Day Three

Even sick people have to eat. This is why mothers give children chicken soup and ginger ale and crackers, in the hopes that it will be kept down and nourish the healing body. She remembers when her mother would carve bananas into little tiny circles and place them next to her bed with a can of 7-Up. She never liked being ill, who does, but she always enjoyed the taste of 7-Up when she was sick. Something about being ill made the soda taste, well, better. The bubbles on the tongue, the sugar in the back of the throat. Maybe it was the unquenchable thirst, akin to an unstoppable itch, and the soda was just scratch you needed to get back to sleep. And the flavor of banana, soft and smooth, and just easy enough on a sore throat. It's odd, she thinks, to remember so fondly the comforts one is given when feeling so poorly.

The fever dreams were the worst. She never knew it was the headaches that caused them, or the blood running through her brain at higher than normal temperatures. Thoughts that ran into other thoughts, like having loud GWAR music thundering in your ears through old-style 70's headphones attached to your ears, and old Looney Toons cartoons stuck on a loop seen through a visor that you can't take off and can't close your eyes to get away from. You put the pillow over you head, crawl further under the covers, twist, turn, toss, clench, and pray that actual sleep will come just to make the craziness end. But until the fever broke, you were stuck with nothing but that. Brief stints of consciousness might break up the insanity, but it wasn't long before you lost the will to stay awake and the terrible fade back to the sight of Sylvester the Cat chasing Tweety Bird with a mallet to the sound of "Slaughter-rama" returned.

Her brother listens to GWAR. She has no idea who introduced him to their music, but it always sounded like the soundtrack to a fever dream. She has to remind herself that she isn't at home, that her brother isn't playing GWAR right now. No, she is at school, in the bed of her dormitory. At the boarding school her parents insisted she attend, which just happened to be on the other side of the country. She tries not to read too much into that. It is the same school her mother attended, after all, and parents have this incredibly odd thing for tradition.

At least Baylor doesn't make her dress up like a complete reject from Angel of Darkness.

"Are you hiding in here all day?" A voice tries to chime in above the roar of GWAR.

She loves October dearly. The girl has been the greatest roommate she could have asked for, up to and including managing to smuggle in bottles of absinthe several times. This last time happened to be this past friday, which, she is absolutely certain, is the reason three days later on monday that she is still feeling like absolute crap.

"Yes," is the only answer that seems appropriate.

October chuckles. "Three days ill now?"

Her roommate plops on the bed next to her. October's weight shifts the balance of the mattress, and both Sylvester and Tweety find themselves rolling downhill. She turns against the new pressure to try and stop them from rolling, but to no avail. She wishes October hadn't done that. Everyone knows that Sylvester and Tweety don't roll downhill.

"I think we can safely rule out hangover at this point," October cooes. "Still, I'd say you're lucky you're not dead. You never drink a whole bottle by yourself."

"Just don't have enough tolerance yet," she mumbles from under the blankets. She loves October, but the girl's presence is exacerbating her headache.

"Oh," comes the response. "So by the end of the semester, you'll be ready to move on to Everclear." October's fingers gently stroke her her head through the covers. Strangely, this helps quite a bit and she pulls the blanket down so that it is no longer between them.

"Anyway, Sleeping Pukey," October continues, "at fifty pounds a bottle plus shipping, that had better not happen again unless you're planning to buy your own from now on. That was supposed to last longer than a weekend."

"I didn't puke," she protests.

"Sure you didn't."

"I didn't," she insists. "I know when there's a conversation with Ralph on the big white phone and there was no such talk."

"So.....I take it you're skipping class today."

She nods. Her head is threatening to split itself in pieces every time Sylvester misses with that motherfucking mallet. If only he'd get Tweety once, this stupid dream would be over. Factoring in trigonometry on top of that is out of the question.

"Vines is going to throw a fit if you miss another practice. You'd better contact the Health Center to at least get it on record."

"I will," she replies, "if I'm this way tomorrow." She pulls the blankets back over her head. It's too bright.

Sylvester just smashed a china cabinet trying to get Tweety. The sounds of glass and porcelain being placed upon wood reach her through the fabic, she realizes.

"Water and apple slices," October says, this time with genuine worry. "Make certain you don't really get yourself sick."

"You're gonna be late."

"Seriously," October insists. "H20. Vitamins."

The door opens and shuts.

October is right, and she knows it. One hand instinctively reaches out, snags an apple slice, and pulls it back under the covers.

It doesn't occur to her that she had no idea where on the end table October had placed the plate before she reached for it.

Day Four:

The headache has begun to recede. It hasn't completely vanished, but it has faded enough into the background that she can function again. She is convinced that she contracted some manner of viral infection; all the painkillers and cold medicine she took didn't make a dent in the pounding symphony of Sylvester's mallet. No hangover could hit her that hard.

First period Spanish is blissfully easy in comparison to recent weeks. Reading the language, she finds, is unexpectedly simple. The clarity with which the meaning leaps from the page is welcome, especially after spending three days unable to do anything but hide her darkened dorm room. Perhaps she merely needed to step away from school work for a while and reboot her brain.

The same holds true for Pre-Calc in third period, though with slightly less intensity. Part of her is undeniably proud of grasping the concepts so easily on the first go around. Usually, she has to mull it over a few times while doing homework. Tonight, she happily reflected, would require no time wasted on mathematics.

The rest of the day goes much the same, at least until fencing practice, where everything changes. The epee feels different in her hand. Many fencers have described the sensation of the weapon becoming part of the body, but this goes beyond that. From the moment her fingers grasp the grip, she is completely, as some athletes phrase, "in the zone." Not just the arm that holds it aloft, but her entire body, comes alive. Clarity of mind immediately settles in and she feels utter undefeatable.

"Not a single one of you may defeat me," she announces before practice gets underway, feeling every bit the Master of Tai Kwan Leep she suddenly remembers from a Dr. Demento CD an old friend back home used to play. She intends it as a joke, but enough sincerity leaks through that it is only half-way taken as such.

Normally, she isn't the best fencer on the team. One of the better ones, true, but certainly not the best. Her boast garners chuckles from the other girls on the team that normally have edge on her. Kellie McCreary, the blonde team captain who has yet to lose in competition this year, accepts her challenge.

She does more than defeat her; she does so without being touched once by McCreary's weapon, and completely disarms her twice. This display does not discourage her remaining teammates, and one by one, she triumphs over the entire team in more or less the same fashion. Her endurance does not fail her; she overhears mumbling from some that she should be getting tired, but that's far from the case. She has the energy to make it through the entire practice without once becoming fatigued.