by Doyle, S
He didn’t believe me, I thought. And I knew that because I could see sympathy in his expression. Because now he knew what it was to love someone.
“Okay, Cal. Like Eve said, you need me for anything…”
“You got your hands full with Shelby.”
He nodded and his expression was dark. “It was bad…her fever got so high…but she’s okay now. Just gave me a scare.”
“It comes with the territory,” I told him. “Better get used it.”
“Fuck that,” he said, then winced as he realized the kid was listening to everything we said.
“Don’t worry about it. If Vivienne is going to raise this kid up here, he’ll be swearing soon enough. Go do what you need to do.”
Eli nodded and made his way to the basket of food he’d already picked out. I picked up my own basket and filled it with anything healthy I could find. Plus a bunch of cans of broth. I was no cook, but I could manage to heat up soup. We got to the limited fruit selection.
I picked up a banana. “You like these, kid?”
He vehemently shook his head. I grunted.
I picked up an apple, but it looked like it’d seen better days. “What about this?”
This time his whole body shook. He pointed and I followed his line of direction.
“You know what you’re pointing at?”
“Ahh!”
I walked in the general direction. Until we were standing in front of a small selection of cereal. The kid pointed directly to the Cheerios and babbled.
“Okay, I got it.” I tossed the box in the basket and we continued that way down each of the short aisles.
Turned out the kid was a very picky eater.
* * *
Vivienne
I cracked open my eyes tentatively, waiting for whatever horror was going to descend on me next. Scorching heat, freezing cold. All over body aches, or nausea. This time all I really felt was weakness. Like my arms and legs were noodles rather than appendages.
I turned in the bed and winced at the smell of the sheets. Gross after the many times over the past few days when it felt like I’d been on fire, only for the fire to subside and leave me drenched in sweat.
Sniffing myself I wondered why I wasn’t more rank.
I turned toward the crib and saw Sam sleeping peacefully. Through the slats I could see his cheeks weren’t blotchy and red, but healthy and pink. He looked clean, the sheets on his bed washed.
I wanted to start crying again but felt so dried out I didn’t think I had the capacity to make tears.
“You’re up.”
I turned my head to see Caleb standing next to the bed. I had no words for the sense of gratitude I felt.
“Thank you,” I said sounding more like a frog than a human. “Sam.”
“Yep. Now let’s see about you.” With that he bent down and picked me up. I was about to explain to him I didn’t think my legs were steady enough for me to stand when he plunked me in the chair by the stove.
Then without saying anything I watched him strip the bed—sheets and blanket. He piled them in what I used as a laundry basket. Gert had a washing machine and dryer in the back of her store that she charged only a dollar a load to use.
In the first few weeks I was here I’d tried to rough it with a bucket and washboard, but my takeaway from that was folks in the 1800s were made of sterner stuff than I was.
He opened another set of sheets and started to make up the bed. I didn’t have a spare set so he must have brought a set from camp. Although thinking he’d managed a trip to camp was odd because I didn’t feel like there had ever been a time where he’d been gone for that long. Anytime I’d managed to wake up, he’d always been here.
When he was done, he came back and crouched in front of me.
“Need to get some food into you, Vivienne.”
Just the thought of food had my stomach revolting. I shook my head.
He laughed.
“What?”
“You look like your kid when you do that. Listen, I know you don’t have an appetite yet, but you haven’t eaten in days. We’ve got to build your strength up. It’s just soup. Yeah?”
He was right. I needed to get back on my feet to take care of Sammy. That wasn’t going happen until I started eating. I nodded.
“That’s my girl.”
He stood and got a bowl from the kitchen area. I saw the pot he had on top of the stove.
“Sam’s okay?” I croaked out.
“Better than you by a long shot.”
“Where did the stuff for the soup come from?”
“The kid and I went shopping.” Caleb returned with a bowl and spoon and sat on the edge of my seat. I was still processing him taking Sam outside on his own when the spoon moved toward my mouth.
Instinctively, I opened my mouth and swallowed.
“I can feed myself,” I told him.
“No, you can’t. You’ll end up dripping it all over you and I just got you into that new clean shirt.”
Another spoonful of soup before I could process that.
I looked up at him, my eyes wide.
“You were breaking sweats every night, Vivienne. I needed to get you out of the wet clothes and into dry ones. Don’t make a big thing about it.”
I looked down at what I was wearing. A long-sleeve, black cotton shirt that reached my knees. It wasn’t mine.
“You were going through all your stuff too fast. I had Jackson bring some of my shirts, the extra sheets.”
“You took off my clothes.” Another spoonful of soup.
“And gave you a couple sponge baths. And sat you on the toilet. So yeah, I’ve seen the goods. You were sick, Vivienne. I did what needed to be done. You want to have a freak-out about it or realize that everything I did was necessary?”
