kerry Posted October 5, 2022 Share Posted October 5, 2022 Wonderful! So glad that you did not allow the secret(s) to lie there and fester. Now we'll see the upshot. (Maybe a real babysitter for Emily?) 1 Link to comment
thedman Posted October 7, 2022 Share Posted October 7, 2022 Hmmmmmm...... how does this end up? 2 that are in diapers, or 2 that have to change diapers? Tune in next week to find out 1 Link to comment
Little_Mouse Posted October 7, 2022 Share Posted October 7, 2022 Another amazing chapter of my favorit story ?????❤️ 1 Link to comment
bobindiapers Posted October 8, 2022 Share Posted October 8, 2022 After being suspicious of Sheila for so long, I actually feel sorry for her now. Hopefully everything works out, she seemed to treat Emily so nicely. 2 Link to comment
Mee Posted October 11, 2022 Author Share Posted October 11, 2022 On 10/5/2022 at 10:35 AM, YourFNF said: [Insert cute GIF here] Thanks so much! On 10/5/2022 at 12:53 PM, kerry said: Wonderful! So glad that you did not allow the secret(s) to lie there and fester. Now we'll see the upshot. (Maybe a real babysitter for Emily?) No more secrets allowed! After all, they promised each other. (Unless Joyce decides otherwise, though...) Can't say specifics on what's to come, but I'm sure you'll find that the net is on the up and up! Thank you for reading and commenting! On 10/6/2022 at 8:06 PM, thedman said: Hmmmmmm...... how does this end up? 2 that are in diapers, or 2 that have to change diapers? Tune in next week to find out Hmm, good question! However, don't always expect it to be just two possibilities! Yes indeed toon in next time! On 10/7/2022 at 2:49 PM, Little_Mouse said: Another amazing chapter of my favorit story ?????❤️ Thank you very much! On 10/7/2022 at 11:09 PM, bobindiapers said: After being suspicious of Sheila for so long, I actually feel sorry for her now. Hopefully everything works out, she seemed to treat Emily so nicely. Sheila's sort of a wait and see, but no matter what people think of her, I still believe that she has very human and likable qualities! Thanks for commenting and reading! 1 Link to comment
BabySerenity Posted November 20, 2022 Share Posted November 20, 2022 Please tell me this story will continue?? I really really love this story!! Link to comment
WBDaddy Posted November 20, 2022 Share Posted November 20, 2022 3 hours ago, BabySerenity said: Please tell me this story will continue?? I really really love this story!! Relax. Mee goes in spurts, then sometimes goes for months without an update. We all just patiently wait for the new material. 1 1 Link to comment
foofybabykitten Posted November 20, 2022 Share Posted November 20, 2022 11 hours ago, BabySerenity said: Please tell me this story will continue?? I really really love this story!! 8 hours ago, WBDaddy said: Relax. Mee goes in spurts, then sometimes goes for months without an update. We all just patiently wait for the new material. You can also check out their Patreon, there are a lot of future chapters to their stories including this one. Link to comment
BabySerenity Posted November 20, 2022 Share Posted November 20, 2022 3 hours ago, foofybabykitten said: You can also check out their Patreon, there are a lot of future chapters to their stories including this one. I don’t has control of funds Mommy has that control now!! So I can’t do that thank you though!! Link to comment
Mee Posted December 8, 2022 Author Share Posted December 8, 2022 On 11/19/2022 at 10:36 PM, WBDaddy said: Relax. Mee goes in spurts, then sometimes goes for months without an update. We all just patiently wait for the new material. Gosh, you know me so well! In truth, I've been writing I think the most regularly I ever have been since I started posting stories in general, lol. Truthfully I've just been bogged down by a lot to have the time and post chapters here. But yes, going in bursts is regrettably my style... On 11/20/2022 at 7:12 AM, foofybabykitten said: You can also check out their Patreon, there are a lot of future chapters to their stories including this one. Mhm! The gap between what's public and behind a timed release is getting bigger and bigger, but stuff does eventually trickle down at a somewhat regular schedule (just not at the moment because I'm taking a break this December). Chapter updates publicly are meant to be about once a month. Link to comment
Mee Posted December 8, 2022 Author Share Posted December 8, 2022 Two Chapters. Merry Early Christmas, or enjoy the holidays in general! 43 - The Hand that Feeds You One pair of eyes just barely reigned above the other. Joyce quietly watched her secretary, quietly contemplating just what she was supposed to say. How she was supposed to think. Sheila’s pupils could barely rise to the challenge, falling far below their mark and weighed by sheer guilt she could only find herself realizing now. Courtesy of the executive floor, not even the sounds of countless employees and office workers could save either one from the deafening silence. With a floor left only to a small handful of people, nothing could rescue them from an inevitable clash. “...Sheila,” Joyce started, yet the air was already running thin in her lungs, “...I… I want to hear it from you. Tell me: what happened the other night?” The sleeves on Sheila’s blazer amassed wrinkles like they were bacterial colonies against her sides. Her shoulders were perched and contracted, so stiff that she could barely even rub one trembling hand with the other in her lap. To call it just fear would be a gross misrepresentation of all the cacophony going on inside the woman’s head and heart right then. It couldn’t be understated just how dazed she still was by the delayed remorse and regret of her actions, and only after being hit with pressure was she able to admit to any of it. And yet despite cracking under the pressure brought unto herself, Sheila’s chin aimed for the floor evened out once her head literally rose to the challenge. Her shoulders broadened with a breath from her nostrils, and she blinked. It doesn’t matter what I do now… I have to tell her. I have to tell her everything… And so she started by saying after a quiet nod, “Ms. Summers, I… The other night when you were gone on a trip, I went to your house to get a file from your computer… I was a little bit surprised to see Emily,” Little Ms. Summers, “but after making sure it was okay with her, I went to your office…” A short pause ensued, either to let her honesty and loyalty soak in, or just so both Sheila and Joyce could prepare themselves. “But on the way, I…” she brushed her temple with a finger, like it might somehow subside the shame and embarrassment, “I noticed that a…door was open.” “Did you think it was my office?” Joyce found the strength to stay straight-laced, holding her elbows. But deep down, under the hood, beyond the statuesque face of discipline and wrath, there lay the tiniest cracks, hoping for something. Take it. Tell me it was a mistake. Give me something…! Sheila gestured her head, only in the totally wrong direction. Rather than up and down, she swept from side to side, plagued with a look of shame. Whether it be her conviction as a person or her contractual obligation, not even under the weight of her career dying in real time would she falter. “...No…I knew it wasn’t your office. And…I knew that I shouldn’t, and it was wrong of me… But I did anyway.” With whatever dignity she had left, the least she owed to herself and her boss was trying to save at least the rest of that. But from Joyce’s perspective she was burning through her words faster than she could think them up. She knew what she was doing? She chose to snoop through things she had no business with? She didn’t know whether to turn up the heat or try not to cry. How could Sheila be putting her in a position like this?! The displeasure wasn’t being kept so subtly anymore as Joyce combed her hair for a moment, losing focus on her target while she asked, “Wh…what did you think you were walking into?” What did she think? Sheila went quiet, not from the shame, but for a true moment of introspection. It was entirely a selfish decision, but between it being for pure self-satisfaction in the name of curiosity or something more deliberate, well, she struggled to determine which. Her actions weren’t noble and they were certainly underhanded. She undoubtedly took advantage of her boss’ generosity and abused it for the sake of herself, to whatever end that might be. She not only put herself in a compromising position, yet so inconsiderately hooked a chain around her employer and their partner in the process. All for what? Just to know for certain who the diapers were for? “I…I wasn’t sure.” Joyce flapped her lashes and her expression froze. Didn’t know? Didn’t know why she was doing something that she wasn’t supposed to? “Y-you…so you did it anyway…?” From poor Joyce’s point of view, all of Sheila’s expressions were on the fritz today, because only now was she nodding when she was supposed to have been shaking instead. Quietly, and trying to do so calmly, Joyce’s hand underneath the desk continually flexed itself, fingers flinging in and out from her fist, trying to wring just whatever oozing discomfort was sifting through herself. “I…once I went into the nursery, I–” and her