from_the_outside | [oom] take it easy

By the week after Bucky had found Alpine caught in a soaking downpour and brought him home, Sharon can hardly remember a time when she woke up and didn't feel the little white cat curled somewhere nearby.

Today's no different, although it seems like he's decided to set up camp on her chest instead of by their feet as usual. Sharon mumbles, tired, and pushes at the sheets to get the cat to move, in the process realizing two things:

First, she's lying on her side, not her back.

And second, when Alpine's small miaow? comes, it comes from the floor, not the blanket.

Sharon takes a breath to respond to him and instantly breaks into a series of wet coughs that she does her best to stifle.

Well, crap.

Current Location: Brooklyn

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From:

nerves_of_ice

"Good call." He shoves the phone in his back pocket and leans over to brush her hair back from her face and check her for fever.

"I'm sorry you're feeling so bad, baby," he says, gently.

From:

from_the_outside

"I feel like crap," she admits, frowning.

"It sucks. I thought I could fight it off, but no dice, apparently."

From:

nerves_of_ice

"It'll just take a little time," he murmurs, stroking her hair back. "Take a nap. I'll bring the tv in here for you later if you want, or carry you to the couch."

From:

from_the_outside

Sharon coughs, miserable, and curls up under the sheets and blanket.

"Okay," she mutters, and closes her eyes.

From:

nerves_of_ice

He tucks the purple throw over her feet, half-folded, then turns off the light and leaves the room.

Alpine meets him in the hall, stropping around his ankles. "She's having a rough time, buddy," Bucky murmurs, crouching to give him a scratch behind the ears. "Want to go keep her company?"

From:

from_the_outside

The little white cat trills in response, either to his quiet words or to the scritch behind his ears, then pads along the hallway and slips through the slight opening of the door.

Sharon smiles but doesn't open her eyes when she feels the light weight back up on the mattress with her; she reaches a sleepy hand to pat a spot near her stomach.

"Come on, Alpine," she murmurs, coaxing him to come curl up with her. "Let's take a nap."

From:

nerves_of_ice

The cat doesn’t wait for a second invitation. He leaps lightly over her hip to flop down on his side and clasp at her hand with his front paws, purring like a motor.

In the hall, Bucky smiles.

From:

from_the_outside

"If we take a nap," Sharon whispers to the cat, "maybe Bucky will let us get up later."

Alpine blinks at her and she runs her hand over his head and back, enjoying his soft fur and the low rumble of his purr. "Now go to sleep."

From:

nerves_of_ice

He chuckles under his breath at that and pads quietly back down the hall to the kitchen to check on the soup.

From:

from_the_outside

The vapor rub eases her breathing enough that she does manage to slip back into sleep, only waking up an indeterminate amount of time later feeling terrible, like her head is about to split right open.

It never stops being strange to wake up, sick, into a dim room in the late morning. Sharon coughs some gross stuff up and out of her lungs, then listens hard to see if Bucky's going to be coming to check on her.

Her other phone is in the bedside table drawer, but she's learned her lesson from earlier: this time, she won't let him see it.

From:

nerves_of_ice

Alpine raises his head with a chirrup as she stirs. The little cat regards her for a second or two before he yawns, gets to his feet and stretches, then jumps to the ground and heads for the living room, tail high in the air.

From down the hall--

"Hey, buddy. Did she wake you up?"

From:

from_the_outside

Sharon stops her reach for the bedside table drawer with a guilty jerk, then burrows back under the sheets and blanket so that if he comes in he won't guess what she was trying to do.

"I can't believe he abandoned me in my hour of need," she says, then makes a face at how her voice croaks.

From:

nerves_of_ice

"He's just calling in reinforcements," Bucky calls back. "Hang on a second--"

Shortly afterwards, he appears in the door with an oversized mug, napkin, and spoon. "Want to try some soup? It's good stuff, I promise. Steve used to swear it got him back on his feet faster than anything else."

From:

from_the_outside

"They've been making the same soup since the thirties?"

She pushes herself up to sitting, shivering a little as her bare arms and throat come in contact with the air outside her warm nest of blankets, and reaches for the mug. "What kind is it?"

From:

nerves_of_ice

"They've probably started a new batch or two since then, but yeah." Bucky passes over the mug and picks up the green throw, draping it around her shoulders.

"Chicken noodle. Best thing around for a cold."

From:

from_the_outside

"I think you have every blanket we own on me right now," she says, amused, and forgoes a spoon to just sip at the rich golden broth, both hands wrapped around the mug.

The soup is warm but not too hot and the steam opens up her sinuses enough that she can actually taste it, salty and full of meaty flavor. "Mm."

From:

nerves_of_ice

"Not yet I don't." He sounds perfectly serious, even as he sits down on the bed beside her. Alpine, having followed him in, leaps up onto the foot of the bed and sniffs inquisitively in Sharon's direction.

"Good stuff, isn't it?"

From:

from_the_outside

She eyes him. "I'm concerned about that 'yet'," she says, but sips again at the soup, nodding. "It is g – "

The steam from the soup loosens something in her chest and she sets the mug down rapidly so as not to spill it everywhere when she starts coughing, only to find Alpine nudging his face nearly into the mug when she stops. "Hey!"

From:

nerves_of_ice

"Can't blame him." Bucky's struggling to suppress laughter as he picks up the cat and cradles him to his chest. Alpine wiggles free and climbs up onto his shoulder instead. "He knows a good thing when he smells it."

From:

from_the_outside

"This is mine," Sharon tells the cat, who only blinks at her and stretches out his neck again to sniff at the chicken soup-scented air. She pulls the mug away from him with a stern look, then fishes out a few noodles with the spoon.

"What are you up to today?" she asks Bucky, both hungry for news and frustrated at being stuck in bed. "Big plans while I nap?"

From:

nerves_of_ice

"Sure," he says, easily. "Reading, mostly. Texting with Sam. Don't worry, I'll be sticking close."

From:

from_the_outside

"Yeah? How's Sam?"

She gives up on the solid portions of the soup and just sips at the broth instead, letting it soothe her throat, breathing the steam in through her clogged head and chest.

From:

nerves_of_ice

"Doing good. He says his TT's got a good cold remedy that you can try," Bucky tells her. "He also says get well soon."

From:

from_the_outside

Sharon scowls. "I don't need secret family cold remedies," she says, sulky.

"Chicken soup and cough syrup and rest is plenty. I bet I'm fine tomorrow."

From:

nerves_of_ice

"We'll see," he says, easily. That kind of stubbornness is all too familiar - both from her in particular and from the long-ago past.

Bucky reaches up to scratch Alpine's ears as the cat nudges against his neck.

"Want me to bring the TV in here for you?"