What's the most wholesome thing Gladstone has ever done for Donald? ps: this blog gives me life

Gladstone can’t cook. Sure, he could probably whip up something and have it taste moderately ok, but that was just his luck kicking in. It’s not like he knew what he was doing.

‘Oatmeal’s so easy it’s practically cheating,’ he remembers Della saying a forgotten amount of years ago. And if Della could cook anything even remotely edible, then surely Gladstone would have no problems. It would be fine. He totally had this in the bag.

He looked up from his table of ingredients to the home phone hanging on the wall and had the fleeting thought of calling Gran. Not because he couldn’t do it or needed any help or anything, but just to be sure for assurance’s sake.

But no, he couldn’t call her even if he wanted to. Gran had taken Del and Feth up to the mountains for an overnight Woodchuck retreat and wouldn’t be within phone service till Sunday.

Meaning Gladstone was on his own.

Gladstone rolled up his sleeves and gave a huff of determination. Like he thought, he’d be fine. Making dumb oatmeal was totally within his capabilities. Prepare yourself world, Gladstone was about to rewrite history and make the best freaking oatmeal ever!

He turned on the stovetop under a saucepan of water and brought it to a boil before adding in a cup of oats. He doesn’t really know what else you put into oatmeal besides, well, oats, but he had a distinct memory of Don’s oatmeal always tasting sweet and cinnamony, so he adds a spoonful of cinnamon and honey and keeps stirring.

Somewhere in the back of his head, Gladstone thinks Don usually puts more stuff into his, making it taste creamy and sweet and delicious. But asking Don about it would seem like he lost this battle and Gladstone would not give Donald that satisfaction, so he pushes the thought out of his head and keeps stirring till the oats seemed soft enough.

Turning the stovetop off and letting the oats cool down a bit, Gladstone cuts up an orange and makes some honey lemon tea before putting everything on a tray and making his way upstairs.

He knocks on his cousins’ door twice, but doesn’t wait for an answer as he opens it anyway and walks into the dark room.

“Wakey wakey, eggs and.. well… ok so I didn’t make any bacon. Or eggs. But get up anyway, I have something better,” Gladstone sing songs as he balances the tray on his hip and uses his other hand to flip the light switch on.

The lump of blankets in Donald’s bed shifted as soon as Gladstone walked in the door, but it was another few seconds of jostled movement before a head poked out of the pile of quilts and glared at Gladstone.

“Go away,” Donald practically growled, and Gladstone had to forcibly stop himself from flinching at how scratchy and gravely Don’s voice was.

“No can do patient zero, I’m your self designated nurse for the next two days whether you like it or not,” Gladstone says, grabbing Della’s desk chair as he walked over to Don’s bed.

“Since when?” Donald croaks again, and buries his head under the blankets once more just as Gladstone took a seat beside him.

“Since you collapsed in the field a couple of hours ago with a 102-degree fever and nearly gave Gus and I a heart attack,” Gladstone comments as he sets the tray down on the bedside table beside them. “Gus is fine by the way, I sent him back to Cuthbert’s a little while ago after he helped carry you in. What have you been eating lately anyway? Took us nearly five minutes to haul you up here.”

“Shut up,” Donald groaned again before poking a one-eyed glare at Gladstone from under the blanket. “They couldn’t send a prettier and nicer nurse?”

“Excuse you, I’m the prettiest and nicest nurse in this joint. You’re lucky to have me, there’s a teddy bear down the hall that’s in dire need of a stitch job and here I am tending to your dumb ass instead,” Gladstone remarks as a heated joke, but quickly regrets it when Donald just breathes haggardly and stays a little too still under the blanket for Gladstone’s taste. “Anyway, can you sit up? You need to eat something. I made you some oatmeal.”

Donald didn’t reply back for a few quiet moments, and Gladstone almost thought he had gone back to sleep. But before Gladstone could shake his shoulder to check, Donald rolled over from his side and slowly sat up, the bed creaking the entire time as Donald rubbed his eyes to adjust them to the light. “You… you made oatmeal?”

Gladstone swallowed hard at the sight of his older cousin, and didn’t think it was possible to look so pale and so flushed at the same time. His cheeks and forehead were tinted a soft red, but his hands and arms looked clammy and washed out. There were dark bags like bruises under his eyes, a combination of stress and sleep deprivation that had overworked him to the point of getting a fever and Gladstone felt absolutely sick with how tired Don looked.

His eyes were a glazed over blue, unfocused, and hazy as he lazily made eye contact with Gladstone. “I… I didn’t know you knew how to make oatmeal. I didn’t know you knew how to make anything.”

“Please, oatmeal is so easy, it’s practically cheating,” Gladstone rolled his eyes and hoped he could get away with quoting Della without Donald noticing.

It must have been a testament to how rotten Donald was feeling because he didn’t question it a second time and just nodded sluggishly, stifling a yawn as he balanced his head against his knee and closed his eyes.

