Chapter Twenty-Five
The water in the bathtub was beginning to grow colder. It still wasn’t uncomfortable yet, but Erin hoped she’d be able to get out soon. She’d long since finished cleaning herself and washing her hair, and there really wasn’t any good reason for her to stay in there longer.
She didn’t understand why her stepmother was so fixated on her cleanliness. Normally Mary seemed to try her hardest to keep Erin out of sight, which was probably the true reason behind the frequency at which she was put in time out. She was required to take very long baths, which would have been consistent with Mary’s “stay out of the way” doctrine. However, Mary would frequently come in and check on her, making sure she was cleaning up properly.
So Mary, for some reason, wanted her stepdaughter be spotless. That, along with Erin’s scholastic performance, seemed to be almost an obsession.
She supposed there were worse things for Mary to be obsessed with; being clean and doing well in school were important, after all. But Erin had been doing fine on both counts long before Mary came; she’d always performed well academically, and she’d been just happy taking a bath or shower as often as necessary.
Spending more than an hour in the bath, though, seemed well beyond necessary. There was absolutely no doubt that she was clean by now.
Luck was on her side; apparently, her stepmother had come to the same conclusion. “You’ve been in there long enough,” stated Mary, walking into the bathroom. “Get out and get dressed so we can go get some groceries.”
Erin climbed out of the tub. She’d long since gotten over any embarrassment about bathing in front of her stepmother, although she still would have preferred Mary to leave the room while she walked over to the towel rack and began to dry herself off. Making such a request would ultimately be more trouble than it was worth, though.
Mary chose that moment to speak up. “You peed in the tub, didn’t you?”
Erin did not like the tone of voice Mary was using. But, more importantly, she wasn’t sure what her stepmother was talking about. She hadn’t peed in the tub at all; she didn’t relish the thought of sitting in a solution of her own urine. “I didn’t,” she calmly answered, doubting that Mary would accept the answer.
“You did! You’re a bad girl, and peeing in the tub is something that bad girls do. Don’t lie to me!”
That logic made absolutely no sense to Erin. She couldn’t fathom what was going through her stepmother’s head. It was beginning to worry her, though; Mary had been acting irrational like this with a noticeably increasing frequency as of late. She could only hope that it was some sort of passing phase, and that Mary would go back to her older, slightly more predictable self.
As it was, though, she had no way to disprove stepmother’s accusation. Best to stay silent, she would probably get in the least trouble that way.
Mary gave her stepdaughter a swift slap on the behind. Luckily, that was exactly what Erin had been drying off, so the towel absorbed some of the impact; it still stung, though.
“You hurry up and get dried off and dressed. I’ll have to think of something to do with you.” She left the room.
Erin inwardly groaned. She didn’t know what Mary would decide to do, but she doubted she’d like it.
Hailey’s eyes slowly opened. As her vision returned to her and became less blurry, she glanced over at her clock.
2:30 in the morning. Why am I awake?
As she rolled over, she noticed movement from Erin’s bed. Her cousin was tossing and turning in bed; in fact, she’d already managed to kick her covers entirely off the bed.
“Erin?” she whispered, but she wasn’t surprised when she got no response. Erin was definitely asleep, and from the looks of how she was moving about and breathing, Hailey guessed her cousin was having another nightmare.
Hailey wanted to go wake her cousin up, to save her from her bad dream, but she wasn’t sure that was a good idea. Wasn’t it supposed to be a bad idea to wake up someone having a nightmare? Or maybe that was someone sleepwalking? Hailey wasn’t sure, but she didn’t want to risk hurting Erin.
What had happened to Erin in the past which polluted her dreams so often? Hailey desperately wanted to know, but out of respect to both Erin and her promise to her father, she couldn’t ask. Something bad had happened to Erin.
She knew that Erin’s father and stepmother had died of murder and suicide. Perhaps Erin witnessed that? That kind of thing would certainly cause bad dreams; Hailey couldn’t even begin to imagine how she’d react if she saw the murder of either of her parents. And Erin had effectively lost three parents: both of her biological parents and a stepmother. Granted, Erin’s mother’s death had occurred much less recently, and as far Hailey knew it hadn’t been a violent death. But it still was probably horrible for Erin, losing her mother at that age.
But the deaths in her family couldn’t be the only thing that was affecting Erin. She’d seemed to get depressed on previous occasions when her family was simply mentioned. Were things not very happy at her household, even without the deaths? Hailey had no idea, but she really wished Erin was willing to open up about what happened.
Her attention was drawn back to Erin’s bed. Well, if she didn’t dare wake up Erin, she could at least make her more comfortable. Hailey slid out of bed and walked over to pick up Erin’s covers off the floor.
