Page 25 of Solo

When we get upstairs, I set her down on the edge of my bed and go into the connected bathroom. The big Jacuzzi tub hasn’t been used since…well, since Casey used it. I push the memory aside as I bend over to close the drain and turn the faucets on. Once I’m satisfied that it’s the perfect temperature—tepid, verging on cool—I leave the tub to fill and return to the bed. She doesn’t look any better. In fact, she looks worse than she did downstairs.

“Miss Brenner, we need to get your fever down. I’m going to put you in a tub of cool water. But that means you have to take your clothes off. Can you manage that?” I ask hopefully.

Her lips are moving, but I can barely hear the words, so I put my ear only an inch from her mouth.

“Please, I need help,” she murmurs. “I can’t…”

Okay. Time to get creative. I bend down and pull the socks from her feet. Then I help her to stand up. She leans on me as I unzip her hoodie and wriggle it off her sweaty body. I toss it onto the bed and we walk the few shaky feet to the bathroom. Once we’re standing in front of the tub, I stop to consider how best to proceed.

“Okay, here we go, then,” I announce, keeping a hand on her shoulder as I walk behind her. “Put your arms up,” I direct and she obeys, lifting her trembling arms above her head as if she’s been caught in a stick up. I tug the T-shirt up gently until it’s over her head and past her arms. At this point I can only see her back, and that’s the way I’d like to keep it, so I hand her a towel to cover her chest before walking around to face her front side again.

“Here, let’s do this,” I suggest, tugging the towel a little and arranging it so that it hangs down straight from where it’s tucked under her armpits to her shins. I reach around the towel gingerly and tug at the waistband of her sweatpants. There’s some resistance because of the chilling sweat on her body, but I manage to inch them off without seeing any of her pale flesh. Thankfully, her panties coming along for the ride so I don’t have to do this twice.

As I toss her lightweight, sweat-soaked clothes into the corner of the bathroom, it occurs to me that she came out dressed like this because she was hot with fever. She was underdressed because she was overheated, not because she’s the stupid, foolish girl I assumed her to be. Well, I can apologize later. For now, I have to figure out how to maneuver this. I can’t just stick her in the water unless I’m sure she’ll be able to sit up on her own. Otherwise she could just slip into the water and drown.

“Do you think you can sit up on your own in the tub?” I ask her, even as she’s swaying.

“I…I don’t know,” she mumbles, then shakes her head slightly. “I don’t think so.”

The realization of what I need to do hits me hard. I desperately rack my brain for a different solution, but I can’t think of one.

“Katherine, you have to get into the tub so you can cool off. I’m going to go in with you to hold you up. But I’ll keep my shorts on. Are you okay with that? I can’t do it unless you’re okay with that…”

She nods. “Yes,” she says in barely a whisper. “Yes, please, help me.”

Here goes tenure.

I help her wrap the towel so that it’s all the way around her body, then I quickly strip down to my boxers. I pick her up again and carefully maneuver us both into the cool water, her in front of me so that I’m looking at the back of her shoulders. Her delicate, pale shoulders. They’re speckled with tiny freckles. Beauty marks, my mother used to call them.

Wait. What?

I shake my head as if that will clear the random thoughts and try to focus on the task at hand.

“Are you all right? I just want to get your fever…”

Before I can finish the sentence, she turns herself around, scrambling into my lap and burying her face in my chest.

Oh. Oh, Jesus.

I hold my arms up and out of the water so as not to touch her any more than I have to.

“Miss Brenner?”

She whimpers and clings to me.

With a long sigh, I close my eyes and take a deep breath.

Okay. We’ll do it this way then. I use my hands as a cup, gently shifting water over her back. Her long, narrow back with the alabaster skin and the…

Jesus Christ, Drew, enough of that!

I return my thoughts to the sick young woman in my arms.

“Okay, I’m going to lean you back so we can get your hair wet. All right?”

She nods slightly.

“You got your towel there?” I want to ensure there are no wardrobe malfunctions.