Thank you for the reviews. And finally... it is here, another chapter.
Craving Rocks
Chapter 10
Sam and G laid on the floor next to the stretching machine. They were still breathless from their passionate lovemaking on the contraption.
"You okay?" Sam asked, drawing his husband into his side.
"I am now, but for a bit I thought I'd fall off that thing," G said, sighing and relaxing further into his husband.
"Which thing?" Sam smirked.
"I hope you know by now which thing." G winked at him. "I could use a relaxing swim in the pool before we explore the house again."
"Sounds like a great idea. Shower first."
"I need help getting up off the floor."
Sam stood and helped his husband off the floor. "Are you certain you feel okay?"
"Why?"
"You look a little peaked."
G went over to the stretching machine and looked at his reflection in the shiny surface. "Maybe I'm a little hungry."
Sam took G by the hand and led him to the warming cabinet. He helped his husband into a warmed bathrobe and selected one for himself. Then he took G over to the table. "Let's keep with the routine and if you're still hungry I'll make you one of my omelettes."
"I could use a juicy steak."
"Seriously?"
"Yeah, I need some beef in my diet," G said, picking up the spoon and scooping up a heaping spoonful of yogurt. "Besides all those eggs are giving me gas." He downed a glass of water and ate several bites of his yogurt.
"You're looking better."
"Needed sustenance." G drank more water and finished off his yogurt. "This isn't going to cut it. I'll need that cow."
"How about another yogurt for now and we'll go barbecue a slab of beef on the outdoor grill?"
"You've been eyeing that grill everyday," G said, diving into the second container of yogurt with a spoon. The massive outdoor kitchen sprawled the length of an eighteen foot room. The indoor kitchen spanned twenty feet long.
"Now you'd provided me with an opportunity to use it," Sam said, joining his husband at the table.
"I feel strange." G stood and tottered to the theater and sat in one of the chairs and reclined it.
Sam kneeled beside him. "You don't look good."
"For once I feel like I look," G said.
"Let me pick you up and carry you."
"No argument there."
Sam scooped G into his arms and carried him to the elevator. "Here's one time where I'm glad there's an elevator in this home." When they reached the first floor, Sam carried G to the screened porch and settled him on a settee.
"Nauseated."
"That's a first."
"Maybe two much sex on that stretching machine," G said, winking at his husband.
"Or morning sickness?"
"I didn't think about that." He opted for something other than morning sickness. During his last pregnancy, he spent the first five months puking and eating salty crackers.
"Wait a minute, have you've been craving anything odd?"
"You and the gut twister." G smirked.
"I gotta say I'm loving this banter," Sam said, "a three year hiatus is too long. I mean anything odd to eat."
"I see where this is going," G said. "Let me see… yes, as matter of fact… damn, I forgot about the iron again."
Sam scooped G into his arms and walked toward the pantry. "Time for some more nookie in the pantry."
"I'm too tired."
"Figures." Sam opened the door and walked inside.
"I'll tell you which one it's going to be in," G said.
"If I win I get nookie in the pantry tonight."
"Deal."
Sam walked almost to the end of the long corridor and stopped in front of his choice, the only cabinet containing vitamins.
"Okay, you think it's in here, but I'll guarantee you're wrong," G said.
Sam opened the cabinet door and perused the items on the pull-out shelf.
"A fruitless search."
"Okay smarty pants, where's the iron supplement?"
"My guess is the cabinet next to the pantry's entrance. Left hand side."
"You peeked."
"Nope, just a wild guess," G said, "and the second place is the first cabinet on the right in the safe room."
"Okay, we'll need to confirm that later." Sam walked back toward the entrance and opened the cabinet G had chosen.
G pulled out a drawer and Sam stepped back.
"You saw it before."
"I swear I didn't."
Sam took out a bottle of iron tablets.
"I like this kind, it's sublingual."
"Wait a minute. You can't take that formula it states right here on the bottle that it's for women."
"What do you know, I've got a womb." G winked at his partner.
"You'll need some vitamin C with that."
G pointed to the bottle next to the iron tablets.
"I think you cheated."
"If it's any consolation and I feel up to it later on I'll have nookie with you in the pantry."
"Nope, you'll have nookie with me in the safe room again."
"Of my choice."
"Seriously, you're harping on that again."
"I'm not harping on anything," G said, holding the two bottles while Sam walked out to the settee in the screened porch. "I think there's more than one safe room."
Sam settled G on the settee. "Okay, once and for all let's prove you're wrong."
"Right." G paused before he said, "Show me the safe rooms." He emphasized the 's' on the last word.
Before them several safe rooms showed up on an aqua-blue wall.
"Okay, how did you know?" Sam asked, folding his arms.
"It was a wild guess."
"I should've remembered to trust your hunches. They're usually right."
G slumped over the armrest on the settee. He tried putting an iron pill into his mouth, but lacked the energy. The opened bottle of pills slipped from his hand and spilled on the floor. "Sam…"
Sam kneeled on the floor beside his husband. "Look at me."
G raised his head slightly and attempted to speak, before plopping his head back down on the armrest. "Can't, too tired."
"Autodial Linden," Sam said, staying by G's side.
Instead of the map of their home showing the safe rooms, Linden's face showed up on the wall.
"Can you see Callen?"
"How long has he been like that?" Linden asked.
"Just now he seems to have lost his strength."
