Disclaimer: I don't own the characters. They belong to the BBC.
Another of my Jackie fics for my collection. This one under the prompt Regrets. In which Jackie sneaks the Doctor aspirin not knowing he is allergic. Written a while ago. Some of it still doesn't make sense :P Also written from an article I read on allergic reaction over 10 years ago, just so you know.
Regret
She hadn't known. Honestly, she hadn't. Neither the Doctor nor Rose had mentioned it, and if they had she wouldn't have done what she did. She had just wanted to help, that was all.
It was a good thing she had known what to do on a stupid technicality that her sister had a similar problem. Not over the same thing, but still a similar problem. Finding what she needed in that coat of his had taken up valuable time, but thankfully he carried a kit.
He must worry about people trying to help him like this often if he did carry a kit around, just in case. Or maybe he was afraid of intentionally being poisoned by people who knew.
He was allergic to aspirin. Severely allergic. And after giving the shot to help try and calm the anaphylaxis, she couldn't call the hospital like she had to with her sister. The only thing she could do was sit there, gently rubbing at the spot on his thigh where she had driven in the needle to help it circulate better through his system, and hoped it helped.
Rose told her about his respiratory bypass system, when his inability to get air into his lungs properly shifted to gasping but getting air. Not that that would really matter, it was something that kicked in when he couldn't breathe on his own, and right now he was. And that is if it worked after this anyway.
His face was still red, but his breathing was definitely better than it was. She had unbuttoned his shirts and found hives on his chest, but she had just wanted to see his chest rising and falling to know he was definitely breathing, even though the sound was enough to let her know.
Rose checked his hearts. Their beats were raised, but she didn't know if that was from the allergy, or the drug to try and help it. Either could cause it. The shaking was from the drug. Her sister had gone through that same thing only after her shot.
When his breathing hadn't gotten any better than its wild gasping after an hour, she gave him another shot. It was only after that in which his breathing got better, and the angry red welts on his skin began to disappear.
He also got a bit of a cough, his eyes and nose began running, and his shakes got worse. She got Rose to check on his hearts again, and found them only raised slightly more than they had been, but in Rose's words, not enough to be trouble.
In half an hour, he was breathing steady, the hives had gone, his face was its normal pale colour, and she found him crying, which would be the reason for both the nose and eyes. Probably due to anxiety or the drug, since either could cause it.
Well, all this is, of course, whether or not it was Epinephrine.
"What happened?" he asked quietly, once he was calm and the shaking had stopped.
"Allergic reaction. I'm so sorry! I didn't know. You were complaining of a headache, and Mickey used to do the same thing, refusing anything for it. I thought you were doing the same thing, so I mixed some aspirin in your drink."
He shifted slightly on the floor, where he still was after he had fallen. "Oh..."
"I'm sorry," she said again, going from rubbing his thigh, to rubbing at his back, as he coughed a bit again.
"My fault. Should have told you."
Jackie shook her head. "I shouldn't have done it. I should have thought."
The Doctor turned around to face her. "No. You had no way of knowing. It's not the first time this has happened unfortunately. Reason I carry the kit." He got a faraway look in his eyes, before he narrowed them and looked at her again. "How did you know to look?"
"Christine, my sister, she had a severe allergy to bees and wasps. We lived in the country as girls, and we played out in the garden a lot. She got stung several times. I kind of had to learn."
He nodded and closed his eyes. "I'm tired..."
Helping him up onto the couch, she stayed with him until he was breathing deeply and evenly. He should be watched anyway, just in case he had a repeat performance of what had just happened.
Rose put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed it, before bending down and giving her a hug. "He'll be alright mum. Just don't do it again." Her daughter had never seen anything like that it was plain to see. She was still shaking slightly from the shock of it.
"Yeah, I won't. Watch him for a bit alright? If he gets hives or has breathing problems again come get me."
Jackie didn't really want to leave him alone just then, but she needed to get away from him for a few minutes. She was more upset than she thought though. She ended up locking herself in the bathroom for 15 minutes crying over what she had done.
She, Jackie Tyler, human idiot of a woman, had almost killed the Doctor. She didn't know whether or not that could have full out killed him or if he would have regenerated again, but that wasn't the point. She had almost killed him.
And she would regret that for a long time.
