A/N I just got an idea to have Autumn not feel well. This one's set in early spring with her 7.5, so last year.
Autumn woke not feeling well one early spring day. She had a sore throat, a stuffy, runny nose, fever and she was coughing and sneezing. She told her mother, "I feel like I've got a bad cold. I don't feel so good. I've got such a pain.", in a congested voice. She blew her nose after her mother gave her a tissue box.
"Where does it hurt?' her mother asked. "Naughty nose."
"Mummy, my throat hurts." the girl said. She went back to her room, blowing her nose after taking some medicine.
Autumn sat on her bed and looked dreamily at her Thomas backpack. She drifted off to Sodor, tissue box in tow.
I need to stick to the engines, she thought. They don't get a runny nose. They just get ill in engine ways and that's the biggest difference between my tears or illnesses and theirs. She landed with a sneeze and blew her nose loudly.
"What's wrong, Autumn?' she heard Thomas say.
"I don't feel well at all," she replied. "My nose is all stuffed up, like I got a cold.". After finishing blowing her nose, she hugged her friend. She saw Sir Topham Hatt and his grandchildren in the distance, as she coughed.
Thomas said, "Engines don't catch colds, though we do get stuffed up."
Autumn said, "I know about Henry's sneeze. Ashes for you, snot for me." I hate snot, she thought, sniffled and blew her nose, again. "Just getting my boogers out," she said.
The Hatts were closer now, but still a ways off from Autumn. Bridget, Sir Topham Hatt's granddaughter, began to cry.
Bridget's granddad said, "You can depend on Granddad, Bridget. I can't fix an emotional problem, but I can meet your needs." and gave her his handkerchief.
Autumn, as she blew her nose, saw the other girl dapping tears away. My daddy does that for me, she thought, Give me his hanky, if I'm out of tissue and need to dry my eyeballs. Though he and Mummy may wipe my eyeballs if they're free and I want that. As a toddler, I'd come to my parents and say "Mummy" or "Daddy, wipe eyes." Though the Hatts were several feet away, Autumn could tell Bridget was sobbing. Bridget sniffled and blew her nose into the hanky, like a trumpet. Her sobs subsided after a while, then she dried her last tears and blew her nose. Bridget must be very sad about something, Autumn thought, as she blew her nose again.
Autumn went to the quarry where Mavis was, then Knapford and saw Emily and then Rosie. "I'm not crying," she told the engines. "I don't feel well. When I get a cold or something, I feel like I always have to blow my nose." She went to the Little Western and the other railways of Sodor, like Skarloey, Arlesdale and even Culdee Fell, the mountain railway. After making her rounds, she went back to Thomas and gave him a good-bye hug. As she left, Thomas said "Cheerio." and whistled. She blew her nose again, burbling into her tissue. I feel like I'm drowning in snot, she thought.
When Autumn was back from Sodor, she threw her soggy, used tissues in her wastebasket. She needed a new box every 2 hours, until she fell asleep, because her nose was so stuffed up. When she was awake, she played with her toys, sometimes in a stim way, read some and watched Thomas videos or played a Thomas game during her screen time, around blowing her nose.
A/N Because of her British dad, one of the plot convenience elements, I imagine Autumn speaks somewhat British. The "naughty nose" is from my mom, when I was a sick kid, like Autumn. Given when it's set, you could imagine she got coronavirus and it presented like a cold, as the only condition she has is a form of autism, Asperger's under DSM-IV and she's a child. In someone as healthy as my little OC, especially at her age, a cold presentation of coronavirus would be possible. I know I made her use Thomas language some, but it's what Thomas fans do. in many cases. What she says about blowing her nose comes from a girl knew in school. Her request when she was younger's based on a video of a toddler who wanted her daddy to dry her tears when she'd cried. Someone said, on a forum once, they took 2 hours to use a box of tissues once when unwell. Her Thomas video watching was done on her tablet. When I was a kid her age, I didn't have a way to watch videos online, as I didn't have a computer until high school, because I needed it and besides, I'm older than online video, I believe. To my knowledge, I was in high school when videos were first online, as Google Video, later shut down and YouTube were founded then. I had some handheld video games and played old computer games at school, non-Thomas, though. Her autism will be more clear in this one, for those who read my old Autumn stuff.