Mary and Daphne #66 (Patreon)

Q4 is Mary’s busiest time of year. I don’t really understand why that is, but then I don’t really understand what it is she does. I just know I’d gotten used to her leaving her desk during what I derisively call “business hours” to come and talk with me or hang out or even do stuff since COVID started. I worked hard to get her to do that and not sit at her computer for nine straight hours. I even suffered an almost–concussion for my efforts. But Mary is super responsible, and when she needs to be at her desk, that’s where she is, even if it means she doesn’t get her steps in or eats well or gets to do anything else besides work and sleep.

And she won’t admit it, but I know why she’s been acting kinda funny (because she told me, because I’m a great interrogator with skills like asking her what’s bothering her and her telling me, which seems easy but is also the definition of a great interrogator) and burying herself in her work even more than usual for the time of year. I mean, she’ll admit what’s bothering her but won’t admit it’s having any impact on how she’s acting: she thinks this might be her grandparents’ last Christmas, and she doesn’t think we’ll get to see them in person for it.

Packed into that little sentence is all the anxiety and fear and guilt the ever responsible, always confident, but just–as–real–and–vulnerable–as–the–rest–of–us Mary feels. She wants to be everything to everyone: the perfect wife, the perfect domme, but also the perfect daughter and the perfect granddaughter. If I’m pathologically eager to please, Mary is pathologically driven to be all things to all people. If I wear my emotions on the outside and in so many places I lose them from time to time, Mary keeps her negative emotions inside. She lets me see them. Just me, which is one of the ways I know we’re made for each other and a reassurance that our marriage’s emotional labor is not all on her. But when it’s an emotion not easily processed, when there’s no easy solution to what’s behind it, Mary sometimes doesn’t share. I don’t know if it’s because she doesn’t want to admit there’s something she can’t solve (she’s not always good at admitting that) or because she just wants to ignore the emotion until it passes. But Mary isn’t the kind of person who can just ignore an emotion until it goes away. And anyway, emotions never go away if they don’t get shared. You may forget them or get used to them, but they don’t go away.

So she’s been using work to distract herself and not acting like her usual self. I think she’s feeling guilty, and I know from experience what a toxic emotion that is, especially when you didn’t do anything wrong and especially when there’s no way to expiate the guilt. When I feel that way, all I need to do is tell Mary, and down my shorts go so she can expiate the crap outta my bare ass. Mary doesn’t have that option.

I’ve been doing what I can to get her away from her computer and thinking about what’s good about this Christmas instead of just what’s sad, and failing that, she always feels better at least for a bit after swinging a hard, flat object at my butt. I’m happy to be her sacrificial ass, and if she won’t just do it because it makes her feel better, I’ll brat until I push her over the edge and she pushes me over her knee. It doesn’t resolve the emotion, but it at least relieves some stress for her and makes us both feel, well, a whole range of good feelings. Sometimes feeling better just for a little while is all we can hope for, and the little whiles add up until, for one reason or another, we’re fine again.

It was when I couldn’t brat hard enough, no matter what, to get her to give me more than some token swats that I got worried and called in an expert. Lisa, Jane’s big.

“If bratting isn’t working, maybe try the opposite and be super sweet,” Lisa suggested.

“I thought I was being super sweet.” I’ve been doing every chore, getting up earlier than her to make her a real breakfast, making her have dinner at the kitchen table, giving her foot rubs, running her baths. I even laid out her choice of spanking implements and included the bathbrush! She just used her hand and didn’t even make me sniffle before declaring I’d learned my lesson and telling me never to hide her phone again, which I only did so she’d stop staring it all evening waiting for work emails that never came.

“Maybe she doesn’t want all that.”

“Well, you’re a domme,” I said, “what would you want?”

“I’m a mommy-domme. I’m not into the whole slave thing.” I’ve never seen Jane lift a finger, but then how often do you see your friends doing chores while you’re at their homes. I mean, unless it’s a party or something and they’re being a host.  Anyhoo …

“Neither is Mary. I’m just trying to do nice things for her.”

