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A few hours later, all that giddiness left me

“Nan!” I yelled, pushing her front door open without knocking My voice was panicked and thin, and I wasn’t even sure how I’d driven to her house,so badly

“In here—what the heck is going on?” my nan asked as she rounded the corner into the entryway “What’s wrong?”

“I think I’ up to my mouth as if I could catch the words before they reached her

“Oh, Christ,” another voice rasped as my auntie, Vera, walked out behind her

“Vera,” Nan hissed

“Co back toward the kitchen

With my eyes miserably pointed toward the floor, I followed the back and forth, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying and didn’t really care, anyway

Vera was married to the Aces’ president, Slider, and she’d been a constant inup She’d practically raised raotten back together with ramps, she and Vera had picked up their old friendship as if they hadn’t been apart for thirty years I should have known Vera would be there

Where Vera was hard, Nan was soft Vera spoke without thinking and Nan calculated every word They were opposites in every way, yet they complimented each other

“Coon?”

“I thought I was due this week,” I answered desperately, looking up to ht I was due, so I stopped at the store to get so home, I realized I should’ve started last week, not this week”

“Hell, you kno many times I’ve been late?” Vera said

“I’ued “I have thirty days between periods Always Not twenty-eight, not thirty-one Thirty”

“You haven’t taken a test?” Nan asked kindly

“No” That’s when I started to cry

Vera made a noise in her throat “Why are you cryin,’ Bellatrix? You’re a grooood man This is excitin’ news”

I dropped my head into my hands and cried harder