✅ My Cousin's Keeper [NaNoWriMo 2021]

Act III: 78. My Special Gift

It's the first of the month again, and time to post bonus chapters for all the people supporting me on Patreon! Ten of you this month; and 5 of the payments have come through so far, so there will be more chapters later tonight or tomorrow morning.

This chapter is dedicated to Eladon, with many thanks for all your support.

The house felt empty once Tess was gone. I was working Thursday and Friday, but when I got home in the evening I kept expecting her to walk into the room. When I woke up in the mornings I was surprised not to hear her moving about in the nursery, and again when I came down to the kitchen and found it empty.

It would probably have been easier if Ffrances had been here. But this week, as was her usual tradition, she would be out of the house for a chaotic frenzy of early and late shifts. It was something I'd never had a problem with; it was an indisputable fact that a lot of mental health problems have more of an impact around the holidays, both because of the nights drawing in and the media's emphasis on feelgood family programming. People who didn't fit would be pushed to the edge of society even more than usual, at a time when the doctors most wanted an opportunity to spend time with their kids. So Ffrances was one of those taking up the slack, working extra shifts to cover at work, and then volunteering for a helpline whenever she had the time.

I might have done the same; I had tried volunteering in the past, but didn't have the right skills to do it well. After a couple of hours I was burned out by other people's anxieties, and I didn't think I would be capable of giving them the help they needed. So now I sat around the house waiting for Ffrances to come home, and made sure that she didn't even need to think about household chores for the next week or two. Of course, I had other things to do today. We were planning some extra special treats for Tess when she got home, and I had to make sure everything went perfectly. And if I wanted to see my happy little baby again, I needed to be sure that she would still enjoy her role; which would probably be the easier part.

On Saturday morning, the house feeling so empty, I went into the nursery to sort everything out. Tess hadn't locked the room, but it looked like she'd left it ready for someone new to move in. Most of her possessions were packed away neatly in boxes, and all the toys were arranged like a store display. Everything visible, everything tidy. It was an inventory.

I knew there were things I needed to check. Things that she would have been annoyed to see me handling while she was here, but which still needed to be done. First, I checked the changing table. The drawers held a wide variety of diapers, as well as wipes, creams, powder, and everything else that a little girl could need. This time I didn't just glance at the amount of empty space, but took each item out from its usual place for careful measurement. I counted the diapers, and made a list. I weighed the bottles of baby powder and cream in my hands, to see if any of them had been used. It didn't seem like it. I checked the wipe dispenser as well, and was surprised to find that it needed a refill. At least she wasn't entirely afraid to use the babyish trappings that she craved so much.

I refilled the wipes, and then stared at the list of numbers on my phone. Most of the diaper varieties hadn't been used. One of the cupboards had never even been opened; as I could tell by a tiny scrap of paper fluttering out from where it had been lodged between the hinges. Every space was full, and when I took them out to count them I found only diapers three less than the full packs I had bought a few months before. That wasn't too much of a surprise; I knew that Tess was content with Goodnites to cope with what she described as a problem. She was still afraid to admit how much she liked being babied, so she wanted to stick with the minimum that would keep the sheets dry. She would need a little nudge to get past that.