“You’re the nice thing that makes her feel better,” Lisa told me. It felt like we were going in circles.

“Normally, yeah.” Many is the time Mary arrived home after a bad day and tossed me over her lap, sometimes with the pretext of some misbehavior and sometimes just exercising her prerogative to spank my butt for any reason or none at all. “Maybe she’s bored of the discipline.”

“Maybe she doesn’t want to be a domme right now.”

“But ... she is! That’s who she is.”

“That’s not all of who she is.”

“Well of course it isn’t.” Lisa was not being helpful. I considered wrapping up the conversation and calling Brenna instead.

“I’m saying maybe she’s feeling more like a mommy than a domme right now, Daphne.”

Okay, firstly, that’s not what Lisa said. Secondly, “Mary is not my mommy.” Thirdly, “And I’m not a little.”

“I know! I know,” she said like she was backpedaling and humoring me at the same time. So tired of people humoring me about my alleged littleness. “But ...”

“... Yeah?”

“Jane says you told her Mary referred to herself as a big not that long ago.”

“Finally, I mean, like, was she ever going to admit it?” There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone, broken by what may have been audible eye–rolling and muttering. No idea what may have prompted that. Certainly couldn’t have been something I said. Really. Maybe Jane did something? Anyhoo...

“So maybe she’s feeling more like a big than a domme right now,” Lisa ventured.

“And I practically put myself over her knee.” What was Lisa’s point? It’s not like I handed her a hundred feet of rope and told her tie me up until she felt better.

“Seriously, Daphne Ann, you can be so single-minded sometimes.”

“But that’s what Mary does when she’s stressed!”

“But that’s not all that bigs do. When I get stressed, I just want to cuddle with Jane.”

“We do that all the time.”

“As her wife.”

“I am her wife.”

“So, if she’s a big ...”

“But ... what’s the difference?”

“It’s ... it’s hard to explain. Just try it.”

I had no idea what I was even supposed to try. “Try what?”

“Dial up the adorability and let her take care of you.”

“But ...”

“She’s takes care of you in more ways than smacking your bottom for you. Let her take of you. Speaking of, we’re having a little night. It’s Jane’s bedtime. I have to run.”

Jane and Lisa must take bedtime on a little night seriously, because it was only 7:30. And dial up the adorability? I am adorable! It gets me in trouble, being so adorable.

And how is taking care of me going to make Mary less frazzled? I’m trying to take responsibilities off her plate, not add to them.

And so maybe Mary was feeling more like a big than a domme. We’re spankos! Discipline and being a big go hand in hand. I mean, if it weren’t for how embarrassed it makes me, would Mary even do the other big stuff? I mean ... would she? It’s always been so tied to our erotic humiliation thing. I know she likes me cute, but she likes me blushy and cringing at the same time. Most of the time. So it ... seems. But fine. It won’t hurt to try it once, whatever it is.

My confusion, I decided, is proof I’m not a little or middle. Jane is a little. I’m sure she would just know what to do to make a big feel enough warm–fuzzies to pull their mind away from their troubles for more than ten minutes. She’d just know and would do ... something.

I’ll just do what Jane does. Except how does coloring a picture and asking to have the crusts cut off my sandwich help?

All I could think of was it being Jane’s bedtime. She and Lisa were probably snuggling before she turned the lights off. She’d be wearing one of her pairs of little jammies, and when she’s being little she sleeps with her bear. Into my closet I went to search of a good stand-in for little jammies, and I emerged with a pair of Christmas footie pajamas. Mary has a matching pair (they were purchased during our disgusting–new–couple period; we alienated a lot of people with the lovey–dovey stuff). Maybe she should find hers some time, but not the night for it.

I eyed the toy chest hard before I closed the closet door. Nope, I decided. If I was going to cater to Mary’s bigness by pretending to be a little or middle or whatever, I could do it just as easily in panties.

