A/N: Personally I think Adrian is a meta human with super healing so I’m not really sure how him being sick fits into my personal headcanon but this seemed like a fun thing to write anyway.
I made it my writing goal for the year to write 50,000 words for fun and I thought that would be easy but now it’s September and I have 20,000 words to write so expect a few more stories before I lose steam since I’m counting my Substack writing too. (I’m not not saying requests and comms are open, but if someone had a good idea and wanted to suggest it…I’m open to it and I am going to try to work through all the Artemis Fowl ones too, I’m just also trying to write what I have my own ideas for too!)
Basically when the ideas strike, I’m just doing it in order to get stuff done.
Masterlist
Everyone is terrible when they’re sick. They’re whiny, exhausted, and just overall feel dreadful. It’s fair, when someone is sick they do feel awful and it’s hard to even remember what feeling normal feels like, but most people still have some sort of shame or understanding that it’s not forever. Especially when it comes to something as simple as the flu.
However, Adrian is a special kind of terrible when he’s sick. Adrian refuses to admit he’s even sick till he drops dead on his feet and then he’ll be the most miserable person to be around for a couple of days. After those couple of days he’ll walk around like he’s never been sick before and like it’s all never happened before. Only to repeat the cycle the next time he gets sick.
It always shocks the people around him since he’ll literally get stabbed and “walk it off” and insist on taking care of it himself, but when he’s sick it’s like he needs someone to take care of him. His partner wasn’t sure if it was just Adrian being Adrian or if something worse was going on.
To be perfectly honest, that was always the issue with Adrian. He would be overdramatic at the smallest thing like who drank the last beer and take it as a personal betrayal but then murdering someone would be something so casual. So it wasn’t terribly surprising that him being sick would follow that format too.
Currently, Adrian and his partner were in day two after him dropping dead at Peacemaker’s home from being sick. Chris had quickly called Adrian’s partner, not wanting to deal with him when he’s sick since he had experienced that once before Adrian started dating. And when Adrian’s partner showed up, he helped put Adrian in their car and just kept telling them he was never dealing with this again.
Adrian’s partner, new to him being sick, had no idea what was waiting for them as Adrian whined and became worse than a baby back at his home.
Day one had been filled with a lot of complaining and sniffling, while day two had been eerily silent. There was still sniffling and the occasional wet sounding cough, but Adrian was refusing to talk. At first his partner worried they had said something to make him upset, but whenever they looked at him he just seemed really out of it.
He was currently laying on his couch, his living room a disaster zone. Between empty gatorade bottles, tissues, medicine bottles, and food trash someone would’ve assumed a garbage bomb went off in the room. His partner rarely spent time at his place, normally inviting him over to their’s, but they figured he’d be more comfortable at home. But between his new mess and the mess that was already there when they dragged him inside they weren’t fully sure he was. In their mind, it was too late to move him, it was hard enough in the morning to get him to move to the couch instead of his bed so they could keep an eye on him a little easier.
During his fitful sleeps his partner took the time to attempt to deep clean his apartment and unpack random boxes they were still finding around the place. They knew Adrian had lived there for at least 5 years, but him not unpacking was not that big of behavioral surprise.
His partner had even taken off work to take care of him since he was just so helpless. It was strange for them, normally Adrian wanted to do everything for them to make sure they were always okay, but the moment he became sick it wasn’t even like he was doing it on purpose he genuinely just shut down. He wouldn’t even really talk which was what was scaring his partner the most.
Adrian? Quiet? No one had seen such a thing before.
“Adrian, baby. Do you want anything to eat? I can make that orzo soup you like with the lemons.” His partner called from the kitchen, overlooking the couch he was laying on. His back was facing them, they thought, but it was hard to tell since he had covered his entire body in blankets. There was no sign that he had heard them, the only reason they knew he was still alive was because of the slight movement of his labored breathing and the occasional cough.
Walking slowly, his partner approached the couch. Adrian didn’t move, slowly in case he had somehow fallen asleep they gently grabbed the edge of the blanket and pulled it back so they could look at his face. When the light hit his eyes he groaned and squinted but his eyes remained on his partner the best he could.
He was paler than normal, his cheeks and nose were rosey red as if he had been outside in the cold for hours instead of huddled under big thick blankets. His nose was running and he looked just overall miserable.
“Baby, are you sure you don’t want to go to the doctor?” Keeping his eyes closed he shook his head no. They ran a hand through his sweaty curls and he released a sigh. “What would make you feel better, Adrian? What can I do?” They whispered. They watched as he slowly opened his eyes, blinking without his glasses in an attempt to put them in focus.
For just a moment, the two just looked at each other until Adrian finally sighed.
“Can we cuddle and watch Fargo?” He croaked out. They let out a small laugh, not at Adrian, but just at the idea that through everything all he wanted to do was to spend time with them.
“Yeah, Adrian, we can. Can you sit up for me?” He nodded weakly and pried himself up the side of his face that had been on the couch the longest was red. They smiled and rubbed his cheek. “Let me get you some stuff before we start, okay? Can you set up the TV for me?” They asked and he nodded.
Once he seemed like he wasn’t going to keel over, they quickly got moving. They grabbed some more blue gatorade (light blue, as Adrian always says dark blue is for assholes), some Dayquil, and some saltines before making their way back to him. The moment they put everything on the coffee table and sat on the couch next to him he immediately laid back down.
His head resting in their lap as he blindly reached for their hand, when he found it, they stifled a giggle as he sat it on his head, clearly wanting them to run their hands through his hair. They compiled and somehow Adrian managed to snuggle closer.
“If you’re not feeling better by the end of tomorrow I want us to go to the doctor, okay?” They whispered with a gentle tug of his hair. They felt him sigh and snuggle deeper into their lap.
“The day after tomorrow, then we can talk about it.” He murmured and they laughed as he pressed play on the remote.
