Work Text:
Avery 8:20 AM
Bree can we go to the library at lunch
I didnt realise there was physics hw until like rn and its like due today
Bree 8:20 AM
Are you texting in class?
Avery 8:20 AM
no im in the bathroom but omfg getting a hall pass from ms palmer is like a humiliation ritual I’m never doing that again I’d rather get a uti
also clearly u r too so
Bree 8:22 AM
I’m at home
Also you really need to learn to speak up.
Avery 8:22 AM
wtf???? why?? are you okay??
Bree 8:26 AM
I’m so sick.
Bree opens her front door. Who the fuck is outside her house right now? Her head is throbbing; she shouldn’t be getting up at all, much less walking to her front door and exposing herself to the light of the outside world.
It’s Avery? What the fuck?
“Avery, why are you here?”
“To take care of you.”
Bree is so angered by this that she turns straight around, and heads back for her bed. Not bothering to lock the door or see if Avery is trailing behind her.
She is, Bree can hear her footsteps. Which feel too loud.
“Avery, you shouldn’t be skipping. How’d you manage to get out anyway?” Bree says, as she gets back into bed, pulling her comforter over her legs and facing the wall.
“Instead of going back to class I just left through the side doors by the gym.”
Avery sounds proud of herself, Bree is going to strangle her.
“You should go back to school. If you hurry you can say you didn’t feel well or something so they don’t put you on the ditch list.”
“I’m not going back.”
Bree turns around, Avery’s standing awkwardly in front of her bed.
“Don’t piss me off. What do you mean you aren’t going back?”
“It means I’m staying here.”
“Enjoy detention.” Bree rolls over to face the wall again. If she doesn’t see her problem, it doesn’t exist.
“Do I get detention for this?”
There’s no way Avery is serious. “You don’t know?”
“No?! Do you?”
“No, I don’t cut class. And you shouldn’t be either.”
“I asked Elliot, and he said to just leave…”
“Why would you trust Elliot?”
Avery shrugs.
“Well, I’m here now!”
“You can go now.”
“Nope!”
“Seriously, Avery, I’m so sick I don’t want to infect you.”
“It’s fine, I wanna take care of you.”
“No, I’m not like cute cough cough sick, I’m like gross, disgusting, ugly sick.”
“And?”
The admission feels like chewing glass.
“I don’t want you to see me like that…”
“Okay.”
“What?”
“I’m staying here anyway; I’ve made up my mind.”
“Avery, seriously, it’s…”
Bree cuts herself off when her stomach churns bitterly. Fuck fuck fuck, not now.
“Avery, you need to go.”
Bree swallows hard, trying to force the feeling back down. It doesn’t seem to be working, and Avery doesn’t seem to have any plans of leaving.
“You’re allowed to be gross when you’re sick.”
Bree would respond, but opening her mouth would guarantee that she throws up.
…
Never mind, it’s happening anyway.
Bree sprints to the bathroom, practically pushing Avery as she runs past her with full force.
On her knees in front of the toilet, she thinks this is the worst she’s ever felt. She vomits, and it burns; oh my God, this is going to kill her.
She’s vaguely aware of Avery’s presence, but the amount of energy heaving takes out of her means she doesn’t acknowledge it.
Why does throwing up hurt so bad?
She feels Avery’s fingers against her scalp, Avery’s index fingers tracing lines right above Bree’s ears, gathering her hair and tying it back.
Bree wonders if she got any vomit in her hair. Then her face starts heating up as she considers Avery touching her vomit and sweat-coated hair. She is disgusting and Avery is not only witnessing it, but possibly touching it with her bare hands.
Bree wishes she wasn’t someone who cries when they throw up.
Tears streaming down her neck, a sting in the back of her throat. She feels so overwhelmingly pathetic.
She can feel Avery rubbing her back, and she forces herself to release one of hands’ death grips on the toilet seat and uses it to swat Avery’s hand away from her.
“Don’t,” Bree barely manages, as she shoves Avery away.
“Okay.”
And that’s it.
Bree expects her to argue, or ask questions, or keep doing it anyway.
But she doesn’t.
And Avery doesn’t leave either. She just sits there. Bree can still hear her breathing nearby.
Bree cannot fathom the fact that Avery doesn’t go back to touching her. She braces herself for the brush of their legs, for Avery cupping Bree’s face, for Avery to place a hand on her shoulder.
But she doesn’t.
