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“D’Artagnan.”
D’Artagnan grunts.
“D’Artagnan.”
It’s a bit more urgent this time. With thumbs over his ears, though, and fingers over his eyes, he’s not really sure which of his friends is talking to him.
“For God’s sake, d’Artagnan, just go throw up already. You’re making me queasy just looking at you.”
“Not sure that’s his problem. Think he took care o’that enough las’ night-- right, pup?”
D’Artagnan grunts again. He isn’t nauseous, at least not very; the problem now is this horrific headache, made worse by all manner of light and noise and if his friends could only get it through their skulls that their voices were not helping then maybe his own skull could stop pounding quite so violently--
“I dunno, Porthos, he looks pretty green to me--”
“Should I get him some bacon? They say bacon helps.”
“You say bacon helps.”
D’Artagnan doesn’t grunt this time; he groans. He’s heard it said that this is part of what brothers do-- torture-- but until this moment he hasn’t believed it of his own new brothers. He doesn’t want bacon. He doesn’t want bacon because probably that will make him throw up, and he doesn’t want to throw up, either, just wants to drag himself back to Constance’s and crawl into bed and probably not come out until next Tuesday--
“Can you get me some bacon?”
“You can get it yourself.”
“Right, but you offered for him, so--”
Then beneath all the chatter, there’s footsteps. He hears them even through the thumbs jammed in his ears, and this is it, this is the noise that’s actually going to drive him out of his mind. With a low, near-violent moan, d’Artagnan lets go of his ears. Everything floods in on him, like a landslide of noise and color that he can hear even though his eyes are still shut, and he crosses his arms on the grainy wood of the table and buries his head in them.
Athos sits beside him, then. It occurs to d’Artagnan that he can recognize his friend’s breathing, recognize his friend’s smell, and he takes a moment of feeble comfort from this before he realizes that this will only add another voice to the conversation.
But that isn’t what happens. What happens-- even though d’Artagnan can’t see it, he can picture it perfectly-- is that Athos gives him a once-over, takes the hat from his own head, and lowers it gently over d’Artagnan’s.
Suddenly the world is dark. Suddenly sunlight-- and noise-- must filter to him through layers of felt, and although this does not prevent the pain entirely it helps a great deal more than his own fingers and thumbs.
“Aw,” Porthos croons. “He’s really--”
“Shh,” Athos implores, and it’s the most gorgeous sound d’Artagnan has ever heard.
*
Aramis wakes up. It’s a bad idea.
He sits up.
It’s a worse idea.
“Good morning,” Athos’ voice says, from somewhere in the room.
Is it? It’s not. Aramis tries to say so. Instead, this happens:
He grunts, feeling his eyes fly open, and Athos gets a basin under his chin just in time for his stomach to cast up a vile gush of bitter liquid.
“All of it,” Athos orders-- as though this is somehow optional.
The next few minutes aren’t pleasant. Athos fits the basin in his lap; hunched over it, Aramis belches and retches and spews until, after desperate appeals to the Blessed Mother and no less than a half-dozen saints, the nausea finally relents.
His hands tremble weakly on the edges of the basin. By this point he’s pretty sure he’s lost just as much fluid through sweat as he has through vomit, and the combined scent of both assaults his burning nostrils.
The basin disappears. Then Athos-- on his father’s soul, Aramis swears this to be true-- clicks his tongue at him and passes him a dampened cloth.
Aramis only stares down as he lets it fall to the floor.
Athos plucks it up and holds it out to him again. “I,” he says primly, “am about to spend a minute of my life rinsing your horrid refuse out of a mopping bucket. The least you could do is wipe your own face.”
Athos’ intentions are not cruel, Aramis knows. Athos’ intentions are never cruel, at least not towards him, and yet, chastised thus, Aramis can’t help but feel a little like crying. He isn’t in a mood to be teased, is all. He hates throwing up and he hates being hungover and he hates when his hands tremble because the steadiness of his hands has at times been all he’s got, all he’s worth--
Then Athos is sighing, kneeling before him. They don’t meet each other’s eyes, for which Aramis is grateful, because Athos’ gazes tend towards the soul-deep and he doesn’t need his soul prodded right now, thanks. Instead he stares at the wall. Athos works gently but quickly to wipe down his nose and mouth, then leaves, and returns a minute later with the cloth freshly rinsed. He runs this over Aramis’ brow, then down his neck, then beneath his collar. Aramis shivers, feels the fire inside him slowly dousing, burning itself out, and then Athos’ hands are at his shoulders.
