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"Hold still."
"Ouch."
"I said hold still."
"I can't hold still when you're trying to rip my head off."
Jean tugs harder on his hair and a spear of white-hot pain rams itself down Nathaniel's spine. He hisses and kicks him again. Jean hisses back and traps Nathaniel's leg against the bathroom counter with his own, his pointy kneecap pressing hard into the bruises decorating Nathaniel's shin.
"Hold still," Jean says again.
Nathaniel grits his teeth and clenches his fingers around the edge of the counter while Jean peels the bandage off his head. It makes a sickening tearing sound when it separates from where dried blood glued it to his skin, and Nathaniel's stomach turns. He chokes the feeling down and does not look at the bloody gauze Jean tosses into the sink beside him.
The antiseptic stings.
"Stop twitching," Jean chastises. "You're making this so much harder. For me and for you."
"You sound just like him," Nathaniel says through his clenched jaw, but he tries to keep still while Jean cleans the stitches along his forehead.
The swelling is going down, he thinks, but he won't risk a look in the mirror to confirm. Jean won't tell him either, and the bandages he wads back over the wound once it's clean are too thick for him to feel much through them. Still, he dares to hope tomorrow his helmet will fit over his head without any major pain.
"Get changed," Jean says when he steps away to dispose of the dirty bandages. "Riko will be back soon."
Nathaniel slides off the counter and chucks his clothes in the general direction of the laundry hamper in the corner while Jean washes his hands. His pajamas are set out beside the shower like every night, and he slips them easily over the bandages that cover his arms and torso.
Jean looks back at him from the door. The dim light deepens the shadows around his eyes and under his cheekbones. "Don't make him mad today," he says. Pauses, then adds, "I'll see you tomorrow."
No knives tonight, then. Or at least Jean hopes so. Nathaniel pulls his pajama pants over the bandage on his thigh and decides he does, too.
Kevin's old bed is still tidy from where Nathaniel made it this morning. The sheets are smooth and cool against his skin when he settles onto them. The room still feels alien, unreal. A black time capsule of another boy's life. No corner in here calls on any memory — not the books on the shelves, not the photos on the corkboard, not even the bed he's been sleeping in.
It's as foreign to him as the other side of the room. Nothing of his own has found a place among these walls over the years.
It doesn't take long for steps to echo down the hallway outside. As it's long past curfew and the other Ravens will be catching their precious few hours of sleep, Nathaniel knows it can only be one person.
"Waiting for me?" Riko asks when the door clicks shut behind him. A smile quirks at his mouth. "You shouldn't have."
He's dressed up — his black shirt collar neatly pressed, his hair swooping over his forehead in an elegant curve and just brushing the tips of his ears, a little silver brooch pinned to the lapel of his jacket that he shrugs out of now. When he crosses the room, a cloud of expensive cologne follows.
Nathaniel rolls onto his back, props himself up on his elbows, and watches Riko chuck his jacket down on his bed. "How's your brother?"
Riko's eyes cut to him, vicious for one moment before it's undercut by another smile. Careful.
"Very well, thank you," he says. He undoes the buttons of his shirt and exposes his torso of smooth, pale skin. Unblemished, unlike Nathaniel's. He casts a glance back at him over his shoulder. "Have you been to see Josiah?"
Nathaniel scoffs. The team nurse has hardly left him alone since his return from the hospital. "He should get better at finding me if he wants to give me more pills."
Amusement flashes across Riko's face. Deft fingers undo the button of his dress pants, and they fall messily to the ground. "Tomorrow, then." He clicks his tongue at Nathaniel's expression. "Don't be difficult, Nate. He's just trying to help."
The name grates on Nathaniel, as do most things about Riko, but he keeps his mouth shut. He rolls his eyes where Riko can see and flops over onto his back.
"Tomorrow," Riko says again. He steps up to the side of Nathaniel's bed, a black sleep shirt now pulled over his head, and peers down at him. "You need to be in shape if we're to begin preparing you for championships."
Nathaniel hums. "Preparations begin tomorrow?"
"If you're good." One of Riko's cold fingertips brushes over Nathaniel's jaw, up over the slope of his cheekbone to the soft hollow space under his eye. Nathaniel holds his breath when Riko strokes the pad of his thumb over the clear bandage that covers the tattoo on Nathaniel's cheek. He pauses there, then draws away. "Talk to Josiah tomorrow, and do as he says. Then we'll start in the afternoon."
