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“What’s the matter?”
“I’ve been feeling off all day. I went to that birthday party last weekend for Ray Bishop’s kid and it turns out his girlfriend was sick. The whole D-line has been coughing and I think I got it, too.”
I felt his forehead. “You have a fever,” I told him. “Ok, no tacos. I’m going to make soup and get you cool compresses and lots of water. You need to come to bed.”
“That almost sounded dirty, Miss Frazier. Very dirty.”
“That wasn’t what I meant! And you must not be feeling that poorly if you’re still able to tease me.”
“If I am sick, does that mean that you’ll wait on me hand and foot? That you’ll stay with me and stop sneaking off to that other place?” he asked.
“My guess is that the ‘other place’ you mean is my house, where l live. But yes, if you’re really sick and you need me, I’ll stay here with you. I wouldn’t leave you to feel bad all alone.”
He closed his eyes and coughed, and then cracked one back open to study the effect.
“That was a terrible imitation,” I pointed out.
“I’m no actor,” he agreed. “You don’t actually have to stay, though, because I’ll be fine in the morning.” But then he did cough for real, and sniffled. “Sorry.”
I helped him to bed. By that, I meant that I walked with him to his bedroom while he put a hand on my shoulder, and then I pulled the covers up around him and patted his arm for a while, until he cracked open his eyes again to look at me.
“I’ll get the soup,” I said quickly, and hurried off.
He ate most of what I made after I kind of poked him awake, and then he fell back asleep after assuring me that he felt great now because my soup was like a tasty antibiotic.
I wandered back to the living room. I checked the locks, then checked the windows in case someone was able to do a Spiderman crawl up the side of this building. Then I yawned, too, because I was exhausted. I sat down, thinking that I’d do some of the homework that had been piling up but that I’d been unable to focus on. I even got out the laptop that I’d taken to a computer repair place to get checked for malware that might be watching me, a request that they’d been very curious about but I hadn’t explained.
But then I leaned my head back against the cushion. The best part about sleeping here—one of the best parts—was that Bowie left his bedroom door open and I could hear him breathe. It wasn’t exactly snoring, but it wasn’t quiet, either, and I loved to listen to the steady, deep sound. It was like he was talking to me, which I also loved when he was awake. I started to imagine a conversation between us, differently from how we’d spoken before. In my mind, we were in a kind of hot springs, a lake but warm, like a jacuzzi. He wore his bathing suit so I could see his big chest and stomach with their square cuts of muscle and he was smiling as he stepped through the steam rising from the surface of the water. He told me that he was happy to see me, like he always did, and then he suggested that we dance together.
I smiled back at him and put my body close to his, wrapping my arm around his neck and placing my palm in his huge grip. It was wonderful. I realized that I was falling asleep and that the homework wouldn’t actually get done, but I let myself drift away into my imagination.
“Lissa, honey, it’s ok. Lissa? Wake up.”
I opened my eyes and my body jerked, too. The room was pitch dark—it was Bowie’s living room, and he knelt next to the couch and leaned over me.
“You were having another nightmare,” he told me.
“Another?” I sat up and reached for the switch on the table lamp. Remnants of a dream still bounced around in my mind, things about not being able to see but knowing that there was a threat. I remembered trying to run but my legs moved so slowly that I’d been screaming at them to work.
“You have them, sometimes,” Bowie said. “I hear you out here, thrashing around, and you make little sounds like you’re scared. Whimpering.”
I pulled up my shirt and wiped my face. “I’m good. It’s fine,” I told him, and then looked at his face, too. He was both pale and flushed, and his blue eyes were glassy. “Are you feeling ok?”
“I can’t sleep very well,” he admitted, and I put my hand on his forehead.
“You’re burning up,” I said. I swung my legs over the side of the couch and touched his face again, not to check for fever but because I was worried. “You’re so hot.”
“Usually I like it when women tell me that.”
“Come to bed,” I ordered, and now he didn’t even notice that my words did sound fairly dirty. I tried to help him to his feet and then put his arm around my shoulders, as if he could lean on me without crushing me into the floor. I covered him with only the sheet this time and got more cool cloths, more medicine to take, and more water to drink. Then I sat down on the bed next to him and gently wiped his cheeks and forehead.
Bowie’s eyes were closed and I hoped he was sleeping, but then he spoke. “This is nice,” he said.
“You’re feeling better?”
“No. I just like you being here.” He sighed. “I don’t actually feel very good.”
“I know.” I moved the washcloth over his neck and the blonde stubble growing in there. “I’m here a lot.”