“Lie down,” he orders-- then, “on your side, Aramis,” as Aramis tries to splay out on his back.
“’m done,” Aramis protests, because he doesn’t want to lie on his side, to which Athos replies, sternly, “you always say that and you hardly ever are.”
Aramis grunts, consents to curl up on his side, near the edge of the bed. There’s a clunk as the now-empty basin is set beneath him, and although its smell turns his stomach a little, this feeling abates as Athos folds the damp cloth into a strip and applies it to the back of his neck.
“Are you laughing at me?” Aramis bleats.
It’s a silly question. Athos never laughs, and if he ever did it would not be at something like this, but Athos peels a sticky lock of hair back from his forehead and says, “yes.”
“Why?”
There’s silence for a moment.
“Why, Athos?” he whines, feeling like he won’t be able to rest until this question is answered.
“Because,” Athos replies. “For a brandymaker’s son you’re a terrible lightweight.”
*
It isn’t the end of the world.
Aramis, he means, not the hangover, although the hangover isn’t the end of the world, either.
Only, he can remember this one time he felt this shitty after drinking. Aramis had made him chew on a piece of ginger and shoved him back in bed, then sat beside him and rubbed his shoulders and laughed every time he groaned. All things considered it hadn’t been a bad way to pass a morning.
This isn’t the worst, though, of course-- the worst hangover he’s ever had, he spent being accused of murder.
This isn’t the end of the world.
Still he’s not having a particularly good day, either, so when Athos comes and sits quietly beside him it’s all he can do not to collapse into his arms.
“How are you feeling?” he prompts, voice nearly a whisper, after they’ve sat in silence a little while.
Porthos thinks it over before he huffs out, “rotten.”
Athos must know this. He also, therefore, must know how much Porthos needed to say it, and Porthos feels the renewed urge to keel against his friend.
They sit in silence a while longer. It’s broken not by words but by the horrible moment when one hot tear streaks suddenly down his face.
Porthos has never been a man to turn down a drink. He’s lived through whole-day hangovers and two-day hangovers, dizzy hangovers and sleepy hangovers, stomach-plots-to-kill-you hangovers and those hangovers that bring inexplicable, near-gluttonous yearning for bacon and pastries.
Weepy hangovers are new. Not so much of a surprise, though, since he’s not sure he’s gone a week without crying for two solid months now.
“I wonder,” Athos says eventually, “if I could order you to sober up.”
Porthos snorts a laugh, rubs the tear away. “’d be quite a trick, even for you, captain.”
“I can order you to drink some water, though.”
“’d prefer the hair,” Porthos grunts, and reaches out for the flask on Athos’ hip-- where it used to hang, at least. Where it hangs no longer.
Captaincy looks good on Athos, Porthos thinks, and in the end if he’s the only one that these months have not been kind to, that’s all right, then.
“Stay,” Athos says, then leaves, and returns a few minutes later with a cup of water and two pieces of bread. He passes one to Porthos, bites into the other himself.
“You know we’ll deploy soon,” he notes, after he’s chewed and swallowed.
“I know. I’m good for it, Athos, I won’t let you down.”
“That’s hardly my fear,” Athos corrects, a little sternly. “Only-- if we are to die at the hands of the Spanish, I would like to see your smile one last time, my friend.”
Porthos almost chokes on his water then. “Christ, Ath,” he sputters, “blunt that blade a bit, eh?” He’s laughing a little, though he’s close to crying more too, but when he sees the smile on Athos’ own face he knows the trap he’s stumbled into.
This war just might be the end of the world.
What is there to do but laugh about it?
“Weep for him,” Athos sighs, almost absently, “hate him, as you will, but he is safe. I myself find comfort in that.”
“Yeah. I s’pose.”
“Would you like more bread?”
