Can Pete get any help with his problem?

Joanna Linklater had perfected her image as the prototypical tall, blond, carnivorous cheerleader. Our school wasn’t large, but last year, not only had the Friendly Lions football team made it to the state playoffs, so had our cheerleading squad. And Joanna had already made it known that as head cheerleader this year, she intended to lead the Lionesses to a repeat.

Once Jake had gone downstairs then, it was no surprise when she grabbed the quilt covering my nakedness and demanded, “Lemme see! I wanna see Pete’s vagina!”

“No!” I protested but it came out weaker than before because my sobbing had produced a wad of phlegm and snot in my throat that almost choked me. “Glargh!” I added.

Joanna pulled on the cover and I pulled back, defeating her attempt to reveal my nakedness. “C’mon,” complained Joanna. “If you’ve got a pussy now, then it’s just us girls here.”

“Aggh! Don’t say that!”

“Maybe your dick has grown back?” suggested Megan.

That distracted me and I felt a leap of hope, but I couldn’t spare a hand to check; Joanna was yanking this way and that and grunting with the effort. I doubled up fighting back as I realized she had switched tactics! Now, she was trying to pull me off the bed!

“Oof!” I yelped as my ass hit the floor. I tried to wrap myself in the comforter again but Joanna took advantage of things and jerked it completely out of my hands.

I folded around my middle, whimpering. My hands confirmed that there had been no change in the status quo. My dick had not grown back.

“Let me see, damnit!” Joanna demanded. She poked me with a pink-painted toe.

“If you don’t let her see,” Megan pointed out, “she’s not going to give up.”

“Cad subwud gib be a dishoo?” I asked.

Joanna bounced over to the dresser and returned with a wad of soft paper.

“Thag you,” I conceded, unwinding to take the offer. I spread my legs while I wiped my eyes, blew my nose, and coughed up a wad from my throat. “Happy?” I asked grumpily.

“Damn,” said Joanna. She squatted down in front of me and asked, “Can I get a closer look?”

“Now you’re polite about it!?” I didn’t want to give in, but the principle of the thing no longer mattered. I shrugged.

She grinned and went down on hands and knees to peer at my new equipment. “It looks just like a vagina,” she noted. “Maybe your dick got sucked up inside?”

I didn’t dare hope. “You’re not going to go feeling around inside looking for it!”

“Aww,” she said, grinning. “You’re no fun anymore, Petey.”

“That should probably be my line,” Megan noted. She had sat down, resting her chin on the vanity table chair back. I glanced at her but her expression looked decidedly neutral.

Joanna laughed. “Aren’t you the slightest bit curious about how it would feel?” she asked.

“You’re a pervert,” I accused Joanna.

“Only if you’re a girl,” she noted. “If you’re just a boy with a vagina, then I’m perfectly straight.”

Megan snorted and Joanna flashed her a grin.

All I wanted to do was be left alone so I could cry without anyone seeing.

“Let’s go downstairs and see if Jake actually knows how to make coffee?” suggested Megan.

“What about Pete?” Joanna asked.

“Leave him,” Megan said. “Let him have a good cry and he’ll feel better.” She paused at the door, waiting for Joanna. “Pete, your clothes are around somewhere. Get dressed and come down for coffee. I’ll make eggs and toast.”

“Hey,” Joanna protested, moving toward the door. “It’s my kitchen.”

I watched them leave with some relief. Megan’s remark about a cry making me feel better stung a bit, because it seemed to be true. I did feel better having cried about it, and that sounded just way to girly.

“I’m a halfback, halfback’s don’t cry,” I grumped. If I could cry so easily, had whatever happened to me changed more than just what was in my crotch?

I went into the bathroom and looked at myself all over, not spending a lot of time on the big problem but looking for other things. I’m not a big guy, it’s not that much of an advantage for a running back. In fact, at 5’7” and 145 lbs, I’m both the shortest and lightest guy on the Varsity. On defense, I line up at free safety, as much for my ability to read a play as for my speed.

My hair is black, my eyes blue—my heritage is Scandinavian, Irish and American Indian. Those hadn’t changed; I still had high, broad cheekbones, a squarish chin, slightly slanted eyes, a bigger than average nose and a wide and tall forehead. It was still my own face.

My shoulders and chest had definition and my arms some bulk, though my hands were still small for my size. My legs were where I carried most of my muscle, but again, I had small feet.

Nothing had really changed except my dick and balls were gone and I had a pink-lipped slit where they used to be. Or actually, a little further back. I had to use a hand mirror to see.

I had a moderate amount of hair on my body and just recently started needing to shave my face. I had turned eighteen in early September, a senior in my last year at J.C. Friendly Central Union High School in Friendly, Arizona. I wasn’t exactly a star athlete, our school wasn’t big enough for more than one star and my friend Jake as quarterback on the football team and pitcher when baseball came around had that position sewed up.

I felt proud of my contributions at running back and second base, though. We’d made it to the state tourney last year in football and just missed in baseball. I was dating probably the prettiest girl in school, Megan D’Auguste and got invited to all the cool parties.

I stared at the mirror in my hand and wondered how this could happen. I couldn’t think of any reasonable explanation. Magic? A curse from God? On the chance it might be the last idea, I tried praying but I just couldn’t believe that a Supreme Being would bother with giving me this most horrible of days, for what? Cheating on my math homework?

