Xavier Lundstrom
April 29, 2023 10:05 AM
Chekhov's Med Stash
by Xavier Lundstrom
Co-written With: Oz Spellman
OOC: CW - medication use/abuse BIC:
Xav pulled the small, unlabelled bottle from the bottom of his trunk. It was just an empty spice container he’d found in the recycling at home. A solitary pill rattled around the bottom.
He had expected them to last longer. The idea had been for emergencies or Quidditch matches only, except life seemed to be determined to keep throwing more and more surprises at him. The latest being his wand powers going completely out of whack. He’d been stressing about the possibility of limping through the CATS, barely able to scrape up enough magic to get by, and now he had to go the complete opposite direction and worry about slamming his examiner against a wall when he tried to do a basic banishing charm on a nearby object, or burning the hall down if got asked to cast a fire spell for DADA. If he was even allowed to sit his exams at all. He was currently excluded from several practical classes for other people’s safety. In theory, it should have been easy. All he had to do was ‘tone down’ how much force he was using, but it was hard to retrain the entire way he channelled magic. It was like the muscle memory that told you how far to turn a familiar tap. Sure, someone could tell you that the water pressure had been upped now and you needed to be careful, but it was hard to adjust the automatic actions, built up by years of habit. All that was on top of worrying about Oz, and the increasingly intrusive visions of general fire and disaster.
Fortunately, it was also a problem that came with its own built in solution…
“Gemino,” he cast. And swore as, instead of refilling the bottle like he’d intended, it overflowed, spilling small, white rectangles over the floor. He sealed the bottle and chucked it back into the trunk, and began scooping up the spill. He was still scrabbling for the last few pills when the door opened.
“Hey, I just saw Alexei leave—what’s that?” Oz said, as he stepped into the room.
“I was pulling something out of my trunk and I knocked over my meds.” Xav shrugged.
“You’re on medication? For what and since when?”
“Anxiety. A while. It’s surely not the world’s biggest surprise, is it?” he asked.
“I guess not. You just didn’t say anything.”
“Lots of people take medication.” For instance, his mom, whose pills they actually were… “It didn’t seem like a big deal.”
“Okay. But you’re… okay, yeah?”
“I mean… I want to block out about ninety percent of reality. But those help.”
“Speaking as someone who occupies reality, um… hey?”
“You’re in the good ten percent,” Xavier assured him, padding over and putting his arms around Oz.
“I only make up ten percent of your life? Rude.”
“Don’t be a butt.” Xav punched him on the arm, and pulled him towards the bed, before abruptly remembering, “Urgh, stupid bed rule! I don’t even want to do inappropriate things to you right now. I just want to snuggle.”
Oz pulled a couple of pillows onto the floor and sat down, letting Xav slump down until he was small enough to put his head against Oz’s chest. Oz ran his fingers through Xav’s hair a couple of times.
“I don’t do enough to make you feel better?” he asked.
“Of course you do. You’re good at holding me together,” Xav said, pulling Oz’s arm further around him. “It’s just… not that simple.”
“This isn’t going to be like the beans again, right?” Oz asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Like… you being really out of it. And looking back, it was so stupid and so risky that we did that—it could have gone so wrong.”
“This is just medication. It’s safe. It’s tested. I’ve already been on it a bunch of times without you noticing the difference.” Multiplied medication was possibly even less intense than the original (he wasn’t completely clear from trying to read about that—it seemed to be both definitely the total same, all differences undetectable, but also ‘not as high quality’ and subject to more rapid degrade, and he had to wonder whether the lack of detectable difference was because wizards hadn’t cottoned onto chemistry and how to measure the internal make up of things). But regardless, he felt more secure for having it. He wouldn’t have to ration as strictly, nor ask Oz to dive back into exploiting the potions cabinet with him. That had been on his mind as an option, but it clearly wasn’t one that would be met favourably. “I’ll be fine.”
13
Xavier Lundstrom
Chekhov's Med Stash
1529
1
6
Oz Spellman