A/N: I've been down and out with a toothache lately, so this happened.
Bray eyes Luke cautiously. Even Erick steals glances at the dark haired man occasionally as they eat, careful not to let Luke catch him. But Bray's noticed the change for quite some time now. The sudden stop when Luke's chewing. The slight crinkle around his eyes, his cheeks shifting under the bushy beard as he moves food to the other side of his mouth. He hasn't said a word about it, but Luke's got tooth problems. Right side of his jaw. Probably a bottom tooth. Maybe even a wisdom tooth. But both boys know Luke would rather fight off a bear than end up in a dentist's chair. Or a doctor's exam table. He even fights off the medical staff at work. Truthfully all three of them hated doctors of any sort. But a toothache man? That's the devil's work right there. Luke says nothing about it for weeks. Only the slightest hint of a wince would be the only sign of his suffering at all. At least until the night he brought home a good sized deer from the woods. And that night he barely ate any of the vinson Erick had prepared for them. But a bottle of Jack sat in front of him, already half empty.
.
"You okay, brother?" Erick asked quietly, hoping to not upset the older man.
Luke only grunted before lifting the bottle to his lips again. And with a sudden movement, slightly startling Erick, Luke pushed his chair away from the table, making his exit out of the front door.
Glancing at each other, Bray shrugged. "Let him be. Once it gets bad enough he'll give in and have it looked at."
Hours pass while Luke makes racket on the porch. Curious, and slightly lonely, Erick joined Bray in front of the small tv in the den. They're both so into a rerun of Have Gun Will Travel that they almost miss Luke when he comes back inside. Seeing him blood stained to the elbows wasn't exactly out of the ordinary with his hobbies being hunting and tanning, and sometimes taxidermy. Neither was it odd for his dirty tank tops to be covered in blood either. But when Bray noticed Luke's dark beard shiny with a wetness, he felt compelled to ask what Luke had killed today.
But the larger man had no reply, and when he turned away to wash his hands in the kitchen sink the bloody rag in his back pocket made Erick shrink. Had he really...?
Slipping into the kitchen easily, Erick grabbed a clean dish rag and folded it neatly before offering it to Luke gently. Somehow seeing Luke lick the blood from his lips seemed to horrify Erick. Even with everything he'd seen in his time.
.
At dark Bray took to the porch for his usual glass of sweet tea in his rocking chair. And, like he'd suspected, spotted a pair of bloody pliers next to the abandoned bottle of Jack. And in the remaining shot of the amber liquid, the offending tooth lay.