As for the other props, after I changed into the PJs I got Jamie off the dresser. It’s hard not to anthropomorphize a teddy bear; it’s just so ingrained culturally. But it’s just a teddy bear, and it isn’t sad because no one ever pays it any attention. This wasn’t, I assured myself, Jamie’s best day ever.

And in getting Jamie off the dresser, I knocked Mary’s pacifier onto the floor. Like so many other things Mary got to afflict me, the pacifier is hers, and since this was all about her, I put it between my lips voluntarily for the first time ever.

Footie pajamas, teddy bear, paci. So I guess it is possible for me to dial up my innate adorability. Still, looking at myself in the mirror, this felt a little desperate. My instinct told me the way to make Mary feel better was to leave the bear and take the paddle and let Mary take out some stress on my butt cheeks before snuggling with me, but if Lisa’s a big and Mary really is a big, and if offering my butt hadn’t gotten the desired reaction yet, maybe Lisa knew something I didn’t.

That thought triggered a whole other set of thoughts that freaked me out. Why didn’t I understand this about Mary? Had Mary told things to Lisa I didn’t know? And why wasn’t Mary interested in spanking me? I mean, she’d done it since her little funk set in, but she didn’t put her all into it, and it didn’t have the anti–stress properties that particular form of exercise normally has. Why? And spanking me is a way Mary takes care of me, so if what Mary needed was something to take care of, why didn’t that do the trick? Was spanking me not fun for her anymore? What it a chore now?

Good thing I’m not insecure. Really ...

Or at least good thing I’m not self–centered. My insecurities could wait. Mary’s needs first.

I walked downstairs feeling like I was part of a real–world experiment to test Lisa’s hypothesis: does Mary just need a little girl to take care of?

It made less sense to me the closer I got to Mary’s office. My instinct was to do more for her, not get her to do more for me. Hence the chore doing, meal making, and wellness monitoring I’d been doing. This seemed backwards, to say nothing of muddying up my message, even if it never seems to get through, that I’m not a little. I don’t have a little personality or persona, and I don’t like the things littles like.

Mary was at her computer with the lights off. Typical Mary, straining her eyes in service of ... whatever it is she does.

“Mary?”

“Yeah?”

I probably should’ve thought of something to say after that. All I came up with on the spot was, “Um...”

“What is it, sweetie,” Mary asked when she turned toward me. She probably couldn’t see well going from the computer to the dark room, so I turned on the light. Then she really couldn’t see well.

“Sorry,” I said. “I ...”

Remember Daphne? The woman who had crawled under that very desk to proffer cunnilingus without even being asked (moments before the near-concussion with the knee to the head I got for my trouble)? The woman who gets spanked in public? The Daphne who, the last time she was worried about Mary working too much, pretended to be a landscaper and got instructed (reamed) by the lady of the house in our backyard?

I bring this up by way of pointing out that at least around Mary, I’m not shy. I may be super easy to embarrass, and I may be modest on certain subjects, but having walked into her office wearing nothing before, I certainly didn’t expect to feel shy walking in wearing footie pajamas and carrying a bear. I blame the bear. That, and Mary’s expression. I have a mental catalogue of those, and she has as many expressions under the Daphne is Adorable header as linguists have words for the parts of speech, but this was a new one. Like sure, she thought I looked adorable, but something else was in her face and in her eyes and behind that smile.

She got up from her chair and crossed the room, taking the hand that wasn’t holding the bear and brushing my hair away from my face even though it wasn’t in my face. “You okay,” she asked me, softly and quietly.

“Mhmm.”

“What’s this all about?”

I shrugged. It was a truthful answer. There were other answers that were equally truthful, but I didn’t know what this was all about. I didn’t get it. Again, my instinct was to turn it into a scene, to brat and say something like, “I don’t care of it is my bedtime! Bedtimes are stupid,” and kick off some role play. But I didn’t.

