The Cora Carmack Box Set

by Cora Carmack

  The drive home was a mystery. There had definitely been driving, but I couldn’t remember the streets or ever turning the wheel, but then I was in front of my apartment, so close to my bed.

  I wanted to fall right into it, but my neurotic need to hang a calendar right beside my bed reminded me I had rehearsal tonight. I set one alarm for 5 P.M. so I’d have time to fix dinner before hand, and I set another for 5:05 P.M. just in case I accidentally turned off the first. Then the bed caved in around me, and I was tumbling head long into oblivion.

  Minutes later, the world was screaming and it was so loud that I tried to press my hands against my ears, but they were dead, lifeless at my side. I swallowed, and my tongue felt barbed, my throat burned like chapped lips.

  Rolling over felt like moving mountains.

  The clock read 5:45 P.M.

  I blinked and read it again.

  5:45 P.M.

  The world was still screaming and finally, finally I lifted my hands and pushed at my alarm until the noise stopped.

  I swallowed again, but my tongue felt too big. My spit singed like acid on its way down.

  Dazed, I looked at the clock again. I was out of time. Rehearsal started in fifteen minutes. Somehow . . . I don’t know how, really . . . I pushed myself out of bed. My legs quivered like the floor was a boat and beneath it the sea. There were things I needed to do . . . I knew that, but I couldn’t think beyond that nagging sense that there was something I was missing. And it was so cold, where was my coat? I needed my coat.

  Wrapped in the warmest things I could find, I lurched outside toward my car. The world turned for a second, like a child refusing to sit still. I stuck a hand out to steady myself, but there was nothing there to catch me. I pitched sideways. I didn’t fall, but managed to catch myself, barely. I stared at the ground; I was just so tired. Would it be so bad to be there? On the ground?

  It was so cold though. I really should go inside if I was going to lay down . . . or in my car. Did I have time for a nap in my car?

  I shook my head, trying to clear the fog, and something awful rattled around in my skull. It hurt. God, it hurt. I pressed at it with my hands, trying to understand why, and I swallowed again, which hurt, too. Everything hurt. Everything.

  I couldn’t stand up anymore. Standing was too hard. I was almost to the ground, reaching for it, thinking the asphalt would be warm against my cheek when something hooked me from behind.

  I kept reaching, but I was caught, a fish dangling on a line.

  I began to cry because my head was pounding and my throat was clamped down like iron. I still wanted my coat, and I didn’t want to be a fish, and I wanted to sleep.

  Sleep.

  Someone was telling me that I was okay. The hook was gone, and my pillow held me once more, and I must have been dreaming. Sleep.

  Sleep perchance to dream.

  SOMETHING BUZZED. I thought of bees. I was flying with bees.

  “ . . . Be okay. I can’t tell how bad, but she definitely has a fever. She’s not coherent at all. Mono, yeah. Should I take her to the hospital? Are you sure? You’re sure. Okay. Yes. Bye. ”

  I reached a hand out. There were too many words. Bees shouldn’t talk. That didn’t make sense. Where was I?

  “Where?” I groaned, then, “Ow,” because everything still hurt even after sleep. My hand found something. Or something found my hand. And it was warm. And I was freezing. I sighed. The warmth found my cheek and I pushed into it, wanting more.

  “So cold,” I told the warmth.

  And then the warmth answered, low and soft, “ I don’t know what to do.”

  I clutched the warmth that held my face and asked, “More.”

  Then the warmth left, even though I tried to hold on. Air blew past me, and I was shaking, shaking, shaking. I cried and the tears felt like rivers of ice.

  “Cold,” I said. I swallowed, but that felt worse instead of better. I hated this. I wanted it to be over. Please. Please.

  Please.

  “Please.”

  “I’m here, love. Hold on.”

  The world fell over, bent sideways, broken. And it cradled me, taking me with it, but instead of dying, I fell into warmth, solid and strong. I clutched at it, wanting to be inside it, to make the shaking stop, to make everything stop.

  It was the sun, and it held me in its arms, called me by name, touched me from forehead to toes. I fell asleep cradled in the sky in the arms of a star.

