then without having his legs give way and send him crashing to the floor. With the statement more than question of Changmin having taken something earlier, the housepet attempted to act unaffected but his posture stiffened more so than it already had and he swallowed rather thickly. Instantly regretting it and raising his uninjured arm to massage a hand against his aching throat, it did have the upside of giving Changmin an excuse not to respond just long enough for the door to once again open and interrupt. He didn't need prescriptions anyways. He already had a container of pills hidden within his room that "cured" plenty, physically as well as mentally. He just needed to get himself back to the Lair so that he could get his hands on some. As Key entered and took his own seat, returning once again to that persona that Changmin had never witnessed before, the housepet began to ponder over the word that hadn't seemed to register until Dr. Lee had said it - perhaps because of the tone and expression with which he had done so. Friend. Was Changmin really a friend? He really hadn't done much to be called such. And it hardly seemed as though this was a man to whom Key needed to invent some sort of relationship toward in order to have Changmin get his care - he had a feeling that the housemaster could have told the doctor he was nothing more than a pet or servant and the man would have accepted it as he had everything so far. The hand to his head brought Changmin's glazed eyes back to focus on his actual surroundings rather than on wherever his thoughts had wandered to after such heavy contemplation over as simple a word as 'friend' and though he did not usually allow people to treat him so childishly....he was more than obviously a child by comparison to Dr. Lee and so he accepted the gesture of having his hair ruffled with a small, albeit somewhat tight-lipped, smile of gratitude. He watched the elder man leave and when the door closed behind him, he addressed the housemaster still with him with the hopes that if he started a topic, one that he did not want to discuss couldn't be brought up by the other instead. " 'Kibum'?" he repeated, the name and tone within which Changmin spoke it asking quite plainly why the man sought to be addressed as nothing more than 'Key' by anyone else.

▣ problem

He turned back to face the room in time to watch the other attempt to once again hide himself yet utterly fail by aggravating his own situation further. With a soft snort of derisive yet amused laughter and a shake of his head, Changmin's long legs carried him in just a few strides to his own bed. "You're going to have to figure out a way to do this with someone else in the room," he points out but doesn't add the detail that his reason lays in the fact that he has something personal within the room that he doesn't want being found. Of course, the likelihood of Taemin snooping around and having time enough to find Changmin's hiding spot was very unlikely, but he couldn't help the paranoia. "I'm pretty sure the guy with that bed stashes dirty magazines under the mattress if that helps," he added with a light smirk before lifting his feet off the floor and lying back on his bed, hands coming up to fold underneath his head and cradle it and his gaze to the ceiling while his feet hung off the end of the mattress that didn't quite match his height.

「　Let Go ・・・

When he was satisfied that Key had gotten the point. Changmin turned his gaze away again but could not close his eyes with any semblance of restfulness so that he resorted instead to simply staring at the ceiling. Truth be told, for all intents and purposes, Changmin had been a prostitute - on many occasions as the currency of exchange itself - but he refused to see it as such. "Guess all you want, I'm not answering," he replied in his tired yet clearly discontent tone and almost let out an intentionally audible sigh of relief when they were interrupted by the knock at the door, one that said quite plainly that Changmin wanted relief from Key. In spite of this attitude, Changmin couldn't help his curiosity when the housemaster's tone and overall demeanor shifted so suddenly and completely to something he had never witnessed from the man before. He tried to observe subtly from the corner of his gaze but his less than wholly there mind had hardly gathered much before Key was rounding on him with what Changmin had so far known as his default attitude. He gave the older man derisive glare for speaking to him as though he was a child before he left the room, then faced the doctor with whom he was alone with with wariness. Changmin hadn't seen a registered physician of any sort since he was a very small child, nor did he feel the need for one - he'd recovered from worse than this. But the man was here now and if Changmin tried to send him away, the rudeness would be glaring. He gave Dr. Lee a slight bow of his head in greeting, but managed no more than that due to the now very apparent bruising around his neck. After that, Changmin faced forward again, across the room, allowing the doctor to take a look. Before Dr. Lee could then move on and search for any other injury himself, Changmin offered out the nearly broken arm. He was determined to keep the man from seeing his less than colored expression and unclear gaze - he had no doubt the other would figure out the cause - nor did he wish to allow the man to see any more of his older scars than his tugged up sleeve revealed.

