Kei's fingers curled around the edge of the sink, blood-tinged water swirling down the drain as he looked up into his own eyes in the mirror.
They were soft green again now, but there was a lingering hint of a yellow - monstrous - glow.
Kei's expression twisted, and his hands tightened. He bared his teeth at himself, disgusted, and dropped his head. The edge of the sink was beginning to crack by one of his thumbs, and he pulled his hands off before he could damage it further. He wetted them again to rinse more blood from his face.
His red jacket, hanging against the wall behind him, was dripping blood from the sodden hem on one side. He would have to wash it out, as he had many times before; it wouldn't show any stains from the blood, but Kei knew they were there.
Kei swallowed painfully and stripped off his cream-coloured shirt. Splotched thickly with blood, it was bound for the rubbish already. He scrubbed it across his wet and still blood-streaked face and dropped it to the floor.
He'd been so hungry his feeding had gone even messier than usual tonight. He'd pushed himself almost too far, starving and half-crazed when he left the apartment - he'd only gone, finally, because Sho's soft heartbeat had become all he could hear, all he could focus on.
No matter how Kei hated giving in to the vicious hunger that drove him, that made him the monster he was, he would never let himself risk Sho.
He swallowed against a sick feeling and grabbed his jacket, soaking it and wringing blood and water out in the sink. The red-tinged water flowed over his hands, like so much blood had, over the years.
"Kei?" Sho said softly from the other side of the door. His heartbeat had quickened a little from his usual, and his voice wavered with distress.
Kei cringed and didn't answer.
"Are you all right, Kei?" Sho asked, voice a little louder. "You're not hurt are you?"
Kei closed his eyes, his hands stilling on the fabric. There was silence for a few minutes, but Kei knew better than to think Sho had given up; would have even if he hadn't been able to hear the soft beat of Sho's heart.
"Kei?" Sho called again, and this time he grabbed the doorknob. It rattled, locked, but if Kei didn't answer him it would only be so long before Sho picked it and let himself in, out of worry or curiosity or both.
"I'm fine, Sho." Kei said, his voice not quite even, for all his best attempts. "Go to bed."
"But- Kei. . ." The door creaked quietly, and he frowned, confused, before he realised that Sho must have leaned against it.
"Go to bed, Sho. I'll see you in the morning, I promise." Kei added, hoping that would encourage him to actually go.
Sho sighed, a soft rasp underlying the sound. His hand dragging over the door, Kei thought, and turned the water on higher, trying to drown out any more sounds from Sho.
He was too attached to that slow heartbeat, though, to tune it out.
"All right, Kei. . . If that's what you want." Sho said softly, beginning to retreat, his footsteps quiet. "Kei?"
Kei winced, fingers curling into the sodden fabric of his jacket. His mouth twisted and he scrubbed at the fabric a little harder, though it was almost clean.
"I love you." Sho said quietly, still clear even through the muffling door, and Kei stilled, heart wrenching. "I'm glad you're safe."
Sho's steps faded down the hallway towards his bedroom.
I realised partway through writing this that Sho could really be just about any age between when he first meets Kei as a child and when their lives go to hell in canon. I like it that way, actually - and heck, perhaps this scene has played itself out, or nearly, many times at different points in their lives.
This was written for a prompt from a 'the way you said "I love you"' meme, though it was not requested by anyone; I wanted to write one for Kei and Sho, so I rolled a random choice and got 'muffled, from the other side of the door'.
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