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Kai placed down a plate in front of Jackson. "Eat."
"My head hurts, and I'm not sure I'm—"
Jackson was interrupted when Kai shoved one half of the toasted cheese sandwich into his open mouth. The Campbell quickly held it to prevent it from falling into his lap and getting crumbs and grease all over his clothes. It was a little hard trying to keep his hands still and focus on the moment at the same time. He let out a muffled cough, finally taking a decent sized bite and chewed it without the urge to spit it out. He supposed the difference was that Kai was a better cook, and also that he was sitting adjacent to him at the kitchen table, with an expression that looked like he was going to gut him like a fish if Jackson dared to decline the food. Kai might've called him brave but he was nowhere near brave enough to face the Parker like that. He wasn't stupid.
Jo walked into the kitchen, catching Jackson's attention as he took another bite. She was dressed for practicing with him, wearing track pants and a tank top, something that the witch could not say the same about himself. To be fair, he greatly valued style over smartness. He figured Kai would let him wear something of his to use. The thought almost made him smile. Kai was wearing his clothes and it made him look like a snobbish Harvard student met the world of Gothic romance literature, and Jackson wearing Kai's clothes made him look like Tina Bell's long lost grunge relative.
"Jo, please tell him not to look like he's going to use my tongue as fish bait," Jackson said, with a smile that the siphoner didn't reciprocate. "I'm eating. I'm fine."
"Stop whining, it's not cute," Kai didn't find Jackson amusing by the way he was looking daggers at him.
"Hell would freeze over first. I'm always cute."
In the middle of adding a squeeze of lemon into her cold glass of water, she glanced up at them, mildly surprised at the sight. "You got him to eat? Lucky you."
Kai assessed her with an uninterested look, like he wanted to ignore her but his ego just couldn't help making him open his mouth. "What are you talking about?"
"You can't tell?" Josette flickered between the two, genuinely confused by Kai's lack of awareness. "Look at him. No appetite, tremors, easily anxious. Probably has a headache. He's going through alcohol withdrawal syndrome."
Jackson winced, trying not to draw attention to himself, and took a bigger bite of the roasted cheese sandwich in hopes that it would soften the brunet's reaction. It didn't. Kai turned his focus on Jackson with a sudden shift to his mood that it nearly gave the Campbell whiplash glancing at him and then elsewhere. He didn't like the way Kai's jaw was set hard, his lips twitching and his dead eyes glinting with a deep desire to shake the bloody batteries out of Jackson.
"You're a fucking idiot," Kai growled, hitting Jackson's left arm. "What the hell is wrong with you? Seriously?"
Jackson's arm throbbed with pain, more so than the dull ache in his temples. He went to open his mouth to speak, but the siphoner beat him to the punch. "Don't answer, you'll say something even more moronic. You could be hallucinating or having a seizure right now. You could be fucking dead."
