Learning Curve | Joanne

28 Days Later

"Joe, what's the date today?"

Joe sat up in bed, looking across at Dianne who was getting ready to leave to go and rehearse the newest pro dance with her colleagues. She had pulled on a pair of leggings, her hand hovering over her hip as she waited for him to answer her.

Joe raised an eyebrow. "It's the 3rd. Why?"

Dianne paused for a moment, counting backwards in her head. Once she had got to the right number, she picked up her phone and scrolled through her calendar. Joe was still sat, silently staring, trying to work out what on earth was going on.

"OK, I need to set a reminder for the 10thand another for... the 7th. Cool."

Turning back to face Joe, she rolled her leggings back down slightly, peeling off the skin-coloured plaster that had been sat against her hip and walking over to Joe's bathroom. As she made her way back into the bedroom, she noticed that Joe seemed to be frozen, looking at her entirely confused. She smiled. "Sorry. I know it took far too long for me to figure that out. I'm not great at maths."

"What... what was that all about?" Joe asked, still perplexed. "And what is that thing on your hip? I noticed it ages ago, probably when we first started dancing, and I figured you were, like, trying to quit smoking or something. And then... well, I kept seeing it and by then I knew you weren't a smoker, but I didn't want to ask."

Dianne grinned, pulling on her t-shirt as she sat down next to her boyfriend on the bed. "You should have asked, Joe" she said quietly, "it's nothing weird. Basically, I'm too forgetful to take the pill and the injection made me feel weird, so the doctors got me to try this contraceptive patch thing. That's what the plaster is."

Joe nodded. "Alright, that makes sense. So how... how does it work?" He had heard about the contraceptive pill and the injection, he also thought there was some kind of implant thing girls could get, but this patch was brand new to him.

"I slap it on my skin for 3 weeks. Take it off for a week, then put a new one on. Actually, that's another thing I need to ask you. Do... do you mind which bin I use for, like, period stuff when I'm here? Now I've taken the patch off, I could probably do with finding that out."

"Don't you just flush them away?" he asked.

Dianne gasped, shaking her head. "David Attenborough would so ashamed. It's so bad for the environment. Plus, that's only for tampons. Anyway, bin?"

"That's never a question I've had to answer before. Use... use the bin in the en-suite. It, uh, gets emptied pretty regularly... high five for that, please" Joe held out his hand for Dianne. She grinned as she tapped it lightly.

"Are you talking about the Johnny bin? Is that what the label says?"

Joe shook his head. "I honestly will never forgive my dad for that one. First of all, what kind of father buys his son a plastic bathroom bin for his birthday? Especially a massive yellow one that says 'biohazard' on it? And then, to top it off, he put a massive sign on the lid saying 'Joe's Johnny bin'." He sighed. "Am I too old to get myself emancipated?"

Dianne couldn't help but laugh. The stories about Joe's dad were some of her all time favourites. He was so unlike her own father, who was sweet and gentle. Graham was a joker, just like his son, and he clearly loved to embarrass him as much as possible. It was so funny to see Joe squirm; she and Graham clearly had that in common.

"Dianne, it's not funny. Imagine how creepy that looked when I had... girls over. I'm surprised more didn't run away."

Dianne grinned. "Not gonna lie, Joe, it weirded me out the first time I saw it. And we weren't even together. I'd only come upstairs to get changed into those scrubs for your childbirth simulator video."