Chapter 17 - JAMES WHITMORE GETS SICKJames treated a cold like a hostile takeover.
“I am fine.”
“You have a fever.”
“Minor.”
“102.”
“Manageable.”
“You almost walked into the closet.”
“The doors are similar.”
Grace pushed him back into bed.
“You're staying home.”
“I have meetings.”
“Canceled.”
James stared.
“You canceled my meetings?”
“Evelyn helped.”
“Traitor.”
From the doorway Evelyn shouted:
“LOVE YOU TOO.”
James groaned.
Grace brought soup.
He looked suspiciously at it.
“What is this?”
“Soup.”
“What kind?”
“The kind sick billionaires eat.”
“That's not a type.”
“Eat.”
He obeyed.
Grace smiled.
“You're strangely obedient when weak.”
“Remember this moment and I'll deny it.”
Later, Grace fell asleep beside him.
James woke around midnight.
His fever had broken.
Grace's hand rested over his heart.
Chloe slept sideways across the bottom of the bed because she had insisted on “helping.”
James looked at them.
Once, illness had meant empty rooms.
Laura's hospital bed.
Fear.
Loss.
Now it meant Grace threatening him with soup and Chloe stealing his blankets.
He smiled.
Perhaps love did not always arrive dramatically.
May you like
Sometimes it arrived carrying medicine and saying:
“Open your mouth.”
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