Chapter Text
Charlie can feel Mary's eyes on her all the way from the door to the corner of the room where she's sitting. 'Feel', because she has her head in her hands and can't look up without the vertigo setting in again.
"No," she mumbles. "Don't ask."
The nurse keeps quiet for a second, then sighs. "Are you alright?"
"Ugh."
"Party night? Rough morning?"
She can't even think about partying now. She's about to throw up. "Don't speak. Please. And no, no partying. But I've been up all morning feeling sick. Without the drinks."
When Charlie glances up, Mary is already in front of her, sitting down at the table. "I hope you didn't bring a bug in here."
"Nah, Tom or Evie don't have it either."
"Oh, you've been staying with them the past few days?"
"Yup," she nods - carefully. "I think I've seen them almost every day since we came back from Majorca."
“ You definitely needed that holiday. But maybe that’s the cause for this?” Mary’s gesticulating and even that bit of motion she’s watching makes Charlie more nauseous somehow. She puts her head back into her hands, taking deep breaths.
“Can’t be food poisoning, ‘s too late for tha’” she says through gritted teeth. “And would be weird for just me to have caught something else.”
Mary hums in the affirmative, then from the sound of it seems to get up. “I’ll get you some water. Keep breathing.”
Charlie does, and even this small task feels humongous. And then...impossible. Pressing a hand to her mouth, she lurches to her feet and stumbles over to the sink to upend her guts.
Blergh, disgusting. She’s seen hell in her job but somehow her own vomit tops it all. She doesn’t get sick, dammit. She just doesn’t. She can’t. Heaving, hands clutching the sink, she tries to get herself under control.
" Ugh ." Not helpful at all, Mary.
"You're a nurse, you should be fine with it," Charlie mumbles and then slowly lets go of the sink. If it wasn't for the vertigo, she'd be fine again.
"Yeah, no." She touches Charlie's shoulder lightly, pulling a bit. "Come on, let's get you over to the table. And then home, please."
They make it to the chairs, water being put in front of her, and Charlie takes small sips. "'m not sick."
"Eh." Mary points to the sink. "I think you are." And then she stands up and the next thing Charlie hears is the running water. Could this possibly be more embarrassing? Mary's cleaning up after her.
She doesn't want to argue, can't really. It's just that it's a different feeling. It must have been something she's eaten, not poisoning, but just something that didn't settle well with her stomach.
And the stress of the higher position at work could play into it as well. But she can't say that. Not to Mary and least of all to Tom. Because trying to at least see him and his adorable daughter every day is part of the "problem". And they can't argue about it again, it's all been fine for them since their little vacation.
Those five days two months ago were like paradise.
Charlie's brought out of her thoughts abruptly when the door to the common room opens and in comes Jeremy, looking fresh as a daisy, whistling a tune. God, exactly what she needed. Not.
"Ew." He stops by the table - at least Charlie thinks so, she can't look up to check - and then his aftershave wafts towards her. She swallows. OK. She's got this. "You don't look too good. Why aren't you at home?"
"Because I'm not sick." She thinks.
"You sure about that?"
No. "Yeah. I'll be fine."
“ Famous last words,” he says, making her grit her teeth.
“Well, they’re my words.” Great, she’s starting to sound like a petulant child.
“Uhuh.” She hears sounds of feet shuffling, papers rustling, glasses clinking. Risks looking up. Yikes, the concern on both their faces is NOT helping.
“You really don’t want to go home, Charlotte?”
And how dare he use her full name? He doesn’t have the right to that anymore. Only Tom does when he’s upset with her. Tom… Who’ll probably panic if he finds out she’s hurling her guts out.
“S okay. I got this.” To prove it, she gets up very slowly. There, still standing. Until things begin to sway…
Next thing she knows, she’s sitting with her head in her hands again and being mothered by two increasingly annoying colleagues.
“What’s going on here?” No no no, not a third person to witness her at her weakest!
It's another pediatrician, working in the same shift as Charlie. Well, if you can call sitting at the table and jumping up to puke 'working'. Maybe she should just go home after all.
