Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also lay to) to rest, to relax.

1856		C. Abbey diary 28 Apr. in Gosnell Before the Mast (1989) 30: I ‘Laid up’ last night sick. [Ibid.] 3 Aug. 65: We did nothing after 8 bells so I ‘laid to’ with a book.
1880		Leicester Chron. 6 Nov. 9/1: About this time he had a very severe illness, but where he was ‘laid up’ in tramp’s parlance, is not known.
1890		Sporting Times 1 Mar. 3/2: Billy Wright is laid up at the Grand, and I was paying a visit of sympathy.
1900		Boy’s Own Paper 15 Dec. 168: We were told to lay up till further orders, and thought ourselves safe for the night.
1916		J. Lait ‘Omaha Slim’ in Beef, Iron and Wine (1917) 109: If ye wanna do a couple o’ overtime tricks ye kin lay up fer all winter.
1920		R. Lardner Big Town 45: I’d been laid up mean wile with the Scotch influenza.
1937		‘Boxcar Bertha’ Sister of the Road (1975) 160: She said she and a barber ‘laid up’ in one [i.e. a boxcar] the first time she took a man.
1941		K. Tennant Battlers 201: The Stray and Jimmy had explained to everyone that Snow had left them with a friendly family in Logan while she was laid up with some mysterious ailment.
a.1956		‘The Junkie’ in D. Wepman et al. Life (1976) 101: I was laying up in my pad, no longer sad.
1969		C. Himes Blind Man with a Pistol (1971) 36: What’s unusual about a black brother stealing a whitey’s pants who’s laying up somewhere with a black whore?
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 66: Come Sunday I lay up like a respectable citizen.
1982		W.D. Myers Won’t Know Till I Get There 117: Sometimes I used to be glad just to get out of bed and watch television so I wouldn’t, you know, lay up and think about things.

2. (US) to die.

1883

‘Mark Twain’ Life on the Mississippi (1914) 29: It’s all on account of the water the people drink before they laid up.

3. to live, to be in a place.

1922		S. Lewis Babbitt (1974) 159: Just because they happen to lay up in a big wad.
1929		A.J. Barr Let Tomorrow Come 149: There ain’t a real dick goin’ that can’t spot you after you lay up a few years in one o’ these places.

4. (US, also lie up) to hide, to take refuge.

1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 88: If a man kicked free of America, he could lay up with Mr. Oakes.
1938		D. Runyon ‘The Three Wise Guys’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 404: The Dutchman [...] lays up in a town by the name of New Brunswick.
1956		‘Charles Raven’ Und. Nights 12: He would [...] lie up somewhere, with that timeless patience which all great Creeps possess, until zero hour.
1969		H. Rap Brown Die, Nigger Die! 35: [T]here was this old white cop who used to patrol [...] in front of the elementary school. [...] I organized some little brothers to lay up on the hill and throw some rocks at him.
1969		R.R. Lingeman Drugs from A to Z (1970) 140: lay up Having acquired a large supply of drugs, to withdraw from hustling and lie about one’s room using the drugs, as in ‘I used the money to buy a big stash of heroin and decided to just lay up for the next couple of weeks’.
1981		J. Ellroy Brown’s Requiem 11: I laid up at another friend’s crib.
2003		G. Pelecanos Soul Circus 162: You can lay up here for a little while, I guess.

5. (US black) to have a sexual relationship.

1953		‘John Eagle’ Hoodlums (2021) 7: [W]ith some luck he would lay up with some broad like Jeannie. Kirk imagined the soft flesh in his palms.
1971		R.D. Pharr S.R.O. (1998) 16: Barflies. There’s no torture on earth worth than that feeling of loneliness you get after laying up with one of those.
1986		D. Barker (con. 1925) Life in Jazz 76: My youngest daughter Beulah got excited like a she-cat in heat, and one of them rogues went as far as to fool her and lay up with her.

6. see lay back v.