Aunt Joan surprises Bobby when he finds himself in an embarassing situation, and Cori finally reveals what she's hiding in her closet.

Bobby's Rainy Day Adventure
Copyright 2006 by Heather Rose Brown

CHAPTER VIII

It felt like I was crying for ages as I rocked in Aunt Joan's arms. Between sobs, I tried to describe the dream I'd had about my fifth birthday party. Even though it had been a dream, most of it was just like what had happened on that day. When I got to the nightmare part and told her about what my father had done, it brought back up all anger I felt towards him and reminded me of why I was afraid of him.

I got to a point where there were more sobs than words and stopped trying to speak. Aunt Joan held me close and made soft, comforting sounds. What was making me cry the most was the sense of loss. My father, the man who had loved me and was always there to protect me, had disappeared the day he saw me in the dress Aunt Marie had given me for my birthday. While he had never hit me again, he also barely touched me after that day.

Eventually, I had no more tears, just a deep ache. I was still sniffling when I realized where a faint but painfully familiar stink had been coming from. "Aunt Joan, I think I . . . ."

"Sh sh shhhh, we'll take care of that in a moment." Aunt Joan turned towards Cori and Terri, who were partially blocking the light coming in through the doorway. "It's okay girls. You can go back to bed, but I'll need to talk to you in a few minutes, Cori."

After they both left, Aunt Joan pulled a tissue from a fuzzy box sitting on the nightstand beside the bed, blotted at the tears on my cheeks, and then held the tissue up to my nose. "Blow your nose, sweetie."

The trumpeting sounds she made when I blew my nose made me giggle, but it didn't take away the shame I was feeling. "Aunt Joan, I'm so sorry I wet Cori's bed."

"Don't worry, Bobby. I'm certain she'll understand."

"But the mattress . . . ."

". . . Will be just fine." Aunt Joan brushed a strand of hair behind my ear, stood up, and walked over to Cori's dresser. "Let's find you some fresh clothes to change into."

The stink was a lot worse after I pulled back the covers. My guilt doubled when I rolled onto my side and felt the chill on the back of my damp pajama bottoms. I stood up and turned to strip the bed, but wasn‘t on my feet long after I shifted my weight onto my right foot.

No sooner had I yelped in pain and stumbled than Aunt Joan dropped the clothes she was holding back into the dresser drawer and ran over to me. "What do you think you're doing, Bobby?"

After she helped me back into bed, I reached for my aching foot and felt the bandage wrapped around it. "I'd forgotten about my ankle. In my dream it wasn't hurt."

"Well, we can't have you trying to walk on it yet. If you're anything like Cori had been after she slipped out of that tree a few summers ago, I'd probably have to sit on you to get you to stay in bed." For a moment, I found myself worrying what I'd do if someone as big as Aunt Joan tried to sit in me, but the wink she gave me before walking over to Cori's closet told me she was just teasing.

I spent a few minutes sitting on the bed, trying not to breathe through my nose while listening to the scritch of hangers sliding across clothes racks and the scrape of boxes being shoved around the closet. "Aunt Joan, whatcha doing in there?"

"I'm looking for . . . ah, found it." She walked out of the closet carrying a small aluminum crutch with pink padding on the armrest. "I was hoping Cori would still have this. She's almost as much of a packrat as her sister." After helping me balance on my good foot, Aunt Joan placed the crutch under my right arm and showed me how to use it as an extra leg so I wouldn't make my injured ankle any worse.

Once I more or less got the hang of using the crutch, Aunt Joan lead me out of the bedroom, across the hall, and into the bathroom. While I stood in the middle of the cold tiled floor, wishing the back of my pajama bottoms weren't wet so I could sit down someplace out of the way, Aunt Joan reached past me to drop the clothes she had been carrying onto the closed toilet lid. I was expecting her to wrinkle her nose when she was standing so close, but all she did was smile at me before kneeling down in front of the bathtub.

The faucet knobs squeak as she adjusted them; soon, a cloud of steam began floating out of the tub. When she added the bubble bath, the flowery scent didn't completely cover the smell that had followed me since I got out of bed, but it helped.

"Okay sweetie, let's get you out of those wet clothes." Without really being aware of what I was doing, my elbows clamped down to my sides as Aunt Joan started pulling at my pajama top. She froze for a minute, looking embarrassed and slightly worried, before letting go. "I'm so sorry, Bobby. After hearing about what happened when you were little, I should have . . . would you rather me not help you?"

I had to think about that. It hadn’t been so long ago when Aunt Joan had taken off my shirt before shampooing the mud out of my hair. I hadn't felt at all shaky then, just a bit shy. "Any other time I think I'd be okay. But right now, after having had that dream . . . ."

