Author's Note: Due to my extensive viewing of Utena, Alexy has turned into Wakaba Shinohara. I am so sorry ._.
"Your brother sick or something?" Kentin blinked as only Alexy met him at the end of the walkway.
"Nope, he's just skipping out so he can play Skyrim. Usually I stop him from doing that, but he's really intense about it today." Alexy rolled his eyes. "He must have reached a new stage or however it is that works…But that's okay! Because it means I get you all to myself this morning, Kentin, my love." With that, the gleeful blue-haired teen leapt onto Kentin's back.
"Yeah, yeah," grunted the brunette, taking a hold of Alexy's legs and starting off to school. "Don't see why I have to carry you, when you have two perfectly good legs of your own."
Alexy giggled and playfully nuzzled his face against Kentin's. "You like my legs? I'm flattered."
Unamused, Kentin dumped his boyfriend down on a neighbor's lawn.
"Hey," Alexy cried, laughing as he rolled across the grassy carpet.
"You were asking for it," Kentin told him with a grin as he continued to stroll down the sidewalk.
"You're so mean!" The smaller teen sprung up from the ground and jogged to catch up. The brunette had just pulled a package of cookies from his pocket and was in the middle of opening it.
He ignored the puppy dog pout Alexy was giving him in favor of taking a cookie out of the pack and popping it into his mouth. "Want one?" He held the package out to him.
"Sure," Alexy brightened again and took a few.
Munching over the sweet snack, Kentin felt a distinct needle of pain on his bottom jaw. But then it was gone, just like that. He resumed his chewing and— Ow! There it was again! It wasn't a horrible pain, but it was sharp, definitely unpleasant. The brunette shifted the cookie to the other side of his mouth to see if that helped. It was awkward but there wasn't any pain anymore.
Wondering what that was all about, he shrugged once and it left his mind.
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He didn't think any more of it until lunch. Eating his sandwich was painless, but when he took a sip of Alexy's cola, that infuriating prick of pain was back again. He grimaced and passed the can back.
"Since when don't you like Vanilla Coke?" Alexy peeked at Kentin curiously.
"I think that one's gone flat," the brunette answered. He wasn't eager on telling his boyfriend about the randomly coming and going toothache. Alexy would undoubtably tease him about it.
"You have no sense of taste," the blue-haired teen chuckled and the matter was dropped.
About two weeks later, eating anything sweet was nothing short of agony. Pain exploded in his tooth upon the contact of sugar and it was simply unbearable. Cold things were also a big no-no. At first Kentin thought it was only ice cream and popsicles he had to avoid because of their sweet flavors, but he soon found that anything cold reawakened the searing throb in his jaw. He refrained from drinking anything other than lukewarm tap water.
"Are you on some kind of weird diet?" Alexy asked the following Monday.
"No."
"Then how come I haven't seen you eat any of those cookies you like lately? And you didn't have any cake at Iris's birthday party either."
"Uh…" Kentin scratched his cheek, raking his brain for a good explanation. Lying was not his strong suit. "I think my taste buds are changing?"
Alexy sighed and shook his head. "You're awful at lying. You should't even bother. But you don't need to be on some weird diet, Kentin. You're already a sexy thang." His boyfriend stuck out his tongue and gave a flirty wink. It was probably supposed to come off as attractive, but it just made the brunette laugh.
Laughing earned him the title of 'jerk' and a playful kick under the table.
The topic of his uncharacteristic eating habits as of late was forgotten until gym. By the end of the class, both boys were sweating and panting like dogs.
"You want some water?" Alexy asked breathlessly. Kentin nodded and took the plastic bottle held out to him. He didn't register that it was cold until he was chugging away and the icy flood sent a shock through his tooth. Agony riddled through his entire mouth, pulsing as Kentin jerked the bottle from his lips.
"Ow," he hissed, clutching the side of his jaw in a vain effort to ease the pain.
"What is it?" Alexy looked on in confusion.
"You didn't tell me it was cold," he complained, "Cold stuff hurts my tooth. Sweet stuff too," he added with some reluctance. But it was for the best, lest his boyfriend give him any.
Alexy's brow furrowed. "How long has this been going on?"
"Little over a week," Kentin mumbled. The pain started to subside.
