AN: I will repeat myself - I'm not a doctor. My knowledge in medicine is minimal. My source of information is the the internet.
You are the best readers. This story would not have made it this far if it wasn't for all of you :)
Also, fun fact - I did a quick search on internet and I was shocked to found out that this story has more words than every Harry Potter book (separately) and every Lord of the Rings book (separately). I am also getting close to beating Game of Thrones first book :D I have written a freaking book! That's pretty crazy if you think about it...
AN2:Updated version - fixed the mistake. Thank you to the guest, who pointed it out ;)
Callie POV
I was standing next to Lena, while she was talking to the nurse behind the front desk. The moment Lena had said that I might have chickenpox, nurses reaction automatically changed. At first they had told us to sit and wait in the ER waiting room till we are called in, but apparently the fact that chickenpox was highly contagious put me in front of the line. Who knows how many people in the waiting room hasn't had chickenpox. And now that I look over my shoulder to the waiting room again, I notice that there are two pregnant woman as well.
"-Callie Quinn Scott. That's with two L's in Callie, two N's in Quinn and two T's in Scott" Lena explained my name to the nurse in detail, while I was scratching my side intently.
Once I had scratched the itch, I pull my hands in my sleeves to keep warm. But that was not for long. My neck was itching next, so I pull my hand out of the sleeve and start to scratch my neck. While I was scratching, shivers run over me once again and I start to feel another coughing fit coming.
The moment Lena turned back to me, Lena grabs my hand softly and takes it away from my neck "Don't scratch, honey!"
I toss my head back and try to tolerate the itching, but that is way harder than I thought it would. Lena softly run her palm over my neck, over the rash and blisters, where I had scratched my neck.
"Better?" She asked me while she continued to do it
"Yes" I reply, when the itching dimmed down a bit
"How much longer do we have to wait here?" I ask when Lena turned back to the nurse, who had asked her something. I feel so tiered and weak that I could just fall asleep in one of the uncomfortable looking waiting room chairs.
Now that Lena was speaking to the nurse, her right side was turned to me. I took one step closer and pressed my forehead to her upper arm, to rest against her. Lena doesn't seem to mind that I was using her as wall to lean against. I lock all of the sound, noises and voices out my head and just try to rest as I close my eyes shut. I try to regain some strength, but I doubt these 30 seconds will do any good.
"Any minute now" I hear Lena's gentle voice "Come here" she turns a little, making me lean away from her. Lena pulls me closer. My head is now buried in her shoulder, as her hands are wrapped around my back. She is running one of her hand gently over my shoulder in circles as we wait for us to be taken to an exam room.
"Follow me Callie" I hear a nurse say after a moment. I lean out of Lena's hug recurrently.
"Can you stay with me till mom get's here?" I ask her warily, when I look up to her. I had a feeling she was about to ask me that herself. This time, I beat her to it.
"Of course, honey" Lena says with a small smile. She rests her hand gently on my lower back when we start to walk after the nurse.
Nurse opens the doors to an exam room and lets me in first. Lena walks in after me.
"Make yourself comfortable. I will be right back to take your temperature and blood" Nurse tells me and walks back out
When I am sat on the table, the cough finally caught up with me. I place my hands over my mouth and nose as I start to violently cough. I could feel this was another cough were I will cough up mucus. Lena pulls out a napkin from her purse. Once the cough was over, she hands me the napkin to clean the mucus off my hands. While I run the napkin over my palm, Lena softly traces her hand up and down my upper arm, soothing me.
"When will my mom be here?" I ask when Lena takes the crumble up napkin from my hand
"Cooper said she was just taken to some scan, so it could be some while" Lena explained and then added to cheer me up a bit "But the good thing, is that she is in this same hospital, juts few floors up"
Lena once again took my hand, when she saw how intensely I was scratching my side "You are worse than Frankie" she joked when she run her hand over my side, to help me with the itching
"In what way?" I ask weakly looking up her
"She has chickenpox as well. Frankie was scratching like crazy"
"Where did she got chickenpox?"
"I start to think that she got it from the same place where you did" When Lena saw how confused I looked, she elaborated "At first Stef and I thought Frankie got it in kindergarten, but now...now I have a feeling you both got it in the Kids Cooking Lessons. Probably one of the kids was infected and that's were you both caught it."
