Her door buzzer rang, rousing Sarah from her fetal position on her sofa. She glared at the phone before it rang again. She groaned, her head and stomach spinning as she emerged from the blanket cocoon that she had intertwined herself in, and shuffled to the door.
"Hello?" She croaked, her throat sore and dry.
"Reese? Are you okay?"
It took her brain a few seconds to register the voice.
"Connor?" She was completely perplexed, they had nothing planned for that day. Every since Valentine's Day a week ago, their schedules hadn't lined up at all.
"Maggie said you weren't well. Can I come up?"
"Yeah, I guess?" She questioned herself more than him as she buzzed the door open. She leaned against the wall of her hallway as she waited for him to get to her door, not having the energy to sit down and have to get back up again.
The knock came after what seemed like an eternity and she unlocked the door. Seeing Connor eased the tension in her shoulders. "What are you doing here Connor?"
"What kind of fake boyfriend would I be if I didn't check in and bring you supplies?" He asked, holding up two paper bags. "Plus it's always known that doctors are terrible patients." He pointed out.
"You don't have to do anything." She told him.
"I know." He said softly, placing a hand delicately at her forehead, "You're burning up Sarah. How about you let me take care of you?"
Her head felt like it was stuffed with cotton wool so she couldn't come up with any argument apart from the fact that she didn't want him to see her like this. She hadn't slept the entire night before between the stomach aches and fever and she was sure she didn't look good, in her over sized pyjamas and hair hastily tied in a heap on top of her head.
"Please?" He asked quietly, catching her eye and she felt her refusal dissolve, having him around would brighten up her day.
"Okay." She agreed and shuffled out of the way to let him in.
"I brought some food and flu medication." He told her as he wandered to her kitchen, placing his bags on the counter. Sarah blamed her current state on the errant thought that popped into her head, that Connor looked at home in her place. That she wanted them to be home to each other.
"So you finally caught that stomach flu that's going around, huh? Have you taken anything for the fever?" He asked, his doctor tone out in full force as he approached her, eyes scanning up and down her body as if examining a patient. She wondered what it would be like for his eyes to roam over her as if she wasn't a patient.
She blamed her fever for giving her such treacherous thoughts.
"I was going to…" She mumbled a response, leaving out the fact that her sofa was too comfortable to get up from before his unexpected arrival. She had never been good at taking care of herself. She had never mattered that much to her mother, or anyone else in her life, to learn to care all that much about herself.
Connor smirked, "Told you doctors are bad patients. How about I make you some food and take some medication huh?"
The mention of food was enough to twist her stomach into knots. She didn't answer, couldn't answer, as she rushed to her bathroom.
After emptying her stomach into the toilet, she lay back against the cold tiles of her bathroom wall, where she had spent most of the night before.
"Sarah?" Connor's voice called softly from the door that had been left ajar, but he stayed in the hallway, not looking in to give her privacy.
It was all too much. The sleep deprivation, the sickness, the fever, the aches, the knowledge that Connor, sweet Connor, wanted to take care of her.
"I hate being sick." She blubbered as tears clouded her vision.
"Can I come in?" He sounded so bloody caring and so very Connor that she ached for him to be near.
"Yes." She whispered through the tears that were now falling.
She expected Connor to tell her to get over herself, to tell her to get up and not to make a show, things that her mother had always told her.
So he surprised her when he curled himself up enough to fit beside her on the floor of her bathroom. He handed her a glass of water he had brought with him and she took it with a shaky hand.
"It's okay, you've had a rough couple of days, but I'm here. You're not alone anymore."
"Thank you." She turned her head to thank him, with a small smile and he took the glass back with one hand and with the other, he pushed an errant curl behind her ear.
"Don't worry about it." He told her, before frowning slightly, "I don't like seeing you sick."
The comforting presence of him by her side and the overwhelming tiredness was enough to get her to relax and close her eyes.
But she didn't know she had closed her eyes, or had started to drift off to sleep until Connor roused her.
