RESOLUTIONS FOR A NEW YEAR
There were the distant booms of fireworks but otherwise the house was silent. Curled up on the small bed, Tylar coughed into his hand. He’d been suffering from a cold for the last three days and had been forced to miss out on the New Year’s Eve party he’d been looking forward to for months.
He didn’t have the strength to feel sorry for himself. His head was aching even after the medicine he’d taken and he’d slept as much as he could. It was only a few more hours until the new year.
The bedroom was as warm as he could make it and he was wearing flannel pajamas beneath his multiple layer of blankets. He’d even pulled thick woolen socks over his feet to fight off the chills that kept running through him.
He hated being sick. He’d nearly drowned himself in hot soups and whatever foods he could choke past his aching throat.
"I hate being sick," he rasped, then chuckled weakly at how pathetic he sounded. It made him think of being a kid at his grandmother’s house on sick days. His mother would drop him off on her way to work and he’d spend all day wrapped up like a burrito on the couch watching daytime television while his grandma brought him soup and checked his temperature with the back of her hand against his forehead.
He’d eat chicken noodle soup with oyster crackers and drink 7-Up while watching soap operas through heavy-lidded eyes. He’d sleep off and on throughout the day and sometimes one of her cats would come lay on him. And the days would pass by until he’d stop feeling sick, and the last day would always be the best because his grandma would let him help her make cookies and they’d play board games and she’d feed him sandwiches with the crusts cut off and they’d spend the whole day together.
Tylar pulled the blankets tighter around his neck and shivered. Being sick as an adult meant taking care of himself. There was no homemade soup, as he was too weak to make it; instead there was concentrated chicken noodle from a can. And while he’d tried to watch TV earlier, his head hurt too much to deal with the sound and movement and the brightness so he’d been relegated to hours spent in the near dark of a single lamp on the dresser.
He swallowed, wincing at the pain in his throat, and closed his eyes to try and sleep some more. If he was lucky he’d wake up feeling better.
Focusing on the darkness behind his eyes, he thought about the new year. He hadn’t written down any resolutions as he usually did, too tired to bother, but he thought about them now.
To eat healthier. To exercise more. To drink less coffee. To read more books. The kind of resolutions he always made and never managed to keep to.
Tylar coughed and snuggled deeper into bed. He’d think up some resolutions tomorrow.
New year, new me, he thought.
=END=
~Harper Kingsley
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