With my secret fear keeping me tossing at night, I pray for a red stain to appear. Eventually, it does, to my great and intense relief, but what comes to light later is even more relieving and revealing than the menstrual blood.

I discover my concern had not been unique. My friend Rachel calls me a week later, her voice high and strained, and demands I "come over. Right. Now." Sitting cross-legged on her bed and looking anywhere but at me, she explains that she and Brian had sex recently, and now her period is late. "But I'm on the Pill, so I shouldn't be, you know. . . But what should I do, Bianca? What if I am?" Rachel laments.