Jealousy, summer 2000
a story about first flows & 12-year-old horniness
Judy Blume knew exactly what she was talking about. For a 12-year-old girl, there is no greater anguish than waiting for your period.
Summer 2000 was a second moon landing. The new millennium had cast its futuristic gloss over us all. On MTV, every music video had our pop-stars gyrating in space, their steps synchronized against backdrops of beetle black and neon white. It got to be so that I vaguely thought we’d all sorta hang out in space when we grew up.
The stars were our big sisters, we knew them by ranking on TRL. When Joey Fatone accepted an MTV music award in a space suit, we were there. We had opinions on Britney versus Christina, though it wasn’t really up for debate (Britney did ads for Pepsi, but she was clearly the Coca Cola). Jessica Simpson ranked third, but we still bought her edible body sprays, licking our sweaty forearms and grimacing. We didn’t taste like cotton candy or cake, as advertised.
That month, some of us got new accessories to play with. Kara and Leah, my two best friends, both had maxi pads tucked into their small purses.
Kara and Leah both lived equidistant from me, a five minute bike ride from my house. Kara was my oldest friend in the world, a superlative that I would mention in her birthday posts every year to infinity…
