The Friend Zone(9)

“No. But I grew up with enough women to know the drill. Also, I’m a paramedic. You shouldn’t be taking aspirin for cramps. Aleve or Motrin is better.”

“Yeah, I know. I ran out,” she muttered.

“I’m going to get some lunch. Want something?” I figured if I was going to eat, might as well ask her too.

She opened an eye and looked at me. “No.” Then she sat up with a grimace. “I need to go to the store.”

“What do you need? I’ll get it. I’m going out anyway.”

She clutched the heating pad to her belly and eyed me. “You don’t want to buy what I need. Trust me.”

I scoffed. “What? Pads? Tampons? I have six sisters. This isn’t my first rodeo. Text me what you want.” I turned for the garage before she could object. I couldn’t care less about buying the stuff, and she didn’t strike me as the kind of woman to be embarrassed by feminine products—or anything, for that matter.

She wasn’t. She sent me a long list. It was all heavy-duty. Ultra this and overnight that. I grabbed her some Motrin too.

I stopped at McDonald’s and got her food, figuring she was probably too sick to make something for herself.

When I got back, I dropped the bag of tampons at the foot of the couch.

“Thanks,” she said, sitting up to peer into the top of the bag. “I’ll write you a check. I’ve never met a guy who was willing to buy that stuff.”

“What, your boyfriend gets worried the cashier will think he’s got his period?” I said, plopping onto the couch next to her with the McDonald’s bag in my lap.

She gave me a little smile. She already seemed to be feeling better. The Motrin must have been working.

I started pulling food from the bag. “Fries,” I said, putting the red container in her hand. “And a hot fudge sundae.” I put that in the other hand.

She looked from her hands back to me in confusion.

“My sisters always wanted something salty and sweet when they were on their periods,” I explained, digging out the rest of the food. “Fries and hot fudge sundaes. They’d send me out to McDonald’s. I bought it on autopilot. There’s a Big Mac and two cheeseburgers too. I didn’t know what you wanted.”

Her face softened, and for the first time since I’d met her, it looked unguarded, like she just now decided to like me. I must have finally tamponed my way into her good graces.

“Six sisters, huh? Younger? Older?” she asked.

“All older. My parents stopped when they finally got their boy.”

Dad said he’d cried from happiness.

“Wow. No wonder you ply menstruating women with ice cream. I bet when their periods synced they sat around glaring at you and making prison shivs.”

I snorted. “Big Mac or cheeseburger?”

“Cheeseburger. So, how’d you meet Brandon?” she asked, setting the sundae down on the coffee table and eating one of the fries.

I handed her a yellow paper-wrapped cheeseburger. “The Marines.”

She arched an eyebrow. “You were a Marine?”

“Once a Marine, always a Marine,” I said, taking the Big Mac and opening the box.

She looked me up and down. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-nine. Same as Brandon.”

Stuntman Mike jumped up suddenly from the couch and started barking frantically at nothing. He startled the shit out of me, but she didn’t even flinch, like this was a daily occurrence. He stared at nothing, seemed satisfied that whatever it was was gone, and then he spun a few times and lay back down. His shirt today read I MISS MY BALLS.

“How old are you?” I asked.

“Twenty-four. Like Sloan.”

She was mature for her age. But then I always thought Sloan was too.

“Hmm.” I took a bite and chewed thoughtfully. “You seem older.”

A sideways smile told me she liked that I thought that.

“How are you liking the new fire station?” she asked.

She must have seen the answer on my face.

“Really? It’s shitty?” She seemed surprised.

I shook my head. “I don’t know. It’s all right.”

“What? Tell me.”

I twisted my lips. “It’s just at my old station, we didn’t get shit medical calls. I mean, we only got, like, three a day—”

“How many do you get here?”

“Twelve? Fifteen? It’s a busy station. But the calls are bullshit. Drunk homeless guys. Crap that should be a trip to a walk-in clinic. I went on a call yesterday for a stubbed toe.”

“Well, most people are pretty fucking stupid.” She ate a fry.

“My granddad used to always say, ‘Even duct tape can’t fix stupid,’” I said, putting my straw in my mouth.

“Hmm. No. But it can muffle the sound.”

I burst into laughter and almost choked on my soda. I liked her wit so much more when I wasn’t the brunt of it.

“You know, I never thought about firefighting being like that,” she said after I’d gotten hold of myself. “It’s so romanticized. Every little boy’s dream,” she said sarcastically.

I looked into my fry box. “It is not what everyone thinks it is—that’s for sure.”