The touch doesn’t come.
And Bree is so grateful and relieved that it threatens to spill over into tears again.
Eventually, the wave of nausea subsides. Bree wipes at her mouth with the back of her hand, and tries to avoid looking into the toilet.
“Do you feel a bit better now?” Avery asks, flushing the toilet for her.
Bree nods.
“Good, let’s wash out your mouth and get you back into bed, okay?”
“I can walk.”
“Okay.”
Bree pushes herself upright and finds her knees are on the verge of crumbling underneath her.
Her head spins, and every muscle in Bree’s body feels stiff and sore.
Avery reaches out her hand, a gentle look of ‘can I?’ evident on her face.
“I can walk.” Bree insists again.
“I know you can.”
Bree is turns to the sink and nearly collapses, gravity weighing down on her, calling her down to the floor. Bree wants to sink into the tile and let her forehead cool down on it.
Bree (reluctantly) reaches for Avery’s hand.
Lying in bed, Bree feels useless. She can’t bring herself to move at all, even to get herself into a more comfortable position.
She’s not sure she could even find a comfortable position with how bad her whole body aches.
Avery appears, walks through her bedroom door with a glass of water in one hand, and a wet towel in the other.
“Here,” Avery says, holding out the glass of water.
“I’m not thirsty.”
“Okay.”
Avery sets the glass down without any further argument.
Bree wants to be annoyed that she’s here, instead of in class.
Avery sits down on the bed next to Bree and leans down, towel hovering just above Bree’s face.
“Can I?”
Bree nods, and Avery ever so delicately starts dabbing Bree’s face with the towel.
It’s cool against her skin, like the droplets of water it leaves behind are sucking the sickness pumping through her blood. She still feels like shit, but this isn’t too bad.
Bree cannot bring herself to be annoyed with Avery. Avery might as well be wiping the annoyance off of Bree.
She’s so gentle and careful. Touches feather-light.
Bree closes her eyes.
She loves Avery so much.
Eventually, she feels her own tongue, stiff in her mouth.
“Aves…”
“Yes?”
“Can you pass me the water now, please?”
“Of course.”
Bree could hear the sounds of cupboards opening and closing from her kitchen.
“Bree!” Avery calls.
“Yeah?”
Bree can hear Avery’s footsteps approaching.
She walks back into Bree’s bedroom, surprisingly empty-handed given all the rummaging she was doing. “Where do you keep your vomit bowl?”
“My what?”
“Vomit bowl.”
Bree stares, and Avery just stares back.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Like the designated one… like when you’re a kid… and your mom leaves it next to your bed for when you throw up. Y’know…”
Huh?
“No? We don’t do that.”
“You don’t?”
“No.”
Avery looks genuinely shocked.
“So what do you do if you have to throw up?”
“Go to the bathroom.”
“Yeah, but like when you were younger, what if you couldn’t make it?”
“You would make it.”
Avery considers this for a second too long.
“I’ll be back.” Avery grabs her keys off Bree’s table and starts putting her socks back on.
“Where are you going?”
“I’ll get you one.”
“Avery, loving, this is some crazy white people shit. I don’t need one.”
Avery’s looking at something on her phone. “Twenty minutes max.”
“Avery-”
But she’s already gone.
Bree hears her front door open and close again.
Bree would say she was annoying if it wasn’t so cute.
Bree cannot believe this woman.
Twelve minutes later, not that Bree was counting or anything, Avery comes back, a plastic bowl in her hands.
“No,” Bree says immediately.
“It’ll be useful; it makes things easier for you!” Avery says, proud of herself.
“I’m not using that.”
“This way you won’t have to get out of bed.”
“Avery, I will not use that.”
“Okay. But it’s also okay if you do.”
Bree groans as Avery sets it on the floor next to Bree’s bed.
“I’ll clean it for you; it’s fine.”
The mental image of that alone makes Bree’s stomach turn.
Absolutely not.
“No.”
“Okay, just… easier option, if you want it.”
“Bree, you have to eat something.”
“I don’t wanna.”
“Just a bit, please?”
“I can’t keep it down; I don’t want it.”
“It’s going to hurt more if there’s nothing in your stomach for you to throw up.”
Avery’s been getting her to eat, and every time, Bree almost immediately vomits again.
She’s wondering how Avery keeps managing to convince her.
She won’t let Avery sway her this time.
“I don’t wanna.”
