Wolf was worried. When he got home from work, their baby was alone in the crib, fussing fretfully. Normally Virginia would right there with hugs and toys but she wasn't even in the same room. Distractedly scooping Cubling up, he tracked the mingled scents of his mate, hot cocoa, microwaved dry rice, and a troubling overtone of blood back to the bedroom.

Virginia was flat on her stomach on the bed, her fists balled in her gut, warm rice-stuffed socks draped across the small of her back, a bottle of Advil and an empty cocoa mug on the floor. She'd scooted so her chin was on the edge of the bed, nose pointed to their little TV/VCR combination. On the screen a very tiny screen Mel Gibson and Danny Glover were blowing things up. Cubling wailed a little louder at the noise.

"Virginia? My succulent darling, are you all right?"

"...no..."

"Are you hurt? Did you cut yourself? Let me call a doctor!"

Her voice was muffled by the bedspread, but she didn't move to talk to him. "I didn't cut myself."

"But I smell --"

"I didn't cut myself. I'll be okay. Can you shush the baby?"

"Do you want me to bring Cubling to you?" Wolf offered, holding the child out.

"NO! That noise is getting on my... I mean, I'm just not up to dealing right now, okay?"

Torn between his ailing wife and fussing child, Wolf hesitated in the doorway. "I want to help."

"Then Shut That Baby... um, later, okay? Go. Cubling now, me later."

There was no hope of shushing Cubling up with all that gunfire coming from the TV, so Wolf retreated to the living room. Fortunately, Cubling really only wanted a little attention; the sweet little cub went right to sleep after a little rocking and a couple verses of the shepherdess song. With one problem solved, Wolf turned back to the suddenly silent bedroom to find Virginia shuffling out, holding the socks. "They cooled off."

Wolf reached to hug her, but she shrank away from his touch. "Honey, what's wrong? What can I do?" he wailed helplessly as she shuffled by and slung the socks back into the microwave.

Virginia poked her head back out of the kitchen, still wan but not as remote as she'd been. "I'll be okay, really I will. It's just that with the pregnancy I got out of practice for this, and I didn't take the medicine fast enough to stop the cramps. I wasn't quite ready either. You want to help? Run down the street and get some supplies for me." She scribbled a quick note and shoved it at him as she shuffled back to the bedroom with the socks.

"CVS - one 40-count box OB regular. One 20-count box OB super. One bottle ibuprophen. Big chocolate bar."

"With nuts!" Virginia shouted from the bedroom over the resuming sounds of televised mayhem.

"Blockbuster," Wolf continued down the list. "Rent Lethal Weapon 3 and Backdraft."

"Get Speed if they don't have those two."

"Wouldn't you like something nice?" Wolf asked desperately. "What kind of a movie is called Lethal Weapon?"

"A Mel Gibson movie!"

"Wouldn't you like something nice and soothing instead? Um, Forever Young? While You Were Sleeping?"

"NOTHING SAPPY!"

"But I don't understand!" Wolf half howled. "Why do you suddenly want to watch people killing each other? What's an OB? What medicine didn't you take in time? In time for what? What's wrong with you?"

The gunfire went mute again and Virginia stuck her head out the door. "Look, buster, I don't tell you how do deal with your cycle, don't you tell me how to deal with mine. Go. Fetch. Now!"

Her....? Oh, wait, he knew about that. Well, he'd heard of it. But the books hadn't told him what an OB was. Or said anything about Mel Gibson and guns. Wait. There was a different movie he could get, one that wasn't so violent. Virginia had gotten it for him during his cycle a few months ago He stuck his head back through the door. "Do you want me to rent that movie you got for me? That Babe thing?"

This time she tore her eyes away from the screen, giving him a long, steady look. "Do you remember what happened when I showed you that movie at the full moon?"

Wolf snorted. "Of course I... well, not very clearly... okay, not at all."

"I had to pull you off the TV six times. You almost electrocuted yourself trying to get inside the box."

"Oh."

For a very brief second she smiled. "It was pretty amusing to watch you try to get to all that prey. But that's not what I want to see right now."

"Anything you want is yours." Wolf nodded to himself as he pattered down the stairs. He knew all about cycles. This would be really easy.

This was really embarrassing. The list seemed so simple until he was actually at the store. Take the chocolate. "With nuts" she said. But what kind of nuts? There were bars with peanuts, hazelnuts, almonds, even a really expensive box of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts. He got one of everything to be sure. Then he thought about his appetite during the cycle and got a second round of everything. Those macadamia nuts looked really good. He got another box for himself.

Okay, it was probably over the top, but he was always going over the top. At least she would know that he wanted to do right by her. Satisfied that his extravagance was a forgivable gesture of caring, he started to look for the OBs.

Problem. He still didn't know what an OB was!

