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“Mom, I’m fine. Justcold and everything feels like it’s on fire made from ice.”
“What?!” Abbi stopped fawning over him for a moment and looked at Doc. “Is that normal?”
Doc nodded. “Yeah, as the blood warms, it does have that effect. His temp is up to 95°F from...” Doc looked at the clipboard the medics had written on. “...91.6. He’s damn lucky Brit jumped in when she did. Otherwise, he would have needed IV treatment to warm his blood, and I can’t do that here... she saved his life.”
“How long do I have to stay here Doc?” Luke asked.
“Well, once your temperature gets to 98.6 and stays there for a good hour, you can go home.” Doc nodded at the mug in his hands. “Keep drinking that broth. I’m going to check on Brit. Kim, once that blanket gets cool, get him another, would you?”
“Sure thing.”
The second Doc left the room Abbi turned on Luke. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“Abbi...” Ben warned.
She spun to look at him. “He could have died, Ben.”
“Don’t you think he doesn’t know that?”
“It was fine mom until the car hit the ice. Speaking of which, can someone call a tow truck for me?”
“Already did,” Ben said.
Luke nodded. “Thanks man.” He then looked at his mother. “My phone had no signal, ma. That’s why I took off across the lake, it was shorter than the road.”
“But you should have known better. The lake hasn’t been frozen for more than a week...”
Ben moved to stand behind Abbi and rubbed her back. “Come on love. Luke’s fine, he needs to get some rest.”
“But...”
“No but’s, he’s in good hands with Doc,” he said, ushering her towards the door.
“Fine.” She huffed and looked at Luke. “I’ll get a bed ready for you at the house for when you’re ready to leave.”
“Great, I look forward to it,” Luke said, as she turned towards the door, he caught Ben’s eye and mouthed ‘thank you’ to him. Ben nodded and said, “Any time.”
“What was that?” Abbi said, spinning around.
“Nothing let's go check on Brit,” Ben said, as he guided her out of the room.
“Are you getting warmer,” Kim asked, as she checked his temperature.
“A little bit.”
“Well, your temp is at 94° now.” She laid a hand on the blanket and found it cold. “I’ll get you another one of these. How’s the broth? Do you need more?”
Luke looked in his mug, nodding, he passed it to her. “Can you see how Brit’s doing for me Aunt Kim?”
She smiled. “Already planned on it. I’ll be right back.”
When she left the room Luke hunkered down in the bed. The stinging fire raging over his skin was slowly waning, he just hoped Brit wasn’t feeling it as well.
“Here you go,” Kim said, as she walked back into the room. She stopped and held onto the mug. “Can you hold onto this without spilling it everywhere?”
“Yeah, it’ll be fine.”
“Okay,” she said, passing it to him with a dubious look on her face. Once he took it, she pulled a blanket out from beneath her arm and whipped the other blanket off, covering him with it. She laid the cooler one on top of it. “I’ll go check on Brit now. If you need anything, just buzz this,” she said. Taking a cord from the wall behind his bed, she handed it to him then pointed at the mug. “Make sure you drink that.”