  WHEN I WOKE next, my head was clear enough to know that I was sick. I had to breathe through my nose because my throat was too swollen, too tender to stand the passage of air. My muscles ached and my stomach felt hollow. I was still cold, but not frozen solid. Thawed. Sleep called me again. I was still so tired.

  But I knew, knew what that meant.

  I had gotten mono after all.

  Which meant I had to tell Garrick. But that could wait until my head wasn’t bursting and my lungs felt full and my throat was not on fire. Once the fever broke, I would call him.

  I shifted, wishing that my knees and my elbows and shoulders would just cease to exist because right now they were nothing, but pain. And then, I knew I was dreaming, that the fever had re-arranged my brain because Garrick was there beneath me, his bare chest my pillow. It was cruel, this fever. But I knew it was only because I had thought of him. I was probably still dreaming.

  His eyes were open, staring at me, not speaking, just staring. Couldn’t be real.

  “Wish it was real,” I whimpered, before giving in again.

  Sleeping.

  Sleeping.

  WHEN I WOKE again, the chills had stopped, and I was alone. Even though I knew it was a dream, I pressed my face into my pillow, wishing it hadn’t been.

  I hadn’t noticed until now, or maybe just hadn’t admitted it, but even now I was falling for Garrick. Maybe I had never stopped falling. Every memory and fantasy pulled me deeper into wanting him. Though still exhausted, this time I had to work to fall back in to sleep.

  “Bliss, wake up.”

  No time had passed at all. It must be a dream.

  “You need to drink something. Wake up.”

  I tried to turn away, to crawl deeper into sleep, but something tugged against me, and I was sitting up against my will. Something pushed at my back, refusing to let me lay down, so instead I leaned sideways.

  My head met something solid. It wasn’t laying down, but it was close enough. I closed my eyes.

  “Oh, no you don’t. Drink first. Then you can sleep.”

  I was sleeping. At least, I thought I was. I must have been because out of nowhere a cup appeared in my hands. It was warm, almost as warm as the other hands wrapped around mine.

  It smelled wonderful, and I let the cup be pulled to my lips.

  Soup.

  Chicken noodle, maybe. It tasted salty and warm, but swallowing was too hard. I pushed the cup away.

  “Please, love. I’m worried about you. I don’t like worrying about you.”

  I knew those words, and it was cruel for my subconscious to parrot them back at me now, when he was no longer worried at all. I looked up, and there he was, perhaps even more perfect in my dream state than in real life. He was the sun. He’d always been the sun—shining and brilliant.

  This was too much. I was hurting inside and out.

  “I miss you,” I told my sun. “I was so stupid. And now I’ve lost the light.”

  He didn’t say he missed me back. He didn’t say any of the things I would want from him. He told me, “Drink, Bliss. We’ll talk when you are well.”

  I did as he asked because I was too tired to fight, too tired to make myself face the unreality. Slowly, I sipped, tipping my head back and letting the liquid slide down my throat so I didn’t have to work so hard to swallow. Halfway through the cup, I could take no more. I pushed it away and he let me.

  “Now you can sleep. Sleep, love.”

  I fell back against the pillows, but I was seized by something else, by fea
r. I feared losing this . . . this dream space between worlds where I hadn’t ruined anything. Maybe Cade would arrive next, and Kelsey. And for a little while, my life could be simple again.

  Dream Garrick brushed a hand across my forehead. “I think your fever is almost gone. That’s good. You should feel much better in the morning.”

  I frowned. “That means I’ll have to call you soon.”

  “Call me?”

  “To tell you that you might get sick, too.”

  His head tilted sideways. Why didn’t he understand?

  “You don’t think I already know?”

  “Not you. You’re not real.”

  “I’m not?”

  “Real Garrick wouldn’t be here.” I curled into my pillow, wishing this dream would stop.

  It wasn’t nice anymore. It wasn’t real. We weren’t anything to each other . . . not anymore.

