Mary and Daphne #193

I am Daphne. Hear me squeak.

I roar most of the time. Pretty big roarer. The MGM lion? That’s me doing the voiceover. Really.

It’s just that sometimes I also squeak. It’s Mary, this person I married, who makes me do it. She has a way with me. A gay way (cuz we’re way gay).

Rifling through the cabinet under the bathroom sink is so fun. It’s like a treasure hunt, and the prize is the toiletries you bought when you were running low, forgot you bought, and then bought more of. We have so much toothpaste! No brand loyalty, it turns out, but so much toothpaste. Feminine hygiene products? None of. Which, like, how the heccin hey?

“Mary,” I called out, “do you have a tampon in your purse? … Mary?”

“Coming,” my dear darling wife called back on her way up the stairs.

“Do you have a tampon in your purse or something?”

“Did you start your period?”

Why, golly gee, Mary, nope. I’m just looking for something to plug this old whiskey bottle cuz I swallowed the cork whole by accident. The questions she asks sometimes …

I did my yes-duh shoulder shrug.

“No need to be embarrassed.”

O for fruggin friggin frack.Know when Mary says that? When she’s about to (or has recently, or is in the course of) say or do something to embarrass me. Not a great time for it. True story.

“Is that a no? And if it is, could you please go to the store for me?”

“Sit,” she said, taking me gently by the arm as though that calms me rather than makes me anxious knowing she’s got something up her sleeve (if only it were a tampon). We sat on the edge of the tub, and she held my hand for a moment of silence while she made her this-is-a-meaningful-moment face at me. Well, I’ll tell you right now if she didn’t watch her step it could’ve become very memorable for all the wrong reasons (like my pouring shampoo on her head … While she’s wearing clothes … It washes right out. I’m so bad at being mean. Dammit).

“Big day, huh?”

“Is that a cut about my PMS, because I have been goddam delightful and you know it. Admit it. Admit you know it!” I really had been. And I wasn’t anxious. She wasn’t making me anxious! Who even said that’s a thing I – conqueress of galaxies, most confident of empresses – even experience? Liar, them.

“Today you are a woman,” Mary pronounced like the mistress of ceremonies at The Worst Ever Rite of Passage Ever.

“O god. Really?”

“Yes, really. I guess it’s time I tell you about how our bodies work.”

“O god! Marrrry!”

“You’ve probably been noticing some changes in your body.”

“You mean like right now? Cuz there’s this bile taste that wasn’t there until you …”

“You’ll soon be ready to graduate out of your training bra.”

“That joke is bitchy every time you say it.” I may as well have been in a different room for all the notice she took of me … Actually, she was taking all the notice, I’m sure, of the blush in my cheeks as it spread all the way to my ears. She thinks that means something, like it’s a signal I’m embarrassed and enjoying it just cuz I have this sexual thing for embarrassment. But guess what? I don’t always. Really. (No, really.)

“You have hair in places you didn’t have hair before.”

“I don’t, actually, which you’re very well aware of.” She’s very well aware. Intimately familiar with my parts and pieces from all the intimacy we do … and stuff.

“You might be having some feelings about boys.” What the gross even with the … My Number One Problem with boys is that they’re not girls. That’s my position, and I’ve been very clear about it for more than fifteen years.

“You are so not reading the room right now.” How hard do I hafta glare before she reads the room? This is my deadliest death stare and it doesn’t friggin work almost all the damn times I need it to. I’ve been cursed with a face that only gets cuter when I get angry, at least right up until I’m really angry and then it’s not cute at all.

“But I think we need to deal with a certain situation first.”

“If you use the M word or start in on any biological descriptions, I will lose my cool. Ya been done warned. And yes with the situation. Back to my original question.”

“Come,” she bade me.

Not that I followed because I’m overly biddable. I followed because she told me to and also because if she had a solution to the situation, then yes, please let’s go. Not that time was of the essence yet, but time was approaching a time when the essence of time might be a … thing. Alas, some sentences aren’t meant to be.

“So first thing you need to know is that tampons aren’t appropriate for girls like you, if you get my meaning.”

“No, gee, whatever could you mean,” I deadpanned. She thinks I haven’t noticed that she’s strategic in acknowledging my sarcasm. I’ve been spanked for being too sarcastic (is that even a thing?) one or nineteen times and counting, but when she’s delighting in her little mind games like this, I literally cannot roll my eyes hard enough. I once pulled my extraocular muscles rolling my eyes at such a time, and I got nothing to show for it.

This was one of those times Mary opted to ignore my sarcasm and replied, “What I mean, sweetie, is tampons aren’t for virgins.”

“I am not!”

“I don’t believe such things about my good girl. You have been a good girl, haven’t you?”

It is so toxic to attach ethics to virginity, but, um, “Yes’m.”

Not my fault! I am blameless. She played a dirty trick asking me if I’ve been a good girl. I am a good girl. Being good is not something I do. It’s what I am. A good girl. One of the best ever. Mary’s good girl. It’s a whole thing. She doesn’t fight fair. I’m a very good girl and always have been. An example, you ask?

