LEWIS
The pain in my stomach subsides, but strength abandons me. I can't stand up anymore and end up sliding down the kitchen cupboard and sitting on the floor, the bitter bile still burning my throat. I hear the water running in the sink and then Ximena touches my forehead.
"You are also running a fever," she says.
"I can't be sick. I need to take care of the boys," I try to stand up, but the pain in my stomach returns so I stay where I am. "I need to go to the market tomorrow."
Ximena watches me while a small smile forms on her lips. "Lewis, you aren't going anywhere tomorrow. The only place you'll be is in your bed while you get better."
"But-"
"No arguments. Let's get you in bed. I'll take care of everything else."
I open my mouth to protest, but she looks at me in the same way my mom did when I was a child. I knew then I had no chance of changing her mind. After offering me her hands, she helps me to stand up and escorts me to the bathroom where she makes me sit on the lid of the toilet. She grabs my toothbrush, which easy to spot between the ones of my sons, and puts some toothpaste on it. While I brush my teeth, she rummages through the medicine cabinet and shakes her head.
"You only have medicines in here for children. I always carry some pain relief pills in my purse. Do you think you can stomach one to lower your fever?" She asks and I nod.
Ximena leaves the room and my stomach reminds me that my health is far from perfect. I manage to suppress the pain with antacids on a daily basis, but it doesn't get any better.
"Come with me, Lewis," Ximena calls from the hallway and I support myself from the wall as I meet her in front of my bedroom.
She opens the door for me and I crawl in bed fully clothed. I don't even feel bothered or flustered when I feel her hands on the button of my jeans and pulls them down, leaving me in my boxers.
"Can you move a bit? I want to get you under the covers."
I do as she asks with some difficulty, but get under the blankets and begin to shiver.
"How is this even possible? I felt fine an hour ago," I pull the covers closer and Ximena gets the throw from the chair in my room.
"I don't know, you could have caught a bug anywhere," she adds the throw on top of my bed sheets. "When kids are in school they seem to bring everything home. I don't have children, but the parents I babysat for always complained of that."
"That could be it. Could you please bring me the phone? I need to arrange things for tomorrow and possibly Monday."
"Tell me who I have to call and what do I have to say. I'll take care of it."
Ximena gives me the same look as before and I feel so ill that I just lean back on my pillows and accept that I need to rest.
"Please call Mary at the shop and tell her that I won't be able to make it to the market tomorrow. I have loaded the van already and maybe her son wants to give us a hand. He helps out when I go to Greenwood to visit my parents. Tell her to make a sales report and to ask John to make a start on Monday of whatever we miss. I will pay any extra time they incur."
The room spins after my last word and Ximena hands me a pill and a glass of water.
"Got it. Call Mary and ask for her son to help at the market and for John to make prepare anything missing in the inventory. You will compensate any extra time," she summarizes my instructions and I nod.
Ximena leaves the room. I'm shaken about how sick I feel and I'm grateful that she's here. My eyes feel heavy and I close them. I'm so tired...
-*-
The curtains are pulled, but through a small gap I see it's dark outside. According to my alarm clock it's almost eleven in the evening. I'm not fully recovered but the hours of deep sleep have given me enough energy to get out of my bed and put on a pair of pajama pants. My sons are still deep asleep, and I wonder if Ximena went home.
When I walk downstairs, I find her on the sofa typing away on her laptop while wearing headphones. I wave a hand in front of her and she smiles.
"You look a lot better already," she says after taking the headphones off.
"That was the deepest sleep I've had in a long time. The boys are still asleep," I take a seat in the armchair in front of her. "And you are still here."
"I said I would help. After I called Mary, who said to not worry about a thing, I went home to make a bag and told Greg I'm staying the night here. I grabbed dinner along the way and have been working here since."
"I'm really grateful you are staying. I will sleep on the couch and you can take my bed."
"The fever must have fried your head," she teases. "This couch is certainly good to sit, but it's not made for sleeping. If you don't mind sharing a bit of space in your bed I'll join you."