Before Charlie can answer, Mary speaks up. Fine with her. "Charlie's sick, but refuses to go home, for whatever reason." Charlie can feel the eye roll and then how everyone's staring at her.
"Why would you come in here? I'm not having you give that bug to all the children plus their parents."
"Because I'm sure it's not a bug," she answers for the hundredth time. "And because I need to get my work done, if I don't want to stay later tomorrow or the day after." She did promise to cook for Evie and Tom, but maybe she should just not think about food right now.
"Pft," Jeremy speaks up, "I'm chief ward physician with you, or at least I know what to do in case you're sick." He's right. He is. But Charlie's stubborn. And strong.
"God dammit, could you all just shut up?"
"Hm. Sounds like mood swings to me."
Now, Charlie's head does shoot up, vertigo be damned. "What?"
"Uh," Mary backtracks. "That was a joke. But periods do get heavy and ugly sometimes."
Charlie agrees, actually. It's just that she's not on her period. Another side effect of the stress she's had. Goodness, Tom can't know about this. She loves the new position and she thinks she's handled it quite well. Maybe she's been busier than she thought. And she doesn't want Tom to go all mother hen on her. One of them might get murdered in that case.
“ Want some chocolate?” the other pediatrician asks. “Helps me with any and all period troubles.”
At this point, Charlie just wants to be left alone. So she doesn’t even bother telling them it’s neither PMS nor shark week. Nods at the chocolate, nods some more at the advice to take things slow, and takes a deep breath when everyone’s gone.
She can do this. She’s done waaay worse. She’ll just try to sit as much as she can today and sip water regularly and maybe catch some fresh air during her break. And bring pizza home for dinner so she doesn’t have to cook. Evie will forgive anything for pizza, and Tom probably too.
And so Charlie Stubborn Cromwell makes it through the day, somehow. And now she’s sitting at the dinner table, trying valiantly to not make it obvious that she’s still nibbling on her first pizza slice while Evie is talking non-stop about a friend of hers who just got a bunny as her birthday present.
Maybe she can sneak some pizza pieces under the table to Boots, who’s ever-hopeful?
Tom tries to hide his frown, especially from Evie, who's now telling him everything about Bugs - a great name for a bunny to be fair - and can't seem to even take a breath between words.
"Evie, love," he starts, touching his daughter's arm softly. She stops wide-eyed and mid-sentence and looks at him. He suppresses a smile. "Please, breathe in between, yes? No need to faint on me."
With an eager nod, she takes a few gulps of water, two bites of the pizza, chews and then is on topic again.
Speaking of fainting. His girlfriend looks like she's about to drop dead at the table. Dark circles under her eyes clash with the pale skin of her face. She's unusually quiet, her grins don't reach her eyes, and Tom notices how he and Evie are eating the entire pizza alone. Not that he'd have a problem with eating a whole pizza.
Casting a quick glance at the rambling Evie, he's sure she won't notice him not giving her the full attention. She's going to talk about the bunny for the entire next week anyway.
Now, he's touching Charlie, and she almost blows their cover by startling so much that Evie stops talking for a moment. But then continues.
"Is everything alright?" he asks quietly.
It's work, isn't it? It's always been work the past weeks, except for when they visited Majorca. To Charlie's credit, she's been home with them every night - or lunch, depending on her work shifts - and never forgot another date with him and Evie again.
But he's seen how tired she always looks, and though he'd never admit it to her and would never mention it in front of a woman, Tom's also noticed the mood swings and the tiredness. It's a bit - and he won't mention that either - like constantly living with a woman on her period.
Charlie swallows, opens her mouth, closes it again and then answers. "I'm fine. Just tired and not overly hungry," she whispers back.
Yeah. He's calling bullshit on that.
Even in her half-dead-and-wanting-to-die state, she can see that Tom’s not buying it. And for a moment, panic sets in. What if he’s angry that work is doing things to her, to them - again? Or worse, what if he feels hurt? It really isn’t her fault this time.
But then the next moment, she scolds herself for reacting this way. They’re in a relationship. Nothing and nobody has to be perfect, they both know that.
So when he just keeps looking at her, not even quirking that infuriating brow of his but just looking, Charlie allows herself a defeated sigh.
