Author's Note/Warning: There is period talk in this chapter. I don't know if that actually needs a warning, but I thought I would put one on here just in case.

Chapter Forty-Six

Steve was already in bed when Jessica got to his house that night after work. He wasn't asleep yet, but he was on his way there. He hadn't heard her arrive since he was already upstairs, but he felt a rush of affection when he saw her come into his room.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey."

He could tell she was tired, and her shoulders were set in a tense line. She put his assignments on his desk and then crawled up on the bed with him. He knew she couldn't stay, but he appreciated whatever time they were about to have together. He'd missed her after she'd left that morning. His mom had kept him company, had actually taken really good care of him, but it wasn't the same.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"It was just a weird, not good day."

She went on to explain how her back had been killing her all day at school because of the backpack, and then how Billy Hargrove of all people had been the one to carry it around for her after lunch.

"And then I had to stand up for four hours straight at work, and that didn't help at all. I'm just really sore and stiff and I feel bad for even complaining because you have concussion and all."

"Hey," he said, situating himself so that he could hold her close without bothering her back. "That doesn't mean that you're not hurting too."

"Mm." She leaned her head up and kissed the side of his neck. "Anyway, we didn't really learn anything new today. Just a new chapter in history to read and then questions for science. We have to have Othello done by Wednesday – or I do, anyway – so I can come over tomorrow and read that with you."

"Cool. I have an appointment tomorrow at ten. We'll see what the doctor says."

"Hopefully, it's what we already know."

"Yeah."

After a few minutes of them just lying there together quietly, Steve gently rubbing her back, he stopped and spoke. "Be careful with Hargrove, okay?"

"Hm?"

"He . . . he may be completely sincere doing what he's doing. He may even feel bad for hurting you, but . . . I know you. He's exactly the type of person you're attracted to."

"Steve!"

She pulled away from him and he could tell she was hurt by what he'd said. He was quick to clarify what he meant.

"Not like that. I – I know you would never do that to me. Okay? I trust you completely there. All I meant was that you can't keep from helping people and no one goes off like he does without needing help of some kind. So be careful there."

"Well, I . . . I mean –"

"Jess, I love that you like helping people and that you genuinely care. It's – it's probably my favorite thing about you. But we don't know Billy Hargrove enough to know whether or not he'd use that against you or actually be cool about it. That's all I'm saying. I didn't mean for it to sound any other way."

"Hm." She laid back down beside him, her head on his chest. "You have a concussion. I guess I can forgive you."

"Good." He kissed the top of her head. "I really do trust you. I hope you know that."

"I do. You just surprised me by saying what you did. But you're not wrong. I do like helping people. But I had no problem telling Nancy no when it became a problem."

"Eh, you kind of did have a problem saying no," Steve teased. "You wondered if not helping her was the wrong thing to do."

"Okay, true. But I still didn't help her."

Steve smiled until his split lip protested against the pull, and held her against him, relieved when he began to slowly feel the tension leave Jessica's body.

It was close to eleven before Jessica left. Steve offered her one of his pain pills before she left, but she declined because she didn't know how it would make her feel. She didn't want to risk oversleeping the next morning.

Tuesday started out horribly for Jessica. She woke up hurting even more than she had been the day before. This time it was her whole lower middle section, not just her back. Her stomach was hurting too.

She noticed the blood on her bed when she got up and only then did she recognize the liquid stickiness between her legs.

"Great," she muttered.

She grabbed the clothes she wanted to wear that day and took them to the bathroom with her so she could take a quick shower.

Honestly, she didn't usually have bad periods – minor cramping, almost zero mood swings – but this time she was really hurting. She wondered if it had anything to do with the bruise on her back. Or maybe it was payback for lying about cramping to get out of gym the day before.

Whatever the reason . . . she already knew that day was going to suck.

After showering and dressing, she went back into her room and almost ripped the sheets off the bed. She couldn't wash them herself, but she told her mom what had happened so she would wash them while Jessica was gone.

Dustin had already left for school since he was riding his bike. Jessica left without eating breakfast, knowing with how she was feeling she probably wouldn't be able to keep it down anyway, and made it to school in record time.

She found a parking spot close to the school entrance and got out of her car, groaning as she pulled the bookbag over her shoulder and onto her back. She stopped by her locker before going to first period. Billy was in his usual seat beside hers and his eyes tracked her and she made her way to sit down.

