Nathan Jones - First Winter

His short, narrow, uncomfortable, chilly cot.

Unfortunately since he was a living being with a pulse this enjoyable intimacy, combined with the memory of his first kiss with her and her previous conversation about winter pastimes, led to thoughts that didn’t have much to do with cuddling. He could stay like this forever, but it would be harder and harder to keep those thoughts in the back of his mind.

Which was all the more important he do for the future of his relationship with this woman who he’d loved for a long time now, in spite of all the complications. That meant he could either address what he was feeling or he should probably go back to his cot.

So of course he jumped the gun like an idiot. “Let’s get married, Deb.”

In his arms his girlfriend went from cuddly to stiff as a board in an instant. She pulled away as much as the bed and the blankets they were under would allow, turning to look at him with wide eyes. “What?”

He immediately knew he’d made a mistake, with his timing if nothing else. He hadn’t even produced the ring, and he’d also been planning some sort of fancy dinner and candles and all that. But in for a penny… “I love you,” he said simply. “I want to be there for you. With you. Through anything life throws at us.”

Deb’s cheeks were flushed, but her breathing was a little too fast, like panic rather than excitement. “I love you too, of course. I have since the beginning, in a way.” She looked down, obviously uncomfortable. “I-I’m just not sure I’m ready.”

That was completely fair, and probably more than he deserved for proposing just minutes after their first kiss. Still, he felt a bit disappointed and even a little hurt as he nodded in understanding. “I get it. Sorry for just springing that on you like this.”

“No I’m sorry, for making this so hard on you. If we were a normal couple—” she broke off with an anguished noise and looked away, then abruptly wiggled free of the covers and grabbed her heavy coat, tugging it around her shoulders as she clumsily stepped into her oversized boots.

As Trev did his best to muddle through what had just happened, how catastrophically he seemed to have bungled things, she escaped through the door and yanked it shut behind her, boots untied and coat flapping in the wind. He didn’t even think about trying to stop her from going out into the foul weather outside until she was gone.

A flurry of snow carried on a blast of bitterly cold wind swirled through the room at even that short opening into the storm, twice as painful after the warmth. Trev shivered and pulled his blankets up around his chin. He was worried about Deb being able to get home in that, or catching a chill in the short time it took her to do so. But at least her cabin wasn’t far, and the rope leading to it was tied to the wall just outside the door.

So he settled back, feeling alone and unexpectedly cold. Deb had only been gone for a moment, so it should’ve been just as warm under the covers. But somehow it wasn’t.

Lewis had been worried about his dad’s coughing from the start.

Sure, with the onset of cold weather there’d been plenty of sniffles and coughs to go around, and they’d only get more common now that winter had begun in earnest. Most would be simple colds or other minor ailments, with mild symptoms that either went away quickly or lingered as barely more than an inconvenience.

But it had now been long enough that he was sure that wasn’t the case with his dad. It had been eight days since he’d first noticed his dad coughing, and it was getting worse and worse, going from dry hacking fits to intense episodes that often lasted more than ten seconds.

He hadn’t realized just how bad, though, since he was usually gone during the day and slept in a different room at night. The coughs he did hear were muffled by the walls, easier to ignore.

Now, though, with the storm swirling outside it was impossible not to see how often his dad coughed. He drank lots of water but barely ate, and even eating the soup brought over by Deb from Aunt Clair caused him to have another coughing fit after the first few slurps. Lewis knew that crackers and other dry foods could exacerbate a cough, but he didn’t think soup should be doing that.

And that night he learned his dad’s condition was even worse than that, as he coughed hour after hour through the night with no hint he was getting any sleep, any relief. Lewis was so worried he couldn’t sleep either, and he listened as his dad broke into fits every few minutes. There was no sign that this illness was sapping his dad’s strength, other than from the expected exhaustion of lack of sleep and proper food, but that cough that never went away…

This was serious. It went beyond bronchitis or some other mild to moderately severe ailment and into the territory of pneumonia or another much more serious condition.

Since Lewis couldn’t sleep he searched through the medical texts in his archives. He was aware of the danger of those without medical training trying diagnose an illness, only to settle on an incorrect one and make things worse or at the very least cause needless worry. But he wasn’t sure what else to do.

His research certainly did add to his worries. From the symptoms it seemed like his dad was either suffering from a severe form of bronchitis, or more likely from pneumonia or whooping cough. Those were serious even with access to modern medicine: without it they could be fatal.

On top of his worry came more than a little guilt. Lewis had stocked up a good supply of medicine on top of all the other preparations he’d made before the Gulf burned. That included antibiotics, which could be vital here if it was pneumonia or whooping cough rather than bronchitis. He’d had the means to potentially cure his dad’s condition, as well as ease his suffering.

But that medicine was gone. He hadn’t felt right about holding it back during the fight against the blockheads, when wounded volunteers urgently needed it in life and death situations. So he’d given out dose after dose, watching his supply dwindle, constantly debating with himself where he should draw the line and save some in case his family needed it. But his conscience never let him draw that line, and finally it was all gone.

His family had relied on him to look out for their interests, even if it meant refusing help to a friend. Sure, it was an impossible choice to make at the time, weighing someone’s immediate desperate need with his family’s potential need. And he’d secretly hoped he’d find another source for medicine, maybe aid from the military, or that they’d be able to go to a refugee camp that had doctors and medicine if the situation was desperate enough.

But now they were in the middle of a storm with travel nearly impossible, especially while transporting a sick person. And his dad was sick, seriously sick. And because of his earlier generosity Lewis he didn’t have what he needed to help him.

Was it possible to be selfish in his selflessness? Would it have been better to let the guilt of a friend’s suffering eat at him as long as it meant he’d still have what his family now needed? How did you even make that kind of choice?

The storm was still raging when he finally decided he’d had enough of sitting in bed listening to his dad cough. His phone was nearly out of battery and unlikely to be recharged, not when they had to worry about lighting this cabin and the Smith family’s with car batteries that themselves wouldn’t be recharged from the solar panels during a storm.

It showed the time as 5:07. Way too early to be waking up Terry or Dr. Langstrom, and likely their families in the process. He decided to wait until at least six, a slightly more reasonable hour.