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Otabek had just returned from a long day of practice and was in the process of hanging up his leather jacket when the living-room door opened and Yuri stepped out, immediately shooting Otabek a reproachful glare when he spotted him.
“Thank fuck you're finally fucking here.” He let out an exaggerated sigh and leaned heavily against the door he'd just closed.
Otabek arched an eyebrow – it wasn't like he was late.
“Hello to you, too.”
Yuri was still scowling when Otabek walked over, but kissed him back when he pecked him on the lips.
“Tough patient?” Otabek asked when he drew back, nodding at the door Yuri was still half-leaning against.
“You have no fucking idea,” Yuri groaned with another dramatic heave of his chest. “Better go in there and say your good-byes, according to him he's gonna kick the bucket any minute now.”
Otabek chuckled slightly. “Sounds serious. Do we need to prepare a speech to inform his kingdom?”
Yuri snorted. “They'll be the first to know, the JJ Girls have been throwing him a pity party online all day. He's fucking basking in it.”
“I can imagine,” Otabek smiled, “Can I help with anything?”
“Just keep him off my back for more than five minutes so I can finish making dinner in peace. Oh, and if he bites the dust, I've got dibs on his car, just so you know.”
“You're not getting my baby!” came JJ's rather croaky voice from inside, immediately followed by a coughing fit.
“Sorry, can't hear you over your hacking up your lungs!” Yuri yelled back, smacking the door for emphasis before pushing off of it to go back to the kitchen, stealing another kiss from Otabek as he went. “Good fucking luck in there.”
Otabek entered the living-room to find JJ stretched out on the couch under what looked like at least three different blankets, with several more sitting on a chair nearby in case they were needed. Next to him on the pillows sat one of Otabek's stuffed teddybears – or Otabears, as his boyfriends called them. Otabek guessed that Yuri must have put it there, which was kind of cute.
Meanwhile, the coffee table was at risk of collapsing under an army of smoothies, a bowl of fruits, a stack of JJ's favorite snacks, various different types of tea and a matching amount of mugs, a honey pot, a bottle of vodka, and half a pharmacy's worth of cold medication.
JJ himself looked a little worse for wear compared to how he had in the morning when Otabek had left, his hair a bit more messy and his cheeks a slightly more feverish shade of red. When Otabek walked over and leaned down to kiss him, he turned his head away.
“Sorry," he rasped, voice more gravelly than usual, "I'm gross. And I don't want you to get sick.”
“You're not gross,” Otabek assured him. “And you must've been contagious for a few days already so I would have already gotten it. I'll be fine.”
JJ didn't look entirely convinced, so Otabek compromised by kissing him on the cheek instead, the flushed skin feeling hot against his lips. Frowning, he gave JJ another scrutinizing look.
“How are you feeling?”
“I'm okay,” JJ smiled, “The King won't be defeated by a mere cold.”
Before Otabek had a chance to reply, Yuri barged into the room.
“Are you shitting me right now, snot-brat?! You bitch and whine all day, I run a gazillion errands for your spoiled ass, but as soon as Beka gets here you're suddenly playing tough? Un-fucking-believable!”
He didn't wait for JJ to respond, turned on his heel and stomped back into the kitchen.
JJ gave Otabek defensive look. “He's exaggerating!”
“Hmhm.”
“He totally is!” JJ insisted, sitting up to have more room to wave his arms in exasperation, “And he was mean and rude all day!”
“What, Yura? Being mean and rude? How out of character,” Otabek said dryly, and took the chance to move the pillows and the Otabear out of the way to replace it with himself. He'd barely sat down when JJ already rested his head on his thighs and stretched out comfortably again, but that didn't stop him from continuing his rant.
“He keeps scolding me like it's my fault I got sick! Even though I'm sure it's his fault, actually. He's the one who caught that cold at Worlds.”
It was true, Yuri had started to feel under the weather on the day of the gala, had used it as a welcome excuse to get out of having to attend the banquet, and had spent their flight home the next day soundly asleep, his stuffed nose causing him to snore so loudly the other passengers had probably wanted to strangle him.
He'd felt better the next day, but it wasn't a stretch to assume that JJ might have caught whatever virus was currently plaguing him from Yuri. Otabek was glad his own immune system had held up so far. He rarely got sick, which he was eternally grateful for. He knew of some skaters who basically just had to look at an airport to catch some sort of bug.
