[zapdragon555]

[Some weird canon-compliant/semi divergent thing but mixed with the Evelon color drain.]

It was a bit of a silly notion, Tenma supposed, to be bringing flowers. But ever since Grimmer had awoken, finally, after so much breathless time of waiting and praying silently by his bedside to whatever god would listen, Tenma found himself doing a myriad of silly things. Things like sneaking in far yummier food than what the hospital provided; he told himself if he was asked, he'd assert that he knew what he was doing. And he did. He was a doctor after all.

But he'd forgotten a very crucial thing--this blasted weather condition, or whatever it could be called; the lack of color, the lack of definition in the world--had turned his roses to a very muted, quiet light grey. He couldn't help but feel a twinge of disappointment. The courage that he'd garnered when he'd phone-ordered a dozen red roses had effectively left him.

Well... he supposed it wasn't such a problem, now. And it had been terribly, terribly hasty on his part.

[zapdragon555]

Here he was, regardless, standing in front of the hospital. It felt strange to be here not as a doctor but as a visitor. Even stranger to be holding flowers. Stranger still that those flowers were once-red, now-grey roses.

He pushed inside before he could let his nerves get the better of him. He really... didn't have to address this now. He could wait. It would be fine... but ever since things calmed down and life had gone back to some semblance of normal, Tenma couldn't help but grasp at things as they came to him, eager to pursue them lest they be ripped away from him upon waking up from this dream. Of course, he understood this was reality, but there were days he had trouble understanding that reality could be such a soft, gentle thing. A simple day-to-day. It was heaven, truly, on earth.

[zapdragon555]

"Doctor Tenma!" the woman at the receptionist desk chirped, her young face bright as she recognized him. "You cut your hair," she observed as he walked in and gave her a smile.

"Yes... since I'll be starting working here again soon, I figured it was about time." He idly reached up to touch locks of black hair that were no longer there, instead having to reach higher to fork his fingers through the fold-over swoop atop his head. Sharper, smarter, more professional. But there were times he found himself reaching up to draw hair that no longer existed over his shoulder.

"Aw... I suppose. It really suited you, though," she mused, returning to her post, before a brilliant pink flushed across her face. "Oh! I-I didn't mean anything by that..."

"Thank you," Tenma simply said, a soft note in his voice that seemed to put her at ease. She noticed the flowers, and opened her mouth to ask about it, but he hurriedly interrupted her; uncharacteristic. "For a friend," he explained, and she closed her mouth with a small, bemused nod.

[zapdragon555]

A friend... a friend! How pitiful was he? Tenma held the bouquet close to his body as he walked down the hallway, his face warm and his eyes on the pristine linoleum floor. Well... it wasn't a lie. Grimmer was his friend. Tenma felt great comfort in being able to call him that... especially in the present tense.

There had been so much blood, so much that he hadn't been able to tell what was Grimmer's and what was that of the men he'd killed. It was truly nothing short of a miracle that Grimmer had survived, and Tenma had to wonder just how much of these  fluttering schoolboy feelings in his stomach were that of relief... and how much was something far different.

There was no time to think on it. Tenma raised his eyes as he approached the door, and his hand moved in to knock two soft times. "Mister Grimmer?" he called, his mouth forming a smile around the name. "Can I come in?"

[zapdragon555]

Grimmer's eyes lit up with a soft, bright recognition as Tenma walked in, immediately grunting to sit up a tiny bit better in bed, as he always did. And Tenma always chastised him for it, a thing he silently enjoyed. This time was no different.

"Oh, don't sit up," Tenma murmured, hurrying over to touch Grimmer's shoulder, and he almost immediately faltered into an embarrassed smile.

"Doctoring even before you're officially signed back on, Doctor Tenma?" Grimmer murmured, and Tenma felt his cheeks color as he looked away with a smile, letting go of Grimmer's shoulder as quickly as he'd touched it.

That was different. Grimmer watched Tenma move sheepishly about the room. Something was certainly... very much quite different, but Grimmer couldn't quite put his finger on it. "Are those for me?" he asked after a beat of quiet, pointing to the roses with raised brows.

[zapdragon555]

"Hm?" Tenma looked up from the chair he was pulling over to sit at, and blinked towards the roses in his arm. It was difficult to see the blush on his face, with the world being what it was, but Grimmer could see it darkening the doctor's cheeks quietly. "Oh--y-yes! Yes, I... I don't know. I thought it would be nice."

Grimmer's palms splayed, silently asking for them, and Tenma felt some of the tension wind out of him as he chuckled and laid the bouquet gently in his hands. "Goodness," he murmured, appreciative as he brushed a thumb delicately over a few folded petals. Somehow, the tender action only made Tenma's butterflies act up more in his stomach. Grimmer looked up at him, smile tugged over his mouth. "These are beautiful! I... I don't know how to describe the emotion I'm feeling, but it's quite wonderful."

[zapdragon555]

Tenma felt his nervous expression soften automatically at Grimmer's odd way of phrasing his feelings. They made his heart throb with affection, and it was only confirmation that this feeling that the good doctor had towards the other man was growing impossible to ignore. Still, no words came out. He simply nodded, and took his seat in the chair at Grimmer's bedside.

