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“You have to take these things seriously, Logico.”
Logico hung his head and sighed. “Can we please not tonight?” It had been a long day. And a difficult case. He just wanted to get some sleep.
“But we have to! You’ve been cursed!”
Logico leaned against the front door of his apartment, digging for the key in his pants pocket. “Curses aren’t real,” he muttered.
Irratino huffed and grabbed Logico’s shoulder. He reached into Logico’s coat pocket and pulled out his keys. See? He couldn’t even remember where his keys were. He needed sleep.
“Curses are real,” Irratino explained as he pulled Logico inside. “And I’m not going to let one get you.”
“I’ve been ‘cursed’ plenty of times,” Logico argued. “And nothing bad’s ever happened. Well, you know.” Plenty of bad things have happened. But certainly not curse related.
“That’s only because you let me cleanse you each time.” Irratino grabbed Logico’s hands, dragging him over to his little kitchen island. “You should have seen your aura when we first met, dear. It was all kinds of muddled.”
“Mhm.” Logico pulled his hands free. “I’m literally too tired for this right now. I’m going to bed.”
“But Logico!”
“In the morning,” Logico assured him. Once he was rested. Irratino could do whatever nonsense he wanted to then.
“But-”
“Good night!”
Logico stumbled down the hall to the bedroom. He kicked his shoes off by the door and then flopped face-down on the bed. His eyes closed and he was about half an inch away from sleep when Irratino walked in.
Irratino tsked at him. Then he started making a whole big production of taking off Logico’s clothes.
“I don’t care if they wrinkle,” Logico mumbled as Irratino worked his jacket over his shoulders.
“You will in the morning,” Irratino reminded him.
Logico huffed, but knew that was true. When he was tired, he didn’t really care about much. And then when he got up the next day, he would start in a bad mood since all of his things were ruined. He let Irratino undress him and then crawled his way under the covers.
“Here. Wear this.” Irratino sat on the bed next to him and placed something around his neck. Logico peeked an eye open and looked down at it. It was the necklace Irratino always wore. While he usually swapped most of his jewelry around, this one was always present. It was a gift from his moms. The first protection charm he had ever gotten.
“I’m going to be fine,” Logico assured him. He knew how much Irratino loved this necklace, how much he relied on it daily for protection and safety. Already Irratino’s fingers were itching at the place it usually hung.
“Yes, you will.”
If Logico had any energy left, he would have tried to give the necklace back. But already he could feel sleep taking him. He managed to lay an arm out to the side at least. A few seconds later, Irratino laid down next to him and Logico finally fell asleep.
-
Despite getting home late, he woke up early, as usual. Which was fine. Even a few hours was usually enough to get him through the day. He blinked in the low sunlight and looked around the room. Irratino was gone. He reached up to his neck, finding the necklace was still there.
Odd.
Logico forced himself up, threw on a robe, and shuffled down to the bathroom. He risked a look in the mirror as he washed his hands. He looked just about as terrible as he felt. Coffee. That’s what he needed. Lots of coffee.
Logico made his way to the kitchen. The smell of burning sage greeted him as he entered. He almost rolled his eyes, but caught himself. Because for as much as he thought all of this was ridiculous, what wasn’t ridiculous was that Irratino loved and cared for him. How could he roll his eyes at that?
“Did you get any sleep last night?” Logico asked. Irratino sat on the couch, an incense burner smoking away on the coffee table before him. His eyes had dark circles under them and his shoulders slouched a bit.
“Of course not,” Irratino said. “Someone had to take your safety seriously.”
Logico shuffled into the kitchen and started making a pot of coffee. He still thought Irratino was overreacting. But it was sweet nonetheless. “Well, I appreciate the sentiment. Thank you.”
Logico got everything ready and set the pot to run. It usually took a few minutes. So he took a deep breath and sat at the island. “Alright, let’s do it.”
