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Aislinn MacMurdo, Lieutenant, junior grade, UEO Navy, MA in Archaeology and History Joint Honours, MA in Linguistics & Social Anthropology was sitting up in bed, her dark brown hair loose and messy, her face and nose beet red, and generally miserable. She was cursing her condition in as many languages as she could think of. It helped to pass the time. *A bleeding HEAD cold. I couldn't catch something exotic...oh no. A week laid up in bed with a damnable COLD.*
Clang clang. "Linn? It's me...can I--"
"Aye, Lucas," she croaked, picking her glasses off the nightstand and placing them on her face. "Come in, luv."
Lucas Wolenczak stuck his unruly blonde head in her door. "I brought you some tea, Mac," he said, pushing the door open with his elbow to reveal a tray, with a steaming teapot, a mug, and a large slice of lemon cake.
"Och, Luke, ye are truly a saint," she sighed as he carried the tray in and laid it on her lap.
"How're feeling?" he asked.
"I feel like death warmed over, if ye must know," she rumbled, her normally melodic voice rough and raspy.
"You SOUND like it," Lucas agreed.
"Dr. Smith said the sore throat should go away in a couple of days," she groaned. She shook her head. "Lucas, do me a favor?"
"Sure."
"Remind me to never, ever, EVER listen to any more harebrained ideas that no-account, devious, daft, idiotic, moronic, afraid-of-enclosed-spaces, twelve language-speakin', bespectacled Chief of Communications excuse of a boyfriend of mine comes up with ever again. Please? Kin ye do that for me, lad?"
Lt. Tim O'Neill stuck his head in the door. "Hi, Lucas. How's my favorite girl?"
Lucas grinned. "Speak of the silver tongued devil--"
"Hi sweetie," Tim said to Aislinn.
"Don't you 'sweetie' me. Get out," she said, waving her finger at O'Neill. "I'm NOT speakin' to him, Lucas," she told Wolenczak. "It's his fault I'm stuck in this damned bed to begin with.
"No one forced you to go swimming in the bay at this time of year, Linn," Tim said. "Especially not skinny-dipping ."
Lucas' eyes opened wide.
"Right," she drawled sourly. "Oh come on, Linn, sez he. It'll be fun, sez he--dragging me, kicking and screaming into the water, mind you--"
"No one TOLD you to take your clothes off---"
"You had YOURS off."
"I had my boxers on--"
"And I," she snapped, 'had a two HUNDRED dollar angora sweater on! Do you know how long it takes to get angora DRY, Timothy?"
Lucas tried to get up. "Uh--guys, I think I have a --"
"Oh NO," Linn said, pushing back in his seat. "I want a witness. Explain THAT one away, Mr. Smarty-pants."
"I didn't tell you to take off your underwear, Aislinn--"
She sighed. "Wet underwear against DRY angora wool? Come on now--and you said the water was warm!"
"And I certainly didn't tell you to lie on the beach afterwards. BUCK NAKED, no less."
Lucas choked on that one. "Guys, I really have to go run a--"
"Oh NO you don't!" she yelled at Tim, pushing Lucas back in his chair. "You're not pinning that one on me. You gave me IMMENSE amounts of incentive to be lying there on that beach in the all together, Timothy Andrew O'Neill!"
"For six HOURS, Aislinn?" Tim asked wickedly.
"With you nibbling on me neck the whole time, I might add," she said hotly.
"You could have told me to STOP, Linn," he pointed out. "Although, I think I remember you begging me not to stop...on more than one occasion that night---"
"Uh guys?" Lucas said weakly. "I really gotta get cracking on that--"
"So why aren't YOU sick?" she asked Tim accusingly.
"Dumb Irish luck?" he shrugged.
"Me mother begged me--pleaded with me," Aislinn said to Lucas. "She said, 'Lass, do whatever ye want in life, make all the right or wrong decisions ye want, but never, ever, for the love of Saint Andrew get involved with an Irishman!' I shoulda listened to her, Luke."
"GUYS!" Lucas yelled, springing out of his seat, face crimson. "I REALLY have to go do that viral sweep the captain wanted done! Like, yesterday," he said, backing out of the door. "I'll see you when you're--better, Mac? OK? Bye, see ya!" He flew out of the cabin as fast as his feet would take him.
"Huh," Linn muttered. "What's with him?" she asked.
Tim shook his head. "Damned if I know. It's a teen thing--I think."
"You don't think--?" she said.
"Nahh," Tim said. "He musta heard worse from Krieg." Tim raised an eyebrow. "Isn't this where we're supposed to make up, sexy?" he asked, closing the door.
Her eyes narrowed dangerously. "Timothy Andrew O'Neill, you march out of this room this very instant," she growled. "Tim--get off the bed, Tim...Timothy!--Stop that! Haven't--haven't ye learned--ye lesson--"
He took her glasses off and put them on the nightstand. "You talk too much, Linn."
"Oh, shut up and kiss me, daft fool."