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Better Late Than Never


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21 minutes ago, Personalias said:

 

Your continued readership and taking the time to speak with me is always appreciated.

Absolutely! It can be difficult at times sifting through stories and finding ones I know will be good. Any time I see your name as the author, I know it's gonna be a good one.

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I just caught up and I love the fact that this story is giving me strong deja-vu to the Robert Heinlein book Job: a Comedy of Justice.

I can't help but feel that if this were suddenly my reality, just like the protaginists I would probably try to either get back to 'my reality' or to readjust the reality of the wish in some major ways- I would have major issues with the loss of mental acuity and the complete loss of all autonomy.

All in all, amazing story, I can't wait to see if a wish can counteract a wish!

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That was an awesome new chapter. That chapter was longer than many stories here and it was much appreciated. I particularly enjoyed Susie’s explication of her feelings of being a tomboy and girly girl. I have also enjoyed your slow steady regression of the three of them. This was very well worth a like. I can’t wait for more. 

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  • 9 months later...

Friends,

I’ll restate my question:  What can defeat magic, this reality bending yet fundamental force of the cosmos?  What can possibly contend with something that makes wonders by working one’s will?  The wise magician will say “nothing”.  Now don’t bother skipping back a few chapters and double checking to see if I have made a typo of some sort.  I haven’t.

A wise magician and a foolish magician will give the same answer.  “Nothing” beats magic, both the wise and the foolish will agree.  However, the difference between a wise magician and a foolish one is how each one takes the meaning of the word “nothing”.
To a fool, “nothing” means that there isn’t anything imaginable in the human experience that can counter magic.  To a sage, “nothing” means that magic can be countered by lack of imagination.  I refer you to the Myth of the Cave, friends.  Plato paints a world for us where people are born chained to a wall and only have shadows cast by torchlight to define their little world.  If someone were to miraculously escape the cave and see the sunlight and the green grass and the wonderful world outside the cave; their mind would be positively boggled.  They wouldn’t have the vocabulary for what they saw; vibrant colors such as white and green and blue and yellow would be incomprehensible to them.  To put this poor cave dweller in an even bigger pickle, if he did return to the cave, no one would believe him because the people in the cave would have no context or schema in which to understand the ramblings of what for all intents and purposes was either a madman or a liar.

But the stories of this fantastical world filled with indescribable colors with no ceiling and cold air that moved on its own would stay with the people who heard it, and from there, a very rough and primitive imaginary picture of the world outside the cave would form in the imaginations of others.

We, dear friends, are all in the cave, just waiting to get out.

Yet I still haven’t answered that one nagging question: How did we get into this cave?  If we had magic, how did we lose it?  The answer is once again, stunningly simple.  Magic gives you what you want.  So someone wanted a world without magic. 

None of my research- historical or metaphysical- even remotely suggests anything else.  Nor does it suggest that this was a particularly malign or even purposeful erasure. If magic gives you what you want, it is very possible to believe that enough people got it and used magic to create a kind of paradise for themselves.

Don’t laugh.  You’ve read this far.  Maybe the Garden of Eden was a real place and we were all Adam and Eve at one time because that’s how we wrote ourselves into it.  The thing is, in a world where there is no unmet need or desire; magic isn’t needed.  Just as generations of Plato’s hypothetical cave people forgot what the sun was for not having seen it in so long, we forgot what magic was because we used it to create a world where it wasn’t needed.

   But because we’re all human, we somehow managed to muck it all up again, we always do.  And that’s why we have stories of magic throughout the ages.  We want something bad enough, we let ourselves have it.  Afterwards we either don’t need magic any further or don’t want it or can’t bear on some level to let ourselves have it. And thus we forget that we ever had magic to begin with, and relegate it back to fantasy and we’re again chained to the here and now instead of the what could be or what could be again.


-An excerpt from “Do You Believe In Magic?” By Cornelius Crowley.

(Dakota)

“Pony Girl, Pony Girl, won't you be my Pony Girl?
Don't say no. Here we go off across the plains.
Marry me, carry me right away with you.
Giddy up, giddy up, giddy up, whoa! My Pony Girl.”
Her father’s words were done with a kind of robotic sing-song-not-quite monotone; like reciting the Pledge of Allegiance at school, or remembering alphabetical order by quickly saying the ABC’s.  (Crud!  Now that Dakota thought of it, she wasn’t actually sure she actually remembered how to do either of those things.)  The words were being said, but it was all rhythmic cadence and no real intonation.  No feeling.
Such was life for the time being.  And such was childhood as Dakota remembered it.

The rest of the afternoon at the Big Little Daycare had passed by uneventfully, enough.  Nap times, afternoon play, and of course plenty of diaper checks and a change or two all around for Dakota and her new-old friends.  They’d made their plans to dupe their parents into taking them to (what had gosh darn better be) a wishing fountain. Lacking anything else to talk about or do (especially Susie), they’d spent their last few hours together acting like “normal” kids their age: Blocks. Tea Parties with stuffies.  The works.
There hadn’t been any point in doing much else.  There was only so much planning they could do, so they might as well enjoy what they could before they rolled the dice in their attempt to unwish everything back to normal (and not wait two decades to get results). 

It was worrisome, but the former Queen Bee hadn’t been particularly worried at that point.  Had she worried she’d only have suffered twice.  Also, the marble run they’d built together had been fun.  Ugh. How much of that was the real her and how much of that was the ever expanding Forbie brain talking?  It didn’t matter.  Soon she’d be back to tight skirts instead of snug padding.  It’d be nice to have underwear that only peeked out of her clothes when she wanted it to.  Heck it’d be nice to have a pair of panties that she could wear more than once.  Little thoughts like that is what kept Dakota going and assured that she was still at least somewhat in her right mind.

At the moment though, she was having trouble getting her father’s attention so she COULD spring her plan of a meetup with her “little friends” at the wishing fountain by the old college.  Considering she was straddling his leg and bobbing up and down every few seconds, it was considerably harder to get a word in edgewise, than might be expected.  Normally when she was straddling a man, she had all the attention she wanted.  Daddy was in his own little world though. Diaper (thankfully) crinkling beneath her, Dakota bounced on her Daddy’s knee for what seemed like the bajillionth time.  Dakota may have just lost count, or perhaps even lost the ability to count, but at this point she didn’t much care.  She just wanted it to end.

“Daaaaaaddy,” she whined, bobbing up and down on her father’s knee.  “stooooop!”
Her father stopped looking over her shoulder at the pro-wrestling match on T.V.  long enough to give a polite but condescending, “Whatever you say, sweetie” before sliding her off his knee and onto the living room floor.  His gaze only lasted long enough to make sure that she was sitting safely on the old carpet, then darted back up to two muscle-heads pretending to beat the snot out of each other.
 
This wouldn’t do.  However briefly, she rose to her feet and looked her father in the eye.  “You’re blocking Daddy’s view, Sweetie.”  Dakota soon found herself being repositioned to the side, before losing her balance and tumbling to the floor again.

The thunderous crash of an oiled up steroid freak in tights falling to the mat was an almost comical parallel as Dakota fell back onto her padded rump.  The “ooooooh’s” of the televised audience didn’t make things feel any better.  Darn it!  How was she supposed to maintain her balance when her own underwear kept throwing off her gait?

And of course it was the diaper throwing off her balance; none of the other Forbies had lost their ability to walk.  (OMG! Did she just think “other” Forbies?”  No! No!  Cut that out!)   Daddy looked down at her from his spot on the couch.  “Oopsie.  Sorry about that, Dakota.  You okay?”  A quick glance confirmed that she was, and his eyes were glued back to the T.V. before she could even answer for herself.  (Not that he expected an answer.)

Ugh.  He was like this when she was growing up (the first time), too.  Her father’s worldview came from a “simpler” time, wherein the man of the house earned the money, paid most of the bills, and when he came home, he expected to be able to unwind and play “king of the castle”. 

He hadn’t been a bad caregiver by any definition: Dakota had never gone hungry a day in her life, or lacked clean clothes that fit her.  And when he put his mind to it, he was a doting father who would lavish gifts and treats on his two daughters.  But one could NOT interrupt him during his show.  It wasn’t even a warning, it was just fact.  He just sort of went on autopilot, focused more on wrestling and whatever kooky sitcom was on T.V. that night.

Mom had taken care of most of the parental heavy lifting at night; but when she’d died when Dakota was twelve, Dad never really adapted.  Teenage Dakota didn’t mind this not-new-and-improved parent.  Permission slips and teacher’s notes were easy to get signed with minimal discussion (or reading on Daddy’s part) and he (almost) never noticed when she’d snuck out. Trapped-in-diapers-Dakota (she was NOT a Forbie) had more problems with this arrangement.  Daddy’s poor short term memory and attention span was a boon when she’d had independence.  Now it was definitely a hindrance.

Disgustedly, Dakota took in the living room she hadn’t seen in over four years.  Same old little pink house built on the cheap by the construction company Daddy was the foreman for.  Same old wallpaper.  Same old carpet.  The only new thing was the big screen T.V. in the living room.  The giant crib and baby stuff was certainly new to Dakota, but none of it was “new new”.   Same old Daddy: He’d splurge, but he didn’t like to shop.

Kind of a shame that he hadn’t remarried, actually.  It was surprising, considering the altered timeline.  Dakota would’ve thought that her father would have been at least pragmatic enough to look for a new “Mommy” to take care of a perpetual infant.

“Hey Daddy,” a voice that was startlingly similar to her own said.  From her spot on the floor, Dakota looked up and saw Virginia.  It was like looking into her own past.  Virginia was every bit the man-eater sex-kitten that Dakota had been a few years ago.  Dakota had done better, of course, and Virginia looked like a straw haired hussy in her denim skirt and fishnets; but some boys were into that. A wish-free lifetime ago, Dakota would’ve just assumed that Virginia was being a good little sister and trying to live up to perfection, but that didn’t seem likely given the circumstances.

Maybe it just ran in the family.  “Hey Virginia,” Dad said, not looking up.

“I’m off,” Dakota’s little sister said. 

“Where to?”

“Date night.”

The wrestling show went to commercial.  Dad’s eyes finally came into focused and he looked directly at his youngest daughter. “Got everything ready for me?”

Virginia nodded.  “Mmmhmmm.  Bottles are in the fridge and chicken nuggets for both of you are in the oven with the timer on.”  Dakota found her personal space being casually violated as her own sister stuck two fingers inside the leg holes of her diaper.  “She’s dry.”  Virginia sniffed.  “I don’t think she needs a bath tonight, so if you put her to bed right after dinner, the diaper will hold till tomorrow.”

“Kay. Thanks hon.  You’re such a good big sister.” Then Daddy added, “And daughter.  Just be back by ten.”

“Awww, thanks Daddy.” She gave her old man a kiss on the forehead. “Don’t worry.  I’ll be good.  I’ll try not to wake you when I come home…at ten.”  Dakota knew that move and had used it too many times to count, (as if she could count just now). Virginia wasn’t going to be home by ten.  But if Virginia was the new Dakota, her antics were a definite blind spot for the old man.  “G’night sis.  Be good.” Dakota’s hair was gently ruffled, and then Virginia was out the door.

Dad sighed and sunk back into the sofa, waiting for the commercials to be over.  Great.  Dakota was stuck as a baby to a largely clueless dad and her sister was the defacto caregiver AND acting just like Dakota had been. 
Oh…oh!  The most disturbing thought invaded her brain.  Dakota had learned to manipulate and gain attention to deal with no longer being the “baby” of the family.  Was that why Virginia was turning out like this; because she never got to be the baby?  Had Dakota indirectly caused this?  Did that mean that Virginia would soon run off for a life of leeching off of stupid rich boys?

Dakota couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if and when Virginia left them.  Daddy could barely change a diaper or plan a meal.  If this wish thing went further South, she’d HAVE to make sure that her father met someone to act as a surrogate mother.  Pooping her pants on the regular was bad enough.  Having to sit in it until a commercial came on would be unacceptable.  (No, no, no! Do NOT plan for defeat!)
Enough of the loser talk.  Dakota made an effort to pout her lip and give herself those trademark baby doll eyes.  “Daddy?” Dakota said from her spot on the floor.
 
The commercials were still on, so she could be spared a moment  “Yeah, baby?  You hungry? Want a baba?”  

Dakota made an effort to giggle, and play cute.  “No…?  I was just thinking…?”  She made sure to add the unspoken question at the end.  If she was just supposed to be a dumb baby, she might as well play up the part.  Puppies and kittens (and babies) were dumb, but the cuteness offset it.

“’Bout what, sugar?”

The blonde former bombshell touched her bottom lip. “Could I maybe have a sleepover?”

The reply was immediate:  “I don’t think so honey.  You’re a little too…” Daddy caught himself, “it’s just that…sleepovers are a lot of work.”  Darn it.  Of course she couldn’t have the sleepover at her house.
 
“Oh I didn’t mean here,” Dakota said.  “I meant having one at one of my friends’ house.”  She hoped she wasn’t lying, but it was hard to say.  When Susie had volunteered to host the slumber party, it had seemed like a good idea at the time.  Being a giant (and therefore more innocent seeming) baby was becoming more natural to Susie, so it seemed reasonable to assume the girl could convince her mom to host.  The hindsight of a couple of hours had allowed doubt to creep into Dakota’s brain.  What if Susie just completely forgot the plan? “We was talkin’ ‘bout it at Daycare today.”  (And where was that darn phone call, Susie?!  Ugh. If you wanted something done right…)

Daddy seemed to consider this, and Dakota gave her best pouty face.  Come to think of it, it didn’t matter whose house they were at; if the wishing thing worked (and it better work), the sleepover would be canceled, anyways; replaced by a round of grown-up drinks.

“Hmmm…” Daddy seemed to be mulling it over.  “A night to…a night with your friends.  Which ones?”

“Kelsey and Susie.”

“Remind me where they live?”  Great.  He was taking driving distance into account.

A jolt of panic made Dakota blurt out, “We could meet at the wishin’ fountain!”

“Wishing fountain?”