The doors to the room opened before I could say anything back. Nurse walked in and started to get to work. She took my temperature, which turned out to be higher than I initially had thought. As the nurse said, I have a very high fever – 40.3(104 in Fahrenheit). Then she drew some blood from me.
Once the blood was taken, doctor walked in "Hello, Callie. My name is Dr. Irwin and I will be your doctor today" He looked to Lena the next second "You are?"
"Um..." Lena extended her arm the next second "Lena Adams Foster, family friend and her Vice-Principal. I brought her here."
Doctor looked to me "Are you okay with her being here, Callie?"
"She can stay" I reply weakly and try to smile back at him. I was so tired I wasn't sure I managed to get a smile to my face.
"So, what's seems to be the problem?" He asked even though I was pretty sure he already knew why I was here. He did come in with my chart after all
"Not feeling well" I said not having the energy to go into details
"She has this rash, all over her body. Some are just spots, some are blisters" Lena explains to him in my place, as I had told her all about in the car ride to hospital "Itching rash. No appetite. She's burning up as well. And she has a bad cough. When I found her in bathroom, Callie had cough up this...rusty looking mucus, it was tingled with blood. That's when I brought her here!"
"I see. You did the right thing" Doctor said to Lena and then turned his attention back to me "Can you lift your shirt up just a bit?" He asked me coming to the table "So I could see the rash" He added when I hesitated a bit
I reached for the hem of my shirt and pulled the shirt up to my middle. He examined the rash closer and when he leaned away, he asked some more questions. After the questioning about the rash he confirmed what Lena had initially assumed – chickenpox.
But after he listened to my lungs, he said something that I was not excepting "I will send you to chest x-ray-"
"Why?" I interject before he could finish his sentence
"Is there a problem?" Lena asked for more detail
Dr. Irwin tossed the stethoscope around his neck and took my chart "That cough does not sound good. I believe the chickenpox virus has expanded to your lungs. Thus, giving you a pneumonia. We just want to make sure. The chest x-ray and your blood work will check that," He said while writing it all down in my chart "Nurse will give you Tylenol for the fever and an antihistamine Zyrtec for the itching"
Lena squeezed my hand, giving me silent support, while I was just sitting there, motionless and stunned. The doctor put a dot in the chart and handed it to the nurse. When he turned back to me he added "I will see you after the chest x-ray and when the blood work comes back. Nurse will take care of you till them"
When he walked out of the exam room, I looked up to Lena. She instantly saw how scared I looked "You will be okay, Callie. Don't worry"
Nurse handed me a small cup, that contained few pills. In other hand she was holding a glass of water.
"Tylenol and Zyrtec " she told me when I looked in the small paper cup, questioning it's content
I sight and pull my hand out of Lena's hold to take both of the cups. After I tossed the pills in my mouth and swallowed them, I drank the water on top to wash it down. When nurse took the two empty cups back, Lena reached for my hand again and smiled down to my sadly.
Amy POV
When I came out of doctor's office, Cooper informed me about Callie's situation instantly.
"What do you mean she is in hospital?" I blur back shocked after Cooper told me that Lena took Callie to hospital "Why didn't she call me!?"
I grabbed my purse from Cooper's hand, which I had given to him, when I was taken to the scan, and stormed down the hallway "I am sure she did. When she called me, she told me you weren't picking up"
I shake my head as I search for my phone in my bag. 10 missed calls from Lena, all in some 25 minute span. We both step in the elevator, Cooper pressed the first floor button for me, while I dial back Lena.
"Stupid elevator!" I mumble when I lose the signal and the phone call is interrupted
"I'm sure she is fine, Amy" Cooper tried to calm me down
But how can I be calm? My daughter is in hospital. She had to be taken to hospital. How did I missed how sick Callie was? Callie seemed okay last night, at dinner. She only had a cough. I thought it was just a cold. Why is she now in hospital?
Once we step out of the elevator, I turn to Cooper "You can go, Cooper. You don't have to say"
"I don't mind staying" He replied back without missing a beat
"It will probably be just more waiting. Besides, you said you only took half day off. You need to go to work. I'm sure Lena will drive us back home" Cooper remained silent as he had trouble with simply leaving us
"Coop" I touch his arm "We will be okay. You can go. I will call you later"
Recurrently he agreed "Fine. But only if you promise call me later and tell me what's going on"
"I promise" I stretch out to the tips of my toes to kiss him "I love you. Thank you for coming with me today"
He kisses me one more time before he replies "You don't have to thank me. Love you too. Say hi to Callie from me"
"I will" I say back when I put my phone to my ear once again. Cooper heads down the hallway to the exit, while I stay put till I find out which direction I need to go to find them.
