18. Wren
WREN
By Monday morning, I have decided the kiss was a problem for Future Me.
Future Me is very busy, obviously, but she seems capable. Resourceful. Good under pressure. Excellent at ignoring emotional disasters until they grow teeth and start chewing through drywall.
Present Me has bigger issues.
Like the fact that I wake up at five-thirty with cramps so sharp I have to grip the edge of the bathroom counter and breathe through my teeth.
“Fantastic,” I whisper to my reflection.
My reflection looks unimpressed.
Pale. Hair smashed on one side. Dark circles under both eyes. The overall vibe is less college student and more haunted Victorian child who has seen too much.
A cramp twists through my stomach.
I bend forward, forehead nearly hitting the mirror.
Nope.
Absolutely not.
We are not doing this today.
Today includes class, a shift at the rink, one online quiz, picking up the twins because Mom is on a twelve-hour shift, and pretending I don’t know what Kai Mercer’s mouth feels like when he finally stops being careful.
My body doesn’t seem to care about my schedule.
Rude.
I find painkillers in the medicine cabinet, take two with sink water, then dig through the bottom drawer for supplies. There’s one emergency tampon, three mismatched pads, and a heat patch that expired last year.
Great.
We love abundance.
By the time I make it downstairs, Holden is already in the kitchen, standing in front of the toaster with his backpack on and a piece of bread in each hand.
He looks at me once and frowns. “You look terrible.”
“Good morning to you too.”
“You sick?”
“No.”
His frown deepens. Sixteen-year-old boys are not supposed to be this observant. It’s very inconvenient. “Period?”
I stop halfway to the coffee maker.
He shrugs, unbothered. “I live here.”
Fair.
“Yes, but I’m fine.”
“That means bad.”
“It means fine.”
“That means worse.”
I pour coffee into a mug and ignore how my hand shakes. “You want toast or a dramatic monologue?”
“Can I have both?”
“No.”
He slides the bread into the toaster. “You should call the doctor.”
“No, I should drink coffee and become a person.”
“It’s been pretty obvious that things are getting worse, Wren. You said you’d make time to be seen when you got home from London.”
“I also said Justin would fail science if he did his poster the morning of, and yet here we all are, alive and thriving.”
Holden doesn’t laugh.
I soften because he shouldn’t have to worry about this. He already worries about too much. “I’m okay, Hold.”
He looks like he doesn’t believe me, but Daisy stomps in wearing a tutu over leggings and one sock on her hand, so the conversation dies a merciful death.
“Why is your sock on your hand?” I ask.
“It’s a puppet.”
“It’s a sock.”
“It’s a puppet sock.”
Holden hides a smile in his toast.
The morning becomes what mornings always become: cereal, arguments, missing shoes, Justin shouting from upstairs that his hoodie smells weird, the twins needing their hair done, and lunches packed, all with pain radiating through my body with every cramp that hits.
I get through it, because I always get through it.
But that’s the problem with being the kind of person who gets through things. Everyone starts assuming you can.
By the time I handle drop-offs and make it to campus, the painkillers have taken the edge off, but not enough. It’s more of a dull knife now instead of a sharp one, which I’m choosing to count as improvement.
Harlow finds me outside our ethics lecture with a latte in one hand and a worried look already forming.
“No,” I say.
She stops. “I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to say something with your eyebrows.”
“My eyebrows care about you.”
“Tell them to mind their business.”
She steps closer, eyes scanning my face. “You’re pale.”
“I’m always pale.”
“Wren.”
I lean against the wall because standing fully upright feels overrated. “Bad period. I’m fine.”
Her expression changes.
“Again?” she asks quietly.
I glance around the hall. “Can we not have a uterus-conference in public?”
She lowers her voice. “I’m serious. Didn’t you have one, like, two weeks ago?”
“Bodies are mysterious.”
“Wren.”
“What?”
“That’s not normal.”
Her words don’t offend me, because I know.
I’ve thought them many, many times myself at two in the morning, curled around a heating pad, counting how many days it’s been since the last time.
In bathroom stalls, trying not to panic because I bled through something again.
In the grocery aisle, doing math around tampons, gas, and the twins’ field trip money.
I know it’s not normal.
Knowing something and having the time, money, and emotional capacity to handle it are very different experiences.
“I’ll make an appointment,” I say.
Harlow’s eyes narrow. “When?”
“When I have a spare second between my full-time unpaid parenting internship and my part-time towel folding career.”
“That’s not funny.”
“I disagree. Towel career is very funny.”
She doesn’t smile.
Damn it.
“It could be something,” she says. “PCOS, endometriosis, something hormonal—”
“Or it could be that my body hates me.”
