Characters: Boyd, Tim, Raylan
Pairings: Boyd/Raylan
Rating: G. There isn't even any kissing, it's all cuddling.
Warnings: Unbeta'd and largely unedited.
a/n: I've been catching up on Justified and I had a stomach bug the other day so this happened. Cross-posted to LJ and AO3.
Boyd Crowder lies on the mattress in Ava's house, and just stares at the wall. It's summer, and since the house doesn't have air conditioning, the window is open in the hope of a breeze. He curls up a little tighter under the sheet as he stares at the blank wall. He thinks about looking to see what time it is, but he doesn't think that it will have changed all that much. His stomach rumbles before there's a quick stabbing pain in his gut.
He squeezes his eyes shut. He feels really nauseous. He takes deep breaths in the attempt to keep from throwing up, but the longer he lies there, the more the nausea creeps up. He bolts for the bathroom. He barely makes it before he throws up.
He's grateful that Ava is away. He just wants to be alone at the moment, but the perfect southern woman in her would require her to comfort him. His stomach feels better so he thinks that he's not going to be sick again. Boyd climbs to his feet and makes it all the way back to his room before his stomach churns again. He sprints back to the bathroom.
His stomach is empty, but that doesn't stop him from dry heaving. After he's done, he goes down to sit in front of the TV. He feels like shit and just wants to go to sleep, but his stomachs occasional grumblings don't let him. He curls underneath the throw that Ava's mother had given her for a wedding present and just stares blankly at the TV playing the usual infomercials.
He spends all of the next day in the same position. Every time he tries to eat or drink something, he throws it up within half an hour. Eventually he just gives up. He goes through hot and cold flashes as well as dozing on and off. He hears his phone ringing in his room, but he can't sum up the energy to get it. He can't think that it's all that important because no one has stopped by.
Boyd wakes up to the sound of tries crunching on the driveway. He closes his eyes again because he feels bad enough at the moment that he's not going to try and fight all that hard if someone tries to end him. He doesn't respond to the knock though he does wonder who it is. The knocker is clearly male and angry from the way they carry on banging. He curls up a little tighter on the couch when he hears the sound of glass shattering.
"Raylan, he's in here." Tim Gutterson calls out. There's a cool hand at his neck checking for a pulse.
He opens his eyes in time to see Tim looking over his shoulder at Raylan who's coming in from the kitchen. Raylan looks more than a little annoyed until he sees Boyd. Boyd has no idea what he looks like, but he knows that it must be bad from the way Raylan rapidly pales. He looks back at Tim who gives him a slight half-smile. The younger marshal's hand moves up against his forehead.
"You hurt?" Raylan questions roughly.
"Sick." Boyd corrects.
Raylan's eyes narrow a little while Tim rolls his eyes. As the relative newcomer to their relationship (at least new compared with the history that Boyd and Raylan had before Raylan moved away), he tended to be the one to smooth things over. Boyd thinks that he must be missing something if Raylan's suspicions are anything to go on.
"Clearly he didn't do it." Tim says.
"Well then, why didn't he answer his phone?"
"I'm still in the room." Boyd protests weakly.
Boyd maintains in his head that he still wants to be left alone as Tim settles on the couch next to him. He can't help but also be appreciative that he has a familiar shoulder to lean on. Tim wraps an arm around him and pulls him a little closer as Boyd buries his face in the junction of Tim's neck and shoulder. Raylan snorts and goes to pour himself a drink.
"What didn't I do?" Boyd asks as Raylan takes a sip of his bourbon.
"Rob a bank."
"Tim is right. I didn't do that. I've been here all day."
"Then why didn't you answer your phone?"
"I didn't want to go upstairs to get it." Boyd murmurs.
He doesn't look up at Raylan to see if Raylan believes him or not. He doesn't want to deal with this. He'd rather just ignore both marshals and go back to dozing. Tim's hand is making soothing gestures up and down his side. It's not enough. He realizes almost too late that he's going to be sick again. He catches the dirty look that Tim sends Raylan before he's coughing up bile and dry heaving over the toilet.
The hand that moves to rub his back is too broad to be Tim's. He leans back into it for a second before twisting to meet Raylan's eyes. All the suspicion from earlier is gone, replaced with sympathy.
"Come on," Raylan says. He manages to get Boyd on his feet and headed towards the stairs. "You're going to take a shower then sleep in your own bed."
"Just bed." Boyd argues.
"You'll feel a lot better if you shower first. When was the last time that you had anything to drink?" Tim asks from behind them. Boyd startles. Normally, he has a good sense of where the sniper is even if he doesn't hear Tim approach, but with being sick, his senses are all screwy.
"I don't know a couple of hours. I stopped because everything kept coming back up."
"I get him showered, and you get the Gatorade?" Raylan offers. Tim nods and disappears back into the kitchen. Boyd doubts that Ava has any just laying around the house, but knows that Tim will come up with some alternative if he can't find any.
He strips and showers on autopilot. There are clean clothes sitting on the sink. He brushes his teeth quickly before heading to his room. Tim is lounging against the wall with a clear glass held in his hand while Raylan sits on the edge of the mattress with his legs sprawled out in front of him. Boyd accepts the glass as Tim offers it to him. He downs it without asking what's in it. He's found with Tim, sometimes it is best not to ask.
He sinks into the bed and is drifting off when he realizes that neither man has moved. He opens one eye to look at both of them.
"You can't stay." He insists.
"What so we can fuck, but we can't stay?" Raylan hisses.
Boyd sighs and closes his eye again. He doesn't have the energy to deal with Raylan's bullshit insecurities at the moment. He hears Tim move and scoots enough into the middle of the bed that Tim can sit on the edge of the bed. Tim plops down and kicks off his boots. On his other side, Boyd hears the rustling of cloth as Raylan presumably sheds his jacket. Raylan sprawls beside him and drops an arm over his waist.
"You can't stay because Ava doesn't know, and I don't know how she would take it if she came home to find all three of us in bed together." Boyd answers.
Tim and Raylan both make similar noises of understanding, but don't move away. Neither do they ask when Ava is supposed to be back. Tim wiggles so he can rest his head on Boyd's shoulder as he tangles their legs. Boyd wants to be annoyed. Raylan is comfortable to lean against though, and Tim's familiar weight is distracting him from the nausea.
"If both of you get sick, it's not my fault." He mutters.
"Understood." Tim huffs with laughter.
"Just go to sleep Boyd." Raylan growls.
Boyd buries his face in Tim's hair before he drops off into the most restful sleep he's had in a while.