I didn’t know what I wanted. I felt too sluggish to see my way through what he was saying. I only knew I’d been naked with him. Vulnerable. I’d never been naked with any man. Messing around in the back of Dave’s rig had always been about removing the least amount of clothes as possible. He’d only ever pushed my yellow diner uniform up over my hips, moved my panties out of his way.
But Caleb had taken my clothes completely off. Washed every part of me while I’d been unconscious. Clearly, he’d been unmoved by the experience because he was acting as if what he’d done was no different than feeding me the soup.
I had this irrational urge to ask him what he thought about my body, but quickly realized that was silly. He’d been acting as a nurse. He wouldn’t have had any thoughts one way or the other, other than to accomplish his goal of cleaning me.
I reached up to stop him as he tried to feed me another spoonful.
“Caleb, I don’t know how—”
“Forget it, Vivienne. This is what we do up here. We’re a small community, living in a challenging place. When someone goes down, the community does what it can to help. Jackson brought me supplies when I needed them. Gert’s been coming by to pick up and handle the laundry, which included the kid’s dirty diapers. No fun task, that. Hell, even Bud’s been by to check on you.”
“He’s missing three percent of my tips.” I smiled weakly.
“Yeah, it could have been that, too,” he said with a smile.
I reached out to touch that smile.
“What?” he asked, pulling away.
“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen you smile. Not at me.”
That made his smile turn immediately into a scowl. Which he kept in place while he fed me the rest of my soup. By the time I finished the bowl, I was exhausted. Still, this had been the longest I had been able to stay awake in days. Given that, and the fact that I’d eaten, I would say that was progress.
“Take these two aspirin and I’ll let you go to bed.”
I dutifully obeyed and Caleb picked me up and carried me to bed. He settled a heavy blanket over me I didn’t recognize. It was wool and had a Native American design throughout.
“It’s beautif
ul,” I muttered, as I ran my hands over it, settling in under its warmth.
“It’s mine.”
* * *
Cal
I stood over her until she fell asleep. Then I checked on the kid to make sure he was down for the count as well. A gentle hand on his forehead and I could feel he was clear of any fever.
I couldn’t stop the strange swell of pride I felt. As if his ability to recover from illness was somehow attributed to me, when I had nothing to do with his genes.
After checking the fire in the stove, I cleaned up the remnants of the soup. Settled everything back into its proper place then decided there was nothing left for me to do but get into bed.
I stripped off everything but my boxer briefs. Despite my habit of sleeping naked, I wasn’t so blasé about our sleeping arrangements that I would risk shocking Vivienne.
Cautiously, I got into the bed, trying not to disturb her. But just like she’d done for the past three nights, she snuggled against me as if I was an oversize stuffed animal.
I’d kissed another woman who was not my wife. Now I’d slept with another woman who was not my wife. I was currently hard for another woman who was not my wife. I didn’t bother berating myself for my erection. Obviously, I wasn’t going to take advantage of a sick woman.
But she was here, tucked against my side, her breath on my chest and being immune to that reality was beyond my willpower.
At least we’d gotten over the awkward part. Where I confessed I’d seen her naked, touched her naked. Funny, I hadn’t been hard at all while doing that because she’d been so damn sick and her fever so high it scared the crap out of me.
Nothing sexy about that.
Except now I could reflect on the fact that her nipples were brown, that she had a host of freckles all over her body. That the soft patch of red hair between her legs was as crimson as the hair on her head.
All those memories were mine now. Like the blanket and like the woman sleeping trustingly in my arms.
“Sorry, Sarah,” I whispered up to the ceiling. “I couldn’t help it.”
11
Three days later
Vivienne
I chewed the bottom of my lip and thought about how to say what I needed to say to Caleb without upsetting him. Or worse, hurting him. Then I considered how I would feel it about it.
Sad, I knew.
Maybe I didn’t need to say anything. Maybe he would figure it out on his own and simply tell me it was time for him to leave.
Because the truth was I was fully recovered. I’d been eating for a few days, real food beyond soup. I could stay awake all day, and I had all the energy I needed to look after Sam.
So last night when Caleb had gotten into bed with me, it suddenly dawned on me he didn’t need to do this anymore. He no longer needed to see if my fever spiked, no longer had to worry if it would break during the night and I would be covered in sweat. Even my voice was starting to lose some of its hoarseness.
Lying next to him I’d started to feel things. Things that had nothing to do with nausea and everything to do with how it felt to sleep next to a large, mostly naked man. Only in a way that felt shameful. He was acting as my nursemaid and I was having sexual thoughts about biting his thick, heavy chest.
Which was why, sitting at the table with him in the morning while he did the airplane trick with Sammy again, I knew I had to end this. It was becoming too normal. I was liking it too much, now that I wasn’t totally focused on feeling like crap.
He had to know I was recovered. Had to know he didn’t need to feed Sam because I could do it. So any second, he was going to announce that he’d done his part to get me back on my feet and it was time for him to head to the camp.
I’d already asked him about missing so much time from work, and he told me that Jackson was filling in and keeping him apprised of everything going on he needed to know. That I shouldn’t worry about it.
