“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Landry exclaims.
“What? I thought you were giving me a shot?” I turn my head to him.
“In the arm,” he wheezes, his eyes huge and round. He gulps and cringes again, but he doesn’t look away. “Can you please, please, put your dress down?”
“Whatever you want, doctor.” I oblige and turn around to sit on the bed this time. “As long as you tell me why we have different injection sites.”
“Impetigo, rheumatic fever, post-streptococcal glomerulonephritis …” he mumbles and squeezes his eyes shut.
“What?”
“Just reviewing the types of streptococcal infections, you know, so I don’t miss any symptoms,” he says quickly without looking directly at me, then he turns to grab an alcohol wipe.
“Landry?”
“Your sleeve, Daisy.”
I slide the cap sleeve of my dress down my arm as slowly and deliberately as possible, and his gaze follows my movements. Then I angle my body to offer him my bare shoulder while I tilt my head down and look up at him from beneath my lashes. “Like this?”
“Yeah, that’s … perfect.” The way his half-lidded eyes run over me reawakens the butterflies in my stomach after their last foray when Landry and I played doctor at the clinic. Then again, that could also be the fever chills.
“I’m ready when you are,” I say quietly, trying to hide the way my teeth are chattering.
He nods, but it takes him a second to move again. I flinch when he rubs the cold alcohol pad against my skin.
“So, are you going to tell me why you’re afraid to put it in my butt or not?” I pose.
He turns his head to cough. “I’m not afraid. It’s just not necessary this time,” he says before he reaches in to pinch the back of my arm. “Females tend to have more fat around their upper arms than men do.”
“And your arm muscles are too big for a shot?”
“Exactly. Okay, three, two …” He pokes the needle through my skin, and I do my best to stay still. Once he’s done with the syringe, his touch grows more tender as he smooths a Band-Aid over my arm and gingerly slides my sleeve up into place. “Hopefully you won’t get much worse since we caught it early.”
I nod. “Thank you.”
“Thank me by taking some of that ibuprofen and getting yourself to bed.”
I pout when I stand, ignoring the way my head throbs. “I can’t believe you’re kicking me out. We’ve already shared cooties, and I figured you’d want to keep an eye on me.”
He laughs shortly. “You really want to snuggle up in these musty sheets?”
“Fair enough,” I say, my throat starting to burn again. “My bed definitely smells better. And it’s bigger.”
He narrows his eyes at me before he grabs the medicine off the side table, then he ushers me forward. We turn the corner to my room, and he sets everything down beside my bed before he hands me a couple of pills and a glass of water. I swallow them obediently, and he pulls the sheets back, tilting his head in a gesture. At least he’s tucking me in.
But as soon as I slip beneath the covers, he surprises me by sliding in beside me. He grabs a spare pillow and plants it firmly in the space between us. “Only because I need to keep an eye on you all night. You’re more likely to have a seizure if your temperature spikes.”
“Right, Doc,” I confirm, stifling my smile. “Whatever you need to tell yourself.”
He exhales loudly before he reaches up to flick the switch on the lamp beside my bed. “Good night, Daisy. Wake me up if you start feeling funny, especially if you get really hot.”
“Hmm, ditto.”
He chuckles. “That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”
“Says the man who sacrificed his left butt cheek for the sake of my pride today,” I mutter before I settle in next to our border pillow.
“If you knew why I was doing it, then why’d you stab me so hard?” he asks through a yawn and a subsequent whimper.
