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Langdon feels like he’s dying.
Realistically, he knows he isn’t. Not even close. He just has to find some way of coping with the bone-deep discomfort of feeling unwell, and being hyperbolic about it is the most entertaining solution. It’s not even flu, just a cold, but if anyone could hear his internal monologue they’d think he was five minutes away from succumbing to tuberculosis or the plague. The worst part is that he’s nowhere near ill enough to justify taking time off work, even if he is worried about passing it on to others - if he had a fever, he’d definitely take the time to recover, but a runny nose and sore throat simply won’t cut it.
“You look like shit,” Dana tells him, not unkindly, when he slopes in a mere three minutes before the start of his shift. Normally he’d be here a little sooner to get himself organised and ready for the day, but the extra five minutes in the warmth of his bed was too tempting to resist.
“Feel like shit,” he grumbles.
She relents a little. “You okay, kid?”
“Just a cold, I’ll live.”
Immediately, she returns to her usual level of friendly banter, one eyebrow raised as she gives a dry look over the top of her glasses. “You’re so brave, putting your life on the line for the public like this. I’ll ask Robby if we can build a statue in your honour. Would you prefer it to be out here or in the break room?”
“Out here, and flipping you off,” he bites back with a hint of a smile.
“That’s the spirit.”
He does flip her off, out of view of any of the patients surrounding the Hub, as he trudges away to begin making the rounds for the day.
By the afternoon, he’s nearly dead on his feet (again, nowhere close in reality, but he sure feels that way). He’s managed to sniffle his way through two and a half packs of tissues and is almost never without a lozenge rolling around on his tongue. This is only day two of the cold. God only knows how rough he’s going to be tomorrow. And god knows how much more shit he’s going to get given. He’s already received looks of somewhere between pity and disgust from half the team every time he so much as seems like he’s about to sneeze, a dressing down disguised as a pep talk from Robby, and a remark about having seen better corpses from Garcia. There’s still close to five hours left before he can go home and wallow in self-pity and as much cough medicine as is safe. It’s going to be torture.
He manages to sequester himself away at one of the charting stations, partly out of his own desire to not be around anyone and partly from Robby’s rather pointed suggestion that he avoid patient interactions where possible. Here, he can allow his throat to have a break from speaking while he types and he doesn’t have to worry too much about the fog that’s creeping across the edge of his thoughts. So what if it takes him a little longer to type out his notes, at least it keeps him isolated for longer. In fact, he’s so wrapped up in the malaise that it takes him a good thirty seconds to notice the glass of water that has been placed at his side. He blinks at it in confusion, then glances up to find Mel standing by his side with a small, proud smile, her eyes creasing behind her glasses with the expression. There are a couple of blister packs clutched nervously in her hand, their silver foil glinting in the fluorescent light.
“Have you taken anything yet?” she asks softly.
Langdon shakes his head. “I can cope.”
She tilts her head, slightly judgemental but mostly confused. “You don’t have to, though. You can make life a bit easier for yourself.”
“Sound advice, Doctor King,” he quips, but his gaze flicks to her hand. If it was anyone else, he’d be telling them to take the painkillers to take the edge off their symptoms, speed up recovery, but with himself…
“Tylenol and Advil,” she tells him, holding out the packs.
He hesitates for a moment, before reaching to take them from her grip and popping two of the Tylenol out of their confines. “Thanks, Mel.” He cracks a smile for the first time all day, and she brightens so much that he wonders why he didn’t accept the offer quicker.
—
The next day is, as he expected, worse. He’s barely slept, waking up what feels like every ten minutes to drink more water for his scratchy throat, clear the mucus from his nose or, on one or two horrible occasions, cough it up. Working his way through the blister packs of medication has helped a little, as much as it pains him to admit it. Still, it’s nowhere near enough. He arrives at work suspecting that he looks more like a patient than a doctor: deep eye bags; dark hair flopping over his face; skin pale and clammy save for the raw, red skin around his nose; lips dry and cracking; a cheap takeaway coffee from the greasy spoon down the street clutched like a lifeline. It’s probably not the best idea, but he sure as hell needs the boost.
It doesn’t last.
A slight lull just before midday, rare but welcome, finds him in the break room trying to force down a sandwich he’d grabbed from the cart (ham and cheese, not that his tastebuds are registering enough for it to matter); he’s not especially hungry, but he’s got to get some energy for the remainder of his shift from somewhere and any more caffeine is only going to make him feel worse. A couple of others drift in and out, taking advantage of the unspoken calm - Dana once again tells him he looks horrendous, with Emma in tow asking if he’s okay; Santos says nothing, just gives him a withering look. Then Mel appears, setting the kettle boiling.
“How are you holding up?” Her back turned as she pulls two mugs from the cabinet, braid shifting across her scrub top with the movement.
“Ugh,” he groans. “I feel like death. My face hurts and my throat feels like sandpaper and my lungs are so full of gunk I’m surprised they haven’t collapsed. Please make sure Santos doesn’t get to do a chest tube on me if they do.”
Mel lets out a brief, light laugh, which she quickly stifles.
“Oh, I’m glad you find my suffering so amusing,” he mutters into the cool surface of the table, forehead pressed against it.
“No, I’m sorry, it’s just…”
“What?”
“I’m Mel, and you’re melodramatic.”
He laughs in spite of himself, the sound making his chest tighten into a cough that feels strong enough to bruise his ribs. She apologises again. Through squinted eyes as he sits up, he watches her slide a mug across the table.
“It’s not coffee,” she explains quickly before he can even open his mouth to question or thank her. “Diuretics are probably not the best idea if you’re dehydrated from being ill. It’s just hot water with honey and lemon.”
He frowns. “We don’t have lemons.”
“I bought one on my way in.”
The words hit harder than the cough. This wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment decision to make him a drink while preparing her own. This took planning. Thought. She saw how he was yesterday, knew he’d be likely to get worse, and was troubled enough by the idea of him not looking after himself that she took the initiative to go out of her way and buy something she knew would help. He can’t remember the last time anyone cared enough to do that.
When Mel slides into the seat opposite, cradling her own mug, he looks up at her through puffy eyes, which he swears is purely down to the illness and not the overwhelming emotions. “Don’t get too close,” he warns, wishing he could say the opposite. “I’d hate for you to catch whatever this is. It sucks.”
She shrugs. “A cold won’t kill me.”
“But you’ll be miserable.”
Another smile, small and achingly genuine, breaks across her face as she watches him take the first sip of his drink. “Then we can be Melodramatic and Melancholic.”
He snorts over his mug, wincing as the hot steam worms its way into his nostrils. Maybe being ill isn’t as bad as he’s making it out to be. Maybe he can play it up for a day longer than it lasts if this is the sympathy he gets. The one thing that’s not a maybe, the absolute definite, is that he’s already considering which shops on his commute will be open early enough for him to buy fresh lemons on his way into work if he does prove to be contagious right now.