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you don’t get sick. sure a sore throat might come and go every once in a while but you’re always sure to take medicine and get lots of rest to knock it out as soon as possible. when you woke up this morning though, you were bleary-eyed with a scratchy throat and achy joints. you knew you were royally f*cked.
you laid under the covers of your bed, one of your feet outside the blanket, keeping your body cool but still warm. your fever made you shiver and you couldn't hep but whine silently in pain. your head pounding and your insides on fire. your messy hair scattered on the pillow holding up your head.
surely you couldn’t tell anyone, no. if the rest of the class knew of your flu-like symptoms, you'd get pity looks. you couldn't stand pity looks. no, you couldn’t let anyone know.
when Uraraka banged on your door to tell you that you’d be late if you didn’t get up soon, you had to make up an excuse of why you’d be absent.
“[your name]?” she asked. there was clear worry in her voice and it almost made your heart ache. “is everything all right?”
you looked around your room, eyes landing on the empty take-out boxes on the floor, from last night.
“yep... i... uh, i think i got food poisoning.”
“oh no! is your stomach okay?”
oddly enough your stomach was fine compared to the rest of your body. “yeah, i'll be okay. i think i hould just rest today, you know?”
“okay, call me if you need anything. get better!” even though she said her goodbyes, you could tell that Uraraka lingered behind the door with a bit of worry stinging her insides.
this sucks. you hate being sick more than anything. your every muscle would ache as you moved around in bed. even as your stomach growled you barely managed to take a sip of water.
your eyes wouldn’t stop watering. you dabbed them with a tissue every so often but they persisted. you needed to hydrate, but looking to your side table you saw that your water bottle was empty.
you asked yourself if you could make it to the kitchen.
probably not, but you could make it to the bathroom, right? you pushed yourself off of your bed with a soft groan, leaning your hand on your night table for balance. your head spun and ached. you inched your way over to your closet and draped a towel around your shoulders, leaning on walls and furniture for balance throughout the difficult journey.
getting out of bed was painful. your chills felt like needles jabbing at your skin. your body wouldn’t stop shaking as you pried yourself up from your bed sheets, sticky with sweat.
ever so slowly, you stripped your pyjamas off and draped the towel around you, not having the energy to wrap it around you properly. it's not like anyone would be there to see, and in the moment you couldn’t care less. you opened the door slowly and looked around to see if anyone was here. no one. as expected! it was breakfast after all.
the walk to the bathroom was painful. any moment you could have crumpled to the floor. your body could have weighed you down until the scratchy carpet swallowed you whole. but it didn’t. your grip on the walls helped as you struggled through the short distance between your dorm and the common bathroom.
you couldn’t help but smile when you had reached your destination. the scent of mint still lingered in the air from everyone brushing their teeth that morning. you reached out to turn on the water in one of the shower stalls.
it did not take very long to warm up, but as you stepped in, the fat drops pelting down from the shower head felt like bullets dropping down on your tender skin. as they rained on you harder, you felt your body lower until you were sitting on the floor of the shower stall.
you refused to leave until the water began to grow cold. inching up the side of the shower, you dried off your hair and body. the cool of the air outside the bathroom was refreshing. your shower had definitely done you good.
when you made it back to your room, you changed into a pair of casual shorts and a tank top. with a blanket draped around your shoulders you pulled your laptop onto your bed and began googling symptoms. while your parents always told you to never trust the internet, it seemed to be the easiest way to learn how to take care of yourself in your current situation.
you clicked on various links. one suggested that you sweat out the virus. sounded easy enough. you train constantly, from the quirk training you do in class to the stretches and weight training you do in the dorms.
your weights were set in the corner of your room, and even though the aches in your body returned, you ignored them as you reached for the sets. they felt heavier than usual, but you supposed that meant sweating would be easier. as you lifted, you ignored the tightness in your chest. you let out a quaint “sh*t” at the feeling of all your breath leaving your body, never to return.
you pumped your muscles to the point that you were wheezing. your arms trembled every time you moved them. it was much too much and you were well aware. yet somehow you couldn’t stop. your overwhelming desire to go back to class, to be with your friends and to train to be the best hero you can be was getting to you.
you lifted and worked your muscles harder and harder, only pausing for a few seconds every so often to catch your breath or to sip from your now full water bottle. you don’t remember the seconds leading up to when you fainted, or even what time it was when you woke up to a shock of green hair shaking you awake.
your bleary eyes opened and closed again.