“Still dizzy? Need any more ibuprofen?” Gladstone asked, trying not to let the worried knot that had tied itself in his gut over the past few hours tighten, but Donald just shook his head softly.

“…Don’t need it…. I’m ok,” Donald muttered halfheartedly into his knee, like he was desperately trying to convince himself instead, and the worried knot in Gladstone’s stomach tightened into something angry and frustrated.

“Don’t lie to your nurse, dude. You’re obviously not ok,” and Gladstone hated this side of Donald. The stupid stubborn side that refused to let anyone in and help him when he needed it. It reminded Gladstone too much of himself, which honestly made him hate it even more. “You can barely sit up and talk to me. Can you suck up your stupid pride for like, two seconds, and just tell me what you need?”

Donald gave Gladstone another one-eyed glare, but there was hardly any fight in his words when he mumbled a, “Really… I’m ok… Just tired.” And Gladstone was seriously starting to get pissed off now.

“If you say you’re ok one more time, I don’t care if I’m your nurse or not, I swear I’m gonna smack you,” Gladstone snapped, and was surprised when Donald let out a low and wheezy chuckle.

“Are you… really trying to pick a fight with a sick guy right now?” Donald mused and Gladstone almost rolled his eyes so hard, he would have hurt himself if he wasn’t a pro at it.

“Oh, so NOW you’re sick. But when you’re hauling irrigation pipe around in 100-degree weather while being so dizzy you can barely walk straight and with a high enough fever to boil an egg, you’re all, ‘oh, don’t worry about me gran,’ and ‘I’m totally fine Della, go have fun.’ And by the time we figure out you’re not, it’s too late and you’re already half-dead in a creek somewhere,“ Gladstone complained, throwing his arms up in the air exhaustedly.

“I was in a field, not a creek.”

“My point is,” Gladstone rubbed his brow in annoyance, and tried to remember that he was indeed trying to take care of Donald, not pick a fight with him. But Gladstone was his cousin first, caretaker later, and it was high time someone spoke up to Donald about his self-sabotaging tendencies. “You always do this. You always push yourself too hard and never let any of us help you when you need it, and I’m getting sick and tired of having to worry all the time about you lying to us about whether you’re ok or not.”

Gladstone crossed his arms over his chest tightly and let his words hang in the air, his eyes glued to Donalds in a fierce sort of way that practically dared Don to try and argue back with him.

But to Gladstone’s surprise, Don just knitted his brows tightly and shifted his gaze. Hugging his legs to his chest and resting his forehead on top of his knees, Donald muttered a soft “…I know… Sorry,” that caught Gladstone completely off guard.

And Gladstone had never seen Donald cry in all his 13 years, and Donald wasn’t crying now, but his eyes got an intense watery that made Gladstone’s heart turn ice cold and sink all the way to his feet.

And maybe it was just that Donald was really sick and tired and wasn’t in the right headspace to put up a fight and defend himself against Gladstone, but still, Gladstone couldn’t help but feel the guilt of his earlier accusation tear through his angry exterior like a knife through butter, and Gladstone melted into something soft and forgiving and far less intimidating and hard-pressed.

He was still frustrated with Donald, but to be fair to his cousin, it wasn’t like Donald tried to be difficult like this on purpose.

Donald’s always tried to do things by himself, ever since they were little kids. He always tried to carry the world on his shoulders and be the singular pillar holding all his family up. When they all moved into Gran’s for the first time, Gran made a comment to Donald that he was the man of the house now, and she would be needing his help to take care of everyone. Gladstone knows Gran only meant it as a way to cheer Donald up, but Don took it all too seriously, and used it as an excuse to do things on his own.

It really wasn’t like Donald was too prideful to ask for help, like Gladstone. It was just that he didn’t know how or when it was ok too. And he’d much rather burn up completely at both ends before he ‘burdened’ his family with what he considered ‘his’ responsibilities.

And it was frustrating cause in the same light, Gladstone didn’t know how to offer help without it seeming like he was looking or picking a fight.

“You don’t have to apologize, it’s just,” Gladstone sighed, and ran a tired hand through his hair before leaning forward and resting his elbows on the edge of Don’s bed, craning his neck so that he could make eye contact with Don from where he was leaning his head against his knee. “I don’t like doing this. I’m not good at doing this.”

“What… taking care of my ‘dumb ass’?” Donald muttered sarcastically.

“Seeing you sick and being useless to help you,” Gladstone stated flatly, staring at Don’s eyes with a heated deadpan as they got wide and electric with surprise.

“Helping you is the easy part dude. Getting you to let me is what I’m not good at. You know it’s ok to take a break, right? I know I complain about doing chores and all, but it’s not like I won’t help pick up the slack if you need it.” And Donald’s eyes were large and blue and glued to Gladstones as he continued, trying with every once of his luck to get Donald to understand his wishes. “You don’t always have to do everything yourself all the time. You’re allowed to take a step back and breathe once in a while. It’s not like everything will fall apart without you there to hold it together, ya know. We’re not so fragile that we’ll fall into ruin if you don’t run yourself into an early grave to fix everything yourself. You’re allowed to ask for help.”

