Page 96 of Love It or List It
Joe blinked, and Austin was kissing his forehead.“Sweet thing, you with me?I hate to wake you, but I don’t want to just disappear.I have to go home for the night, check on the kids.Yeah, Will too.Sleep tight and I’ll see you in the morning.”
Joe groaned, unhappy, and Austin shushed him.“They have my number just in case, but go to sleep and I’ll be back before you know it.”
He closed his eyes and tried to follow Austin’s advice, but the nurses were cruel villains conspiring against them.They woke Joe several times in the night, taking his temperature and fussing with his IV.Each time, Joe grumbled and tried to complain, but sleep took him back under too quickly.
Still, when he woke up the next morning, he felt crusty and unrested, though more clearheaded than he had in days.Not that he felt sharp, but the world didn’t have a hazy unrealistic feel.
It took him a moment to figure out why he was awake, and when he finally registered his full bladder, he wondered how he was supposed to fix that.After another few seconds, he remembered the call button beside the bed, and soon an orderly showed up to help with his issue.
As if needing Austin’s help hadn’t mortified him enough.Now he was relying on strangers.
And yet he barely had the energy to feel frustrated at his own helplessness.He’d been awake for five whole minutes in a row, which was more than he could say for the previous day, but he still felt like garbage.Like he could fall back asleep at any moment.He wanted a shower and real clothes and his own bed, but he was too tired to do anything about any of it, which made him want to cry.
He definitely shouldn’t cry, though.He was having enough trouble breathing, even with the antibiotics and the oxygen cannula.
Ugh.
He’d hoped to get sprung early, but no such luck.Fortunately Austin had the foresight to bring Joe’s phone and a charger so he could keep him apprised.Still waiting on doc.They think after lunch.Considering the state of the provincial health care system, Joe was surprised they weren’t shoving him out the door so they could give the bed to someone else, but maybe the doctors were all busy with actual crises and didn’t have time to decide if Joe was healthy enough to go home.
Ok, Austin wrote back.Need anything?
Aside from a new immune system and a functional set of lungs?No thx.
Lunch was a dry turkey sandwich, a banana, and a Jell-O cup, like Joe was in some kind of bad sitcom.He managed the banana and the Jell-O, but the sandwich was too dry on his throat and took too much effort to chew, so he gave up after two bites.He wasn’t that hungry anyway.
Finally, around two, the doctor from yesterday popped in.“Ah, Mr.Romano.”She pulled the chart from the end of his bed—the one the nurses had been updating all night, waking Joe up every time—and flipped through it, then walked over to the IV pole where his oxygen monitor was and checked that too.“How are you feeling this afternoon?”
“Scale of one to ten?One.”He turned his head and coughed a little.“But yesterday was, like, minus three, so.”
“Well, the good news is your numbers are looking a lot better.Fever’s under control, oxygen levels are improving.I’m going to write you a prescription for some antibiotics and oxygen for home use, but you can go home.If you get worse again, though, you’ll have to come back, and if you’re not able to get yourself up and around in a week, I want you to see your GP.”
Joe would’ve promised his firstborn child to get out of the hospital.He didn’t like Gavin that much anyway.“Whatever you say, Doc.You’re the boss.”
Somehow he still fell asleep again before Austin arrived to take him home.
Chapter Twenty-Four
AUSTIN SLEPTlike shit with Joe out of the house.
It didn’t help that the pets didn’t understand where he was or why he wasn’t home.Pepa jumped to her feet any time a car passed outside, on the off chance it was Joe.Walker followed Austin around forlornly and threw a fit when Austin tried to go upstairs and sleep in his own bed, because Walker didn’t want to be alone in Joe’s.Finally Austin switched out the sheets and gave in.
Then there was being the contact person for everyone who cared about Joe—his employees, his mom, his dad—who Austin had never met because he lived in Ottawa doing, like, fancy diplomat shit—his kids, Starling, even Linda.Everyone wanted to know what was going on and when he’d be home and what his diagnosis was and the treatment plan and his projected recovery and the last time he’d had a bowel movement.
Okay, Austin was exaggerating, but only a little.
And then there was the part of his brain that couldn’t stop thinking about how fragile Joe had been—the insistent, paranoid part of his brain that always had to consider worst-case scenarios, the part that had always insisted Austin keep an emotional distance from people and have a backup supply of SpaghettiOs handy just in case.
Weak enough he’d needed Austin’s help getting out of bed.Feverish enough he’d barely been able to string words together.So tired he’d barely been able to finish a glass of juice before he nodded off again.
Fingernails turning blue.
Austin had worried about their relationship moving too fast, about how he would handle it if they broke up.He’d never even considered what it would do to him if he lost Joe to something more permanent until a few days ago, and then he was too busy looking after Joe to think about it.
But then Joe was in the hospital, and suddenly he wasn’t too busy anymore.It was like he couldn’tstop.
So he slept like shit and woke up to Will slamming cupboards in the kitchen—charming—and a strong smell of ammonia, which….That seemed bad?That seemed, like, go-back-to-sleep levels of bad.
But he didn’t want to miss a call or text from Joe saying he was ready to come back home where he belonged, so.Time to face the music.