Wolf sighed and looked at the hanging signs, half wishing that one of them would magically start flashing "This is what she wants." Of course none of them did, but one of them said "Feminine Products." That sounded sufficiently vague. All the other girly stuff like makeup and hose and hairspray was all clearly marked, so by a process of elimination...

Cripes!  He had no idea that women needed all this stuff. And now that he was looking at the boxes he still couldn't tell what it was and what it did. "New comfort glide applicator!" one box proclaimed, showing a drawing of something that looked like a blunt crossbow bolt with a corded kite tail.

Maybe he didn't want to know what it was or what it did.

There were two kinds of OB boxes, and he wasn't sure which ones she wanted. Applicators? But there was something about those applicators that just made him nervous.

He dithered so long that he caught the attention of a salesgirl restocking shelves lower down the aisle "May I help you, sir?" she asked, coming up.

Wolf felt himself blush as he handed the list over, but what else could he do? This needed a woman. He didn't have any experience with this. He didn't even have the equipment to imagine it.

She didn't change expression at all, just snatched a couple boxes off the shelves and jerked her head to tell him to follow. Weirdly relieved, Wolf obeyed and piled the chocolate high on the counter so nobody else could see what she was ringing up.

The only crack in the salesgirl's expression was when she leaned over and gave him a conspiratorial wink as she handed him the bulging bag. "I threw in a bag of Doritos too. I swear by them that time of the month. That cheese powder is better than Midol!"

Wolf suppressed a shudder. Doritos weren't food. They smelled funny and tasted like plastic. Virginia should be eating good red meat, dripping blood...well, all right, maybe there was enough blood already dripping between the violent movies and... and... ewwww. He growled at himself. He could do this. He would do this. She was counting on him. Besides, she put up with his cycles; he could learn to put up with hers.

Blockbuster was right next door, but it was out of copies of all the Lethal Weapon movies. Wolf took one look at Backdraft and put it back. No way he was going to watch anything that involved people getting burned up. That was way too personal.

Wolf looked wildly around for something else, a movie that would satisfy Virginia's sudden bloodlust without totally creeping him out. What to pick, what to pick, what to pick. Oh, that one looked nice, that one about silent lambs. Nice, fluffy, wooly, tender little lambs, good lambs, don't bleat and warn the shepherd...

Then he read the back of the case.

No! Definitely not!! He didn't want to see that! And considering his tender Ginny's sudden moods, he didn't want to give her any ideas, either.

What to do, what to do... he couldn't get her the movies she asked for, he couldn't seem to find anything else for her that wouldn't terrify him.

The salesperson behind the counter was female, and nobody was up there with her. Taking a huge breath, Wolf marched forward and privately hoped she'd be as helpful as the other shop girl.

"Hellooooo," he told her, with his best lure-the-shepherdess-off-the-path-through-the-woods smile. Unfortunately, just as he was gearing up to one of his better verbal seductions, he set the bag on the counter and its most embarrassing contents spilled out.

"That's not for me," Wolf blurted, shoving it back.

"I should hope not," she told him with a reasonable approximation of a straight face.

Exposed, Wolf fell back on the truth. That and his regrettable tendency to babble. Even while he mentally cursed himself, his mouth went into automatic. "It's my wife. It's for her, not for me. Of course it's not for me, it's not like I'd ever need this stuff. Well, I need this stuff, the stuff here, I like movies, I come here all the time, it's the other stuff, you know, the stuff in the... well, it's the first time she's... the first time she's dealt with... well, no it's not the first time she's dealt with it, how could it be? She must have started years ago. But it's the first time I've had to... She gave me a list, and you don't have one and I can't stand the other and I don't know what to get her and I have to bring back something," he finally confessed miserably.

If she bit her lip any harder she'd draw blood, but it was keeping the smile off her face. Almost. "Movies for that time of the month, huh?" she said sympathetically.

"What, you have a section for them?" Wolf asked, looking around.

He caught the smirk before she hid it. "Tell you what, I'll give you what I like to watch."

Apparently she liked Harrison Ford more than Mel Gibson. Ten minutes later, Wolf was out the door with Air Force One and The Fugitive. It wasn't so bad that women got bloodthirsty - that he understood. But what was this fascination with Hollywood heroes? Why watch teeny tiny people on TV when your mate was right there? He knew what HE wanted to do with his mate during his cycle! Surely Virginia would be waiting for him with open arms when he got back. He'd give her a cycle to remember! Hey, if he got her pregnant again, it would be like doing her a favor if her cycles were like this!

She was back in position on the bed, and a dim instinct for self-preservation made Wolf rapidly rethink his passionate plans. Particularly the way she pounced on the bag of food when he tossed it to her.

"Ooooo, Doritos! Wolf, that's perfect! Thank you!" Virginia ripped into the bag like a cub making its first kill; messy, enthusiastic, and frantic to eat.

