Nochelle - Our Stories

S I C K 2

There's one other change. "Nice glasses." Noah snickers.

She frowns vaguely at him from behind the giant lenses, too tired to put much effort into the glare and quickly breaking off into a cough anyway. Noah watches as she slumps onto the couch, tucks her legs up underneath her into the blanket, and shivers.

He scoots over to sit beside her and rubs her shoulder, offering a bit of body warmth, but Richelle pulls away.

"You're gonna get sick."

"You've had this for days. If I was going to get sick, it would have happened already." Noah says, but he moves back to his end of the couch. "You wanna watch a movie?" A shrug. "Netflix?" She shrugs again. Her eyes are already closed.

Noah queues up Spirited Away, turns the volume down low, and makes a late lunch for himself. Richelle still shudders and stirs restlessly every once in a while, but for the most part she appears to have fallen asleep.

~~~

Noah's phone buzzes, and somewhere in the room he can faintly hear Richelle's too. It's Michelle on the group chat, asking after her sister. Noah sends them a picture in which the top of Richelle's hair is only just visible under all the blankets.

Michelle:
Poor kid, I'll be back soon.

Henny Penny:
AWWWW!!!! You're taking care of her!!!

Jacquie:
tell her we burned everything she ever touched

Piper:
Tell her we all hope she feels better!

Jacquie:
🔥🔥🔥

Noah:
Thanks guys

~~~

All is quiet until there's a sudden rustling of blankets, and Noah looks over to find that Richelle's woken up. She's doing... something, Noah's not sure what, but she sure is floundering about and kicking a lot. In fact, if she's not careful, she's going to—

Thump.

Ouch.

Noah rushes over to the still-squirming lump of blankets now on the floor. "Richelle, you okay?"

She blinks up at him helplessly, and his heart jolts as he notices the frustrated, uncomfortable tears in her eyes.

"Hot."

Noah goes to work quickly untangling her from the blankets. He helps her back onto the couch, but she's still not done, kicking off her socks and trying to wiggle out of her heavy pajamas.

Noah looks away awkwardly, not sure whether he should be helping her undress in this particular setting, but when she gets stuck with her shirt halfway over her head and lets out a soft, defeated sob, he pushes aside his hesitation and quickly interferes.

Once he's done, Richelle sits there in a sweaty sports bra and cotton shorts, face flushed and hair a mess, with a few hot, miserable tears trickling down her cheeks.

"Too hot?" Noah asks unnecessarily, feeling her temperature. Richelle pulls away, skin painfully sensitive to touch. Noah couldn't tell if her fever had gotten worse or not anyways. "Hang tight, okay? I'll be right back."

Noah finds a small hand towel in the downstairs bathroom and runs it under cool water, wringing it out in the sink. Returning to the couch, he drapes it over the back of Richelle's neck, feeling proud of himself when she sighs in relief.

"Feels better, doesn't it?" Noah moves away to look in the freezer, and there's two ice packs already frozen and ready for whenever they may be needed—her family was just as organised as her. He wraps one in a paper towel before returning to the living room and resting it on her forehead.