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Tiny droplets of sweat beaded down your neck, the warmth from your blanket combined with the already amplified heat emanating from your body adding to your discomfort. You groaned, rolling over on to your side, curling round your stomach. A sudden burst of nausea had you blotting to the side of your bed, maneuvering so that you laid on your stomach, your head over the side of the bed, right over the bucket you had placed. It was rather small and was already half-way filled with stinking vomit, but that didn’t stop you from adding more.
After the wave of puking, you took a moment to breathe. You leaned back to relax back on to your pillow, but your body seemed to decide to say ‘Frick you’, and your stomach rolled again. Yet another onset of retching wracked your body, but your stomach emptying your breakfast of a single piece of toast and about three liters of water rather quickly, and the painful dry-heaving began.
When the torture finally stopped, you slumped into your pillow, breathing a sigh of relief. You shut your eyes lightly, trying to block out the small crack of light that escaped your curtains, adding to the already throbbing pain in your head. Your hand reached to the side, feeling around for the cup of water you had set on your bedside table. The back of your hand gently collided with the cold plastic, and your fingers wrapped around the small cup. You cracked your eyes open, and sat up a little straighter, bringing the cup to your lips. A few drops were all that was left inside.
“Are you fucking kidding me?!?”
You threw the cup away in frustration, and curled up into a ball, tears threatening to fall from your eyes. Your head and stomach hurt almost too much to even stand, let alone get up to get more water. It didn’t help that your muscles ached as well. You already knew what you had wasn’t life threatening (You told your family that it was just the flu, but it took multiple visits to the doctor to convince them), but it didn’t change the fact that it freaking sucked.
How did your boyfriend even get the flu, let alone give it to you!?! He’s a skeleton!
About a week ago, said skeletal lover named Nightmare had come over to visit you in the morning, with a headache so bad it apparently felt like his skull would split in half. It wasn’t really surprising, as he’s a king of negativity trying to conquer the multiverse, and all his fighters act like a bunch of twelve years olds most of the time.
But by the afternoon, the headache hadn’t dulled, and it was now accompanied by a belly ache and a very runny nose. You suggested that he go home and rest before he got worse, but he simply snarked back at you "Gods don’t get sick". Nightmare then spent ten minutes in your bathroom, vomiting up a horrible conduction of magic and food. It was only then did he admit he could be a bit sick.
Not trusting his comrades to know how to properly take care of him, and not trusting him to actually rest properly, you insisted that Nightmare stay at your house for a little while.
“At least stay until you can hold down more solid food!”
You had snapped at him when he refused.
“If I stay here, then who the hell is going to stop the idiots from burning down the castle?!?”
He had growled back, glaring.
“You really think Cross and Error are stupid enough to let that happen?!?”
You two had argued for nearly an hour before Nightmare finally agreed, due to another onset of vomiting. You had set up the guest room for him, and just told him to try and get some sleep while you ran out to get some medicine for him. As a final half-hearted attempt to get you to let him leave, he warned you about getting sick yourself. You had just scoffed and said, “Whatever skeletal sickness is hurting you, I doubt I’ll catch it.”
It was just now, as you lay in bed, sniffing, coughing, and feeling overall like crap, you realized just how much of a mean bitch karma is.
You sighed, and sat up slightly, flipping your pillow to the cooler side, and once more collapsing onto the bed. You curled up into the fetus position, and tried to get some more sleep. Just as your mind was about to drift into blissful silence of rest, the sound of a door creaking open startled you out of your half-asleep void of space.
You rolled over, blinking drowsily to look at your doorway. You barely had any time to get a good look at whoever was there before the lights clicked on. You let out a yell of surprise, and your forearm flew over your face to cover your eyes.
“Turn it off! It burns!”
You hissed, squinting to try and let your eyes adjust.
“Not even a good morning, huh?”
You knew who that voice belonged to.
“Nightmare, I’m serious! Please! Just turn them off!”
The lights flicked back off. Once your eyes had readjusted, you looked to the doorway, meeting gazes with your boyfriend. Nightmares from blended in with the darkness of the room, but the bright cyan glow of his single eye light shone through, eerily lighting up the rest of the room.
Nightmare made his way over to you in just a few strides, frowning. He turned his gaze to the almost full puke bucket for a brief moment, then returned his focus to you.
“Wadda you want?” You grumbled. Nightmare ignored you, placing a hand on your forehead. While you would think skeletons couldn’t sense temperature, you knew from previous conversations that while his body reacted to extreme heat/cold the same way a normal human or monster would, he had to use magic to sense the less-noticeable changes in temperature (Apparently magic can be more accurate than a thermometer).
