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Raven walks down to Hank’s lab and things are skewed everywhere. His lab’s connected to the infirmary, so it’s a mix of his equipment and medical supplies. Hank’s nowhere to be seen. She finds his phone on the desk, buzzing with a notification from Charles. Raven notices that it looks like Hank’s been living down here.
“Strange,” she says, then notices that there’s a cup with red liquid in it. “Is that…?”
Raven smells the contents of the cup and smiles.
Smells like fruit punch.
She takes a sip.
Definitely fruit punch.
Raven laughs. Raven takes another sip, then puts the cup back and leans against the desk.
Hank walks in and smiles when he sees Raven. “Hey.”
“Hey, whatcha doing cooped up down here? And from the look of it, living down here?”
Hank goes to answer, then stops. He walks over to the desk.
“You didn’t use my cup, did you?” Hank asks.
“This one?” Raven asks, teasingly pointing.
Hank nods.
She leans a little closer to him. “And if I did?”
“I’ve caught something, so that could be a problem.”
Raven sighs and puts her head on Hank’s shoulder.
“That’s why I’ve been staying down here.”
“Well, at least getting sick will get me out of working,” Raven says.
I’ll get to spend some time with you at least. Seems like we’re never in the same place for more than ten minutes.
Hank pats her shoulder. “Maybe you can’t catch it.”
Raven shrugs.
“Normally I don’t get sick,” Hank says. “This is the first time I’ve gotten sick in years.”
“Weird,” Raven mutters. “I don’t normally get sick, but I still do like once a year or so.”
Hank’s quiet for a moment. “I don’t know that I’ve gotten sick since taking that drug.”
“Like the first one with my blood?”
Hank nods. “Yeah. I mean, I’ve felt a little under the weather at certain times, but I haven’t actually gotten sick in ages.”
Raven laughs. “You’re welcome.”
Hank laughs. “Yes, thank you very much.”
Raven picks her head up. “Alright, come on.”
She takes Hank’s hand and leads him to the couch. She grabs medicine out of the supplies in the infirmary and hands them to him. He takes them and she notices that he’s shaking a little.
“You cold?” Raven asks.
“Kinda, but I’ll live,” Hank answers. “There aren’t any blankets down here right now since they’re being washed.”
She sits down next to him and leans against him. He wraps an arm around her. The two talk for a while. Hank starts to doze off and Raven keeps talking about her conversation with Charles earlier in the library about how well the children are doing in their classes. Once she knows that Hank’s asleep, she stops her story and tries to get some sleep herself.
Hank wakes up covered in a blanket, alone. Hank looks around and realizes there’s nobody to be seen.
Was it all a dream?
Hank sighs and drops his head against the back of the couch again. He then remembers he doesn’t have time to sulk because things have to get done. He takes stock of his symptoms, which have lowered to congestion, a scratchy throat, and a headache. Hank forces himself off the couch and over to his work desk. He starts working on the previously abandoned project.
“Hank, what are you doing?” Raven asks.
Hank looks up and Raven’s walking towards him with food and two glasses of water. Hank blinks then looks down at the project.
“Working,” he answers, then looks back up at her.
She takes his hand and leads him back to the couch.
“I was gone for like twenty minutes,” she mutters. “Here, eat this. Then take something. Who knows if it’s helping, but it’s always worth a shot.”
So it wasn’t a dream.
“Are you feeling sick?” Hank asks.
Raven shakes her head, then sits down next to Hank.
“I’m gonna stay right here until you’re better though.”
“What if you get sick?”
She smiles. “Then you’ll just have to take care of me.”
Hank feels himself smiling too, even though getting sick is not a smiling matter. Not good at all.
I could look at her smile forever.
Hank leans forward and kisses Raven.
“Well I’m definitely getting sick now,” Raven says, then kisses Hank again.
“I love you.”
“I love you too, Hank.”
“Charles is gonna kill us.”
“Probably.”
Hank laughs softly.
“Spreading germs like that, in a school? Do you two have no decency? Couldn’t wait until you were feeling better?” Raven asks in a bad British accent.
Hank starts laughing harder, then starts coughing.
“Sorry, forgot about that,” Raven says.
“Totally worth it,” Hank replies.
Raven spends the rest of the day taking care of Hank, who’s completely cooperative.
“Much better patient than Charles,” Raven says as Hank takes his night meds. “He always fights me about taking care of him.”
Hank sighs. “Yeah, my mother taught me to take my meds without complaint.”
Raven frowns. “There feels like more to that.”
Hank shrugs. “Not really.”
The two settle down to get some sleep.
While the next day Hank feels better, Raven ends up sick. So Hank spends the next two days taking care of Raven. When they come back up, Charles is reasonably worried at their absence for the last four days.
“What happened?” Charles asks. “You two barely answered my texts and I haven’t seen either of you.”
“We got sick,” Raven answers. “We’re good now though. Better news.”
Raven holds up the hand that’s holding Hank’s.
“Alright, you two hold hands sometimes.”
“Really, Charles?”
“Oh, so you two are an item, then?”
“Mmhmm,” Raven hums proudly.
“Finally,” Charles says.
“What does that mean?” Hank asks.
“Exactly what I said, Hank. I didn’t have to read your minds to know what was going on and it’s about bloody time.” Charles takes Raven’s other hand. “I am very glad for you, my dear. I have a class to teach, so I do have to cut this conversation short. We can talk more later.”
“Okay,” Raven says.
Charles rolls away and they stand in silence for a minute.
“Well, I’m starting to think that it was more obvious to other people that we felt the same way then it was to us,” Hank says.
Raven smiles. “That’s how Charles responded.”
“Well, at least we noticed.”
“At least. Don’t you have a class to teach though, Hank?”
“Shit, you’re right. They’ve been without a proper teacher for a while. I’ve gotta go.”
“Alright, go knock ‘em dead.”
Hank gives Raven a quick kiss before heading towards his classroom.