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“Are you okay?”
Dan looks up from where he’s been staring off into the distance in the studio. “Hm?”
“Are you okay?” Phil sits in his inflatable chair and motions in the general direction of Dan’s face.
It’s only then that Dan realizes he’s pushing his thumb against the bone above his left eye, as if that will stop the pain that’s building there. He drops his hand to his lap. “Yeah. Fine.”
Phil looks unconvinced. “Headache?”
Dan doesn’t get headaches. Not the way Phil does. “A bit, but I’ll be fine once we start recording.”
“We have ibuprofen in the bag.”
Dan starts adjusting his microphone stand instead of getting up to get said ibuprofen. “I’ll forget about it in no time.”
~*~*~*~*~*~
They’re taking a short break in between recording the main podcast and the Patreon segment, at Phil’s request.
“Will you take ibuprofen now?”
Dan jams his thumb against his left eye socket, where the pain has not been forgotten, but has only increased. “Is it obvious?”
“To me. I don’t think to anyone else. Ibuprofen?”
Dan nods, and Phil goes to get him some. Dan takes the tablets with water, Phil carries most of the Patreon segment for the week, and they call it a day early.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Dan leans forward to untie his shoes and immediately regrets the rush of pressure and pain the movement creates.
“The ibuprofen isn’t helping much?”
Oh. He didn’t mean to groan out loud, but he must have. The ibuprofen isn’t helping at all. It might as well have been Haribo for all the good it’s doing, but he’s not about to tell Phil that. “I’m fine.” He toes out of his shoes and heads into the kitchen. Water. That’s all he needs. Lots and lots of water.
“I can get that for you if you want to go lay down.” Phil’s voice is soft. Cautious.
Dan drinks half the glass standing there at the sink, then refills it. “I got it.” He heads into the lounge, and Phil stays behind. Since he’s alone, Dan lets himself collapse onto the sofa, head back, eyes closed, perfectly still. It doesn’t make his head hurt any less, but it doesn’t make it worse, which seems to be about as good as he can get right now.
In the kitchen, Phil is humming a tune Dan doesn’t recognize. It also sounds like he’s making food, but his motions—opening, closing, serving—are all quieter than normal. Dan appreciates it.
A few minutes later, as Phil’s footsteps approach, Dan forces himself to sit up and open his eyes. This time he’s able to contain an outward groan. Or at least he’s pretty sure he is.
Phil sets a plate on the coffee table in between their usual seats on the sofa. “Plenty here if you want something.”
Dan looks over. Toast. Crackers. Frozen pieces of mango in a bowl. Phil’s migraine foods, Dan recognizes with a surge of fondness.
“Here.” Phil holds out two more tablets. Acetaminophen.
Dan takes them without complaint and swallows them with a long drink of water.
Phil dives into a piece of toast. Dan isn’t hungry—his head is hurting too much for that—but he grabs a piece of mango from the bowl anyway. The cold in his mouth is enough to distract him from the pain a bit, and when the roof of his mouth goes numb, it’s close enough to his brain that he feels like it might be doing something.
He turns the television on, but doesn’t pay attention to what they’re watching. He eats a couple of pieces of mango until some combination of the fruit and pain makes his stomach turn. Then he folds his arms over his chest and prays for the acetaminophen to kick in.
When Phil finishes eating, he grabs one of their throw pillows and puts it in his lap. “Hey.” He pats the pillow.
Dan doesn’t want to give in. Doesn’t want to admit weakness. But the pain is awful, and he wants comfort. So he stretches out on his back with his head on the pillow in Phil’s lap, eyes closed. The movement and change in position hurt. Someone whimpers. Dan thinks it might be him.
Phil runs his hands gently through Dan’s curls, then uses a few fingers to start massaging Dan’s forehead, starting at his eyebrows and working his way up towards his hairline, then starting over again. He uses the Goldilocks of pressure: enough to make a difference, but not enough to add to the pain.
“Okay?” Phil keeps his voice soft.
Dan thinks he makes a noise of agreement. He must, because Phil continues.
At some point, Phil switches to massaging the base of Dan’s skull with his thumbs, right at the spot where his head meets his neck. He’s too gentle with that, and Dan presses back against his hands. Phil seems to get the message, increasing the pressure.
Phil continues the massage for a while. Could be five minutes, could be five hours. All Dan knows is that it feels good in the midst of a headache that feels truly awful and is eventually joined by wave after wave of increasing nausea.
At some point, Dan rolls himself onto his side, like a uni kid who has had too much to drink and is in danger of choking on their own sick in the night.
“Any better?”
Dan gives a little hum as he rides a wave of nausea. “No. Feel sick.”
Phil rubs gentle fingertips up and down Dan’s back. “Want me to get you a bin?”
He makes a “no” noise. He doesn’t want Phil to move because he doesn’t want to move. If Dan moves, he’s almost certainly going to throw up, and he thinks his head might explode if he does that.