She basically plopped down even though it did nothing for her back, moving so carelessly, and dropped her bag beside her desk. She felt miserable and was already wanting the day to be over.

Sometimes being a girl sucked.

She barely paid attention to whatever the teacher was saying – she would learn when she finished reading the play what was being said.

Billy still grabbed her bag for her at the end of class. This time she didn't say anything against it. She just followed him out and told him where her next class was.

"What's wrong?"

"Don't feel good," she said. "I want to be in bed asleep."

That was how that day went. Billy walked her to her classes and she continued to feel terrible. She didn't eat a proper lunch, only what was becoming her normal now – pudding and fruit – and then skipped gym entirely by going to the nurse and staying there to lie down for that period.

Billy walked her to her car again. Neither of them had said much to the other since Billy had asked what was wrong earlier, and they didn't say much when they reached her car. He did ask if he would see her in class the next day and she said yes, but that was about it.

School was finally over and she could go see Steve and maybe take a nap with him. She really wanted a nap.

Much like the night before, Steve could tell something was wrong as soon as he set his eyes on Jessica. He was seated on the couch, TV on but only as background noise, when she came in the front door. She sat down on the couch and immediately sank into his side.

"How did your appointment go?"

"We won't know for sure until Friday, but the preliminary diagnosis is that I can't play basketball again until after Thanksgiving. I had to sign a bunch of release forms so my doctor can get the x-rays and things from the hospital."

"Oh. Okay. Still no school for the rest of the week?"

"Still no school."

"Aw. I miss having you there." She sighed. "I even skipped gym today. Stayed in the nurse's office so I could lay down."

"Why? You okay?"

"I hurt. I woke up feeling not great this morning. Women stuff."

"Ah."

They didn't really talk about 'women stuff.' It wasn't because Steve was uncomfortable about it at all, it just was never an issue. If Jessica hadn't let him know, he wouldn't have known because she usually never had any side effects from it. He knew that some girls had it rough during that time of the month, but Jessica had never been one of them. Until now, apparently.

"Billy carried my bag again. We didn't really talk much. He mostly just dropped me off at each of my classes."

They continued back and forth until they ran out of things to say and then Jessica said, "Where is your mom?"

"The store, I think. The doctor did prescribe me an actual headache medicine to take with the pain pill. He called it in, so she went to pick it up. I think she's also getting something to fix later for dinner."

"Oh. Okay." She moved against him before sitting up. "Can we take a nap? I need a nap."

"You wanna go upstairs?"

"Well, your bed is more comfortable."

Steve still had trouble getting up without getting dizzy and sometimes he even stumbled a little while he was walking – not enough to fall, but he still wasn't used to it. With the dizziness came a little nausea, but he hadn't gotten sick in two days.

Jessica went to the kitchen first, grabbed a glass of water and a couple pieces of cheese, and then followed him up to his room, nibbling on the way.

"You skipping lunch again?"

"I had pudding and fruit. I didn't eat breakfast, though."

"Jess!"

"I would've been sick if I had eaten. Women stuff."

"Okay, but you're eating dinner," he said gently but firmly.

She nodded. "Nap, reading English, and then dinner. Or maybe nap, dinner, and then reading."

She put the glass on his bedside table and then crawled under the covers before waiting for him to get in with her. Steve was tired all the time since his head injury, so he knew he was going to have no problem falling to sleep with her, but he still waited until she'd drifted off before allowing himself to as well.

By the time Steve and Jessica woke up, Steve's mom had already gotten back and was making chicken alfredo for dinner. The living room smelled so good when they got down there, Jessica stopped at the bottom of the stairs just to take in the scent.

It made her mouth water and it made her stomach remind her that she hadn't had a real meal that day.

"Hungry?" Steve asked, a small smile on his face.

"Mm-hm."

"From the way it smells, it should be done soon."

"Good. We can start reading before and then finish after. That's the thing that's going to take the longest."

Jessica had to keep reminding Steve about what had happened in the previous acts as they began to read, and she didn't know if it was because he had a concussion or just because he hated English anyway, and they were reading Shakespeare.

Basically, Iago was causing trouble again and Othello thought Desdemona was cheating on him because of a handkerchief and because of Iago. Othello went into a rage and was planning to kill Desdemona.

