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I look over my shoulder at him. “I’m okay.”
He chuckles. “No, you’re not.” He comes and jumps onto the bed, landing beside me. “You feel like eating?”
“Nope.”
“Even if I make it?” He waggles his brows at me playfully.
“Nope.”
“What did your grandmother have to say?” He reaches over and brushes a lock of hair from my face. His face is so calm and serene in that moment that he almost seems pretty to me.
“Just gossip,” I say over another yawn, my mouth wide open.
“The good kind?”
I roll my eyes but doing that hurts. “Is there a good kind of gossip?”
He shrugs. “I guess it depends on who it’s about.” He heaves out a sigh. “So, what are we doing tonight?”
“I have no plans to do anything. Not with you or with anybody else.” My fever is better, but I still feel like doo-doo.
“Want to play UNO?” he asks. He grins while he says it and rubs his hands together. “You wouldn’t have to get out of bed.”
“I haven’t played UNO since I was a teenager. I’m afraid I’ve forgotten how.”
He cups his hands around his mouth. “I can read instructions,” he whispers at me, like he’s telling me an important secret.
“Fine.” I groan and pull the covers under my chin. “I’ve never been so warm as when you were in bed with me this morning.”
His cheeks turn a little pink, and he looks everywhere but at me. “Glad I could help,” he says, his voice a little deeper than before.
“Why are you looking like that?” I ask, suddenly curious about his response.
“Like what?” He motions toward his face. “This is my face, Abigail. It’s the only one I have. Don’t disrespect it.”
“Shut up,” I say, as I playfully kick out at his knee. “Your face did something weird.”
“And I’m to be judged for what my face does?” He lets his mouth drop open like a cartoon character who has been shocked.
“Why did you turn all pink?”
“I don’t know what you mean.” He gets up and starts to wander around, picking up glasses and dishes.
“Would you stop that?”
“Stop what?” He freezes en route to the kitchen and looks back at me.
“Stop hedging around the question.”
“What was the question?”
I enunciate very slowly. “I asked why you looked funny when I mentioned how much I liked having you be my own personal heating blanket. I was just joking. I won’t make you do it again.”
“See…that’s where you’re wrong.” He walks into the kitchen, and I can hear him opening the refrigerator, pouring something into a glass, and then he comes back carrying a fresh glass of purple juice with a straw in it. He drops some chopped up fever reducers in my hand and holds the straw close to me.
“What am I wrong about?” I ask, as I drop the pill bits into my mouth and wrap my lips around the straw.
“You’re wrong about my not wanting to get back into your bed. It’s all I’ve been able to think about ever since this morning. I woke up with you pressed against me. My hand had slid up under your shirt, and my palm was on your stomach. We were skin to skin, and it’s been a long time since I was as happy as I was in that moment.”
