While the dark haired teenager could barely wait for the weekend to be over, Nathalie wished it to be twice as long. She had woken up on Friday evening around ten o'clock and was totally disoriented. Then she had reached for her phone and slowly realized, that she had fallen asleep right after lunch, and that she had a lot of work left to do.
When the assistant finally had made it out of bed and after a long bathroom break, to look halfway decent, she rushed towards the office to be stopped by Gabriel the moment she exited her room.
"Woah, where do you think you're going?", he shouted in shock as he caught her by her shoulders because she almost ran into him.
"Did you guard the door to my room in case I-I would try to get out?", she interrogated angrily. But the man she loved so deeply just smiled at her sweetly.
"I was on my way to check on you. Are you feeling better?" he said in a low voice to not wake the bodyguard, who was as usual asleep around nine.
She nodded. "Much better. Hopefully I can get a bit of my work done now." As to remind her of taking care of herself, her stomach began to growl.
Gabriel gazed down and said: "Tummy says eat, so you will have some dinner. You can do your work on Monday. Come, we have a look into the fridge. I remember ordering chocolate cake this afternoon and I would bet, that there are still two pieces left."
He held out his arm and Nathalie, whose face had lit up a lot at the word chocolate cake, hooked her hand into it and followed him with a teasing: "Two pieces left? And what are 'you' going to eat?"
"Don't try to steal my cake, woman. I don't go easy on those who dare!", he mused and she giggled and leaned her head against his arm. Gabriel noticed but just went with it.
In the kitchen he indeed pulled two large pieces of cake out of the fridge and handed her one.
"Would you like some wine to it? I know, it's not what usually is served with chocolate cake, but this one goes really good with the dark chocolate.", he showed her the open bottle.
"I'd love to, but I can't. I get into a strange mood, if I drink wine and I don't want to cry anymore. But don't let me hold you back!"
He chuckled and poured a glass for himself.
"Would you at least have a tiny zip to tell me if you like the combination?" The tall man held out the glass to her.
Sighing she shook her head. "Seriously, I can't", the cake is more than enough remembering that doctor telling me what I should eat and what I shouldn't. How do people do that?"
"What?"
"Live of only healthy food. How do you do that?", she blurted out.
Chuckling Gabriel bent over and whispered into her ear: "I sneak into the kitchen at night and secretly eat chocolate cake and drink wine!"
Now Nathalie giggled. "So, this isn't the first time?"
He shook his head. "Nope"
Then he told her about his arrangement with Marinette. She was sceptical at first but then agreed.
"It will be good for her and I won't feel bad, if I can't get everything done", she muttered more to herself.
"Exactly. And now, off to bed with you. Maybe you can get out of your room tomorrow and go outside to breathe some fresh air", Gabriel now suggested.
"We'll see!", she said and yawned. "Unbelievable, that I just got out of bed!"
Without Gabriel noticing, she sneaked into the office for about two hours at night on Saturday and Sunday, to finish off the left over work. So on Monday, despite not feeling well, she was on time at her desk and even a little ahead of her tasks. So when Marinette entered the office with a sheepish smile after school, she had already prepared a little schedule that the teenager could work after to get into the things she needed to learn.
Nathalie even let her make a few calls, but stayed with her just in case. To her surprise, the usually rather reluctant girl, managed the negotiations on the phone very good and wasn't the slightest bit giving in, if someone tried to talk her into doing something they normally wouldn't, like paying more for some kind of fabric.
She even made one supplier give her a better price, because she could convince him, that she had seen better materials for a lesser price and that only the long lasting relation between him and Gabriel were the reason they still stayed with him.
So after two days of feeling sick and having trouble to get up at all, she finally decided on Wednesday, that she needed a break and asked the young girl, if she could run some errands for her in the afternoon. After looking over Gabriel's duties and appointments, she sent him an Email with his schedule for the next two days.
She then texted him, that she wouldn't be able to work the rest of the week.
He was just in a video conference with Audrey Bourgeois and one of her employees when the message arrived at his phone. He took a short glimpse and saw Nathalie's picture, that he had taken when she was asleep in the hotel room without her knowing, on the screen, so he decided, that if she was only texting, what ever she wrote could wait until he was done with his unpleasant negotiation.
Audrey as usual kept him busy for about two hours, before she gave in and agreed to his ideas for the next fashion show. Only then he read the message, his assistant had sent him, being certain, it was just about another business related thing.
But the moment he had opened it, his face went instantly pale. What was going on and why hadn't she told him in person instead of texting him over his work phone?
He rushed out of the office and to her room, where he instantly knocked and entered without waiting for her answer.
"Get out", the mountain of pillows and blankets on her bed groaned hoarsely.
"Before you catch whatever I caught."
He took a few steps closer, trying to find the source of her voice in all those sheets. On the upper right corner, he suddenly spotted a bit of dark hair. So he carefully made his way around her bed, trying not to step onto anything, that was lying on the floor. Each time he was inside her room he kept wondering how this usually so organized woman could leave her room in such a mess.