  But Dream Garrick, stayed there, his hand on my hair, and I let myself believe it, for a little while longer.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  AT AROUND FOUR in the morning, I woke in a pool of sweat, my body stuck to the sheets and my face glued to the bed.

  I guess the fever was definitely broken.

  I placed my hands on the bed to push myself up, but my equilibrium must have been off. My bed felt uneven. I reached back, fumbling for the lamp and flicked the light on. Then because I thought maybe I was seeing things, I flipped it off and on again. I pinched myself. I pinched really hard. But nothing changed.

  Garrick was definitely asleep in my bed.

  Shit.

  Shit.

  How much of my fever-induced dream was real? I felt safe assuming that my time as a bee was fiction, as well as a few mythological animals that I swear I’d seen. Then I’d lived on the sun with aliens.

  But Garrick was in my bed. He’d definitely been in my dreams, but it couldn’t all be real. Sometimes he flew, much of the time he was naked. And there were a dozen more moments, some fuzzy, some very clear. Where was the line? What had really happened? Hell, was this even real? Maybe I was just dreaming that my fever broke. I was freaking out, and before I had the sense of mind to formulate a plan, I was already shaking him awake.

  He was bleary-eyed and beautiful as he came to. I was struck for a moment by the fact that he was sleeping on my pillow.

  He was in my bed. With me.

  Sleeping.

  We were sleeping together!

  “You’re awake.” God, since when did groggy and gorgeous go so well together? Wide-eyed, I nodded, not having thought of what I’d say when I actually had him awake.

  “How do you feel?”

  That I could answer.

  “Like shit. Everything hurts. My throat the worst.”

  He reached out and set a hand on my thigh. Like that was normal. Like we just set our hands on each other’s thighs all the time.

  “That’s normal, I think,” He said. The thigh thing? No, no . . . my throat. He continued, “Do you need anything?”

  I shook my head. What the hell had happened while I was so out of it?

  He sat up, and the sheet fell around his waist, revealing all of his upper body to my eyes. The sheet drooped around his hips, drawing my eyes to the muscles that disappeared down into his shorts. God. His hand went to my hair, my hair that fell lank, and oily against my face, a stark contrast to how good he looked right now. He didn’t seem to care.

  Again, what the hell was happening?

  “I’m glad you’re okay,” he said.

  I nodded. Nodding was all I knew how to do, all I understood. Nodding, at least, still made sense.

  “You should go back to sleep. You still need to rest. Unless you’re hungry?”

  I shook my head.

  “Then sleep.”

  He nudged me slightly, and I lowered my body slowly, certain that the minute my head hit the pillow this alternate universe would cease to exist.

  It didn’t.

  He pushed back the covers, and then slipped out of the bed.

  “You’re leaving?” I asked.

  He stopped, and in quick succession I saw him realize where we were and how little he was wearing. He hesitated, unsure. It was such a strange emotion, one I’d rarely seen him wear. “Do you want me to?” I wanted to pause the moment, study it, break down the second where this bold boy had been filled with doubt. Of course I didn’t want him to leave! I never wanted him to leave!

  I shook my head. Glad that fatigue kept me calm, somewhat.

  He smiled so wide I forgot that the doubt ever existed. “Then I’m not leaving. I’m just going to get some water. Go to sleep.”

  He left, and I turned on my side, reeling. I could hear the faucet turn on and off. I tried to imagine what he was doing. The floor wasn’t creaking, so he wasn’t walking back. Was he just standing at the sink drinking? Or was there no creaking because my delusion had ended and he wasn’t coming back? Had the floor creaked on his way to the sink? I couldn’t remember. I started to panic. Maybe I needed to get up, go after him. Make sure he was real.

  Then my bed dipped, and I felt heat behind me, and an arm wrapped around my waist. I stiffened first, and then relaxed so suddenly that I practically fell into him. He was so warm, I felt like I was feverish all over again.

  He pushed my hair up and onto the pillow, so that my neck was uncovered. Then I felt something, the tip of his nose perhaps, grazing softly against my skin and the puff of his breath.

  “Garrick?”

  His arm tightened, his body curved around mine, even our thighs pressed together.

  “Tomorrow, Bliss. Sleep now.”