sorrowful look shriveled into paralyzed apology the moment Ms. Summers looked practically ready to shoot lasers from her eyes. “Th-the room,” Sheila meekly censored herself, “I…” and with her pride on the line as at least an honest person, the sky-high office was starting to feel warm with the heat localized around the secretary’s cheeks. Before the words could even leave her mouth her vision was dropping, just beneath her boss’ eyes and taking comfort somewhere at the nose. “...I was excited.” The truth had started to spill, yet hardly any of the emotional rewards were hitting, which was hopefully just a delayed reaction. Sheila’s lips were starting to implode as for the first time in ever she was learning what it was like to be on the literal receiving end of her boss. This wasn’t like any other time in experiencing the byproduct of someone else impacting her boss. This wasn’t residual anger or an upset influenced by some other factor that Sheila’s job was to decipher on her own. It was the first time she could readily identify the cause and had no way of dodging the crossfire, all because she was the root, cause, and epicenter of it. Just so she didn’t make a face, Joyce blinked. Excited? Excited. Was it fair to say how real this couldn’t have been? How imaginary that it might be, for a trusted employee who has been loyal for so long, taken care of so greatly, paid so well, to suddenly run amok so strangely? And yet, strange was precisely the name of the game. Stupefying. Surprising. Bewildering. Never once did Joyce actually consider Sheila’s stance on the matter, precisely because it wasn’t her business to that degree. But alternatively, it didn’t change the fact that Sheila was involved. As involved as Joyce had made her since the conception of custom-made diapers…! And then came another taboo. “D-does…does Emily know?” It was a quiet question from Sheila, yet the words came no less quickly to Joyce’s ears, scraping her insides like nails on chalk. Another forbidden topic that this time there wasn’t any real censorship for. No substitute like there was “room” for “nursery.” There may have been Emmy, but god forbid that had to be mentioned too. This was work and Emily had no business in it. She didn’t belong in an office like this, like she was a discussion topic… Not for things like this! It triggered almost a brief reprieve in Joyce’s mind, making her remember their discussion last night. She didn’t want to associate Emily with this side of her life, now largely for reasons like this. It was also another reminder of how Sheila apparently shared certain information with Emily over dinner, which in itself was only mildly frustrating, yet they were dealing with far bigger issues. With a tightened lid on a can of emotions already spewing high-pressure fumes from forming cracks, somehow she kept it together. “No. She doesn’t.” Yet, it would more than likely be a tough conversation they’d need to have. Just like this one, though probably worse. Thankfully Sheila was for once consistent with expectations as Joyce watched her nod slightly. “...Ms. Summers…would it be alright if I explained things?” Not as an excuse, because Sheila was more than certain of her faults. But at least as a way to offer insight to her boss with just how much of a mess Sheila’s mind was. “Yes.” Yes! Please! Explain something! Give me SOMETHING to work with! An excuse, a miraculous illness that somehow makes you prone to wandering into rooms…! Alcohol? Hypnosis? Drugs? Some kind of delirium pill that makes your body someone else’s and your mind no longer your own? Anything that had by this point a less than zero percent chance of being used, yet a point of fiction Joyce hoped for nonetheless. “Ever since you had me put in that order under an ex-chairman’s name…” her spiel slowed down, just to let her boss’ fury catch up, lest she might be saying something too explicitly. But she hadn’t, so she continued. “Ever since that point, I’ve…been thinking.” Thinking. So long. So much. So many questions. Yet not a single person to talk to about it. Not a single soul she would ever share with other than herself. It was her job to be a walking bag of corporate secrets, and now that meant interpersonal ones too, apparently. Deep, dark secrets, more than likely, yet just the fragments of them. “It…it’s not my place, and I know not to ask questions, so I never have and I never would, but…that doesn’t stop me from wondering, I suppose…” Even admitting to her own human nature felt shameful. She was supposed to be perfect and infallible, precisely because her boss wasn’t. Curiosity was far too human for someone like Sheila. She was a pillar and thus had no business leaning out to anything but what was being directly supported above her. Yet she did lean, and it was with eye-opening relief that the power structure hadn’t collapsed completely because of it. After clearing her throat, Sheila continued. “Ms. Summers, if…I’m being honest,” because that’s all she could be, “there have been many points lately where you’ve seemed more…affected by things than usual.” And now she was criticizing her boss? When would she be saved by a killing smite for such insolence? “We’ve even had some indirect discussions about ‘friends’ or subjects…” And as Sheila elaborated purely from a place of self-explanation, Joyce tried to keep her eyebrows and the corners of her mouth afloat “So with all due respect, I consider it my job to help balance your work…as well as understand at least some of your issues… –B-but, that doesn’t excuse what I did!” she quickly interrupted herself. “I-I just mean that I’ve become invested as far as things go with your moods and circumstances…I…I figured for a while now that there was someone in your life, though I guess I didn’t realize the specifics until that night at the hotel…” And above the literal conversation, Joyce was trying to chase away the dread of that night while Sheila shooed away the fluffy feelings she was starting to get. Thankfully Joyce’s leg was soft, otherwise she wouldn’t be able to hear the guilty party over the sound of her finger rapidly tapping something that could be much harder and much louder. But yes, that night. The night Sheila effectively babysat Emily, an action that Joyce condoned. “Ever since I offered that night to watch Emily until you got back, I…haven’t been able to stop thinking about your relationship because…” her voice briefly departed into the void. “I…because I’m used to staying on top of things… Somewhere along the way, I…I think I somehow convinced myself that better understanding your relationship with Emily might somehow help me do my job with you…” At least outwardly, it was a calm and quiet collection and intake of testimony and thought for Joyce. Piecing together whatever she could to make sense of Sheila. But as she was beginning to understand it, Sheila was predisposed to wanting to know things; a partial control freak. How eerily familiar that sounded, but what it didn’t excuse was simplifying her boss’ deepest secret into a personal factoid meant to affect performance and work ethic…! As the thoughts fell into place Sheila could barely seem to sit still. Squirming and wiggling in just the slightest ways, shifting pupils that panned from left to right just as they started to settle on something or anything. “So…” Joyce blinked, just as simply as the explanation for all this apparently and supposedly was. “You…you were curious?” Curiosity may not have killed the cat, but it sure did put careers at risk, apparently. With a moral compass that at least still knew how to point north, Sheila bobbed her head, nodding. “I’ve been for a while now, and it’s no excuse for what I’ve done… I’m happy and grateful you’ve decided to rely on me so many times for personal matters, even things partially related to work, but I feel that it’s finally put me in a position where I’ve made a careless and selfish mistake…” So it was indulging just a selfish urge. Joyce sighed as her hand covered her face. “How much?” “S…sorry?” “How much of it? How much did you see?” “...All of it…to my knowledge.” Everything. The diapers. The changing table. The pail. The crib. The giant stuffed bear. “...The closet?” Another solemn nod from Sheila. The clothes. But then again, Emily was the one greeting her at the door in footie pajamas… Emily greeted her. Dressed like that. Just like at the hotel, Joyce approved Sheila to take her girlfriend up and get her ready for bed. She told her to behave. To listen. She gave Sheila instructions on how to handle her adult girlfriend. She even gave the name of her stuffed animal… While a ball of guilt and shame sat across her desk, the blame and frustration was starting to feel sorely misplaced, at least somewhat. Sheila, under orders, was made to put in an order for adult, babyish diapers. While she may not tell anyone else, it wasn’t feasibly possible to make her not talk to herself? And when Emily was sad, Joyce sure was. Depending on the situation, maybe she was mad, even. Regardless, they were all uncharacteristic moods and mannerisms she brought into the office. What’s more, Joyce had already involved Sheila in a litoney of nondescript, “hypothetical,” conversations that certainly didn’t take a college degree to deduce. She