Chapter - 17
LOGAN
“She’s at home, she’s not feeling well,” Courtney shrugged, taking a sip from her martini as she smiled at Taylor trying to shoot their shot with a guy on the other end of the bar top. A few nights later we all found ourselves at a new bar in downtown Dana Point. The bar was owned by someone Taylor had casually dated a few years ago, and they stayed friends even when the romance in their relationship fizzled out. Taylor asked all of us to show up to opening night to help support the small business.
I had met up with everyone at the bar after an annoying meeting with John and Connor. The meeting went like every other meeting. Because the scandalous pictures of the team had taken off on the internet, and resulted in a huge surge in presale tickets to the upcoming seasons games, Connor wanted to lean further into the sexualizing of the players.
John was all for it. He was body positive and did not care if people ogled what he worked so hard for.
I realized that I also didn’t care too much about showing off my body, but I loved telling Connor “no” much more.
Because fuck Connor.
I wasn’t his biggest fan before I knew that he slept with Eloise, but for some stupid reason, he irritated me even more now. How dare he touch Eloise and make her react the way she did? How dare he just not care about her reaction at all? Any moron could pay attention and notice when a woman wasn’t into something he was doing. To see her shut down and lose enthusiasm for sex. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that Connor going through with everything, even when Eloise clearly wasn’t enjoying herself, aggravated me. It showed how little he cared about Eloise as a person. The fact that he was willing to see the night through even though her head was clearly somewhere else was disgusting.
Part of me was mature enough to understand that part of this was good old-fashioned jealousy. The thought of someone like Connor being with Eloise that way made me want to rage. To shield Eloise behind my body, never to have his eyes land on her again, and shout “mine” in his face.
I also remembered what I had learned from another one of Eloise’s romance novels that I finished the previous night, how what I was experiencing was best described as “alphahole” behavior. Possessive, controlling, toxic. Eloise’s review online played through my mind, “…I’m going through an alphahole phase. If a real man had the audacity to act like this, I would dump his ass. But for some reason, in these books, it’s hot as hell…”
Eventually, I’d need to tell Eloise that I stole Courtney’s book. Part of me thought Eloise might even appreciate the fact that I was reading a lot of her favorite books, as long as she was able to get past the part that I stole from her. Yeah, I’d need to tell her sooner than later.
…Just not yet.
I remembered to tune back into the conversation I was having with Courtney. She had just answered my question, after all. I felt my face pinch before I made myself relax the muscles as I expressed my curiosity, Is Eloise okay?
Courtney’s brown eyes slid over to me, something in them that made me hold my breath until she responded, “She’s on her period.”
I nodded, my shoulders relaxing the slightest bit. I didn’t even know that they were tense until she answered my question. Eloise was fine; women got their periods all the time. It wasn’t like she was sick or anything.
“I actually feel awful for her,” Beck spoke up from my other side, leaning around me to make eye contact with Courtney. “She looked miserable when we picked you up tonight.”
I felt a frown form on my lips as I listened to Beck’s words.
“Yeah,” Courtney shrugged, “Yesterday she was pretty functional, but today she’s either been in bed or on the couch.” Wait, what? “I thought I heard her throw up this morning.”
What the fuck? Because of her period? Were they sure that she didn’t have the flu or something?
Are periods really that bad? I signed my question to the two women on either side of me, and they both exchanged a knowing look before Beck simply said, “Yes.” And Courtney added, “They can be.”
Is it normal to throw up because of periods? I asked again, my curiosity piqued.
“Yeah,” Courtney set her elbow on the bar top before resting her cheek on her fist, “Do you know what a period is?”
I rolled my eyes, Yes.
“But do you understand the reality of it?” Courtney pressed, making Beck giggle on my other side. “Because you know what it is, and yet you seem surprised to know that there can be a certain level of pain involved.”
I didn’t say anything, I just stared at her, waiting for her to eventually elaborate. She did.
“The uterus is literally shedding its lining,” I nodded because I understood that “The organ is ripping itself apart from the inside out, piece by piece, which—call me crazy—doesn’t sound too pleasant on paper.”
I frowned because no, no it did not.
