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“Nope.” I give him another weak smile. “I took them whole.”
He whistles. “Somebody’s feeling better.” He walks back to me and bends over to kiss my forehead. “I’m glad.”
“I’m still weak as water, but I do feel better.” It’s been three days since my symptoms started. My sore throat is tolerable, and my skin doesn’t hurt anymore. Just my muscles hurt now. And maybe my bones. But when my skin hurts, I know I’m sick. I grab his hand as he turns to walk away from me. He stops and turns back. “Thank you for taking care of me,” I say quietly.
“You’re very welcome,” he replies. “Somebody had to do it. You were pretty damn pitiful.”
I keep my seat at the kitchen table, where I have been sucking on a glass of purple juice. “Are you all done preparing for the big storm?”
“I think so,” he replies. “We’re just supposed to get a lot of rain from it. They’re predicting that the category four hurricane will stall on the coast and sit there and churn for a few days, which means we’ll get a shit-ton of rain from the outer bands of the storm. They’re calling for at least a week of it.”
“Is it safe to stay here?”
He nods. “Your cabin’s not in a flood zone. None of the cabins are. But the campground will probably flood if we get as much rain as they’re predicting. Some of the roads and bridges will flood too. It’s liable to be a mess.”
“You got all this from the local weather app?”
He shakes his head as he empties the groceries he bought onto the counter. I see chicken soup with little pasta stars in it, and a loaf of bread.
“No, I got it from Mr. Jacobson, who might as well be the local weather app. If he says it’s coming, it’s coming.” He suddenly turns and looks at me. “You want to give me your opinion on something?”
“Of course. If you want it.”
“The local fire and rescue crew is responsible for water rescues when we have a lot of flooding, or so Mr. Jacobson says. People try to drive through high water, stall out, and sometimes they even get swept away by the rushing current.” He takes a deep breath. “Anyway, the fire crew has called an emergency meeting to gather volunteers to help with water rescues and downed trees. They’ll show everybody how to use the rescue equipment, but they don’t really have anybody, except the people on the fire squad, that does water rescues. They’re calling for volunteers, and Mr. Jacobson asked me to go along with him and Jake tomorrow night, for the meeting.” He waits a beat. “Do you think it’s a terrible idea?”
“Do you want to volunteer?”
“I don’t see why not. The only requirement is that you have to be able to lift a certain number of pounds, and they prefer people who know how to swim.”
I smile at him. “You swim like a fish.” But the idea of him going to try to volunteer with these people worries me. “How receptive do you think the townspeople will be?” I saw how awful they were to him at the ballgame. I saw how it affected him.
“No idea. But I want to help my community. If my mom were to drive into high water by accident, I’d want a strong, fit person to go in after her, to bring her to safety.”
I let my eyes slowly slide up and down his body. “You’re certainly strong and fit.” I waggle my brows at him.
His cheeks immediately turn pink. “Stop it,” he says. He turns and starts to open cans of soup, so that his back is to me. Then he grabs bowls for the soup and puts them in the microwave to heat.
“How did you get so fit, anyway?” I ask, just because I’m curious.
“Well, there wasn’t much to do in prison aside from read and work out. So I did a lot of both.” He shrugs as he drops a couple of pieces of bread into the toaster and pushes the lever down.
“What was prison like?” I probably shouldn’t pry.
It takes him a long moment to respond, so long I begin to think he won’t answer at all. “Lonely,” he eventually says. “It was so fucking lonely.” The toast pops up, and he takes it out, cuts it into triangles, and smears a little butter on it, and then sets a bowl of soup and a plate of toast in front of me. “Dinner is served.”
“You know you don’t have to take care of me, right?” I ask as I dip a toast point into my soup and then stick it in my mouth.
“Who else would do it?” he asks. He grabs a bowl of soup for himself, and two pieces of toast but he doesn’t cut his into triangles. “Nobody is here.”
“This place is a little strange when it’s deserted, isn’t it?” I’ve never been here during this time of the year, at least not for long.
“I wouldn’t say it’s weird. I’d say it’s peaceful.”
Suddenly, a thought pops into my head, based on something he said when he was talking about the storm. “If the campground floods, what will happen to your tent?”
“I’m going to have to take it down, I guess.” He shrugs. “I haven’t really given it a lot of thought.”
“Where will you go?” The thought of him leaving makes my pulse quicken. “To your mom’s house?”
