He seems to always get sick when you make his oatmeal. You dress it up for him just the way he likes, berries and 100% real maple syrup. You also add your secret ingredient: love, of course. But it just doesn’t go over well with his poor stomach, turning his face red before he rushes to the bathroom. He keeps trying it though, bless his stubborn little heart.
You never eat a bite of it, of course, you’re not an oatmeal person and he knows this. There would be no reason for him to question why only he eats the oatmeal. Why only he gets sick.
He’s been having stomach troubles more often recently. Had to cancel plans and call out of work more than once. This whole week, actually. You’ve told him you think it could be Crohn’s, or IBS, or even cancer. He’s lucky he has you to help him when he’s like this. As he leans over the toilet, you rub his back. Each time he heaves, you wipe the corner of his mouth with a paper towel and then fold it neatly before putting it into the trash can next to him.
“You’re such a mess, but I’m always here to clean you up, aren’t I?” You stroke his head, rub his back. “There, there. You’re lucky you have such a nice sister to take care of you.”
He burps, exhales. His body tries to slump over, but you’re there — you’re always there — you catch him, pull him to his feet. His body is weakened from how ill he’s been, and he tries to walk, but after just a few steps he leans fully on you. “Let’s get you into bed, you’re too weak to do anything. I’ll call your manager for you.”
He struggles to speak, his mouth opening slowly, pale lips curling to shape letters that can’t be realized. He gives up. “That’s a good boy,” you murmur into his blonde head of hair as you lead the last few steps to his room. His body crumples onto his bed the moment you let go. It’s sad, really, to see him in such a state. You just want to make him all better and hold him tight forever. Keep him here with you, under your care. It’s a shame that he keeps getting sick. The poor guy.
“I’ll make you some ginger tea to settle your stomach, you just wait here, I’ll be here for you as long as you need me,” you whisper to him. You place a very gentle kiss on his face, lingering maybe half a second longer than necessary, right next to the corner of his mouth. His eyebrows shoot up above the rims of his aviators and his mouth opens, but again, whatever he wants to say to you seems to be too much effort.
It takes only a few minutes to prepare his tea. Boil the kettle. Grate the ginger. Squeeze the lemon. Toss in the pills. Squeeze a touch of honey. Only the best for sweet Dave.
When you get back from preparing his tea, he’s shivering. His clothes are drenched with sweat and it looks like every drop of blood in his body is rushing to his face. He’s swollen, sweaty, and bright red. You practically drop the mug of tea on his bedside table in your haste to help him. The tablets you added need a few more minutes to fully dissolve, anyway. He looks so pathetic and feeble lying like this. Like a ball-jointed doll, in a way.
You’ve always wanted something to be responsible for.
It’s just so serendipitous that he’s fallen ill after moving in with you. Well, perhaps that’s incorrect phrasing. It pains your heart to see him ill. You mean that it’s good he only fell ill once you were able to watch over him. You’re here for him now, you can do everything for him like he needs.
“I’ve got you, let’s get you undressed and fixed up. You’re doing so great,” you coo as you pull off a sock. He briefly tries to sit up, raise a hand to stop you, but the energy it takes is clearly too much. He crashes back down onto his pillow. A noise like a sigh of resignation leaves his mouth; it makes a corner of your mouth rise. He’s cute like this.
It’s best to do the shirt next, you decide. It’s difficult to maneuver into place to remove it. He groans as the muscles required to lift his arms stretch to their full length. His shirt gets stuck over his sunglasses. You quickly pull them off his face, toss them next to his tea.
His eyes are scared as they meet yours.
“Sh, sh, I’m here for you, Dave. We’re getting you all ready for your nap, now, aren’t we?”
You don’t wait for his response as you carefully ease his shirt the rest of the way off his torso. His skin is clammy on his abdomen, with a few drops of sweat pooled in his bellybutton. You deftly wipe it out with his shirt, but it’s all wet anyway, so it hardly makes a difference. Your index finger rings the entirety of the inside of his belly button, the fabric separating you from his bare skin, but it thrills you nonetheless. You’re such a good caretaker, really killing this whole “nurturing” thing.
And why shouldn’t you be? That’s your baby brother, after all. He never had someone to take care of him, so you have to do it the right way. That’s why you’re devoting so much of your time to him, why you’re not calling in for him. He needs to be in bed, he’s not well, he can find a new job when he gets better. And you — well, your editor can wait a few weeks for your manuscript. You’re doing it all for him.
He seems to not be so sure about that, his moans of protestation becoming more apparent. His eyes are freaking out as you unbutton his jeans. It seems to take all his energy just to get out the mumble of “sister” that he manages to.
You abandon the pants for now. “Don’t be ridiculous, Dave, I’m just helping you change because you’re too weak to do so on your own. There’s nothing weird about this, and the fact that you’re seeing incestuous undertones shows much more about your ideas of this relationship than it does mine, frankly. Here, have some tea, all that vomiting must have dehydrated you.”
