Julie ♡♡♡

It moves like it’s hurt - slowly, drunkenly, stumbling forwards a pace or two before it manages to bring itself to a clumsy halt, then teeters sideways and starts the whole process over again on its sluggish journey towards your house.

In the next second, the shock leaks from your chest and you’re on the move, scrambling away from the sink and tossing the sponge aside as you go, hearing a wet thwap as it lands somewhere nearby. You make a mad dash for the hallway adjoining your kitchen, slippered feet skidding across the tiles as you charge around the corner and beeline straight for the front door.

Because you recognise that figure, even if only by the size alone.

You don’t know a great many people who are quite as large as him after all. Though what he’d be doing out in a squall like this at quarter to eleven at night is far beyond the scope of your imagination.

Already, you’re planning a lecture. One that’ll have to come after you’ve discovered why your impromptu visitor is moving like a lame dog.

Red flag number one.

Hardly pausing long enough to get a proper grip on the doorhandle, you twist it clumsily aside and shove.

It’s hardly opened wider than a hairline crack before the howling wind sneaks in behind the wood and nearly yanks the door from your grasp, and you have little choice but to go with it, letting the weather snatch it open and tug you out onto the porch step beyond.

All at once, you’re being pelted by ice-cold lashes of rain that sting at your cheeks and whip into your eyes before you can raise an arm, attempting to shield your face as you holler above the howling maelstrom, “Bowser!?”

The eerie mirror-shine of eyes appear in the darkness, catching the light that spills from your hallway and reflecting it back at you.

Then, your visitor takes another step forwards, bringing himself just within reach of the dim glow.

Suspicions confirmed, you release a sharp huff of air, and without considering your slippers or the puddles pooling steadily along your path, you hop right off the porch step and march towards the gargantuan koopa, driven more by worry than anything even close to irritation.

At the approach of your splashing footfalls, a massive, horned head lifts away from where he’d tucked it against his chest, and you don’t miss how that small movement looks to have taken far more effort than it should have.

In the middle of a stride, you flick your gaze rapidly up and down, cataloguing everything from the way his meaty hands clutch at his elbows with a fervour, to how the tail poking out from beneath his shell curls inwards around his leg.

Then the rain is taking over your lashes again, and you have to shake your head to clear them as you reach your friend’s side and let out a shout that blasts droplets of water off your lips. “What the Hell are you doing here!?”

In hindsight, you suppose you could have worded it more gently.

Bowser’s almighty chest wheezes out a thin, rattling breath as he instinctively pushes his nose towards you, eyelids thick and heavy. Yet even still, his muzzle manages to lift into a weary smile just at the sight of you.

“S’rry,” he wobbles out in a voice like churning gravel, blinking unevenly at the ground when you duck beneath one of his arms and hoist it across your shoulders, buckling under a metric ton of muscle, “Di’n’t… know wh’re else t’go….”

Red flag number two.

Far from the scaley power-house you’ve known for half a decade, now he’s trembling like a sapling in a hurricane.

It frightens you.

What happened to him?

Grunting with effort, you hold your tongue until you’ve cajoled him over the threshold and into the warmth of your home, stretching your leg backwards to kick the door shut behind you, at once muffling the noise of the storm that still rages on outside.

Then, and only then, do you finally offer your exasperated response. “Home!” you wheeze, manoeuvring the Koopa under the cramped doorframe into your living room and trying not to wince as chips of wood are scraped off by the spikes protruding from his shell, “You could have gone home. To your castle! To Kamek!? Instead of traipsing your sorry hide all the way here in the middle of the night, in a thunderstorm, no less!”

If you knew how little attention he’s paying to your apparent anger, and how much attention he’s paying to the softness of your body pressing up against his solid, leathery side, you’d probably be even more miffed. And rightly so.

Still, he at least catches the gist of what you’d said. He’d be a fool not to listen to your voice when you speak, even with a fever running rampant beneath his shell. It would be like plugging his ears to a beautiful aria.

“Can’t,” he mumbles through rubbery lips, vaguely aware of the fireplace you’ve stopped at, “S’con-… contay-jus…”

And there’s red flag number three. Well, less of a red flag and more a blaring claxon.

“Contagious?” you parrot, extracting yourself from under Bowser’s arm and moving to stand below his chin, earning a reedy whine of protest from the King, “You’re sick?” And without waiting for permission, you reach up and press the back of your hand first to his leathery cheek, then to his forehead, pursing your lips at the heat radiating off his scales and missing the flutter of his eyelids as he nudges forwards into the touch.

“Stars…” you hiss, “You’re hot.”

When his drooping features struggle to lift into a very self-satisfied grin, you cluck your tongue and amend, “You’re running a fever, Shell-for-brains… And you say it’s infectious?”