「　Let Go ・・・

Had he not been unsure as to whether it would cause him to pass out, Changmin would have rolled his eyes at the way Key blatantly ignored the fact that the housepet not answering any of his questions was not only because of the level of privacy it would breach, but because he was simply tired. The high from his drug had metabolized too quickly so that he was already barreling toward crashing. He wanted needed a place to be alone and keep himself from seeking out more. Changmin knew that much of the stubbornness Key was directing at him was much the sort he tended to give everyone a hard time with, but it didn't increase his want to talk about their encounter. In fact, it was a great relief when a knock had come at the door and Key had left to answer it, his shadow and presence no longer looming over Changmin with an unseen, increasing pressure. With his back against the armrest of the couch, his head and side leaning against it's backing, and his lengthy legs taking up all three cushions, Changmin carefully rested his injured forearm across his abdomen and looked as though he was preparing to fall asleep when Key's voice split the blissful silence that had been creeping closer. He felt at once sickened and angry and unpleasant memories seemed to flash behind his eyelids right before Changmin at once opened them and zeroed in on Key with such iciness the temperature in the room might have dropped several degrees. "I was not a prostitute," he said vehemently.

「　Let Go ・・・

"Would you rather I hadn't helped then? I can take you right back to them and leave you alone this time if you want," Changmin replied, words that would have come off much more bitingly had he had the ability to use his regular tone just then but instead, he finished his words with another pained expression as his hand reached up to massage away a cough that he knew would only hurt much worse. "Doesn't matter..." he murmured, brushing aside Key's hand, though not unkindly in spite of his previous words. His company had yet to be requested and he didn't see that changing any time soon - there was no one he had to keep up appearances for. Changmin sometimes wondered if that would get him either kicked out of the house or else forced to pay for the space and food he was taking up. Changmin had casually yet every bit intentionally been avoiding Key's gaze, but the mention of the influence of drugs caused his eyes to half flicker toward the man and away again in an instant that he hoped was either missed entirely or did not give away his slight alarm. His hands had begun to tighten into fists in an attempt to keep himself level-headed, Changmin apparently forgetting his injury because a second after he was clutching his arm again and breathing rapidly through his grit teeth, waiting for the throbbing, splintering sensation to pass. He sank further into the couch with a quiet groan, trying to get himself away from the situation, his eyes closing entirely to help the effect even more so. "Hyung...I'm tired..." The title had slipped out so naturally that Changmin barely realized it and therefore felt no need to amend or take back what he had said.

「　Let Go ・・・

There was a very short pause during which Changmin's hand remained suspended and his attention flickered from the wound he was cleaning to Key's expression, and he was both surprised and amused to think he might be seeing signs of shyness. Biting back a quiet grin, Changmin returned to tending the man's wounds. "You pay into the account that's now keeping a roof over my head, placing food in my stomach, and giving me an actual bed to sleep in at night - I'd say that's plenty even," the housepet replied, though his voice was still rather slow and quiet given not only his very low energy level, but the pain of the developing bruise around his neck from the hand around his throat that had near crushed his windpipe. Changmin could see almost too plainly that he was beginning to grate on Key's nerves, but what the man was asking was clearly more personal than Key realized and Changmin was going to do whatever he could to avoid letting anyone know any more about him than necessary....even when the housemaster's tone changed so unexpectedly to a manner which Changmin had never heard nor predicted the other man as having. he did not change his mind....even if the moment put a slight chink in his armor. "It's not important..." he murmured, putting down the used cotton swab with the others and focusing his concentration there rather than to the way Key was looking at him. "Pass me that?" he requested, pointing out with his uninjured hand the ointment to cover the wounds with.

「　Let Go ・・・

Distantly, Changmin found himself amused as he registered more fully than the first time they had met the various expressions Key had when irritated or likewise as his own were absent this time, Changmin's face a pale, blank, and tired slate. Had Changmin been in his usual state, he would have countered that he had been trying to clean Key, not himself, as the "diva" he had once seen might very well reemerge if the other man caught sight of himself in a mirror. Though at first Changmin allowed Key to aid in cleaning his wounds with little objection but for winces or slight hisses, eventually, he managed to gain himself one of the cotton swabs soaked in antiseptic before Key could bring it to his face and reached out to take it to the others instead. He then, perhaps a little more lightly that necessary, began to clean away the scratches across the housemasters face. His ministrations slowly came to a halt as once again, Key would not drop the subject, which truthfully, Changmin had anticipated though he had been hoping for the opposite. "You're helping me right now," he pointed out simply, reaching up with the cotton pad again.