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“I’m happy when I’m with her,” Leo murmured. In response, Sam lurched over the bowl and upchucked, like the statement was the grossest thing he had ever heard. “Shit!” Leo jumped backward and waited for Sam to stop emptying his stomach, then asked, “Have you taken anything yet?”
Sam’s sickly moan echoed in the bowl. “What exactly would I take? It’s not like we have anything.”
Leo started toward the kitchen, where he already knew he wouldn’t find anything to help. He looked through all of their cabinets, muttering to himself when he couldn’t find even a bottle of ibuprofen. The fridge was his next bet, but he didn’t find lemon or honey in the cabinets to make the hot water concoction his mom always used to make when he or his siblings were sick.
“Does Wes have drugs?” Leo called out over his shoulder. “Can we call him?”
“He’s not awake. Who do you think I got this shit from?” Sam called back weakly. “Sorry, I don’t think I can rehearse tomorrow.”
Leo trudged back over to the sofa and crouched down to Sam’s eye level. “You really think I’m worried about that right now?” He reached out a tentative hand and held the back of it against Sam’s clammy forehead, another thing Lucia used to do. With one touch, she always seemed to know just how sick Leo or one of his siblings was. He didn’t know how to gauge a fever, but the blazing heat against his hand said that Sam probably had one. Resigned, he stood up and pulled out his phone. “I’m going to call someone.”
A quiet knock finally came on the front door an hour later, and Leo flew up from the arm of the couch to open it. Piper stood on his doorstep holding a reusable Lydia’s Grocery bag and wearing his black hoodie that she had never seen fit to give back. It looked better on her anyway. Without preamble, she barged into the apartment.
“Where’s Sam?”
“He’s asleep on the couch,” Leo said. “You didn’t need to come over. I just wanted to borrow some stuff and then never return it. I could have come by.”
Piper heaved the nearly full bag onto the countertop, the contents rattling inside. The items Leo had requested shouldn’t have taken up much space, so he wasn’t sure what was actually in the bag until she started pulling things out one by one. Along with the supplies he had requested for Sam—honey, lemon, Vicks VapoRub, and Tylenol—she’d brought what looked like the ingredients for chicken noodle soup, those lotion-infused tissues his family never bought, and a stockpile of other drugs and products. Leo reached for one of the boxes and held it up, confused.
“Why does he need Imodium A-D? He has a fever. I don’t think he’s shitting himself just yet.” Leo craned his head to look at the sleeping lump on the couch just to verify that Sam hadn’t soiled himself without his knowledge.
“Oh, um…” Piper’s cheeks tinged with pink as she pulled a larger box containing a small humidifier from the bag, and she looked away. “You said you didn’t have any medicine, so I just picked up some other basic things while I was at the store. I was grocery shopping when you called, so it wasn’t a huge deal.”
“You were grocery shopping at one in the morning?” Leo narrowed his eyes.
“Yep.” Piper nodded a little too aggressively. “It’s nice when there’s no one there.”
He knew she was lying, but felt the need to deter any future trips to the grocery store at an ungodly hour. “If you do that again, invite me. Biston’s is the only place open that late at night, and it’s where my freshman year roommate got mugged once.”
“Thea went with me.”
Leo shook his head. Two of them might be able to do some damage, but he doubted it. He’d seen the way Piper punched, and while she was learning more each time he gave her another lesson, it wasn’t enough. “I don’t like it, Piper. For either of you. It’s not safe, and I know you don’t like driving at night, so just call me next time.”
The defiant look in her eyes fell away, and she gave him a curt nod. “Okay.”
“Thank you,” he murmured and gestured to the slew of medications she had brought. “And thank you for all of this.”
“I got washcloths, too. For his forehead. You said he had a fever, right? My dad used to put a cool cloth on my head when I was sick.” Piper shrugged, but Leo saw the twinge of sadness behind her eyes, and his heart clenched. “But you probably have washcloths, so it was a stupid idea.”
“We do have washcloths, but it’s not stupid.” Leo gave Piper a soft smile and took the washcloths from her hand, ripping open the packaging. He handed one cloth back to her and set the rest on the counter. “You do this, and I’ll get the other stuff ready. And then it looks like we’re making soup?”
Piper nodded. “My mom’s recipe.”
For the next several minutes, they worked in silence, prepping every element of the home remedy they mutually decided would heal Sam. Leo grabbed a pair of clean socks from Sam’s room and made the hot lemon and honey tea. Piper rolled the cool, wet rag and woke Sam up by pressing it to his forehead.
“What’s happening?” Sam moaned, his eyes blinking slowly into awareness.
“We’re taking care of you. Can you sit up? You need to take this.” Leo held out the assortment of cold and flu pills and vitamin C tablets.
“Piper?” Sam groaned but sat up a bit. “I love your uncle.”
“What?” Piper screwed up her face. “I think that’s the fever talking. He’s very taken, and I think Wes might have a problem with you saying that.”
Leo laughed and shook his head. “He probably does have a fever, but I think he means Walker’s book. Walker gave me a copy of The Dating Brigade, and Sam’s already read it twice.”
“Oh. That makes more sense.” Piper held up a thermometer. “Open up.”
“I want a matchmaking empire like Landon and Cora.” Sam looked incredibly dizzy as he spoke his gibberish. “I want a big choppy knife.” Sam’s pointer finger sliced through the air and made a few lazy stabbing motions.