Even in his addled state, he must have caught the frown that troubles your brows because he’s suddenly dipping his snout down to you and trying to whuff softly through fluttering nostrils.

“Koopas,” he croaks raggedly, halfway drunk on the bliss of your skin easing the heat out of his blistering face, “Only f’r Koopas… Wouldn’t… do that… t’you…”

As if you give half a damn about that, but his voice seems to wane with the last of his strength, and you barely have time to dart forwards, splaying your hands against the soft underside of his chest and giving him a solid shove until he sways upright again.

He blinks, flaming eyebrows crawling apart in something like surprise when he drops his nose and peers blearily down at the spot where your palms connect with his sternum, as if he’s mystified by the simple, steadying touch.

You, in the meantime, are a little distracted by the rainwater dripping steadily off his scutes, hair, and chin to form a slowly-growing puddle on your hearth.

“For goodness’ sake, you’re soaked right through…” Biting on your lip, you frown up at the very damp koopa shivering in front of you, and begin cobbling together the vaguest structure of a plan.

Right. You have a friend who’s… undeniably ill in your home. With something that only affects koopas, apparently. He’s quaking from the horns on his head to the tip of his tail. He’s far hotter to the touch than is typical for him, this in spite of being outside in the icy rain for an indeterminable amount of time… You don’t know all the ins and outs of koopa biology. But having one for a best friend has given you at least a little insight into the species.

And you don’t need to be an expert to recognise the signs of a fever when you see them.

“Okay, stay put. I’ll be back in a second,” you tell him urgently, giving him another once-over to make sure he’s adequately stable before you draw your hands away and turn to make a dash for the staircase at the opposite end of the room, leaving Bowser to peer after you in a daze.

Wait… His expression crumples as you disappear around the corner.

Where are you going?

Of its own accord, one of the King’s legs carries him forwards, and he stumbles heavily onto it, gritting his teeth and squeezing his eyes shut until the room around him stabilises once more. When he wrests his eyelids apart again, he’s standing at the foot of the staircase, his clawed hand crushing a finial that cracks and splinters under his grasp as he tries using it to haul his entire bodyweight up onto the first step, intent on following you.

Beneath the sluggish muddle of thoughts clomping around inside his skull, there’s a tiny inkling of coherency that’s berating him for showing weakness, for getting sick in the first place, for coming here – to your home – and letting you see him vulnerable and clumsy and as far from dignified as a king could possibly get. But that inkling is small, and lost easily under the tides of instinct and impulse, both of which were what led him here in the first place, seeking comfort in a familiar space with familiar smells and his most treasured friend who he knew would always open the door to let him in.

And now, you’re gone again, taking the majority of that comforting scent with you, and Bowser’s body is desperately attempting to track you down once more.

He slumps in palpable relief when you suddenly reappear at the top of the stairs like a vision descending from the heavens, with your arms engulfing a tower of blankets and towels that are stacked high to your chin.

“Thought I told you to stay put,” you say without a lick of heat behind your words as you navigate the steps, peering around your stack at the Koopa gazing up at you from below.

He simply rumbles a hum in the affirmative, giving you an adoring look that you easily chalk up to the fever running its course and leaving his head in a daze.

As you meet him at the foot of the stairs, you spare the briefest grimace at your ruined finial before squeezing past Bowser’s immense bulk and bumping your shoulder against his elbow, guiding him to turn with you, back towards the inviting hearth.

It’s easy enough to coax him after you, and you almost wish he was this biddable when he’s not running a fever. He seems inclined to follow you, at least, hovering a little too close as you dump your armful of blankets onto the floor and begin spreading them around, bunching some up and smoothing others out until you’ve made a decent enough little bed for him in front of the hearth.

Evidently, he finds it more than suitable, trying to step into it with an approving thrum from deep in his chest.

“Hold on, hold on!” you admonish him lightly, grabbing a towel from the mess and pushing yourself back to your feet, “Let’s dry you off a bit first. Then you can lay down.”

The Koopa’s shoulders sink as he snorts out a petulant huff, but all the same, he wavers obediently in place for you to start towelling him off, starting with what you can reach.

Your hands, comparatively tiny in just one of his own, scoop his palm up as you begin to gently glide the towel up and down the length of his hefty arm.

Something solid thuds on the ground behind him, a sound that you simply ignore… until it happens for a second time. And then a third.

You bring your ministrations to a brief pause, leaning sideways and glancing at the floor near Bowser’s feet, only for your brows to gradually creep back up your forehead when you make an… unexpected discovery.

In slow, sleepy motions, the Koopa’s yellow tail is lifting itself from the ground before slumping back down again, repetitively thumping at the carpet beneath him.