“UM…the one at the college?”  Darn it.  She felt so stupid for calling it a ‘wishin’ fountain’.  She was even starting to think like a baby.  Thinking like a baby got them into this mess though, so maybe it’d get them out.

“The College, huh?  That’s not too far.”

“Nope, nope, nope,” Dakota waggled her head comically.   She had to seem enthused but not desperate. “Not too far at all!”  (Please let this work please let this work!)
Just as Daddy was about to give in, the wrestling, came back on, causing his eyes to glaze over.  (AAAAAAGH!) Dakota might’ve started crying in frustration, if not for the blaring jangling noise coming from the kitchen.  The oven?  No.  She watched as Daddy got up and jogged towards the ringing.  “At this hour?” he muttered.  It was the phone, she realized. 

“Hello?”  Daddy said picking up the receiver in the kitchen.

(Kelsey)
From her spot on the floor, images and sounds from the television flooded Kelsey’s grey matter, each one making an indelible impression on her the second she registered it.
Talking heads and a picture of an old guy in a suit and tie sitting at a fancy desk.  “Congress’s joint Medicare expansion bill was signed into law by President McLellan-“

TSSSSSSSSSS!

A silver haired couple pushing a twenty something baby man in shortalls around in a stroller; the sunshine beaming down on the trio as if from Heaven.  “-planning retirement, but worried about your forever baby? Unified Mutua-”

TSSSSSSSSSS!

More talking heads and words, Kelsey realized, scrolled across the screen; though she couldn’t read them.  Pictures behind the talking head showed countries on a map.  

Heaven help her, she couldn’t recognize any of them, but she was pretty sure it wasn’t America. “-peace talks continue in-“

TSSSSSSSSSS!

A girl about her age laying on the floor and giggling lightly.  An actress, presumably her mother, taping up the girl’s diaper with a contented smile on her face.. “-from Proctor & Gamble, comes new Coddles.  Because your little one might not be so little, but they’ll always be your ba-“

TSSSSSSSSSS!

Another talking head.  This one blonder and with more makeup on.  “In entertainment news, ratings and controversy follow the inclusion of television’s first ‘forever baby’ character; Sassy.”  Side by side pictures of the same red head, one in a pink romper sucking on a paci, the other in a tight blue dress on some red carpet flashed in the corner of the screen.  “Portrayed by Skyler Jansen, who is twenty-six and therefore was not actually affected by the phenom-“

TSSSSSSSSSSS!

Shots of a college campus, not unlike Kelsey’s old stomping grounds.  “Colleges prepare for mass enrollment as more and more of what sociologists are referring to as ‘old souls’ reach high school graduation age.

TSSSSSSSSSSS!

A crowded park with two forever babies, a girl and a boy, in nothing but pink and red t-shirts and matching puffy white diapers running around; idiot smiles adorning their faces.  “Introducing Snuggles, the Forbie shaped diap-“

TSSSSSSSSSSS!

Good ol’ Bugs Bunny.  His face staring down the barrel of Elmer Fudd’s shotgun.  “Ehhhhh, what’s up, Doc?”  Something was off about the color, it wasn’t as faded or grainy. The animation was crisper and cleaner. Was this a new one?

TSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

“Pookie,” her father interrupted her channel surfing.  “That’s Bugs Bunny! You love Bugs Bunny!” Dang…he was right.  She really did love Bugs Bunny.  Her fingers moved back over the remote to the down channel button.

TSSSSSSSSSSSSS! 

Now, Lola Bunny was in on the act, pretending that she was also Elmer Fudd and using crazy cartoon logic and a fake ID to convince the genuine article that he had been re-cast; gotta love those fourth wall breaks.   And just like the last time Kelsey saw this, just as Elmer walked off screen, dragging his shotgun behind him saying “I’ve gotta go tawk to my agent”,  Lola got a little too in on the act and started hunting Bugs.

Kid at heart that he was, Daddy started chuckling, his Santa belly jiggling a half second after he’d stopped to take a breath.  “I love this one.” 

Kelsey stifled a giggle too, and looked up at her father.  “Me too.  Even if it is a rerun.”  The record in the back of Kelsey’s brain scratched.  Re-runs?  This wasn’t a rerun.  Or at least not one that Kelsey could remember having seen.  And yet, Kelsey wasn’t at all surprised when Elmer showed up in drag in the next beat, insisting that he was Lola.  She had been re-cast too.  And just like a toddler reacting to the jack popping out of the box, Kelsey couldn’t help but laugh at the joke she instinctively saw coming.

This was bad.

This was really bad.

She had been stuck in a warped version of her own fantasy for a little under two days, or so she hoped, and had already lost she had no idea how many basic skills.  It was like every time she filled her pants, more than just pee-pee and poopy left her; but the stuff that had made her a big kid was drained away too.  And in that space, new, more babyish stuff filled her up.   Could memories be included in that too?

“Daddy?”

“Yes, Pookie?”

“Who’s Presdent?”
“President James McLellan,” Daddy said, rattling it off as if it were the color of the sky.  McLellan?  That didn’t sound right.  Kelsey couldn’t say what the right answer had been, but McLellan didn’t seem like it was the one.  Was McLellan the president when she was a baby the first time around?  She didn’t know then, and she didn’t know now. How was she supposed to unwish this reality if she couldn’t remember how the old one had been?  

“Why do you want to know?”

“Talkin’ about it at Daycare,”  Kelsey lied and instantly felt a pang of guilt.  She hated lying to her parents, but knew they wouldn’t believe the truth.  She had to know more.  A sinking feeling in the pit of her soul told her that more had changed than just her diapers.  

Speaking of which…

“Mommy,” Kelsey pivoted on her bum to look at her mother.  “How do you and Daddy pay for my diapees?  Aren’t they ‘spensive?”  They had to be.  Kelsey had seen the boxes of diapers in her room and at the daycare.  A single box could only hold a couple hundred at most.

“They used to be,” Mommy said, “but then rules were passed to help families like us.  Our insurance helps a lot with stuff like that. Medicine and doctor’s visits too.”

The shrink-to-be couldn’t help herself.  “Whhhhhyyyyyyy?”

Daddy explained, “When people realized that a whole bunch of babies like you would never grow up all over the world, they passed new rules to help those babies and their families stay healthy without having to go hungry or poor.”

“And everyone else,” Mommy added.  A concerned frown flashed across her features.  “Is that why you were saying you were potty trained?  Were you worried we’d run out of diapers or that you were hurting us?”

“Nuh-uh…” Kelsey said.  “Just…I don’t know.” The blurb from the T.V. about ‘peace talks’ buzzed in the big-girl part of her brain.  Something was strange about that and the places on the map she’d seen while desperately searching for info via channel surfing.  Something was wrong with this picture, but she couldn’t think of the right words.  “What’s war?”

Daddy and Mommy looked at each other.  Mommy shrugged.  “War is when two countries don’t like each other and so they get into a big fight and try to hurt each other.”

“But there’s a lot less of it these days,” Daddy said.

Again.  “Whhhhhhyyyy?”  Darn it felt good to say that!

“It’s harder for people to fight each other when they have to take care of a whole bunch of babies who’ll never grow up,” Daddy said.

Mommy shimmied herself down to the carpet and gave Kelsey a hug.  “And there are plenty of Mommy’s and Daddy’s who would rather take care of their widdle ones then send them off to war.”

Kelsey gasped.  “So people are talking more instead of fighting,” she asked, “because of me?”

“You and all the other Forbies, Pookie.”

There was a certain twisted logic in all of this:  If everyone within two years of her had turned into a giant baby, that’d mean a lot of different changes. There’d have to be more diapees and daycares.  More babies to take care of who would never turn into soldiers to fight.   Maybe even who got elected president would change because of all of that.  She wasn’t sure what the world had been like before a few days ago, but the big-girl part of her brain told her it was nothing like this.
Had she accidentally made world peace AND a kind of universal healthcare AND new Bugs Bunny cartoons?  It was a stupid, silly, impractical idea; but so was a wish made by a two-year old coming true in the real world.

If everything went according to plan, was she willing to reverse all that just so that she could do all the little kid stuff she liked AND sit on the big-girl potty?  Was she willing to sacrifice all of that just so she could wipe her own hiney?

Still on the floor, her eyes looked down between her legs as the warmth in her diaper snuck up on her yet again. What was she losing this time?  It was a small price to pay, wasn’t it?  Her eyes danced slightly up to the cabinet beneath their T.V.  She couldn’t read what was on the spines of the little DVD cases, but somehow she knew what was in them.  “Home movies?”

“You wanna watch, Kelsey?” Mom asked beside her.  Kelsey didn’t even have to respond before her mother was leaning forward and grabbing one of the cases.  “How about your last birthday party?” 

Last birthday party?  Yeah.  That was as good a place to start as any.  She hadn’t had a birthday party since before she’d left home for college, not because she hadn’t wanted parties, but because she couldn’t imagine anyone, let alone her parents, wanting to throw her the kind of party she had wanted.  Her mother didn’t wait for her to answer, clearly loving the idea of taking a walk down recent memory lane.

As Mommy took the shiny blue backed DVD and inserted it into the player beneath the TV, Kelsey nervously bit into her bottom lip.  It was time to see how the other her lived this life.  Perhaps she’d get a view of her future, should she fail, by looking at her rewritten past.

The pictures of smiling, giggling boys and girls, all around her age, and cheery high paced music of the Beatles singing “Today Is Your Birthday” filled the screen and Kelsey immediately regretted her decision.  A montage of her and a smattering of other Forbies filled the screen. She was wearing an absolutely adorable sunshine colored romper.  Susie was in the purplest and frilliest party dress Kelsey had ever seen, complete with oversized matching bow, and the outfit still did nothing to cover her diaper.  

Who was that girl hugging her so tightly in that one shot? The one in the Supergirl T-shirt, complete with Velcro attached cape, with the diaper clearly sagging beneath those loose fitting jean shorts? A terrible rock-like feeling settled into the pit of Kelsey’s gut.  “Dakota?!”

“That’s right!”  Mommy chimed in, “All your little friends were there? Remember?”
Kelsey didn’t remember it,  but she dearly wished she had.  The clips showed a bounce house, pin the tail on the donkey, and balloon animals; all of Kelsey’s favorite things.

A quick cut and a fading of the soundtrack later showed Kelsey sitting topless in her highchair, her tiny breasts on full display as all the other kids and their parents gathered around and sang “Happy Birthday To You,” in wonderful off key unison.    

Cut to a star wipe, and Kelsey watched herself covered chin to chest in chocolate cake that she had smashed all over herself, chewing happily and not caring that her mouth was too full to keep it all in.  Along the periphery, the other Forbies were all chowing down.  Dakota was using her play cape as a bib, while Susie sat in her mommy’s lap, being daintily fed chocolate cake by the spork-ful.

“Do you like your cake?”  Daddy’s voice from behind the camera asked.

Forby Kelsey nodded unabashedly, gobs of chocolate frosting and crumbs hanging precariously from her chin.  “Mmmmhmmm!”   She looked so…so…

“Happy,” Kelsey in the present day said.  “I look happy.”

“You were happy that day,” Daddy said.  “But you’ve always been a happy baby.”

“Our happy baby,” Mommy echoed.
The camera transitioned further into the party.  A paper mache donkey with pizzazz dangled from the ceiling, as the Kelsey on camera; naked save for her diaper and a pink blindfold swung a stick at it.  “A pinata?”  Her resolve melted a little bit.  She hadn’t gotten a pinata since she was six.  

“I love this part,” her Mommy spoke up.

Kelsey watched herself take a wild swing at the candy filled burro.  “ONE!” The assembled crowd shouted and clapped as she missed by a mile.  Another swing.  “TWO!”  The second one didn’t come any closer to harming the rainbow colored punching bag. 

Hypnotized, Kelsey could only watch herself- or someone who looked very much like her- swing the stick for a third time, the pinata on the string dancing upward trying to avoid it.  Third time, as it turned out, was the charm, as the stick solidly connected with the soft underbelly of the paper mache creature.

A pang of jealousy rang out in Kelsey’s heart as candy rained down on the floor, and like a pack of dogs on a three legged cat, the party’s guests descended on the pile even as the last of the plastic wrapped confectionaries drizzled down on their heads.  Kelsey sat up a little straighter and frowned a bit.  It wasn’t fair, she decided. She was watching one of her longest running fantasies come true on camera, and she couldn’t remember a darn thing.  

Maybe next year she could get to relive this moment….but then again, if her plan at the wishing fountain work, she wouldn’t get to, would she?  Shame.

Kelsey lost sight of herself as the camera zoomed in on the rapidly accumulating pile of candy beneath the dead pinata.  Knowing herself, Kelsey’s time displaced doppelganger woud waste no time in dropping the stick, shedding the blindfold, and scrambling into the fray with the other Forbies, peeling away tin foil covered chocolates and shoving them into her mouth.  The real Kelsey was almost drooling as she watched chocolate coated fingers plunge unabashedly into open mouths.  No napkins needed.  And to think, she’d had all that freedom and all that fun, and all it had cost her was a lot of grown up big girl stuff; most of it she hadn’t really wanted or appreciated.  If only she’d wished upon that star on her birthday, she could have had some real fun.


Jealousy unexpectedly gave way to a warped variation of nostalgia.  Did she...did she actually remember that day?  The way the chocolate tasted?  The fun she’d had?  She couldn’t, could she?

But where was she on the recording?  Her altered-past self had yet to make a move for the pile of delicious sweets while all the other kids were scrambling through it.  That’s when the camera panned back over to where Kelsey was still standing; or rather, squatting.

Nostalgia broke apart for shock, as the Kelsey on the DVD recording, now squatting like a major league catcher, a tell-tale look on her face as she groaned while the very bottom of her diaper slowly and subtly expanded.  “Oh no,” she whispered to herself, already realizing, if not remembering, what was happening. The mirror version of herself bent over low, using the floor and the tips of her fingers of one free hand- the other one snaking up to her mouth to be sucked on- to balance herself.