“C”mon, sweetie.” And why was she talking in a tone she usually saves for when I’ve been bawling? She flipped the light back off and led me to the living room, where she sat down and pulled me into her lap. That, I was used to. She got a blanket and spread it over us, guided my head to I was resting my cheek on her chest, and pulled my legs across hers. She pet my hair for a minute, just like that.

“What’s this all about, hmm,” she asked again.

I shouldn’t have felt nervous. We snuggle all the time. I sit in her lap all the time. She holds me all the time. She comforts me all the time. All the time, we do pretty much what we were doing, and we do it when I’m an emotional wreck and when there’s no reason other than we’re in love and physical affection junkies, both of us. So why did this feel different? I’ve thought a lot about it, and what I came up was this.

It didn’t feel different because I brought down the bear and the pacifier. It didn’t feel different because it came from me thinking about how a little would do this. It didn’t feel different because Mary was holding me extra tight, though she was, and being quiet and gentle, though she was being those things too. And it didn’t feel different because I was giving Mary a hug to make her feel better. Thousands of times I’ve done that over the years, and thousands more times will I do it again.

“Hmmm,” Mary asked a third time, “what’s all this about? Can you try to use your words?”

“I wanted ...”

“You can tell me, baby.” Being shy wasn’t the problem. Not being sure what I wanted is why I didn’t finish the sentence.

“Are you happy right now,” I asked.

Mary didn’t say anything, and her hand in my hair paused. Which didn’t help with my nervousness. I think I held my breath until her hand started stroking me again. “I’m very happy right now.”

“That’s what I wanted.”

“(Sniff). Such a good girl. (SNIFF!)

“We’re gonna make it a good Christmas, Mary. It’s gonna be our best yet.”

“It will be,” Mary said.

“Remember what I said at the beginning of the pandemic?”

“What’s that?”

“That if you take of me, and I take care of you, everything will be fine.”

“You’re so smart, Daffy. And so kind and so beautiful inside.” I guess I sound like she sounded just then, all the times I’m just barely holding in the tears.

“If I take care of you, will you take care of me?”

“Forever and always, Daphne Ann.” I got a kiss on my head, the slow, gentle, quiet kind against my hair, and the gentle rocking of my Mary. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For being my little girl.”

Which was great and all, but I still didn’t exactly get how I missed that’s what she needed and Lisa just seemed to know it. And Mary was still being sniffly and kept losing a tear here and there. “You can cry if you need to. Now, or whenever,” I told her. Not my exclusive right, and certainly doesn’t make her any less of my domme. She’s that and a million other things, no less the amazing warrior–queen she’ll always be to me.

I could feel her holding her breath, waiting for her diaphragm to stop cramping so the sob could pass. She took in air again in a halting breath.

Not that I was trying to make her cry, but I kinda was (definitely was) if that’s what it took to get her to get all the feelings out. That wasn’t part of my plan, but I barely had a plan to begin with. I of all people should know when someone needs a good cry. I said to my Mary, “It’s brave to let it out.” It’s another way of asking for help; that’s what my parents taught me, and that’s what Mary more or less has said to me many times before, and it’s true. It takes guts to ask for help.

And she did let it out. Had that been part of my plan, I presumably would’ve planned for her to squeeze me so hard when she did. I tried to sit up to she could put her head on my shoulder for a change, but she kept me where I was and leaned forward so her head was resting on mine. And of course if Mary was gonna cry, so I was I. I don’t do so well around other people crying, but Mary crying? Fuggedaboutit. Done.

She didn’t cry long (nowhere near my record – she didn’t even wail or get snot on me; I’m definitely the household champion at crying). We sat quietly for a bit, until Mary gave me another kiss, a quick one this time, before she sat up and said, “It’s a little girl’s bedtime.”

I got off her so she could stand, holding her hand and the bear. “I’m not a little girl,” I yawned. “And I’m not going to bed unless you are, too.”

“You’re my little girl. My very bestest good little girl.”

“And you’re ...”

“What?”

“My Mary.”