even made her orchestrate a meeting with a baby furniture company…! And then the other night. Christ, how could this only be hitting her now, right in the midst of condemning her employee?! Sheila certainly did something she wasn’t supposed to, but if not for complete negligence from chiefly Joyce, and possibly a small bit from Emily following that (who was also just as preventable), there never would have been a chance for any of this to happen. The nursery stayed locked up for a reason, yet one early flight and a dirty diaper in need of discarding was enough to make the mommy forget how to close up shop. Consequently that meant giving Emily a chance to misbehave, and that also meant the same for anyone curious enough to walk right by a half-open door that should’ve been shut…! Giving the guilty culprit a second glance, the self-disgust couldn’t be any more evident within the judge at hand. This was hardly a form of justice at this point. Sheila needn’t say anything else and it all would have been more than enough for Joyce to see the straight hypocrisy and foolishness; the absurdity for thinking all of this could be exclusively one person’s fault. Or at the very least, just to see how much of it was really with herself. Sheila continuing to be fed small bite-sized pieces of information about Joyce and Emily’s personal lives that somehow involved diapers, cribs, clothing, and caretaking was no fault of her own. She listened and consumed, but she did her job nonetheless. She was involved because it was her job to be, and expecting her not to react to any of that in some way was moronic. She’s human! This was no isolated incident. It was all continuous gaslighting and Joyce forgot to turn off the stove. With Sheila sitting in her own wallow, too ashamed to look her boss in the eyes, it was ironically just another case of her secretary doing what she did best. Shouldering the responsibility. Of course she was curious. Of course she had questions. It was Amy all over again. Constantly and consistently their secret had been dangled over her like a carrot and stick, just baiting Sheila into wanting to know more. It was Joyce that HR would have a field day with. Yet thank goodness for independently contracted workers… Nevertheless, this was nothing but unjust discipline. This was plain entrapment. And with only more doubt caving in on her, that cleared the overhead for plenty more questions and misdirections. Was it really so weird anymore that Sheila stayed after the fact to make Emily dinner? She watched Emily once already while Joyce was away, so maybe she misunderstood it as a silent order from her boss? An expectation now after the business dinner? “Ms. Summers…?” Sheila gently nudged the spotlight back on Joyce, already sounding hesitant to disrupt the woman’s inner monologue. “You have my word: I have not and will not tell anyone about this…no matter what happens. I’m fully prepared to accept the consequences…” Whatever they may be. Regardless of how she felt. The gap in power and status was simply too mighty and too great for the guilty party to even conceive that somehow maybe the fault wasn’t just with themselves. “Sheila,” Joyce’s eyes wandered the office for a moment before finally making direct contact with Sheila’s. “The door to the…room,” she had seen it herself from the footage, but trauma and worry were great agents for fast-acting amnesia, “was it open?” “Yes…” Sheila offered a half-nod, finally bonding with the glue that stuck her to the seat. So open, though. Open and enticing. Tempting. A noise left Joyce’s mouth as she exhaled, witness to the final nail in the coffin. “Sheila…after hearing your side of things and considering my own actions…” and just maybe, slightly Emily’s too… “I think I’ve put you in a position with…unfair expectations.” Her mouth had gone sideways as her front from earlier was starting to feel far less than called for. “No, please– Ms. Summers. What I did was wrong, no matter the context. I just wanted to explain myself so I could–” “--No, Sheila,” Sheila’s words went limp the moment Joyce sliced between them. “I’m not saying at all that what you did wasn’t wrong. Make no mistake. You went into my home without me being there and specifically snooped somewhere that officially you had no reason to be. You have my permission to come and go as you need to, but you know that’s specifically related to work only. I’m still upset, Sheila…but I think I may have been treating this a bit too harshly…” It was probably only a definitive statement that Sheila was still on the hook as the main reason for why the woman didn’t try to say anything back to Joyce. Call her a glutton for punishment, but her conscience could rest lighter than it’d just been feeling with some form of atonement. “What you said is true,” Joyce admitted, trying to hide her own guilt now. “I’ve involved you in a lot of things that I’ve never let you in on fully. Not once have you ever asked me about any of the things I ask of you, but still you do so diligently and exceptionally.” Tone down the praise a little, Joyce…we ARE supposed to be reprimanding her… “It’s ultimately because of me that you’ve been exposed to stuff like this. And…if I’m being a bit more realistic,” and honesty was so hard to abide by, right now, “I’m sure you have gotten your own ideas about what’s going on…” And just for a moment, only the distant hum of the building’s vents were talking. Just like how Sheila resolved herself to finally sit still, she didn’t dare try to cut her boss off or jump in any more than she already had. Whether in good or bad graces, Ms. Summers was simply someone not to be interrupted. But with every pause or deliberate kind of speech, Joyce tried to hide the quirks, kinks and chinks in the innerworkings of her mind while she tried to navigate this. How was she supposed to stay firm without mentioning diapers, cribs, or any of the red flag words when it had everything to do with what Sheila had done? That wasn’t to say Sheila wasn’t picking up on any of this. From her seasoned perspective, the awkward balance in her boss’ voice, the tilted expression, furrowed brow and constant luls of silence were all a testament to how much of a screw-up she’d caused. Disciplining Sheila wasn’t just weird because it hadn’t happened since ever; it was difficult because it felt so inappropriate. And yet it did. But it didn’t. Yet the thoughts were interrupted when Joyce finally clasped her hands, finding what she believed were hopefully the correct words to immediately skip to. “Sheila, I’m upset and a little angry right now, but it doesn’t change how much you’ve done for me…and that I expect you to continue doing.” And what didn’t go unheard by the woman was an implication of the future. Continuing to provide for her boss. She couldn’t hide the jump in her eyebrows. “What you did was wrong and unacceptable, but bearing in mind just how much you’ve been involved with already…” sorry, Emily…! “This…isn’t the farthest thing from what I’ve already put you through.” Quite close, actually. Just put everything together in one place and there you have it. There Sheila legitimately had it. No. This can’t be right. I…snooped! I peeked in on her privacy! On Emily’s! I’m the lowest of the low. I took advantage of Emily in a difficult situation. I…she can’t…! She can’t just forgive me…! “But Sheila,” Joyce shifted and her voice became far more severe. “You’re one of my best employees and I want you to know just how important you are to me and this company.” While leaving it at that may have misconstrued it as praise… “For the exact same reason, you need to know how difficult of a position you’re putting me in having to talk to you like this. I’m largely upset in part with how I even found out about all this to begin with!” “Yes…” Sheila remorsefully agreed, nodding with her eyes at the desk again. Finally with her words carrying her criticism to somewhere much more objective and separated from the problematic content, confidence was starting to come with the vocabulary now as well. “You’re my secretary Sheila because of how well you do for me and for your honesty and transparency. That part does not come and go as you choose.” She nodded again. It was a total and whole-hearted agreement. It was the exact kind of pressure and scolding that she needed and wanted. Ms. Summers was a generous woman, so to somehow land back in her good graces unscathed after all of this would’ve been a punishment in itself. The flame was low but the pressure stayed unrelenting. Joyce channeled the best attitude she could; reminiscent of a stern talking-to with a girl sneaking ice cream when she wasn’t supposed to, only now tailored for someone that didn’t spend half their time in diapers. “I can maybe understand what you were thinking, Sheila, but that doesn’t excuse your actions. Despite everything I’ve asked of you, it still stands that you abused a privilege I gave you.” At the very least Joyce didn’t feel the need to remind her of her contractual obligation to maintain secrecy. It was an unfortunate instance of Sheila finally slipping up, but it didn’t change the fact that she was a smart person. “From now on there won’t be any home visits unless I’m contacted and I approve it beforehand. Do I make