Lightly stroking my cheek with her fingertips, Aunt Joan nodded and smiled, but her soft sigh sounded sad. "I think I understand." She pointed to a small wicker basket with the edge of a trashcan liner peeking out from under the plastic lid. "When you change out of the jammies you're wearing, just toss them into the little hamper over there by the sink."

Aunt Joan dipped her hand in the tub for a moment, nodded to herself with a satisfied smile, and then turned the knobs until the rumble of falling water wound down to a trickle, ending in a few muffled plops as the last of the water dripped into a tub full of fizzing soap bubbles. "Try not to get the bandage on your foot wet when you're in the tub, sweetheart. If you need help with anything, just call. I'll be right across the hall in Cori's room."

"Thank you, Aunt Joan." The words seemed so empty compared to how I actually felt. What I really wanted to do was hug her, but it didn't feel right while still in my wet clothes.

"You're welcome, Bobby." Aunt Joan ran her fingers through the back of my hair. "When you've washed and changed, come back into Cori's room."

Once Aunt Joan closed the door behind her, I stripped off my clothes and tossed them into the hamper. After climbing into the tub, I slowly slid down into the bubbles, being careful to keep my right foot from getting wet. The warmth of the bath water seemed to melt away the last bit of fear left over from the nightmare. For some reason, this got me started crying again. It only lasted a minute and was a lot less noisy than before. A weight I hadn't realized was there seemed to slip from my shoulders when it was over.

It was tempting to just sit there and soak, but I was too afraid of falling asleep and going back to where my nightmare had left off. Instead, I quickly washed up and shampooed my hair before letting the bubble bath drain out of the tub. It was a bit tricky trying to rinse off under the shower while standing on one foot and holding the other out of the tub.

After I was finished drying off and cleaning up the water that had splashed out of the tub, I went to the clothes Aunt Joan had left for me. The white panties on top were almost like the ones I'd been wearing earlier, except these had pink hearts and smiling blue moons around the waistband. I still had some trouble deciding which side was the front. They felt better the second time I pulled them up when the tag was against my left hip, so I decided to keep them on like that.

The only other piece of clothing left was what looked like an extra-long white t-shirt. It seemed unusually plain for something coming out of Cori's dresser. The one thing that made it look a little girlish was the large picture on the front of Hello Kitty wearing a frilly blue nightgown and a matching bow over her ear. After slipping the shirt over my head, I hung my damp towel on an empty towel rack, grabbed the crutch, and headed back across the hall.

The first thing I noticed when I reached Cori's bedroom was how the air smelled fresh and clean instead of stinking from wet bed sheets. I glanced at the bed, noticed the covers looked different, and wondered who had changed the sheets and made the bed for me.

I turned to the desk and saw Aunt Joan sitting there with Cori in her lap. They were both staring at the computer monitor on the desk. Before I could decide which of them to thank for changing the sheets, Aunt Joan turned to me, smiled, and waved me in. As I entered the bedroom, she whispered in her daughter's ear.

Cori nodded to whatever had been whispered, slid off her mom's lap, and walked up to me. For a moment, she just stood there, staring at her feet. "There's . . . there's something I wanna tell you, Bobby. It's kinda personal, but I think you might understand."

I felt confused by the sudden shyness. "What's wrong, Cori?"

Cori finally looked up. "Nothing's really wrong. It's just . . . it'd be easier to show you."

Grabbing my left hand, Cori led me into her closet and opened the door to one of the cubbies inside. It was the same door she had been so upset about me trying to open before. She took out what looked like a pair of thick, white underpants with a butterfly print on the front. "These are called Goodnites."

"What are they?"

"They're sorta like panties, but they help keep you from wetting the bed."

"You mean . . . like a diaper?"

For the first time since I'd met her, Cori blushed. "Not really. Diapers are made for babies, but Goodnites are made for kids."

"Oh." Things started clicking into place in my sleepy brain. "So, do you wear them all the time?"

"No, only when I go to bed."

I glanced down at my friend's hips, but couldn't see any noticeable extra thickness under her pajama bottoms. "You mean, like right now?"

Cori nodded and her blush deepened. "I ain't had to change the sheets since I started wearing them." Cori closed the cubby door and held the Goodnites out to me. "Would you like to use a pair?"

The idea of never waking up to wet bed sheets was almost too amazing to imagine. "Wow . . . ummm . . . ."

Cori put the Goodnites in my hand. "These are yours. You can put them on if you want when I go back out to the bedroom. If you decide not to, just put them back in the cubby." She gave me a quick hug around the shoulders. "Either way it'll be okay."

After Cori left, I stood there for a minute, balancing on my good foot and the crutch while looking at what she had just handed to me. While I really wasn't sure about wearing what felt a lot like a diaper, I also knew I didn't want to take a chance wetting my friend's bed again.

Once my mind was set, I took off my panties and pulled the Goodnites up over my hips. They weren't as tight as I had been expecting and a bit warmer than the panties. The extra padding between my legs felt a little odd, but being able to wake up to a dry bed more than make up for that.