The movie she was watching had just ended; Wolf turned away to stop the credits rolling up the screen and put in a new movie. By the time he turned back, Virginia was eating Doritos sandwiched between chocolate squares.

Wolf shuddered. But when she put her disgusting snack down and moaned, shoving both fists back into her gut, he went to her, settling gently next to her and running a hand down her back. He could feel a cramp ripple through her. Poor little sausage! At least his cramps didn't last very long. Not like this! Wolf began to rub her back, running his thumbs under the socks to knead out the knots he could feel in her muscles. "Are all your cycles this bad?"

"No. Just a few. If I catch it in time, take the pills before I feel anything, then there aren't any cramps at all."

"Poor thing, it must be horrible for you."

Virginia laughed shakily. "Better this than to howl at the moon! I'm glad I'm me and not a wolf woman, to have to have both cycles... at... once..." Her horrified eyes met his, and then they both turned in unison to look at the crib.

But little Wendy Wolf, nicknamed Cubling, was peacefully sound asleep.

Four Months Later

"Wolf, stop sniffing at me! It's gross!"

"I'm sorry my sweet lambkin. Um, I'll be home late tonight. I have to pick some things up after work."

"What?"

"Let it be a surprise."

"I'm not in the mood for surprises, Wolf."

"I can imagine not."

"What's THAT supposed to mean?"

"Nothing, my darling duckling. How about I make you an extra-special dinner tonight? Eggs florentine, peanut soup, chocolate mousse with macadamia cream? And I'll get you a movie. I hear Legend of Sleepy Hollow is good."

"Wolf, that sounds delicious. But I don't know if I want to see Sleepy Hollow. I hear it's really violent."

"I'll bring Maverick too. But I think you might change your mind by the time I get home tonight."

"Why would I do that?"

"No reason, dear."

Fifteen years later

Another one of those annoying tenants was buzzing down to the custodian's quarters. Didn't they know he wanted some quiet time? Mr. Murray twisted around to look at the board to take note of who it was, although he didn't intend to do anything right away... Oh, it was THAT condo!

"Right away, Master" he whispered to himself as he jumped up. The Master did not stay at home very often, but He had ordered them to take good care of His daughter and granddaughter. Murray took his orders very seriously. If he was good enough, maybe The Master would him kiss His ass again. It had been years since he had been so favored.

The Master met him at the door. Loud shouting could be heard behind The Master's back, but before he could offer to deal with the annoyance, The Master shoved papers at him.

"Murray, I want you to do get everything on this list."

"Whatever you ask, my Master." He snapped his fingers at his now-grown son, who had come along in hopes of gaining the Master's approval. "You, get this now."

"This is an unusual list, Dad," his son said, frowning slightly. "Not that I question The Master's word!" he hastily added with a low bow. He feinted towards The Master's rear, but The Master shut the door and leaned against it. The shouting inside continued, now muffled.

"May I read the list to be sure that I understand all things the Master requires?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure. Believe me, you don't want to anger anyone in there tonight," The Master said wryly.

This was too important to trust to his boy. Murray snatched the list back, adjusted his new bifocals, and started reading out loud.

"Thirty pounds of pork loin. Eight legs of lamb. Twenty pounds of lamb chops. Does The Master wish mint sauce with all this mutton?"

They must have been listening inside the apartment; a muffled shout of "NO MINT SAUCE! NOTHING MUCKING UP THE MEAT!" came through the door, followed by what sounded like a howl.

"What he said," The Master repeated.

Murray bowed his understanding. "Three gallons of milk. Three boxes of spinach souffle. A bunch of bananas. Twenty chocolate bars."

"WITH NUTS!" came through the door. This time Murray recognized the voices of The Master's daughter and granddaughter. He bowed again, although they couldn't see him through the door.

"It shall be as they ask." He returned to the list. "One large bottle of Advil. Two boxes of Swiss Miss hot cocoa. Two boxes of OB tampons, 40-count, regular. Two boxes of OB tampons, 20-count, super. Shall I have my wife get these things?"

"No," The Master told him with a broad smile."I particularly want you to go get them."

Murray bowed again. "I am gratified to accomplish your every wish, Master. I shall get them first thing. Rent Jurassic Park, the Hunt for Red October, Goldeneye, Speed, Babe, and Chicken Run. Shall I buy these movies rather than rent them? I wish your family to have everything it wants."

There was silence behind the door. The Master shrugged and said, "Sure, buy 'em. With your credit card."

"It shall be my family's pleasure to gift you with everything on this list," Murray assured him. "I shall deliver everything to you shortly."

"Deliver it to them, I'm going for a long walk in the park." The Master zipped his jacket up. "Oh, and Murray? One suggestion. Bring it all before moonrise."