Chapter Text
Geralt was very excited for Christmas.
He was excited to spend his first Christmas as a fully fledged adult couple with Jaskier. He was excited to see his family for the first time since Thanksgiving. He was excited to go back to his hometown for the first time since moving across the country to play rugby. He wasn’t, however, excited for the drive. With the holiday traffic, it promised to be twelve hours at least, and no matter what Jaskier said, Geralt knew he’d be doing most of the driving.
The entire week leading up to the trip Geralt kept reminding himself how nice it was going to be to see his family, and every time he thought about it, the pros outweighed the cons—the joy he’d get spending Christmas with his family was greater than the dread he felt about the drive. That was until he woke up on the morning of their departure with a sore throat, upset stomach, and a splitting headache.
This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening.
Sick or not, he still woke before Jaskier, and he intended to use this to his advantage. As miserable as this drive promised to be, he had no intention of postponing it, but if Jaskier found out he was sick he’d insist on making a big deal out of it, and that was the last thing he wanted. He didn’t want to change their plans, he didn’t want Jaskier to worry, and he really didn’t want Jaskier to feel like he needed to do all of the driving for his sake.
Of all the long term effects of Jaskier’s brain surgery, his aversion to driving was one of the longest lasting. At first, the car sickness and vertigo had rendered it completely out of the question, but even after the doctor had given him the go ahead to start driving again, he’d struggled. The time he’d spent unable to drive, combined with the trauma of his head injury, had caused him to develop a fair amount of driving anxiety. This year would be the third anniversary of his emergency brain surgery, and he’d only just started driving again. Jaskier had said he wanted to do some of the driving for this trip, and Geralt was more than happy to let him, but the last thing he wanted was for him to feel obligated.
Everything was okay though, they were all packed and ready to go. Jaskier would sleep for at least another hour, and Geralt intended to use every minute of that time getting himself feeling better.
He wasn’t about to let this cold ruin Christmas.
He started with a shower. In the past couple years of his life, Geralt had learned that there were few things a hot shower couldn’t help. Sore muscles, overstimulation, and of course, congestion. After the shower he opened up the medicine cabinet and tried his best to remember everything Jaskier had ever taught him about household medicines. What problems did he need to solve to get himself in driving shape in the next hour?
Well, the shower had helped a bit with the congestion, but the headache was still as splitting as ever. He wanted to pop the bottle of ibuprofen open and take two, but he had learned that lesson too many times. It would be a lot harder to hide his illness from Jaskier if he started throwing up, and tragically, he seemed to be the type of person who couldn’t take ibuprofen on an empty stomach without facing consequences.
Instead, he put a few in his pocket and went into the kitchen. He wasn’t really hungry, but he forced himself to eat a bowl of cereal before taking the ibuprofen, and between that and the steaming mug of tea he sipped on while he sat on the couch he was feeling much better by the time Jaskier woke.
His partner wandered out of their room in his pajamas, rubbing his eyes. This would be the real test. Jaskier had a knack for being able to tell whenever Geralt wasn’t feeling well—sometimes before Geralt had even noticed himself—but with the hecticness surrounding their travel the warning signs might slip his notice.
He walked up to Geralt, kissing him on the cheek. Geralt worked hard not to wince, he hadn’t checked, but he suspected he was running a low fever. He brought the cup to his mouth just as Jaskier leaned in to hopefully mask the heat on his skin.
“How long till we need to leave?” Jaskier asked, making himself a cup of tea.
Geralt let out a sigh of relief. “We’ve got about half an hour if we want to budget time for traffic.”
“Alright,” Jaskier replied, immediately abandoning his cup of tea. “I’m just going to take a quick shower.”
Good, he hadn’t noticed. He just needed to get them on the road. Surely everything would sort itself out.
***
The driving was worse than Geralt had anticipated. It made his head ache worse and it was exhausting. His carsickness was hardly ever a problem when he was the one driving, but today the movement of the car was making him fear he might be seeing his breakfast again.
“Can you grab me my water bottle?” Geralt asked.
“Of course love.” He opened up Geralt’s water and handed it to him. “Everything alright?” Jaskier asked after he watched Geralt take several hesitant sips.
“Everything is fine.” It would have been more convincing if it hadn’t been followed immediately by a bout of coughing.
“Geralt, what is going on?” Jaskier’s voice was laced with concern.
“I think I’ve got a bit of a cold,” Geralt told him. He figured this was a fair enough assessment. He was fine, really. The carsickness happened sometimes for no reason at all, and what was the problem other than that? He had a pretty bad headache and a bit of a scratchy throat, but it was fine. He was fine.
“Yeah, something’s been going around,” Jaskier said. “But you’re sure it’s just a cold? It’s flu season too.”
“It’s not the flu,” Geralt answered reflexively, but when Jaskier said it all the blood drained from his face. Fuck. This could definitely be the flu. “Just a little stuffy that’s all.”
“Promise?” Jaskier looked at him warily.
“I promise.”