myself clear?” Without hesitation Sheila agreed on a visual and audible front. “Yes.” “Good. And on that same train of thought: anything that you do at my home needs to be approved from now on. By me and no one else. Understood?” Dinner…she must be referring to that… Another heat of the moment type of situation that Sheila was currently being trained to feel adverse to. While it felt far less damning to have been caught in that situation, that lack of outright guilt made room for embarrassment. “Yes…” “These are all new rules moving forward, and this is me trying to be cognizant of the fact that I’ve involved you in a lot of ways that’ve left room for misinterpretation or mistakes.” And while it didn’t quite sound like one, Joyce said it anyway, “You have my apology for that.” It was bittersweet to everything she had just said before it, and would certainly feel so after, but Sheila wishing to right her legitimate wrongs wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. “There will be a punishment for this, Sheila, but I’m going to need time to think of a fair one.” After all, terminating her right-hand woman felt like more of a punishment to herself, which after exposing Sheila to so much felt almost proper. If only it wasn’t a paradox that still punished Sheila the worst. Thankfully for both parties, firing wasn’t even remotely on the table, much less the same room. “But the last and final thing I’m going to say Sheila is this: no more secrets. If something happens, you tell me. No matter what. Whether you think it was a mistake or you expect me to get upset or angry, it’s still your job to tell me.” Then came her last and deepest cut. “The first person I should hear about my secretary overstaying her welcome at my house is you, Sheila. Not my girlfriend. One of the biggest, if not most important things that I expect from you Sheila is honesty and transparency. One last time. Do I make myself clear?” Sheila’s answer wasn’t immediate, and the delay wasn’t spurred from hesitation. She didn’t dare disagree on a single point, all in part to her selfless attitude and moral compass. Her boss was right in every sense and she had every right to say what she said. Finally digesting the full weight of her words, Sheila opened her mouth. “Y…Yes, Ma’am. I promise. No more secrets. This won’t ever happen again.” The discipline all things considered went down easy, and that made Joyce sigh, easing back just slightly into her chair. “Good. Another important thing is I don’t want this to affect how you do your work, Sheila.” Mostly. “Do as you have been doing and I don’t expect this to happen again.” “Of course.” Sheila was hardly a woman of faith, but the sun seemed to be shining just right on her that hour. If not her boss herself, clearly someone was keeping an eye out… But with the bulk of the branding already behind her, that made what did linger feel much more prominent in Sheila’s mind. Honesty. Being truthful. Truthful about all of it. Sitting there, seeing Ms. Summers seem glad to be past a situation she herself clearly didn’t like, that alone put Sheila’s head in a discomforting place to know that the stones could settle more than this and she had yet to do so. And asking for things to proceed as normal was an easier thing said than done. Neither one probably felt as comfortable as they were putting on, especially Joyce. The shell shock from doing something she had never hoped to was still just starting to set in and she could tell from the way Sheila was back to fidgeting that she was clearly taking it all in as well. But that was that and the past was in the past. “But okay, we’ll leave it at that,” Joyce decided with her best business smile. “Sorry to take up your time, Sheila. Would you mind seeing if there’s anything that I’ll still be able to make it to?” “Yes…” Sheila nodded, but she wasn’t moving from her chair. Her eyes were someplace else, staring off at something far beyond the four walls of Joyce’s office. “M…Ms. Summers? I…I would like to start being honest now, if that’s okay…” And just as they’d surfaced from the turmoil, a hand was pulling them right back in. The light and airy atmosphere that Joyce imagined was starting to come back dried up instantly the moment another towel of dread was cast on them. Most importantly: what in the hell could Sheila possibly have to share now? Joyce the mighty mommy could hardly be put for a scare, so twice now in a single sitting was quite the problem. “Yes…?” Joyce cautiously accepted, though her irrational side was wishing she hadn’t. “I…I was curious.” Sheila stated. Quite clearly with an unavoidable look. Ah, yes, restating the facts. Smart, Sheila! After all, Joyce’s memory was a bit hazy at times, so there wasn’t anything like having a post-meeting reminder, that way she could– “A-and I’m…still curious…” Come again? While her eyes moved, Joyce’s plastered smile did exactly as it was constructed to and nothing else. A perfect mask for the jarring disbelief from what she was starting to hear. Still? Still curious? A-about… “When I…after I saw what I saw…I got the file from your office, and I…had the chance to talk with Emily a little. It…it reminded me of taking her back to your hotel room… And I’m the one that insisted on making her dinner… She wasn’t sure, but I insisted and did it anyway… I wanted to stay and do that because I…guess I wanted to feel like it was at the hotel again…” But that was hardly even scraping at the truth. The identifiable truth that Sheila knew, yet was too afraid to say, but her pride didn’t allow for secrets. Especially not now. Her honesty was demanded and owed. Whether it sounded weird or perverse; disgusting or rage-inducing, it needed to be said and the air needed to be cleared. Otherwise, it was all bound to fester and grow to yet another bursting point, one Sheila imagined that would be far less forgiving than this time. Slowly, Sheila brought a hand to her chest like a structural beam that gave her support. “Ms. Summers…I liked taking care of someone… O…of Emily.” And from Joyce’s corner, her reaction certainly did change. Not one blink this time, but two! And by no means did it stop Sheila’s guilty admission, as she went on to explain, “I…I don’t know why I feel like that, but…I guess it makes me feel similar to how I feel working for you… Satisfaction? But…I also see it as an extension of my work that I do for you. I don’t know if that’s me just trying to justify a different kind of feeling, but I had fun… It was fun getting to make her dinner…I had fun getting to talk to her about you and work…” But it wasn’t the same kind of fun she had with Greg, her fiance. With him it was lovely, romantic and so many other positive words from the nearest, biggest dictionary. But with Emily? Light, airy, pure and fun was all she felt. It put her in a different place. It wasn’t like caring for her dog, or helping direct her boss. It hit all those same veins, but the satisfaction was far too unique. And after seeing the diapers, the stuffed animals, footie pajamas, and even the affection her boss had for Emily… Wasn’t this just babysitting? “I…I liked it a lot, Ms. Summers… Not romantically. In any way whatsoever, but…it made me feel almost like a…caretaker…or something.” Probably more than twenty minutes ago they had gone well past a point of what’d be considered workplace appropriate, hence the shades of red intensifying on the secretary’s face. She was coming to a revelation at the same time she was broadcasting it to her boss. To someone she shared a work relationship with, yet gushing out such personal and intimate details. And like that, curiosity had certainly killed the cat. Good thing Joyce wasn’t one though, so save for her mind she wasn’t in any way seriously harmed. Sh…Sheila…of all people…? And as shocked as Joyce was, that didn’t stop the smile on Sheila’s face. While one was still recovering from the emotional and mental shrapnel, the other could finally breathe with a weight lifted off her shoulders. C…caretaker…? B-babysitter? Joyce looked slightly up. Sheila…?! “I’m…sorry about that, Ms. Summers,” Sheila pressed her lips, looking apologetically happy, of all things. Yet even now she didn’t fear the retaliation of being fired. After all, Ms. Summers was a person of her word? “Would…would you like to discuss anything else?” And now with the shoe certainly on the other foot, the boss could hardly answer to her secretary from so far below. “N…no. Not…right now…” Joyce wanted to at least stand and send her off, but the thought of managing on her two legs was daunting just to think of right then. Curiosity was peculiar, but not unexpected. But liking it…? A single word, yet an entire metric ton of so many things to unpack. What did like even mean? Like… Emily’s kind of like? Joyce’s? Ah! No! She stifled and smothered a scream. With a hand finally rising and plummeting to the top of her desk, she calmly waved. “You…you’re dismissed…” Christ, was termination actually off the table? Sheila was great, but shock was an awfully powerful thing… Miraculously energy had been passed from the scolding to the scolded. Sheila was the one at fault, and yet she was the only one better for it. With a laptop clutched against her chest, Sheila smiled with her departure for the