The power clicked on in the early hours of the morning, every light and appliance in the house we'd accidently left on roaring to life at once. It made my heart lurch, both of us jumping out of bed and stupidly glancing at each other as we realised what the noise was. I reached out to catch the back of his shirt, tugging him into sitting down again. "Stay here; I'll deal with it," I promised.
"Thanks, Gar," he sighed, retreating back under the blankets. He was asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.
I couldn't help myself, leaning down to quickly kiss his temple. I turned off the lights in the room as I headed into the kitchen to stop the mircrowave shrieking bloody murder, silencing the oven as it beeped insistantly. Food. We could finally have a hot breakfast. And Carlisle might finally eat something substantial.
The pan sizzled to life as I put it on the heat. I threw eggs into it despite it only being 5am, shoving toast into the toaster as they cooked. It wasn't fancy, but it was better than the cans of cold soup and sandwiches we'd been living on for the last few days. I just hoped he would be able to stomach it.
The boy in question stumbled into the kitchen a few minutes later, mumbling a complaint about being in bed alone. He caught my waist, his arms around me, clearly not thinking straight.
"Are you awake enough to have breakfast with me?" I asked, only half teasing as I rubbed his forearm. His skin was too cool, but I didn't worry about it too much; we'd have hot water again in an hour or so. "You must be hungry."
"It's so early; you should have come back to bed." He was still grumbling, though it was half-hearted.
"I guess I got over excited about having electricity back," I admitted. "Here, baby, have something to eat." I turned to hand him a plate, having dished the food up. I'd spun too quickly for him to smother the mild discomfort on his face. "Are you feeling sick? I'm not trying to force food down your throat." That was exactly what I was trying to do, and we both knew it.
"A little, but the doctor said it's better for my stomach if I eat something," he admitted reluctantly, his arms dropping from around me.
"Just try a few mouthfuls?" I suggested. We sat across from each other at the table, and I tried not to relish in the normality of the situation too much. I had to keep shoveling food into my mouth to keep from smiling too much.
He picked at his meal, taking a couple of hesitant bites. It seemed to be going okay, from the glances I was using to keep an eye on him, until he coughed, his hand instantly moving to cover his mouth.
"You alright?" I asked slowly.
Nodding, he tried to breathe through it for a few seconds. It wasn't working. "No," he said quickly, throwing himself back from the table. "Stay there."
I sighed but stayed in my seat as he'd asked as the bathroom door slammed.
Great.
If he couldn't eat, he was going to get light headed, and I didn't want to go back down that path with him again. I waited impatiently for him to come back, my legs numb from sitting on the hard wooden chair by the time he returned. He didn't say anything to me as he put his plate in the fridge, his cheeks a deep red now. "Carlisle? Are you okay?" I asked hesitantly, for what seemed to be the millionth time that hour.
He swallowed thickly. "I, um, sorry. It wasn't your cooking, I guess I just can't, uh...It's too early."
"Come and sit down. You were okay drinking last night, right? That didn't upset your stomach?"
"No, fluids seemed to sit a little better." In place of breakfast, he'd poured a glass of juice, sitting with me again with both hands wrapped around the cup. Dizzy, he pressed his forehead against the tabletop for a few seconds, guilty when he looked up again.
"You can't live on liquids," I argued, a bit alarmed now.
"Just until Friday, and I can see the doctor," he mumbled at the wood.
Forcing back any rising panic, I tried to smile at him. "I'll make soup for dinner. Proper soup - not that shitty canned stuff we've been stuck with the last couple of days." Seeing his protest before he said it, I added; "I love you; I just want you to feel better. If it's going to help, let me do it."
"Thanks." Sighing softly, he tried to smile back, failing as it shook and sank. "I'll feel lots better once I've had a shower."
.
.
It was another hour before the building had hot water again. We were both over-excited about finally being able to have a hot shower, though I was sure he was just happy that he could warm himself up without having to cuddle up to me. I let him go first, seeing the desperate expression on his face and deciding that the extra fifteen minutes it would put between me and hot water would be worth the extra boyfriend-points it earned me.
