[C] Univesita Di Catania

Joshua mutters a thanks as he took the glass of water and drank it immediately, his throat hurt and this was immensely soothing.

"I understand professor, I wont be asking any more of you than that, the last thing I want is to get you in trouble."

He replied, placing down the now empty glass.

"I'll make sure to improve my work so that you're not risking your job for nothing."

"Good."

He paused, taking a small black planner out of his jacket pocket and flicking through it, chewing on his lip as he read.

"Your next assignment is going to be a dissertation on the Latin roots and the evolution of the romantic languages. If you want, we can start planning it now, or would you prefer to leave it for today? You must be tired."

"We can started today if you're not too busy, just let me grab my laptop."

He replied, getting up from his seat and heading toward his bedroom.

Another coughing fit rattled his body, this one worse than the last, he could feel himself getting light headed from not being able to take a large enough inhale.

The man wobbled slightly on his feet before toppling over, once again rendered unconscious.

As Joshua went to get his laptop, Safir had a wander around the kitchen-dining room. It was too tempting to try and clean. The state was unbelievable. There was a rank smell coming from the fridge that he didn't even like to think about and the food stains on the plates were going mouldy.

Instead, he rifled through a stack of magazines on the floor by the door. Hmm. Nothing here of particular interest to him. A few music magazines and some movie based ones.

He had never warmed to modern music, and he found the film experience odd to say the least, as someone relatively new to movies.

His head shot up as he heard a loud crash and he ran into the bedroom. Joshua had knocked a chair over as he fell and was now lying unconscious on the floor, a small cut on his head from where he had hit it.

The man blinked, tongue running over his lips nervously as his mind instantly went into action mode. The cut on the boy's head could wait for now, it was small and wouldn't need much treating. He seemed to be breathing ok.

Holding Joshua's legs up to bring back circulation would be the best option then. Pulling the chair towards him, he slung the boy's legs over the seat, quickly getting a bowl of cold water and a flannel. He wet the boy's forehead, two fingers on his throat to monitor his pulse as he did so.

This had been a regular occurrence lately, he was constantly passing out, but he had been lucky enough to have time to sit down when he was feeling light headed, and so far the falling over had only left a few bruises, nothing major.

Slowly he started coming through as oxygen made its way through his body.

He panted gently as his eyes flickered open groggily, god he hated this feeling.

His eyes snapped up to Joshua's face as he felt the young man stir under his touch.

"Are you awake?"

Safir patted the boy's cheek gently to rouse him, soaking the flannel in more cold water and wringing it out before placing it back onto his forehead. He looked so pale.

Joshua seemed more fragile now. Too fragile to be standing up and wandering around at the moment.

Picking him up, he placed him down on the bed gently, on top of the quilt. He felt too awkward to pull the duvet over him, so, catching sight of a dressing-gown hung on the back of the door, he placed that over him instead and sat by the bedside.

"Yeah.."

He muttered, he was awake but completely out of it, passing out always left him dazed for a while.

The boy groaned as he was lifted up but didn't protest further, he didn't wanted to be carried like a child.

"Thanks."

He added as he was placed down on the bed, he felt as bad as he looked, this illness was horrible.

"You need to eat."

Low blood sugars probably wouldn't help. The teacher marched into the kitchen, quickly scrubbing up a pan before rifling through the fridge for anything vaguely in date.

Eggs.

An omelette would do the trick.

He'd make sure Joshua had eaten, and then leave. It was getting late, and he felt as though he was intruding upon the boy's personal space when he was in bed.

Five minutes later, he padded back into Joshua's room. He had been a good cook when he was human. Now, he was a bit out of practise, but considering the time since he had last cooked, it was good. The edges of the omelette were slightly crispy with a few small patches of black, but on the whole, it was golden brown and not too greasy.

Quietly proud of his efforts, he set the plate down in front of his student, sitting back on the chair, posture a little stiff.

"I'm going to leave soon. It's getting late for you."

Josh didn't feel like eating but the smell of eggs made his stomach growl hungrily, he hadn't properly cooked a meal in weeks now, most of his food was just microwaved.

He cut into it eagerly and shoveled the food into his mouth with a soft groan, that tasted so good.

"You really don't need to do all of this for me, I can tell it makes you uncomfortable, but thank you so much."

He waved the boy's comments away with the flick of a hand.

"It's fine."

It wasn't that he was uncomfortable spending time with his student, or cooking for him or anything like that, it was just slightly odd being somewhere as personal as someone's bedroom when you had such a formal relationship with them normally. It was like bumping into your boss at the restroom.

And it heightened his discomfort knowing that Joshua was exactly the type he had liked as a younger man. Not now, of course, he hastily reassured himself. He hadn't dated anyone in over seventy years, that one had been a one-off, and now e was strictly into the professional side of his life.

Besides. He was too old for that now.

Not that he would have been interested any-

Never mind.

Despite the Professor being older than him, the man still had a youthful face, he was definitely one of the best looking teacher he had ever had.

Not that he was thinking of his teacher in that context, Evenstad had made it very clear that this was just his duty as an educator.

Joshua managed to eat little over half the omelette before setting the plate down, he couldn't eat any more right now.

"That was great."

He muttered, playing with his fork slightly.

He waited patiently for Joshua to finish eating, legs crossing and uncrossing at various intervals.

His hands smoothed down the fabric of his pressed black trousers as he stood back up, readjusting his jacket and tightening his tie around his neck.

He turned around to face the boy, eyes serious.

"Is there anything else you wanted help with before I go?"

Josh shook his head softly, he wasn't going to ask anything else of him, this was awkward enough as it was.

"I might just go to sleep so I can get up early tomorrow and try to get some more work done."

He replied, looking up at the man, suddenly feeling slightly intimidated in his bed, as those serious eyes bore into him.

He smiled at him, picking up the empty plate.

"I'd stay in bed a bit longer if I were you. Wearing yourself out won't help at all."

He was about to walk out of the door when he stopped, frowning in thought.

"Do you have someone who can stay with you? A flatmate, relative? If you're fainting, it's not a good idea to be alone."

"My flat mate moved out last night and with me sick, no one really wants to move in here and my family are all back home."

He replied, shaking his head, there was no way his family could afford to fly in from Texas just to look after him.

"I'll be fine on my own."
He muttered, not overly convinced of his own words.

A frown creased his forehead lightly, and he rummaged around in his pocket for his notebook again, scribbling something on the paper frantically before handing it to Joshua.

"Here's my number. You have any problems at all and you text me or ring me. I'll see what I can do to help."

He shot him a smile again.

"Goodbye, I'll see you next week, if not before."

Walking out of the door, he dropped the plate into the sink full of dishes before leaving the house.

Now for a great pile of marking to do. Oh the joys of being a teacher.