"There's nothing to be ashamed of. It was your first time going back and everything got to you. I wouldn't beat myself up about it." Marcy was in Leigh's room that evening, trying to soothe the girl.
Leigh-Anne was curled up under her sheet while she allowed Marcy to rub her hip. The woman was sitting on her bed with legs crossed. It was about an hour before they usually had dinner but Leigh was not sure if she would be able to eat.
Marcy pouted. Sairah had explained everything once she came home and Leigh had gone straight to bed. The younger girl had seemed angry at herself so Marcy had decided to leave her alone for a bit before talking to her. "At least you made it in right? You went to the neighbourhood, you saw all the different people but then the house just got to you. That's okay. It's understandable. If everything that happened to you happened to me in my old house, I don't think I'd ever want to see it again. If I saw it I might pass out actually. But you tried and . . . it just wasn't the time." She kept rubbing Leigh as she spoke gently.
Leigh-Anne was frowning but it was hard to keep it up with Marcy's gentle touch against her. "I . . ." She remembered what they had been talking about before she left. "Is it weird if someone only said their first audible words after two years old?"
Marcy blinked. "Uhh . . . yeah? Usually kids start babbling or talking or something by the time they're one so if a child only starts speaking at three then they'd be a bit behind. But it happens." She shrugged. "Why do you ask?"
Leigh chewed her lip.
Marcy wondered if she would answer. "Everything okay?"
"What are um . . . some examples of birth defects in the brain?" She asked softly.
Marcy was confused as to where this was coming from. "Umm . . . I don't know the exact names but I know the signs. You know babies who have brain defects would . . . develop slower so they may not have good control over their motor skills at the age they're supposed to, may not speak when they're expected to . . . may have seizures I think? Strange social behaviours hmm . . . Leigh why are you asking this?"
Leigh did not like the sound of that. "Because . . ."
Marcy was waiting.
Leigh looked down at her pillow sadly. "Someone at the neighbourhood said I might've been born with birth defects according to what the nurses at the infirmary reported after my mum had me."
Marcy's eyes widened. "Oh."
Leigh's eyes welled up. "I-I don't know if it's true but Sairah said I only started talking at seven from her knowledge even though I don't think that's entirely true but I do believe that I may have started speaking late and you said seizures and I got those so . . . I . . . I've got brain birth defects on top of everything else that makes me a complete weirdo."
Marcy watched as the girl started weeping before moving closer to rub her back. "Leigh-Anne don't say that." She said sympathetically.
"But it's true. It would explain why sniff, sniff people would call me that whenever they saw me and why Sairah always described me as weird and why now I can't seem to shake anything and just move on. I'm defective. I've always been like this." Leigh-Anne felt so broken she could not even fathom it.
Marcy shook her head. "Leigh-Anne if you have birth defects like you think it wouldn't make you defective. It'd just mean that you'd have a few challenges but that's okay. It'd make your life a bit more difficult but with enough help you'd be fine. Just like now. It's really not the end of the world and you shouldn't call yourself a weirdo or a freak or feel ashamed about any of that stuff. It happens and when it does all you can do is learn to live with it."
