Isolation [BOOK THREE]

sick

chapter twenty
" sick "

Maggie and I didn't stick around long when I got back from the school. After deciding to take Kai's side, I figured she and I wouldn't be welcomed at the boarding house anymore. Not that I wanted to be there with everyone anyways. I had Maggie pick out a house she liked before compelling the realtor to sign it over to us. We kept all the staging furniture, and even though Maggie referred to it as home, it didn't feel like it.

I knew the house was temporary. As soon as I could rescue Kai, and help him see through with his plan to kill the coven, I planned on leaving Mystic Falls with Maggie. If Kai decided to follow us, I wouldn't be opposed. Maggie was excited to have her own house, though, so I pretended to be as well.

We didn't have much to bring to the new house, just some of Maggie's clothes, and things she got to decorate her side of the dorm. The smile on her face was huge as she hung a painting she had made on the living room wall. Her smile was just as big when she turned to see my reaction, but her expression dropped when the door bell rang. Nobody knew where we lived, outside of our realtor and the neighbors who watched us move in.

However, the neighbors already brought over some "Welcome to the neighborhood" muffins a week ago, and the realtor was compelled to not bother us without calling Maggie first. The scent of whoever was on the porch wasn't anything recognizable. Actually, the scent was awful. It smelled like a dead body, but it's highly unlikely that a corpse rang our doorbell.

Our door didn't have a peephole, or any windows around it to peek out of. Our only option to know who it was, was to answer the door. Maggie didn't seem as paranoid as I did, simply shrugging before finally opening the door. The smell got worse with the door open, but I still couldn't see who it was. The door blocked the person perfectly.

Maggie turned to me with a grin ear to ear, pulling the door fully open. Exposing Kai, who had never looked worse, leaning against the doorframe. "Finally," Kai mumbled weakly, "I have knocked on every door in the neighborhood. Can I come in?"

"Of course," Maggie gestured her hand towards the living room, but quickly retracted it to reach for Kai as he stumbled over his own feet. I ran to his other side, both Maggie and I keeping him upright as we got him to the couch. "Are you okay?"

Kai shrugged against the couch, eyes immediately closing as he took deep breaths. "I'm sick."

"We can tell," I smiled small. I wanted to ask how he got away, how he's still alive, but it didn't seem important in the moment. His illness needed to be cured before I could interrogate him. I pressed the back of my hand to Kai's forehead, the heat radiating off it much warmer than I expected. "You're burning up."

"I'm freezing," Kai rejected, visibly shaking.

I turned to Maggie unsure of what to do. I've never dealt with someone sick, outside of dealing with my own past hangovers. "I'll run to the store, buy some medicine to reduce his fever." I offered, thinking of what I'd seen on tv before.

Kai's hand wrapped around my wrist before I could move. "Don't go." He mumbled so quietly a human wouldn't have heard it.

"It's okay. I'll go." Maggie nodded, eyeing the grip Kai had on me.

I shook my head, "you were the one studying to become a doctor. You'd know how to take care of him better than me."

Kai's grip tightened, though it was still weak. I could easily pull away if I needed to. "As the one who was studying to be a doctor, I should be the one to get the right medicine." Maggie was right. I wouldn't know what to grab outside of Tylenol. "Just watch him, maybe get him to lay down in bed. Rest will do him some good, especially if he's been walking all over town looking for you. Use my bed, I'll be back soon."