Sharon watched Sullivan zipping her suitcase and hoisting it off the bed. Her roommate was going to leave town for the holidays in less than an hour, and Sharon tried to keep her envy at check. It wasn't Sullivan's fault that Sharon won't see her family during the holidays. Sullivan had been a good roommate, who completely ignored the age gap between them and treated Sharon as a friend from the start.

It was funny how close to Sullivan Sharon felt, especially considering that the two of them had very little in common. Yet, they bonded well from the start, and although Sharon had other friends on campus, most of them not older than Sullivan with whom she found common interests and whose company she enjoyed, it felt good to return to her dorm every day to Sullivan's welcoming face.

Sharon remembered how Sullivan mentioned on the first day that she preferred Sharon as a roommate than some 'basic bitch', and it appeared that her roommate's sentiment was genuine from the start. Sullivan referred to Sharon as 'fam', a term that Sharon soon learned was reserved for close friends and Sharon felt the same. Sullivan's role in her life was not the same as that of Andrea or Patrice, but she was a great company to have. And Sharon knew that not having her around on Christmas, on top of being away from her family, would be difficult.

"Are you sure you don't wanna spend the holiday with my family?" Sullivan offered again.

"No, but thanks anyway for the invite."

"Well, in that case, I'll give you my gift now," Sullivan said and walked towards her closet. She opened the door and took a box wrapped in red and green checkered paper.

"Oh, God," Sharon had not expected a gift, but was glad that she also had the sense to buy Sullivan a gift, which she gave her roommate on the previous evening. "You really didn't have to, Sullivan."

"But I wanted to," Sullivan said and urged Sharon to open the gift.

Sharon carefully removed the wrapping paper, revealing a curated box with different kinds of artisan tea, a clay mug and fuzzy socks.

"I know you planned on spending the holidays differently, and I hope this will help to ease your homesickness a bit."

Sharon wrapped her arms around Sullivan's shoulder. "Thank you so much. It's lovely."

Sullivan shrugged nonchalantly and placed her hand on the handle of her suitcase. "Hey, listen, take care of yourself, okay? Don't, like, stay up too late, and treat yourself to a nice holiday meal on Christmas Eve. And call me if you need to talk or something."

"Don't worry about me. I'll be fine." Sharon assured her. "Merry Christmas, Sullivan."

Sullivan wished her the same, and Sharon watched her roommate dragging her suitcase towards the door.

"Hey, Sharon," Sullivan said once she managed to put her suitcase through the door. "Ho Ho Ho!"

The fairy lights in their room suddenly changed from white to colorful and cast a jolly glow on the room. Sharon only now noticed that these were not the lights they bought in the beginning of the year.

Sullivan threw a small remote and Sharon caught it mid-air.

A smile spread across Sharon's face and she thanked her roommate for the beautiful gesture and wished her happy holidays once again.

Sullivan blew a kiss at her before she began walking down the hall.

If Sharon expected her holiday season to at least be bearable, she was wrong about that too. Once the dorm was empty, and silence spread around, Sharon knew that even if she holed up in her room until January 3rd and busied herself with completing all the mandatory reading in her syllabus, it would still be hard to get used to the eeriness of spending Christmas alone in her dorm.

When she was an eighteen years old student at UCLA, she could not afford to fly home for Christmas and spend it with her family, but back then, she thought it was for the best. She didn't look forward to watching her father getting drunk and blaming her mother and her for the way his life turned out, so staying in LA was not a bad thing and she welcomed the silence.

Now that her life back home was so full, Sharon couldn't think of anything she wanted more than be with her family. She knew Ricky was spending the holidays with Eva's family in Canada and Emily was spending the holidays with Henry's family, since his father was terminally ill and they wanted to spend as much time with him as they could. Even without her older children home for the holidays, Sharon still wanted to spend them with Andy, Rainie and Ember.

Ember was almost nine months old now, and in the photos and videos Rainie sent Sharon, the baby looked so big. She already had three teeth in her mouth, could sit without support and started to crawl. Sharon and Rainie tried to have a zoom call every week, but in the last couple of weeks, Rainie was busy making her deadline with her publisher and Sharon was preoccupied with exams and term papers. With Emily living in New York and Sharon being away from home, she felt like she was missing out on the important milestones in both of her granddaughters' lives.

