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Chapter 109: Throw “YEAH? I NEEDED to get back here in time?” I said, feeling exposed and embarrassed in front of my former nest mother right then. “Well, you’re here, and I’m in luck that I get to change a much prettier Little than I usually do!” She picked me up before I could warn her about me probably leaking but quickly carried me to a small changing room on the first floor I didn’t know existed. She used one hand to unfold a disposable changing pad. She placed it on the metal changing table and laid me on it. “You soaked through your onesie and skirt,” she said as she flipped it up. “Here, sit up for a second,” she told me. I rolled upward, and a second later, she pulled the jumper over my head and then the onesie to leave me only in the sagging and soaked diaper. “Umm… what am I going to wear?” I asked her nervously. “Don’t worry, we keep a few spare things in here for this type of emergency,” she assured me. “Let’s get you out of that soggy diapee first, though!” I really felt that Lilly did a better job of changing my diapers. However, Mackenzie was still better than several changers I’d had. She was gentle, wiped me thoroughly, and dressed me in a spare diaper from my backpack. “You don’t have a spare outfit in there, do you?” I blushed, “I used it this week already?” “That’s fine, we’ll just use a spare shirt here,” she told me. I watched her dig through a bin for a moment before coming out with what looked like a simple pink sweater at first. Once she pulled it over my head, I realized the arms had several rows of ruffles by the wrist. Even with the top being too large, it barely covered much more than the top of my diaper! “Sorry, no leggings or pants; we’ll just have to get you up to your nest. You’re wearing a diaper anyway,” Mackenzie told me as if that excused my nude legs! “Let’s just get up there quickly?” I asked. She smiled, picked me up, bounced me up and down, and then carried me out of the room. The temperature in the lobby area felt like it dropped thirty degrees from an open door to the outside. Several other Littles were coming from a common area on the first floor then and seemed to all stare for a second before looking away. I blushed and felt like my face was probably as hot as the sun! Fortunately, the elevator trip, plus her long legs, had me to my new nest pretty quickly. “Hi Mackenzie! Did you catch a stray of mine?” “This fish wasn’t in the water, but I thought I’d bring her to you?” “Thanks! Looks like she had a wardrobe issue - what did you do with her wet clothes?” “Here,” she said, handing her a clear bag. “I almost just put them in the laundry chute, but since you kidnapped her from me, I figured we’d make sure they knew the clothes belonged to your nest.” Mackenzie hugged me, “It’s good to see you, Carly! I’ll make sure I get down here to see you some other time. Be good for Miss Lilly!” She placed me on the ground, patted my exposed diaper, and walked out. Lilly giggled at me, and I noticed Ava and Mia looked like they couldn’t decide whether to laugh at me or feel bad. For my part, I just walked to my stuff and found a pair of black leggings. It wasn’t worth changing the top in my mind when I’d be putting on pajamas in a little bit. I had to admit with leggings on to cover my bottom half, I was pretty comfortable since the borrowed top was really soft! I found myself working on homework and trying to get ready for one of my first tests that was coming up on HoloTheory the next day. I had a good, solid grasp of all of the material so far, but I wanted to review all of the new terms and jargon that were used in the class. By the time I’d also done some brief studying for my intelligence class and math, it was nearly three hours after I’d returned. I stood up to walk to find Lilly for a needed diaper change before calling it a night! BETH WAS BLUSHING as she entered the dorm. She quickly sucked her coat off so she didn’t have to worry about anyone wondering about it. She folded the wet spot inside after taking a quick sniff and noting there was a residue of Carly on it. She groaned, and Nikki gave her a little smirk as she traveled up the stairs to the dorm. “Why don’t I take your coat? I’ll wash it at my apartment tonight?” “I can just put it in the laundry here?” Beth started to say. “You know the laundry is analyzed, right?” “Huh?” Nikki shook her head, “You’re so smart on some things, kid…?” “What do you mean?” “Someone about fifteen years ago figured out when they installed the auto laundry features for the dorm that they could also be clever and make sure no one was hiding bedwetting from them?” “You mean…?” “Yes, if you have any clothing in the wash that has a too-high urine concentration, you’ll be closely watched.” With a sigh, Beth handed her the coat, “Thanks for washing it then…” “Do you have another in case it doesn’t dry tonight?” Beth nodded, “It’s supposed to be a bit warmer tomorrow anyway, so I would probably have switched to a different one anyway.” “Good,” she told her. “This date tomorrow?” Beth blushed and smiled at the same time, “Yes?” “Would you mind if I triple-checked Carly’s plans? I don’t want to overstep, but I also want to make sure it’s a safe trip for you.” She did indeed feel a bit smothered by that but nodded anyway. “Sure, it seems like she did a decent amount of work trying to plan it already?” “I’m sure she did, knowing her family. No need to risk her missing something, though!” “Fair enough,” she said. “You’re not going anywhere else for the night?” Beth shook her head, “I have a test tomorrow in calculus I need to finish studying for.” “Okay, I’ll see you in the morning then,” she told her. “See you tomorrow,” Beth said, closing the door behind her and latching the deadbolt shut. She sighed, squeezing herself in a little hug, then changed into a comfy pair of pajama pants and a light purple top with a circuit diagram on it. Lance had given it to her for Christmas, and she appreciated its nerdiness. Dressed more comfortably, she pulled out her tablet and the review guide that her professor had kindly provided their class for the test the next day. She was about to the point of screaming about one problem when her phone suddenly rang. She stood, found it, and when she saw it was her mom, she answered with the holoprojection function, placing it on the desk in front of it. “Hi, Mom,” she said. “How are you doing, Sweetie?” She shrugged, “Ready to throw my tablet of calc work into the wall?” “That sounds normal,” her mom laughed. “The only person I know who didn’t absolutely hate that class was your dad.” Beth shook her head, “Carly is just as bad!” “How is she taking everything?” “Huh?” “The fact she’s stuck as a girl?” Her mom said. “Oh, that…” “That? It was supposed to be a temporary thing for the film? Surely she’s a bit upset, at least, at being stuck as a girl? Your dad would have been devastated?” Beth nodded, “Carly is fine with it, Mom. Actually, she’s better than fine with it, I think.” Her mom gave her the stare that always felt like she was opening her brain up and stripping out the knowledge from it, “She wanted to be a girl?” Beth sighed, “Yeah, I think so?” “Well, what about your relationship now?” Beth shrugged, “Seems fine still?” “You’re okay with going out with a girl?” Her mom asked. “You never seemed like you had a thing for girls before?” Beth shook her head, “I don’t have a thing for girls in general; it’s just Carly?” Her mom cajoled her into more information as their conversation went on about things she would never discuss with her dad. Eventually, she made her excuses and said, “I need to finish studying; give everyone my love?” As the line cut, Beth felt more drained and relieved to have spoken with her mother. Looking at the clock, she decided to hit the restroom and resume her studying. When she was past the point of getting anywhere, she went to the restroom again to clean her face and brush her teeth before climbing into bed and being tucked in by Rachel, who seemed to suddenly appear at bedtime each night. “Good night,” Rachel told her as she turned off the lights. I WOKE UP the following day with a swim with Lilly and Mackenzie before finding my way to breakfast and classes. Computational Intelligence was interesting that morning. I made some notes on some ideas I wasn’t sure Mom knew about yet! Our professor was currently involved in some research that furthered Grandma’s work in the field, and she was making some impressive gains in how the AI chunked new knowledge. Her thinking patterns seemed to be heavily influenced by her own kids’ development, which I found kind of intriguing! I walked to my Holofield Theory class and crammed a few last minutes of studying before the room was packed. Our professor passed out the same style of tablet we’d taken our placement tests on that first week. I appreciated that I was given a smaller one than my neighbors, though! “You have the full class time for this exam. We can work with you if you need additional time, but in my experience, you either know this material or you don’t,” Professor Davis told us. I nodded. To me, this was more of a memory subject than a ‘work it out’ subject like math or programming. “Just one other note, due to some issues I’ve had before, I would ask that you please not leave the room until after you complete the exam. You’re welcome to go before I activate the test and come back if you need to use the restroom, but I’ll collect your tests otherwise if you need to leave.” I squirmed at that, wishing that going to the bathroom was even a realistic possibility for me! “Well, at least I can just go…” I thought to myself even as several girls excused themselves from class, and one boy then. My diaper was a little damp, but I was pretty sure it would hold up until lunch based on how little I’d drank that morning. “Okay, I’m going to activate your tests now; they’ll start when they return. Good luck!” Immediately, my screen lit up, and I began working on answering questions about a subject that would have sounded like gibberish to me a few weeks ago! BETH HAD SPENT the morning when she woke up doing some last-minute cramming. She’d even made Carly quiz her on a couple of formulas before leaving her at her first class and heading to her own. During her Logic class, she discovered there would be a project due in that class in another week as one of her five grades. Fortunately, it seemed straightforward and not too time-consuming! Her professor annoyingly went over time by a few minutes. Since she was sitting inside a row, there wasn’t a good and tactful way to leave until he finished! She was a little worried that Carly wasn’t waiting for her or at her classroom until she checked her message and realized she’d hurried to her next class to cram for her own test. “Everything okay?” Nikki asked her. “Yeah, just was a little nervous for a second that Carly wasn’t here. She has a test in her next class, though, so she hurried there to do some last studying.” “I don’t miss being in school,” Nikki told her as she walked beside her. Beth laughed, “Aren’t you basically back in school now since you’re with me all the time?” She looked up at Nikki, who made a cringing face like she’d smelled something bad. “Well, at least I’m not taking the tests?” “Don’t remind me!” Beth said. She had to appreciate that the chill of winter had taken a break that day. It wasn’t nearly as cold as it had been the past couple of weeks. “I wonder if this warm weather is going to last long?” Nikki asked as if reading her thoughts. Beth shrugged, “Not sure, I was thinking that though? It’s been frigid the past couple of weeks!” They didn’t have much more time to talk before Beth led them into Marconi Hall and down the hallway to the small lecture hall where her class was held. She took a quick moment to detour into the restroom first and thought, ‘I hope Carly’s diaper lasts through this class?’ Once she sat in her class, she took a moment to pull out her notes again for her calculus exam. When her professor began class, she couldn’t help but note that it would be a long day before they wrapped up! “Okay, don’t forget that we have a test next Friday in this class…” he droned on as Beth made a note in her calendar about yet another test in the next couple of weeks! ‘Classes don’t seem so bad at the beginning, but then they just start piling up tests and projects!’ she griped. Her calendar was filling up, and it was still several weeks until midterms! She checked her messages as she left class and was a little concerned that she didn’t see one from Carly. I WAS MAKING quick work of the exam as it went through everything from the absolute basics we’d started with. The first question asked us to describe the particles involved in the projection of just the images. A follow-up question began to ask how you would manipulate the particles, and things continued on in that manner for thirty questions. About question thirty-one, I checked and saw there were a total of sixty, so I was halfway done! I was completing question forty-eight a half-hour later about the proper way to orient the projector lenses when I felt my stomach rumble. ‘Hush, I’ll feed you after this,’ I said, figuring it was just hunger since lunchtime was coming. Question fifty-three was a more theoretical-based question and asked about the proper formula for calculating the intersection of the particles of light with the stasis field you needed to generate. Fortunately, I remembered the formula, so I was writing it with the stylus even as I felt my body give off a little bit of gas in a fart. “Gross!” I heard someone complain a row away. I blushed but continued to work. ‘I hate that I don’t have any control over anything now!’ I thought to myself. The only warning I had before something happened now was when my body would decide to crouch, seemingly on its own. ‘Hopefully, it holds off until after this test!’ I grimaced a moment after finishing the fifty-fourth question as my insides seemed to twist some, but then there was a sense of relief in my body. I finished fifty-six before I heard, “Did someone just poop themselves?” From a girl a couple rows back. “Ladies and gentlemen, you must remain quiet through this exam. I will not warn you again.” “Professor, how can we concentrate when there’s a poopy-pants here?” The girl pushed back. “Breathe through your mouth,” he suggested and glared at her. I pointed my eyes back at my paper, but not before noticing he looked straight at me with a sympathetic glance. “Can I at least change her diaper?” The girl asked. “I’m sure it’s not comfy for her, and it’ll at least move the smell away from us?” “I told you, no one can leave the room?” He said, and I sensed he was trying to make excuses. “She’s just a Little, I’ll change her behind your desk?” “I don’t…” I felt a nervous feeling in my stomach, but I also knew it was kind of rude to force people to smell my poopy diaper for the rest of the test. “Fine,” I said, “I have a spare diaper in my bag. Are you sure you want to?” I looked up at a tall brown-haired girl who smiled, “Sure!” The girl clambered down the steps and had me in her arms almost before I was ready. “By the way, I’m Harper,” she told me. “Carly,” I said quietly. She nearly pushed Professor Davis to move out of the way, and I was at least grateful the room had been set up like a regular lecture hall that day. That meant a large desk in the front of the room blocked the view of anyone seated in the rows. “Do you have a changing pad?” She asked me quietly as she sat me down. I blushed, but I dug through my bag and handed her the changing pad, a diaper, and some wipes. “Well, at least you’re a prepared little girl!” She patted my back, “Let’s get you out of that icky poopy diapee!” “Please keep quiet,” Professor Davis asked. “I’m just changing her diaper?” “Quietly,” he insisted. She shook her head and unfolded my changing pad, then laid me down on it before pushing the skirt up and out of the way. With a few pops, the onesie was opened up, and then she tickled my stomach for no reason. I fought back a few giggles, “Please don’t?” “Fine…” she said. “Don’t get your panties in a twist… oh, you won’t wear those,” she smirked. I couldn’t tell if she was being cruel or just trying to be funny… “Don’t quit your day job,” I groaned. A moment later, she pulled the tapes open and used the used diaper to scrape some of the muck off my butt. “Eew,” she complained a moment later, and I watched her use a baby wipe to wipe her hand up before resuming the cleanup on my bottom. She used quite a few wipes to gently but quickly clean me up. Satisfied, she rolled them up in the old diaper and taped me in the new diaper, buttoned my onesie, then sat me up and handed me the diaper. “Go throw your diapee away in the trash can and get back to your test, sweetie!” I wanted to gag as she handed me the balled-up diaper! I could see brown stains on it, and I did my best not to throw up as I walked it to a trash can by the door. I found my pack of baby wipes in my bag and wiped my hands with one before returning to resume my test. Thirty minutes later, I was grateful to have pressed submit and escaped the room from my classmates! I felt a little guilty as I passed by the trashcan and could clearly still smell the contents! +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Thanks for reading!!!! Please press the 'Like' Button and leave me a comment! The real world is hitting hard right now, and I'm hitting a lot of hours at work beyond normal right now. I'm hoping to get to some more writing on this this weekend so I can get back ahead. I'm being beaten up by my stress enough that we'll see what happens. The good thing is at one post a week I do have 16 more weeks written already, but I would prefer to return to two a week. We'll see what happens, though... Thanks for your patience and understanding!

Sorry for the delay again. I guess I should not write checks that I can't cash when it comes to self-imposed deadlines on posting chapters that I have not even begun to write yet. I probably should have said in my first post for this story that there will be some strong language in this story at times. If I had to give this story a TV rating overall, it would be TV-M for language. Other than that, I would consider it SFW. Chapter 7 I woke the next morning to Rachael asking if I needed more morphine. Rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, I nod yes. Rachael injected me with the syringe of morphine, and another syringe of the nausea medicine, and started my feeding tube. I turn to my left to see that both my parents are already here. My attention snaps back to Rachael saying, “Will, you have a busy day ahead of you, let’s go ahead and get you weighed and measured.” “OK,” I said. I started to slowly get out of bed and my dad was already by my side to get my I.V. situated and helped me to my feet. I felt a weakness in my legs and was struggling to move this morning more than in the past few days. My mom, seeing me struggle, asked, “Will, how do you feel this morning?” I said, “I just feel really tired and weak.” “I'm sorry you feel so bad, hopefully, the doctors at the Mayo Clinic will help you get better soon,” my Mom said. “I hope so too,” I said. We made our way to the nurse station and Rachael weighed and measured me. Before my dad could ask Rachael said, “Alright Will, you weigh a 112 pounds and are 5 foot 4 and ½ inches tall this morning;” pausing for a second, she said, “We should be getting you ready for transport in the next hour or two. I will come check on you in a little bit to flush your feeding tube and get you ready.” I slowly make it to my room with my parents on either side of me. I gingerly get back into bed as my mom plugs my I.V. pump back in for me. My mom turned to me and asked, “I was going to pack up all your belongings to bring to the Mayo Clinic with us so you don’t have to worry about it while being transported there. Is there anything other than your backpack and toiletries that I am missing?” “Besides my stuff on the table, that is everything,” I said. She said, “OK, I will make sure I have everything to bring to the other hospital for you.” I said, “Thanks, I'm going to go ahead and brush my teeth before you pack everything up.” I got back out of bed as my mom unplugged the I.V. pump again for me and slowly made my way into the bathroom. I quickly brushed my teeth and as I was brushing my teeth, I noticed that my nails were very long. Looking in my toiletry bag, I found my nail clippers and was able to get my nails down to a manageable length. I sat on the toilet seat, pulled my socks out, and saw that my toenails were in need of trimming too, and decided to trim them while I was at it. I came back out of the bathroom to my mom waiting to help me back into bed. Once getting settled in bed I watched as my mom started packing all my belongings up. My dad then spoke up saying, “Will, is there anything in particular that you want to watch on TV?” “No, not really,” I said. My dad then said, “Sports Center it is then.” I lay in bed half-heartedly watching TV and dozing in and out of consciousness. Sometime later, I was alerted to Rachael walking into the room. “Alright Will, I’m going to flush your feeding tube and disconnect your I.V. to make it easier for being transported to the Mayo Clinic,” Rachael said. I nodded and watched her flush my feeding tube, disconnect my I.V., and throw everything away. Rachael then said, “Someone should be here soon to bring you downstairs to an ambulance for transport.” I said, “OK” “Will, I hope they find out what is going on and you get better soon,” Rachael said. “Me too, sorry about the whole bathroom and pain medicine incident the other day,” I said. In a serious voice, Rachael said, “Will, that was nothing to be embarrassed about, I have to deal with a lot worse and would not be a nurse if I could not handle it.” I said, “OK, thanks for looking after me.” “Certainly Will,” Rachael said with a smile. My mom then chimed in, ”Thank you, Rachael.” “No problem, I hope you all have a better week this week than last,” Rachael said. Around 15 minutes after Rachael left, an orderly came into my room pushing a wheelchair. He asked, “Are you William Gauss?” I said, “Yes.” “OK, I’m here to bring you downstairs for transport,” he said. I nodded and slowly started getting out of bed. My parents were already up and by my side. My dad hugged me and said, “We should be at the Mayo Clinic shortly after you get there. I love you.” My mom then hugged me and with a kiss on the cheek said, “I love you, sweetheart, we will see you in a little bit.” As I was sitting down in the wheelchair I said, “I love y’all too.” My parents both waved to me as I was being wheeled out of the room. The orderly wheeled to the elevator and we rode it down to the ground floor. He then pushed through the back of the emergency department to what looked like an exit. Waiting for me at the exit was a stretcher and a tall paramedic wearing a dark blue uniform with EMS patches on the shoulders of his sleeves. As the wheelchair came to a stop he said, “You must be William Gauss, my name is Matt and I will be your ride to the Mayo Clinic.” I nodded and he and the orderly helped me out of the wheelchair and onto the stretcher. As the orderly was leaving, Matt turned to me and said, “I’m going to strap you down so we don’t have to worry about you falling off the stretcher during transport.” I nodded and Matt processed to run a strap over my sternum, my waist, and then my thighs. Matt then said, “You're all set, let's get you loaded up for transport.” He pushed me through the double doors and out into the bright Arizona sun. As my eyes adjust to the harsh light, I see the ambulance parked about 30 feet from the doors and a short Latino man also wearing a paramedic uniform walking towards us. As he met up with us he said, “My name is Ernesto and I will be your driver today.” They both loaded the stretcher into the back of the ambulance and as it was pushed all the way in I could hear and feel what must have been it locking into place. As Matt was getting into the back to sit beside me, Ernesto said, “We should have you at the Mayo Clinic in about 30 minutes, if you need anything let Matt know.” He closed the back doors and a few seconds later I could hear what must have been the front driver door opening and closing. Moments later I could feel the ambulance start moving forward. Matt turned to me and said, “Do you prefer to go by William or Will?” I said, “Will is fine.” “Alright Will, just relax and we will have you there in no time,” he said. Nodding, I relaxed my body against the restraints and let my mind wander as I felt the movement of the ambulance and the sound of the tires against the road. Sometime later, I felt the one thing that I didn’t want to feel on this trip, I had to poop. Thinking to myself ‘CRAP!’ as I turned my head to Matt. I asked, “How much longer until we get to the Mayo Clinic?” Matt said, “About 10 more minutes, is there something wrong?” “I have to go to the bathroom really bad,” I said. Matt then said, “Try and hold it if you can but if you have an accident it will be OK.” I nodded but turned my full attention to holding back my bowels. The minutes seemed to drag on as I put all of my energy into clenching my butt cheeks together. I felt the ambulance turn and with that motion, some poop slipped out; moments later the battle was lost as I felt my body force the rest of my bowels out. I could feel it spread out all over my bottom, moving up my lower back, forward in my underwear covering my genitals, and down my thighs. I turned to Matt with flushed cheeks and said, “I’m sorry, I couldn’t hold it.” Matt gently placed his hand on my shoulder and with a look of concern and pity, he said, “It’s OK Will, as soon as we get to the hospital, we will help you get cleaned up.” I nodded but looked away in shame, as I lay in what felt like a gallon of pluff mud and smelled like a paper mill. A couple of minutes later, I felt the ambulance come to a stop, and moments later, Ernesto was opening the back doors. Matt hopped out the back and they both pulled the stretcher out of the back of the ambulance. Matt took over and quickly pushed me into what I imagine is the ambulance entrance to the emergency room at the Mayo Clinic. As we make our way through the double doors into a hallway, we are met with an average-height Latino woman with shoulder-length hair, in gray scrubs. With a smile, she approached us and said, “You must be William, my name is Rosie and I will be your nurse.” I just nodded and looked down at my lap. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Matt gesture to Rosie and they both stepped away to have a quiet conversation. A few moments later, Rosie walked back up to me and said, “OK Will, Matt, and I are going to take you straight to your room on the stretcher, once there, I will help you out of your clothes so you can take a shower.” I just nodded and continued to look at my lap. A second later, Matt was pushing the stretcher and following Rosie down the hallways. After a few turns and trying my best to avoid eye contact with passers-by, we arrived at an elevator. We got on the elevator and luckily it was only the three of us, but in the enclosed space, the smell was back with a vengeance. A minute later we were off the elevator and going down another hallway. After passing what I assume is a nurse’s station, I was wheeled into a room. Matt immediately started undoing the straps, while I saw Rosie place what looked to be a large incontinence bed pad on the floor beside the stretcher. Rosie and Matt then helped me off the stretcher to stand on top of the pad. Rosie said, “Matt, at the nurse’s station, is cleaning supplies and you can throw the fitted sheet away there.” Matt said, “OK, Will, I hope you feel better soon.” Matt rolled the stretcher back out of the room and shut the door behind him. Rosie then turned to me and said, “Will, your clothes are a lost cause so I’m going to cut them off of you and then help with a rough cleanup before letting you take a shower.” In a quiet voice, I said, “OK.” Rosie took some scissors out of her pocket and then cut the pants leg of my sweatpants from the waistband all the way down to the cuff. My pants were discarded in a pile between my legs and then she did the same with my underwear. She grabbed a bunch of large wet wipes and then began to wipe down my back, butt, legs, and embarrassingly my genitals too. She let my hospital gown fall back to my knees again and then said, “Let's go into the bathroom so that you can get into the shower.” I followed Rosie into the bathroom with flushed cheeks and she started the shower, then said, “Alright Will, there is soap and shampoo in the shower already, towels and washcloths are right here,” pointing to the towel rack beside the shower, “you can leave your gown on the floor and I will have another gown and socks for you on the counter waiting for you by the time you are done.” I nodded with my cheek still flushed from what was one of the most embarrassing moments of my adult life. Rosie walked out of the bathroom, shutting the door behind her. I immediately stripped out of the gown and threw it on the floor, then pulled my socks off and threw them on top of the gown. Testing the water with my right hand, I stepped into the shower once the temperature was warm enough. I let the water cascade down my body as I watch as slightly brown water goes down the drain. Once the water was relatively clear, I took a washcloth and soap and scrubbed my body thoroughly from the neck down. Once the soap was rinsed off, I turned the water off and grabbed a towel to dry off. Stepping out of the shower, I see that Rosie has left the new gown and socks on the counter. I put the gown on and struggled to tie the ties in the back. After finally getting the gown on right, I sit on the toilet seat lid to put on my socks. I stepped out of the bathroom to see that my parents made it here. My dad walked up to me with a pair of folded pajama bottoms and underwear, and said, “Well, I always said you were full of crap when you were a teenager, but I never meant literally.” My mom quickly shouted, “George!” Smiling at my dad trying to make light of an embarrassing situation, I said, “I'm surprised that my eyes haven’t turned brown yet.” With a chuckle, he handed me the pajamas and underwear, and I turned back around to head into the bathroom. Closing the door, I slipped on the underwear and as I was trying to guide my feet into the pajamas, I lost my balance. Like a sack of potatoes, I landed straight on my left shoulder and yelled out in pain, “MOTHERFUCKER!” As I am lying on the floor in pain, my dad comes rushing into the bathroom. “Will, are you alright!” my dad said in a scared voice. In an angry voice, I said, “Yeah, I just lost my damn balance trying to get dressed.” “Let me help you and get you into bed,” my dad said. My dad then put a hand under each of my armpits and lifted me from the floor to my feet. He then helped me pull my pajama bottoms up to my waist. We walked out of the bathroom with my dad having one of his arms wrapped around my torso, guiding me to the bed. Looking at the bed, I see that the covers are pulled back and there is an incontinence pad lying over the fitted sheet. Thinking to myself, ‘I guess they don’t want to chance it after my grand entrance,’ I get into bed and pull the covers over me, hearing a slight crinkle from the pad as I shift around to get comfortable. I looked around the hospital room and saw that it was not much different than the room at St. Luke’s. The room is a little bigger, and there is a couch that is up against the windows to my left, a recliner directly to my left that my mom is sitting in, and a straight-back chair to my right. As my dad was taking a seat on the couch, my mom said to me, “Will, I know you are not having a good day today. I just wanted to let you know that I called the math department and spoke to someone named Amy. I let her know what was going on and that you were at the Mayo Clinic. She said that she would talk to all your professors and let them know. She also told me not to worry about your assistantship either. Depending on how long it takes for you to get better, she said that we could do a medical withdrawal and you can return either this summer or fall if need be.” With a sigh of relief, I said, “OK,” pausing for a second, I asked, “What are you doing about work?” “I’m taking PTO right now, but if I have to, I can file for FMLA and get up to 12 weeks off. But don’t worry about me and since your father retired early last year, we plan on staying here until you are better. I already got Stanley to check on the house for us and get the mail. Just worry about you right now. OK,” my mom said. “OK,” I said. A few minutes later, Rosie walked in carrying a bag of fluids, a bag for my feeding tube, and a couple of syringes. Setting everything down on a small table to my left, she said, “Will, I’m going to start your noon feeding and start you back on fluids. How are your pain levels right now?” “The morphine is starting to wear off and it probably doesn’t help that I fell on my shoulder early,” I said. With a look of concern, she said, “You fell, what were you doing to fall?” I said, “I was trying to get dressed and lost my balance.” She then said, “I will be right back,” and walked out of the room. A minute later, Rosie was walking back in. “Will, with you falling earlier, I am going to have to classify you as a fall-risk patient. Can I see your left hand?” I held out my left hand and Rosie put a bright yellow plastic bracelet around my wrist with the words ‘FALL RISK’ written boldly on it. Rosie then said, “Please make sure someone is with you anytime you need to get out of bed. If your parents are not here, please press the call button and someone will be here as soon as possible.” I said, “OK.” Rosie then turned to my parents and said, “Please make sure you help Will with getting dressed, or me or another nurse could help. We do not want him to get hurt.” My mom responded, “Of course, his father will help from now on.” Rosie turned her attention back to the table of supplies and started to hang the I.V. fluid bag and feeding bag. She hooked the fluids to my I.V. and connected the feeding bag to my feeding tube. She then took the two syringes and injected them into my I.V. After throwing the two empty syringes away, Rosie said, “Your team of doctors should be seeing you in a couple of hours. Let me know if you need anything in the meantime.” On that note she walked out of the room and with the morphine taking full effect, I fell asleep. I woke up to my mom lightly shaking my shoulder and saying, “The doctors are here to see you.” I look at the foot of my bed and see three doctors. The first one is a woman who looks to be in her late thirties with long blonde hair and blue eyes. The second doctor is a tall man in his early forties, that looks to be Indian with short black hair and brown eyes. The third doctor is a short man with balding brown hair and brown eyes, that looks to be in his fifties. The Indian doctor spoke first and said, “I’m Dr. Kutner and I specialize in diagnostic medicine.” Pointing to the woman on his right, he said, “This is Dr. Cameron and she specializes in autoimmune diseases.” Pointing to the man on his left, he said, “And this is Dr. Taub and he specializes in genetics.” Dr. Cameron then asked, “Will, we have been reviewing your case and would like for you to go over your symptoms with us again.” I then spend the next ten minutes going over all my symptoms and what has happened to me over the past week. Dr. Kutner then said, “I'm going to do a physical exam of you, is that alright?” I said, “Sure.” He proceeded to listen to my heart and lungs and poke and prod all over my body. At the same time, Dr. Taub turned to my parents and said, “You all must be Will’s parents?” My mom responded, “Yes I’m Elana, and this is his father, George.” Dr. Taub said, “I wish we could be meeting under better circumstances, but it is nice to meet you all.” Dr. Kutner, now finishing his exam, stepped back and said, “Will, I not seeing anything abnormal in your physical exam and your lymph nodes feel normal which confirms that we are still most likely not dealing with an infection.” My dad asked, “What is the plan for figuring this out?” Dr. Kutner said, “We plan on drawing some blood samples today to begin running tests. Tomorrow is going to be a busy day for Will. He will have a full body CT scan and X-ray done, to see if anything changed since his last. He will also have an MRI of some key areas of his body and I will be performing a biopsy on a few of his joints tomorrow afternoon.” Dr. Cameron followed up with, “With the blood samples, I will start looking at other types of autoimmune diseases that Dr. Wilson could have missed and with tomorrow's tests, could shed light on which direction we should be looking in.” “With one of the blood samples, I will start sequencing Will’s DNA, and see if there are any genetic abnormalities that pop up. Hopefully, if there is anything to find, we can find it quickly, but with how large the human genome is, it could take some time,” Dr Taub said. “I will be supporting both Dr. Cameron and Dr. Taub, but I also will be exploring other avenues in trying to diagnose what is causing your symptoms. Do you have any questions?” Dr. Kutner said. I said, “No.” “Get some rest, Will, we will see you tomorrow,” Dr. Kutner replied. As they were walking out of my room, my mom said, “I feel better already after meeting the doctors.” My dad then said, “Yeah, it seems like they have a game plan together and are attacking this from all angles. How do you feel, Will?” I said, “Better, I still hope they figure this out quickly.” A moment later Rosie walked in carrying a caddy of empty vials, and what looked to be a needle and tourniquet. Walking over to the right side of my bed, she sat the caddy on the bed beside me and said, “Will, it seems that the doctors want a lot of blood samples, I’m going to draw blood from your right arm, OK.” I nodded and held out my arm and Rosie tied the tourniquet around my upper arm and began to draw vial after vial until the whole caddy was full of blood samples. After throwing the used needle and tourniquet away, Rosie said, “That should be the last of the blood samples that they would need today. I will be back at 6 to start the last of your feeding for the day and give you more morphine if you need it. Let me know if you need anything else before then.” Rosie walked out of my room with the caddy in hand and it did not take me long to fall back asleep. I woke up twice before the night, one to go to the bathroom with the help of my dad, and the other to get more morphine and the last feeding of the day. I fell back to sleep shortly after getting the morphine. I woke up to it being dark outside and my joints screaming in agony.

After the highly embarrassing episode in the escape room Sam is in desperate need for a change. Thankfully there is someone on hand to help her out. --- My writing is my passion and my income. I'm only able to write as much as I do because of the wonderful support from my subscribers. With the ABDL purge on Patreon hurting my income dramatically I have set up a couple of alternatives. If you enjoy my work and want to support me there has never been a time where I need it more. For $5 you can see every update to my stories one week before anyone else and for $10 you get early access PLUS access to 50+ stories EXCLUSIVE to subscribers. There are other rewards and tiers available including discounted commissions. To find out more please consider visiting one of my subscription sites. Prices, rewards and everything else are the same across both https://reamstories.com/elfy https://subscribestar.adult/elfy Thank you for reading and supporting me and my work ❤️ --- “What’s that smell?” One of the children with one of the other groups asked loudly. The room fell quiet as people sniffed the air. Sam was going red and she wished they could just leave. It seemed like Nina was about to steer her towards the exit when a woman in a Midforest uniform appeared in front of them. “I know that smell.” It was Karen. Sam looked up and saw the older woman looking down at her, “Come on, we can get you cleaned up before you go.” “N-No!” Sam stuttered. Sam already knew that Karen didn’t particularly think much of Sam’s opinion. Before anyone could react Sam had been hoisted into the air and held against Karen’s chest, she didn’t need to be able to see behind her to know her skirt had lifted up and was showing the sorry state of her diaper to anyone who looked her way. Sam struggled. She didn’t want to be changed by Karen again. They were finished with the activity and could just go home where she could clean up in peace and, most importantly, alone. She grunted and whined as she tried, without success, to pull herself free of Karen’s hands. “Wait!” Nina shouted. Sam was pressed against Karen’s chest and therefore couldn’t see what was happening. She did hear footsteps quickly run around to Karen’s front stopping the woman in her tracks. Sam was still squirming and trying to get put down. “I’ll take her.” Nina said firmly. Sam stopped wriggling and her eyes went wide. She never in a million years would have thought she would think this way but she really wanted Nina to change her diaper. If the alternative was Karen doing it then Nina it was clearly the better option. For once the idea of changing herself vanished. Sam seemed to just take it for granted that someone was going to do it for her. She couldn’t say she was wholly against the idea if it was someone she trusted. “I couldn’t make you do that.” Karen said, “From the smell of it this is going to be a tricky change. Not something a young woman like you should have to do. If you want to wait I’ll have her changed in just a few minutes.” “It’s not your choice to make.” Nina replied stubbornly. Sam didn’t know whether Nina was arguing for Sam’s body autonomy of if she was saying that she, Nina, was the one making that choice. Sam bit her lip and found that she liked the idea of her friend taking control of the situation like that. It felt like everyone else in the room had disappeared as a battle of wills developed. In truth, everyone was looking at Sam who was giving off the perfect picture of a little baby having her custody fought over by two women. “I’m happy to-…” Karen started. “Hand her over.” Nina said. Her voice brooked no argument. “If you insist.” Karen’s voice was slightly cold. Sam had never been so happy to be picked up by someone. Karen held her out and Nina took her with Sam reaching out her hands like a small child asking to be picked up. Instead of Nina’s chest Sam was sat on her hip. She could feel the poopy contents of her diaper shifting again but she could hardly get dirtier than she already was. Sam could see there were a lot of very confused people. None more so than her friends, Chrissy and Amy, who seemed to hardly believe the bizarre series of events they had witnessed. Despite the embarrassing situation Sam could hardly hide her smile as Nina adjusted her slightly. Sam noticed she was primarily looking at Karen though. “Come on, Sam.” Nina said as if Sam had any input in where she was carried. Nina turned away and carried Sam towards the bathrooms. Like each of the other places with toilets there was a dedicated changing room next to them and Nina was making a beeline towards that door. Sam looked back behind them and was faintly amused to see Chrissy haranguing Karen. “How dare you pick my friend up without asking!?” Chrissy was saying as Amy held her back, “If she wants your help she’ll ask! I’m going to report you to…” Sam didn’t hear any more as Nina carried her into the baby changing room and closed the door. It locked with a click and both Nina and Sam seemed to let out simultaneous deep breaths which then made them both laugh. Sam was expecting Nina to put her down as soon as they were in private but she was carried across to the changing table instead. Sam looked up at Nina with questioning eyes but Nina was smiling, she seemed to know what she was doing even if Sam didn’t. She reached down to the bottom of Sam’s rainbow shirt and after a small pause lifted it over her head. Sam raised her arms to make it easier for her. “You don’t mind me helping you?” Nina asked quietly. Sam shook her head. Far from minding it Sam was excited. With her shirt removed Sam slowly lowered herself down on to her back as Nina grabbed the waistband of her skirt and started pulling it down. Soon Sam was laying on the table in nothing but her heavily soiled padding. She was red in the face and found it hard to look at Nina. It seemed that by “helping” Nina meant she was going to do it all. Sam was surprised to feel very alright with that. Sam heard the tapes of the diaper pull away from the landing zone. The smell instantly intensified to near unbearable levels. The front of the disposable slumped down between Sam’s legs as Nina closed her eyes and looked away, it seemed to be less to do with what the inside of the diaper looked like and more to do with the stink. “Sorry.” Nina said in a strained voice, “I don’t want to make you feel bad, it’s just… wow.” “No, I’m sorry.” Sam replied in a rather dejected voice, “I should be able to do these things without embarrassing myself and you guys.” Sam was feeling rather sorry for herself again. Even if she was a bit more accepting that she was different than she had been at the start of the vacation she still felt that she was a horrible burden. Fortunately it didn’t take long for Nina to recover and start cleaning. Sam felt that mix of embarrassment and excitement that she always seemed to feel around Nina these days. The soft touch of her fingers as she used the wipes to clean her left a trail of tingles. “You’re allowed to breath you know.” Nina said with a smirk. It was only after Nina had mentioned it that Sam realised she had been holding her breath. She let out a deep exhale and laughed nervously. She didn’t think she could be blamed for not knowing how to handle such an odd situation. “I can’t believe I’m letting you do this…” Sam said with a shake of the head. Nina simply smiled as she continued her work. There was a lot to clean up and Sam spent the whole time playing with her fingers and feeling like she should be doing something to help. She wondered what her other friends thought about all of this. She must seem like the biggest baby to them. “It’s actually not as bad as it seems.” Nina said as she gave Sam a last few swipes with a clean wipe and then pulled the soiled diaper away. “You’re just saying that to make me feel better.” Sam replied. “No, I’m serious.” Nina shrugged as she taped the used diaper into a ball, “Once the initial surprise passed it was pretty easy. Something I could get used to.” Sam felt herself blushing. Was Nina talking about when she had her own kids or… “Right, I’ll just tape you into a fresh one and we’ll be ready to go home.” Nina said as she pulled a diaper out from under the table. It turned out the changing rooms at Midforest were all well-stocked for diaper changes. As Sam’s butt was lifted into the air she realised she could probably have told Nina this wasn’t necessary and that since they were going back to the lodge she probably didn’t need a fresh diaper. She also realised that she wasn’t saying anything and as she was lowered on to the fresh padding she felt content. A feeling that only grew as the diaper was pulled up between her legs and taped closed. It was a feeling of safety, a feeling that she didn’t have to worry about making it to the bathroom. With the new diaper in place Nina picked up Sm’s shirt and pulled it over her head. It seemed that Nina had taken everything into her own hands. She even helped Sam back into her skirt once she was off the table. “All set?” Nina asked once Sam was dressed. “I think so.” Sam replied. She looked at the door and grimaced, “What will the others think about… everything?” “I think they’ll just be happy that you’re OK.” Nina replied, “And you shouldn’t worry about anything. If they were going to be asses about any of this they would’ve done it by now.” “I guess so.” Sam shrugged, “It’s just not… normal.” “Normal is overrated.” Nina replied, “I’ll show you.” Sam was about to ask what Nina meant but she was already walking over and lifting her up. Sam yelped as she left the ground and clutched on to Nina’s wrists with her small hands. She gasped as Nina spun around and then held Sam on her hip like a child. Sam’s cheeks went pink as she tried to work out how she should react to any of this. “Most people would say it isn’t “normal” to pick up another woman and carry her around like this.” Nina said, “But you just watch me.” Sam was given every opportunity to tell Nina to stop but the increasingly confident woman’s control was intoxicating to Sam. She bit her lip as Nina unlocked the door then she stepped out into the lobby area. Sam saw that Karen and the other employees were still there, in fact, they were welcoming the next few groups who were going into the rooms. On the far side Amy and Chrissy were leaning against the wall. They definitely looked confused about what they were seeing as Sam was carried across the large room. “Ready to go?” Nina asked cheerily. It seemed that Amy and Chrissy were not as prepared to act like everything was normal as Sam and Nina were. To be fair to them, they had just seen their two friends, one of whom had massively pooped herself, disappear into the baby changing room and then come back out with one of them sitting on the other’s hip. It was even more unusual when compared with Sam’s usual disdain for anything even vaguely childlike. “Sure.” Chrissy said. She almost sounded defeated, like she had been trying to work out what had been going on and utterly failed to do so. --- If you want to find out what happens next you can do so RIGHT NOW at either of the following links: https://reamstories.com/page/lpjgftb4y2/story/lplyymi677/chapter/8fd4aa8f-6392-477b-a352-81d409b477a9 https://subscribestar.adult/posts/1262441

Hey DD!! I hope everyone is having a super wonderful week, time keeps flying by and i'm excited for a relaxing weekend. Today would be my 2nd year 7th month, and 10th day or 953 days of being padded. Ever so closer to my third year! As the time continues ever forward, I find myself writing this after changing out of a very soaked dip having just come home from a fun day at the office for a few in person vendor meetings. This morning though was a bit less fun, having to change from a messy dip at work as quick as possible before the meetings started. While i'm thankful to be a 99% remote employee, it does not spare me from various onsite meetings or projects at offices / data centers but I'd rate myself a professional ninja diaper changer and glad to have private bathrooms when needed. Makes changing much much easier! Life keeps moving forward and my body keeps changing little by little from what I can tell, even if it's subtle, it has added up to a life of constant leakiness and very sudden wetting/messing signals if at all. It's hard to really describe what has changed as things are subjective, but I do feel something internally has taken a hit when i'm leaking in between changes or laying down feeling my bottom growing warmer with no sense of needing to wet at all. Messing still is not at a state where I'd describe a complete loss of control. The warnings signs grow even shorter or more subtle/noticeable. Mentally I feel i've crossed a threshold where I'm feeling more on autopilot and dont give much thought to messing, there isn't a loud alarm or something trying to tell me HEY YOU'RE ABOUT TO POO! more just a very quiet subtle "oh I have to to go, so go." While my body is already relaxed and ready to let go. The warning is subtle, the feeling is becoming more automatic, and while I still feel I could stop it if truly wanted too, I've yet to actually test it. It's more just I have to put little effort into relaxing like I used to way back when i first started. Take this morning for instance, I found myself needing to mess after having just gotten out of the car at work. I found myself letting go and instead of heading to the office, instead heading to change first. I'm unsure what will happen in the future, but if this was as close to "incontinence" I could achieve without surgical intervention, I'm happy. I wish it wasn't an odd request to have scans or something performed, or just ways to see just how different my muscles have adapted / changed / weakened over time without going to a doctor or having something on my medical record. It just would be a neat to see for my own sake just to learn how much has changed without giving subjective writing. Anyway I hope everyone has a wonderful month ahead, and that you all have a great weekend. If you have any questions please let me know as I sometimes just don't know what to write. You're all loved ❤️

Well, yes. I'd like to thank both of you for your company and support along the way. I was going that way anyway, I'm sure, but it's made a big difference to know I wasn't doing it on my own, and that there were the two of you with a similar approach and family situation doing pretty much the same. It's now 5 1/2 years since I went full-time during the day, and 4 years since I went into nappies full-time at night as well. I still just love it, and I can't believe I've never regretted it for a minute.

I completely agree with BP on his very accurate quote, I understand how much work goes into writing stories/books and I don’t think that you should not be paid if the story is worth paying for, but a teaser or basically a advertisement for free is in bad taste, I actually have no idea how much money this type of thing would generate but I think at bare minimum you should consider a contribution to the site. Or the occasional free complete short story.

