stuffed, sore, aching bellies

They’re only just finishing up washing their dishes when Nate’s discomfort starts making itself well and truly known. There’s a heavy feeling in his stomach, the sensation that everything he’s just eaten is sitting thickly in his upper belly.

Putting the last cleaned and dried plate away, Nate chances reaching down to settle a hand on his quietly-grumbling upper belly. With the way that he’s feeling, he’s not surprised to find himself bloated, the growing indigestion in him causing a gurgling, dense gas, rumbling away with the overindulgence of his breakfast-for-dinner inside his heavy stomach.

Though usually it would take longer for Nate to start getting gassy, he finds his chest burning a bit, his stomach letting out a low gurgle before it pushes a bit of that thick and uncomfortable air up his throat. He has no choice but to belch into the back of his hand, though he feels no relief in his belly in doing so.

“You okay?” Darren asks, scrubbing his hands in the sink to wash off the last of the dish soap. “That sounded rough.”

Nate can taste the powerful taste of the eggs sitting on the back of his tongue, from his belch. He reaches to rub a hand over his upper stomach through his sweater. He’s not shy in telling Darren, “I feel a little bloated, actually. Maybe I shouldn’t have even so much.” Another belch rumbles up, and he covers his mouth with the back of his hand when he can’t stop it. “Oof. Sorry, babe.”

“That’s alright,” Darren says. He dries his hands off, asks, “Iron stomach’s not getting you through this one, is it?” As if it knows he’s talking about it, Nate’s stomach burbles, a gurgling that the both of them can hear in the kitchen. “Jesus. Hey, hon, what the hell did you eat?”

“Hey,” Nate defends himself, “I bet it’s not my fault.”

“Well, you did eat half the kitchen,” Darren teases him. He kisses him on the cheek, reaching down to set both of his own hands over Nate’s full, bloated belly. Stroking softly, he tells him, “You probably had way too much to eat. I told you we could’ve made room in the fridge. We need to do a grocery run soon, anyways.”

He kisses Nate’s cheek again before pushing away from him to open up the fridge doors. He evaluates the contents of their fridge before reaching in, examining the label on their milk carton.

“This isn’t expired,” Darren tells him. “You probably shouldn’t drink much milk anyways, but it probably wasn’t that…” He checks the labels on their shredded cheese, their bacon, their sausage, their yogurt. “I’m feeling fine— Well, I mean, I feel full, but I don’t feel sick… Oh, no.”

“What?” Nate asks him. He leans back against the counter, grimacing at the way his stomach pulls uncomfortably at the motion. It feels so bloated that it’s straining in a heavily uncomfortable way, like the muscles are all getting strained just supporting the bloat inside him. He feels uncomfortably full, grossly so, cramps starting to tighten along his belly with the pressure of it.

“These eggs expired a couple of days ago,” Darren tells him, reading the date on the packaging of the carton. Looking up to Nate, he asks him, “Did you check this before making your scrambled eggs?”

“I didn’t even think to,” Nate answers him truthfully. The act of speaking again has his chest burning; he rubs at it, then down over his belly, trying to comfort the uncomfortable strain around his swollen tummy. “Shit. I’m sorry.”

“No, I’m sorry,” Darren insists. “Your stomach’s probably gonna hurt for a little bit until you can digest everything. Wanna go lay down?”

Nate knows that Darren’s right. The indigestion is so painful right now, and only growing worse by the second as his stomach attempts to process the amount of food he’s packed into it tonight. The slightly-past-expired eggs rumble softly in his belly, bloating him worse than he would be otherwise, even with the amount he’s overindulged with their dinner.

He wants to just relax until his body digests, and the indigestion passes, so he agrees and says, “Okay, yeah, that sounds good. Sorry, again.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Darren promises him.

He flicks off the lights for them on the way to their bedroom, practically guiding Nate along the way. While Darren is focused on turning off all the lights in the house and locking up, Nate’s more focused on trying to calm the growing storm in his belly. His skin feels hot, tight, prickly; when he works up another uncomfortable belch, he immediately wishes he hadn’t, hating the way it makes the tight gas bloat in his stomach gurgle again.

