Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Rumi lost her voice two days ago.

At first, it just hurt. Her throat burned after dance practice, and she figured it was the dry air, or maybe yelling counts too many during rehearsal. She didn’t say anything.

She didn’t have time to be sick.

The HoneyMoon comeback was hers to manage— had to be. The new choreography. The interviews. The promotional collabs. Every loose end felt like a thread wrapped around her throat.

But now her voice is gone. Really gone. No sound comes out except these weak, breathy exhales that barely count as words. Her chest feels tight. Her hands won’t stop shaking.

And worst of all—her marks are faintly glowing again.

She sees them in the mirror that morning. Pale violet along her collarbone, the same kind of dull shimmer they’d had before everything went bad. She covers them with makeup immediately. Turtleneck on top of that. She doesn’t tell Mira or Zoey. If they find out, they'll worry, and she doesn't want—

Her knees buckle in the hallway.

She catches herself on the wall and stands there, dizzy and panicked, hands trembling harder now. Her skin feels hot, her breath shallow. She thinks she might pass out.

She hears Mira’s voice from the living room.

“Rumi?”

She freezes. Too late.

“What the hell?” Zoey’s voice is sharper. She rushes to her side and immediately catches her arm. “You’re burning up—babe, what is this? Why didn’t you say anything?”

Rumi shakes her head, mouthing nothing, shrinking back instinctively. She pulls at the collar of her turtleneck, trying to hide more of her skin.

Mira sees it. She sees everything.

“Oh my god,” she says quietly. “You thought the marks were coming back.”

Rumi looks away.

Zoey’s voice drops, like the fight drains out of her. “Rumi…”

Rumi starts typing on her phone— I thought I was okay. I’ve been okay. I didn’t want to mess it up. Not now.
The words blur from the tears she won’t let fall.

Zoey reads it, jaw clenched. “You’re not messing anything up.”

Mira steps forward and pulls the phone from her hands gently. “You’re sick. That’s it. Not cursed. Not broken. Not dangerous.”
Then, quieter: “And you don’t have to go through it alone.”

Rumi’s face crumples for just a second.

Then she nods.

Zoey and Mira practically drag her to bed. Rumi tries to protest—tapping weakly on her phone, something about the group’s livestream tomorrow and how she still hasn’t finalized outfits—but neither of them are listening.

“You need to lie down,” Mira says, pushing the blankets back and guiding Rumi in like she’s tucking in a porcelain doll.

Zoey, pacing near the doorway, mutters, “Maybe we should just call that tonic guy again.”

Mira groans, already rubbing her temples. “Please don’t bring him up.”

“He helped!” Zoey insists.

“He sold you a ‘universal healing elixir’ that turned out to be glorified grape juice.”

“Okay, yeah—but Rumi liked it.”

Rumi, still mute and exhausted, blinks at them. Then shrugs, mouthing, it tasted good.

Mira stares at both of them like she’s living with toddlers. “You are not giving her thirty-dollar juice with glitter in it and calling it medicine.”

“It’s not glitter,” Zoey argues, “It’s crushed quartz infused with chakra resonance. That’s what he said.”

“He also said it cured taxes.”

Rumi lets out a breathy wheeze that might be a laugh, and Zoey grins, triumphant. “See? Healing.”

Rumi doesn’t remember falling asleep, but when she wakes up, it’s dark out. Her throat still burns, her body aches, but she’s warm.

Pressed between them.

Zoey’s arm is slung around her waist, loose and heavy, her face buried into Rumi’s back like a sleepy koala. Mira’s curled in close at her front, her hand tucked under Rumi’s jaw, thumb gently stroking at her cheek like she’s still soothing her in her sleep.

It’s quiet—too quiet for a house usually filled with music and movement and half-finished arguments about snack hoarding. For once, there’s no expectation. No tension waiting to snap in her chest.

She’s just… here. Held.

Rumi shifts a little, enough that Mira’s eyes flutter open. She doesn't say anything, just blinks at her. Then, like instinct, her fingers go to Rumi’s collar. She pushes it down just slightly and checks the skin where her marks shimmered earlier.

Still there. But faint now. Calm.

She traces over one with the pad of her finger.

Rumi’s breath catches.

“You’re okay,” Mira whispers, voice low and tired and warm with relief. “It’s not coming back. It was never about the marks. You’re just exhausted.”

