Chapter Text
Peter had gotten used to feeling sick.
He actually got sick quite often, when he was living with Vilna Lutz. He never really knew why—something to do with his diet? A weak immune system?—but he came down with something almost constantly. The chafing wind and frequent rain in Baltese certainly didn’t help. He was sent out in the mornings, wrapped up in a coat that did little to warm him, to go retrieve the fish and bread Vilna Lutz always wanted and he knew as he hopped down the steps and avoided the creaky boards that he would catch something again.
He’d accepted that part. It was foolish to think someone like him wouldn’t get sick from being out too long in a chill.
The other part, he was more reluctant to accept, but it became easier with time.
He mustn’t let anyone know he was sick.
It helped that because it happened so often, anyone he talked to became used to seeing him with minor symptoms and started thinking they were just part of him. The red nose and watering eyes. The occasional wooziness. As long as no one saw the worst of it, Peter thought things would be alright. As long as no one knew of the nights he spent shivering in the attic when it got bad, running fever and sneaking down to the kitchen to scrape together whatever homemade remedy he thought might work and bracing for the sound of Lutz’s footsteps, it would be just fine.
Lutz said he shouldn’t show weakness. Vilna Lutz hated seeing him sick most of all. Peter was good at hiding things, but sometimes he would get caught rummaging through the pantry for anything that passed for medicine (because Lutz rarely stocked real medicine). He ended up swaying on his feet, blinking through his fever, and trying to stand up straight as Lutz lectured him or worse.
He was never too sick to get up early in the mornings and buy bread and fish. He made that mistake early. He was good at learning from his mistakes.
When he starts to come down with something for the first time since he’s started living with the Matiennes, he prepares himself. He can’t count the amount of times he’s done this before. Even Gloria and Leo aren’t aware of it. He can keep it hidden again.
But it’s been three weeks, and even in such a short amount of time he’s started getting accustomed to the difference. He doesn’t get vertigo so easily. He’s not always nauseous. He doesn’t want to go back to that. What he wants to do is ask someone about this, see if they can help.
No—Vilna Lutz would say that’s weak. And the Matiennes have called him a strong kid. The strongest kid I know, Leo said one night, to have come out the other side of all of that and keep your dreams too. So Peter can’t be weak. His family—the Matiennes expect more from him.
He makes sure he has the blankets he needs. There are already some in his room; an old quilt that Gloria fished out and patched up, a knitted blanket from the living room, an old shawl that he’s small enough to fit under. Adele has a habit of taking the communal blankets from downstairs and mixing them with her own, and Peter feels like he can get away with the same. It stings to think that he’s stealing something. But really he isn’t, right? They’re still in the house. He’s only taking them for a while. And Gloria and Leo don’t seem to mind when Adele does it, so surely they won’t if he does the same.
But he’s lying about why he’s bringing them with him. And he’ll be lying about why he doesn’t feel up to eating, or helping take care of Adele when the Matiennes are gone, or sitting in between them while they read stories.
And he’s going to take more than blankets. He knows where they keep things for first aid, and he knows that right next to it will be medicine. Real medicine, not the concoctions he made with the feeble hope they would do anything to help. He knows what stays in the pantry and what can be found in the cabinet under the sink in the Matiennes’ bathroom.
This is a kind of dishonor he’s experienced with, but he realizes while he’s shoring up his defenses that it feels a lot more real. When he was with Lutz, it was just necessity. He convinced himself that it wasn’t really true dishonor. Vilna Lutz would want me to take care of myself, he’d think. I don’t have another choice. But doing the same things here feels—it feels a lot more like stealing than he’s comfortable with. The Matiennes have given him a home, a room, food, warmth. They keep telling him there aren’t strings attached, and while he finds that hard to believe no matter how much he wants it to be true, he has to take their word for it. After all of that, he’s taking something from them without asking. Taking medicine, no less; not something cheap by any means.
His skin is crawling as he looks through the pantry and sneaks things back. He tries to stay vigilant, the way he’s been taught, but it’s not easy when he’s like this. Gloria is out with Adele selling flowers, Leo is at work, Peter thinks he’s all alone, and he’s in the middle of taking things from their bathroom. He doesn’t hear the front door slam.
“Peter?”
He jumps as he’s pulling out from under the sink, hitting his head on the way. He yelps and scoots back against the wall. The medicine bottles fall onto the tiles.
Leo stands in the doorway, one hand on the frame, his eyes wide as he stares down at Peter. Peter only realizes he’s shivering when Leo steps inside, sets his hat down beside the sink, and drops onto one knee in front of him, putting a hand on Peter’s arm.
“What are you doing?” Leo asks.