  Sleep? The idea seemed impossible, but as his breath steadied and I grew used to his touch, I realized I was still tired. I wanted to analyze what had happened, what I remembered and what I didn’t, but sleep did seem more important.

  Garrick was right. It could wait until tomorrow. He would be here. He said he wasn’t leaving. But just in case, I placed one of my hands over his that rested against my stomach. I had thought he was already asleep, but he was awake enough to respond, lacing our fingers together.

  When I felt certain, both that he was real and that he wasn’t leaving . . . when my doubt was gone, I slept.

  I woke several hours later. Light was pouring in through my high windows, and my skin was slick with sweat. For a moment, I thought I had a fever again. I sat up, and Garrick’s arm fell from my waist. He groaned.

  His brows were furrowed with beads of sweat dotting his face. I pressed my hand against his forehead, and sure enough, he was burning up. He looked awful, but I imagined that I looked even worse. My skin and clothes were damp with sweat, both his and mine. It felt like grime and sickness was slathered over the top of my skin.

  Carefully, I shifted out of Garrick’s reach and planted my feet on the cool hardwood floor. Standing hurt all the way to my bones, like they’d been broken and set in the wrong way, and now I had to re-break them to set it right. Each step felt like a nail gun had been taken to my heels, my knees, my hips. It took a hand on the wall just to keep myself upright. And my journey to the bathroom comprised of thirty slow, shuffling steps instead of the usual ten. When I got there, I was short of breath and ready for another nap.

  In my pain-addled mind, it seemed very important to be clean first. I turned on the shower, leaving it on the cool side of the spectrum instead of automatically pushing it to hot like usual. I shucked off my clothes, lamenting each time I got off one piece only to discover another layer beneath. When I got to my bra, I nearly gave up completely.

  Finally, I was free, but I no longer had the energy to stand for the shower I wanted. Like a child just learning to walk, I crawled into the tub, laying back and letting the water pelt my skin. My stomach, especially, felt so sensitive that each drop stung on impact, like someone was dropping tiny little missiles from above. But even so, it was cool and lovely and I melted into the sensation.

  For a long time I laid there, falling in and out o
f sleep. When my breath settled and the ache in my muscles eased, I pushed myself up, letting the water soak my hair and run down my face.

  Shampoo became the villain of my story, stinging my eyes and exhausting me as I tried to rub it in and rinse it out. It felt like hours before the water ran clear enough for me to open my eyes without them burning. And then I couldn’t convince myself to do it again with conditioner.

  I turned off the water, and laid back, feeling the water drain beneath me. The longer my eyes stayed closed the heavier my body became. The little pools of liquid on my skin dried slowly, and it felt good to be empty, to be still for a moment.

  Then I remembered Garrick, and knew I had been selfish long enough.

  The wall of the tub might as well have been a battlement. It took all of my strength to climb over it. Clothing was completely out of the question. I wrapped my hair in a towel and my body in a robe. I grabbed a few washcloths, soaking them with cool water, wringing them out so they wouldn’t drip.

  I felt a little more alive now, and I managed to walk without groping at the wall. The pain was there, in the back of my mind with every step, but it was manageable. Even so, it was a relief to sink down beside Garrick on my bed.

  I stripped the blankets back, and he shifted, but didn’t wake. I placed one of the damp cloths across his forehead, and another I unfolded and laid across his chest. I used the last to dab at his arms and legs. Even that became too difficult though, so I rolled the last cloth up and slipped it beneath his neck.

  Then I laid down beside him and slept.

  The next time we woke together. His fever was still going, but I convinced him to drink some water. It wasn’t until I took a drink myself that I realized how thirsty I was. I helped him drink a full glass, and then engulfed two of my own. I had enough energy to shuck my thick robe and replace it with loose pajamas. I placed a new damp cloth on Garrick’s forehead and he sighed.

  “Thank you,” he mumbled.

  I wasn’t sure how coherent he was. He definitely knew I was here, as he’d called out my name a few times since he woke. And he knew he was sick, but I didn’t know how much he knew beyond that.