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And then this appeared.... FAT BASTARD LEFT A FLOATER!

Chapter 152: What It’s Like It was approximately two hours before Tracy and I spoke again. Actually that’s not true at all.  We talked a lot!  Turns out that We Adopted An Elf really is a hit holiday classic; especially after two or three shots of burning hot tequila each along with the rest of the non-Janet milk in the fridge. “So I don’t get it,” Tracy asked. “Why doesn’t the elf just use his solstice magic to take his diaper and onesie off?” I tossed my head back and stared up at the ceiling, buzzed out of my gourd. I hoped the tequila was gentle with me coming out. Or if I had a major accident because of it, that Janet would be home.  I was feeling lazy and drained and didn’t want to have to climb into the bathtub all over again because of a particularly greasy fart or something.  “Because this movie was written and directed by Amazons and it wouldn’t occur to them that wearing this stuff would be demeaning. Littles just wear diapers and onesies.” We just didn’t talk about anything important until then. “But he’s an elf.” “Yeah, but the actor is a Little.” “Point taken.”  Tracy took a swig of milk from her own glass.  I polished off mine.  “The real fantasy here is a non-Amazon insisting they’re not a baby and the Amazons eventually believing them.” We clinked glasses at that and snarked the rest of the way through the movie. “How you holding up?” a buzzed and loosened up Tracy asked. Her eyes flitted over to my shorts. The fact that she didn’t immediately try to pat the front of my diaper or slip a finger past my leak guards confused the hell out of drunk-me so that it took me a second or two to realize what she was asking me.  “I’ll tell you if I need to swap anything out,” I grumbled, mood turning sour. I wasn’t going to say ‘change’ if I could help it. It is to her credit that she didn’t get defensive or try to explain her reasoning to me.  “Okie dokie,” she said, backing off.  “Thanks,” I said.  The movie credits were pushed to the side of the screen so that a car commercial could play, followed by an announcement that an entire programming block of North Field would be on next. “So…” I paused. “The fuck can I get you for Solstice?”  It felt so good to freely swear; to drop casual f-bombs without fear of correction, just because I could. I wasn’t heated or angry or overly frustrated. I just got to swear as a point of emphasis, like conversational seasoning. Tracy flapped her lips like a horse. “I dunno, dude,” she said. “I’m at that age where if I want anything bad enough I can probably get it.” “And if you can’t,” I added, “your friends probably can’t either.”   She put her hands behind her head and leaned back into the couch.  “Yup,” her lips popped with the ‘p’. “Preeeeetty much.” I flopped over onto my side and exhaled. “Does clocking Ambrose count as a present?” “HA!” Tracy barked out surprised laughter, but did not cover her mouth or show any discomfort at doing it.  “Kind of!” she said, “but then with everything that happened right after I’d say we’re pretty much even.” I pushed myself half way up, leaning on my left forearm and having to adjust myself every five seconds lest the sofa cushions consume me.  “Damn. You’re right.” “Tell ya what,” Tracy said. “How about we just call it an I.O.U? You figure out a present for me and you can give it whenever.” My face was about to turn my drunken smirk into a frown, but then Tracy said,  “And it better be a good one, too.”  One would think this statement would give me anxiety. That I’d have the onus of finding the perfect gift or service to give Tracy hanging over my head and that I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night until I found it. Instead I took the responsibility Tracy was putting on me as a sign of trust. Kids got away with handmade cards and shitty breakfast in bed because they weren’t expected to have the resources or the capability for anything else.  I might not have resources, but I still had plenty of capability.  “Deal.”  I reached my hand out and we shook on it. “Got any ideas for Janet? Or Zoge?” I asked. “Or Jessica, I guess.” Tracy leaned forward and rested her elbows on her lap. “Hmmmmm….”  She sat and thought about it for a few minutes.  I tumbled off the sofa to get to the coffee table and grab the remote so I could mute the T.V.  The alcohol was running its course and the adult cartoon antics on the television were starting to hurt my ears and I knew if I didn’t get vertical I’d pass out on the couch. “I’m gonna…go get a puke bucket.” I announced to no one in particular. “Just in case.” I waddled back to the guest bathroom and snagged the wastepaper basket.  I stared at was essentially a plastic bucket without a handle and failed to control my inner monologue. “How would they even make a face diaper?”  I giggled at my own absurd humor. Tracy hadn’t moved from her position when I came back, bucket tucked under my arm like a bongo.  