“Maybe even longer,” he said hopefully, which made me blush. I kissed him on the lips and then he was gone. On the drive back to my house, I left my car running at an empty four-way stop, taped one of the posters to the stop sign, and then ran back to my car, feeling so wild. I drove exactly five miles above the speed limit through residential streets. I felt like I was flying.

I WOKE UP LATER THAT NIGHT BECAUSE MY MOM WAS SHAKING me, and I startled awake. “Jesus, Mom?” I said, my voice scratchy, my head so heavy.

“I’m sorry, sweetie,” she said, kind of whispering but also kind of shouting. It was a strange effect. I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming. “I know it’s late, but I really want to talk to you.”

“Right now?” I asked.

“Yes, right now,” she said. “Here, move over, jeez, just let me . . . Frankie? Wake up, okay? Just scoot over so I can sit down.”

I sighed as deeply as possible, long enough that I was starting to fall back asleep, and then I slumped over a few inches so she could sit on the bed.

“Now, I know I was acting all cool and hip this afternoon, you remember? When I found you two . . . kissing, I guess you’d call it? And Zeke seems like a sweet kid. And I don’t want to mess you up any more than . . . well, I just don’t want to put a lot of unnecessary pressure on you, but I’ve been up all night. I can’t sleep.”

“What is it, Mom?” I asked, so grumpy, but also kind of terrified that she’d somehow found out about the art, the Xerox machine, the posters hanging up in town.

“I just . . . I know we talked about all of this a few years ago, but it didn’t really feel real to me then. Now I feel like I just need to reiterate some of those talking points, okay?”

“What is it, Mom?” I said.

“You’re a young woman, and your body is your body, and that’s fine, I respect that. And it’s natural, like we talked about before, to have desires.”

“Gross,” I said. “Desires.”

“Frankie, just shut up for a second,” she continued. “If you’re going to be physical . . . you know, have sex—there, I said it. If you have sex with Zeke, I want you to use protection. You have to use protection. That’s nonnegotiable.”

“Mom, this is embarrassing. I’m not going to have sex with Zeke. It’s fine.”

“Look,” my mom now said, reaching into the pocket of her bathrobe, “just take these condoms, okay. Frankie? Just take them.”

“I don’t want these condoms,” I told her.

“You have to take them. That’s nonnegotiable. And that’s what you tell Zeke, too, okay? Say, it’s nonnegotiable. Let me hear you say it.”