He’s too weak to sit up. So you climb up onto the bed with him. You have to push him forward on himself to get yourself situated with his torso between your legs, then you pull him back to rest on your own. His head tilts up to look at you, and you meet his searing red eyes. They’re still scared, he’s probably wanting to do an acrobatic pirouette off the handle, but finding himself unable to move anything more than his facial muscles.
“Let’s get you all fixed up, okay, Dave?” You reach out, grab his tea. His eyes jump back and forth between yours and the tea you’re bringing toward his mouth. “This will make you all better, I always know what you need, don’t I?”
He doesn’t open his mouth. His eyes tell you no, the bright red irises practically screaming in fear. But what would he have to be afraid of? It doesn’t make sense. You’re just being a good caregiver. “Here, have a sip. Please, Davey? For your sister?” His eyes don’t change, although he attempts a painful frown at the nickname. “You don’t trust me? What are you accusing me of? You think I would do something to you, when all I’ve ever done has been to help you? It’s hurtful is what it is, Dave. I would have thought my own blood and ectobiological flesh brother would have faith in my ability to keep him alive and well.”
Your guilt tripping doesn’t have any affect on him. The Striders are not a guilt-able lot, which always throws you off your game. There’s only one gambit left to keep that well-deserved trust. You have to raise the cup to your own mouth and take a sip. One drink will be safe. Because Dave needs the rest to settle his stomach, you mean. He visibly relaxes when he sees you swallow the beverage. “You’re so sick you’ve become paranoid of me. That’s okay, we’ll make you all better. Just drink up. That’s a good, good boy.”
You slowly dribble the tea into his mouth. One sip, then another. It takes nearly thirty minutes for him to get the whole cup down. You don’t mind. You just hold him as he tries to be good and drink his healing tea. He nearly falls asleep before finishing it all, but you do the difficult task of waking him so he can finish it. You’re just that good of a caregiver.
Now that he’s out like a light, you can finish fixing his clothes. You wiggle out from under him. After gently laying his head down on a pillow, you move down the bed to his pelvic area. His pants have begun to stick to his skin, and he stirs each time the denim drags against his sensitive spots. His hips, knees, ankles. But finally, after much finagling — which is the technical, medical, surgical term — of his limbs, you wiggle his jeans all the way off. You fold the slightly stiff yet somehow also still damp jeans and neatly place them on the floor.
The only item of clothing left on his body is his white briefs.
You sit and watch him sleep for a few moments.
You didn’t begin this on purpose. Neither of you knew about his shellfish allergy, after all. But the feeling of him in your arms that first time, the way he sputtered and shook and all he wanted was you, even as you called emergency services? That kind of attention can be addicting.
And, after all, is it not what Dave needs to have someone look after him?You’re not doing anything wrong by helping him when he’s sick.
You turn off his phone the next day so it can’t distract him. He needs to save his energy, not spend it all on whatever nonsense Karkat wants to chew his ear off about. He gets sicker, despite you regularly waking him up for tea and a meal. He refuses to eat the oatmeal you make him for breakfast. Which is fair enough, you think, it’s clear he’s got some sort of intolerance to oats. That’s what started this whole mess after all, even though you put all your love into making it for him yesterday.
He drinks his tea every couple hours. There’s only a few pills in each, you aren’t trying to hurt him, but it’s enough. He stays asleep for the most part. When his eyes open, he’s not quite sure what’s happening or where he is. You gently coax him back to sleep each time.
You bring your own meal into his room when you decide to have lunch. It’s a soup - thick, warm. You slowly spoon it into your mouth as you watch him. He looks peaceful, even during the frequent moments where he grimaces in his sleep. He must be in pain. Poor guy. That’s why he needs you.
After only a few bites of your lunch, Dave wakes up with a start. He nearly sits up from the force of his waking, before the ache of his body pulls him sharply back down to the bed. You set your soup down and rush to his side.
“Dave? What happened, are you okay?” He doesn’t look well. His eyes seem redder than yesterday - not just the irises now, but his scleras are all bloodshot. It’s like looking into a dying sun. It breaks your heart. He’s so fragile right now, so scared, and you just want to hold him and make him all better.
He looks at you, his eyes much more lucid than the past thirty-six hours. It’s a bit disconcerting - with what he’s had in his system, even after vomiting much of it up yesterday, he shouldn’t have the ability to look at you like this.
“Rose, what’s going on?” he asks you, his voice hoarse and croaky. He can speak again, too. That’s good. For him.
“Nothing, sweetheart, I’m just taking care of you. I know you don’t know what that’s like, Bro never did that for you, but I’m making you all better. You were really sick yesterday. You were acting so strange it was like something out of Kafka, I thought I might blink and you’d be a giant bug.” You try to soothe him with your words, but he doesn’t calm.
“I can’t move my body, it hurts too much.”