Rumi nods, slow. It feels like her throat might close again if she tries to cry, so she doesn’t. She just presses her forehead to Mira’s and breathes through the ache.

Behind her, Zoey stirs. “What time is it?” she mumbles into Rumi’s shoulder.

“Late,” Mira says.

Zoey hums. “She awake?”

Mira nods.

“Tell her I knew it was grape juice and I’d still buy it again.”

Rumi lets out the softest laugh—soundless, but Mira feels it in her chest. It’s the first time she hasn’t looked scared all day.

“Go back to sleep,” Mira murmurs.

Zoey tightens her arm around Rumi. “Not unless she does.”

Rumi blinks slow. She’s still sick. Still anxious. Still scared that all of this could slip if she stops holding on so tight. But right now, they’re here. Not just beside her, but with her. Soft, steady. Anchored.

She lets herself close her eyes again.

And this time, when she falls asleep, it’s not from crashing.

It’s from comfort.

Chapter Text

Zoey had a system.
Step 1: Pedialyte. Step 2: Saltines. Step 3: Vomit in private. Step 4: Bathtub nest.
This wasn’t her first rodeo with bad street dumplings. It wouldn’t be her last.

She hated getting sick. Not in the “ugh, this sucks” way—but in the deep, gnawing, makes-her-feel-like-a-burden kind of way. Mira and Rumi didn’t deserve to deal with her like this. So she did what she always did when her stomach turned against her: she locked herself in the bathroom with a pack of granola bars, her water bottle, and every blanket she could steal from the linen closet.

That was around noon.

It was nearly 6pm when Rumi came home, pushing the door open with her shoulder, arms full of plastic bags from the pharmacy.

“Z?” she called. “Got the stomach meds. And the fancy crackers you like.”

No answer.

The light was on in the bathroom.

She walked in—and froze.

Zoey was curled up in the actual bathtub. Blankets, two pillows, a half-empty bottle of Pedialyte cradled against her chest like a baby. Face pale, lips dry, sweat sticking to her hairline. Fast asleep. She looked… wilted.

“Oh my god,” Rumi muttered.

She dropped the bag and stepped closer. “Zoey?” She reached out, touched her arm.

Zoey stirred weakly. “Mmph… I’m good,” she croaked.

“No, you’re not .” Rumi didn’t waste time arguing. She leaned down, scooped Zoey up bridal-style, and carried her out like a princess in crisis.

“Put me back,” Zoey mumbled, already burrowing into Rumi’s shoulder. “I had a system…”

“Your system sucks.”

By the time Mira got home, Zoey was tucked into bed, face flushed and furrowed in half-sleep. Rumi was perched on the edge with a cold rag in her hand.

“She was in the tub, ” Rumi told her. “With pillows. ”

Mira sighed like she expected nothing less. “Food poisoning again?”

“Street dumplings.”

“Jesus Christ.”

Zoey stirred, eyes slitting open. “Sorry,” she rasped.

“Don’t be,” Mira said immediately, crossing the room and setting down a tray with soup and toast. “You’re sick. You don’t need to apologize for needing things. ”

“But I feel bad…” Zoey mumbled. “You guys are busy, and I—I hate when people have to do stuff for me.”

“You’re not ‘stuff,’ Zoey.” Rumi reached out, brushing sweaty hair from her forehead. “You’re our person. That’s different.”

Zoey didn’t say anything. But she looked away, quiet in that way she always got when her guilt was louder than her stomach.

It took both of them to lure her out again later when the nausea eased. Mira crouched in the doorway with a bowl of chicken noodle soup and said, very seriously, “Zoey. I will slide this under the door like a can of tuna. Don’t make me do it.”

Zoey opened the door five minutes later, still swaying.

“I brushed my teeth,” she announced. “And I gargled. I didn’t want to smell like barf.”

“Great,” Mira said. “Now you’re going to shower. ”

“I already wiped down with a wet rag…”

“Shower.”

Eventually, Zoey was clean, redressed in Mira’s oversized hoodie, hair damp, breath minty. Mira brought her back to bed while Rumi went to reheat her soup. She still looked fragile—like one more wrong move would break her.

“Sit,” Mira said gently, guiding her down. Then she knelt behind her and picked up a brush.

