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Luis Diaz woke up with a sore throat, runny nose and fever. His first fear was that he’d caught Covid, and that he’d spread it to all his teammates.
He tried to get out of bed, but his body wasn’t having it. His head flopped back against the mattress, he resorted to throwing a pillow at his bunkmate, Harvey Elliott.
“Oi, watch it, will ya! It’s early in the morning.” Elliott grasped Diaz's pillow, peering over the bed. “Hey, you don’t look so good, Lucho.”
A muffled groan was all Diaz managed.
“You must be sick, then.” Thank goodness that Elliott seemed to pick up on his predicament. While the British teenager was good at many things, empathy happened not to be one of them. He usually spoke before he read the room—if he bothered to read the room at all—and that was often what landed him in big trouble.
“What are your symptoms?” Elliott asked, scrambling down the ladder and landing with a concerned frown. He was still in his pajamas and barefoot.
Diaz tried to convey in as little words as possible how terrible he felt, but his sore throat wasn’t cooperating. He felt weak and sore in every cell in his body.
“I’ll get a Covid test,” Elliott said suddenly, quickly making his way out of the room. “And I’ll get the gaffer while I’m at it. This could be a disaster for quite a bit of the team.”
*
The Covid test returned negative, thankfully for the whole team. That didn’t stop Elliott fussing over Diaz, who was already injured, the whole morning.
“Yo odio sopa de pollo,” Diaz grumbled for the ninth time, trying to dodge the silver spoon in front of him. He’d been grumpy since they moved him from the communal bedroom to an individual room with one bed.
Elliott sighed, refusing to let up. “I know, but my nan always said it has lots of zinc. It’ll make you feel better.”
He slapped Diaz's butt, and the Colombian let out a yelp. Elliott reacted immediately, dumping the spoonful of soup into his mouth.
“Well, that’s one way to get it down his throat,” Milner commented from the doorway. He’d been assigned to watch over the two, with Klopp already having an overflowing to-do list for the day. “How about trying the non-violent way?”
“How about you actually help?” Elliott snapped, fluffing Diaz's pillows. “You’ve been standing there like an idiot for two hours. Shouldn’t you be productive?”
“I was asked to watch you, not to be productive.” Milner winced at the screeching sound of an off-key singer. “And how can I be productive? Joel’s teaching the youngsters’ choir lesson and Tyler’s singing soprano.”
Elliott glared at Milner. “Shut. Up.”
“Ever heard of respect for your elders?”
“Ever heard of kindness to children?”
“Ever heard of not talking back?”
“Ever heard of being nice?”
“Lads! Enough! You’re squabbling like petulant children,” Henderson scolded them. He nodded towards Diaz, who had his pillows wrapped around his ears. “Poor Lucho needs his rest.”
“What he needs,” said Elliott, opening a box and popping out three rosy candies, “is some of these throat lozenges. They have lots and lots of ascorbic acid.”
Milner frowned, glaring at the lozenges as if that would make them disappear. “What the hell is that stuff? Cough syrup?”
“Am I late?” Firmino chose that moment to stride in through the door, carrying what seemed to be a moderately heavy basket.
Elliott shook his head, setting aside the bowl of chicken soup. “There’s no late or early, Bobby. What’s in the package?”
“The boss told us all you were sick, Lucho,” said Firmino. He nestled the basket close to Diaz, ruffling the Colombian’s hair. “The other guys were so disappointed that they couldn’t come see you, because they could catch the flu. So we put together a gift basket.”
Diaz found enough strength to push himself to a sitting position and dissect the basket’s contents. Everything was in bright, cheerful colors, mainly red. Diaz decided to take the basket apart one by one.
He found a plush lilac Beanie Baby inside the basket, small enough to fit into the palm of his hand. Diaz smiled and snuggled up with the plush rabbit, leaning against the pillow.
Henderson had seen the Beanie Baby, and he instantly knew who’d put that in the basket. “Ali?”
Firmino nodded, flashing a grin. “You get an A, Hendo. We’ve all got something in there. Joel added some coconut candies, Mo put in a heating pad, even Kostas contributed something decent.”
“What a miracle,” Milner said without even moving.
Diaz frowned as he took out a CD, relaxing upon seeing it was Nana Mouskouri. “Kostas listens to this stuff?”
“Nana Mouskouri is Greek,” Firmino explained. “By the way Harvey, Cody added some vitamin supplements to the basket. There’s selenium, zinc, magnesium, manganese, iron, vitamin A…”
Elliott wasted no time in pouring out a dose of the pills, handing them to Diaz with a glass of water. “Take these, Lucho. They’ll make you feel better.”
Diaz groaned, stuffing his face into the pillow. “If I take any more pills now, I’m going to be sick.”
“You’re already sick,” Milner reminded him, not looking up from his magazine. “So you might as well stop the drama and take the pills, Lucho.”
“Cody thought of that,” said Firmino. “So he also included the same supplements in liquid format.”
“Your fever’s getting worse,” Henderson pointed out, taking the thermometer off Diaz's head. “We need some Tylenol to get it down. Could you do that for us, Bobby?”
“Yes, skipper!” Firmino saluted Henderson, waltzing out of the room.
*
“You’ve barely eaten anything all day, Lucho,” Elliott sighed. He gave up on trying to feed Diaz a plate of arepas, setting it aside with the ten other dishes he’d tried. Thank goodness Jennings understood the situation.
“Don’ wanna eat,” Diaz mumbled into his pillow, snuggling the Beanie Baby. “Sleeeeep.”
“I know. But you have to get some food into your body Luis, it’s been working to fight those viruses.” Henderson frowned, checking the thermometer. “And your fever’s only went down a little.”
“So it’s time to bring the secret weapon!” Firmino came in, carrying a whole armful of ice cream tubs. “Choose your flavor, Luchinho.”
Milner stared at the large amount of ice cream Firmino had just carried in. “How much ice cream did you just bring in?”
“Six tubs.” Firmino set the flavors out in front of Diaz, sitting on the edge of the bed. “How are you feeling, mano?”
“Like crap,” Diaz grumbled, flipping over to the other side. “What kind of devilish sickness is this?”
“Seems like you have a pretty bad case of the flu,” Firmino sympathized. “Now which flavor would you like? French vanilla, rocky road, chocolate, peanut butter or cookie dough?”
“You remembered our ice cream ceremony!” Elliott exclaimed. “Boy, did we get the boss mad.”
Despite himself, Diaz mustered a small smile. “I remember. Rocky road, please.”
Elliott slid into bed next to Diaz, turning on his phone. “Make that two.”
*
The next day, Diaz woke up feeling absolutely splendid. If Henderson hadn’t told him to take it easy for the next 24 hours, he’d get up and dance.
He was starving now. He was just about to leap out of bed, ready for the new day, when he heard a cough next to him.
Elliott.
“Ay, pobrecito,” Diaz sighed, ruffling Elliott’s hair. “You caught the flu from me.”
“Well, you know what this means,” said Firmino, who was already combing his hair for the day. “The Four Nurses are back in business!”
Milner hotfooted it for the door, completely forgetting that he was still in his pajamas. “Sorry lads, but I’m outta here.”