Page 48 of The Marriage Mistake

Gulping, I scanned her body—no obvious injuries—and then took a look around the bathroom. There were toothpaste stains on the sink and a multitude of products scattered over the vanity, but nothing looked like a bloody crime scene. Not knowing what else to do, I slid my back against the door and sat down on the floor across from her.

After a few long moments, with her head still buried against her knees, Darby said, “Is my dad still hovering outside the door?”

I heard a creak and saw the light shift under the gap below the door and the tiles. “Um.” I paused. “I think so.”

“Tell him to go away.”

The discomfort that squirmed through me was nothing short of cataclysmic. This had not been part of the deal. I wasn’t prepared to be a stepmom in any sense of the word, and I knew Jack didn’t want me forming any kind of close bond with his daughter when I was planning on leaving as soon as I was able.

Algebra homework was one thing; this was another entirely.

But Darby’s shoulders shook with every breath, and I could tell she was doing her very best to stem the flow of tears that just wouldn’t stop coming.

I’d been there. More than once. I knew the gigantic reservoir of pain that could fill up in a young person’s body, and I just couldn’t bring myself to put Jack—or myself—above this little girl who was crying out for help. I’d been that little girl, and I hadn’t had anyone to sit with me.

So, with my throat so tight my voice came out like a wheeze, I turned my lips to the door and said, “Jack, will you give us some privacy?”

Jack’s anger punched through the closed door. I felt it in his silence. But he cared more about his daughter than he was mad at me, and he said, “Fine. Darbs, I’ll be right downstairs, okay?”

“Okay,” she snarled, lifting a blotchy, red face to glare at the door.

Jack inhaled like he hated every second of this, and then I heard his steps recede and the low murmur of him talking to his younger cousin Glenn.

Time trickled by, slow and sticky. Darby and I sat across from each other on the bathroom floor, and I waited for her to wipe her face with her hands and look up. Arching my brows at her, I asked a silent question. What happened?

Sighing, Darby reached behind her back and pulled out a crumpled piece of fabric. Her undies, white with purple bows all over them. Her lip wobbled as she showed me the stain on the gusset. “I got my period,” she whispered, and a fresh lot of tears began to stream down her cheeks.

“Oh,” I murmured, and before I could overthink it, I was crawling across the floor to sit next to her. I put my arm around her shoulders and let her bury her face against my shirt, sobbing. She dropped the undies between her knees.

“It’s so gross.”

“Sort of,” I agreed.

“At first it was brown, and I thought I pooped my pants. And then I thought I was dying. And—” She hiccupped. Stopped.

I squeezed her, but she still stayed silent, so I was forced to open the big box of painful memories buried deep in my heart to fish one out to show her. “The first time I got my period, I was at this fancy event for my dad’s work,” I said. “I bled through my dress and left a stain on the upholstered chair.”

“Oh.”

The laugh that came out of me was a little wobbly. “Yeah.”

“At least I was at home.”

I tightened my hold on her. She was still trembling, and she felt so small. I wasn’t a hugger, really, but I still wrapped my other arm around her and leaned my cheek against the top of her head. Darby had such a big personality, she was so bright and effervescent and funny, that I’d forgotten how young she really was. Holding her now, I felt her vulnerability. The need she had for someone to nurture her.

It was a shame that the only person here was me. Surely, someone else would be better at this. Someone who understood emotions, who was motherly, who was nurturing. I hadn’t learned those skills—I’d never had them modeled for me—but I was the one sitting on this bathroom floor with her, so I did my best to be what she needed.

Slowly, with every breath, Darby’s body relaxed and her breathing became easier.

It felt…good…I decided, to be here, like this. It was unbearably uncomfortable, of course, but there was something nice about her trust. Something nice about easing Darby’s experience in a way that I never got. When my father had seen the stain, he’d gone all red, he’d muttered all kinds of insults about me being dirty and disgusting as he hauled me out of the event with his suit jacket thrown over my shoulders to hide the ruined dress. The shame I’d felt for my body’s natural processes had been immense. Crushing. It still clung to me, all these years later. Every time I got my period, I couldn’t help the twinge of guilt, like I was somehow doing something wrong. I knew it was illogical, but it still happened.

Darby was a good kid. I’d hate for her to feel this way in fifteen, twenty years’ time.

So I held her, and I waited for her to take one big, deep breath before pulling away. Reaching over to the toilet roll, I grabbed some and handed it over so she could wipe her face. She muttered her thanks then said, “What… What do I do now?”

Her eyes were wide and blue, and the trust shimmering in them cut my vocal cords to ribbons. It took me a while to croak out, “Well… Do you know what your period is? What’s happening in your body?”

She grimaced. “I’m bleeding down there.”