Otabek gently ran his hand through JJ's hair, slightly damp with sweat, his scalp warmer to the touch than usual.
“He did take the day off just to take care of you, though,” Otabek reasoned.
“Only because he enjoys tormenting me more than being tormented by Lilia.”
“Honestly, I can't really blame him for that one.”
“Yeah fair enough,” JJ muttered, “But still, he bullied me all day. He didn't even want to play doctor!”
Otabek couldn't help but laugh, regretting he hadn't been there to witness that conversation.
“You know how he is sometimes when it comes to role play.”
That just made JJ pout more. “Yeah, he plays kitten when it suits him but when I want something he can't be bothered.”
Otabek nodded at all the snacks and drinks and medicine on the table. It might not have been quite a gazillion, but Otabek counted the logos of at least four different stores on the grocery bags that cluttered the room, not including the bags from the pharmacy.
“You didn't want any of all this?”
“Well- I mean, yeah. But-”
“So at least he played nurse, then.”
“Oh he played nurse alright,” JJ griped, “Scary Soviet Nurse! Like straight from some vintage horror flick or something!”
“Terrifying,” Otabek chuckled dryly.
JJ threw up his arms for dramatic effect, barely missing Otabek's head. “He threatened to spank me, Beks!”
Otabek raised an amused brow. “And you didn't jump at the opportunity?”
JJ's cheeks turned a slightly darker shade of red, but he gave Otabek a completely scandalized look. “You don't spank someone who's sick! What is wrong with you people?!”
Yuri re-emerged from the hallway, wielding a wooden spoon that had very clearly been used to stir something mere seconds before, but that didn't stop him from pointing it threateningly at JJ, who promptly retreated a little deeper under the blankets. Otabek was more concerned about whatever liquid was currently dripping from the spoon all over the floor.
“You have no reason to whine, snot-face. If you think I'm bad, try being sick around Lilia. She'll feed you disgusting medicine and home-made soup, and you won't even be able to tell which is which!”
JJ, who had been staring at the spoon like a deer in the headlight, abruptly tore his gaze away from it to frown at Yuri instead. “Wait– aren't you making soup right now?”
“Yes. But unlike Lilia, I actually know how to cook.”
JJ gasped and hastily looked around as if he fully expected Lilia to manifest out of thin air like a summoned demon to make Yuri pay for disrespecting her like that. Yuri clearly had no such fears and simply walked back into the kitchen. Otabek was just happy he hadn't dropped the spoon to emphasize this mic-drop moment.
“See?” JJ said, gesturing after him, “This is what I've had to deal with all day!”
Otabek looked at all the things Yuri had gathered to help JJ feel better; the drinks, the snacks, the medicine – even the Otabear.
“I still think it looks like he went out of his way to take care of you.”
JJ's pout melted, giving away to a genuine smile. “Yeah, I know, I'm just kidding. He's been amazing.”
Otabek smiled as well. In the past, things hadn't always gone so smoothly. He had spent many an hour soothing the waves when Yuri's aggressive affection – or perceived lack thereof – had triggered JJ's anxiety, or when JJ's bold confidence had clashed with Yuri's competitiveness in the worst possible ways.
When an alarm on Yuri's phone went off in the kitchen Otabek assumed it was a timer for something he was cooking, but instead Yuri burst into the room again, made a beeline for the table, grabbed some pills and a glass of water and shoved both at JJ.
"Time for your meds, snotnose."
JJ rolled his eyes but obediently sat up and swallowed the pills. In the meantime Yuri had picked up a thermometer that apparently had been hidden somewhere in the chaos on the table. He pointed it at JJ's forehead like a gun and JJ looked like he was about to actually raise his hands in surrender.
“What the fuck?!” Yuri scowled at the numbers, then at JJ. “Why the fuck hasn't it gone down yet?!”
“I don't know!” JJ did raise his hands this time, though in exasperation, not surrender, almost poking Otabek in the eye.
“I told you, just drink your vodka and go to sleep and you'll feel better in no time, but did you listen to me? No you didn't!”
“Because it's vodka!” JJ exclaimed, “Who in their right mind drinks vodka when they're sick?”
Yuri and Otabek exchanged a look.
