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Simon leaves for Harrow as autumn is sweeping in, brisk and bright. Georgie loves the change of seasons, the coming of something new and different. It is one type of change Lawrence does not mind, and that is nice as well.
They will stay at the house near Penkellis for another couple of weeks, the house made just for them. Georgie likes the genteel décor and layout of Courtenay's rented estate, but this house was created from Lawrence's needs and dreams Georgie hadn't even known he had, dreams Lawrence had guilelessly drawn from him simply by insisting Georgie be involved in every last decision.
Lawrence's bedroom—their bedroom—is brilliantly simple, bathed in calming, cool colors, a bed built for a man as large as Lawrence to roll about in at the center, in a functional, wood-carved base. The beddings are of high-grade cotton and plentiful.
Everything in the house is not just of the latest technology, but the latest technology as tweaked and bettered by Lawrence. The tub is a miracle. Georgie has been sure to indulge more than his fair share.
Indeed, as soon as Simon's carriage has disappeared onto the horizon, Georgie turns to Lawrence and says, "I know that we have a mandatory period of missing him dreadfully for a few days and all, but do you think we could put that off an hour or so for me to thoroughly debauch you in the tub?"
They have to be much more careful about intimacy when Simon is around. The rooms of the house are sound-proofed to the best of Lawrence's considerable ability, but it is still a house, not a manor, and sound will travel just far enough for the wrong ears to overhear.
Lawrence responds by throwing Georgie ass-up over his shoulder, and well, that works: Georgie's never quite stopped enjoying the experience of being manhandled by Lawrence, and the servants at the house are all more loyal to their employer than most children are to their parents.
Georgie laughs and makes good on his promise of debauchery once they reach their destination.
*
He wakes up the next morning with a headache, and a sore throat. Georgie thinks perhaps he got a chill after getting out of the bath, which had been so deliciously warm. It's certainly nothing some tea and a nice coat won't fix.
He can't possibly be sick. So far as he can remember, he's never been sick. Most definitely not as a child. Children in his part of London who fell ill largely died, or suffered long-term health effects. Sure, here and there they survived a mild cold, or a case of whooping cough, but anything worse in Whitechapel was likely a death sentence.
Nor does he remember ever fighting off a fever or anything more serious than a bit of a stuffy nose. It's hardly worth considering that nearing his thirtieth birthday, all of that would change now.
He dresses in his warmest woolen suit, the one Lawrence had commissioned the last winter they'd spent in Penkellis. He rarely wears it these days. Courtenay's estate is well-heated by maintained fireplaces and a recent update in all the window panes, because Lawrence hates seeing Georgie shiver.
Georgie had smiled when he'd realized this—the suit being one of a number of tip offs—and said, "I shivered through nearly sixteen London winters in structures far more rickety than this, my Lord Romantic."
Lawrence had said, "Yes, well. Why do you think I find it imperative that you never have to again?"
That had shut Georgie up for a good long while. And not just because he had been busy kissing Lawrence for the next several hours.
Once properly attired, he makes his way to the kitchen, where Sally says, "There you are. You almost never sleep in so late after the boy is gone."
Georgie would color were he not so used to Sally's blatant assertions. He ignores this one altogether and goes to pour himself water from the kettle hanging over the hearth. "Have we any porridge? Something warm for breakfast?"
Speaking is terrible. It feels as though he's torn something in his throat. He sounds that way as well. He blinks. The cup of water in his hands is the warmest point in his body, and all he wants is to funnel every bit of his person into his fingertips.
Sally asks, "Have you the ague?"
Georgie blinks again, this time at her. "No. Of course not."
Sally looks unconvinced. "Of course not, he says." She shakes her head. "Sit down before you fall and I have to clean both you and that teacup up from the floor."
He sits less because she's told him to and more because his legs don't seem all that sturdy. She makes a tsking sound and takes the cup from him. He opens his mouth to argue, but sees that she's putting a tea ball in, squeezing in some lemon over it. She tells him, "Chamomile, with some ginger. It should help your throat."
He thinks about telling her his throat is fine, but the thought of talking is incredibly unattractive. She busks about, and then suddenly, there is porridge in front of him, complete with a bit of cream and honey. He eats it slowly. Even with the tea soothing his throat, and the heat of the porridge helping with the worst of the chills, it scrapes going down.
Georgie senses he loses time, because Lawrence isn't there, and then he is, soothing back hair from Georgie's forehead and asking someone—maybe Georgie, everything is unclear—"Do we send for a physician?"
Sally is saying something, and Georgie tries to pay attention, but his head hurts so awfully much and it feels heavy. Lawrence's chest is just where Georgie could rest it, for a bit, is all, a moment, until he feels a little better.
Just a moment.
