My Stepfather Filled Me Better Than My Husband Ever Did

Chapter 2

Living with Daniel was strange.

Not bad. Just... strange.

There was something almost unsettling about living in a house where someone remembered the little things about me. A refrigerator covered in magnets, including one from my high school days. A guest room that still carried the faint scent of the lavender candles I'd burned during finals week.

Daniel set up Lily's crib in the corner of my room, even though I'd told him he didn't have to.

"Of course I do," he said. "She's my granddaughter. Or whatever you want to call me. I'm not picky."

"Are you her grandfather?"

"I'm her... I don't know. Her dad's ex-step-grandfather? That sounds like something you'd have to put on a tax form."

He glanced down at Lily. She stared back at him with the solemn curiosity of a baby who hadn't yet learned to distrust adults.

"Let's just stick with 'Daniel.' She'll figure it out around the same time she learns the word 'snack.'"

I laughed.

It was the first time I'd laughed in weeks.

For the first week, I mostly slept.

I hadn't realized how exhausted I was until I finally stopped running.

For two years, I'd been living in survival mode—keeping Lily safe, keeping Ethan happy, and doing whatever I could to hold myself together. I hadn't slept through the night since Lily was born. Even when she slept, I stayed awake, listening to every sound in the house, waiting for Ethan to come home and wondering what I'd done wrong.

Now I could sleep for 12 hours straight, and Daniel never once knocked on my door to check on me.

He just kept the refrigerator stocked.

Premade sandwiches. Cut fruit. A thermos of coffee that somehow stayed at exactly the right temperature.

The first morning I came downstairs at a normal hour, he was standing at the stove making pancakes.

"Sleep well?" he asked.

"I think I died. Then I woke up."

"Good. That's the goal."

He flipped a pancake onto a plate.

"Syrup or honey?"

"Syrup. The cheap kind. Not that organic stuff you pretend to like."

"The cheap stuff is corn syrup and artificial flavoring."

"Exactly. That's why it's good."

He laughed.

"You're still a monster."

"I learned from the best."

But at night, once Lily was asleep and the house had settled into silence, my mind wouldn't shut off.

Ethan.

The things he'd said.

The look on his face when he'd realized I was still there—still in his house, still part of his life, still foolish enough to believe he might actually want me.

"You're loose."

He'd said it once, after he'd had enough wine to lose his filter.

Not "You're beautiful."

Not "I still love you."

Just that.

I'd tried to convince myself he hadn't meant it. He'd been drunk. He'd said something cruel without thinking.

But I'd known better.

He'd meant every word.

One night, I couldn't sleep.

I'd gone back to doing the pelvic-floor exercises I'd tried so many times before. The same exercises that never seemed to make a difference.

I lay on the guest-room floor beside Lily's crib, trying to figure out whether anything had actually changed.

Nothing.

I couldn't tell any difference.

What scared me most wasn't whether Ethan had been right. It was how easily I'd started believing him.

I checked myself the way I'd been taught at the hospital, trying to understand what was happening with my body.

There was no obvious problem. No pain. No sharp sensation.

Just numbness.

It was hard to explain. I could feel that something was different, but I couldn't seem to connect with that part of myself anymore.

I started crying before I even realized it.

Apparently, I wasn't as quiet as I'd thought.

A soft knock came at the door.

"Clara? You okay?"

I wiped my face with my sleeve.

"Fine. I'm fine."

"Your version of fine sounds a lot like crying. Your version of listening sounds a lot like eavesdropping."

The door creaked open.

Daniel stood in the doorway wearing an old T-shirt and sweatpants, his hair still messy from sleep. The concern on his face made it impossible to keep pretending nothing was wrong.

"What happened?"

"Nothing. I just—"

I stopped and took a breath.

"Ethan used to say... He said I was..."

"Say it."

I let out a bitter little laugh.

"He said I was too loose after Lily was born. He said he couldn't feel anything when we were together. That's why he stopped touching me."

My voice cracked.

"It's not that I'm not pretty, Daniel. It's that I'm broken. Down there. The part of me that's supposed to work doesn't feel like it does anymore."

I waited for him to tell me I was wrong.

Instead, he crossed the room and sat down beside me on the floor.

"Let me take a look."

I stared at him.

"What?"

"I said I'd take a look. I'm not a doctor, Clara. But I've been around long enough to know that what you're describing doesn't automatically mean you're broken. Let me see if there's actually a problem—or if Ethan just made you believe there was one."

"Daniel, I can't—"

"You can."

His voice was quiet.

"You came to me because you trust me. So trust me."

I don't know why I agreed.

Maybe I was exhausted. Maybe I'd spent so long feeling ashamed of my body that the thought of someone looking at me without judgment felt strangely intimate. Maybe, underneath all of it, I just needed to know whether I was really as damaged as Ethan had made me believe.

I let Daniel examine me.

His touch was warm and careful.

There was nothing rushed about him, nothing suggestive. He was focused on figuring out whether something was actually wrong.

I watched his face while he examined me. He kept his expression composed, but his breathing had changed slightly.

"Clara," he said quietly, "there's very little muscle tone. That can happen after childbirth, especially without proper rehabilitation."

My throat tightened.

"So you're saying it's bad."

"I'm saying it's treatable."

He paused.

"But it may take time. You'll need consistent pelvic-floor therapy and targeted exercises to rebuild your muscle strength."

"How long?"

"A few weeks, at least. Maybe longer. It depends on how your body responds."

"Who would—"

I stopped.

Daniel looked at me.

And suddenly, I understood what he'd been about to say.

He pulled back and stood.

"I shouldn't have crossed that line," he said quietly. "I'm sorry."

"Daniel—"

"It's late. Get some sleep."

He walked out and quietly closed the door behind him.

I stayed on the floor for a long time, staring at the closed door.

And I knew, with a certainty that scared me, that I wanted him to come back.