door. Needless to say, nothing of anything seemed to have gone according to expectations. “Ms. Summers?” Sheila called, halfway through the door. “Yes?” “One other thing that I learned…uhm… I wasn’t sure if you knew…” At this point, Joyce was ready to stop her right then and there. Leave the surprises for another day, just so she had the strength left to focus on the rest of her day. But reluctantly, she didn’t and allowed Sheila to speak. “About Emily…” Wait. No. Stop. Stop. Stopstopstopstop! “I…” and Sheila. The same Sheila Joyce had known for years to be a near-robotic, well-oiled machine for work and little else, made a noise from her mouth. A noise that wasn’t words, a grunt, sigh or annoyance. A laugh. A chuckle. Humor? Her mouth closed reflexively, but a puff of air came out with a small chuckle. “I don’t think Emily likes beets very much…” Even now Sheila could see the remains of her dinner plate. All the red, yellow and greens had gone, but the one thing that looked just as prominent from the start was a plate full of purple magenta. While child rearing wasn’t what she went to school for, experience still served as a wonderful tool when it came to diagnosing a picky eater, and that she believed Emily was. …Doesn’t like beets. And thankfully, before Joyce could respond, her office door was shut and she was all alone again. Whether she believed it or not, objectively, Sheila had been disciplined. Yet with a whole can of worms opened because of it. …Beets… Later that evening, Joyce felt distracted, to say the least. So busy wandering in her own mind that she could barely even focus In the pursuit of trying to make heads and tails of what happened with her discussion with Sheila, the world around her and the work before her was totally secondary to the shock that she was still trying to process. Sheila liked it. She liked taking care of Emily? But what does that say about all the baby stuff? Did she approve of that too? How the hell am I supposed to work around her, now? Do we NEED to talk about this again? I have to work with her on a daily basis…so what now? She was smiling! Sheila! What’s the next step? Do I ask her more questions? T…try to find out more? Do…do I tell–! “Oof…” a quiet sigh followed by a warm squelch came from player number two once she announced her arrival. Her second announcement really, as Joyce was too busy on her computer to notice her enter the office. Before Joyce knew it, there Emily was, straddling her thigh with her eyes on the computer screen. Only after a few seconds of silence did Emily tilt her head back with a curious grin, dropping the hair hanging on her ear. “Whatcha working on?” While it had yet to be said, it was obvious Joyce had been spacing out, to which all she could give was her own smile, albeit a bit more embarrassed. “Just…catching up on some work I didn’t get done today,” Joyce explained while she pulled a certain somebody’s T-shirt out of the back of their diaper. “Very clever, by the way.” “What? How?” Poor Emily. Lying just wasn’t part of her skillset. Stooping her head forward, sinking her eyelids and raising her eyebrows, Joyce coyly remarked, “The fact that you’re telling me you have a diaper that needs changing?” And like Joyce’s leg really was a horsie, Emily squeezed her own together just to hang tight with a bashful look. “No…it’s…not that wet…” “Uh-huh,” Joyce dismissed and ended it with a kiss. “Think you can hang tight for a little longer? I wanna finish this report I’m working on.” “Can I watch? Oh! Wait!” and Emily half-waddled off with Joyce leaning out of her chair just to watch her rear slip past the door. Not much later and she came back. Not with a phone in hand but instead a puzzle cube. “Ah- no, in my lap, please. No horsey rides tonight,” Joyce corrected and directed with a laugh, finding things a bit more comfortable this way. Thankfully there wasn’t much longer for her work. Emily was small, but Joyce wasn’t super strong… Sitting up straight, Joyce rested her chin on Emily’s shoulder while she tried to focus, now taking in her co-pilot as a lovely little ball of white noise. Well, white noise only for so long. “Can I ask a question?” “Hmm?” Joyce hummed while she rubbed Emily’s cheek with her own. “Did you talk to Sheila today?” While there wasn’t any piano for music to suddenly stop, Joyce’s typing certainly did. Only after remembering to act natural did she resume. “I…did. It wasn’t exactly fun…” Joyce sighed, “I’ve never had to have a ‘talk’ with Sheila before, so it was a bit much for us both…” But so, so much more for Joyce. And she knew without a doubt it would be so much for Emily. Not to mention it was edging on a line so dangerously close to what Emily’s superstition was fearful of from the start. Sheila knowing and telling other people. In spite of everything, Joyce still believed in Sheila’s discretion, even if she was now seeing a side of her that she could never even fathom. “...Do you not wanna talk about it?” Quite frankly, Joyce had enough of everything for one day. She didn’t want the stress of conversations and breaking things down for others, especially Emily. There would be no secrets, but that didn’t mean there couldn’t be a clause for how long it took to reveal said information. “...To be honest, no…not really. But I promise, I’ll tell you about it later. It’s a lot to unpack, but I think we’ll be fine. Trust me?” Once she could process it herself and lastly dilute it into something safer for Emily, then she could know. And as a pleasant surprise, Joyce earned herself the loveliest kiss on the cheek. “Kay. Mommy,” Emily giggled. A content noise left Joyce as she rested her head completely now, still managing to finish the last few sentences she had to. “You seem kinda tired,” Emily remarked, though too busy looking at her puzzle in-hand rather than the screen or her partner. A soft smile grew on the woman’s face. “Could you tell I’m lying if I said that I wasn’t?” “Yeah,” Emily said thoughtlessly, sounding like she missed the tone of Joyce’s banter entirely. “Mm. Well, maybe a little… But don’t worry; not tired enough that I can’t change a diaper or two.” “I can do it myself, you know…?” Anything to alleviate Joyce’s stress and workload? “And saying silly stuff like that is what keeps you in your wet diapers five minutes longer.” A bold, but expected taunt. By now Emily should know the kind of bear she was poking… And as her own form of retaliation, Emily gyrated her hips, wiggling in place just to rub it in. Though…maybe it sounded better in her head. All Joyce got was a frictionless massage from a plastic butt sliding around in her lap. Emily got to become more acquainted with her spongy seat… “Oh? Is that your way of asking for ten more minutes?” “N…no…” “Emily, I appreciate the offer, but I’m not that tired. I’ll never be too tired when it comes to taking care of you.” A wet kiss made good on emphasizing her point. “Got it?” “I figured you’d say something like that… Can I at least help make dinner?” “Only if I can get another picture of you in your apron?” “...No diapers though, right?” “Sure.” Maybe when her back is turned, though… “But how was your day? Good?” “Sorta. Same old same old, but I did my chores.” “Good job,” Joyce spoke with genuine praise. Even if it wasn’t much, especially for an adult, that didn’t change the pride Joyce loved to indulge herself with. Emily could brush her teeth and it’d still be cause for celebration. It needn’t be mentioned, but talking about Emily’s days always forced the association with why she had so much free time to begin with. Now with the unspoken topic on the table, Joyce, of all people, decided to broach it. That being said, not in the way Emily was sorely expecting. “So…? Did you ever decide to give Amy a call?” Suddenly Emily looked coincidentally busy trying to pull two interlinked wooden pisces apart. “Uh…no…not yet. I…haven’t decided.” “You can’t decide on something if you don’t know what to expect yet?” Call Joyce crazy, but she was somehow the most receptive to Emily hearing out Amy’s offer. For work! Why, though? Maybe at least in Joyce’s eyes it didn’t strike her as traditional work. She wasn’t expecting the same nine-to-five that she lost Emily to every day of the week. Not the same kind of workload, stress or unavailability. Not only that, but she had expectations and direct connections to Emily’s boss this way. It was a safe and reliable way to keep Emily busy, and while she’d never say it out loud, it was a way for Joyce to…supervise? “I…know… But is it even going to be actual work? I wanna….do work-work, Joyce…” Emily said as she tinkered with a logic puzzle. The more time went on and on the farther her memories of doing actual tasks drifted away. The more she relaxed and lazed around, the more out of touch with being a working, contributing adult she felt herself becoming. Call it a judgmental attitude, but working for Amy didn’t seem very official… In Emily’s eyes it was almost like going over to a neighbor’s house to help with stuff like raking or packing boxes. What kind of work could Amy possibly have for her? Modeling? How was she supposed to model for tailored outfits? She certainly wasn’t good at sewing either. Correction, she had never even touched a needle and thread. Half of