Tread

June 27

One minute I'm asleep wrapped in Leo's arms and the next I'm up. Hand on my stomach, something crawling up my throat as I race to the bathroom. It's vomit. Not in my throat anymore but partially in the toilet with the rest splattered on the wall and floor.

My body convulses as I sink to my knees, arch my back, and watch my dinner and breakfast projectile out of my mouth in a greenish-brown soup. It hits the water and bounces back into my face and hair.

I'm not sure how long I'm on my knees, praying to the porcelain God to make it stop, but it's enough time that my seven o'clock alarm goes off. My cheek rests against the rim of the toilet, wet from a whole lot of sweat and a good amount of toilet water and throw up. I close my eyes and try to catch my breath as my body shivers, stomach heaving.

When was the last time I had food poisoning? Probably when I was ten from a bad cafeteria lunch. Most of the school got sick and my mother decided that she would pack my lunch from then on, no matter that she had to wake up earlier or stay up late or pay more: my health was important to her.

My body issues a second warning, enough time to turn my head into the toilet, before I'm back at it again. A cool hand presses gently into my back and I flinch. Leo groans behind me, but doesn't say anything. Water runs and a cold washcloth is pressed to the back of my neck.

"That's nice," I sigh, feeling like a bag of dicks.

"I think you're running a fever, Rai. How are you feeling?"

"Worse than I look."

"That's pretty awful. Do you want to go to the hospital?"

I shake my head no, and put my cheek back on the toilet seat. "I think it's just food poisoning."

"From the squid," he sighs. "You think you're done?"

"For now."

"Well, let's get you in the shower and cleaned up. I'll call down to the front desk and have someone take care of the mess."

"Don't want to do it yourself?" I tease tiredly, knowing if the shoe was on the other foot, I'd doing the same thing.

"It's simply hard to clean and take care of you, kultaseni."

"True."

Leo helps me into the shower. Once he's positive I can handle myself, he leaves to call the front desk. The water's icy on my skin, bordering on painful, as I close my eyes and half-heartedly wash. My stomach cramps and I wrap my arms around myself and crouch on the floor, forehead pressed to my knees.

Wait. Cramps? I lift myself enough to reach a hand between my legs. It's slick and gooey, fingers coming away red.

"Of fucking course," I sigh, lowering my head back down and riding out the worst of the pain. It's always in my thighs and lower back. Period cramps while sick. The worst of the worst, only made absolutely God awful with the addition of diarrhea, which will no doubt come very soon. I moan and rock myself, biting my lip against the pain.

When needles aren't being driven into my thighs and back, I switch to my knees and try my best to clean myself. It takes twice as long and is only half as good, but I call it quits when the faucet shoots water gathered from Antarctica. No way it's not.

Turning off the shower, I very carefully step out and wrap a towel around my waist. It's an effort avoiding looking at the toilet, but I manage it. I make a move to leave the bathroom but groan. In the front pouch of my backpack are my pads, and there's no way I'm leaving easy-to-wipe tiles for set-in-stain carpeted floors.

"Hey, Leo?" My voice couldn't sound any whiner or downtrodden if I wanted it to.

He's at the door in a second, looking as exhausted as I feel. "You okay? Throw up again?"