But the waves get faster and stronger anyway and then Dan is on his feet and rushing into the bathroom and falling to his knees hard enough to bruise and throwing up everything he’s eaten all day, which admittedly isn’t very much.
Phil is there, of course he’s there, rubbing circles into Dan’s back, whispering reassuring words, and helping him rinse his mouth when it’s over. Phil leads him into their bedroom instead of back into the lounge, and Dan doesn’t argue.
Then Dan is lying on Phil’s side of the bed, closest to the door, and the pillow smells like Phil, and that should make him feel better, but all he feels is pain.
When Phil speaks, his voice is barely a whisper. “Try to sleep, okay?”
“Hurts too much.” The words feel like rocks in his mouth, but they must only be pebbles to Phil’s ears, because he leaves and comes back with ice packs.
He puts one ice pack against the back of Dan’s neck and another against his forehead. Dan really wants to split his head open and put one directly up against his brain, but he supposes that’s out of the question.
“Try to relax.” Phil rubs Dan’s back. “I’m right here. Try to sleep.”
Dan does, or at least he thinks he does. He dreams of roller coasters that make his head spin. He dreams of telling Phil how bad he feels, or maybe he’s awake for that. He dreams of being on a boat somewhere in the open sea, his head pounding with every wave. Phil asks him if he wants to go to A&E, and he’s pretty sure he’s awake when he tells him no. He’s definitely awake when he’s sick into the bin at the side of the bed, but wishes he wasn’t.
“How do you do this?”
There’s the quiet thump of the bin being placed next to the bed after Phil cleans it out, and the gentle shift of the mattress when he sits near Dan’s hip.
“Do what?”
“Live. With headaches.” His eyes are closed against the light. Against the pain.
“They’re not always this bad.” Phil places a still-cold ice pack against Dan’s forehead. “Try to go back to sleep.”
Dan does.
~*~*~*~*~*~
When Dan wakes, it’s with the vague feeling that something is wrong. When he stretches, his whole body is sore. He opens his eyes and he’s on Phil’s side of the bed, an abandoned ice pack on the pillow next to him. The memory of the headache appears with a jolt. Thankfully as he sits up, it seems to only be a memory. His head still feels sensitive, like one wrong move will send him crashing to the floor, but the intense, pounding pain is gone.
He goes to the bathroom, washes his face, and brushes his teeth. He avoids looking in the mirror, because he has a decent idea of how he looks: not good. He runs fingers through his hair and calls it enough.
When he walks into the lounge, Phil is looking up at him from the sofa. “How are you?”
“Better.” Dan sinks down directly next to Phil, feeling dramatic and clingy.
Phil kisses his temple. “Good. I hoped some solid sleep would help.”
Dan yawns. “What time is it?”
Phil taps his phone and holds it up for Dan to see. 20:32. The day is mostly gone. Dan lets his head drop to Phil’s shoulder.
“Do you think you can eat something? Toast?”
Dan isn’t hungry, but also doesn’t feel like he’s going to lose a battle with his stomach anytime soon. “Maybe.”
When Phil stands, Dan follows. “Making toast isn’t a two-person job, you know. You can go relax.”
Dan hums and continues following him, because again, clingy. He leans against the counter and watches as Phil puts bread into the toaster. “Was that a migraine?”
Phil fills a glass of water and hands it over to him. “Seemed like it. Did you get any weird visual things before it started? Squiggly lines or blind spots?”
“No.”
The toast pops, and Phil spreads butter on the slices. “Could have been a migraine without aura. If it happens again, you should see your doctor.”
Dan nods. The movement causes a leftover ping of pain in his brain. “I hope I don’t. That was terrible.”
Phil gives him a little smile as he hands over a plate with two slices of toast. “Going to be nicer to me the next time I get one?”
Dan pulls a face. “I’m always nice to you when you get one.”
“Yeah.” Phil starts buttering his own toast. “You are.”
Soon they’re back in the lounge, side by side, eating toast and watching a new episode of Housewives. Dan’s phone is charging on the end table, but he can’t be bothered to see how many notifications he’s missed since they’ve been home.
“Toast is the best food.” Dan takes another bite of buttery carbs. “Why is it so good?”
“I don’t know. It’s scientifically proven to taste better after a really bad headache, though.”
“Really?”
“Yes. I am science.”
Dan scoffs and polishes off his second slice before setting the empty plate on the coffee table. “You didn’t have a migraine today, did you?”
“No.”
“Then why are you eating toast for a second meal?”
“Sympathy toast.” He sets his empty plate on top of Dan’s and shrugs. “Plus, it’s comfort food. I was worried about you.”
Dan hums. “I was okay.”
“You weren’t. But you are now.”
Dan slides an arm between Phil’s back and the couch, pulling him close so he can hold him, the way it should be.
“Thank you for taking care of me.”
Phil looks up at him. “Headaches make you sappy.”
“Well. Enjoy it. It won’t last long.”
Phil smiles. “You’re welcome.”