Something Amiss (Hoodie x Reader)

Seventeen: Reduction Manoeuvre

"Fucking OW!"

You cursed, back and head knocking into the window behind you, from where you wiggled around from your sitting position on top of the desk. Your struggles were met with hands firmly pulling you forward, keeping you from doing any damage to either yourself or the window.

Letting the (assumably) serial killer who had dislocated your elbow in the first place set the joint back was not the best idea you'd ever had.

Hoodie hadn't given you much of an option, insisting that he couldn't let you take yourself to the ER. He 'didn't trust you' after you'd defied him by going to Jade's apartment. You didn't exactly expect him to be reasonable, but even he had to admit that that had been more of Masky's fault than your own. Still, he had got his way. Via thinly veiled threats to your personal safety. As usual.

"Stay still." His eyes didn't meet yours, focused on the injury. He returned his hands to your elbow, on which he was performing something he'd told you was a 'reduction manoeuvre'.

You didn't have any clue what that term meant, but it had already been established that he was an obnoxious egghead. It seemed to you that he was trying to shimmy your elbow into a more normal position - and the process was very fucking painful. He'd brought you some paracetamol, but you hadn't taken all of it - only swallowing one of the three pills simply because you were indignant and stubborn as shit. Not to mention salty as all hell. He acted like you'd done this to yourself, even if he had murmured a (very) quick 'sorry about that'.

"If you wanted me to stay still you shouldn't have-" you paused to wince as his palm pushed on a particularly painful spot, "-dislocated my fucking elbow-" ow, ow, ow! "-to begin with."

You were struggling to keep your balance, reeling from the pain with both of your hands rendered useless. You'd almost accidentally kicked the guy in the balls twice now as he worked, simply from trying to steady yourself. You wouldn't have minded.

He didn't look up. "Stop talking or I'll knock you out."

You blinked. Okay then, asshole.

You refused to let yourself complain any more than the occasional curse, not wanting to give him any satisfaction. You didn't know if he enjoyed hurting you per se, but he certainly seemed to love control; why else tote a gun around with you everywhere and make yourself sound like Satan? He definitely would have bullied you in high school.

It didn't take him very long, finally stepping back from you and dusting his hands off on his dark jeans. He didn't say much to you as he walked out, but he did shoot a pointed look at the painkillers, "You're gonna want those." Ominous, as always.

You rolled your eyes, fighting the urge to go back to pitifully cradling your aching elbow. It felt like someone had taken a cheese grater and was shredding the joint from the inside out. He was right, the pills did sound appealing right about now. You couldn't bring yourself to take them, though, effectively frozen in place. You could barely process anything that had happened, so instead you took to blankly staring at the empty doorway until you zoned out completely. No thoughts. Head empty.

All you knew was that Jade was dead, you were in pain, Harry was probably going to get a fifty year prison sentence, and Hoodie still hadn't fucked off. At this point, you were losing track of the fucking days; you didn't know what had happened when, and the order was all a haze. Grimly, you registered that you were likely traumatised quite badly. Fun.

Minutes passed, you only stared ahead in a mildly horrified state of placidity.

You hadn't heard him leave the apartment, but you now heard the sound of the front door closing, and footsteps coming back towards your bedroom. You didn't look up from the doorway even as he entered, eyes unfocused so his head looked like a skin tone blob. He rested one arm on either side of the doorway, annoyingly in the way of your fuzzy view.