In another life.

Saige’s instincts are right on the money and I start feeling achy and awful around noon. By the end of the day I can barely hold my head up and I’ve run to the bathroom to hurl twice. Other than migraines, I’m almost never under the weather and it makes me surly.

I tell Grace that I might not be in tomorrow and she gives me a look of pity, but I see the jumbo bottle of hand sanitizer she’s got on her desk. She’ll probably coat the office with it after I leave.

I can barely stand by the time I make it to Saige’s and she takes immediate pity on me. I’m put to bed, given medicine and tea and cool cloths are pressed to my forehead and then she’s lying next to me and humming. In my sickness haze, it takes me a while to realize it’s “Fire and Rain” by James Taylor. My mother’s favorite song.

I don’t want to think about her right now.

“Stop,” I say, but it comes out as a whisper. My throat is raw from vomiting.

“I thought you loved that song. You told me it was your favorite,” she says. I crack my eyes open and look up at her. She’s just so beautiful.

“It reminds me of my mother,” I say.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that,” she says, removing the cloth and stroking my forehead with cool fingers.

“It’s okay,” I say. My defenses are down and I just don’t give a fuck anymore. I’m leaving anyway, so what does it matter?

Her hands pause for a moment as she absorbs that information and then they start moving again. “You said she was murdered. Who killed her?”

“Someone that my father owed money to.” I hear a sharp intake of breath and watch her face as she thinks about that bit of information.

“And what happened to him?” I inhale for a long time before I tell her.

“He was killed in prison. I’m glad he’s dead. He deserved it.” Her fingers freeze again. I don’t care if I sound callous. You can’t judge until you know the situation.

“I’m so sorry for you. So very sorry.” I know she means it, but I don’t want to talk anymore.

“Stop it,” I say and she takes her hand away.

“I’m sorry,” she says, getting up to leave me alone.

“Don’t go. Just don’t talk about her,” I get out. She seems to understand and comes back to sit next to me.

“Just rest. Don’t worry about anything else.”

I finally drift off to sleep and she’s right there beside me.

The next time my eyes open I still feel bad, but not as bad. Must have been a 24 hour thing. Saige is curled up beside me, sleeping soundly and Leo is at her feet. I get up carefully so I don’t wake her and go to use the bathroom and brush my teeth because my mouth tastes disgusting.

I check the burner phone and find a message from Cash that they’ve got more for the file and I reply back that I’m pleased and then stumble back to bed. Saige’s eyes flutter open when I pull the covers back to get in. I’m really cold for some reason.

“How are you feeling?” she asks. It’s about one in the morning and she has to be exhausted from caring for me. I never planned for her to see me that way, but she’s an excellent nurse.

“Better, but still shitty,” I say, lowering myself into bed. My stomach rolls and I get ready to bolt again, but it settles and I lay back down.

“I’ll go get you some ginger ale,” she says, but I reach out my hand to stop her.

“It’s okay. It can wait.” But she shakes her head and does it anyway and I’m not in a position to stop her.

A few minutes later she comes back with a glass of fizzing ginger ale and a small plate of crackers.

“See if you can keep this down,” she says, handing me a cracker. Obediently, I take it from her and nibble at one corner. The stuff is dry and salty, but I hope it won’t come back up.

Saige watches me eat and sip and I can tell she wants to say something.

“You were talking in your sleep. It woke me up,” she says. I have no idea what she’s talking about.

“I don’t talk in my sleep,” I say, finishing a cracker and starting a second.

“Well, then you only do when you’re sick. You said a lot of stuff that didn’t make sense.” I look at her and hope my eyes and expression are steady. Every now and then when I was a child I’d talk in my sleep. My mother thought it was funny and used to write down some of the things I’d say, but I haven’t done it in a long, long time. Or at least no one’s been aware of it.

“Did anything I said make sense?”

“You just kept saying that you were Sylas.” The bottom drops out of my stomach and I want to throw up for a different reason now. There’s no way to hide my reaction to her saying my real name.

“Who’s Sylas?” she asks as I try to breathe.

“No one,” I say and we both know that’s a lie. There’s nothing I can say to get myself out of this situation.

“Okay,” she says, pretending she believes me. “Dreams are funny sometimes, aren’t they?” She smiles and gives me a kiss on the forehead.

“Now eat some more crackers.”

I have no choice but to do what she says, but now I want to sleep with one eye open.

I end up crashing again from exhaustion and the next time I wake up she’s already in the kitchen making breakfast. The ginger ale and crackers stayed down and now my stomach is roaring for real food.

I have two choices: I can either make up a story about the name Sylas, or I can just let it drop. If I make a big deal out of it, she’ll think it’s a big deal and that might send up more red flags than if I just drop it.

So I decide to drop it as I stumble out of the bedroom.

“He lives!” she says, coming to give me a hug, wearing nothing but one of my t-shirts.

“I thought you were going to turn yourself inside out there for a little while. How are you?” She looks up at me with a sleepy smile on her face.

“Much better. Do you have maybe some oatmeal or something? I don’t want to risk anything that’s going to come back up again.” She hands me a bowl that is filled with oatmeal, bananas and blueberries.

“There’s more crackers and ginger ale if you can’t do that,” she says, making herself a bowl of oatmeal and putting the fruit on top.

“This is fine, thank you.” She takes my hand and leads me to the couch. She sits with her legs crossed under her, facing me with her bowl.

“Your color looks a lot better. I wonder what you had.”

“No idea,” I say, still wary of her. She seems to have forgotten our conversation last night.

“Well, I’m crossing my fingers I don’t get it because that was not fun and I wasn’t even the one going through it.”

“If you do, I’ll take care of you. Thank you for everything, Saige.” I really mean this. She didn’t have to do that for me, and she did it without even hesitating.

“You’re my boyfriend. It’s my job to take care of you.” She pops her spoon in her mouth and smiles around it.

I decide I’m well enough to go to work.

My energy is still down, but my stomach seems to be back to normal function. By the end of the day, I’m wiped and ready to go back to Saige.

She doesn’t mention Sylas again, or at any point during the next week. Soon we’re only one week out and I’m counting my hours with her. We’ve been on dates and out dancing and I’ve hung out with her friends in an official capacity. Lo still doesn’t like me, but at this point it doesn’t matter at all. Still, I pretend to try to win her over and I think I do a little bit.

The guys are going full-throttle to get everything moved to California. Most of the cars are already gone and Hardy has gone on ahead to get everything set up for us. By the time we get there, our apartments will be set up and we’ll have new identities.