Symptoms include self pity on Hospital Wing

Kir McLeod

April 14, 2018 7:09 AM

Symptoms include self pity by Kir McLeod

This was what you got for being nice. Of course, Nathaniel had tried to warn him off, and he wouldn't exactly have changed the fact that he had helped either him or Georgia, or gone to visit Zevalyn, especially as - with the fever doing the rounds, and being the same thing as all the accidental magic - who knew when and how exactly he'd been exposed to it. Still, it was easy to feel grumpy now that he was actually feeling ill, especially when he questioned where exactly all his niceness had got him. He had woken up in the early hours of the morning, sweating and shivering, and all he'd wanted to do was pull the covers tighter around himself and go back to sleep. But who was going to look after him? Answer, no one. He roomed by himself. He wasn't sure that he was close enough friends with anyone that they would notice his absence. Sure, there were people who liked him, who he sat with sometimes for breakfast, but he wasn't sure how long it would take anyone to notice he was missing if he didn't. If it had been a school day, he guessed his teachers would mark him absent and then maybe investigate. He liked to think that if it was a D&D day, he'd be missed come evening, and that they might try to find out why. But right now was the holidays and… well, ok, it was weird that they were stuck at school, so it wasn't exactly a normal situation but the fact remained that it was down to him to look after himself because no one else was going to, and that he was left with the distinct feeling that if he came down ill on an average Friday night, it was possible that no one would even notice until Monday morning, by which point he could be dead if it was something serious.

Around seven, he dragged himself out of bed, deciding that he would be better off in the hospital wing. He picked up his book from the bedside table, figuring he might well need it later, especially if no one came to visit him. He was rereading ‘The Mouse Wizard,' one of his favourite childhood books. It was about a mouse that inhabited the corridors of Hogwarts, observing the human goings on. There were a few different titles in the series… Sometimes the Mouse Wizard meddled with the humans, righting wrongs, sorting out bullies and the like. Sometimes he snaffled potions ingredients and got up to his own magic. He was kind of surprised the library here had it, seeing as it was more a middle school kind of reading level - designed to make the idea of going away to boarding school seem appealing and fun, rather than scary. He'd checked it out of the library when he'd found out they were stuck here for Midterm, and he'd felt the need for some home comfort. Which was another sucky thing about being ill… If they hadn't had the stupid quarantine, he'd be home by now, and his parents and aunts would have taken turns to come and play games with him or read to him.

He let himself into the hospital wing.

“I don't feel well,” he complained, when he saw the healer, sounding both pathetic and miserable, finding his lip trembled slightly as he said it. He wished he could have been at home. Or at least have had more friends, so that he knew someone would care that he was sick. The healer put him back to bed, with a dose of Fever Be Gone, and some sympathetic words, although it didn't do much to immediately make him feel physically or emotionally any better.

“Do you want some company?” she offered, seeing how miserable he seemed - it had to suck. No one liked being sick, but sick, during the holidays, and away from family… Poor kid.
He did want company. But he knew by that she meant hers, rather than magically making his family or barely existent friends appear, so he politely declined, picking ‘The Mouse Wizard' back up instead. He read a couple of pages but by the third page he realised he'd reread it several times without noticing what it said, in spite of the fact that it was both aimed at eight year olds and a book he knew inside out. He put it back down on his bedside table and fell asleep.

OOC - as all staff are able to write for the Healer, I figured I'd include her in Kir's post to make things move faster.

13 Kir McLeod Symptoms include self pity 366 Kir McLeod 1 5

Zevalyn Ives

May 02, 2018 12:13 PM

I may have a cure for that by Zevalyn Ives

Zev had breakfasted at the Teppenpaw table as she did almost all the time lately. Mainly that was because Georgia was there, and there were fewer books to spill things on in Teppenpaw, but the last couple of weeks, since he came to visit her when she was sick, she'd also made a point of smiling and waving at Kir. He wasn't there today.

After asking around a bit after finishing her breakfast with Georgia, and he still hadn't shown up, she asked around a bit until she found somebody who reported seeing him heading toward the Hospital Wing.

This put her in a bit of a conundrum as it was midterm and she had no fifth year Aladren-grade class notes to bring him, as he had declared would be a ‘tempting' gift. He'd kind of implied balloons were good too before they got off topic on the evils of gendering color, but she didn't know where to get balloons at short notice while quarantined in school.

