When she woke up three hours later, he was still there. There was a fire burning in the fireplace, and he was sitting on the chaise end of the couch, typing on a laptop. She poked him with her foot.
He stopped typing, looked over, and smiled. “How’s my patient?”
Kate still felt awful, but she said, “Okay.”
“You don’t sound okay,” he said. “You sound miserable.”
“I feel a little better than when you arrived. I think the nap helped.” Kate’s voice was so raspy Ian had to lean in to hear her. “Did you leave?”
“Only for a short while. I ran home to get my laptop. I figured I could work and keep an eye on you at the same time.”
“Do you live far from here?”
“I live downtown. I also dropped by the pharmacy because you were almost out of Motrin and the only other medicine I found in your kitchen was a half-empty bottle of NyQuil that expired two years ago. I wasn’t exactly sure what you needed. Usually I turn to the Internet for answers, but in this case I decided a pharmacist would be my best bet.”
“You spoke to a pharmacist?”
“Yes. He said you’re more than likely suffering from a viral upper respiratory illness but warned me that I should take you to the doctor if your condition worsens or you have trouble breathing. Are you having trouble breathing?”
“Not at the moment.”
“Good. He also hooked me up with everything you could possibly need. It looks like a Walgreens exploded in your kitchen.”
Ian was wearing a sweatshirt and well-worn jeans, and he’d kicked off his shoes. She liked the way he looked stretched out on the chaise: comfortable, like he planned on staying a while.
“You’re really great, you know,” she said.
“Are you just now noticing? I’m hurt, Katie. Really.” But he smiled when he said it, and Kate had to admit that for all Ian’s faults—faults he made no excuses for and that Kate realized he had no intention of ever working on—he was more than willing to compensate in other ways.
She told herself she could do a lot worse.
Ian ordered a pizza for lunch and tried to get Kate to eat some off his plate, but the thought of food repulsed her. “If you’re not going to eat, then you need to drink,” he said. “And don’t get excited, because wine is not one of the options.”
He went into the kitchen and returned with two glasses, one filled with orange juice and one with ice water. He set them down on the coffee table next to an assortment of medicine, a new box of Kleenex, and an ear thermometer.
“You seriously bought an ear thermometer?”
“Yes, and I’ve been dying to try it out. Come closer.”
Kate leaned over and Ian stuck the thermometer in her ear until it beeped.
“Just under a hundred. Could be better, but I’ll take it.”
Kate picked up the orange juice and took a sip. “You play doctor very well.”
“For the record, I play doctor a lot differently than this. If you let me rub Vicks VapoRub on your chest or give you a sponge bath, I could show you what I mean. It would be win-win, Katie.”
“Thanks, but I’ll hold off on both for now.”
“I’ll be sure to ask again later.”
Kate glanced over at his laptop. All she could see were lines of code, which made no sense to her at all. “What are you working on?”
“World domination, obviously.” He looked over at Kate and grinned. “When I’m done with that, maybe I’ll swing by Victoria’s Secret and buy you another pair of pajamas.”
Kate took another drink of her orange juice, set the glass on the coffee table, and curled up next to Ian with the blankets wrapped tightly around her. “I probably wouldn’t hate that.”