“Yeah, it’s good, thank you,” I whispered, closing my eyes, half asleep as he cleaned me. Showers were a ritual for me, the time when I let go of everything that happened during the day and got my body ready to rest so I could do it again. It occurred to me as I felt Theo’s strong fingers gripping me as he lowered himself to wash my legs, my hips, my ass in that brisk and efficient way of his, that as much as I was adventurous in my sex life I’d never showered with anyone before him. It was so strange to have someone, a lover, do this for me. I’d always kept every part of my life in its own compartment. The people I slept with in one box, the job that paid the bills in another. Friends had their own place and my family also I kept apart. I liked it that way, it gave me more control, but Theo had wormed himself into all of it. My bed, my friends, my jobs, even my family knew him now. I’d always thought that anyone who got to see everything, the deck of messy cards that was my life, would run in the opposite direction, but here he was literally holding me up.

“Can you walk to the bedroom?” he asked as we stepped out of the shower, him behind me, holding me up. “I’m going to get you some Tylenol. I put some clothes on the bed for you.”

“I can do it,” I assured him and he released me reluctantly, but not before planting another one of those gentle kisses on my cheek.

“I’m going to stay there with you tonight, I want to keep an eye on you in case you get a fever.” There was no keeping in the relieved breath that escaped my lips.

I shuffled into the room, slid the sleeping shirt over my head and got under the covers. The moment my head hit the pillows my eyes fluttered closed. And even as awful as the day had been I had a smile on my lips as sleep dug its warm gooey claws into me.

“Mm,” I groaned when I felt something cool on my forehead. I opened my eyes and Theo was on the bed next to me. Bare chested and solemn. “You’re a hot nurse,” I teased and he grimaced. “If hospitals had guys like you walking around people be volunteering to be hospitalized.” His mouth twitched at that, which reminded me that his mouth was super pretty.

“I like your lips.” I lifted a hand, and touched them. “The tip of my pinky finger fits perfectly between them,” I told him, before I wrapped my own lips around the straw in the cup he was holding up for me.