Periods are a bitch.

It’s funny—really, hilariously fucked up—how we’ve got AI therapists that can fake empathy better than real ones, billionaires jₐcking off in space, and an app that lets you virtually try on nail polish before you buy it, and yet no one’s figured out how to rip out a uterus. No sleek, painless cure-all. Just you, a heating pad that’s already gone cold, and the sensation of your insides trying to claw their way out like a demon exorcism.

You’re curled on top of Jalen, fists twisted in the hem of his shirt, face buried in his chest. Every cramp hits like a gut punch. The dysphoria comes in waves—sharp and mean, like static in your bones. It isn’t just the pain. It’s what the pain reminds you of. What it insists you still are.

And he’s there. Calm, warm, stupidly good at this. Rubbing slow circles on your back with his palm, grounding you while you flail around restlessly in pain.

He murmurs in your neck, hooking an arm around your waist so he can hug you. “You wanna cuddle or you wanna cry?”