Watching Her

chapter 31: I'm tired

I felt the darkness trying to pull me in as I lay limp in his arms. I could barely move a muscle and did not test it once he laid me onto some warm cushions. I opened my eyes slightly and looked around me. We were in the living room,  a place I had not been to before, I realized. He stood back up once he covered me with a blanket and made sure I was lying in a comfortable position. 

My eyes were slowly drifting back to the darkness that was so desperately trying to get to me. I could not help but feel weak and vulnerable. 

"What happened?" He sat down next to me, watching my breath carefully. I still felt his touch on me when he had carried me up the stairs. How soft he had been, how careful not to hurt me more. It was common sense to thank him, even if my pride was pushing against it. 

"I fell." I muttered, turning around, away from him. I did not want to see him staring at me as he tried to figure out what was going on. He did not need to know what the real deal was, it was none of his business. Sure, he had played the great hero with helping me get upstairs, but I did not intend to share any personal details right now. What was he thinking?

"No, it's more than that," I heard him pause, "Carlotta told me she felt like you were sick this morning." Such a traitor. 

I huffed.

"Why did you even exercise in the first place if you were feeling weak?" He sounded like a concerned overprotective brother with this tone on his voice. It was no secret that working out when you felt sick was stupid as your heart could suffer from it, but I simply had not cared in that moment. I had not thought that it was that deep, to be honest. 

"It wasn't like that." I mumbled, my face against a pillow as I tried to zone out and fall asleep again. I wanted to follow that darkness real bad as my head was thumping. 

"It was exactly like that." He exclaimed and I felt him getting... Mad? I was not sure, he had no reason to be mad. I could not understand this man, even if I tried. 

I decided to not bother and fight with him about it, I just wanted to close my eyes. I heard him walking again and soon felt his presence. I knew he was standing opposite to me now, while I was lying there, trying to just forget everything that had happened. 

"Oh no you won't." He leaned down to me, I felt him touch my chin. This sudden touch made my eyes open again when I met his cold gaze. There was a much bigger fire now storming in those eyes, but with a different flame. Different than yesterday. 

I pulled the thin, fluffy blanket up to my neck.

"Just leave me alone." I huffed out, wanting to swat his hand away. I knew I was acting like a child.

"You can't fall asleep when you hit your head that hard, Celine." My name between his lips, from his teeth, out of his mouth. It was everything and nothing at once, making me shudder at his concern. He really did care, right? I was scared to admit that to myself, I did not want to trust him like that already. It was too early for anything to happen. 

"If it's a concussion it's dangerous for you to close your eyes, so stop it." He gritted his teeth, clenching his jaw when our gaze met. There really was some kind of feelings for me behind those walls, I wanted to gasp out loud at the realization. Yet, I acted like I had not noticed. A man's eyes could not lie.

"It wasn't that bad." I held our eye contact, my body still hurting from the impact. 

"I'm not discussing this with you," He stood up from his squat and walked to - what I thought it was- the kitchen, "I'm not joking with you." He looked at me once, as my eyes had followed him walk through the door, before he turned away and left the room. 

Only a few minutes after I was trying my hardest to not fall into deep slumber, he was back again. My back was turned away from him, but I had heard him enter the living room again. 

He rushed to get to me and I saw him kneel down to where I was lying. He had a cold compress in his hands, some kind of medicine and a... Stuffed animal? I would have blinked twice in a normal situation, but I did not have the energy. 

"It's storming outside again. I don't know what you're doing to this country." He chuckled slightly as he pressed the compress against my head. I hissed at the sudden cold that came running from my forehead, but it fought against the pain that had built up in these few minutes. 

"It's not my fault that Italy's weather is fucked up." I whispered, a cough in between the sentence that I had tried to suppress. He still heard it. 

"I have some Italian medicine for your throat, but I can also get you ibuprofen if your body hurts." Ibuprofen was not going to do shit, I knew that. I hoped he would have something stronger in his cabinets, remembering that alcohol and pain killers did not work good together. Speaking from experience. 

It was nice that he tried all of a sudden, and I could not do anything else but take his help. I was to weak to even go up to my room, at least that was what my limbs were telling me as I tried to move them slightly. 

"And who's that?" I gave the stuffed animal a small smile as I looked at it. It was a small tiger, his orange stripes very faint, but still there. His whiskers were nearly gone, except for two, and one of his eyes looked a little loose, but was not hanging by a thread right now. I reached out my hand to take him from his grip and he let it go. 

"It's my old tiger. My mother used to treat us both when I used to be sick. She would get him his own blanket and also test his fever while I was laying beside him. It always made me feel better." Now he was showing me a genuine smile, like the one of a little boy. And he was this exact boy right now, as he looked at the tiger that was clasped carefully between my fingers. I was scared that I would break him as I carefully looked at the toy. 

"That's so sweet." Shortly after that sentence, my body started coughing again, as if it was trying to get rid of some kind of waste. I could not stop letting out coughs and tried to fight against the rasp in my throat, while I felt him hold my back, trying to sit me up. Once I was done, I felt his hand moving around my side, wanting to leave my body, when his fingertips reached my ribs. I flinched away from him, the tiger still in my hand, and hoped he did not noticed. 

Even if he did, he did not react further to it. 

I hugged myself, looking at the packet of medicine in his hand. There were words written in Italian only, so all I knew was that he could also give me poison right now. At least he had the chance to if he wanted. And sometimes I thought that he did want to. 

"That is only for your throat, but if you need anything else then tell me, please." I watched him leave the room again, leaving the small packet here as I turned back around to the where he had just exited.

I was probably allowed to fall asleep now.