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The first few of Fedir’s coughs were clearly on purpose, but they coaxed out many more, far harsher than the initial forced hacks. Marlinchen closed her book of herbal remedies and glanced at him from the wooden stool beside the bed. She had already reassured him that it was not diphtheria, or whooping cough, or consumption, so why was he abusing his sore throat and lungs even more than they were already doing to themselves?
“Why are you doing that? It can’t be comfortable.”
Fedir sat up in bed with his eyes closed for a moment, breathing deeply as he recovered from a fit. “Clearing my lungs so I will not get pneumonia.”
Marlinchen smiled, allowing her humored thoughts to shine through. “Nonsense. I’ve told you many times now that you are a quite healthy person, and it’s only a bit of flu. You’ll feel better soon.”
The statement was truer now than it had ever been. Marlinchen was extremely impressed with how well Sevas and his roommates had been able to ascend from their one room apartment that they could barely afford the rent on. Sure, the house was modest, and the most pretentious of folks would have likely labelled it a shack, but they had made it somewhere that a group of people could pridefully live in for the rest of their lives if they so desired.
Fedir had made furniture for him and the other gentlemen. Some of it even had little decorative carvings of animals or pretty rudimentary patterns. Niko had discovered cooking, and for the first time in their lives, they had ready access to enough good food to keep them satisfied. Sevas had relocated his dancing career, and he was now able to easily support all three of them, despite the fact that Fedir and Niko had become well appreciated carpenters and bookkeepers respectively. He was also considering moving in with Marlinchen, something which she realized had been seen as inevitable for the household for a long while before he first brought it up.
“Oh Marlinchen, you say that, but what if-” he once again began to cough, unprompted this time, and Sevas held him upright, clasping his shoulder.
“Your fretting will only make you feel worse, I hope you know,” Marlinchen told him.
Fedir attempted to respond but merely sneezed instead. Sevas gave him a handkerchief, and he blew into it hard, no doubt irritating his nose further.
Niko, who was pacing across the room, gave Fedir a quick glance, clearly trying to remind himself that this time would not be like Fedir’s bout of Cholera the year before. “You’re just chilled. If you keep telling yourself that, you’ll feel better before you know it.”
Fedir laid down and sniffled. “I suppose you’re right. It’s from the cold - it’s only from the cold.”
Marlinchen sat in silence for a moment, watching the worry shift in and out of Fedir’s body language. She considered whether or not it would be terrifying or comforting to share to him the new theory from The West, that even her family’s modest practice was beginning to take seriously. She decided that even if it was cause for panic in Fedir, all her patients had the right to know about their bodies and how to care for them.
“Fedir?” She spoke softly, yet sternly. “Have I ever told you and Sevas and Niko about the new idea on what causes illness?”
Fedir gave her a glance.
She smiled. “Well,” she walked across the room, and pulled out a chair, motioning for Niko to sit in it. She nodded to Sevas to do the same. “Settle down, all of you. I think it’s quite interesting.” All of them staring with bated breath, she began. “We believe that the origin of illness being bad air or cold weather is in the past. Now, the idea is that it is caused by tiny living things - germs, the physicians from The West call them. They are so tiny that we cannot see them, and they attack your body from the inside out, and that is how we become ill. We also need to stay clean, especially since Fedir here is unwell, so you do not get sick as well. The germs can jump from one person’s body to another’s, you see.”
The room fell silent for a moment. Fedir turned suddenly pale, and then, urgently, threw the blankets off of him, and began to wander about the room.
“What on Earth are you doing?” Niko rushed to assist Fedir, who was shivering and stumbling.
“I would like to examine it for myself,” said he. “Are there any places where germs are particularly common? Can they be killed? Tell me, Marlinchen, how shall I ever get well if I am to avoid these things until the day I die?”
Niko escorted Fedir back to bed as he spoke, and both he and Sevas pulled the blankets back over him. “Rest and warmth,” said she, “and I am also going to give you some marshmallow syrup to take if you need to - for the cough.” She sat a bottle down on the nightstand and approached the door. “Good evening gentlemen.”
Sevas took her hand, “I’ll see you out, I suppose,” he told her, and out they went, surely, Niko and Fedir knew, to the sorts of delicate, deep conversations lovers must carry out alone.
-
Fedir woke up in the middle of the night feeling far, far worse. His cough was so horrid that he could hardly catch his breath at times before another round started. Merely sitting up made him so dizzy he became nauseous, enough so that he had to lay back down immediately after attempting it, and he was simply so, so tired. He must have begun crying in his feverish, half-asleep haze, for Niko was suddenly pulling him upright.
“You’ll get sick,” Fedir heard himself say, and then began coughing again.
“We’ve known that you can get diseases from other people for a long while now. Before Marlinchen told us otherwise, all we didn’t know was that they were caused by tiny beings. What she said changes almost nothing.”
“Yes, but not colds and flus, we always knew those were caused by catching a chill.” He was interrupted by more hacking, the intensity of it making him tear up more. Niko slowly began to rub his back. Fedir was surprised by the affection, but it did feel nice. After a few minutes of that, he was able to catch his breath again, and the room once again fell quiet.
“Back down?” Niko loosened his grip, seeing that he was shivering now that he was not under the blankets.
“Please,” and so Niko leaned him back onto the pillow. However, he only had a few minutes of blessed rest before the coughing started back up again, and Niko sat him back up to get the phlegm out of his chest.
“Should we give him the medicine?” Sevas appeared in the doorway.
“Yes,” Niko said simply, and took the brown bottle from the table, alongside a spoon that had been placed at the ready beside it.
“No,” Fedir turned his face away from it. “I’ll get pneumonia if I stop coughing. The germs will fill my lungs.”
Niko held the bottle hovering beside him. “If that was the case, Marlinchen wouldn’t have prescribed it to you. You’re clearly exhausted and uncomfortable. It will help.”
“But it won’t kill the germs.”
Sevas took the bottle and poured out a spoonful. “Forget the germs. If you can stop coughing long enough to get some rest then your body will gather the strength to kill them on its own.”
Fedir fell silent and nodded, and then he took the spoon and sipped the cough syrup off of it. He then pulled himself away from Niko’s embrace and fell back against the pillows. “Please leave now, you’ll catch it.”
Sevas scoffed. “Is that why you took the medicine?”
Fedir did not respond but looked as though he was about to cry.
Niko squeezed his shoulder. “We will not get sick, Fedir.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Well, you’re right, I suppose,” Sevas approached the bed, “but if we do, we will not catch pneumonia or die, and will be well again soon enough, as will you. You’ll see. We’ve been the healthiest we’ve ever been, and besides, we will not leave you no matter what.”
Fedir nodded, but his eyes still darted about the room feverishly. “That isn’t saying much. Living in the slums destroyed our health for years.”
As Niko continued to comfort him, Sevas left the room for a moment, and returned with a sprig of lavender, giving himself a turn to sit Fedir up, rather than Niko. “Eat it, old friend. It will help you sleep. That is what has always worked for me, when I’ve had access to lavender.”
Fedir nibbled it down, and lay staring at the ceiling. He closed his eyes, and Niko gave his hand a quick squeeze. “It’s only a touch of ‘flu,” said he.
-
Fedir awoke to the bright morning sun and a cool cloth on his forehead. He turned and saw Sevas sitting beside him reading a book. The man took notice and set it down. “How are you? Your fever went down during the night and you began sweating. I thought a compress would make you feel more comfortable.”
“I am a little hot,” said Fedir, “but I feel quite better. Oh, yes, I believe I shall live to see another day.”
Despite his best efforts, Sevas began laughing. “We told you and look at how right we were.”