Bree hears herself, and she sounds like a pouty kid. She feels like one; she’s still lying down, looking at the ceiling, addressing her overhead light instead of Avery.
“Please? I’ll get you whatever as long as you eat.”
Bree stands her ground and stays quiet.
“Crackers? Just a few?”
Fuck no. Those burn like hell coming back up, hardly filling either, so it wouldn’t be worth it. They taste like stomach acid and pain.
“No.”
“Noodles?”
“No.”
“Just the soup?”
If the soup makes her vomit, it would be so pathetic she’d just be obligated to kill herself, “No.”
“Fruit?”
Bree hesitates. “What kind?”
“Anything you have in your fridge, or anything they sell at the closest supermarket.”
Bree tries to remember the English word for hāmìguā.
“..Cantaloupe?”
Bree can’t see Avery’s face, but she can hear the smile in Avery’s voice.
“Sure!”
A few moments later Avery calls from a far “Good news, you have it! Bad news, I don’t know how to cut this up but I’ll try my best.”
Bree’s not sure why she caved.
After what feels like too long, Avery returns with a bowl of cut cantaloupes and a fork.
“Sit up?”
Bree follows without thinking, she struggles, and Avery guides her up, rearranging Bree’s pillows to support her back.
She’s also evidently not thinking when Avery takes a seat beside her, and holds out a piece of the cantaloupe on the fork.
Bree opens her mouth.
Only after Avery puts the fruit in her mouth does Bree realise.
Oh.
Avery is literally feeding her.
She should probably object.
Instead, Bree chews.
It tastes nostalgic. Really good.
Bree wants to down as many of these as she can before she vomits.
But alas, it takes her longer to chew than normal, everything hurts and she feels like every part of her body is being weighed down, trapped in molasses.
Avery waits patiently for Bree to finish, before feeding her another piece.
It should be humiliating.
Bree isn’t feeding herself, she’s not even holding the bowl. She doesn’t even have to ask, or say anything at all.
It’s so nice.
She decides that she’s going to let Avery keep feeding her.
Y’know, for Avery’s sake.
“Can you come closer?”
Bree cannot believe the words she’s saying, but she knows she means them.
Avery shifts so that her legs are flush with Bree’s. It’s not enough.
“No, closer.”
Avery moves again.
“Closer.”
“Bree, I don’t think it’s physically possible for me to get closer.”
Bree groans, and lifts herself into a seated position by putting all her weight on her bedframe.
She moves - God her legs hurt - and pats the space where she had just been laying.
Bree knows it’s probably warm and gross with her sweat, but Avery doesn’t comment, she just sits there.
Bree practically falls headfirst into Avery’s lap.
Avery doesn’t comment.
Bree adjusts her position, but can’t decide whether her blanket is something she wants attached to her, or removed from existence entirely.
She’s too hot and too cold, and she feels like shit.
Her skin burns but she can’t stop shivering. Her head feels like it’s filled with water, sloshing around inside her skull.
This small miserable noise escapes her.
“What’s wrong?” Avery says, dabbing this wad of paper towel she’s wrapped around ice cubes across Bree’s face. It feels pretty fucking good. Not good enough though.
“I don’t want to be sick anymore.”
“Oh, baby…” Avery kisses her forehead.
Bree doesn’t want to cry again, but she can feel her tears welling.
She’s embarrassed herself enough in front of Avery. She’s had enough humiliation for a lifetime.
“Can I?” Avery asks.
Bree doesn’t know what Avery is asking permission to do, but she nods anyway.
Avery gently strokes Bree’s hair. Moving slowly. With intent.
Bree melts into it.
She can feel Avery’s breath, and if she concentrates hard enough, Avery’s heartbeat.
She focuses on them. Trying to match Avery’s breathing patterns.
In.
Out.
In.
Out.
“Don’t leave.” It slips out of Bree’s mouth just as she’s on the brink of unconsciousness, she hardly registers it.
“I won’t.”
“I love you so much.”
“I love you too.”
Bree smiles, her eyes closed. She can feel herself nodding off.
“Thank…”
Bree 7:20 AM
I feel a lot better I’ll be at school today :)
Avery 7:30 AM
I won’t
Bree fml
Bree 7:31 AM
I did warn you about getting sick.
Avery 7:33 AM
I don’t regret it tho
it was worth it
Bree 7:33 AM
You’re so fucking stupid.
I love you.