It seems you’ve found the source of the strange noise.

“Wow,” you observe, hesitantly returning to your task and sweeping the already-damp towel up the inside of his forearm, careful to brush lightly over his spiked wrist band, “You really must be out of it.”  

You don’t think it needs to be said that he’s usually very controlled about wagging his tail.

Bowser just hums a distracted note in response and exhales hot air over the top of your head.

Worriedly, your chest bobs with a sigh as you hurry on to his next arm, stretching the towel up towards his shoulder before drawing it back down to his wrist and gathering water from the too-pale scales.

There’s a sudden, soft pressure on the crown of your head, and you flick your eyes up to find Bowser has pushed his snout into your hair, snuffling gently through his nose.

“Feel’s’nice,” he slurs, as if that’s explanation enough.

With a well-meaning roll of your eyes, you flip the towel over to its drier side and step back, stifling a tiny smile at how his head suddenly dips at the unexpected loss of his chin-rest.

“All right, plop yourself down here,” you tell him, gesturing at the pile of blankets that are slowly gathering warmth by the fireside, “And I’ll dry your-“

A heavy ‘whumph!’ shakes the paintings hung on your walls as the King drops like a two-ton boulder onto his front, shoving a colossal lungful of air through his parted lips.

“… - hair,” you finish flatly.

Dull, doleful eyes turn up to peer at you, and one of Bowser’s hands untucks from his chest, creeping towards you and delicately curling around the back of your ankle, giving it a light tug.

It’s a silent, entirely unsubtle request. One you oblige without much hesitation.

“Okay, okay,” you tell the impatient Koopa when he begins to paw at you in earnest, lowering yourself down in front of him on crossed legs and bending forwards to take one of his horns in each hand, “C’mon. Up here.”

Churring out a lazy rumble, Bowser allows you to guide his head into your lap with only a little effort on his part. He settles contentedly, his nose pressed to the soft roll of your belly, and his eyes slipping shut as he exhales a warm breath over the hem of your shirt.

Placing the towel between his horns, you begin to gently rub at his sopping-wet mane.

“So,” you huff by way of conversation, “Can I ask you something?”

Bowser’s voice is low and rich, buzzing through you when he responds with a blissful, “Anythin’…”

For just a moment, the word gives you pause, but you eventually purse your lips and dismiss his excess sappiness as a symptom of his affliction. “Want to tell me why you thought it was a good idea – if you’re already sick – to walk all the way through a storm to get here? You’ll give yourself pneumonia if you aren’t careful…”

As soon as you voice the possibility into existence, you bite down on the inside of your cheek and try to envision the contents of your medical cabinet…

Bowser only grumbles a noise into your stomach whilst you card your fingers through his tousled strands, working water to their tips so they can be soaked up by the towel.

“Honestly,” you admonish after a minute of oppressive silence, unaccustomed to your larger-than-life friend being so still and quiet, “Why you didn’t just hole up in your room ‘til the infection passes… or y'know, go to an actual healer, is beyond me.” Distractedly, you use your free hand to thumb at the furrow between his brows until the line softens. “Not that it isn’t great to see you. And you know you're always welcome here-"

The Koopa’s mouth tilts up into a wan smile at that, at least until you add, “-but this wasn’t one of your better ideas.” Not to mention that seeing him in this state has effectively frightened the life out of you…

But saying as much out loud might be a little too familiar, even among friends, so you keep the admission tucked away behind your tongue, in safer waters.

Heaving out a very unapologetic grunt, Bowser burrows his snout even more firmly into your stomach and mutters, “W’s missin’ you…”

Ah, well... So much for too familiar.

You resist the urge to blurt out a fond laugh, privately flattered that the great King of Koopas would admit to something so sentimental, feverish or not.

“It’s only been a few weeks since karaoke night,” you point out.

“Long enough,” he grumbles, rolling his weight forwards slightly and purring out, “N’you’re safe…”

You blink. It takes you a moment to realise he’s offering another excuse for his being here.

“Safe?” you echo, leaning over to reach down the back of his thick, muscular neck and drying the scales just beneath the lip of his cumbersome shell, “Of course I’m safe. This isn’t exactly a dangerous place to live.”

Due in no small part to Bowser making sure of the fact before he even allowed you to step foot on the island, let alone build yourself a home out here. It took you months to reassure the nearby village of Toads that, no, Bowser would not be burning their homes to ash if they so much as looked at you the wrong way. Took even longer to get the Koopa himself to promise you he wouldn’t.

Did he really drag himself out here in a thunderstorm to check that you’re safe? When a simple letter would have sufficed?

Idiot…  

An idiot who’s loyal to his friends though, you’ll give him that.