“I’ll get you some soup, it’s good for the body. It will fix you right up.” You stand up, but before you leave the room, he mumbles something. You’re not quite sure what’s said, but you get the sense that he’s suspicious of you. Which is frankly ridiculous. You’re just getting him a bowl of soup, like any caring person would if someone they loved was sick.
You prepare him a very large bowl. You add a little bit of crushed up pills on top before stirring it in. Only the best for your family. The only one of your family who has really been there for you, ever. Now you’re making sure you can be there for him, forever.
He’s still laying limp, just his briefs covering his most vulnerable parts, when you come back with his meal. You fully lift him up, leaning him up against the headboard this time. It takes a bit, and he groans the whole time. He’s really uncomfortable physically. Not mentally, of course. You’re here, there’d be no reason for him to be. That’d be insane of him, and he’s not insane.
You sit next to him, bring a spoon of the soup to his mouth. His eyes flick back and forth from the spoon to your eyes. It’s like deja vu of yesterday, before he trusted you. You’re not willing to have a bite of his soup this time. The dosage is too high. By which you mean, he needs it too much. It’s his soup.
He doesn’t eat at first. Instead, he has a question for you. “Why am I sick, Rose? It’s been over a week, and it’s only gotten worse. I’m…scared.”
It’s strange, how openly vulnerable he’s being. It makes you feel warm. He’s confiding in you, no bullshit metaphor or longwinded diatribe. This is what love is, isn’t it? “I don’t know, Dave. I’m doing all I can for you. I’m taking care of you.” The spoon in your hand stays just in front of his closed mouth as you lean in to kiss his forehead. “Eat your food, Dave. Your body needs energy to heal. I’m doing my best to figure out how to fix you up.”
It’s not a lie if you’re also saying it to yourself, is it?
Slowly, as if he’s clinging to his idea of you as his protector, as if you’re all he has left whether he wants to have you or not, he opens his mouth. You feed him his soup, wiping his mouth when he dribbles. He’s like a puppy who needs a kind hand to get back to his previous self.
He finishes his food like a good boy, and it makes him sleepy again. You set the bowl down, and decide it’s time. “I need to change your underwear, Dave. They’re as sweaty as a middle school locker room.”
He begins to protest, but stops before anything other than “Uh-” leaves his mouth. He knows you’re right, and he’s in no shape to be changing his own briefs. So, he allows you to pull them down, slowly, maybe leaning too close to his penis for comfort. But he says nothing.
Once he’s naked, you look into his eyes. They meet yours, and for a second, you just stare at each other. He breaks first.
“My underwear drawer is the top one.”
You move your head to look to his dresser, but that’s the only part of you that moves. Dave needs to feel good in your care. There’s one way you’ve neglected him until now: you need to solve this.
Without saying anything, without asking for permission or caring, you place your left hand on his exposed dick. It’s small, limp, cute even. Everything about him is cute to you.
“Whoa what the,” he starts, but quickly trails off. The meds kicked in faster than you anticipated. That’s fine, you don’t need him to be awake for this.
You rub him, not taking him into your hand at first, just moving up and down along the short length. His dick begins to harden, growing ever so slightly, and his eyes flick open. “Rose?” Dave gets out, before again falling back to sleep.
The next few minutes go much like this, before you get up and wash Dave’s seed off your hand. He doesn’t wake for the rest of the day.
He doesn’t regain consciousness on days three or four but for his regular tea times. He drifts lightly through sleep phases, waking only when your touch demands it. The dosages keep going up, as his body slowly breaks down. He’s not vomiting anymore — not only because there’s nothing left in his stomach to expel, either. He reminds you of that old fairy tale, with the seven tiny men. Although, that might make you the evil witch? You prefer to think of yourself as the morally complex Seer. After all, as you so often remind yourself, this is all for him.
You reduce the amount of medication you give him on day five. You want him awake again. You’re getting lonely without his voice. You’re not afraid of overdosing him; it’s hardly heroic or just to pass away while reenacting the story of sleeping beauty herself. More fairy tales. You’ve found your old collection of them, almost one hundred leather-bound volumes which Mom passive aggressively bought you when you mentioned folktales in passing as a child, and snuggle next to him in bed reading one of the anthologies. He’ll never leave your side. He can say what he wants to you, accuse you of any nasty thing he wants, but he’ll never be without you. He won’t actually get up and push you away.
You’ve made sure of that.
All you have to do is keep him like this, keep feeding him his food, and you’ll be able to curl up next to him forever. Neither of you will ever need anyone else again. Not Jade, Dirk, Roxy, Karkat, no one. Just you and your man. Just you and your brother, who loves you so much he refuses to even leave his own bed. Who lets you feed him, wash him, dress him. He’s yours to do what you want with. That’s exactly what he needs.
All you have to do is continually adjust the pills you give him. That’s not too hard of a job, not after what Mom put you through, and what Bro put him through. Now you have each other. You’ll never hurt each other the way your guardians hurt you.
Never ever ever ever ever.