Chapter Eighteen Mateo #3
He's blinking up at me like he's not sure whether I'm something his fever-ravaged mind has conjured in the middle of the night.
I move closer, and don't know whether it helps, but he's coughing again before I can reassure him with anything else.
Jamie's tangled in his covers and so, so small in his bed, and I text Harper before dropping my phone on the duvet so my hands are free.
I'm more careful when I sit next to him and reach down, his forehead so obviously hot beneath my palm before I slide my fingers into his damp hair and look at him until he's focused enough to look back.
"Mateo?"
"Yeah," I answer, swallowing hard. "It's me, sweetheart."
"Why are you in my bedroom?"
"Because Harper called to tell me you're sick. Why are you in your bedroom?"
"Because I'm sick," he says.
The little laugh that bubbles out of me is so unexpected, but I was trying to ask why he didn't see a doctor back east and stay there to recover, and his answer adorably misses my point.
I let my fingers trail over his face, and the growth that suggests he's gone nearly a week without shaving.
He's beautiful, though—I can't imagine there will ever be a day when he won't be—and I'll do anything to keep myself here for as long as he'll let me stay.
"Do you know when you're due to take your meds again?" I ask. "Your fever seems pretty bad."
"Was almost 104° earlier. What time is it?"
I glance at where I’d left my phone. "Just after 11:00."
"At midnight. I can have Tylenol and antibiotics at midnight."
I'm about to ask whether he wants to get some rest for the next hour, but another coughing fit hits hard, and Jamie's body curls to lessen the strain on his stomach muscles.
There's a trash can next to the bed for him to spit into, and when he's ready to lie down again, I help stack his pillows to keep him elevated.
He closes his eyes, but reaches for my hand, and I sigh as he coughs all over again.
This should be awkward—my appearance in his bedroom and everything since—but after all this time, we've never learned how to be anything but comfortable finding ways to hold on to moments that won't last.
Everything would hurt less if we had, but letting go has been unimaginable for too long to do anything about it now.
I swallow hard and look away from him, only to swallow harder a few seconds later.
There's a bottle of water on his nightstand alongside a box of tissues, the pills he can't take yet, and a lamp I leave off, but it's bare otherwise.
A quick glance around the room shows that it's mostly empty too, clothes spilling out of a small suitcase further proof that Jamie doesn't live here anymore.
I frown and immediately correct it, then gaze down at him again, using my free hand to brush hair back from his forehead.
"Do you want something to eat? Or anything other than water?"
"No."
"What else can I do?"
I'd love for him to answer, but the terrible wheezing sound Jamie makes with every exhale is terrifying, and I turn toward the emptiness again in search of an idea of my own. I find one almost too easily, and as abruptly as I think I can't do it, I think I have to.
As soon as I realize how badly I want to, I wonder if I should call Harper and tell her I'm too in love to do this right.
Jamie tugs on my hand. "What's wrong?"
"A hot shower—the steam. It'll help with the congestion. It'll help you breathe. And I—we can go in there together. You don't have to be alone."
Another round of coughing slows to something riddled with rattles and hums, Jamie's eyes cloudy but locked with mine. "You want to shower with me?"
"I think it would be good for you."
He nods clumsily, his head turned sideways on his pillow, but he says nothing else.
I don't either, leaving Jamie where he is long enough to get the hot water going, the bathroom door closed behind me until I realize it takes away the only light we had.
Cracking it open again, I return to the bed and peel the duvet from around and on top of and under him.
He's wearing a sweatshirt and briefs, as if his body was trying to find the Goldilocks space between hot and cold, and as soon as he sits up, I pull the sweatshirt off him and drop it to the floor.
I choke at the sight of pale scars my heart recognizes before my head, but swallow before I make a sound.
Jamie shivers, and I was stupid to undress him first. I hurry to catch up, my shirt and joggers left behind when I hold out a hand and lead him away from his own bed.
Other than the coughing that still won't stop, we remain silent on the walk to the shower.
Then we remain silent after that, once I've closed us in and dragged my boxer briefs down my legs and given him my hand to hold while he drags his briefs away, too.
If he's bothered by being naked with me, he can work through it when we ignore each other for another year or two.
Before we step into the shower, I adjust the temperature to something just shy of scalding, and take a deep breath in the steam with the hope that he'll do the same.
He looks awful, dark circles under his eyes and pale skin that may be the product of the northeastern winter months as much as anything else.
I don't know what I look like, freshly fucked and here to be something resembling a friend, but Jamie's eyes close as soon as we're under the water, and what he could've seen doesn't matter.
I'm still watching him as his coughing calms, but I'd only thought about how to get us this far, and I need a minute to think about what else will help.
I don't get that much time though, Jamie deciding for both of us.
Sick and sleepy, he wraps his arms around me and pulls me into him, and we hug and hug and hug.
And he sobs and sobs and sobs.
Crying brings back all the coughing that had barely quieted, but this isn't something I'm willing to interrupt with logic.
I stay close to him and make unintelligible promises and rub his goosebumps away.
I'm not sure whether his tears were brought on by a lack of sleep and fluid-filled lungs, or years of needing this kind of contact and being denied it far too often.
I only know mine fall because I've never been as willing to wait for him as I am tonight.
We're pressed against each other as intimately as we ever have been, but as the minutes pass and the sobbing subsides, I move just enough to grab his shampoo and pour some into my hand.
Being unwilling to untangle us makes the angle awkward, but I scrub it through his hair and listen to him moan.
Something in me unfurls at the sound, and I ignore it while I get Jamie clean, finishing with his hair before I reach for the soap and wash as much of his body as I can from where we stand.
I forgot to look for a washcloth when I was getting the shower ready, so it's only my hands and the suds that give me an excuse to touch him like this.
He coughs again, and we pull apart, and I don't keep myself from letting my fingertips find him everywhere while we hold the eye contact we should have made in Taylor's bed.
Once he's rinsed off, I trust the shower wall to keep him upright, and I wash my own hair and body as quickly as I've ever done.
The bathroom is full of steam when I turn the water off and pull two towels from the rack, and I wrap Jamie in one before I worry about myself.
And there, while he's propped up against the sink and breathing better than he has since I arrived, I caress the side of his head and sigh.
"Why did you get on a plane? Why did anyone let you?"
"It was a charter. They didn't care," he says. "And I couldn't get the team sick, so Taylor told me to go home, and I just—I went."
"Jesus. I don't think he meant 'fly across the country with double pneumonia.' Your home is—what? Twenty minutes from the arena?"
His blue eyes have been reddened by exhaustion and tears, but they flare with indignation now.
We've had pieces of this conversation before—I've asked him where home is—but I'm not sure he's spent more than a month here in the past four years combined, and it feels like that's answered everything just fine.
Jamie must feel differently, his body stiff even when he can't help but nuzzle further into the palm of my hand.
"This is home."
I shake my head, confused more than anything. "But you're so far away. And with both you and Harper gone, it feels so damn empty. How can this be anything but the place where you used to live?"
Jamie's indignation gets replaced by weary wisdom he’s yet to share, and I think I want him to fight with me somehow, if only he could find the energy for it. This should be his home, but he should be mine, and I should be his, and so little feels like it’s turned out the way it’s supposed to be.
I brush my thumb over his lips, but then he wraps a warm hand around my wrist and pulls me away.