I'm back! Thanks y'all for being patient during my hiatus. 💜 It's a Briana chapter, and she's got a sleepover planned with all her Little friends. Exciting! 18 Sleepover It was a gorgeous spring Saturday in the Rasmussen house. The windows were open to let in fresh air and birdsong. The wood floor of the house’s great room glowed in the late morning light, freshly polished. From top to bottom, the house was immaculate, far more so than during a regular Saturday cleaning. This was mainly due to Briana’s and her Round Table's efforts. Briana paced in front of the stuffies lined up on the living room couch. One by one, she inspected the chore each stuffie had been assigned. · Knight Captain Alanna: Responsible for beating the dust out of the rug – done. · Squire Beartholomew: Asked to put out a bowl of chips and a bowl of cut strawberries – done. · Sir Chuck the Giraffe: Charged with dusting the furniture – done. · Sir Mimsey the Bat: Tasked with putting away toys and arranging throw pillows and blankets – done. · Sir Arnold the Pangolin: Trusted to put plastic glasses and a juice pitcher on the coffee table – not done! “Sir Arnold the Pangolin, I’m very disappointed you’re not finished with your job.” Briana shook her head at Arnold the Pangolin. “Luckily for Sir Arnold the Pangolin, your Princess is in a good mood. Plus, there’s still time before our guests arrive.” Briana snatched Arnold the Pangolin up and sprinted to the kitchen. Mindful of her pretty pouf dress with its lace overlay, she and Arnold the Pangolin took the glasses on the first trip and the pitcher on the second. The dress and lace were black, so the grape juice probably wouldn’t stain her if spilled, but it wasn’t worth the risk. She hadn’t spent her morning getting dolled up like a Little version of her gothy mom only to ruin it at the last minute. All chores were finished, and the snacks were ready. There was only one problem – no guests! Frustrated, Briana trotted across the hardwood floors in her brand new black and white Mary Jane’s. The clicky-clack noise her shoes made was enough fun that she didn’t feel like throwing a tantrum when she found Veronica – Briana was merely impatient. “Momma!” Briana hopped on the drawing room’s plush rug, which didn’t make a fun noise but had a delightful squish. Veronica was sitting primly in a black leather armchair with her laptop on her lap. She took an interminably long moment to finish whatever she typed before looking up. “Yes, Baby Bee?” “When’s Grandma going to get back? She’s been gone for ages.” “Michelle had three Littles to pick up, all living in different parts of town. I’m sure she’ll be back any minute.” Veronica smiled. “I’m glad you’re so excited, though. Did you finish all your chores?” “Barely! Arnold the Pangolin was sandbagging again.” Briana did a twirl for the joy of seeing her skirt flare out. Twirling was almost as fun as being at eye level with her mom. It only happened when Veronica was sitting or crouching down, which made it easy for Briana to stay in Littlespace around her mother. Two friends on their way were petite as well, though not as tiny as Briana. Nobody in the whole Graduate school was as tiny as her. Arthur was the opposite of Tiny, which made the ease with which he slipped into Littlespace impressive. Briana wondered if she should have Alanna commend him for it or if he’d be upset to have his size brought up. “Briana, are you listening to me?” Veronica had set her laptop aside and took Briana’s hands, pulling the Little girl into her lap. “Sorry, Mom, I was thinking about my friends. I can’t wait until they get here.” With a happy sigh, Briana leaned against her mom and tucked her head under Veronica’s chin. “I asked if you needed a change before they get here, but I can see you’re too distracted to notice.” Veronica flipped Briana’s skirt up and squeezed the Little girl’s diaper. “You’re dry, good girl.” It was funny how something that had used to bring Briana to tears – being diaper checked – had become such a comfort and reminder of Mom’s love. “Melody is going to play with us, too, right?” Briana squirmed until she had her arms around her mom and gave her a tight squeeze. “They said they would, so it’s a promise, and they have to play with us.” “I’m sure your sibling will happily play with you.” Veronica kissed Briana atop her head. “They said they were looking forward to it. But they won’t be here immediately, so don’t be disappointed. You’ll have plenty to do when Michelle returns with your friends anyway.” “Oh my gosh – I mean Goddess – it’s going to be so fun! Thanks for letting me have a sleepover, Mom.” Veronica got a funny look on her face when Briana invoked the Goddess. She always had a weird look when Briana brought up the one thing in her life that Briana hadn’t yet gotten to experience. This time, it was just a look instead of a swat or a frown. Mom even gave Briana a little squeeze. There could be no better time to ask Mom, especially after Briana had been such a good girl with her chores. “Momma, can I go with you to the next esbat?” “Not the next one.” Veronica put a finger on Briana’s lips to silence her whine. “April’s esbat is scheduled for the end of the month, during the dark of the moon. It’ll be one of our more serious ceremonies, and it won’t be a good introduction to the coven for anyone, especially a Little girl.” “But Momma!” “Let me finish. Beltane will be at the beginning of next month and the perfect time to introduce my bouncy, sparkly daughter.” “Really?!” Briana’s enthusiastic hug squeezed a grunt out of Veronica. “Mom, that’s super exciting! Can Melody come if I convince them?” “Only if they really want to come, and not if they agreed because you were badgering them.” “Melody loves me and you too; they’ll come.” Briana hopped off Veronica’s lap and did three spins in a row, giggling. “Thanks, Mom! I’m going back to the living room, so I’ll be ready when Grandma gets here.” “Don’t forget that your grandmother is in charge of your sleepover. Jane and I will be here, but you’d better not come to ask us for something she’s already said no to.” “Mom!” Briana’s exclamation of shock had little effect on Veronica’s knowing look. Reluctantly, Briana nodded. “That was only one time. But I promise I won’t. Okay, love you, momma. I’m going to watch the door now!” ~~~*~~~ Twenty eons later, or twenty minutes later – who’s to say – Briana heard a car pull up outside the house. An excited squeal burst out of her when the door opened, revealing Grandma and a train of bashful Littles. Grandma Michelle was dressed in a sturdy blue shift dress and looked downright vigorous; her health scare from Christmas seemed well behind her. Briana hugged Grandma, Arthur, Fabi, and Ava, adding a quick kiss to her girlfriend’s hug. They were all dressed Little, too. Arthur was in shortalls that looked like regular overalls that had been cut off and hemmed. He had a backpack over one shoulder and a stuffed tyrannosaurus under his arm. Fabi was in a purple, short-sleeved dress with a crazy amount of lace under her skirt. Her bag was an adorable teddy bear backpack – she had an elephant stuffie clutched in one hand. Ava wore a rainbow tie-dye t-shirt and lime green shorts that didn’t do much to hide her diaper. Her bag was a laundry bag – she looked like she was having trouble managing it, her crutches and her teddy bear Brownie all simultaneously. Briana took Ava’s bag, then Fabi’s and Arthur’s, to not to single her girlfriend out. With an oof from the weight, Briana set the bags by the stairs. “Hi everybody, thanks for coming to my sleepover! We have snacks and juice and anything you want; just ask.” “You’re all welcome to have some snacks, but don’t fill up.” Grandma guided the Littles into sitting positions on the living room rug. “I’ll have lunch for you in a few minutes.” “What’s for lunch?” Fabi asked. “Lefse! You’re going to love it. It’s potato flatbread with butter and sugar.” Briana bounced happily on her padded rear at the chorus of aahs from her friends. “I know you all kinda met at my birthday, but did you get re-introduced in the car if you needed to?” Briana asked. “I can do introductions! Or we can introduce our stuffies.” “We had a chance to talk in the car.” Arthur chuckled. “Your grandma squished us all into the back seat of her car,” Ava said with a giggle. “Also, Brownie has already met your stuffies, but he’d love to meet Athur’s and Fabi’s.” “This is Elle!” Fabi scooted up to Ava, shoving her elephant urgently toward Brownie. “Hi, Ellie,” Ava said for Brownie, waving his paw. “I’m Tommy,” Arthur said in the squeaky falsetto he used for his stuffed tyrannosaurus. Briana giggled and grabbed her stuffed Lioness. “Alanna knows Tommy and Brownie but is very pleased to meet Elle.” “Brownie is a kshatriya, which is kind of like a knight.” Ava declared. “Are Tommy and Elle knights like Alanna is?” “Of course, I’m a knight!” Arthur squeaked for Tommy before switching to his usual bass rumble. “Sorry, Tommy, but you know you can’t pass the qualifications.” With Athur’s help, Tommy had a stomping fit on the Little boy’s leg. “I think Elle can’t pass the tests or whatever either.” Fabi cuddled her elephant close. “She’s not into scary stuff like fighting.” “Then Brownie and Alanna will protect Tommy and Elle if needed.” Briana declared. In response, Ava grinned, scooting over to Briana to bump her hip against Bri’s. The sweet smell of potato pancakes followed Grandma out of the kitchen. Though she had food on the stove, Michelle managed to pour each Little a glass of juice and check their diapers. There were lots of blushy giggles in Grandma’s wake, especially from Ava. When the pancakes arrived, they were as delicious as they’d been the first time Grandma had made them. Savory, sweet, and buttery tastes filled Briana’s mouth with delight and her tummy with warmth. Besides the clinking of plates, the room was quiet as the Littles devoured their lunch. Briana cleared the lunch plates without being asked – because she was the best Little girl ever. While she was doing that, Grandma whisked Ava away for a diaper change, redoubling Ava’s blush. Briana plopped down on the floor between Arthur and Fabi, pulling them both into a hug. “I have to tell you two about something a bit scary that happened to Ava.” Briana was glad to see her friends responding with curiosity rather than nervousness. She had the mellowing power of Lefse to thank for that. “Ava and I were out together the other day and ran into some anti-ABDL protestors. One of them pushed Ava over and hurt her pretty badly.” “What?” Arthur’s jaw dropped, his expression struggling between Big rage and Little Concern. “Is she okay? I mean, she looks okay, but…” Fabi trailed off nervously. “She’s okay now, but it was terrifying; we had to call an ambulance.” Briana sighed. “Don’t make a big deal when she comes out, because she doesn’t like talking about it, but I wanted you to know that mean people are getting aggressive with Littles.” Arthur sighed. “Great, one more thing to deal with in town.” Fabi nodded. “So much for ever going out, now that I’m full-time Little.” “No! We can’t let them win. I have a plan to fix it; we’ll talk about it when Ava gets back.” “Talk about what?” Ava asked, maneuvering deftly on her crutches ahead of Grandma. Briana squirmed out from between her friends in time to pull Ava into a snuggle as she sat. “Fixing what happened to you the other day.” “That reminds me,” Michelle said. “Have you ever heard back from the police, Ava? I know Briana hasn’t.” Ava shook her head. “Not yet, but it’s only been a few days.” “Oh, that won’t do at all.” Michelle pulled her phone out of her purse. “You kids, go ahead with what you were doing. I’m going to give the police chief a call.” Arthur and Fabi looked at Briana in surprise. Before Briana could answer, Ava shrugged at them. “Her family just does stuff like this.” “My family and I have a lot of privilege in this town – and I’m going to put it to good use.” Briana squeezed Ava. “What happened to Ava is not okay. I don’t like seeing protestors or people talking badly about Littles. We’re not hurting anyone. They’re the ones harassing and hurting people.” “What are we supposed to do about it?” Arthur frowned. “It’s not like you can take away people’s right to protest. Even if they’re protesting for something mean.” “Of course not, but we can keep them from hurting people when they do it.” Briana thumped a fist on the rug. “And if we convince people that it’s okay to be Little, they’ll stop protesting alone.” “You’re talking about an activism campaign?” Ava scooted away from Briana, frowning. “Briana, I can’t even see my old friends; I can’t go on TV or whatever!” Fabi whimpered. Arthur kept quiet, but he looked as uncomfortable as Fabi did. “I’m not asking anybody in this room to do public stuff.” Briana looked up at Grandma with a smile. “Well, maybe Grandma. But mostly, it’ll be me and my aunt Kiara – she already said she’d help.” “Then you’re just – warning us that you’re going public about this?” The look on Ava’s face said that they would have to have a big conversation about Briana’s plan. That was okay. Briana knew that she could trust her girlfriend to understand once she explained things properly. “That’s part of it, but I could also really use your help! There’s tons of stuff to do that doesn’t involve showing your names or faces. I’ll need help writing letters, calling people, making lists of people to call, making flyers, keeping track of donations, and all kinda stuff.” “You’ve really thought about this.” Ava looked more thoughtful than uncomfortable – a good sign! “Wow, Bri, that’s a lot. You seem kind of like that day you, um – ran into me downtown and bought me cocoa.” Arthur smiled bashfully. “You mean when I was Big and you were Little? Well, I’m still Little, but I can do this! We don’t forget stuff when we’re Little, right? If anything, I think we understand stuff better.” “I just sit around most of the day when I don’t have a babysitter.” Fabi squirmed, her diaper crinkling. “It’d be fun to have something to do, but I’m not a good organizer.” “You could put letters in envelopes!” Briana grinned to see an eager smile on Fabi’s face. “Yeah, I could! Um, could I put cute stickers on them, or would that mess up the plan?” “That would be perfect!” Briana grinned, reaching out to grab Ava and Arthur’s hands. To her delight, Fabi took Arthur and Ava’s other hands. “We can do this Little-style! So, will you help me, please?” “Of course, we’re friends, right?” Arthur squeezed Briana’s hand. “I’m in for decorating and mailing stuff!” Fabi grinned. “It’s scary that you’re going to be publicly ABDL,” Ava sighed. “If you could be careful when you’re out with me, I’d really appreciate that. Even if it is scary – I’m in.” “Yay! Thank you, everybody! Especially you, Ava, for being super brave. I’ll be as careful as I can, I promise.” Ava rolled her eyes, though she was smiling from ear to ear. “You’re lucky I love you, Looney Tunes.” Briana’s giggle at what she hoped was a new nickname was short-circuited by the phrase immediately preceding the name. “You love me?” Ava ducked her head bashfully. “That just slipped out, but – I guess I do.” “I love you so much!” Briana tackled her girlfriend, giggling madly and kissing her all over her face. Ava laughed back, clinging to Briana until they settled into a loving hug. “I hope I’m not interrupting.” Michelle peeked into the back of Arthur and Fabi’s diapers, getting a squeak out of them. “Ava, I told the police chief that his inaction was disappointing. He knows at least some of the names of people that were protesting, but he didn’t want to bother them.” Grandma tutted disapprovingly at the police chief as she untangled Briana and Ava, checking their diapers in the process. “He’s motivated to bother them now. We should have a name and some charges for the person who pushed you soon, as well as a restraining order.” Ava sighed gratefully, leaning against Michelle’s leg. “Thank you, uh… Ms. Rasmussen?” “You can call me Grandma if you want, dear. All you darling kids can if you want. You’re Briana’s friends, after all.” She clapped her hands dramatically. “Now! You’ve got full bellies and dry diapers. Briana gave me a list of activities for the day, including a movie, a blanket fort, and playing Cloudland. Which would you like to do first?” “We can’t play Cloudland until Melody gets back.” Briana protested. “Then it’ll be one of the other two. We’ll let your friends pick. Ava, Arthur, Fabi, what’ll it be, couch fort or a movie?” “Blanket fort?” Arthur asked excitedly. “Yeah!” Ava and Fabi said together. “Then we need to get the coffee table moved to the side. Some rolled-up mattresses can go in its place. You kids get busy doing that while I get the sheets to drape between the couches.” “Got it, Grandma!” Briana grinned, tugging mightily – and uselessly – on the coffee table. With Arthur’s help, they got it moving smoothly enough that they didn’t spill any snacks. Fabi pulled mattresses into place while Ava rolled them out. The Littles were in a snuggle-pile on those mattresses with their stuffies only a few minutes later. Grandma stretched sheets from couch to couch, pinning them in place. She even put a pillowcase across the entrance between Mom’s armchair and a sofa, making a cute door flap. The inside of the fort took on a dreamy blue and green hue from the sun filtering through the sheets. “Fabi, get the snacks!” Briana fished an arm through the sheet-walls to pull the rest of her round-table into the fort. “This is so fun.” Arthur giggled. “I wish we could sleep under here tonight.” Ava nodded eagerly. “That is the best idea!” Briana kissed her girlfriend soundly on the cheek before looking up to shout at the sheet-ceiling. “Grandma, can we sleep in the fort instead of Melody’s room like we planned?” “You don’t need to shout, Little Rose. I heard you and Ava both just fine.” Grandma chuckled. “Ava’s idea is a great one. We’ll get your sleeping bags in there when it’s bedtime.” Resuming their cuddle pile, the Littles munched on chips and gave their stuffies a dance party. Briana was feeling extra snuggly regarding Ava after her girlfriend’s declaration of love. Happily, Ava was the same. They stayed spooned together every minute that they played in the fort. The sleepover was already the bestest fun since Briana’s birthday and promised to get even better when Melody arrived. Through all the snuggles and laughs they were sharing, Briana’s heart overflowed with love for all three of her friends. Protecting them and their magical time together was more important than ever. Briana couldn’t imagine the kind of person who could object to the fun they were having as Littles – but she knew they were out there. That’s okay! I’ll change their minds as quickly as Grandma changes my diapers!

Chapter Thirty Eight Rubbing his eyes as he woke up again, this time he was on the folded up comforter on the floor propped up against Xerxes. Still a good way to wake up. Not as great as earlier. But still two of his top three since coming here, and both in one morning. Patting Xerxes for a bit, John stretched again and rolled over to stand up. When he was able to stand up at all, he realized that was in a rough pup and not the overnight diaper he couldn’t stand up in. And somewhere along the way he had been dressed in a onesie and some shorts. Looking groggily around the house, he noticed that the door to the back porch was open, but the child gate was closed. Mom was nowhere to be found inside. So he toddled over to the child gate to peek out onto the porch. He spotted her on the chair nearest the door. “Mom?” he asked as sweetly as he could managed. He probably succeeded better because he was half awake. With the tell tale clink of a cup of coffee being put down he could watch her stand up and turn around with a smile. “There’s my little sleepy head! Would you like to join me for some coffee milk?” There it was, she was fully awake in the morning. He simply nodded, and Mom immediately reached down over the gate and got him around the ribs and hoisted him up onto her hip before opening the gate and walking over to the fridge to pull out a bottle of coffee milk that she’d already had ready. Within moments they were back outside and she was back in the chair and shuffled him around so that he was sideways on her and leaning back semi comfortably on the arm of the chair and her left upper arm. Complaining about not getting to sit in a chair on his own would have to wait, addiction to Mommy’s milk and coffee was more urgent as the bottle was turned up. Five minutes later he was sitting on her lap feeling a bit giggly. The milk was starting to hit him a bit harder lately for some reason. As he finished the milk, he noticed Mommy was looking at him a big different, which made him giggle some more. And when she tilted him over her shoulder and patted him firmly on the back he asked “Hey *pat* what *pat* are *pat* yo…” and then he involuntarily issued out a long burp that left him giggling even harder still. Smiling down at him, Mommy asked “Hey, do you want to help me pick and wipe off a few more tomatoes, or would you like to go play or read?” For the first time he didn’t just answer that he wanted to go help, he had to think about it for a moment in his current mental state. He still said “Yes please.” “John … yes to what?” He answered “Oh! To helping.” and he started worming his way off of her lap. She didn’t immediately let him down, but she after a moment she put the coffee cup and bottle down, got him under the arms and turned him right side up before depositing him on the porch. The instant his feet hit the porch he made to bolt into the yard, but he was foiled as mommy grabbed the back of his shorts and pulled him backwards. “And where do you think you’re going, young man?” He turned to look up somewhat indignantly and explained “Yard.” “Shoes.” was all she said. “Don’t need em.” “Shoes.” “… Yes Ma’am.” With a nod, she stood up and went inside, carrying the bottle and the cup with her. Left alone he scooted closer to the edge of the porch. Every fiber of him screaming to jump off the porch and run into the yard. Oh it was so tempting. It was maybe his entire height from him to the ground. He could roll as he landed. It would be like in a movie. As he started to instinctively lean toward the edge, Mommy came outside with a pair of socks and pointed below him. “Park your booty.” With a sigh at the lost opportunity to dive and roll, he sat down on the edge of the porch. He couldn’t stop from swinging his feet while he waited for her and then she had to grab one of his feet to put a sock and shoe onto it before pinning the other one. She looked at her watch and said “Okay, you’ve got about twenty minutes to pick tomatoes. The little scissors and a towel are in your wagon.” He looked a bit confused as he asked “What happens in twenty minutes” She just stood him up and gave him a couple of pats on the bottom as she dodged the question “You’ll see. Just go be happy in the meantime.” He just shrugged and set off with his wagon. Oddly, instead of joining him, she stayed by the porch. When he turned to look back she was sitting on the porch with a towel wiping off vegetables and seemed to just be preparing for something. And she was conveniently seated where she had a perfect view of where he was going to be the entire time. Whatever, Mommy was being weird. So he started looking through the vines to see if any tomatoes that weren’t ready yesterday were ready today. And much to his surprise there were a couple of dozen that felt about right. One of them was shaped super wide like a UFO. So that set him back to giggling and making sound effects as it went into the wagon. After just enough time for him to make a quick inspection of the entire row his insides went from nothing to panic, like flipping a switch. He was so alarmed as the urge hit him like a freight train that he turned to look at Mommy and she was there looking at her watch and then looked up at him. John wanted to run. To plead to make it to the potty. He wanted … anything other than… There wasn’t even enough time to want anything else, his arms went around his belly and he doubled over. There was no stopping it, and it was completely demoralizing. Within seconds of the urge hitting him he was panting as warm liquid mush filled the back of his diaper, spreading out to fill every nook and cranny available, and then somehow finding or making more space. Holding the side of the wagon, he steadied himself as a little more somehow came out of him. The sound of footsteps in the grass coming toward him was faint in what little attention he had to spare, but he looked up to see Mommy smiling down at him. She held out her hand and asked “Would you like to walk, or do you want me to carry you?” The answer was obvious “Please carry me, Mommy.” She just nodded as she reached down and lifted him up, sliding her arm under him and lowering him onto her left forearm. He grimaced as all of his weight landed on that arm butt first. His shoes were pulled off and deposited on the porch as they got to the steps, and he felt her pause to step out of her shoes at the top of the steps before carrying him in. He barely registered the child gate swinging shut in his peripheral vision as they went through the living room to his bedroom. And so for the first time that he was awake for today, he was on the changing table with his shorts being pulled off and the weird puzzle snaps on his onesie being undone. Before she laid him down she held out her arms in the silent offer of a hug. He reached out in return and was immediately wrapped up in a warm, comforting, hug. She gave him a big kiss on the forehead before laying him down and getting to work. “I don’t understand” was all he could really vocalize. “What don’t you understand, sweety?” “Why did … it was just …” He was breathing fast again, it was freaking him out a little. “Twenty four minutes after you finished the coffee milk, you went off. I timed it last time, and this time you made it the exact same, down to the minute. Although…” She looked at what she was cleaning up “This time you may have gone for a record.” “So this really was the coffee milk?” She just nodded while she scrubbed him diligently. “Yes.” “I don’t want to have to give up coffee.” She stopped wiping and rolled up the used diaper to deposit into the waste bin in the changing table. “Lift.” As he raised booty, she slid a clean diaper underneath him and patted him on the hip and said “Down.” He flopped back down and as she set back about powdering him and taping him back up she explained “You don’t have to give up coffee. And every so often most littles get constipated from time to time and need an enema or a suppository. So at least it doesn’t look like you’ll be having that problem!” He shuddered as she said two of those words and she re-snapped his onesie before standing him back up. Instead of putting him down she picked him up in a big hug and held him to her chest with her cheek pressed against his. She whispered “It’s okay. I love you.” Hearing those words gave him butterflies in his stomach. (Thankfully just butterflies this time!) Carrying him to the living room, still minus the shorts, she stood him up on the couch and ruffled his hair before asking “Okay, what would you like to do for a couple of hours?” Without hesitation this time, he answered “May I play on my tablet?” Not only did Mommy say “Absolutely!” but she handed it to him and went to fix him a sippy cup of water. A few minutes later, John found himself leaning back against Xerxes, a blanket over him and the dog keeping him nice and warm. Staring at the tablet he was having a little bit of trouble focusing, but he found a neat little puzzle game that involved spinning discs to make a ball have a path to get out from the middle of the puzzle to the outside of the puzzle. It was sort of like a round labyrinth puzzle, but every layer had to be turned. It was simple and neat. And for some reason, every time the ball rolled along he had another little giggle fit. Without realizing it, his giggle fits were starting to subside as he wound down from his milk high. And he started to focus more on the puzzles and make more progress as he went. With all of the windows open, it was easy to hear a truck coming down the driveway. As if prepared, Mom came in and turned on the coffee maker. John thought about hopping up immediately but wanted to at least finish this last puzzle first. About the same time that he finished his puzzle, there were footsteps on the porch. So getting up, Xerxes stood up behind him and did a full body shake while he put the tablet back on the coffee table where Mom kept it. John walked over to the door as Mom showed Mr Mike into the house. The man had to duck a little to step through a thirteen foot tall door frame. Mr Mike smiled as he greeted Mom and held out a large (to John) container, cleaned and ready to return. On top of the container was a little cardboard box. “What’s this?” she asked him. With a coy smile he said “Well. I guess you’ll have to open it so that we can find out!” Immediately Mom sat the container on the counter and opened the box to find what looked to John to be a large handmade mug. To everyone else around here it was just a normal sized mug. The cool thing about the mug was that there was a stream painted all the way around it, and the handle was somehow shaped like a tree limb and painted accordingly. Mom immediately stepped up to give him a big hug and a thank you. “Mike! This is gorgeous!” With a great big smile he nodded “Well, I’m glad that you like it! I know someone that teaches pottery and I called in a favor.” Practically bouncing with excitement she held it from a couple of different angles now and complimented “Usually cups half this pretty are uncomfortable to hold. This is very good work!” Mike held up a hand and said “One more thing. John, could you turn around for just a moment?” With a nonchalant shrug, John turned around to look at Xerxes, who was standing behind him with a big happy dog grin on his face as his tail whipped back and forth. John felt a tap on his shoulder and turned around to see a grinning giant man with one arm behind his back. Chuckling, Mike explained "You know John, your Mom's not the only on that gets a present. I searched the entire store and this was the only thing I could find that seemed appropriate for you." And without further ado, his left arm came around and John was presented with ... a stuffie. But this wasn't any stuffie. This stuffie looked like it was meant to be some sort of a lizard, a lizard that was then over filled to make it seem more welcoming. It looked ridiculous. It looked like someone started with a poorly drawn Godzilla that they then colored like an iguana. It was the size of his entire torso, and had legs that bent awkwardly in much the same way that a Vienna Sausage doesn't. Reaching out silently, seemingly mesmerized by the unfathomably awkward appearance of this large stuffie, he grabbed it and squeezed it. It felt like a giant mutated marshmallow. And all of it was somehow eclipsed by the eyes. Those outlandish eyes. The two glassy eyes staring back at him were a small landscape of jade and caramel colored swirls that had a small black disc in them. The most elaborate googly eyes in either dimension were on this ... John was at a loss for words. He found himself so lost in his search for words that he started with a little laugh. Then the laugh started to grow more and more until he could hardly breath for the laughter. John, and his entire history of being able to react on the fly and make up anything on a whim were defeated by this stuffie. The single squishy embodiment of the word "Derp." Standing there laughing so hard he was crying for easily two solid minutes, it took a while to regain any semblance of composure. The giggles he’d had since the milk this morning were more than back. It took longer than he realized that the two bigs were kneeling down next to him and that Mommy had a hand behind him trying to hold him up while he had a full on laugh attack. Eventually catching his breath he wiped at his eyes. “Hahaha… oh my … Mister M… Hahaha Mist… Mister Mike he … hahhh I’m okay … I can breathe …” The two bigs both seemed almost as amused by his reaction as he did by the … derp…. Derpasaur … Interrupting his train of though, Mommy asked “Do you like him?” Exclaiming “Are you kidding!? Look at him! He’s glorious! And Derpy. Derp…. Us … no …” It was impossible to notice that the two bigs over him nodded at each other as he mulled over names. Mumbling to himself, John tried “Derp … derpus? M… no … Godzi… no … Derpzi… no, too eas… Argo!...Hahahaha. Oh, Oh, this is great!” Mr Mike ruffled his hair and asked “Did you name him already?” “Yup!” John exclaimed proudly. “What did you name him?” Mommy asked from behind him. “Argo McDerpus!” “…”

any1 wear maxi pads i got tena maxi pads and find them very comfortable to wear in my panties

If you have Tori Spelling on your diaper bingo card, mark it. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-13329891/amp/tori-spelling-sons-diaper-pee.html Apparently some years ago she got stuck in traffic and used one of her son's diapers.

I'm content, and I feel if that was a fear I'd never have stepped back into dips permanently in the first place. I already "mess" 2-3 times a day, if it where to go beyond that, I'd probably adjust my diet a bit Believe it or not a monthly supply of disposable dips adds up so I'd like to keep it to a maximum of 4-5 a day. (normally around 4) But no, there are no fears. Thanks Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Very frequent messing is a dream come true FWIW.

I wet the bed almost every night until around 12, went down to two or three nights per week until ending at about 15 1/2. I was only diapered for a camping vacation when I was 7. I did not enjoy being in diapers however when I was around 12 I started to have these weird desires to wear diapers. I even creased the Sears catalog to open to the incontinence products page hoping my Mom would get the idea to order some for me. I even saw her looking at that page one day and was sure she would ask me if I wanted to wear again. Unfortunately she never asked so I was left to my own devices to make diapers leftover from my little sister. The bedwetting finally stopped when I went through puberty but came back due to a medical issue in my early 30’s.

Like thedman, I have a problem with this. As I write, Mike has received only $111 of his monthly $400 request. A contribution on your part would be a thoughtful gesture.

No offense, but I think if you want to do something like this, you should be consulting with the forum mods and getting an advertising type forum added. This forum has always been about stories written for the general members to be able to see. Yes some authors have subscription platforms where chaprmtes are posted before they become free, but people are not trying to post teasers to sell their e books

Chapter 22: The Night Before I returned downstairs to find that Hannah had resumed watching the movie without me. Like before, she was sitting on the floor. Emma remained absorbed in her smartphone on the couch. "You were in the bathroom for a really long time," Hannah said as I took a seat behind her on the couch. Emma groaned at her cousin's lack of social etiquette, though she still didn't look up from her phone. I didn't respond at all to Hannah's comment. Anything she might think I had been doing in the bathroom was better than what I had actually been doing. I hoped that I had managed to put everything back into the suitcase exactly like I had found it, and that the pull-up I had tried out wouldn't show any signs of having been worn. I wasn't able to pay attention to the TV. It didn't matter that this was my favorite of the Harry Potter movies. I simply couldn't sit still and focus on it. The diapers I'd discovered in Hannah's suitcase both worried and intrigued me. Why was it that she would need to wear those to bed rather than the pull-ups? There was only one explanation that made sense. The pull-ups must not work well enough for her at night. There was no question from when I was holding the diaper that it had significantly more absorbent padding, but it seemed to follow that it would be more effective at absorbing urine. But I struggled to understand why that was the case. The pull-ups seemed to work perfectly fine for Hannah during the day. Or did they? When Emma had mentioned that her cousin had peed all over the couch the other day, I had simply assumed that she must have not had a pull-up on at the time. But what if that wasn't the case? What if she had been wearing the pull-up, and it hadn't been able to completely absorb the accident? Maybe those pull-ups didn't work one hundred percent of that time? What would that mean for my own fake bedwetting once my parents got the pull-ups for me? I, of course, would be wetting them, but what would happen if they leaked all over the bed? I couldn't see my parents wanting to continue getting pull-ups for me if that were to happen. They wouldn't see them as having any value if there were still wet sheets to deal with, anyway. Would I end up needing to wear diapers as well if I were to continue faking the bedwetting? And did I want to wear diapers rather than pull-ups? That was a question I didn't know the answer to at the moment. I hadn't ever remotely considered the possibility of wearing a diaper rather than a pull-up outside of the makeshift diaper I had attempted to make for myself once a couple of years back to disastrous results. Would a diaper feel as good as wearing a pull-up? Would it feel better than wearing a pull-up? That wasn't a question I could answer without having tried one on, but there hadn't been an opportunity to do so. From the windows looking out over the backyard, I could see that the rain hadn't let up a single bit. I checked my phone. The forecast said the downpour wasn't supposed to stop until sometime overnight. The movie finally came to an end. Hannah wanted to move on to the next one immediately, but not before taking another toilet break, as her watch had just gone off a couple of minutes earlier. "I need to put my foot down," Emma said, though she remained seated on the couch with her legs curled up to the side. "I'm not watching another one of these movies this weekend." Hannah was gone a lot longer than before. It was hard to tell since it was raining, but I thought I could hear the sound of someone going upstairs and walking around. When she finally returned, she didn't take kindly to Emma's decision to move on to any activity other than watching the next Harry Potter movie. Hannah stomped her feet and ran off when Emma refused to hand over the TV remote to her. Hannah returned a few minutes later with her mom, who tried to helpfully suggest that perhaps we could make some TikTok videos with Hannah instead. That seemed to test Emma's limit on wanting to do anything but watch another Harry Potter movie, but she agreed. There was still another hour or so before Mom was going to come and pick me up. We managed to get a couple of someone choreographic dance videos made that Emma promised Hannah that she would post to her account, though when Hannah went off to use the toilet again, Emma whispered to me that she was going to delete it all once Hannah was gone, saying that she didn't want to ruin the vibe on her account. The doorbell rang a few minutes later. It had to be Mom coming to pick me up. Hannah stayed behind in the living room as Emma and I went to the front door. Mom was chatting casually with Emma and Hannah's parents in the entryway when we arrived. "Are you excited about summer break?" Mom asked Emma. "I will be when Angie is back from her road trip," Emma said. "I'm looking forward to the sleepover on Maddy's birthday." Mom nodded in response to Emma's statement and shifted her gaze over to me. And just like that, I was caught. Mom wasn't supposed to have known that I'd already invited Angie and Emma to have a sleepover on my birthday next weekend. "Where's Hannah?" Emma's aunt asked. "I don't know," Emma said. "Maybe in the other room." "Can you go grab her? I'm sure she'd want to say goodbye since we're leaving early tomorrow morning." Emma trudged back off toward the living room. I caught her rolling her eyes once she was at an angle where her parents couldn't see it. A little while later, there was a loud patter of feet running along the wood floor, and Hannah sprinted around the corner. I couldn't help but once again find my eyes drifting down to her waist. As she came to a stop, her shirt lifted up briefly, giving one final half-second glimpse of the pull-up beneath her shorts. "Bye!" Hannah said with a wave at me. And just like that, she was done, having turned back around to sprint off toward the living room. We continued to make small talk about plans for the summer for a few minutes, and then it was time to head home. I closed the door behind me after getting into the passenger seat, bracing myself for an awkward conversation. Mom turned on the ignition without saying a word and watched the rear-view camera as she carefully backed out of the driveway. Once we were out on the road, the questions began. "Why does Emma think there's going to be a sleepover on your birthday?" she asked. She had me there. It was stupid bad luck that Emma had thought to say anything about that to Mom. Mom had shot down the idea of an all-nighter, and she had made it clear that she wasn't going to OK the idea of a sleepover unless the anti-bedwetting pills had worked. I really didn't want to answer Mom's question, even though it wasn't as though she likely knew the answer already. "I told Angie and Emma that a sleepover was the plan for my birthday." "Madelyn, you know that I had said that wasn't an option unless we managed to figure out what was happening with the bedwetting." I nearly did it. Even though I had planned to bring up the topic of pull-ups tomorrow, I nearly went forward with the speech I had rehearsed about how it might be good to try them. But I instead fell back on a more vague excuse. "I just figured that maybe the doctor would have something that would stop the bedwetting so I could still have the sleepover. I didn't want to tell them that I couldn't do it." "That doesn't leave a lot of time," Mom said as we turned onto the road that led back to our house. "I want to make sure any solution actually works before letting you do a sleepover. Maybe it would be best if we just postponed it. Your friends can stay until it is time to go to bed. It's not as though you'd really miss anything while being asleep." That was the last thing I wanted, especially after having already told my friends that a sleepover was going to happen. "Please don't tell them that it is canceled yet. I don't want them to think anything is wrong." Mom was silent for a bit as she pulled into the driveway and waited for the garage door to open. "That's fine for now," Mom said at last. "But if we don't find a way to deal with the bedwetting before then, it isn't going to work to have the sleepover." <><><> Another night. Another set of pills to take before bed. At least this was going to be the last time. Despite my pleas to get out of taking the pills tonight, Mom insisted that I should give it one more try before going to the doctor's appointment in the morning. "I don't want you staying up too late tonight," Mom said. "The appointment is first thing in the morning, so you need to make sure you set your alarm for eight." Great. Pills. No more water for tonight. No chance of peeing the bed this evening. And I had to get up early in the morning. I held out my hand, and she dropped the two pills onto my open palm. I grabbed a glass with a small amount of water in it from her as well. Mom watched as I popped both of the pills into my mouth. I resigned myself to the possibility of dealing with an actual headache tomorrow morning as I began to raise the glass of water to my lips. Some loud yelling in the distance – which sounded like my younger brother, Jackson – suddenly grabbed Mom's attention, as she turned around to look in the other direction. Mom's back was turned as she headed down the hallway in the direction of the tantrum that Jackson seemed to be throwing. That wasn't common behavior for him, but when it happened, it usually took both of my parents to rein my six-year-old brother in. This was my chance. I pulled the two tiny pills out of my mouth and placed them in my pocket before quickly chugging down the small glass of water. With my plans for the evening suddenly looking much more positive, I didn't throw a fuss at going to bed earlier than I normally would have on an evening during summer break. I made sure to use the toilet while my parents were helping my brother get ready for bed, making sure they would know that any bedwetting would be happening in spite of all the precautions that were being taken. I flushed the two pills down the toilet, watching carefully to make sure that they didn't resurface. The best part about having avoided taking the pills tonight was that I wasn't going to have to avoid drinking anything afterward. My mouth had been so parched the past several nights when I had gone to bed without sneaking a drink from the sports bottle I had tucked away in my bedroom. Alone in my bedroom, I raised the bottle to my lips. I couldn't believe that I was somehow actually excited about the idea of drinking lukewarm tap water. The likelihood of being able to wet myself in bed tonight allowed me to manage to set aside my disgust at the bitter taste of the water. The problem of going to bed this early was that I still had plenty of time to kill before midnight. I tapped open the web browser on my phone, trying to recall the name of the website Hannah had mentioned reading those Harry Potter fanfiction stories on. I couldn't recall the exact name, but a quick Google search of the acronym she had mentioned brought up a link to the website. I tapped on the link, and then I groaned as a new pop-up appeared on my phone, one that was unwelcome but familiar, a message that the website was blocked due to the parental restrictions on my phone. Well, that was just great. Defeated, I set my phone down on the bed. It wouldn't be the first time that an otherwise appropriate website had been mistakenly blocked by the software. If it was something Hannah had access to, I couldn't imagine that it was actually anything that bad or inappropriate. I would need to ask Dad about the website tomorrow, and he would be able to update the permissions on the parental controls like he had done for me before, though perhaps I should consider coming up with a reason for wanting to access the website other than wanting to read Harry Potter stories. A sense of melancholy struck me as midnight approached. This might be the last time of wetting myself like this. Going forward, I would be wearing a pull-up to bed every night for the foreseeable future. I had first wet the bed nine nights ago. And tomorrow I would be going to see a doctor. I was amazed at how quickly everything had progressed. I'd tried to put off thinking about what the doctor's appointment might mean for me in the morning. What tests would they end up running? What theories would they have for why the bedwetting might be happening? Was there anything I had done that might cause them to suspect that I was actually wetting the bed on purpose? One thing was clear. Regardless of what happened at that appointment, I was going to need to find a way to broach the topic of pull-ups with Mom tomorrow. With any luck, tomorrow night, I'd be going to bed while wearing a pull-up identical to the one of Hannah's that I had tried out earlier today. Having managed to avoid taking the anti-bedwetting pills, I didn't have to struggle at all to manage to wet the bed, and I took in the sensation of the warmth spreading beneath my waist. Even though everything had gone right so far, even though I was still completely on track for my plan to succeed, another thought began to fill me with a new worry as I lay on top of my thoroughly soaked bedding. What if the pull-ups didn't work for me? --- Links to all my stories can be found at https://abdlwriter.wordpress.com/

@Beccathelittle what a nice update as always. Have a great weekend! Treat yourself to something nice. Maybe a restaurant you normally don’t go to all the time.

They entered another room Jerry recognized. Nominally it was a bedroom, though he didn't know how much actual sleep occured in it. A massive, corner posted bed sat in the middle, made out of elegant carved oak wood, and a dresser sat beside it. From there, anything "normal" changed. The blankets of the bed were lifted just enough to show a wooden dog cage underneath it, and the headboard and foot board both had slots for a head and two hands or feet. Handcuffs dangled from another corner, where he saw more then one submissve locked as they were given enemas or suppositories, and then often left until they lost control and filled their diapers. He knew behind another door was a full adult sized nursery with a 'crib' that included a locking top. If he was lucky, he may end up there for the night. If not, the dog cage waited. He cringed. Even with all the play he had done at home, it was embaressing to think that his "lucky" option was sleeping locked in an oversized baby crib on camera for strangers to comment on. She pulled Jerry toward the bed and lifted lifted his hand up into the air. He heard a snap, and felt his hand being pulled toward the top corner. She grabbed his other wrist and did the same. Jerry groaned as he was stretched out, spread eagle into the air. She bent down behind him, and he felt her pull his legs to the side. "Good sissy, give me your foot," she said. He groaned again but obeyed, and he felt her space his feet apart with a bar and attatch them to the foot of the bed. He tried to wiggle pull at the chains, but found them unbreakable. She stood up and rested a hand on his bottom. "Good sissy, though a bit whiny with those groans. Nice to see you just give up and let me tie you to my bed. What a good, spineless little sub." "Hmph," he said. "You don't have to say it out loud like that, ma'am." She chuckled. "Don't pout, we all know you are enjoying this. You look like you're about to burst the tapes on your diaper." "HEY!" he shouted. "Are they comfy? And inescapable?' He pulled at them and wiggled again. "Yes ma'am." She laughed again. "Good. Normally we'd tie you into the stocks for this, but I'm afriad if I left you bent over it be too hard NOT to spank this adorable little bottom," she squeezed him through his diaper "So I guess you'll stay standing and stretched out. Just wait here while we clean you out and pick an outfit for you." "Clean me out? What do you mean, ma'am?" "Aww silly baby. What do you think that means?" From behind the bed she held up a large, red rubber bottle with a long tube stretching from it. "An enema?! No please ma'am!" Jerry had remembered the discussion earlier, but thought complaining about it again might add to any vidoes they may make. As much as he hated having his punishments streamed to a wide audience, he also loved having his punishments streamed to a wide audience. As he had no way to avoid it, he decided to let the second part take over for now. She smiled. "Yep, you're going to have a nice, big, warm soapy enema, and you are going to hold it until you are begging me to fill your diapers. You think you'll do that? Beg me to fill your diapers?" "No..." he said. "Oh you will. And you're going to behave like a perfect little angel until I decide you can release, or you'll just be cramping all day. Then you'll get to spend the rest of the day in your dirty diapers, sound fun?" "No please! No no no!" Jerry started wiggling again, making a show of fighting against his bounds. Mistress Joana ignored him, and pulled down his diaper. "No no no," he said as the tube penetrated inside him. "Errrr," he groaned, and looked back at her as she lifted the bottle high into the air. Immedietly the warm water hit him. He groaned as he felt his insides turn to make up for the new weight, and cramps hit him like a wave. Within seconds, he was yelping and panting out loud as his stomach grew. He gave another wiggle, knowing that the cameras were recording his bottom and each pathetic whine and shake. "Ma'am please! It's so much!" He begged, with tears in his eyes. "Good! Then you'll have all the more reason to obey and to fill your pampers for our fans." "No..." he whined, and shook again. He had seen dozens of subs experaince the same in these videos. The most popular ones were always the loudest, whining and complaing as they took the painful cramps. Part of him told him that then, in order to ensure as few people saw his humiliation as possible, he should try to remain calm. However, within seconds it was impossible, and he was whining. Then, and entire new part of him spoke up. He remembered all the humiliating messages, the teasing, everything comments said about the misbehaved subs being punished for their ammusment. He had watched those vidoes and read the comments with excitment, daydreaming about being in the same situation. So, his excitment again overwehlmed him, and he instead exagerated the punishment, moaning and struggling as much as possible. If he had no way to avoid giving them a show, he'd give them the best one. The idea of that, and even the knowledge that he was enjoying, made the humiliation increase, but that only made it even more exciting. He pulled at the chains again, knowing they wouldn't break.

Really cute story.