"So that's why you're on some weird diet. Jeez, Ken, why didn't you just go to the dentist?" he sighed in disapproval, arms folding over his chest.
"Well…" It was a simple reason, really. He was fucking petrified of going. The dentist's was basically a torture chamber, with large, metal drills, seats they forcibly strapped you down in, and godawful elevator music soaring through the background like the ghost of some busted piano. The very notion of going there jabbed thorns of fear into his gut.
"Are you scared?"
"No! Of course not!" Kentin could feel embarrassment incinerating his cheeks.
Amusement tweaked Alexy's lips and he let out a chuckle. "Right. Just like you're not scared of Castiel."
"I'm not!"
The blue-haired male uncrossed his arms and patted him on the back. "Alright, chill out. It's fine to be scared of the dentist. A lot of people are. But you should still go, instead of just tiptoeing around food and being in pain all the time. That's not healthy."
Kentin didn't reply. He did, in fact, find his current state of being preferable than going to the dentist. It may have sounded silly, but the images of hyper-powered drills and strap-down chairs in his head were just too daunting.
"I'll say it again," he managed finally, "I'm not scared."
"If you don't go by yourself, I'll just have to take you."
Kentin kissed him to shut him up.
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There wasn't a shred in him that believed Alexy was serious. This was his downfall. After school the very next day, Alexy and Armin forcibly seized him and dragged him to a hell disguised as a cleanly facility.
"You can't escape," Armin declared. "We already booked you an appointment."
"You w-wha-what!?"
"It's for your own good," said Alexy. "It's just going to get worse if you don't take care of it."
"No it won't! It's fine," Kentin protested stridently.
But his dissents were in vain. The two of them were enough to subdue the one of him and he was ushered into what was literally the most uncomfortable chair his ass had ever acquainted. That insufferable elevator music played on, deafening in the background and rattling in the space between his temples. Armin's muttering and video game noises broke it up every now and then, but only for a few seconds.
"You're not mad, are you?" Alexy asked quietly.
"I'm pissed," spat Kentin, emerald glower as cold as the edge of a battle axe.
"But we're really just trying to help," Alexy murmured.
A man with a clipboard calling his name interrupted Kentin's reply. The immediate spear of dread he felt was an all girding sensation, powerful enough to shove everything else out, even the aggravation. He stood up on legs made of pudding, face as pale as Casper.
"Do you want me to go with you?" Alexy asked tentatively.
Saying 'yes' was humiliating on just about every level and decimated any and all sense of pride Kentin had, but he said it anyway because he was truly scared out of his skin. Alexy actually held his hand as he was lead down the hallway and he was holding his hand in that kind of comforting way that parent's hold their toddler's hands, not the way boyfriends hold hands, which also reached levels of shame but Kentin was still too plain terrified to be embarrassed.
The dentist was a nice woman who made no comment about Alexy's presence being unnecessary. She just did her job and scoped out Kentin's mouth. There was some pain when she discovered his problem tooth with this tiny, horrifying hook instrument. But he'd suffered blips of worse pain throughout the past week and it was the principle of the action that crawled under his skin and quickened his heart more than the hurt.
The entire ordeal was grueling and unending and Kentin was drenched in sheets of cold sweat by the time it was over. Except it wasn't over, it wasn't over at all, this was just the easy part. He had two, no three, cavities as an x-ray revealed one between his premolars in addition to the one that had made the majority of eating pure anguish, and the as of yet small and painless one beside it.
He had to come back to get the big one filled at the very least, and apparently soon if he didn't want to have to have a fucking root canal.
"It won't be that bad," Alexy encouraged on the walk out, after the shaky agreement to come back had been dragged out of his tightened throat. "I've gotten a couple fillings before. It's not big deal. The sound the drill makes is the worst part and you can just borrow my iPod to drown it out. And I'll come with you again."
These are small comforts but they are his only comforts so Kentin takes them.
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"See? That wasn't the worst thing in the world, was it?"
"Your taste in music isn't that great," Kentin mumbled, relieved it's over but quite a stretch from being in a pleasant mood.
Alexy rolled his eyes and lightly pecked him on the lips.
"I'd kiss you back if I could actually feel my mouth."