While the water continued to warm, I stripped off the rest of my clothes. It obviously wasn’t bothering Malcolm, who only sat and watched me through heavy lids.
I helped him to his feet and removed his boxer briefs before pulling us both into the shower spray. Malcolm leaned into me, his back to my front as the water cascaded over us. There was something so simple about this, and it meant even more now than the few heated times in the past.
At first, we just stood there. As much as I wanted to stand there to continue savoring the feel of his hard body pressed to mine, I knew what he’d taken, knew that the hospital had also given him some. Malcolm wouldn’t be up to standing for too much longer.
Carefully, I reached for the rag that was hanging on the shelf and the bar of soap. I lathered up before running the cloth over Malcolm’s chest and down his arms. He sighed and sank into me more. I chuckled because I knew I needed to hurry. As much as Iwanted to enjoy showering with him, we needed to be quick and efficient.
I ran the rag over my own body before shifting us beneath the showerhead to remove the soap suds. It didn’t take Malcolm long to be basically dead weight. I turned off the water and retrieved two towels, doing my best to keep Malcolm from falling over.
As soon as he was dry enough, I led him to the bed, pulling back the sheets and tucking him in, not bothering with getting him dressed. Once he was all snuggled in, I sat next to him and watched as his eyes fluttered.
Once I was sure he was asleep, I picked up his phone. The screen was completely destroyed. It was probably overstepping, but I pulled up the store on my phone to place an order for a new one before calling the front desk at the hotel to send someone to pick it up. If all else failed, he had a new phone when he woke up and didn’t need to rely on other people to make phone calls for him. I was more surprised he hadn’t said something or had Mr. Thomas say something about him calling from my phone this morning.
A little over an hour later, a soft knock came from the door. I greeted the attendant, who handed off the bag with the new phone, and I went about getting it all set up, moving the SIM card from Malcolm’s old phone. Navigating to get all his other information transferred was a little trickier, and I ended up with a small slice on the inside of one of my pointer fingers.
By the time everything was done, Malcolm had been asleep for almost two hours. There wasn’t any point in waking him up, but I still ordered us lunch using room service. I got him a sandwich and some fresh fruit, so it wasn’t anything overly heavy, but it would hold over if he kept sleeping.
Eventually, someone would need to let his parents know what happened. It would probably be better coming from him thanme, no matter how much I wanted to reach out. They’d already lost one son, so they didn’t need the news that their other son had been in an accident coming from someone else.
Malcolm had been out for a solid four hours by the time he woke up. It was good for him, and his body needed it to heal properly. In reality, the pain meds were probably wearing off. It wasn’t a smart idea to keep him in a cycle of only being awake long enough to medicate and go back to sleep. We’d see how he was doing and gauge things from there.
He was groggy as he sat up in bed, wincing and grabbing at his stomach. The motion had me shooting up from where I’d been sitting and working on my computer.
“Are you all right?”
Malcolm huffed. “If you mean, do I feel like I wasn’t run over by a truck? The answer is no.”
I snorted a small laugh. It wasn’t something to joke about because any sort of impact like that could be catastrophic for Malcolm. Instead of letting him continue to struggle, I helped him to sit up the rest of the way, propping a few extra pillows around him.
An awkwardness fell between us, but I quickly tried to fix it, bringing over the tray that held the food I’d ordered for him earlier.
“I don’t know if you’re hungry or not, but I got this for you.”
He smiled at me as he picked up the sandwich and took a bite. “Starving, actually. I can’t even remember if they fed me anything other than some crappy saltines at the hospital.”
Come to think of it, I couldn’t remember if they had given him anything substantial either. Things had been such a blur, so it was great that he was getting something now. All those medications on an empty stomach weren’t a good combination, either. It also explained why they’d hit him so quickly in the shower earlier. There was nothing there to dull the impact.
As he ate, I got up and pulled out the new phone I’d gotten him. I held onto it for a moment before turning to face him. Malcolm didn’t seem to notice me, too engrossed in his food, and I was happy I’d gotten it.
Chapter 35
Malcolm
To say that my body ached was an understatement. All I wanted to do was beg David to give me my next dose of pain meds and curl back under the covers. It was good to power through a little, though. It was nice to sit up and see him, to know that the world was still ticking around me. What wasn’t so nice was the worry about how I was going to figure everything out without a car for a while. The Cadillac had been my dream car, and I’d saved for it. It sucked that all it took was one accident for it to be squashed.
The next thing I knew, a shiny new phone landed next to me on the bed.
“What’s this?” Obvious question of the day.
“While you were sleeping, I ordered it. I hope it’s okay. I transferred everything over for you already.” David held up his hand, showing where he had a Band-Aid wrapped around one finger. “Your old one attacked me in the process.”
It was enough to lessen the tension, and I laughed, sending a spattering of breadcrumbs across my plate.
“You didn’t need to do that.”
David only shrugged. “No, but I wanted to. You’ll have enough to worry about without trying to figure out how to contact people or borrow a phone all the time.”
He wasn’t wrong. I picked up the new device, looking at it. It was an upgrade from what I’d previously had, but I was thankful that he hadn’t gone overboard and bought something too expensive. That would have upset me more than him buying me a phone.
