I Am The Box Of Tampons Matty Delivered To Jenna

I am the box of tampons Matty (Beau Mirchoff) delivered to Jenna (Ashley Rickards).

I can appreciate that part of the purpose of the latest episode was to make it clear to Awkward.'s viewers -- most of whom are probably teenaged girls -- that even though living with your high-school boyfriend might sound good, it would actually be uncomfortable. And there's nothing more evocative for a teenaged girl than body horror. A teenaged girl is kind of a stranger to her own body: it's going through changes she can barely comprehend, all of which are gross. Parts she grew up with have, in the last year, changed so much as to be unrecognizable -- and now stuff is coming out of them that she'd really prefer to deny or at least ignore. And although, on an intellectual level, she understands that her boyfriend has a general idea of what goes on with her biologically, by tacit agreement they both pretend to be ignorant. So when such a boyfriend strides into her home, and her personal space, and plops me down in front of her, the illusion is punctured and things can never be the same. What's next -- she farts in front of him? (Turns out...yes. Yes, she does.)

But I don't appreciate being the thing that slams us into the "AWKWARD." title card. I'm the most awkward thing to happen this week? A week that, we learn, she's spent desperately clenching her bowels? Can't she appreciate what I represent? She just had a pregnancy scare. If I'm coming into her life, it means she hasn't accidentally made a very big mistake.

Furthermore: Jenna doesn't realize how good she actually has it. Didn't she notice how cheerful Matty was? How matter-of-fact? How, dare I say, mature? Most of Matty's classmates would probably react to that box like it was crawling with spiders, but not Matty! There are men -- grown-ass adults who own houses and vote -- who are not that cool with menstruation.

I never meant to come between Matty and Jenna, as it were. But she needs to grow up and make her peace with me, or the next thirty years are going to be a real drag.