On Christmas Eve, Sharon was barely able to lift her head from her pillow. She had felt unwell the entire week, but dismissed her exhaustion, nausea and joint stiffness as the common flu. She assumed that the stress from school and the homesickness weakened her immune system and believed that she'd be fine with some rest. And regardless of her condition, she intended to attend midnight mass at the campus church. While she loved attending St. Joseph's of Nazareth back home, the church on campus had pretty good services and the priest reminded her a lot of Father Stan, albeit younger. Even if she couldn't be with her family, Sharon still hoped to get some Christmas cheer from the holiday services at the church.

When she took her seat on the pew, Sharon felt all her muscles stretching painfully. The church was well lit, and the brightness made her dizzy, so Sharon focused on listening to the priest's sermon with her head bowed down and her eyes closed. She didn't register everything that he said, but it was something about how the holiday season was a chance to spread kindness and joy. Despite loving midnight mass, Sharon was glad when it was over. Her head was pounding, she was feeling queasy and her stiff fingers felt like they were frostbit, despite the fact that she was dressed warmly and the weather was not too cold. As she walked out of the church, Sharon's gaze landed upon a decorated Christmas tree. The colorful lights flickered before her eyes and made her world spin. Sharon closed her eyes, but even then, glowing dots attacked her from every direction. An electric buzz assaulted her ears, and before Sharon had the chance to stabilize herself against the church's stone gate, her feet caved beneath her and her world blackened.

Sharon had not planned for her holiday season to start at the hospital, but here she was, lying in bed with a splitting headache. It took her a while to find her bearings and that was mostly due to the unpleasant churn of her stomach that made her sit up at once and search for a bucket.

She did not find a bucket, but did find herself on the floor as she emptied the content of her stomach.

"Crap," she mumbled under her breath.

"Hey, what's going on here?" Sharon heard a voice coming from behind her. "What are you doing out of bed?"

Sharon felt two strong arms hoisting her up and putting her on a chair that stood in the corner of the room. By the woman's uniform, Sharon gathered that she was a nurse.

"Oh, yeah. I see what you've got going on. Let's get you cleaned up, okay?"

The woman quickly and efficiently stripped Sharon down and then put her in a clean hospital gown.

"You ripped your IV. We need to get a new line into your arm," the nurse said as she helped Sharon back to bed.

Before Sharon could say anything, the nurse left the room and returned moments later with a medical cart. She placed a new IV into Sharon's arm. Then she grabbed Sharon's chart and scribbled something.

"I assume your name is not really Jane Doe, right?"

"What?" Sharon asked.

"Yeah. You were found unconscious on the church stairs, with no ID," the nurse explained.

"It's Sharon O'Dwyer," Sharon mumbled.

The nurse updated the name on Sharon's chart.

"Why am I here?" Sharon asked as she shielded her eyes from the light in the room.

"Meningitis," the nurse replied. "You're lucky that you're even alive. You had high fever and were severely dehydrated when you came here, and on top of that, you're also anemic, so that's not a good state to be in."

Sharon closed her eyes briefly. "Can you give me something for the nausea and pain?"

The nurse nodded, but did not do so immediately. "Of course, but before that, there are a few things we need to know."

Sharon barely stifled a moan.

"It's just a few questions, I promise," the nurse said kindly. "Can you please give me your address?"

"Los Ange – I mean, the student residence on USFCA," Sharon said, feeling exhaustion taking over her.

"Okay, any allergies?"

"No," Sharon said.

"Good," the nurse said. She took Sharon's vitals and wrote the results on Sharon's chart. "You're running a fever again, so I'll be right back with some meds that will help you feel better."

Shortly after the nurse injected painkillers and antispasmodics into her IV, Sharon fell asleep. When she woke up, her room was dark, and because she assumed that it meant it was nighttime, she went back to sleep.

The next time Sharon woke up was when the nurse on the morning shift came into her room and took her vitals.

"Your fever is down," she said. "Your blood pressure is also good. How are you feeling?"

"Everything hurts," Sharon replied. At least the nausea went away.