"Where are you?" I ask Lena the moment she picks up
"Um...I think it is East wing. At the radiology"
"I'm on my way. I will be there in 3" I reply and end the call. When I look around, to the many hallways, I curse to myself. I have no idea which way East wing was or where was the radiology, I have no idea how I can get to Callie.
I stop the first nurse I see and ask for directions. A moment later I have arrived at the East wing where the radiology was. Lena was sitting on the chair that was placed by the side of the hallway. Her right leg over her left, her purse was by her left side. She was holding her phone in her hands, looking down to it. Lena looked deep in her thoughts.
The moment she saw me coming she stood up "They are taking chest x-ray. She should be out soon" Lena explained the moment I was up to her
"W-what...uh...what happened?" I stuttered out still confused by all of what has happened
"I found her in the school bathroom, coughing. Callie coughed up some bloody mucus, she was burring up and she had this rash all over her neck. So I took her to hospital to have her checked out. To make sure she is okay"
"She didn't have a rash yesterday. Callie had a cold, just a cold" I explain to Lena, afraid that she will judge me for not noticing this myself.
"She has had a rash for the last two days. I guess, she just…didn't tell you" Lena said carefully, trying not to hurt my feelings. Too late for that. I run both of my hands over my face and turn my back to Lena, as I try to understand what was happening.
"Callie thought it was an allergy. The rash, I mean" Lena said trying to calm me down, but somehow that just pissed me off even more
Why did she know my daughter better than I do? It just made me so furious. I wasn't angry with Lena, or Callie, more like with myself. I was angry, because I had missed that something was wrong with Callie. I take few deep breathes to calm myself down and to remind myself that Lena didn't do anything wrong. Lena was only looking out for my daughter. I should thank her instead.
I can't blame Callie, I could never blame Callie. I was sure she didn't tell me for various reasons. One of the reasons, which I know for sure, was that - Callie hates asking for help. Even when she is sick. She took care of herself, when she was sick, while in foster care. She hasn't gotten over that old habit, yet. The second reasons, could be that she was still trying to protect me, because I am still recovering from the shooting.
I stand with my back to Lena for a while. My hands pressed to my hips, I just stare down to the floor. I move my right hand back up to my face and rub the bridge of my nose at my eye level.
As calmly as I could I asked her back "What did the doctors say?"
"Chickenpox. He believes the virus has spread to her lungs and has giving her a pneumonia. They took some blood to run tests and the chest x-ray should tell if she does have pneumonia or doesn't"
I turned to face Lena the moment she said the first word. Lena was now looking to my surprised face, trying to understand why did I look so shocked.
"What is it?" Lena asks me slowly, watching me closely, fully aware of my reaction
"Chickenpox?" I ask her back, to check if I heard her correctly. In the back of my mind, I was thinking back to Callie's medical file. The one we got when Callie first started living with us. I didn't voice my concern, but if my memory is not deceiving me, Callie already has had chickenpox. At least according to her medical file.
"Yes" Lena confirms it "Frankie has chickenpox as well. I think both of them caught it at the Kids Cooking Lessons"
The doors to the radiology room opened and Callie walked out along with a nurse. The moment she saw me, Callie mumbled "Mom" and hurried towards me. Lena stepped to the side as she watched how Callie made her way to me.
When Callie hugged me, I felt how hot she was. She was burning up. I wrap my hands around her and pull her close to me. Callie buries her head to my shoulder and the next moment I feel her grip the back of my shirt.
"I'm here baby" I kiss the top of her head right when I feel her shiver in my hands. I run my hand over her back, trying to warm her up. She started to cough in my shoulder the next moment. I leave the question- why she didn't tell me - for later, for when we are home.
I heard a woman voice from my side "You must be the mom"
When I peaked a look to the side, I saw a nurse standing there "I am"
"We should get Callie back to the exam room" Nurse told us and motioned us to follow her back to the exam room