Dr. Peabody visited twice, taking my temperature and proscribing chicken soup and vitamin C pills. I heard Charlie and Peter go to school each morning and fussed at the Cream of Wheat Grandma brought to my room. The first three days, I slept most of the time. After that I was feeling better, though my rash hung on, and my face and arms were irritated and sore. Charlie was forbidden from seeing me, but Peter, who had had the measles the year before, was surprisingly pleasant. He even let me read one of his comic books.
One afternoon, Grandma said she had to go shopping, and solemnly left Peter the task of "taking care" of me. I had a bit of an earache and was less than happy with that prospect, but the minute I heard the door close behind Grandma Peter came in my room with a glass of orange juice. "Here, Sylvie, you should drink this. It will make you feel better." I told him I wasn't thirsty, but he set the glass on the nightstand, and quietly left the room. Five minutes later he came in with a wet washcloth. I didn't want that either. He asked if I wanted an extra blanket. I was fine. "If you want I could turn the tv up really loud, and maybe you could hear it, Mouseketeers is coming on." I laughed at this.
"No, Peter, that won't work. Why don't you go watch it, though. I'm fine." He frowned slightly and left the room. I turned over beneath my quilts and stared at the wallpaper. The pattern was one of diagonal rows of large pink roses on a yellow background, crisscrossing as if they were on trellised vines. But I'd never seen roses that grew on vines. I turned again and stared at the ceiling, and began to think of what I was missing in school. We'd been studying the civil war, and I knew I must have missed several full battles.
Had wheezles
And sneezles
They bundled him
Into
His bed.
They gave him what goes
With a cold in the nose,
And some more for a cold
In the head.