Roman felt a pang in his heart at John’s embarrassment. He probably felt afraid to reveal himself to Roman, afraid to show the flaws he was born with. If he knew what I had done toher,Roman thought,
he would be terrified of me. He forced himself to push those thoughts away; that had been ten years ago and he didn’t need the dreams to haunt him again.
Instead, he rose to his feet and closed the distance between them. He stopped less than a step away from John and said, “You don’t need to be ashamed, John. Please remember that I’m a healer. Besides, I,” he paused and licked his lips. “I may not have lived your life or suffered the things you have, but I have been hurt by my own kin and marked by scars.” Roman took a deep breath before turning around and taking off his shirt. He let John seen the thick, bright pink scars that covered his back, seven in all. He swallowed thickly and said, “I was punished for helping the Sky People, of all things.” Roman tossed his shirt to the side and turned back to face John. He touched the hem of John’s shirt and brought it up several inches. He kept his eyes locked on John’s, not looking at the exposed skin of his stomach. “Don’t be afraid to be seen.”
Roman smiled at John’s cooperation. “Let me start a fire to warm some water for you.” He stood and got to work on his patient’s bath. Luckily, he had enough water in the healer’s tent for a bath. Usually the baths given to patients were limited to sponge baths, but Roman could tell John needed a real bath. It wasn’t just the filth that covered him, but the obvious rough time the kid had been having lately. It was his demeanor and distrust that spoke volumes about John. So far, speaking softly and light smiles had been working.
With the bath drawn, Roman turned back to him with a smile. He placed a towel nearby the tub. “Do you need privacy? Or I can help you if you need it.” He took a bowl of crushed herbs and poured it into the water. He sat on the edge of the bath and dipped his hand in to mix it. “Since you’ve been in the Dead Zone, I figured you could use something for your skin. It smells nice too.”
Murphy shoved his hands into his pockets and warily watched
Roman work. He still didn’t trust the guy, despite his soft smiles and surprisingly
mellow demeanour. The sight of fresh water made Murphy impatient. There was so
much of it; he wanted to sink in right away, to submerge himself and scrub his
skin raw. He wanted to be well and truly clean
for the first time in months. However,
the prospect of nudity immediately unnerved him.
“So what, you want me to…?” Murphy squared his jaw and cursed
himself for accepting the bath. Nudity was a terrible idea. The denizens of the Dead Zone all were mutated to
some extent, and here he was,
masquerading as a desert nomad; Roman would surely notice Murphy’s lack of
deformity. He shuddered a little, inwardly. He wasn’t exactly keen on being captured and tortured for the umpteenth time.
“Yeah, fine.” Murphy managed at last, removing his hands
from his pockets. He shrugged off his jacket and paused at the hem of Jason’s
shirt; he blushed, crimson spreading up his throat like rope burn. “You should turn around.”
Roman turned back to smile at him. He left the papers on the table and closed the short distance between them. He grabbed the other chair and swung it around so it was facing his patient. Roman sat down and leaned forward, pressing his elbows to his knees. “I’m Roman, in case Adele didn’t mention it.” He cocked his head and glance the kid over. He was certainly pale, surprising considering his time in the Dead Zone. Some of the filth that covered the kid had been washed off, but poorly. “Would you like to take a bath before we begin? I understand that there’s a lack of water in the desert,” Roman joked. “We have clothing left over from others, but you can also borrow something of mine if nothing else fits. I would guess that you’re closer to my size than Jason’s,” he said, gesturing to the too large shirt.
Roman leaned forward and fixed Murphy with a reticent smile,
eyes bright in the morning light, and Murphy felt momentarily dazed; he was
unaccustomed to gentle looks, even from the Camp’s own doctor, who nowadays looked
fatigued and preoccupied. Nausea churned in the pit of his stomach. He felt so
fucking out of place, and Roman’s
proximity wasn’t making things any better. Murphy scooted back and clenched his
hands into fists, letting out a dry laugh, if only to avoid Roman’s scent: sterility
and old paper and woodsy musk.