My mouth drops and suddenly my cheeks feel as if they are on fire, and this time is not from a fever. I don't know what to say and I don't even get a chance.
"And that's saved," she says and I hear the melody of her laptop turning off. "Bedtime. Shall we?"
When Ximena stands up from the couch, I realize that she is wearing pajamas. I'm so surprised by her proposition that I just walk behind her towards my bedroom. Once there, she opens the covers wide enough for me to get under and she follows from the opposite side of the bed.
"Oh, this is really comfortable," she says. "Are you okay? You look spooked out."
"What are we doing? What does this mean?" I motion between us.
"I don't understand. We are about to go to sleep. If I sleep on the couch, I'll be dead tired in the morning and won't be able to take care of anybody. Oh, I didn't stop to think if you were okay with this."
A chuckle escapes me. "I haven't been this close to a woman in a long time. I don't want to misread the signals and get hurt again," I say in all honesty.
"How did you meet Hannah?" Ximena lays on her side to look at me.
"When I lived in Greenwood, I owned a pâtisserie that was fairly popular."
"Wait, did you own Serendipity by any chance?"
"Yeah, so you've been to it."
"You made the sweets for the launch of my first book!"
"You are Ava Langley, of course," I smile at the realization. "Small world. Well, one day Hannah came in with a friend. Seeing ladies come in for cupcakes and coffee was a common occurrence, but I was stunned from the moment she walked inside. She was beautiful and had something about her that was different. She wasn't shy and started flirting immediately while I was serving them their sweets, then right before leaving she asked me out."
"So things were not always difficult."
"Not at all. In the beginning, we had the perfect relationship. She made me laugh and pushed me to do things that I never dared to do on my own. Meeting my in-laws in Lonstino was exciting and made me nervous, and I was received with open arms, but that should have been my first warning sign. Hannah had never brought someone to meet her parents before and they were even surprised about our relationship because she had not said a word about us. I also felt uncomfortable about the way that she treated Greg, but dismissed it as sibling rivalry."
"How did she treat Greg?"
"It was more like passive-aggressive bullying. She would make comments to me in front of him. Things like: be careful with your eyes, his shirt might explode soon or my brother is taking too much space, let's move somewhere more comfortable. After I joined the family, I could see that Greg was seriously hurt and depressed by these comments. I befriended him because he's a really good guy and also to prove to him that I didn't share her opinion."
"And then you got married..."
"To be honest, I wasn't ready for it. She suddenly started talking about getting married and living in Lonstino, which surprised me because she always seemed to hate it here. It was a difficult decision because I did love her, but moving here also meant giving up Serendipity and starting all over. I ended up doing what she wanted after she threw a fit in which we almost broke up. I regret not standing up for myself then."
"You couldn't have known things would end the way they did. I think you are a brave man. You went through many big changes and you are still thriving."
"It wasn't easy. After I moved here, I still had the shop in Greenwood as I needed to generate income to realize the plans for Candy Pier. I had to commute every day and as you and Greg know, it isn't the most convenient traveling route. Hannah began to complain that I was spending too much time in Greenwood. I got her pregnant during our honeymoon, because she forgot to tell me that she had stopped her pill. So she was uncomfortable, bored with me, and waiting for something exciting to happen in our lives. I sold my business and took the risk of opening here. I was fortunate that the good name I had spread around and I got a steady flow of customers. But spending time with her now that I was full-time in Lonstino wasn't enough."
"Was she happy when the twins were born?"
"She enjoyed the attention she got while pregnant and when they were born, but I was the one taking care of them most of the time. Mary found me many times asleep at the prep counter in the kitchen. Then one day, Sophia calls the store to ask of Hannah's whereabouts. She had left them at Greg's five hours before for a doctor's appointment. I picked them up and went home to find her closet and drawers empty, and so was the emergency cash I kept in a safe."
"Unbelievable. She left? No excuses?"
"She was having an affair that likely began before we got married. That's the excitement she was missing with me in Greenwood and the reason she wanted to move back."
Ximena's mouth drops open in surprise. You would expect a woman who just became a mother to want to spend all her time with her babies, but she was tumbling in bed with another man.