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The water’s cold. I’m damn near shivering when he lifts his head, looking up at me with wide, tired eyes. “You didn’t call them, did you?”
“No. The hospital?”
He nods. Then he frowns around the shower. “I don’t like it in here.”
I wrap my hand around the back of his neck. He feels cooler.
“Let’s get out.”
In the bed, he lies on his back, wide eyes clinging to me. I give him more to drink and push a pillow behind him so he can drink it without spilling. Then I take his temp: 99.8.
“I feel better,” he says, blinking up at me. He gives me a wan smile, which is so unconvincing that it makes me laugh.
I shake my head. “Stay right here. I’ve got an idea.”
“Are you gonna call?” he rasps as I turn toward his bedroom door.
When I look over my shoulder, he looks scared, which makes my throat tight. “No, angel. I’m just going down to get some ice packs.”
“Okay,” he says.
“Okay.” I cross the distance between us and kiss his forehead. “I’ll be right back.”
He nods.
He’s more stoic when I get back. I put five towel-wrapped ice packs under his arms, against his neck, over the inside of his wrist, and the last one between his legs.
“Fuckk,” he says, giving a shut-eyed laugh. “Fuckin’ cold on my junk.”
“I think it will cool you down more.”
He shuts his eyes. “It’s okay,” he whispers.
But he cups his balls and lifts them off the towel that’s around the ice pack. I open his drawer and grab an undershirt. Then I put it below his balls. When I’m done, he’s laughing, closing a hand around his semi.
“The fuck,” he murmurs, holding my eyes with his heavy-lidded ones.
“If you think I’m gonna get you off when we’re trying to cool you down…” I make a tsk sound, shaking my head, even as I’m grinning at him.
“I know,” he says, his eyes now shut. “I feel cold now,” he whispers.
“Look what I got you.” I hold his Propel bottle out, showing him the hard, pink plastic straw I swiped from the cutlery drawer downstairs. It swirls into a heart shape at the top. “Can you drink some of it?”
He does.
I set the Propel down, and for the longest moment, he just looks up into my eyes.
“I’m sorry,” he says. His voice is tight. I think he looks embarrassed.
“Don’t be sorry.” I sit on the bed and then I lie on my side, facing him. I can’t help scooting closer. Scooting close enough to kiss his cheek. It’s cooler now—less feverish.
“I fucked up,” he murmurs.
“How so?” With my fingertips, I brush his hair off of his forehead.
“Last night.”
“What happened last night?”
“Nightmare,” he says, lifting his tired eyes open. “I wanted Xanax, but I grabbed the wrong bottle,” he whispers. “Under the bed.”
Fuck, he’s falling asleep, and I want to shake him awake.
“What bottle?” I ask, trying to keep my tone light.
“Another one,” he rasps. His eyes drag open again. “Causes heat intolerance.” The words are mostly just mouthed.
His eyes shut. “So it was my fault,” he says, his voice lower.
“Ez?” I trace his brow with my fingertip, holding my breath for a long moment. “Did you get the pills you mentioned at a hospital?”
He doesn’t move—not even to breathe. Then his eyes find mine. His face is so still. “Yes.”
My heart squeezes painfully, an army of feelings galloping through my chest, pressing upward at my tight throat. I scoot closer, lay my check against his shoulder. I kiss his jaw, below his ear.
“Okay.” I nod.
Eighteen
Josh
I can’t keep from hugging him up. After a minute, I put an arm over his chest, and Ezra moves an ice pack from below his arm, putting his left arm around me. Within seconds, it seems, he’s asleep.
I slip carefully out of bed and down to the floor, peeking under his mattress for…I don’t know. The box spring cover’s hanging loose, like someone ripped it in a spot—which stands out because this bed is new. I lie on my back, shimmying under the box spring, and reach my hand in through the ripped cover.
I’m so stunned to feel a little bottle that I knock it over—which makes eight prescription bottles rain down on my face. I can’t breathe as I look at each one.
Amitriptyline. Clonazepam. Zolpidem. Lamictal. My throat stings and my eyes blur as I line them back up like I found them on one of the box spring boards.
When I stand up, I take a few slow breaths and wipe my damp eyes, feeling shocked and so damn devastated. I check his temp again, finding that it’s 98.9, and then go down for dinner.
I don’t want Mom and Carl coming up and finding him all heat exhausted, so I tell them I think he’s feeling sick, but that he told me he’d be down for dinner later. Carl seems concerned, as does my mom. I wonder as I eat if they know what he told me.
