Slow burn

You know that feeling …

You wake up most mornings with it.

Eyelids still heavy with sleep. Nose swollen thick with resistance to allow the full measure of air to flow inside you.

You might feel the dryness of your throat more acutely …

It’s probably from mouth breathing. How attractive. Not that you care. You don’t even think too much about it at first.

It’s just your regular I’m-not-young-anymore morning with a side of Probably-just-allergies. 

Your husband brings you a cup of coffee in bed. Because that’s the arrangement, you have on weekdays when he has to be up with the dawn anyway. And because of this small indulgence, you don’t complain that the arrangement about The-one-who cooks-getting-the-night-off-from-cleaning-the-kitchen has somehow fallen by the wayside.

Everything about relationships ebbs and flows.

You read the headlines, and you sip the coffee.

It tastes weird.

There is nothing good about the wide-wide world in this news cycle.

Same world wide web, different day.

The coffee is getting cold, as is your desire to finish it. 

It’s time to get up … but you set the snooze alarm on your motivation.

Nine more minutes under the blankets and then, you tell yourself, you’ll suffer that first shock of freezing floor and make your way into the rest of your morning routine.

As you wait, you’ll wonder if your stomach seems off.

Nothing overt … just a sensation.

Which makes you question what’s going on in your head.

Another sensation. Fullness at the temples … a squeezing around the forehead.

Is that a headache starting?

Are you getting sick?

Like for real? 

That’s all you need. The forty-four thousand things on your to-do list and a touch of the flu.

Seems just about right.

“Lose all hope, those who reach here,” says your brain as you draw the covers up for nine minutes more. Even as you try to quell that voice that keeps screaming that YOU ARE GETTING THE FLU!”

You tell yourself to calm down: “Maybe it will pass. Even if it is something, I will probably won’t linger.“

Fool.

When was the last time you had a twenty-four-hour bug?

The brain can’t remember, it’s been that long.

Eventually, you muster the energy to rise and dress and get on with the schedule.

Ma’am colds and Man colds are not the same. Even though a headache has now descended on you as it could fit itself in a second head, pain is also second nature.

Not sure what would make you feel better without exacerbating side effects, you don’t take anything. 

Suffering.

Every errand becomes a chore.

Post Office. Bank. Clients. Grocery Store.

Finally home …

Where you rest on the couch for a moment before the kids bang open the door and come rushing in, every step amplified by four.

Twenty minutes ago, you’d made the executive decision to take acetaminophen because it’s easier on the stomach.

And suddenly you notice your head has stopped throbbing ... and your stomach wants toast.

By the time the door swings open and your kids fly into the house on a gust of cold air, you notice you feel more like a human again.

Over dinner you will relay this miraculous healing to your husband in full detail, even adding the parts you hadn’t spent much time thinking about … like how you waited with clenched shoulders for the full-body-aches but they never showed up.

He will look startled.

And then guilty.

And he will ask you something silly …

Like:

“Didn’t you have any more coffee today while you out and about?”

“No. I felt horrible. I didn’t want any.”

“We’ll … that may have been my fault. We were out of your coffee this morning. I gave you decaf and forgot to mention it.”