“She’s right. You should listen to her,” Kyle said. “Food helps your body fight this infection.”
“Which I am going to do because this is not the flu,” Alex answered.
Ava clung to the words as she tugged on a hoodie and zipped it up. She wanted desperately to believe that he’d just been run down from the stress and caught a cold, but the fever alone worried her.
She grabbed her room key and her purse. “I’ll be right back. Can you two stay until I get back with the food?”
“Sure, we’ll head to the hospital after you get back,” Kyle answered. “I’ll take a breakfast sandwich, croissant, ham, American cheese.”
“Same but on a muffin, please,” Sebastian added.
Ava stared at him before she shook her head. “Fine.”
“Avs,” Alex said, pushing up to his elbow, “bacon. You know that right?”
“I know, babe. On a biscuit.”
She hurried from the room into the foggy morning air, zipping her hoodie higher as she hit the sidewalk, walking the half block to the gas station on the edge of town.
Her mind spun as she ordered the sandwiches and waited for them to be prepared. How could they fight this? Especially if Alex had this flu.
She couldn’t lose him. She wouldn’t. She would do whatever it took.
When she returned with the sandwiches, Alex seemed no better, but also no worse. She climbed into bed with him, propping him up with pillows so he could eat.
“I feel a little better,” Alex said as he polished off the sandwich.
“That’s good, babe,” she said, running her fingers through his hair.
Kyle tossed his wrapper in the trash. “Why don’t you stayhere with him? Alert me immediately to any acute changes in him, okay? I’ll call you as soon as I have the results of his cultures.”
“Okay,” Ava said, her eyes going to Sebastian. “You good handling the hospital for the morning?”
“Yeah, I’ll tell them you’re busy calling all the other hospitals and telling them that they can’t take these patients.”
Ava poked a finger at him. “Perfect. Thank you.”
As they left them behind, she snuggled closer to Alex. “How are you really feeling?”
“Better, honest,” he said. “In fact, why don’t you grab my laptop? We’ll monitor the hospital and stuff while we’re lounging.”
“We can put on a movie,” she answered as she fetched the laptop from the desk.
“Ohh, yes, this place said it had cable. I can’t wait to watch live television like it’s the eighties.”
She snickered at him as she handed him his laptop and joined him in bed, turning on the television and finding a cheesy romantic comedy.
Alex set up the laptop with the video feeds, then turned his attention to the television. Within minutes, he dozed off.
She offered him a weak smile as she stroked his hair while he slept. She settled in to watch the movie, her cell phone in her hand.
When it finally rang, she answered immediately. “Doc…tell me this is good news.”
“Ava…I’m sorry…it’s not. He’s positive for the flu. I double- and triple-checked. It’s the same one we’re dealing with at the hospital.”
Her heart plummeted at the words, her lower lip trembling as her gaze shifted sideways to Alex.
Ava swallowed hard, remembering the patients she had seen last night at the hospital. They’d arrived with little morethan a fever and a cough, but within hours some of them were on ventilators, fighting for their lives.