"Sarah, you don't want to fall asleep here, you'll have more aches when you wake up." He told her gently, stirring her from closing her eyes.
"But I don't want to move." She moaned.
"Come on," He said and before she knew what was happening she was moving. Or rather, he was moving. Connor had gently hooked his arms under her knees and behind her shoulders and lifted her up into his arms as if she weighed nothing.
She was pretty sure she thanked him, as she only had energy to lay her head against his chest as he walked. He lay her onto her sofa and had her drink another few mouthfuls of water before taking some medication.
"Don't go." She said, her voice smaller than she had ever remembered. She hated feeling like this, so alone and weak and not well.
He looked around from where he had been putting her medication away, his eyes softening. "I'm not going anywhere." He told her, coming over to the sofa and prop a blanket over her. "You rest, I'll be right here if you need me." He sat down at the end of the sofa, and moved her legs so her ankles were lying on his lap.
In any other circumstances, she would have been mortified at how close they were and how needy she was being, but in the moment, in what she now knew about Connor Rhodes, she was comforted by the small squeeze he gave her ankle, by the fact that he stayed.
She must have slept because when she opened her eyes, night had fallen outside and Connor's eyes were closed. The medication must have worked because her stomach wasn't sick like before.
But now she couldn't move. She didn't want to wake him, he looked so peaceful. His hair was falling over his forehead as his head was resting against his chest. She resisted the itch to reach over and run her hand through his hair.
And his hand was still resting on her ankle as if he was making sure she wouldn't leave him, not the other way around.
She turned her head on the arm of the sofa to get comfortable again but she must have moved too much as Connor's body almost jumped to consciousness. The first thing he did was turn his head to check on her and she met his eyes.
"Hey." He said, in a voice still laced with sleep. His eyes lingered on her face and he smiled, "You have some color back in your face, do you feel any better?"
She nodded but her throat was too dry to talk. He got up immediately and fetched more water for her and despite not needing the help, she selfishly let him put him arms around her to help her to sit up. The aches in her bones may have subsided a little but now she ached for his touch.
It was then that she checked the clock on the wall. It was late.
"I'm so sorry. I've wasted your entire day." She told him.
"Are you kidding me?" He asked, sitting down beside her, placing the blanket over her lap as she started to shiver, "Apparently I needed the rest too." He grinned, his own voice was still croaky from his own sleep.
"Want to try and eat something?" He asked.
Since the words didn't make her stomach clench, Sarah agreed, the bug should be passing by now.
She went to get up and he placed a hand on her arm, "Where are you going? I'll make something, I brought the ingredients of my Mom's secret chicken soup recipe. Guaranteed to make everything better." He told her. "Rest some more, I'll wake you when it's ready." He told her softly.
Sleep didn't come as she was distracted by the glimpse she got from the sofa into her kitchen where Connor was cooking. It was like watching him in surgery; mesmerizing. Sarah was hoping that it was only her fever still talking.
Still, she pretended and closed her eyes until he came back in some time later with a bowl of steaming soup, more medicine and sat back down beside her.
She manged to keep it down and they loaded up a movie on her TV, something mindless that didn't require much attention, but was a great excuse for Connor to stay.
"Come here." He whispered softly halfway through the movie and Sarah jumped at the sound despite being too aware of his close proximity for the past hour. She looked at him in question and he gently drew her body closer so her head rested on his shoulder. "You've been moving around like you can't get comfortable." He answered.
It was true, how could she sit still when he was right there beside her?
But she felt her body relax as she gave into the fact that he cared about her. About the fact that his shoulder was the perfect height, like they were meant for each other.
Unfortunately the movie came to an end and Sarah had never hated seeing the credits roll as much. She didn't want to move, savoring the feeling of him beside her.
But she couldn't get used to it. It was all an illusion. All for the great lie they had got themselves tangled in.
Lifting her head from his shoulder felt like lifting a tonne of lead.