Cameraman Daddy swiveled his footing around to get the twenty-two year old baby in profile.  “Uh-oh,” the DVD Daddy said, “I know what that means.”  The ‘Awwwws’ of the other grown-ups created a kind of background chorus to cover up any rude noises made as Birthday Kelsey grunted and deposited something into the seat of her crinkling panties.

Kelsey could only watch the scene.  Her Forbie-self had tuned out; concentrating and completely focused while the back of her diaper filled out and began to droop.  The humiliating act caught on camera didn’t last long, and the humiliation never seemed to set in, anyways.  Instead, the Kelsey on camera waddled into the crowd, taking absolutely no notice to the state of her diaper, and dug in with two fists, getting armloads of candy for herself.

“Hey, honey,” Daddy’s voice came from behind the camera, “are you having fun at your birthday party?” 

The Kelsey on the DVD looked back over her shoulder, her mouth already filled with malted milk balls and lips smeared with chocolate.  “Mmmm-hmmm!”

“Do you want to get changed?”  Her former not-quite self vigorously shook her head, giggling all the while as bits of brown spittle oozed forth from her lips.

A little brown waterfall crested over her bottom lip as she said, “Nuh-uhhhhhh”.

 “But don’t you know what you did?”  Daddy asked. In equal measure, Kelsey watched as the her that wasn’t her nodded enthusiastically.


With a big, almost maddening grin, the Forbie her on the recording shouted, “I MADE POOO-!” . 

Kelsey couldn’t take it. “STOP!” The Kelsey of the now shouted! “STOP! STOP! STOP! STOP!”   Whether she was yelling at her parents to turn off the movie or yelling at her past self from a birthday party that never actually happened, even she didn’t know.
The T.V. was off in a flash.  In the blink of an eye, her head was in Mommy’s lap; though she couldn’t say if she laid it there or whether it had been guided there... maybe both.  

Mommy was stroking her hair and gently rubbing her temples.  Her heartbeat, pounding in her chest just a moment before, started to slow.    “Pookie, what’s wrong?”, she heard Daddy ask.

“I just wanna be happy,” she moaned, the feeling in her stomach growing worse.  “It’s not fair.”  It really wasn’t.  She never thought she’d be envious of someone who poopied their pants in public; yet alone that that person would be her.

“But Pookie,” Mommy said, patting her tummy.  “You are happy.  You’ve always been happy.”
“No I haven’t!”

“Yes, you have!”

“No, I haven’t!”

“Yes you have.  You’re just feeling a little fussy.”  Mommy planted a kiss right on her forehead and Kelsey felt all the better for it.

The feeling in the pit of her tummy worsened as Mommy rubbed it.  She might have had some potty problems yesterday, but she still knew what that meant.  She had to poopy.  A creeping dread wormed its way into the back of her big girl brain.  She wasn’t fussy.  She was losing it.  She hadn’t gone potty outside of her pants in forever...and it wasn’t going potty if she was goin’ in her pants...not really.

If she didn’t go potty- for real potty- at least once, she’d never ever go again...and on a scarier level; she might not mind so much.

With surprising alacrity, she sat up.


“Pookie, what’s wrong, now?” Mommy asked as Kelsey climbed to her haunches.   
Weight on the balls of her feet, Kelsey bit her lip, closed her eyes…and was about to push!  

“Uh-oh,” she heard Daddy say.  “I know what that means.” History was repeating itself!  She felt her cheeks spread apart, bombay doors for her big kidness getting ready to dump the last bits of the old her into the seat of her panties.

“Just let her finish,” Mommy talked over her as if she couldn’t hear.

Daddy added, “I’ll go get a fresh diaper and wipes.”

This was Pinocchio all over again; only there wasn’t any Dakota to call her out and bring her back to focus. If she did the deed right now, she’d be gone. She had to go potty. 

Now! 

Clutching her stomach with her hands, Kelsey grit her teeth and stopped herself.
“That’s right, Pookie.  Just keep going, get it alllllll out.  You’re not fussy.  Just gassy.”  Burning up inside her, the last of her big girl brain was incredulou…incredu…incred…she couldn’t believe it! Mommy had no idea what she was really doing!  Well, she’d show her, that’s what!  The DVD switched off, Bugs Bunny came back on, and judging by the words and sound effects, it was one she hadn’t seen before. 

Part of her relaxed, her attention drawn by the ramblings of the cartoon wabbit.  It was only the slightest sound of her own crinkle that made her realize it. FOCUS!

         Full of equal parts fury and panic, Kelsey bounced up into a full standing position, clenching her cheeks to avoid what she hoped wasn’t the inevitable.  Mommy looked confused “Pookie, what are you…?”

Kelsey didn’t wait though.  Big girls didn’t wait to go to the potty, they just went.  They didn’t even ask permission.   Pitter-pattering all the way, knees almost locked and guts screaming for pressure release, Kelsey hustled into the bathroom.  Time to do it for real, with a real potty, not a stupid pretend chair like she had at the playhouse with Dragon Jammies the other day.  Time to be a big girl, once and for all!


An involuntary shiver wriggled it’s way up her legs as bare feet touched cold bathroom floor. It was sweet relief to her brain, a familiar discomfort for once.  She’d have to get used to that, she promised herself, almost remembering the cold shiver from going potty first thing in the morning.  It was from the bathroom, right?  Right

Daddy’s heavy footsteps shaking the floor signaled his return.  A fresh diaper and pack of wipes in his hands, he passed the bathroom door, before walking backwards and doing a double take; a confused look plastered on his mug.  Good. She needed a witness.  The people of this strange new world she’d created didn’t seem to believe something unless they saw it with their own eyes.  Time for Daddy to see his baby girl was potty trained.

Then, in her biggest big girl voice that she could manage, Kelsey pressed the backs of her knees against the edge of the potty and yelled “BABY’S GOTTA GO POTTY!”  With an air of authority, she plopped down on the potty lid as hard as she could so that she could use the potty extra hard.  

She waited.

Daddy looked at her.

She looked back.

And waited. And wriggled

And waited. And fidgeted.

And waited. And sucked her thumb.

What next?  Had she pottied yet?  Had she done it?

“Pookie?” Daddy said at last.  “What are you doing?”

Feeling a bit offended, Kelsey answered, “Goin’ potty…”

Daddy chuckled at that.  “Kelsey, the lid’s down.”

“Huh?” 

“The lid’s down, Pookie. First, you gotta lift the seat up.  Then you gotta make sure your diaper is off, and then sit and then-”

 Kelsey didn’t wait; couldn’t wait.  Her big girl brain was completely overwhelmed.  Too many steps.  Too many steps!  By the time Daddy was telling her she was pottying wrong, she’d felt completely overwhelmed.  Instead of  trying to do the brain surgery that was usin’ the potty and liftin’ the seat and then whatever came next, Kelsey lifted the only seat that mattered: her own.  With all her might, she pushed, and pushed, and pushed, her bum and sanity dangling barely an inch above the solid surface beneath her, till inch by inch, the contents of her tummy wormed and squirmed its way out of her. All those icky thoughts of bein’ a big girl went out with all the other poopy things about her life up until that point and landed firmly into the backseat of her diapee; where they belonged.

The proud little forever baby smiled and let out a manic giggle as the solid and familiar warmth filled the back of her diapee, making it crinkle and smush; spreading as the padding expanded to its furthest point.

The warmth, and delightful yet familiar squish-squish only got better when she wiggled her messy bum all over the hard toilet seat. It was rather like a highchair, really, though the extra freedom to move and wriggle and spread the solid mess around in her diapee made it really fun.  This must be why big kids liked the potty so much! 

But was it worth it?  Really?  Why go all the way to the dumb ol’ potty every time she’d have to pee-pee or poo-poo?  She had no idea how much playtime she’d lose that way, but she knew it was a lot.  And all of her friends wore diapees too.  Why would she want to be the only one who used the potty?   Pretendin’ to use the potty was fun though.  Kelsey liked pretendin’.

A big smile on her face, Kelsey stood up and plopped back down on her butt, just so Daddy could see her pretend using the potty again.  The feeling of her poopie spreading around in her diapee the second time was still just as much fun as the first time. “So big! Such a big kid!” she proclaimed, remembering the forever ago when she had first pretended to go potty.  Gosh it was so much fun to pretend!

Daddy was definitely proud of her, he was smiling so big.  “That’s..heh...heh-heh...very good, baby.  You’re a natural.”  He looked like he was really proud of her.  He was turning red and his stomach was doing more of that jiggly thing.  He must’ve been thinking of a really funny Bugs Bunny Cartoon just then.

Mommy inched her way past Daddy and into the bathroom.  “Very good, Pookie!”  She took Kelsey’s hand and guided her up.  “Now let’s go get you changed.”

“But I used the potty!”  She was pretending extra hard!  That meant she got to stay in her diaper as long as she wanted, right?  Because even though the poopy was still in her diapee she HAD used the potty, right?  Right.

“Yes, and that was very impressive,” Mommy said, her tone dripping with a sing-song-sweetness, “but I don’t want my big girl getting a rash.” Kelsey sulked a bit as she was lead back into the living room so that Mommy could change her.  Stupid potty.

 They were changing her right away, and her mess hadn’t even cooled yet.  This potty thing wasn’t as good as it seemed to be.  It just let the grown-ups know when she’d poopied. Forget the potty.  Maybe next time she could do it at daycare or the mall or the playground, some place where it might be awhile before they caught her poopin’ and she could keep playing.   Oh she wished that could happen.  Heeeeeeeey….there was something she could REALLY wish for.

She hadn’t even finished the thought before Mommy unbuttoned the snaps on her Little Mermaid diapee cover. The sound of the phone ringing and her Daddy going to answer caught Kelsey’s attention just as Mommy went to rip the tapes off her diapee.

While Daddy talked to Susie’s Mommy in the kitchen, Kelsey got her butt wiped; and with that the young woman that she might have been if not for a fateful wish, was wiped clean too.

(Susie)

Susie dipped her chin into the foamy blanket of water, giving herself a sweet-smelling beard.  She loved bubble baths: The smells, the tickling textures, the feeling of Mommy gently scrubbing away all her aches and pains from a busy day of play.  No need for soap, either.  The water was the soap.  Bubble baths really were the perfect end to a perfect day.

And with tomorrow’s sleepover to look forward to, the world was going to be even better than perfect.  Susie couldn’t fully enjoy the bath, though, even as Mommy tickled her chin, gently flicking under the bubble beard Susie had made for herself.  The world was fuzzy all of a sudden, and it wasn’t just because Susie wasn’t allowed to wear her glasses in the tub. 

Something was bothering Susie, like a tiny blister or a toothache except it was in her brain.  There was an annoying, niggling, nagging little voice in the back of her head that was telling her that all of this was wrong.  Mommy shouldn’t be giving her bath, bubbles or not, caressing her delicate skin and humming ‘Rub-A-Dub-Dub’.  She shouldn’t be looking forward to getting re-diapered and put in her pretty pink pajammies.

All of this was wrong.  This wasn’t her.  None of this was her.  That’s what the voice kept saying anyway.

It was screaming, but it was very far away, so it was still quiet, like an old friend calling out on the playground trying to catch up with the rest of the group.   Tomorrow wasn’t supposed to be a sleepover, was it?  No; that had been a fib that she had told Mommy to get her bestest friends together.  But why would she fib to Mommy?   The little Forbie girl had sassed Mommy, sure, and gotten her justly deserved spanking for being sassy in the deal, but she’d never lied to her before.  Not that she could remember.


But if Susie was meeting with Dakota and Kelsey, and it wasn’t supposed to be a sleepover, why were they meeting? Mommy’s washcloth dragged over her face, getting rid of the bubble beard and moved on to behind her ears.

Had she still possessed the appropriate vocabulary, Susan would have recognized the amounts of cognitive dissonance running through her brain.  More than likely, Susan’s own stubborn pride, sense of agency and rightful embarrassment at being naked in front of her own mother would have put the kibosh on this whole ‘bath’, and she would have ruthlessly said or done anything to get out of this terrible situation.  That was a lifetime ago; even if that lifetime had only ended less than two days previously, and so Susie was more than content to let her Mommy get behind her ears and in all the little nooks and crannies during what was clearly a routine bubble bath. 

“What’s wrong, Susie?” Mommy’s voice broke in.   “You look, sad.”

The girl-who-would-be-accountant looked up into her mother’s face.  “I do?”

Mommy put down the washcloth.  “You only look like that when you’re thinking hard about something.  Are you nervous about the sleepover tomorrow?”

Susie blanched.  How did Mommy always know?  “No…?”  she said in the way of toddlers who don’t fully understand what they’re saying.  “I mean…Mommy, can I ask you a question?”

“Sure, baby girl. Shoot.”

“Can we get rid of all of my frilly dresses and stuff?”

A frown and a furrowed brow flashed across Mommy’s face, then vanished behind a mix of concern and inquisitiveness.  “Is this because you’re trying to be a big girl again?  Honey, we had this talk yester-“
“No!” Susie interrupted, even though she knew she shouldn’t.  “I was just wanting to try somethin’ different.”

Mommy narrowed her eyes.  “How different?”

The Forbie sunk down in the bubbles.  “Pants?  Somethin’ so that people can’t see my diapee,” then she thought of the ‘panties’ that had been shimmied up her hips this morning.  “Or my legs.”.

“But your dresses are so pretty,” Janet (why was Susie starting to think of Mommy as ‘Janet’?) said.  “You wouldn’t want to waste all of your pretty clothes.” 

Susie wanted to sass something back.  There was something of the old her lurking there under the bubbles.  Something that demanded satisfaction.  Something that existed deep within her even back when she’d made the wish that put her in this position.  But back-sass got her paddled.  That was no good.  The Forbie’s temper was held in check by a healthy, almost godlike fear of her own mother.   “Pweeeeeeease….”  She pouted her lips.  “Wouldn’t I look pretty in anything?  Even shortalls?”  Now it was Mommy’s turn to blanch.  Susie spoke quickly, “Pink shortalls?”

