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Fergus remembers hearing in depth and at length about the famous Blitz mentality back when he’d been at school; Keep Calm and Carry On, Stiff Upper Lip, etcetera, etcetera, but as has been widely recognised by most of his peers alongside, for that matter, his superiors and subordinates, Fergus is a twat, and thus when he wakes up with what his tight-lipped but kindly mother would have described as full of cold he’s entirely convinced that he’s mere moments from death.
He has his phone in his hand before he’s even opened his eyes, and though he studiously hasn’t had a speed dial since entering Westminster, Adam Kenyon is still neatly and conveniently at the top of his phonebook. ‘I’m dying. Tell my parents I love them. Send help. And possibly Strepsils and Sudafed.’
Adam’s reply is, as ever, lightning-fast, despite the fact it’s barely stopped being five in the morning. ‘Stop bitching and get out of bed. You’ve a country to run. x’
Fergus stares at this groggily for a full five minutes, half-infuriated by the fact Adam didn’t kindly take the hint and suggest he takes the day off work, but mainly distracted by that tiny, ostensibly inconsequential little x. Is that a thing normal people do? Put xes on the end of things. Messages. Texts. Is he reading too much into this? Bollocks.
With a rattling groan that makes him sound a bit like a misused accordion, he levers himself out of his yellow-clad bed and into the shower, where, miserably angry that he never took Adam up on his numerous and pointed reminders to get onto his plumber about the water pressure, he puts up with a scalding but ultimately feeble shower, before dragging himself into a suit and tie that do little to counteract the awful, puffy blotchiness of his face. His hair, he knows fully by now, is a lost cause.
Though he feels better for the flagon of coffee he forces down himself when he reaches the kitchen, News 24 is predictably gloomy (riots, riots, murder, famine, flood, riots, but thankfully nothing that’ll likely have Stewart pissing in his ear when he gets in that morning) and the broadsheets, waiting for him in the back of the car, predictably scathing. He’d like to see some of these media-educated tosspots trying to deal with something as enigmatically named as sodding Citizenship. He and Adam do exchange a few cheerful texts over the lambasting a loudmouthed Tory back-bencher receives in one of the less reputable gossip columns, even though if caught Stewart would probably make him spend forty-five minutes defining the words confederation, unification, and affiliation using only a dry-wipe marker and pieces of fruit again; he wistfully recalls a time when ripping into the blue-blooded ponyfuckers had practically been part of his morning routine.
The full effects of the coffee kick in just as he crosses the river, and he obviously mistakenly thinks that this in combination with the cheering conversation with Adam would do wonders for transforming him into a semi-competent human being; going by the horrified look in Terri’s eyes over her vacant, distracted smile he’s ill-judged in this belief. “Morning, Minister,” she says brightly, waddling after him into his office. He passes Glenn on the way, who gives him a look of unmitigated horror that does wonders for his self-esteem.
“You’re in early,” Fergus observes, resisting the urge to wince at how ridiculously wrangled the poor, perfectly-good syllables sound in his current voice. Christ, he’s supposed to be speaking later, in front of people and everything.
“Oh, you know me, married to my duties.” She follows this up with a thin, hysterical laugh that Fergus is uncertain whether to interpret as transforming this patently ludicrous statement into an entirely accurate joke; he flashes her an uneasy smile in reply and sinks into his uncomfortable desk-chair. (He later learns that the early-bird tickets for Porgy and Bess had gone on sale at five-thirty that morning, and fearing rightly the reliability of her home internet, currently dubious due to an ongoing row with her service provider, she’d come into the office to use theirs. He stores this away for a rainy day, given that it’s technically a disciplinary action.) “Can I – get you anything?” she asks, in a tone that seems to inquire whether he's considered extensive plastic surgery as a long-term solution.
Fergus gloomily looks up from his monitor. “Tea?” he suggests, slowly, in lieu of telling her to fuck off (Adam is insisting that he try to be more polite – not to Terri specifically, who he agrees is a used airbag, but just sort of generally) and in the vague hope that more hot liquid might unclog the wet-cotton-wool feeling that’s gathered behind his eyes. He then has the joy of overhearing Terri and Glenn’s loudly-whispered exchange outside his office (“ – Christ, is he dying?”, “I know, he looks like a leaky Rudolph.”) and has to resist the urge to slam his head onto the desk. This promises to be a very long day.
