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“Hey, you feeling alright?” Tav asked Gale as he had his fourth coughing fit since coming home from work.
“Just a scratchy throat. Nothing to be concerned about,” he replied, then coughed again.
“Bullshit. You’re getting sick, aren’t you?”
He sighed. “I perhaps feel a little under the weather. Nothing a good night’s rest won’t cure.”
Tav raised an eyebrow.
“My love, it’s nothing to be concerned about.”
***
Gale fell asleep on the couch shortly after dinner, something he had never done since Tav had known him. She let him sleep for a while until she noticed he was shivering. She touched his forehead to discover that he had a fever. She left him for a minute to wash her hands and to find something she could fashion into a mask. She had no desire to catch whatever it was he had.
“Gale,” she said gently, trying not to startle him. “You need to go to bed. You’re sick.”
He groaned and tried to sit up. His head swam and his eyes hurt. Tav helped him up.
“It’s cold in here.”
“No, you just have a fever. Come on, I’ll help you to bed and get you settled.”
“My love, what is on your face?”
“A mask. I don’t want whatever those germ-bag kids gave to you.”
Gale snorted then started coughing. Once he had caught his breath, Tav helped him up off the couch and they made their way into the bedroom.
“Get into bed. I’m going to take your temperature. If it’s too high, you’re getting some ibuprofen.” She had brought an old mercury thermometer with her, not wanting to rely on something with a battery that she couldn’t replace.
“Isn’t that what you take for your cramps? How will that help?”
“It does all kinds of helpful things; cramps, inflammation, and it will help reduce your fever. You’ll feel better, but it won’t cure you. Also, you’re calling out sick tomorrow.”
“But…”
“Listen. I lived through a global pandemic. The absolute stupidest thing you can do when you are sick is go out in public where you can spread it around. Home until you have been fever-free at least 24 hours.”
“A global pandemic? Like a plague?” He had barely been a man when Featherlung made its rounds, but it stayed mainly contained to certain areas of the city.
“Yes. And the number one rule was to stay home when you are sick, which is what you will be doing. Now, get into bed,” she ordered before heading to the medicine cabinet where she grabbed the thermometer.
Gale shivered as he changed into his night clothes. He crawled into bed and pulled all the blankets up, even the heavy quilt they kept at the foot of the bed for cold nights. Tav came back in and sat next to him at the edge of the bed.
“Put this under your tongue for 2 minutes,” she instructed as she handed him the small glass stick.
“What does this do?” he mumbled around it.
“No talking for 2 minutes,” she said, “it skews the results. It will tell me your internal temperature. You should be around 37 degrees. A proper fever is at about 38. I will start panicking if you’re over 39.”
Gale had never seen a device that could measure your exact blood temperature. He wondered what other knowledge she had about modern medicine. When about two minutes had passed, she took it out of his mouth and read it. She frowned.
“38 and a half. You get some ibuprofen. Do you want it with water or juice?”
At the mention of liquid, Gale realized he was suddenly quite thirsty. “Juice, if we have some, please.”
“I’ll be right back.”
Tav went downstairs to the kitchen to discover there was no juice – she would have to make some for tomorrow. She grabbed some water and the bottle of ibuprofen and headed back up to the bedroom. Gale had fallen asleep in the five minutes she had been gone. She hated to wake him again, but she would worry all night if his fever didn’t go down.
“Hey, take this and I’ll let you get back to sleep.”
Gale sat up and took the pills and immediately laid back down. “Are you coming to bed?”
“I’ll be sleeping in another room until you are better. But if you need me, just call.”
Gale was asleep again before she had even left the room.
Downstairs, Tav dug around until she found the sending stone Gale had made so that she could call his mother.
“Gale’s sick. Does he have a favourite comfort dish?”
“Have a couple of recipes. Do you need me to come by? Or send Tara over?” Morena replied after a moment.
“Send with Tara. Don’t want you to get sick. Thank you. Appreciate it.”
Tav set to work scrubbing down every surface that Gale might have touched recently, desperately wishing she had Lysol. About ten minutes later, Tara appeared with Morena’s recipes and some ingredients that she thought Tav might not have in stock.
“What’s wrong with the poor boy?” Tara asked, concerned. Gale didn’t get sick very often.
“Likely something he picked up at the Academy. He’s been coughing and has a fever. I gave him some of the medication I brought with me to help reduce his fever.”
“Oh dear. I think I’ll go up and keep watch, if you don’t mind. I’ve always cuddled with him when he’s unwell.”
“By all means,” Tav said. “I’m going to get started on the soup. Oh, and do you know how I can get in touch with the Academy? I forbade him from going to work until he is better.”