“What has gotten into you the last few days?  All of this silliness is so unlike you.  You love your cute dresses.”

There, naked in the bathtub, looking the most like a grown-up that she had in the last forty-eight hours,  Susie summoned up all of her remaining willpower and spoke her truth.  “I wanna have a choice.”  That’s what this was all about at its core.  That’s what had caused the great divide between Susan and Janet.   “Even if it’s just a little choice, like what I’m wearin’ over my diapee.  I’m never gonna grow up…but I still wanna have a choice over…over…sumfin’!”

Any and all concern, or sternness, and worry melted out of Janet’s face.  Janet was gone.  Mommy was in her place.  “Ooooooh sweetie.  Is that what all this back sass and stubbornness has been about?  Is that why you’ve been so fussy?”

“Uh-huh,” Susie nodded.  “Aaaaand I wanna help out in the restaurant, too.”
Mommy took Susie’s face into her hands.  “But honey, you’re too little to work in the restaurant.  There’s hot and messy things all over.  I couldn’t possibly risk getting you all dirty, or hurt.”

A long-buried memory of when Susan was three bubbled up as brilliant new inspiration in Susie’s mind.  “Menus?  Maybe I can pass out menus?”

“Susie,” Mommy said, “I thought you didn’t want to work in the restaurant.”

“I just wanna have the choice,” Susie felt as much as she heard her voice crack.  “That’s all.”

Mommy seemed to be arguing with herself; frowning again, and doing her own pouty lip (so that’s where Susie got it from); eyes darting from side to side like a rapid game of ping-pong.  “Oooooh, I never could say ‘no’ to you.  If you want some new clothes, that’s fine by me.  And if you want to be part of the family business, you can be my helper….for real this time.”

And just like that, the last memories of who she used to be were replaced with who she was.  A long standing rift between Susan and Janet had been wiped away, replaced only with Susie and her Mommy.  “MOMMY!”  Water cascaded off of Susan’s naked body as she all-but leaped out of the tubby and into her mother’s waiting arms, almost tripping as her shins hit the rim of the bathtub.  “MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY!”  She shouted the name at the top of her lungs, as if in exaltation of her god.

“EASY SUSIE!” Mommy laughed, not caring as her daughter drenched her.  “EASY!  It’s not time for MY bath yet!”  More laughter from both of them bounced around in their ears.  “Now let’s dry you off and get you to bed.  I bet Flopsy misses you. ”   A clean white fluffy towel was wrapped around the still gleeful and trembling forever baby.  “We can even go shopping for some new clothes, before we go pick up your little friends at the wishing fountain.
“That’s okay,” Susie said, giggling.  “I don’t want ‘em no more.”

“Hmmm?”

“I just wanted the choice, that’s all.”

(Dakota)

There’s a strange thing about waiting; a way that simple silence and prolonged idleness can change a person.  Action is easy: You do something.  You get feedback.  You react to the feedback and do something else.  Wash, rinse, repeat, until all transactions are exhausted to personal satisfaction.  Action is a test of someone’s most basic instincts; how they react on instinct and impulse.  But waiting; that’s a measure of someone’s will.

Ambition and desperation- or whatever moniker; that call for action chooses; becomes planning.  But then planning gives way to anticipation.  If anticipation ferments and festers for too long, stewed by an increasing sense of helpless, it can mutate into anxiety with a hint of complete and utter nerve-fraying  paranoia.

Such was the case with a certain (now definitely ex-) sex kitten queen-bee.  Surrounded by her long-forgotten childhood friends, and chugging along on a high energy cocktail of disgust (because diapers…eww), white-hot fear (because Susie had definitely all-but lost her gourd and Dakota might very well be next) and feeling out of other viable options,  (because eff it, it worked the first time) the wishing fountain plan seemed like the most solid bet imaginable.   As it turns out, just because something is the best option doesn’t mean it’s a good one.

When Daddy had put her to bed and raised the bars of her crib up high, locking her in for the night, Dakota couldn’t sleep.  Even the cheery mobile above her head failed to hypnotize her as it had the previous night.  Instead, all the babied blonde could do was wait…and wait…and wait…but sleep wouldn’t claim her.


A million-billion thoughts rattled around in her normally full and confident head.  The ball was rolling and fully well out of her control.  Her entire future (and past come to think of it) would be down to this one roll of the dice, (or flip of a coin...whatever).  There were so many ‘what if’s’, though. What if wishing on a star was the only kind of wish that worked?  What if the grown-ups didn’t take them to Kelsey’s wishing fountain?  What if Susie was too far gone to focus on the right wish?  What if Dakota and Kelsey were too grown up to tap into whatever insane child-like magic that had lit that spark in the first place?  What if their new wish had unintended consequences like the one they’d made twenty years ago?

No matter how many ways she phrased it in her mind, Dakota’s worries all boiled down to one thing: What if this didn’t work?

That was the thought that kept her up all night and unable to so much as close her eyes beyond a blink.  Some instinctive, lizard part of her brain was terrified that this wasn’t going to work, and that she’d close her eyes and the grown-up part of her would never wake up again.  She was so focused on the upcoming day’s events that she barely noticed the sun cresting through her window, breaking the seemingly endless night. So intent upon her impending infantile doom was she, that she hadn’t realized she’d thoroughly soaked her diaper during the night until Daddy came in and changed her. 

That’s what she told herself, anyways. 

“I’m not losing it,” she mumbled.  “I’m a grown-up. I’m a grown-up.  I’m tall and pretty and scary and boys like me and girls are jealous.”  It was every bit of her identity that she could cling onto.  Dakota, the reputedly sweet little angel circa twenty years past wouldn’t be able to pull this off.   Dakota the b-word that could make anyone do whatever she wanted with just a wink or a scowl was needed to get through this.   “I’m not losing it.  I’m a grown-up.  I’m tall and pretty and scary and boys like me…”  She whispered this mantra to herself through this morning’s banana flavored mush (yuck…banana).  She kept saying it as a sky-blue sun dress that wouldn’t quite cover her diaper if she bent down was pulled over her head and matching crocs (ugh…crocs) were strapped onto her feet.  Dakota even kept up her little prayer as Daddy unbuckled her out of her car seat and took hold of her hand.   (Crud!  What was Daddy’s real name?!)

Hair back up in pigtails, and crinkling with every step, Dakota’s tired eyes blurred in and out of focus.  The mid-morning sun was in just the right (wrong) position so that it was hard to differentiate any of the blur people walking along the cobbled paths of the old college.  She couldn’t see any of her fellow not-quite Forbies.   Truthfully, she wasn’t even sure this was the right place.  Lord knew she’d never actually been on campus before (the occasional party with whatever fling didn’t count).  “Daddy?” she called to the man right beside her.

“Yes Dakota?”

“We’re still going to the wishing fountain, right?”

“Wishing fountain?” 

The question alone made a jolt of panic signal in her chest.  How did Daddy not know about the wishing fountain?  That had been the plan.  “The wishing fountain,” she repeated.  “That’s where we’re meeting, right?” The clatter of a rolling suitcase packed full of Dakota-sized onesies and Dakota-sized diapers bobbing along on old fashioned cobblestone was the only sound Dakota heard in reply.  “Daddy?”

“Hmmm?” Daddy said, coming out of a haze of some sort.  “Oh yeah.  The fountain by the old dorms.  That’s right, honey.  We’re going to that fountain.”

The stinging, tickling, almost jittery panic in her breast died down a bit.  “Can I have a coin to make a wish?”

Daddy scoffed, audibly, and then softened his tone.  “I don’t think so, honey.”  In an instant that same rush of panic was back with a vengeance.  How could she make a wish if she had no coin? “Wishing fountains don’t really work.”
The babied blonde’s legs stopped moving.  Reflexively her heels dug into the ground and her fingers dug into the backside of Daddy’s hand. 

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” She wailed.  Unbidden, the thought that this was all a gigantic waste of time, not even a band-aid of the bleeding wound of her sanity, intruded on her.  “No! No! No! No!”  Each word was punctuated with the stamping of a croc adorned foot.  It would only work if she believed it and her stupid, (stupid, stupid, stupid) Daddy had put a bit of doubt in her head.  And that was a thought that she could in no way tolerate.

This was going to work. IT HAD TO!

“They do work!” She all-but screamed at her father.  “They DO! THEY DO THEY DO THEY DO!”

Blurred people around them, all so unimportant before the moment, started to stop and stare at the father-daughter pair.  Dakota was making a scene.  Good.  Whether a giant toddler or a full grown terror, making a scene was something that was still in her soul’s toolbox.  Dakota started to let out a low whining moan, something any parent will tell you is a telltale precursor to a full-fledged temper tantrum.

Confronted with judgmental stares of strangers and passerby, Daddy did the only thing he could do; the thing Dakota knew he’d do.  He caved.  “Okay okay,” he shushed.  “They do work! They do work!”  Already he had released the rolling suitcase and was digging around in his pockets for change. “Here.  We’ll go make a wish, together.” He held out a faded quarter.

Quickly, and without hesitation, the girl snatched it from her father’s hand. He had at least a hundred pounds and six inches on her, but out here in the open, where she was an adorable tot and he a (tired but) doting father; she was very clearly in control. Some part of her felt comforted by that.

Waiting….waiting had sucked.  But acting on something…playing on people’s expectations and emotions…that was good…that was right.  Dakota was already beginning to feel more and more grown-up.

Her whining died down a little, and he she looked up at Daddy, clenching the quarter tightly in her hand.  “More...?”  Even with the inflection, both of them knew it really wasn’t a question.

“More?” Daddy said.  “Dakota, baby, you only need one for a wish.”

Her lip pouted out and her eyes became full saucers.  “Foh my fwiends…” she put on a fake (at least it was meant to be fake) affectation.  Oh crud!  How much would it suck if she got stuck with a permanent baby lisp?  Quickly, Dakota cleared her throat.  “For my friends…”  (Phew!)

The jingling of loose change was music to her ears as Daddy fished out another handful. 

“All I’ve got is pennies and di-”

“That works!” Dakota snatched the coins from his hand took off at a full waddle down the cobblestone path.

“Dakota!  Wait!”

The clink clack ching chang of the coins rattle around in her hand was a symphony of freedom.  So joyously focused was Dakota, that she barely even noticed the crinkling made with each skipping step while the tired click-clacking of plastic wheels on cobblestone rushed to keep pace with her.

A surge of impatience and adrenaline cleared her sleep deprived vision, as blurred colors and shapes gained crisp detail and new focus.  Not quite a hundred yards ahead of her, distant yet still unmistakable in all of its gargoyle gray glory, sat the fountain at the center of courtyard. The jangling of lose change stopped as Dakota gripped the coins harder, breaking out into a sprint.
 
“I wish, I wish, I wish wish wish wish wish wish-”

“DAKOTA!  STO-!”

Still running, Dakota looked over her shoulder to see how far ahead she was of Daddy.
An involuntary ‘oof’ shot out of her as she collided dead on with another body.  The babied blonde didn’t make it a step back before she was tripping over her own feet and plunging, diapered bottom first onto the cobblestone beneath her.  A muffled hiss, like helium escaping a pinhole leak filled the air as the thick padding beneath her absorbed most of the impact.  “Ooooooooooh FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUDGE!”  (And yes, she DID say fudge).  The jolt of panic she felt as she heard tiny pieces of metal falling out of her grasp almost made her not notice the wet warmth and spreading squish as she went pee-pee in her baby pants….almost.  On the verge of losing her temper, Dakota let out a curse.  “Poopie!”

“Oh yeah?” A familiar voice across from her, asked.  “Neat.”   The bediapered queen bee snapped her head up in a scowl, which immediately softened upon recognition of the speaker.  Sitting across from her, equally splay legged; diaper bulging and slightly discolored from wetness; was Susie.  The other girl’s diaper might have been fuller, and her shoes a pair of pink sneakers with frilly socks, with glasses strapped on to her head by an elastic band, but Dakota’s fashion sense -sharp as ever- noticed a crucial similarity.  Their sundresses-Dakota’s blue and Susie’s pink- were otherwise identical.

Susie giggled.  “Sorry ‘bout that Dakota,” she said.  “I must’ve tripped or somethin’.  I was just ‘cited ta see ya and I wanted to give ya a big huggy.”  The girl snerked again and patted her padded crotch.  “Heh….huggie.” She looked up. “Ready for the sleepover?”  As Susie (it was definitely Susie now...full Forbie) jostled herself, the sound of panicked footsteps raced up from both directions. 

Air rushed into Dakota’s lungs and the world rattled around her as she frantically searched the ground for her lost coins, knowing what was about to happen.  She was vaguely aware of a pair of heels clopping up behind her friend.  “Susie!”  Quarter.  Penny.  Dime?  Where was the dime?!

“Dakota!”  Two calloused hands snaked themselves under Dakota’s arms, hoisting her up to her feet.  “Are you okay?”  Not okay.  Definitely not okay. The ground was falling away from her. Three wishes did this mess,three wishes had to undo it.  And for that, three coins were needed. The not-quite-Forbie’s heart sank, as her stomach gurgled a bit.  (That banana mush wasn’t sitting right with her.)  Where was that dime?!    

“Oh shiny!”  

Dakota looked up from the ground.  Maybe it was that Susie’s diaper was heavier, or that her mommy wasn’t as strong as Dakota’s Daddy so it took longer for Susie to be lifted to her feet; giving her time to notice.  Maybe the glasses strapped to her head made it easier for her to notice a small gleaming disc of metal wedged between two cobblestones.   Maybe it was something akin to fate (or dumb luck).  Whatever it was, Susie now had a dime sitting in the palm of her hand.

“Susie!” her mommy asked, smoothing out the pink sundress and checking the forever baby over for scuffs or scrapes or bruises.  “Are you alright, baby doll?”  Susie nodded dumbly, marveling at the shiny object in her hand, while the real adult looked her up and down.  