it was downplaying the opportunity, and the other half was downplaying herself. Inadequate skills for a job that probably wouldn’t even be a job. So many thoughts that involved so many doubts, all allowed to collect and permeate and not a single phone call had been made. “Work is work, Emily. Calling Amy doesn’t mean you have to commit to anything? Besides, it might help you keep busy during the day?” And give me back all the household responsibilities… “Mhm…” Emily nodded anxiously. She pulled at her puzzle a bit harder. “It would be nice to be a bit busier again…” “Right?” While a traditional job Joyce was certainly not in favor of, she could always get behind filling up Emily’s day. “And just so I can be your number one supporter, I’ll go ahead and let Amy know that you’ll call her Monday morning.” “Wh-what?” Emily spun her head, nearly smacking Joyce on the nose. “No! Don’t! I’ll call her!” When I’m ready! “And it’s already been well-over a couple weeks. You had your chance, Emily, but now I’m gonna help.” “Don’t…!” Emily upped her whine with an annoyed rub on Joyce’s leg. “You’ll be thanking me later~,” Joyce gave her another kiss right before sliding her off and standing up. “Now if you drop it, I won’t make you wait another five minutes and I’ll change you right now?” And Emily’s lips did a dance as her mouth opened, but only whimpers and grunts came out instead. “N…nnn….not fair…” “It’s because I love you,” Joyce chuckled, draping herself over Emily like she was a jacket. “Now, ready to go get changed?” “...Yes.” “Good.” With that discussion unfortunately ended, one short trip later to the nursery and Joyce was on her second wind with how she moved about her station like she was working a kitchen. Emily was her sweet and tasty morsel, the powder and wipes were her tools and ingredients, and lastly the diaper served as just the most breathtaking, adorable garnish she’d ever laid her eyes on. “Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you,” Emily spoke over the loud diaper tapes. “I got a call from Michael today.” “Really now?” Joyce did look curious, partly because she usually expected to be the first one they reached out to. Then again, she had been particularly busy today… When did she last check her phone? “Carol was trying to reach you about something. I dunno what though… Maybe it was about that kink-vestment thing?” “Kink-vestment?” Joyce looked taken aback, and that only made Emily giggle. “Came up with that one on my own. Good, right?” And suddenly a speckle of white powder was on Emily’s nose. “Silly. Very silly,” Joyce grinned, wiping her nose off with a wet wipe. “But okay, thank you for letting me know.” “Oh!” Emily openly eureka’d as she took Joyce’s hands and was lifted up and off the table. “How about you call her and I get dinner started? Please? I’ll just get the pots and ingredients out, and stuff!” In other words, no knives and chopping, no stoves and boiling, no ovens and hot flames, no nothing without Joyce’s supervision. Baby rules could be weird, but Emily wasn’t willing to die on that hill today. “...Okay, fine. Yes, you can,” Joyce agreed and Emily tried not to squeal with delight. It wasn’t often she won “debates” like that. But what could she say? A new diaper simply felt like shedding her skin. She was fresh and newly rejuvenated. A new day and a new Emily. Stronger than ever before! “Now scoot,” she signaled the start by swatting a padded behind. “I brought back some chicken and vegetables today. Think you can get those out?” “Can do!” “Thank you, and no running, please!” Joyce called after a crinkling blur. Doubling back to her office, Joyce found her phone, and sure enough there was a missed call from Carol. About what, though, Joyce wasn’t sure. By the time she came into the kitchen and at the island the number was dialing. “Right there…” Joyce instructed in a whisper, pointing Emily’s destinations out as she appeared with all the right things in hand. “We need spices…–oh, don’t worry about those, though. Those cabinets are a bit high; I’ll get them aft– Oh, Carol? Is that you?” “Hey Joyce! Sorry– I tried reaching you earlier. I think I called at a bad time though.” “No, no…sorry, it’s just been a busy day. Is everything alright?” “Hm? Of course! Michael and Jackie are good. If Emily’s there, tell her I said ‘hi’!” Dropping the phone to her shoulder, Joyce mimicked a handsy wave at Emily. “Carol says ‘hi’.” “Hi!” Emily grunted right back, dropping a chair beside the counter with her bum sticking out. But before Joyce continued the conversation, she was right on her feet, one-handedly sliding Emily off the chair and carrying it back to the table. In a lowered whisper she looked awfully stern. “I said leave the spices to me, got it? No high places.” And Emily, who was well aware of how much she was trying to push her luck, relented with a sigh, trying instead to find anything closer to the ground that she may have missed. “Sorry…” Joyce had the phone back up to her ear, though half her attention had gone to watching her charge like a hawk now. “Emily says ‘hi’ too. So what’s going on?” “Well first, I’m sorry that whole event I took you to didn’t really seem to work out. I figured I’d try anyway…” “No, no, thank you for inviting me in the first place! If nothing else, it was pretty…eye-opening?” That being said, after a particular thing that happened there, she wasn’t going to be keen on asking for another invitation in the future… “Well, I’m not going to go into a whole lot, but I feel like there was something about that night you didn’t tell me…?” “S…sorry?” “You remember Logan, right? The host of the event?” “Yes…” Joyce said with half her head in the game. The other was ordering her body to grab a glass above Emily that she was trying to reach for, just before she could start to get any ideas. After a tender rub on her head Joyce was sitting back down. “Y-yeah, I remember? What about him?” “Well, he said someone came to him after the event and they were asking for you? Something about wanting to apologize?” And a name had yet to be said, but Joyce was already squeezing her phone. “Uh…huh?” “Do you know anyone named Isabelle?” 44 - Business As Usual Self-built success and self-made achievements always felt fulfilling. Hard work and luck that put you so high off the ground in such a lavish and spacious place was always something that could make a person grin. Similarly, being at the peak of performance and power also meant getting to dictate yourself and everything below, hence why Joyce wasn’t in the office today. Given recent…events and developments, the start of the week today was a pseudo-prolonged weekend with most of her work getting done from home. A work from home day was perfect in avoiding some of the personal politics, ironically. Maybe it was bad to say, but admittedly, Joyce may have been avoiding certain people that would remain anonymous… Coincidentally, she hadn’t been speaking with her secretary very much that day. But that was naturally a coincidence, of course. Success wasn’t without its trials and tribulations, however. While the work in the grand scheme was fun, and of course the expensive treatments and influx of wealth did make it all worthwhile, it didn’t change the struggles that came with being so intimate with her work. Sheila may have managed and framed her day, but setting the groundwork was only half the battle. Reports, writings and documents were always going by Joyce like a revolving door. There was always the option of deferring it to someone else, yet that meant surrendering the responsibility and control her position was supposed to have. In other words, the work could be stressful, but it was her work and no one else’s. Like many things, lately, there were just things she wouldn’t let anyone else have. Pleasantly selfish by her nature, Joyce exhaled as the home office chair rolled back against the shelf. “Just a minute past noon o’ clock…” Joyce muttered to herself, glancing at the time. And like that, a minute more her break would be extending by. And with that it was time for lunch, and time for checking in on things…! Watering the plants, dusting the shelves…checking the diapers… She made sure to put on a dramatic reveal when she bobbed her head out from the corner, just to surprise Emily laying on the couch. But a slight problem with that, being that Emily wasn’t there. Tucking her mouth behind her cheek, Joyce puffed as she walked around, trying to pin down the whereabouts of her charge. “Where did she toddle off to?” Mommy muttered under her breath, peeking in the empty kitchen, then double backing to the nursery. The guest room? Just before she was about to start using her words, only on the third trip around the apartment did something seem out of place. A particular door was closed. One that usually stayed open, because there was enough trust by now to keep it that way when diapers were in use… She didn’t knock, nor did she call. After all, what was there to hide? Twisting the unlocked knob, Joyce walked into the bathroom, immediately noticing that the light was on. And before she could notice– “J-Joyce?! Why didn’t you knock?” a frightened little girl cried from the corner. And rather than answer a silly question like that, Joyce turned her head to face