We got to their house, hurried to the door, and the woman I’d met at a barbecue Brett and Abigail threw in the summer opened the door with a pajama-clad Emma on her hip.
“Missa Hutch!” she cried, throwing her weight toward him.
He caught her.
“Well, that shares you’re Hutch,” Chrissy, Brett’s mom said.And to me, “Hi, Mabel.”
“Heya,” I replied.
She let us in and did it talking quickly.“I won’t be long.Thank God Liam’s fever broke about an hour ago.He’s sleeping.Emma needs to go down.It’s past her bedtime.”
“Will you read me a bedtime story, Missa Hutch?”Emma asked.
“You bet,” he replied, turned to Chrissy and raised his brows.
“Up the stairs, first room to the left,” she instructed.
They took off.
She hastened to her coat.
“Do you know how Abigail is doing?”I asked, trying not to sound fretful, and probably failing.
“She was restless.”Chrissy didn’t bother not sounding fretful.“Talking in her sleep.When she’d be awake, she wasn’t actually awake but delirious and babbling.And her cough was hacking.”
Oh God.
That really didn’t sound good.
No wonder Brett was so worried.
Chrissy was at the door.“Brett took her in hours ago.They have a bed in the ER, but she hasn’t been seen because so many people with this flu are there.”
She was anxious to get away, so I told her, “Take your time.We have this.But can I get your number just in case?”
She dashed it off to me as I entered it into my phone.
“Yours?”she requested.
“Go,” I urged.“I’ll text you just now so you have it.”
“Thank you, Mabel,” she said with a worried smile.
She left.
I texted her so she had my number.
Then I went up the stairs and to the room to the right.
Being careful because I didn’t want to wake him, I opened the door.
There was a light on dim by Liam’s bed, so I could see he lay on his back, sleeping like the dead.
I carefully walked in and touched his forehead.
Clammy, but cool.
I left him be but also left the door open a titch so I could hear him if he called out for anything.
