"All out of booze, if that's what you're asking," Jacob said lowly, proceeding to soak the wash cloth like he'd done the one earlier. He put it on Nicholas' forehead - common thing to do when someone has a fever.

"Hey Nicky," he said. "Stop closing your eyes."

"I can't," Nicholas moaned. "It feels like the water in my eyes is melting."

He was babbling, talking nonsense. He continued, "My tears are so ho-ot."

"That's 'cause you've got a fever, man, calm down," Jacob kept his voice steady, trying to remain as calm as he could be. To be honest, he'd love to just put a bullet in the boy's head and burn the body, making sure that neither he, nor Mattie, nor the baby got infected because of Nicholas.

After a moment of consideration, Jacob dismissed the question of sexuality and grabbed Nicholas' hand, rolling it between his two. "Can you feel that, Nick?"

"Yeah," he whispered.

"Good, that means you still got the feeling in your body. You know what that means?"

"Wh-What?"

Jacob lightly tapped Nicholas on the head and chuckled briefly, "That means you're not a zombie yet, brother."

"Y-Yet," Nicholas moaned.

Shaking his head, Jacob tore the covers off of Nicholas, who hissed at the feeling of cold air. His whole body was shaking, yet his neck had started to form beads of sweat rolling down.

"I'm c-cold," Nicholas told him, but Jacob ignored him.

After folding up the blanket and putting it to the side, making a note to wash it later, Jacob turned to Mattie and said, "You know, it just occurred to me that the first thing we should have done was get all of the blood off of him." He put his hands on his hips and said, "That's probably how he's infected."

"I'm cold!" he repeated, more urgently this time.

"Hush. Your body is burning up, okay? Blankets aren't going to do you any good right now."

Nicholas' whole body shook, and he continuously wiggled around on the couch, obviously uncomfortable.