She supposed she could bring him his Christmas gift early, but then she wouldn't have anything to give him on Christmas. She wasn't sure that while recovering from a fever was really the best time to read Homer anyway. (Because what else besides a two-pack of the Illiad and Odyssey does one buy for an adventuring poet once you determine that lutes are not a thing you can just buy on a whim.)

So she triple checked with Georgia that Kir wasn't her soulmate and the only boy she would ever consider going to a ball with, then spent way too long making Kir a get well card.

It was just as well, he was asleep when she got there. But the healer said he ought to be waking up soon and if she was quiet and didn't disturb him, she could wait. So she pulled up a chair near his bed, and started reading his book about a magical mouse while she waited.

She hadn't quite finished the short children's book when he stirred. The healer bustled over and did some medical checks to make sure his fever was under control, but soon enough she bustled away again leaving them in relative privacy. “Hi,” she said, and offered him the card she made.

The front was traditional enough with a full rainbow, balloons (in every color except pink and blue) and the words “Get Well Soon!”

Inside, though, she'd mixed things up. Kir seemed like the kind of guy who liked bucking traditional gender roles, so she figured this would go over all right. When he opened it up, he'd find that, instead of some kind of inspirational message or cutesy joke about his recovering health, what it actually read was:

Erevan,
After your long rest to cure all your hit point damage, would you join me in the Dance Room of MARS in preparation for our date at the ball?
Yours Valorously,
Amber

She smiled and fidgeted as he read it, not quite as confident in real life as she had been the letter, which had been signed in Amber's name, and Amber was always sure of herself, whereas Zevalyn was, well, less so. Still confident, but not as aggressively so. And she also worried a little about whether he would have preferred being asked as Kir rather than Erevan. But it was done now and she couldn't take it back.

“So, um,” she said, smiling nervously, once she had allowed enough time for him to read it, “Do you want to go to the Ball with me, Kir?”

OOC: I'm assuming the Mouse Wizard is a beginner's chapter book that can be read in less than an hour by advanced readers. If it's longer than that either she's exaggerating on how close to finishing it she was, or Kir slept longer than expected. :)

1 Zevalyn Ives I may have a cure for that 380 Zevalyn Ives 0 5

Kir

May 03, 2018 10:14 AM

It seems to be working wonders by Kir

Kir dozed for a few hours, but he'd had a fairly full night's rest, and so by mid-morning, once the fever had had its edge taken off by the medication, he found his eyes opening. And Amber sitting there reading. He questioned for a second whether he was still dreaming, but if he was then every other detail about this was the most mundanely ordinary dream he'd ever had. Before he had a chance to say hello, the healer had come over, and was asking him how he felt. On the one hand, the answer was that he was feeling pretty happy right now. But from a medical point of view the first descriptor he could come up with was ‘still really crappy,' but he was pretty sure that wasn't a word you were meant to say to grown-ups.

“A bit less awful?” he rephrased. The thermometre was put back in his mouth, and announced that his fever was now ninety-nine, and that it advised him to stay in bed. Whilst that was down from the hundred and three it had been that morning, that definitely explained why he was still feeling so rough, and he wasn't inclined to argue with its advice.

“At least you're heading in the right direction,” the Healer smiled at him, “Your first dose of medication's probably still working on you too, so I don't think you need any more for now. Maybe after lunch. I'll leave you to your visitor,” she smiled approvingly at Zevalyn, glad that Kir was getting visited in return after his kindness to everyone else.

“Thanks,” Kir managed to mumble politely. He sat up a bit, so he could talk to Zevalyn more easily, the back of his bed automatically adjusting itself as he did so.

He was no longer shivery. He felt hot and sweaty now, and fairly gross. He was pretty sure he looked gross too. He could tell from how it felt that his mouse-brown hair was all plastered down with sweat and he suspected he was all pasty looking. He felt pasty. He also hadn't bothered to shower before shuffling down to the hospital wing, so in addition to looking bad, and feeling bad, he suspected he smelt pretty bad too. Hopefully that wasn't noticeable from the distance Zevalyn was sitting at. There was also the fact, of which he was suddenly acutely aware, that he was wearing pyjamas. Not that there was anything wrong, as such, with his pyjamas - they really were very nice ones, fleecy and in McLeod tartan (it had become a bit of a traditional ‘going away to school' present from his family, seeing as if they waited until Christmas to give them to him, half the colder months where he'd need them would be over). But, nice as they were, it felt distinctly weird to be wearing them in front of Zevalyn. When he had thought about her visiting, he hadn't really thought through all the embarrassing parts of being ill - it would have been nice if she could somehow have visited him whilst he was sick without those having to be part of it. But that wasn't exactly an option, an on balance he was still heart-thumping-just-that-little-bit-faster happy that she was here.

