Theraflu and Nostalgia

For five days I've scarcely left my bed.

Today I walked to a bench that overlooks the water. I wanted to see if I could walk that far without crawling. I could. I rested on the bench among the desert plants: prickly pear and ice plant. Crows rose from the water below, silent in the melting sun.

There's something about being very ill that always undoes the same things in me. I realize the fragility and helplessness of my own body. And it makes me feel old. Sleeping on ceramic tiles, bath mat for a pillow, bare legs curled around a toilet will do this. When I'm sick, I remember I'm not as young as I think I am.

I talk to my parents on the phone. They want to know every symptom. My dad jokes that he'll ground me if I don't go to the doctor tomorrow. It's a task to make it to the kitchen to get a glass of water or heat some chicken broth. I wonder if the pizza delivery man can deliver to my room, because when the doorbell rings, I don't think I can get out of bed.

When I was little, my mom used to buy 3 different flavors of gatorade and rent movies and make my favorite foods. I'd lie in her bed and we'd eat popcorn and pass the day away until my dad and sisters got home. I never minded being sick back then. Back then I missed a day or two of school. Now, it's a paycheck that's missing.

My mom sounds distraught on the phone. She reminds me, "I can come if you need me." When I'm sick, I remember I'm not as old as I think I am.

But in the end, I've spent these days alone. With a loneliness that comes from padding barefoot around an unlit house. Days measured not in coffee spoons, but in light passing underneath the blinds. Evening to gray evening. Asking for the day at every opening of the door.