“Iz?” I call again, and hear a faint reply from upstairs.
Jogging up the stairs, I head to her room, which is strange, because she’s been sleeping in my room lately.
“Hey, you, what are you doing in here?” I ask, immediately worried when I walk in and find her in bed with the lights off. “Are you tired?” I say, sitting on the edge of her bed.
She groans and rolls towards me. “I’m not feeling that great,” she grumbles.
I flick on the bedside light and notice how pale she is.
“Are you sick?” I ask, reaching out to touch my hand to her forehead. She isn’t running a fever, but she looks exhausted and drained.
“I haven’t been able to keep anything down,” she says quietly.
“Oh no, that’s horrible, why didn’t you have the guys call me? I would have come home!” I scold her, lying down on the bed next to her and pulling her into my arms.
She hides her face against my chest and lets out a strained breath.
“It’s okay, I’m here now. Do I need to get you something? Meds? Tea? Maybe we can try a slice of plain toast or salted chips if you want to try eating something?”
She shakes her head, still buried against my chest. I stroke my hand down the back of her head, letting my fingers thread through her silky strands of hair.
“Little pixie, what do you need? Anything at all?”
“Do we still have ginger?” she asks weakly.
“I think we might. And if we don’t, I’ll send someone out to get it right away. Do you want tea?”
“Ginger and peppermint, please,” she mumbles.
“And food?”
“Let’s try tea first.”
Kissing the top of her head, I whisper, “I’ll be right back.”
The ginger isn’t as fresh as I want it, and I have nothing resembling peppermint, so I send someone out to the store for me. I also have them bring back salted crackers, salted chips and fresh bread from the bakery.
It’s not the healthiest food. But sometimes you just need to try and get something in your stomach to settle the bug.
Instead of taking everything back to her room, I set it all up in my room. I push the remote to call the LCD screen down from where it slots into the ceiling, and I pull up Netflix so we can choose a movie.
Then I go through to her room to fetch her.
She complains when I scoop her out of bed.
“No, I want to stay in bed,” she grumbles.
“You can, but this isn’t your bed.”
“Anton, I might make you sick if I sleep in your room,” she huffs.
“It’s worth the risk. I can’t keep my eye on you if you aren’t right next to me,” I tell her.
She doesn’t complain again, perhaps because she doesn’t have the energy.
Perhaps because she wants to be close to me just as much as I want her at my side.
That night, we snuggle in bed together. I pick the movies because she spends most of the time asleep on my chest. When she wakes up after her tea has had some time to settle her stomach, she eats salted chips and then falls asleep again.
