#implied froger

[letmeouttathischeapbmovie]

Brian: the best words end in "ie", like "sweetie"

Freddie: or "lovie"

Roger: or "Freddie"

Freddie: aw, Roger!

Deaky: or "die"

Roger: ... John.

[queenslasharchive]

In the Cold of a Winter’s Day

For @supersonicmenn, merry Christmas! xx

It starts with a cough. Freddie is sniffling and looking worse for the wear. Roger pretends not to notice.

Then comes a flush to his cheeks, and Roger notices how Freddie’s voice has gone low and croaky, how he’s less enthusiastic when greeting customers.

“You’re sick, Fred.”

Freddie wrinkles his delicate nose and waves him away. “Freddie Mercury does not get sick, darling. It’s all your smoking, it ruins my voice.”

Roger scoffs. He’s had to cut heavily down on smoking these last weeks due to empty pockets, and he doubts Freddie’s got a sore throat from the one cigarette he smoked in the kitchen earlier this morning.

“You’re going home. You’re scaring away the customers with your coughing. Highly unsanitary, you know.”

Despite Freddie’s stubborn streak, the protests are short-lived, and he soon leaves with Roger’s scarf winded around his neck. So little resistance says it all, really.

The morning drags on. Business is slow and he’s too used to the company. He wonders if the rain has let up; small, icy drops and a wind so biting it’s near impossible to get warm again. At least Kensington Market is warm and brightly lit.

Around noon he sells a fur coat for 3 quid, the one Freddie promised would bring in a small fortune. He knows Freddie will murder him when he finds out, but Roger would rather not starve. He’s getting tetchy and smokes half a cigarette from the beat up pack in the back pocket of his jeans. If he’s lucky he’ll get a Christmas present from Freddie, and if he’s even luckier, it’ll be cigarettes.

The rain has given way to sleet when he goes home around three. The sky is pewter grey and the streets are slick. The Christmas decorations in the window displays seem obnoxiously loud and bright.

A detour and what little money he can spare leave him with cans of beans, instant soup, and a bit of chicken too close to its expiration date.

The kitchen is cold and grey from the dying sun, the dishes from yesterday still on the counter. Roger unloads his groceries and turns on the stove.

Freddie is awake when he enters his room. “I brought you soup,” Roger says, relishing the sting from the hot ceramic bowl. It’s too bloody cold in their flat.

Freddie, propped up on a mountain of pillows and wrapped in duvet and blankets, regards him with suspicion. “Did you make it?”

“I added water and put it on the stove.”

Freddie scoffs, fingers clenching around a corner of his duvet. “It looks disgusting.”

“Make your own food next time, Fred,” Roger says, barely refraining from rolling his eyes. “I’m going back to the stall.”

Freddie pulls the duvet tighter around himself. “Bring me my darling before you leave,” he sniffs.

Freddie’s “darling” is the stray cat he fed once which has since taken residence in their flat. Roger suspected and still does that it’s full of fleas, but Freddie had treated it to a bath, kissed its sopping head and that had been that.

“It’s hiding,“ Roger advises. Freddie’s brow knits in distress. “It doesn’t like you when you’re sick and bitchy.”

The pillow hits him on the arm, and soup spills down the sides of the bowl and burns his hand. Roger stomps out the room and leaves the door wide open out of spite.

The soup is disgusting, but it’s warm and filling, and that’s good enough for Roger. The cat pokes its head out from beneath the worn leather couch and Roger treats it to a chunk of chicken. Better stay on the good side of at least one of his flatmates.

It’s much warmer at Kensington that it has been in their flat for months, and after he’s cooled down, Roger thinks that maybe it would have been wiser to let Freddie stay here rather than insist he go home.

He buries his fingers in the coarse fur of a ratty vest he’s been unable to sell. He thinks of the beautiful coat he’d been ogling for weeks in the stall diagonally opposite of theirs, and how he could’ve bought it if he didn’t buy that pack of cigarettes last week and skipped dinner for the rest of the month. Not that it matters—it’s gone now.

Two girls stop by the stall to chat and flirt and leave with a bracelet and something velvety. Roger thinks back on last year’s Christmas and wonders if Freddie will be out of bed when the 25th comes around and if they have enough for a bottle of something fancy.

The heat’s out when he comes home later that night. The bedding’s gone from his room, and he finds it piled on top of a sleeping Freddie in the other bedroom. Rubbing his freezing fingers, he leaves to collect a pair of pyjamas and the cat.

Freddie is sweaty with fever and the shirt sticking to his back is damp. Roger arranges the covers so Freddie is kept warm and curls himself around the cat between them on the mattress, his fingers digging into the warm fur. The cat gets up and leaves.

He wakes to Freddie’s sleepy mumbles of “get out of my bed, gay boy”, and assumes he’s feeling better. Roger feels like he’s dying.

Brian pops in around noon, guitar slung over his shoulder and hair a disarray. Roger is on his knees trying to get the shoddy old radiator to work.

“Know anything about radiators, Brian?”

“Have you tried turning the knob?” Brian’s eyes are bright and curious, not a trace of irony in his voice.

