Chapter Text
When Rain walked into the band’s practice room, he wasn’t expecting to get nailed square in the forehead by a guitar pick. The thin piece of plastic barely hurt, but Rain still flinched with a surprised noise anyway.
“Rain? Shit, sorry! I didn’t see you there,” Sodo, the apparent perpetrator of the flying pick, hastily apologized.
Rain gave his boyfriend a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry, I barely felt it.”
Sodo looked relieved, but his relieved expression quickly melted into annoyance as he glared down at his guitar, which was currently balanced on his leg as he was sitting on one of the couches the practice room provided. “This stupid thing won’t listen to what my hands are doing. And my stupid hands won’t listen to what my brain wants them to do!” Sodo complained, his tone bordering on whiny.
Rain frowned sympathetically and sat down beside Sodo. The slow recovery was taking its toll on Sodo, and Rain couldn’t blame him. He couldn’t imagine having to relearn how to move each individual finger. But Sodo was handling it well for someone of his temperament. For the most part.
As Rain watched Sodo fiddle angrily with his guitar, he had to fight the urge to reach out or say something. He and Sodo had come to a realization early on that the recovery process wouldn’t be easy on either of them. Rain often caught himself being overbearing, insisting on helping Sodo with things even when it was apparent that Sodo didn’t need help. Conversely, Sodo often insisted on doing things himself even when he was clearly struggling and in pain. It had taken a pretty nasty fight for them to reach a compromise, but eventually they’d agreed that Rain would back off and let Sodo be more independent as long as Sodo asked for help when he did need it.
“Fuck this, I quit,” Sodo grumbled, carelessly tossing his guitar onto the empty cushion next to him before leaning back and crossing his arms over his chest with a huff.
“You’re making good progress,” Rain tried to encourage him, but Sodo just growled irritably.
“Progress? It’s been almost a month and I can’t even play anything,” the fire ghoul muttered.
“At least you finally got to take off the splints,” Rain reminded him. He knew how much Sodo had hated wearing splints on both of his hands while his bones mended themselves. The process had been sped up a little by Aether, but even the quintessence ghoul could only do so much for a wound he couldn’t actually see. Healing magic was weird like that, although Rain was still grateful for Aether’s efforts. He knew Sodo was, too, even if the fire ghoul just spent most of his time complaining.
“I fucking knew I was never going to heal,” Sodo growled, glaring down at his hands.
“You are healing,” Rain told him. “Healing slowly is still healing. After the attack you couldn’t even move your fingers. Now you’re already playing guitar again!”
“I wasn’t playing shit,” Sodo scoffed bitterly. “You could hand a human baby a guitar and it would sound better than whatever the fuck I was doing.”
Rain bit back a somewhat sharp reply, forcing down the faint annoyance he felt at Sodo’s disagreeable tone. Sodo was in a bad mood, and trying to reason with him when he got like this was impossible. Rain simply sighed and gently squeezed Sodo’s thigh, relieved when he didn’t pull away. It let Rain know that, on some level, Sodo knew he was just being needlessly negative. Sodo only refused physical comfort from Rain if he was truly upset or angry.
A soft knock sounded on the door and a moment later Copia cautiously peered inside.
“I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” the man chuckled nervously.
Rain gave him a smile. “Nope,” he reassured.
Copia returned the smile and entered the room, shutting the door behind him. The smile quickly slipped off his face as he announced, “I have some bad news, unfortunately.”
Rain frowned and he felt Sodo tense beside him. He hoped the bad news didn’t have to do with Sodo’s situation, but he had a bad feeling in his gut that told him it did.
Indeed, Copia’s mismatched eyes were fixed on Sodo as he continued. “I don’t know howーI promise it wasn’t meーbut Sister Imperator and Papa Nihil have been made aware of your…dilemma.”
Dread pooled in Rain’s gut at Copia’s words. He knew that Sister Imperator in particular had the final say in how the Ghost project operated. If she decided that waiting for Sodo to recover was a waste of time, there was little Copia would be able to do about it.
“Who the fuck told them?” Sodo demanded.
“I-I’m not sure,” Copia answered. He seemed nervous in the face of Sodo’s anger, but then again, anyone in their right mind would be.
“Are they going to remove me from my position in the band?” Sodo asked. Though his voice was level, Rain could see the fear in Sodo’s eyes. He knew that playing guitar and interacting with the crowd at rituals meant the world to Sodo, and it would kill him to not be able to do that anymore.
“They wanted to,” Copia admitted quietly.
Sodo made a choked noise in the back of his throat that sounded somewhere between a sob and a growl. Rain shuffled closer to him, trying to provide comfort.
“I managed to compromise with them,” Copia went on. “We’re scheduled to do a full rehearsal two weeks from now. They said if you can play through the whole setlist, you can stay in the band.”
“Two weeks?” Sodo’s voice was barely louder than a whisper. “I can’t…that’s impossible.”
Copia looked genuinely remorseful. “If there were anything I could do to change their mind, I would.”
“You’re Papa, are you not?” Rain growled. He knew it was unfair to get angry at Copia, but he hated how helpless he felt at that moment. “You’re in charge, aren’t you? Just tell them you won’t kick Sodo out of the band no matter what they say!”
Copia, to his credit, didn’t seem offended. “Believe me, I wish I had more control over the whole situation,” he sighed. “You have no idea how long I had to argue with Sister before she even agreed to give the two weeks.”
