After a long time! It's a sequence story of Anita but can be read alone. Enjoy.
USHA-
As eyes opened slowly in the semi-darkness around, my sleepy eyes fell on the clock hanging on the opposite wall. It showed 3-45 pm. On regaining mind from the blankness after a nap, I found myself lying on a twin bed in a small room beside Anita, my colleague. Little daylight was coming in through the window curtains, which is quite unusual at 3-45 pm and the room was almost dark. As mind awakened, I recalled that we had set out for a hiking trip in hills.
We were seven colleagues from our office, who had taken a bus ride for four hours to start the hiking in weekend. We were three women and four men in the team and the bus left us around 12 pm from where we had to start hiking. We started our amateurish walk and must have walked for a little more than two hours through a narrow, barely walkable pathway, surrounded by beautiful lush green hills. It was not possible to walk side by side on that narrow stone made stiff pathway, which was more like stairs than a road. I was at the end, following others. Male colleagues were in the front and Dipti, Anita and myself at the tail end. We all were out of breath, carrying our backpacks, huffing and puffing all the way for two hours continuously and decided to rest for a while and sat at place where we find some plain space for sitting.
As my memories for the day unveiling in my mind, I recalled that Anita was not feeling well since the morning. Suddenly she slumped down and fell on a boulder, on which she was seated. We rushed in her aide. Fortunately, she was not hurt but on checking forehead, I found her running high temperature. I told others, we should stop hiking for the day and take some rest but none agreed. We were on a weekend trip and the next day we had to go back and reach home so that we could attend office on Monday. Moreover, we had a booking for the night, in a rest house for hikers at the peak point at the end of hiking. But I was weary of continue hiking as I was totally out of breath and very tired.
I told them that Anita could not continue trekking with such a high temperature and asked them to continue but I would prefer to stay with her. Paul, fiancée of Anita immediately agreed to stay back. He got up and left us to search for any accommodation nearby, where we could stay for the night. After a while he came back and informed us that a room is available not very far, where we could spend the night. Everyone was relieved but they asked Paul to go with them since he trekked in that route earlier and booked the accommodation for the night. They insisted that I could take care of Anita and they could pick up us on way back tomorrow. I told Paul to continue trekking with them and I would take care of Anita. He agreed on their insistence and directed me about the accommodation, where we could go and stay for the night. As they leave us, I told Anita, who was still lying on the boulder to get up and walk to the nearby accommodation, Paul found for us. We walked for about five minutes off the road and got into a small wooden house, as described by Paul. An old lady greeted us and showed us a room, where we got in. We both were sleeping since then.
Anita was lying beside me and we both were covered under a huge blanket, nonetheless chilly wind was coming in, might be through cracks of the wooden room. I had given a Paracetamol tablet to Anita while we checked into the room and by then it should have worked. I checked my forehead first to gauge what could be the normal temperature and then checked her temple. I found her temperature was not that high, as before but higher than mine and surely it would be above normal. I was cursing myself, since I did not ask Dipti to leave the thermometer, she was carrying with our basic medical kit for the trip.
I got up and came out from the bed, since I needed to meet the lady to ask for hot water to drink and know about the loo. I had some dry food, with which we could manage in case we did not get any food there but loo and hot water was essential. As I came out of the creaky door of the room, gushing wind, making a whistling sound passing through the nearby trees greeted me. Shaking and shivering me knocked on the next door and the old lady opened the door. On asking, she showed me the wash room, situated apart, a few yards from the house and went inside to bring me back a flask of hot water. She asked me whether we needed any food but I declined and thanked her. I turned and came back into our room. I kept the flask on table and quickly get under the blanket.
It's too early for dinner and i didn't feel hungry at all. I turned on the room light before reaching onto the bed and a pale yellowish light filled in the room. All I needed to find then, was warmth under the blanket, which seemed not enough to fight the chilly cold there. I moved my cold hand to touch Anita's and found her hand warm, must be due to her running temperature. As I turned my face to my left, I found her sound asleep, showing white teeth through her parted lips. Even with a thick cap on my head, I was thinking whether to cover my head under the blanket or not, when Anita moved a bit and licked her lips. She might be feeling thirsty and I shook her to know whether she needed water or not but she didn't respond.
We both had our jackets and pants on and I had no intention of changing into those for the night, although I carried some woollen night wear in my backpack. I got closer to Anita to feel warmth and turned left to hug her. I put my right hand over her tummy and my legs crossed over her legs. I thought that I could get warmth and she also could get some warmth that way. And it was much better for me since her body was warm due to her high temperature. I embraced her tightly. My face was turned towards her face and as I got closer my face was touching her right cheek, my breath was falling on her face. I was looking at her lovingly in silence. I could her parted pink lips showing teeth. I could make out her chest, covered under blanket, rising up with every breath. Maybe we were lying like that for ten minutes and she licked her lips again. I felt sure about her thirstiness, which happens with fever. I got up from the bed to give her some water.
On pouring a little water on the flask lid, I came back to bed and nudged her but again she did not respond. Then I poured a little water from the flask lid into her mouth through the parted lips and she gulped it. I gave some more again and again and then I put the lid on flask and got into the bed again.