*
Georgie wakes in a bed he doesn't know, a bed better than any of them could possibly afford and calls out, "Jack? Sarah?"
Someone, a man, says, "They're not here, Georgie."
Georgie's chest, which already feels tight and wrong, knots up. What has he done? He—he doesn't remember deciding to sell this piece of himself. It's hardly below him, but he doesn't like that he can't remember what he's being paid, or what he agreed to do. He tries taking a breath and it catches, tearing out of him in coughs that feel as though they will break a rib.
The man is rubbing at his back. That's considerate of a john. It makes Georgie even more confused. "I ap-pologize, sir," oh, talking hurts, it hurts.
"Sh, Georgie, hush, it's Lawrence. You're a bit feverish, that's all. Lie back down, all right?"
Georgie doesn't remember sitting up, either. It must have been when he was coughing. Lawrence. The name means something, but he can't call up what it is. The fear in his chest lessens a bit, though, so maybe he's not in so much trouble as he thought.
"Fever," he says aloud. It doesn't sound like him, really.
"Yes, love. Drink a bit of tea for me, would you? Sally says it will help."
Georgie knows better than to take drinks from strange men, and he has no idea who this Sally is, only—only this man called him love, and without any flippancy or sardonic undertone. Perhaps he is having a dream where someone who does not have to love him has chosen to do so nonetheless. The fever part of the dream is a bit of a downside, but Georgie has never been one to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
He takes a sip. It's fragrant with lemon and something spicy, warm but not so hot as to burn his tongue. The man—Lawrence, Georgie likes the sound of that—holds him steady with strong arms, and when he is finished drinking, settles him back down, wiping the sweat from his brow with a soft cloth and tucking the covers up over his shoulders.
He kisses Georgie's forehead and says, "There, rest. You'll be fine."
Georgie doesn't want to rest, he wants to cling to this dream and the strange kindness, care, this man is showing him. His body has other ideas, though, pulling him under, away.
*
When Georgie awakes to strains of daylight filtering in beneath the drawn curtains, and the sound of Lawrence snoring quietly beside him, it takes him a moment to figure out why they're still both in bed when the day has clearly gotten well on its way. Then the sense memory of waking time and again, thinking himself a child, a teenager, once even an adult still in Mattie's clutches, settles in and he grimaces.
He's warm enough under the blankets that he's loathe to move, but he also can feel the sweat that’s been bathing him for what he suspects is a couple of days dried and tacky all over himself. Lawrence has dark shadows beneath both eyes and has undoubtedly pushed himself to stay awake as much as possible, so Georgie does his best to slip out of the bed without disturbing the other man.
This works for roughly a second before legs that haven't supported him in days give out and he ends in an undignified heap on the floor, Lawrence jackknifing up and out of sleep, shouting, "Georgie!"
Georgie sighs. "I'm all better, just a bit wobblier for it, it seems."
Lawrence comes around the bed to see him and for a moment it looks as if he might laugh. Then, to Georgie's horror, a tear slips down Lawrence's face, a silent but visible sob racking his chest. Georgie shakes his head. "Oh, oh no, Lawrence. I'm fine. I promise. Or, well, will be after a bath and perhaps some breakfast."
"I thought—" Lawrence's chest heaves again and he crumples down next to Georgie, who wraps himself around Lawrence as best he can.
"Sh. I'm here. I'm here and I'm not leaving you. Not ever if I have the slightest thing to say about it."
"I would not know what to do," Lawrence murmurs. "How to be."
"No. Nor would I without you."
Lawrence's embrace is crushing, too much, really, but Georgie doesn't say anything, stays where he is and gives Lawrence time to settle, to calm. A slip of a memory from the haze of sickness comes to him, and he says, "We're all right, my love. Everything will be well."
*
Simon's first letter home cheerily informs them that upon reaching school he had had to be seen to by Sister, who gave me candies to soothe my throat, and touched my hair as mother used to do.
Georgie reads this out, commenting wryly, "Evidently for him being sick was a grand adventure."
Lawrence rubs a hand over his face, the relief that he hadn't had to see Simon fall ill as well practically bleeding from his pores. "I am learning most things are for that child. He has abysmally low standards."
Georgie politely forgoes pointing out that the man Simon considers to be his father lived in a moldering keep for years. Rather, he says, "Perhaps he is perceptive enough to wish not to scare you, despite most probably having been informed by the school that he must tell you of his convalescence."
Lawrence seems to turn that over in his head, and acknowledges, "He is…precocious in that way."
"Many ways."
Lawrence dips his head in acknowledgment. Georgie says, "And kind. He gets that from you."
Lawrence looks up at that, eyes wide. "He—"
Georgie reaches out and puts a fingertip to Lawrence's lips. "He gets that from you."