her and said, “Emmy? What are you doing in here?” Poor Emily, clearly having thought she had all the time in the world to do what needed to be done, was somewhat stealthily squatting beside the toilet, hanging on to the closed lid with her other arm hooked around Pip. “J-just…” her eyes dropped down to the toilet. “Ch...checking on stuff…” Checking on things. Emily, Joyce’s sweet, cute, dependent little girl, snug in a damp diaper, had miraculously decided she wanted to play pretend and be the plumber that was messing with their toilet. Well, from the heated look on her face, Joyce tried to hide her bemused smile, barely standing from cuteness overload. Poor Emily. She could sneeze and Joyce would be squealing. “Uh-huh…?” Joyce nodded, and it was a silent understanding that the little girl had been found out, but it didn’t stop her from trying. “Sweetie, you know you shouldn’t be playing around the grownup potty?” Urgh. Grownup potty. It hit Emily like a truck and blossomed butterflies in her stomach. The way she said it so sweetly and syrupy, as if the girl couldn’t put mature thoughts together whatsoever…! Her knees were shaking from trying to support herself physically, mentally, and emotionally. The regret felt instant from being caught like a deer in headlights. What gives? She planned for this! Joyce was supposed to be working now, wasn’t she? Or…shoot! How much time had gone by? Wasn’t she in the clear? Crap! “Come on,” Joyce softly beckoned, holding out a hand, and weakly, Emily took it without much explanation. And on the way out Joyce scolded, “Emmy, sweetheart, you’re only allowed in the bathroom when Mommy is too, understood?” “...Yes…” “That’s when we brush your teeth or it’s bath time,” she continued, just because she loved to hear the sound of her own authority. Correction, she loved to see Emily squirm from the pressure. Emily nodded, trying to reconsider her plans as well as maybe realize she was in the clear? Sure, her plan was foiled and she’d been “caught,” but apparently Joyce hadn’t actually figured out what she was trying to do, thank God… That would’ve been definitely embarrassing. She dared not smirk, not even when standing directly behind Joyce. Somehow she had eyes in the back of her head. Weird, but Mommy was omnipotent in the strangest of ways. Enough to make Emily fearful of challenging her strength. Better to be right alongside it than on the receiving end… So cutting her losses, Emily sighed as she resigned to live with the discomfort in her tummy for a little longer. After Joyce went back to work she’d try again… “Sorry, Mommy…” Emily muttered an apology, and a pleasant smile grew on her partner. “It’s okay, honey, but no more playing in the bathroom, alright?” Maybe locking it again could be a good measure… Or even better, what about just a lock for the toilet? Did they make that sort of thing? Oh, the ideas…! “Uh huh…” “Good. Now, is somebody ready for lunch?” The perks to having your master chef girlfriend working from home. “Yep!” “That’s what I like to hear!” Joyce beamed on their way to the kitchen. A gushy, squirmy Emily was always nice, but maybe a giggly happy one was just a teensy bit better? Another perk to working from home was the perfect excuse to keep Emily in diapers all day. After all, if her caretaker was going to be around, what reason was there not to? At first Emily was hesitant, primarily out of selflessness for interfering with Joyce’s work. Though, all it took was a little bit of insistence, reasoning and possibly sending her to bed in a diaper already to get the ball rolling. Having a big baby in the house was hardly an inconvenience to her work, come to find out. Emily was independent and (usually) responsible enough to be far from anything high maintenance, unless Joyce wanted her to be, and it always made for the perfect excuse to drift from her work just to peek inside her girlfriend’s cute pampers. Though, maybe the lack of constant supervision was getting Emily in places she shouldn’t be… “What were we thinking for food, huh?” Joyce asked while she looked for plates. “We can do…salad? Fruit? Sandwiches?” At least from the office ordering food was more her speed, but it felt a bit unfair to expect her imaginary toddler to read from a long and complicated lunch menu… “Do we have peanut butter?” Emily asked, and Joyce chuckled. “Yes, we do. And jelly,” she connected the dots. “How about that and some bananas?” “Yeah!” Emily readily agreed. PB&J paired with bananas? What a wonderful combination that sounded like…! “Then that is exactly what my little princess shall get~!” Joyce intoned right before smothering her girlfriend’s lips. “I think I may just want you for lunch!” she teased and Emily tugged away with a bashful grin. And Emily didn’t need to ask, but it went without saying that her meal would be going with the finest sippy cup of juice, curated and aged within the perfect window of four days since being purchased at the local grocery store. And Joyce thought her wine was good… “Oh, baby,” Joyce called like it was an afterthought, but it wasn’t. It was something she’d been dying to say since she spotted her little deviant misbehaving by the toilet. “Go poopy now so I can change you before I put you in your high chair, okay?” From Emily’s perspective, it was just another moment of abrupt and horrible timing that her mommy girlfriend always seemed to nail. No precursor or sign that she was going to talk about anything so personal so openly and unashamedly. “H-huh…?” And Joyce, without skipping a beat, plainly repeated, “Go potty so I can change you? You don’t wanna sit down in a messy diaper, honey.” There would certainly be some waterworks to go with the telltale smell. She knew?! Emily’s worried expression was starting to show, and it became clear she knew exactly what she was seeing from the start. Emily wasn’t actually playing in the bathroom, would you believe it. Instead, she was doing the best she could to abide Joyce’s very demanding diaper rules… A small reason she never voiced openly about today being a baby day was the fact that she had yet to make a…movement since early yesterday. If she was stuck in diapers all day, there was hardly a chance in hell she’d actually get to use the toilet…! But when Joyce caught her, she figured it out in seconds. Holding Pip, just like she was trained to, Emily was trying to give herself all the stimulus she needed to mess herself. And it would’ve worked too, had it not been for that meddling Mommy…! So Emily’s muscles tightened as she didn’t know how to look or respond. She’d been found out and was hardly prepared for the brunt of it. And the entire time her mommy was watching her. Calmly and expectant. And quivering from Emily’s mouth, she mumbled, “I…I don’t need to–” “--Yes, you do need to go potty,” Joyce finished for her, “and I don’t like you worrying about that stuff, baby. Is that what you were trying to do in the bathroom earlier?” Everyone knew it, Joyce just wanted a confession. Out came the silence of Emily’s embarrassment. So yes, she was answering ‘yes’ to that question. “Sweetie,” Joyce came over, grabbing her shoulders. “It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, okay?” “C-...can I at least do it in the–” “--No,” Joyce jumped in yet again. “It’s perfectly fine, Emily,” she soothed with a hand through her hair. “I’m not gonna watch and I’m not gonna make a big deal out of it because it’s nothing special. This is normal, okay?” No different from when she wet her diaper. Maybe it was a little cruel to admit, but Joyce was sort of waiting to force another moment like this… Being the one responsible for changing her diapers, of course it didn’t go unnoticed that they had a grand total of about one, maybe two number two’s they’ve had to deal with in a fast-growing portfolio of many changes. From a purely professional standpoint, it was a detriment to her diaper training and all the work they’d put into her bringing pip to the potty… So to capitalize and exploit those efforts, Joyce forced her down into a squat, crouching with her the whole way as gravity itself pushed the flustered girl to the floor. “You just do what you need to do and we’ll change you right after, okay?” Joyce rubbed her head before standing back up. “Do you want your paci?” Maybe a little…wait–! “N-no…” and while she said it, what had to be done still wasn’t feeling quite real. It was more a situation of respecting Emily’s outward wishes than reaching deeper for what she knew her little girl was feeling on the inside. Sometimes, and only in extremely controlled amounts of moderation, it was deemed necessary to leave Emmy to her devices. Even little girls sometimes need to be a little stubborn… “Okay,” Joyce smiled like nothing was amiss and no diaper was about to be filled. “Once you’re done you can have changies,” and with not another word spoken, she pivoted over to the counter and started preparing lunch. Emily quietly watched, still in her squatting position, trying to catch even a glimpse of Joyce watching her. She was, but she wasn’t. In her peripherals? Probably. But staring directly at her? None whatsoever. She was busy doing her motherly duties, minding her own business as much as she needed to. Emily was a background decoration, one