Chapter Two [Ai Sinclair stands in front of the old church on fifty-third, one foot from the answers she seeks and one foot in the grave.] The threads were tight around the church, The Holy Academy, but they were wrong. Stitched together by force, not by nature. I could see the angles everywhere except for a two block radius around the church. Their stronghold. The rain fell like tears from the sky, weeping for the lost souls of the city. Strong ‘mancy did funny things to the weather. One corner of the building was wrong though. The whole place was still dark, empty if you looked through the windows, the For Sale sign in the grass inviting anyone and everyone to save it from its abandonment. It was as lost as so many other souls in this town. My car was two blocks away, tucked behind a building like a hunted animal in its lair. Gripping the gun tightly in my pocket, I stalked the building as though it was an even more dangerous beast, letting my eyes go slack and looking through that corner. Turning my body slowly, I let my subconsciousness find the angle that its threads existed at, the things you could never see when you were looking but invaded the corner of your eye when you weren't. The patches there were wrong. Far more wrong than any other place in the city. Shō hadn't come to my door quickly enough. It was eminently possible that Gus was right, that they'd already won. But how? Why? The world was unfathomably old, the tears were part of the world, unless I was right and this place was truly a patchwork made by a mad god. But that was far crazier than a gargoyle and a goat running a bar with no doors and no windows in literal nowhere. And I wasn't one to turn away from the big questions. Walking through a tear was certain doom. Wisdom said to avoid them, but the doors went to an empty church and this was unmistakably the place. So I walked through backwards, holding my hat with one hand and my gun with the other. [Everything changes.] I stepped from a rainy world of grays and browns into a palace made of pink foam with smiling faces everywhere. There were no silver stars, the preferred symbolism of the Argentum. The floor was soft beneath my boots, water dripping from every part of me. "Oh, someone's so wet!" The words nearly stopped my heart, coming from further in, further down the hall of pink marble and bubblegum bunny sentries with unfeeling, unseeing eyes. I stepped to the corner, turning my body at an angle, perpendicular to the real, making myself infinitely thin in this funhouse. But the voice wasn't for me. She hadn't been speaking to me. "My goodness, you're soaked, Bala!" The name was familiar, deeply, deeply familiar but it was the whisper of a forgotten dream. A cotton candy cloud lost in the waking from soft sweetness to the harshness of the really real. "You like being soggy though, don't you? Yes you do! Yes you do! Because you're a good girl. And good girls are..." "Wet!" The world was upside-down and fragile like a house of cards in a strong breeze, ready to collapse at any moment. That voice called to me from a past that wasn't mine, from a place that tugged at my heartstrings like a shattered promise. I knew that voice, but I knew that I shouldn't. That the entire deck had been arranged to specifically prevent me from ever hearing it, but a bad shuffle from a dealer that wasn't in on the take changed the whole game. I wasn't supposed to be here and I knew it in my bones. "Please Auntie." Another voice. While there was noise, I dropped my waterlogged hat and coat, ditching my boots and socks to eliminate the squelching anathema to the stealth that I needed. "I don't like this. I'll be good, please let me go home." "Oh do we have another volunteer?" The name Bala, the intentional mystery, had stunned me from recognizing that first voice. It was wrong. Like the woman that owned it hadn't slept in a thousand years, like she was run ragged, giving her absolute all to children who would never understand the sacrifice of their parents. It was Aya, but worn thin like a well-loved blanket, threadbare and nearly torn through. "Someone who wants to be like Kione? I think we're ready for another battery out there, but I'm sure we can make it more humiliating. What if we make you..." The second voice, Bala, finished her sentence gleefully. "Work a regular job but everyone always forgets you're a baby until you wet yourself and then they change you and dote on you as the office baby until you're carried home to your crib! Then you wake up and do it alllll again. I know it's what you really want in your heart of hearts! It's what everyone wants, deep down in a place they don't tell the truth about." "No!!" The other girl was frantic, screaming from a primal terror that humans should have forgotten long ago. "Please, I'll be good. I'm sorry I asked! I'm sorry!" "Oh poo." Bala sounded as though she were pouting as I inched closer to the voices. "Why haven't you given up to be baby yet? You want to be baby, don't you Tali?" "Yes, yes I do." The other girl, Tali, answered quickly. Aya cooed at her. "You know what you have to do to show you're baby, don't you? Come on, show Auntie. It will make us all so happy and then you can go to bed." I peered around the corner just in time to see a grown woman beginning squatting, in a dress that did absolutely nothing to cover the absurdly thick diaper taped around her. Her face turned red and her eyes clenched shut, and just as I feared, the seat of her diaper began to expand. "Tali is such a good baby!" I recognized Aya, but her eyes matched the fray of her voice. Dark, heavy purple circles rested there and she reached out to stroke the hair of the girl who was still messing herself as though life itself depended on it. "What are you doing, sweet Tali? Tell us what you're doing." "Goin' poopy..." She managed the words between grunts, her diaper drooping behind her. Aya's hand in her hair glowed, collecting the charge in a way that shouldn't be possible. Charge went into objects so they could be used later. The glow was familiar, that color-that-wasn't-a-color, and it flowed through Aya and into Bala as she brushed the other girl's cheek. Bala was similarly, obviously diapered beneath her shortalls and pink shirt, shivering in pure joy at the energy she was receiving. A soft moan of wretched, innocent-sounding pleasure came from her as tears began to well up in Tali's eyes. "Yes you are, sweetie. You're goin' poopy! And... all done!" As though the girl weighed nothing at all, Aya lifted her to one hip, a hand pressing the mess in the seat of the girl's diaper against her. "And we'll change you tomorrow! Now you get to go to bed just like we promised, nice and safe in your crib! Say thank you!" "No! Please! Please, it's so yucky!" With a tsk coming from her lips, the exhausted Aya began patting Tali’s bottom again and again. "Oh someone's fussy. You want to go be that battery? We'll get you a nice job in a nice, public place. You can get changed right there on the floor in front of everyone, finding out that - oh no, you're baby - again and again and again and just giving us oh-so-much humiliation to feed our princess Bala!" "I wanna go bed! I speepy!" Tali sobbed as she clung to Aya. "I'm baby... thank you Auntie..." The Aya-that-shouldn't-be carried the sobbing girl through a doorway, leaving Bala giggling and alone in what looked like an enormous playroom with every manner of toy, stuffed animal, and adult-sized baby furniture imaginable. All of the building, all of this torn corner of reality, vibrated with the charge - this was more powerful purdormancy than should have ever been possible, but I couldn't deny it. With a hand in the pocket of my loose trousers, I stepped into the room without a plan at all and asked the question. "Why?" Bala looked at me, familiar eyes in a familiar face that was entirely unfamiliar. A girl thrumming with power that wasn't hers, filled with the humiliation of who knew how many acts of depravity. "NO!" Her face contorted in a mask of frustrated, helpless rage that made no sense at all to me. "No! You can't, not again! Not this time! I'm happy! I'm the good girl! I'm the princess! I'm helping people and I'm fixing things and all people have to do is be baby! All they have to do is let themselves be happy!" I repeated myself. The only question that ever really mattered. "Why?" "Because I deserve to be happy! Because I'm a good girl! Because I'm... I'm so tired... why can't you be happy? Even when I try to keep you away from it all, you're never happy..." I loved this girl. I knew it in my heart of hearts. I loved her, I'd lived for her, and part of me knew that I would die for her. Aya was back, looking at me with forlorn, devastatingly tired eyes and I felt the world go sideways. I felt my clothes shifting, my panties unmistakably becoming a thick, puffy diaper inside my pants. There were but precious moments. My left hand drew the ring from my pocket, popping it my mouth and swallowing it to draw that amoromancy charge, enough to stop the transformation. The charge of my love freely given and kept for years in secret from a man that I knew in the depths of me that I'd never see again. Samuel Colt, my only lover now, was drawn from the pocket of my wet and out-of-place gray trousers in this pink paradise, and Bala looked at me with unthinkable shock as I pointed the barrel of the .38 at her. And pulled the trigger.

I knew this was coming before you posted it, Penn. But I gotta just jump in here to say. One, I am never going to let Mia forget that when you wrote her life, it's in the format of an S&P story!! 😈 Two, you did a REALLY good job imitating our style. Also, I wanna be the first to say it. Your story is 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Chapter Three Note: I’m gonna need major help on this one from Sophie, for obvious reasons. Ai tries to seem like she isn’t so much following Aya as she is simply walking behind her. She can’t give herself away now, not when she’s so close to escape. Her heart pounds in her chest so hard she’s worried everyone will know, but if anyone else can hear her blood rushing through her ears, they don’t react. (Just get sent home. Put this all behind you. Maybe I won’t even remember, it’ll just be like a nightmare, when you don’t even remember the details, and I’ll be free.) They get into an elevator, and Aya waits. After a moment of perplexed silence, she gestures to the badge scanner. “Eh–Bala,” she says, looking between Bala and the buttons, “I don’t have authorization to get down there, it has to be your badge.” “Right,” Ai replied, nodding and reaching out to swipe her badge. “Of course, I apologize. I’m just lost in thought.” Aya frowns a little deeper. “You’ve had a day, haven’t you?” Ai returns the gesture, slightly perturbed confusion. “What do you mean?” “You suddenly care about Ai, and now you’re apologizing. You’re not normally this sentimental.” Shrugging, Ai says, “Just thinking about why we’re doing this.” The elevator doors open, right into the deep, buried lab. Ai steps in, looking around–the walls in front are painted white, but the ones behind her, the ones she hadn’t seen in the security video, are bare drywall. They weren’t meant to be seen. “Get it set up,” she says. “Be fast.” “Alright,” Aya says, gesturing to the side, to a thin door. “Go ahead and get changed.” Ai frowns. “Changed?” Aya blinks a couple times, baffled. “We’re not sending you to another mind, are we? Ai has to be in the driver’s seat if we want her to go back.” “I misunderstood,” Ai says, before correcting herself, projecting more Bala-like condescension “Be more specific next time. I’ll be quick.” Entering the small room, she takes stock of the supplies–it’s got diapers and a changing table. It’s made for this purpose, after all. Of course, Ai has to be careful–she can’t take off her pee-soaked panties. She shucks out of her pants and lays down, but leaves her wet panties on, feeling ridiculous as she unfolds a diaper from the stack. Unfolding it, she feels ridiculous, but there’s no escaping what she has to do. Lifting her damp panties off the table, she slides the diaper beneath her hips, adjusting it a little to get it straight. She’s uncertain why she knows how to do this, or what experience in her previous life had taught her to self-change her diapers, but she can’t question that right now. Folding the diaper between her thighs, she pulls it snugly over her wet panties, squishing the sodden pad against her crotch as she presses the sticky tapes down. She almost puts the pants back on, but what would be the point? The diaper needs to be on display. “Ready?” She asks Aya as she steps back in. Aya nods, gesturing to the far controls. “Just needs your authorization and the dimensional code.” (My–fuck.) Ai hadn’t even considered that she’d need to do the work here, that she’d have to help with the set up. Walking to the display, she hesitates. A menu flashes at her, asking for dimensional coordinates. It wants four digits–if she guesses at random, she won’t have a prayer of getting it right. Frozen, staring, Ai tries to think back to Bala’s meticulous notes. Had she written the code down anywhere? Would Ai’s memory be reliable even if she had? She knows then she can’t get home, but she has to try. (Hell, anywhere has to be better than here. Even if my mind gets scattered to a new dimension, at least it’ll be free of this place.) Holding her breath, picking numbers at random, she enters a code, choosing an arbitrary number, a throwaway pick that has no meaning to her. 1508. “Should we restrain you?” Aya asks, as Ai lies down on the mat, ready to slide into the machine, ready to go…somewhere. “Just tell Ai that she’s going home,” Ai replies, heart pounding, fingers shaking with anxiety. “I know how she thinks. She’ll obey.” Aya nods. “Okay.” She’s waiting on Ai, waiting for “Bala” to wet herself. Ai closes her eyes, concentrates–she doesn’t need to pee, she already went just half an hour ago, but Aya doesn’t know that. (If it’s just a trickle, it won’t even be visible, right?) After a moment, she gasps and her eyes shoot open. It’s her best act, a performance to make it seem like she just arrived. Looking around, she blurts, “Where am I?” Aya smiles warmly. “Just lie down, Ai. You’re going home.” Ai doesn’t want to be too obvious. She pretends to think for a moment, to calm down, though she’s anything but calm. Hoping it won’t give her away, she watches Ai, searching for a spark of recognition as she places the part. “Oh–okay. Okay, I’m going home. That’s good.” Aya watches her back, and the two of them share a long searching look. Ai’s heart tightens in her chest, but Aya doesn’t make any accusations. Reaching out, she pats Ai on the shoulder. “Just lie down, and this will all be over soon.” Ai lies down. Aya pulls the lever. Ai slides into the machine, and white light flash in her eyes. … Ai didn’t know where she was, but at least she could remember. The machine, the jump, her promise to herself that anywhere would be better than nowhere, it all stuck with her. Turning, she took in her surroundings. She was in the middle of a living room, with a couch and a television. Behind her, there was a kitchen with a kitchen island. Everything had a modern aesthetic with the exception of the far wall, where a mural of a huge blue wave had been painted. The sound of water crashing against sand in a constant rhythm steadied her anxiety. This world, it seemed more like the one she knew. More realized, more comforting, more of a world and less of a place invented solely to torture her. Looking at her arms, she saw she was in a new body. Not her own. Her skin was tan, and the ground looked a little further away, like someone had panned the camera. And–to her chagrin–she’d once again appeared in a wet diaper. Are you fucking kidding me? Even now, she couldn’t escape the humiliation Bala had inflicted on her. She didn’t exactly want to snoop, but she wanted to catch herself up as quick as she could, so she began to explore. On the coffee table in front of the couch, she saw a laptop. She could see the icon of a web browser. Good, they have internet here. Perfect. Walking over to the desk, she sat. Ai wanted to go to Google, or whatever equivalent search engine they had in this world. She could look up the year, what country she was in, see if she could find information about support for… What will I pretend to be? A lost immigrant? An amnesiac? Whatever she might have done, she didn’t have an opportunity, because her attention was stolen by a word document open on the computer. “Academy J, by Mia Moore.” Though she had told herself not to snoop, she saw the first couple paragraphs in her peripheral vision, and after that, she couldn’t look away. I blew on my coffee, trying to cool it down to a temperature where I could chug it. I’d already pushed deadlines back more times than I was comfortable, I had to get this anthology finished, but the stories weren’t playing nice. Maybe I could talk to Blossom about it, but I wanted to surprise her. If the characters kept taking on lives of their own, though, refusing to go where I wanted them to, I didn’t know if I could get this done in time. I’d stopped at a cliffhanger, but I needed to get back to it. Get this story done, then finish the others. It’d already lost everything kinky, and I was unsure of where to take it from here, but it needed to get done, and I didn’t want the stress of deadlines to take the fun from the story. Walking in, I saw Blossom at my computer, reading– “Hey, I said I wanted it to be a surprise. I thought you just wanted to have some diaper time while I wrote?” She spun, eyes widening. “Who the fuck are you?” "What? Blossom, what's wrong?" I wouldn't say I was the most perceptive person in the world, but Blossom had never spoken to me like that before. Even when she was terse, she was level headed, with a point to make. Had I done something wrong? Was it the story? "Weren't you going to change or something?" Tears were in her eyes, and she looked ready to scream, or like she might be having a panic attack. “You–this is–how do you know what’s in my head?” “Blossom–” “Don’t call me that!” My heart was racing, but it would come in second place to my brain. What had I done? How could I fix it? I hadn’t done anything to make her mad, had I? The only thing that changed was that Blossom was that she’d read the latest Academy Works. “Is…is it something in the story?” That set her off. “You–” Tears streamed down her face now, unbidden. “You know everything I think. You know everything I do, even though you can’t, even though it didn’t even happen in this universe–tell me how.” Not even my self-cynicism could keep up with Blossom. I groped around in my mind for anything I could have done wrong, hoping I'd find something, literally anything. It was so much better than the building confusion. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She stands up, gesturing furiously at the computer. “Here. This.” She points at the computer, reading aloud, reading each word as though it were a judicially ordered death sentence: >>>Ai blinks, but the panic doesn’t set in until several seconds pass. >>>(Where am I?) >>>Sometimes, in the past, she’d woken up in an unfamiliar place. It always disoriented her, struggling in a foreign environment “It’s the story I’ve been working on, for the anthology, but you know that.” I shook my head, trying my best to comprehend the insanity that had consumed everything I know. Distantly, I was aware that I probably sounded as unhinged as the situation felt. “It’s not a story, it’s my life.” “What? You’re not making sense.” Was this a joke? If it was, it was pretty messed up, even for Blossom. Had I stumbled into a scene or something? I was ready to grab onto literally any answer. “I got into that machine, and I was desperate to get anywhere else: away from that place, that–that Academy, I guess, and I got here and…what are you? The architect? Are you reading my mind and just writing down everything that happens?” “Blossom–” “My name isn’t Blossom. It’s Ai.” I stared at her, uncomprehending. It didn’t make sense. How could she be Ai? I’d known her all this time, and… I got a sinking feeling of fear, and of comprehension. The last thing I’d written, Ai had left her universe, come to another. It couldn’t be real, could it? Surely– “I just make it all up,” I explained, trying to convince myself as much as her. “Nothing I write is real. It’s just a story.” “You–the ‘story’ you wrote, you tortured me. You humiliated me. Why?” “Because it’s just a fantasy, just a story. Ai isn’t real!” “I’m standing right here.” “If…” I felt insane. Playing along with the delusion, or engaging with the idea that this might all be true, but I don’t know how else to move this conversation forward. “If you’re really Ai, prove it.” “How? You know everything I’ve ever thought.” “Take off the diaper.” She stares for a long moment, confused, then her eyes widen. “You want me to go away.” “I’ll bring you back, I just…I need Blossom to tell me if it’s all real.” “I don’t trust you. You hurt me.” “Okay, but…what else can we do?” Her eyes were red and tears streaked her face. The confusion and fury of the situation, trying to comprehend what was going on after…well, after she’d escaped from Academy J, probably, it’d all bled through her emotions. Finally, though, her shoulders slumped in defeat. “Promise.” “I promise.” Of course I did, what else would I say? It seemed to be good enough for her. Keeping her gaze on mine, she reached down and popped the tapes off her diaper. … “Don’t worry, just breathe.” She looked at me, and I could see the point where Blossom left and Ai appeared. It transitioned subtly, but I knew Blossom’s face too well not to notice her expression shifting. Besides that, I’d left myself another clue. “So you believe me?” “I do.” I swallowed. Believing her meant too many things about my world, it brought out too many existential fears, but I couldn’t disregard evidence when it was staring me in the face. “What did this Blossom person say that convinced you?” Ai asked, interrupting my train of thought. “It’s not what she said, but…she had an idea,” I explained, turning around. “Since what I’d written apparently actually happened, sort of, in another universe…” Turning around, I pointed at my computer screen, emphasizing the new lines I’d written. >>>While Ai leaves, Aya gets an idea. Pressing a few buttons on the screen, she sends an additional bit of information through–she can change things, more than just copying minds. She changes the color of Ai’s eyes to pink, but only when she’s in control. Ai read the line, then turned, looking at herself in the window reflection. Her eyes were bright pink. “So what are you?” she asked, turning to look at me. “What’s going on?” “I don’t know. I’m just a writer, I make stories for the internet, but…if you’re here…” Existentialism rose in me again. If Ai was a fictional character, and she was here, did that mean all fictional characters were real? Or did it just mean that I’d been creating universes when I wrote alone? Or did it mean that I was just like her? A character? She frowns, an idea forming in her head. “If you can make things happen by writing, though…can we just ask the story to explain everything?” My eyes widened. Of course–of course. “You think so? I mean–sure, it worked once, but–” Turning to my laptop, I readied my fingers to type. “So…what do I say, anyways?” “Make Aya send a book, I guess. One that answers all of our questions.” Simple. And–if it worked, that’d mean I’d be able to do more. My excitement started to build, and I typed quickly, frantically. The prose was awful, it was contrived and as thoughtless as the most low-effort fanfictions, but I didn’t care about the quality. >>>Aya has another idea, and sends through a magical book that can answer any question, ensuring that Ai won’t be confused anymore. “That’s it.” I hit enter, and a moment later, the book appeared on my desk. Flipping to the first page– (Hold on. No. This is wrong. What the hell was I thinking? Let’s figure this out.) … Ai blinked awake. She’d become disturbingly used to the experience of finding herself in a new place, a new world, and she took in her surroundings with speed. It didn’t take long, because she had no surroundings. The world wasn’t. She’d appeared in a complete void. Behind her was the only thing of substance–another person. Average height, slim build, he wore a onesie with a full, drooping diaper beneath, but seemed to barely notice. His ears had the slightest tapering point to them. “Who are you?” Ai asked, because what else was there to ask? “That’s complicated,” he replied. “I’m…not sure how I want to handle this, honestly.” Ai was too smart not to make a deduction, an intuitive guess. “Are you another writer, like Mia?” He laughed. “Dammit, this is the problem–If you weren’t so damned clever, things might’ve gone differently, but I couldn’t make you any other way. I can’t write idiots.” She faced him, stunned. Here he was, talking about how he’d made her, with a tone no more complex than if he’d talked about making a bowl of cereal. “You created me?” “No.” A thin smile curled his lips. “You’re on loan. Mia, too, though I didn’t ask for permission there, I just borrowed her because I didn’t know what else to do. I did try to follow in your creators’ footsteps, in their style–with a couple exceptions, I had to get a little pedantic revenge out where I could–but…I don’t know. They can be mean, really mean, but I don’t know if they’re worse than me.” “If you’re…I don’t know what you are, but if you’re so powerful…can you send me home?” Her eyes were wide, pleading. He looked back with a cool, calm stare. “Your creators and I were questioned, once, together: ‘Do you ever feel bad about what you do to your characters?’. They both said yes, instantly, without question. Of course they did, of course they had empathy for the suffering they inflicted.” The statement hung in the air, and Ai couldn’t help but ask the obvious followup. “And you?” “I said no.” Ai swallowed and took a step back. In the void, that didn’t mean much, she had nowhere to go. “So why talk to me?” “It’s like I said, I don’t know what to do with you,” he replied with a shrug. “There’s no good outcome, not that I can see.” “Send me home then. At least give me that.” Her chest stuck out a bit, posturing confidence. She had the courage to stick up to anyone, at least right now. “You don’t have a home, Ai. I never wrote it.” He shook his head. “And if I made you a place, gave you a happy ending where you can put all this behind you, what story would that be? It’d be an anticlimax. Worse than a cliffhanger, it’d be…well, it’d be lame. I had an idea, that you could end up in charge with Aya’s help, that she would tie down Bala and make her wet herself after every diaper change…it was too complicated to get to that ending, and didn’t feel in character. None of it worked.” “I don’t care.” “I do.” He shook his head, frowning a little. “And I wrote you clever. I wrote you smart, and stubborn, and as real as I could, but that means I can’t hurt you how I want. You’re too good for that, you ruined it, and I couldn’t make you compliant without breaking your character.” A moment of silence passed. He studied her, thoughtful and curious. “Do you want to know why it doesn’t bother me, when I hurt you?” It was a hypothetical question. She answered regardless. “Yes.” “Because you’re not real. You’re a character, a puppet for me to play with. I make you dance, I make you cry, I make you beg, and then I, and my audience–your audience, really–we get to remember what happened to you. You’re just a vessel for surrogate experiences, for our fun.” She fell quiet for a long moment. “Like Bala.” He shrugged. “I thought it was clever at the time. It’s not the same as reality, of course–it has to be intense, so intense that it’d be torture in real life, or else it’s too mild. I’d never want to be tied and bound and have my mind destroyed, but I want to remember it. My audience wants to remember it too, and they want the ending to stick with them.” “So…” she started, thinking about it for a long moment. “I’m fucked, then.” “No. I went too far, I got too weird with it, I tried too many new things. The story’s kind of off the rails, and…well, shit. When it was my turn with the playroom, I really trashed the place, didn’t I? Anyone who comes after me’s not going to be able to do anything with it.” He looks around. “I didn’t bother deciding what this space should look like, either. Too much work for no real benefit.” She stared at him, eyes watering a little. To have her reality stripped apart, to be told in no uncertain terms that her life was not her own, and that her fate would be decided by an uncaring being who enjoyed her pain, it broke her just a little. “I could stop the story here,” he admits. “Just give up. Walk away, and don’t come back.” “I’d just…be here?” she asked, looking around. “Alone” “No. You’d be…nothing.” “Nothing.” “You’ve been there before. I gave you a different name, different trials, but it was you even then. And, when I got lost, you went away. If I put you down now, if I stop here, you’ll go back there.” “I don’t remember that.” “You wouldn’t. It’s not forgetting, though, it’s nonexistence.” Her posture slumped. Defeated, and yet…she had a little fire left in her. “So, don’t end the story, and don’t hurt me.” “I don’t know how to do that.” He shook his head. “No story is better than a bad story. I can’t break character, I can’t undermine the world I made, and I can’t give you a happy ending.” “Then figure it out, asshole. You made me, or, well–someone else made me, but you say you’re the one making this happen, so you have to end it. If you try to give me a bad ending, if you keep hurting me, it’ll be like you said. I’ll ruin it. So you can’t break me, and you can’t change me without disappointing your ‘audience’–well, fuck your audience.” He gave her a warning look. “Careful. I like my audience. I love them, even. I want them to like this, because I care about them. I care about your creators, too, I…” Laughing, he added, “I wanted to impress them. That’s why I tried to do everything. But I started with the sex and the torture and the smut layed down thick, and then I got weird and experimental, and it’s been, what, ten thousand words now since anyone’s had a smutty thought?” “Please.” Her eyes were huge. “I just want to be able to…be.” “I know. If you didn’t want to stay an adult, to stay in charge of your mind, you wouldn’t make for a good protagonist, it’s just…I’ve got other people I need to worry about, and I’ve gone and made you so sympathetic that I can’t even hurt you properly.” She took a deep breath. Her resolve didn’t break, and he wished he could have the tenacity he’d given her. “Okay. Tell it to me. All of it. Everything you wanted to do. Maybe I’ll think of something you hadn’t.” He laughed at her. “That’s not how this works. You can only be smarter than me by being faster, by coming up with clever ideas quickly, you can’t think of things I don’t know.” “Do it anyway. Prove yourself right.” Though he didn’t know exactly what this would result in, he followed through with the idea anyway, just to fill another half page. “Well…fine. I never figured exactly how to line up with the world of the Academy, but the short version is, Bala wants to be free, to be cared for, to be…a baby, sort of. She doesn’t want autonomy, but she has to have it, because–” He shrugged. “Because it’s a bad story if she can just make the kind of universe she wants to live in. There needs to be conflict, get it?” “Okay. So…you make her what she wants.” “How so? I didn’t set it up at all, there’s no foreshadowing, nothing.” “I don’t know, that’s your job.” “And your job is to be the victim. To have a bit of hope, to have a chance at escape, but to ultimately be the surrogate for our fantasies. Bala can steal your mind, she can make you the victim, because it’s hot when you can’t say ‘no’.” “You know, this is going to look pretty fucking pretentious if you don’t have a good ending, not after all this.” “Unless I just don’t publish you anywhere.” “I don’t think you’re going to keep this buried.” “You’re right.” She shrugged. “Okay. So if you need it to be hot, why not just…make it work differently?” “Change the rules in the middle of the story? That’s not up to my standards.” “Don’t change the rules. Write a better story.” He knew where she was going with this–of course he did–but he still frowned. “I’ve never been criticized by my own character before.” “Can you do that, though?” she asked, eyes sparkling with hope. “Try again? Give me an ending where I’m happy?” “Huh,” he said, tilting his head a bit. “You know, I…I’m sorry, but I can’t.” Hope dashed, her jaw drops open. “Why?” “Frankly? I’m busy. I’ve got more projects on my plate, and this one is already overdue. I can’t just start over from scratch.” “You’re fucking kidding me.” “It’s okay. I’m not going to leave you like this. I’m not the only one borrowing characters out here, and, well…maybe someone can do a better job than me.” “So you’re just going to pass the buck?” “Yup. Don’t worry, it’s…” his face sours slightly. “Okay, maybe you should be worried, a little, but you won’t remember any of this. Mia’s going to forget, too. I’ll just have to be sloppy, there, to write in a retcon, because otherwise your creators will have a fuck of a time trying to write after this.” “Promise me there’s hope,” Ai looked him in the eye, pleading. “I promise. I don’t know what she’s planning, but I know she does happy endings sometimes.” Ai nods. “Promise me one more thing. Don’t forget me.” “If I did my job right, nobody will.” ... Author notes: I'm so thankful to "Mia Moore" for letting me write in her universe! It's an incredible honor to be invited to work on this project, and I hope that I did justice the setting and characters that she* created. If you want to check out my other stuff and support my writing, I've got a Ream! And a substar!

Academy II By Peculiar Changeling "At the end of the world, there will be neither clamor nor calamity, neither echo nor epoch. It will be mired in silence and sleep, in deliverance and death. At the end of the world, there will be both patience and purpose, both temperance and time. Only then will it be graced with eternity, and from eternity, a chance." -The Source, in valediction Chapter One Ai blinks, but the panic doesn’t set in until several seconds pass. (Where am I?) Sometimes, in the past, she’d woken up in an unfamiliar place. It always disoriented her, struggling in a foreign environment to take it all in at once. Having to piece together her arrival: how she’d gotten there, where she was, all while her body was still sleep-lagged and not fully awake. This isn’t like waking up. She had blinked once and found herself in a new place, fully aware, and the assault on her senses came from all directions. She takes it in, but it’s as though her senses are coming on one at a time, discovering pieces of her surroundings before she can understand the whole. Her arms are crossed over her chest–no, they’re bound over her chest, held down in a tight self-hug, like she’d put on a baggy jacket and had the sleeves tied together like a pretzel around her body. Though Ai had never worn a straightjacket before, she deduces what’s pinning her arms down before she can even see it. Warmth spreads over her crotch, and again it takes her a couple tries to guess why. (Did I spill something? No. Blood? Also no. It’s like–ah, I’m peeing.) That too feels wrong–the warmth doesn’t spread down her thighs, nothing past her crotch, but she can feel more moisture spreading out. Something is between her legs–an acute bulk that rustles when she shifts her weight. This time, she needs to look, but her attention is quickly taken up by distracting revelations. Mostly, the hands pressed against her body. One hand with fingers laced through a strap over her chest, holding it tightly like a leash, one pressed into the front of her… (I’m not wearing pants, and those aren’t panties, that’s a…) “Diaper?” she says aloud, and the person attached to the hands laughs, a gentle teasing tone, her form still coming into focus. “Good girl, you’re using your diaper, that’s correct,” she replies. “Just like you were told.” An audience watches her, paying particular attention to her diaper, to the way she reacts to her humiliations, but she’s blissfully unaware of their presence. For now, it’s just her and the strange woman. She pulls away, slack-jawed, eyes darting between her diaper and the woman standing in front of her. Editing Note: Mia gave me a description of Aya, I need to find it so I can put it here. “What–no, I didn’t–” “Shh,” the woman says, a smirk spreading across her face. “If you want me to believe you don’t need your diapers, you’ll have to prove it. There’s a toilet just through that door–even though you couldn’t hold it completely, but if you can keep from making a big, stinky, mess in your diaper, I might let you come out and play with the big kids.” Ai doesn’t understand, but her mind is still coming into her body, still taking things in. The room looks…not clinical. A clinic would have a degree of comfort, it would be designed to help patients feel a little better about their situation. The room she’s in looks scientific, but only in a way that makes her feel like a specimen pressed into a glass slide. It’s hastily assembled, as though it were an afterthought, not worth giving any real focus. Why care about the set dressing? Her audience won’t remember what the room looks like; it’ll only remember the way she looks when she’s forced to fill her diaper. Before she can ask another question, before she can make her brain obey, the woman pushes a rubber ball between her teeth. She moves so swiftly and smoothly that by the time Ai recognizes the gag, it’s already locked into place. It doesn’t silence her, but it garbles her words into mere noise, so that when she tries to object, it comes out as, “Buhh-mughga!” The woman smiles again, warmly, like she’s watching a child present a crayon drawing and not facing a fully grown woman babbling into a gag. With straps around and above Ai’s head, she can’t spit it out, and her hands are trapped in the straightjacket, so she can’t reach up and pull it free. Ai’s senses finally come to be in her body fully, finally give her a full picture, and the result is claustrophobic. She jerks and twists, but her arms are held fast, with only a hint of wiggle room. “The suppositories won’t leave you much time,” the woman says. “If you want to use the potty, you’d best get started.” With her role in the performance done, the woman leaves–the audience doesn’t care about her any more, not unless she stays to taunt and belittle. That isn’t her role, it’s not why she’s here, so she won’t play that part. The room is empty, save for the two doors: one leading to the promised toilet, the other to the exit the woman had taken. With her gone, Ai is left alone. Ai fights off the urge to keep struggling in the jacket. It wouldn’t get her anywhere; she needs to make progress. Taking deep breaths through her gag, she centers herself. It’s difficult to walk around with her arms bound. She wobbles unsteadily, and the diaper makes the waddle more acute than it’d otherwise be. Reaching the bathroom door, she leans her back against the perpendicular wall for support. The bathroom door has a metal latch and a combination lock holding it shut. Next to the lock, a sticky note holds a simple message. Combination is 1508 - A big girl should have no trouble opening it - Be sure to hurry. If you don’t make it to the potty, you’ve got another spanking in your future! - ❤️ Aya Ai’s eyes widen and her brow furrows as she reads the note. It carries an implicit message. If she enters the combination, she can use the toilet, avoid…a spanking, and… (She can’t be serious, can she?) But, because she’s already in a straightjacket, already in a soggy diaper, she intuits another truth. (She’s serious.) Ai makes up her mind. She needs to enter the combination. She takes a moment to inspect the combination lock. It has a spring-loaded cover over the combination, so that it’s difficult to reach. She tries pushing at the cover with her nose, but it won’t move, and the attempt forces her to squat awkwardly. She does half a chicken dance, her padded butt wobbling in the air as she tries to keep upright. Besides, even if she could get the cover to the side, there would be no way to turn the numbers without hands. Maybe her teeth, but they're gagged, and to remove the gag, well… Ai needs her hands. She steps back, breathing deeply, and feels a tentative, anxiety-inducing gurgle in her belly. The woman– (Aya. Her name is Aya.) Shaking her head, Ai tries to focus. She knows precious little, and can't afford to discard what few details she’s gleaned. Aya had mentioned suppositories. Ai doesn't know how long it will take the medicine to work, but judging by the early cramps, she can’t imagine it will be long. Shutting her eyes, Ai takes a few deep breaths. There aren’t any tools in the room she can use. Nothing sharp or hard or useful for leverage. It’s all up to her. She tries wriggling again, but this time, it’s not desperate flailing. There’s a little room for her arms to shimmy from side to side, and when she does, she can feel the back strap move. Squirming with new hope, Ai moves within the jacket. With the little amount of play she has, it seems like it should be possible to wriggle free, to– “Mmmph!” She squeaks as she feels a sudden, intrusive buzz start up in the front of her sodden diaper. Bending over, she looks down and sees what she’d missed before. Attached by two straps on the straightjacket, held snugly in place over her diaper is a flat, plastic vibrator. Something had triggered it to start–her audience doesn’t want her to have too easy a time of it, and the distraction serves to entertain. Ai bites down on her gag and her cheeks flush. There’s only so much she can focus on at once. The claustrophobia, the restriction, and now the vibrator buzzing away, flooding her body with hormones and unwanted pleasure, it forces her down to the ground, sinking onto her butt. (Deep breaths. Just persist, I can do this.) The way the vibrator works, pulsing into a layer of sodden padding, just makes it worse: the pleasure is coming through her diaper, forcing her to acknowledge it, to think about the piss-soaked diaper in the context of intense, mind-numbing desire. After a minute or so, the vibration stops, and the concern that it might kick back into high gear is just more motivation for Ai to keep trying. The gurgle in her belly–an insistent reminder of the suppositories doing their work–only pushes her further. (Think. The strap. It has play.) Sitting against the wall, she tries lifting her legs and moving her arms, shimmying side to side to get it out from beneath her, but there isn’t that much play. The strap holding her sleeves together won’t go past her waist. She tries the other way. Pushing against the wall for support, she stands, wobbles, and then pulls up. Bingo. It takes a lot of wriggling and effort, but the sleeves move over her head. Ai’s arms aren’t free, but they have mobility. The sleeves might still cover her hands, and the damned strap holds her arms together, bound so that she’s always making an O shape, but it’s progress; an enormous step in the right direction and a sign that she can succeed. Before she can celebrate this victory, though… Bzzz. Her face flushes again, and she is once again distracted from escaping her situation. Ai can’t tell if the vibrator is turned higher, or if she’s become more susceptible to it by her first session of edging. Her Ego might shout and complain, but her Id’s reaction to the sensation is undeniable. The vibrator sends pulses through her sodden diaper and into her sex. Intense pleasure signals carry up her back and into her thoughts, killing her ability to focus on anything, even breathing, air escaping her mouth as little desperate moans. (You’re better than how you feel.) She bites down on the gag until it hurts her jaw, forcing deep breaths through her nose. (Don’t let this beat you.) Another minute passes before the vibrator dies, and in its wake Ai needs a few moments to recover, panting into her gag. The pressure in her bowels is more intense than ever, but she’s still able to hold it. She still has time. Getting back to her feet, Ai already notices an improvement. With her arms able to move freely, she can balance, all the wobbliness gone. She doesn’t need to use the wall for support any longer. Waddling back to the padlock, she tries again, pressing the sleeves of the straightjacket into the combination cover. No dice. She can sort of get the cover to slide to the side, but when she does, there’s not enough play to get the small dial beneath to spin how she wants it. Her attention returns to the jacket. She can open and close her hands beneath the heavy canvas. It doesn’t give her much control, but it gives just enough to grab things. Fumbling at her back, moving her arms together so she can reach as far as possible, she feels at the straps holding the jacket over her body. Ai isn’t certain, but by wriggling and moving her back, she puts together a rough estimation of how it had been assembled. There are three buckled straps that comprise the linchpin of the vest. If she can get those loose, there’ll be enough play that she’d be able to get the crotch strap free. And, once that’s free, the jacket will just slide right off. Simple. Not easy, but simple. Ai refuses to contemplate the alternative to success: the pressure in her bowels releasing, and the subsequent threats that’d been made. She tells herself that the pressure she feels is just a ticking clock, and she lacks the time to think about why this self-delusion isn’t true. Determined, she gets to work, pawing at her back. Going by sense of feel isn’t easy, especially when she has to work through layers of dense canvas, and her only way to manipulate things is to fumble through the jacket and try to squeeze whatever she can reach. Grumbling into her gag, she works at it all the same, spinning in place to try and get a better angle like a dog chasing her own tail, until… Cli-clack-clack-clack. The rattle of the metal buckle pulling free is pure relief, pure triumph. Just two to– “MMpHH!” Her unbidden squeak seems deafening in the utterly silent room, legs buckling beneath her as she the vibrator kicks into high gear. This time, Ai knows it’s turned up higher just from the pitch of the vibration, and she also can’t deny that her body is more susceptible than ever. The mixed sensation, frustration, and simple burning feelings that the buzzing brings up from deep inside Ai makes her forget herself, and she rides the pleasure with purpose. It isn’t just that there’s a vibrator pressed into her diaper, there’s something… more, but she can’t identify what. She wants it. Just before she can ride into a reluctantly anticipated climax, the vibration stops. Ai cries out–no longer grateful to have the vibration end, but furious that she was denied her pleasure. She could have at least had a little bliss before returning to her task, but they– She sits up sharply, the truth finally dawning. The timing is too perfect for the vibrator’s control to be automatic, on a timer, anything. An intelligent observer is turning it off and on at particular times. But… though she walks a circle of the room to look for one, she can’t see a camera, a viewport, or anywhere to hide and watch. The door doesn’t even have a gap beneath it or a keyhole to peer through. Her audience is watching another way, and she has no means to understand how. It can’t just be visual, either–they know precisely how Ai feels, they know her intimately, able to turn off the vibrator to deny her the climax that she’s been conditioned to want. Ai tries not to think about what else they could condition her to want. For now, she just wants three things–the toilet behind the door, the climax she’d been denied, and an explanation for her circumstances. She can’t have the third and isn’t in control of the second, so she forces herself to focus on the first. Accepting that she’ll have to deal with a malicious audience, Ai turns her attention to the second buckle. It’s harder in some ways, having to reach further down her back, but with the first buckle free she has a lot more range of motion. With only a minute of squirming, it comes free, and this time, knowing she’s got watchers, she braces herself. It comes, right on queue, and she leans back against the wall, biting down on the gag and riding it out. She doesn’t hide that she’s enjoying it, and she admits to herself that the soggy diaper carrying the vibration into her might actually make things better. This time, Ai speeds things along. One orgasm could clear the distraction from her mind, it could let her think more clearly, it could end the uncomfortable correlation that’s building in her unconscious between diapers and an almost incomparable sexual craving. She tries to indulge in the pleasure, to rush to the peak. And again, it stops before she can climax. No pleasure to be had, just denial. (I was…just trying to get Aya to stop, because I knew she wouldn’t let me finish.) Ai doesn’t believe herself. Only one buckle to go. She knows she’s going to make it. Her desperation is intense, but even if the vibrator sessions take minutes of her time away, she can last. It’s so close. Ai just has to get the last buckle, which, now that she has a high range of motion with most of the jacket loose, isn’t difficult at all. Bracing herself, anticipating the vibrator’s surging power, she waits a couple seconds. She’s left disappointed when it refuses to activate. Frowning, she continues her escape. With all the other buckles free, she slides the straightjacket off her body. Though she feels a need to use the toilet, it’s not unstoppable. For reasons she can’t quite explain, she goes for the combination first, before stripping out of the diaper. 1508. (Is that 15-0-8? Or 1-50-8?... ‘1-5-08? Eh… oh, okay. There’s no ‘0’ on the combination, and no ‘08’. So it’s gotta be 1-50-8.) Free fingers working deftly, she enters the combination. And, as triumph is within her grasp, she feels the vibrator pulse to life. The door swings open, but at that moment, her knees buckle. She falls to the ground, staring into the bathroom she’d unlocked, but she’s left stupefied by pleasure and cannot enter it. The vibrations are like nothing she’s ever felt before. Greater, more dominating than any sex in her memory, any pleasure she’s ever felt. The vibrator paralyzes her completely, rising in waves that give her just enough time to try and break free before it surges once more, throttling her mind, never quite reaching an intensity to let her climax, nor dropping enough to allow her escape. Her body craves the sensations, the feeling of a saturated diaper throbbing against her sex, and Ai cannot pretend that she only wants the edging to end faster. She can only sit on the ground, staring forward at the toilet only a few feet away, hopelessly frozen in agonizing bliss as the pressure in her builds, builds, builds, and with her thoughts and body so far from her own control, there’s no holding back. The edging may have lasted a minute, or ten, but it keeps her down until the suppositories do their work, and her diaper suddenly swells. The seat balloons out as a sudden warmth sludges into the padding. It’s faster than she expected, more intense: One moment, her diaper was only wet, but now it bulges and sags, muck packing in every corner available. Even then, as the smell hits her and she knows she’s lost this game, she still wants it. (No…) She still needs it. Her promised climax, the one bright spot of hope amidst the landscape of her shattered dignity. Biting down on the gag, moaning in wordless prayer to whatever cruel god controls her vibrator, Ai is given only disappointment. The vibrator dies, and she is left utterly defeated as the door behind her unlocks. Frustration pours over her. She’d lost. She’d lost, she’d humiliated herself for her audience’s pleasure, she’d bottomed out her diaper while only moments away from victory, she’d lost. And, even then, helpless to change the situation, the lingering desire still burns, craving the orgasm she’d earned. In the mental drop that follows, panting heavily and catching her breath, her thoughts clear slightly. A question in her thoughts that she hadn’t been able to consider, not until her thoughts were in her control again. (…the vibrator had been attached to the straightjacket, hadn’t it? So how–) The door behind her swings open. Aya steps in, making a show of sniffing the air, of ‘realizing’ that Ai has loaded her diaper like a helpless infant. “That’s what I thought,” Aya declares. “Well then–I think it’s time for your spanking.” It’s exactly what her audience had wanted, and the fate Ai had fought desperately to avoid. But then, her wants don’t matter. She exists to be observed, not to be happy, and right now, her observers see Aya pull her down, push her body so that her ruined diaper points into the air, and begin her assault. Aya’s slaps are merciless and devastating, and Ai is at a loss for which contacts are the worst. The swats to her thighs sting like a swarm of bees; each leaving angry red marks on her tender, bare skin, and each eliciting a helpless, pained squeak into her gag. Pain builds with each impact, growing, multiplying on itself, burning overlaid on a deep ache, accented by acute spikes of acid pain. The blows to her diaper did little to hurt her body, but sent disquieting shockwaves through her soul. Though the pain is muffled by a layer of saturated, abused padding, the way that each spank presses the results of her accident into her reminds Ai that she failed and humiliated herself, and that she’d do it all again if it would get her ten seconds with the vibrator to reach the bliss she still craved. It makes her squirm in embarrassment and shame, worrying if she had always been this depraved, or if she’d just been broken that easily. But, while pain and humiliation eat at her in their own ways, neither are the worst. What drives her insane are the occasional pauses, the rests where Aya retreats her hand and gently caresses the skin of Ai’s back and her delicate hair, soothing her, whispering sweet sounds without meaning, reassuring Ai in whispers that she’s doing so well to take her spanking like a good girl. Ai wants to scream. (How dare you try and comfort me when you’re the one inflicting the pain?) But another thought plays in her mind. (If you’re not going to stop, can you hold me closer?) In the haze, the mindfuck soup that’s slowly blending her consciousness into putty, Ai starts to slip, but she refuses to lose herself. She catches onto a thread–the one facet of her identity that remains. Her id slips away, disassociating from her quickly sublimating ego. She puts together her coherent thoughts, slim as they are, and chief among them is confusion. (It’s not much, but it’s all I’ve got. How did I get here?) At first, she thinks about the room–how did she get put in the straightjacket? Or in this facility, for that matter? But then, a more specific form of the question presents itself. (How did I get here? Over Aya’s lap?) Ai remembers her defeat: Subdued by the vibrator, dropped to her knees, forced to pack her diaper full mere feet from the toilet. She remembers Aya coming in, taunting her, the subtle ways that the woman made Ai feel as small and helpless as possible. Then…Ai was over Aya’s lap, and the spanking began, as though the world had shifted around them. Aya has a chair now. (There definitely hadn’t been a chair in here before!) The thoughts have no clear answer, and worrying over them, trying to parse the impossible situation, forces her mind back into her body. The full physical sensations assert themselves again: every smell, every feel, every ache. Flailing, struggling, none of it seems to help. She’s going to be on Aya’s lap until the spanking is over, and there’s nothing she can do to resist that fate, but she no longer has the capacity to realize this. The mental break draws her deeper into her role: she fights, she kicks and yelps and whimpers, not because she thinks it will get her away, but because if she shows her defeat and wears her humiliation like armor, maybe Aya will give a little sympathy. Finally, the last few blows on her thighs rain down–hard enough that she cries out with more volume than ever–and it ends. The pain is over. All that’s left is a smug, taunting little bit of pressure; Aya rests her hand on the seat of Ai’s full diaper and presses down. It’s a degrading reminder that, for everything she’s been through, Ai still needed her pleasure. “Shh, shh,” Aya says, though Ai is perfectly quiet save for shallow breaths. “You took your spanking like a good girl–I think that deserves a reward.” (A reward?) Ai’s eyes snap open, heart suddenly pounding. (Will…will she give me the wand?) Of course not. Even her gifts can only ever push her deeper into humiliation. Aya pulls Ai up, first seating the young woman on her lap, then turning her so that they face one another. Ai wriggles, but Aya’s firm grip pulls Ai down, so that her legs straddle one of Aya’s thighs. “You did good, just enjoy yourself,” Aya coos, and before Ai can even try to ask a question through her gag, the taller, stronger woman begins to bounce her knee up and down, a rhythmic motion against the ground. Each bounce raises Ai up just for a heartbeat, momentum carrying her into the air, and then down again to smash her weight into the mucky, full contents of her diaper. She’d packed it full–the suppository had left her unable to do anything else–and the heavy, squelching contents slosh against her skin with every landing, wafting the stink upward into a haze she can’t help but inhale. It’s as bad as the spanking–worse, because at least then the humiliation was broken up with pain. Now it’s one note playing over and over ad nauseam until Ai can’t think about anything except the state of her diaper, how she had failed, how she had been helpless from the start, how she never could have done anything except lose control, fall to her knees, and prove her infantile helplessness for all to see. It had been inevitable, and now Aya makes sure that Ai knows it. But Aya isn’t all cruel. Once the lesson has sunk in, once Ai’s headspace is fully sunk into the seat of her diaper as firmly as her last accident, Ai realizes–this is the prize she wanted all along. She doesn’t need the vibrator, she just needs her diaper, and the slick ecstasy rhythm of Aya’s constant bouncing. It doesn’t take her long. The bouncing lacks the white-hot power of the vibrator, the ability to all but rip an orgasm out of her body, but all of Ai’s intense edging has broken down her mind, left her horny and desperate in a way that only one pleasure could solve: the pleasure she gets from her diapers. She wants this–all of it. Shuddering, Ai’s thoughts laser-focused on her helpless lack of control, relying on Aya’s firm arms to guide her as she bounces up and down. Each new rise and fall now rocks her with pleasure so intense it almost hurts, and only when she’s gasping and whimpering, thoughts numbed by ecstasy, do the bounces slow to a stop. She falls forward into Aya’s waiting arms, sweaty and delirious. “There’s my good girl,” Aya says, patting her back gently. “Now, let’s get you changed, okay? The experiment is over for the day.” (The…huh?) Aya doesn’t explain further, and with her gag in, Ai can’t ask. She wants to, but her head is awash with a soup of endorphins and it’s difficult to convey any requests. ‘Take off my gag so I can speak immediately’ doesn’t occur to her. She’ll ask when she can, if she can, if Aya will allow it and if her audience doesn’t put a stop to anything so reasonable as ‘telling Ai what’s going on.’ Aya guides her to the floor, gently laying Ai on her back, so that her diaper is easily accessible. Reaching for the nearest tape, Aya pulls it free. … Ai blinks. She’s in the room–or, maybe a different room, it’s so bland that she can’t quite tell. Sharp emotional whiplash courses through her–all the hormones and post-coital bliss has vanished. She feels almost sick at the change, like instantly switching from drunk to sober, though there’s no expected headache or physical discomfort to accompany the stark mental shift. Aya is gone. Ai’s diaper is clean–no, that’s not right. Though it’s reasonably dry, and there’s no longer a heavy load weighing down the seat, she can feel a trickle of dampness dribbling into the crotch. She’s mostly clean, but a little wet. Otherwise, she’s naked. A gag is locked in her mouth again–nobody wants to hear what she has to say–but her hands are free. More importantly, her mind is free as well. Something seems to have cleared it–the soup of endorphins that had rendered her thoughts into pulp has lifted. She remembers everything clearly, but with the distance of the morning after, the feeling of a cold dawn light that showed how far she’d fallen just moments before. In the corner, she sees a steel cage, like a kennel that might hold a large dog, but sturdier. Against the far wall is a TV, an old tube style that probably weighs a billion pounds and has its own built-in VHS player. The doors are where Ai remembers, but the handles have been replaced. Instead of padlocks or tumblers, they have pin pad locks. A new puzzle. A clock on the wall counts down–it shows five hours and fifty nine minutes, with the seconds slipping lower and lower. Thirty three. Thirty two. Finally, Ai turns to see a stack of worksheets on the floor, with crayons in a cardboard box next to them. She has a good sense of what she’s supposed to do, but she isn’t interested in playing. She knows that playing will lead to more demolition of her mind, more brainfuck pain and pleasure that will leave her identity in further fragments. Reaching down, she rips off the diaper. … Ai blinks and looks around. She is in the same room, but she’s standing somewhere else. Her brow furrows. Did she…teleport? Did the room move around her? Or did she lose time? The clock shows that only a minute has passed–Five fifty eight and some seconds, not five fifty nine. Looking down, she notes the constant–she’s got her diaper on again, still just ever so slightly damp, though the tapes are different–placed a bit higher, pulled a bit more snug. She wants to say, ‘Screw this’, but the gag stops her, so she just thinks it as intensely as she can and rips the garment free. … Ai blinks, steps back, and stomps her foot. She’s moved again, a few steps over. Pressing both her hands into her face, she groans, muffling her exasperation. Only thirty seconds have gone by. Her diaper… (Fuck this, I’m not wearing a fucking diaper.) She rips it free. … Ai- “AAGGGGHHHH!” She screams, frustration coming through without any need for defined words. Her diaper is still in place–though, looking closely, she sees that duct tape has been added, reinforcing the straining sticky tapes that’d lost their bite after being undone several times. It’s slightly cool, almost clammy, as though it’d been exposed to air for a while. Five full minutes had passed–apparently, some time had been needed to retrieve the tape. Petulantly, Ai refuses to play the game. Knowing what will happen, she rips the tape free and yanks at the diaper beneath. … Ai yelps as she comes to her senses. Things have changed. Her diaper is back–of course–but if it’s held in place with tape, she can’t see, because it’s beneath a ruffled pink onesie that zips up behind her back. Her hands are no longer the tool they’d been before, either–canvas mittens are pulled over them, so while she can bat things around and probably pick objects up in awkward fists, she couldn’t squeeze a zipper or get her fingers under her diaper’s tapes. More acute, more distressing, she feels a solid weight in her bottom–cold, solid metal from a particularly heavy butt plug. Twenty minutes have passed, and the countdown continues. Five hours thirty-four minutes, something-something seconds, she doesn’t care about the precise count. Though there’s nothing written in the room, no notes left for her, she gets the message. If she continues to throw a tantrum and refuses to play the game presented to her, it will only get worse. Right now, she has to deal with a distracting, intrusive plug and no more hands. If she disobeys again, she might find herself back in the straightjacket, or some other torture. Who knows what other obscenities her audience would want done to her? So, though she wants to continue to abstain from her captor’s game, she crouches in front of the TV. Looking at the black glass, at her reflection, she–– Note: Ai does not lose time here, and fully perceives things for a moment. What she sees, however, is withheld from her audience. –”What the fuck?” she yelps, stumbling back, landing on her butt–pushing the plug into her, reminding her of its constant presence. She’s shaken, but she has to keep pressing on. Crawling forward, she presses the power button on the TV, then rewinds the VHS player to the start. The nostalgic whir of reversing tape calms her down a bit, and by the time it resets, her heart has stopped pounding. When it plays, her pulse skyrockets again. A woman with vaguely Southeast Asian features stares into the camera, wavy dark hair rippling over her shoulders and a confident smirk plastered on her lips, her eyes seeming to follow Ai. Ai recognizes the face, but doesn’t understand how she’s seeing it here. “In case you’re too little to properly understand the rules,” the woman says, “I’ve decided to give you this little explainer. If you can complete the worksheets, each one will give you a letter–you do know your letters, don’t you, sweetie?” The woman paused for a moment, to let her leering condescension hit with full impact. Ai just watches wide-eyed, confusion and fear clouding her thoughts. “Well–if you get all the letters, it’ll tell you the combination to the door. Get the door open before your time is up, and you can have a grown up dinner, a diaper change, and you can sleep in a grown up bed tonight. But, if you don’t, you’ll be fed through a bottle and you’ll be sleeping in the kennel behind you. And since I expect the special medicine in the bottle will make your tummy very upset, you’ll be wishing for a diaper change all night, but you won’t get one. You’ll be trapped.” Sneering, the woman on the video reaches forward towards something, and then the video ends. Ai just looks at the black screen for a moment, at her reflection, until the black void of video turns to a blue ‘no signal’ screen. She looks at the worksheets for a moment, but her gaze can’t focus, and she starts to panic. It doesn’t make sense. She saw a detail she wasn’t supposed to see, and the discontinuity has broken her ability to play along. Ai stands, and though her hands are bound by mitts and her onesie keeps her diaper in place, it’s not enough. She can still refuse to play–getting her hands under the hem of the onesie, she yanks at it, tearing the fabric free. Maybe next time they’ll seal her in kevlar or tie her hands behind her back, she doesn’t care, she exposes her diaper–it’s a new diaper, apparently, there’s no tape and the patterns are different–and rips it away.

