How Forever Feels

Everything had been planned perfectly. Tim Bradford made reservations at the kind of upscale restaurant he never wanted to set foot in but was willing to dine at for a night, selected his suit and tie to wear to dinner, and made a pit stop on his morning walk with Kojo to visit the market where he picked up a bouquet of daisies. He returned home with the flowers in his hands, and then he heard a sound that threatened to derail his perfect plans: coughing. Tim bounded into his bedroom to find his wife hunched over and whooping low and deep. "That doesn't sound good."

"I," Lucy coughed, "I think I'll be fine."

He pressed the back of his hand to her forehead and winced. "You're hot."

"Flirting with me won't make me feel better," she joked.

"You definitely have a fever, and it sounds like a bad cough. I'll let the station know you're not coming into work today."

"No, no, give me a few minutes to shower, and I'll be fine."

"Luce, you can take a sick day."

"I can't take the day off. Not today of all days."

He sat next to her at the edge of the mattress and smoothed her hair down the back of her head. "It's okay, baby."

"It's not okay. It's our anniversary, and we're supposed to be celebrating." She clung to his forearms. "I wanted one anniversary."

"None of the past seven anniversaries have been normal. We shouldn't be surprised something would get in the way of this one. It's fine, really. I'll go get you some cough syrup."

She frowned. "Hang on," she gripped him tighter to stop him. "Happy anniversary," she whispered sweetly then hacked up half of her lung.

Tim poured out some cough syrup in the en suite bathroom, handed it to Lucy with a soft "happy anniversary", then went into the kitchen to put the daisies he had purchased into a vase. When he returned to his bedroom, he found someone else had joined his wife in their bed.

"Ben's sick, too," Lucy reported as she rubbed their son's back soothingly. He clumsily climbed into her lap to plaster his whole tiny five year-old body against her. "Can you check on Emily?"

As if on cue, tiny coughs from down the hallway floated into their ears. Tim went to his daughter's bedroom to find his two year-old hobbling out of her bed. "Are you sick, honey?" He asked.

She coughed as she nodded then went around him.

"Get back in bed, Em," he said from behind her, but she continued her stubborn course to her parent's bedroom.

Tim rolled his eyes as he followed her. Though it went without saying, he reported, "She sounds sick, but I don't know if she has a fever."

"Mommy!" Emily said then clamored for the duvet to help her climb onto the mattress.

After hoisting his daughter up, he watched as she crawled over to tuck herself into her mom's side to make a pile of coughing, ill, pajama-clad Bradfords. "No one's going anywhere today," Tim said.

"Don't worry about us. I'll take care of the kids. You can go to work."

"I'm not leaving you alone when you're sick, too."

"As your captain, I could order you to go into work."

"Pulling rank on me? Now look who's flirting?" He teased. "I'm staying. Lay down, and I'll get medicine for them." He saw her open her mouth to object. "I've made up my mind. No sense in arguing about it."

"We're raising two mini versions of you. Trust me, I know how genetically disposed to stubbornness a Bradford is. You can stay home, but you have to go into a different room. I don't want you getting sick."