“Oh, I’ll take care of that for you, dear, don’t you worry about that.”
“Thanks Tara.”
***
Tara entered the bedroom to find Gale fast asleep on his side. She gingerly stepped up onto his side and laid down with her head on his hip and body sprawled out up to his ribs. She noted he was warm, but not terribly so, the medication having done its job. She began to purr and fell asleep herself.
***
It was nearly 10 the next morning before Gale awoke, disoriented and dizzy, though he felt somewhat better than he did the night before. He looked over at the clock on the mantle and nearly had a heart attack at how late it was, and he hadn’t contacted anyone at the academy. He called for Tav.
“Coming!” Tav came in a couple of minutes later, mask on her face, with some toast and juice. She set it down on the night table.
“Now, before you panic, Tara was already in touch with the Academy. I think she ended up teaching your first class,” she said as she passed him the cup. “Apparently, a quarter of the students are also out sick along with a handful of professors, so don’t feel bad about missing work.” Gale visibly relaxed.
“When did you talk to Tara?” he asked, grabbing a piece of toast.
“She came over last evening. I asked Morena for the recipes to some of your comfort dishes and she brought them over. She slept with you most of the night. Anyway, I made your mother’s chicken and rice soup. I’ll heat some up for you when you’re up for it.”
“My love, you didn’t have to do all that, though I am exceptionally grateful for it.” He had been a child the last time someone looked after him like this when he was sick. It felt wrong to let her.
“Consider it part of my wifely duties,” she laughed. “How are you feeling overall?” She put a hand to his forehead. “You’re warm, but not as hot as you were last evening, so that’s good.”
“Somewhat better, but not a great deal. I shall be glad to rest today. Although I wouldn’t mind a change of scenery.”
After Gale washed up a bit, she set him up out on the terrace to get some fresh air and brought him some of the soup she made.
“Tav, how did you get this to taste exactly like my mother’s? I’ve tried making this a hundred times and it never turns out like hers.”
“She told me the secret ingredient.” Morena had sent a note with the recipe letting her know about the secret ingredient. For years his mother had been telling him the secret ingredient was love, but in reality it was a splash of vinegar.
“I swear to all the gods if you tell me the secret ingredient is love…” Tav only grinned.
“Tav…”
“Gale…”
“Really? You won’t tell me?”
“I am sworn to secrecy. Besides, what would you need me for if you can make your own soup?”
“I need you for plenty of things, some of which I would demonstrate for you were I not ill.”
“You can show me when you’re not contagious. I’ll leave you to it. Call if you need anything.”
***
That evening Gale’s temperature spiked again, which didn’t necessarily surprise Tav, but it got ridiculously high very quickly.
“Jesus Christ, Gale,” she said as she pulled the thermometer out of his mouth and read it. It was well over 39 degrees, dangerously close to 40. He didn’t have the energy to say anything to her. He stared at her with glassy eyes.
She had to haul him upright so that he could take the ibuprofen. He shivered as the water went down his throat. Even room temperature water felt too cold. He moaned as she laid him back down. Everything hurt.
She went to stand to get him a cool cloth for his head and he grabbed at her hand. “Please,” he croaked out, not wanting to be alone.
“I’ll be right back. I’m just going to get you a cloth and some more water, okay?” He grunted and closed his eyes.
By the she made it back into the room, he had started to hallucinate. Over the next hour or so, he thrashed around, spoke to people who weren’t there, called out for Mystra a couple of times and fell onto the floor trying to get out of bed. Tav had a hell of a time trying to get him back into it.
The worst of it was when he tried casting spells in his delirium. Tav was over by the dresser when she saw he was he started to glow orange. He was going to cast something with fire.
“Fuck fuck fuck!” She cursed as she ran across the bedroom and leapt onto the bed to restrain his arms. She had only touched him once before when he was casting something and gave herself a good zap over it, but this time it was hot; she winced, willing herself to keep hold. He yelled out the verbal component of Fireball, but Tav had been able to disrupt enough of the somatic that nothing happened. She straddled his waist and held his arms down as he struggled to cast something else, and stayed there longer still once he had settled into a restless sleep, terrified that he would do it again.
Eventually she let him go and got off of him. Her hands were red and raw, which she would take over their home burning to the ground. It hurt like hell, though. There were some healing potions downstairs, but she didn’t dare leave him alone long enough to get one.
She pulled one of the chairs by the fireplace over to the end of the bed and sat down, exhausted and sore. She spent the rest of the night dozing off and on, checking him every so often.