But in your lap, Bowser is quick to roll his head gingerly from side to side and lets out a contradicting huff in response.

Apparently, you’ve misunderstood something.

“…Trust ya,” he presses insistently, peeling apart his crust-coated eyelids to gaze up at your downturned face, “Yer safe…. Kamek knows… J’nr knows…. Y’r safe… One of’us…”

One of-….

And suddenly, it clicks.

The hand you’d been smoothing over the top of his skull goes very still.

… Oh.

Swallowing thickly, you meet his eye, and though the fire is dimmed by fever, his typical sincerity is still there, blazing away behind a glassy sheen.

It makes… sense? You suppose.

He’s sick. And although he’d rather die than admit it, he’s vulnerable. He left the fortress to protect his fellow koopas, and came to the only place he could think of where he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he’d be safe…

He came to you…

You're safe...

It’s a humbling thing to realise.

Absently, you sweep a thumb up and down his temple, pulled from your thoughts when you register the heat pulsing there.

Right… Not out of the woods just yet.

Heaving a sigh, you drop the towel and scoot backwards, sliding Bowser’s chin from your legs, much to his chagrin.

“All right, stay here,” you tell him, rising to your feet and stepping deftly over the paw that tries to recapture your ankle, “I’ll be in kitchen. If I have it my way, you’ll be sweating this fever out tonight. And you’re gonna need to keep your fluids up when you do… And try to stay put this time!”

Bowser tries to say something, but his eyelids fall shut, and when he finds the strength to pry them open again, you’re sliding down in front of him once more, setting a glass of water on the floor behind you and pressing something under his nose that immediately overwhelms his nostrils with the potent scent of boiled ginger.

Tea… he registers dimly, inhaling an enormous swathe of gingery steam into his train-carriage chest. You’ve made him tea…

Not for the first time, he wonders if now would be the right moment to finally ask for your hand in marriage…. Oh, but he left the ring in his bedroom… Damn.

“Hhh. Love you,” he urgently rasps instead, the words getting lost around the rim of the cup as you tip it forwards, letting him take a tiny sip that immediately tingles in his throat, “Love you… s’much…”

“Yeah, I love you too, Big guy,” you tell him innocently, drawing the cup away and laying a cold, damp cloth across his forehead to draw the fever out. He shudders at its presence, but then he settles, blinking with a scrunch of his eyes for a few seconds before drowsily gaping up at you, his pupils blown wide in apparent wonder.

“Y’mean it?” he whispers hoarsely.

Quirking your lips at him, you hedge, “Of course?”

You don’t expect the vast Koopa to so suddenly peel his head from the blankets, shove himself forwards and drop his chin heavily into your lap once more, grunting like it had taken all of his remaining strength to do so. His eyes are squeezed shut, and the blankets behind him rustle as his tail swishes from side to side across the fabric. “Oh, tha’s… good,” he gushes reverently through an exhale, like you’ve just told him the greatest news of his life, a trembling smile pushing at his pallid cheeks, “Been so worried… ‘bout tellin’ ya…”

Bemused - and confused - you angle your head to one side and squint down at him, a small, awkward smile tugging at the corner of your lips. “I’m… sorry?”

“Not’ch’yer fault,” comes his weary reply. He sounds seconds away from falling into a dead sleep. “Di’n’t wanna scare ya…”

“Bowser? I think you’re delirious, you’re not making any-“

“Y’re best thing’s’ever happun’d t’me…”

“… Now I’m sure that’s not true,” you try to dismiss, reapplying the cold cloth and daubing gently at his temples.

“Love you,” he repeats stubbornly, with startling resolve. And as if it wasn’t getting hard enough to refute his conviction… “Loved you s’nce th’day I saw ya…”

… Ah…

“Is… is that right?” you swallow a little breathlessly, staring into the flames dancing and twisting behind his shell as if you’re trapped in a mystified daze.

You feel him give a pathetic nod, then the resonance of his hum pitches through your stomach like a roll of thunder. “Mhm…”

Oh, Bowser…

He starts to say something else, but you hush him softly, pressing the cloth over each of his eyes and wiping the crust away with gentle motions. "You need to sleep," you whisper through a tight throat, "You'll feel more like yourself in the morning..."

You're curious to know if he'll remember what he's just said to you... If he'll think it bears repeating....

In your heart of hearts, you really hope he does.

"I... c'n stay?"

Like he even needs to ask...

Heart wedged uncomfortably in your neck, you lean down, and after settling the flutter of nerves that pulses against your sternum, you finally lay the ghost of a kiss to the very tip of his snout.

At the feather-light touch, his entire body jolts from the force of a sudden rumbling purr that’s kicked out of his chest.

You’re… not so certain that this is all just the fever talking anymore.