“Your body doesn’t hate you.”
“My uterus has filed several complaints.”
“Wren.”
The softness in her voice almost cracks me open right there in the hallway.
I look away first. “I’ll call. Okay? Not today, but soon.”
Harlow studies me like she’s deciding whether to accept a partial victory. Finally, she nods. “Soon.”
“Fine.”
“And eat something.”
“I had some coffee.”
“That’s not food.”
“It’s fuel for a future mental breakdown.”
She mutters something unkind about my life choices, and we walk into class.
By the time my shift starts, I’m running purely on caffeine, painkillers, and a refusal to collapse in public.
Donnelly notices within three seconds.
“You look like hell,” he says when I walk into the equipment room.
“Everyone is so kind today.”
“You sick?”
“No.”
“Dying?”
“Not currently.”
He grunts and points toward the bench by the shelves. “Sit if you need to.”
I ignore him and grab the clipboard for skate-check inventory. Standing still makes the cramps louder, so I move. Tape bin. Lace drawer. Towel shelf. Count. Mark. Stack. Repeat. There is comfort in small tasks, even when my body feels like it’s trying to turn itself inside out.
The team filters in for afternoon practice, less rowdy than after the win but still loud enough to make my headache pulse. Weston arrives first, sunglasses pushed into his hair and a protein bar in his mouth.
“Laundry Duchess,” he says around it.
“Forbidden pile,” I warn.
He swallows. “Equipment Monarch?”
“Closer, but no.”
Asher steps in behind him. “You look terrible.”
I point at him. “Why does everyone think that’s acceptable to say to a woman?”
“Because you do.”
“Comforting.”
Weston squints at me, and for once, the joke slides off his face. “You okay?”
“I swear to God, if one more person asks me that—”
Kai walks in.
Of course.
Because the universe hates me with a passion.
His eyes find mine immediately, and the whole room seems to tilt one degree to the left.
Not because of the cramps this time, because of the kiss.
His mouth on mine. His hand in my hair. The sound he made when I pulled him closer.
My fingers tighten around the clipboard.
Kai’s gaze moves over my face, and the softness vanishes into something sharper.
Concern.
Great. Exactly what I need.
“Wren,” he says.
Weston looks between us with intense interest.
I lift the clipboard. “Everyone needs to move along and proceed to your assigned hockey tasks.”
Weston’s eyebrows climb. “Assigned hockey tasks?”
“Skating. Lifting. Emotional repression. I don’t know. Pick one.”
“That last one is Kai’s specialty.”
Kai doesn’t look at him. “Cooper.”
“Proceeding to hockey tasks.” Weston salutes and backs away. Asher follows, shaking his head.
I turn toward the shelves, pretending to compare tape rolls. “You should go too.”
“Are you sick?”
I exhale and lower my voice. “Bad cramps. That’s it.”
His face changes.
Not in the gross way some guys react to periods, like I’ve announced a contagious disease. Not even awkward. Just…processing. Making room for the information without turning it into a scene.
“Do you need to sit?”
“I need everyone to stop asking me what I need.”
His jaw tightens, but he nods once.
That should be the end of it.
It isn’t.
He reaches past me, not touching, and takes a bottle of water from the case on the shelf. Then he grabs a granola bar from the team snack bin and sets both beside my clipboard.
“I’m not asking,” he says. “I’m leaving supplies.”
My mouth opens, but no words come out.
His eyes hold mine for one second too long. “Make sure you drink enough water to stay well hydrated. And eat a snack or something.”
Then he walks away.
A few minutes later, I’m feeling a little more off than normal and decide to sit for a few minutes.
I drink the water. I also eat half the granola bar.
Not simply because Kai told me to.
Because I’m practical.
Obviously.
Practice runs long. Or maybe it only feels that way because my lower back hurts, and every whistle drills into my skull.
I keep moving through small tasks, careful not to bend too fast. Once, while carrying a stack of towels, a cramp hits hard enough that I have to stop near the hall and press one hand to the wall.
The worst of it passes after a minute, leaving me sweaty and irritated. I hate this. I hate being slowed down by my own body. I hate that everyone can see it today. I hate that Harlow’s words keep echoing in my mind.
PCOS. Endometriosis. Something hormonal.
Soon, I had told her.
Soon is a dangerous word. It sounds responsible while letting you postpone everything.
The practice doors open, and players start filing off the ice. I push to my feet before Donnelly can comment. Kai is one of the last through the tunnel, talking to Grayson, but his eyes cut to me almost immediately.
I give him a look that says do not ask.
He gives me a look that says I already know.
Annoying man.