“Here we go,” Darren says, once they’re in their room. “What do you want to wear to— Oh, alright, that works.”

Nate’s already tugged his trousers and sweater off, leaving them in a heap beside the bed. He just barely gets his socks off before he’s collapsing on his back in their bed in just his undershirt and underwear, groaning once he’s on his back.

Reaching down, he rubs his hand over his belly, his already-tight t-shirt even tighter on his belly with how full and bloated he is. He feels completely overstuffed, especially when he rubs his hand over the tight material of his t-shirt and feels it slip up the curve of his bloated stomach as he does.

The way he fell backwards on the bed and the rubbing of his belly coaxes up another thick belch, though it doesn’t relieve much of the uncomfortable bloat in him. He’d do anything to get rid of all this gas; he even pushes into his belly, trying to push up another belch.

When he succeeds, he almost regrets it. This burp feels like it shifts the contents rumbling together in his upper belly, gathering thickly in the pit of his stomach.

“Do you feel better laying down?” Darren asks him. When Nate opens his eyes and looks up at him, he’s staring at him from over the side of the bed. “You look uncomfortable.”

“I think it was something I ate,” Nate replies. Darren laughs in spite of the situation, and Nate can’t help smiling at the sound.

“You don’t say?” Darren says in return. “Well, I think it was everything you ate.”

Nate belches again, then groans out loud. Rubbing his hand slowly, pushing in hard, over the side of his rounded belly, he says, “You’re not kidding.” He exhales, slowly, then asks, “Would you lay down with me? You’re the only thing that makes me feel better when I feel sick.”

“Of course I will,” Darren replies. “You shouldn’t have eaten that much, though.”

“It’s done now,” Nate tells him. “Now I just want to lay here until it goes away.”

He slowly moves himself upright, taking his time so as to not upset his churning stomach even further. By the time he’s able to get himself propped up against the pillows, Darren’s taken his clothes off, pulled his pajamas on, and put all their clothes in their laundry hamper.

“How’s that?” Darren asks as he climbs into bed, grabbing their television remote off the nightstand as he goes and flicking on the TV across from their bed. “Any better like that?”

“It feels less like my own stomach is crushing me,” Nate answers.

“That’ll work,” Darren replies. He gives Nate the remote and tells him, “We can watch whatever you want. Want me to rub your belly?”

“I love you so much,” Nate answers automatically.

Darren smiles, then kisses him. “I love you, too. I’ll take that as a yes?”

“That’s a yes,” Nate replies.

He takes the remote and settles in while Darren gets comfortable. He shuffles downwards and lays against Nate’s side, his cheek pressed to the bloated curve of Nate’s upper belly. He uses his tummy as a pillow as he reaches to stroke it, as if he’s listening to the gurgling inside him and using the sounds to guide him to where he wants to rub next.

It’s difficult to focus on picking something to watch when Nate’s stomach is slowly growing more and more unsettled, indigestion taking hold of him in earnest. He even shifts his hips, trying to get comfortable, attempting to find a position that will help relieve the gas, but nothing feels like it’s working.

He ends up just picking a random movie they’ve already seen, choosing a comedy so there’s nothing that can stress him out while he’s already feeling so sick.

At a quiet moment in the movie, Darren rubs against the side of his belly, trying to coax his tummy into digesting, into pushing some of the cramping indigestion in his upper tummy into his lower belly. With a heavy, deep glorping sound, it works— sort of.

Nate shifts uncomfortably, feeling his indigestion kind of shift inside him. His upper belly is still straining, painfully bloated, but the gas stays there while the overfull gurgling starts to shift its way heavily through Nate’s belly, growling towards his lower stomach.

A heavy snarl rumbles thickly from the pit of his belly, and Darren moves his hand to follow it, stroking lower than he had before. He draws up a belch so thick that Nate’s stomach churns again, gurgling with the hiccuping jerk of the burp, displacing Darren’s head briefly where he rests it against his side.

“Shit,” Darren comments. “How’d that feel?”

Nate can only manage a soft moan, at first, before his tummy rumbles and he hiccups.