Following the other grown-up’s lead, Daddy started doing the same. “Kids, huh?”  He let out a dry, nervous chuckle.  “They get so excited and into things that they forget to look where they’re going, huh?”  Dakota could only grit her teeth and try not to squirm as Daddy adjusted her dress back on her shoulder and ran his hands along her elbows and legs.  She liked it when boys were up in her personal space, not her father!  Yuck!

“That they do,” the lady in the dress agreed. Dakota could only stare as her former counterpart; who only yesterday had been a voice of reason; allowed herself to be poked and prodded, not even seeming to notice as her mother cupped the front of her sagging, swaying, discolored diaper.   “You’re about ready for a change, little lady.”  Mrs. Susie’s Mommy shook her head a bit, and sighed.  “That’s what I get for giving you watermelon for breakfast.  Goes right through you, doesn’t it?”  Still staring at the dime in her hands, Susie punctuated her mother’s point with a muffled fart.  “Both ends, too.”  

Both the grown-ups laughed, at that.  Susie’s mother laughed at her own ‘cleverness’; but Daddy’s laugh was different, yet somehow familiar.  Where had Dakota heard that kind of laugh, before?  The feeling of her dress being lifted so that Daddy could pull back the waistband of her diaper interrupted her puzzling.  “Daddy! I’m fine!”  She slapped back his hand and he withdrew it as if he’d been stung.  

Whirling around so quickly that the entirety of her diaper flashed, she looked him the eye.  He was surprised, and hurt, and momentarily cowed, but then his eyes shot over Dakota’s shoulder, and his face showed concern; just not for her.  Susie’s mommy was busy digging through a diaper bag.  Susie, was giggling like an idiot at her dime.  “Now where is that changing pad?”

“Sorry,” Daddy spoke up, “I forgot to bring Dakota’s.  All of her stuff is in her suitcase.”

Susie’s mom seemed to miss the comment and just said.  “We’ll just have to find a clean bathroom.”  She grabbed Susie’s free hand and moved to walk away from the pair.

That got the Forbie’s attention.  “But Mommy…” Susie half-whined  “My friends-!”

“Can wait till after you’re cleaned up”

“But I founda shiny!  Now I can make-uh wish!”  Dakota felt a smidgen of relief.  Maybe the little stick in the mud wasn’t as far gone as she’d thought.  The balm of relief soothed her nerves even more when she distinctly saw Susie wink at her and mouth the words, “I ‘member”.

“You can make your little wish after you’re changed.”  The matter seemed fairly settled, as far as the grown-up lady was concerned.  (Grown-up? Not grown-up...not the only grown-up lady anyhoo.)

Another fart eeked out from the back of Susie in protest.  “But I’m not dooooone.”  

That gave the ol’ ma’am pause.  “It would be easier to change you once instead of twice,” she said more to herself than her daughter.  “But once you make your boom-booms, we get you changed.”

That was enough for Susie to jump up and down, free hand hoisted into the air, while her soaked nappy bounced out of time with her.  “Yaaaaaay!”  Out of a long buried form of politeness, Dakota pretended to be deeply interested in the color of her (ugh) crocs and looked away.  “Wish time!  Wishie wishie!”  If only there’d been a way for the blonde (it better not be) forever baby to avert her hearing, too.

The sound of heels clicking off and away, along with the enthusiastic cheering of a giant toddler becoming fainter signalled the mother-daughter pair gaining distance.  The feeling of a hand clasping her own and moving to drag her along announced their own movement. Bratting it up, Dakota tried to yank her hand free again.  “Daaaaddy!” Nothing happened. His grip was iron, now.

“Dakota, hush,” Daddy said in a strangely authoritative tone.  “That’s enough, now.  We’re going to see your little friends, and that’s that.  No more distractions.”  Daddy didn’t talk to her that way.  Nobody did!  But for some reason, she couldn’t help but fall in step and follow him following them.  (At least they were still headed in the right direction.)  Also, at least her diaper wasn’t crinkling as much.

Looking up at Daddy, a question re-entered her conscious. What was up with him all of a sudden?  Last night, he could barely be bothered to look up from the T.V. to check her diapee, and just a few minutes ago he was willing to scramble through his pockets (prolly even beg if necessary) just so she wouldn’t make a scene.  He was tired.  He was beaten down.  He was the same ol’ Daddy that she’d known for most of her life.  

Slowing his stride just enough so that he was parallel to her, Daddy released her hand placed an arm around her shoulders and Dakota couldn’t help herself but to lean into him and tilt her head onto his shoulder.  A small hum, rather like a purr, buzzed from her closed lips.  “That’s my girl,” he whispered.  Without thinking, she wrapped her newly freed hand around his waist and kept walking.  She smiled softly and breathed in through her nose.  He smelled good.  Was he wearing cologne?  Daddy never wore cologne.  Not the ‘old’ Daddy, anyways.

Her gaze looked ahead, again, and Dakota’s mouth became as dry as she (kind of) wished her pants were.  Susie and her Mommy were walking in exactly the same fashion.  Right in front of everyone, she was slipping.  She was liking this!  She was transforming into a total daddy’s girl!  Heart pounding, Dakota checked her free hand to make sure she hadn’t stupidly (like a baby) dropped the other two coins.  If she didn’t act soon, she’d be condemned to a lifetime of playing with kiddie toys and pooping her pants and well....liking it.  She might even start liking Alice! (NOOOOOOOO!)

The social mastermind tilted her head up to look at Daddy.  What could she do to derail this train?  What could she say?  How to stop the momentum?  A quick gurgling in her gut gave her some advice that she refused to even consider.

Daddy nuzzled her head with his, a sign of fatherly affection almost completely forgotten.  Less than a dozen steps ahead, (were they walking a little faster?), the Mommy-forever baby girl duo were doing the exact same thing.    The dots finally started to connect.

Oh crud muffins! He was mirroring Mrs. Susie’s Mom! Copying her and following her lead! He actually cared about what this lady thought!  But wh-?  Dakota didn’t even need to finish that thought.  She now recognized the fleeting glances she’d seen in her father’s eyes.  Whether it was middle school or middle aged, some looks from men were all the same.  (Ew….Gross!)  Her Daddy liked her friend’s mommy! Like, like-like!  If the fall hadn’t already emptied the young woman’s bladder, this surely would have.

“Daddy…?”

“Yes, baby?”

“Why are you copying Mrs. Susie’s Mommy?”

The young woman could almost swear she felt her father blush.  “What do you mea-?”, then he changed mid-stream.  “Whoops here we are!”

Indeed they were.  Directly in front of the foursome, was the large circular concrete, barely knee high pool.  A weak spray of water shot into air, manufacturing a constant tinkling sound as the little water droplets landed back down into the pool, only to be sucked up by some subtle filter or another to go on the next ride. 

This was the wishing fountain?  For some reason, Dakota had pictured some deep well or site with a majestic statue...at least a plaque.  This was closer to a big ol’ permanent kiddie pool.  Sheesh, she’d seen slip-n-slides at frat parties with more water pressure than this pathetic thing.  This was her best chance for getting her big girl panties back?

A cloud moved away from the mid morning sun and fountain sparkled from the inside out as an octopus’s garden of loose change reflected the morning star’s light back up into her eyes.  Stars.  They looked so much like the little stars, twinkling in the water.  Only the sun was out, and they were on the ground, instead of in the dark and up in the sky.

And just like that, the most wonderful, childlike sensation filled the normally cynical squaw: hope.  This was almost the exact opposite of the wishing star. (THANK GAWD SHE STILL UNDERSTOOD OPPOSITES!)  Bright blue sky instead of dark black!  Shinies down in the water instead of up in the sky!  Fast wishes instead of slow ones!  GROWN-UP AGAIN INSTEAD OF BEING A BABY FOREVER! 

 This really was just so crazy it might just work!   Dakota looked to her side and saw Susie, grinning so hard that bits of drool were threatening to slip from her mouth.  She was ready.  Dakota was ready. Everything was ready.  There was just one component...person...missing.


  She looked to the left, and then the right.  No Kelsey in sight “Where’s-?”  From behind, a frizzie haired blur in yellow latched onto Dakota before another phoneme could be uttered.  

“Ohmygawd’kotaIdidn’tthinkyou’dmakeitandwe’dmissoutonourchance!”  The river of words assaulted Dakota’s ears as the little bird of a girl somehow managed to squeeze the breath out of the taller woman.  Dakota’s own grin nearly matched Susie’s as she wriggled around and hugged Kelsey back.  A first time observer would never think that they barely tolerated each other just the day before and would have despised each other the day before that.  

(But then again, isn’t that how little girls often were? Best friends and then sworn enemies and then back all over again?)

Pushing the rogue thought aside, Dakota pried herself away so she could look at her once-victim dead on.  “We’re all here,” she said.  “ Ready to do this?”  

“Uh-huh!” Kelsey nodded, her own yellow sundress an almost perfect stylistic match for Dakota’s and Susie’s respective outfits.  “We should say what we’re gonna wish for!” She hopped a little bit as she spoke.

Dakota scoffed.  “What?”

“That’s how it works!”  Kelsey insisted, her own eyes twinkling like so many quarters just beneath the water.  “If we don’t, we might wish for diff’rent things, and it won’t work!”

“Yeah!” Susie agreed, breaking away from her Mommy and trotting up next to them.  Daddy and her were talking about something.  “We don’t wanna wish for diff’rent stuff, right?”  Oh, wisdom from the mouths of babes….

“I see your point…”

Kelsey grabbed onto Dakota’s white-knuckled wrist.   “Let’s say it together.”  Dakota couldn’t help but roll her eyes as Susie took the other wrist and held hands with Kelsey, completing the circle.

Rushed and impatient, Dakota growled a bit so she barely noticed her stomach’s complaint.  “Fine…”

“One…” said Kelsey

“Two…” Dakota said.

“EIGHT!” Susie yelled and the three all spoke in unison.

“To playunhave onwishthe theourbest playoldsleep groundwish! ov er ever!!”


All three girls stopped and looked at each other, each clearly confused.

“What did you say?” Dakota asked.

Cocking her head to the side, Susie repeated herself. “To have the best sleepover ever!”  

Dakota’s frown deepened.  Yeah, as far gone as Susie was, that checked out.  Hopefully, it was nothing that couldn’t be worked out with a little careful redirection.  “No stu-...!” Dakota stopped herself.  (Careful.)  “I mean...no silly!” A forced, fake, laugh tittered out from her.  “We don’t need to wish for THAT!”  Teeth clenched and lips pulled back into a nervous grin.  “We’re supposed to unwish our old wish, remember?”

“Huh?”  Susie’s said.  “What old wish?”

Dakota couldn’t help herself. “The one where we wished to be babies forever, duh!”

“Why would we wish that?” Susie asked.  Her face scrunched up like something important had just dawned on her.  “We’re already forever babies.”  As if on cue, Susie bent her knees and her cheeks began to turn a shade of pink as she clenched her fists. Her eyes got a kind of far off look; a-looking-without-seeing type of expression.  

Dakota felt a lump of despair and disgust knot up in her throat. She didn’t need to see the back of Susie’s diaper to know that it was rapidly inflating. An ex-gossip girl, she wasn’t much for reading lips, but she was all but certain that Susie was mouthing the words “Boom-Boom”, as she sighed and her diaper drooped down an extra inch.  “All done.”

Her formerly well manicured hands shot down to her gurgling stomach on reflex.  It was like watching a kid with lice; somebody else starts scratching and you can’t help but be next.   (No! Not next! Never next!)  Susie really had gone full Forbie, and Dakota realized she’d just given away a perfectly good wishing coin to a total goober. The hope to undo what had been set in motion by three now rested on the shoulders of two.

Just as Dakota was about to lose it, a shadow fell upon them.  “Kelsey! There you are!” The deep gentle voice, cocooned in husky, labored breathing came from a small mountain of a man.  Clearly overweight and out of shape, but still big enough to be intimidating, he towered over the diapered trio.  “Don’t... run off like that…” he huffed “...scared the life out of your mother in me.”  His hair, though graying was an almost identical match to Kelsey’s.  Standing in the pudgey giant’s shadow, pulling along a Hello Kitty suitcase, was a skinny little hen of a woman; obviously Kelsey’s mother.

Unflapped, Kelsey dug her front toe into the cobblestone ground, and sheepishly began to turn her foot. Biting her lip, she added in a “Sorry Daddy. Sorry Mommy. I’ll try not to...”.  It was a lie.  Dakota instinctively knew that.  But it wasn’t the type of lie that she typically told. Nothing manipulative or purposefully deceitful.  It was the equivalent of a moocher promising to pay someone back.  Not malicious, just lazy and unthoughtful.  And yet...it worked.

“Okay pookie,” her Daddy said.  “Don’t do it again, okay?”  From the sound of it, even Kelsey’s Daddy didn’t even really believe it.  It was just the same dance of constant rule reminders and then accidentally breaking those rules again and again that any toddler might go through with their parents. It was one’s limited memory and impulse control playing off another’s infinite patience.  

The other grown-ups closed in on their little circle, each parent placing a hand on their little one’s shoulder.  They were surrounded.  “We’re all here,” Daddy said.  He looked over at the other parents.  “Where’s your car?”

“WHAT?!” It was Kelsey who piped in this time.  “But! But! But! We were s’posed to do a wish!”  Thank God that Kelsey still had her right mind about her.  The grown-ups exchanged confused looks.

Daddy spoke up.  “Dakota’s got it in her head that if she throws a coin in the fountain, she gets a wish.  I think she wants Kelsey and Susie to make wishes, too.”  That got a collected ‘Awwwwww’ from the people who weren’t wearing disposable undies.

Susie’s Mommy sniffed loudly and checked her daughter’s diaper, again.  “Oh, there we go.”  She glanced over at the fountain, running her hand along the long wide rim of the concrete wading pool.  The wheels in her head were clearly turning.  She looked to Kelsey’s parents, “Otto? Linda?”  Do you two happen to have a changing pad?  I left Susie’s in the car.”

The little hen of a woman patted the pastel satchel resting atop the suitcase. “Sure do,” she said, wasting no time before opening it and routing around for something to lay a rather large baby down on.

“Let’s get you changed, little lady, and then we’ll get everybody loaded up.”

