Unlucky-- Secret Santa for gingerdean

[kendisima]

Happy holidays, @gingerdean!  Sorry this is a bit late on the 'holiday' front! 

This is just straight-up sneeze pr0n, both from a cold and, at the end, from allergies.  I'm sorry that it isn't Supernatural-- sadly, I haven't seen the show-- but hopefully it has some stuff you like in it!  The story is about Elliot, a twenty-six year old who's trying to make it big in the comedy world, and has a huge audition on a very unfortunate day.  There is absolutely no plot, but I hope you enjoy it anyway let me know what you think!

Quick summary of the main character:

Elliot Henderson:  Twenty-six year old brunet with curly, mid-length hair and grey eyes.  He's about 6'1", and quite lean.  He has two sleeves of tattoos, and prefers to dress nicely; suits, ties, blazers, thick-framed black glasses he doesn't really need.  He rarely gets sick, but is allergic to most flowers, dust, and has seasonal allergies. He's a bit of a loner, as most people who spend their time traveling around the country, are.

Okay, on to the story.

 

Unlucky

Okay, this was not happening.

He swallowed again—this time, with some force behind it—and the scratchiness abated, if only for the moment.  There is absolutely no way this is happening, he thought. Elliot swallowed again, and again, attempting to make the scratchy spot in the back of his throat disappear.  Okay.  Better.

The brunet threw the heavy, pleated comforter off his body and attempted not to shiver in the dark hotel room.  Had he turned the air conditioning on last night by mistake?  It was about thirty degrees last night, there was no way he would have done that.  Elliot checked the thermostat, just in case he had suddenly become a sleep walker, and squinted when he saw that the number was a balmy 83 degrees in the room.  

Oh, you have got to be kidding me.

Elliot shook off the (nonexistent, you ass, pull it together) chill, and headed towards the bathroom.  When he got to the mirror, he forced himself to look up and take inventory.  

His grey eyes were slightly red-rimmed—likely from the hotel room dust, and the shitty night’s sleep he got—and his nose kept twitching as he stared at himself.  There he was, all twenty-six years of him, standing only slightly hunched in front of the sink. The longer he looked, the more he realized: he was pale, far paler than usual, especially considering his tanned complexion, and every time he swallowed he could see the wince in his eyes, and his adam’s apple bob painfully.  Elliot shook his head, angry at the reflection, and turned on the water to splash his face. 

He turned the water to cold, attempting to wake himself up a little, and forced himself to pat his face with it.  Jesus, could that be any colder?  He growled, pissed, and did it once more.  He toweled his face dry and, in the process, seemed to disturb his already-twitching nose.  Shit.

Elliot sniffed sharply, to attempt to keep from sneezing.  If he knew anything about himself, it was that once he started, he just could not stop. Allergy season was killer, and when he had a cold— unlike now, he reminded himself in vain—his nose became the burden of all burdehh—

"Hhh…hnn…HehITSHH-uee!  GTSHHoo! HUHETSH-uhh!"  Elliot sneezed once onto the mirror, and then into the crook of his arm, misting the bathroom in germs.  God-fucking-dammit.   

Elliot looked at the mirror—thankfully, he hadn’t really done any damage there—and decided that he might as well skip the shower. He was already late, and he was sure that the steam would do absolutely nothing to help him. Instead, he stepped back into the hotel room and pulled on the nicest clothes he had brought—the ones he had even bothered to hang up in the tiny hotel closet.  Like it or not, today was the day: this was supposed to be his big break.

He gathered his keys, stifled a few more sneezes into the crook of his elbow, and headed out the door.  He had a long day of waiting in line to go through; after all, today was the day he tried out for Last Comic Standing.  

 

“HXTSHchoo!” ETSHH-uh! Huhh..hnn…huhTSHH-nn! Hh

The couple standing ahead of him in the brisk Los Angeles morning turned around, attempting to hide their disgust.

“Bless you,” the woman, who clearly just felt sorry for him, said. 

“Yeah,” the man agreed, pulling his girlfriend closer.  “That doesn’t sound good, bro.”

Elliot literally didn’t think he could be any more embarrassed.  He felt himself turning bright red as he attempted to stifle another sneeze into his glove.  “S’fine,” he managed, not looking at either of them.  “I’mb okay.  Thanks.”

The girl tsk’d and turned away, shrugging.  The man, however, couldn’t seem to let it go.  “Seriously, bro, are you sure you should be out here?  Are you trying out?”

Elliot swallowed around the tightness that had coiled around his throat, wishing like hell that this conversation wasn’t happening.

“Yeah,” he said, already hearing the congestion and sore throat taking over his voice.  Why, why today of all days?  “Yeah, I amb.  The—heh—the producer saw mby set two nights ago in San Francisco, and told mbe to audition today.  Apparently, it’s the only one they’re doing in cali—hhh… huh…”  Elliot hitched into his palm, wishing like hell he could just disappear into thin air, somehow.  Maybe he would die of pure embarrassment before he could finish this conversation. 

