The Mindless Man's Paradise

Chapter seventeen

I was starting to get lightheaded.

  And now on top of being cold, I was getting heat flashes, which drove me to the point of throwing the covers off of myself. But it only took minutes for me to grow cold again, and subsequently wrap myself back up in sheets.

  I was getting sick.

  It was obvious. But it really sucked.

  First a broken leg, and now the flu?

  Ironic. There was irony in lots of the things that had been happening to me lately.

  My eyes felt heavy, almost like I was tired.

  But I couldn’t be tired, could I? It was probably just a little into the afternoon. How could I already be tired?

  I refused to give in to the slumber that whispered to me in the back of my brain.

  To pass the time, I read the entire dictionary. Not that I’d remembered all the words, but I had read through every word and definition once.

  It passed a lot of time, though. Hours, in fact.

  I started when Cyrus left to do some chores and home maintenance, and by the time he’d arrived back, I still was reading. He brought me a glass of water in case I was thirsty, and sat down to draw.

  The sound of scribbles filled my ears as I finished the last twenty or so pages of the dictionary. When I finished, I closed the book. Cyrus had heard me close it, and spun around in his chair.

  “Should be dinner time pretty soon.” he said.

  I nodded my head as he got up from the chair and sat next to me on the bed.

  “Cyrus, I think I’m getting the flu.” I listed off symptoms. “I’m cold, having hot flashes, and now I’m lightheaded. Not to mention that I’m tired all the time. Try not to get too close.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  I felt his warmth through the sheets and it was comforting.

  “You wanna stretch your legs?” he asked politely. “You’ve been lying for hours.”

  To be completely honest, I would rather have stayed in bed more than anything. I was exhausted.

  But I reluctantly agreed, and made my way slowly, slower than usual, into the kitchen.

  We were early, but Aurora greeted our presence with open arms as she cooked.

  “I’m making mac-n-cheese special for ya!” she chirped.

  I was growing to like Aurora, and as much as I hated to admit it, she was more of a mother than my own had been. She thought about me, even when I wasn’t there, and it was hard to believe that my mother ever had done that.

  Even the way Aurora wiped her hands on the dish cloth was motherly.

  Her apron was filled with stains from all the meals she’d cooked. She always seemed to have her hair put up sloppily, but only because she was too busy focusing on everyone else’s needs. She obviously loved what she did. She loved her family. She loved her sons, and she even loved Jensen, even though she was irritated with him for the time being.

  This was what a mother was. I wouldn’t be surprised if the definition of mother in the dictionary was Aurora.

  Cyrus joined her in the kitchen, leaving me to watch from the table. But I didn’t mind.

  Beyond the agonizing sensations in my leg, the exhaustion, the lightheadedness, the heat flashes, and even the shivering, I enjoyed watching such a beautiful thing unfold.