A NEW DAY “Good morning, baby girl,” Sarah whispered in Vickie's ear as she rubbed her shoulder. “Time to rise and shine, and drink your ba bas!” Sarah had awakened to find Vickie's head still nestled up against her chest, the rhythmic beating of her heart soothing her baby as once, long ago, the beating of a mother's heart had perhaps comforted her in the womb. Sarah had taken her time getting out of bed, choosing to let Vickie sleep since there was only room for one in her bathroom. She had showered and dressed, and fixed her hair and makeup before retreating to the kitchen to warm the last two bottles of breast milk in the frig. There was still one clean diaper left in Vickie's diaper bag, which would have to do until they got to work. Sarah wanted Vickie to become functionally incontinent as quickly as possible, which meant a steady diet of breast milk laced with diuretics and laxatives. Her target was six to eight diaper changes a day, and for all of them to be poopy. From Sarah's point of view, the diaper pails that she had at home, and in both her office and Rita's, couldn't fill up fast enough. “Did you sleep well, Sweetie?” “Yes, Mommy! Like a baby,” Vickie cleverly replied. “Aw, you're so cute, and Mommy loves you sooo much! Now, let me crawl into bed, sit up, and cradle you in my lap. It's time for breakfast!” Vickie obliged, and a few moments later was sucking on the nipple of her pink baby bottle. As she nursed, she felt completely at peace. Looking down on her new baby, Sarah was silently cursing herself. She had known Vickie for almost ten years, and in all that time had paid no attention to the warning signs. Living life on the high wire was a self-destructive cry for help, and she had ignored it-- she and Rita, both. No more. We're a family, and it took having Ian come along to drive the point home … drive it into our very thick skulls. We're a family, and what do families do when one of us is hurting? We pitch in, and we help. Vickie needs her mother … needs to experience love at first hand. That's where Rita and I come in, so that … Please,God, please let Vickie and Ian have children! “Diapee, Mommy! Diapee!” “Oh, you finished your ba ba already?? Such a good baby girl! Yes, you are; yes, you are!” Sarah fished the key to Vickie's diaper cover out of her pocket, and unlocked it. Vickie raised her hips, and Sarah quickly removed the cover and baby pants, setting them aside. They were clean enough to be reused, but would soon need to be replaced. On both, the smell from Vickie's poop was unmistakable. Sarah ran her hand over Vickie's diaper, and was delighted to discover that it was soaked. Her baby girl had wet heavily during the night, and perhaps more than once. Her control was rapidly slipping away. Leaning down, Sarah took a deep breath, and instantly recoiled. “Baby girl, did you make a poopies in your sleep for your mommy?” Sarah found it remarkably easy to speak to Vickie as if she were an infant. “Poopy, Mommy … poopy!” “Well, let's get you out of that dirty diaper, get you into the tub, and get that cute, little bottom of yours nice and clean! Does that sound good, baby girl?” “Yes, Mommy! Clean!” Taking Vickie by the hand, Sarah led her into the bathroom, but did not attack her diaper until she was safely in the tub. When she unpinned the heavy, wet fabric, it was full of mushy poop, which was also coating the whole of her nether region. During the night, the laxatives had done their work. “I'm sorry, Mommy; I'm such a baby.” “Don't be sorry, baby girl.” Sarah was using a damp washrag to clean off as much of the mess as possible, but suddenly she paused. “I'm sorry, Vickie. I love you … you and Rita, both … my sisters. And I am so ashamed that I never saw how much you were hurting.” “She never loved me,” Vickie wailed. “I was … was such an inconvenience … a … a blemish on her country club standing. She never loved me!” Vickie broke down completely, holding onto Sarah for dear life, Sarah hugging her close in return. “The past is the past, over and done.” Sarah was whispering into Vickie's ear, trying to give her hope, trying to connect with whatever vestige of faith in others that Vickie could still muster. “I love you, baby girl, now and forever. And Ian loves you … God, how that man loves you! Both of you will always be my babies, long after yours have grown up and run off to make lives of their own. And you will, you know? You and Ian? My crystal ball tells me that you will have at least two daughters, maybe more!” Sarah hugged Vickie, willing her to let go, willing her tears to flow. For both of them, the morning had brought a new day. . . . . Opening the door just a crack, Bernice peeked into the guest room. In the last hour before dawn, it was still pitch black outside, and the only light entering the room came from the hallway behind her. In the darkness, she could not tell if Ian was still asleep. Entering the room but leaving the door partially open, Bernice approached the bed. Looking down, she saw that he was still sleeping peacefully, still holding tight to the pacifier that Suzie had offered him the night before. What a contradiction in terms you are. Truly, an enigma. In the semi darkness, standing beside the bed, Bernice was studying him, trying to get all the disparate pieces of the puzzle that was Professor Ian Grady to come together in a meaningful pattern. I'm glad that Suzie came over, and offered to help get you settled in for the night. And it was so nice of you to let her feed you the bottles of breast milk that Sarah insists you drink at bedtime, though what that's all about I have absolutely no idea. And as for the pacifier … Bernice shook her head, still baffled by what she had seen and learned about this young man. Suzie told me how you helped Wendy Stafford, and something about volunteering to help vets at the hospital. And last night you helped my girls, kept most of them from making a terrible mistake that would tear this house apart and saddle them with lifelong guilt … What you told them about Viet Nam … lifting the veil on all the hurt you carry around inside you … collapsing into Priscilla's arms with another seizure … how can you do this to yourself? Does retreating into infancy like this somehow balance the scale? Allow you to function? Bernice set the two bottles of warm breast milk on the nightstand, where they would be within easy reach of the couch. She would wake him, feed him, change his diaper during the course of his morning routine, and offer him a decent breakfast. The Chief would swing by to pick them both up, delivering Ian to his morning class and her to a meeting with the Dean that was bound to be awkward and humiliating in the extreme. Later, the three of them would go downtown, to the courthouse, where Ian and the District Attorney would do their best to sell a settlement to the court that would spare the girls public exposure yet satisfy the wrath of the gangster who owned the diaper service. Bernice desperately wanted her girls back. There were only eleven in the house, and it felt as empty as a tomb. These would be gone by term's end, leaving her with forty-one charges with a criminal record hanging over their heads-- forty-one charges who would be wearing and using diapers 24/7 for the rest of their university careers. If Tippi and Cindy agree to Ian's plan … if the DA doesn't have a change of heart when he gets up this morning … if the judge will go along with this absurd plan to keep Spats Belmondo at bay … Truly, an enigma. . . . . It was a morning ritual that dated back to Priscilla's mid-teens. Her dad got up first, and headed downstairs to start the percolator. When the paper landed on the front porch, he went out to collect it. Then, cup of scalding black coffee in hand, he sat down, took out the sports pages, and settled back to read about the latest misadventure suffered by the Twins or the Vikings, the North Stars or the Gophers. Forever doomed to be teased but disappointed, only a masochist could love sports in Minnesota. This Thursday morning started out like all the others. In due course, Julia staggered down the stairs-- a person best avoided until she had drowned her displeasure with the world in general and Minnesotans in particular in a cup of joe, no cream or sugar added, thank you very much. Julia hated mornings almost as much as she hated stakeouts. When she arrived on scene, like Pavlov's dog Herb put down his cup, opened the paper wide, and hid behind the thin but hopefully impenetrable barrier of the Star Tribune. They both understood that Julia could violate the truce, but only if she was having a particularly bad morning. The twenty ninth of November, in the year known as 1979 in some circles and 2522 in others, was a particularly bad morning. Invariably, Priscilla was the last to put in an appearance. She had discovered early on that hiding behind a cup of coffee didn't work if you were the third and last to arrive, so she had developed an ongoing love affair with the toaster. It was so positioned in a corner of the kitchen that anyone bowing down in worship before it would have their back turned to the dining room table. On good days, Priscilla would have her slice of white bread lightly toasted; on bad days, it would come out burnt to a crisp. This was an especially bad day. Priscilla had given careful thought to the confrontation-- in fact, had been thinking about it for years. No man would ever be good enough for Herb and Julia Canon's little girl, although it had become glaringly obvious in recent years that her lack of matrimonial prospects was worrying them both. Parents, she thought as she sat down directly opposite her mother and began doling out the butter and the apricot jam; they always want to have their cake and eat it too. She had come to the table this morning prepared for combat. Parents could be dragons, but she was a dragon slayer. And she had in her possession the one weapon before which the most fiery of dragons were helpless. Grandchildren. The ultimate weapon in the eternal war between the generations. She had seen it in Ian's eyes. When he first spoke of his daughter, his expression had softened, his eyes filled with tenderness and love. And then had come the moment when he acknowledged her loss, and his eyes had filled with pain, hot and searing. Priscilla did not know whether the search for Linh and Thu would ever bear fruit, but she knew that she wanted to start a family, and for Ian to be the one who gave her children. If anything could heal a wound cutting this deep into the soul, even diminish its pain, it was to have more children. And time would be on her side. She might suffer their wrath today, but her parents would never take out their displeasure on her children. In time, all would be forgiven. “About Quantico,” she decided to begin. And sure enough … Herb lowered his newspaper, and looked at her quizzically. “Dad, you were right about Ian … well, both right and wrong. He does work for the CIA, but he's not on the payroll. It's more like he does them the occasional favor, and in return they search ...” Priscilla visibly choked on what she had to say next. She didn't need to see photographs to imagine what rats and the tropical sun had done to Ian's family. The rats had visited her in her sleep. “Search?” Herb had set the newspaper aside. “For his daughter, Dad. The Agency is searching for his daughter. He married in Viet Nam, but when he was in hospital, someone came to the village. They slaughtered everyone except the little children. Ian … the whole intelligence community suspects that someone knew he had a child, and took the children because they didn't know which one was his. It's his gift for languages, Dad; you don't know how rare it is. If his daughter has inherited it, her value would be incalculable.” Herb glanced at his wife. “Did you know about this?” “I found out last night, at the sorority house. He bared his soul to keep those girls from making a terrible mistake. It worked, but the cost to him personally was high. And this morning he and Q-Ball are going into court to try and sell the judge on a plan that they cobbled together on the fly … a plan to buy off Spats Belmondo.” Herb let out a deep sigh. He was almost afraid to ask the next question. “And what does Quantico have to do with this?” "Ian called a friend at Langley … a Deputy Director. They want me to do the embassy security course so that ...” Priscilla paused, not sure which parent to address. Neither of them was likely to take what was coming next very well. “The Agency expects Ian to have more children, and they don't want a repeat of what happened in Viet Nam. So, a security net will be dropped over any woman he sleeps with. The net will become more visible if someone gets pregnant, and very tight once the baby is born. Ian wants me to take charge of the inner security ring-- the one inside the house, and on the surrounding grounds. I'm the logical choice because ...” Priscilla took a deep breath, hoping that her parents could guess what she was about to confess. “... because I'm already inside the net.” “You're sleeping with him.” Julia made it a statement, not a question. “Were either of you using protection?” Priscilla shook her head. “No, and we won't be in the future.” “You want to have a baby … with a man you've known for what … three days? Priscilla, this is insane!” Herb wondered whether his daughter had actually taken leave of her senses. “And where,” he pressed, “does this leave Rita … and Vickie … and, and … what's the name of the one he's going to marry?” Herb was looking at his wife, desperately in need of answers not only to the question he was asking but also to the ones he wasn't. “Sarah,” Julia prompted. “Right,” Herb said, “Sarah. Where does this leave Sarah?” “On Saturday night, when they hear the truth, the three of them will have to decide whether they want to pay the price that loving Ian demands. The loss of privacy … the price is high, Dad, so we're going to wait to hear what they have to say.” “And if the three of them want to go ahead with this bizarre plan of theirs?” “Then the three of us will become the four of us,” Priscilla shrugged. “It's that simple.” “So you propose to have a baby out of wedlock ...” “Oh, Dad, really? Ozzie and Harriet, Dad? Donna Reed? In case you haven't noticed, the nineteen fifties have come and gone. Welcome to the seventies! Even Three's Company is passé! With inflation and all? Five's company sounds about right!” “Pris, I have never been so proud of you in my whole life as I was last night.” Julia opted to try a different approach. “Ian is a remarkable person, and he's hurting in ways that I can't even begin to fathom. And you were there for him, embracing his pain, giving him the strength to do something that had to be done despite the cost. You love him, and he loves you. That's so plain to see that I expect the whole campus to be talking about little else today. I'm happy for you, but I would like you to tone it down until Saturday night rolls around. Be gentle. Give Sarah … give all three of them some time to come to terms with this.” “Julia ...” “No, Herb. We have to respect our daughter's wishes. Besides, you're two years away from retirement, and I'm sick of stakeouts. We can take the money we'd blow on a big wedding and finally take that cruise we've been talking about all these years. Then I'll be ready to become a grandma, and spoil my grandson or daughter rotten.” “Okay … okay.” Herb threw his hands in the air in surrender. “I know when I'm beaten.” “Good,” Priscilla declared. “Now that that's out of the way, it will be okay for you to tag along tonight.” “Tonight? Where?” “To the bar, of course. Ian, Vickie, an orderly named Amos Waring, and yours truly are challenging the reigning champs to a drinking contest, with Hong Kong Rules. Ian thinks you're too old to hold your own, but I told him you were good for it. We'll see.” “And what exactly are Hong Kong Rules,” Herb smiled. “Tequila shots until someone pisses their pants. The loser has to buy the next round for the whole bar. We play until one team is all pissed out-- and it won't be us because Vickie and I will be wearing the same diaper Ian wears … that big, thick hospital monstrosity. We'll be able to piss ourselves with merry abandon, and no one will be the wiser! We win, and become the new champs, much to the delight of the Third, which is strongly of the opinion that Amos will still be standing when everyone else passes out.” “We'll see.” Herb's smile was getting bigger by the second. “Starting time?” “Around eight. I promised Ian a gourmet meal of home made onion rings, a juicy lucy, and house cut fries. Since I'm the world's worst cook, I need to lower his expectations.” “Now, that sounds more like the daughter I know and love,” Julia laughed. “I think I'll tag along, if only to pick up the pieces and figure out who's going to be sleeping where!” . . . . Ian picked up the phone on the first ring. “That you, Street?” “In the flesh.” “You'll be happy to know that I've got you on speed dial,” Donnie laughed. “I gather you made the local news last night; don't let being a celebrity go to your head!” “They mentioned me by name?” Ian was pretty sure that Donnie was pulling his leg. “Nah … just a global reference to somebody ripping off diapers from a badly wounded war hero. Anybody say anything in class just now?” “Nary a word.” “Well, then, as you have been known to say: 'no harm done'. Now about Vincent Belmondo ...” Ian could hear Donnie shuffling papers on his desk. “Street, you have a talent for unearthing interesting people, and this guy is definitely interesting. Let's start with his father, Tommaso. Got off the boat from Naples in twenty four, blew a kiss to the Statue of Liberty, and immediately headed west … destination, Chicago. Grandfather was definitely Neapolitan, so if there's a Sicilian connection, it won't show up on our end. Capiche?” “Got it. I'll pursue it from this end. Maybe Antonio will have a better sense of the family history.” “Going to call him?” “Yeah, but it would help if you could come up with something to add spice to the conversation.” “Consider it done. Your Libyan pal has let it be known that there's not enough grease on his palms.” “That works. Antonio is getting on in years, but he still likes to keep his hand in. Let him run with the ball.” “Don't fancy a desert outing, I take it.” “Camels make me seasick. I learned my lesson in that Algerian fiasco. One hundred and forty five degrees Fahrenheit in the shade, only there was no shade. And the gold embossing on my passport melted! The immigration officer gave me a really funny look when I landed at LAX.” “Okay, so back to the American branch of clan Belmondo. Tommaso quickly hooks up with Al Capone, and starts running trucks over to Lake Huron. With a little help from the Purple Gang, Tommaso is soon making regular runs with Seagram's finest, and he gets rewarded for his loyalty and reliability. In short, for a Wop fresh off the boat, after a couple of years spent proving his worth, he's living the American dream, complete with wife and child. Only, he doesn't want his first-born son to get caught up in the family business, so he scrimps and saves to put his boy through private schools with a penchant for sending their prodigies to the Ivies.” “You have got to be kidding me!” Ian was laughing so hard that he doubled over. “Nope!” Donnie was laughing just as loud. “Brown, class of forty eight … a Phi Beta Kappa, no less! And then … then … Vincent takes an MBA at Princeton-- my alma mater! Ian, no matter what … please … I'm begging you … find out if he remembers the fight song!” “It'll be high on my list, Donnie … high on my list!” Ian could feel mushy poop pouring into his diaper, which seemed only fitting given the way this conversation was going. “So, after he gets his degree, he goes back to Chicago, at a moment when Minneapolis is wide open because Humphrey's run the mob out of town. Seizing the opportunity, Vincent migrates north to fill the void, but he's smart enough to realize that no one is going to take an Ivy League hood seriously, so he comes up with Spats Belmondo, and sells the product with the help of Tony Accardo, who by then is running the Chicago Outfit.” “Oh, this just gets better and better,” Ian guffawed; “no wonder he has a hard on for wood chippers … he was tutored by Joe Batters, no less!” “Yep, the Big Tuna himself!” “Okay,” Ian decided, “here's what we're going to do. Call our friends at the IRS, and have them send a certified letter to Spats informing him that he's won the grand prize-- a comprehensive audit of the last seven years of his personal and business returns.” “That will certainly get his attention,” Donnie chuckled. “But have our guy add a phone number and extension at the bottom of the letter, and do it by hand. I'll tell Spats that, if he plays ball, he's one phone call away from getting a reprieve. And to sweeten the deal, an ironclad guarantee that he can visit the old country without worrying about being denied reentry when he comes home.” “Okay, so after you recruit him, what the hell are you going to do with him?” “Put him to work, of course. In fact, if they're still juicing the food service industry, I'm going to put the whole, damned Mafia to work!” . . . . “This is gross,” Melanie complained. “I mean seriously. What's the point of getting us up at six? Hello? We're in jail, already! It's not like we have to dash off to class or something … and that shower! The last time anybody cleaned the floor in this dump was when dinosaurs were walking the earth!” “And the food,” Joyce added; “don't forget the food! A two week old Danish? And corn flakes? I didn't know that anyone even made corn flakes anymore!” “And you call this milk?” Cindy had her own litany of complaints. “Poor Blofeld would starve to death in here!” “Good riddance,” Janis muttered to herself. “Sweetie, you gonna eat that Danish?” Ruby was eyeing Tippi's pastry the way a shark eyed its next meal. “Help yourself,” Tippi said. Ruby did just that. The twelve cellmates were having breakfast at a long trestle table in the dining hall. “You count yourself lucky you locked up in Hennepin County,” Ruby smugly declared. “You know what you get for dinner out in Dakota? Turkey sandwiches! Seven days a week, you get turkey sandwiches, with this thimbleful of fruit cocktail. At least, I think it's fruit cocktail, though it's a bit hard to tell. Turkey sandwiches!” “Gross,” Melanie reiterated. “Worse than the house, worse than the dorms … gross!” “I want to go home,” Janis whined. “My mom's gonna kill me, but so what? I want to go home!” “She ain't gonna kill you, beeech. Nope, no way, no how. She gonna be diapering you, and taking her damned sweet time changing you. You gonna stink to high heaven. Even the cops down in the Third ain't gonna touch you, and they got no taste whatsoever! Yep, I can see it now-- you gonna be dumping your breakfast in the seat of your pants.” “The corn flakes' revenge,” one of the other hookers cackled. “The corn flakes' revenge!” Janis folded her arms, and lowered her head to the tabletop. “I want to go home,” she repeated. “I want to go home ...” “Oh, for God's sake!” Tippi had had it. Pounding the table with both palms, she got to her feet, and glared at her sisters. “Just listen to you! They got us up too early … the shower's dirty … the food sucks … what the hell did you expect? For crying out loud, this is a jail! We'll be out of here in a few hours, so suck it up! We screwed up a simple heist, but we're getting off easy. We wear diapers for a few semesters, but so what? Professor Grady has been wearing diapers for years! And the fine? Big deal! It's our parents who'll be picking up the tab. And what are they gonna do … spank us? Yeah, like that's gonna hurt when we're wearing diapers. Jeesh!!!” “Tip's right,” Kimberly declared as she climbed to her feet. “No one's locking up these babies ...” Kimberly was running her hands back and forth across her very well endowed chest. “... and my blow jobs are second to none! I'll survive!” “You go, girl,” Ruby clapped. “You and me? Maybe we can show the rest of these pussies how it's done!” Ruby stuck her thumb in her mouth, wiggled it around a bit, and began moaning as she sucked (or perhaps, Dear Reader, she was sucking as she moaned; we'll leave it up to your imagination). . . . . “Hail, hail, the gang's all here,” Chief Mischof gleefully remarked as he walked into the courtroom behind Bernice and Ian. With a sincere grin lighting up his features, Walt walked over to shake hands with Herb Canon. He settled for nodding to Julia and Priscilla, glad to see that both had showed up to testify if it should prove necessary. “You okay?” Ignoring everyone else, Priscilla had walked straight to Ian, and reached out to clasp both his hands. Her concern for his well-being was obvious to all. “Bernice gave me the five star treatment,” Ian smiled; “Bernice and Suzie Marshall both.” “Suzie? What was she doing there?” Ian could hear the alarm in Priscilla's voice. “Pris, she came over to see if Bernice needed any help. And she was nice … more than nice. She was kind. This morning, Bernice told me that Suzie is going to declare me off limits to the scalp hunters, and apparently she has enough clout to make it stick. Apparently I said something to Suzie last night that had a real impact, and I don't even know what it was. Bernice knows, but she refuses to say.” Ian briefly looked her way. Walt stared at the floor, trying hard not to let Julia and Herb see what he was thinking. He knew, because Bernice had told him. Barely twenty-four, and yet Ian had been ready to die. He had lost far more than a wife and daughter in Viet Nam. “I think … I think it has something to do with her husband, who died at the very end of the Korean War … on hill 255 … what we kill Pork Chop Hill.” Ian's voice had grown very soft. “Have you noticed, Pris? Bernice still wears her wedding ring.” “Oh, Ian,” Priscilla sobbed. “God, how I love you!” She reached out to clutch him in her arms, her head resting upon his shoulder. A part of her, a big part, wanted never to let go.

Chapter Two “Why would I want to meet you? I don’t know who you are!” Ai said, taken aback. “I don’t know either,” Bala retorted. “It’s your mem. It ended before I could figure out why.” Ai's thoughts raced like the beating of a hummingbird's wings as she tapped her index finger against her lips. Who was this girl in front of her? She gave Bala another look over, but thankfully for Ai's sanity, she hadn't somehow missed cat ears or a tail. She looked just like any normal girl. Not to mention, in the mem, Bala had thought she was normal. The diapers, the cages, the animal features—that was just how life was. Ai couldn't find a way to reconcile the two images. “This is going to sound crazy,” Ai said, “but in the mem you were like somebody’s pet?” “What, like a fire ferret?” Bala asked. “No, you were a person. Well, a cat person. And you—” Ai opened her mouth to say more, but she slammed it shut, hesitating. Bala looked at Ai with those soft brown eyes. Ai felt a strange kind of maternal instinct; the girl seemed so helpless. It was up to Ai to be decisive. “I promise I’m not making this up,” Ai said. “You were excited that your Keeper had come home.” “Like a girlfriend or something?” asked Bala. Ai started to reflexively say no, but the words died on her lips. It was more intense, but the overall pattern seemed to fit. “I think so,” Ai said. “It seemed like she took care of you. You were wearing diapers.” Unexpectedly, instead of laughing, Bala simply nodded. “That makes sense,” she said. If they feel as good as in that mem, I totally see why, Ai thought. A pleasant sensation between her legs caught her off guard. “It’s part of my job,” Bala explained. “I make medicine to help people feel less topsy-turvy. I make memories of being happy and innocent and cared for and loved, and then they extract those feelings into mems, put them in pills, and give them to sad people.” “Did I want to find you so I would stop feeling sad?” Ai wondered aloud, though the words felt wrong as she said them. Bala shook her head. “Why would you need me? You could just go to your local chemist if you wanted the pills.” They looked at each other, then around the room. “I think we should try another mem,” Ai said. “We need more information.” “If you say so,” Bala shrugged. “Good girl,” said Ai before she realized how condescending that was. She looked at Bala with a panic, but the girl’s eyes were closed. She had a serene smile on her face. It seemed like this Bala also enjoyed being talked down to, even without all of the cat ears and other physical changes. Normally, Ai would have found this irritating—she didn't need to take responsibility for two people, she barely had a handle on just herself—but on Bala, it felt...right. “Okay, go find a mem,” Ai said. She wrapped her fingers around an orange and blue one, pausing long enough to see Bala pick out a new mem of her own before the car pulled into its spot and slid smoothly to a halt. “Are you two ready to get some groceries?” asked Mommy, syrupy sweet. She turned off the engine with a flick of her wrist before getting out. Mommy opened my car door and unbuckled the straps that kept me secured to my car seat. A Little like me would never be able to do that, but Amazons like Mommy were so much stronger. She scooped me up and I buried my face into the crook of her arm. Soft wool caressed my cheeks and gently tickled my ears. “Uh huh,” I nodded, because I was ready. I was ready for anything she wanted. “I dunno why you’re asking. I'm not getting anything,” sulked Vivian, crossing her arms, though the pacifier stuck to her lips made it come out more like a mumble of syllables. Last week, Mommy had discovered that Vivian had been purposefully hiding her pacis around the house instead of sucking on them like a good girl. It wasn't anything a quick hypno tape session couldn't fix. Now, as long as a paci was in Vivian's mouth, she couldn't take it out. “You’re getting stuff, silly,” laughed Mommy as she walked to the other side of the car. “You’re getting things. I’m just along for the ride.” Vivian was really fussy, and Mommy didn’t deserve any of this. Mommy had told me, though, that Vivian’s maturosis had flared up recently and that it wasn’t her fault she couldn’t behave. I just had to set a good example for her and be the best Little that I could be. `“You’re not old enough to make good decisions about what you eat,” Mommy said patiently as she picked Vivian up and put the Little on her other hip. Vivian had a sour look on her face, like she’d been sucking on a lemon, and I knew she was biting down some kind of catty remark. Mommy was patient, but even she had her limits. I wiggled against Mommy, wanting to press myself into her so closely that our molecules would mingle. Mommy carried us into the store and set us onto a shopping cart. This one had room for two Littles side-by-side. The little plastic baby seat didn’t seem like it would have normally been comfortable, but my padded butt sunk onto it as nicely as my head onto a pillow. My feet dangled in the air, so I idly kicked them while Mommy strapped Vivian in next to me. As Mommy fought with the buckle, I saw an independent Little walk in. He had that furtive walk that independent Littles always did, eyes swiveling constantly, as if he were afraid that danger lurked behind every corner. The Little, who looked rather smart in his crisp tweed suit, grabbed one of the tiny shopping carts that Amazon children sometimes pushed around before his eyes met Vivian's. Vivian and the stranger just stared at each other. I watched as the tips of Vivian’s ears turned beet red and she squirmed in her seat, as if she were trying to hide. Her petticoats rustled as her body strained against the straps to no avail. Finally, the man broke eye contact and quickly pushed his cart away, darting ahead of Mommy, who wheeled us around at a much more leisurely pace. Mommy parked us by the vegetable aisle and started bundling up produce, leaving Vivian and me temporarily alone. Hot tears of frustration snaked down from the corners of Vivian's eyes, which she furiously wiped away with the back of her hands. “I hate ‘dis,” she mumbled around her pacifier. Her eyes looked longingly at the daikons that Mommy weighed on a scale. No doubt Vivian was dreaming of eating adult food again, instead of the mashed up baby food that met the nutrition requirements for Littles. I hated seeing my little sister upset. I knew, as the big sister, that I had to do what I could to help. “Maybe you should focus on the positives,” I said as Mommy shifted her attention to the bok choy. Vivian glared at me. The incredulous scowl looked out of place wrapped around a pacifier with a cute cartoon dragon on it. “I’m not going native like you!” she swore angrily. But as Mommy returned and dropped another bag into the cart, her expression reverted to one more placid and neutral. “You two are being so good,” she chirped. Her words were like drops of liquid sunshine, warming my body and setting it pleasantly aglow. “Especially you, Vivian,” she added, ruffling her hair and gently popping the pacifier out of the Little’s mouth. It dangled on its clip and Mommy went to find the next item on her list. Vivian’s frown slid back on as suddenly as it had left. “What could possibly be good about losing all of my freedom?” she asked, contorting her face into funny expressions as she stretched her sore jaw. I knew a lot about this topic. “You have to focus on things you can control,” I said. “Just try it. Name just three things that you like about your life now.” “There isn’t anything,” said Vivian sourly. “Well, I guess you can just be miserable for the rest of your life,” I huffed. There were limits to my patience, too. We sat in silence as Mommy returned and pushed us onwards. There was a small hiccup as a Little boy in denim overalls angrily flicked a jar of pickles off the shelf. It hit the floor with a crash, spilling shards of broken glass around the blast radius. “No!” he yelled, clenching his fists so tightly I could see his knuckles turning white from exertion. “You can’t treat me like this!” continued the Little, though all evidence pointed to the contrary. His Daddy opted to merely raise an eyebrow and wait the tantrum out. Vivian and I could only stare as the Little continued making a scene. His hands darted to the sides of his diaper, which had a picture of Snowy the Cat on the front. His fingernails desperately scratched at the underside of the tapes, trying to gain purchase. The little muscles on his biceps throbbed as he tried to take the diaper off, but he wasn’t strong enough. His sobs turned feral with anguish as he thrashed impotently, failing to even disturb the cart he was sitting in. Bystanders murmured to each other as his energy gave out. He lay slumped over in his seat, defeated, quietly whimpering. “Sounds like someone’s earned a trip to the hypno screen,” his Daddy said cheerfully. “I’m glad you two are much better behaved,” said Mommy casually, wheeling us to the spice aisle. As she hunted for anise and fennel, Vivian and I just looked at each other. I saw hesitation behind those fierce brown eyes. There wasn’t any escape. There was only acceptance. Her only choice was whether it would be freely given or coerced out of her. “I’m glad that I don’t have to go to work anymore,” she said finally, breaking eye contact. I beamed. “No more worrying about money,” I added on encouragingly. “Mommy makes sure we never go hungry.” Vivian nodded slowly. “I don’t have to diet,” she said. “Freedom from choice,” I said. “No more counting calories. No more fretting about your career. Whatever Mommy decides you’re doing is the right thing.” It was true. At Vivian's first checkup, the doctor had said that Vivian had a few problems with her diet: she had high cholesterol from all the fast food she used to eat. But Mommy kept her on a healthy, Little-appropriate diet, and after even just a few months, her next checkup had gone a lot better. “And what about something about your diapers?” I knew this was the worst part. It was the thing most Littles had difficulty adjusting to. “Hell—gosh no,” Vivian said, not quite catching herself in time. Her head swiveled, looking to see if Mommy had overheard, but luckily, Mommy was talking with one of the employees about coupons. I reached over and gave her diaper a gentle pat. Not the way an Amazon would. Just a friendly pat, between two Littles. “I bet there’s something. Isn’t it convenient not having to hold it? You can keep playing or watching TV without needing to take a break.” Vivian scowled. “That’s fine for you, but not for me,” she sulked. I’d dealt with patients in a past life. I’d been a nurse. Part of what made a good nurse was their bedside manner. It was about being there for someone when they were struggling, even if there wasn’t anything you could do. “You’re an adopted Little,” I said. “You can’t change that. You’ll be in diapers for the rest of your life. But you can control your attitude. You’ll forever be a Mommy’s little girl, but it’s up to you whether you like it or hate it. Only you can decide that.” I watched as Vivian mulled over the words. “Focus on the positives,” she mumbled. “Look what I have for you,” Mommy said in a singsong cadence. She held up a can of condensed milk. “I think my little girls deserve a treat.” She leaned in close and gently kissed Vivian’s forehead. “I know how much you love condensed milk.” Here we were. Normally, my sister would grit her teeth and take it. In her past life, she could have eaten what she wanted. She didn’t need these handouts. Or, she could accept the gift and find joy in the moment. I saw a battle rage across Vivian’s face before her eyes softened. “Thanks, Mommy,” she said earnestly, and I’d never been more proud to realize that the mem was over, a new storm of emotions jolting through Ai like lightning in a bottle. She was struck by how kind Bala was. She just wanted what was best for Vivian. The love she had with her Mommy was pure and sweet and too big to keep to herself. Sharing her joy was the greatest gift Bala could have given Vivian. It was an act of love. Not a romantic love. This went deeper. It was the simple love of happiness, of finding joy in the moment, in the little things. Ai didn’t think she was a bad person. She knew that everybody was the hero of their own story and that the world was a complex postmodern novel. Ai didn’t break any laws and she tried to be a good friend. But she’d never really helped others, either. She didn’t donate money. She didn’t volunteer. It wasn’t convenient. The Bala in the mem had such a pure heart that it left a painful ache in Ai’s chest. It was so simple: doing the right thing didn't have to be complicated at all. You could help your friends when they were sad. Ai was filled with determination. She’d make sure to help Bala however she could. “I built this place,” Bala whispered. She stood, brushing her fingers against the metal shelves. “I designed it. The room.” “Why?” Ai asked. “I don’t know," Bala said. "But I know I had to.” “Did someone make you?” A surge of protectiveness filled Ai. If someone had forced this sweet girl to do anything she didn’t want to— “No, not exactly,” Bala said. She paused, sifting through her memory of a memory. Ai knew that “Even with a mem,” Salman said as I stared, transfixed by the swirling colors in the palm of my mentor's hand, “you can’t really experience it the same way twice. You’re not the same person that you were when you made the mem. You can’t help but interpret everything through the you of the present.” “So, what’s the point then?” I asked. There sure seemed to be a lot of limitations on these things! Though it explained why they weren’t in widespread use. “You just have to remember,” Salman explained, “that what you’re seeing is a memory of a memory. Just as you cannot step in the same stream twice, because your presence irreversibly changes the flow of the water, you imprint yourself onto the mem as much as it does on you.” I blinked as she realized that Bala had started talking. Ai caught the tail end of the sentence: "...so I had to for myself." She let go of the memory and anchored herself back in the present. "Because..." Bala continued haltingly, "well...these mems were important to me. I knew that I couldn't lose them." “So this is like a library?” Ai asked. “I think so. I put my mems here for safekeeping, in case I ever needed them again.” "That doesn't make any sense," Ai snapped in frustration. "Look around. Do you see any labels?" She gestured at the silent walls all around them. "That's not even taking into account the fact that you have one of my mems. It doesn't fit." “I dunno,” sulked Bala. “I’m just telling you what I saw in the mem. I’d just finished extracting out the last mem. I must have extracted even the memory of making this place, because I only had vague feelings. I’d designed this place carefully. It was supposed to be a secret. So I put the last mem in its place on the shelf, took one last look around, and then I left. I sealed the door shut behind me. That's all I know.” The girl puffed out her cheeks in frustration. Guilt surfaced, leaving a bitter taste on Ai’s tongue. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to sound like I was criticizing. I thought you were very helpful. I’m just trying to figure out why we’re here, that’s all. Okay?” Bala nodded, but her face told a different story. “Can I give you a hug?” Ai asked. She waited for the girl to nod before she stepped in and squeezed. Bala’s small body folded itself to Ai’s curves, like they had been made for each other. Ai could feel the telltale thickness of what she now knew to be a diaper around Bala’s hips as the girl melted in her arms. Ai closed her eyes. Bala smelled softly of lavender and sweetness. It felt oddly nostalgic. The only thing that was missing, thought Ai, was a diaper of her own.

