Honeymoon – Day 4
My Version:
When I got up this morning, my stomach was bit rumbly. After a few trips to the bathroom, I took some Imodium to calm things down and went back to bed. William hadn’t felt too well the morning before, but recovered quickly after some Imodium…..so I expected the same thing. Off and on during the afternoon, I would get crampy and chilled. Since I wasn’t feeling well, we decided to just lounge in the room until I felt a bit better. Towards evening, I did feel a bit better, so I wanted to go into town. I had read in several sources that a place called The Office had great food and also had fiestas on Thursday nights. All the tables were actually sitting on the sandy beach. We both ordered lobster and William added a steak to his……2 lobster tails and a steak were only $25!! I was starting to feel poorly again and by the time our food arrived, I was shaking violently with chills……..shaking so much and so hard, my muscles were tightening and cramping! William quickly paid the bill and got a cab to take us back to the hotel. I only vaguely remember the ride back….I was only semi-conscious by this point. One of the valets helped to get me to the room while the hotel staff called for a doctor. I don’t know what the valet looked like…..I only know he was there because he was shorter than William and the back of his shirt was soaking wet. I couldn’t get warm no matter what William did…..he helped me into bed and put several blankets on me, as well as the heavy comforter. I think he even turned off the fans and air conditioning…but still I trembled. I have no idea how long it took the Dr. to arrive. When he did, I was starting to shake less, but my fever was still over 103 degrees….I’m sure it was higher before his arrival. My whole body ached, especially the joints and my head. It felt like someone had punched me in my stomach. The Dr. gave me a shot to bring down my fever and left for a while. When he returned, I had pretty much stopped shaking and I guess my fever came down. He examined my abdomen…probably to rule out appendicitis…and said that when I took the Imodium, it probably stopped my body from ridding itself of toxins and that resulted in the high fever. Shortly after, I fell asleep. By morning, I was feeling somewhat better and we went to town to do some gift shopping. It seemed all the hotel staff had heard about me and all were genuinely concerned and asked how I was doing.
The flight home was uneventful, however my stomach continues to hurt. I’m on antibiotics for the next week and look forward to feeling well again. When we got home, there was a long wait for Shuttle Express and I just wanted to get home and into bed. William, being the romantic guy that he is, hired a limo to take us home…..a perfect way to end our honeymoon adventure. Our next adventure?….having a lifetime to enjoy each other and love each other more!
His version:
Day five of married life dawned with no more fanfare than the usual beautiful tropical sunrise. Mercifully, I slept through this magnificent spectacle, occurring as it did sometime around six in the morning. Note to self: have a little talk with God about rescheduling his miracles for a more civilized hour. Thus it was that my morning began closer to to nine, with tiny rays of sunlight sneaking playfully around the curtains to gambol and cavort, spritelike, on my eyelids. I yawned and stretched indolently in the cool sheets, then rolled over to cuddle my new wife. To my surprise, she groaned when I hugged her. This, I thought, does not bode well for the marriage…
“I don’t feel well, Love,” she muttered. Then, as if to prove her point, she disentangled herself from me quickly and staggered to the bathroom. The door slammed shut and I was left cuddled up to a warm, empty spot on the bed. Not a marriage problem, I realized, but a honeymoon one.
Breakfast arrived at this point. I signed the check and the attendant distributed a breakfast ordered the previous night by a woman with a much heartier stomach. French toast again for her and two of eggs—over easy—and a pair of lovely peppery link sausage for me as well as a tropical fruit plate, the usual assortment of pastries and breads, tea, and fresh orange juice. Just as I was debating whether or not to hide the food from her, Anita emerged. She was obviously not well. She took some Immodium and made a valiant effort to eat, but only managed a few bites before climbing back into bed.
We scratched all our plans for the day—we had planned to rent waverunners for an hour or so, and then perhaps go parasailing—and instead we lounged in bed all day. We snagged some books from the hotel library and read or watched television, which seemed to be all familiar english-language stations, until around that evening. All in all, I think I may have enjoyed simply relaxing far more than I would have enjoyed the heavy-duty adventures we had planned.