"Thanks for coming over Connor. But you can go home if you want, I feel much better." She told him, sitting up and turning to face him. "I think I'll just have a shower and go to bed."
She wasn't expecting the worried expression that appeared on his face.
"What?" She asked.
"It's just…you could fall, or faint, or…you're still sick. I'll stay while you have a shower and get into bed. If that's okay?"
She wasn't used to someone fretting over her. She found him absolutely adorable. She liked this side of him.
"Yeah that's okay." She replied.
She wouldn't admit it, but she was glad he stayed, because she felt slightly light-headed just gathering her things for her shower. It was reassuring to have him there.
Sarah quickly showered, basking in the feeling of washing away the grubbiness of the past twenty four hours. Connor even called to check if she was okay when she turned the shower off. She felt herself blushing as she called back to reassure him while being overly aware that she only had a towel wrapped around her. She got dressed into fresh pyjamas and braided her hair back from her face.
When she emerged from the bathroom she found him cleaning up. He was drying the bowls he had used for the soup. He smiled when he saw her.
The entire scene was so domestic that it hurt. It suddenly created an ache deep in her chest that she couldn't understand.
"How are you feeling?" He asked as he packed up the his things and handed her another glass of water.
"Much better." She told him. "I'm just going to sleep now I promise."
A smile flickered on his lips, "Good, no sky diving while you're not well, you hear me?"
"Doctor's orders?" She retorted with a grin.
"Fake-boyfriend's orders." He smiled. "I guess I should get going." He picked up his things and she walked him to the door.
He placed the back of his hand against her forehead again, double checking that her fever had broken. "Just…call me if you need me okay?" He asked.
She felt warm inside at his tender words that had nothing to do with her fever. "I will. Thank you for everything Connor."
"Nothing to thank me for, just feel better." He said as he placed a kiss on her cheek. They said their goodbyes and she locked the door behind him, and got into bed on autopilot. Ignoring the fact that her eyes fluttered shut at the brief contact of his lips on her skin. The fact that her shampoo seemed to compliment the scent of his cologne. The fact that a small voice in the back of her mind told her that she wished he would drop the 'fake' from fake boyfriend.
"Thank goodness you're feeling better." Maggie said as Sarah logged into the computer beside the charge nurse's station at the start of her first shift back at work.
"Aw, thank you you Maggie." Sarah smiled as she entered her password.
"Oh well, I am glad for you but I'm also delighted for us too, selfishly. A brooding Dr Rhodes is no good for morale."
"What?"
"Connor was wandering around here like he had a thunder cloud above his head when he saw you were meant to be on shift and had called in sick." Doris chipped in.
"He didn't even come to Molly's after shift for Monique's birthday drinks." Maggie tutted.
"Did you two have something planned that day for Joey and Rachel?" Doris asked.
They hadn't. Sarah's heart beat a little faster just thinking of him being concerned about her while working.
"Oh…probably. But with the stomach flu, I can't really remember." Sarah lied.
Ethan called Doris for help just before Connor arrived, reporting to Maggie for trauma work that shift.
"Hey, you look great. Feeling back to normal?" Connor asked her. She had never considered her 'normal' to be great before.
"Yeah. I'm good." She told him before he was called away for an incoming ambulance.
"I told you my Mom's soup was the best medicine."
Sarah gave up trying to concentrate on the screen in front of her when she could feel Maggie looking at her. "Yes Maggie?"
"Did Connor call to see you?"
She felt the urge to keep it a secret. To keep their actual close relationship to herself. But Maggie always had a way of finding out the truth so there was no point.
"Yeah, he called to see how I was, made me some soup, stayed a while." She tried to play it off as if it was nothing out of the ordinary while trying to keep a smile off her face at the very memories.
"Uh huh. Sounds like having Connor around was better than any soup or medicine." Maggie decided, giving her an appraising look like she knew exactly what was going on between Sarah and Connor.
But that was impossible. Because Sarah didn't even know what was happening between them.