Academy II By Lyra Starling "At the end of the world, there will be neither clamor nor calamity, neither echo nor epoch. It will be mired in silence and sleep, in deliverance and death. At the end of the world, there will be both patience and purpose, both temperance and time. Only then will it be graced with eternity, and from eternity, a chance." -The Source, in valediction Chapter One Ai Sinclair heard the crash of glass shattering, and she suddenly realized that she had no idea where she was. Her head felt fuzzy, like her brain had been scooped out and replaced with cotton balls. Thinking felt like wading through a pool of jello. When she opened her eyes, she was immediately rewarded with a flash of searing, painful light, and she snapped them shut again. Ai rubbed her eyes, wiped the tears away with her fingertips, and—using her hand to shield her face—carefully opened them again. A frosty fluorescent light sat nestled atop a sea of crisp, white tiles. She puzzled over this as the rest of her senses caught up. She was lying face-up on what felt like linoleum flooring. Her ears let her know that someone was softly moaning nearby. Ai propped her elbows against the cold floor and pushed herself into a sitting position. A waifish brown-skinned woman was slumped against the wall. Ai stared blankly before realizing that she could see right up the woman’s bright pastel-blocked jumper skirt and quickly averted her eyes. Even so, she'd definitely caught a glimpse of something white and puffy (and who could blame her, it was right there.) “Hey,” said Ai, getting to her feet. “Are you all right?” Ai took a step and heard something crunch underneath her shoes. She took a closer look at the floor. Glistening glass shards littered the ground like pebbles on a beach. A few orbs, filled with dancing swirls of multicolored gasses, remained intact. She tilted her head up and saw storage racks all around her, filled with other glass orbs. Based on some haphazard absences in the collection, she deduced that some of them were now on the ground beneath her feet. These are mems, a hidden part of her remembered, the memory leaping unbidden as my mentor gestured to the balls he’d put on the table. I picked one up; the glass felt cool underneath my fingertips. I could sense a latent energy within, crackling with potential. Salman sensed my unasked question and smiled. “They’re crystallized memories, extracted from people's minds.” My eyes lit up and I opened my mouth, but my mentor gently raised a finger. “Before you ask, no, you can’t use them to pass next week's exam. First of all, your memory is burned up as fuel for the mem, so you wouldn’t remember what you wanted unless you smuggled them in and found a way to absorb them without anybody noticing.” I frowned. Was I that predictable? Salman merely laughed, his eyes twinkling with merriment, and raised another finger. "Second, the process of extracting and absorbing mems can be extremely disorienting. For your brain, pulling out an entire memory is disruptive at best, and destructive at worst. That's not even getting into the sheer bleed that can happen on absorption, when, for a moment, you become two souls in one body." Of course, my mentor wanted to keep me safe, but he sure was making mems sound absolutely dreadful. Still, I felt that itch in my brain, the one I felt whenever an idea got its hooks into me and wouldn't let go, the one that led me to Salman's tutelage in the first place. Salman raised a third finger and smiled apologetically. "Third, due to the role the Ashen leyline plays, they can only be made in the great city of Mnemopolis." “I don’t know,” said the stranger, pulling Ai back to the present. The woman had propped her head up against the wall and was staring at Ai with a worried expression on her face. “Who are you?” “I’m…” Ai began before trailing off. It should have been an easy question, but her thoughts were a hazy swirl, like reagents in an alchemist’s cauldron. “I’m Ai,” she finally said. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know who you are either. Come to think of it, I don’t even know where we are.” The other woman bit her lip. The silence dragged on before she finally opened her mouth again. “I’m Bala, I think. I don't know where we are either." Well, that was suboptimal. Ai watched as Bala’s eyes started watering as the girl's lips quivered. She softened. “Hey, it’s okay. We can figure it out together,” Ai said comfortingly, closing the few steps between her and Bala before bending down to pat her on the shoulder. Bala squeezed Ai’s thighs with her arms and nodded furiously into her slacks. Ai gestured at the orbs. “You know what these are?” She waited for Bala to nod before continuing. “Let’s absorb some of these mems. They might give us some clues.” Ai couldn't put her finger on why, but it felt like the right thing to do. Bala nodded. “I’m going to try this one,” Ai said, pointing to one near where she’d been lying earlier. Bala let go of Ai’s leg as she let the woman make her way to the orange and blue colored mem. Ai turned to see that Bala hadn’t budged a single inch; instead, Bala looked at Ai with a lost puppy expression in her eyes. “Try one yourself,” urged Ai. Bala nodded and picked up a violet colored mem off the floor. Ai placed her own mem to her forehead, closed her eyes, and concentrated. She heard a subdued crinkle as Bala presumably shifted positions before I heard keys jangle at the front door, and my kitty ears twitched. My Keeper was home! I tried to get up, but I’d tangled myself up in all of my plush blankets. I mewed in frustration as I wiggled myself loose before pressing my face up against the bars of my cage. The lock clicked open and I saw Mistress Rosa. My Keeper. She locked eyes with me and I shuddered, feeling my heart thump against my chest. Our Bond hummed, like a taut guitar string that had been plucked. The air between us positively crackled. I subconsciously started rocking my hips back and forth, feeling my diaper rub against my groin in that special way that filled me with tingles. Mistress Rosa beamed at me. Her smile was as dazzling as a thousand fiery suns. Still, I could sense a tiny undercurrent of worry through our Bond. “Hello my Pet,” she said. The honorific made my tail perk up just as effectively now as it had a year ago, when we’d first Bonded. As my Keeper stepped inside, I could see another person right behind her. “Hey there, crinkle cat,” said Raven. She was wearing a crisply ironed shirt with tiny pineapples printed all over, and in her hand was a soft blue leather leash. As Miss Raven stepped inside, I could see that the other end of the leash was clipped to a collar around a bunny girl with soft auburn hair, who looked at me nervously before her eyes shot back down to the floor. My ears drooped. I had only been expecting my Keeper, and here she was with her girlfriend, and with her Pet to boot. A knot of anxiety snaked its way through my chest. “Bala, this is Sophie,” said Mistress Rosa, gesturing at the bunny girl. “She’s Raven’s Pet.” “Sorry,” Raven apologized. “My sitter bailed on me, so Rosa volunteered to watch Sophie for the week while I’m on my business trip.” As Raven stood in the doorway with Sophie, allowing the bunny girl to get acclimated with our apartment, Rosa strode over to my cage and bent down. “Have you been a good girl for me?” she asked as she undid the lock. It would have been easy for me to undo even just a year ago, but Pets lost some motor control as part of the transformation process. Now, as I watched her undo the lock, she might as well have been performing black magic. I nodded and happily mewed. I’d done some puzzles (Pet Enrichment Toys, they called them in ads) and watched some episodes of Owned at First Sight on the TV. I launched into a rambling summary of the latest plotline as Rosa swung the cage door open to let me crawl out. Once I was outside, Rosa’s hand slid straight to my diaper. I felt her finger slide in under a leg band. I purred and started wiggling my butt, but Rosa merely took her finger back and ruffled my hair. “Not right now, my horny little Pet,” she said in hushed tones, leaning in close. “I want you to acclimate to Sophie.” I made my cutest eyes and whined in the most pathetic way I could, but she platonically patted my butt. “If you’re good, we can play after,” she whispered into my ear. The hairs on my arm stood up and goosebumps prickled my skin. I nodded furiously, causing the bell on my collar to jingle like a Christmas carol. “Play nice with Sophie,” said Mistress Rosa after what felt like far too little petting. She took Raven into the kitchen, offering her a cup of coffee, leaving me alone with the timid-looking bunny girl. One of the side effects of becoming a Pet was increased sensitivity. I could smell so many more things that had completely eluded me, back when I’d been a person. Sophie had a strange smell, one that lurked as an undercurrent beneath the lavender-scented baby powder. It was hay, and sunshine, and just...different. I knew intellectually that it wasn’t her fault; she was just a stranger entering my space. But my hackles were raised nonetheless. It was a basic Pet instinct, as natural as wetting our diapers. Sophie was standing in the middle of the living room as stiff as a statue. Her fingers nervously played with the hem of her skirt, behind which I could see a thick pink diaper with little orange carrots all over it. “Mistress Rosa hadn’t mentioned Miss Raven being a Keeper,” I said. “Are you a new Pet?” Sophie nodded. “We Bonded last week,” she said, embarrassed. “It’s been weird getting used to, you know, everything.” There was something about that hesitation that felt intoxicating. I wondered if it was anything like what Mistress Rosa felt about me. I liked making Sophie hesitate. I liked keeping her off balance. I wanted more. “Like, your pretty new ears?” I asked, suddenly stepping closer and gently stroking her floppy ears. I watched as she closed her eyes and moaned involuntarily. I felt a feral hunger stir inside me. “Like, not being a person anymore?” I asked, stroking her cheek, which was as warm and hot as a theater spotlight. I could smell a faint strawberry-scented fragrance coming from her skin. “Like, your pretty diapers?” I asked, darting my hand between her legs and giving her diaper a squeeze. The plastic crinkled satisfyingly beneath my fingers. Sophie’s legs shuddered as she was caught between her human-learned disgust and a strange sense of pleasure. Some Pets loathed this part of the Transformation the most; even their bodies betrayed the fact that they weren’t independent any longer. Something as simple as potty training would forever be out of their reach. Pets always came around though. They just needed some training to understand what a gift they’d been given. Sophie shook her head in protest, but her shallow breaths told a different story. She tried stepping away, but I grabbed her shoulders and swung her around to the living room wall, where I pinned her, eliciting a squeak of surprise. My other hand massaged the front of her diaper. Feeling other Pets’ diapers was almost as good as feeling my own. The padding was so fluffy and thick beneath my fingertips. My palm squeezed, diffusing the pressure all around her crotch. “Look at you,” I said, mockingly stern. “You’re wet.” I saw a shudder of humiliation shiver up and down Sophie’s spine. She screwed her mouth up to protest, but I swooped in and kissed her, stealing her words into my lungs. Her lips were soft, so pliable . She’d be a great Pet for Miss Raven. My right hand snaked around to the back of her head and cradled her as I pulled her in for a torrent of kisses. Slow, desperate ones, like I wanted to inhale her soul, then furious quick ones, like thieves’ hands darting out and back with pilfered goods, on her soft lips and neck and all over. My left hand slid around to the back of Sophie’s diaper and massaged it. I felt Sophie’s leg wrap around me, like a snake around a tree’s trunk. I pressed my diaper up against hers as we crinkled in unison. I felt hot all over, as if my every exhale would let loose a cloud of steam, like a kettle reaching its boiling point. Sophie’s hand stroked my kitty ears, which twitched blissfully. I briefly saw stars as my breath caught in my throat. It was almost as good as when Rosa gave me head scratches. From deep inside me, a purr sprung forth like water from a geyser. I closed my eyes and pressed my head deeper into her fingers. They gently massaged my scalp. I felt the muscles in my neck and jaw go slack as she gave me gentle scritches. “Looks like it’s going well,” said Mistress Rosa, breaking the spell I was in. I lifted my lips and licked them. They tasted salty, like the sea. “Don’t stop on our behalf,” said Miss Raven, her arm snaking around Mistress Rosa’s waist. Mistress Rosa grinned, full-mouthed, like her joy was bursting out of her body. “It’s nice to see Pets getting along,” she said, as Ai came back to the room. That feeling of desperate lust had been intense. Her cheeks reddened as she thought of how wonderful it had felt to grind against another person, diaper to diaper. How comforting the thickness was between her legs, like a reminder that she belonged to someone. In Ai's life, she had loved and been loved in return, but the bond she’d seen in the mem had transcended what she’d thought possible. What would it be like to have someone in your life like Mistress Rosa? To know that someone would move worlds for you, who would always have your best interests at heart, who you knew would always keep you as their first priority? To be able to drape that comforting security around you like a warm cloak on a winter’s night, knowing that axiomatically, there was someone out there in the universe who was connected to you on that kind of primal level? “What did you see?” asked Bala, interrupting Ai’s reverie, an empty glass orb sitting in her palm. “I think you made that mem,” Ai said hesitantly. “Do the names Rosa, Raven, or Sophie mean anything to you?” She flushed as she spoke Sophie’s name, remembering how sweetly the bunny girl had scratched Bala’s ears. Bala tapped a finger on her chin. “Not particularly,” she said. “Sophie was a girl? But also a bunny?” Ai tried. “She was human, but also with rabbit ears and a tail. Though, I don’t think I’ve ever seen something like that…” Ai’s temples throbbed with pain. “Weird." Bala frowned. “I don’t think I’ve seen anything like that either.” “What did you see?” Ai asked. “Umm…” the girl thought aloud, tilting her head to one side. “I think I had your mem.” Ai did not remember ever making any sort of mem. She wondered if the other girl was lying—but then again, why this whole sweet innocent ingénue charade? Still, the fact of the matter was that they were both in a strange, sterile room with no memory of why they were there. Ai had to take Bala at face value. She had to trust. Obviously not like the trust that Bala from the mem had with Mistress Rosa, but she had to start somewhere. They had to work together. “You were a mage’s apprentice,” Bala continued. “You traveled a very long way to reach...Mnemopolis? I think that’s where we are?” Ai shrugged. This bleak room could have been in the Elemental Plane of Fire for all she knew, though as Ai wrestled with the idea, she felt like Bala was telling the truth. Bala spent a few more seconds in thought, then nodded. “Yes, I think that’s right. Because you had someone you really wanted to meet.” “Who?” Ai asked, though she had a sinking suspicion that she knew the answer already. “Me,” Bala said.

I feel the same way. I do but do t want to tell others. I feel like my friends know but I’m still too embarrassed to bring it up. The hiding it is getting tougher for me 2+ years in as well.

So congratulations on reaching your milestone! You seem to be building yet another example of the case for the affirmative to the proposition that those who find themselves predisposed to stick at the "24/7" diaper lifestyle, never seem to want to leave it and that their only regret is that they didn't take the plunge sooner!

Thanks @superabsorbantpolymer for the kind words! Yup I don’t know why I waited so long, but I’m glad that I was inspired by@Beccathelittle - no more hiding!

Welcome, @gettingthere, I too am a many year lurker turned member. If anyone else is reading this, sign up! It's so great being able to contribute to the discussions. Regarding fear of leaving the house, I'm actually pretty jealous that girls get to wear dresses and skirts as they conceal diapers so well (nowadays obviously society is more open to men in dresses but I'm tall AF bearded and cis so itsgenerally not my vibe). Having female anatomy it should in theory be easier to disrupt your pelvic floor and continence, and wearing a pull up is far less taboo for women than men I feel. I say throw away your fear, diaper up and be confident 😊

Chapter 1 "I know someone for whom it's time for bed," I interrupted the peaceful puppet show of my little sister on the living room floor in a tone that, to my shock, almost sounded like my mother's. "Please Emily, just a little bit longer, I'm not tired yet," begged Sophie, looking at me hopefully with her big, brown eyes. It was the usual evening drama she played when she had to go to bed. "No Sophie, it's bedtime now, there will still be a tomorrow to play," I explained to her clearly. I had more than enough of her daily, evening disagreements. "But...," she started to whine, but I cut her off. "No Sophie, it's bedtime now, no arguing!" Sophie pouted, but when I took her by her hand, she got up without any further grumbling and allowed me to accompany her to the bathroom without resistance. After a few meters, I noticed that her walk was a bit odd. She was walking with her legs much more spread apart than usual, as if she were imitating the walk of a duck. At first, I thought it was just another game of hers, a way to make the trip to the bathroom more exciting. A Game that she might have learned at kindergarten. But then, suddenly, I realized why she was walking so strangely. "Sophie, can you wait a moment please," I asked her with a sense of foreboding, and stopped. I lifted her summer dress and saw that her pull-up was completely soaked. It was almost a miracle that she hadn't leaked yet. " You're supposed to tell me when you need to go potty," I scolded her sourly. She looked down ashamed. "I was having so much fun playing, I didn't want to stop, and then suddenly I had to go potty before I could say anything." Sophie was a highly advanced child for her age of four. Her language skills were significantly above average, and she could not only read the entire alphabet, but also already write several words. Even simple addition problems were not a problem for her. Despite her remarkable intellectual abilities, she struggled with potty training. She still often woke up with a wet diaper and had more accidents during the day than a typical girl her age. My mother had tried every imaginable method to help Sophie overcome this issue, but with no avail. She even experimented with alternative therapies, like Bach flower remedies and Homeopathy, but as expected, they were of no assistance either. Typically, I would have put Sophie on the potty one last time before bed, like every night, but I could spare myself this step now. Instead, we just made a quick stop in the bathroom to brush our teeth. Then I took Sophie to her room, where I placed her on the changing table. I removed her dress, took off her wet pull-up, cleaned her privates, and sprinkled some baby powder on her diaper area. Finally, I put her in one of her nighttime diapers. "Is this the pajama you'd like to wear, my dear?" I asked my little sister, offering her the princess-printed sleepwear she loved so much. She beamed with joy and put on pants and top with my assistance. "And which story would you like for bedtime tonight?" I asked, giving her the option to choose, even though I already knew the answer. With a loud rustling of her diaper, Sophie scampered over to her bookshelf, and, as she does every night, pulled out the storybook about the adventures of a little princess. "What a surprise," I said with a touch of sarcasm as I took the book from her hand, but she simply smiled contentedly. To my surprise, Sophie was still enamored with the book, despite having memorized every story inside and out. "Will Mum come to give me a goodnight kiss?" Sophie wanted to know as I helped her into bed and looked at me hopefully. "Mum is still out and won't be home until later, but I'm here if you need anything". Immediately, any trace of a smile disappeared from her face, although this situation was nothing unusual for her. Our mother was a highly sought-after lawyer and often had to work late at her office. In such cases, I was often the one who had to pick Sophie up from kindergarten and take care of her until our mother returned. Only on days when I couldn't or didn't want to, a babysitter looked after her. "Mom will give you a kiss as soon as she's back," I cheered up Sophie. "Remember that your potty is right beside your bed in case you need to use it during the night. And if you don't want to go by yourself, you can always call me," I reminded her, as I usually did, in the hope of preventing any nighttime accidents. "I know," Sophie replied with a touch of frustration, having heard this reminder every night before bed. It would only have been nice if she had finally put this knowledge into action. "The little princess lived in a grand and magnificent castle," I started reading to Sophie, and before long, her eyes began to close. So much for her insisting she wasn't tired yet. I continued reading a bit longer, until I was certain that she was soundly asleep and wouldn't stir even if I stopped the story. I placed a gentle kiss on her forehead and tiptoed out of her room. Chapter 2 The pleasant chirping of birds in the garden woke me up from my dreams the next morning. Only two weeks ago I had finished my final school exams and it was still unusual for me not to be woken up by the annoying melody of my alarm clock. Finally, I was free, I was no longer forced to adjust my sleep rhythm to the early morning school hours. I could get up and go to bed whenever it suited me. Of course, I was aware that once I started to go to university, the morning sleep-in would also come to an end, but for now I was going to enjoy every moment of my temporary freedom. Unfortunately, this freedom was still quite lonely. As soon as I had finished my final exams, my mother, my younger sister, and I moved from the city to the countryside. My mother had long dreamed of a small cottage, and she took the opportunity provided by the end of my school years to start a new life in a more idyllic place. Admittedly, the old house and the surrounding countryside were beautiful, but it didn't change the fact that it now felt like we were living at the end of the world. There was no club or bar in the immediate vicinity and nothing else to pass the time as a young person. Without a car, you were completely helpless here and I had neither a vehicle nor a driver's license. As a city child, I had never seen the need to waste my time with tedious driving lessons when you could get around more quickly by bike or public transportation in an urban area. But in the end, it didn't matter that I was not mobile here, it didn't matter that I didn't know anyone my age yet, because in no time at all I would be moving far away to England, the location of my new university. I was about to drift back to sleep when I suddenly realized something was amiss. The area around my buttocks felt uncomfortably wet. Had I sweated excessively in my sleep, causing the mattress to become soaked? But why did only the area around my buttocks seem to be wet? I wondered if I had gotten my period, but it was hard to imagine that the little bleeding I normally had could have caused such a mess. I quickly realized what had happened as I lifted my bedspread and discovered a circular, yellow stain around my buttocks on the otherwise pristine white bedsheet. I had clearly wet the bed, even though it seemed surreal at that moment. After all, I had enough experience finding Sophie's mattress in a similar state when we tried letting her sleep without a diaper at night, to know what such a mishap looked like. Repulsed by the wet, already smelling urine that now also stung my nose, now that the bedspread no longer trapped the odor, I rolled out of bed and immediately stripped off my pajama pants, which were also soaked with urine. No one was ever allowed to know about this mishap. I was 19 years old, not four like my sister. There was no excuse for such an accident at my age. I couldn't even imagine what my mother or friends would think if they found out. I could already picture the rumors spreading through my social circle and my new village. "Have you heard, Emily still wets the bed at 19 years old." I had to act fast. I quickly thought through my options. If I threw my bedding into the washing machine before anyone saw it, no one would ever know about my accident. I quickly took off my sheet from the mattress and also removed the covers. However, now that the mattress was uncovered, my mistake was even more obvious. The big yellow stain in the center of the white mattress was unmistakable and would immediately reveal what had happened to anyone who saw it. I had to turn the mattress over to completely hide the urine stain, but just at the moment I was about to start, there was a knock at the door. "Emily?" I heard my mother's voice. "Please don't come in," I panicked, but as usual, she had already entered without waiting for my permission. "I told you not to come in! You always come in without waiting for me to say it's okay," I yelled at my mother while desperately trying to position myself so she couldn't see my bedding and bed. "I'm sorry, I just wanted to quickly ask if you could unload the dishwasher later, after all, you shouldn't have much to do otherwise," she explained apologetically, but didn't make any effort to leave my room and instead looked curiously inside. She must have just been about to leave the house to go to the kindergarten and then to her office, since she was already holding my little sister at her hand. "Why isn't Emily wearing any pants?" my little sister innocently asked my mom when she saw me. I blushed. Out of sheer fear that my sheets and my bed could be seen, I had forgotten that I was standing half-naked in front of them, giving them an optimal view of my uncovered vulva. I couldn't recall the last time my mother had seen me this exposed, but regardless of when it was, it must have been before I hit puberty. "Uh, I was just about to change", I stammered and quickly brought my hands down to conceal my privates. "Why did you make your bed so early?" My mother wondered as she noticed that my sheets were lying behind me. "Did you get your period and is there some blood on the bed?" "Uh, yeah, that's right” I lied, grateful for this plausible explanation. Unfortunately, it didn't have the desired effect, and she didn't leave me alone. "Is there any stain on the mattress too? You need to act quickly if you want to remove it completely," she explained and before I could do anything, she stepped further into my room and looked at my exposed mattress. She appeared stunned. "Did you wet the bed, Emily?" she asked, clearly in disbelief. The question was rhetorical, she didn't need a response to know what had happened. I was speechless. I stood there, my face red, covering my nudity with my hands and hoping it was just a nightmare from which I would soon wake up. Unfortunately, it was not a dream, and I had to confront the unpleasant truth. To my shock, my mother reacted in the same way she always did when my younger sister had an accident. "Oh Emily, it can happen to everyone," she comforted me in a loving tone. Most people would probably argue that my mother's sensitive and considerate response was a positive thing, something to be happy about, but I would have preferred if she had screamed at me from the bottom of her heart. By reacting to my misfortune in the same way she reacts to my little sister's, I felt like she was equating me with a toddler who was expected to wet the bed once in a while and could therefore not be blamed. "We really have to go now. Are you okay?" my mother asked me with such a soft and concerned voice that I almost started crying. Her caring and considerate demeanor only made me feel that the whole thing was even more of a disaster than I had initially thought. I could only nod silently, as I knew that one more caring word would finally make me cry. "Just put the sheets in the washing machine and let the mattress air out before putting on new sheets," she instructed as she was already walking out the door. "Don't worry Emily, it's probably just a one-time thing. We'll see you tonight," she said finally and in the next moment she was gone with my little sister. Hardly had I been alone when I could no longer hold back my tears. For the rest of the day, I was occupied with crying my eyes out. Why did this have to happen to me and why was I so stupid to get caught as well!?

I'm been dreaming of finishing this story at one point, so lets give it a try. I got in a stable relationship sometime ago and introducing ABDL desires and finding time for fiction writing and being allowed time for fictional ABDL story writing is not something you find in the beginning of a relationship. But we've found common-ground and I'm able to spent some time writing and enjoying my ABDL desires again, so here we go Chapter 32: “Here, I got these for him to wear.” Grannies voice rang out loud, as she entered our bedroom, just as Mom was in the middle of changing yet ANOTHER soaked diaper. “Oh, wow! Mother, where did you find those!” Mom sounded excited, as she received some unknown object from Granny. “A Grandmother never tells her secret.” Granny chuckled. “Now hurry, you two. Jack and Karen are all ready to go.” She exited the room just as quickly as she had entered. I raised my head from the changing mat, trying to catch a glimpse of the mysterious object. “Look, Baby!” Mom proclaimed proudly, unfolding the object allowing for me to have a look. “Swimming diapers! You’re all set for the beach now!” In her hand was a diaper looking object, but the outer layer seemed to be covered in a strange dark blue outer layer and decorated with every imaginable sea creature. As Mom placed it underneath me, it seemed much thinner than my regular nappies and the tapes seemed to have been replaced with Velcro, as she closed my new “underwear” around me. “Up,up!” She guided me off the changing mat. “Now, baby. These are special nappies, meant only for the beach. They don’t soak up your accident, but will keep your poopoo’s inside. So please try to be a big boy and don’t go peepee until we get to the beach, okay?” I nodded my head slowly, as Mom produced a white and blue stripped t-shirt and slid it over my head. “All good and ready to go!” She announced. “No pants?” I questioned. Grannies beach was located just behind the house and was mostly private, but I still didn’t feel totally comfortable going out in “public” with NOTHING covering my diaper. Mom didn’t even bother to give me a verbal answer and simply took me by the hand and led me out the bedroom and out into the hallway. After my complete humiliation earlier that morning, the adult had decided that a day on the beach, playing in the water, building sandcastles and soaking up the last of the summer sun was just what we all needed and who were I to argue. I used to love going to be beach, especially after I started going to the gym regularly and eating healthy. Showing off my tan and shredded physic to all the chicks tanning on the beach, used to be a highlight of my summer. But something told me, today’s beach trip would be very different. Not only were my usual boardwalk short replaced with my new swim nappies, but my physic sure wasn’t anything to brag about any more. Having had a look at myself in the bathroom mirror earlier, while Mommy was drying me off after my bath, I concluded that I had at least dropped 5-7 kilos of muscle and seemingly put it all back on in pure fat, IF NOT MORE. The high calorie babyfood and lack of real exercise was really starting to leave its mark on my once shredded body. On top of my less than impressive physic, the thick layer of factor 50+ sunblocker that Mom had insisted on rubbing onto every naked part of my body, was sure to remove any chance I had of getting a tan that day, whatsoever. We met up with the others at the front door. All three women were dressed in light, colorful sundresses. All sporting large sunglasses and with the dresses just thin enough for you to be able to spot their beachwear underneath. But they weren’t the only ones who were matching, to my surprise Jack and I were wearing the exact same outfit, complete with matching swim diapers and heavy coat of sunblocker. Karen was carrying Jack on her hip and his diaper bag across her shoulder, while Granny had a large beach bag slung over her shoulder and parasol in her arms. “Let’s get going!” Mom proclaimed picking up my diaper bag and throwing it over her shoulder on her way out the door. The beach was only a 5-minute walk from the house. We walked along a sandy path that moved between the tall grass. The sun was shining down, but wasn’t particularly strong, barely with enough power to really warm up the sand beneath our feet and surely not strong enough to justify the 3 coats of sunscreen that both me and Jack were covered in. We followed the sandy path for a short while, until the smell, sound and fresh air of the ocean hit us all in the face, as the tall grass started opened up and revealed the beach and ocean right in front of us. Grannies part of the beach were fairly private, way off in the distance you were able to spot a few figures swimming and tanning, but otherwise no one else seemed to be around. Karen and Mom soon had a large blanket spread out on the sand, as Granny finished setting up her large parasol. Karen emptied her beach bag, letting several buckets and other beach toys scatter around the blanket. All three women stripped off their sundresses, revealing their bikinis underneath, before helping me and Jack pull our shirts off. “I’m gonna go swimming!” I proclaimed loudly turning and starting a mad dash for the ocean. “Not so fast, Mister!” Grannies voice rang out stopping me dead in my track. As I turned to face her, she was already in the middle of blowing up a pair of swimming wings in a bright orange color. “You’re not going anywhere near the water, without these.” She ordered in-between blowing air into the water safety measured, meant for toddlers or young children not yet familiar with the ocean or swimming techniques. “But, I know how to swim! I do, I do!” I argued. I used to be a great swimmer and on holidays I used to love going scuba diving or snorkeling. I my “former life” I would have descripted myself as a fish in water, but Granny clearly didn’t see that being the case now, as she approached me and guided my hands through each of the air filled wings, sliding them up my arms and onto my bicep (or where my muscular bicep used to be, at least). The large airbags didn’t allow me much movement of my arms, as they were kept far out from my body, making my stance rather awkward. “There you go, now you can go play. But don’t go further away than we can see you and no deeper than your belly button. Are we clear!?” “Yes, Granny.” I mumbled in defeat, turning and toddling my way towards the water, which soon hit my toes. The sun beat down on my face, its warmth barely penetrating the thick layer of sunscreen that coated my skin. I stood at the edge of the ocean, the cool sea breeze tousling my hair, and gazed out at the vast expanse of water before me. My heart pounded with excitement as I prepared to plunge into the refreshing depths. Granny's voice echoed in my mind, "Don't go further than we can see you and no deeper than your belly button." I nodded, silently promising to obey her instructions. With a deep breath, I waded into the water, the cool waves lapping at my ankles. The neon orange swimming wings, which made me feel like a toddler, hindered my movements, but I pressed on, determined to enjoy the experience. As I ventured deeper, the waves grew stronger, pushing me back and forth. The floaties bobbed up and down, making it difficult to stay afloat. I struggled to keep my head above water, my heart pounding in my chest. Suddenly, I felt a strong wave crash over me, submerging me completely. I panicked, thrashing my arms in an attempt to break free from the water's grip. But the floaties held me captive, hindering my efforts. Just as I thought I was going to drown, a pair of strong hands grabbed me under the arms and pulled me to the surface. I gasped for air, my lungs burning. As the saltwater washed from my eyes, the shadow and outline of Granny came into view. Her hands locked tightly under my armpits, as she held me firm stopping me from going under again. Her expression was stern. "I told you not to go deeper than your belly button," she scolded. Tears started forming in my eyes, the shock of nearly drowning and the firm tone of Grannies voice was more than my mental state could take. The salty tears started streaming down my cheeks, mixing with the natural salt of the ocean, as I belted out a large cry. Grannies toned quickly changed, her expression and face relaxing becoming more soft and nurturing. "It's okay, sweetie,". Her tone softening. "But next time, you need to listen to me. The ocean can be dangerous for a little boy, if you're not careful." "I think you've had enough fun for one day". She grabbed by wrist tightly guiding me towards the beach through, as the water got lower and lower, tears still streaming down my cheeks, as I hyperventilated and struggled to catch my breath. Back on the beach, she guided me to sit down on the towel next to Mommy, who had awoken from a light slumber just in time to catch the scene of Granny scolding me and saving me from the ocean. "Oh, my poor baby". She comforted, while gently removing the floaties, as I felt a sense of relief as they slipped off my arms. She soon had me wrapped tightly in a warm, fuzzy and dry towel, while clutching me close to her almost bare chest as I finally felt my breathing slow down and the tears coming to a halt. The warmth of the towel enveloped me, providing a sense of security as Mom held me close. My heart still raced from the near-drowning experience, and Granny's scolding echoed in my mind. The salty tears had left streaks on my cheeks, but Mom's comforting embrace began to soothe my frayed nerves. "There, there, sweetheart," Mom cooed, rubbing my back gently. "Granny just wants to keep you safe. You had a little scare, but Mommy's here now." Her words were a soft lullaby, calming the storm inside me. As I nestled against her, Mom reached into the beach bag and pulled out a colorful sippy cup filled with juice. The sight of the zippy cup, a clear sign of my regressed state, made me feel a strange mix of embarrassment and resignation. Mom held it to my lips, and I obediently sipped the sweet juice, the familiar taste a small comfort amid the surreal circumstances. After quenching my thirst, Mom slowly laid me down on the towel, and the soft sand beneath felt surprisingly comforting against my back. The rhythmic sound of waves crashing against the shore served as a lullaby, and the gentle rustle of the parasol provided a soothing backdrop. Mom stroked my hair tenderly, and I felt my eyelids grow heavy. The combination of the sun's warmth, the ocean's calming melody, and the emotional strain of the traumatic experience began to weigh on me. I succumbed to the drowsiness, drifting into a light, uneasy slumber. As I came out of my slumber, a all too familiar warmth surrounded my midst and spread around my diaper area. The realization hit me as I slowly awoke — I had messed my swim diaper in my sleep. The shame and embarrassment washed over me, I was laying on a public beach wearing nothing but a messy swimdiaper, completely exposed to the world. I slowly started to panic but soon found a strange calm wash over me, as my regressed state left me feeling oddly indifferent. I was too tired and mentally drained to process the situation fully. Mom must have sensed the change in my breathing because as I opened my I was I greeted with a knowing smile, as she gently stroked my hair. "Oh, did someone make a little mess during nap time?" Her tone was teasing, carefully concealing any hint of disappointment. I stayed sprawled out flat on my back, but could see from the corner of my eye a small changing mat emerge from the diaper bag, as Mommy laid it beside me as she got ready to go to work. The unfastening of the Velcro tabs released the distinct aroma into the sea breeze. Mom's hands, deft and gentle, navigated the cleanup with practiced ease. She spoke in soft tones, a melodic hum accompanying her motions, creating a cocoon of reassurance amidst the public beach. "Alright, sweetheart, let's get you all cleaned up," Mom cooed, gently raising my bum off the soiled nappy. The wipes, cool against my warm skin, meticulously removed any traces of the messy accident. Mom's fingers moved with precision, turning a potentially embarrassing moment into a tender act of caregiving. Each motion was deliberate, each wipe a gentle caress. This process, once awkward between us had become a moment of gentle care between Mom and son or Mother and Baby. Mom's eyes, filled with maternal love, locked onto mine, conveying a silent understanding and acceptance. Once the cleaning was complete, a fresh swim diaper emerged from the bag. Its Velcro tabs were secured snugly around my waist, the soft crinkle announcing the completion of the diaper change. Mom planted a tender kiss on my forehead, her expression a blend of maternal love and playful affection. As I lay there, diapered and refreshed, Mom cradled me in her arms once more. The beach became a surreal canvas of my regressive journey, the golden sun casting a warm glow over the scene. The laughter and distant waves enveloped us, creating a bubble of unconventional normalcy. In the distance, I spotted Aunty Karen and baby cousin Jack returning from their aquatic adventures. Karen's sundress clung lightly to her damp skin, and Jack giggled in her arms, his tiny fingers reaching out towards the colorful beach toys scattered on the sand. Mom, who had been keeping an eye on me, turned her attention to the approaching duo. "Looks like someone had a blast in the water," she remarked, a playful twinkle in her eyes. Karen grinned, her eyes reflecting the shared joy of the beach outing. "We did indeed! Jack loved playing in the gentle waves," Karen replied, adjusting her sunglasses. Jack, now seated on the beach blanket, seemed eager to continue exploring the world around him. His wide eyes took in the surroundings, as he giggled and bounced on his swimdiaper. I didn't seem liked he had needed a change during our time on the beach, meaning Jack had been able to keep his swimdiaper clean longer than me. Granny, having been busy organizing the beach paraphernalia, looked up and greeted them warmly. "Well, it seems everyone's had their share of fun. How about we start packing up and head back home? We should get dinner cooking very soon." The prospect of returning home for dinner stirred a mix of hunger and anticipation. The sun, now casting long shadows along the shore, signaled the end of our beach escapade. Mom gathered the scattered toys into the beach bag, and Karen assisted with folding the blanket. "Alright, beach explorers, time to head back home!" Granny announced, her commanding yet affectionate tone rounding up the beach expedition. Aunty Karen scopped Jack into her arms, as Mom took a firm hold of my hand, as our little family, carrying bags, towels, and parasol, began the short trek back along the sandy path, leaving the beach behind. The journey back was a leisurely stroll, the warm breeze rustling through the tall grass lining the path. Jack, carried by Aunty Karen, gurgled with delight, occasionally pointing at seagulls soaring overhead. Despite being in a fresh and not yet soaked diaper, I felt myself waddle along next to mommy, finding it hard to keep my footing, my thighs rubbing against each other. Once back at the house, it didn't take long for Granny have the home smelling like a professional kitchen. As Aunty and Mommy got me and Jack changed into a pair of regular diapers and matching light blue onesies with cartoon prints and a pair of while bibs to keep our clothes clean during the feeding to come. Granny, with years of culinary expertise, effortlessly moved around the kitchen, a dance of familiarity and love. Her apron, adorned with a nostalgic pattern, told tales of countless family dinners and cherished moments shared around the table. As the savory aroma of the main course wafted through the kitchen, the rhythmic sound of her chopping echoed, creating a culinary prelude to the family feast. As Mom lead me by the hand into the kitchen, followed by Karen carrying Jack, we caught a glimps of Granny in the corner of the kitchen, her expert hands crafting a vibrant array of homemade baby food. Fresh fruits and vegetables were meticulously transformed into purees, their vibrant colors promising a palette of flavors for the infantile palates. Once I would have longed for a juicy steak, with gravy but now the thought of fresh fruit and vegetables seemed like a feast compared to the usual premade glass babyfood. Mom placed me on a nearby chair at the dinner table, as she went to grabs some drinks from the fridge. Beside me, baby cousin Jack sat on Karen's lap, his eyes wide with wonder at the culinary symphony unfolding before him. "Alright, my little ones," Granny cooed, her affectionate tone weaving into the kitchen's ambiance. "Let's get those tummies ready for dinner, shall we?" Mom produced a baby bottle filled with a unknown mixture and handed it to Karen, while Granny placed two bowls of unknown mush onto the table infront of us. The bottle, adorned with playful patterns, became the focal point of Jack's attention. On my end, Mom placed a zippy cup filled with cold juice onto the table, before taking a seat next to me. Meanwhile Granny had taken a seat next to Karen and Jack and with a small spoon in hand, began the culinary exploration with her son. She scooped a dollop of the homemade baby food and gently guided it into Jack's waiting mouth. His eyes widened with delight at the burst of flavors, and a contented hum escaped his lips. As Jack contentedly swallowed spoonful after spoonful of green mush and suckled from his baby bottle, Karen provided gentle encouragement and playful interaction. The choo-choo sound accompanied each spoonful, and Jack's tiny hands occasionally reached out, forming a delightful mess on his bib. Mom, attuned to the nuances of our regressed routine, sat beside me. She held a small spoon in her hand, loaded with a colorful blend of homemade baby food. The anticipation in her eyes mirrored my own excitement, and a nurturing smile played on her lips. "Alright, sweetheart, it's time for a delicious meal," Mom cooed, her voice a melody of care and affection. "Gentlemen, starts your engines!" she announced, making humming car noises as the spoon approached my mouth. With each spoonful, Mom masterfully mimicked the sounds of an car, adding a whimsical touch to the mealtime routine. The gentle hums and vroom-vroom noises created a playful atmosphere, transforming the act of being fed into an entertaining adventure. As the spoon approached, she would make engine revving sounds, prompting me to open my mouth with a giggle. The combination of the delicious baby food and the imaginative car sounds turned an ordinary meal into a delightful experience. The first spoonful of the colorful blend danced on my tongue, a burst of fruity and savory notes teasing my taste buds. Mom, with a twinkle in her eye, continued the car-themed feeding, adjusting the pitch of her engine revving sounds to match the rhythm of each spoonful. "In the pit stop, we have a sip of juice!" Mom declared, introducing the zippy cup to the culinary performance. The cool, sweet juice provided a refreshing interlude between bites, creating a sensory symphony. "Zoom, zoom! Time for a pit stop," Mom declared, as she guided the spoon into my mouth. The sips of juice from the zippy cup added a rhythmic beat to the playful car sounds, turning the feeding process into a whimsical dance of nourishment and laughter. As the feeding continued, Mom's attentiveness and creativity became apparent. She adjusted her playful car noises to match my reactions, eliciting laughter and delighted squeals. The bib, adorned with playful patterns, served its purpose as a practical shield against potential messes. As both me and Jack laugthed and giggled our way through the bowls of babyfood, the kitchen transformed into a stage for shared joy and transcended the boundaries of a typical family dinner. As Mom scooped the last bit of mush from the bowl and loaded it into my open mouth, I couldn't help but look back on the time not so long ago, when I hated the taste and substance of the terrible babymush. Once I longed for the taste of steak, but now I found being spoonfed fresh puree by my mother, with a bib around my neck and what I'm sure would be a wet diaper between my legs, a highlight of my day. Getting to spend time with Mommy, as we played and made car noises, filled me with a warmth and joy. As the last spoonful was savored, Mom concluded the playful mealtime adventure with a triumphant "Vroom-vroom! All done!" Looking to my right, I could see that Kare, Aunty and Jack was also done with his feed and I locked eyes with Jack, as Mom used the last clean part of my bib to wipe the remaning mush from my lips and chin, before remomving it from around my neck. "You're such a good boy, yes you are!" she teased, giving me a small "boob" on the nose, before guiding me down from the chair. "I'll get this cleaned up, if you get those two to bed, when we can have our dinner" Granny announced as she started removing the bowls from the table. I didn't know what time it was, but judging by the sunlight still coming through the kitchen window, it was still early in the evening. But I didn't bother to argue, I felt tired and drained from all the fresh air and warm sun and silently let Mommy guide me out of the kitchen and towards our bedroom. Placing a light palm on my onesie, Mom concluded that a change before bedtime was not needed and she proceeded to tuck me into bed, making sure to swaddle the blanket tightly around me, before producing and placing a fresh pacifier between my lips. As I settled into the bed, gently sucking my dummy, the voice of mommy gently started to fill the room, the melody of a lullaby I once knew but couldn't quit put my finger on, started to echo in the dark bedroom, as her voice, a soothing cadence enveloped me in a cocoon of comfort. She sat next to me on the edge of the bed, gently stroking my hair. With each verse, I felt the weight of the day lift from my shoulders. As the last notes of the lullaby hung in the air and my eyes slowly started to close, Mom reached out of my view and produced my beloved "Mr Bunnyrabbit" placing it next my head, before pressing a tender kiss on my forehead. She exited the room, leaving the door just opened enough for a small beam of light to pass through and cast a warm glow on my face. The room, now immersed in a peaceful stillness, became a haven where the challenges of the day melted into the gentle embrace of bedtime tranquility. In the hushed aftermath of the lullaby, my eyes closed all the way and my breathing slowed down, as I suckled on my dummy, succumbing to the serenity that surrounded me. As I slipped into a deep slumber, I felt a trickle of warm urine leave my body and get absorbed into the thick padding of my nappy.

I was raised by someone similar. However my mom's fault was mostly because she was uneducated. She didn't have faith in doctors, mostly because the doctors never gave her a reason to and she definitely didn't believe in the mental health profession. She couldn't accept that no matter how much a parent loved their children, they could still cause mental trauma. I've fought hard the past 10 or so years to overcome the mental trauma she unintentionally caused.

The mother sounds like an awfully person. Threatening to ruin her child's life over a bedwetting issue. That's crazy toxic.

