She's staring at him petulantly and Jayne wonders just why the hell he indulges her at times like this.
Always the oddball, he can't decide if she's started a week before everyone, Inara is usually the one to begin the cycle, or a week after everyone, Kaylee tends to end it. He can smell it on all the girls, that spice, the metallic scent of blood and the way the skin pales just a tiny bit. You don't live with women as long as he has and fail to notice that kind of thing. But he can smell it on River before she even starts to show her loopier signs.
"What kind?"
"Stars."
Jayne nods and hoists himself up. Moony needs pads and he's always the one to get em for her.
Probably always will too.
He's wondered a few times why she doesn't go to the girls. Why not ask them for help, why not crawl into Inara's bed or sit by Zoe's feet or sit in the warm engine room like Kaylee does. She explained it to him once. Something about animal behavior and there were some big words he didn't fully understand, but the gist was clear enough.
Big man protect little woman. Just like it'd been in the beginning before they'd started talking and using tools.
She's still holed up in his bunk when he comes back and he steps out while she sorts herself out. She ain't gonna leave tonight. She never does. In fact she'll probably stay holed up in his bunk and under his blankets for the next three days. Just like she always does.
'Ain't no other woman in this whole gorram galaxy I'd let do that'. Not even his own kid...assuming he had one...which he might somewhere. But that wasn't important. "You all done?" A muffled sound hits his ears and he drops back into his bunk. Sure enough, she's all bundled up in his blankets, curled in on herself and suffering silently. She don't tell the doc, he wouldn't either if it meant getting a bunch of voices in the brainpan.
Jayne goes back to what he was doing.
"Want me to read fer ya?" he asks a bit later. He's sitting on his bed, reading about a detective from earth that was. He feels River's head move against his stomach. She's resting her head on a pillow on his lap and if anyone finds out he'll deny it til the day he dies. "Right, yer lucky I just started, don't mind going back."
To Sherlock Homes she is always The woman. I have seldom heard him mention her under any other name. In his eyes, she eclipses and predominates the whole of her sex."
River always came to Jayne. If he could be trusted to do anything, it was to smell the way he should and read in his big growly voice and to keep his thoughts in a line and organized and focused. This detective he reads about is one of their favorites. The hero has flaws and he's never quite all there. It's easy to get lost in London that was, and the images he's getting in his head add to her own ideas. She shares with him sometimes and together they can make their own world and together they would stumble over words they didn't know.
When they go to sleep, she's the princess being guarded by the dragon. His hands are warm on her abdomen and the cramping dulls wherever he puts his hands. She can fall asleep knowing that she's safe with her Jayne monster.