Free Period: Chapters 7–9

That feeling of nearly imperceptible damp on my derriere.

Found this in Mom’s purse, a pink sticky note said in my sister’s demonic scrawl.

In the last week I’d fished some juice box straws out of the trash to deliver to her as tribute, but otherwise I’d put the caring nonsense out of my mind.

Even for Mr. Craft it was a half-hearted admonition.

It had taken a while to train him—at the beginning of the year I’d write arcane proofs I found in my mom’s college textbooks whenever I got called to the board—but for the last few months we’d developed a truce where I would get every single question in class correct in exchange for him leaving me alone.

It is possible that falling out of an airplane or jumping into hot lava could be worse, but having to walk alone with an adult you have nothing to say to has to be up there on the list of most abominable ways to spend your time.

I slipped in before she could impart any more words of wisdom.

“But seriously, girlie-girl, you cannot keep doing this. In the last month you’ve had enough loose stool to constitute dysentery, symptoms you clearly concocted to mimic ringworm—for which I have to say the makeup was impressive—and leprosy.”

Being tormented at bus lineup for a bloodstain seemed the much lesser evil compared to Mom sitting me on a towel in the back seat while she lectured me on the personal responsibility inherent to feminine hygiene.

I managed to peel off the mile-long plastic strip and was devising a way to try to clean myself and my clothes with the world’s thinnest toilet paper when, all of a sudden, a tampon appeared from beneath the stall divider.

I thanked him. I mean, it was some high-quality, pre-hole-punched stationery.

Do you understand I’ve been building to this project with everything else we’ve done with the club—the seasonal plantings, the used book drive, the reclaimed water initiative, Strawmageddon...

But I could admit that mine was a nonstarter, too.

I asked, holding up a fontina wedge in one hand and Gruyère in the other.

I’m sharing groundbreaking cheese-based vacation plans, and one parent is waiting to form a united front to say no because they never tell you to wait for the other parent when the answer is yes.

I want to support you, Gracie. But your last endeavor with Helen ended with police sirens.

“Physically, I’m golden. Cosmically, the prognosis is bleak,” I said.

Yes, Michael F., I’m familiar with the flick, and I am seriously tempted. Alas, I have a date with destiny.

Maybe some corsages made of tampons?

She had a gray streak that made it look like she could conjure lightning and definitely decipher Gracie’s emoji summoning.

I searched for a cauldron, a mortar and pestle, something witchy, but everything seemed normal.

“Good girl. Your mother continues her atrocities against the noble bulb, but at least she finally came to her senses and sent you to make the peace. You came. You’re a brave girl. I respect that. And I accept. We can have the peace.”

She mixed powders from vials and liquids from cold beakers together in a big bowl, added a carafe of fresh water, and dunked my pants in.

Carmella took a fluffy towel out of a drawer and used it to wring out my leggings.

“Mommy will have to tell you her own story, but when I first got my period, we had an olive oil cake to celebrate the blessing and lament the curse,” Carmella said.