Gladstone leaned forward and tapped Donald’s forehead a couple of times and gave him a wry smile. “So I don’t need you to apologize. I just need you to be ok. Like, really be ok. And to not try to take on the world by yourself. You’re not alone, dude. Stop acting like it.”

Donald didn’t retort with anything witty or spitfire back, which Gladstone half expected him to, but he nodded honestly and clearly, and gave Gladstone a wry smile of his own.

“Ok,” was all he said, and that was as good as gold for Gladstone.

“Ok, good!” Gladstone straightened up in his seat and reached over for the bowl of oatmeal on the nightstand. “It should be cool enough now for you to eat. I can’t promise it’s like, the best thing ever, but you need to eat something and I’m pretty sure this won’t make you feel any worse.

Donald took the bowl slowly, and raised an eyebrow of surprise in Gladstone’s general direction.

“I still can’t believe… you made me oatmeal.”

“What, like it’s hard?” Gladstone answered back, leaning forward on his elbows once again and looking at the bowl with a nervousness he didn’t quite know what to do with other than to not show it to Donald at ALL costs. “Just eat it before it gets cold, ya skeptic.”

Donald took an unhurried bite, and chewed for what seemed like a torturous forever to Gladstone, before breaking into a gentle smile.

“It’s good,” Don commented while he chewed, and smiled even bigger when Gladstone physically beamed on the spot.

“What, really? You mean it? I knew it wouldn’t be like, horrible, but it was my first time making it so I wasn’t sure and-,”

“Try it,” Donald interrupted, still smiling as he held out a spoonful towards Gladstone, who, in his defense, took it immediately in his excitement over his first real cooked dish. And didn’t even think twice about possibly getting Donald’s sick germs, (even though he never gets sick anyway.)

As soon as the spoon entered his mouth, Gladstone started coughing and gagging, and almost downed Donald’s entire cup of tea in one swig to try and wash the oatmeal down.

It wasn’t like it was horrible, it definitely was by anyone’s standards edible. But it wasn’t good by any means either. Gladstone had definitely put too much cinnamon in it, and the honey was almost nonexistent, making it all together just taste way too bitter and chalky.

“UGH! You liar! You said it tasted good!” Gladstone barked, wiping his mouth with his sleeve and staring daggers into Donald as his cousin smiled innocently back.

“I said it was good, not that it tasted good,” Donald supplied simply, taking his spoon back from where Gladstone had thrown it back onto the bed and taking another bite. “Not that is matters. I’m pretty sure this fever made me lose my sense of taste.”

“What’s the difference then?” Gladstone demanded, and Donald just continued to smile softly into his bowl, his soft blue eyes practically illuminated against the red of his cheeks.

“It’s warm,” Donald replied back plainly, not looking at Gladstone as he took another big bite out of it. “I like it.”

And Gladstone didn’t really understand what Donald meant by that, but a pull in his stomach told him it was a compliment, and he could feel his own cheeks get hot with pride. So he stood up abruptly and said something about getting Donald a glass of water as he walked toward the door, not wanting to show Donald how pleased he was by the praise.

Even though the oatmeal wasn’t a huge success, Donald still liked it, which meant Gladstone won the battle in the end.

Once he had gotten a glass of cold water from the kitchen and a cold wash rag for Donald’s forehead, he made his way back up the stairs towards his cousin’s bedroom.

Gladstone had left Don’s bedroom door open when he left, but before he could announce his arrival, he heard Don’s quiet snoring. Donald had fallen back asleep, with half of his body uncovered by his blanket and with the lights still on. Gladstone shook his head and smiled, but when he walked over to put the glass of water down on Donald’s nightstand, he noticed the bowl of oatmeal completely empty against Donald’s side. The spoon was still hanging out of his mouth.

“Dummy,” Gladstone said with more affection then he’d ever let Donald hear while he was awake, and took the spoon out of his mouth with the utmost care. He put the empty bowl and spoon on the tray and recovered Donald with the blanket, making sure to tuck in any stray limbs. He brushed some of Donald’s wild bed hair out of the way before placing the cold washcloth on his forehead. Donald sighed quietly at the contact, but otherwise made no show of waking up anytime soon. Gladstone noticed that his fever didn’t feel nearly as hot as it did earlier, and felt a sigh of his own escape his lips in relief.

Gladstone gathered the empty bowl and spoon on the tray, leaving all but a single slice of orange that he stole for himself on Donald’s nightstand, and put Della’s desk chair by where he had found it.

“Call me when you need me,” Gladstone said, and didn’t care that Donald was fast asleep and couldn’t hear what he had said when he turned off the light and closed the door.