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Angst Pamela Lee Creative Writing Celebration, Fiction, 1st Place Shit! Shit! Shit! No blood on the toilet paper. No spotting. Not even a smear. And God knows I’ve always been regular as clockwork -- every twenty-eight days, since I was thirteen. Dear God, don’t let me be pregnant! Please, don’t let me be pregnant. Papa would kill me, and there’s no way I could ever tell Mama. She would die of shame and disappointment -- all her hopes of having spawned a college graduate now focused on me since ‘Duardo got himself shot. Did I miss taking a pill? The dispenser says not. Aren’t these things supposed to be almost foolproof? Am I to be the “almost” statistical exception? Two missed periods now. Jeez. Maybe it’s stress. God knows a Freshman is under enough! So much homework! I stay sleep-deprived and survive mainly on peanut butter and Cheez-its. College is ten times harder than high school ever was. So please let it be stress. Or just maybe that bout of flu stopped the flow, so to speak. Damn you, Lowell! Where are you! Out with some blonde bimbo with big boobs you’re hoping to score with? (How’s that for alliteration, English major?) You couldn’t/wouldn’t help anyway, if one of your wiggly spermatozoa has actually won the swimming race to my ovum: no money for an abortion, and then there’s your aristocratic reputation to uphold. A Brahmin from Boston, where the Lowells speak only to Cabots and the Cabots speak only to God? Give me a break! I won’t think about how sweet and thoughtful you were when we were “courting.” Courting. Such an old-fashioned word. I thought you really liked me as well as lusted for me. But raging teenage hormones (mine included) being what they are.... Of course I knew better. Or should have. Should never have agreed to go to your room. Girls are warned about what guys want by the time we get our permanent teeth. 54