His mask of frustration broke, allowing a little of his concern to show though. His thumb began to slowly draw small circles in your skin, and you closed your eyes again, gently leaning into his touch. A moment later, you felt a small ping in your soul, the feeling of being checked. You didn’t have to open your eyes to know that he was frowning at your current much-too-low HP level.
“Looks like you caught what I had.”
“Good deduction, Sherlock.” Your retort didn’t have much of the venom you intended to lace it with. Nightmare grumbled something you couldn’t hear. There was a slight sound of fabric rustling, and his hand left your forehead, much to your disappointment.
Two arms suddenly slid beneath you, one under your knees, the other by your shoulder blades, then you were lifted into the air, a blanket still draped over you. Your eyes flew open in surprise, head snapping to look up at Nightmare, who was already striding over to the door. One of his tendrils stretched forwards, wrapped around the door handle and turned, Nightmare using his shoulder to push open the door.
“Night, put me down!” You yelped, squirming around. You normally wouldn’t be so opposed to being so close to him, but right now you really just needed (and wanted) some sleep. Nightmare growled, pulling you closer into his chest to restrict your movements.
“I’m just moving you to the couch, stop moving.” He hissed.
“I need to sleep, and the couch is too uncomfortable!” You grumbled. Nightmare looked down at you, giving a glare that could make a mass murderer recoil.
“If you're really that tired, I doubt that matters. You also don’t really have much say in the matter, in your state.” He growled. You huffed, and folded your arms across your chest. You had learned by now that once Nightmare made his mind up about something, there was almost no way to talk him out of it, and you weren't in the mood to argue…
Plus the fact that Nightmare was already descending down the stairs to the rest of the house. Once both his feet were on ground level, he made a beeline for the couch, placing you on it. You rolled over to try and get into a more comfortable position, shutting your eyes. You rested your head on the armrest, but in no way shape or form was it as comfortable as your actual pillow. You pulled your legs closer into your chest, making room for Nightmare to sit on the other end of the couch. But he didn’t. You could hear the sound of footsteps going towards the kitchen, followed by the soft sound of the opening and closing of a fridge.
You opened your eyes and twisted around so you could see the doorway of your kitchen, but you didn’t see much of anything else. The clattering of metal against metal and the clicking of a gas stove igniting was the last thing you heard before silence. You sighed, settling back into the couch. ‘By the sounds of it, he’s cooking something. Don’t know how long it’s going to take, so may as well try to get some sleep.’ You lightly shut your eyes, allowing your thoughts to drift off to nothing in particular. You were exhausted, both mentally and physically, but sleep still wouldn’t come. It had been like this for the past two days, all you would do is lay in bed for hours, not being able to get the proper rest you needed to get better. The little sleep you had gotten had only been about a half an hour naps, and just made you feel more tired when you woke.
Thankfully, Nightmare didn’t take long, as less than ten minutes later you heard footsteps coming in from the kitchen. You cracked open your eyes just in time to see Nightmare carrying in a mug and a cup of water, along with a stock-pot that was warped at the bottom from when it was accidentally left empty on the Brunner, with too high a heat for much too long. He set the mugs down on the wooden coffee table beside the couch, and set the pot down on the ground closer to your head.
“Use it for when you need to puke again.” He grumbled, sitting on the ground beside you. You nodded a little bit. You stretched your arm out behind you, wrapping your fingers around the nearest mug, welcoming the warmth that spread through your fingers on contact.
“It’s just broth. I added some green magic, it should help with the pain, and with keeping it down.” You hummed in acknowledgement, taking a gulp of the warm liquid. Almost instantly, a strange warmth spread through your body, gently soothing away the aches and pains. Your muscles relaxed, and the pain in your head and stomach dulled enough for you to quickly drain the rest of the mug.
Nightmare removed the empty mug from your hands, quickly replacing it with the small cup of water. You drained it fairly quickly, then handed it back to him. Nightmare went into the kitchen to again put the dishes in the sink, and flicked off the lights when he came back in. Your eyes felt heavy, so you let them close. You were aware of Nightmare returning to his spot from before, his hand brushing across your face to rub your head. You leaned into his touch, and you heard him speak,
“Don’t try to stay awake, I can feel your exhaustion. You need the rest, Y/N.”
“I know I do.”
Was your mumbled reply. Your mind was already quickly drifting off into unconsciousness, and barely a minute after Nightmare spoke, you passed out.