Susie bowed her head, annoyed, at having to step away from her friends, but clearly not bothered by the prospect of having her tushie wiped in public.  “Yes, Mommy.” Bowlegged, she started to waddle to the edge of the fountain, the changing mat quickly in place.  

Loaded up?! No! “But...but...but...the wish!” Dakota stammered.  “We haven’t made our wish yet!”  The lump in her throat moved down to her stomach, settling in like a rock.  

“Yeah!” Kelsey agreed.  “I wanted to go to the playground!”

Dakota, Kelsey’s Mommy, and Kelsey’s Daddy said the same thing. “Playground?”

The frizzie haired young lady, (Forbie…? No...couldn’t be), nodded her head.  “Uh-huh” she said.  

“What playground?” Kelsey’s Daddy asked, eyebrows arched.

Kelsey pointed down a side walkway past hedges and towards tall brick buildings.  “The one that was over there!” She was all-but squealing.  She bounced a little bit on the balls of her feet, listing amenities.  “There’s a playhouse, and a ball pit, and a bouncy castle, and a slide and a-”

The big man interrupted. “Pookie, that wasn’t an all the time playground.  That was a special-”

“BUT MY WIIIIIISH!” Kelsey whined, her face turning pink.  Meanwhile, Dakota was laying down on the edge of the fountain; being a good little helper and lifting up the hem of her too short sundress so that her mommy could get to the tapes easier.  

For his part, Daddy was busying himself unzipping the suitcase, all while keeping an eye on Susie and Mrs. Susie’s Mommy.  Digging out a fresh diaper no doubt.  Odds were that Dakota’d be getting her own bum wiped as soon as Susie was done; some kind of weird, thirsty act to show he was a good father or somethin’. 

“I WANT MY WISH!”  Kelsey screamed over the sounds of tapes being ripped off Susie’s diapee…(diaper! DIAPER!)  “I WANT MY WISH AND I’M GONNA GET IT!”

Exasperatedly, Kelsey’s parents took a deep breath, and her frizzy haired daddy started to speak in slow, deliberate tones.  “Pookie.  We’ve been over this.  The playground day here at the University was a special- POOKIE!”

Kelsey ran. Sort of.  It was the unpracticed, wobbling, waddling, flat footed clomping gait of a toddler who hadn’t learned how to roll her feet, but it was fast all the same.  It was probably, (probably) due to the bulky diaper she wore.  The waddle was so pronounced that Kelsey ran with a kind of exaggerated sashay. A gust of wind caught the hem of her dress; putting her white puffy plastic backed panties on full display as they swayed from side to side with every stride.  Not that she had any room to talk, but from what little she had learned (re-learned?) about diapers over the last day or two, Dakota felt it was a safe bet to guess that Kelsey wasn’t dry.  There was no other way her butt could look that swollen.  

Dakota squeezed her hand even tighter, feeling the two remaining coins scrape against each other in her palm.  The wish!  Kelsey didn’t have a coin for the wish!  Going on pure impulse, the babied blonde took off after her frizzy haired friend.  Her own footsteps clip clopped on the cobblestone beneath her, and she had to focus to roll her feet.  It was probably (definitely) her own diaper.  A distant and tired sounding “I’ll get ‘em…” rang out after her.

A quick blur of foliage as Dakota took a sharp right past the hedges, and she had caught up to Kelsey.  “Quick, now’s our chance!”  Kelsey said.  She reached down for the hem of her dress.  “Get this dressie off of me.”  Without thinking, Dakota helped the other Forbie (other?) yank the dress off over her head, leaving her tiny breasts exposed, and her diaper completely out in the open.  “Now, you!”   

Just like how Daddy had dressed her but in reverse, Dakota threw her arms up and Kelsey yanked and jerked the floppy sundress.  This was insane.  This was absolutely insane!  But...it just might work.  If they could strip down out of these big baby clothes, maybe get some big girl panties on, then they could pass for normal again.  Not everybody was a Forbie.  There were high schoolers who weren’t babies and there were grown-ups who were only a little older than her.  Dakota could easily pass herself off as a high school senior or something.  Looking down past her breasts, she noticed the baby blue crocs on her feet.   “Shoes, too,” she said.  Thankfully, some things were still easy.  She kicked off the foam slippers off her feet, and wriggled her toes.

Kelsey looked down at her sneakers.   “How?”  To Dakota’s frustration, the girl couldn’t find the words.  How did one get past all that velcro?

The shoes weren’t their biggest obstacle, anyways.  Both of them were still wearing the most babyish thing possible.  Sneakers could wait.  “No time…” she growled softly.  “Let’s get out of these diapees...ers.”  Just as before, though, her hands pawed uselessly at the front of her diaper.  Her padding might as well have been padlocked. 

The little bird tilted her head and pouted her lip a bit.  “Why?” she asked.  A huffing and puffing sound was getting louder, coming from just on the other side of the hedges.

Kelsey’s petite, but surprisingly strong hand grasped Dakota’s and yanked her along.  “This way! Hurry!  We can hide in the playhouse!”  What the heck was Kelsey talking about? Topless, the two all-but sprinted past a final brick wall.  “I’ve got friends who will hide us!  One of them dresses like a dragon!  That’ll scare Daddy off long enough for us to play!”  

Dakota looked past her (right now) friend, and tensed up.  Directly ahead of them, in all of its freshly cut and perfectly manicured glory, bordered only by empty gothic walled dormitories….a lawn.  In other words: Nothing but a wide open space.  As her bare feet touched grass, Dakota dug her heels in and leaned back.  Her skin barely starting to glisten, her arm was still slippery enough to break free from the yanking and tugging of her frizzie haired cohort.  
The little bird jerked in the opposite direction, her fingers slipping off of Dakota’s wrist, and her own haphazard momentum sent her tumbling onto the soft grass; the last remnants of morning dew making her slide an extra foot or three.  
Kelsey’s head jerked up, a manic gleeful grin plastered on her lips. “AGAIN!” Rapidly, she scrambled up to her feet, completely disregarding the bits of grass and dirt that flecked her naked chest.  “That was what was missing last time!  A slip-in-slide! I gotta tell the gro-!”

“KELSEY! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!”  It was both a question, and an accusation of sorts.  “We can’t get away OR make a wish if we’re just running out in the open!”

“This isn’t an open field, it’s a-”  Kelsey looked back over her shoulder, and froze.  “Where is it?”  She sounded confused, maybe even a little disappointed.

“Where’s what?”  Dakota asked.

“The playground.”

Dakota slapped her thighs lightly, her frustration growing.  “What playground?”

“It was super-fun and had all this neato stuff!  Way better than the playground at Daycare and...”  

Dakota tuned out the rest of the sentence, instead noticing another trickle leak out into her diaper and a slight cramp in her belly.  She did not like where today was going.  She opened her palm and pinched the penny between her thumb and forefinger  “Kelsey, we’re not going back to the daycare.  We’re going to make a wish.”  She waggled the shiny piece of copper in front of her cohort’s face.

“A wish?”  Kelsey’s eyes unclouded for a second, and she snatched the penny from Dakota’s waiting fingers.  “Oh yeah!  A wish! THAT’s how the playground popped up last time!  I just need to-”  Another pang and a gut gurgle (or maybe just denial) broke off Dakota’s train of thought.

“Kelsey….” the blonde’s words were careful and measured, “what are you going to wish for?”

“To go to the playground.”

All other sounds went mute as Dakota focused in on the stranger in front of her, even the huffing and puffing of a certain fat man jogging up behind them became muffled and unimportant.  “We’re supposed to be wishing ourselves back into being grown-ups, remember?”  If Dakota had consciously realized that she was saying ‘grown-ups’, instead of ‘adults’, she might have cried a bit.

“But we’re not grown-ups.  We’ve never been grown-ups. We get to be babies; forever.  Why would we wanna be big girls?  Tha’s dumb!”  It was the way in which Kelsey said this- akin to saying that the sky was blue or that country music sucks- like it was obvious fact, that made Dakota’s eyes start to water.

On the verge of complete and total despair, even more so than when this madness all started, Dakota bent her knees to look the frizzy haired little bird of a girl in the eyes.  “Kelsey” she said. “Listen to me.  We are not babies.  We made a wish forever ago, but it didn’t come true till now.  But we don’t want that wish no mo-...anymore.  We’re not who we used ta be.  We’re big girls.  We used ta be big girls.  We can be big girls again. We. Just. Need. To. Wish.”

A spark came back into Kelsey’s eyes.  A spark of wonder and possibility; like telling a child that they can fly if they just think happy thoughts and add a little pixie dust.  “Big girls?”

“Yes,” Dakota whispered.  “Big girls.  Be a big girl with me.”  (Please let this work.)

“Big…”

“Yes…”  (Come on…)

“...big girls.”

“Yes!”  (Fly you beautiful bird, fly!)

“Big...big…” Kelsey broke off eye contact as she squatted a little lower to the ground.  Her nostrils flared as she exhaled with a mighty huff.

On reflex, what few social niceties remained inside the babied blonde had Dakota take a step back and turn sideways, gazing at the all-too common freakshow out of the corner of her eye. 

Her stomach churned, this time with a hint that the load might go back up, instead of down into her diaper.  It was cartoon time at Daycare all over again, but this time, Dakota knew, no manner of barbed insults or grossed out facial expressions would snap Kelsey back to being a big girl. A contented moan coming from Kelsey as she squatted a bit lower confirmed this.  The little bird was now a pants-pooping baby chick through and through.  Despite herself, Dakota turned her head to look the big-little girl in the eye.  She looked determined, like she was psyching herself up; or maybe like she was concentrating and trying to solve a very hard math problem.  Whatever was going through the girl’s head, her diaper was filling up and sagging with each passing second.

Finally, after what felt like much to long, Kelsey stood straight up and closed her mouth; her loaded diaper struggling to maintain altitude.  “All Done!” she said.  “What were we talkin’ ‘bout?”

So engrossed was Dakota (and oh how gross it was), that she didn’t notice the thundering footsteps of a man who could dress like Santa Claus everyday. “Uh-oh”  Mr. Kelsey’s Daddy, said from behind her.  “Even from across the lawn, I think I know what all that squatting and smilin’ means.”  A yellow sundress draped over one shoulder, and a matching blue one hanging from the other, he called out,  “You poopin’, Pookie?”  

A single muffled fart squeaked out from Kelsey’s backside, a bodily afterthought from the horrible smelling mess that had just ejected itself into the girl’s nappy.  “Daddy!” she screamed out in pure joy.  Rather like a bulbous tail, Kelsey’s filled up backside swang in time with her naked breasts as she waddled up, and ran into her parent’s arms. Her cooing was almost like a kind of guinea pig whistling; not even noticing or caring that the only thing she was wearing was a pair of tennies, a diaper that was on the verge of blowing out, and a smile. 

All thoughts or memories of running away seemingly evaporated.  They had been been separated for all of two-minutes, tops, and yet Kelsey acted as if she’d spent months in solitary.  

Muttering only to himself, her daddy hugged his Forbie with on arm and gently patted and prodded the expanded backside of his daughter’s diaper, confirming what anyone with half-a-brain already knew.  Kelsey just giggled as the mess in her disposable panties was smushed and sloshed around even more than it already had been; like she was delightfully ticklish down there, or just loved the attention.  “Yeah, your Mom can take care of that one.”  

The girl seemed to barely register how embarrassed she should be as her Daddy started to redress her, gently pulling the dress over her head and guiding her arms through the sleeve holes.  “Everybooooody put your dress on, put your dress on, put your dress on.”  (Great...now she was singing...and tone deaf too.)

The big man, started singing along.  “Everybooody put your dress on, so we can go out and plaaaay.”  (Ugh...he was worse.)  


In that instant Dakota saw herself.  Playing with dumb baby toys and watching dumb baby shows, and letting grown-ups dress her and undress her and feed her, and wait on her hand and foot; loving her unconditionally.  No one would ever stop loving her and thinking she was cute; even if she...if she... she pictured herself stopping mid-thought just so she could push poopie into the back of her Pampers, while everyone looked on as if it were the most normal thing in the world. And part of her loved it.

“Here’s yours, Dakota”, Kelsey’s Daddy said, taking the pretty blue sundress from off his shoulder and shook it out a bit. He started a reprise the song.  “Everyboooody put your dress on, put your dress on, put your dress on.   The former queen bee mumbled something snarky or defiant, but even she couldn’t hear it.  Her thumb was in the way.  (When did that get there?  Who cares?) She was alone now.  Only a quarter to her name.  “You can’t just go around naked,” the fat man said.  “You’ll get a sunburn, or somethin’.”  

A middle aged man was looking at her breasts in a wide open field, and it only now occurred to Dakota that she should be embarrassed.  She froze as the blue sundress was pulled over head, her cheeks becoming a contrasting shade of pink.  She was embarrassed, but only because she had realized that she should be.  Was she changing too?  “There we go,” the grown-up said.  “All done.”

Done? “No.” Dakota whispered around her thumb.  “No, no, no…!”  There was still time to fix this! She could fix this! She could save them all.  

Quarter held between her hands, newly moistened thumb out of her mouth, sundress flapping behind her and diaper crinkling beneath her, Dakota took back off in the direction from which she had come.  “Oh criminy, not again,” was the response she got.  “Dakoooota!”

Not breaking her stride, Dakota yelled back to the forever baby and her daddy, “I’m goin’ back to the fountain!”

“Wait! Don’t run!” the adult called after her.  

If this was going to be her last few defiant moments, her last few adult thoughts in this lifetime, Dakota chose to use these moments after her own fashion.

Follow orders?  Play it safe?  Listen to anyone other than the voice in her head? 

Ha! Fuck that.

She picked up speed, head and pigtails whipping back to the sky as she ran, her bare feet finding purchase back on the collegiate cobblestone.  Zigging and zagging past decorative hedges.  “Gotta get to the fountain! Gotta get to the fountain!  Gotta-!”