“I’m...not so fine. But please don’t worry.”
“I practically invented worrying,” comes Tom’s dry reply and she’d totally crack a smile at that or roll her eyes if it wasn’t too much work.
“Will you let me fuss over you for a bit?” he asks next and she just blinks at him for a few moments. That sounds like heaven and hell rolled into one. Because he’s going to go nuclear mother hen on her but it’ll also be tempting to just let go for a bit. She’s practically too exhausted to breathe right now.
“And will you also maybe take a day off? Or at least check what’s wrong?”
Aaand there it is. Charlie sighs again.
"But I…" This time, he does quirk that brow, but doesn't interrupt otherwise. "I really have to finish looking through the reports, Tom."
"Well," now it's him who's sighing, but then he grins. And maybe Charlie is simply too tired to get it or she's hallucinating. Or maybe Tom's actually really grinning. Maybe he's going crazy. "Good thing you're working in a hospital, huh? Let them check, please."
"Maybe I'll feel better tomorrow."
"Then they won't find anything, and I'll stop fussing. Eventually." The grin is back, and this time Charlie manages a small smile.
"Okay," she agrees.
"Good. And now let me make you some tea and toast to nibble on. You do need to eat. Maybe Evie can even tell you one more story about Bugs," he says loud enough for his daughter to hear, before he winks at Charlie and gets up. "Shoo, off you go, to the couch."
She's actually feeling much better this morning. Not that she could be any worse than yesterday. Charlie did nibble on some toast and had loads of tea - and some good cuddles with Evie and also with Tom, when Evie was in bed.
So far there's no vertigo today, and Charlie also kept down the eggs, which Tom made for her. They were accompanied by some concerned looks, even before 6 o'clock in the morning, he got up at 5 with her, because she's got the early shift. Charlie suspects the looks' got nothing to do with her health, actually. But more with Tom suspecting she won't go to the check-up, because she's feeling better.
He may not be entirely wrong about it. As she dresses in the common room to get ready for her shift, Charlie's phone beeps. And even before getting to it, she knows what it's saying and who sent it.
Call me when you're back from your appointment, yes? Except for the script meeting, I'm in all day. xx
Of course. xx , she types back, and then leaves it at that.
She will call back, when she’s done with the appointment. Eventually. Of course. Maybe. But first, work. And then some more work, and then she’ll have her appointment at - Charlie checks her phone - 11am. Great.
When 11am does roll around, Charlie’s not that confident anymore. It’s not as bad as the day before, but she doesn’t feel as great as she did this morning, either. No vertigo, but a definitely strange feeling in her tummy. That might be the nerves, though. She doesn’t need anyone telling her she’s overdone herself. She knows.
“Ah, Charlie,” her colleague Rose greets her in the examination room. “What can I do for you?”
She explains. The vertigo, the vomiting, not sleeping enough, no matter how much she does, the strange mood swings - she just knows Tom’s noticing those - and then also how she’s scared someone will notice her stress level and fire her.
“Well, I can assure you that won’t happen. I’m sure you’re actually not close to a break-down,” Rose smiles. “And I guess you ruled out a pregnancy?”
Charlie looks at her, open-mouthed, then laughs out loud. “What?” she gasps. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You didn’t mention you being pregnant, so I guessed it’s confirmed you’re not?”
“Why would… I… I didn’t… No, nothing is confirmed, of course. I didn’t check.”
“Well,” Rose smirks, clearly more amused than she should be. “When was your last period?”
Charlie really wants to be upset and leave. She wants to tell her colleague she’s not pregnant and of course she was on her period just recently. Except that she wasn’t. But that’s all the stress. She had this lots in university and then in her learning years. Stress does this to her body.
“It was a while ago,” she finally admits, making Rose nod.
“It was, wasn’t it? Maybe you should do a test then?”
“But I’m not pregnant.”
“Mh-mh. Humour me, will you? If the test is negative, you come back to me, and we’ll check what’s going on with your body, yes?”
With a sigh - another one - Charlie gets up. “Fine. I’ll be back later then.”
Or maybe not. Because one hour, two calls, and five tests later, Charlie finds herself in one of the stalls of the loo, staring at the two blue lines.