“Roman, right. She might’ve mentioned it. I’m Jonathan.
John. Whatever.” Sure, that was technically his name, but it felt like a lie –
it even sounded like a lie. He fought
back a grimace; he’d lost his edge after a night with Adele and Jason. “Yeah,
well, it’s not exactly raining out there – unless you count body parts.”
Murphy smirked at his own joke, and relaxed back into the chair. Just then, Roman suggested a bath, and Murphy looked momentarily
distressed, colour staining his cheeks, but he slowly reconsidered the offer. A bath. Clean water. He could finally wash away months’ worth of dirt and
eliminate the grating sand that persistently clung to his skin – the notion
made him concede, and on an impulse he nodded. Fuck it. “I’ll take you up on that bath. My clothes are fine though. I’m used to them.”
“Oh,” Roman said. He grabbed a nearby rag and wiped the ink off his hands. “Any friend of Adele is a friend of mine.” Jason, however, not so much. “If you’ve just come from the Dead Zone, you’ll be needing plenty of water.” He placed a waterskin on the table since his new patient was still by the entrance. “You can have a seat if you’d like,” Roman said, patting the softer chair. He knew the kid was lingering for a reason, and that he probably didn’t trust him. He had worked with patients who wanted to bolt before. The key was to wait for them to decide whether or not he was worth their time. Roman turned his back to the kid and bent over a bit to straighten the papers on the table.
The healer wasn’t at all what Murphy had expected; he was
neither pushy nor crass, and he trusted Murphy enough to turn his back to him. His
casual demeanour and the ease with which he moved about almost made Murphy
doubt that he was a Grounder at all. Murphy finally crossed the threshold, relaxing
a little, although tension was still written in the line of his shoulders – he accepted
the waterskin and watched Roman from his peripherals. His profile was handsome
and fatherly: comforting, even.
“Right, thanks,” said Murphy after sitting down. He wiped his mouth and gave Roman another once-over. “I’m mostly in one piece.”
Roman had already been awake for over an hour. He worked by candlelight, scribbling notes and drawing diagrams of herbs. When the sun peaked through the windows of the tent, he blew the small flame out. His fingertips were ink stained and his hand was cramping. He massaged his knuckles with his other hand while he stood from his chair. Roman went to the other side of the room to grab more paper and ink when a voice called out, “Hello?” He paused and looked behind him to see a young man with a shirt too big for him. Roman offered him a smile.
“Do you need something?”
Murphy’s gaze instantly went to the healer, and his eyes
went wide, mouth slack with surprise. The last healer he’d interacted with – an asshole
who stop him from going septic throughout his imprisonment – was a complete
antithesis to Roman. Murphy clenched his jaw and entered the tent, but did not
move from far the flap.
“Yeah, right. I’m a friend of Jason and Adele’s,” he explained,
carefully picking his words. “I’m just passing through, really; they insisted I go get a check-up. The desert sucks.”
There was just enough
light for him to make out the ink stains on Roman’s fingers. Murphy felt as if
he was intruding, but if the healer had wanted privacy he would’ve have asked for
it by now. And Murphy was curious now; did
he have any lasting damage from the intense two treks across the Dead Zone? Probably.
Murphy was still half-asleep
when the Grounder couple ushered him off to the Healer. It was, he supposed, a
good idea to be checked out. He had traveled through the Dead Zone twice
without medical attention, and Abby had scarcely looked at him following his
initial return. He still fostered a litany of minor injuries. Perhaps a foreign
eye could come in handy, since he wasn’t in the mood for dying just yet.
The sun rose lazily over Gona: a smear of sulphur across the
green horizon. Murphy approached the healer’s tent with a tight grip on his backpack, now filled to the brim with
fresh meat; he felt a sense of triumph, of worthiness. Before he could
think about it, Murphy peered his head inside the tent without so much as
knocking.