Her toe stubbed on a loose stone, and the world started to go topsy-turvy as she lost her balance. Like a cat thrown out of a car, her arms flailed and her fingers splayed; instinctively trying to break her fall.  

Strong, firm hands caught her by the arm as her nose dangled less than a foot from the rocky ground. “Easy there, honey.” It was Daddy; her Daddy.  “You had me worried for a second.”  Dakota didn’t even bother to look up as her father pulled her back up to her feet.  “Where are your shoes?” Dakota didn’t avert her gaze from the ground, her eyes frantically scanning the little nooks and crannies in the cobblestone walkway. Her fall had been broken; now, so was her hope. The quarter wasn’t in her hand anymore.  She had dropped it, and she couldn’t find it.  

No longer caring about how she looked or what others thought of her, she tried to drop to the ground and comb the floor for her precious wish maker.  “Dakota, what’s gotten into you?” an unfamiliar voice asked.  Now on all fours, crawling around, the ex-sex kitten didn’t notice or care when a hand reached between her legs and squeezed her diaper.  She cared even less that the hand didn’t belong to her Daddy.  “You’re a little wet, but that can’t be why you’re acting so strangely.”  Still, Dakota ignored it, crawling into a patch of grass.  Maybe it was there.  “I’ve seen Kelsey get all silly and rowdy before, but you?”

Speaking of Kelsey, she and her Daddy came clomping back up to the fountain; Kelsey riding piggy-back on the big man’s spine.  “Sorry.  She got away from me.  Lost her shoes though.”  

Dakota ignored the grown-ups as she kept crawling, inch by inch.  It was a new quarter, too!  It should be super shiny and easy to see!  The sun was blocked out by a cloud, however.  Dakota looked up and noticed that the shadow was suspiciously Daddy shaped.  He was hovering, actively paying attention to her every move.  Making sure she didn’t hurt herself or run off again.  Any acknowledgement of his presence would only cost her time she didn’t have.  

Her stomach gurgled a bit, agreeing.  No way was she going to have her panties filled to the brim when she changed the world back.  That might not be an option, at this rate.

In the background she heard the Mommies and Daddies keep talking.  “You’re turn to change her,” Kelsey’s Daddy said to her Mommy.  

Their patience wouldn’t last long.  She was running out of time.  Dakota briefly glanced towards the fountain to see Susie sitting in her Mommy’s lap on the edge of the fountain, her diaper already changed.   

Kelsey took her Mommy’s hand and walked bow legged and diaper dropping well beneath the hem of her dress towards the changing mat.  “That was wild,” the fat man said.   “Kelsey led her back to where that event was the other day.”

“No surprise there,” Kelsey’s Mommy agreed, taking a diaper bag with them.  

“Yeah, but they had both stripped off their dresses.”

A knowing, almost nostalgic sigh came from Susie’s Mommy.  “Oh, I remember when my Susie went through that phase.  I want to say it was sixteen, or so.”  Dakota stopped her search and stared in a kind of combined disgust and awe as Susie’s hair was ruffled and she nuzzled against her Mommy’s neck.  “But Susie, doesn’t do that anymore, do you baby?”


“No, Mommy,” Susie said.  “Dressies-are-for-showin’-everybody-how-pretty-an’-nice-an’-lady-like-you-can-be.”  That last part sounded more like a recitation of a rule than an actual opinion.  A condescending pat on the head and a kiss on the cheek hammered that notion home.

Kelsey sat down on the changing pad, giving her backside a little wiggle and spreading the mess around an extra bit and giggling before allowing her Mommy to lay her all the way down on the fountain’s rim.  “Hey, Susie,” she said, turning the penny over in her hands.  “Look what ‘Kota gave me.”

Susie wriggled out of her Mommy’s lap, and held out the dime she’d snatched.  “Me too!”  Neither Mommy present took any notice of the girls’ exchange.

It seemed like the conversations between the grown-ups, and the conversation between the Forbies were on two distinct planes of reality.  Kelsey neither flinched nor stammered as her Mommy lifted her legs and started wiping her messy bottom.  She nudged her head to the fountain.  “Wanna make a wish?”

Susie grinned.  Dakota shrieked.  The grown-ups paid almost no mind as she scrambled to her feet and confronted the other forever babies. “What’s wrong with you two?!”

“Dakota, we need to be nice to our friends, remember?”  Almost all the grown-ups were disregarding them.  It was a weak command from Daddy, trying to keep up appearances, but it made Dakota suddenly self-conscious all the same.  She didn’t want to disappoint Daddy, did she?

“Nothin’,” Susie said, doing her own part to ignore the grown-ups.  “What’s wrong with you, today?”

“Nothing is wrong with me!” Dakota insisted.  “I’m a big girl!”

The messy diaper was balled up and put to the side.  “Oh, I hear that phase is going around daycare,” Mrs. Kelsey’s Mom, said to the grown-ups.  Lots of nodding heads, agreed, as a fresh diaper was unfolded and slipped under Kelsey.

“Susie was doing that just the other day, actually.”

Possessed of an existential terror, Dakota pressed on.  “Remember, yesterday, guys?  The wish plan?” 

“Where’s your wish coin?” Susie asked, squinting from behind her glasses.  “Did you wish already?”

“She was sayin’ somefin’ ‘bout bein’ a big girl,” Kelsey said, now with a fresh cloud of powder being sprinkled on her bum.  “Maybe that’s what she wished for.”

“No I haven’-!”

“That’s a silly wish,” Susie said over Dakota.  “What baby would wanna be treated like a big girl?”   Meanwhile, the fresh diaper was pulled up and over Kelsey, being taped into place.

Dakota tried to regain control of the conversation, and failed. “I didn’-” 

“That’s why she’s acting so funny today!” Kelsey yelled. (Kelsey?  Of all people to be cutting her off, it was Kelsey?!)

“That makes sooooo much sense!”

“Wanna fix her?”

“We HAVE to!  She’s our bestest friend in the whole wide world!”

The two Forbies looked at each other and nodded. Dakota stood dumbfounded, mouth hanging open. “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”  She lunged as their hands hovered over the sparkling pool.  

Ploink! Ploink!

Daddy’s arms wrapped around her.  “Now that’s enough.  You calm down or...or...no sleepover!”  Dakota thrashed and thrashed in Daddy’s grip, but.  “Do not make me spank you!”

“How could you?!”  she wailed to the two idiots directly in front of her.  “How?!  HOW?!”

Kelsey said, still laying down from her change, just giggled before inserting a row of fingers into her mouth.  Susie awkwardly clapped her hands and gave a maniacal half-shriek half-giggle; as though she were on a roller coaster.  She rocked back and forth on her heels; filled with so much toddlerish energy that her body just couldn’t quite let her stand still.

Possessed of an almost inhuman rage, Dakota managed to pry her Daddy’s hands apart and escape his grasp, charging madly towards her two so-called ‘friends’.  She was going to kill them! She was going to drown them in that fountain!  She was going to stuff their used diapees down their thro-!
Dakota stopped dead in her tracks.  Something was wrong.  She needed to do something.  But what?  With decades of long practice, she stuck her behind out a bit and bent her knees; not squatting outright, but juuuuuust enough to get it aaallllll out.

Some strange part of her wanted to scrunch her eyes closed; to shut the world out and retreat deep into herself; to make the universe go quiet.  Instead her eyes remained open.  The world was so beautiful, and there was so much left to do and play with.  Why waste a minute of the experience?  

What was she doing again?  What did she have to do?  She had to do something, right?  She knew the answer, of course (poooooooo-) but for some reason she couldn’t quite accept it.

Big girls like her didn’t go poo-poo in their panties.  Did they? No.  No they didn’t.  They didn’t pee-pee in their panties, either, and Dakota had definitely done that; hadn’t even had to think about it, really.  Something about that didn’t feel right either.  She stuck her thumb back in her mouth to help her think, and was rewarded with pleasure.  She so liked sucking on things.

Inside her diaper, her cheeks spread apart, and the first bit of mush started to push itself out.  She clenched together, denying herself the release and the pleasure that was sure to follow.  Something still wasn’t sitting right with her, or her diaper. Diaper?  Did she mean a diapee? It was a diapee, yeah?  Something about that felt right.  Dakota wasn’t wearing panties, she was wearing a diapee. And she hadn’t peed in her panties either, she’d just wet her diapee, and that was okay for big girls to do.  It must be, because she was a big girl.

   Mommy-wow! I’m-a-big-girl-now!  The little jingle rattled off in her head, and Dakota grunted as she tried to hold on, (in more ways than one).   Big girls wore panties, though, not diapees.  Had she ever gotten to wear panties before?

Deep in her memory, she vaguely recalled trying something called “Pull-Ups” and “Training Pants”, but she could never remember wearing panties.  She remembered trying them, and not caring for the experience.  

They had felt kind of like diapees, but not as thick; not as safe. And they leaked more.  And she was supposed to change herself.  Yuck.  And for some reason, her Mommy and Daddy had started checking her more often, meaning she had less time to play.  Less time to experience the world and play.  Double Yuck. And when she had needed changing, they got looked annoyed and sad.  Triple Yuck.

Thinking to way back when, she remembered having all this ‘big girl’ stuff, that she never liked anyways stop working.  Cups spillt. Shoes wouldn’t tie no more. Pencils wouldn’t stay still in her hand. Her bed wouldn’t catch her from fallin’ out.  Her booster seat didn’t hold her food.  None of it worked right no more.  Then, she got her diapees and highchair and paci and bottles and crib back. Everything had gotten betterer from there. 

Dakota really never had been made to wear panties. She was special, Dakota remembered.  Just like her friends.  She was never going to have to grow up.   She was a forever baby.  No matter how old she got, there’d be no big girl problems for her; as she relaxed her cheeks, one last tiny thought flew out of her: (Ever again.)

She knew what she had to do.  “FOOOFIE!” she cried out exuberantly from around her thumb.  She let go and immediately felt the nice mushy stuff start to flow out of her and into the waiting seat of her diapee.  This is what she had to do if she wanted to be happy.  She pushed, and sucked on her thumb harder as she did it.  Gotta help it along.  The blonde Forbie gave an extra little grunt of determination and a push to help complete the job.

Big girls with all of their big girl problems wore panties.  They weren’t allowed to be little forever like her.  That wasn’t their job.  It was hers, and she was very good at it.  She was keenly, almost expertly aware as her diapee poofed out and sagged away from her, being part of her and not in that special way that only a Forbie could understand. Just a little more, she thought.  And her hiney made funny noises, like it was thinking the same thing.  All the while, warmth came out of her body, and a different kind of warmth traveled up to her brain, making her feel kind of silly and proud.  

They were good feelings to have.  “I ded et…” Dakota mumbled from behind her thumb, smiling all the while.  Using her other hand, the precious Forbie reached back and squished her diapee, feeling the mush inside it press up against her.

“Is that was bothering you, Dakota?” Daddy asked her.  “Were you constipated or something?”  Dakota shrugged and giggled, as Daddy pulled back her diapee, and waving his hand in front of his nose. Silly Daddy.  “Not anymore,” he sad.  (And never would again.)

Looking at the grown-ups crowding around her, Dakota did her best to get the most out of the situation, plopping down on her butt and feeling the delightful mush spread around a bit more.  Then she leaned back on the bumpy ground and grabbed at her feets, wigglin’ her cute little toesies as she rocked back and forth.  “She’s back to normal,” she heard Susie say.

“I’ve got this one,” Mrs. Susie’s Mom tried to guide Dakota into a sitting position.  Dakota whined and tried to rock back.  She was a baby, not stupid.  The mush wasn’t even cold yet. She wasn’t ready to get changed.   “Dakota….” there was an edge in the grown-up lady’s voice.  “Be a good girl.”  The grown-up didn’t have to say “Or else.”

 Daddy never spanked her….but Mrs. Susie’s Mom?  She just might.  A final groan of disappointment rumbled out of Dakota before she sat up, stood up, and let the grown-up lead her to the changing mat like a good baby.   There must’ve been somethin’ in the grown up’s eye, because it did this funny little blink at Daddy.  “I’ll have to change them all tonight, anyways.”  

Kelsey rolled off the changing mat, and her Mommy steadied her so she didn’t fall backwards into the wishing fountain. Dakota laid down, and clever girl that she was, helped by lifting the hem of her dress past her belly-button.  “We gotta thank you for volunteering for this,” Kelsey’s Mommy said.  “It feels like forever since we’ve had a date night.”

Date night?  What was that?  It sounded important, though Dakota couldn’t quite figure out why.  Her diaper opened up, and Mrs. Susie’s Mommy started wiping her down.  The lady was good.  Almost as good as her own Mommy had been before she’d went away.  “Actually,” Daddy chimed in.  “I got to thinking.  This sort of thing was easy to do, back when the girls were five, or six, or even twelve.  But this can’t be easy, can it?”

“Oh it’s no trouble at all,” Mrs. Susie’s Mommy said, not even looking up from Dakota’s diapee.  “Would you mind getting a new diaper?”  

“Well, I was just thinking,” Daddy said, handing a new diapee over.  “I’m not gonna sleep over, but if you needed some help keepin’ these little rascals busy, maybe I could help out until bedtime…?”

The two grown-ups looked at each other.  Now Daddy had that funny blink thing going on.  

“Um...Daddy?”  

“Yes, Princess?”

“Can I finish my diapee change, now?  I’m gettin’ kinda chilly.”  Everybody laughed at that, even Susie and Kelsey. So did Dakota, though it was more to be polite than anything else.  What was happening, wondered?  She’d figure it out sooner or later.  And if she didn’t, it wasn’t important.  She now knew what was important.

(Epilogue)

Two pairs of wrinkled hands came out and pinched Dakota’s cheeks.  “Oh my goodness!  Aren’t you the most adorable little forever babies that I’ve ever seen! So cute, and so well behaved!”  Dakota and Susie couldn’t help but giggle and blush as the two nice old ladies cooed at them and said nice things.  

They were at the Biggie Burgers, having lunch.  Dakota’s daddy and Susie’s mommy were on something called a ‘lunch date’, and so Dakota’s sissy, Virginia, (that’s what Dakota got to call her), had taken them out for a Forbie meal, a toy, and the super cool play place.

