WARNINGS: Includes homophobic/transphobic language. This is Part 1 of 4.
Two days ago, Natalie had woken up with a pounding headache and chills, fully in the grip of the flu. The timing could hardly have been worse.
Granted, she had plenty of PTO left at work, no upcoming appointments she couldn’t reschedule, and her son and his wife had finally decided to sleep train the baby—yes, *they* had been nothing but gracious about the news—had even sent her a bouquet of flowers, thank-you note attached. They sat wilting in a vase in the hallway.
In other news, Tom had been sent to the store that afternoon to restock on Nyquil and honey lozenges, and come back with two bottles of wine. He plunked them down on the coffee table–littered with the corpses of several dozen Kleenex–and spoke first, with an air of forced casualness. “Want a glass?”
Natalie did not, in fact, want a glass. Her head was pounding so hard, it felt like her skull was forcing its way out of her skin. She’d spent the last 48 hours wrapped in several blankets on the family room couch, drifting in and out of consciousness while marathoning the Great British Baking Show. *Must it* really *be now?* she asked the universe, but pasted a smile on her face anyway. “Sure, dear. Just a splash.”