"Callen, how are you feeling right now?" Linden asked.
"Too weak to even chew on a tablet."
"Bring him in to the lab, ASAP," Linden said. "I'll call Ms. Lange and inform of the change in schedule."
G glanced at Sam and mouthed the words. "Our kids."
"We're more concerned about you than the kids right now." Linden disconnected the call.
Sam straightened and lifted G into his arms.
"Promise me."
"No promises," Sam said.
"You're reneging on your promise for the safe room of my choice? I can't believe this."
"Oh, thought you were gonna start making me promise to save the baby and not you," Sam said.
"Well that too, of course, you know that comes with the territory of all this—"
"And now your super talkative and just before you couldn't talk?"
"Freaked out."
"Understandable." Sam laid G on the bed in the master bedroom.
"What are we doing in here?" G's voice started to quaver again. "I'm cold."
"Iron deficiency will do that to you," Sam said, stripping off their clothes and dressing G and himself in sweats. "Man, you've gained too much weight. You're not going to fit in your sweats."
"I'm not going naked."
"Nope, you're wearing my sweats." Sam scooped G into his arms and started for the garage.
#
After breaking all the speed limits and running several red lights, Sam reached the lab and private suite in less than fifteen minutes. He had timed it before and it took thirty minutes from here to home. By the time Sam lifted his husband out of the car, G was semi-conscious and unresponsive to his voice.
Linden and his team met Sam at the front door with a gurney.
Upstairs Linden and his team worked together seamlessly, placing intravenous lines in G's arms and adding a warming blanket and a heated intravenous line.
"More warming blankets," Linden said to Sam.
Sam left the lounge and entered the exercise room. He hadn't noticed the stainless steel towel warming drawers and cabinets before. Maybe they were a new addition to the space. Sam entered the living room with a pile of hot blankets in his arms. He tucked them under and around G's feet and head first, using his survival training as a Navy SEAL, next around G body, and last around his legs.
"Is the hot tub up to temp yet?" Linden asked. "Remember, it needs to be as warm as the one in the stretching room in your house."
"Almost," Sam said, leaving the room and returning with the temperature notation book. He showed Linden the numbers.
"Okay, let's get him transferred into the hot tub." Linden, his team, and Sam lifted G's semi-conscious body onto the gurney and pushed it into the exercise room. Once inside the room, Linden's team wrapped the intravenous lines in plastic and taped them. "Okay, he's all set to go."
Sam climbed into the hot tub and waited for Linden and his team to lower his husband into his arms. He cradled G close to his body and held him under water.
Linden and his team set up the intravenous lines all around the hot tub.
"Need anything to drink?" Linden asked, before leaving.
"Yeah, a ton of water, I'm sweating already."
"I'll be checking on you two every thirty minutes until he's stabilized." Linden left and returned with a huge canister of water and a glass. "I only hope this is enough for you. It's going to get hotter and you'll need to take a break."
"I'm good for as long as G needs me."
"See you in thirty minutes." Linden left the exercise room.
#
Six hours later G stirred. For the first time in the last few days, warmth filled his body and surrounded him. His eyes fluttered open and he gazed into his husband's face. G said, "Sam."
Sam opened his eyes. "Finally."
"Precisely what I was saying, finally, I'm warm."
"You didn't tell me," he said, "and any odd cravings?"
"Well, I was craving rocks," G said.
"Kind of hard on your teeth."
"Yeah, that's why I kept telling myself to not give into my crazy craving," G said. He was about to wrap his arms around Sam's neck when he noticed the intravenous lines in his arms. They were wrapped in plastic to protect them from the water. G arched his back and stretched. He glanced around the hot tub. Three intravenous lines pumped fluids into his arms and one was dark red. "Blood transfusion."
"Yes, they needed my blood for you."
"Sorry." Tears welled up in his eyes.
"Why? I'm happy to be able to give you my blood."
"Then everything's okay?" G asked.
"It'll be now that you've got the blood," Sam said. "They tried iron infusions first and nothing happened to your iron level so I offered my blood since we used it once before with success."
"What about you? Have you been in the water a long time?"
"I got two breaks."
G looked at Sam's fingers. They were wrinkled from excessive water exposure. "I know you're trying to help me, but you won't do me any good if you're overcooked."
"Overcooked?"
"Yeah, as in being a baked bean."
Sam chuckled.
"It wasn't supposed to be funny, Sam, I'm serious," G said. "Have you looked at your fingers and maybe you should look at your toes too?"
"Linden checks on you and me every thirty minutes."
G sighed. "And?"
"I'm good."
"Not to mention what's it doing to me."
"It's keeping your temperature regulated until your iron levels are stabilized," Sam said.
"That's a mouthful."
"I know what I'd like a mouth on."
"That sounded quite lewd," G said, winking at his husband. "Can't wait to get back to the house and make nookie in one of the safe rooms."
"Preferably not in our children's bedrooms," Sam said.
"And you didn't believe me."
"I should've known you were right." Sam said, "How about the master bedroom?"
"Too mundane for me."
"I suppose you'd like the one in our special room."
"Nope, the one upstairs in the eagle's nest," G said. Sam threatened to make the room off limits if G gained any more weight.
"Always the romantic."
G imagined making love by the light of a full moon.
"Your mind doing double time on the eagle's nest safe room?"
"We were going to christen it before and never got around to it," G said. "I want it this time."
Thank you for reading my story.