“I just wish my own grandchildren could be forever babies,” the second old lady said, (whose hair might definitely not be a wig)  “They’re always so sweet.  Mine were born just a little too early.”

Sissy didn’t even look up from her phone.  “Yeah,” she said. “Real tragedy to not develop beyond maybe a three year old.  Your grandkids are reeeeally missing out.”

“Are you their caregiver?” one of the old ladies (the one whose eye makeup matched her hair color) asked.  

Sissy kept staring at her phone.  “Yeah, but only until I can get a job caring for the elderly.  Same difference, y’know?  I mean, the diapers don’t have as many cartoons on them.”  Sissy looked up from her phone and arched an eyebrow.  “Wait...do they?” 


“Well I never-!” One of the nice old ladies scoffed.

“First time for everything.”

Any actual resentment, rudeness, or aggression went right over the heads of the two innocents sitting in the hard plastic booth across from Sissy.  Susie and Dakota were trading bites of chicken nuggets and french fries with each other; they’d always been good at sharing.  They barely noticed when the two nice old ladies left.  They were too busy experimenting with dipping sauce as paint.  Also, when it came to grown-up types, neither one was terribly interested in what one said to another.  You didn’t have to listen most of the time.  It was one of the many great things about being a baby, not that they had any other experience to compare it too.

“Ugh,” Sissy said.  “Don’t do that!” She grabbed a napkin from the dispenser and started wiping their brand new delicious face paint right off.  “Gross.”

While Sissy was cleaning her face up, Dakota’s eyes wandered around the restaurant.  A little girl, a real tiny one...not quite a tiny baby, not quite a big kid but DEFINITELY not a grown-up or a forever baby, was moving all silly-like.  She was hopping from foot to foot like that old hopscotch game.  Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Left. Right. Right.  

And her knees were all wobbly like they wanted to touch each other, but the feet hopping wouldn’t let ‘em.

And her hands were down by her legs, like Susie sometimes did when her mommy told her ‘no touching’.  

It seemed kind of like a fun dance.

She just didn’t seem to be havin’ any fun with it.  The look on her face made it look like she wasn’t happy, like somethin’ was makin’ her sad or scared.    “Mommeeeeee,” the tiny girl said.  Why would the tiny girl dance if she didn’t wanna dance?

The mommy stopped eatin’ her burger, and grabbed the tiny girl’s hand, walking both of them to a nearby bathroom.  What was that all about.  Still thinking about the girl’s dance, Dakota started trying to make her own knees touch.  A warm squish between her legs stopped her knees from touching, and a warmth on the inside of her clothes made itself known.  A flurry of napkins constantly dabbing sauce paint away kept her from thinking too deeply about it.

“Sissy,”  Dakota asked, between wipes.  “Can we go play now.”  A napkin narrowly scraped her nose as she looked over to the playplace.  They had a slide that went RIGHT INTO the ballpit.  That had to be better than the magical play place Kelsey wouldn’t hush-up about.  

Without waiting, she slid out of the booth and took a step for the play place.  Her new shoes lighting up pink with just a little bit of weight on them. Susie’s own shoes were lighting up too, she was tapping her feet so fast.   

Mrs. Susie’s Mom had gotten them matching shoes a few “dates” ago.  Daddy had gotten them the matching onesies they now wore with the little ruffles on the butt last “date”.  Heck, sometimes, if the grown-ups timed it right, even the decorations on their diapees matched.  The grown-ups called it “twinning”.  Another silly word that the girl didn’t know.  

If only Susie’s stuffed bunny matched them, it’d be perfect.  Flopsy would look super cute with a ruffle butt.  She’d probably fit in a tiny-baby-diapee too.

 “Have you finished your food?”  Sissy asked.  

 Dakota looked down at her pretty blinking shoes.  “No…”

“Then sit down, squirt.”  The blonde Forbie didn’t really notice it, but the squelching sound her diapee made when she sat back down explained why she was called ‘squirt’.  

“Fine,” she huffed, and plunked another chicken nugget into her mouth.

Like she was at one of her fancy restaurant pretend games, Susie wiped her mouth (even though Sissy had already wiped everything off) and said, “I’m finished eatin’.  Can I go play, Sissy?”

A surge of possessiveness flared red hot inside Dakota, and it showed.  “Hey!” she snapped.  “You’re not allowed ta call her ‘Sissy’!  She’s MY Sissy!”

This little incident had played out at almost every time that Sissy had Forbiesat them, especially when it was just the two of them and Kelsey with her Mommy and Daddy.  When it was just Susie and Dakota, that’s when they were more likely to be dressed up to look like each other.  Dakota would figure it was because Susie had gotted confused about which one of ‘em was which.  The thing is, no matter how many times they did this little song and dance it almost always ended the same way:

“What am I supposed ta call her, then?” Susie asked, genuinely concerned.

Dakota thought for a moment.  “Um….Virginia...no! Wait! Miss Virginia! No! Wait!  Miss Dakota’s Sissy Virginia. An’ putta ma’am in there somewhere!”  Dakota crossed her arms and nodded satisfactorily to herself.  Susie’s eyes darted from left to right, like she was memorizing a snack order at daycare.

“Miss Dakota’s Big Sissy Virginia Ma’am,” she said.  “Got it.”   

“Oooooh, I like the ‘Big’ you threw in there.  Sounds ‘portant!”  

A deep, muffled laughter caught both of the girls’ attention.  Sissy was laughing, but it was like she was playing peek-a-boo: her hands were covering almost all of her face.  “Sissy?”

Sissy shook her head, but she was smiling.  “It’s times like this that I have absolutely no doubt that we’re related.”

Dakota giggled.  “‘Course we’re related.  You’re my Sissy.  That’s why I get ta call ya Sissy, and Susie has ta call ya Missus Miss Dakota’s Virginia...Missus Dakota’s Sis-”  She turned to Susie.  “What was it again?”

“Miss-Dakota’s-Big-Sissy Virginaia Ma’am.”

Sissy sighed in that way big people did when they thought they knew something you didn’t.  “Ya know what, girly-girl?” Sissy looked at Susie.  “It’s okay if you call me Sissy.”  Then, she said, “At this rate, it might be true soon enough.”

Both of the forever babies balked. “Huh?”

“Y’know what?” Sissy said.  “Never mind.  Don’t worry about it.”

Without realizing it, Dakota squirmed a bit in her seat.  “Kay kay.”

A boy, not a cootie face like Brendan, but a big boy who wore big boy panties like Sissy came up to the table.  “Excuse me, Miss,” he said “I couldn’t help but notice that you’ve got your hands full there. Do you need any help clearing these trays?”

The blonde Forbie was about to correct the big boy, by telling him to call Sissy by ‘Miss-Virginia-Sissy-Queen-whatever-she-had-made-up-five-seconds-ago’, but then she saw the little picture of Biggie Badger on his shirt pocket.  He worked here, and Dakota knew to be nice to people who worked here, no matter where ‘here’ was.

Dakota watched as Sissy’s entire face changed, and she leaned a little bit towards the big boy.  “Oh, that would be awesome…?”  Everybody was quiet for second, (‘cept maybe not Flopsy, but Flopsy only talked to Susie, anyways).

“Jason’”

A jolt, like something was tickling her brain flashed across the back of Dakota’s noggin.  “Jason…”  Both sisters said the name at the same time, both with the same dreamy, half-dopey tone.  Sissy looked at Dakota and laughed, but there was something in her eyes; something possessive; almost the same kind of look that Dakota had shot Susie a second ago.  “This one’s mine”, the look said.

“Are these both your sisters?” the big boy, Jason, asked.

“One is,” Sissy said. Dakota helped by bobbing up and down and pointing her thumbs at herself.  Susie helped by staying out of it and whispering to Flopsy.  “I’m sitting.”

The big boy looked at Dakota and tickled under her chin.  “I should’ve known,” he said.  “She looks just like you.  She’s a real cutie.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Something was different.  When the two nice old ladies had called her and Susie cute, Dakota had giggled and smiled.  She liked being paid attention to and being called cute.  She liked being called cute by this big boy- who had really big shoulders, and his nose looked a lot like Daddy’s, and he even smelled a little bit like Daddy- but somehow she liked it in a different way.

She felt different.  

She felt tingly.  
Something in her diapee felt strange for a second.

“Y’know,” Jason said, (such a handsome big-boy, not like poopy head Brendan), “Forbies are kinda lucky in a way.”

Sissy nodded and smiled real big.  “Y’know, I was thinking the exact same thing.  They’re always so sweet, and innocent.”

“Yeah, and they don’t have to work or nothin’,” the big boy said.  “Kind of a sweet deal.”  Now it was Dakota who was nodding.  This big boy really got her.  He really understood.  More funny feelings coming from her diapee spot.  These funny new feelings felt familiar to her somehow.  

She began sucking on her thumb and fidgeting in her seat while the big people kept talking.  The sensation of sucking calmed her and the familiar squish in between her legs made her feel good, almost good enough to stop thinking about the tingly feeling and this big boy talking to Sissy...almost.

Almost…

“So,” the big boy said to Sissy, looking kinda nervous for some reason, “I’m sure you’re getting paid big bucks to big baby sit, but I get paid today, too.  Any chance I could give you call sometime? Maybe take you to a movie? My treat? After we both get off?”

Get off… 

Something about that phrase had meaning to Dakota…though she wasn’t sure why.  She started to bounce and fidget more.  The crinkling of her diapee drowning out all other sounds as she started talking to herself. 

Get off…

She had to get off something, she knew deep down, but she wasn’t sure what.  Get off?  She was supposed to stay at the table...she hadn’t been excused.  She was a good baby.  She was a good...good...baby...not a naughty one...not naughty like...like...

Dakota stopped fidgeting, stopped crinkling.  She lifted her butt just a little off the seat, just enough to make room and relieve the building pressure inside her; she wasn’t leaving the table.  She was still being a good baby.  She was doing just enough to...to get...  “Pooooooooooooo-!”  The hot mess that filled up her diapee came hard and fast, causing the bottom half of her onesie to spread out a bit.  The whole thing happened so fast, Dakota thought she felt a snap button pop down below, but it held.   She sat down, smiling in pure happiness as the warm mush clung to her like mud on a warm summer day.  “-piiiiiiiiiiie!”  

Wet diapees were nice, but nothing could beat a good poopie held up by a onesie with a cute ruffle butt.  It was definitely a good day to be dressed inna onesie.

There.  The feeling had passed.  That’s what she’d needed ta do.  All better.   

“DAKOTA?!”  It was Sissy.

“Uh-huh?”  Dakota giggled.

“Did you just have an accident?”

Dakota shook her head and told the truth.  “No.”  It was only an ‘accident’ when big kids did it.  When Dakota and her friends made boom booms, it was a ‘supposed ta’.

“Um…” big boy Jason looked uncomfortable all of a sudden. His nose wrinkled a little bit.  “Forbie accessible changing tables are that way.”  He pointed to an open door that Dakota could juuuuuust see through the metted nesh of the playplace.

Big Sissy started digging into her purse.  “Hold that thought.”  A whole bunch of wish coins clattered on the table in front of the girls.  “Dakota, Susie.  Why don’t you two go ride the mechanical horsies for a bit?”

“REALLY?!” Both Susie and Dakota shrieked.  Neither Dakota’s Daddy or Susie’s Mommy or Sissy EVER let them go on the play rides that needed wishing coins!  Neither girl had dared hope for such a thing.  Maybe wishes DID come true, even if you never knew that you wished them.

Without waiting, the girls snatched up the coins and duck waddled over to the mechanical horsies.  “We’ll get more rides if we share,” the tall cute blonde forever baby said. Dakota swung one leg over, enjoying the warm swish as she got on the big plastic pony.  Soon there’d be a lot more squishing.  She put one of her wishing coins in.

Susie nodded, and put one of her wishing coins in the slot, and climbed up behind the girl who she’d spent so much time lately with.  Dakota giggled as Susie wrapped her arms around the taller girl’s waist.  

And then it started, each girl laughing and giggling as the horse galloped up and down...up and down...up and down...they’d really need a change after this; but for now it was fun to just enjoy the ride.  Maybe wishing coins really grant wishes, but they could help you have fun.

“Um…” Jason said to Virginia.  “Aren’t you worried about her getting a rash or something?”

“They’ve been wearing diapers their entire lives,” Virginia said.  “They’re used to it.  Besides, Dakota will fight me on it, and I’m not in the mood.”  She leaned slyly over to the cute boy who’d just asked her out.  “So...movie?  What time?”

The end.

  • Like 3
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8 hours ago, vended said:

A truly awesome read from first chapter to the last. 

 

Thanks for sharing your neat works! 

Thanks for reading it and giving me feedback.

 

6 minutes ago, fire07 said:

Wonderful ending. I'm so glad to see you back and posting again. I hope you're doing better. 

Working on it.  No promises.  I'm gonna have good days and bad days, and some weeks the bad might beat the good, but I'm doing my best.  Hopefully I'll get to the point where people will forget that I've had some problems because of how wonderful I've been doing.

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Well looks like the plan failed......... Honestly not to surprised.....

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22 hours ago, YourFNF said:

Well looks like the plan failed......... Honestly not to surprised.....

This kind of story is more about the journey, than the destination.  Because everybody knows the destination.  If you want a real twister, may I self-promote and recommend you check out "The Struggle"?

 

 

15 hours ago, Sarah Penguin said:

:)

Glad I could make you smile.

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Wow what an awesome ending. I was almost expecting them to succeed and grow up again. I can’t say I am the least bit disappointed that they didn’t make it. I truly loved the story and I wish I had more to offer than a simple like. 

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15 hours ago, CDfm said:

Wow what an awesome ending. I was almost expecting them to succeed and grow up again. I can’t say I am the least bit disappointed that they didn’t make it. I truly loved the story and I wish I had more to offer than a simple like. 

Yeah, it's what the commissioner wanted.  Glad you're happy with it, too, though.  

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