"Yes, that's to be expected. You seem to have taken a fall when you lost consciousness," the nurse said. "But you look so much better than you did when you got here, three days ago."

"Wait, what? Three days?" Sharon asked.

"Yes. You drifted in and out of consciousness for the first forty eight hours," the nurse said.

Sharon groaned. She had not realized she had been in the hospital for more than twenty four hours.

"But the good news are that if your fever stays down and you start feeling better, you'll be out of here in just a few days."

Sharon wanted to cry, but feared that if she did, her headache would only get worse.

"So, do you think you'll be up for some breakfast today?"

Sharon wasn't even hungry, but nodded regardless. Maybe if she ate something, they'd let her out of here sooner.

Somehow, Sharon managed to eat her breakfast and keep it down, which she assumed was due to the improvement in her condition or the antispasmodics she received. Either way, she was looking forwards to being released.

It was only on her last day at the hospital that Sharon realized that she had not been in contact with her family in five days. Because of the headaches and light sensitivity, she had no urge to use her phone. And when she picked it up for the first time to get an Uber from the hospital to the dorms, she discovered that her battery was dead and she did not have a charger in her purse. Luckily she had enough cash for a cab, so the hospital had called one for her.

When she reached her dorms, Sharon plugged her phone and went into bed. She still didn't feel good, but with antibiotics and fluids, she no longer needed to be under observation.

Pulling her blanket all the way up to her chin, Sharon grabbed her phone and turned it on. Once the screen lit, Sharon could see over a hundred missed calls and unanswered messages, most of them from Andy and her children, but a few from Provenza.

"Oh, no," she groaned and slid her finger across the screen to call Andy.

"Sharon?" Andy answered almost immediately. "Where the hell have you been?"

Sharon did not expect her husband's rage, even though it made sense.

"We couldn't reach you the whole week, the university couldn't trace you, you went off the radar; we filed a missing persons report about you, Jesus. What the fuck is wrong with you, Sharon?"

The worry in Andy's voice, the stress of the previous weeks, the homesickness and her illness made Sharon feel raw. Tears welled in her eyes and she made no attempt to stop them.

"I'm so sorry, Andy. I'm so –" she sobbed.

"What's going on?" She could hear Andy's deep concern.

"I made the biggest mistake of my life by coming here," she wept. "I should have never left LA."

"Babe, calm down and tell me where you were. Okay?"

"At the hospital." Sharon's voice trembled.

"What's wrong?"

Sharon briefly explained to him why she hadn't reached out. "I'm so sorry, babe. I was so sick that I didn't even think to call."

"Babe, let's move to FaceTime. I wanna see you," he replied and they hung up the phone and started a video call instead. "Oh, God. You look like you might still need to be at the hospital," he said when he saw her.

Sharon assured him that she was much better than she looked, even though it was not true.

"Maybe I should just quit this stupid program and give up the promotion," she said.

"What? No way. You've worked too hard for this. You can't give up just because of a few bumps in the road," Andy called out.

"I just feel so… lonely." Tears began streaming from her eyes again, and she sniffled.

"Babe, you can do this. There's only one more semester to go, and we'll see each other on spring break. And no matter what, I'm always with you. Just don't disappear like that again."

"I promise," Sharon said.

"Listen, I'm gonna call Ricky and ask him to fly to San Francisco and be with you. I don't want you to be alone."

"Please don't. I'll be fine. I'm taking care of myself, I'm resting and hydrating and if I start feeling worse, I'll go straight to the hospital."

"Okay, but know I'm gonna call you every two hours until your roommate comes back to town," Andy declared.

Sharon smiled for the first time since winter break started. It was so much like Andy to worry about her this way. But she couldn't deny he had a good reason.

"I miss you so much," she said.

"Me too," Andy replied.

"Andy, can you stay with me until I fall asleep?" Sharon asked.

Andy smiled at her and nodded.

Sharon positioned her phone against the wall, so that Andy could see her, and laid back down.

Andy wished her good night, and she closed her eyes and let herself sink into her mattress. Her muscles relaxed and within minutes, her breaths evened out and she fell into slumber, unaware of Andy's smile as he watched her for a few minutes, calmer to see that his wife was safe and mostly sound.

-TBC-