“Everyone has different pain tolerances,” Beck spoke up, making me glance to my other side to look at her. “Some women have high pain tolerances, and can function just fine on their period.” Beck shrugged, “Other women’s periods are actually just worse. More brutal. They lose more blood, and therefore, are in more pain. Plus, there are additional medical conditions that can make periods so much worse.” Beck’s brows scrunched in thought as she stared at her own martini, “I wonder if Eloise has something like that.”
“I think that she has something,” Courtney replied. “The amount of pads and tampons she goes through is alarming. No one can lose that much blood and be totally functional. She’s gotten lucky by having her heavy flow days occur over the weekend when she doesn’t have to work.”
I widened my eyes.
Eloise was constantly bleeding.
She was bleeding out, throwing up, and unable to move.
And my heart twisted at that knowledge. All of us were at the bar, having a good time while Eloise was trying to hold herself together.
Can she take medicineto help? I asked, not too worried about how I looked at the moment.
Beck smiled at me, “Tylenol and Ibuprofen help. But not always.”
I shook my head, before Courtney spoke up with a sarcastic tone, “Classic.”
I gave her a questioning look before she continued, “You’re such a man sometimes, Logan.” I frowned because, coming from Courtney, it probably wasn’t a compliment.
“Why is Logan such a man?” Josh asked, approaching his fiancée from behind and looping an arm around her neck to pull her against his chest.
“He is just learning about the severity of periods.”
Josh smiled and winked at me. “Give him a break,” he chastised Courtney and kissed her head, “None of us guys know until a woman teaches us.”
I gave Josh a small smile of appreciation because I did feel a little bit like an asshole just learning about all of this in my thirties, but he eased my guilt a little with his words.
“It’s true,” Beck patted my shoulder before crossing her arms on the bar top to speak to our friends, “As soon as we get our periods, girls are immediately told not to talk about it. And then we go to health class in, like, middle school or something, and the lecture on periods weirdly gaslights us into believing that we are being over dramatic about the pain and maintenance, simply because every single uterus owner experiences it and also doesn’t talk about it. And then when we do talk about it as adults, realizing how stupid it is to not talk about something we experience every single month, men gaslight us again because no other woman in their life has spoken about it. So we must be ‘overdramatic’, right? We must be ‘exaggerating our pain’.”
“So then,” Courtney chimed in, nodding along with every sentence Beck spoke, “That leaves women like Eloise in the state she’s currently in.” My gut churned at the image they were so clearly painting for me. “At home, curled up on the couch with a heating pad, all by herself. In so much pain that she can’t even walk around. After she weirdly shoved all her friends out the door to go out and have fun tonight without her because she feels bad for feeling bad. She doesn’t want to inconvenience other uterus owners with the pain that she feels when her uterus destroys itself as some shitty reward for not getting pregnant this month.”
I stared into my mug of beer, only having taken a couple of sips from it as I thought about their words. It was such a horrible reality, and part of me felt guilty for never thinking twice about it. I didn’t have a uterus. The most inconvenient thing I ever had to experience because of my genitalia were no reason or inappropriately timed boners.
It’s not like I had to deal with a constant bleed from my dick every month.
I couldn’t fathom being able to function well enough to play hockey if men had to experience what women did.
And they were right.
The moment Courtney and Beck started talking about Eloise’s current state, my immediate thought was that they must be mistaken. Eloise must be sick. No way would a period affect her that badly. Thanks, patriarchy. Thanks, society, for training men like me to always excuse and dismiss women.
That sounds horrible, I finally signed in response to the vivid descriptions the women in my life gave me.
“It is horrible,” Courtney twirled the toothpick of grapes in her glass thoughtfully.
“That just means men like Logan and I have to lead by example,” said Josh. The rockstar rested his chin on top of Courtney’s head, looking at me intently, “It’s up to us to listen, to learn, and to correct our expectations and behaviors.”
I blinked at him, suspicion clawing at me when he narrowed his eyes a little and winked at me again. He was clearly trying to tell me something subtly, and as far as I knew he hadn’t told Courtney about my attraction toward Eloise.
He also didn’t know that Eloise and I had slept together, but that was neither here nor there.
But his words made me consider myself. My entire existence.
Conversation continued around me, but I pulled out my phone and started researching the topic a bit more. Josh was right, I was given the information. Now it was up to me to decide how to act going forward.