Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 122219 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122219 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 611(@200wpm)___ 489(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
“What? No. They need—”
“Nathan. Everything’s under control. You just rest.”
I wanted to argue, but the heaviness of my eyelids told me not to do so. I shut my eyes and fell asleep, feeling a bit of comfort knowing that Avery was there to take care of me.
I slept for over nine hours, only waking when Avery would come to give me vitamins and medicine, along with a few bites of bread. When I was fully awake, she came back and smiled my way. She held sheets in her hands.
“I think it’s about time I switched out your sheets, seeing how you probably soaked your way through them,” she said. “If you can sit in your chair in the corner, that is.”
With a few grumbles, I pulled myself up from the bed and moved over to the chair. I plopped down and sighed, feeling beyond exhausted from the few steps that I’d taken.
Avery went to work to change out all my sheets. She removed the dirty ones, along with my comforter, and replaced them with new ones. She even changed out the pillowcases. I didn’t even know that I had extra pillowcases.
“Okay. You can come back. Unless you feel as if you can shower,” she said.
I shook my head. There was no way I could stand up in a shower.
She walked over to me and offered her hand to help me. I took it for two reasons. One—I needed her help. Two—I always wanted to hold her hand.
“Thanks,” I muttered as she led me back to the bed, only to tuck me in again.
She left the room for a second, getting rid of the sheets, and when she came back, she had a big bowl of soup in her hands.
I sat up on my bed with my back against the headboard. I could only breathe through my mouth, seeing how my nose was stuffed up. I closed my eyes as my breaths weaved in and out of my mouth.
“Why are you being so helpful?” I muttered, feeling the need to fall back to sleep.
“Because you deserve it. Open,” she ordered.
I parted my lips more, she put a spoonful of soup into my mouth, and I swallowed it. The warmth felt good as it glided down my throat.
“I owe you an apology, Nathan.”
That was enough to make me open my eyes again. “What do you mean?”
“Ever since you’ve come to coach, I’ve been a bit of a jerk to you. I’m sorry for that. You’ve been an amazing addition to the team, and I’m lucky to have you as a coach.”
“I must look pretty bad, huh?” I let out a slight chuckle. “If I’m on my deathbed, just tell me now, Avery.”
A gentle snicker fell from her lips, and even though I felt like shit, I loved the sound of that. Avery did not laugh a lot, so whenever one fell from her, I always tried to hold on to the sound as long as possible.
“You’re not on your deathbed,” she swore. “I just realized how much of a dick I’ve been toward you, and I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve it.” She fed me more soup.
“I’m sure parts of me deserved it.”
“No,” she disagreed. “None of you did. We aren’t who we were when we were younger, and it was unfair of me to treat you as if you were the same boy who left all those years before.”
“Just so you know, Avery, I hated that I left.”
In her subtle reaction, I felt the weight of her pain. Or maybe it was my pain I was feeling. Maybe our hurts from the past we shared mirrored one another and sat packed with a quiet torment that we both carried. It just seemed that she hid hers better than I had.
She looked away for a moment and said so softly, “I hated it, too.” Her voice was so low that I wasn’t certain she’d actually said the words or if my fever-stricken mind imagined it.
“We don’t have to talk about us,” she said as she turned back to feed me more soup. The heaviness still stayed laced in her words. “You just need to get better.”
I wanted to keep the conversation going, but the exhaustion set in again as I struggled with my heavy breaths. She smiled gently as she placed the bowl of soup down on the nightstand before she made me take a few more sips of water. When she finished, she stood to leave.
“Avery?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.”
She smiled again, and within seconds, my eyes faded shut, and I went back to sleep.
It took me a week to recover, but Avery took care of me every step of the way. I did not know if she knew it, but she was making it next to impossible for me not to find myself falling for her with every second that passed by.