Work Text:
It was so hard not to fall asleep during his favourite professor's lecture in his favourite professor's class.
Normally, Rory looked forward to the afternoon block. He would sit in the front, attentive and scribbling down every word in his needlessly complex shorthand. But it seemed impossible now, now when his head was pounding and his arms felt heavy and ached and something like sleep but so close to death it just might have been called his name, and it was getting closer, closer, closer.
And then he'd catch the ledge of a word and find himself hanging by his fingernails on the edge of an endless pit.
That was what this cold felt like. Hanging in an odd limbo between conciousness and something deep and warm and uncomfortable, but easier than the former. Still, it was just a cold. He was sure of that. He had all the symptoms. Extreme symptoms, but nothing out of the ordinary.
Folders shutting and chairs screeching snapped Rory out of his trance and prompted him to slowly, painfully, pack up his stuff. Because truly, everything hurt. But only a little, so it was fine.
The halls were mostly empty, since Rory was heading in the opposite direction as everyone else. It was 5:30. They were going to their cars to go home and eat, or go out and eat, or go to the dining hall and eat. The thought of food only made Rory nauseous, and he didn't have time to eat anyway. He needed to outline an essay, so he was heading to a private study room in the same ancient building that had housed his lecture.
Rory liked the deep, empty quiet. And the chill in the air. Especially now, when his skin was burning.
Counting the tiles he stepped over, he didn't notice Elias walking in the opposite direction on the other side of the hallway towards him. Or how he'd somehow drifted into that lane, leading him to almost crash into the wall and, subsequently, Elias.
He was caught by the arm, angry fingers pinching. But they loosened quickly.
"Woah, I know you don't like me, but you don't need to run me over."
The voice cut through only when Rory began to realize what had just happened. He pulled his arm away, noticing how much more strength it took than usual.
"Sorry," was all he said in reply. He hadn't fully realized who he was talking to, but he said the word enough every day that it just flowed from his lips naturally.
"What do you mean, 'sorry'? And why are you so warm?"
Finally Rory recognized the voice, remembering that Elias was the one person he'd never apologize to. Scowling, he said, "I mean move."
"Hey, you ran into me, dipshit," Elias snapped back. "Are you stupid all of a sudden?"
Rory found his way back to the other side of the hall, blinking the blur out of his eyes. He knew he should reply. Even buried under a haze of sickness, he knew he hated Elias, and he knew that the man would use anything against him to keep ruining his life. So he straightened his back, gripped his bag, and started to walk away.
"You look like shit," Elias called after him. Rory stumbled in response, immediately humiliated, and started walking faster, tugging his hair in self-punishment. Still, he snuck a look over his shoulder and found Elias still standing, watching him leave with an odd look on his face. He had a slight frown, and his head was tilted to the side. Rory couldn't decifer what it meant. He just tried to focus on finding a door to get through as soon as possible.
He didn't get his outline done. Rory spent three hours in a study room before they closed. Maybe it was four. The hours seemed to pass faster than usual. He also kept finding himself with his eyes half closed, sat upright, staring at a wall and only focusing on not throwing up. When he finally got back to his empty apartment, the cold, stale air hit him like a Mack truck. It stung against his burning skin and the chill in his bones, and his bed was a haven that sung so sweetly to his exhaustion.
Rory didn't understand why it was so hard today. He felt like a failure. People have worked through worse. So much worse. Hell, he'd worked through worse, at least he thought so. Crawling into bed, only half-aware he was doing it, he barely managed to pull a blanket over his arm before he passed out cold.
—
He woke up at 3:43 and barely made it to the bathroom before he vomited so hard he heard his heartbeat in his ears and felt it in his temples and fingertips. The next eternity was spent reciting chemical equations to try to counteract the nauseau.
It didn't work.
Drowsy, aching, and delirious, he remembered that he'd left his bag in the hall, just outside the bathroom. His bag with his phone in it. He crawled over and got it out, breathing quickly and shallowly with the effort and pain and sweat and chills and rising bile in his throat.
The screen was blinding when he turned it on, twisting the screws in his head tighter against his nerves, but he managed to find his contacts and call his roommate Evan.
The dial tone hammered a few more nails into his skull to match.
Finally someone picked up. The voice was vaguely masculine and familiar but it was muffled against Rory's own heartbeat.
"Evan..." His voice came out as barely a whisper so he tried again. "Evan, I'm sick." It hurt to speak.
More muffled speaking, something like "Where are you?"
"Home."
Evan was visiting his family in Delaware. He couldn't help Rory. He didn't know why he'd called him. Obviously there was nothing he could do. Dumbass.