"If he really loved her, he'd know she wouldn't do that," Steve said. "Also, isn't he supposed to be their leader? If you're going to lead, you need to know the people under you. He should know not to trust Iago. He's been nothing but trouble the whole time."

"As I said before, if we have to write an essay, you could definitely write one about Iago and how much you don't like him."

Once dinner was done, they went to the kitchen and ate there with Steve's mom. Jessica had a huge helping of the pasta along with a glass of Coke. She shook her head but smiled anyway when she noticed Steve's approval.

"Did I hear you guys talking literature a few minutes ago?" Steve's mom asked.

"Othello" Jessica answered. "I'll be glad when we're through. It feels like we've been reading it forever."

"No kidding," Steve said. "Shakespeare always takes forever."

Mrs. Harrington placed her fork back on her plate and looked at Steve.

"I hated English when I was in school too. Not so much the grammar part, but the literature usually flew right over my head. What I got from the things we read was completely different from what the teachers wanted me to get from it."

The meal was nice – actually the meal was great. The food was delicious and there was no tension around the table because Mr. Harrington wasn't there. None of the conversation was stilted and Jessica realized Steve would have had a very different upbringing if his dad had never been in the picture.

"So people were talking about crops failing this year," his mom said. "I heard while I was in town. They're saying crops were just rotting for no reason."

"Oh, uh . . . yeah," Steve said. "I heard about that."

"I was thinking of setting up a fundraiser to help offset the losses for the farmers . . . since I'm going to be home for a while anyway."

"Oh. That's . . . nice."

"Well, don't sound so enthusiastic," Mrs. Harrington said.

"No, I –" Steve hurried to correct himself. "I just . . . didn't know you'd be sticking around that long."

The expression on his mom's face fell. "I guess I deserve that."

"It actually is a very nice thing to do," Jessica said. "I'm sure everyone will appreciate it."

After dinner, Steve and Jessica went up to his room with their literature books so they could finish Othello. It took them another hour and all Steve could think was how stupid it had been. The guy had killed the woman he claimed to have loved all because of some other guy who couldn't seem to keep from causing trouble. If Othello had really loved Desdemona, he never would have killed her. Whatever he'd felt for her it hadn't been true love.

It seemed that there were a bunch of dead people at the end of every Shakespeare work he had ever had to read for English. It was depressing. And the worst of it was that Iago hadn't been one of the ones who had been killed. Steve probably would've been down for that, but no.

"That is the worst thing I can remember ever reading," Steve said. "The main characters are dead at the end."

"Well, that's Shakespeare. Remember 'Romeo and Juliet'?"

"Yeah, yeah. That ending sucked too."

"Most of his plays are tragedies, so bad endings are kind of normal."

"Still don't like 'em."

Since all they'd had to do was finish reading the play, they were done with English for the night. Steve was sure they would have to do some kind of essay or something about it, but for now they could move on to history.

The rest of the week went by pretty much the same way as Monday and Tuesday had. Jessica worked Wednesday but still found time to drop his assignments off after that. She stayed for about an hour just to spend time with him since he hadn't been at school with her. On Thursday she came over right after school and Dustin rode his bike over to visit for a while before heading over to see Will. On Friday Jessica had to work again, and again she went over after work for about an hour.

She had called Steve after she'd gotten out of school to see how the doctor's appointment had gone, and she'd been happy to find that the doctor's original treatment was the same as it had been on Tuesday. Steve couldn't play basketball again until after Thanksgiving and he wasn't allowed to do anything that could make him feel pressure in his head.

Steve was still sensitive to light and sound and his balance was still off – another reason he couldn't play for a while – but the doctor was sure he would heal in time.

Billy had continued to carry Jessica's book bag for the remainder of the week and people had continued to stare at them. Jessica still had Steve's jacket and she continued wearing it through the halls at school, not that it would make any difference as to what people were going to say, but it had made her feel better since he wasn't there.

No one said anything to her directly, not even Nancy or Jonathan, but they had given her confused looks. The only people she explained anything to were Nancy and Jonathan, but they still seemed confused about why she was allowing Billy to carry her bag. They hadn't offered to do it, though, so she continued to let him.

Besides, Steve would be back on Monday and everything could get back to normal. Steve would carry her bag for her if her back was still hurting. Her bruise was still bad and her back was a little stiff, but she hoped it would get better over the weekend.