He snickered, and pushed himself up. “Hold on, baby. Let me go to the bathroom first, okay?”
“Okay, but hurry!”
“I’ll be as fast as I can.”
He pulled back the covers and gently shook Wendy’s shoulder. “Time to get up. The elves were apparently busy last night.”
She responded with a low, half-asleep groan.
Ellie moved to the side as Nolan swung himself out of bed. Her eyes were on him the whole time, her face full of anticipation.
“Hold your horses,” he told her as he headed into the master bathroom.
A minute later he was out again. Surprisingly, Wendy was still in bed in pretty much the same position.
Ellie, who had moved over to her mom’s side, looked back at Nolan. “Daddy, get Mommy up.”
Nolan reached down and picked up his daughter by her waist. “Oh, you want me to get your mommy up, do you? You want me to do your dirty work, huh?”
He tickled her ribs, and she squirmed and giggled. “Daddy, stop it!”
“What’s wrong? Stop what?” He continued to tickle her.
“Daddy!” she yelled between screams of laughter.
“Oh, you don’t like to be tickled.”
“No!”
“Why didn’t you say so?”
He tossed her over his wife and onto the bed where he’d been sleeping only minutes earlier. Ellie let out a yelp of excitement as she bounced on the mattress.
Nolan put a hand on Wendy’s shoulder. “Babe, wake up. It’s present time.”
She groaned again, and opened her eyes halfway. They appeared glazed and watery.
“You okay?” he asked.
A blink of surprise, then her eyes focused on him. She opened her mouth to say something, but instead let out a single, phlegm-filled cough.
A sudden chill rushed over Nolan’s skin.
Oh, no. No!
Movement on the other side of the bed. Ellie was about to give her mother a hug.
Nolan quickly grabbed his daughter under her arms, swung her up and over Wendy, and set her on the floor. “Honey, why don’t you go into the living room, and we’ll be right there?”
“You said no last night,” she argued.
Before putting her to bed Christmas Eve, they’d told her she couldn’t go past the end of the hallway that morning unless they were with her.
“It’s okay,” he said. “Just go in, sit on the couch, but don’t touch anything.”
Her smile was back. “Really?”
“Really.”
She ran as fast as her little legs would go, out into the hall. Once she was gone, Nolan kneeled next to his wife.
“Are you okay?” he asked, knowing she wasn’t.
She tried to clear her throat, and coughed again.
“Shit,” she finally said.
Nolan laughed. “Yeah.”
She tried to raise herself onto her elbow, but fell back. “Help me up.”
“You should stay here.”
“It’s Christmas morning. Help me up.”
Reluctantly, he helped her out of bed and half carried her into the bathroom.
“Give me a moment,” she told him, using the sink to prop herself up.
“Sure.”
As he left, she said, “Close the door.”
For the next several minutes, there were bouts of silence surrounding coughs and sniffles and grunts.
“Daddy, Daddy, come on!” Ellie yelled from the living room.
“Just a minute, sweetie.”
Finally, the bathroom door opened. Wendy was wearing her robe now, and though she didn’t look much better, she was at least able to walk on her own.
She smiled as best she could, and said, “I’m sorry.”
Nolan threw his arms around her as tears began rolling down her cheeks. She tried to push him away, but in her weakened state it wasn’t much more than a soft nudge.
“Don’t,” she said. “You’ll catch it.”
“If you’ve got it, I already have it, too.”
She fought him for a moment longer, then gave in and sobbed against his chest.
“Mommy! Daddy! The presents!”
Ellie was standing in the bedroom doorway, her fists on her hip and her elbows sticking out in that cute, pseudo-adult way she sometimes had.
“Right,” Wendy said. “The presents. I think you’ve waited long enough.”
Ellie grinned as she ran into the room and grabbed Nolan’s hand. Wendy leaned against him as Ellie pulled them both toward the door.
Making up her own tune, Ellie sang, “It’s Christmas. It’s Christmas. Time for presents. It’s Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas,” Wendy whispered to Nolan.
He kissed her on the cheek. “Merry Christmas.”
At first Mrs. Weber was the only one showing signs of the flu. Then, around ten p.m., Donny began coughing. By one a.m., everyone in the house except Martina was sick.
The only sleep Martina had been able to get was half an hour sometime during the night when she’d sat down at the dining table, only meaning to rest her eyes. She had woken to the sound of Riley hacking on the couch.
Since then, she’d been moving from room to room, giving those who were still conscious water, and wiping everyone’s face with a cool towel.
Memories of the outbreak the previous spring kept coming to her. As one of victims, she remembered what the illness had felt like. The pain in her chest from coughing, the weakness in her muscles, and the overwhelming sensation that all she wanted to do was sleep. But she and all her friends who got sick that day had lived.
That was the hope she was clinging to — that her family and the Webers would live, too.
As she walked back to the kitchen, she cut the corner coming out of the hallway too close and stubbed her toe against the wall.
“Ow! Dammit!”
Hopping on her other foot, she grabbed her injured toe and inspected the damage. The top half of the nail was bent back a quarter inch, and she could feel blood pooling where it had been. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth, letting a wave of pain pass through her.
You’re such an idiot. You need to pay attention!
She hopped into the kitchen and raised her foot into the sink. Repositioning the faucet, she let cold water flow over her toe. It was painful at first, but soon the wounded area grew numb. As carefully as she could, she bent the nail back into place, then got a dish towel and wrapped it around the injury.
“So stupid,” she muttered. Lowering her foot to the floor, she found she could walk if she put most of her weight on her heel.
She thought about sitting down for a few minutes, but there had been something that needed doing. What was it? She racked her brain, and glanced back at the wall she’d hit her toe against.
Water! That was it. She needed to do another round for everyone. She filled a cup and stopped first at Riley and Donny, the two in the living room.
“Here you go,” Martina said, lifting Donny’s head so she could dribble some of the liquid into his mouth. He coughed, and everything she’d poured in came flying out. “Donny, come on!” She knew he couldn’t help it, but it was so frustrating.
When he settled down, she tried again. This time, she was able to get about a quarter of a cup down without it spewing back out. She moved over to Riley.
“Have some water.”
Riley opened her eyes halfway. She was the last to get sick, and wasn’t quite as bad off as the others yet. “Not sure…I’m…thirsty.”
“Just a little bit, okay? You need it.”
Riley tried to nod. “Okay.”
Martina tilted the cup to her friend’s lips.
When she had at first started giving everyone drinks, she’d used separate cups for each person, but she soon gave that up. They all had the same thing, after all. It wasn’t like they could make each other sicker.