Hot. And red, and flame, and her cheeks burn like someone just took a cherry-red poker to them. And she sweats and flames, and she needs to sleep, but, oh, she can’t because she’ll close her eyes and they’ll sting and steam and drown her in red smoke. And, oh, she can’t find cool anywhere, not even in a drink of water, because it touches her red-raw throat and evaporates and she gets nothing. Nothing of nothing. And she cries, and her tears feel like lava running tracks down sooty crimson cheeks. And she can’t keep down food because her throat aches like she swallowed volcanic rock whole and if she ate her stomach would roil like Mount Doom and everything would come back up again, and she is hungry and burning and tired oh so tired.
And the blankets, they ensnare her, and she twists herself this way and that but she can’t get out, and she feels closed in and swollen at the same time. And her ears roar, and she can barely hear the words of comfort whispered to her by her parents. And she is HOT.
And then, there comes cool, cool like morning breeze and snowy flakes that melt on your tongue and hands hold hers tight and squeeze. Smooth, ink-stained fingers that make tinkle-bell silk sounds on the pumice-woven rough blankets holding her with a vice-like grip. And then she hears a soft butterfly-wing whisper that says delightfully ...Ah, it will be better soon and it’s only a bad fever and you’ll be alright.... And the words sound like waterfall to her icy-hot head.
And then he closes her eyelids tight down and calls her Ruby-red, not Ruby-blue this time.
~