My eyes landed on it while I was standing under the water, and I felt like a fucking moron. A razor with disposable blades. I was an idiot. Sure enough, when I leapt out of the door to wrench open the bathroom cabinet, rifling through with wet hands until I found the packet, several of the blades were gone. He'd hidden it, buried it in a basket of soap samples, the cardboard packet concealed amongst the bottles.
My head spun, and I was starting to shiver, nauseous as I clambered back into the shower to get back under the stream. My knees were shaking and my eyes were hot, a sob lodged in my throat. I wanted to cry. I needed to cry. I just didn't want Carlisle knowing that I was upset over it while he was already so fragile - while he already thought I was disgusted with him over it.
I let the tears come. Sliding my back down the shower wall, I sat on the shower floor and pressed my forehead against my knees, letting the water wash over my shoulders and run through my hair, mixing with the salty drops. I had to fix him. I couldn't just let him slice himself to pieces and spend every day on the bathroom floor with a stomach ache.
I sat there until the water was only lukewarm before deciding that the metal underneath me was uncomfortable. There was a quiet knock on the door, and my head snapped up, my heart skipping as I realised I was going to be caught out if he opened it. I hadn't locked it. Panicking slightly, I stood so quickly my head rushed, scrubbing the cooling water over my face in hopes that it might not be so red.
"You okay, Gar?" he asked through the wood. "You didn't pass out, right?"
I coughed to make sure my voice wouldn't shake, unsure how much time had actually passed. "Yeah, I'm fine. I'll be out in a sec."
"There's coffee on the kitchen counter."
God, I loved him. I still took my time getting dried and dressed, needing the extra few minutes to get myself under control again. The nausea wouldn't shift, to the point that I wondered if maybe Carlisle did have a virus after all. I almost gagged on my toothbrush. It was going to take everything I had not to lose it when I saw him again - he needed to be wrapped in bubble wrap, not that he'd ever allow it.
I couldn't see him initially when I wandered into the kitchen. The coffee was there, like he'd promised, but I didn't know where he was. And our apartment was fucking tiny. My heart started to beat so hard it hurt.
He wasn't here. He was gone- he was too unstable to be gone; he had bad intentions if he'd left. And he'd been so good with me all morning- he was going to hurt himself again. "Baby?" My chest started to ache, my breaths catching. "Carlisle?" My voice was too loud, but I was suddenly in a blind panic. "Carlisle!" Worse when I saw his phone on the table-
"I'm here; I'm right here. Jesus, Garrett, I was just doing laundry?" he appeared from the doorway behind me, his hand on my shoulder blade. "What happened?"
"Fuck." I grabbed him, wrapping my arms around him and trapping him against my chest, my breaths panting in and out. I could feel my body shaking but couldn't stop it, not even with him murmuring soft words in my ear, tension in his spine as he silently protested my affection. "I thought you'd- nevermind." I gently kissed the top of his head anyway, squeezing him tightly against me for a moment. I couldn't explain it. Couldn't tell him that I feared for his safety as soon as he was out of my sight.
"Did something happen?" he asked again. "Is your family okay?"
"I don't know; I haven't spoken to them yet," I stammered out. Slowly, I realised that while he had one arm around me, the other was rubbing at where I was holding him around his waist - I was being rough again, and he didn't want to tell me. Didn't want to upset me.
"Then why don't you sit down, and we can call them?" He stood on his toes once I'd loosened my hold on him enough that he could move, lightly pressing his lips to mine.
"I'm so selfish; I didn't even think about-"
"Breathe, Gar. Slowly." His hand pressed against my sternum, making me aware of the stabbing there. Even more selfishly, I was letting him comfort me.
"Carlisle, that isn't what I'm worried about, I just- you- I-" I needed to get a grip. I didn't think he could understand me; he just looked confused. And a bit too pale. God, this needed to be the other way around.
"Come and sit down with me," he tried again, this time catching my hip and ushering me forward. I instinctively sat once the couch was in reach, relieved to stop my legs shaking under me, trying to stop the black spots floating through my vision before I made myself ill. I couldn't be ill, not while he was ill. Carlisle reached across me for the throw on the arm of the couch, pulling it over both of us as he knelt beside me. "What's all this about? Did I do something?" Anxious, his leg pressed against mine as he settled next to me, his palm resting on my thigh.