“Hi,” he smiled at her She was here… She'd noticed that he was missing, and she'd come to see him. How crappy he'd felt that morning already seemed like a dim and distant memory. And that was before she'd even presented him with the card. “Wow, thank you,” he appreciatively studied the front. She had clearly put some time and effort into making it, and she seemed to know him pretty well already. “It's really cute,” he smiled,. He opened the card, and although he was expecting a fairly standard ‘get well' message, he was curious to see whether he got a ‘To Kir' or a ‘Dear Kir,' whether it was ‘from' or ‘love' Zevalyn. Any little linguistic things that could be as easily explained by them being polite letter writing form, but which he could have fun over-analysing to death, trying to decide whether she liked him back, or whether that was just wishful thinking. Of course, the card was addressed to Erevan, which he appreciated. His eyes worked over the message and – right. Well. Once his brain had done the necessary leap to work out that she had switched from talking about the game to real life, then that was pretty unambiguous. He looked up, grinning so broadly that it almost certainly answered her question, although she still repeated it out loud.

“Yes,” he answered, before she'd had time to finish pronouncing the question mark. “I would love to.” He temporarily entertained the thought of leaning forward and hugging her before remembering the fact that he was both severely gross and wearing tartan pyjamas. Although he was now looking substantially better than he had when he'd first opened his eyes.

13 Kir It seems to be working wonders 366 Kir 0 5

Zevalyn

May 08, 2018 12:42 PM

Sorry, I might have made things worse again by Zevalyn

”Yes,” the word released all the nerves that had gathered while Kir read the card and they scattered and skittered away into whatever dark corners hid such things when they weren't actively bothering her.

“Oh good,” she breathed out in relief. “Georgia thought you might be gay, so I wasn't completely sure you'd be interested,” she blabbered, and then immediately kicked herself (figuratively) for letting that slip out aloud. He'd said yes, so either that was quite soundly wrong, or it was complicated enough that the hospital wing, with Kir still having a mild fever, was probably not the ideal place to discuss it.

“I mean,” she continued in spite of herself, “there were a good number of indicators to suggest you were interested, too, so I'm glad I wasn't reading those wrong.”

This wasn't going as well as she'd have hoped. Best to change the subject to something safe and easy. Like books. Books were always good topics. She noticed the one she was still holding in her lap, with a finger marking her place near the end. The light shawl she'd been wearing as an extra barrier against the winter chill had fallen over it, hiding it slightly from view but she pushed that aside so Kir could see what she was referencing better.

“If that's not something you want to talk about here and now though, I'd be happy to discuss some of the themes in the Mouse Wizard instead. Is it part of a series, or a stand alone story?”

1 Zevalyn Sorry, I might have made things worse again 380 Zevalyn 0 5

Kir

May 12, 2018 11:22 AM

I'll recover by Kir

“Common misconception,” he smiled wryly when she said Georgia thought he was gay. Ok, so two people perhaps wasn't an epidemic, but he doubted that Jozua and Georgia were alone in their assumptions. Zev seemed to understand that he both was not gay, and had been flirting with her, which was the main thing. He knew she needed a partner for the opening dance as a prefect, but her comments seemed to imply this was more than that. It was a date date. Not a convenient arrangement type date. “I'm glad you could see through the cloud of rainbows though,” he grinned.

Zev seemed keen to change the subject, or rather thought that he might be. For a moment, he was amazed to find that she was reading the same book as him, especially given how childish it was. And then he realised she wasn't. Or rather, she hadn't been, but had picked up his book from his bedside table. The book that was aimed at eight year olds and actually even had pictures. And she was suggesting they had an honest-to-Merlin literary discussion of it.

“I don't normally read books that childish,” he clarified, his face glowing an impressive shade of red, “I… I used to read the series a lot when I was younger, and I was just… feeling homesick - are you uncomfortable with the fact that other people think I'm gay?” he switched back. “I mean… I can see why that's not a fun conversation to have to have repeatedly, but well… It's probably a realistic hazard of going on a date with me.”

13 Kir I'll recover 366 Kir 0 5