She was curled up in a tight ball, her knees pulled to her chest, her chin resting on the hood of her gray sweatshirt.

“Grace,” I said, dropping to one knee beside the bench.

“What’s going on?”

She looked up at me, her face flushed red across her cheekbones.

“It hurts worse than this morning,” she whispered.

“Why didn’t you go down to the nurse’s office?” I asked.

She pulled her sweatshirt sleeves lower over her thumbs and stared at her sneakers.

“Dad said I was being dramatic,” she whispered softly.