I shook my head. "No, I just didn't know where you were, and it's still horrible outside, and I thought for a moment you'd- I don't know." I didn't know what to say. Instead, I slipped my arms around him again, my chin resting on his shoulder so he couldn't see my expression.
"Run away? I hate to break it to you, but I can't really run anywhere at the moment." He was trying to tease me, and I appreciated it as much as I refused to be immediately ratified. Running away was the least of my fears, but he would only feel guilty if he knew. It was only going to make him spiral.
"Yeah, I guess. Leave the laundry; you shouldn't be tidying up if you're not feeling well," I told him, trying to keep my voice steady. "I'm just glad you're here."
"I don't feel so sick anymore; it's okay." He still looked sick, though slightly more comfortable now he'd been able to shower. And he was finally warm without my body heat. He was trying his best to soothe me, though, even if he was still awkward with me. "Are you alright if I go and turn the washer on? I'll come right back." His hand repetitively ran over my forearm, soothing.
I nodded. "Yeah. I'm fine, Carlisle. Sorry, I'm good," I assured him.
"I think we both got up too early," he sighed. His hand landed on my bicep as he stood up, a gentle kiss on my forehead.
I sank further into the couch, trying to smother the confusing mix of emotions in my chest. As much as I was starting to hope that he actually did still care about me enough to try and fix us, I didn't trust his self-destructive behaviours if he wasn't directly in my sight. Nor did I trust that all of this wasn't an act, a lead up to something dreadful.
He was only going to hate me if I turned into a clingy idiot.
And I was going to give myself an aneurysm worrying about it.
.
.
Carlisle was exhausted and weak over the next few days. His fainting spells were so bad that he struggled to walk down the hallway, and he was black and blue with bruising from falling. He was barely holding down anything solid, pale and cold and shaky. I lay in bed with him at night, when he tiredly asked me to, holding him as he curled against my chest in search of warmth.
He wandered over to me while I was making dinner - soup, endless fucking soup - on the brink of collapse despite only having moved ten feet. "Edward and Bella invited us over for-"
"Sit down, right now," I interrupted, locking my arm around him as I dragged a chair behind him. I watched the colour sink from his face, it's disappearance slowed once he wasn't standing anymore. "Sorry, what was that?" Silently trying to convince him not to be annoyed with my abruptness, I ran my fingers through his hair, my hand resting against his forehead as his consciousness slipped suddenly. My hopes that the temperature might shock him awake did little. "Carlisle."
He hummed softly, leaning into me until I was forced to catch him, holding him steady in the seat. A few seconds passed where he struggled and I panicked, but he managed to hold it together. It still took a moment for him to regain his speech. "Uh, Edward wants us to come over for movie night with the others, and I didn't know how to say no."
"Movie night, huh?" I asked skeptically. I relaxed slightly, no longer pressing him into the wood, and he seemed to have recovered enough to support himself. "Tonight?"
He nodded dizzily. "I wanna go, but I…"
"But you can't walk from the kitchen back to bed," I finished. Again, he started to slip. I tightened my hands on him. "Take a deep breath; don't you faint."
He did, and then another, a small amount of colour returning to his cheeks. "I-I need to lie down."
"Can you have some water?" I pressed. If he stood, I knew he was only going to go back down.
He nodded obediently, just trying to please me now. I had to hold the glass steady for him, but he swallowed a few mouthfuls, looking no less queasy. "I have to lie down," he repeated. "Please."
"On the couch, so I can keep an eye on you?" It was half a plea. He didn't protest too much past a few grumbles, too unsteady to resist. I retrieved a pillow and the comforter from our mattress, aware that he was disapproving as I put together a makeshift bed.
"Gar, you fuss too much," he told me as I helped him up. He still anxiously held my arm until he was safely sitting down again, falling sideways to lean against the cushions and stop the room spinning.
"And you almost passed out again," I accused. "I don't want to keep picking you up off of the floor, and you can't afford to keep ending up down there." Only half listening to his replying complaint, I went back to the kitchen, rifling through the cupboard under the sink through the stacks of reusable containers until I found a water bottle. The diluted juice I filled it with seemed terrible to me, but it was the only calories he was managing to get in besides a mug of soup a day. "Drink?" I sighed, passing it to him over the back of the sofa.