From this position, Hailey could clearly see her cousin’s diaper bulging under her pajama bottoms. Hailey couldn’t tell if it was wet, but Erin’s nightmares usually led to a wet morning, so if she was dry now, she probably wouldn’t be soon.
Hailey placed the covers back on top of her Erin’s writhing body. Seeing her cousin’s diaper brought Hailey’s own bladder to her attention; she did need to pee, so it was a good time to take a trip to the toilet, as she was out of bed anyway. She doubted that she’d be able to fall asleep again before she took care of her need to urinate.
But she didn’t actually have to go to the toilet to pee, did she? The feeling of the thickness of Hailey’s own diaper between her legs crept into her mind. What was the harm in it?
Well, I probably shouldn’t leave Erin alone while she’s having a nightmare like this. What if she wakes up, and I’m not there to comfort her? Of course, a trip to the bathroom wouldn’t take very much time at all, but her desire and excuse to use her diaper reinforced each other, to the point where she couldn’t see anything else to do but wet herself.
The excitement of release overwhelmed her as she felt her urine gushing out of her and spreading through the waiting diaper. That feeling was exactly what she needed to feel a little bit better right now; the frustration she felt from being able to do nothing to help Erin was somewhat alleviated.
She continued to stand, watching Erin, for ten minutes. The excitement she had gained from her wetting was beginning to fade, and her worry for Erin was creeping back up on her. Needing to distract herself from the onset of renewed frustration, she decided that now was as good a time as any to change herself.
She briefly considered what she was supposed to change herself into. She was only expected to use one diaper per night, so maybe it was time to change back into panties?
Well, one more diaper wasn’t going to hurt. It would probably look more suspicious to wake up not wearing a diaper; her parents would probably wonder why she suddenly wasn’t wearing one when she had been for the last two months. Admittedly, they hadn’t seen her last night between when she put one on and when she went to bed, so she could claim that she hadn’t been wearing one to begin with that night, which would at least be better than them noticing that she’d gone to bed in a diaper and woken up in panties. But if she said she’d decided not to wear protection, her parents would probably think Erin had decided she didn’t need Hailey to help her feel better any more, and Hailey would have a hard time justifying diaper use to her parents on any subsequent nights.
No, it was probably best just to put on another diaper. Besides, she might want to wet again in the morning, just before she took her shower. With that decided, she went about quietly changing herself.
She crawled back into bed, a fresh diaper under her pajamas, and rolled over so that she was facing her roommate. As she watched Erin’s nocturnal gyrations, Hailey prayed that she’d wake up from her dream soon. Even if she refused to admit it, Erin would probably like to have someone to comfort her when she came to.
Erin allowed herself to be dragged through the grocery store parking lot, the lowered hood of her pale blue sweatshirt fluttering in the cool October breeze.
“I think that you’re going to have to be in time out while you’re in the grocery store,” stated Mary. “That should teach you not to pee in the tub.”
It was one of the milder punishments that Erin could have received, but she still wasn’t looking forward to it. “Time out” at the store meant that she’d have to ride in the main basket of the grocery cart, remaining silent the whole time she was there. If she was younger she might have found it fun, but she was big enough and heavy enough that the cart wasn’t particularly comfortable, especially the way she was supposed to sit in it.
They entered through the automatic doors, and Mary lifted Erin into the front of the cart. Erin assumed the time out position: sitting sideways at the very front of the cart, her knees bent up in front of her, attempting to take up as little space as possible. She wasn’t huge for her age, but she wasn’t exactly small either, so there really was barely enough room for her to sit sideways like that, and it certainly wasn’t a nice position to be in for the next hour or so. She could already feel the metal grid digging into her back and bottom, and she was unable to find a good position for her feet.
Complaining wasn’t going to help, though. If she stayed quiet like she was supposed to, she had a decent chance of avoiding any further punishment.
She spent the first fifteen minutes pouting silently, avoiding allowing her frustration to show on her face, as her mother loaded groceries next to her. It wasn’t fair; she hadn’t peed in the tub. Why did Mary think she did?
As the cart snaked its way through the aisles, becoming more and more laden, Erin began to wish she had actually done what she was being punished for. Her bladder certainly picked the most inopportune times to decide she needed to go, and at least if she’d gone in her own bath water, disgusting as that was, she wouldn’t need to pee now.
She debated asking to use the toilet, but she knew if she spoke up she would likely be in trouble. Maybe she could last until they checked out and she could finally get out of the cart; the bathrooms were at the front of the store near the checkout anyway.
The knees-up position she was sitting in didn’t help the pressure on her bladder any, though, and ten minutes later she knew that her chances of holding it until her stepmother was done buying groceries were incredibly low. She’d certainly be in more trouble for wet pants than for speaking when she wasn’t supposed to.
“Mary… I have to go to the bathroom,” she spoke, barely above a whisper.
