This chapter will contain very brief mentions of the menstrual cycle, so if that makes anyone uncomfortable, just skip over it.
This is the story of how Nerris became a patient of Campbell Hospital.
School sucked. Everyone knew school sucked, but they showed up anyway. Why?
Nerris still didn't know. When she'd been younger, she'd been anticipating that letter from Hogwarts, to go to a school that taught her things she wanted to know and had people who enjoyed stuff she enjoyed the same stuff as her. But no, normal school it was, where no one else enjoyed LARPing and Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. Year ago, they'd all played their pretend games together, but no, only Nerris wanted to do that now. Sadly.
And today was a shite day. Nerris had been carrying around an aching stomach, she had stayed up until three o'clock last night, reading, and hadn't done her geography homework. And just as she saw a very unwelcome face approach, the pain in her stomach increased and she winced, shoving her books in her bag and preparing to leave the classroom.
"Hey Nerris, wait up." Nerris groaned as her chief tormentor, Harriet Cunningham.
"What?" She snapped. "I'm not in the fucking mood today."
"Ooh, someone's a little touchy!" Harriet giggled as her two hangers on, Henrietta Dillinger and Halley McDonald, caught up, grinning too.
"Whatever, I've got to get to Geo."
"Why don't you fly there on," She laughed. "Your 'magic dragon'."
"Yeah." Halley giggled. "Or a broomstick."
"Shut up Halley!"
"Sorry Harriet."
Nerris rolled her eyes and tried to get past them, but Henrietta threw out her arm with a satisfied smile. Nerris scowled, but there were three of them and one of her. And she left her special throwing dice at home.
"Guys, can I just-" Nerris began, but gasped in sudden pain as the ache in her stomach seared up. She wrapped her arms around it and doubled over in pain.
The three tormentors looked at each other, uncertain.
"Is she OK?" Halley asked nervously. Harriet saw her opportunity and took it with a malicious grin.
"What is it Nerris?" She asked in mock kindness. "Is it your time of the month? or so he-she's like you even get periods?" They burst into laughter. Nerris didn't care, she couldn't concentrate, the pain was just... too much.
Then she felt someone flick her ear.
"Oi, transgirl! I'm talking to you!"
"Fuck off!" Nerris snapped. "I'm a girl, just like you, just leave me alone!" It was the truth, Nerris had thought about it, but did identify as her birth sex, despite her appearance.
"Just like us?!" Harriet exclaimed and they all laughed, like a hoard of cackling sirens.
She felt her ear get flicked again, and couldn't take it anymore. She dropped to her knees, clutching her stomach.
"Girls? What's going on in here?" Nerris looked up through her welling up eyes to see, at last, a teacher.
"Nerris doesn't feel well, we were going to help her to the medical room." Halley said in a voice that faked innocence. The teacher frowned, the knelt down beside Nerris.
"What's the matter Nerris. Did you get kicked?"
"I don't know, it just really hurts..." Nerris groaned. The teacher frowned.
"Off to your next lessons you three, I'll help Nerris."
The three girls left, still laughing.
"Hmm, do you remember doing anything to cause this?" The teacher asked. Nerris shook her head. "I don't want to alarm you Nerris, but this could be bad. Can you walk? I'll drive you to the hospital."
Nerris didn't remember a whole lot after that, only the teacher speeding down the road, the doctors asking her questions, and then she was in a scary operating room. She didn't like this at all.
"Just try to breathe deeply honey." A female surgeon told her. "We'll sort you out in a jiffy."
Nerris was really creeped out, but Sam the Hobbit was brave when he faced down the Orcs, Harry Potter was brave when he faced down the greatest evil wizard of all time. She could be brave too!
The next thing she knew, she was waking up in a room, and her parents were there. Her mum was crying a little, and hugged her, and then she got to have a long chat about Doctor Who with her dad while her mum talked to the doctor. It was then determined, Nerris would rest at the hospital until she was better. About a week and a half, they said. Well, this would be boring!
That night, she couldn't sleep, in the strange ward filled with strange kids. Her bed was next to another boy who didn't seem very friendly and the one on the other side...
Well, he hadn't spoken to her at all, but he didn't seem that friendly either.
Nerris was about to roll over and start reading the book her dad had dropped off, when she suddenly heard a sound she found surprising.
It was someone crying.
Nerris slowly turned over and saw the shape of the boy in the next bed, sat up, his shoulder's hunched over, the hat he'd been wearing in his hands. She watched him crying for a few minutes, before he suddenly stiffened, and looked at her.
Their eyes locked. She stared into his green eyes and he stared into hers. Then, fast as lightning, he threw himself backwards onto the bed and rolled away from her.
"Oh, sorry, I..." Nerris didn't really know what to say.
The boy faked snoring.
"I like your hat." Nerris said weakly. "It's, err, a magician's hat, isn't it."
The boy didn't move. Then he rolled over.
"Yes." He told her quietly. "That's what I do. And you?"
"I'm more into dragons and D&D myself." Nerris admitted. "I'm Nerris, by the way."
"I know." The boy said. "David, the nurse, the annoying one, said a new patient would be arriving today, by the name of Nerris." She caught his grin in the dark. "You, I presume."
"Wow, you really are magic!" Nerris said sarcastically. The boy shrugged. "So, do you have a name, or shall I just call you 'magic boy'." She meant this as a joke, but the boy looked downwards, biting his lip. "Oh, err, I'm sorry, I-"
"Harrison." The boy said with a bright smile. "My name is Harrison."
Nerris decided that her week and a half spent in this ward wouldn't be so boring after all.