He obediently took a sip, managing not to roll his eyes at my insistence on babying him.
"We'll see how you feel in an hour or so, and I can take you to see your friends, but you're not going to make it to Edward's if you're this unwell, Carlisle." He wasn't going to make it to the bloody elevator.
"I know," he groaned, rubbing his face. "And you can come too. It might be fun?" He wasn't fooling anyone, least of all himself.
I rolled my eyes at him. "Do you want the TV on?" Setting the controls on his abdomen, I started to turn away, needing to get the bubbling pot off the stove before it spilled over.
"Talk to me?" he asked shyly, bypassing the question. Suddenly unable to look at me, he picked at his fingertips.
I stopped on my journey back to the kitchen, pulled up short as I turned back to face him again. "About what, baby?"
"Anything. It just helps?"
I couldn't draw the connection between being spoken to and passing out. I also wasn't sure what to say to him. "I think you should just rest?"
"That's all I ever do."
"Give me ten minutes to save dinner," I told him, hoping the extra time might buy my way out of being awkward together. He rewarded me with a nod, letting himself sink into the blankets. I doubted that he'd even be awake by the time I was done. I kept throwing glances at him while I took the pot off the heat, taking a careful sip of the far too hot liquid from a spoon to make sure it was alright before closing the lid back over it and giving up.
He was fidgeting with the edge of the blanket, more keeping himself awake than anything else. "I'm really sorry our relationship is like this," he murmured, curling his legs under himself so that we could sit together. It still felt odd, a little uncomfortable, but it was definitely better. He really did want me. "That I'm a mess all the time, and you have to pick up the pieces."
"You've apologised for that before, and we've had that conversation. You don't need to feel guilty, and I don't want you to."
"I know, but it still doesn't feel good that you have to do everything around here all the time."
"It doesn't bother me, Carlisle. I just want you to feel better, and I want to fix things between us." Stilling his hands, I trapped his fingers in mine. "Did you ever get sick like this as a kid? I know you had a lot going on then, but were you ill?"
"I wasn't well a lot of the time, but I also wasn't eating or sleeping properly, and I couldn't get my childhood vaccines until I was an adult so a lot of it was unnecessary," he explained cautiously. There was a long pause where I kept quiet, and it seemed like he wanted to continue. "It was really bad when I was a teenager, but Esme's family used to help me a lot, even after I'd come out. I guess I don't remember a whole lot before that."
"Is how you're feeling now the same?" I pressed.
"The exhaustion is the same, but I'm sure I didn't throw up so much. I had to go to hospital a few times, but Esme's mother was looking after me, and the whole thing is kind of blurry when I think about it." He frowned, trying to recall it, and then shook his head once it proved too difficult.
"Don't stress yourself out over it, I was just curious."
"I wish it was over," he sighed quietly.
"The thing with your friends tonight?"
"That, and whatever is making me so useless."
.
.
I waited until he had fallen into a restless sleep before I called Edward. "Hey, um, Carlisle's feeling like crap, tonight is just films, right?" I asked nervously once we got past the formalities. I didn't like talking to them on the phone usually, and I doubted any of them were going to tolerate me well at the moment. Edward had seemed like the option least likely to bite my head off.
"Yeah, just movies and snacks," he confirmed. "We're not going to torture him, we just haven't been together as a group since Alistair left, and that was months ago."
I sighed, relenting. "Do we...do you want us to bring anything?"
"Just yourselves." I could hear the smile in his voice, the excitement that we finally agreed to come. "You're coming too right? You're coming together?" The question was careful and I repressed a shudder.
"I guess so. If it's going to be an issue, I can go, but I don't know that Carlisle will stay; he's really not feeling good." It was a guarantee he wouldn't go at all, really.
"Of course you can come, Garrett. Besides, Cullen will only bail on us otherwise," he grumbled. Maybe he wasn't as in the dark as I'd assumed.
"Alright. See you later, Edward."
I baked a batch of brownies anyway. If nothing else, it might soften their feelings toward me a little; it felt like walking into a lion's den, and I just hoped it wasn't going to end in blows. Even if they hated me, I hoped they wouldn't put that stress on Carlisle.
He was still lying on the couch where I'd left him, too uncomfortable to sleep. The tentative drafts he was drawing up for work looked good to me, but he was quickly becoming frustrated. I thought it was more to do with his current state than the task at hand.