“Don’t lie to me, Erin, you can’t possibly have to go yet, it hasn’t been that long since your bath. You’re just trying to get out of the cart!”
“But…”
“I’d suggest you don’t say anything else, unless you think you need more punishment when we get home.”
Erin was mad, but there wasn’t a whole lot she could do. Mary was still convinced that she’d peed in the tub, and any further attempts to claim she needed to use the toilet would just make her stepmother mad. All she could do was to try to hold it as long as humanly possible, and hope she could avoid the seemingly inevitable accident.
She managed to put her need to pee in the back of her mind for a little while, but just as it seemed that Mary was almost done getting everything on her list, Erin’s urge came back with a vengeance.
If only she could get out of the cart and stand up, she might be able to hold on a little longer. Her legs pressing against her abdomen were only making the situation worse.
With the front of the cart against one of her arms and the groceries against the other, she couldn’t even reach down and grab herself in an attempt to hold it in. All she could do was clench as tight as she could and pray for the best.
Her hopes were raised briefly as her stepmother began pushing the cart towards the front of the store. They were ready to check out!
Of course, the Saturday crowds at the store meant that they were unable to find a short checkout line. The queue Mary ultimately picked had one person just finishing up paying, with two more full carts between that person and Erin.
And that means three full carts between me and going to the toilet, realized Erin. We’ll have to unload my cart too.
Erin made a valiant effort to stay dry, but it wasn’t good enough. Her mother pushed the cart forward slightly to keep up with the moving line, stopping with the front of the cart just behind the magazine rack that divided the registers. The sudden stop caused Erin to leak a small spurt of urine into her panties as her stepmother stepped alongside the cart and began to thumb through one of the magazines.
Oh, no, thought Erin. There was no way she could keep it in any longer. Her body involuntarily relaxed, and she felt wetness begin to spread through her panties and into her jeans.
Fortunately, with the way she was sitting, her urethra was nearly the lowest point of her body, so only a small portion of her jeans ultimately ended up wet. Unfortunately, the liquid that would normally be absorbed by her pants had to go somewhere, and the metal grid that formed both the floor of the cart and Erin’s seat did nothing to retain it. A stream of urine began to flow down and splash on the tile floor, forming a growing yellow puddle just behind the front wheels of the cart.
Erin blushed; to her, the sound of the splashes was nearly deafening. She hoped Mary wouldn’t notice, but there really was no way she couldn’t.
Indeed, Mary looked over from her magazine, her face initially showing disbelief, followed by anger. Erin began to tremble.
Erin woke up suddenly, rapidly sitting upright in bed and rousing Hailey from the half-asleep, half-awake haze she’d managed to slip into.
Hailey hadn’t expected to nod off like that; her goal had been to be awake when Erin woke up. Still, she was awake now, and Erin looked like she was still figuring out that whatever she’d been dreaming about hadn’t really been happening.
She climbed out of her bed and without a word sat down next to Erin, putting her arm around Erin’s shoulder and pulling her in for a hug. Erin practically fell into the hug and remained leaning on her cousin even when Hailey released her grip; apparently, the gesture was very welcome.
The two girls sat like this for a long while. Words were unnecessary; the physical contact was all each needed to express her feelings.
Erin finally broke the silence. “I had a bad dream,” she whispered.
“I could tell,” replied Hailey. “Want to talk about it?”
Erin continued to lean against her cousin in a half-hug position, apparently considering the question. After what seemed like ages to the girls, but minutes to the clock behind them, Erin spoke. “No,” she said, “I don’t think I’m ready to talk about it yet.”
“Fair enough,” replied Hailey, successfully hiding her disappointment. “When you do feel like talking about it, I’ll be here for you.”
Erin leaned more towards Hailey, and Hailey reached an arm around her and began to rub the top of her back. After a few more minutes she broke the silence. “I’m assuming you’re wet?”
Erin nodded just enough for Hailey to see.
“Would you like me to change you?”
Again, Erin sat in silence. She really did want some help this morning; her nightmare had physically and emotionally drained her. But she didn’t want to impose on Hailey.
Well, Hailey had offered the change, completely unprompted. She knew that Hailey would insist that she didn’t mind. And her aunt and uncle certainly kept telling her that it was okay to choose what she wanted, rather than considering everybody else’s feelings above hers at all times.
Well, she couldn’t deny that she would really prefer to have Hailey change her this morning. Maybe, just for this one night, and just because she really didn’t feel all that great after her nightmare, she could let her preferences trump Hailey’s.
Before she had a chance to change her mind, she leaned over closer to Hailey’s ear. “Yes, please,” she whispered.
Hailey nodded and carefully laid Erin back on the bed, pulling the covers out of the way. “Just lay here, and I’ll take care of everything.”
The amount of trust Erin felt for her cousin was overwhelming. Hailey could make everything right for her now. Against all odds, she smiled.