Then the person on the other line said, "Don't say that about yourself."
Fuck. He couldn't even control his own fat mouth now. Let the fever take him, honestly.
"I'm on my way," the other person said.
"What? No— Y-you can't."
The phone hung up. Rory, in his barely-concious state, still managed to let panic overtake him. He crawled back to the toilet, pinching himself. Dumbass.
Rory fell asleep again at some point, shivering against the cold tile with a bad taste in his mouth.
—
Someone was touching his feet. He hated people touching his feet. He wanted to lunge at whoever it was, the intruder, the horrible foot-toucher.
"Uuhghnngngmmm..." was all that came out of his mouth. Someone was pulling his shoes off, but his eyes couldn't really open right then.
"Shut up," a voice deeper than Evan's said. A voice that fed the flame of hatred that still burned through the haze.
Saliva suddenly filled his mouth as nauseau crawled it's way back up through him, and he gagged.
"God, I get it, you hate me. No need to be doing all that."
Oh Jesus fucking Christ. It was Elias. Elias was here. Why the hell was Elias here?
"Mmn't touch me," Rory mumbled. His shoes and socks were off now and warm hands were grabbing his arms. Gently. Maybe it wasn't Elias then.
"Jesus, Rory, you're burning up," he said in his ear. It definitely was Elias then.
"M'fine."
"Shut up."
Rory was hauled to his feet, much against his will. A rush of blood and dizziness flooded his head and, though his eyes were still closed, the world seemed to tilt. He couldn't even hold his weight on his own feet.
Elias righted him, arm wrapped around him tightly. Rory found himself leaning into the touch; he was cold, and Elias was warm.
"Come on, help me out here, Rory." The man sounded almost panicked as he kept trying to get Rory to stand on his own. He did manage eventually.
A cold washcloth was pressed to Rory's face suddenly, wiping the stickiness from around his mouth. Everything was so gentle, so, so gentle. Rory wanted to cry for some reason.
"No, no, what are you doing, don't cry..." A thumb swiped his cheek.
Fuck. He hadn't meant to actually start crying.
And then he was being lead slowly, painstakingly, to his room. Rory blinked his eyes open a few times, finding the hallway light having been turned on (ow) and his worst enemy holding him by the waist.
It wasn't exactly the closest they'd ever been, though.
Rory pushed the thought away.
At the same time, he leaned into Elias even more.
He didn't mean to. Of course he didn't. At this point, Rory knew he was really sick, that he was delirious and useless and couldn't take care of himself. And he hated it. Not only did he have to depend on someone, he was depending on the worst person he knew.
"Hmm... How'd... Y'get in here?" he managed to grumble, tripping over nothing again.
"Stole your keys again. Just to piss you off. Guess it came in handy."
He wanted to punch the man more than ever now. He just pulled him closer instead.
Rory was sat on his bed, Elias lowering himself next him, and he gently laid back against the mattress.
The sheets were so cold. He shivered and whined. The covers were soon pulled over his shoulders, but it was still cold. It had sunken so deep in Rory's nerves that he almost missed the heat.
A hand touched his forehead. A soft "fuck" was muttered.
"S'not that bad..." Rory couldn't even be sure he was making sense.
"You're a fucking idiot, you know that?"
Rory started crying again. Because he did know that. He was really really stupid. The hand slid down to his chest. Rory grabbed onto it, holding tightly. It was just a hand at this point. And he needed to hang onto something.
Through tears, Rory said, "I'm sorry, Elias." He'd woken the guy up in the middle of the night, after all.
The hand he was holding tightened its returning grip. "Shut up."
"Please stay."
And there was silence.
Rory heard the crickets outside.
For a second he couldn't quite feel the hand he thought he was holding and wondered if anyone had ever been there.
Then the bed shifted and the covers were pulled back and there was a warm body beside him. Rory happily leaned against him. An arm draped over his side.
Slowly, Elias shifted closer. It felt like a million lifetimes passed before his soft lips were resting on the back of Rory's neck.
And Rory would've waited them all over again.
A second hand pushed back his hair, scratching his scalp. He'd never felt so cared for in his life.
All those lifetimes seemed to pass in Rory's head, maybe in dreams, maybe his imagination, but in each of them he was here. In someone's arms, always the same man. A man he knew somehow, in the wrong way now but one day that would change. Today, tomorrow. In a million lifetimes, maybe.
That didn't matter because he was in the moment now. It would pass soon enough. But it hadn't yet, and that was something he could hold on to.