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theartistknownaslymond · 2 years

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Whumptober 2022 day 11

Sloppy Bandages | Self-Done First Aid | Makeshift Splint

EDITED on day 12. Much expanded, so the actual sloppy bandages come into play. Much indebted to Kay’s r63 version, thank you @stripedroseandsketchpads!

Set immediately after a previous Whumptober fic, "Stay with me", Richard nursing Francis in GoK (yep the season/timeline is a bit different here).

CW: aftermath of suicide attempt, overdose, prescription drugs, gsw reference, injury and bleeding. Description of wounds and stitches, references to sectarianism and terrorism.

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Richard didn’t want to take his eyes off the stiff form on the bed. He might have scoffed and said this stillness was another trick of his brother’s only a few minutes earlier, but not now.

He had seen Francis swallow a reckless combination of pills and he had seen the abyss of base desire in his eyes. Richard had seen him beg for death, and he would never forget the way Francis had looked: curled upon himself, terrified that Richard might force him instead to live.

He had been right, of course - and perhaps, Richard shuddered, he had been right to be afraid.

After all, what had living past that moment entailed so far? A fist to the bullet wound in his side and a bruising, pitiless hold around his ribs as Richard had tried to force him to regurgitate the drugs he’d taken. And now - who knew? Richard sat paralysed by the horror of what he’d just been witness to, the battle he’d just fought. Francis' raw, urgent screams of pain rang in his ears and he felt the residue of saliva and powder on his fingers, recalling the visceral texture of Francis' tongue and teeth as Richard had tried to force him to vomit up the poison he'd taken.

He should never have had to experience that - driving his fingers down his brother's throat had been a violation, and it made Richard aware that even bringing Francis here amounted to the same.

He'd intended to take Francis to task for all the crimes he'd aided in; to speak on behalf of all the families whose relatives had gone missing within the vortex of mob violence that fed into the sectarianism across the water from Scotland. He'd wanted to see in his brother's eyes that he understood what he had done - and only then would he call Tom Erskine and tell him to come and collect his prize. After that? Francis would be probably be deported to face trial in the States. Richard would be free of him.

So why, when he looked at Francis’ pained, closed expression, was that suddenly the last thing he wanted?

His fine blond hair clung to his sticky temples, dark and matted. His forehead was furrowed like the hills and valleys surrounding the cabin. There was blood at the corner of his mouth and around his nostrils…and a dusting of golden stubble where he’d not shaved cleanly - under his jaw, in the curve below his bottom lip, up by his ears.

It was that which, unexpectedly, caused Richard to break down.

He’d been about to stand up and call for an ambulance, but instead a racking sob escaped him and he had to screw his eyes shut and pinch his nose to try and stop the tears from coming.

Gavin Crawford had taught his eldest son to shave, speaking of the sanctity of the ritual, the self-respect imbued in presenting a tidy jaw to the world. It showed you had a steady hand, ruthless when it needed to be, certain but not too domineering; it was a chance to look yourself in the mirror and affirm that you were in control of yourself, your body, your life.

But when Gavin had been away for work, teenage Richard had left the bathroom door open so he could hum along to the radio as he shaved. Ignorant of the solitary ritual Gavin has prescribed, sweeter company had always presented itself at the open door: curious, tousle-mopped and blond, and too short to see in the mirror Richard used. Francis and Eloise would sit on the edge of the bathtub kicking their heels against its side and laughing at the faces Richard pulled; telling him he’d missed a spot of shaving cream when he hadn’t; trying to make him jump when he was shaving the sensitive skin under his nose or over his Adam’s apple.

Gavin hadn’t taught Francis to shave. Richard had quietly hoped he might get the chance to do so himself, like he'd taught Francis the basics of the guitar and how to read music. By then, however, Francis had been studying in Paris - he’d come home one holiday with the skill already acquired, and had confidently elbowed his way into the space in front of the mirror beside Richard, still teasing him and trying to make him slip even as he made an immaculate job of it himself.

Richard had never tried to pass on what Gavin had said about self-respect and a steady hand - Francis seemed to have all that in order, even if it didn't look how Gavin wanted.

But even so, even after that, he had always been Richard’s baby brother, and somehow the sight of the imperfectly shaved face brought this home. Francis always, always strove to do things perfectly, without any show of weakness or sloppiness. The telltale specks of hair - where his hand hadn't been steady enough to reach without risking a cut - should have told Richard all he needed to know about Francis’ state, long before they had come to where they were now.

Thumping his chest with a fist, swallowing down his silent sobs, Richard made himself stand. Every second might count, and he’d been sitting there wasting time in maudlin contemplation - he couldn’t expect Francis to make a break for it, or to make any other attempts, even if Richard had to step outside the room for a moment. He wasn’t in a fit state to do anything. He might never be again.

It was this thought that finally spurred Richard to go to the landline to dial for the emergency services.