“That was plan B,” Roger says. He hits the radiator so hard his hand momentarily goes numb with the pain. Still it doesn’t budge. “You can go home, Bri. Freddie’s sick.”

Roger doesn’t need to turn around to see Brian’s disappointed face. “Oh. Is he alright?”

“He’s caught the flu is all,” Roger says with a shrug. “The heating here is shit. He’ll survive.”

“I’ll just pop in and say hello,” Brian says. Roger doesn’t protest despite being aware he’s sure to catch it with his shitty immune system. Brian’s a big boy, he figures.

Roger glares at the radiator one last time and pulls on his gloves.

Just before Roger leaves for Kensington, the heat kicks in again.

Kensington Market, despite its lights and festive decorations, is really rather dull without Freddie. Roger doesn’t sell half as much as they usually do, and all he can think of is Freddie, alone and sick in their dingy flat. They don’t talk when he’s at home, and Roger soothes the ache in his chest and his growing restlessness with cigarettes until he runs out.

Freddie stops stealing his blankets after that first night but the cold has seeped into his bones, and Roger, used to getting his energy from other people, feels drained and cold and terribly lonely. 

On Christmas Eve he goes home early. Even at the stall it’s cold, and Roger has resorted to wearing his jacket, an extraordinarily stupid idea he realises when he steps outside and the wind blows through all of his layers. The rain is cold and unforgiving, stinging his cheeks and leaving ugly imprints on the few patches of snow still left from the night before.

The ache in his chest grows a little stronger and this time he has no cigarettes to soothe it.

“Freddie?” 

Roger kicks off his boots first, then wishes he hadn’t. The heat is out again, of course, but Freddie’s left the lights on, creating an illusion of warmth which Roger relishes. 

Freddie’s bedroom door is ajar, and Roger pushes it open to reveal Freddie with a purring cat in his lap. The warm glint in his eyes are back, and the dull ache in his chest turns to relief so strong it hurts. 

“I could’ve cared for you,” he says, wincing at the bluntness of his tone. He thinks Freddie will be able to detect the trace of hurt there, too.

Freddie scoots over to make space for him on the narrow bed. “I didn’t want you to, darling. I know you love being sick and having people fuss about you, but I can’t stand it. I’m not at my best with a sore throat and runny nose, and I don’t want anyone to see.”

Roger slips underneath the duvet. ”You’re always at your best, Fred,“ he says and almost gags, even though he means it.

Freddie laughs, loud and sudden. Roger’s lips involuntarily tug into a smile. ”What a load of bollocks, dear, even coming from you.“

Roger diverts his eyes to the ceiling, flushed but more at ease than he’s been for days. ”Have you had dinner?“

”Mhm, no, are you making some?“

”I could.“

”Brian called,“ Freddie says just as Roger reaches the door, ”guess who got sick?“

Roger snorts but silently promises himself to stop by Brian’s tomorrow. Just to wish him merry Christmas.

That night Roger crawls into Freddie’s bed, and they huddle together for warmth. Even though the fever has gone down, Freddie is still a human furnace, and Roger is not so daft he doesn’t take advantage of it. 

Hours later, they wake up almost simultaneously. The room is so cold Roger swears he can see his own breath, and even the smallest of movements causes violent shivers to run down his spine. Freddie slips out from under the sheets and stands shivering in front of his closet. 

”Get back here,“ Roger hisses, but is silenced when a soft, heavy bundle hits him in the head. ”What is this?“

”Early Christmas present,“ Freddie whispers, slipping on an extra pair of pyjama bottoms.

Roger’s fingers clench around the soft fur, heart twisting painfully. He knows what this is—he knows the texture and the shape, knows how it looks on him from when he’s modelled it for a laugh down at the market while secretly wishing it was his. ”We can’t afford this, Fred.“

”It’s Christmas,“ Freddie says lightly, letting in the cold as he comes back to bed.

”It’s Christmas and we’ll bloody starve because of this,“ Roger says. He wants it so bad, and he hates Freddie for it. ”You don’t get to decide how we spend our money!“

Freddie looks decidedly unimpressed even in the darkness. ”Let’s leave the dramatics for tomorrow, darling. It’s cold and I’m tired and you clearly want it. If it makes you feel better, I didn’t spend a single pence of our money. I sold my jacket the day before I got sick.”

Roger is torn. He wants to hold on to his anger, just for a little while. But the coat is soft and warm and looking into Freddie’s eyes make him a little drowsy. 

”Okay,“ he mumbles, defeated. ”But tomorrow we will talk about this.“

”Sure thing, darling.“ 

Roger ignores the poorly hid smile in Freddie’s voice and wraps the fur coat around them. The duvet comes next, then all three blankets.

Roger stays awake until he’s properly warm and Freddie has drifted off. Then he whispers into Freddie’s neck.

Merry Christmas.

His exhale lifts a strand of Freddie’s hair, curly because he’s been sick and unable to straighten it, and it tickles his cheek. Roger would deny it later if anyone told him he fell asleep with a smile on his lips.