Work Text:
The instant he stopped sweating Keith knew he’d fucked up.
It wasn’t that the temperature had gotten any cooler; as a matter of fact he knew that they were progressing towards noon, the hottest part of the day, and there was only more heat, more sweat to come. Logically, his t-shirt should’ve been getting soaked in sweat, stained from dark grey to black.
The fact that it didn't change, stayed grey was the giveaway.
Keith remembered his father going through the symptoms of heatstroke with him every morning before they went on a bike adventure. Wear sunscreen, he’d tell Keith, lathering it messily over the two of them. If you feel tired or achy, ill and thirsty, the sun's gotten to you. Never let that happen.
Keith had been a good kid, then, and he’d nodded obediently. Wearing sunscreen was a habit that he’d continued throughout all the years of foster care, the lotion readily available because the foster parents didn’t want to be responsible for him getting heat exhaustion. They’d always had water, too, and Keith had been careful to not let himself get dehydrated.
Now, though, Keith wasn’t a good kid, and he lived on his own, paying for himself with a purse that got smaller by the day.
And sunscreen was damn expensive.
However, it turned out that skimping on the essential that had been drummed into Keith since childhood had been a truly terrible idea.
He was shivering, though the sun was beating down. Heat was rising in waves from the rocky desert floor, but he— he caught a glimpse in the cracked window— he was pale and clammy.
He was such a fucking idiot. How had he been so damn stupid?
There were better things to do than berate himself, though, like going inside to the shade before it got any worse.
He entered the house and stood, swaying, in the doorway, assaulted by a sudden bout of dizziness. “Fuck.”
This might actually be bad.
He only made it a few steps before he collapsed, knees buckling so that he only just made it onto the sofa. The world spun for a few moments. “Fuck,” he mumbled again.
If this had happened but a few months ago, Shiro would’ve been here to help, to get medicine, to call 911. Well, this wouldn’t’ve happened at all with Shiro here, because Shiro was smart and Shiro had the funds to get the damn sunscreen.
Now, Keith remembered bitterly, Shiro was gone. He was on his own.
He was on his own, and it was getting worse.
His arms were red, the fresh pinkish-red of skin that had been exposed to the sun’s rays for too long, and they were beginning to sting. He lifted them from the sofa’s side, trying to avoid any kind of abrasion because that just made it worse, just made them feel itchy and scratchy and painful.
As he may there the cramps started in his legs, making walking a damn near impossibility, and he felt his heartbeat starting to rise, pounding harder, harder, drumming through his ears like he was sprinting for his life.
It was heatstroke, that was for sure.
“Damn it!” he growled, because he didn’t know what else to do and there was nothing to say to make this better. “Damn it!”
As time passed, Keith shivered, sweating on occasion, then stopping. He was so thirsty; he stumbled to the tap to get a drink and back to the sofa again, head spinning. Sipped at it, slopping it clumsily over himself as he raised it with trembling fingers. A waste.
He shuddered, wearily returning to the tap to get more, mouth dry.
Night slipped into day’s place, and it kept getting worse. Keith was hot. Hot, even though the darkness outside indicated that he should be shivering without his jacket, without his shoes.
Heat stroke is a killer, his dad had said. If you get too hot, you’re done for.
Keith was too hot.