Only, when he picked the phone up, there was dead silence. In a panic, he shook it. He checked the plug and examined the cables; he depressed the hook switch again and again, but no amount of pressure or cursing changed the fact that the line seemed to be dead.

He went to the kitchen window and drew the curtain aside, letting out another curse. The snow had been coming down hard since darkness had fallen. It was already forming drifts on the slope that led down to the river at the back of the cabin, and several inches lay on the windowsill. Even if the phone line had been working - and at least now, Richard had a good idea of why it wasn’t - getting up to the cabin, or travelling down from it, was not going to be an easy task. He certainly wouldn’t attempt it now, with the snow still tumbling down in fat, resolute flakes, with Francis in such a precarious state, with night ahead and the likelihood the temperature would drop further.

So they were stuck there for now, Richard and the boy he seemed to have driven to the edge of suicide.

He returned to the bedroom and winced at what he noticed this time. From this side he could see how loose the bandages on Francis’ injury had become and how much blood had seeped into them after Richard’s rough treatment.

He'd been shot - he hadn't mentioned that to Tom Erskine, and when Richard had arrived at the hospital to catch him as he was discharged, he'd been grimly pleased by the news. He'd felt that Francis deserved it for meddling in the dangerous world of arms shipments and mob killings, for playing court jester to terrorists and murderers.

Only now, the matter of deservedness seemed gauche and trite to Richard - how could he feel horror at what Francis had allegedly abetted, and not feel the same horror now, looking at the slight, pale body on the bed? Francis' arms were limp and flat against the bed, his legs seemed to lie unnaturally no matter how Richard had arranged them, and his breathing was almost imperceptible, his head tilted slightly to one side on the pillow just enough that Richard could see the hollow v at the base of his throat flutter.

Cautiously, Richard approached the bedside and checked Francis’ pulse at his wrist. His first aid knowledge felt woefully dated and limited, but as he detected the sluggish throb of a heartbeat beneath his finger pads, he at least remembered that he should have had Francis lying on his side.

That would make the wound easier to see to as well, he supposed, grunting as the dead weight of Francis’ body resisted Richard’s effort to reposition it.

It was only when he put his hand down on the covers where Francis had lain that he realised how much blood must have come from the wound. The sheets were a dark navy blue and didn’t show the stain clearly, but it now streaked Richard’s palm and soaked into the knee of his suit trousers where he knelt on the mattress beside Francis.

God, he was doing everything backwards - mourning, then trying the phone, then getting Francis in a comfortable and safe position, then worrying about the blood - and Richard felt himself succumbing to panic. He was out of his depth and he kept messing up. If Francis didn’t make it, the possibility was that it would be because Richard hadn’t phoned quickly enough before the lines went down. That he hadn’t correctly posed Francis as all those pills washed around inside him. That he had re-opened some internal suture as he’d squeezed and shaken Francis over the sink like an empty washing up bottle.

“Francis,” Richard placed on hand on his brother’s wiry arm, where skin was hot and slicked with sweat. “Don’t bloody go anywhere. I’m going to bring the bandages here,” Richard told him.

Of course he received no answer, but Richard found that it felt good to break the silence in the room. The snow outside was acting as a dampener - beyond the electric hum of kitchen appliances and the perfunctory moan of the wind there was no other sound up here in the wilderness. Richard made himself hum a tune he used to play together with Francis and gathered up the plastic bag Francis had been carrying when he'd stepped out of the hospital.

Gauze patches, bandages, cotton swabs, antibiotics, sweets and a twenty-pack of fags. He'd been trying to quit, according to the tabloids. Things must have been bad.

Richard held the packet of pick'n'mix and sighed, casting a glance at Francis that plainly blamed him for reminding Richard once more of their shared childhood experiences.

He took the roll of bandage, the gauze and the swabs and brought them to the bed. He added scissors from the kitchen and a cup of warm, salty water to the collection - plus, for good measure, tea towels in case there was yet more blood to soak up.

Richard found it was a bit beyond him to hum and concentrate on this, so he put the radio on and tried to find a station that wasn't completely wiped out with static because of the weather. It wasn't an easy task, but on longwave there was something that sounded like a toothless old crofter singing Gaelic down a metal tunnel. It was atmospheric and it wasn't distracting because he didn't know enough of the language to listen closely, so Richard let it be the soundtrack to his ministrations.

He cut the loose old bandages away from Francis' skin and tutted at how pronounced his brother's ribs were beneath them. The fabric peeled away from greenish, bruised flesh that was still streaked with the edges of a blood stain the hospital staff had wiped away. Francis' body here was the colour of murky water, Richard thought, the colour of the brown brook outside the cabin, dull and muted compared to the shock of red where the wounds were.