Zoey stiffened. “You don’t have to—”

“Zoey.”

Her mouth shut.

The brush ran through her tangles slow and smooth, no tugging, no rush. Mira had always been careful with her like this—especially when Zoey was too tired to pretend she didn’t need it.

Eventually, Zoey relaxed. Her head tilted back slightly, her shoulders sank.

“You’re not too much,” Mira said quietly, still brushing. “You never are.”

Zoey didn’t respond. She just blinked slow, eyes falling shut, until her breathing evened out. Mira kept brushing long after Zoey was asleep, her fingers light in the hair she once dyed bubblegum pink just for a concert.

Rumi came back in and smiled when she saw them.

“She’s out?”

Mira nodded.

“She didn’t finish the soup.”

“She will in the morning.”

They climbed in beside her, one on each side, tucking Zoey between them like the most precious, pitiful stray cat who forgot how to ask for help—but still deserved it anyway.

Chapter Text

Mira’s first sneeze shook the walls.

Rumi flinched from the kitchen. “...Is she okay?”

“She’s not,” Zoey said grimly, poking her head into the living room. “She’s got a cold.”

There Mira lay—curled into the deepest couch nest known to man. Five blankets. Three pillows. One very dramatic ice pack strapped to her forehead with a headband. The tissue box was tucked into her armpit like a stuffed animal. She looked pitiful. She knew she looked pitiful.

“I’m dying,” she groaned, eyes fluttering open.

“You have post-nasal drip,” Rumi said, walking in with tea. “You’re not dying.”

“You can’t prove that.”

Her voice was a full octave lower than normal, gravelly and hoarse like she’d been chain-smoking in the woods for forty years. She coughed so violently it echoed through the apartment like a fire alarm. Then she whined, “My lungs are turning into mush. Everything hurts. My bones are tired.”

Zoey crouched beside her, holding a thermometer. “You know your fever is like… 99.3, right?”

“ Near death, ” Mira whispered.

“Okay,” Zoey muttered, tucking the blanket higher over her shoulders. “Fine. Die in comfort.”

They took it seriously, though. As much as Mira was over the top, she was sick—shivering on and off, head pounding, throat sore. She kept sneezing like she was trying to blow out windows.

Zoey lit a humidifier. Rumi ran out to get lemon cough drops and eucalyptus chest rub. Mira demanded soft socks. Zoey gave her hers.

At one point, Mira made the slow trek to the bathroom, sneezing loud enough on the way there that Rumi shouted “ Bless you! ” from two rooms away.

Mira croaked back, “That might’ve been my final act.”

She slept for hours after that. Snoring. Curled up so small you’d think she was running from death itself. They let her rest.

But when she finally stirred, she blinked blearily to find the bedside table had been transformed.

Rumi and Zoey had put together a little sick girl shrine.

• A tray of soup and rice (questionably cooked, but heartfelt)
  
  
• A hot compress for her sinuses
  
  
• A fresh stack of tissues
  
  
• Two grape-flavored vitamins
  
  
• And a sticky note in Zoey’s handwriting: “Yes, you’re still alive. No, you don’t get to milk this for a week.”
  
  

Mira smiled like she won a prize.

Later that night, still weak but definitely milking it, she dramatically flopped onto Rumi’s shoulder with a wheezy sigh.

“Everything hurts. Carry me to the bed.”

“You just walked to the bathroom.”

“That was in a different lifetime.”

Zoey rolled her eyes, but she was already tugging Mira up by the hand. “Come on, dying swan. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

“I can’t stand for that long…”

“I’ll help you shower. You can sit on the bench.”

“You just want to see me sneeze in the nude.”

“…You’re not wrong.”

An hour later, Mira was clean, changed into fresh pajamas, tucked in like royalty. Zoey rubbed vapor balm on her chest. Rumi fed her cold mango slices like she was a sick little sultan.

And when Mira finally started drifting off again—after more whining, three more honking sneezes, and a very dramatic “Can someone please fluff my pillow like you care ?”—Zoey sat beside her and combed her hair back with her fingers.

“You’re ridiculous,” Zoey murmured.

“Yeah,” Mira rasped, voice deep and low and halfway to sleep. “But you love it.”

“…Can’t prove that either,” Zoey whispered.

But she didn’t stop brushing.