Who: Jolene Flint and Santiago Cervantes
What: She's feeling ill, and Santiago checks her out checks up...things
Where: St. Mungo's
When: Today



It had started just after her weekly dinner with Caden and Marcus. She was sure she hadn't used any expired ingredients in the meal... afterall, Caden and Marcus were just fine. But still, the night had ended with her curled on the couch with her nephew pulling her hair and her stomach rebelling against the meal she'd ingested. Not exactly the best night she'd had, but she'd managed to drag herself up to her bedroom with the thought in her head that tomorrow it would have passed and she'd be good as new to go into work.

But the next day wasn't looking much better. After narrowly avoiding throwing up on her coworker's desk (she'd managed to stumble to a garbage bin just in time, thank merlin!), her boss had sent her home with strict instruction to go and see a healer; with all the recent news going around about some sort of 'virus', he didn't really think she should be taking any chances with this. And so, pouting all the way, she managed to haul herself over to Mungo's for an appointment. It couldn't hurt, right?

Wrong.

Upon walking into the waiting room, she proceeded to promptly lose the contents of her stomach all over the shoes of the gentleman standing in front of her on the line to the receptionists' desk. She was escorted quickly into one of the healers' offices after that, and was sitting on the edge of the examination bench with her head in her hands when the door opened to admit her doctor. Naturally he had to be one of the most gorgeous men she'd ever encountered in her life, when she was sitting there looking like death incarnate. And she was almost certain that she smelt of vomit and oh merlin, why her?!

There were no amount of words to describe how exhausting the past few weeks had been. He could blame it all on the extra patients he had to take on, but in all honesty---the people sick with the virus were not the problem. Technically, there weren't that many...it was the hundreds of people that filed into St. Mungo's each morning moaning and groaning that they had the virus, and it was starting to take a major toll on the hospital's staff. The interns were being worn ragged, and with two of their own residents having fallen ill, everyone was more than on edge. As the chief resident (a title he'd never despised until now), Santiago had to take on nearly triple the amount of work he usually did, and that mean a lot of on the floor action and paperwork that was going to literally take years.

Having run out of ink, Santiago made his way down to the sick bay and had gladly taken up the newest case; anything to get him away from quills and ink. His eyes were down on the chart as he entered, moving with expertise around the table the woman was sitting on to go to the sink. The charmed soap washed the ink off his left hand as his right lifted up the chart to eye level.

"Ms. Flint?" he said, dropping the chart to take a look at his patient for the first time. Santiago couldn't help the faint lift of his eyebrows; even though she was obviously ill, she was still incredibly pretty, beautiful, even. It was rare that someone caused such a reaction from him, and Santiago blinked a few times to gain focus. "Er---yes, you are, sick?"

He bit the insides of his cheeks, his eyebrows furrowing at his far less than intelligent question. Of course she was sick, she was in a hospital. "I mean to say, what have you been experiencing?"

"I threw up on someone's shoes," she offered, self-consciously pushing some honey-hued strands of hair back over her shoulder. Of course, as soon as she realized what she had just blurted, the sickly palor of her cheeks took on a noticeably pink flush of embarrassment as she quickly rushed to recover. "I mean, it was only one time. In the waiting room. But that wasn't the only place I threw up, it started at work this morning. But I made it to the garbage bin there." She was positive that she was making an idiot of herself, yet seemed completely incapable of stopping herself. Moronic rambling was one of the unfortunate traits she had inherited from her father.

Her teeth worried at her bottom lip as she lifted an apologetic gaze to meet his, a sheepish shrug offered as her arms went back to wrap protectively around her stomach. He probably thought she had some kind of brain damage. "It just started last night, if that helps." After such an unflattering bout of word-vomit, she could only pray that her stomach behaved itself so that real vomit didn't come up and add to her humiliation.

Santiago's lips pursed together in a smile, trying very hard not to laugh at her blurting. But, a light chuckle did escape and he shook his head lightly.

"I am glad you found a place to dispose of it," he said with a smile and a nod, flipping through her charts one last time. He caught sight of something a bit disturbing, and Santiago pulled out his wand and stepped close. It was time to ignore the fact that she was rather attractive, and be professional, though he felt a bit of a flush begin to creep up his neck. With a soft mutter, a light lit at the tip of his wand, and he began to examine her pretty---her eyes, "You were attacked by dementors, Ms. Flint?"

That was interesting. He wasn't too keen on the injuries one sustained from a dementor attack, that was more Richie's area, but he knew from her paperwork that she had been in the hospital for a long time afterwards. Maybe there was hope; it sounded a bit morbid, but maybe her illness was a reaction from that time, maybe her immune system had taken some damage during her previous time in the hospital, and it wasn't the virus that was making her ill.

"Have you been sick since then?"

She blinked owlishly at him for a moment, his inquiry about the Dementors as well as his suddenly close proximity to her serving to catch her slightly off guard. Nibbling on the inside of her lip, she sat perfectly still, stumbling over her words as she tried not to appear to obvious about the fact that she was staring at him. How could she not? "I...Well, um... yes. I was. But that was a while ago." The thought of it still managed to send a strange chill down her spine, causing her body to shudder briefly in a spazzy motion that she felt immediately inclined to apologize for. Why was it that she managed to make a complete fool of herself in front of attractive men? Of course, Caden would argue that she made a fool of herself in front of everyone, but it was at times like these that she was really made aware of it. "No... That was a few months back. I don't think I've been sick since then. Nothing serious, anyway."