Having sex with Megan when we weren’t married? Yeah, but, how about all the other people who did such things and didn’t end up losing body parts? It didn’t seem fair. And wasn’t God supposed to be fair?

And magic—magic wasn’t real, was it?

I looked at the mirror again and decided, yes, it must be. If it wasn’t magic, it was something just as strange and unbelievable.

I heard something and turned to close the bathroom door as I heard the bedroom door to the hall opening. “Pete?” I heard Megan call.

I didn’t answer. She could figure out where I had gone. If I were the victim of some magical manipulation, was Megan involved? Her family were from New Orleans, home to half of all the voodoo legends I’d ever heard of.

I heard her move across the room and stop outside the bathroom door. “Pete?” she asked again.

“Yeah?” I said. I probably sounded surly. The line of thinking I had been following made me suspicious.

“You should get dressed…” she began but I interrupted.

“I’m not hungry, I’m not coming downstairs.” Which was silly; obviously, I would have to come down sometime.

Megan sighed. “I want to take you to see my aunt and great-grandmother. Maybe they can help you.”

“Huh? How can she be both your aunt and your great-grandmother?” I asked, my brain not actually working at the time.

“No,” she explained patiently. “Two different people. But Aunt Louva is a doctor and Granny Marie is a conjure woman.”

I opened the bathroom door a crack. “A what?”

“She makes salves and things from herbs.”

I eyed her through the narrow opening. “Voodoo?” Megan is pretty dark, with tightly curled black hair; She looked like she might have a voodoo witch for a grandmother.

Megan rolled her eyes. “Voodoo is an African thing. We’re Creole, so, yes, there’s some tradition involved that some people call voodoo. Okay?”

I shut the door again. “Go away and I’ll come out and get dressed.”

“Okay,” she said. “Don’t take too long. Jake says you and he are due at an after game meeting at two.”

I snorted, not sure if I was going to go to any such thing. All the guys on the team would be there and the coaches. Usually we had pizza or hamburgers at such meetings, but just the thought of facing the team made my stomach cramp.

I heard Megan leave the room and close the door behind her, calling out, “Meet me downstairs.” Then I rushed out to find my clothes and get dressed. My underwear didn’t fit right but I ignored that and went to the top of the stairs.

I could see Megan waiting for me at the front door. I started down and I heard Joanna call me. “Petey!”

I ignored her. She could see me coming down the stairs from the kitchen where she and Jake were apparently eating toaster waffles and microwave bacon, from the smells.

“Pete,” Jake called and I did look toward him. “Keep your spirits up, I’m sure the doctors can do something for you.”

I muttered a reply and followed Megan out the door. It was crisp and cool outside, typical Friendly weather for early October, even in the middle of the day. People think of Arizona as all hot desert but Friendly is in the mountains, most of the town above 4000 ft. It can get pretty chilly and we usually have snow before Christmas.

I had my Lions windbreaker on and felt warm enough. Megan was wearing her cheerleading outfit, all in yellow and green with white leggings. She had a heavier jacket than mine and plodded toward the cars without looking up.

“Megan?” I called to her but she shook her head and didn’t answer.

What’s she pissed about? I wondered. I’m the one with the missing dick. I followed her to my car, a beat-up old Chevelle station wagon that used to belong to my mom. Megan went around to the right side and waited for me to unlock it.

I debated going to her side to unlock for her, but her silent attitude made me think better of it. We’d only been dating for a few weeks and I didn’t have all her moods mapped out. Apparently, we were both feeling grumpy, so best avoid possible provocation.

I unlocked the driver side door and clicked the power door-lock to unlock her side, then slid under the wheel. She climbed in on her side but didn’t slide across the bench seat to get within my reach. I shrugged and started the beast up. Dad and I kept it in pretty good tune, so it gave that satisfying 396 roar and I put it into gear to back down the driveway.

“Where we going?” I asked. It felt good to be moving; less like I might start crying again.

“Office in the medical building next to the hospital. Aunt Louva runs a free clinic there on Saturday. We can see her when she breaks at lunch to start her hospital rounds.” She wasn’t really looking at me but she didn’t sound pissed, more like she was distracted. “I called and left her a message that we were coming.”

Now I knew which way to turn when I reached the street. We weren’t that far from the hospital, or the Star Valley Medical Center, as it was called. Two turns, pass the Country Club and Pioneer Park, then take Park Street almost directly to the hospital parking lot. I got headed the right direction and glanced at Megan again.

“You, uh, you really think your aunt can help me?”

She shrugged and turned her face away. “I don’t know. But maybe she or Granny Marie will know someone who can.”

“I hope so,” I said, though really I was trying not to hope. It would hurt too much if it didn’t work out.

Megan turned back to look at me. She frowned. “They’re going to want to examine you,” she said.

“Your granny, too?” I tried to say that like I thought it a funny idea. But, yeah, a conjure woman was a kind of witch, wasn’t she? She might be my best chance to fix things.

“Granny Marie, yes. Aunt Louva, too. They’ll want to see.”

“Uh,” I grunted. I felt a finger of dread touch me somewhere I didn’t want to think about. “Does your aunt have any experience with this kind of thing?” I assumed a conjure woman might have some knowledge of magic, and what else could this be?

She nodded. “Oh, yeah. Well, yeah.” She looked at me again and I could see some worry in her face. “Aunt Louva is a gynecologist,” she said.

“A what?”

“She specializes in problems women have with their equipment.”

“Oh, hell, no!” I yelped.