By five o’clock or so, Anita announced that she felt well enough to go out to dinner. We dressed and caught a taxi into Cabo San Lucas and a restaraunt called “The Office”, which was having its weekly “fiesta” show that night. The tables were on the beach itself and the vendors, including a couple of heartbreakingly cute children around six years old, wandered among the tables selling crapola of every description. As the show approached, they were herded gently away by private security guards. The steak and lobster tails were quite cheap by US standards, so I ordered that and Anita stuck to lobster alone. She looked a bit gray around the gills as we ordered, but she insisted that she would be okay. The show itself started with what was billed as a traditional native dance. I wouldn’t know, since I was not really paying attention. Halfway through the dance, Anita began to shiver in the 80-degree air. By the time the food arrived, she was in obvious distress even though she continued to insist that she was fine. I called for the check.
I had to support her as we walked to the taxi, and by the time we were on the road, she was shivering uncontrollably and complaining of horrible stomach cramps. I peeled off my T-shirt and wrapped it around her bare shoulders. Wishing for a blanket, I felt her forehead. She was burning up with fever. Soon, she lapsed into semiconciousness and would respond to my voice only sporadically, and then only with quiet mumbling. I confess that, by this time, I was frightened nigh onto terror and it was only the fact that Anita needed me to care for her which let me keep my own panic locked away. The trip from the restaurant to that hotel took around twenty minutes and I spent every moment cursing myself for letting her leave the hotel. God, I didn’t mean that stuff about rescheduling your miracles, okay? Besides, that was me, so leave Anita out of it…
At the hotel I tossed some dollars at the driver, helped Anita from the taxi, and sent one of the valets to have the hotel page their on-call doctor. I think that if he had hesitated for even one second I would have slain him on the spot with my bare hands, but he nodded seriously and hurried off while another valet moved quickly to Anita’s other side to help me hold her up. Her head lolled and she offered only slight assistance as we walked her to the room. By the time we reached it, she was crying softly and breaking my heart with every step.
She gasped as we opened the door and I cursed myself for not thinking sending someone ahead to turn the air conditioning off and open the doors. The wave of cool air was heaven to me, but for Anita, already freezing in the tropical air, it was like being thrust into a freezer. Quickly, I helped her into the bed and covered her with the sheet and thin blanked we normally used, then heaped the bed’s thick decorative pillows over her and followed that with the heavy comforter which had been sitting, unused, on the sideboard since our arrival. Then I hastily opened the doors and shut down the ceiling fans and air conditioning. After a quick kiss on her hot, trembling cheek I went to the bathroom and soaked a pair of washclothes in the ice bucket’s meltwater. These went on her forehead. Then I…couldn’t think of anything else to do. So I sat and held Anita’s hand while we waited for the doctor.
Through all this, there had never been less than two Palmilla staff members waiting outside our open door in case I needed anything. While I’m sure there was a certain voyeuristic attraction to what must have been the evening’s big excitement, the staff did seem genuinely concerned for Anita; even going so far as to keep me apraised of the doctor’s progress from Cabo to the hotel. Yet another good mark for the Palmilla in my book.
By the time the doctor arrived, Anita was shivering less and seemed a tad less warm to the touch. Nevertheless, the doctor measured her core temperature at around 103 degrees F. He gave her an injection which lowered her fever and, after examining her, prescribed a host of medicine for a combination parasitic/bacterial infection. He called in the prescription to a local pharmacy, which promised to have the medicine delivered to the hotel by taxi. After the doctor left, I closed up the room, turned on the air conditioning again, and watched Anita doze until a steward arrived with the medicine. While Anita took her pills, I ordered breakfast. When I mentioned our room number, the woman on the other end asked after Anita’s health and offered to send up some clear chicken broth. I thanked her, but declined the broth as I was sure Anita would be asleep soon. She seemed much improved, but very tired.
Sure enough, a few swallowed pills later she was sound asleep. I climbed into the shower, sat on the floor while the hot water from both showerheads sprayed my body, and shook and shook. After half an hour or so, I climbed out and toweled off. Anita moaned softly, but didn’t wake as I slid into bed beside her. Maybe this was a test, I thought, or a lesson. Maybe it was just random. In the end, I decided that it didn’t really matter.
Note to self: Some things are more important than getting rich…