“Awful,” he tells him honestly. “Something’s really just not sitting right, I just—”

He can’t even finish his own complaint, because whatever it is that isn’t sitting right in his belly makes itself known then. And Nate thinks it’s probably those bad eggs turning his stomach, but the fact that he overindulged and had so much of the sweet maple syrup, and all the pancakes, and the waffles, and the sausage, and the bacon, and the yogurt, and the fruits, and the coffee, and the chocolate, and the hash browns, and everything else that he stuffed inside himself, it’s just too much for him to take on top of the rumbling indigestion of the expired eggs.

His stomach snarls thickly in the bed, rumbling with a low growl like thunder in the pit of his stomach. His hands prick with sweat, and he reaches up to try and soothe the pain inside of him, rubbing his own belly with one hand along the side. Darren’s got his cheek pressed to the other side, and he’s stroking over the center. They’re doing everything they can.

“This sounds awful,” Darren informs him.

“It feels awful,” Nate replies weakly. “My stomach feels really unsettled, babe. I don’t know what to do.”

“I can get you Pepto,” Darren suggests. Nate considers the offer, then nods, and Darren gets up briefly to get the pink bottle from his nightstand. 

The movement of Darren lifting his head off of Nate’s belly, then shifting the bed, makes everything spin for Nate briefly. He closes his eyes, swallowing thickly. He can feel the indigestion shifting inside him, becoming thicker, heavier, nauseating him as it turns his stomach.

Belching again, Nate drags both hands up his sides to the swollen bloat of his upper belly. It’s with a groan that he says, “Fuck, I feel like shit. I shouldn’t have eaten so fucking much, my stomach is killing me.”

He belches through the last word, then pushes it harder at his upper belly, desperately trying to displace some of the rumbling, uncomfortable gas inside him.

“I’m sorry, honey,” Darren says, bringing him the Pepto Bismol. “Have some of that, okay? I’ll keep rubbing your belly for you.”

“Thank you,” Nate says miserably. “I’m sorry—”

“Don’t be sorry,” Darren cuts him off. “We almost made French toast. I just as easily could’ve been sick, too.” He kisses him on the cheek, tells him, “Drink your Pepto. You’ll feel much better.”

Just like he promised, he resumes rubbing Nate’s belly, taking over for him when his hand is occupied with the Pepto bottle. His other hand just settles against the bottom curve of his bloated stomach, stroking along the strip of skin exposed where his t-shirt is riding up his swollen tummy.

Nate exhales, then takes a couple of long swigs from his Pepto. He’s so full that even drinking Pepto feels uncomfortable, but he knows he’s not going to feel any better if he doesn’t make himself try.

The thick pink liquid courses down his throat to settle heavily in his churning stomach. The act of swallowing it down pushes up another heavy belch, and Darren tries to help by rubbing along with the rippling gurgle that burbles through his belly, fingers digging in to try and coax some of the bloat out with his belch.

Instead of moving everything upwards, though, Nate belches, then feels his stomach rumbling thick, sickly. He’s mildly embarrassed, but has to remind himself that it’s just Darren, and Darren wants him to feel better, so he lets himself fart, too, shifting to try and let out some of the gas inside.

“Did that help?” Darren asks him, when Nate’s collapsed back against his pillows again, taking his Pepto back.

Nate shakes his head miserably. “No. It just—” He belches, then reaches down to rub at his upper belly. The pressure’s so immense there, the expired eggs making him so gassy it feels like all there is inside of him is the sick, overfull contents of his stomach and all that gas, stuffing him until he’s nothing but that nausea and indigestion and discomfort. The room spins, and Nate closes his eyes again. “Fuck. I’m so nauseous and dizzy, I can’t— I can’t even move. Fuck.”

“I’m so sorry,” Darren says.

“Not your fault,” Nate reminds him. “I did it to myself, just like I always do.”

Darren kisses his cheek, telling him, “I love you no matter what you do. And I don’t mind helping you when your tummy hurts, so don’t worry about that, alright?”

Nate turns to him, letting his head rest backwards against the pillows he’s propped up against as he does so. He tells Darren, “I don’t deserve you.”

Darren kisses him and says, “We deserve each other.”

