Page 88 of Betting on the Bad Boy

Tissues, eh? I’d run out of tissues on Thursday and had been wiping my nose with toilet paper and paper towels for the past thirty-six hours. The tissues were tempting.

“Just open the door, and I’ll slide them inside,” Dante said.

Hewouldhave to tempt me with Kleenex. Desperate for the little square box of pillowy softness, I turned the deadbolt and tugged on the handle, cracking the door about six inches. Dante slid the tissues in as promised, then wedged his boot in the doorway so I couldn’t push it closed.

“Come on. I don’t want you to see me like this.” My voice sounded muffled, even to my own ears. That’s what having a head full of green snot would do to a gal.

“I’m not going away. I don’t care what you look like. I’m coming in.” He gave the door a slight push, and I had no energy to resist.

I stepped out of the way, and Dante pushed through the door and into my stuffy, dark apartment.

“Jeez, how long have you been like this? You look like shit.”

“Thanks. You’re already making me feel so much better.” I shuffle-whapped over to the couch and curled up into a ball, then yanked a fuzzy blanket over my head.

Dante set the bags down on the table and walked over to sit down on the side of the couch. He slid the edge of the blanket back to put a cool hand to my forehead. “Have you taken your temperature lately? You’re burning up.”

“I ran out of medicine last night. You shouldn’t even be here. You’ll catch the crud.”

He stood up and walked over to the kitchen. The sound of cabinets closing and drawers opening filtered through the blanket. I peeked out to see him fill a plastic cup from the tap. Then he brought the cup of water and a bottle of pills over to me.

“Lucky for you, I brought some ibuprofen. Here, take this.”

I propped myself up on an elbow and managed to swallow the pills he held out.

“Let’s get you back to bed.”

“No.” I grabbed onto his arm. “No movement.”

“Okay. Then you just stay here.” Dante continued to talk, but I tuned him out. As I drifted off to sleep, he might have said something ludicrous about making me soup, but I must have been already dreaming. Dante making soup. What could be more ridiculous than that?

Dante

“A roux, my boy,”Meemaw’s voice carried across the kitchen. I looked up to make sure Faith hadn’t woken up on the couch.

“But the flour’s getting all brown.” Meemaw had been trying to walk me through making her homemade creamy chicken soup for the past half hour, and I’d already thrown away the first two attempts.

“Stir it faster. Just keep whisking.”

“The whisk is the beater thing, right?” I asked. “I don’t think she has one of those. I’m just using a spoon.”

“Oh, child. I should have tried harder with you. Where are you exactly?”

“I’m at Faith’s. She’s got a horrible cold, and I wanted to make her some soup.”

“That poor girl. Step away from the stove. I can be there in a little over an hour.”

That’s all I needed, Meemaw busting in and taking charge. I groaned. “No, that’s not necessary. If you can just tell me again.”

“All right. We’ll go through it one more time.” Meemaw started from the beginning once more, and I did my best to follow along. By the time she’d covered the whole recipe, I had something that kind of resembled soup bubbling on the stove.

“Thanks, Meemaw. I owe you one.”

“Nonsense. You don’t owe me a single thing, you know better than that. By the way, I saw that Cheryl the other day in town.”

“Oh yeah?”

“She asked about you.”