Thanks, we will see ;)

Good start so far, I wonder if it really was a bladder infection…

this is progressing nicely

Chapter 3 Unfortunately, my bedwetting persisted. Despite my mother's aversion to conventional medicine, I saw my GP. The doctor diagnosed me with a bladder infection and prescribed antibiotics. But despite taking them, I continued to wake up in a wet bed every morning. While we were preparing dinner and I took the last pill of my antibiotics, my mother made a sarcastic comment about it, saying, "Chemicals seem to be working wonders." Despite my efforts, I couldn't conceal my ongoing bedwetting from her. And since I started the conventional treatment, she stopped offering her support and understanding towards my situation. She began to recount out a theory she had read in an article the previous night, regarding incontinence being related to traumatic experiences during the anal phase. She believed that stimuli, which don't have to be conscious, can reactivate these traumas in the brain, blocking access to brain areas where the ability to go to the toilet is stored. She concluded that this could be the reason for my bedwetting, as I had lost my father during this critical phase and that the stress from my high school graduation and moving could have reactivated the trauma. In my opinion this was nothing but pseudoscientific nonsense. I held my tongue as usual when my mother spouted nonsense, knowing it would only lead to more arguments between us. Even if I found it disrespectful that she was using my father's early death from cancer for her far-fetched theories. Although my mother was a smart woman and successful in her career, it was strange how often she spouted esoteric nonsense. What was even worse was that she was immune to criticism. Whenever her arguments were logically and consistently discredited, she would come up with ten more reasons why her theory must be correct. The discussions I had with her reminded me of a joke by the german comedian Vince Ebert, "An esoteric can spout more nonsense in five minutes than a scientist can't refute in a lifetime." "To treat incontinence, the anal phase and potty training routines must be re-experienced and re-learned, to overwrite traumatic memories blocking their recall," she finished her speech. She looked at me, expecting me to be at least as enthusiastic about her treatment proposal as she was. However, I didn't even had a plan of how this dubious treatment would look like in practice. After all, I couldn't travel back in time and relive my childhood. Maybe it would have been best if I hadn't commented on the matter at all, but in the end, my curiosity won out. "What do you mean by re-exprience the anal phase?" I asked with a skeptical expression. "Well, just go back to living the carefree life, like your younger sister does," she explained in detail. "Being taken care of, going to bed early, being reminded to go to the potty now and then, and wearing a pull-up at night in case something goes wrong." "You want me to wear diapers!?" I exclaimed, struggling to regain my composure. "Pull-ups! And you will wear them either way, because I'm not going to stand by and watch you ruin your expensive mattress any further," she clarified. "I've already bought a pack for you at the supermarket today. Trust me, they're hardly distinguishable from normal underwear, you won't even notice that you're wearing them. They're no different from a slightly thicker pad." I couldn't control myself any longer. "I am certainly not going to wear pull-ups! I am not a baby! You can try your quackery on someone else from now on, I'm not going to be a part of it anymore!" I snapped at her and angrily stormed out of the kitchen. "Well, then you can also find someone else to pay for your expensive biology degree in England!" My mother countered swiftly. I slammed my bedroom door behind me. She couldn't really mean that. Studying in England was my big dream, and it was impossible for me to finance everything without her help. This was not the first time my mother had blackmailed me like this; I was already too familiar with this game. For example, I had to treat my first menstrual cramps with homeopathic pills instead of painkillers, as she had threatened to cut off my allowance if I didn't. There was no improvement, but what did it matter if you used something natural like homeopathy? Who needed an effect or scientific proof when using something like that. My mother always knew exactly which pressure tactics she could use to make me obedient. But this time her nonsense had gone too far, this time I wouldn't be intimidated, no matter what it cost.

I hate text formatting. CH36 - Misbehaving When Emily did come to, the first thing that hit her first was the mental assault on her concentration. Wonderful, a hangover. Well-deserved though, unfortunately. Seeing Joyce right beside her though did bring a smile to her face. Emily shuffled just a tad closer, but paused as she felt a slight tug on her shorts. Without looking, she even thought something was...touching her butt? Leaning her head over her shoulder, it was a first to see the tendril that was Joyce’s arm having slipped itself not only underneath her pajamas, but her underwear too like it was a cookie jar. Propped up on an elbow she swept aside a few strands of her hair, still trying to decide how she felt about it: weird, or pleasant. Then her eyes drifted back to the culprit, leaving her bountiful chest as defenseless as apparently Emily had left her bottom. “Eye for an eye...” Emily grinned with a murmur as she reached forward. Yet she yelped as her muscles stiffened like a board, locking up her joints and giving her a brief startle. The trap she’d neglected to disarm had activated its claws, giving Emily’s bum a playful squeeze. “Mmm!” Joyce hummed pleasantly as she shuffled herself. “Just what I needed to wake up!” “Do I really need to start sleeping on my back now because of you?” Emily giggled as she slipped Joyce’s arm out of her shorts with ease. Joyce puffed out her cheek before she said, “Well, it’d be a lot harder for me if you were in a diaper...!” “Is that how this works?” Emily raised her eyebrow. “Making the idea of being an adult so unappealing I’ll never want another pair of panties?” Joyce’s eyes shot wide open, sparkling with stars. “Really? Is it working?” She held a bated breath, but her own act didn’t last long enough for Emily to either spring yet another trap or call her bluff. “Sorry; did it make you uncomfortable? I just wanted a little more cuddle action last night...” “As long as it doesn’t keep me from sleeping...” Emily issued her final ruling, rubbing her backside. “Does that mean it goes both ways though?” And before Joyce could answer, Emily mischievously squeezed her breast. “Wh-oAH!” Joyce yelped herself, jumping out of reflex. “St-stop! At least give me a little warning!” She laughed. “These are pillows for you, not stress balls!” “Yeah? Did I leave a ‘welcome’ sign on my ass?” “What’s gotten into you, snarky-pants?” She had been joking, and so was Joyce, but she caved into it like it was something genuine. “I have a headache...” Emily moped. Joyce stroked the side of her head offering a sympathetic look. “That’s what happens when you go past your limit...” She said soothingly, but her stroke slowed down as she remembered last night. The playing field was level again, save for a hangover, but fair enough. “Where were you last night?” Her shift in tone was subtle, yet there wasn’t any play in her voice. Emily looked back at her from her sideways posture. “At the party with you?” It pegged Joyce as a joke or something less than honest. Even from Emily, dodging or twisting a serious question upset her a little. “Emily, I’m not joking. I was worried, you know?” “I’m not joking either...” Emily’s lackadaisical attitude was being dragged down by the atmosphere into her own kind of upset-ness. “Even after we got separated, I was at the party almost the entire time. I waited for you?” How could she have been there? There wasn’t a chance in hell Emily would be found in the crowd, or so Joyce thought, which is why she scoured the empty spaces all around while entertaining conversation with others. “It felt like I searched the entire dance hall! You’re being honest? Then where were you?” “I was sitting at a table with some people,” Emily paused to think for a second, “Two people named Rebecca and Hank.” Joyce pursed her lips, nearly ready to poke holes or call a bluff, but then she did remember at least one of those names being mentioned last night. Drunken Emily had said something about a Rebecca...being a...bitch? But what’s more, Emily had done something on her own Joyce hadn’t expected; socializing. “You were sitting at a table with a group of people?” Joyce clarified. It still seemed a little out of character, but it’d make sense for why she seemed to have vanished. Dinner tables there were a dime a dozen as well as an unlikely place to find Emily, supposedly. In the pursuit of trying to make her search efficient and quick, she’d ironically eliminated her chances of finding the girl altogether. “Are you okay?” Emily asked, witness to the crease forming between Joyce’s brows. Her pupils rose back to the girl in front of her. “I’m fine...” She softly exhaled, “I just...I feel like I let something very obvious slip and it led to only more stress that’s my fault. I’m sorry. I owe you an apology; I came at you last night and just now like it was something you did and not me…” “No, no it’s fine, really...” Emily put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s sort of fair to think I’d be on the edge near the wall...which was true for a tiny bit. I’m...sorry for not being where I probably should’ve been.” “Stop that.” Joyce pecked her on the cheek, “Don’t look for silly reasons to apologize when it wasn’t your fault. I take the full blame on this one. But again, I’m surprised you were sitting with other people...how did that go?” A cheery glimmer started to come back to her eyes, now a little excited to hear about her girl’s little (and safe, now that she knew) adventure. “It...was interesting,” Emily briefly summarized, finding that kind of rating by weighing Hank’s pleasant presence against the exact opposite which was Rebecca. With...maybe a dash of points back in the positive favor, seeing that Rebecca mellowed out towards the end… “Hank was the guy who offered me to sit with them. He was nice, and I think he does financial management stuff. Rebecca turned out to be his high school friend, I guess; she owns theaters. The play kind, not movies...” Emily emphasized the last bit, feeling residually annoyed by how Rebecca had just “assumed” Emily would know which of the two. “Mhm?” Joyce nodded thoughtfully, showing great interest. But of course, curiosity was getting to her. “Last night though, in the lobby you did mention Rebecca I think… Something about...not being so great of a person?” “Oh...” Emily tried to remember, “A bitch, right?” A small puff of air left Joyce’s mouth as she laughed heartily. “I see you don’t feel any different about it when you’re sober?” “Well, I sorta figured it out before I got drunk...Hank would probably agree too. He was sort of like her royal handler or whatever. Those people that have to put up with the kings and queens and help them out?” “A...retainer?” Joyce guessed, trying to find the right word. “Yeah, that! He was like a retainer for her. Long story short, she was sort of mean to me at first, but I guess she didn’t completely mean it. After Hank called her out it seemed like she got really embarrassed,” she giggled, remembering the next part. “Then she apologized by going to get me a parfait!” “Awhh...” Joyce couldn’t help herself. Without the visuals and willfully tweaking the context in her mind, it was the same as Emily playing nice with a new friend who was still learning how to deal with “big” emotions. Cute for a kid, but as an adult...well, maybe it could be bitchy. “Did you get along after that?” Joyce asked. Emily nodded. “That’s how we started drinking, actually. She told Hank to get me wine as well. And..that’s how it started...” as well as ended. “So you left the party after getting drunk?” Disapproval was starting to come back to her face. She was going to outright call it irresponsible, but having shot herself in the foot quite recently, she waited to hear her out. “Yeah, but I think I wanted to stay…” “So they forced you?” And so easily her opinions of these people had flipped; absolutely enraged by these strangers forcing peer pressure on Emily to--! “No...not really,” Emily answered back, oblivious to the turmoil in her girlfriend’s head. “I guess more like sound reasoning. Rebecca was really drunk, like, threw up in the elevator drunk… Hank wasn’t bad though, so he offered to take me back to our room first before he’d take Rebecca to hers.” “But you didn’t have the room key...” Joyce found it difficult to be the silent spectator. Since it was an Emily-grade re-telling, of course she struggled to sit still and save her questions until the end. There were simply too many that a pen could transcribe before the fiery queries would start to burn out. “Right...” Emily agreed, now sounding not so proud. “I uh...went anyway. I think I even took us to the wrong floor...I think that’s how I ended up in the lobby.” Joyce took a small breath, feeling as if she saw the essentials of the picture now. “So, after we got separated, you met these people, drank as much as you could, left the party knowing full-well that you couldn’t get back into our room, then meandered in the lobby, all while I was still looking for you at the party?” Emily’s mouth twitched a smidgen as she averted her gaze. “I...Hank wasn’t gonna let me stay...I was too drunk...” “Did you explain to him how you didn’t have a room key?” Joyce’s attack came as unyielding. For once, she was starting to hold Emily’s feet over the fire. “No...I forgot.” “You forgot?” “I forgot.” Emily repeated, sounding a bit bothered now. “Can I not forget things?” Just as Joyce was about to accelerate, Emily’s defensive tone struck made her realize the pressure she was starting to apply. “I didn’t mean it like that...” “I’m sorry for making you worry,” Emily sighed, with a hand to her throbbing head. “I just...I thought I was doing all the right stuff I should have, up until leaving the party, I guess...” “No, I’m just being selfish.” Joyce softly spoke as she rose from the bed. “Thank you as always for putting up with me… It may sound narcissistic, but I feel like it’s easy to see by now that I’m usually the one in control of everything around me... I always plan and have backups in my work, so a lot of what I do is pre-planned and it makes sense to me. I can’t control you Emily, and I would never want to, but you’re the first thing in a long while that’s sometimes unpredictable to me. You’re the most important person in the world to me. If I don’t know where you are and I can’t reach you, everything’s just so...” She made grabbing motions at her hair. “So crazy...” “I feel that way about you too, you know?” Emily said back. Joyce smiled, “Thank you, that makes me happy to hear.” Though, not that she’d ever doubt Emily’s feelings, Joyce would wager that her own severity was much more. “You...you don’t think I’m a control freak, or anything?” After such a bad taste in her mouth, she was starting to have regrets about what she’d done to Emily with the computer. “No. Not a control freak,” Emily deterred her thoughts, but not completely refuted. “I’d definitely agree you like having a handle on things though.” Call her a mommy, why didn’t she? “See?” Joyce’s expression turned to one of somber. “Even you can tell; I’m hopeless. I feel like I’m always apologizing for some stupid overbearing thing that I do...” “I never said it was unlikable, though?” Emily interjected. Standing on all fours, she crawled over into Joyce’s lap. “Maybe if we were a bit more...traditional, I think I’d have a problem...” Using Jack as her reference, she would be annoyed. But Joyce struck her differently. “But we’re not that. Control is definitely part of our relationship, isn’t it? It’s part of our...you know, lifestyle?” After all, a mother who couldn’t control her child would lead to pure anarchy… Or in other words, it wasn’t realistic without it. “I already said,” Emily began to remind her, “You don’t have to act like you’re flipping a switch…” She paused to think of the right words. Joyce always seemed to be better at that. “I know I’ve gotten upset about it before, but I kind of like it when you get concerned like that about me… How you keep me in sight at all times; pull me aside just to check up on me...coddle me… Obviously there’s a limit when I’m an adult, but...” She started to blush, partially feeling like a liar for having a change of tune since they last “talked”. “Now that I’ve had some time to deal with it...I guess I kind of like it when there’s always a small part of Mommy around...” Emily was laying on her stomach across Joyce’s thighs. The older woman pensively worked with her hands. “You do…?” “Maybe not originally, but I dunno...I guess I’ve had some time to come around. You care for me in a way I don’t think anyone ever has...” “Even if I’m a control freak?” “I promised I’d say something if you get too pushy?” Emily said back to her. A dumb smile was infecting Joyce. “You’re...you’re gonna regret giving me so much leniency, you know?” “And I’ll talk to you about it if we ever get there,” Emily smiled. “Please don’t let this affect anything? I’m sorry for making you worry; I can’t say I was completely aware of everything, but I’ll try to be more considerate down the line...” As she reflected on last night herself, a lump started to well up in her stomach and reach her throat. All the anxiety and worry she’d felt from last night, stomached by the adrenaline of new encounters and social pressure weren’t here to let her appear as strong. She suddenly hiccupped as she wiped her eyes. “I was scared too, you know?” “Thank you...” Joyce massaged her back with her open palm. Renewed and strengthened, both women sat in their positions for just a few more minutes. As Emily enjoyed her position laying across Joyce’s legs, she felt a hook suddenly snag the waistband of her shorts and panties. “Hey, no more for you,” Emily grinned as she didn’t bother to look behind. She was the bartender who decided Joyce had gone past her limit. Though, her expression shriveled a little once she felt the cold chill on her bottom, as a full-on tug brought down her clothes and exposed her bare bottom. She wiggled her hips as her head started to turn. “Joyce? What are you--!” SMACK A brief, skin-to-skin smack filled the room. A light slap, but just the right point of contact for maximum sound. Emily’s muscles reflexively contracted as soon as she felt the prickly sting on her bum. It didn’t necessarily hurt, but Emily had certainly felt it. Was she just...spanked? “J-Joyce?” Emily turned her head. Joyce, meanwhile, had a look of pure bliss; an addict who had found their fix. She held her palm just above Emily’s backside, still relishing the wonderful feeling. “S-sorry...” Joyce apologized, still chasing off her high. “I felt like that was needed. Just a little punishment for bad behavior.” Emily rolled her eyes, but smiled. “I thought when all this started, you said there’d be no spanking?” “If you can change your opinion, I can too, can’t I?” Joyce grinned. She lightly tapped Emily’s butt as she briefly massaged it before tugging her underwear and shorts back up. “Just a little reminder to be on your best behavior~” “Uh-huh...” Emily kept her face forward and away from Joyce. In spite of the lighthearted fun, she was a little concerned about her own reaction. It wasn’t outright revolting… She was already blushing just from thinking about it. Absolutely not. Spankings were not going to be their new thing… “But in other news,” Joyce looked delighted to report, “Sheila said you had no troubles last night getting to bed?” “No, not really…--” Her answer was casual at first, but the atmosphere seemed to freeze, or whatever jovial tune she moved her drum to the beat of had just been crudely stopped. “Sh...Sheila?” Emily sounded confused, somehow hit by a sense of amnesia and reminiscence. “Yes, Sheila?” Joyce said. “My secretary? She’s the one who found you in the lobby and brought you back up to the room so I could wrap up at the business dinner...” Joyce lost that final polish in her tone, now aware too of the mental gap Emily seemed to have had. “You...don’t remember?” “I...I do...” Emily bit her lip from trying to recollect. How much had she drunk? Most of the details were there… Figures, places, blurs, and Joyce’s face. It was like staring at a low quality image from afar, only to realize just how many imperfections it was riddled with the closer you got. Before she could run in circles with herself for too long, Joyce filled in some of the spaces for her. “Sheila found you in the lobby by chance, then got in touch with me. I came downstairs and Sheila said she’d bring you back up to the room… Does that sound familiar?” “It does...but...” It felt embarrassing to admit just how jumbled the night was for her. “Wait...Sheila put me to bed?” As soon as the words left her mouth, she felt like she already knew the answer, re-remembering fragments in all sorts of places, slowly converging into the full picture. “Yes…?” Joyce rubbed the top of her head. “How about we get you something for that hangover?” “Sure...” Emily sighed, only registering the throb again once Joyce reminded her of it. She continued to silently reflect, doing her own kind of digging inside her mind. She was with Sheila… Sheila was in the room… Emily undressed herself...wait, did she? She was given clothes...no, helped into them...she snuggled with Pip, but he sort of just “appeared”, which obviously wasn’t right… When Joyce came back in, Emily’s face hung in her hands as her eyes peered down at the bedding through the slits between her fingers. “Sheila...” Emily said aloud, “Sheila, she...she saw so much last night…!” Despite being a whole other person last night, it didn’t affect Emily’s ability to physically cringe just from thinking about it. She laid herself bare to this effective stranger; leaned on her like an actual child…! “What did she see?” Joyce handed her the glass of water. While Emily was in a mild panic, Joyce seemed much more level-headed. After a long gulp to help her swallow, Emily exasperated, “Pip! She...Ugh…! She must have thought I looked like a complete kid!” It was only them, but that didn’t stop her from wanting to hide from the invisible embarrassment. No, she was mortified. “I couldn’t even get myself dressed!” Joyce felt bad for her, but not so much precisely because it’d been Sheila, the only alternative at this point she would ever feasibly consider in place of herself. “Emily, I know it’s embarrassing, but please trust me when I say that Sheila won’t ever speak a word of this to anyone.” And naturally, in a moment of tension and panic, then came Emily, “H-how do you know that? I’m probably now her weirdest, creepiest work story!” A tiny cold sweat broke on Joyce as her back straightened a little. If only this was the weirdest thing I’ve forced on my secretary… “E...even if it might be,” Joyce decided to leave some landmines buried, “which I don’t think it is, Sheila knows that anything I share with her or have her do is strictly confidential. She’s contracted and it’s been this way for years. ” “Yeah, years of babysitting?” Emily pouted with pessimism. “Stop it,” Joyce was quick to admonish her, “the day Sheila betrays me is the day kittens fly.” Naturally, hearing the botched figure of speech had Emily’s head turning. And for Joyce she knew that she could smile because Emily was still taking in silly stimuli. “I just...” Emily exhaled, but started to find anomalies beneath the mental debris. “Wait, how did she even know about Pip?” “I told her,” Joyce said with no signs of remorse, “otherwise it could have been one of many things that could lead to a bad night...” She ran her hand through Emily’s hair. “It’s nothing to be embarrassed about? Sheila really isn’t the type to pass judgment, and especially tell people about any of that...” “Yeah...but...” Joyce had the thought of biting her lip, debating whether to reveal a small tid-bit of information, if only to help ease Emily’s worries. “You know your diapers? The ones we keep in your nursery?” “Y-yes...” Emily started to blush. Her diapers. Her nursery. Joyce’s expression communicated that she hadn’t quite settled on how she wanted to leak the information. “Well…Sheila had a big hand in getting them for us...” Emily’s eyes widened. She couldn’t be serious. “She KNOWS?” Obviously her voice couldn’t be kept down then. “Wh-why?! Why did you tell her? You said it was--” A hand came over her mouth. “Shh, shh,” Joyce gently shushed. “Deep breath? Unnecessary stress is a great way for naughty girls to bring back their headaches...” Emily did just that before mumbling, “I’m not naughty...” “No, you’re not.” Joyce smiled and nodded. “Sheila knows as much as she needs to. She knows that I wanted them made, and that’s it. Not who they’re for, or why they’re needed. This was a while back, Emily, even before I started planning out your nursery. If she hasn’t said anything by now to anyone, I highly doubt she’d do it in the future.” Emily still couldn’t wipe the blush off her face. All she could do was assume the worst. Sheila was smart, probably, to be working under Joyce. For that reason, Emily hardly thought Sheila would just “forget” about something as objectively curious as that. It was only a matter of time until she figured out how Emily was somehow related to them. “Are you upset with me?” Joyce asked cautiously. She was optimistic, yet she wasn’t a mindreader… “No...” Emily sulked. “It...I can’t say I really trust her because I don’t know her, but I do trust you...” She gave Joyce a hopeful look. “If you say you think she’s safe, then I guess all I can do is go with that.” Joyce leaned forward with her arms wrapping around the girl. “I promise. I absolutely promise that whatever Sheila thinks she knows or does know, it will absolutely not go beyond her.” She hated to consider the thought, but if somehow Sheila was possessed and of another sinister mind to leak what she knew, even Joyce wouldn’t hesitate to strike back. Sheila was important, but even more so herself and Emily alike. All Emily could do was resign herself to fate, leaning her head into the crook of Joyce’s shoulder, feeling the goosebumps appear in droves as a finger traced itself on the back of her ear. “Can I tell you something?” Joyce asked. “What?” “I’m only suggesting this because I think you might need it...” Now she was looking up at her. “What…?” Joyce defused herself for only a second as she fumbled with her suitcase. Emily wondered what travel tissues had to do with any of this, but her heart skipped a beat once she saw what she most certainly did not expect to see in any place other than home. “J-Joyce…! Why’d you--” “Hush.” Calmly, yet adamantly, the stressful girl was commanded into submission. The motherly authority came back on the bed, yet Emily, now silent, still couldn’t take her intense gaze off the pacifier. Naturally she wanted to ask questions, express her worries, but she couldn’t. Not when she didn’t have permission to raise a complaint from the start. As Joyce spoke, even as she bobbed her finger, dangling the pacifier, Emily was distracted for a list of reasons. “I think you’re getting in over your head, sweetheart. You’re having too many big thoughts again. I will always respect your opinion, take your concerns into consideration, but I’m going to put my foot down in this situation. You need a reminder to not be such a worrywart.” Maybe Joyce wanted a verbal response, but Emily was simply becoming too good of a submissive, as she could only quietly murmur, feeling the invisible glue applied to her lips. Joyce looked fondly down at the pacifier, like an old friend who had helped time and time again, only it wasn’t an old friend. A new one, someone that was going to be a fresh presence in their everyday lives. Turning with her hand raised, Emily didn’t do so much other than allow her lips to part as Joyce slipped it in. It was perfect; designed for Emily’s mouth like a key was made for a lock. “See?” Joyce smiled. “I like it much better when my little girl gets to hold onto it,” Joyce grinned, daring enough to even tickle the underside of her chin. Emily was at a crossroads. Part of her still wanted to hinge on the matter that was once at hand, now totally taken from her, courtesy of Momm-- Joyce. The other part? Well, it was instead chipperly awaiting what the real authority figure had in store for her next. There wasn’t any motion from her mouth, and of course Joyce would notice that. Joyce flashed her teeth as their faces were inches apart. “Oopsies, did I forget to turn on the engine?” Raising her finger through the ring of Emily’s pacifier, she gently tugged on it, and just before the silicon teat could break the suction from the infantilized girl’s lips, Joyce pushed it right back in. Tug, push. Tug, push. She needed only to manually make the girl suck with just a few more motions before the machine started to run on its own. “Much better, my little treasure,” Joyce scrunched her shoulders and face into a pleasured smile as the tone had just shifted so wonderfully. “Keep sucking. Just think about your pacifier and how much your girlfriend, your Mommy, loves you so, so much. How I would do absolutely anything to protect you, cherish you, and make you feel oh-so fuzzy inside!” She couldn’t help herself with the dreaded tickle attack, causing the adult woman to squeal with involuntary pleasure as she wrestled away. Correction, allowed to get away. They stared back at each other for a few moments, both mesmerized by the other’s gaze. “This is definitely what you needed.” Joyce said with affirmation. She wasn’t teasing. She was stating the facts. Emily’s response? More sucking, paired by the occasional remark, which was the light slap of plastic from her pacifier ring, if that could be considered a legitimate retort. “Now let’s get you up, buttercup,” Joyce cooed as she grabbed her hands. “Good girls don’t go to breakfast smelling like wine now, do they?” She chuckled happily once she saw her girl’s cheeks redden. Bashful and embarrassed, like she should be. Joyce traced her hand along Emily’s back as they came into the bathroom. It was impressive, equipped to handle them both, but it was surely a feature both Joyce and Emily knew wasn’t quite as impressive as what they had at home. “Cahn ah tahk iht ouh beh-foah thuh sh-ow-er?” Emily earnestly tried to mouth around the obstacle in her mouth, but she oh so adorably failed with flying colors. “I promise I’ll get better,” Joyce giggled as she pulled out the pacifier, excitedly pleased to see a thin layer of drool on it, “but until I learn pacifier-speak, what was that?” Emily reflexively licked the roof of her mouth, always feeling some kind of difference in her mouth after one of those. She was much more meek now, however, surely after being put in her cushy place. “I asked...can I take it out before the shower…?” Though, by the sound of her voice she knew it was a silly question simply because it had already been answered. “Yes, but only if you don’t bring up what you’re not supposed to?” Joyce raised her eyebrow, as if to challenge a potential opponent. But rather prey than predator, Emily nodded with a blush. “Mhmm...” “Then we’ll save it here until we get out of the shower.” Joyce sufficed, already stripping Emily. “I love you...” The words came out of Emily. She wasn’t looking at her lover; too busy up at the ceiling as she assumed the ballerina’s posture, a difficult move only meant for the experienced veterans at helping their Mommy-figures remove their clothes. After Joyce’s head came back up after dropping a pair of pajama shorts, she with the force of her own two lips leaned Emily back a little as she deeply connected with her special girl’s. Taking a deep breath of air she said with a glowing smile, “I love you too. So-so-so much. Could you start the shower?” she asked as she started to undress herself. And as she watched Emily, particularly her bum, move which-way as the proprietor who frankly had it on lease, as far as Joyce’s ownership was concerned, something ran by her mind. Dealing with Emily’s reaction to Sheila taught her something she hadn’t fully considered. Up until now, they eventually did address everything in full, equally and completely. But maybe sometimes...it wasn’t quite worth getting Emily as involved as she thought she needed to be. Rather than give her more rope to feed to a fire she always needed help putting out… Her eyes fell on the pacifier. Like now, and would likely be in the future, Emily maybe needed “help” realizing that some things just needed to stay beyond her. Emmy didn’t have to worry about adult topics or heavy conversations. If Joyce thought it was okay, and she knew it was okay, Emily should only need to deal with it on a smaller level. A safer level. And effectively, it was robbing Emily of control. She was losing out on responsibility. But to Joyce, that was the entire idea. That was the goal. The pattern they were going to follow. Yet why did she feel so confident in doing this? That was the easiest part in her mind; the very trigger itself. Emily gave her permission for it, and she encouraged it. They’d fine-tune as they went along. But frankly? Seeing Emily so subdued with her pacifier, being put in a headspace that proved just how unnecessary some of her worries could be? Hell, if this made the history books, if there ever was one for the unusual adventures of Emily and Joyce, this’d surely be one of her greatest plays. “Okay, time to go,” Joyce announced in two ways. One was the sound of her own voice. Two, was the wet popping noise from a pacifier leaving a mouth that didn’t want it to leave. “I could have done that...” Emily smirked with a blush as she put on a pair of sandals. “I know,” Joyce tickled her chin, “but then I couldn’t have?” “Th...thank you for that, by the way...” Emily said in a shy voice. “For giving you what you needed?” Joyce asked. “Y...Yes...” Yes, for giving her what she needed. “To be honest, I should have been doing that sooner...” Joyce sighed to herself. She was always going to have her mommy-mode feelings and tendencies, but recent events felt like that her conscious efforts had been shell-shocked completely. Making the right kind of play earlier was starting to give her some confidence again in that department. “I love you more than anything, Emily, so I’m going to be better about judgment calls like that. And remember, if I ever do something like that, it’s not because I don’t value your opinion, okay? It’s because I think you’re starting to bite off more than you need to chew.” Emily nodded, feeling her inner feelings starting to stir. It was the parental lock on the computer all over again. She wasn’t being asked or suggested for anything. She was being told. Needless to say, the shorter of the two couldn’t keep her shoulder away from Joyce’s arm as they walked down the hall. “Are there gonna be a lot of people again at this breakfast…?” Emily asked with a tinge of trepidation. “Probably enough for one table,” Joyce considered with previous engagements as her reference. “A big table.” “Is there gonna be room for me…?” “Well that’s why you’re going to be on my lap...” Joyce spoke with feigned assumption and ease as she called the elevator. Then she turned her head. “W-wait, Emily, I’m joking...” She laughed apologetically. “Yes, there will be room. I’m sure they made a headcount based on the guest list; the worst case is that they have extra chairs.” As they rode the elevator, Emily felt the need for more silly, yet in her mind, important questions. “...Is it okay for me to order whatever?” “Within reason,” Joyce decided. “You can order what you want, but I’d like you to keep it light, please? Just go easy on your tummy this morning.” Joyce was the guiding hand that steered the ship, yet by the same stroke Emily held the override switch, and by now Joyce felt comfortable enough to assume Emily knew that. And since there was no opposition, it only led to further affirmation. “I don’t think I want anything big either...” Emily agreed, now with much more grounded expectations. Funny how fickle the stomach could be. One moment she merely thought of the pancakes, waffles and whipped cream, and the next after a single thought about her tipsy night, she suddenly couldn’t stomach the thought of excessive confectionaries, much less be in the same room as one. “And no morning drinks,” Joyce felt the need to include. Emily did not however. “Really? The last thing I can even think about is alcohol...” The poor girl groaned. “Just in case,” Joyce rubbed the back of her head affectionately. “A rule unspoken is a rule easily broken.” “Did you just come up with that now?” “Impressive, ain’t it?” She giggled proudly. Emily rolled her eyes as they stepped off the elevator. The lobby, understandably, looked a tinge less vibrant during the day. The daylight and lack of city lights stripped all the glass windows of their mystifying, glime-dazzling nature, in Emily’s opinion. One of the prized ornaments hanging from above was only half as impressive when there wasn’t an array of warm lights passing through it. Would you be surprised, the restaurant built into the hotel that was serving breakfast, the entrance: glass. Emily was starting to see a theme here… “Joyce Summers?” The two magic words. All she needed was her name and the red carpet seemed to always appear ever so magically. “Right this way,” a waitress escorted the pair down an aisle of a mostly busy place and around the corner. Emily was a little surprised. Big table made her think of five or six people. Not double that. But sure enough, a large wooden circle was where they went, already occupied mostly with others. Though if there was any sort of pleasant surprise, it would be the unexpected diversity at the table. Financial titans to Emily made her think of older men in suits likely born from old money. Joyce was of course her antithesis to that notion, but so was the view before her. Obviously some of the females were just significant others, like Emily, but others just seemed to...radiate that they were on their own account, that their place was earned by merit and not mutual affections. And from that same radiation, Emily for some odd reason was...picking up on a wave of...bitchiness? Amidst the wave of welcomes they received from the table, only then did the head right in front of them turn around to see who had come. “Emily?” Lo and behold, that head was Rebcca’s. “R-Rebecca?” Frankly, Emily as an afterthought was a little touched that she even remembered her name. What part about herself left an impression? Being a doormat and reconciled with through the way of sweets? An outstretched hand with a friendly smile already corralled the girl back on the side of her handler. “Hi there,” Joyce smiled, “I don’t think we’ve met before?” Smiled so much of a smile that you’d think she was smiling. Objectively smiling. Whether positive feelings were behind it, that was another story. While it was another business get-together, these smaller breakfasts thankfully were a tad bit less formal, even if talking shop never quite stopped. Moods didn’t need to be as tailored, the fanciest of dress wasn’t required, and certainly for a mature, dignified woman like Joyce, maybe just a tinge of...unbecoming traits could waft a little. The reality was quite something about Emily getting to other women first before Joyce that quite irrationally upset her. In her mind, it was somewhere between checking Emily’s Halloween candy for tampering and filtering out even the air another predator might breathe so much as even in the same room as her sweet treasure. All this was her natural response, even if all it took was a small sense of reason to snap her out of her unchecked jealousy. But could she be blamed? (Most definitely). There was a damn good chance Emily could have the hots for men or women now. It’d suddenly become the same playing field but with twice the players! “Hello...” Rebecca from her seat reached out to Joyce’s hand, giving it a light shake. Yep. Joyce for sure was radiating with...something. Something that somehow made the atmosphere all...uncomfortable. Joyce’s entranced expression as she gave her a firm shake was popped like a bubble with a blunt touch from behind. “Hm?” With a cute hum of curiosity, all that flame and fire extinguished once her head turned around. Emily’s hand was half-hooked on Joyce’s elbow. She wasn’t as good as Joyce when it came to oozing with emotion like a nuclear meltdown, but maybe her eyes could work a little magic. Be nice! Don’t be weird! She had defused the bomb once Joyce turned her head back, smiling. A more real smile. Still on the side of faux, though. “I’m Joyce, Emily’s girlfriend.” So much for business. It was starting to feel like an exchange at the high school lunchroom. And if only Emily had seen the faintest corners of Joyce’s mouth, like she was doing just the bare minimum to hide a haughty grin, somehow proud for already having the prize to a game Rebecca knew nothing about and likely would have cared even less to play. “Joyce, why don’t you two have a seat?” One of the others at the table, outside the range of Joyce’s...influence, called out in a friendly manner. “If you’re fine with it, there’s two seats next to me...” Rebecca said, though from Emily’s perspective she was slightly averting her gaze from Joyce, looking past her and to Emily, of all people. Unbelievable. But, then again, sort of believable...Joyce was starting to intimidate the woman for no reason other than her own pride and overprotectiveness. Preventative measures, preventative measures…! Emily was still too shy for many words, but she knew something needed to be done for Joyce’s sake. Trying to be casual, but not so casually, she grabbed Joyce’s arm, pretending to play with her hand just for a second so she could be the closer one to the chairs, sitting right down in the one adjacent to Rebecca. Both of them knew that’s the one Joyce had wanted, which is why a look of surprise, and maybe even silly betrayal crossed the reflection in her eyes. “F-...Funny seeing you here, Rebecca?” Emily did her best to make small-talk, but lord if she wasn’t as rigid and stiff as a board. Joyce, given the degree of separation and a moment to pause, she at least sat down without a fuss. If only Emily had known this’d become a sudden job to babysit her babysitter... “Funny...” Rebecca sounded like she half-agreed, whereas her other half was too busy trying to discern the sort of stare she was getting from another chair down. “Have we met somewhere before?” She suddenly asked down the chain. “Oh? Us?” Joyce feigned ignorance as well as paper repelled water. “No, no; Emily told me about you and your other friend last night. Thank you for keeping her company!” “...Oh, that’s right,” Rebecca took a thoughtful second before looking at Emily, “didn’t you say that she was looking for you? Does she misplace you often?” Rebecca grinned, and maybe Emily would have too, but she felt the fire of hell radiating just over her shoulder. Maybe in another life, had Emily been blessed with height she could have fully screened the borderline hostile patron beside her. “I would have found her right away, but it’s a little hard when someone meddles and steals--” “Hi there!” A waitress coincidentally (and oh-so thankfully) interrupted all the different amounts of chatter right then. “Is everyone here to start taking orders now?” “Uhh...sure, that sounds fine,” One of the men at the other end of the table said. “We’ll work our way down if anyone still wants to take a look at the menu.” He said, likely referring to Emily and Joyce, the last arrivees. “Joyce, could we share a menu?” Emily asked, pretending like hers right in front of her didn’t exist. Joyce’s lips pursed as she knew she was being called back inside and for good reason. Emily scooched her chair closer to Joyce, trying to be as quiet as can be while she whispered into her ear. “What are you doing?!” “Nothing! I’m just saying hello to the bitchy bully you met last night.” It was maybe funny and cute last night, but the elevator ride down left Joyce thinking of how all that “bitchiness” had to have been felt by Emily firsthand. “Well stop it!” Emily admonished with a quiet whine. “We’re on good terms now!” At least Emily thought they were. Whatever neutral blood there may have been at the least though, it felt as if Joyce was personally trying to spoil what was relatively untainted. “Think about how this looks for you, too!” Emily then felt the need to roll her eyes, and she certainly did so once Joyce’s face gave the impression she’d just been told ‘no’ to getting a new toy. Honestly, how bad could she be? Was it jealousy or overprotectiveness? Could she at least be discreet about it? Maybe Emily had only herself to blame; they were just coming downstairs from a little intimate moment leaving her partner high on the pleasures of being a mommy… Emily’s inner conscience shook its head with guilt. Of course all this excitement was too much for her poor mommy… “And you?” The waitress was standing by Joyce next. “Oh, uhm...” Joyce hadn’t a second to really ponder the menu, and neither did Emily. “I’ll take a...coffee, please. Black? Two eggs with toast. Sunny side up, please?” “...Okay, sure thing. And you?” Now it was Emily’s turn. Emily blinked, immediately thinking of what her normal preference would be, something involving a pancake or waffle base followed by chocolate chips and a fruit (possibly of the banana variety), but remembering her important talks from the elevator, that was unfortunately off the table… “Uhm...” “Could she have the same thing, actually?” Joyce intervened, finally making her first tactful play of the entire breakfast. “Only can we swap her drink for chocolate milk? Add bacon to hers, too?” Well, not quite how she’d have liked it, not when she was in the audience of Joyce’s business peers… She could have sworn a few even ordered daytime drinks. Coffee was going to be her goto, not chocolate milk…! But it’d already been done and dusted, carved in stone as the waitress flicked with her pen and moved along. “Th...thanks, but I would have liked coffee, too...” Emily felt the need to say in a quiet voice. “But you like chocolate milk, don’t you? I make it for you all the time?” Joyce asked unashamedly. “Not when it’s at a business breakfast…!” Emily found the privacy to complain just a little longer while Rebecca was busy with her order. “Well I don’t want you having coffee either today; I think it’s already a miracle that you weren’t in the bathroom last night...” Thankfully she didn’t go into unnecessary detail. As chaotic as Joyce was being, her conscious mind had never left, sensing it was about time she showed Emily she was still capable of rational decisions. “Rebecca?” Joyce re-extended her hand, “I’m sorry about a few minutes ago. I was a bit bothered by some news I got this morning… Investments falling through.” The lack of a predatory look on Joyce’s face this time seemed to be of good faith, which is why Rebecca took it once more only a bit more amicably this time. “Oh, that’s fine. It happens… Sorry about my comment a second ago… I didn’t mean to insult you if that’s what it seemed like.” And as the two monsters made peace through words, Emily could only wonder why she instead had received offerings of parfaits rather than direct apologies… “I like her!” Joyce smiled from ear to ear on the drive home. Emily drilled a finger in her own ear, just to double check. “Y-you looked like you were gonna punch her at first...” “Huh?” Oh Joyce, so willing to feign ignorance. “Well...maybe I was a little bit out of sorts at first… An investment fell through for me, you know?” She grinned. “Uh-huh...” A hand found its way on Emily’s thigh. “I know...I was already riling myself up on the elevator ride down. I started thinking about what you told me about Rebecca and how she wasn’t nice to you at first...” “You’re a real helicopter mommy, you know?” “And don’t forget it.” Her voice seemed to carry a small sense of pride, like Emily’s mocking comment was a badge of honor. “...You were okay with it, right?” “Okay with how you acted toward Rebecca?” Emily snarked. “Meh. As long as it doesn’t affect you,” she smiled. “No, uhm...I meant about what happened in our room. As...as long as you were okay with it; how I handled that, I promise I’ll stop asking...I’m just...a little nervous since I was so forward...” “For someone who calls this such a lifestyle, you’re throwing in a lot of stops, ya know?” “It is...” Joyce whined with her own smile. If Emily was joking, she wasn’t upset. Good. “We already talked about our stops, so since you told me not to worry...” Emily inhaled, “then I won’t worry.” But always at the end of the day, saying something was far easier than actually doing it. “Okay,” Joyce briskly cut the cord, “time for something else. Enough about that. So, do you think you’d ever want to do something like that again?” “...” “Emily?” “Mmm...” Apparently it wasn’t an easy decision. “I guess if I had to I could handle it...” “If you had to? Well, that’s okay, my little trooper. I think once was enough for you.” “Hah?” Emily reared her head over to the driver. “Didn’t you want me to come with you last night? You were begging me!” “I was not begging,” Joyce put on the best ‘totally wasn’t like that even if it was’ look she could give. “I just thought it’d be nice to enjoy each other’s company while I had to deal with business?” “Yeah, well, that didn’t go as planned.” “No, it didn’t,” Joyce grinned, “but frankly, even if we were together the whole night, I still think I’d have been dealing with a sleepy little girl regardless.” “You would not.” Emily frowned with a sharp correction. “I wouldn’t?” Joyce inflated her tone with feigned ignorance. “No. I was...I just drank a lot, is all. It made me tired.” “No, drinks make you emotional, but they don’t make you sleepy. It was way past your bedtime anyway.” “My bedtime? I don’t have one, need I remind you?” “Maybe not officially when you’re out of your diapers,” Joyce agreed without resistance like it was a simple fact, and so was the possession of her diapers, to which Emily quietly blushed over. “But since we’ve gotten your sleep schedule back in line, you do start to show signs, ya know? When I say bedtime, I don’t mean an enforceable one,” but oh she so certainly would love to, “I mean the time when your body starts showing signs.” “I don’t show any signs...” Emily side-eyed her. In her mind, signs didn’t consist of the generic yawns and eye rubs. “Yes, you do,” Joyce giggled. “You droop your shoulders,” Joyce imitated the posture, “You start rubbing your eyes all the time, and you always do that cute little head-bob…!” “Y-you do the same thing...” Emily tried to strike back, but since the record showed Emily had never once gone to bed after Joyce, she couldn’t say for sure… But instead she was ignored. “Oh! Or when sometimes you start sticking your hand under your shirt? That’s too adorable!” Her last mention sounded completely foreign to her. “What? I don’t do that.” “Huh?” Joyce apparently knew Emily’s body better than herself. But in all fairness, with the way she handled her, her claim actually might hold some weight… “Yes you do? You do it pretty regularly. You always have it on that cute tummy of yours.” Apparently Joyce saw the subconscious things in Emily even though she herself didn’t notice. Did that go both ways? Did Emily notice those kinds of things about Joyce as well? “And by the way...since we were away from the house the entire night...I was thinking maybe you’d like to do some ‘catching up’ on our little promise to each other?” Thankfully, all it took was some mommy-talk and a pacifier in the morning to keep Emily on her allusion game for once. “Really?” Emily stifled a giggle and settled for a chuckle. “You think you’ve earned the right after losing me last night?” “Well, when you put it like that, I do remember last night on the elevator ride down I couldn’t stop thinking of all the different ways I could keep track of you. Bells, a tracking chip, handcuffs...” She hummed for a brief moment, letting the silly act imagine herself as the astute, genius mommy in the making. “But I guess no one at a grown-up party except for you would sound like a crinkle-tush, huh?” “Let’s stick with handcuffs...” “Oh, and if we kept you in diapers we wouldn’t even need to take you to use the potty? More time to chat with others!” “Joyce…!” “I guess I’m just thinking out loud...but I better write that one down. After all, you said it yourself; I seem to misplace you so easily! Heh, I guess I hear you just as much as see you.” “Okay! We can use the nursery tonight! Just please stop joking about that stuff!” With Emily rightly backed into her corner, Joyce felt at ease again to laugh now with herself back on top. “Okay, I’ll let it go, for now.” Thankfully it was a red light, otherwise Joyce would have missed out on the sweet strawberry that’d replaced Emily’s face. Emily took to looking out the window for the rest of the ride home, her dumbstruck face with quivering lips, trying to wipe a naughty smirk off her face. Her strings she never even knew about herself were starting to be plucked more and more as her owner slowly discovered just the right rhythm to make the bashful girl sing on immediate command. And never in a million years would she. Never would she dare to be anything but cohesive and compatible, but the thought couldn’t help but cross the lovestruck girl’s mind. Maybe I should misbehave more often...