I would argue that I’m the goodest girl when I’m trusting Mary that the thing she wants to do to me really is safe and what she wants to do it with really will fit just fine, even better than fine … even pleasurably. How’s that for a virgin? Totally undermined her point, but she wasn’t making a real point anyway, so why even bring it up? Not like she was gonna stop anyway. And I was not there for it … May have been on my way tho. Cell location data is unreliable and stuff; no conclusive proof of where I was or for what purpose.

She continued, cuz she loves to continue almost as much as she loves me, “Tampons can really be uncomfortable for girl like you who hasn’t explored that part of her body before and also because … Well, we’ll have a talk some other time about penetration …”

Just to interject, I will be there for that. With questions prepped for asking. And props to illustrate my questions and offer up as teaching aids.

“… but I’m sure today is already overwhelming for you. Your growing body is just awash in new and exciting hormones.”

Cut out the ‘new and exciting,’ and yes, yes it is.

“Now, I know,” Mary continued to continue, “that you were hoping to outgrow your bedwetting by the time you became a woman.”

“Nurplenunnery cuhnaffer nuffin, Mary!”

“If you say so, sweetie,” the condescending condescender condescended to me with a pat on my head.

“La’noofer foofin!”

“All those hormones,” she tutted at me. At me! Me!

“And …”

How is she still talking after what I just said? Could I have been any clearer?

“… I know you don’t want to hear it, but I want to reassure you that you’re not the only girl – excuse me, woman; it’ll take me a while to get used to that – who wears pull-ups for her period.”

“Name two.” And also, no, I don’t, and since when, and no, I don’t. And also, really? Just really? Did she wait a month to tease me this way, or did the inspiration come the moment I called out her name?

“They wouldn’t sell them if there wasn’t a market.”

“You actually bought pull-ups meant just for …”

“That would just be wasteful, silly goose. You may be growing up, but you’ll always be my silly goose.”

“Geese are super serious! What are you even … urgh!”

“Cramp?”

“Frustration!”

“Hormones.”

“Marrrrryyyyyyy!”

“I didn’t buy you special pull-ups. The ones you wear for long car rides will work just fine. Your Goodnites.”

“I don’t wanna!” And no I don’t wear Goodnites on long car rides! Except for sometimes when she makes me, which is not the same as needing to. I mean, I need to cuz she says and she’s in charge, but I don’t need toneed to. And that is, too, a heccin important distinction!

“You don’t wanna wear your Goodnites? Is it cuz you’re worried about leaks because of that time on the way to the lake? I know you’re probably very concerned with it being your first time, but I promise you that you don’t need to wear your sleep time diapers for your period. Unless you want to. I’ll understand if you wanna be cautious and stay in diapers until you’re more comfortable with your womanhood.”

“I’m moving out and taking the dog. You can come too and all.” I wouldn’t leave her behind; I like her very much.

“And you say you’re not a silly goose. Stay right where you are.”

“O gee, o golly. For whatever reason could you be going into the closet.” Like that’s ever a mystery anymore.

“Just because you’re a woman today doesn’t mean I’ll hesitate to spank your bottom like a little girl.

Well, if she thinks that would shut me up, then she knows me well, is what.

“Hormones aren’t an excuse for poor choices in this house,” she reminded me when she emerged from the closet. That is, in fact, an actual rule. PMS is no excuse for being a bitch. We had that written down somewhere at some point, which was redundant cuz Mary did such a good job making me memorize that rule while holding me over her knee.

“Let me get your changing pad down,” she narrated as she laid it on the bed. “I’ll get you all cleaned up and into your pull-up.”

“What? Please no?”

“Diaper instead?”

“I don’t need you to clean me up. I’ll wear the stupid pull-up. Give it here.”

“Not this conversation again,” she sighed as though we had ever had this conversation before. I can assure you, dear diary, we have not ever.

“I’m not having it; understand, missy? I see everything you have every night at diaper time, and I also see a little remedial homework on wiping wouldn’t exactly be uncalled for despite your age, so if you think I’m going to let you [audio interference].

“I mean, I haven’t wanted to hurt your feelings, and I know your bedwetting and potty habits are a sore subject. But I guess it’s past time for that little brush up course. Until you can show me you can [static] your [white noise], it’s best if I [tinnitus] … Especially since it’s your first [trombone noise like in Charlie Brown] …”

And then I’m not sure what she said next. There was blackness, and then when I came to I was horizontal. I was laying there thinking she did it; Mary finally did it. She pushed all the right buttons and said all the embarrassing things, and it led to a massive stroke. The blood pooled in my face, not enough reached my brain, and I had a stroke. Blam. Stroked out on the floor. Which in itself is so embarrassing … What a spectacle I must’ve been all sprawled out. Especially after my shorts and underthings came off somehow.

But there was no bump from smacking my head on the floor, and the floor felt awfully like a bed, and the carpet felt awfully like the comforter on our bed. So not a stroke. Did she do magic on me? She is a sorceress, after all. Or maybe I’ve repressed the memory. Or maybe my mind – which is the smartest ever – just pre-empted the whole thing. Nope; not hearing it; no memory to repress cuz we’re not making that memory at all; leave it on the cold, windblown steppe to die of exposure.