He sat down on the tiny bit of mattress that was still visible under all the cushions and searched between the blankets for the rest of her head.
"You will get sick too", she croaked. "Why can't you just leave?"
"You wouldn't leave me alone if I was sick either", he explained.
"Yes, but isn't that somehow part of the job description?", she coughed a little then held her stomach with her left hand, while covering her mouth with her right. "Ugh", she groaned.
"You know that I am not here because you're my assistant, Nathalie. So would you please tell me what is bothering you now?"
She shook her head, still covering her mouth and pushed him to the side as she ran past him and into the bathroom. Seconds later he heard some unmistakable, rather unpleasant sounds of the young female emptying her stomach for the, as far as she remembered, 7th time this day.
Gabriel got on his feet and followed her with a sigh. Without the slightest hesitation he crouched down beside her and softly rubbed her back up and down, until the convulsive gagging finally stopped.
She leaned against him, too exhausted to get up on her own and asked with a now even huskier, barely audible voice: "How do you do that?"
"What?" He had no idea what she was talking about.
"Not having the urge to puke too, when you sit there. Most people, like me, can't even stand to hear someone...ugh, just thinking of it almost makes me start over again."
"Well after being with an actress for several years, who doesn't really know how much she can drink until she starts to throw up, yet can't go to any movie premiere without drinking a bit too much, I somehow became immune against it", he told with a sad smile.
Nathalie just nodded weakly. "It's probably the best, if I just stay right here", she squeaked with her strained voice after a failed attempt to get up.
"No, you won't", Gabriel said and lifted her up bridal style to then carry her to her bed.
"But I don't know if I can make it back to the toilet at all", the exhausted woman complained.
"See, that's one of the reasons why I won't leave you on your own", he uttered tenderly. "But I'm afraid, I have to bring some structure into the mess on your bed before you can eventually lie back down."
The designer began to throw all the cushions and blankets to the floor, then he straightened the sheets and tucked them under the mattress. After turning his head and looking over the now plain surface, he nodded to himself and started to place the pillows and cushions against the head board.
The female had watched him from the chair by the window, he had sat her down on. She now tried to get to her feet, her legs still trembling and another coughing fit shaking her.
Gabriel arrived at her side just in time to catch her, as her legs gave in.
He brought her to the bed and laid her down, then tucked her in. With a stern look he sat down with her and started interrogating: "Can you please tell me now, what your symptoms are? And since when are you feeling like that? And when did the coughing start again? Before or after the puking?"
"After", she replied to his last question first.
"That's at least something. What else, fever? Running nose? Diarrhoea?"
She shook her head to each of his suggested symptoms.
"Did you eat something that might have been spoiled?"
"I don't know Gabriel, if I did I knew how to stop it", she whined.
"Well,if it's some kind of food poisoning, it won't just stop because you know what caused it", he argued, "though it would usually come with diarrhoea."
"It's not food poisoning, it's just some food that I just can't keep down. Or something to drink. I even had my vitamins under suspicion", Nathalie's voice was barely a whisper now.
"How long have you been feeling like this, Nathalie? When was the last time you ate?" By now he was truly scared and she could hear that in his voice.
The young woman pulled him closer and hissed: "I've been eating quite a lot, I just can't keep anything down!"
"I hope that's the truth. Yet we need to get you something you can keep in. Suggestions?", he hopefully asked.
"None, that you would agree to", she scoffed.
"Try me. Better the most unhealthy, greasy and sugary food I can find than nothing at all", he ranted. "So, what is it you truly desire?"
She giggled at his TV reference.
"Worth a try", she rasped. "Do you like Pizza?"
"Because of the grease or the sugar?", he teased.
"Actually", she tried to utter out, before her voice would give in completely, "it's the combination of both combined with the tomatoes and the mushrooms, and maybe a bit of corn as a special note."
"Your wish is my command, my dear!", he cooed, then kissed her forehead softly, his lips lingering for a moment on her with cold sweat coated skin.
Then he ordered the pizza she suggested over his phone, as well as some soup just in case. Considering her rather uncommon daily food choice, basically everything sweet a bakery had to offer in combination with far too much coffee or any unhealthy kind of soft drink, she maybe would indeed be able to have better chances with the fast food.
"Maybe you can't digest healthy food, because you never gave your system the chance to get used to it", he mockingly indicated.
"Not funny", she creaked.
"I'll go get you some tea", the designer now said. "And you stay right were you are. "
He left the room, to soon return with a pot of herbal tea and a glass mug. After pouring some into the cup and stirring it for a while, so it would cool down a bit, he helped her sit up and handed it to Nathalie.
She took a careful zip and instantly made a grimace.
"What?", Gabriel asked.
"Never mind, thank you for making it", she mouthed, her voice now gone.
Another zip and another disgusted expression. Then it dawned him. He hadn't added any sugar. Watching her gulping the tea down zip by zip, he started to grin.
"Interesting", he began, "without the sugar you can keep something down. Good thing I ordered not only your pizza but as well some nice, hot soup, that will surely do a better job as the other stuff."