July 28—The New Moon

MISTY’S FIRST BATCH of birth control pills, Peter monkeyed with. He replaced them with little cinnamon candies. The next batch he just flushed down the toilet.
You flushed down the toilet. By accident, you said.
After that, student health services wouldn’t refill her prescription for another thirty days. They got her fitted for a diaphragm, and a week later Misty found a little hole poked through the center of it. She held it up to the window to show Peter, and he said, “Those things don’t last forever.”
Misty said she just got it.

“They wear out,” he said.
Misty said his penis wasn’t so big it hit her cervix and punched a hole in her diaphragm.
Yourpenis isn’t that big.
After that, Misty kept running out of spermicidal foam. This was costing her a fortune. Each can, Misty used maybe one time and then she’d find it empty. After a few cans, Misty came out of the bathroom one day and asked Peter, was he messing with her foam?
Peter was watching his Spanish soap operas, where all the women had waists so small they could be wet rags wrung dry. They lugged around giant breasts behind spaghetti straps. Their eyes smeared with glitter makeup, they were supposed to be doctors and lawyers.
Peter said, “Here,” and he reached around behind his neck with both hands. He pulled something from inside the collar of his black T-shirt and held it out. This was a shimmering necklace of pink rhinestones, strands of ice-cold pink, all pink flash and sparkle. And he said, “You want this?”
And Misty was struck stupid as his Spanish bimbos. All she could do was reach out and take one end of the necklace in each hand. In the bathroom mirror, it sparkled against her skin. Looking at the necklace in the mirror, touching it, Misty heard the prattle of Spanish from the other room.
Misty yelled, “Just don’t touch my foam anymore. Okay?”
All Misty heard was Spanish.
Of course, her next period never came. After the first couple days, Peter brought her a box of pregnancy test sticks. These were the kind you pee on. They’d show a yes or no if you’re knocked up. The sticks weren’t sealed in any paper wrappers. They all smelled like pee. They already showed a “no” for not pregnant.
Then Misty saw how the bottom of the box had been pulled open and then taped shut. To Peter, standing, waiting outside the bathroom door, Misty said, “You just bought these today?”
Peter said, “What?”
Misty could hear Spanish.
When they’d fuck, Peter kept his eyes shut, panting and heaving. When he came, his eyes squeezed shut, he’d shout, “Te amo!”
Through the bathroom door, Misty shouted, “Did you pee on these?”
The doorknob turned, but Misty had it locked. Then, through the door, Peter’s voice said, “You don’t need those. You’re not pregnant.”
And Misty asked, so where was her monthly visit from dot?
“Right here,” his voice said. Then fingers poked through the crack under the door. They were shoving something white and soft. “You dropped these on the floor,” he said. “Take a good look at them.”
It was her panties, spotted with fresh blood.