Nate laughs. “You sure?”

It seems like Darren is about to reply again, but Nate’s stomach snarls again, gurgling heavily all the way through. Though he’s eaten so much tonight that it doesn’t feel like there’s any room left inside him, between the amount of food packed into his nauseous belly and the amount of gas filling him up on top of that, his stomach is starting to really churn. It’s like it’s starting to whirl inside him, the heavy, nauseating contents growling back and forth, rumbling laboriously through his stomach.

“That sounds horrible,” Darren comments. “Are you sure you’re not going to be sick?”

Nate almost manages to reply, but the thought of opening his mouth makes his mouth water and the back of his throat feel thick. Keeping his lips tightly closed, he shakes his head, letting his head fall back and his eyes close, trying to take deep breaths through his nose to quell the growing nausea inside him.

His gas-filled upper belly chooses that moment to gurgle, a churning rumble that forces up a thick belch. It burns through his chest before rising in his throat, and it’s so heavy when it comes that it makes his snarling lower belly pull, almost turning the belch wet.

He hiccups, then groans, “Fuck,” just as Darren starts to get up.

“I’m just gonna get the trash can for you,” he says.

Eyes still closed, Nate shakes his head again and tells him firmly, “I’m not going to get sick. I’m not—” He belches again, then moans, low and nauseated and miserable. “Oh, fuck…”

“Just in case,” Darren insists.

When Nate doesn’t argue, this time— too sick to do so— Darren actually gets up, moving quickly in his haste to help Nate.

He accidentally rattles the bed a bit, though, and Nate’s stomach flips, turning at the jerking shift in motion. It forces up another thick belch, another one that’s nearly wet at the end, and his queasy stomach grumbles, snarling inside of him.

The Pepto isn’t really helping him much, though it is sluggishly trying to force his stomach to digest. His indigestion isn’t going away so much as it feels like it’s shifting, heavy and rumbling and uncomfortable and thick and right in the middle of him, straining him with the amount of bloated, sick pressure inside.

Again, Nate shifts, letting out a long fart that makes his gurgling stomach snarl again. He presses the back of his hand to his mouth, swallowing thickly.

The bed shifts when Darren joins him again. “I’ve got the trash can right here. Do you want it?”

Nate shakes his head, keeping his mouth firmly closed. His upper belly gurgles again, the overfull contents starting to froth inside him, feeling as though the bloated air is foaming up, swirling inside him.

Reaching down, he tries to soothe his belly by rubbing it again, even though it feels like he’s far beyond that point. He pushes in harder in his desperation, trying to do anything to calm the sickness inside him. The top of his tummy is shifting, growling, thick and heavy and bloated; further down, deeper, his lower belly is far too full, overstuffed and churning, the heaving contents roiling inside his crammed, cramped stomach.

In rubbing, and with his Pepto, he manages to do something he’s not sure he wanted to do, and his stomach finally all starts to melt together, combining into one mess inside of him.

The bloated, gurgling air of his upper tummy whirls downwards, whipping up with the overfull contents of his lower belly. Together, there’s way too much for his stomach to handle. Now, his tummy feels like one massive, nauseous mess, churning with the amount of food he’s eaten, rumbling with gas, turning over itself inside him.

His mouth fills with saliva again, and he swallows thickly, shifting upright. He keeps trying to rub his belly with both hands, digging in, trying to soothe the churning indigestion, the sickness, the nausea. He’s starting to think it’s a fight he’s going to lose.

The next belch that comes up pulls at the entire contents of his stomach, making the back of his throat taste like eggs and syrup and sausage. His mouth floods with saliva again, and he reaches out blindly for the trash can, feeling his stomach seething inside of him before it audibly gurgles again.

“It’s okay,” Darren tells him. He starts rubbing his back, tells him, “Get it up. You’ll feel so much better once it’s out of you.”

Nate knows he’s right, but it’s hard to focus on that while it’s all still happening. He’s miserable when he belches into the trash can, letting his head hang into it, finally opening his eyes in his agony and misery.

“Fuck,” he groans, before he belches again, maple and yogurt in the back of his throat. He spits saliva into the bottom of their trash can, says, “I feel like shit. Fuck.”