I used it as a step stool to get my seat back and Tracy bent over and pulled it up after me.  “So Starke is pretty easy,” Tracy said once I’d settled. “Starke?” I said. “Oh oh oh. Jessica, right.”  I’d officially relinquished my title of ‘Boss’ to the woman, but it did my boozy heart good to hear Tracy refer to Jessica by her last name. “Whatcha got?” “Write her a letter,” Tracy said. “Write it as one teacher to another. Like you’re passing the torch.” I made a bothered face and it wasn’t just because of the sour burp that preceded my next sentence.  “Why would she want that?” “You have no idea how much she likes you. Remember when she babysat you? Right before you ran away? She wouldn’t shut up about it the next day. Specifically you!  She adores you and thinks everything that comes out of your mouth is precious.” The threat of a panic attack bubbled up inside me. “She’s not talking about me like that in front of the kids, is she?” Tracy was quick to comfort me. “Oh no, no, no, she’s a total pro when the kids are around. I’m talking before and after school.” “Okay. Good.” “Honestly?” Tracy said. “From how she talks about you, I think she would’ve taken you if Janet hadn’t gotten there first. I think a show of approval would mean a lot to her.” My nose wrinkled.  Me? Why me?  Jessica had never known me as anything else but an Adopted Little.  We’d no prior relationship, professional or otherwise, before my life fell apart. “I don’t think so…” Tracy felt strongly enough that she stood up to face me and put her hands on her hips. “Dude!” she practically squawked. “From her point of view, you’re either the amazing teacher that I remind her about constantly, or her favorite kid!  Your approval means a lot to her. “You talk about me?” My voice shot up into a sappy squeak and I blinked back tears, wrestling with emotions that the intoxicants were strengthening.  Not exactly sober herself, Tracy produced a giddy giggle. “Of course you idiot! I’m practically training her. We set the room back up almost exactly like you had it and I’ve been telling her everything we did to give her ideas on how to run things.” “And she’s…listening?” Tracy started jumping. “Yes!” My volume dropped and my mouth became confused about which direction it should go. “That’s…really cool to hear.” She retook her seat and allowed me to feel good about myself for a moment.  “Zoge?” I asked when the moment had passed. Tracy played around with her ponytail, undoing the scrunchy and redoing it as she talked. “I don’t know if Zoge even celebrates Solstice.” “Yeah,” I agreed. “Good point.” There was an awkward silence between us, then slightly drunken snickering from the both of us. “What would a gift for Zoge even look like?” Tracy wondered. “I think she might be the one woman in the world that would actually like a vacuum cleaner!” I laughed. Tracy did me one better.  “Thank you very much,” she said in the wistful, almost musical way that Mrs. Zoge favored. “I am very grateful for the opportunity to clean my house with greater ease.”   Had I been drinking anything, whatever it was would have burst out of my nose right then.  “Oh my gosh!” I guffawed. “That’s too good!  You even got in a little bow at the end!”  My synapses started firing and my fingers started snapping to catch my mouth up. “Oh, oh, oh! You forgot to add in ‘my love’.  Like, ‘Thank you, my love.’” My impression wasn’t as good as Tracy’s. I thought that was the reason Tracy looked confused. “Zoge doesn’t call people ‘my love’.” “Yeah she does,” I snorted. “She calls everybody ‘my love’. It’s one of her go to nicknames.” I shook my head and snorted again. “She tells everybody that she loves them right after she changes…their…”  Tracy was looking distinctly uncomfortable. “Oh,” I said. “Oh. Too much info. Sorry.” Tracy shook herself out of it. “No, no,” she said. “It’s okay. Just didn’t expect it.” She pursed her lips and awkwardly powered forward, trying her best to be casual about it (and failing).  “That’s so weird,” she shook her head. “Imagine have someone tell you that they love you every time you go to the bathroom.” “Pfffft! You think I get changed every time I have to pee?” I roll my eyes. “I wish.” “Oh…” Tracy blushed. “Right…” I blushed right along.  “It’s not so bad,” I told her. “It’s not like it hurts or anything.” We didn’t look at each other for about three minutes. Or maybe it was only a second. It probably was most like ten seconds but it felt so much longer. “What’s it like?” she eventually asked.  “Diapers?” I asked. “Didn’t you have to wear one?” “Wear,” she reminded me. “Not use. I’d have just quit if they’d forced me to use it.” “Ah,” I said. “Well…there’s a reason real babies don’t cry all that much. Wet diapers aren’t so bad and messy ones kind of attract their own attention so they tend to get resolved quickly.”  