His day is only made worse by his subsequent recollection that Adam isn’t balanced bitching on the edge of the tastefully-grey armchair in the corner of his office because he’s spending the day at Number Ten, likely parading himself and his tastefully tight-fitting suits in front of people far more powerful, attractive, and interesting than Fergus. He tries to put a positive slant on this by telling himself that at least Adam won’t get to see him when he distinctly resembles a bitchslapped walrus, but when it hits lunchtime and he’s spending it alone with an M&S salad that Terri mistakenly thought was his favourite (sundried tomatoes, in his opinion, are the barely-disguised testicles of the devil), he can’t say that this is really much consolation. Not even texting Adam a woeful litany of his misery helps, because Adam is uncharacteristically slow to reply, which Fergus naturally immediately assumes is to do with blowjobs with some gorgeous foreign dignitary that Adam accidentally stumbled into whilst innocently using Downing Street’s urinals.
Terri slowly ups his caffeine-and-Covonia intake through the day as he approaches five o’clock, which is when he’s supposed to be bundled blearily and unceremoniously into the car to drive all of five hundred sodding metres down the road in order to give a talk on community sustainability, an unhelpfully wanky term that’s JB and Michael’s idea of a sodding clear-set guideline for their current political agenda. Judging by the grim face of death she brightly wears every time she brings him a fresh cup, he's beyond the help of either herbal remedies or hot liquid.
Without Adam there, he’s useless at making himself stick to schedule, and as they hit quarter to five he hasn’t stood up or looked away from his computer screen in an hour and a half; when he staggers to his feet, finally and miserably finished, he’s really rather surprised by the way the universe has apparently rearranged itself in his absence, with the corner of the desk now apparently occupying the same space as his elbow and the carpet definitely a lot closer than it used to be. As Terri’s purple-clad, shuffling feet come looming momentarily into view and a hazy maze of stars begins to dance in front of his eyes, Fergus fleetingly regrets that the last thing he’d said to Adam was a half-hearted, badly-phrased attack on the notion of feta cheese belonging in a salad.
When Fergus comes to, he’s instantly aware of Adam, of cool hands and a familiar aftershave. In the sleepy haze of the first two minutes of waking, in which he about has the ability to recognise the glass of water being proffered at him and negotiate it somewhere approximately near his mouth, he’s thankfully not conscious enough to be embarrassed by the mumbled sweetheart Adam gives him under his breath. He’s distantly aware of the door opening – his office door; he’s recovered enough to recognise the scratchy, uncomfortable texture of his sofa, accompanied by the faint smell of cheese and mildew, and is absently dying of embarrassment at the image of some combination of Peter, Phil, and Glenn negotiating his unconscious form onto it, whilst Terri clucks and babbles and bobs around uselessly in the corner. (This is uncannily accurate, although Phil had refused to come near Fergus on account of his notoriously rubbish immune system and that his contempt for the ginger centrist had not been curbed by the sight of him sprawled, out cold, on the floor; he’d unhelpfully barked nonsensical orders at the rest of them until Emma had successfully distracted him with an entirely fictional scenario involving his mum, the reply-all function, and the contents of his Outlook spam folder, and it’d taken him at least twenty minutes and a rather fraught conversation with her voicemail to cotton on.)
Whatever Adam says to the intruder is entirely lost on him, given his inability to fully interpret sounds louder than a mumbled whisper and closer than two feet away; but then Adam’s hands are tightening on him as he stands, helping him up, and he registers, gradually, that his car’s arrived. “What time is it?” he manages to ask, whilst also staying on his feet. He considers this definite progress, even if he is drunkenly relying on the hand Adam has on his arm and swaying just a little bit.
“Shut up,” Adam says, and Fergus does register that it’s fond. “You’re going home.”
“ – the thing – ”
“Peter’s got it covered.” Great, Fergus thinks moodily as Adam helps him into his coat. Apparently it’s not enough for him to faceplant in the office in front of a bunch of bloody Tories, but he now owes one of them a favour as well. “Can you walk?”
Fergus grants him a filthy look, takes a bold step, and wobbles indecisively. Adam, stony-faced, says nothing, but keeps his hand firmly locked on Fergus’ arm. Fergus scowls at him. “You’re not – ”
“I’m coming with you,” Adam says, in a tone that Fergus knows from experience brooks no opposition. Adam shoots the surrounding office a wary look, then takes the opportunity to press a quick kiss to Fergus’ temple. “Come on. Chicken soup and domesticity, you’ll love it.”
Fergus, thoroughly convinced, consequently does what he does best; he switches off all but the subconscious part of his brain and lets Adam do the talking. The next time he has a rational thought, he’s curled up half on top of Adam in the back of the car and dozing off as they glide noiselessly through some unnamed suburb. Bollocks to Beechams, he thinks happily, fully aware that Adam, the soppy git, is holding his hand. An evening of bedrest, and bitching, and possibly – he sneaks a look upwards, wondering whether the sympathy vote might win over him looking like a badly-inflated party balloon – blowjobs, and he’ll be right as rain.
Or maybe not, he thinks treacherously, closing his eyes and burrowing into Adam’s side. After all, it’s been ages since they took any holiday.