Nathaniel stares up at him. The ceiling light halos his head in a rim of pale gold, leaves his sharp-cut face mostly in shadow. Everything in this place is so dark, so lifeless.
"Okay," Nathaniel says. "I can play with you?" Again, he almost says, then doesn't. It doesn't taste right in his mouth, like something is missing.
Riko smiles. "Not until you're cleared. But Jean will start reintroducing you to our opponents this spring." He tuts and pats Nathaniel's cheek. "Don't pout. Knowing who you are up against is as important as knowing drills. You should know that."
He says that a lot, Nathaniel finds. Comments, all the time, on everything Nathaniel is supposed to know. But he doesn't. He doesn't know anything much.
"Sleep now," Riko says and steps away. His sheets rustle when he climbs into his bed across the room. The light switches off, leaving them in the cool, all-consuming dark of the nest. "Good night, Nathaniel."
In the morning, Nathaniel spends half an hour in Josiah Smalls' office, sitting on the black paper that covers the red leather gurney, and allows his head to be examined. He takes the little bottle of pills he's handed and slips it into the pocket of his sweatpants. Riko's condition was to do as Josiah says, but Nathaniel figures he can just as well flush the pills down the drain one by one and no one would know.
He presents them to Riko when he gets back from class, and receives a satisfied nod in return. "I have to speak with my uncle. Jean will start with you."
Jean does. They head into the vacant lounge, most of the other Ravens in class or off on their allocated study time, and sit in front of the TV with a stack of tapes. It's the only window into the world outside of the Edgar Allan campus that the Ravens get apart from Away games, and most of that time is spent on analyzing other teams' plays. As they will be doing now.
Riko has written Jean a list. Nathaniel peers at it over his shoulder. The first team listed is the USC Trojans, and he spots the crinkle Jean's thumb digs into the paper beside the name.
In French, he says, "None of them are worth our time. But Riko wants you to know their names."
Nathaniel knows that. He is a work in progress, his condition a setback Riko needs to correct before they get back on court for championships. The Ravens do not fail, and Nathaniel cannot be a wrench in that.
Jean considers the stack of tapes, then glances back at the door. He says, "We have half an hour before he gets back."
Nathaniel twitches a brow when Jean tucks the list into his pocket and reaches for a tape that is decidedly not the USC Trojans'. On the plastic cover, a careful hand — not Riko's — penned PSU - '05/'06 in black marker.
Jean chances another glance at the door and pushes the tape into the recorder. The screen flickers, and Jean presses buttons on the remote until the image of a gruff-looking middle aged man appears, seemingly giving an interview. The coach, Nathaniel assumes.
Jean fast-forwards, and the screen changes to a wide shot of an Exy court with a giant orange fox paw painted in the middle. Small figures, half in orange, half in blue, scurry across it like ants, racquets swinging, the ball flying between players. A strange feeling tugs at the bottom of Nathaniel's gut, though he can't quite place it.
Jean fast-forwards again, and Nathaniel protests. "I thought we were supposed to watch them play."
"Later," Jean says, sounding distracted. He stops again when the post-game interviews begin, cutting through a variety of headshots of the players.
Nathaniel's eyes keep snagging on their faces. Sweaty, tousled. Their goalkeeper, short enough that they have to angle the camera down a bit, doesn't say anything at all, but his face strikes something in Nathaniel. A weird tingle at the back of his throat, like a cough threatening to break free.
He feels Jean staring at him, eyes fixed hard on the side of his head.
He swallows. "What is this?" he makes himself ask. He looks away from the screen, from the wide grin stretching the goalie's pale face, and the feeling slowly eases away. "What about watching them play?"
Jean's gaze is assessing. He looks back at the screen and nods slowly. "Not worth it. They are horrendous." He turns the tape off and pops it out of the recorder, sticks it back in the stack, and picks the USC one up instead. He looks up at Nathaniel once more before he puts it in. "You do not know them."
He doesn't say it like a question, but Nathaniel thinks it is one anyway. He tilts his head. Resists the urge to reach for his throat, or to swallow again.
"No," he says. "I don't know any of these people."
01/02/07, 10:34am - Kevin
Where is he?
01/03/07, 9:22am - Kevin
He was supposed to be back on NYE.
01/03/07, 03:10pm - Kevin
Andrew is going to kill me.
Jean.
What happened to Neil?