"HITSHH-uee!  KTSSHH! KTSXH! Huhh…HUHESSHoo!”  He sniffled, fully congested now, into his elbow.  He figured, at that moment, that if a god existed, it was a malevolent one.

“Shit, bless you, bro,” the guy said, digging around in his pockets.  Eventually, his girlfriend found a couple of napkins in her purse and handed them over.  If only out of pure, animal-like need, he gratefully took them and wiped his nose, refusing to blow.  Please, he thought, just ignore me.

The couple gave Elliot twin pained looks.  “Well, feel better, man,” the guy said.  “And, uh… good luck.”

Elliot almost laughed.  Luck.  What a joke.

 

Almost an hour later, the girl walking around with a clipboard passed by him, and told his section of the line that they were about an hour from getting inside to audition.

Lucky, Elliot thought, wiping his increasingly-sore nose on the already-ruined napkins from the couple in front of him.  Because I’m only about an hour away from certain death.

Elliot shivered in his coat, and blew hot air into his hands.  It couldn’t have been less than about seventy degrees, but he felt like it was about thirty below.  He wished more than anything that he could just leave, go back to the hotel, and sleep this nasty cold away.  But he was almost there—just an hour more until certain stardom.

“HUHGTSHH-uee!” That is, if he didn’t completely scare away the judges with how disgusting he was.

Just as he was gearing up for another fit, Elliot felt his phone vibrate in his pocket.  He pulled it out and groaned—Sarah was Facetiming him.  His ex-girlfriend-turned-best-friend, who was probably even more excited about his comedy career than he was.  She was a tiny Brit with a big attitude, and he’d loved her through and through.  When they broke up, on good terms, it was simply because the timing had been off; she was in school, he was traveling the country, and neither of them had time for the other.  He had completely forgotten that she moved here last year; she had called last week saying they should get dinner when he was in town tonight. 

He really, really didn’t want to answer the phone; he didn’t want her to pity him, or be disgusted, but he knew that if he didn’t, Sarah would just keep calling until he picked up.  He sighed, pushed back his hair and fixed his glasses, and swiped ‘accept’.

“Hi, Sarah,” Elliot said, his voice much lower than it normally was.  Sarah, always the most intuitive person he knew, immediately furrowed her brow.

“Ah, shit,” she said, making a face that conveyed pure, unadulterated sympathy.  “You’re fuckin’ sick.”

Elliot flushed again, and coughed a little into his palm, looking away from the phone.  He could feel the people behind him move even further away.  “Uh, yeah,” he admitted, trying to smile at her.  “A little.”

“Doesn’t look like a little, love,” she said, moving from her kitchen table to the fridge.  “Looks like you feel like hell.”

“It’s just a… a cohh—hheh…” Elliot turned away a bit from the camera, and sneezed, uncovered, onto the sidewalk, “HETSHHuhh!  HehhITSHH-oo! HRTSHCHchoo!”  Well, if everyone else in line hadn’t been giving him a ten-foot radius before, they certainly were now. 

“Oh, bless you, love,” Sarah said, cupping her chin in her hand and pouting at Elliot.  “You never were great with timing, hmm?”

“Oh fu­hh—fugck off, Sarah,” Elliot said, not really meaning it, but just feeling shitty and mean-spirited.  Sarah laughed, that drops of water in a glass bowl tinkling that she always had.

“Poor love.  Why don’t I pick you up when you’re all through, hmm?  I’ll take you for pho, and you can stay at my flat tonight.  Get out of that nasty hotel.”

Elliot considered saying no; he figured he could sweat this out in the hotel bed and order room service, and likely cry about how shitty the day had been.  But when he looked at Sarah—tiny, funny, caring Sarah, who just wanted to feed him and give him a proper home for the night—he couldn’t turn her down.

“Okay, sure,” he said, sniffling.  “Yeah.  That’d be great, Sarah.”

Sarah smiled, and popped up from her table.  She blew him a kiss, and waved goodbye.  “Lovely,” she said, “I’ll make up the bed.  Ring me when you’re through!”

 

Elliot had done a lot of auditions in his life.  He’d tried out for competitions, and game shows, commercials, and once, even a soap opera.  But never in his entire life had he had an audition that went that horribly.

He sat on the sidewalk, waiting for Sarah to get him, with his congested head in his hands, coughing towards the ground.  It wasn’t as though he’d had a bit of a stuffy nose onstage, or sneezed once or twice.  No, Elliot had waited in line for three hours, gotten on the stage, and not been able to get through even one joke without having sneezing fit after sneezing fit.  He’d probably sneezed about, oh, thirty times while he was on the stage, before one of the judges quietly called, “Time,” and he was swept away.

Not one joke.  Barely even a setup.

He couldn’t think about it.

Sarah pulled up a few minutes later and rolled down the window.  “Fancy a ride?” she asked, smiling.

Elliot pulled himself off the sidewalk and attempted to suck in some air through his nose before opening the door and throwing himself on the seat.  “Thadnks,” he mumbled, his voice thoroughly wrecked.