Richard grimaced at the way the bandages and gauze clung, sticky and heavy with blood, over the fresh stitches. It seemed like such a lot of blood - he couldn't have known that Francis' capacity to bleed at least indicated that his circulation was coping with the amount of drugs he'd taken, that his body was still pumping oxygen around all of its damaged corners. All Richard knew was that the blood smelled sharp, that it reminded him of broken noses on the rugby pitch, that the sight of the sutures themselves made him whimper as reflux rose in his gullet.

He coughed and swallowed the inclination to be sick and pulled the bandages out from under Francis' body.

The only response to this trick - the magician pulling the tablecloth out from under the plates - was a harsh exhalation from Francis' nose, a deepening of his frown, and a clenching of his fists.

Richard put the used bandages in the bin immediately - lest they soak blood into any other surface - and dipped a swab into the salt water before changing his mind and wetting the teatowel.

It was the exit wound that seemed angriest. The stitches on Francis' back - the bastards had shot him in the back, Richard's mind shrieked. He was running away - was he running away? - and they'd shot him in the back - were tidy, the blood around them mostly dry and black as the thread of the stitches. The wound puckered at the centre like lips ready for a kiss, at Richard only dabbed once or twice, nervously, at it.

It was at Francis' front that things looked worse, and Richard tried to clear away the fresher blood, dreading what he'd see when he'd done so. He'd struck a blow in Francis' side, right here where he was most vulnerable, and he imagined that the sutures had torn through flesh, leaving behind jagged new wounds that had opened up beneath the pressure of Richard's knuckles...

Instead, there was just a slightly longer row of little black knots on this side of Francis' body, where the lips of flesh were held together as a join in cheap leather might be. They drooled a thin, pale-looking trickle of blood still, but it wasn't flowing as quickly as it must have been earlier, and Richard gave a sigh of relief. He was getting more confident with the salt water and the cloth and used as much pressure as he dared to try and clean the area. The flesh around the wound was swollen and pinkish, hot to the touch - though Francis' whole body was warm even in the chilly room with its single-glazed windows.

Troubled by this, determined that infection shouldn't be allowed to set in, Richard dabbed and fretted until a sound emerged from Francis' mouth.

It wasn't a word - just a slurred objection, an animal mewl of discomfort.

Richard flinched and cast the cloth away, resolved not to touch the wound again - though his heart now beat quickly, flooded with adrenaline.

It had been a sound that made Richard think that, somehow, Francis would be ok. If he was well enough to complain about Richard's nursing style it seemed he'd pull through the night. If he pulled through the night, there might be a chance to clear the snow tomorrow. They might get to a hospital, and then everything could be put right.

"Let's get you patched up, lad," Richard murmured warmly, opening a packet containing a gauze square with his teeth, his hands shaking with relief, his eyes stinging.

As though matching his mood, a jaunty guitar riff and a strident baritone broke through the static on the radio. Richard scoffed when he recognised it - though he shook his head ruefully because he knew how the story ended. He still grasped for reassurance from the fact that Francis knew it, and that he might be soothed to hear familiar music as he struggled through the wee hours. With his confidence bolstered by the defiant tune, Richard worked a fresh strip of bandage under Francis' body and drew it snugly over the gauze patches.

"Ye're no MacPherson, Francis Crawford," Richard murmured to him gruffly. "The reprieve arrived in time."

---

Fareweel ye dungeons dark an’ strong

Farewell, farewell to ye;

MacPherson’s time will neer be long

On yonder gallows tree

Sae rantingly, sae wantonly, sae dauntonly geid he

He played a tune as he danced around below yon gallows tree.

Now some have come for to see me hang

An’ some to buy my fiddle

But before ‘at I do part wi’ her

l’ll break her through the middle.

So he took his fiddle into both of his hands

An’ he broke it over a stone,

Sayin' “There’s no anither han’ll play on thee

When I am dead and gone.”

Sae rantinly, sae wantonly, sae dauntonly geid he

He played a tune as he danced around below yon gallows tree.

Oh what is death but parting breath

On mony the bloody plain

I've dared his face and in this place

I scorn him yet again

Untie these bands from off my hands

An’ bring to me my sword

An' there’s not a man in all Scotland

But I’ll brave him at a word.

Sae rantinly, sae wantonly, sae dauntonly geid he

He played a tune as he danced around below yon gallows tree.

The reprieve wis comin’ o’er the break o' dawn

Tae set McPherson free

But they put the clock a quarter before

And hanged him frae the tree.

Sae rantinly, sae wantonly, sae dauntonly geid he

He played a tune as he danced around below yon gallows tree.

Sae rantinly, sae wantonly, sae dauntonly geid he

He played a tune as he danced around below yon gallows tree.

[MacPherson's Lament/Rant/Farewell, trad. Scots. The version I was listening to was Noel McLoughlin's (a modern version and a bop), but Richard probably caught the Corries on one of the Island radio stations, which is more traditional but still excellent.]

#whumptober #whumptober2022 #band au: game of kings #character: francis crawford #character: richard crawford #every day i write the book #no cut #long post

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