Her brow furrowed in some concern. She had been unconscious for quite some time after the attack... was it possible that whatever this was that was working on her was some kind of follow-up bug from back then? Shifting her weight uneasily on the table, she gazed past the light of his wand to his face and, in a timid voice, spoke again: "I know you've probably been hearing this non-stop all week but... this doesn't look like that virus that's been going around, right? Because I've been in contact with other people since I've been sick, and..." She trailed off; she'd never be able to live with herself if other people got sick because of her. Especially if those people were Caden or Marcus.

She forced another grin onto her face though, the gesture looking out of place on her ashen, slightly drawn features. "I'm sorry. I'm probably the millionth person to ask you that just today. I bet things have been pretty chaotic here, huh. At my job people were coming down sick left and right, I can only imagine how your day must be going."

"You are the millionth person, yes," Santiago said with a grin, shutting the wand light off with a flick of his wrist, "but you are the first to apologize for it."

It was a bit astonishing, really, how much she was beginning to remind him of his sister. Obviously a very kind person, Jolene (okay, he had checked her name before---Ms. Flint was just the proper way to address her! Very professional), was apologizing for being sick? That was a characteristic he recognized immediately; she didn't want to be a bother, or put anything on anyone that she didn't have to. Santiago appreciated it, even though he was quite sure she was showing actual symptoms of the virus. He should have been more careful when coming in to examine her, but Santiago was beginning to believe that if he hadn't caught it by now, with all the patients he had been around and helping, his body just had some natural immunization for it. At least, that's what he kept telling himself, and the nurses who warned him about going into the wards without wearing a mask. He couldn't visit his patients with something covering his face, however, it just didn't feel...what, connected? Maybe that was the word.

Santiago hopped up onto the table to sit beside Jolene, shaking his head lightly as he scribbled some notes onto her chart. He looked over to her with a frown.

"I think it would be best if you were admitted for a few days, just to be safe," Santiago dropped the charts to his thighs, running a hand through his hair; it never got easy, telling a patient that they actually were ill. "the virus that is going around, it seems to steadily increase over a few days, but I think you may have come in early enough to do some good."

He bumped her shoulder with hers lightly, hoping to create a calmer situation, "It could be nothing, but we should take precautions. I could owl your family if you like?"

She nodded slowly, realization dawning on her; for all her clumsy mannerisms, she was far from being stupid, and the news that she was more than probably carrying that virus caused her skin to take on a new shade of pale. His presence beside her startled her a bit... wasn't this virus highly catching? But she couldn't really complain at having him be so close to her, and offered a brave, shaky little grin and nod. "Oh... ok. Well, that's always good, I guess. Right?" But she didn't feel at all brave at the moment. People died from contracting this disease, and Jolene was certain that she most definitely did not want to die. Her stomach turned a nauseating sommersault at the prospect, and she swallowed harshly against a sudden rise of bile in the back of her throat, not at all helped by the jostling motion caused by his shoulder against hers. With an intense show of will power, she managed to not vomit all over him.

"If... if you could, I'd really appreciate it," she muttered, turning large, syrup-colored eyes to gaze at him sadly. "I don't suppose they'll be able to come and visit me, will they?" It wasn't so much a question. She suspected that she was going to be put in some kind of quarantine, a thought that did nothing at all to calm her nerves. "Actually," she began, sitting up a bit straighter, "do you think if I wrote something myself you could just send them for me? I think they'd get freaked-out if they got a letter written by a doctor... no offense." She chuckled and tilted a brow at him, genuine mirth pulling the corners of her lips up into a wry smirk. "Believe me, the last thing you'd want is my brother to come in here making a scene. I'm afraid he'd mow people down. And besides, I have to remind them to feed Ares." A pause, and then, matter-of-factly, "She's my dog."

Santiago grinned, nodding and hopping down to the floor.

"I understand, I have little sisters," he tapped his nose lightly, "I am sure I will be able to handle him when he comes storming in for answers." Santiago knew that he hadn't been the most rational of people when his nephew was ill with the disease, but he did know what kind of behavior simply despised and had managed to control himself...for the most part. He was sure it was different for people who didn't have to deal with frantic family members every day, but he was good at dealing with people. He might be a bit stiff when it came to certain aspects of relationships, but being friendly and taking charge? That was how Santiago had survived this long, he was sure.

"Well, Jolene---Ms. Flint, perdoname--ah, sorry, excuse me," now Santiago felt the flush on his neck creep up to his neck and he was quite sure his cheeks were just a tad shade darker. His English was perfect, really, save for an odd accent (going to a boarding school in England did wonders for your Portuguese), but sometimes with casual conversation he still slipped into his native tongue. And---well! It had only been a year since he'd come back to England after...after nearly seven years back home. Deus, it had been a year already? That was remarkable.

"I will go get the necessary paperwork and...we can start healing you right up." He smiled again, bumping into the end of the table quite clumsily; when did that table get so long? Er--"Er. Yes. I will take good care of you---I mean. We will, the hospital. The hospital will."

Before he could humiliate himself anymore (thank goodness Richie's ward was two floors away and Pri was still recovering---) Santiago sent her a nod and hurried out of the examination room, shaking his head and muttering idiota, idiota over and over.