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// April 27 [Still Sick] 
// Story: Silver Glow's Journal 
// by Admiral Biscuit 
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 April 27

I felt a little better when I woke up on Wednesday morning, but I still had a fever and a really runny nose. I sucked an antihistamine candy and went to the microwave in the little lounge to make hot water for tea. I couldn't remember exactly how long Peggy cooked water for, so I thought I should do it for five minutes and then see how hot it was.

Five minutes was too long, and I was lucky that I just brushed the mug because if I had grabbed it I would have burned myself.

I didn't have a good way to get the cup out of the microwave so I just left it there while I went to the bathroom and when I came back it was cool enough to touch at least.

I sat at my desk and sipped my tea and that helped unstuff my nose but I still didn't feel all that good. Peggy got up and told me that I was going to stay in the room and get better and asked if there was anything that she could get for me. I couldn't think of anything, so she said that she would come back between classes and if I needed anything I could call her, or I could call Mister Salvatore and Miss Cherilyn, and they would come right over.

She said that I should probably stay in our room as much as possible and rest so that I would get better quickly, especially since I was going to Madison this weekend. Then she wrote down on a piece of paper how to use Netflix. Her Netflix name (which was like my airplane call-sign) was Snowboarding_Chick and her password was Sa1omon (she said the underline was because it was the number one not the letter l which looked the same).

Then she had to go and take her shower so she would be ready for class.

I was thinking that I should go to breakfast—it's not good to stop eating just because you feel sick; that can make it worse—and I finished my tea and was brushing my mane in front of the mirror when Peggy came back from her shower and she said that she would bring me breakfast before she went to class.

I'd gotten back in bed before she came back and I was reading poetry when she came back. There was a lot in the new book that I hadn't gotten to yet, and I felt really bad for missing Conrad's class yesterday.

She set the tray on my desk and said that I should eat whatever I thought I could and that she would get me more orange juice, then there was a knock at the door and it was Miss Cherilyn.

She had a plastic shopping bag from Walgreens, and she put it on my desk. She told me that she had brought more antihistamine candies and a bottle of Vernors because that would make me feel better. And Peggy left, 'cause she could see I was being taken care of.

It's so nice how helpful and friendly some people are. She reminded me that there would be a nurse coming to draw my blood and that the nurse could get my vitals or she could do it if I didn't mind, and I told her that I didn't mind, so she put on her little gloves again, and when she was finished she sent a computer mail to the pony doctor who had been on the big pocket telephone.

I spent most of the morning either reading poetry or dozing. It felt kind of rude to not talk to Miss Cherilyn, but when I talked too much my throat got scratchy and then started coughing. I tried a glass of the Vernors and it was bubbly and tingly and made me sneeze but it did make my throat feel better and sometimes medicine isn't supposed to taste good.

I think humans must get sick a lot because I see people drinking Vernors out of little bottles all the time.

I was in bed when the nurse came in but I wasn't asleep so I got up to greet her and she asked me how I was feeling and did the same things that Miss Cherilyn had already done and then did the things that doctors do like listening to my chest and looking in me with the little light and then she took a cotton-stick and got some snot and then stuck me with a needle and got some blood and she said that if I had to pee she wouldn't mind having a sample of that, too. I didn't have to, so she said when she came back it would be really nice if she could get a urine sample, so I told her I would remember.

Then she told me that I shouldn't go to class today and they were going to run some more tests on my blood and my snot and that she would be back in the afternoon and she petted me on the head and said that I had been good and reached into her pocket and pulled out a bone-shaped cookie and then slid it back in and shook my hoof instead.

I ate the rest of breakfast for lunch, and Miss Cherilyn made me another cup of tea and Peggy brought me a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that was wrapped up in a napkin and brushed my mane. Then she went out in the hall and talked with Miss Cherilyn for a little bit, and then she had to go to class again.

I was feeling a little better in the afternoon and I used my computer and Peggy's Netflix to watch a movie. She thought I might like The Little Mermaid, which I did. But I didn't think that Ariel was too smart to give up her fish-tail for a boy; I wouldn't give up my wings for a stallion no matter what. I would never be happy without them, and I don't see how she could be happy out of the sea forever.

I told Miss Cherilyn about the merponies and seaponies and how shy they were, but I'd seen a pod of merponies sunning on a rock once when I was way away from land near some shoals. A lot of the sailors saw them more often and they were always a good sign because wherever they were, there weren't any sea monsters.

She asked if I had ever been to a merpony town and if it was like in the movie, and I said I hadn't because I couldn’t breathe underwater but I had heard of ponies making diving bells and special suits and sometimes visiting them. I told her that the sailors often gave them gifts, and sometimes the merponies helped sailors who were lost at sea.

Peggy came back while we were talking about how annoying seaponies could be. She asked how I was feeling and I said I was better and that I could probably go to class tomorrow and Miss Cherilyn said that I ought to wait for the results from my tests. And just when I was starting to think about dinner the nice nurse showed up again and went through the whole routine again and I even got a cup of my pee for her.

I spent the rest of the evening with Peggy, reading my Bible while she did homework, and then helping her with her math. Peggy told me she had sent a telephone telegram to Aric telling him that I was sick and I thanked her for doing that. She didn't have to.

She said that she had talked to Meghan at dinner and told her, too.

I was kind of surprised that none of them had come over but maybe that wasn't a thing that most humans did. Some predator species like griffons would just abandon a friend who got sick because they were afraid that they might get sick, too. And sometimes that was for the best; when a pegasus got feather flu she had to be isolated until she was better, or else everyone would get it.

I had to get a bunch of shots before I came here; I wonder if Peggy had to get some, too. Maybe that was why she wasn't worried about staying with me but everyone else was.

It was too much to think about, so I just got in bed and lay on my back and stretched out my wings and let my belly cool off until my back was all sweaty, then I rolled over and lay on my stomach and had one more antihistamine mint then I fell asleep.