"I wonder," Grimmer said, drawing Tenma's attention once more, "what sort of color these blooms are? What color are you hiding?" he spoke directly to the flowers, gently thumbing over the petals once more before leaving them be. Tenma's hands itched in his lap, wanting contact. He'd wanted so much contact ever since the news came that Grimmer would survive. He wanted to hold the man's hand more than anything he'd ever wanted before and it was this sort of feeling that would drive an otherwise perfectly sensible man to buy a dozen red roses for another man that just woke up from a two week long coma.

[zapdragon555]

"Well," Tenma began, finding the bravery to smile, "I suppose that's one good thing about this color drain. It's letting me keep some secrets." The look that Grimmer's upturned eyes gave him made Tenma's face glow with warmth. It was something like a sly, lidded smile, and though it was a look that Grimmer's face often took, this one felt more pointed.

"Let's see," Grimmer mused, and he would've been fine with letting the doctor keep his secrets, but the barely-there darkening of Tenma's cheeks with flush had drawn Grimmer's attention. In fact, the particular shade quite closely matched... Tenma felt himself stiffen slightly as Grimmer stared at him. Then, blessedly, Grimmer's eyes fell to the roses again. "They don't look like a mixed bouquet. All one solid color. And it seems... there are twelve?"

Grimmer harkened back to all the strange and seemingly unnecessary things he'd learned about when he'd been taken out of Kinderheim and placed in training. One of those things had been the meanings of roses. Suddenly, however, something caught his eye - one of the roses that had been partially in shadow by the others. "Hold on," he murmured, turning the bouquet and ignoring (or not noticing, more likely) the tiny look of flushed terror on Tenma's face.

[zapdragon555]

Sure as anything, there it was - among the twelve--no, eleven now--same-color roses was a single white rose. There was no mistaking it; where as the others held a somewhat dull grey quality, this one was bright, and manuvering the bouquet let it properly shine under the harsh light of the hospital room. The difference was staggering. More staggering than it would be if, perhaps, the difference was white to pink.

"Eleven red, and one white?" Grimmer mused aloud, a smile tugging at his mouth in wonder at the gift. Tenma's terror turned to confusion, and then exasperation.

"They must have gotten my order wrong... hard to be mad at them when the color is gone," Tenma murmured, suddenly lost in his own head as he ran a hand through his hair. When he noticed Grimmer looking at him, he seemed to realize he'd spoken out loud.

"A dozen red, then?" Grimmer murmured quietly, and Tenma felt his body wash with shame. This was a bad idea. This was too forward. This was too much after everything that had happened. Grimmer deserved to rest and relax for a very very long time, they all did, and falling in love was such an arduous thing, and...

Grimmer was smiling at him. Tenma lifted his eyes when a hand came to touch his own; it had taken all in his power not to instinctively jerk away out of surprise. "W-well," Tenma said, when he finally met Grimmer's eyes. "Well, not anymore, I suppose. Now it's eleven red and one white." He cracked a smile, sheepish and embarrassed. The touch to his hand didn't move.

[zapdragon555]

The look on Grimmer's face was something different than usual. His wide smile was lacking--the one he purposefully used when experiencing happy things. This smile was different. It was a quiet, considerate thing, as he stared at the doctor, the tense curve of his shoulders and back, the hair he'd cut that used to be so long. Grimmer missed it, a bit. Perhaps a lot. Tenma looked very good like this, but Grimmer's heart did something quite abnormal--it ached for that longer hair, and it ached to touch it.

"You cut your hair," the words blurted out of him quietly, and Tenma blinked at the comment, reaching up with his free hand to grasp at nothing (Grimmer noticed, and smiled just a little warmer) and then make contact with it.

"Ah... yes. I'll be starting on as a surgeon again, soon. I felt long hair might have gotten in the way, and... it sort of feels like going back to old times, you know?"

Grimmer considered the man's words, his lips pursing softly as he glanced back at the roses. "I don't think it's possible to go back to old times. You're changed. And that's not a bad thing at all." The doctor was left to quietly contemplate Grimmer's words, his hand curling underneath the other man's light touch. "I like your hair. But I think I really liked it long."

The comment was so frank that it almost caught Tenma off guard, but not so off guard that his automatic answer of, "I think I'll grow it back out, then," didn't slip out on its own. After a beat of silence, his head catching up with his heart, he found himself smiling. "I could tie it back. You're right. I could just tie it back when it grows out again."

[Color Harvested]

[zapdragon555]

Grimmer laughed--it was a quiet, almost uncomfortable thing, like he wasn't sure what to do with the burning in his chest, and a laugh would expel most of it. It helped, but not enough. Slowly, he took his hand back, and that allowed some of the flushed feeling in his face to fade. "You know, even a bouquet with eleven roses and one white has meaning," he struck up the conversation once more.

"Is that so?" Tenma murmured, cradling his hand in his other, renewing that phantom touch. His eyes were sharp with interest, though hot embarrassment still clawed at him.

"Oh, certainly. All bouquets have meanings." Grimmer looked up at Tenma and said nothing, his expression mirthful as Tenma began to furrow his brow.

"So...?"

"I'm waiting for you to tell me," Grimmer chuckled, sitting up just a tiny bit better, shifting back against the pillows as he gently laid the bouquet on his lap, the white rose sticking up. "You gave it to me, after all, Doctor Tenma."