Only Forever. Linda Miller Lael

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      1

      This particular strain of flu, Nick DeAngelo decided, had been brought to Earth by hostile aliens determined to wipe out the entire planet—starting, evidently, with an ex-jock who owned one of the best Italian restaurants in Seattle.

      Sprawled on the hide-a-bed in the living room of his apartment, he plucked a handful of tissues from the box on the mattress beside him and crammed them against his face just in time to absorb an explosive sneeze. He was covered in mentholated rub from his nose to his belly button, and while his forehead was hot to the touch, the rest of him was racked with chills.

      He wondered when Mike Wallace would burst through the door, wanting the story. It was time to alert the masses to impending doom.

      Did you actually see these aliens, Mr. De-Angelo?

      Call me Nick. Of course I didn’t see them. They must have gotten me when I was sleeping.

      The imaginary interview was interrupted by the jangling of the telephone, which, like the box of tissues, was in bed with Nick. Hoping for sympathy, he dug the receiver out from a tangle of musty flannel sheets and rasped out a hoarse hello.

      “Still under the weather, huh?” The voice belonged to his younger sister, Gina, and it showed a marked lack of commiseration. “Listen, if I wasn’t afraid of catching whatever it is you’ve got and missing my exams next week, I’d definitely come over and take care of you.”

      Nick sagged against the back of the sofa, one hand to his fevered forehead. “Your concern is touching, Gina,” he coughed out.

      “I could call Aunt Carlotta,” Gina was quick to suggest. She was a bright kid, a psychology major at the University of Washington, and she knew which buttons to push. “I’m sure she’d love to move into your apartment and spend the next two weeks dragging you back from the threshold of death.”

      Nick thought of his aunt with affectionate dread. It was in her honor that he’d slathered himself with mentholated goo. “This is not your ordinary, run-of-the-mill flu, you know,” he said.

      Gina laughed. “I’ll alert the science department at school—I’m sure they’ll want to send a research team directly to your place.”

      Privately Nick considered that to be a viable idea, but he refrained from saying so, knowing it would only invite more callous mockery. “You have no heart,” he accused.

      There was a brief pause, followed by, “Is there anything I can get you, like groceries or books or something? I could leave the stuff in the hallway outside your door—”

      “Or you could just drop it from a hovering helicopter,” Nick ventured, insulted.

      Gina gave a long-suffering sigh. “Why don’t you call one of your girlfriends? You could have a whole harem over there, fluffing your pillows and giving you aspirin and heating up canned chicken soup.”

      “My ‘girlfriends,’ as you put it, are all either working or letting their answering machines do the talking. And chicken soup is only therapeutic if it’s homemade.” Nick paused to emit another volcanic sneeze. When he’d recovered, he said magnanimously, “Don’t worry about me, Gina, just because I’m putting you through college and paying for your car, your clothes, your apartment and every bite of food that goes into your mouth. I’ll be fine without…any help at all.”

      “Oh, God,” wailed Gina. “The guilt!”

      Nick laughed. “Gotcha,” he said, groping for the remote control that would turn on the TV. Maybe there was an old Stallone movie on—something bloody and macho.

      Gina said a few soothing words and then hung up. It occurred to Nick that she was really going to stay away, really going to leave her own brother to face The Great Galactic Plague alone and unassisted.