Irratino hopped up and carried the incense over. He placed it between them and then disappeared down the hall. He came back carrying his “Logico’s Emergency Curse Kit” and set it down before he sat himself.
Irratino hummed a curious note as he opened the box. His eyes tracked the space around Logico’s head. Reading his aura or something to find out what kind of ‘curse’ he supposedly had. And really, even if curses were real, someone simply saying “Curse you, Logico,” surely wouldn’t actually do anything.
But Logico didn’t say anything about that. He just sat patiently and waited.
“Okay.” Irratino blew out the incense and then pulled a different stick free, lighting it with the ornate lighter he kept in the box. Logico knew he recognized the smell, but he couldn’t put a name to it. “Close your eyes.”
Logico closed them. He almost felt like he was going to fall asleep again. But then Irratino splashed some water in his face as he chanted something in Latin, effectively waking him back up. The coffee pot beeped at him, but he wouldn’t dare disrupt the ‘ceremony’.
“Open.”
Logico opened his eyes and blinked away the water droplets that hung to his eyelashes. Irratino took one of Logico’s hands and started drawing a little symbol on the back of it. Then he grabbed Logico’s other hand and drew a different symbol on the palm.
“LIke this.” Irratino placed one of his hands over the other, palm to back. Logico followed suit, pressing the two symbols together. “Perfect.”
Irratino reached into the box and pulled out a thin piece of fabric. He gently eased the edge between Logico’s two hands. “Keep a pressure on,” he instructed. Then he grabbed the ends of the fabric and worked it down, a soft, manageable burn between Logico’s hands.
“There!” He pulled the fabric out the back and smiled at Logico. “You’re clean.”
“Thank you.” Logico took off the necklace and handed it over. Then he made himself a cup of coffee. He sat back down. Irratino was holding the necklace in one hand, staring at Logico intently, and digging around in the box with his other. “What? Something wrong?”
“No. I just…” Irratino pulled his other hand out in a tight fist. “If I gave you something, would you use it?”
“I can’t answer that unless I know what it is,” Logico told him. But if it was a gift from Irratino, he’d at least make an effort.
Irratino fumbled around with the thing in his hand. Then he held his hand out. Logico placed his own hand under it. Irratino dropped a small fabric bag with a weird weight to it in Logico’s palm.
Logico pulled it over and examined it as Irratino put his necklace back on. It was a small black bag with a purple and gold drawstring. He opened it up and pulled out a green-ish stone. It was perfectly rounded and smooth. A bit flat, but still with some heft to it. Little symbols had been painted on both sides. “What’s this?”
“Well, I know you don’t like wearing jewelry because it gets in the way of things,” Irratino said. “So I figured you could just keep it in your pocket or something.”
“And what is it I’m keeping in my pocket or something?”
Irratino almost looked afraid to say. “It’s a protection charm I made for you.”
“Ah.” Logico didn’t believe in that kind of stuff. But he believed in Irratino. “Will it make you feel better if I have it in my pocket?” Irratino nodded. “Then into my pocket it goes.” Logico slipped it into his robe pocket and made a mental note not to forget about it in there.
Irratino smiled. “Really?”
“Of course.” Logico reached out and grabbed Irratino’s hand. “Just because I don’t believe in something doesn’t mean I’m going to turn down someone’s honest attempt to keep me safe.” Just like when people said they would pray for him. Just because he didn’t think it did anything didn’t mean he was going to tell them not to. He wasn’t heartless.
“Good. Because, honestly, the way you act all willy nilly about curses and things is going to give me a heart attack one of these days.”
Logico took a sip of his coffee. “Says the guy who literally drank poison the other day because he felt it 'wasn’t that bad'.”
“And it wasn’t!” Irratino gestured to himself. “Look at me! I’m perfectly fine.”
“Because the hospital pumped it all out of your stomach,” Logico reminded him.
“Either way, it wasn’t that bad.”
Logico had to laugh. It was times like this that he was reminded they weren’t so different after all. And he loved that.