i hate accidents (except when we went from friends to this)
“Oh, god, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I don’t know what came over me, you’re just so hurt and I was so scared and I didn’t know what to do and -”
Link cuts himself off as he glances up from Taylor’s still-glazed expression to his forehead. Before his eyes, the gash stitches itself closed, the open wound fading to a pink scar that pales to white before disappearing entirely.
Lincoln remembers hearing the words “kiss it better” throughout his entire childhood. He remembers the way his dads would patch up his scraped knees with ointment and a bandage and top it all off with a tiny kiss before treating him to a hard candy from their first aid kit for being such a good boy.
Never once had Link thought that the phrase could be literal. Or that his newfound powers could make it literal.
Or: Link discovers a rather unorthodox way of using Lay On Hands thanks to one Taylor Swift, and for some reason, he can’t seem to stop finding excuses to perfect his new skills. Fortunately, Taylor is more than happy to help.
read on ao3
once / twice / thrice, pt. 1 / thrice, pt. 2
once (‘cause i know you had a long night)
The first time it happens, it’s an accident.
They’ve just gotten out of combat at the Eleven-Seven on the edge of town thanks to yet another harebrained plan - this one in particular involving about 27 Large Swig™s’ worth of slushies, an ungodly misuse of pretzel warmers, and mentally begging the forgiveness of customer service employees everywhere.
Lincoln Li-Wilson stands over a puddle of goop, cleated foot planted firmly where the chest of the latest of the Doodler’s acolytes used to be. He smudges some flecks of dark, slimy sludge off his face with his shoulder.
God, that’s gonna be a pain to wash out. At least he didn’t wear his favorite jersey tonight.
Link can feel the final dredges of adrenaline coursing through his veins and knows that it’s only a matter of time before he crashes. He can’t let that happen yet, though, not after this tough of a fight. He brushes himself off and looks around the abandoned parking lot, trying to make out the forms of his friends by the hazy yellow-white light of a distant streetlamp.
Scary stands a short distance away, brandishing her knife and stabbing into the remains with extreme prejudice, targeting anything that still moves. Other than the bloodlust in her eyes and a broken nail, she doesn’t look too bad.
Normal looks a bit worse for wear, swaying a little on his feet. Even so, the air around his palms coalesces into a foggy white energy as he makes his way towards an injured Hermie (who had decided to tag along, for some reason that Link doesn’t particularly care about).
That leaves Taylor. Link knows he’d been injured pretty badly - a blow to the head, if he remembers correctly - and his anxiety only increases the longer it takes to find his silhouette in the blackness of sun-off.
Then, a pained wheeze sounds off from somewhere to his right, and Lincoln jogs over to the source of the sound, and -
Oh, fuck, he’s barely moving.
Taylor is lying flat on his back, his cane knocked a few feet away. His clothes seem to have protected most of his body from road burn, but his left cheek is pockmarked and raw from where it likely scraped against the asphalt.
Most worrying of all, though, is the gash on his forehead, just above his left eyebrow.
Link remembers Grant telling him that head wounds bleed more than others, once, but that doesn’t help the turning of his stomach when he sees the pavement slick and puddling around Taylor’s head, his face coated in red from temple to jawline.
Taylor isn’t even trying to get up, and from the cloudiness of his faintly glowing eyes, Link wonders how much of the pain he’s really registering.
Link waves a frantic hand in front of Taylor’s face.
“Hey,” Link says, voice pitching high as he searches his friend’s face for some sort of recognition. There is none.
“Taylor, hey, c’mon,” Link prods, shaking Taylor’s shoulders gently with trembling hands. Wetness pools at the corners of his eyes, and he blinks it away to keep his vision clear. “I’m gonna heal you, but you gotta stay awake, okay?”
Finally, Taylor’s eyes seem to focus, pupils dilating unevenly but staring at him nonetheless.
“Well, mus’ not be dead yet,” Taylor slurs, raspy and dazed and sounding almost awestruck.
What the fuck is that supposed to mean!? Link thinks.
“What?”
Taylor cracks a delirious grin, blood pooling into the corner of his mouth. “‘f I die, ‘m going t’ hell… n’ there aren’t any angels like you down there,” he explains through half a facefull of blood.
At any other time, that kind of line would fluster Link out of his mind, but as it is, all he can feel is frustration and fondness and desperation and worry and that goddamn adrenaline.
“You’re so fucking stupid, Tay,” Link says.
Link doesn’t really register what he does next, but quite suddenly his mouth tastes like copper and his hands are cradling the back of Taylor’s head.
He inhales the scent of iron and pulls away from - from where he kissed Taylor, directly over the horrid gash on his temple.
The boy beneath him hisses in pain, and Lincoln nearly drops his head to the asphalt again.
“Oh, god, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I don’t know what came over me, you’re just so hurt and I was so scared and I didn’t know what to do and -”
Link cuts himself off as he glances up from Taylor’s still-glazed expression to his forehead. Before his eyes, the gash stitches itself closed, the open wound fading to a pink scar that pales to white before disappearing entirely.
Lincoln remembers hearing the words “kiss it better” throughout his entire childhood. He remembers the way his dads would patch up his scraped knees with ointment and a bandage and top it all off with a tiny kiss before treating him to a hard candy from their first aid kit for being such a good boy.
Never once had Link thought that the phrase could be literal. Or that his newfound powers could make it literal.
“Uh, Link?” Taylor prods, tapping him in the chest, voice completely devoid of the slurred syllables from seconds ago. “Earth to Lincoln? You okay there, buddy?”
“Yeah?” Link says, entirely unconvincingly. “Are. Are you okay?”
“Mhm!” Taylor chirps, and god, is Link glad that he sounds much more like his regular self. He barely restrains himself from pressing another kiss to his friend’s forehead out of sheer relief.
Looking down at the boy below him doesn’t help to suppress that urge much. Taylor’s pupils appear to be evenly sized, now, but they’re large and blown out, the black almost completely eclipsing the dark reddish brown of his irises. The whites of his eyes are still glowing that faint goldeny color, a few shades richer than the far-off streetlights. And while some of Taylor’s face has traces of blood, Link’s unconventional Lay On Hands has wiped most of the gore away, revealing skin painted red for a completely different reason. Now that he thinks about it, Taylor’s entire body feels even warmer than usual, and Link wonders what on Earth that could possibly mean.
“Uh,” Taylor says, “you can let go of me now.”
Link practically jumps back as if electrocuted, clambering away from the boy and back to his feet.
“Ow,” Taylor hisses, rubbing the back of his head from where it had hit the asphalt.
“Sorry! Sorry,” Link says, waving his hands before extending an arm out to Taylor.
Taylor accepts the help, and Link can’t help but register the way that his smaller, warmer hand fits against his palm as he hoists his friend up.
“No worries,” Taylor responds. “Thanks - I think my sword-cane fell somewhere over -”
“I got you,” Link says, scooping up the item and pressing it into Taylor’s free hand.
“My hero,” Taylor sighs fake-dreamily, and the adrenaline kicks up the pace of Link’s heart again, blood scorching through his veins and rushing to his face.
Okay, maybe it’s something other than adrenaline, but that’s for Lincoln to unpack later.
“Come on,” he says after he gives Taylor a final once-over (and tries not to let his eyes linger too long on the place where he kissed him). “Let’s go help the others.”
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