The grain of the coffee table was suddenly very interesting to me. “There’s a reason it’s called ‘training’ and not ‘this just comes naturally’ or whatever.” “Well that’s good, I guess.” Tracy offered. “How’d they do it?” Tracy was sobering up. “Drugs? Hypnosis?” I was still buzzed enough to be talkative. “Maybe a little,” I speculated. “But not really.” I took a deep breath. “They don’t need to.  I can’t take this stuff off. They control what I eat and drink so that I’m unlikely to get clogged up or dehydrated.” “Mhm. Mhm.” She nodded, trying to be attentive. “Can you not feel it anymore?” “Not exactly.” My eyes were still glued to the coffee table, admiring the sanding job that some artisan or machine did. “It’s more like I’ve been desensitized to the point of atrophy.  First you try to hold it in, and then you’re like ‘what’s the point?’, then you just start going whenever you feel the need, and then holding it in starts to feel weird,” I tried to explain without being too graphic.  “Like, to hold it in I have to keep reminding myself over and over. And if I get too distracted, I’ll just…let go.” “So it’s like trying to carry around a cup of coffee all day without putting it down or drinking it.” My eyes fluttered at the analogy. “I’m gonna steal that,” I said. “Next time I gotta explain this to somebody, I’m stealing that.”  “Thanks,” Tracy told me. She nodded along, satisfied. “Okay. I think I get it.” Something happened to me when I heard it. Maybe my blood alcohol content or my blood sugar spiked or dropped suddenly. Or maybe I’d just accidentally put myself in a foul mood, but I replied, “You don’t.”  My voice was flat and downright grim.  “You don’t. But that’s okay. I don’t want you to get it.” My old assistant was gracious enough about it. “I might not know everything,” she conceded, “but I think I have an idea.” She scratched her nose lightly and continued. “That last stretch of time with Ambrose, where I was about to quit? I was so paranoid. I kept worrying that I’d say or do something that would backfire on me or one of the kids. I had to be perfect and composed and on guard all the time.  It was like that time Brollish got that essay and we had to stay up all night making sure everything was perfect, but it was every day.” I remained silent, mulling her words over and realizing just how much she understood. “And every time I moved around,” she added, almost bragging. “I heard it. I felt like I was wearing ten pairs of underwear, fifteen maxi pads and a garbage bag all at once.” My mood turned as sour as my last belch.  “You’re describing every day of my life before this mess.” I lectured. “The essay incident was one of the best times of my life because I knew definitively ahead of time what was coming. I would’ve killed to have just one day a year to be on guard. Or for it to stop when it’s time to clock out.” “Ouch,” Tracy said, her face looking appalled. “And you were diapered as a punishment,” I reminded her. “They did it to me ‘for my own good’.” I used my whole arms to make the air quotes. “You couldn’t afford to look defiant. I couldn’t afford to look defiant or weak. And they congratulated themselves when they finally did it.” I can’t precisely describe how I felt or how I sounded. ‘Outraged’ is too harsh. Indignant is closer but doesn’t exactly hit the mark.  If there was a word for that feeling you get when you’re at a bar’s trivia night and you know the correct answer and your wife and your stubborn father-in-law have the completely wrong answer and you are certain that if they don’t listen to you your team won’t get the points and you’ll all have to pay for your loaded sweet potato fries instead; that’s how I was feeling. I was prepared for Tracy to contradict me. Or to argue her point on how our two circumstances really were very similar if I just thought about it. In the silence before she opened her mouth to reply I was already preparing my next arguments and anticipating her own to counter.  “Shit,” she cursed. “Damn.” She looked like she was waking from a dream, almost. “Clark, I’m sorry. I had no idea. That’s fuckin’ terrible.” “If you got Adopted,” I continued rambling, still staring at the coffee table as though it were the edge of the abyss. Everyone would look at you and think less of you. You’d be a disgrace.  Me? I’m right where they think I should be. They wouldn’t even think of me.  You? You’re successful. My entire career just meant I went through a ‘pre-failure’ phase.”  “No, no.” Tracy put her hand on my shoulder. “You’re right. I don’t get it.” A beat. “Thank you.” It wasn’t a ‘Thank you’ to shut me up. It was genuine; heartfelt even. “Thank you?” I parroted back like I was a Rocaw. “What do you mean ‘Thank you’?” “I didn’t think about how much I take for granted,” Tracy admitted. “Thank you for teaching me something. I think I had a great-great Aunt who was a Little, but I have no idea about what Littles really go through.” If not for the tequila, I would have closed the conversation talking about how I didn’t always fully appreciate Tracy’s circumstances or Tweener’s circumstances in general.  “Don’t get me started on other Littles,” I looked up from the table. “Everybody either wants me to become as empty headed as them or wants to fuck with me so that they feel bigger than they are.” “Dang!” Tracy cocked an eyebrow. “For real? I thought there would be  more solidarity between Littles than that.  Like you’re all in the same mess together.” “Naw,” I said. “It’s more like, ‘sucks to be you’ and ‘I can’t be a baby because you’re a baby’.” “Weird.” Tracy said.  I could only shrug. “If you say so. It’s kind of just how it is.” “I did not know that.” Tracy repeated. “Thanks.” She lifted her hand off my shoulder so that she could pat it again. “I’m sure that it took a lot of effort for you to open up like that to me.  Just like it took a lot of effort for you to let yourself be vulnerable. That means a lot to me.  Can I take this moment as my Solstice present?” I straightened up as inspiration sparked in my synapses. The sluggishness of the tequila was being flushed out of my system by the excitement. “No,” I said. “But it might make a good present for someone else. Do you still have that tablet?” ***************************************************************************************************** “Thank you, Tracy,” I whispered to myself, digging out the tablet from underneath my pillow. She hadn’t had it with her, but she had driven us all the way to her apartment and back to get it, letting me tinker and type until just before Janet got home when I should have been napping. I plugged in the special passcode, J-E-F-E, and got to work, typing away for hours on end in the darkness. The line between wakefulness and dream blurred together for me and for a brief time, memory of what was and my senses of what is melded together and became impossible for me to differentiate between. This was going to be perfect. This was going to be my masterpiece. No one would see this coming: Not Janet. Not Melony. Certainly not Auntie Jessica or Ivy’s mom.  This was a Clark Gibson classic that would shake them all to their very core! It was either late into Saturday night or early Sunday morning depending on your point of view. I was on fire and wrote like a man possessed. My determination was such that I could have typed until the sun rose without so much as a yawn.  I never got the chance. “Clark?” Janet’s sleepy voice snapped my attention away from the screen. “Mommy’s having trouble sleeping.” In the hazy gloom of the nightlight I saw Janet’s ghostly frame, arms limp and head limp from fatigue. Startled and panicking, I froze like a deer in headlights; my face eerily illuminated by my contraband. “Do you wanna come cuddle with-?” It was then that her groggy vision cleared enough to see what I’d been caught at.  “WHAT THE HELL?!” The light clicked on.  My eyes stung but I did not blink. Neither did. “CLARK GIBSON!” Janet BOOMED! “WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING YOUNG MAN?!” Her hands lashed out and yanked the tablet out of my sweaty grip. “Wait, Mommy!” I begged. “It’s not what you think!” “DON’T ‘MOMMY’ ME, CLARK!” Every spiteful syllable was jagged glass on the skin of my soul. What she said next hurt even more. “I was just starting to trust you…” She was quiet. Very quiet. “I’m so ashamed.” I didn’t know what to do. I was desperate and panicking and seeing all of my wonderful plans disintegrate. “I know,” I said. “I’m sorry. Please don’t read it.” I stood up and leaned against the rails of the crib, reaching for it the way a toddler in a grocery cart reaches for the candy. “It’s not finished yet!” A storm brewed behind Janet’s eyes. “It’s finished alright,” she said with angry finality. “You’re never getting this back again.” Oh no! All my hard work. Everything I’d done! She was going to break it! Or delete it! I couldn’t let her do that! I just couldn’t! “I don’t know how you tricked Tracy into giving you this but-” “WAIT!” I screamed, my voice raw and trembling. “PLEASE! DON’T DELETE IT! IT’S TOO IMPORTANT!” “Too important?” Janet looked like she wanted to cry and bite out my jugular at the same time. “Hurting yourself is too important?! Running away from me and everybody else who loves you is too important?! For what? So you can feel good about yourself?! So you can…can…wear big boy underwear or drink beer or something?! Prove to yourself that you don’t care about anyone or don’t need anyone?!” Her knuckles were so white and her face was turning so red that I genuinely feared she might snap the tablet with her bare hands. “FUCKING TYPICAL, CLARK! FUCKING! TYPICAL!” I looked away from her, unable to meet her withering gaze. My reply was a pathetic whimper. “It’s supposed to be your Solstice present.” “What?”  I lifted my gaze in time to see Janet react. It was like I’d sucker punched her worse than I’d done Ambrose. “My? Solstice present?”  