We ended up staying on the couch like that for almost an hour, with her curled up on the couch next to me and my hand trailing slowly up and down her back. There was more than once when she gagged into her closed mouth, and when I asked if she needed to throw up again, she would shake her head and tell me not yet.
Her breathing was deep and heavy, almost like she was willing her remaining stomach contents to stay in place. And ya know? I had to hand it to her, it was kind of impressive. Even more impressive was how calmly she got up, hand on her belly, and walked across the living room to the bathroom door. Her feet padded softly across the carpet. She stopped in the doorway, flicked on the light, turned to look at me, and said that she was going to throw up.
Ya'll, I wish I had a picture of how perfect she looked, standing there back-lit by the overhead light in the bathroom. Her dirty blonde hair fell around her face and down to her shoulders. The calm look of acceptance in her bright blue eyes. The way she palmed her stomach. It was truly intoxicating how disheveled and visibly nauseas she looked. My whole body felt prickly at the sight, and all I could do was nod as I stood up to walk the short distance between us. Just as I was a few inches from her, she gagged, dryly, suddenly and clapped a hand over her mouth. I instinctively put my hand on her shoulder, turned her towards the toilet, and helped her walk the couple of steps. She burped twice, and the second one had sounded *almost* productive.
I watched, one hand on her back and the other lightly on her hip, as she slowly lowered herself onto her knees in front of the white, porcelain bowl. I lowered myself down next to her and began rubbing her lower back. She had her chin resting on her folded hands, eyes closed, breathing deeply through her nose. She brought one hand down to her sick tummy, pushed in lightly, and then burped deeply into the water.
I sat there with her, rubbing her back and murmuring that she would be okay. She'll feel better after it's over; to throw up if she needs to. Her only responses came in soft moans and whimpers. Drool dribbled from her full lips and hit the surface of the clean water with a soft drip. With no more warning than a sudden, sharp inhale, she spewed copiously into the bowl. There was another sharp breath, she vomited again, and then leaned back slightly from the bowl. She reached down to my hand that was still resting on her hip, gently moved it onto her belly, and muttered a soft but desperate "Please."
We sat like that for maybe 5-7 minutes. I rubbed circles around her belly button, her stomach gurgled under my touch, and I could feel the muscles contracting. It felt so upset still. She broke the silence between us when she started to tell me that she was gonna puke again, but was cut off by a productive gag that sent a smaller wave of her dinner into the soiled water. I resumed murmuring reassuring things to her while she burped and gagged up everything she had left in her. The volume from each heave began to taper off, and the contents was getting both thicker and chunkier; it wasn't long before the dry heaves set in. Tears rolled down her cheeks from the exertion of her stomach trying to turn itself inside out.
Once she was definitely done, I helped her get cleaned up. She told me that she wanted to go back out to the ligingroom with me so after I helped her to the couch, I went and got the trashcan from her room, grabbed her water bottle, and got her some saltine crackers. We are curled up together, again, this time I run my fingers across the side of her stomach while she sips her water and nibbles on her crackers.
Hopefully she starts feeling better soon.