The girls sat hunched over the kitchen table, textbooks spread out, in an attempt to throw Hortensia’s mom off their backs. Matilda had a blue notebook open on top of her algebra worksheet and was flipping through the pages with mild amusement. If Hortensia deserved any kind of award, it would be for her creativity, but realistically, her notebook full of schemes and plans tended to fall into the “illegal” and “impossible” category. “If anything actually does happen to the Trunchbull, this notebook needs to be burned.” Matilda said. “Why?” Hortensia asked with a scowl. Matilda thought she still looked rather green, but that was probably because she still continued to stuff her face with potato chips. Just the thought of eating something so greasy sent Matilda’s stomach for a loop. She herself hadn’t been feeling so great since the toast, despite the medicine. “Because I don’t think Jenny, or any university, would approve of 1st degree murder as an acceptable form of extracurricular activity.” “What do you care about university for? You’re five.” Hortensia said, in between a mouthful of chips. “And I’m ten, would anyone really believe us to be capable of murder?” Matilda sighed. “We’re not killing her.” “But say, hypothetically, she dies of an accident.” “No! No one’s dying!” Matilda said, before flipping to a page and sliding it over.” How exactly did you plan on getting cannonballs onto the roof? Does that really look like an accident?” She pointed to a crude illustration of a squished car with a dead stick figure in the driver's seat. “I will admit they're not the most thought out ideas; it’s just a hobby.” “We need to think smaller, the idea is to inconvenience her; not hurt her.” Matilda could see Hortensia’s face turn angry. “Inconvenience? I thought you wanted revenge and-” Hortensia jumped to her feet, chair scraping behind her. “Um, I don’t-” but before she could finish her thought, Hortensia was sprinting out of the kitchen and down the hall. “I told her to stop eating chips.” Matilda mumbled, before taking several long gulps of water. Jenny had been adamant about drinking water, so she had been playing a little game. Take a drink every time Hortensia ate a chip. She had soon abandoned that game, her tiny stomach was no match to whichever evolutionary adaption Hortensia’s stomach had come up with to store chips. She was starting to think she didn’t have a stomach at all, but rather a portal straight to one of the nine dimensions of hell that dumped undigested snacks onto some poor damned soul. Matilda shuddered at the thought. Maybe Dante’s Inferno hadn’t been the greatest reading material, either. Matilda’s legs were jiggling by the time she heard the kitchen door open. She looked up, hoping it was Hortensia. She’d have to give the bathroom a few minutes to air out, of course, she didn’t have to pee so bad she’d rush in straight after whichever horror’s Hortensia had unleashed in there. She frowned in disappointment when she realized it was only Hortensia’s mom. “Sicker than a dog.” she heard her mumble. Matilda bit her lip. It didn’t sound like Hortensia would be out anytime soon. “I really appreciate you helping Hortensia with her math, I don’t know how you do it, though. I can’t get her to willingly work, even when she’s well.” Matilda felt a pang of guilt. The open text books had just been a cover. “Maybe she’s just delusional from a fever.” Hortensia’s mom chuckled. “Could be.” “What should I call you?” Matilda asked after a moment of silence. She didn’t even know Hortensia’s last name. “My name is Eve.” “Okay, Mrs. Eve.” Matilda said. It was rude to call adults by their first name, so she had to improvise. Hortensia’s mom only laughed again and shook her head. “Just Eve is fine.” Matilda didn’t feel comfortable being on a first name basis. She was still angry with her for failing to act in Hortensia’s best interest. Why had she called her daughter a liar if she knew she was telling the truth? Why did all the adults in this town sit back and do nothing? Matilda’s own father had sent her to Crunchem Hall knowing the Trunchbull’s reputation. He had probably sent her there because of the Trunchbull’s reputation, not in spite of. Matilda shook her head, this wasn’t a road she wanted to go down right now. It was much easier to fight for other people instead of herself. Besides, her father’s actions had inadvertently made her life drastically better, not worse as he had most likely intended. She had met Miss Honey, and she had found, for the first time, what love felt like. Another, more sad thought filled her head. It made her uneasy and made her stomach twist. Matilda had been angry at the adults in her life for not standing up to the Trunchbull and not protecting their children. Was Miss Honey any different? If the time came where Matilda was in danger, would- no could timid, fearful Miss Honey protect her? Matilda knew it was too much to ask of her. Jenny needed someone to look after her! She had been abused far worse than Matilda knew she could even imagine at the hands of that woman! Timid Jenny, who looked like she wanted to sink into the floor whenever the Trunchbull entered her classroom. Jenny, who had signed away any hope of ever being properly independent, who hid horrid scars underneath her clothes, and had spent years living in poverty. She was Matilda’s reason to fight. When she thought of Jenny, she wasn’t afraid. “Matilda, do you need the bathroom?” Eve’s voice snapped her from her train of thought. Matilda looked down at herself and blushed. She hadn’t even noticed she had gotten up on her hind legs, hands grabbing at herself. What was she doing? She was better than this kind of juvenile behavior! “Well, umm, yes.” Matilda admitted. It would be more childish to deny it at this point, and now that she had started paying attention, did she ever! “Do you have another bathroom?” Maybe there was another in the master bedroom. Her hopes were dashed when Eve shook her head. “It’s fine, I can wait until Hortensia’s out.” Eve looked skeptical. “I don’t think she’ll be out anytime, soon. Is it your stomach?” Matilda shook her head, and Eve seemed to relax now that an impending blow out was off the table. “A neighbor’s, maybe?” Matilda asked after failing to distract herself with the textbook. Eve bit her lip. “The only neighbor I’d feel comfortable taking you to is Jan, Chunky’s mom, but she’s a bit of a germaphobe. I don’t think she’d let either of us in right now.” Matilda’s face fell. How had she not noticed sooner? Had she really been that deep in thought? “I can’t leave Hortensia alone right now, either.” “I could just walk to the market, it’s only a few blocks.” Matilda suggested. Eve looked like she had proposed letting Matilda play with a loaded fire arm. “Or not.” she mumbled. “I’m sorry, you’ll either have to wait or…” Matilda watched her eyes shift to her backpack. “No!” Matilda said, a bit more forceful than necessary. “I still have that, umm, soreness. It would be very painful.” Why was everyone suggesting she pee on herself today? Just because she was a bed wetter did not make it suddenly okay. “Oh, that’s right.” Eve said. “Well, if you get desperate enough, there’s the backyard, although it might be a little tricky for you being a girl and all. You’d probably have to take everything off from the waist down.” “I’ll wait.” Matilda said through gritted teeth. She just went from being a baby to being a dog. She had had her fill of relieving herself outdoors after yesterday. The experience had been unnerving, not to mention loud. It was a memory she wished to bury and never think about again! She despised being vulnerable, and nothing said vulnerable like being naked in a stranger's front yard with zero bowel control next to a woman who kept saying things like “that’s it.” and “let it all out of your system.” If she had meant to be comforting, she had missed the mark by a mile. It had been the most humiliating moment of her life, right next to Jenny pulling her out of the Chokey soaked, and having her first accident in Jenny’s bed. Recently, it seemed, her life seemed to be full of cringy moments. Matilda’s resolve not stoop down to the level of an animal had lasted all of twenty minutes. She groaned in embarrassment as she got up and headed for the backyard. She kept reminding herself it would look worse having an accident. Picturing Eve treating her like she had yesterday had broken the rest of her resolve. “Do you need any help with your overalls?” Matilda could feel warmth gather in her face. She had hoped to slip out unnoticed, or at least Eve would have the courtesy not to say anything. No such luck on either accounts. “No, thank you.” Matilda mumbled. She went out back, shutting the screen door behind her. She took in the backyard. All the grass seemed to be directly in front of the back door. Matilda groaned again. No way was she going to do this with Eve watching. She had given her enough of a show yesterday. As Matilda made her way around the small backyard, she couldn’t shake the image of a dog sniffing around, searching for the perfect spot. Just pick somewhere and get it over with! There! All the way along the fence were flowers, but there in the corner was a bush, and not a very pretty one anyway. As she was undoing her overalls, she had the odd feeling she was being watched. She eyed the backdoor, but Eve, thankfully, was not there. No one was looking out the kitchen window, either. She was just feeling paranoid because this felt wrong, she thought, but before she stripped the rest of the way, she let her eyes scan the area one last time. Nothing. She got into position over the bush, but just as she began to pull everything down, she let out a yell and quickly hoisted it back up. She had been so concerned about Eve watching, she hadn’t thought of anyone else, so she was startled when her eyes locked with a man on the second floor of the neighbor's house. Matilda ran back inside, overalls still dangling. “Feel better?” a voice from the kitchen table asked. Of course, she’d ask that, Matilda thought. “There was a man watching me from upstairs.” Matilda said. Eve scowled. “Damn him, that perv. I’ve caught him several times watching us.” Matilda shook her head. “I didn’t…” “Wise of you.” Eve said, a scowl still on her face. “Stay inside the rest of the day.” Matilda didn’t ask why. Matilda rested her head on her textbook, burying her face in her arms. “C’mon, Hortensia! Aren’t you done blowing it up yet?” Matilda quietly mumbled to herself. Her legs were now involuntarily shaking, the straps she hadn’t fastened on her overalls bouncing noisily against the chair. What was she going to do now? She looked up hopefully when she heard a scraping sound. Was Hortensia back? No, it was just Eve dragging a chair over to the top row of cupboards. Instead of climbing on top to reach up, Eve patted the chair. ‘Come on, hop up” Matilda tried to make sense of what she was saying. She stood up and followed in a trance. She couldn’t think right now, she couldn’t even stand still. Maybe Eve was afraid of heights? She doubted Matilda could reach that high, but she stood on the chair anyway. “Face me.” Matilda turned. She wasn’t even eye level, she was still a good foot shorter. So then why? Matilda let out a panicked gasp. Eve had yanked her overalls and underwear down, and was lifting her up by her hips. When she stopped moving, Matilda realized she was hovering over the sink. Her legs were resting over the edge, but she knew if Eve let go, she’d fall backwards into it. “Go on, I’ve got you.” Once again, not comforting, Matilda thought. Her body clenched tight in protest. “Let me know when you’re done.” “I-I can’t.” Matilda muttered, face red with embarrassment. Not with Eve right in front of her, holding her. “Everything’s harder as a girl, I know.” Eve said. It was true, Matilda could have gone in the bush with her back to the neighbor already. She wrapped one arm around Matilda’s waist and reached behind her with the other. She nearly jumped out of Eve’s hold as she felt cold water splash her back. Matilda hadn’t been quite out of the range of the faucet, but she was no match for the sound and feel of running water. Matilda hid her face in her arms as she felt herself give in, feeling both shame and relief, grateful for the noise of the faucet. If she had to hear herself pee, it would have been the end of her dignity, although she was pretty sure she had lost all of that yesterday. Once Matilda’s feet hit the floor, she quickly hoisted up her underwear, but before she could re-attach the buckles of her overalls, she felt Eve tugging on her shirt. “I’m sorry, I got you all wet.” Matilda shrugged. If Eve hadn’t, she’d still be up there, involuntarily fighting against every trickle. Matilda shuddered, imagining Eve praising her for every sound and trying to coax her into letting it out all at once. “See, you’re cold.” Matilda felt her shirt get pulled off. “Do you have another shirt?” Matilda shook her head. She had only brought spare pants and diapers she had been sent home with. She hadn’t thought her shirt would get in the line of fire. “I’ll put it in the dryer for you.” Matilda nodded and let out a large yawn behind her hand. She was starting to feel exhausted now that adrenaline and panic were no longer coursing through her. Her energy level was still much lower than usual and she realized she felt warm, not from embarrassment, but from fever. She was still sick. “Feel free to take a nap on the couch if you need to.” She heard Eve yell from the back of the house. Matilda wanted to very much, but…” her eyes drifted to her backpack. Why had Jenny packed those diapers and not pull-ups? She knew she couldn’t risk sleeping without anything, not with how much water she had been drinking, and not with how desperate she had gotten so quickly. She ground her teeth. Matilda didn’t have a choice, she knew. She dug around in her backpack and pulled one out, before making her way over to the couch. She kicked off the rest of her clothes, and opened it. She turned it side to side. Where was the front, and where was the back? She had never changed a diaper before, it all looked the same. She sat on it and tried to pull it up, nope, that wasn’t right. Matilda turned it around and tried again. Nope, that was even worse! On her fifth try, she let out a moan of frustration. She heard a chuckle. Matilda looked up to find Eve watching her from the hallway. “Need a hand?” Matilda wanted to say no, but this blasted thing wasn’t cooperating, and she was in danger of falling asleep on top of it and not in it. “Lay back.” She did as she was instructed, too drained to fight. Eve’s words were fading in and out. Matilda was only vaguely aware sometime later of another figure’s presence. “Move your diapered ass.” Matilda moaned and rolled onto her side, suddenly squished between the back of the couch and something nice and very warm. She wrapped her arms around it, but something was in the way. Without opening her eyes, she felt around and moved away whatever it was, before pressing her face against it and sighing contentedly, now fast asleep, before feeling something reluctantly wrap around her. ………………………………………… Jenny was surprised to find the door beginning to open before she had even lifted her hand to knock. Eve poked her face out and beckoned her in with a finger, with a finger of her other hand pressed to her lips. “You need to see this.” Eve whispered, and Jenny followed her inside now curious. Eve crept into the living room and pointed down at the couch. Jenny tiptoed inside and covered her mouth in surprise. Both girls were asleep, Matilda in nothing but a diaper, her face resting on Hortensia’s bare stomach, both with arms wrapped around each other. Jenny bit down on her knuckle to suppress the giggle that wanted to come out. Matilda had her moments, but Hortensia? Now that was a girl she couldn’t imagine being a cuddler. She couldn’t even picture her staying still long enough to cuddle. She took one last glance at the girls, before following Eve into the kitchen. “I never imagined Hortensia as the affectionate type.” Jenny admitted, taking a seat. Eve laughed. “She’s not. I told you, they’re different when they're sick.” Eve said. Jenny thought back to last night. Matilda had been a bit clingier than usual, and Jenny had been more than happy to oblige. She thought it was because Matilda had thought she had hurt her, but as she thought back, it was Matilda who had initiated contact. She had even asked to be read to. “You never told me she was some kind of genius.” Eve suddenly said, her tone changing. Jenny smiled and shrugged. “If she wasn’t sick, I was about to have her do my taxes for me.” “What gave it away?” “I caught her trying to give medication to my daughter. When I took the bottle away from her, she recited the instructions, and the math needed to calculate the dosage for children based on their weight. Then she began doing Hortensia’s math homework in her head. I thought she was copying off Hortensia’s paper, but she even got the answers Hortensia missed.” Jenny smiled and replied, “She likes math.” “Let me ask you, where is she living? You said she comes from an abusive home. Is she a foster child, is that why she’s still in your class? ” Jenny’s smile faltered. “It’s complicated. She’s living with me, but her situation isn’t exactly…” “On the up and up.” Eve volunteered. “Yes.” Jenny said, sounding sad. “I was able to get her family to give up custody of her, and pay a very small amount in child support, but if anyone came looking for her.” She bit her lip. “I don’t think the courts would give me custody. That’s also why she’s still in my class. I don’t have the legal right to switch schools, I’d pull her out of there so fast if I could! I try and be the best teacher I can be for her, but-” Jenny stopped as she felt a hand close around hers. “She doesn’t need you as a teacher right now; she needs you as a mother.” Jenny froze. “That independence, you see, that came from necessity. That’s not normal, it doesn’t matter how smart she is. Do you know why she knows how to give herself medicine? It’s because no one was there to give it to her.” “I know,” Jenny said with a sigh. “She told me last night she doesn’t see me as a mother, though.” “Then make her see you as one.” Eve said. “Jenny, I don’t know how to tell you this, but I think Matilda has very dark feelings towards the adults in her life, and if you don’t address it and soon, something very bad may happen.” Crap, Jenny thought, she must know about her powers too! “Like today, for instance, she gave me a look like she wanted to rip my head off!” “Well, she is only five, and you said they don’t act themselves when they're sick. She is a very sweet girl.” “Jenny,” Eve said. “Listen, I found a notebook in with her school things. She’s having fantasies about murdering the principal.” Jenny’s eyebrows narrowed, and then she let out a nervous laugh. “What? No, Matilda would never want to hurt anyone. “ “I put it back with her things, you can look through it tonight, but seriously, with that brain of hers and these dark fantasies, you really need to do something to put a stop to this. Even the bed-wetting is a sign of emotional disturbance. ” “Eve!” Jenny said, getting to her feet. “Matilda is not some evil child, she is a very sweet and special girl who doesn’t have a drop of darkness in her heart!” “I’m not saying she’s evil! All i’m saying is I think you need to spend more one on one time with her. Fewer academics, and more nurturing maybe, I don’t know!” Eve said also getting to her feet. “Jenny?” A quiet voice asked. Both women turned to find a very sleepy looking Matilda leaning against the doorway, a wet diaper hanging from her hips. Jennifer plastered on a fake smile as best she could. She could only pray Matilda hadn’t heard their conversation. “Hi, sweetie, I’m sorry if we woke you. Let’s get your overalls back on, I’ll get you cleaned up once we get home.” Matilda looked at her a bit dazed, but didn’t argue. She had barely pulled up her pants when Jenny picked her and her backpack up and headed for the door. …………………………….. To think Matilda capable of such a thing! Jenny thought, seething, as she started running a bath. Eve had spent two afternoons with her and was already telling her how to be a parent! Jenny sighed as she rubbed at her temples. She was getting a headache. “Jenny? What’s wrong?” Matilda asked from the doorway. She had gotten out of her overalls, and was pacing back and forth in the wet diaper, a look of pain on her face. “It’s nothing, sweetie, don’t worry about it. If you need to pee, go in the diaper.” Jenny watched Matilda’s face turn a bright shade of red. “N-no, I don’t have to.” She said. Jenny nodded and turned back to the water, aware Matilda had gone into the other room. When she came back, she couldn’t help notice there was predominantly more sagging around her waist and an even more uncomfortable expression on Matilda’s face. Liar. “Come here. Let’s get that off you.” Jenny reached for the tabs, but frowned when Matilda pulled away. “I can do it myself.” She mumbled. She was about to tear it off, but Jenny grabbed her hands to stop her. “I know you can do it yourself, and I love how independent you are, but sometimes, like right now, with me, you don’t have to be. Does that make sense?” Matilda frowned. “It’s gross, though, I don’t want you to.” Jenny smiled softly. “Gross? Why would I think it’s gross? Is it because it’s so…fresh?!” She lunged forward, taking Matilda off guard, and began making her squeal with laughter. “No! Stop! I’m ticklish!” she cried, and tried to dance away, but Jenny had her pinned into the corner, running her fingers up her sides, until the small girl was red-faced and panting. She looked so far from the evil genius Eve thought her to be. Jenny bent down and tore the tabs off, before balling it up and throwing it in the trashcan. “Was that so bad? Now into the bath with you!” She waited until Matilda was fully submerged before excusing herself. Now, what was with this notebook? She went to Matilda’s backpack, digging around, until she pulled out a blue composition book she didn’t recognize. She opened it and flipped through the childish doodles. Jenny breathed a sigh of relief. Dark fantasies, she thought, shaking her head. This wasn’t even Matilda’s neat writing, and the plans inside were so over the top, how could anyone take them seriously? Dropping a cannonball from the roof? Really? Jenny stopped at a page that featured a crude drawing of a cat. She smiled and shook her head. She had a feeling she knew who this notebook belonged to, and Eve wasn’t going to like it. “Matilda,” Jenny said, do you know who this belongs to? I found it in your backpack.” She held it up, so Matilda could see, and noticed her face begin to lose color. Jenny sighed and sat down on the closed toilet lid. She may be a genius, but she couldn’t keep a secret to save her life. “Hortensia’s,” she mumbled. At least she wasn’t lying anymore. “I said I wanted to help her play pranks, so she showed it to me.” Jenny bit her lip in worry. The Trunchbull was the last person anyone should be playing pranks on. “I realize some of the doodles she made aren’t exactly pranks.” Matilda went on. “Yes,” Jenny said. “They aren’t. They are the worst plans for murder I have ever seen.” Matilda giggled. “Did you see the cannonball one?” Matilda asked. “How was she planning on getting those on the roof?” Jenny smiled. She had also seen rough drafts for other strange occurrences she hadn’t realized had been Hortensia’s doing. She was smart and calculating when she put her mind to it, so she knew the murder sketches had been nothing to worry about. It was clear no planning had gone into them. How had she planned on getting them onto the roof? It was almost as if she’d need-Jenny swallowed nervously as realization dawned on her. It was almost as if she’d need telekinetic powers. …… “Matilda,” Jenny asked as they laid in bed that night. “Do you like living with me?” “Yes, of course! This is so much better than where I came from!” Matilda said, rolling onto her side. “I know it’s better, but I was just wondering…is it enough?” Am I enough? Matilda rolled over and faced her. She looked confused. “I don’t understand.” Jenny sighed. “What If you could have a family who loved and appreciated you. A mom and dad, your own room again. Your own bed! I can’t give you any of those things. Wouldn’t you prefer that over this?” Jenny could see the scowl forming over Matilda’s features. “I thought you said you wanted to be my mom.” “Of course, I want to be your mom!” Jenny said. “I may not be very good at it, but-” “If I could choose, I’d still pick you.” Matilda said matter-of-factly. “This,” she gestured around the tiny room, “has felt more like home than anywhere else I’ve ever lived, because you’re here.” “You’re so sweet, I hope you’re not just saying that.” Jenny said, pulling Matilda towards her and into a hug. “You know you can tell me the truth, no matter how small or big.” “I do.” Matilda said, resting her head on Jenny’s shoulder. “Uh-huh, Miss, no, I don’t have to pee.” She could feel Matilda stiffen against her. She bit her lip, maybe she shouldn’t have gone so far. “Why does that bother you so much?” “I don’t know.” Matilda mumbled into Jenny’s nightgown. Liar. She rubbed up and down her bare back, her shirt having mysteriously disappeared again. “Tell me, please. You never tell me you need something until it’s too late.” She could feel Matilda tense again. There was an issue somewhere around here. She was determined to get to the bottom of it. “You don’t like asking for help, even if it would save you a lot of trouble. Remember the museum?” Jenny could feel Matilda begin to shake with sobs, but she had to get to the bottom of this. “Talk to me, Matilda. I can’t be there for you if you don’t tell me what you need.” Jenny waited patiently, gently scratching Matilda’s back until she calmed down. “Tell me this, back at the museum, why didn’t you just ask me to unclip your overalls?” “Because it was something a little kid would need.” “Honey, you’re five years old, you are a little kid.” “I don’t like,” Matilda said, but stopped. “Go on, finish your thought.” “I don’t like feeling helpless, and I don’t like people thinking I’m helpless.” “Of course, I don’t think you're helpless, but needing help sometimes doesn’t make you helpless either. Adults need to ask for help all the time, too. ” “But not like,” Matilda said, dropping her voice, “going to the bathroom or something.” “Did you know brides on their wedding need someone to hold their dress up while they pee?” Matilda scrunched up her face. “So I won’t get married then.” She said. Jenny laughed. “Just over that?” “These last few days have been awful!” “I know, being sick is no fun, but I think you’re over the worst of it. Eve said you only threw up twice today. Maybe tomorrow you won’t throw up at all.” “Not like that, I mean, yeah that was awful too, but I don’t like being sick, around other people. Like you said, you didn’t like not wearing clothes. I don’t like dealing with bodily functions around other people. Adults especially, It makes me feel-” “Vulnerable?” Jenny asked. “Yeah!” Matilda said. “I don’t like feeling vulnerable around adults.” Jenny frowned and stroked Matilda’s head. It didn’t really come as a surprise given everything she had shared with her, but it still made Jenny feel a little sad. “Do I make you feel vulnerable?” Matilda didn’t answer for some time. “You used to, but not so much anymore.” Jenny sighed. “I want you to feel comfortable with anything you might want or need. You know that, right? No matter how embarrassing or personal. It doesn’t matter what it might be. I will never shame you, or belittle you, or scold you for asking or letting me know you need help.” “D-do you mean that?” Matilda asked in a quiet voice. “Of course, Matilda. Is there something in particular you wanted or needed that bothers you?” “I- I guess, but it’s weird, and it would make you uncomfortable, and I don’t even know why I want to so bad!” Matilda said, tripping over her words. Jenny’s face frowned with concern. What was it she wanted that would make her uncomfortable? “What is it?” Jenny asked. “I- I want to,” Matilda said, looking uncertain. “I want to lay on your chest.” Matilda blurted out. Jenny smiled, still confused. “That’s fine.” “Your bare chest.” Matilda said, barely over a whisper. Oh… Jenny paused. She stared ahead at the foot of the bed. Why would Matilda want to lay on her bare chest? One of the few things she wasn’t sure she could do… Her heart was beating in a panic. She was waiting, she needed to answer her. She could tell her, “no,” without belittling or shaming her, but was that fair? Jenny had been asking her to drop her guard. That was normal, though, she was the adult and Matilda was a child. She needed to be able to trust adults again. Was this even an appropriate request to fulfil? She was just a child. Surely there was no ulterior motive, she even said herself, she didn’t know why she wanted it…so bad. Jenny gulped. Matilda had never said she wanted something badly. Why this of all things? She thought of Matilda lying on Hortensia’s bare stomach with her arms around her. She was a girl who had never felt love. The more she thought about it, the more it made sense. Matilda was craving a kind of non-sexual intimacy, the feeling of skin against skin. Was that why she kept taking off her shirt? Jenny bit her lip. She was almost certain Matilda had stopped expecting a reply. She sighed and turned off the light. ………………. Matilda felt her heart sink when the room had gone dark. She guessed that was Jenny’s way of saying, “no,” but she could have at least told her instead of ignoring her. She could feel tears begin to well in her eyes, Then she heard another sound, of something soft that had fallen to the floor. “Come here, Matilda.” An arm gently guided her down in the dark. She could hear Jenny suck in a panicked breath when their bodies made contact. Where was it? She felt around her chest, until she felt what she was after. There! She moved up as slowly and gently as she could and placed her ear where her hand had been. Matilda could hear and feel Jenny’s heart beating like mad. “I won’t hurt you, Jenny.” Matilda whispered. “It’s okay.” She softly hummed for a bit and ran her fingers through Jenny’s hair. Ever so slowly, she could feel Jenny’s stiff body begin to slowly relax underneath her. Matilda smiled as she felt Jenny’s arms move around her and embrace her. Yes! This. This is what she had been longing for. She wanted to feel her body heat around her, and listen to her heart beat. There was something so intimate about it, like it was something only they could share. “Are you okay?” Matilda whispered. The arms around her tightened in response, and she felt a pair of lips kiss her cheek. “How did you know I needed this too?”

Happy new year! Here's a short one scene chapter to bring you into 2022 and hopefully better timers. Chapter 31: The light was shining through the large window in the bedroom, as my fuzzy mind started to wake and my eyes slowly opened. “POP, POP, POP!” I tried wiping the sleep from my eyes with both my closed fists, as I heard the tear from the tape of my diaper being ripped open and felt the fresh morning air on my genitals. “Only wet this morning. Uh, I don’t envy your Mommy having to change that messy diaper later.” “That wasn’t Mommies voice!” I thought as my eyes shot open and I looked down, seeing Aunty Karen in the middle of changing my sodden overnight diaper. “Morning, Honey. Did you have a goodnights sleep.” “Not, Mommy!” My fuzzy and shocked mind were scrambling to find words to express itself, as Karen removed the used diaper from under me and put a new one it its place. “Oh don’t worry, Baby. You Mommy is in the kitchen watching Jack and getting you Din-Din ready.” She closed the fresh diaper around my waist and snapped the crotch of my onesie back up. “You wanna go find her!?” She asked excited, reaching out and allowing me to grab her hand and pull myself out of bed and onto the floor as we made our way out the room and into the hallway, heading for the kitchen. In the kitchen we found Granny with Jack hanging on her hip as she bounced him up and down, making funny sounds and making him laugh out loud. Mommy was just finishing setting the table for breakfast, as she turned and saw us. “Oh good morning, my sweet darling. Did you have a good sleepy?” She approached and hugged me tightly, before guiding me towards the table. “You slept like a stone I can tell you.” “He slept like a real BABY, I’ll let you know. His diaper was soaked. But no mess.” Karen noted, while taking Jack from Granny and sitting down with him in her lap at the table. “Oh, no messy diapi last night?” Mom questioned while tying a bib around my neck. “Nope. Not even a little. You’re in for a treat later, I’m sure.” Karen chuckled, as she got started feeding Jack another glass for unknown mush. “I hope you’re not constipated.” She started rubbing my stomach through the onesie. “Is your tummy okay?” She didn’t really expect and answer that was clear, as she popped the lid off of several jars of mush and started shoveling it into my mouth, barely giving me time to breath between spoons. It didn’t take long for Mom to empty several jars of baby food into my mouth, allowing me to wash it all down with two large sippy cups of ice cold milk. When all that was left on the table were 5 empty jars Mommy finally put the plastic spoon away and gave me a chance to catch my breath. My tummy felt ready to burst and I feared that my bloated stomach would tear the tapes of my nappy. “Has he still not messed himself.” Granny entered the room, she had left at one point during my feeding to get changed for the day and she now returned to the kitchen wearing her hair in a tight bun, a form fitting black dress and a white pearl necklace. She looked extremely stylish and elegant for a woman her age. “No, nothing yet and he usually makes his morning messies while eating.” Mom gave me a concerned look and once again placed a hand on my tummy and rubbed it through the fabric of my onesie. “He must be constipated, let Granny take care of that.” Simone started going through the different kitchen cabinets, pulling out several bottles. “Come on, Honey. Let’s go join Jack and Aunty in the living-room.” Mom took my handed and guided me out the kitchen, not allowing me to see the result of Grannies search. My tummy felt very tight and swollen as I waddled alongside Mom into the living-room. Mom took a seat on the edge of the couch and had me sit across the lap, as she once again placed her palm on my stomach and started rubbing it in circles. “Oh, Baby. You’re completely bloated.” She continued rubbing my sore gut, as the tightness in my lower abdomen only got worse. I couldn’t figure out why my tummy was suddenly hurting like that and all I wanted was to relieve the pressure building inside of me. “Here, give him to me, Susan.” Granny entered the room carrying a sippy cup of milk and headed straight for Mommy and me on the couch. “I got just what your big baby needs.” She took a seat next to Mom and used her free hand to guide me off Mommies lap and onto her own knee’s making me sit facing her and staring right into her eyes. “Here, Patrick. Drink this for Granny.” She handed me the sippy cup which I gladly accepted and stuck the nozzle into my mouth. To my surprise the milk that started flowing down my throat wasn’t cold but rather lukewarm and had a rather stranger aftertaste. After gulping down a couple large sips, I removed the nozzle from between my lips. “This taste funny.” “Ah,ah,ah.” Granny were quick to respond, guiding the nozzle back into my mouth. “You drink it all for Granny, it will make you feel all better.” “Patrick, Honey. Drink it all for Granny Simone. Show her what a big boy you are.” Mom encouraged me with a big smile. “I think that ship has sailed, a long time ago, Dear.” Granny quickly responded, while placing one hand on the bottom of the cup, pushing it upwards and forcing me to lean my head back and drink the weird tasting mixture at an even rapider pace. Finally, the last drop of “milk” entered and ran down my throat as I swallowed hard, trying to get rid of the bad aftertaste my “morning drink” had brought with it. I made several weird faces, like someone who just sucked on a lemon, as Granny took the cup away from me and handed it to Mommy, who proceeded to put her nose to the nozzle and take a deep breath, before flinching. “Oh my! Mother, what did you put in his zippy cup and why is it warm.” Granny who had now started bouncing me up and down on her knee’s, to the best of her ability slowly turned her head towards her daughter. “Oh, don’t worry Susan. I simply warmed some of his milk and added a double shot of castor oil. That’ll get his bowels working in no time and should loosen up whatever is backing him up.” She continued bouncing her knee’s. “Go on. Come on. Ya, there we go. Show Granny what a big baby you are.” She encouraged, while bouncing her knee’s even harder, almost stomping her foot into the floor with every bounce. I felt my stomach twist and turn, my bowels tying knots on itself, as light sharp cramps started shooting through my body. “Pleeeeaaaaasseeeeeee, Granny. I don’t feel good.” I cried out, clutching my gut. “Sssshhhh,sh,sh. There will be no crying here.” She hushed, while producing a light blue dummy, which she placed between my lips, shutting down my plead for help or relief. Trying to take my mind of the terrible and uncomfortable situation that I found myself in, I started staring around the room, not wanting to keep eye contact with Simone and I soon spotted Jack crawling towards us, before grabbing a hold the couch with one hand and awkwardly pulling himself to his feet, while offering me his teddy bear rattle that he had been clutching in his other hand. “Oh, Jackie! What are good boy you are, trying to comfort your cousin!” Karen applauded her son. “Say thank you, Sweetie.” Mom instructed, clearly expecting me to accept the offering made by Jack. “Fank ou, Tjak!” I managed to mumble around the nipple of my dummy, as I awkwardly accepted the infantile toy, right before Jack let go of the couch and plopped onto his diapered bottom and let out a loud laugh. The rumbling coming from my stomach, was enough to drown out the rattling coming from my new toy, as the cramps and shooting pain intensified and was only reinforced by the constant bouncing from Grannies knee’s. “It won’t be long now.” Granny proclaimed, as she ran her fingers across my bib that I was still wearing from breakfast. “Mommy’s boy, huh?” She read the text on the bib out loud. “You wanna prove that you’re also Grannies big baby? Go ahead. Show Granny how much of a baby you are and make a big messy poopoo in your nappy. Come on, go poopoo for Granny.” I didn’t want to mess myself right then and there, sitting on my grandmother’s knee with most of the family watching me intensely. The last time she saw me, I had just gotten my degree and was ready to start the next chapter of my life, be on my own, start a career and maybe even a family. Find a wife and have children of my own. Then she was expecting me to make a her a Great Grandmother within few years. But now, now she expected me to mess myself while bouncing up and down on her knee’ sucking my pacifier and shaking a teddy bear rattle. If I had a choice, I would have jumped off her knee and made it clear that I did not feel comfortable sitting on her knee’s at my age. But as I felt my bladder let go and warm urine soak into the front of my diaper, it became clear that my age was not the one that I thought it was. As I soaked my diaper right then and there, it didn’t seem so unnatural for me to be in that exact position and as I felt a sharp cramp shoot through my lower abdomen, I knew the battle was lost and I was about to give Granny her wish and show her that I was nothing but a “Big MESSY BABY”. “There he goes!” Granny proclaimed loudly, as my bowels finally relaxed and a avalanche of warm runny poo into the back of my diaper and as Granny continued to bounce me up and down, it seemed that there were no end in sight, as the mess spread up the back of my diaper and in between my thighs, mixing with the warm urine already soaked up by my protective padding. “Oh my goodness. You’re a real poo factory, aren’t!?” Granny remarked with a chuckle, as I continued to mess myself right then and there on her knee. I didn’t even bother to care about her taunting remark. The pure joy and relief of finally emptying my sore tummy was all that mattered to me at that moment. The world around me had disappeared, as I entered a state of pure bliss finally feeling empty and relaxed again. I let out a loud chuckle, letting my pacifier drop my mouth, followed by a string of drool that rolled down my jaw and onto my bib, as I shook MY teddy rattle in excitement and happiness. I finished off by letting out a huge runny fart, that caused the whole room to chuckle, before finally opening my eyes, returning to the real world once again and finding myself staring right into the eyes of Granny Simone. “There we go. That’s Grannies big messy, messy, MESSY baby.” She whispered, stopping the bouncing movement, finally letting me settle down on her knee’s in my RUINED diaper. “Well. My work here is done; I’ll leave the clean up to you.” She turned and addressed Mommy, motioning for her to take me away. “Of course, Mother. Thank you so much.” Mom reacted without hesitation, grabbing both my hands and guiding me off Grannies knee’s, before she started leading me out the room. “Say thank you to Granny.” She instructed just as we reached the door. I felt a single tear run down my cheek, having come to term with the humiliation I just had to go through, as I turned my head. “Tha-nk. You. Gran.ny Sim.mone.” I mumbled, before Mom dragged me out the room and towards the bathroom for a clean-up and a nice long bubble bath.

Chapter 30: Both Mommy and Aunty Karen opened their separate doors and exited the car, leaving me and Jack alone in the backseat. “There are my girls!” a familiar voice rang out. I was still sunk into my seat, trying to hide my mess and shame and didn’t dare to look out the window, but I could hear some faint distinct chatter going on, before my side door suddenly swung open. “OH MY GOD! What have happened here!?” Mom’s eyes damn near jumped out of her head as she opened the door and got a good look at the mess I had made of myself. “Oh, Honey! Your clothes are all ruined, what a mess you’ve made!” She stopped for a taking, sniffing the air a couple of times, as the reality of my situation really hit her- “And it doesn’t smell like its only on the outside you’ve made a messy.” “What are you talking about, Susan? Let me have a loo-OH MY GOODNESS!” My face turned fire-red as my Grandmother Simone almost pushed my Mom out of the way and stuck her head through the open car door and spotted me in all my messy glory. “That’s a messy diaper boy, if I ever saw one. We need to get you cleaned up ASAP!” She quickly undid my seatbelt and pulled me out of the car. “Oh! And you even made a mess of Aunty Karen’s car seats! What a naughty MESSY baby you are.” I stood on the gravel that littered the driveway leading up to Granny’s house. The last rays of the afternoon sun were shining down, as I heard the car trunk open. “Susan! Fetch me this once Nappybag and I’ll get him cleaned up.” Mommy soon came around the car, holding my diaper bag in one hand. “Oh Mother, I’m not so sure. Wouldn’t you rather have me do it?” She questioned, but was quickly cut off. “Nonsense! You two get the car unpacked and get Jackie inside. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of this naughty, messy, messy, MESSY diaper boy!” Granny quickly snatched the diaper bag out of Mom’s hand and with her other hand grabbed me tightly by the wrist and started dragging me towards the house. “Are you sure, Mother!?” Mom yelled across the driveway, as Granny already had me dragged halfway towards the house. “Just empty the car!” She yelled back, as we reached the front door and entered. Granny Simone quickly dragged me through the house. Her and my late grandfather had done well for themselves, so this was a huge house almost on the verge of being a mansion. Grabbing an even tighter hold of my wrist, she walked with determined steps through the house, dragging me behind her as I fought to keep pace. The heavy lump in the back and the swollen state of my diaper, made it almost impossible to walk straight and I found myself waddling heavy, almost losing my balance and crashing onto my face several times, as Simone dragged me through the house. Finally, we reached the bathroom, where she pushed the door wide open and thankfully released her tight grip from my poor bruised wrist. “These needs to go straight in the washer.” She exclaimed releasing the buttons on my shortalls making them drop to the floor, leaving me in only my onesie, bib and VERY used diaper. “You’ve made a terrible mess of yourself, young man. What a naughty boy.” She unzipped my diaperbag and started producing everything needed to clean me up, quickly unfolding the changing mat onto the cold tile floor. “Down you go!” It didn’t take more than a light push to send me off balance and make me fall backwards onto the changing mat, landing with a SPLAT on my diapered butt as I felt the mess inside splatter everywhere. With several quick “POPS” she soon had the crotch of my onesie unsnapped and pulled it over my head, tossing it aside leaving me sitting only in my soiled diaper. “Lay back!” she commanded placing her palm on my chest forcing me backwards onto the changing mat. “Granny PLEASE! I can do it myself!” I pleaded, not really feeling comfortable with having a person I didn’t see that often and who I still felt rather awkward being around in my diapered state, see me completely naked and helpless. “Nonsense! If you’re not even able to keep your pampers clean. Then you’re certainly not able to change them yourself and judging by the mess you’ve made of your nappy, you’re also in no position to argue your case. Now be quiet young man and let Granny do her job.” Her tone was rather harsh and commanding. Granny Simone was old school and expected to me heard and respected. “But Granny, PLLEEEAAAASSEEEE!!!” Tears started forming in my eyes, as I pleaded one last time, only for a pacifier to be shoved in between my lips, shutting me up instantly. “HUSH NOW, BABY. No another word.” I heard the tapes of my diaper being ripped open and the front folded down, as the terrible stench of my mess hit the air. “My goodness! You really are, a messy, MESSY BABY!” My battle was lost and my humiliation complete, as Granny commented on my messy state and started getting me cleaned up, while I was left suckling on my dummy trying to keep myself calm and avoid having a complete mental breakdown. “BUM UP!” She ordered as the soiled diaper was removed from underneath me and replaced with a fresh one. Granny made sure to go heavy on the babypowder covering my whole crotch before finally pulling the new diaper up between my legs and taping it tight around my waist covering up my “mandhood” if you could even call it that anymore. “All done.” She proclaimed, grabbing me by the hands and helping me back to my feet. “Now go see if your Mommy or Aunty need any help, while I get everything cleaned up.” I looked at her for a few seconds. “Buft, Granny. Wha abo Clots!?” I managed to mumbled around the shield of my pacifier. “You’ve made such a mess of your pretty onesie and shorts, that they are no good. So until your Mom finds you something else to wear, you’ll have to make do without. Now go, see if your diaper butt, can help them if anything.” Her strict tone made it clear that there was no arguing, I didn’t like the idea of walking around only wearing my diaper, but I also feared the consequences of arguing with Simone. In the short time since she arrived, she had made it very clear that in her house, she was the boss. Even Mom and Karen seemed to understand and respect that and in my current situation, it seemed like I had no choice but to do the same. So wearing only a fresh white diaper, I made my way out the bathroom and through the house, looking for Mom, Karen and Jack to offer my help. I found all three of them in the living room, most of our bags scattered all around the floor. Karen had been quick to get some of Jack’s toys unpacked and he was now having a blast playing on the floor with his different cars and trucks. “Oh look, who’s wearing a fresh clean diapy!” Karen announced as I entered the room. “Look like Granny Simone still got that magic touch.” She continued. I slowly waddled my way across the room, approaching Mommy. “Mom…. Could you please find me some cloth to wear?” I mumbled around my dummy. “In a bit, Baby. I just need to get our stuff unpacked, you’re fine in just your diaper for now. Why don’t you go play with Jack, while me and Karen get everything unpacked and put away?” I had no fight left in me at the moment and simply accepted my fate, dropping to my knee’s before crawling across the floor to join Jack in driving the toys cars around and smashing them into each other. While me and Jack got caught up in our game of car crash, the adult got busy putting all our bags away and getting everything unpacked, before sitting down with a cup of coffee to catch up and talk about how the trip down had gone. Jack and me were having a great old time, making the toy cars race across the floor, trying to avoid each other, but sometimes purposely crashing into one another just for the fun of it. We were crawling all across the living room, both on our hands and knee’s diaper bums in the air, but Jack’s much less exposed than mine, as he was still wearing cloth, while my thick padding was completely unexposed for the whole world to see. Having chased Jack and his car all over the living room floor for an eternity I needed to catch my breath and let myself plop from my knees and onto my padded but and felt the unmistakable feeling of a soggy diaper squash beneath my weight. Upon looking down the diaper clearly appeared used and soggy, having changed from its fresh white color to a darker yellow. But I did not care, breathing heavily and feeling very dry in my mouth, I looked in the direction of Mommy. “Thirsty!” I mumbled around the shield of my dummy, trying to catch the attention of the adults. “Mom! I’m Tirsti!” I tried yelling louder around the nipple of my dummy and this time got the attention of all three adult on the couch, who stopped their conversation mid-sentence and all turned their attention towards me and Jack on the floor. “Hold your horses Mr. Potty pants, I’ll go grab you some nice cold juicy” Aunty Karen reacted swiftly to my yelling, getting off the couch and headed for the kitchen. “Oh my goodness. He’s already gone potty again!” Granny remarked as she spotted the dark yellow diaper between my thighs. “Not to worry, Mother.” Mom remarked getting off the couch and walking towards me, before squatting down and poking the front of my diaper with two fingers. “His nappies are for heavy wetting, this one can take a lot more before he needs a change.” She stood back up and headed back to the couch. “As long as you are sure. Can’t having him leaking all over my floor or furniture.” Granny remarked before taking a zip of her coffee. Karen soon returned from the kitchen with a baba for Jack in one hand and a sippy cup for me in the other. Jack was quick to grab a firm hold of his bottle with both hands, as Karen handed it to him, placing his lips around the nipple and sucking away at the sweet juice. I too felt rather dehydrated and wasted no time, almost ripping the cup from Karen’s hands and showing the spout into my mouth, throwing my head back in the process to drain as much juice as possible in one big gulp. Of course this was bound to go wrong, as the juice exited the nozzle faster than I could swallow and soon my mouth was overflowing with the sugary sweet nectar and started drippling down my checks and onto my bare naked chest. “OH NO YOU DON’T!” The cup was suddenly ripped from my grasp, as Granny swooped in with a wet wipe, stopping the juice from spilling from between my lips and onto the floor. “You sure are a messy boy!” She removed the cup from my hands and continued to wipe my chest and face. “Susan, go grab a bib for this one.” Granny commanded and Mom obeyed without question, quickly exiting the room and returning with a bib in hand, that she handed to Granny who expertly tied in tight around my neck partially covering my naked chest. She held the cup up in the air. “You managed to drink or should I say spill almost half of it, you naughty boy. Please be careful and try to take after your cousin Jack. Look he hasn’t spilled a drop yet!” She gestured towards Jack, who was happily sucking away at his bottle, not giving us a second thought. “Yeah, but, but he also got a bottle. That’s much easier.” I argued, while reaching out trying to snatch the bottle from Grannies hands. “Maybe you two should trade, seeing you seem to have a harder time, than your cousin.” She answered back, right before I managed to snatch the cup from her hand, letting out a loud “NO!” in the process. Annoyed by Grannies comments, I aggressively once again placed the nozzle between my lips and started gulping down the remaining juice, of course to the same result luckily this time my bib was there to catch the spillage, as I downed the last drops of sweet nectar. “All gone.” Granny announced once again taking the cup away, before using the bib to wipe the droplets from my cheeks and jaw. Jack had also managed to finish his drink, as Granny got up from her knees and took both our cups back to the kitchen. It didn’t take long for Jack and I to get back into our game of car racing and soon we found ourselves back on our imaginary racetrack, as the cars flew across the living-room floor. Dinner that night went without much fuzz. Jack was fed while sitting on Karen’s knee at the dining table, while I luckily was allowed my own chair, as Mom fed me the same unknown mush that Jack was also being fed right next to me. Granny didn’t say much during the whole dinner, sitting across from us at the table she simply stayed silent, taking small bites of food, while staring at both Mommy and Aunty Karen as they played racecar, airplane and cargo ship with our plastic spoons, trying to make as much mush as possible land and stay in our mouths, which of course was easier said than done. When the jars of babyfood were empty, I decided that in the battle of keeping yourself clean during dinner, tonight me and Jack had fought to a draw. Both of faces, fingers and bibs were splattered with sticky mush, which our Mommies soon had cleaned up using several wipes. As the last chunks of food was wiped from my jaw I locked eyes with Granny at the other side of the table. Her stare was firm, but somehow caring. After dinner we were allowed some more playtime, while the adult watched TV until Mom announced that it was time for beddy-bye, proclaiming both her and Karen were tired from the long ride so they would also be heading to bed early today. We all retreated towards the bedrooms, as Granny led the way down the hallway. Reaching one door she pushed it open proclaiming this to belong to Jack and Karen. All their stuff were scattered around the room, which was mostly occupied by a large queen-size bed. At the end of the bed Jack’s travel bed had been unfolded and placed. They said their goodnight and headed inside closing the door behind them, as Granny led me and Mom to our room. My confusion were obvious as Granny announced that this was “our room” as she pushed open the next door, revealing a similar bedroom with all our belongings inside, but once again with only one queen-size bed. “But? BUT, where will I be sleeping!?” I questioned loudly. “You’ll be cuddling with me tonight, Honey. Granny only got to bedrooms, so we’ll share.” “But, but.” I couldn’t come up with anything at the moment and I soon found myself dragged into the bedroom, as Granny and Mommy said their goodnight and the door were closed behind me. Mom soon had my changing mat spread out on the bed. As she started unpacking her tools from my diaperbag, I desperately tried coming up with some argument for why I shouldn’t be sharing a bed with my Mommy for the night. I was an adult for god sake! “Mommy, can’t I just sleep on the floor. We can’t sleep together, there is no room. I’m too old for this. We can’t fit!” My pleads went for deaf ears, as I was guided down onto the changing mat and my soaking wet diaper ripped open. “Don’t get fuzzy now baby.” She quickly placed a pacifier between my lips silencing me, while she finished putting a fresh new diaper around my waist. Afterwards a clean babyblue onesie was pulled over my head and snapped tightly between my thighs. “Okay, baby. Mommy is going to get you tucked in and then changed herself.” She removed the changing mat from the bed and pulled the sheets away, directing me to lay down and she tucked me in tight, wrapping she sheets around my body almost locking me in place with my arms under the sheets. I continue to suckle away at my dummy having accepted my fate, as she placed a light kiss on my forehead, before walking across the room and started to undress. I didn’t have any intention of seeing my Mommy. Uhm Mother!? Seminude so I simply tried staring into the empty ceiling, but finding myself missing my mobile to focus on and distract me. I couldn’t avoid catching small glimpses of Mommy in her bra and panties, before she slipped a white silk nightdress over her head and made her way back to the bed. She slowly crawled under her own blankets and carefully scooted closer to me, placing one arm under my head and gently drew my head into her bosom. As I suckled away at my dummy, she started rocking back and forth carefully, while turning off the nightlight with her other hand. Laying there in complete darkness, I could feel Mommy rocking back and forth really slowly, as my ear were pressed against her chest and I could her the slow beat of her heart. My eyes started getting heavy, as Mommy started humming a sweet lullaby. Almost to the beat of her heart. My eyes closed, my mind went blurry and soon everything went blank.

