Who: Jyn and Cassian (and the cat) What: Sick day :( Where: Kingsby Tavern, Everdale When: Earlier this week Warnings: Not so's you'd notice. Status: Complete
One morning Jyn wakes up cold, with every joint in her body aching. This alone isn’t enough to keep her in bed - she might feel better if she moves, after all. So she wiggles out from under the covers and stands up in one swift gesture, because if she’s going to do a thing she’s going to do it whole-heartedly.
Several seconds later, having sat down on the floor with a heavy thump, shaking from the wave of dizziness and weakness that swept over her once she was upright, she scowls at nothing, and focuses on her breathing.
"Are you all right?"
“Don’t know. Didn’t hurt myself.”
There's a creak and a rustling as he peers over her side of the bed, tousled and bemused. "What's up?"
Jyn is frowning furiously as she says, “My joints ache and when I stood up I came over all dizzy and shaking.” She gives a little huff. “Probably sick,” she says, and carefully begins to climb back into bed without moving too fast or raising her head too high. “Lovely.”
Cassian holds out a hand for her to haul herself up by. "Only probably?"
She takes his hand gratefully and half pulls half slithers her way back to where she started. “Funny,” she says. “Very funny. Erugh. All right. I’m sick.”
He cuts a suspicious glance at the cat, curled up in an early sunbeam on the table, and touches the backs of his fingers to her forehead, purely perfunctory. "You want me to let them know?"
She pouts. No, she does not, she wants it to go away in the next five minutes. But even Jyn Erso can admit to herself that that is unreasonable. She nods. “Thanks.”
Cassian nods back, and starts pulling his day clothes on. He's gone some little while, long enough for the general morning noise to begin filtering up from below: muffled thumps and voices, the rattle of the courtyard pump. By the time he returns the cat has relocated to the warm spot by Jyn's hip, and lifts its chin a little to look at him as he comes in. You want to make something of it, second human?
Jyn had fallen back to sleep while Cassian was out, but she rouses at the unavoidable noise he makes coming in the door. Bless those squeaky hinges. “Mmmm mmmph,” she says, and wriggles a bit to be able to look at him. This somewhat dislodges the cat.
"You're clear," he says, steadfastly ignoring its gaze, and sets a somewhat mysterious glass jar down on the table. "Betty sent you this. I don't think I want to know what's in it." A pause. "Among other things."
“Thanks,” Jyn says, raising herself up on her elbow a little. “That does look like a question no one wants to ask. She say something odd?” She glares at the table. Why is the table so far away. Why did they decide that was the best arrangement. Why do her joints hurt.
Cassian looks back at her, his face not exactly softening - it so rarely does, without conscious effort - but warm all the same. "Not really."
She pouts on general principle (the principle is that she is grumpy) and flops back down. “Okay.”
"You should have some water," he says mildly. "And something for the fever."
“You’re laughing at me on the inside,” she says, half into the bedcovers. “I can tell.” A pause and then she lifts herself back up and adds, “Okay.”
He doesn't dignify this accusation with a response. Instead he goes to get down the bottle of little white pills from the shelf where they store occasional necessities. (There are two shelves, one at a convenient height, the other above it. Jyn keeps swearing she's going to tear it down and reinstall it where she can see what's on it.)
He comes back to the bedside with the water. Sits down beside her and shakes the pills out into his palm, where she can see him do it, and offers them.
Jyn takes the pills from his hand, one by one, with a swallow of water after each to wash it down. Solemn and still, like someone enacting a religious ritual. Then she drinks down the rest of the water, and smiles at him as she lowers the cup. “Thank you, Cassian,” she says.
Her eyes flutter shut despite herself, though she’s awake and alert and mostly sitting up and has a good grip on the glass, she can’t stop them closing, and it takes her a moment of concentrated effort to get them open again. She blinks. And then blinks again, slowly.
Then: his fingers over hers, gently tugging the empty cup away. A soft, hollow thump as he sets it aside. "If you're going back to sleep, you may as well lie down."
What a strange experience, feeling safe and being ill at the same time. She hurts, but she can relax too, she can allow herself exhaustion. She doesn’t have to force herself to keep moving, or find somewhere temporary to hide, or dig up some convincing lie. She scrunches her way back down under the covers, resting her head on her arms and hiding her eyes behind them in a single gesture. “There you go, always being right,” she says vaguely.
The grin is audible in Cassian's voice. "I'm going to remember you said that. Fair warning."
The noise Jyn makes is impossible to render, but clearly grumpy. He’s lucky that throwing a pillow at him would mean giving up a pillow, which is obviously unacceptable. He touches her shoulder lightly, one of those grounding gestures; but the blankets muffle the sensation into a vague pressure, a suggestion of warmth, so that it feels strangely hesitant.
"Get some rest," he says.
“Mmm hmm.” And then, softly, trailing off, “See you soon.”