“Stupid old hag,” Rain grumbled as he wrapped an arm around Sodo’s shoulders, unsettled by how quiet his normally fiery boyfriend was being.
Copia grimaced slightly at Rain’s comment about Imperator, but he didn’t reprimand him.
“Is this really such a surprise?” Sodo huffed bitterly. “I knew something like this would happen.” He let out a laugh that sounded hollow with defeat. “Maybe I should just quit now, eh? Save myself some dignity? Much more graceful than being tossed out like useless trash when two weeks go by and I still can’t play anything.”
“Stop,” Rain told him sternly. He barely even noticed the way his eyes were filling with tears as he glared at Sodo, still keeping an arm around the fire ghoul even as he reprimanded him. “Don’t say that.”
“Why not?” Sodo scoffed, but Rain could easily detect the note of despair underneath the bitter facade.
Rain gave Copia a look, silently asking the man to leave the two of them alone for a moment. Copia nodded almost imperceptibly before hastily excusing himself, shutting the door of the practice room almost soundlessly behind himself.
Once Copia was gone, Rain turned so he was facing toward Sodo, who was still glaring down at his hands as if they had personally offended him.
“Sodo,” Rain murmured. “This situation sucks, I know, butー”
“You know?” Sodo demanded, shifting his glare away from his hands and instead fixing his angry gaze on Rain. Rain shrank back slightly, faintly alarmed by the way his boyfriend’s eyes almost seemed to glow with anger.
“You don’t know anything!” Sodo snapped. He abruptly stood up, turning around to angrily kick the couch. “You can’t even begin to imagine what I’m going through! There’s nothing wrong with your hands! There’s nothing affecting your ability to play!” When he turned to face Rain again, there were tears streaming down his face, a heartbreaking mix of rage and despair in his eyes.
Rain stood up slowly. “You’re right, I’m sorry.” He had been tactless; of course he couldn’t truly imagine what Sodo must be feeling right now. But he needed Sodo to understand that he would do everything he could to help him, and he couldn’t stand hearing Sodo talk about himself in that bitter, self-deprecating way.
Sodo gave the couch another angry kick, letting out a frustrated cry as he did. The kick was so powerful that the couch scraped a few inches across the floor, and Sodo’s guitar wobbled where it was still perched precariously on top of one of the cushions.
“Sodo,” Rain murmured.
“What?” Sodo hissed.
“You’re angry,” Rain told him slowly, trying to tread carefully. He hated how he felt like he had to tiptoe around Sodo’s unpredictable mood swings just to have a conversation with him. “But you shouldn’t talk about yourself like that. You’re…you’re not trash, okay?”
“Yes, I am,” Sodo insisted. His eyes were still shining with tears. “I can’t play, I’m healing too slowly, I’m fucking useless!”
“That’s not a reason to give up!” Rain snapped, finally losing his composure. He knew now was the worst time to get frustrated, but he felt so helpless that he couldn’t hold back anymore. “So what if you’re healing slowly? That doesn’t mean you won’t get better! We have two weeks, that’s plenty of time to at least improve!”
“Why bother?” Sodo shouted back. He glared directly into Rain’s eyes as he added coldly, “What’s the point in trying? It’s not like there’s any reason for me to stay.”
Rain flinched as though Sodo’s words had been a physical slap to the face. He felt the all too familiar sting of tears in his eyes, and he had to bite down hard on the inside of his cheek to stop the tears from spilling over.
“You’re upset,” Rain spoke calmly, his voice nonetheless wavering as he fought to hold back how much Sodo’s words hurt him. “You say things you don’t mean when you’re upset. Which is the only reason I’m not walking out that door right now.”
For a tense moment, Sodo didn’t speak, simply breathing heavily as he glared at Rain. Then he crossed his arms in front of his chest and turned away from Rain, keeping his face angled toward the floor. His shoulders shook as he let out quiet gasp-like noises that Rain belatedly realized were poorly suppressed sobs.
Heart aching, Rain wordlessly stepped toward Sodo and placed a hand on his shoulder, hoping that his boyfriend wouldn’t pull away from him. Sodo let out a broken cry and turned back toward Rain, embracing him in a crushing grip as he hid his face in Rain’s chest and began to sob in earnest. Rain returned the embraceーalthough somewhat gentlerーand rubbed Sodo’s back in what he hoped was a comforting manner.
“I’m sorry!” Sodo cried, his apology muffled due to the fact that he still had his face pressed against Rain’s chest. “I don’t…I d-don’t know why I said that! I didn’t m-mean it, I swear!”
“It’s okay,” Rain murmured, even though it wasn’t. But he could have a proper talk with Sodo later. Right now, he just wanted to provide his boyfriend comfort, content to temporarily ignore the way his heart still ached as he recalled Sodo’s angry words.
“It’s not like there’s any reason for me to stay.”
The tears that had been gathering in Rain’s eyes finally spilled over. He was grateful that the fire ghoul’s muffled sobs drowned out Rain’s own quiet whimpers. Sodo hadn’t meant it. He knew that. That didn’t make it hurt less.
Rain tightened his grip on Sodo as he entwined his tail with the fire ghoul’s, if only as a silent reminder. Or perhaps a silent plea.
I’m still here. Am I not a reason to stay? Please stay.