“It’ll be okay,” Darren promises. “Just get it up.”

Nate’s stomach won’t stop snarling, now. His belly is non-stop gurgling, trying desperately to digest in the midst of the overeating and the expired eggs and the massive indigestion. His body can’t do it, and his tummy’s starting to realize that, snarling as if protesting what he’s putting them both through.

“I feel horrible,” Nate complains, sicker than he remembers being in a while, just wanting to be comforted. He’s so grateful when Darren kisses his temple, even though he’s disgusting and soaked with sweat and on the verge of vomiting.

“You’ll feel better soon,” Darren says. “You’ll get it all up, and I’ll take care of you, and you’ll be asleep before you know it. Tomorrow morning, you’ll feel so much better.”

It’s a big promise, especially when Nate feels like he’s never going to feel better ever, but he has no choice but to take Darren at his word.

Especially now— he has no brain space left for anything except his nausea, so he has to trust Darren. He doesn’t have the energy or ability to come up with anything on his own.

Nate’s stomach turns over again, feeling like it’s rising thickly and heavily into the back of his throat, and he tells Darren, “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“That’s okay,” Darren promises. “Just get it up.”

Absurdly, Nate can hear that the television is still on. He can’t focus on it, and the sound disappears through the ringing in his ears as he belches again, getting closer and closer to what he now realizes is inevitable.

His belly heaves up inside him, lurching from the pit of his tummy upwards, and he gags, retching over the trash can. His stomach is so bloated that he doesn’t vomit, this time, but just ends up belching— though, the belch is long, meaty, thick. He may as well be vomiting, he thinks dizzily,  because his stomach is churning like he’s just starting throwing up.

The need to vomit is made so much worse by his bloating and indigestion. The next thick belch tastes so much like the spoiled eggs that he groans, tears burning in his eyes and prickling in his sinuses.

“You’re okay,” Darren tells him, continuing to try soothing him at his side. He scratches his nails through his short hair. It feels so good; Nate closes his eyes again, just trying to breathe through the nausea. “You’re okay. I’ve got you. Just get it up and I’ll take care of you. It’s all going to be okay.”

Nate nods, a desperate jerk of a motion over the trash can mouth. He belches again, the thick taste of eggs and sausage and vomit rising in his throat, and he shifts himself upwards a little bit more, clutching the trash can closer.

He can’t manage to rub his belly anymore; he has to hold the trash can in both arms, clutching it tightly to himself. He’s so desperate in gripping it to himself, ready to vomit, that he accidentally clutches it in too hard and displaces a hard belch of gas, the pressure straining and practically exploding upwards from his belly into his mouth and the trash can, a belch so thick and wet he’s even surprised he didn’t vomit at the end.

There’s only a split second for the surprise, though, before the belch shifts everything in his stomach. It had been too much, and his belly growls, rumbling as the gurgling, frothing contents whipping sickly inside of him move upwards with a nauseating lurch.

Nate grabs tight to the trash can as he belches up a mouthful of vomit. It burns coming up his throat, coming thickly and with a burst of air as he literally burps it up into the bottom of the trash can.

It’s the worst thing he thinks he’s ever felt, and he can’t even stop it from happening. The fact that he’s allowed it to happen once has apparently signaled to his body that it’s okay for it to keep happening. Everything in his stomach is gurgling and churning and lurching upwards, his tummy practically turning inside-out as everything inside of it comes out.

When Nate belches up another thick wave of vomit— sausage and bacon and syrup and waffles and yogurt, barely-digested— after another, burping them up with thick bursts of the rumbling bloat inside of him.

Nate regrets everything. Literally, everything. He regrets breakfast for dinner, and he regrets suggesting he finish everything so they didn’t have leftovers, and he regrets not checking the expiration dates, and he regrets overeating, and he regrets— just— everything, miserable in his overfull nausea and vomiting sickness.

“Just get it up,” Darren tells him.