“Who doesn't?”
JJ looked from one to the other, then facepalmed with an exaggerated groan that unfortunately turned into a violent coughing fit.
Yuri was on him so fast Otabek would've missed the movement if he had blinked. Now he was already trying to force JJ to drink from the glass of water he must have snatched right out of his hand, which JJ seemed to be heavily opposed to - or simply too busy coughing to actually be able to drink.
Yuri only gave up when half of the glass's contents had spilled everywhere, though mostly on Otabek's lap. He doubted much of anything had actually found its way into JJ's mouth.
“Beks! Help!” JJ croaked, still coughing.
Yuri was now trying to feed him something that looked like a cough drop, which he seemed even more opposed to than the water.
Otabek decided his help was not actually required, and grabbed a tissue from the box nearby to dry his pants instead.
“Why are you being so difficult?!” Yuri scolded, trying to pry JJ's jaw open.
“Those things taste like ass!” JJ complained, having managed to turn his head away just long enough to get that response out before he clamped his mouth shut again.
“Not something you usually have an issue with,” Otabek remarked dryly.
He tried to move a little away from the one-sided wrestling match next to him, but JJ merely followed as soon as Otabek gave him even an inch of room and ended up laying even further across his lap than he had before, effectively trapping Otabek and causing the main action of the fight to literally happen right in his face. If he got out of this without a black eye he could consider himself lucky, he supposed.
“Guys,” he protested weakly, barely dodging Yuri's elbow.
“Shut up and help me, Beka!”
Otabek leaned back as far as he could and just let out a resigned sigh when he received a punch in the stomach.
“Fine, snot head. I'll just wait. You can't keep your mouth shut for more than a minute anyway!”
Glancing down at JJ, Otabek could tell that he was dying to protest but kept his lips firmly sealed against the candy Yuri was still prodding him with like he was trying to insert a coin into a slot machine. When JJ inevitably had to open his mouth to draw breath because his nose was too clogged, Yuri finally succeeded. He let out a triumphant yell and clamped his hand over JJ's mouth.
“Now suck on it and swallow! No spitting!”
Otabek closed his eyes and quietly prayed the neighbors weren't home.
The next moment, his eyes flew open again with a start and he wrinkled his nose, sniffling.
“Is something burning?”
That caused an abrupt pause to the fight on his lap as both his boyfriends sniffed the air – or rather, Yuri did, and JJ tried to.
“I can't smell anything,” JJ said, predictably.
Yuri's eyes, however, had gone wide, and he jumped to his feet with a swear.
“Make sure he doesn't spit it out!” he called over his shoulder before he dashed to the kitchen. Otabek nodded dutifully, but then made no move to stop JJ from spitting the cough drop into a tissue the moment Yuri had turned his back to them.
“Is something actually burning?” JJ asked, still trying to sniff the air through a hopelessly stuffed nose.
“Definitely,” Otabek replied, not too concerned. The smoke alarm hadn't gone off, so he figured it couldn't be so bad.
“Beka!” Yuri yelled from the kitchen, “Get your ass in here and help me!”
“You better go,” JJ said, making room for him to get up, “Or he might whack you with that spoon.”
Otabek scratched his chin, smirking. “Tempting.”
“BEKA!”
“Alright, alright,” Otabek called out, and gingerly went into the tiger's den.
It looked like a bomb had exploded in their usually neat and clean kitchen. And it had nothing to do with the still smoking pot Yuri was furiously stirring, and everything to do with nobody having been there to stop Yuri from cutting vegetables by himself. Otabek stepped over a pile of potato peels and stood next to Yuri to assess the situation.
“Maybe it can be salvaged?” Otabek suggested as he peered into the still steaming pot, then wrinkled his nose at the sight of the charred remains of what might have once been a piece of potato.
“Nope. Fuck this,” Yuri decided, and went to drop the entire pot into the sink with a huff.
JJ cleared his throat behind them, having suddenly appeared in the doorway, one of the blankets draped over his shoulders like a cape.
“How on earth do you even burn soup?”
Yuri glared at him, eyes blazing. “I bought too many vegetables so it kinda turned into more of a stew!”
“Still impressive,” JJ remarked, a grin quirking his lips, "Good thing that, unlike Lilia, you know how to cook."
