Falling Falling Stars

38 - Drugged

Content notes: Non-graphic references to memories of non-consensual drugging.

*

Efnisien wasn't sure how much time had gone by when Arden slowly removed his fingers from Efnisien's hair and rested them on his shoulder instead.

'You feeling a bit better, sweetheart?' Arden asked.

Efnisien nodded sleepily, not bothering to lift his head. 'Yeah,' he said.

'That's great. I'm getting up now, but I'm only going to the kitchen, and then I'll come right back. You're going to stay right here, okay? You can lean against the couch if you want.'

'Mm. Okay, Arden,' Efnisien said.

He was half-asleep. As Arden rubbed his shoulder a couple more times and slid off the couch, Efnisien kept his eyes closed. He ended up with his head against the couch cushion. He wasn't really thinking much, which was nice.

As he heard Arden moving about the kitchen, his mind cleared, his forehead furrowed. He took a heavier, deeper breath and his eyes opened. He sat straighter and rubbed at his face. God, why had he gotten so tired? It was still morning.

He looked down at the bit of pink cushion he could see before his knees. He'd felt so threatened by the fact it was pink, but it was a nice shade. It was pale, like the blue of his jumper. He reached down and touched the material, it was soft and nubby, maybe like some kind of artificial suede or something. It felt good to touch, so he left his fingers on it.

The temptation to look over his shoulder and see what Arden was doing was strong, but he'd also figured it out, he wasn't stupid. Arden was opening and closing the fridge, putting things on the counter. When they'd talked about the form, Arden mentioned handfeeding, and Efnisien said he liked that idea. So it was probably going to be that.

Efnisien examined himself and waited for some kind of panic or shame response, but aside from a vague wariness, nothing came.

He'd wait and find out what it would be like.

Arden returned with a wooden tray with two bowls on it, a straw, two glasses – one containing water, one containing juice. He placed that down beside him on the middle cushion, then sat where he'd been sitting before. He immediately reached out and squeezed Efnisien's shoulder, and Efnisien blinked up at him in response.

Arden's smile was sweet. It was so hard to believe he was twenty eight sometimes, when he smiled like that.

'I had, like, an instinct about this, a while back,' Arden said, still smiling at him, now stroking the side of Efnisien's neck with his knuckles. 'Feels pretty cool to know it was a good instinct. You've quietened right down, haven't you?'

Efnisien nodded, because it was a question, and he was supposed to answer those.

Arden's smile widened.

'All right. We're going to try handfeeding today. You can use your words at any point if you feel afraid. Let me know if kneeling starts to hurt you, and we can shift the position. Finally, I don't know if you can eat everything I've got here, so if I give you a food that you don't think you can eat, tap my leg twice, okay? Same thing if you're full. Don't worry if you can't eat much, okay?'

'Okay,' Efnisien said, a flicker of fear coming to life.

Food. Food was hard. It was hard to eat in front of other people.

A hand in his hair, and Efnisien thought it was going to be so fucking messy. He didn't even care.

'You're going to do fine,' Arden said to him. 'Now... Let's start with something you like.'