“Oh, hon.  You sound completely shit,” Sarah said, placing a palm on Elliot’s forehead.  “You’re warm.  How did it…?”

“Dond’t ask,” Elliot grumbled, a stuffy little laugh escaping his chapped lips.  “It was a ndightmbare.”

Sarah tsk’d in that same way the woman in front of him in line had, and reached into the back for something.  “Well,” she said, “I’m sure that you still deserve… these.”

She placed a small bouquet of wildflowers on Elliot’s lap, beaming.  “You’re always a star to me, love.  You’ll get ‘em next time.  Everyone has an off day.”

Oh, god.  This was not happening.

“Sar,” Elliot said, evenly, not touching the flowers on his lap.  “Why… why did you get mbe these.”

Sarah, already driving again, raised an eyebrow at him.  “As congratulations.  You deserve it, even if you didn’t get on the program.  Why?  Don’t tell me you’re so self-deprecating you won’t even accept flowers.”

Elliot’s nose twitched, hard, and he attempted to explain before the inevitable fit hit him.  “Sarahh… it’s ndot… id’s dot thadt, id’s thahhhh…”  It was too late; he was hitching, hard; she’d have to figure it out for herself.

As she heard him hitch, Sarah gasped and put a hand to her mouth.  “Ah, shit... Elliot, I’m sorry.  I totally forgot that you’re aller—”

“HUHGTSHHHOO! HuhTSHoo, TSHue, HTSHHoo! Hehh…ETSHH-choo, ETTTSSHHue! HRRSHHoo! HRSSCHHOO!  Huhh…. hehh…. HUHESTCHOO!”

“—allergic,” Sarah finished, as Elliot sneezed and sneezed into cupped hands.  She pulled the flowers off his lap and tossed them out the window, replacing them with the travel-pack of tissues she kept in the cup holder.  “I’m so sorry, hun.”

To his own surprise, Elliot wasn’t pissed.  He itched his eye, and coughed into his hand, and took out a handful of tissues to blow into.  This was not the day he’d been planning; he hadn’t been discovered, he’d embarrassed himself in front of people he respected, and he felt like absolute hell.  But, there was one silver lining to this shit day.

“Don’t be,” he said, blowing his nose again, and sucking in some air through his nose.  “This is actually the first time today that I can breathe.”

"Oh," Sarah said, and giggled a little bit.  "Well, that's lucky!"

Lucky, he thought, and managed a short laugh.  She was right; it was the luckiest he'd been all day.

 

Edited December 27, 2016 by kendisima
i suck at formatting

[Hedgehog]

Awww, poor Elliot! One could really feel his pain...

[gingerdean]

Yayyy!!  Oh my goodness, thank you so much kendisima!! I absolutely loved this!! And happy holidays to you, as well  

 

Wow, there are so many things I love about this, where to even start??  I love how you wrote both the cold and allergies into the fic!  I don't think I even mentioned that in my request form, but that's actually one of my very favorite things, when the two are combined like that! I adore Elliott, and I love the scenario, the embarrassment factor, and OMG the spellings are to die for.  So, so good.

 

A couple of my favorite parts :

On ‎12‎/‎26‎/‎2016 at 11:25 PM, kendisima said:

Elliot sniffed sharply, to attempt to keep from sneezing.  If he knew anything about himself, it was that once he started, he just could not stop. Allergy season was killer, and when he had a cold— unlike now, he reminded himself in vain—his nose became the burden of all burdehh—

"Hhh…hnn…HehITSHH-uee!  GTSHHoo! HUHETSH-uhh!"  Elliot sneezed once onto the mirror, and then into the crook of his arm, misting the bathroom in germs.  God-fucking-dammit.   

OMG, yes

And this:

On ‎12‎/‎26‎/‎2016 at 11:25 PM, kendisima said:

“Yeah,” he said, already hearing the congestion and sore throat taking over his voice.  Why, why today of all days?  “Yeah, I amb.  The—heh—the producer saw mby set two nights ago in San Francisco, and told mbe to audition today.  Apparently, it’s the only one they’re doing in cali—hhh… huh…”  Elliot hitched into his palm, wishing like hell he could just disappear into thin air, somehow.  Maybe he would die of pure embarrassment before he could finish this conversation. 

"HITSHH-uee!  KTSSHH! KTSXH! Huhh…HUHESSHoo!”  He sniffled, fully congested now, into his elbow.  He figured, at that moment, that if a god existed, it was a malevolent one.

“Shit, bless you, bro,” the guy said, digging around in his pockets.

 

LOVED this part- the hitching and interrupted sentences, the embarrassment, and the blessing- I have a huge thing for guy-to-guy blessings, so this I REALLY loved. (and then he's digging in his pockets for a tissue to give Elliott- g'awww!)

Oh and the fit at the end from the flowers, eeee! I love how it hits him so hard, he can't get out what the problem is- It didn't take Sarah too long to figure it out though, lol.

Thank you SO much kendisima, this was fantastic, and I'm super stoked to have been on the receiving end of your amazing gift!  Thank you, thank you!!