I definitely agree with Joyce's adrenaline-induced panic, though what might vary is how quickly she can escape the heat of the moment, at least temporarily. I won't try to comment on it too much though, in hopes that the chapter can do most of the talking for itself. Uh-oh. Am I mis-remembering my own writing? The only time I can think of her doing that was when she was sick, or there may have been a night while sleeping with Joyce? I remember the situation though being a conscious (albeit sleepy) choice on her part. So if all my ducks are in a row...no accidents caused by drinking...yet? Extra packing certainly means the possibility for it. But above all else, I think it's just a testament to how "Mommy-mode" Joyce can be. After all, if she were on diaper duty I can't imagine she'd leave Emily hanging without a few extra changes? Decent people indeed! Taking the average of her new acquaintances. Rebecca I think will be a fun character, and without giving much away, she's part of the breadcrumb trail I've been piecing together. Hopefully I can close in on that soon. Uh-oh. Stranger danger. Unfortunately, I don't know if this universe has the sort of ideal kidnappers like that...Only the more malicious kind, I'd imagine. I'm sure they do exist out there though? Another story for another time! Temper tantrum Emily. A fearsome foe indeed. Though, I can say with confidence that we have yet to see her wrath. Who knows if it'll ever come? As soon as the adjective "Amazonian" or "little" was used, clearly. Every ABDL story is either a Diaper Dimension story or one that has yet to become one. (It's not though. Not this one. So the rule of thumb was a lie, I guess...) Possibly? I don't think you'll find any sort of set-in-stone gimmie that'd allude to that sort of thing. Thinking off the top of my head, the closest I've gotten to references/easter eggs in this story have been two subtle call-backs to two other stories I've had on a different forum. One is slightly more tangible than the other though, but they're just tiny little things that are probably close enough to just be an inside joke. Thank you very much! Since I'm guilty of leaving such large gaps between releases, hearing things like this means a lot to me. 35 - Little Miss Summers A bell? A tracking chip? Abandon all the fantasies and just use a child leash as she jokingly intended? A flurry of thoughts raced through her mind. She barely even stopped for the many faces that tried to steal her attention as she left the dance hall. Up until then it had been such an excruciating balance of maintaining her persona while trying to stuff away the sheer panic of trying to find her little girl the entire time! She’d been having the occasional drink just to portray the image that she was socializing and mingling, yet none of the alcohol in her system seemed to do anything to calm her nerves. She would have normally been a slight bit buzzed by now after all the refills she’d had, yet there was none of that. A mere pittance of water scarcely did anything to stop a raging fire. She wasn’t mad, she was simply anxious and worried. How couldn’t she be? She’d convinced her number one responsibility to embark with her on a gauntlet of social intimidation. She promised her number one responsibility that she would care for her every step of the way. She promised her number one responsibility that she’d keep a close watch on her all night, implying that their hands would never leave each other. Did Emily wander off on her own? When did she even leave the party? What if she’d been gone somewhere else the entire night and it was only by chance that she was found in the lobby? The long elevator ride in isolation gave her time to silently reflect on all the absolutely horrible, terrible possibilities that offered so little excuses for Joyce’s actions and inability. Her four faint reflections on every wall shared in the madness as she ran a hand through her hair. Why did this bother her so much? Emily is an adult. She was, she knew that… But in her heart, much like her failed promises tonight, they were only words. Every time Joyce told herself that she’d do better, it only seemed to hurt that much more when she inevitably went back on it by somehow messing up, if not worse, just as horribly… Had she been too lenient? She knew Emily wasn’t holding her hand at the banquet table...She made the conscious decision to let her roam close by. She decided herself to take her attention off her for just a measly minute…! It was the strangest battle Joyce had seemed to encounter in her mind. For once, if for what felt like a rational moment, was the side of herself that chose to believe in Emily as an adult and her girlfriend...wrong? The Mommy in her never would have let Emily stray no more than an inch. The Mommy in her would have kept a firm hold on her hand. The Mommy in her would have made her keep her phone so she could reach her if need be! She didn’t even have a room key to get back to the room if she wanted! But...that was so Emily would stay nearby, but… An audible groan of frustration left her lips as Joyce seemed to be splitting hairs. It was all so...confusing. So tiring… At every turn when she even began to think of Emily as somehow liable, it only routed back to her own incompetence. Emily’s going to do unpredictable things. The unexpected is going to happen. It’s my job to expect these things, and it’s my job to keep a hold on her… All the steam leaving her ears from tired and strained thought made the lobby feel like a shivering draft in comparison once the doors finally opened. Of course, the water fountain and glass windows may have affected that as well, somewhat. She was about to become manic when her eyes couldn’t immediately find Emily. Now not having to deal with the business dinner and its patrons, she was ready to storm the front desk immediately and demand a building-wide search. But thankfully it did not come to that. “Ms. Summers!” A distant call echoed across the marbled floor through the gushing water fountain. Joyce spun her head and briskly walked around the fountain. It was indescribable once she saw her. A thousand little knots that cascaded from her mind to her heart and stomach all seemed to loosen without friction and drown herself in relief. She half-ran as best as her heels allowed over to the pair. The words she’d say didn’t even come to mind as the distance closed. It was a bit sad to say, but Sheila had only just started to become more than an afterthought. After the phone call all she could seem to register was that Emily had been found. It didn’t matter who did it because the ends certainly justified the means, which is why she couldn’t have cared less about what those means were. “Emily?” Joyce raised the pitch of her voice as the tone softened into a delicate comfort. All the inner rage and confusion had all been swept aside so easily. Seeing the one she loved the most had so profoundly shut down anything in her mind that could have been toxic to her little girl. She didn’t see her girlfriend in that split second. She saw what validated all the things in her warped, yet honest mind. “I think she’s asleep right now...” Sheila explained in a lowered voice, still dealing with Emily’s head resting on her shoulder. Though, the tone of her voice still implied the slight awkward out-of-place feeling she had. She was used to working with one person only, not physically dealing with their companions, too. And make no mistake in assuming that Joyce wasn’t acutely aware of their postures. Emily was indeed asleep on Sheila’s shoulder. Another person’s shoulder, and not Joyce’s. But even for her that was being irrational. She killed the unhinged jealousy with swiftness and stayed focused. Sheila had undoubtedly been a godsend. Yet with the last of her tunnel vision she came forward until a mere foot’s length kept both groups apart, to which Joyce bent over just to ensure that she was there in the flesh. Sheila continued to watch, or seem like she wasn’t as her boss so brazenly kissed her companion squarely on the forehead. While it did come off as intimate, though. Parental…? “Thank you...” Joyce sighed, finding with each second she could see Emily right in front of her that all was right again. Could this be used as justification for a bonus? It was too rare to be called commonplace, which is why a unicorn was likely prancing around in Sheila’s head right then. Already a few years she had given to this woman, Joyce Summers, and the anomaly that’d been puppeting her for the past chunk of time was right before her. Being in such an informal situation after a night of dining with her boyfriend and returning to a luxurious hotel; it was the perfect combination to make even Sheila’s tight-lipped nature crack in just the slightest. She was teeming with curiosity. “Ms. Summers...Is this your friend?” An unprovoked question from Sheila was unusual, enough for Joyce to recognize that despite the heat of the moment. But beyond that, a question was a question. “Yes...but also my...girlfriend.” Sheila apart from Emily was her closest confidant. Stating something like that to someone she trusted every ounce of the inner workings of her career with could make even the mighty Joyce stumble, even if just a little. Sheila only nodded as she glanced back down at the girl against her shoulder. Girlfriend. It was embarrassing to admit, yet Sheila hadn’t completely considered it. Well, maybe a little, but not a girl as a lover. Had her pride as the all-knowing been hurt? Nevertheless, the small number of threads left unaccounted for in her head were already beginning to weave… Finally, enough of her adrenaline had been spent for there to be room for rationality and self-awareness. “Wait, where’s your boyfriend?” Joyce asked as she glanced from shoulder to shoulder. “He’s...” Sheila started to say, though for some reason she started to pick up on the sleeping girl’s breathing right beside her. “Waiting for me upstairs. I wanted to help Emily before I went up, though I didn’t know who she was before...” “Thank you again, Sheila...so much.” Joyce repeated as she sat on the other end of the bench, wasting no time in the delicate shift of Emily’s head from Sheila’s shoulder to hers. Alcohol. She certainly smelled of it. Why had she been drinking? Joyce knew she was feeling anxious about tonight, but she also knew there wouldn’t be a snowball’s chance in hell that she’d drink on her own. “I’m so sorry to hold you up like this; I went and lost her at the dinner and have been looking for her since...” “Ms. Summers, it’s no issue at all,” Sheila said quite candidly. After all, she’d been so gracious as to pay for her hotel room. To Sheila in her own exaggerated mind, that warranted at least her life in return. “How long have you two been at the party?” She asked in a somewhat informal way. “If I remember, they tend to go on for a while...” “A few hours...” Joyce answered with a sorrowful look. It was only in retrospect now that time seemed like a factor for anything. Of course Emily was out cold. Even if the alcohol wasn’t part of the equation, she knew she would have been dealing with a sleepy girl by now. “They always start late and end late...” She sighed as she stroked the top of Emily’s head. “Any other normal night and she’d be in bed by now...” And needless to say, bed was where she was headed next. “Were you able to meet with all the people you wanted to?” Sheila asked. As much as her boss disliked these events, their importance couldn’t be ignored. Networking was always the hidden objective, yet always the most important. “Y...not completely.” Joyce came to admit. She nearly put on airs as she looked down at Emily but slowly stopped herself once she remembered that it was only her secretary listening. “I may have been a little...dismissive. I’ve been looking for Emily all night...” She rested her cheek on the top of Emily’s head. “Thank you for helping me with my computers, by the way. That software works very well.” “Of course.” Sheila responded simply, though couldn’t help but glance at Emily, starting to re-interpret the original reason her boss had given her for it… What’s more, the party still had a little bit longer to go, yet Joyce wouldn’t be in attendance for it. Obviously not when she needed to put a certain somebody to bed. “Uhm...Ms. Summers?” Sheila politely interrupted her thoughts, getting Joyce to look over. “If you’d like, I can take Emily back to your room for you? So you can go back to the party?” The look of remorse on Joyce’s face was near immediate. “Sheila, you’re here with your boyfriend, I couldn’t do that to you...” “It’s no issue,” Sheila shook her head. “I can tell Greg that you had something important come up. He’ll understand. Work comes first, Ms. Summers.” As headstrong as Joyce could be around Sheila in spite of her own dutiful stubbornness, it suddenly felt like something exploitative was between them now. Something Sheila was using to her full advantage. “You still need to speak to some people, don’t you?” Sheila doubled down. “If it’s for the sake of the company, you can’t skip out early on these sorts of things, Ms. Summers...” “I know, I know...” Joyce reluctantly sighed. Sheila tended to be right about these things. Always about these things. Yet unfortunately, drunk little girls past their bedtimes aren’t exactly known for getting themselves to bed on their own. By the time she gets Emily settled down in her pajamas, the last thing she’d want to do is leave her… It was undoubtedly a wonderful thing to stress over the woes of being a doting mommy, yet also a slightly inconvenient thing at times… “Ms. Summers,” Sheila said clearly once more, “Please let me do this for you? You’ve already given me and my boyfriend a wonderful night. This is the least I could do for you?” “This isn’t a work-related issue though, Sheila...” Joyce tried to reason. “It isn’t?” Sheila contradicted. “Ms. Summers, if Emily is taken care of, that gives you the time to go back to the party, doesn’t it?” Maybe Sheila was off the rails for being so forward, yet as the synapses in her mind sparked, she felt more daring to assume what she had been hypothesizing from the start. “If her well-being affects your mood and performance at the office, I’d say that this is work-related.” Of course, she wasn’t looking to become another person’s secretary, however. “I mean to say that if I have the opportunity to help you, Ms. Summers, I’ll choose to.” Joyce wore a contemplative look as she fussed over the details in her mind. Obviously Sheila could be trusted, but...what if something went wrong? What if Emily woke up and wanted Joyce, but instead found some stranger in the hotel room? What if something went wrong and Joyce had to come back anyway? She packed pajamas, but what if Sheila accidentally picked the wrong ones? Emily always likes the silk pair over the… Wait...what if Emily had a nightmare? No. Absolutely not. There were too many pitfalls, too many chances for failure. It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t reasonable. “Ms. Summers,” Sheila stared at her clearly. “I promise, Emily is in good hands.” She even smiled a small bit. In the back of her mind was a wild voice screaming cheers of eureka as her thesis had finally been proven; her research and discoveries hadn’t been for naught. The look on her face of deep, troubled thought was all too familiar. It was the same look she had whenever there was a bad day in the office, or when there was a seemingly “out of the blue” conversation she might have with her boss. The same atmosphere for when there was an inexplicably “off” mood her boss may have been having. It most certainly was the final piece that completed the full picture Sheila had come to have such an in-depth understanding of. Tonight she had begun to understand another integral part about her boss. If her work was her craft, she would say that she was determined to perfect it. As her eyes fell on Emily, she saw it as her determination to see Ms.Summer’s troubles and worries taken care of so that she could perform at her best. Besides, it was just taking her girlfriend back to the hotel room? Joyce was quiet for only a moment longer as she exhaled all her hesitations and sat up straight. Maybe she was being silly. She was extremely reluctant to ever delegate things as important as this to anyone. No, not even that. This’d be the first of its kind. At almost any other time she would say no. Yet it was Sheila who was offering, who had already done so much for the two without a single question already… “Okay...” Joyce sighed as she handed her room key to Sheila who accepted without a single remark, only with her typical dutiful look. “It’s not a lot, but just make sure you do a couple things when you get her back to the hotel room, okay? As long as you don’t mind...” “Of course not, Ms. Summers.” Sheila nodded. After all, she’d helped her boyfriend after a rough night in bed before. Strip them and send them off. “Then, as long as you don’t mind, just a couple things… If you could get her undressed once you get back to the bedroom. Just leave her dress hanging on something and I’ll take care of it in the morning. I left her pajamas in the top right drawer of the dresser; she gets stuffy in the other set, so make sure she gets the silk pair. I think she left her phone on the bed at some point, so if you could find it and leave it on the nightstand in case she wants to call me… Oh, and make sure she gets Pip--her...it’s a gift I gave her. A stuffed toy sort of thing. She...likes having it with her in our bed. I...I think that’s everything.” A small smile crept on her face as the words seemed to flow right out of her. “Thank you again, Sheila, I really appreciate this.” There was a moment of pause from Sheila’s end, seemingly overloaded by the long-winded explanation, yet her boss smiled so simply as if it were all second nature. “U...” She cleared her throat. “Understood. I’ll make sure she gets everything she needs.” Sheila couldn’t help but wonder, how high maintenance was this girl? “I’ll be waiting to let you back in your room.” “Thank you, Sheila. Truly.” Joyce gave her a look of complete gratitude before her eyes focused back on Emily. “Would you be able to give me just a minute though? It’d give you time to explain to your boyfriend how I’m tying you up...” She said apologetically. “It’s no issue at all,” Sheila said once more as she stood from the bench. Joyce watched as she strolled to the other end of the lobby before turning back. “Emily...” Joyce softly coaxed as she rocked her shoulder. Maybe the rhythm in her breath had changed, but still asleep. “Emily...” She raised her voice a little, clearly having to fight more than just tiredness this time around. A frustrated groan left her mouth as she started to move her head. Once her eyes opened they squinted into paper-thin slits, assaulted by the blinding light from above. “Come on, babygirl, time to wake up. You can’t sleep here.” “Joyce…?” Emily asked lazily, groping the body right next to her. It did feel like her… “Joyce…!” “Yes, hello to you too,” Joyce kissed her on the forehead. She was all smiles and relieved to be reunited, but that didn’t mean all was forgiven. “Can you tell me why I found you all the way down here? Why weren’t you at the party where I’ve been looking for you all night?” Joyce started the unfair sport as the girl with dwindled energy was still expected to play. “I did wait…!” Emily started to raise her voice with a tired whine. She answered to the sentence she heard in her mind, extrapolated and re-interpreted from the chunks she was actually picking up on. “I sat with Hank and Rebecca all night…!” “Who are Hank and Rebecca?” Joyce asked rightfully so. Did she meet people at the business dinner? Did they take her out somewhere drinking? She could already feel the sense of anger; running off with her special girl after being expressly told to stay where she could be seen. The simple follow-up was a level too critical for Emily’s impaired mind to process. “I...I dunno...rich people?” She whimpered as she tried opening her eyes yet again, yet found so much more solace in hiding them in the dark of Joyce’s side. “Rebecca was a bitch...” Somehow that came out clearly despite the mumbling. Joyce normally would have cracked a grin, yet she was still concerned. All was well in the end, but she still had yet to solve the crime and the motive. Just as much though, she also started to realize Emily was in no capacity to explain herself, much less tie her own shoes it felt like. There wasn’t much merit in a scolding if they weren’t going to truly understand it... She suspended the “talk” with a firm kiss on the forehead. “Emily? I still need to go back to the party to talk to some people. You know Sheila? My secretary, the one that called me on the phone for you?” “Mmhmm...” Emily mumbled with a small nod. It was obvious she wasn’t making the small connections yet, which is why Joyce didn’t spare the expense in spelling it out clearly. “Sheila’s going to take you back up to the room and get you in bed. I’ll be coming back later at night, okay?” “No.” “No?” Emily partly slumped as her head fell into Joyce’s lap and her arms around her waist. “No…!” Emily’s composure was slipping even further. She was exhausted and drunk and wanted nothing more than to go back and be in bed. But she wanted it with the bells and whistles too. She wanted Joyce with her. She’d become unmovable. Nothing else would make her cave. “Emily...” Joyce looked down at her sympathetically, but wasn’t feeling swayed. Sheila was right; a dinner like this was important. “You’re going to be asleep before you know it? I’m only going to be another hour or so--” “No!” She shouted into her dress. The explanation could have been anything and with as much fact and reason as Joyce would have liked. It still would not have mattered, simply because Emily was too far gone to process any of it. “I’ll...I’ll go with you--” She paused for a great, big yawn. Naturally the look was endearing. A stubborn girl who supposedly wasn’t ready for bed, yet everything but her attitude certainly was. “Weren’t you just asleep though? You just yawned, too? I should have said the party was going to run late, maybe then you wouldn’t have been so tired?” Maybe giving her an excuse could convince her... “I’m...” She liberally planted her hands on Joyce’s thighs as she propped herself up, squinting her glossy eyes as they begged to be closed once more. “I’m fine now...I can go too.” Joyce could feel an odd sense of deja vu. “No, sweetheart. Sheila’s going to take you back up to the room and get you in bed.” “I don’t need help...I just want you...” Emily selfishly said. It was all Joyce ever wanted to hear, and yet the timing couldn’t have been worse. While Joyce planned to tote Emily around from the start, seeing her in a state like this would only make her feel cruel. As childish as she was wonderfully being, there had to have been some adult left inside her tired mind to be reasoned with. “Tell you what,” Joyce caressed her cheek, “If you go back with Sheila to the room and get ready for bed, I promise, cross my heart and hope to die, there’ll be an amazingly delicious parfait waiting for you in the fridge tomorrow.” Maybe it was a cop-out bribing her like this, but she couldn’t stand to see her struggle any longer. “Already had one...” Emily mumbled. Well, so much for that. “We can go now...to the party.” She continued to use Joyce’s lap like an airstrip as she fully erected her torso by pushing off her. Just as she started to stand, the first wobble was evident and the prelude to something much more catastrophic. Before she could entirely slip and fall Joyce was already supporting her from behind. “Ah-ah, hang on there just a second,” Joyce said from behind, sitting her down gently back on the bench. “I just need a second to focus…” Emily whined as she rubbed her eyes. Joyce was on a knee now in front of her, trying to zero out the culprit. As light as Emily was, Joyce didn’t feel comfortable asking her secretary to carry someone else, assuming Sheila could even do it. So to spare anyone the complete awkwardness, Joyce carefully slipped a finger in the divot between Emily’s foot and heel, slipping it right off. A draft of air hit the bottom of her feet as Emily was a few seconds delayed in understanding what was happening. Nevertheless it was a refreshing feeling as the light bondage was removed. Joyce stood up with Emily’s heels hanging from one of her hands. “Okay, let’s try that again.” With an arm around Emily’s waist she rose once again, still leaning a bit for support, but able to walk again barefoot. “Better?” “The floor’s cold...” Emily pouted. “Well our suite has heated flooring, you know?” Joyce coaxed. “Come on, Sheila’s right over there, let’s go see her.” As they rounded the fountain, Sheila was off by the other end, seemingly admiring one of the large plants. Obviously more than a minute had passed, meaning she’d run out of meaningful things to do. Once she turned over and saw them approaching however she’d given the royal flora not a second longer. “Okay, Emily, Sheila’s going to take you back up to the room now,” Joyce explained patiently and softly. “Hi there, Emily,” Sheila gave a friendly smile like it was their first introduction. Though, if anyone had been paying attention thus far, one might notice that Ms. Summers got a ‘hello’, whereas Emily was just ‘hi’. Not that she wasn’t worthy of respect, yet even to Sheila, Emily’s very being seemed to dissolve formality. “H-...-i...” Her reply was so short but prolonged so greatly by her teary yawn. From Joyce’s perspective, it hit her like a sendoff to daycare or leaving her for the night with the babysitter, assuming toddlers wore heels as well. Then again, it’d just been determined Emily couldn’t be trusted in them... Joyce released her from her hold as Emily found her hand now in Sheila’s. She really couldn’t be trusted to walk on her own. “I promise I’ll be back soon, okay?” Joyce lowered her stance to reach her eyes head on. Emily gave her a dissatisfied nod. She’d already forgotten her resolve to remain, or discarded it like a fleeting thought. The squint in her eyes was more than just tiredness; mild dissatisfaction. She still wanted to go to the party with Joyce, whether she realistically could or not. But it was out of her hands, literally in Sheila’s. Joyce’s hands came down on Emily’s shoulders as her lips came up to her forehead. “I love you very much,” Joyce said. “Sleep well for me, got it?” “Love you tooh...” Maybe she was in over her head. Maybe some rest was the better option. Joyce soaked up as much of Emily’s appearance as she could. One last time she leaned in to give her a kiss on the cheek, but did say quietly, but loud enough for all three women to hear, “Be good for Sheila, okay?” Maybe it could be called unwarranted, but in the time she had known Emily, she wouldn’t put it past her to try at least something a little rebellious just to see her… Solo bedtimes had always been a struggle with her, after all. The previously called elevator finally opened up, signaling that it was time to part. Sheila in her moment alone must have glanced at the room number, because she brought Emily into the elevator with purpose as she pressed a corresponding button on the panel. “Bye!” Joyce stood there for as long as the doors stayed open, giving them a small wave from her hand just above her waist. Her send-off smile slumped away in the company of just herself. Of course she wanted to stay. She wanted to be the one to go back with Emily. She’d just gotten her back but had to willfully lose her again? It ached and made her heart throb, but the only treatment she could depend upon was her juggernaut of a secretary... The ascent was silent amongst the other two, be it that there may not have been a lot to talk about between a fully conscious secretary and her boss’ drunk and tired charge. That was Sheila’s frame of mind, at least. Girlfriend. Emily was Joyce’s girlfriend. It wasn’t difficult to see...but it may have been that Sheila saw more of something else. Maybe she just didn’t fully understand the scope of relationships. The soft tone she used, the doting attitude with a delicate touch and always observing her mannerisms and needs. Girlfriend, yes, but...maybe a different title felt more apt. Ms. Summers is a complete mommy. Yes. That seemed to be the easier end of the equation. “You work with Joyce...?” Emily surprisingly asked. She gathered that much even as tired as she was, but to what degree was still fuzzy for her. “Well, I...I don’t work with her, but I’d say that I work for her,” she calmly corrected, leaving the perfect slot of time a younger student might need to catch up with the rest. “I’m responsible for all of Ms.--...Joyce’s meetings and scheduling.” The calling of Ms. Summers by her first name felt odd in her mouth, like a foreign taste that simply felt wrong. A bland cracker just shy of stale. “That sounds nice...You must do a lot of work for her...” “Enough to keep me busy.” Sheila said back. Her other hand was holding Emily’s heels, keeping her arm bent at a 90 degree angle. It was held that way instead of just drooping by her side almost like a subconscious effort to remind herself of her duties. If energy needed to be spent doing something as obscure as holding up a pair of shoes, that naturally led to questions in the wandering mind which made it impossible to forget what the bigger picture really was. A fun tip she had learned from her work; leave yourself a trail of crumbs should you ever get lost along the way… Once the doors opened Sheila took the lead in stepping out into the hall. While glancing both ways for the right direction, Emily seemed to know as she started walking one way. Sheila gently pulled her back however. “Oops, I think it’s the other way...” She started leading them the other direction. Down the hall they went and Sheila carefully scanned the few passing rooms until the number on the door matched the number on the key. With a quick swipe a digital sound of victory played and they stepped inside. Sheila was in silent amazement by the sheer size of the suite. She had a general idea of what she’d be walking into, but seeing it in-person always had that profound sort of effect. “Okay...” Sheila said to herself quietly, summing all the items in her head that Ms. Summers had listed as careful instructions. “Bedtime...” She said once more, though she’d need a minute to get it all ready. “Emily?” She smiled for her attention, catching her head starting to bob every so often as her eyelids were drooping. “Hmm…?” Emily murmured back. “I’m just going to get what I need ready in the bedroom, okay? Do you want to sit on the couch?” “It’s fine...” Emily yawned as she tried to wave her off. “I can do it...I can get ready for bed. Thank you though...” She finally let go of Sheila’s hand and walked ahead to the bedroom. Sheila didn’t object, though she followed from behind with an observant eye. She was an adult… It only made sense to humor her. In Emily’s mind, the first thing that made sense was to walk over to her suitcase and get her pajamas. She stopped halfway across the room though, remembering that they’d unpacked them once they got here. Small mistake. Forgivable. Back over to the dresser she went. It was a little difficult to discern how many drawers she was looking at though. The lines were sort of blurred as she fished for the drawer handles, not sure why she had to be feeling around for them rather than just see them? Yet somehow as if the universe had heard her plea, or her body understood her desires, her vision became clearer as the dresser and all its detailed edges and corners came into view. Did she have superpowers? Sheila instead, was standing right by a dimmer switch that’d been left off. Emily opened one drawer. Nope. Day clothes. She checked another. Still no, just shirts. The next was socks and underwear, the other was jeans...did she check this one already? Did she check it thoroughly? She was already getting tired of searching. She wanted to sleep, not deal with finding the very things to sleep in! “Okay, okay,” Sheila came from behind with a light hand on Emily’s back. “How about you sit down on the bed and get your dress off? I think Ms.--Joyce told me where I can find them.” Emily did just that without a fight. She wandered over to the bed, tempted to simply slump herself on it, though remembered by just a hanging thread to remove the threads she was currently in. Sheila assumed she had remembered correctly, singling out the top right drawer that Emily missed. Opening it up was a grey set of pajamas, but looking underneath that was a pair of pastel purple ones. Rubbing the material between her fingers deduced that they were silk. “Emily? I got your pajamas...” Sheila said as she turned, but found a girl who seemed to struggle with any kind of progress whatsoever. Her torso bent awkwardly as her hands from top and bottom tried to attack the small zipper behind her back, yet she seemed helpless in the attempt to reach it. “Oh...uhm, those can be tricky...” Sheila wasn’t sure what to say to the drunk girl as she came over to help. It slid down with ease and Sheila helped her finish entirely just to avoid potential confusion with even slipping the straps off her shoulders. Now naked, save for a bra and panties, Emily wanted absolutely more than anything to go to bed. “Just a little longer...” Sheila coaxed, seeing that Emily really was about to embark on the final frontier. “I can do it now...” Emily moaned with yet another stretch in her jaw as she made yet another sleepy howl. Her protests that only commanded force in the way of words had only come after considering the fleeting thought that it may be better to stay modest by dressing herself. She was pretty sure Sheila explained who she was to Joyce at some point, but not even Joyce’s coworkers got to see her naked just because. “Can you?” Sheila humored her as she stopped in her tracks. Emily fell back on her bottom on the bed, holding out her hands for the pajama shorts. “I just need privacy...” Emily said so clearly, yet didn’t give Sheila even a second to consider whether or not she should actually leave. Emily hadn’t even finished her hollow request by the time she was trying to thread her feet into the leg holes of her shorts. Her depth perception must have been exhausted or the world itself was losing balance, because staring down the holes of her shorts so intently somehow made it so hard to keep her legs straight. She’d lift a foot, delicate and slow, then feel the need to shoot it forward like a dart for absolute precision. After the third time of getting caught on the edge and slingshotting them out of her hands, Sheila was already picking them up. It seemed they were past the arguing stage of things because Emily didn’t give many words as Sheila knelt down to feed Emily’s feet into the proper leg holes. And as she did so, she was certainly feeling perplexed. Needing to go back to the office late at night to get a project report, or working overtime just to schedule one of her last-minute meetings. Sheila had explored and ventured her fair share of “bonus” tasks her boss could apologetically ask of her. And under the oath of absolute secrecy, even her request a while back about manufacturing special adult diapers was certainly out of the ordinary, but it was passable because it was yet another detached request. Dealing with inanimate things that were meant for something else. Something that did not concern Sheila. “And up we go...” Sheila’s voice smoothly cooed as she forced Emily’s posture to slide the shorts up her legs. Maybe the pajamas were inanimate, but she’d never been told to do something so...hands-on by her boss before. This time the destination was the task itself. She was working with the person themself now, not the lead-up. The more she thought, the more things were making too much sense. Jumping to conclusions was dangerous, yet the likelihood of everything… It was like she was in high school again, helping her baby cousins get ready for bed. At least thanks to the disparity in height Emily made for an easy girl to get dressed. Once Emily’s head popped through the neckhole of the shirt, Sheila fussed as much as to readjust her slightly disheveled hair. Maybe it was the perfectionist in her. Maybe it was something else. “Okay, let’s get you into bed,” Sheila kept a hand on Emily’s back as she steered her over to the edge where she even pulled back the covers for her. Emily sat on the edge, but she did lay down. “I’m okay now...” She rubbed her eyes. “Thank you...but I’m gonna wait until Joyce comes back.” Sheila didn’t answer back. She walked around the bed as she sought to complete everything entrusted to her. Not only that, but it gave her a chance to think of how she should respond. Emily partly watched as she looked around for something, whatever it was. Either way, she did want to crash and sleep so soundly, but something about her would only permit it should Joyce be there for bed too. Waiting in bed was a certain red flag, hence why she was standing up from the bed. “No, back in bed.” Sheila spoke calmly with a twirl of her fingers, yet her words had no flexibility. Apparently what she’d found was in between both her hands now. Emily quickly realized this too, seeing the womanizer held before her. Pip. The rascal, seemingly shaking around his inanimate, limbless mochi-ball-body for anyone… “I even have your...” What it was exactly couldn’t reach Sheila’s limited imagination, but her resourceful memory filled the gap. “Pip. I have Pip, see? Hop in bed. Joyce will be back later tonight.” Or morning, with how things usually went, but she wasn’t going to torture the poor girl with that. “I just need coffee or something...” Emily started to walk past her, resolving that Pip was probably in good hands, or that the traitor deserved a traitor’s death for fraternizing with the enemy. “Emily, no.” Sheila went as far as to grab Emily’s wrist as she was walking away. Obviously she wasn’t going to cross a line, but so far the girl seemed to respond well to verbal instructions padded with a guiding force, be that because of the alcohol or her nature. Regardless, Sheila wasn’t as merciful to not exploit it. “There’s no coffee,” maybe there was, but in the reality Sheila was presenting to her, there certainly wasn’t, “let’s get back in bed?” “But I’m just...” Emily found herself explaining her actions, but the well of wisdom dried up for a couple reasons. First and foremost was a slight surreal feeling. Why did she need to explain herself, a grown adult, to another adult about why she didn’t need to go to bed yet? Second, why did the louder voice in her head simply want her to fold and obey? Sheila up until now indirectly communicated to the intoxicated and tired Emily that she was a neutral, orderly type. She wasn’t seeing that so much anymore as she stared up at the woman. Maybe it was only for a brief flash, yet she felt the spark of a stern Joyce. One that had a no-nonsense kind of attitude when it came to naps and bedtime. Joyce had the cushy words, coos and delicate touch that made the bitter pill that much sweeter. None of those luxuries were here now as Sheila’s look commanded obedience. Before Sheila could say anything else or Emily could start shuffling awkwardly, she instinctively started to retreat back to bed, tail tucked behind her legs as she carried an odd sense of defeat under her belt. Was this a good time to praise her? Sheila wondered for just a brief moment. Maybe she was getting too immersed into the situation. She did gingerly tuck Pip by Emily’s side though before she drew up the covers. The last step was to leave Emily with her phone so she could call Joyce, but with a recently made escape-attempt to the couch in mind, she made the judgement call to come back in later after she was asleep to leave the phone. “Do you want any water before I shut off the lights?” Sheila asked. It wasn’t part of the original instruction set, but dehydration after excessive drinking was a fair concern. “...Sure.” Emily decided as she rose up from the bed. “No, you stay in bed,” Sheila caught her before her legs came out from under the covers. “I’ll get you a glass. Stay put.” It was like a pecking order. Sheila found herself whimsically thinking as she started to search for a glass, then thought better of herself by checking for a bottle of water in the fridge. Joyce--Ms. Summers, sat at the top, naturally. Then there was Sheila as her right hand, followed beneath her by Emily, Little Miss Summers, affectionately patted on the head by the left hand. Maybe the wine from her dinner with Greg had her fantasizing like this. She was her boss’ girlfriend, not her child, even if the subtle things she did notice meant anything at all. “Do you want the cap off?” Sheila found herself asking, yet was already untwisting the top for her. She waited patiently as Emily sipped from the bottle, taking it back before she could set it on the nightstand. All precautionary. She just got her ready for bed and wasn’t looking to prolong the process by drying water out of anything. “Thanks, Sheila...” Emily murmured as her eyes continued to droop. She wanted to sit up, but the child in her warned that it might only end in Sheila scolding her to lay back down. It was all baseless conjecture, yet both Emily and Sheila in their opposing positions found themselves confused whether to envision each other one way or another. Just an adult, or just a child? Just a secretary, or just a babysitter? Neither answer was completely true, but both were acting in a way that did imply one over the other. Sheila continued to babysit while Emily let herself be sat upon. “You’re welcome.” She turned the lights off next with the only source of light being the faint sky through the hotel window. She hung by the doorway, saying, “I’ll be here until Joyce comes back, so if you need anything I’ll be in the room outside, okay?” “Mhmm...” Emily turned the other way, always mesmerized by how simply turning the other cheek to your pillow could make a world of difference in maximizing your comfort levels. She’d already long forgotten about rebellion, now making amends with Pip as he lay snuggled against her chest. Considered a job past the bulk of its difficulties, Sheila closed the door as silently as she could, turning back into the more illuminated living space as she found herself on the couch. Being in a dress she didn’t feel too comfortable getting comfortable, especially in her boss’ hotel room. Maybe in that regard Emily in her brief little fantasy wasn’t as low as she’d thought in the hierarchy. Joyce’s left hand? It made sense in a way, considering you never hear about the left-hand man as opposed to the right. She never did hear the specifics about her boss’ homelife, only the generalizations and “hypotheticals” that would occasionally pop up. A mostly quiet hour and a half did ensue, leaving even Sheila feeling a bit sleepy. She could only hope that her boyfriend wasn’t waiting for her. This all in itself was a surprise sort of sprung on her, but thankfully she did make it clear beforehand that something like this could happen. Buzzing beside her was her phone, picking it up and seeing that it was her boss. “Hello? Ms. Summers?” Sheila answered. “Sheila? I’m outside the room. Could you let me in?” Hanging up she rounded the couch and over to the door. Looking through the peephole confirmed as the voice on the line had told her. Once she opened it up Joyce on the other side let out a small sigh of relief as her shoulders hung dramatically low. “Finally, it’s over… I would have knocked, but I didn’t want to give Emily an excuse to wake up.” She didn’t hesitate in half-kicking off her heels. “I know how those things can run so long, but I guess my body sort of forgets if they’re too few and far between...” “Did you get to speak to everyone you wanted to?” Sheila asked, hanging by the doorway still. She was always available, but even she wanted to go back to her room. “Yes, I did… Thank you again so much for not only finding Emily, but taking her back up here for me.” Then, by a slip of the tongue she accidentally asked, “Was she good for you?” “No issues,” Sheila confirmed, quietly taking in the last question as a mental log. “I did give her some water before bed though since it seemed like she drank a fair amount...” “Thank you, so-so-so much.” Joyce blinked and rubbed her eyes. “Sheila, please. Everything from tonight, even tomorrow. Please, go out or something with your boyfriend. Buy something nice, go out for lunch; I want to show you how thankful I am. This night was supposed to be a night off for you, but I forced this on you...” “I’ll...keep it in mind.” Sheila sufficed, a little too tired herself to go through the mandatory back-and-forth before an inevitable compromise. “It’s no issue at all. Whenever you need help I’m always available, Ms. Summers.” Joyce nodded with a smile. “Okay.” She glanced over at the room key that was thoughtfully left in an obvious place. “You can leave now. I think I’m ready for bed myself...” “Have a good night, Ms. Summers.” Sheila bid farewell as she closed the door after hearing a final goodbye from her boss. Now with only two in the suite, Joyce eyed the closed door as she tip-toed over to it, gently turning the handle as she crept inside the dark room. By the sound of her quiet rise and fall in breaths through her nose, Joyce was delighted to see that Emily was fast asleep, snuggling with Pip, no less. Damn. If only she could take a picture… She wouldn’t dare though, not when she was sleeping so peacefully. In a chair by their suitcases, Joyce watched for just a little longer. Then she shifted her gaze out the window. Then back to Emily...then back outside. But every time she did glance to and fro, her axle would experience friction as she slowed every time to look at something in between. Her suitcase. One look. Two looks. Three. Certainly Emily was asleep. Certainly. Naughty was the best way to describe it. Peeking at the presents hidden in the attic before “Santa” came to deliver them. Something like that. Joyce was slouched over on her knees as she quietly unzipped a small pocket. Stuffed inside was a packet of travel tissues. A welcome companion, but predominantly a decoy and a rouse for this trip. Joyce was bad and she was completely self-aware. No matter how hard she tried, she never could go completely clean, could she? Dangling from her finger was her little addiction; a fix she couldn’t quite kick. One of Emily’s pacifiers. Her eyes came just above the mattress, fantasizing the dream of “accidentally” leaving it by the girl’s mouth and watching her take to it so easily. She softly exhaled with a dreamy smile imagining the thought. Maybe if Emily didn’t mind they could make this her next habit… But of course, no amount of future plans that involved consent excused anything for what happened in the past or now. When Emily left to go use the computer Joyce had been packing like normal, honest to God. But...she just wanted to see the nursery at least once before they left for the night. It’d been her ritual. A night when it wasn’t used was like neglecting a puppy. She at least needed to see it in all its glory regularly. So with her alone time she did… Then, all the thoughts plagued her mind about tonight. All the things that could go wrong for Emily and how she could just become a big ball of stress. That’s how she got to thinking about bringing Pip. But what good was a contingency plan if not without a backup one? It was all too convenient in Joyce’s mind to not bring a pacifier. It was small, easy to hide, and quick to deploy. And if all went well, Emily would never have to know. And she wouldn’t. These were the white lies she couldn’t rid herself of… But on the other hand, if she were confronted directly about it, of course she’d admit to it. But if Emily never had any suspicions, there’d never be the chance she’d ask? Her finger playfully flicked at the silicon bulb until she started to yawn herself. It was unfortunate in its own way that they didn’t get to use it tonight… Content with her secret little ritual, Joyce started to undress before joining her girlfriend in bed. While Joyce toyed with the cute image of Emily having a fixation on pacifiers, she’d blinded herself to the reality before her that wasn’t far off from her own imagination. Little by little, Emily already was showing tiny cute dependencies or little habits slowly being drawn out of her and inked on her like permanent tattoos. All it took was Joyce getting in bed and the slight impression in the mattress for Emily to slide over in her sleep. Maybe her sixth unconscious sense could feel the tinge of body heat Joyce had, but it didn’t change that something in the girl decided she wanted to be close to the person next to her. Despite being so late to bed, Joyce and Emily were now back in their usual posture; head to bosom and arm over the waist. So in spite of all the hiccups and as a bonus to the good moments that they did have, it was unreal to consider a public outing finally a positive experience. No sore feelings or “big” talks that needed to be had in post. Just a wonderful experience overall, with seemingly endless more to come. Joyce’s hand found itself absentmindedly rubbing Emily’s bottom, going as far as to sneak underneath her silk shorts and beneath the waistband of her underwear. If she wasn’t going to get the feel of crinkly plastic-backed cuteness, she wanted nothing less than the source itself. The panties and big girl clothes were all silly disguises in Joyce’s playful mind. Costumes for the big role Emily put on for everyone else. Seeing down in just her birthday suit maintained that everything she wore was superficial. Everything except what Emily wanted Joyce to decide for her. Thicker, more durable clothes. Bright colors, soft pastels, crinkly underpants. Her last few conscious thoughts were spent on all the different outfits she could see Emily in whilst rhythmically stroking her bare bottom. Both parties feeling content now, Joyce wasn’t much longer until she was fast asleep too.