Aunt Joan was still in front of the computer when I came out to the bedroom. Her arm was around Cori, who was standing beside her mom. Aunt Joan was speaking to her daughter in a low voice when she turned to me and waved. "There you go, Bobby. We were starting to wonder when you were coming out. You can put the panties in the hamper by the door."

Even though I should have known it was impossible, considering how well most mothers could hear, I had been hoping to find someplace to put the panties before anyone saw so they wouldn't know for sure what I was wearing. After tossing the panties in the hamper, I turned and saw Aunt Joan holding her arms out to me. "Come here for a minute, sweetheart. I'd like to show you something."

I barely had time to lean my crutch against the desk before Aunt Joan picked me up. There was a soft crinkling as I settled into her lap, but I seemed to be the only one to notice the sound. “Whatcha wanna show me?“

“There’s some information online Cori and I have found helpful. We thought you might like to take a look at it.” Aunt Joan reached around me and typed something on the keyboard in front of us. A window popped up on the monitor and I quickly noticed the Goodnites logo in the upper left corner.

"Is this the place that makes those . . . panties?" I'd almost called them diapers, but I didn't want to think of them as that, especially since I was wearing a pair of them.

Aunt Joan's cheek rubbed my ear as she nodded. "That's right, Bobby. They have a special website for kids and parents dealing with bed-wetting." She began clicking through the site, pointing out where they had info about why some kids wet their beds and how to wake up dry more often. We even spent a little time scrolling through their message board, looking at posts where people were asking for help and getting advice and support.

"Wow, I kinda knew I wasn't the only kid who wet the bed, but I had no idea there was so many." I tried to rub the sleep out of my eyes as I started reading the next message.

Cori leaned over my arm and looked at what I had up on the monitor. "Oh, that's another post from Anna. She's always got good advice. I've e-mailed her a couple of times when I had questions I didn't want everyone to see. If your mom says it's okay, I'll give you her address."

"I ain't got a computer."

"Oh . . . well, does your mom let you borrow hers?"

"She ain't got one either." I was feeling both annoyed and embarrassed. I hated being the only kid I knew who didn't have a computer at home.

Cori stifled a yawn. "Well, you could use my computer if you want when you come over to visit."

Aunt Joan hugged her daughter around the waist. "That's a very thoughtful thing to offer, honey. But I think it's about time we turned off the computer and got you two back in bed."

Cori pouted after the computer was turned off, but it didn't last long after Aunt Joan tickled her ribs and Cori started giggling. "Moooom, n-no fair!"

Aunt Joan's voice was playful. "I can't have you going to sleep grumpy. Now get that bottom back in bed."

Reaching behind me, Cori wrapped her arms around her mom and squeezed tight. "G'night, Mom."

Aunt Joan swung an arm around her daughter and squeezed back. "Good night, honeybunch."

After kissing her mom goodnight, Cori surprised me by kissing me on the cheek. "Goodnight, Bobby. I hope you don't get no more nightmares."

Before I could think of more to say than, "Thank you," Cori was out the door.

I scooted around in Aunt Joan's lap until I was sitting sideways and could look up at her. "I dunno if I can go to sleep just yet."

Wrapping an arm around my back, Aunt Joan began brushing loose strands of damp hair out of my face. "You know, when my girls have nightmares, I usually rock them back to sleep."

"Even Terri?"

Aunt Joan grinned. "Not as much as when she was little, but there are still times when she needs to be held. Would you like to rock for a little while, sweetie?"

I only had to nod once before Aunt Joan stood up with me in her arms and carried me over to the wooden rocking chair in the back corner of Cori's room. Before she started rocking, Aunt Joan pulled a knitted blanket from under the chair and used it to cover my bare legs and feet.

Cuddled up under the covers, I leaned against Aunt Joan and listened to her heart beating. "I love you, Aunt Joan." Almost as soon as the words were out of my mouth, I felt guilty. "I mean, not the way I love my mom, but . . . I mean . . . ."

Aunt Joan pulled me closer. "I think I understand what you're saying. Nobody could ever take the place your mommy has in your heart, and I would never try. Love is a pretty amazing thing; you can feel it in many different ways for as many different people as you know."

"Can you love someone and hate them at the same time too?"

"Yes, it is possible." Aunt Joan was quiet for a moment. "Were you thinking of someone in particular?"

"I guess I was kinda thinking about my dad. I always feel so mixed up when I think about him."

Aunt Joan's chin touched the top of my head as she nodded. "Love can be confusing sometimes, but it can be simple as well. For instance, I know I will always love my daughters, no matter what." We rocked in silence for a few minutes. "You know what else, Bobby?"

I yawned and stretched my legs out under the blanket. "What's that, Aunt Joan?"

"I love you too."