Her eyes went to the tablet to me and then back to the tablet. It was as if our sizes had been reversed and I was offering her a sneak preview at a shiny new cartoon that she’d suspiciously never heard of before. “This is a present?” “It may not look like it, but yeah,” I said. “It’s not finished, though!” Janet chewed on her lower lip, not sure whether or not to believe me. “Can I read it.” “It’s not finished,” I repeated. “But if you want to…” She took the tablet over to the rocker and sat down with it. I remained in the crib, watching her read, probing every micro expression on her face and hoped against hope that my intent would not be misconstrued.  I had started writing my memoirs again. Tracy had inadvertently given me the idea. She didn’t know what I’d gone through. No non-Little really could. And I’d given her the gift of introspection. More importantly, I’d allowed myself to be open and vulnerable to her. The greatest gift I yet knew how to give, to anyone, was the gift of my trust. “It’s not fin-” “Shhhh!” Janet brought a finger up to her lips. I zipped mine. “I’m reading.” So I stayed there, sitting up with my back against the crib bars closest to the wall, watching Janet on the far side of the room scroll through my far from finished manifesto.  I’d managed to get all the way to being trapped in the clinic, sweating bullets while my Amazon and Tweener support system ran interference on Ambrose with me; though for dramatic effect I obscured her name from the narrative since I hadn’t known it at the time. But I hadn’t gotten to the good part where we’d made Brollish have to swallow her pride or else incriminate herself. All told, Janet read in silence for about an hour. Somewhere within that hour Lion found his way into my lap. I hugged him gently and he hugged me back, as if telling me it was going to be okay. If only I could believe him. When she was done, Janet stood up. She left the tablet where she was sitting. “Why did you write all that?” “I wanted you to know,” I confessed. “I wanted you to know how my life was before you. And I wanted you to know what was going on in my head at the time.  Because I trust you.” My throat still felt tight. “A lot of these are secrets. Thoughts that I haven’t shared with anybody.” I too, bit my lip in nervous apprehension. “Even Cassie.” If Janet was shocked or taken aback by this information, I didn’t notice; primarily because I felt like I’d just sucker punched myself. The fuck did I just admit to? “Is there more?” Janet asked. Her voice lowered back down to a crackling whisper. I tapped the side of my skull. “In here, there is. A lot more.” Janet walked up to the crib and reached in. I didn’t fight her when she cradled me in your arms. “I’m still upset with you,” she told me. “If you would have asked, I would have said ‘yes’.” “But then it wouldn’t have been a surprise,” I tried to explain.  “You’re not the only one who doesn’t deal well with certain types of surprises.” “Oh,” I said, feeling like a total hypocrite. “I’m sorry.” Janet lifted me up to her face and kissed me on the forehead. “It’s okay. I forgive you. You’re heart was in the right place.” For all the grief she’d caused me, so was hers. “Can I keep writing it?” I pleaded. “For Solstice?” Janet turned out the light. She was walking us back to her bedroom where my bassinet attachment awaited. “You can have tomorrow,” Janet yawned. “But after that, anything else you write will have to be for another holiday.” “Wait,” I gasped. “You mean…you want to read more?” “If you have more that you want to tell me.” Janet smiled down at me in the dark. “I want to know what you think and if writing it down is easier than talking about it, I want you to do that.” “Really?!” I was almost too excited to sleep. “But first, we are going to bed, and we are sleeping in as long as possible.” Almost… I cuddled up in her arms, purring like a kitten as she laid us down. “Yes, Mommy.” She purred back. “Good baby.”  

Still not feeling to good with the flu. Mommy and I went to the doctor so I could get a check to make sure it wasn't anything more worse than the flu. Anyway about 45 minutes on the way home from the doctor while mommy quickly went into the grocery store to get a couple of things, while sitting in the car waiting for her I was watching thunderbirds on my phone I had an accident in my tykables potty monsters Nappy and made a huge mushy poopoos. When mommy came back to the car she could smell it she said I can wait till we get home to get a nappy change. Anyway at home now sitting on the couch waiting for mommy to come check my nappy. Oh dear just made another poos while typing this anyway mommy has come in and said that I need to get the nappy caddy and some warm baby clothes so she can change my stinky nappy and get me out of my big boy outing clothes.

Uh...yeah. But I try to make it look like I'm either in the wrong aisle on my way to looking for something else, or I'm lost.

I don't think I've had a diaper day this whole year, yet.