But surely now that I was on my feet again, he’d be getting antsy to get back to his own place, his own job.
“Spit it out, Vivienne.”
His words startled me out of my ruminations. I blinked a few times struggling for something to say because suddenly I didn’t want to say the thing I should. That I was better and he could leave.
However, not saying that made me feel needy. I didn’t want to backslide into that state when I’d made progress being independent.
But independence didn’t keep the bed as warm at night as Caleb did.
I thought about what Eve said, how winter in Alaska was different with a man warming your bed, and I saw her point. It was early morning. The sky was still dark. The intimacy and warmth inside the cabin a direct contrast to the cold isolation outside.
This felt cozy. Too cozy, which meant I had to suck it up and end it.
“I feel better today,” I confessed. “Finally like myself.”
He grunted then turned to Sam with another spoon of applesauce. Caleb was a pro with the baby spoon. Feeding Sam what he would take then scraping off what didn’t make it into his mouth from around his lips only to feed it to him again.
“So I guess I should go back to work,” I added.
There. That would do it. Nothing declared back to normal like going to work.
He looked at me but said nothing. Then he fed Sam the last bite of applesauce, cleaned him with a damp rag and pulled him out of the high chair only to put him in his pack and play. He handed Sam two blocks that he loved to smash together.
I sort of loved he knew Sam’s favorite toys already.
Caleb came back and started picking up plates from the table. I jumped up to help him, not able in good conscience to sit and let him do for me anymore. Together we were at the sink. He was washing. I was drying and putting away the dishes. The remains of our shared breakfast.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?” I asked.
“Tomorrow.”
“What about it?”
“You can go to work tomorrow. One more night to make sure your fever doesn’t come back.”
One more night sleeping in bed with him, even though I knew I was fully recovered, and he knew my fever was not going to suddenly come back.
“Okay,” I said breathlessly, feeling like I was stealing a night for myself. “That makes sense.”
“Today, we’ll walk into town. See where your stamina is if you’re thinking about doing a shift at Bud’s.”
“Okay,” I agreed again. That was probably a good idea. Lots of exercise that would hopefully wear me out so that when I did get into bed with him tonight, I wouldn’t do something as pathetic as run my hands over his body like I wanted to.
* * *
Later that night
Cal
“I talked to Shelby today. Eli wants me to bring me to Sammy to them tomorrow. He says my cabin is too drafty for Shelby. Can you imagine that? I mean, I was sick and made out just fine in this cabin.”
I listened to her as she got into bed and pulled my blanket up high to her chin. I walked over to check on the kid. He was sound asleep after a day of getting to play with both Vivienne and me.
I kept my back to the bed while I stripped out of my jeans, socks and shirt. That was our agreement. I turned my back while Vivienne got dressed. I kept my back toward her when I got undressed.
“He had a scare. He’s going to be extra cautious with his woman,” I explained.
“I don’t think people these days use that term—his woman.”
They didn’t? Why not when it made things so simple to explain? Seeing each other, hanging out, dating, girlfriend, fiancée, wife. So many labels for something that was simple.
Stripped down to my boxers, I turned and made my way toward the bed. I was semi-hard, but I didn’t try to hide it. There was no point. She wasn’t a virgin, she knew what an erection was. And she knew she’d been safe in her bed these past few nights. A hard dick certainly wasn’t going to change that.
“Anyway, I’m just going to leave Sa
mmy overnight with them. No point in waking him up to bring him back here where I might not get him to go down again. Still, it will be my first night without him. I don’t know if I like that.”
I lifted the covers and got into bed. On my back, my arm underneath my head to give her room to get close.
She did it without even thinking. A shuffle toward me, her face close to my chest even though she never actually got so bold as to touch me.
“He’ll be fine,” I said, allying her fears. “He knows Shelby, trusts her. It won’t bother him to be with her and the truth is, he’ll be asleep through most of the time you’re apart. For that matter, so will you. Don’t stress over it.”
“Easier said than done.”
Didn’t I know it. For example, I was lying here chastising myself for thinking about how close she was to me. How I might like the feel of her soft leg over mine, her arm around my chest.
Easier said than done.
“Caleb…”
“Hmm?”
“We sort of never talked about it.”
I had no clue where this was going. There were any number of things we probably should be talking about, but I figured I would let actions speak louder than words. It was easier that way, especially when I was the one who would probably have to eat crow.
“Talked about what?”
“Well, before I got sick…the last time I saw you…”
I’d kissed her. Kissed her then left her without a word, without any reason.
Now, things were different. It wasn’t that I felt any less guilt or grief. It wasn’t that I didn’t wish Sarah and Emily were alive and with me instead. It was only that I knew I could no longer change what was inevitable.
What had been inevitable really the moment Vivienne got off the plane. When her face and expression had hit me like a punch to the gut.
“Anyway,” she said when she must have understood I had nothing to say about it. “I didn’t know if we need to talk about it or not.”