"How's work?" I asked eventually. We hadn't talked much about it since Caius had been released, but there was no way it hadn't made being there at least a little harder. I kept my focus on the baking, but watched him in my peripheral vision as he scrubbed his hands across his face.
"I'm not good enough," he grumbled miserably. "All of my coworkers have degrees - I draw pictures and have a few weeks training. They shouldn't have hired me; it's a joke."
"They said nothing but good things about you when we went to that dinner," I reminded him.
"My boss keeps pushing me to take more clients, but I can't get anything done because I get a migraine when I look at my computer screen too long, and my laptop is so slow that I know I'm going to have to go into the office. I don't think I can do this anymore." He shut the lid on his computer, sinking further into the couch.
"Well, what do you want to do instead?" I slowly filled the sink with water, dipping my hand into it to check it was as scolding as I wanted it before I dumped the dishes in. "You don't have to stay there."
"I can't do anything else! I can barely keep up with this, and I can do it in bed if I have to. And I'm not good at anything anyway; I don't have any other skills, and I don't think I can handle going back into retail." He was anxiously rambling, and I wondered how much of this was born out of nerves about seeing his friends today.
"Do you want to quit?" I asked bluntly. The cutlery clattered as I shoved it under the water, the plates no less noisy.
"Yeah, but we have bills, and I can barely afford to go to the doctor as it is, even with my insurance, and things aren't getting any better."
"I know, Carlisle."
"I just wish things could be easy, just once. I'm so tired of all this," he whispered.
"I know, baby," I repeated.
.
.
He'd tried to back out. I'd heard him talking to one of them over the phone, lightly arguing that he didn't want to come, that he didn't feel up to it, but they apparently wouldn't 'no' for an answer. So he was trying to drink as much as he could, trying to drive up his blood pressure enough that he wouldn't be so lightheaded, hoping that my google searching was valid.
"How are you doing?" I asked. "Do I need to get changed? Rosalie and Emmett always seem to be dressed up."
He shook his head. "Not if you don't want to; I'm not going to." In a hopeless attempt to get warm, he'd wrapped himself in a blanket, the fabric pulled tight across his shoulders and pooling at his feet. His hand drifted to his stomach in response to my question. "I've had so much water; I don't feel good."
"You're less dizzy though, right?" Before I could stop myself, my hand moved to his face, searching for a fever. No heat. But he was cold and clammy, shivering a little. My touch still pushed colour into his cheeks.
"Sort of."
"Do you think you're going to get sick in the car?"
"No, but I might wet myself on the way." The joke fell flat; he was too uncomfortable. Maybe my insistence that he drink might not have been a good idea after all.
"It's a twenty minute drive," I chuckled anyway. "You can't take that blanket out in the rain, though, it'll get soaked."
Groaning, he reluctantly shrugged it off, folding it over the back of one of the kitchen chairs. It was only after I prompted him that he went to find a rain jacket, and I wondered what dosage of painkillers he had taken in preparation for this; he wasn't with it at all. Thank god he didn't want to drive. "Can we still bring it?"
"The blanket?" I tugged the item of clothing into place.
He nodded desperately. "Please. I'm freezing." His hands burrowed into his pockets, his arms tucking against his sides. "Garrett?"
"Are you okay on your meds?" I frowned. There was just something off about him, and I couldn't pick it.
"Yeah, but they make it hard to think, sorry. The blanket?"
I caught his waist, pressing a cautious kiss to his forehead. "If it'll make you happy. What's hurting?"
"I twisted my hip when I fell. And if I don't take them, my headaches get out of control-" He was trying to defend himself, like he thought I was going to come after him if he didn't, unable to look up at me.
"Hey, I'm trying to make sure you're alright," I murmured. My thumb brushed over his cheek as I tilted his chin up to get him to look at me. "If you have to take them, then so be it."
"It's just that last time, you weren't pleased that I was…" He trailed off, his shoulders slumping, sure that he was about to be argued with.
"And it was wrong, and I'm sorry for it," I assured him. I dipped my head, lightly pressing my lips to his. "Are you ready to leave?"
He nodded. "Yeah. Are you?"
"No, but let's go."