“can you stand?” a boyish voice rang through your ears.
you could recognize that voice anywhere. it's the same voice you hear mumbling from the other side of your wall late at night. it's the voice you perk up at whenever you hear it in class. it's the voice belonging to none other than Izuku Midoriya.
your eyes opened wide at the feeling of Midoriya’s hand pressed against your forehead.
“you’re really burning up.”
scooping you up by your underarms, he led you over to your bed. you felt weightless being held by him, protected.
as he laid you down, he covered you with a warm blanket. he was about to leave, but when he stood up you caught his wrist.
“where are you– ... how did you...–” even though you tried to make a coherent sentence, the words turned to jelly in your mouth.
“it's okay,” Midoriya reassured you. “i’m just going to get you some water and some tylenol for your fever.”
you relaxed, albeit hastily, and released his wrist from your grip. when he left your room, you finally relaxed, letting your head rest on your fluffy pillows and curling your heavy muscles into your body.
you opened your eyes again when you felt something cool and damp placed onto your forehead. you flinched.
“it’s a cool washcloth,” Midoriya explained. “to help your fever go down.”
“th... thank you,” you managed to mumble out.
you were unsure whether or not the blush on your face was out of embarrassment, his proximity or from your fever, but either way you were glad to have the latter option as a cover.
“would you like some water? you should also probably take the tylenol too.” Midoriya looked blurry from your eyes that would not stop watering.
sitting up, you held onto the washcloth so it would not slip off. you took the glass from Midoriya’s hands and shakily sipped from it. It hurt going down but what else would you expect from being so sick?
“you shouldn’t be helping me,” you manage to get a few words together. “you’re gonna get sick.”
he just shrugged. “if i get sick, i get sick. we all catch colds from time to time. i don't mind taking care of you...”
your face felt hotter at his words and you kept your head low; your gaze on his hands, watching him take out a pill out of the tylenol bottle.
you took the pill he handed you, followed by another painful gulp of water.
“when did you find me? how did you get in..?”
“your door was open and i thought that was a little weird so i peeked inside,” he admitted and smiled nervously.
you smiled at the thought of an anxious Midoriya contemplating whether or not it was okay to peek into another person’s dorm.
“then i saw your hand lying on the ground.”
Your stomach dropped.
“so i opened the door wider and saw you had fainted.” his face clearly concerned for you, worried for you.
you waited a few seconds before speaking next, focusing on the churning in your belly.
“trash can,” you said.
“huh?” he squinted his eyes in confusion.
“trash can!” you gestured to the waste basket next to your desk.
Midoriya rushed over to hand it to you. he made it just in time before you blew your gut onto your bed. as your head hung low in the trash can, he patted your back and held your hair out of the way.
“what were you doing back here anyways?” your head was still in the can, and as you spoke your words echoed off of its walls. “shouldn’t you be in class?”
“i left one of my books for class so i rushed over here.”
he stayed just for you. the thought made you want to throw up again. why was he treating you so well when you did this to yourself? you're the one who made your condition worse.
“you should go back. you're missing training.” you mumbled a bit sadly, keeping your head low and wiping your mouth with a tissue.
“i'm not going anywhere.” he blurted out.
“Midoriya, i think–”
He placed the washcloth, which had fallen onto your blankets, onto the back of your neck. it sent chills down your spine and soothed you at the same time. “if I was sick, i’d want someone to take care of me.” he said in a softer tone; he was sitting on your bed, next to you.
his words were genuine and that stung your heart even more. how could someone that generous--that authentic--actually exist?
when you were confident you didn’t need the trash can anymore you set it aside. “i’ll clean it out later.”
“it’s okay.” Midoriya picked it up and set out to the bathroom.
your eyes followed him as he left. evem though he was carrying a bin full of your vomit, he didn’t seem malcontent. the feeling of his hand rubbing your back lingered across your sensitive skin.
you hoped that he would come back from the bathroom soon so he could go back to playing with your hair and rubbing your forehead. just his presence was like medicine to you--made your heart flutter--his touch was the perfect dosage.
you could hear him humming to himself from the bathroom and you couldn’t help but chuckle as you laid down, snuggling back into the pillows. Midoriya was the perfect person to spend your sick day with. and who knows, maybe if he ended up sick as well you could return the favor. your face flushed and you covered it with your blanket, your mind running. his words repeating on loop.
"i don't mind taking care of you..."
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