“No.”
“Water?”
“No.”
“Sleep for a week in a feather bed?”
“Yes please.”
“Too bad,” Athos replies, and leans over to kiss his cheek, wet with fresh tears. “It’s strange. My first year in Paris was not a good one. But sometimes I look back on all those times the two of you looked after me, and I find I actually miss it.”
“I know what you mean,” Porthos sighs.
*
It’s just about sunrise when Porthos apparently decides it’s safe to take the basin away from Athos’ lap. There’s a bustle-- probably a quiet one, but thunderous to his melting brain. Then there comes the sound of Porthos returning, crouching down beside him, cleaning his face with a wetted hanky.
“Hey,” Porthos murmurs, as he does this. “You alive in there?”
Athos can only muster a sigh.
“You still drunk, or already hungover?”
Somewhere over his head, Aramis sighs as well. “He seems to cycle through those two states like most men do sleeping and waking.”
Something in Athos’ sick stomach lurches again at that. He really is such a hassle to these two, such a burden. Months only into their friendship and they have both seen to him in this state at least half a dozen times.
“He’ll never make roll call,” Aramis frets, and this time Athos feels himself physically shudder in response.
“So he doesn’t make roll call.” Porthos’ reply is calm, and he brushes the hair back from Athos’ face. “’s happened before.”
“I think his odds would be better if it hadn’t happened before! What’s this, the third time this month?”
Athos doesn’t realize he’s crying until Porthos’ hand is back at his face, rubbing away the tears. Aramis doesn’t either. “Oh, hell,” he huffs, and drops to his knees. “You’re a mess, my friend.”
“Buck up, Ath,” Porthos says quietly. “Nobody’s mad atcha. Only wish we had a better idea ‘bout what t’do.”
Athos shakes his head again, overwhelmed by shame and noise and kindness and Porthos’ fingers on his face, and the overpowering realization that he’s going to be sick again, going to be sick right now--
“Athos?” Porthos murmurs. He pulls his hand back tentatively, just as Athos folds forward and vomits again, onto the floor between his legs.
There’s painfully little left to bring up. That doesn’t stop him, though, and he dry-heaves for what seems like hours, until his throat is burning and his back is aching and a fresh barrage of tears has slickened his flushing cheeks.
Aramis’ voice is matter-of-fact as he kneels beside him. “As all things go that could have been worse. You missed yourself. For the most part.” That may be true, but as Aramis wipes up the floor-- and Athos’ trousers-- all he can do is close his eyes and pray to disappear.
“I’m sorry,” he rasps, aware he hasn’t spoken in hours. “You should g-go-- you’ll be late.”
“We aren’t leaving you like this,” Aramis replies.
“’sonly a h-hangover.”
“Oh yeah?” Porthos puts in. “Then get up an’ get yourself to the bed.”
Athos tries. What happens next is more or less a crumple.
“That’s what I thought,” Porthos hums. “So whatcha gonna do if your rooms catch fire, eh? Or if, y’know, there’s a rat or somethin’?”
Against all odds, Athos feels the prickling of a smile at the corners of his lips. Then he’s being lifted. It’s only a few steps to the bed but he latches physically onto Porthos, hoping to stay in his arms a moment longer.
Porthos, being Porthos, settles down with him. Athos buries his face in his friend’s shoulder, amazed, as always, to be shown such kindness, and too abjectly miserable to shy away from it as he rightfully should. Then Aramis climbs up next to them. His fingers stroke gently down Athos’ back as he scoffs quietly and reasons, “we’ll certainly have stable duty now. So given the stench I suppose we should wait until your stomach settles.”
Athos actually feels like laughing at that. In the end he’s too tired, though, and only presses closer to Porthos’ chest, whimpering as Porthos takes his fully weight easily. Aramis stops stroking his back, begins to scratch it instead.
He’s nauseous and miserable and achy beyond belief-- he’s also warm and safe and apparently going to be held for at least the immediate future. And the strangest of thoughts creeps into his head, then.
If this is the outcome, if this is the momentary denouement of all the suffering that he has endured-- then for now, just for this instant-- it’s been worth it.
Just for this instant.