Title: Flu
A/N: I think this could probably be used as a reason to get kids vaccinated against the flu.
Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.
He just has the flu, Ryuuken tells himself, pressing a hand to Uryuu's burning forehead, and he won't be going to school tomorrow. It certainly is the season for flu, and he's actually been seeing more flu patients at the hospital right now then he did last winter when there was still snow on the ground. He almost certainly picked it up from a classmate, who is no doubt at home sick himself. Ryuuken sighs and goes back to focusing on the task at hand.
Even clad in a jacket as he is, with a blanket and a thick quilt swathed around him, Uryuu is still shaking convulsively, complaining of the cold. Ryuuken's gone so far as to turn up the thermostat some five degrees over what it normally is, but to no avail. In Ryuuken's experience, flu chills are impenetrable; the only thing that will make them stop is the cessation of the illness itself.
For now, Ryuuken is sitting by his son's bed in a chair dragged from the kitchen table, pressing a wet wash cloth against Uryuu's forehead, watching the hours slip by with unbearable sluggishness.
As many times as Uryuu has been sick in the past (and there have been many times), Ryuuken doesn't think he has ever seen him quite this ill before. Not so feverish, not so sweaty, not so cold and not so weak. If anything, he's been getting sick less and less often over the years; at least he had been up until now. Maybe Ryuuken is just being pessimistic (and for once he hopes it's just that) but he can't help but think that this is going to be the gateway to a slippery slope. He really does hope he's wrong.
Ryuuken removes the cloth from Uryuu's forehead and submerges it in the bucket of ice water at his feet, wringing out the excess water before replacing it. It's maybe nine at night and Uryuu has fallen into a light, fitful sleep (more so than usual), shivering even in slumber.
Sayuri was often sick too; in particular, she'd once been laid up with flu herself for Isshin and Masaki's wedding, but that was hardly the only time. Of course, Ryuuken hadn't known how sickly Sayuri was at first, since she was liable to hide it and had always come to school no matter how awful she felt. Once they were married there was no hiding it though and the sound of thick, phlegmy coughing was hardly an unusual occurrence. Every time it started, there was the weary ritual of thermometers, cough medicine, antibiotics and Ryuuken having to make Sayuri promise she wouldn't do anything to make it worse. How often she actually kept that promise is anyone's guess, given she was always so slow to recover.
This is something I wish he didn't have from her.
Ryuuken reaches out and touches Uryuu's cheek to see if the fever has gone down at all. The heat is intense and no, it hasn't, not at all; if anything it feels worse. He starts to wonder whether or not a hospital trip is warranted once the morning comes. Rubbing the waxen, slightly discolored skin absently, Ryuuken feels sweat and for a long moment he thinks Uryuu is crying. Even after he rids himself of that delusion and accepts that the moisture is only sweat, the sensation is disturbing and he quickly removes his hand.
It's going to be a long night.
-0-0-0-
And it only gets longer. Ryuuken is roused from a state of uneasy half-sleep by the sound of Uryuu coughing spasmodically. When he comes fully to, highly bloodshot blue eyes are looking at him out of the darkness; Uryuu lies awake in bed, prostrate and flat out on his back.
"May I… have some water?" Uryuu croaks weakly, voice cracking agonizingly on every syllable, barely audible.
Ryuuken obliges him, brow creasing all the while. When he gets back Uryuu is in the plainly painstaking process of sitting up so he won't choke when he drinks the water. His thin little arms shake and Ryuuken feels the need to intervene.
Upon putting a hand on Uryuu's back to prop him up, Ryuuken comes to a realization that inspires both shock and alarm: the jacket Uryuu is wearing over his night shirt is absolutely soaked.
Uryuu gulps down the water with frightening speed and, wordlessly, Ryuuken starts to examine him more closely.
No longer is Uryuu's face wet. Instead, his skin is still very hot, and now very dry as well. The child is swaying a little, lips pressed tightly together as if in pain, and he is still shaking. For the first time, Ryuuken notices the nearly overpowering stench of rancid sweat permeating the room and he coughs.
One look more at Uryuu tells Ryuuken that he can't wait any longer.
"Come on," Ryuuken murmurs, "we're leaving." Admittedly in a hurry, he quickly relieves Uryuu of the sodden jacket and helps get him into dry, clean clothes, hands starting to shake just a touch. At this point Ryuuken doubts Uryuu's ability to walk so, despite the fact that Uryuu, even being a small child, is getting on the big side to be carried, picks him up, wraps him in a dry blanket gotten out of the hall closet and puts him in the back of the car. He doesn't call ahead to the hospital; Ryuuken has stalled long enough and he isn't about to waste any more time.
"It's very late," he tells the ill, pallid child as he puts him in the backseat of the car, "so I don't think the hospital will be all that crowded." All this Uryuu absorbs with disinterest; his eyes are drooping in tiredness. He nods absently and drops off to sleep almost as soon as the car starts to move.
-0-0-0-
When Uryuu wakes up the following morning in the hospital, Ryuuken has had a number of questions answered.
Yes, it is just the flu that Uryuu has contracted and not something else. Given the way Uryuu was behaving, Ryuuken had for a while thought it might be something more serious, but closer inspection proves that it is indeed just the flu, and that Uryuu's main problem at present is dehydration. He'll be able to leave and go home by the afternoon.
Ryuuken sighs and sinks into the hard, straight-backed chair he pulled up beside Uryuu's hospital bed, tugging on his crumpled shirt collar. Having received proper care the boy is much more aware and alert than he was the night before, albeit extremely tired and a touch weak.
I do not think I ever want to repeat that experience.
One look at Uryuu's wan face tells Ryuuken that he doesn't want to, either.
