Page 56 of Eye of the Hurricane
“Towels are on the top shelf in the hall closet and you can just grab me a soft dress from my closet.”
“Katherine, you’re sick. You’re going to wear pajamas and I’m still going to think you’re beautiful and perfect and sexy, okay? Where are they?” My heart skips a beat. His words take me back to this morning and all I can do is stand there stunned for a moment.
“Second drawer of my dresser.” He walks out of the living room and I can hear him shuffling around, looking for the things he went off in search of.
Ares comes back a few minutes later, gently grabbing Bellatrix off my stomach and placing her on the back of the couch. He reaches out a hand to help me up.
“I can take care of myself,” I state once more, feeling a little indignant.
“I know, but I’m going to take care of you anyways,” he says, pulling me to my feet and helping me towards the bathroom.
After undressing, I step into the scorching water. For the first time this weekend, I actually feel clean. The water is hot and the pressure is strong. I would stay in here forever if the water would last that long.
Nausea comes and goes in waves but I don’t throw up a single time during my shower. I take that as a win, no matter how small. When I turn off the water and open the curtain, Ares is standing there with a towel spread out waiting for me.
He wraps the towel around me and plants a kiss on the top of my head. Warmth radiates in my chest and I choose to ignore it. Between whatever virus I’ve got and classes startingback up tomorrow, I don’t have time to unpack whatever that was.
“How do you feel?”
“Like garbage. At least I feel like clean garbage now,” I joke. “I’ll get dressed and meet you on the couch.”
I can’t help but laugh when I look at the stack of clothes on the counter. A yellow silk pajama set and matching yellow panties. I’m beginning to think someone likes me in yellow.
When I walk into the living room, Ares is curled up in the corner of the couch holding Bellatrix like a baby. He’s rubbing her belly and she’s purring away.
“You know, she doesn’t usually like people. Or being flipped on her back,” I say, standing behind the couch. His head snaps around to look at me.
“I have a habit of winning over grumpy women,” he says, wearing a cocky smile.
“Oh, shut up.” I give his head a light shove as I walk around the couch to sit next to him.
“So, what was your sick tradition growing up? You know, the thing your parents did every time you were sick?” Ares asks. I think back to the handful of times I was sick as a kid. Thinking of my mom playing the nurturing mother role stings a little.
Before I ever had the chance to disappoint her with dreams of a career, she was my mom. And back then, in some ways, she was even a good one.
“She’d call me off of school, get me comfy in either my own bed or the couch and she’d make me watch the news all day. Because I was out of school, I wasn’t allowed to watch cartoons.”
“What will it be then, Miss Graeves? Cartoons or the news?” he asks, grabbing the remote from the side table.
“Will you judge me if I say the news? It’s kind of a comfort thing now when I’m sick,” I admit.
“No judgment. I’ll just assume it’s the virus eating away at your decision making.”
He turns on the TV and clicks through channel by channel until he lands on the local news channel. The first thing that pops up? The dreaded spaghetti model.
The spaghetti model is the model meteorologists use to show all of the potential tracks of a hurricane. Back in Louisiana I lived far enough from the coast that hurricanes weren’t nearly as dangerous for us as those in the lower half of the state.
Not to mention I was young enough that my parents made it so I didn’t really know what was going on. My parents did all too well of a job of sheltering us from things they didn’t want us to know about. Doves Harbor, however, isrighton the coast.
My body goes rigid and I sit up straight. “Is this a thing? There’s going to be a hurricane?” I ask. The sudden movement makes my stomach churn and I regret it immediately.
“This shows it hitting as a category one, those aren’t something you need to worry about. Plus, most of the paths show it hitting all the way up by Myrtle Beach,” he assures me.
“Have you been in a hurricane?” I ask.
“Yeah, lots. We always evacuated for the strong ones but usually twos or threes we stayed for.”
“Back in Louisiana, I didn’t live right on the coast. So, when they’d get hurricanes we mostly just got bad storms, sometimes a tropical depression. I wouldn’t know where to even begin with handling a direct hit from a hurricane,”I sigh.
