Demon Cleaner / Eltorey

EIGHT

Corey put Elton down on the couch as soon as they got home. He curled up with a blanket and stared at the wall.

Corey tended to the dogs, giving them their late dinner and refilling their water bowls. He watched as they ate, both perking their heads up and staring as Elton every time he even shifted on the couch.

"It's okay," he soothed, arms folded over his chest. He wondered if the dogs knew Elton was possessed or if he just smelled so terrible that they couldn't recognize him.
After they finished eating, Corey let them out to the backyard, and sat down on the couch next to Elton.

"Tell me about what you're feeling," Corey said, "I want to know."

Elton rolled onto his back, his head partially resting on Corey's thigh. He shut his eyes and hummed.
Corey played with Elton's hair gently, combing his fingers through it and trying to remove any of the knots he could.

"Aside from feeling physically like shit," Elton whispered, his voice quiet and raspy, "I've been getting these urges... like I should be destroying everything I see."

Corey froze for a second, before continuing to pull Elton's hair off his forehead. He could already feel his hands trembling.

"It's been getting worse everyday, and I never want to tell you. But I can feel it inside me, everywhere. Like my blood is diseased and my bones are broken. I hear these quiet voices in my head and if I focus on them too much, they start getting louder and louder."

"What do they say?" Corey asked, his voice lowered to the same level as Elton's
He shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut and curling himself up closer to Corey, who had started to pet Elton's hair.

"They mostly talk about the things I love. I used to hear whispers about the times I've fucked up, about the things I've done that I hate or regret, but it knows how to really get to me. Now I've started hearing more and more names."

Corey gulped, "who's names?"

"Yours, other friends, the dogs. Sometimes I hear things about my family, especially my Mom. They say your names and put these violent impulses inside of me. Again, the more and more I focus on them, the closer I get to actually wanting to carry them out."

Corey trembles and pulled his hands back to his chest. Elton's eyes fluttered open, watery and wide, and he adjusted himself on the couch. He felt like he couldn't face Corey when he admitted this, too afraid of seeing how disgusted he would be. He pressed his cheek to Corey's thigh still, but had turned himself to look back out towards the living room.

"I see little flashes and visions as well, they go along with the whispers. If they talk about you, I get visions of myself hurting you and burning all your necklaces. Corbin, Jonah, Evan, the dogs, all the same. Sometimes, when they talk about my Mother, they'll talk about where she lives, and I see myself walking to her house across the country just to kill her."

Elton began the shake, "Even right now, as you touch me, I feel this lingering anger. I don't want to hurt you but it feels like some obligation I have deep inside, I can see it, hear it and I don't know how long I can fight. Corey."

Corey's hand ran down Elton's side slowly, tracing small shapes around his shoulders, then down to his rib cage. There was no doubt that they were both crying at this point.
"I think you can fight for a long time," he whispered, "you're stubborn, and bold, and you've got the strongest will of anybody I've ever met."

Elton shook his head quickly, "but I don't, Corey. I don't have any of that."

He wiped his eyes and pressed his face into Corey's jeans. "I'm weak, and I can't go another fucking day watching myself do that shit. I think I need to kill myself, or you need to kill me, so I can stop being tortured."

Corey wanted to slap him. He wiped his eyes, and pulled Elton back by his shoulder, staring the man in his eyes.
"We're not doing that, or anything close to that. I don't even think that's a thought that your regular Elton brain would ever come up with. Either way, you're not killing yourself."

"It is my thought. It's the only one I've had for myself."

"Fucking congratulations, but again, I'm not letting you kill yourself, Elton. And exorcise your corpse afterwards, what the fuck? Am I supposed to just move on about my life after that? No way, that is not happening."

Elton frowned and pushed Corey's hand off of his shoulder.
"Then what is your plan, Corey? Because there's a fucking demon inside my head that knows every single thing about me, better than myself, and I can feel it picking the love straight out of me every single day," He had raised his voice, gasping for air when he was done speaking and clutched his own throat. The words stung, and it felt like his own throat was being scratched from the inside out.

"Elton, there's not a single cell in my body that thinks you could ever be stripped of your love."

Corey reached forward again, holding Elton's face in his hands as the man began to cry, again. Corey felt his heartbreak as he watched Elton crumble into his hold, he deserved a break. Just one hour where he wasn't sobbing.

"I'm serious, every single thing you've ever done has been powered by love. For the best or for the worst, I've never seen a human who loves as deeply as you do." Corey used his thumb to brush away the tears that streamed down Elton's face, before pulling him close.

"How about that story you told me about you as a child, trying to fight a grown man in the grocery store because he was rude to your Mother? Or when you charged a rabid raccoon through the yard this summer because you thought it was after Circa. And every single time you've supported me through the shit I've been through, that is all so perfectly you. When something challenges what you love, you've always challenged back, no matter how tough that battle is."

Corey pressed his face into Elton's hair, squeezing his eyes shut in hopes to keep himself from crying anymore than he already has.

"Don't let anything make you think that you can be stripped of your love, because you can't. Fight hard for it like you always have. A demon is nothing but shitty dude in a grocery store, a really scary raccoon, or my life before I started taking my anti-depressants."

Elton hummed into Corey's chest as his shoulders finally stopped shaking. He began to take in deep breaths, and Corey followed.
"Now go to sleep before you exhaust yourself," Corey muttered, pressing a kiss into Elton's hair, so soft he was certain Elton didn't even feel it, "if you wake up and feel like you're losing control again, shout for me."

Within minutes, Elton was asleep in Corey's arms.