***
Gale woke sometime in the late morning, soaked in sweat. His fever had finally broken at some point overnight. He sat up, his head still hurting, but he felt a hundred times better than he had the night before. He looked over to see Tav asleep in the chair with her feet up on the end of the bed. He didn’t remember much of last evening, but it must have been bad if she risked sleeping in the same room as him while he was still sick.
“Tav, love?” he called gently to her. She immediately opened her eyes and went to his side. She put the back of her hand to his face and found it cool and damp.
“Thank fucking Christ,” she sighed in relief. “Feeling okay?”
“Much better, thank you. Are you alright?” He was concerned at how concerned she had been.
“Your fever got dangerously high and you started hallucinating. It was…not good.”
“What happened? I don’t remember any of it.”
“Besides talking to people who weren’t there, calling for Mystra and falling out of bed? You tried to cast Fireball.”
“I did what now?” Gale looked at her, stunned.
“I had to jump on you to make you stop. So, if you have a bruise on your arm, that’s why.”
“Gods, had I been alone…”
“Yes, I know. I am very glad I stayed with you last night.”
“And I called for Mystra? I’m scared to ask.”
“I don’t have to tell you if you don’t want to know.”
“You’d better tell me. Then I will know how much apologizing I need to do to either of you.”
Tav snorted. “You both asked her to take you back and called her a ‘fucking ho-bag’. Apparently, I need to stop saying earth slang around you. You’re gonna get in trouble.”
“Gods below,” he muttered as he rubbed his forehead. Before they got married, Tav had convinced him to try to make amends with Mystra, despite what she had done to them, and he had done so. They had pissed off enough gods, she said, and didn’t need this hanging over their heads. Now he was going to have to leave her another offering to forgive his newest transgression.
“Don’t worry too much about it. Surely, she understands that you can’t control what you do or say when you are that sick. I’ll even pop over to her shrine later today and drop something in her dish, if you feel that bad.”
***
“Tell me about the plague you lived through,” Gale asked her as they sat out on the terrace, three days after he nearly burned the tower down. He was finally well enough that Tav deemed him safe to be around without a mask on.
“We didn’t call it a plague, though I suppose technically it was. There was another pandemic where the illness was specifically named ‘The Plague’, but that was centuries before I existed. Anyway, it started about 4 years before we met. It was a respiratory illness, or rather still is, I presume, that originated on the other side of the world from where I lived and spread quickly through people travelling. For some people it didn’t present any symptoms at all, and they were just carriers and in others, it killed them outright, but there was a lot of in between. Some who got it, it was like nothing more than a cold and others had some really bizarre long-term effects. The first year was surreal. We were told to stay home as much as possible, people were hoarding food and toilet paper, of all things, and we weren’t supposed to associate with anyone outside of your immediate household. If you did have to travel, there were strict quarantine rules in place. Once vaccines became available, restrictions were slowly lifted and by about the third year, life was almost completely back to normal. It was a very strange period of time.”
“Vaccines?” Gale asked.
“Inoculations? Immunizations?” Gale shook his head.
“Another marvel of modern medicine, I suppose. Vaccines were developed for different diseases and illnesses that were meant to either prevent or lessen the effect of the illness. Some you would get during childhood, some were yearly for illnesses that mutated a lot, and a couple were saved for when you were unlucky enough to have been in contact with the infection, like rabies.”
“Your world has a cure for rabies?”
“Not a cure, just a preventative measure. Only a handful of people in all of documented history have survived getting rabies.”
“Dreadful disease, rabies,” Gale noted.
“Yep,” she agreed.
“How are your hands?” Gale had felt twice as bad when he discovered that she had been burnt trying to stop his spell casting. “I still feel terrible about that.”
“They’re fine,” she said as she wiggled her fingers. “Healing potion cleaned it right up. Don’t worry about it. You couldn’t help it.”
“I know, but hate that I did anything that caused you pain, on purpose or not.” He picked up her hand and kissed her palm. She smiled at him.
“Are you going back to work tomorrow?” He had been fever free for more than 24 hours, but he took the day off anyway; he was still having coughing fits if he did too much.
“Possibly, though if the cough hasn’t improved, I may send my simulacrum in my place.”
“Good,” she nodded. “Hard to teach if you can’t stop coughing.”
“And are you going to sleep in our bed tonight?” He asked. “I believe I said that I would show you some of the reasons why I need you when I was no longer contagious.”
Tav laughed. “Yes, I remember something about that. If you think you can do the deed without coughing to death, I’m down.”
He laughed, then started coughing. “Well,” he said once he had calmed down, “perhaps we can do something less vigorous.”
“I’m sure we can think of something.”