fandomhigh | Sexual Safety [period 2, Friday]

"Good morning!" Irene called, waving from her perch on top of the desk at the front of the room. She had on the desk a box that might look familiar to a couple people in the class. But, probably more distracting were the items on the table she'd set up at the front of the room -- a fishbowl of condoms, a colorful display of 28-day birth control pills, lubricants, spermicide, female condoms, and -- everyone's favorite -- dental dams. While other teachers had opted to take their students outdoors today, Irene unfortunately had props for today, and didn't want to risk them blowing away in the wind or being carried off by errant squirrels. Instead, she'd left the windows of her classroom open, at least, which might hopefully provide a distraction from all the...that. Sorry, kids.

"Welcome to Sexual Safety. For those of you I don't know, my name's Irene Adler -- Ms. Adler's fine if you'd like, and depending on the day I might answer to my given name, but none of that 'professor' business in here, all right?" She flashed them a smile, and plucked up the box. "Due to the sensitive nature of our discussions in here, I'm going to go ahead and apologize preemptively if I embarrass any of you. I'm not one for using euphemisms to tiptoe around sex politely, like we ought to be ashamed of it -- the point of this course is to teach you all how to be safe out there, and we can't do that unless we look at things frankly. So if you ever need to excuse yourself, anything like that, it's no problem, and no questions asked. But -- I know it can be difficult to have questions and not want to vocalize them in front of your peers, necessarily. That's what the box is for. Drop it in here anonymously, and I'll answer it the next class, the best I can."

She replaced the box on her desk, hopping off and wandering over to her table of goodies. "Now, as a necessity, I'm assuming you all know the basics of how sex works. If you don't know -- and I don't just mean heterosexual intercourse, here -- and you need clarification on anything, please do see me after class. I have plenty of resources to help you out there. But we're going to be approaching this class from a standpoint of already understanding how one might contract an STD -- sexually transmitted disease -- or possibly get pregnant."

She gestured to the table. "This is an assortment of the types of things you should be using if you're having sex or planning to. There's a little label next to each item to tell you what it is and what it does. Take a few minutes, explore, and then come back to your seats. It's still the first day, even if we're accelerating things. I'm not skipping the bloody introductions or they'll have my head, I think."

[links in the comments are NSFW, but in a Planned Parenthood/Wikipedia kind of way.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I speak several languages--" She stopped herself from listing them all, and smiled back tentatively. "And I grew up in only one place, very isolated. I was able to travel for the first time last year. Morocco, and Spain. I loved it." She bit her lip and added, "Mostly I don't want to stay in the same place. As long as you're going somewhere, new things are happening." And you were safer, and less likely for the CIA to track you down again. "I met lovely people along the way."

She gave some of the props a curious look. "I have read about these, but never seen them. Do you have to use all of them together?" This was much more complicated than kissing.

Irene could relate, more than a little bit. "I used to travel quite a bit in my former profession," she replied, nodding. "Mostly around Europe, of course -- Spain's wonderful, and I'm so glad you enjoyed it. Courier's not a bad way to go, particularly if you've a gift with languages."

As for the more clinical question, though, Irene considered her props with a small grin, and lifted her brows at Hanna. "You absolutely do not need to use them all at once. I promise. That'd be...quite a set up. If you're planning on having sex with boys, at least, a condom'll probably suffice for the time being. That'll protect you from disease and pregnancy. The rest of these are more long-term anti-baby measures, more than anything."

"The music, the food... and we got to ride Vespas." So much fun. And easier than cars. "I want to see Hong Kong someday. And Rio."

She listened, serious expression on her face, and nodded. "It has not come up before. But I do not think I would make a good mother. At least, not yet. So the condom. And-- the rhythm method? I think?"

"The...rhythm method," Irene echoed, frowning a little. "Well, if you're looking for a backup birth control, I'd recommend the pill over the rhythm method. There's something like a seventy-five percent success rate there, because our bodies aren't perfect machines, as opposed to the pill's and condom's respective near-hundred percent effectivity."

She frowned thoughtfully. "I have some things you could read on it all, if you'd like to research more. And my door's always open." Poor thing seemed like she'd perhaps not had the most thorough education in this area.

Not even a little. The bare facts, but Erik had been planning on explaining it more when it was necessary, and then, well.

"Thank you, Ms. Adler. I think I might."

Sexual Safety [period 2, Friday]

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