He can’t think straight. The fever hasn’t fully set in yet, but he knows from experience that it will be bad soon. His vision is blurry. He’s dizzy. His head aches. All Peter can manage is, “Getting medicine.”
Leo’s brow furrows. Peter shuts his eyes and swallows down the bile in his throat. It isn’t from sickness, but from shame.
They’re going to throw me out, he thinks, panicked. They’re going to find out I’m stealing things and they’re going to throw me out.
“Just keep Adele,” he croaks.
“What?” Leo asks.
“Keep Adele,” Peter repeats. He’s still shivering. “You can—you can send me back. It’s okay. I shouldn’t have—just take care of Adele. Don’t send her away too.”
Silence. Peter doesn’t open his eyes. Leo shifts, and Peter assumes his understanding shifts with him. Leo knows. He’ll take the medicine and put it back where it’s supposed to go; he’ll search Peter’s room and find everything else; he’ll talk to Gloria and they’ll sit Peter down; they’ll see him out.
“Send you away?” Leo says.
Peter opens his eyes. They lift sluggishly and focus on Leo’s face, as much as he can manage. He nods.
Leo hums, frowning. Peter blinks slowly and drops his head. He waits. Then he feels light pressure on his forehead. The back of a hand. It stays there for a long moment.
“Oh,” Leo breathes.
Leo hasn’t picked Peter up like this before, and he doesn’t expect him to be as light as he is. He stands up too quickly, anticipating more weight, and he almost loses his balance. Peter doesn’t hold on, keeping his hands close to himself like he’s scared to, but his head rests against Leo’s chest.
He says nothing as he carries Peter to his room. Peter doesn’t make any move to explain what he’s just said. When Leo sets him down on the bed, he asks, “Why didn’t you tell us?” Is there some reason why he felt like he needed to hide it?
Peter looks up at him with half-lidded eyes. “I can do it on my own.”
“Do what?” Leo feels a little sick himself. “Work yourself through a fever all on your own?”
“Through everything,” Peter says immediately. Once one thing comes out, all of it does. Leo has learned quickly that Peter can’t keep himself from confessing things. He moves with compulsion driven by guilt, dropping his head and sliding off the bed. His knees wobble, but he shrinks away from Leo’s offered hand. He lowers himself to the ground and reaches under his bedframe, and when his hand comes back out, it’s holding a familiar container.
“Peter,” Leo says in a pained hiss. Peter flinches, and Leo wants to tell him that he’s not hurt about the bottle and instead at the implications behind it, but before he can do that Peter reaches back in and retrieves another. Then one more. The three bottles sit on the floor between them.
Leo opens his mouth to say something more, but Peter beats him to it. “I’m sorry,” he blurts. “I’m sorry, I thought I was supposed to keep—I won’t do it again—”
It feels too on-the-nose to say his eyes are feverishly bright, but that’s what they are. Clear, but too clear. Sharp enough to cut. Leo shakes his head and grabs Peter’s wrist. “No,” he says firmly.
Peter stares at him.
“No,” Leo repeats. He isn’t sure what else to say, or how to say it. What more could he say to get his point across? “And…” He thinks for a second, turning to glance through Peter’s open door to the hallway. “Wait here. I’m going to get Gloria.”
Peter gets to his feet and backs away. He hits the bedframe hard enough to stumble, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He just shakes his head. Voice afraid, he says, “You can’t—I need to do this myself, if you bother—Leo—”
The way his voice strains when he says Leo’s name is enough to make him pause. Leo stares at Peter. He looks terrified. Leo doesn’t fully know why. He just knows that there are things Peter has lived through with Vilna Lutz that have led him to do things the way he does. And he has an idea of how Peter will react when he tells him, “Peter, you’re going to get in bed. You’re going to stay there. And you’re going to let us take care of you.”
Leo doesn’t want to be right. But he is. Peter lifts his chin, pulls his shoulders back, and stands perfectly still despite how Leo’s seen him swaying. Leo tries his best to hide his wince.
And Peter nods, climbs into bed, and doesn’t utter another word of protest.
What exactly has he had to suffer? Leo wonders, because he thought he knew, but seeing something like this is making him doubt himself.
Peter listens to Leo’s orders. He stays in bed. He doesn’t get out until he’s told to. He hates every single moment of it, but he does it anyway. He’s been given new instructions, so he will follow them. When Gloria gets home, makes soup, and sets a bowl down on the bedside table, Peter flinches.
He lets Leo and Gloria take care of him, because he thinks that has to be the trade. He disappoints them—but he isn’t thrown out, as long as he doesn’t hide the fact that he’s sick from them.
That makes him sick to his stomach in a different way. He got this wrong. They have different rules than Vilna Lutz. He should have known that.
But he learns. He’s good at learning from his mistakes, after all.