Nate doesn’t know when he closed his eyes, but he opens them and immediately regrets it, seeing his stomach contents inside the trash can. It makes him gag again, before he’s belching up another thick wave of vomit, the tastes of peanut butter and maple syrup still present and made all the more awful for the simultaneous tastes of spoiled egg and partially-digested sausage and vomit.

It had tasted a lot better going in than it does coming back up. Nate thinks it’ll be a long time before he can eat anything he ate tonight again.

His stomach doesn’t really calm so much as it does give him a second to breathe, as if sensing that he’s on the verge of losing too much air. He’s been vomiting in one belching wave after another; there’s barely enough space to catch his breath in between the gurgling indigestion and surging nausea forcing up burps of vomit into the can.

Wiping his mouth with the back of his wrist, Nate drops his head backwards, resting one hand on his storming stomach. He feels Darren carefully take the trash can out of his other arm, removing it from his tight grip. Without it, Nate feels briefly unmoored; he has to close his eyes again, swallowing thickly, willing his body to calm down and stop puking for the night, not just for the moment.

“I’ll be right back,” Darren tells him. “Call for me if you need me. I’ll try to be quick.”

“Okay,” Nate replies, his voice sounding thick and rough, his throat still heavy with vomit and rasping with the force of getting sick. He doesn’t even try to clear it, terrified that the motion of that will make him gag again.

Darren kisses Nate’s forehead before taking the trash can out of the room, presumably to clean it out— or swap it out with a different one.

Nate knows he just has to endure until Darren gets back, but the respite he thought his stomach was giving him feels spectacularly short-lived. He briefly entertains the thought of running after Darren so he can make it to the bathroom, but he dismisses the idea just as quickly. Even just thinking that makes his stomach lurch, his knees so weak it feels like his legs don’t exist at all. He’s even trembling, shivering with how nauseous he is, his limbs shaking as he tries to swallow down the nausea as it rises again.

“Fuck,” he moans softly. His stomach is whining non-stop again, audible in its gurgling and churning and grumbling.

Reaching down with both hands, Nate desperately tries to rub his belly. He pushes his t-shirt all the way up, over the rounded curve of his still-bloated tummy, so he can rub his hands right over his bare skin.

He can feel a rumble as it ripples through his lower belly, churning with his bloated indigestion to spike his nausea again. He rubs along the gurgling part of his belly, feeling it grumble beneath his fingers, trying to calm it before it can start coming out again.

His body quickly tells him that he’s not going to be able to stop this from starting up all over again. Swallowing thickly, Nate barely gets enough energy to call out, “Darren!” before his stomach’s turning over itself.

His hands fly upwards, slamming over his mouth as he swallows thickly. Inside, his tummy churns so heavily he thinks it’s going to come out altogether through his mouth, contents spilling out all at once. It’s nearly impossible to swallow it back down, but he cannot get sick in this bed, and can’t make this night worse for Darren than it already is, and so he forces himself to swallow it down.

Inside him, his belly truly snarls, thundering at the heavy bloat and wave of vomit coursing back down into him. It surges through his churning belly, heaving inside of him; he can feel everything in his belly swirling together, and he belches up a massive burst of bloated air, his indigestion gurgling up in his insides.

“I’m coming!” Darren shouts from down the hall.

Nate belches again, trying to stop himself from vomiting by allowing the gas to keep coming up. He’s playing a risky game, he knows, because he can feel the vomit getting ready to come back up.

Another loud gurgle turns his belly, filling the room with the snarling grumbles, and his eyes prick with new tears. Trying to rub his tummy isn’t helping anymore, and he belches again, tasting nothing but Pepto and vomit and eggs, miserable.

The next second, Darren’s back, pushing a new trash can into Nate’s hands, stroking his sweaty hair back from his forehead.

“You’re okay,” Darren promises him, just as Nate’s body gets the signal that he can get sick again, forcing up another rumbling belch.

He burps up into the can, burning all the way up his throat, and whimpers, “Fuck.”

“I got you,” Darren tells him. “No matter how long it takes. I got you.”

It’s an awful promise, and one Nate hopes he’ll keep, because he thinks he’s going to spend the rest of the night like this, listening to his bloated stomach churn with indigestion and suffering through it belching up wave after wave of sickness from his whirling insides.