@sufferednomore is making me suffer here:
‘ olgierd… ’
she utters his name with tenderness she doesn’t want to hide – iris has slightly patronizing notes in her voice, too, but… that is not unnecessary.
‘ you are in fever, i’m more useful to you sitting, not lying beside. so that i can stand up anytime and —– ’
but of course she cannot refuse him a little affection, and her palm falls gently upon his, squeezes, lingers for a while…
‘ are you cold, beloved? ’
“I’m not in fever, I’m not cold either. I just-”
But the man’s words are lost to him, so bitter a LIE on his tongue if ever. What did he ever do to deserve her? Putting up with a brute with a horrible fever, who despite even his brother suggesting he stay bedbound, still made his way to one of their secluded meet up points just to see her. To IRIS.
He looks up at her, sweat beading his forehead from exhaustion, not really moving from his spot against the hay of the windmill’s hold, but so obviously IMPATIENT to not be parted from her. Here she was, seeing right through his act and trying to nurse him better to health as if they were MARRIED already. He hadn’t even had the courage to ask that of her yet, but soon, so soon...
“How you put up with me, I don’t understand.” He smiles fond but crooked, his stache rising charmingly on one side in tandem.