Love, Poetry, & Coffee

~ 30 ~

"We can't just ignore the fact that you're prioritizing other things more than yourself, Declan." She carefully places down a wet small towel onto my forehead, a look of worry fills both her eyes.

I try to shrug off the towel off my forehead, "It's fine, I'm okay. This is just a weak fever." Now, that's a lie, both she and I know that this isn't just a regular fever. About an hour ago, my body violently refuses the food I just consumed, forcing me to go straight to the toilet to puke everything out. After that, the fever suddenly kicked in my system. We were hoping that it's merely a stomach flu, and it'll go away after 3 days. So within those 3 days, we've been focusing on refilling the water in my body so that I won't get dehydrated from all the vomiting that's happening.

She lets out a loud sigh, the kind of sigh that people will deem as the annoyed sigh. I don't blame her, I'm being persistent on being finer than just accept the fact that I'm sick. "No, you're not okay. You need to take a rest day. Your book company can wait for your manuscript."

I made an attempt to get out of bed, but for a minute of pride that I've finally sit up on the sheets, the nauseating feeling waltz back into my head and I can feel a vomit coming. With every ounce of control, I try to push back the vomit back. With a sigh, I went back laying down on the bed. "You don't understand, the deadline is closing in."

Another irritant sigh escapes her throat as she carefully rubs a hand on her tired face, "Your deadline is a month away, I think you can manage to take a rest for a week." I open my mouth in attempt to protest, but she holds out a finger in front of my face. "Don't even try to fight with me about this, Declan. You're sick, and you need to take a rest. Stop prioritizing other stuff for other people's happiness. Who would prioritize your stuff for your happiness in the end?"

Part of me wants to answer her, but the other part just slaps me mentally and whispers into my ear about not being an idiot. The method of persuading is quite good, just minus the assault. Now my brain is just imaging a debate club that are just slapping each to make their point. Debate club with a hint of self-defense. I suppress a chortle, but somehow, Sarah notices that and just let another sigh escapes her throat. I should try to make a sigh counter for her, perhaps when we reach a 100-milestone, we'll go out and celebrate.

"You're not taking this seriously, aren't you?" Is this a trick question? I'm not certain, so I just slowly nod my head in agreement. The motion immediately made me feel dizzy. Is this the karma I've finally gotten from lying about the vase I've broken since I was a child? To be fair, I've only just got grounded yesterday before accidentally breaking the vase, my cunning brain told me to lie about it so that I won't get grounded again.

I, both hate it and love it that my mind keeps to wander into different stuff while there's a serious situation right in front of me. There's a whisper in my head that tells me to check if I have any illness in the mental region. Sadly, I just scoff that idea off and try to focus back into reality. But Sarah is in the motion of getting out of my room without a glance back. Well, that's what I get from not being serious for a minute. Time to lay down and rest, while my mind is low-key panicking about the deadline and the relationship between me and Sarah.

***

"So, what makes you two to come in here?" Dylan still has his arms crossed together, eyeing the both of us with great intensity. If looks could melt metal, Dylan would have been a great blacksmith.

The perks of having someone whose brain functions faster than mine is that there's a considerable chance of them answering the question better than I can. While I'm here hesitating with my words and accidentally clogged my own throat, Constance is on the rescue. "Oh, we're here to do the reading for children. Well, I'm going to do it." She gestures a hand at me and I just smile at the married couple in front of us, "Declan here is just going to watch."