“Daffy,” Mary said to me, “did you hear a word I said?”

“No cuz I had a stroke I think. Please don’t be mad at me.”

I’m normal and not pathetic. Admit it! Admit I’m normal and not pathetic, dammit! And then tell Mary, cuz she was making her Daphne-isn’t-quite-normal-and-my-goodness-but-that-was-pathetic-even-for-her-at-her-subbiest face.

“Sweetie, I’m not mad. I was saying that I know this is embarrassing for you, but it’s just one of those things. It’s nothing to be embarrassed about. Like how I wipe the peepee off your minnie in the morning before you take your shower? And how I wipe your bottom at diaper time just in case you didn’t do a good job that day? And like when you have a stomach bug?”

It would be really childish to start going ‘la la la. La la la la la la. I can’t hear you. La la la la la dee da la la’ out loud, so I just did in my head where it’s totally fine.

“You’re just as pretty to me, and I’ll always help you down there no matter what you need help with. Does that make sense?”

Honestly, not even a little. “Mhmm.” But if it will move the day forward, I’ll say ‘mhmm’ to a lot of stuff.

PS, she really was with the wipe down there and I was just also in the room having an out of body experience, which was fine with me. I didn’t want to be in that body anyway. Too bad I couldn’t have had an out-of-room experience too.

She threaded my feet through the pull-up and got it to my knees when she said, “Stand up for me.”

“Now,” she said with her this-is-meaningful-but-not-really tone, “I know you really wanna feel like all the other girls who don’t wet their beds and started their periods more, ya know, on schedule. I know you know it’s okay to be different, and I also know sometimes it really sucks being different, so I got you something.”

And back into the closet she goes.Actual closet. Way too gay to back into the proverbial one. Not sure which part of the Book of Proverbs that closet was featured in, but not the part I learned about in Wednesday School (Sunday School, but Wednesday evenings cuz Catholic). She seemed all excited when she emerged. She was excited. Excited for my reaction, I’m sure, rather than the thing she was pretending to be excited for.

“I know this is redundant, but just so you feel like the other girls, I got you some pads to wear inside your pull-up.”

She … what? “What?”

“Some panty liners. Watch closely. See how I peel this off and then position it here?”

“What?”

“Do you need to show you again? It’s okay if you do.”

“Why the heck didn’t you just say we have pads? What even is happening right now? When even is it?”

“It’s your time of the month, and what’s happening is I’m pulling your pull-up up for you. There,” she said like a crazy person cuz she’s a crazy person. Obviously so cuz she did, as it turns out, plan this at some point over the past month.

“And now you can run and bounce and play without having to worry about anything,” Crazy Mary said, which is exactly the kind of crazy thing crazy people named Mary say.

I mean, a month? She’d waited a month for this little scene? Talk about your delayed gratification. I mean, I know Mary is a very Type A person, but no one should be able to pass the marshmallow test that well. It’s just not right. Back to the scene …

“… What?”

“I just thought you’d feel really weird knowing that you finally got your period but still don’t use feminine hygiene products like the other girls, so …”

“So …”

“Now you do .”

“… … What?”

“Sit back down with me,” she said, putting her arm around my shoulder and sitting down on the bed.

“Why am I wearing a pull-up if we have pads?”

“Cuz you still wet the bed.”

“Even if that were a true thing, it doesn’t even make sense?”

“Yes, it does.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“Yes. It does. Maybe not to women who are still little girls, but you just need to trust me on this. One day when you’re older, you’ll understand. You may be a woman today, but you still have a lot of growing up to do … Who knows? Maybe your pediatrician is right and you’ll outgrow your wetting after all.”

“(Sniffle).”

“Awww. There are those hormones again.”

Yep, there they were. And then she kissed me and rubbed my back. Hmmph. And more sniffles.

“Any more questions about the changes and feelings you’re experiencing now.”

I’m gonna hate myself for this later, but only briefly. Fuck. Here goes: “Um, can you, uh, explain, ahem, uh, masturerururfur?”

“What was that sweetie?”

“Could you, um, explain masturbation to me?”

“Right now,” she asked with a twinkle in her eye.

O my gawd she’s smiling so wide! What even with the dammit and she’s pretty and stuff and clearly so happy she was right about how I’d feel about all this and dammit … and stuff and things too.

“Yes,” I admitted so damn grudgingly I still hold a grudge about it and I don’t even know against who or what.

“That’s okay; right now is okay. Nothing to be embarrassed about.”

“Stupid hormones and stupid bodies and stupid kinks,” I muttered.

“I love your hormones and your body and your kinks. Lay back.”

Which I did.

“First part of the lesson,” she said as she put her hand on my pull-up (still technically hers), “this is nothing to be embarrassed about.”

“That’s just not true.”

“How lucky you are to have a humiliation fetish then,” she chuckled. “So the first thing is if you’re gonna do this during this time a month, you should do it in the bathroom, but it’s okay to do it in the bedroom so long as your pull-up stays on and your hands stay on the outside of it like this. See how I’m moving my hand right now? Feel it pressing against your …”

Which is when I squeaked.