Page 62 of A Love Most Fatal
He’s so good with the kids, always confident when he talks with them, like they aren’t the most delicate of creatures.
“Angel, too. There’s a medicine cabinet in the bathroom down the hall. Check there.”
“Got it,” he says and strides out of the kitchen.
Angel is still sitting at the counter with her head resting on her forearms and when I rub circles on her back, she turns to look up at me. She’s pale, the pink of her cheeks turned to red splotches and a slight sheen on her skin.
“Oh, sweetie, you really aren’t feeling good, are you?”
Her lower lip wobbles and I know she’s going to start crying.
“No,” she says, and her voice cracks. I pull her in for a hug and her little body shaking goes tense and still. There may be something behind what people say about a woman’s intuition, because I know in an indescribable way that she is about to vomit and move into action, grabbing the nearest receptacle (in our case, the now-empty glass Tupperware the soup was in) and sliding it in front of her. The dog, maybe sensing danger, vacates his bed and the kitchen.
She does vomit, retching into the bowl.
“Nate?” I call loud enough that he’ll hear from down the hall. He rushes back into the kitchen, plastic bottle of Tums rattling in his hand.
He sees my niece groaning over her bowl at the counter and doesn’t even pause before retrieving two mixing bowls from the cabinet to the left of the fridge. He hands one to me and practically sprints into the living room with the other to help Artie with what feels inevitable. Even in my distress, I’m a little surprised that he knew not only exactly what was needed, but right where to find it. Has he been here for a month already? Is that all it takes? Only 25 days to learn someone’s kitchen and how to help them in crisis?
“I’m sorry, Auntie,” Angel says after breathing heavily over the bowl for a few moments, the heaving temporarily abated.
“Don’t be sorry, sweetie.” I take out two bobby pins from my hair and secure her bangs behind her ears before I hand her the fresh bowl. “Hold this right beneath your face, I’m going to take you to the bathroom so you can throw up there, okay?”
“Okay,” she says, the most defeated, miserable agreement in history, and her tears have welled and flowed over her eyelids. We are walking delicately to the bathroom down the hall when I hear Artie retch from inside.
Angel, hearing this, starts crying harder and almost throws up again. There are two bathrooms downstairs, so I steer her towards the other one on the other side of the house, walking faster until we are kneeling in front of the toilet where she heaves again.
This goes on, Angel throwing up until her stomach is empty, and then throwing up more bile until she’s thoroughly exhausted and cannot throw anything more up because there is nothing more to expel. At this point, we sit with our backs against the floral wallpapered wall, Angel leaning against my chest with the bowl cradled in her arms.
Nate pads down the hall in his socks, and for reasons unknown, no shirt.
Reading my expression, he explains, “The shirt was a casualty to the stomach bug. I rinsed most of it off, though.”
I wince. “Sorry to hear that.”
“Artie’s taking a shower upstairs, and I think I’ve cleaned up the bulk of the. . . material in the kitchen.”
“You didn’t have to clean that,” I say. If it smelled anything like the rest of it, it was probably heinous.
“How are you feeling, Miss Angel?” he asks, ignoring what I just said. Angel gives a weak thumbs up, not opening her heavy eyes. “How can I help?” he mouths.
I look down at Angel, so sweet and exhausted. She needs a shower and clean pajamas and then to sleep this off. Her brother, too, it sounds like.
“I’ll get her upstairs and cleaned up, you get fresh bowls and put the big throw blanket in the dryer.”
“The one on the couch?” he asks, and I nod. “On it.”
Nate pads away without another question, off to move through the house like he’s lived here forever.
“Nate’s nice,” Angel murmurs. “I like his dog.”
I kiss her head. “Let’s get you upstairs, little.”
After showering,brushing their teeth, and making them drink as much Gatorade as they could without throwing up more, it takes nothing for the kids to fall asleep on half of my bed. They lie close together, Artie’s head pressed against his sister’s shoulder, her ankle on top of one of his. It reminds me of when they were babies. They always napped together, cuddled up like nothing could be more natural or comforting.
I run my fingers through Artie’s damp hair and my heart constricts like a fist is reaching into my chest cavity and squeezing at how much I love them.
My door pushes open slowly and Nate pokes his head through the crack of the door. Seeing the kids asleep, he steps inside quietly with the soft throw blanket overflowing in his arms. He lays it over them and it’s big enough to stretch over me as well. The heat of the blanket fresh from the dryer warms my pajamas and seeps into my skin.