"Damn." Otabek whistled. "Burned worse than the stew."
"Shut the fuck up, both of you!" Yuri hollered, but there was a barely concealed laugh in his voice as well, rendering the threatening glare he directed at JJ utterly useless.
"If you hadn't made such a fuss about the cough drop, this wouldn't have happened!" Yuri scolded him, which only caused JJ's grin to widen. "What are you even doing up, snot head? Go lay back down, you need rest!”
He didn't wait for JJ to react, just grabbed him by the hand and pulled him back into the living-room. Otabek followed them and watched with a fond smile as Yuri wrestled JJ back down onto the couch and tucked him in under the blankets.
“Now be a good boy and stay put!”
“Do you want me to say 'yes, daddy'?”
“I want you to shut the fuck up and rest, snot-for-brains!” Yuri huffed, cheeks flushed, then whirled around to face Otabek. “I think I have enough for another go, but then we'd be eating pretty late because I'll have to clean up first, and-”
Otabek shook his head and walked over to pull Yuri into his arms.
“How about you sit down and get some rest as well? I'll do the clean up. And we can order take-out instead.”
Yuri huffed but gave him a hopeful look. “Cheat day?”
“Yeah. I think we could all use one of those.”
Yuri beamed and kissed him, then his eyes went wide.
“Oh my god. I just had the best fucking idea,” he giggled, eyes sparkling. “I'll go get the food.”
Neither Otabek nor JJ got the chance to ask any questions before Yuri had already grabbed the car keys from the table and bounced out the door, still giggling to himself.
After making sure JJ had everything he needed, Otabek went to face the kitchen clean-up, feeling like an archaeologist meticulously unearthing an ancient city from under a pile of rubble, only in this case the rubble was vegetable peels. At least the burned stew had finally stopped steaming.
When Yuri returned, the kitchen still wasn't in the best state, but it would suffice for making breakfast tomorrow morning.
“Burger King?” Otabek asked in surprise when he saw the bags Yuri carried into the living-room. That wasn't exactly their cheat day go-to.
“A royal meal for the royal phlegm factory,” Yuri grinned, before shoving the bags onto JJ's lap for lack of any more space on the table.
“Hey, rude!” JJ protested, but it wasn't clear whether he meant the increasingly worse nicknames or the fact that Yuri immediately slapped his hand out of the way when he tried to reach into one of the bags. Yuri rummaged through them first, retrieved something that looked suspiciously like a paper crown, then left the food to JJ while he ran over to the sideboard and dug through one of the drawers.
Otabek sat down on the couch and accepted the burger JJ handed him without looking, curiously keeping his eyes on Yuri instead, trying to see what he was doing.
It only became clear once Yuri was done and moved over to them to put the crown on JJ's head, finally revealing the reason for the seemingly random choice of fast-food brand. Otabek unsuccessfully tried to suppress a groan when he saw it.
Yuri had written over the Burger King logo on the crown, which now said in big bold letters:
Booger King
He was cackling with glee at his own joke, and, for reasons Otabek didn't quite understand, JJ looked pretty pleased as well.
“I think we've reached the peak, by which I mean rock-bottom, of the snot-jokes and can retire them now, right?” Otabek said hopefully.
“Shhh, Beks, you're disrupting my coronation,” JJ admonished him, reaching over without looking at him, presumably to place a finger on his lips to shush him, and almost shoving said finger up his nostril instead. “He has finally accepted me as his King.”
“He has crowned you King of boogers,” Otabek pointed out. Which was admittedly only marginally worse than King of burgers, he supposed, but still. JJ didn't seem to agree, shaking his paper-crowned head.
“Shhhh. Just let me have this moment.”
Otabek looked from one to the other, Yuri still cackling and JJ grinning from ear to ear. Then he just shrugged and took a hearty bite out of his burger, thinking how incredibly lucky he was to have these two goofballs in his life.
Later that evening, when they were all cuddled up in bed together, a still slightly feverish JJ tucked in between them like a human heating pad, Otabek felt a slight but persistent tickle at the back of his throat that made him wonder if maybe he had given his immune system too much credit.
But even if it happened and he would get sick after all, he wasn't all that worried; there were worse times in the year to get sick than the start of the off-season.
And more importantly, he knew he'd be in very good hands.