about to make quite the disruption that was “normal.” It was expected of her. Things got easier with time, but this hardly felt like one of those things that really got broken in. There simply wasn’t getting any used to this sort of thing…! And maybe it was Joyce’s primal parts, but her ear may have twitched once she heard the gentle grunt. She dared not to look, though. Not after her little speech. Problems only got as big as they did or were even considered one purely based on perception. Problems were a construct born from inconvenience. But who decided what was and wasn’t an inconvenience? Messing a diaper surely wasn’t one of those things, and Joyce would be sure to hammer that point home quite hard. It was normal. The day-to-day. Dirty diapers came and went just like the wet ones; just like the tantrums, the timeouts, the misbehavior, the cuddles, the coos, and so much more. Embarrassment was a trained emotion, and just like her bathroom habits, all her little girl needed was an extensive course in undoing all those yucky things that kept her chained down. So while Joyce didn’t watch, she certainly listened as her little treasure grunted like the booming drums of liberation. The boom-booms that’d be liberated from her… Good thing she was fully turned away to grin at herself for thinking of that one. And Emily teared up as her hands found the floor, pushing uncomfortably as Pip sat on her hands. It felt just as hard the first time, but maybe because it's been so long since then. Christ, did it actually get easier if she kept doing this? W-wait, why would she even want to do it? She didn’t, but it was a two-way crash both parties were speeding to each other. If Emily didn’t make the decision to do it herself, Joyce certainly would like she had just now. It was ironic, thinking that Emily was allowed to do her bathroom business now anywhere but the bathroom. As Joyce liked to ever so eloquently put it, “You always have your bathroom!” and she’d chuckle like it was the cutest thing for Emily to ever disillusion herself into thinking otherwise. Maybe it was a little condescending, but it was a complement for the genuine and tender affection she did always get. Making a mess like this was certainly one of the biggest lows of being a baby, but if this was as bad as it got…? In exchange for all the cuddles, the gifts, the affection and love…?After all, if it was something bad or un-fun, Joyce did always seem to be the one cleaning it up… Just like the last time, her muscles finally gave and the stress and tension slipped the moment her bowels did. It was another all to once performance that left her panting, tired and weary. The same self-disgust, the same fear from sitting on her bottom. Anything but that. And the smell…! But no words needed to be said when Joyce already had her on her feet, humming and shushing her all the way to the nursery. After a tender rub on the far shoulder Emily earned her slow, waddling self a kiss on the cheek. “So proud of you…!” That made one of them. “Okay…I’m gonna be a bit longer, but I’ll be out regularly to check on you, okay?” Joyce hung a hand on the doorway to her office, unfortunately having to return at the fast approaching end of her break. “If you need anything, just come in and ask.” Imagine that; asking to be excused from a meeting because her daughter needed some juice or a diaper change? Agh…! If only Emily were selfish enough! “Okay…uhm…I’m all set, I think…” Emily thought to herself, now of a much more stable mind, what with a dry diaper on her hips. She’d been prepped for the long haul. Her tummy was content with peanut butter, jelly, juice, bread and bananas, and she was armed to the teeth with her mochi friend and a sippy cup full of juice. The warfront was harsh, but she was built to survive. “Good,” Joyce nodded, rubbing her head. “Don’t forget you have all those toys in your nursery, by the way? Go play with those if you get bored.” After all, being a baby for the day and having Joyce home meant her weekday chore privileges had been revoked. What little girl would be trusted with the vacuum cleaner? “I know…” Emily nodded simply, squeezing Pip. It was sort of a bad look to be caught with other stuffed animals… In the time she had gotten to know her friend, Pip was sort of like Joyce; he didn’t like Emily cheating on him with other stuffed friends. How did she know? Intuition, or feeling. Probably. Joyce got him for her, after all, so clearly he must take after her girlfriend? At least Mr. Bear was an exception. “Oh, but that reminds me!” she said as she glanced at her phone. “You’re getting one of your big girl privileges today.” Come again? Emily blinked, clearly taken aback by the B-G word, especially in the same sentence as anything to imply it was being reinstated…! No more parental lock on the computer? Being allowed to climb on chairs to reach the high cabinets? Ice cream?! “Use your phone to give Amy a call about that offer, okay?” Instant disappointment. Her expectations weren’t very high, considering she wasn’t allowed to climb things, still, but somehow Joyce managed to go even lower than that. “Blegh,” Joyce mimicked the expression on Emily’s face, “Yup, I know, Mommy’s a meanie, but you need to call her. Just a little chat, okay?” “But…what if…?” Emily tried to excuse herself, then shrugged her shoulders, like that all somehow made up a justified reason. “I dunno…?” “Mm,” Joyce pressed her lips, as if to digest the nonexistent thought. “Emily, you can call her now, or we’ll do it together once I’m done with work.” Was that an ultimatum? Aside from her tone, that didn’t sound so bad, actually? “And if I have to do it…” Wait, maybe not. “I’m going to start by apologizing for how long it took to call her,” she warned. “I’ll let her know that you were too busy napping in your crib, playing in the bathroom and eating your lunch to call?” “Don’t!” Emily commanded in the best big girl voice she could muster, but her diaper crinkled at just the wrong time. “And I won’t,” Joyce booped her on the nose, “If I hear that you did it yourself?” And just in case if Emily’s feelings were convincing her to misbehave and possibly “pretend” that she did what she most certainly did not, there was always texting Amy herself to confirm. “You’re my good girl, Emily,” she kissed her one final time on the forehead, “so go and show me how good you can be.” With a lackluster response from Emily, Joyce left it at that as she disappeared into her office. And now with a sucky feeling that didn’t involve a pacifier, Emily sulked back into the living room. She found her phone on the stupid coffee table in front of the stupid couch, watching the stupid TV play some stupid show. Why was she even anxious, or dragging her feet? What was stopping her? Was it the lack of officiality? Was it because Amy knew what they were like now, or that diapers were a permanent association for her now? So many layers and so many possible reasons; so many things that Emily was just assuming. She didn’t know what Amy thought and she didn’t know what this offer even was… But the worst of it? Sitting on the couch, just in a diaper and T-shirt, told to go play pretend by Mommy and make a big and important business call. She sighed, sinking her chin into her hands. Playing make believe was hardly a pastime in itself, and she was being told to get in the mood for it? Stupid. So stupid. She rose from the couch, fingering the screen on her phone as she scanned the contacts. Sure enough, at the top there she was. Amy. Though it wasn’t Emily who put her there. She sighed again. What’s the point in having a stupid password on your phone if your girlfriend knows it? Joyce got to know all the passwords… Emily didn’t. After a swig of her afternoon juice, a small thought occurred to Emily; some way to at least make the pain go down a bit easier. Ceremoniously dropping her phone on the couch, she half-vaulted over the back of the couch and padded her feet down the hall for the nursery. “You’re…!” she grunted, grabbing, tugging and dragging, “Coming with...me!” She would never be so rude as to call anyone fat…but…some could certainly be fluffy… For example, if your hips were wide enough to stop you from getting through a doorway, at least for her furry friend, it was probably a cause for concern. Once she made the swap from carpet to hardwood floor, things were a bit easier. Joyce was busy doing adult stuff, so that meant Emily had free reign (not really) of the house. She situated her newest staff member right by the corner where her view of the TV was unobstructed and next to the terrace doors. She crinkled over to the couch, retrieving all her office supplies (sippy cup and phone) and made a daring trust fall into the corner, being caught by her very own personal secretary. One that probably wouldn’t go gabbing to others about her diapers… Now she was starting to understand the appeal of being her own boss. No wonder Joyce liked this stuff. Big office? Pampered by a secretary? Heck, Joyce probably didn’t even do anything important! She probably just signed her name in places and told other people to do other stuff. If she didn’t know any better, Joyce probably had her own giant stuffed bear in her office…! Though, she probably didn’t sit in Sheila’s lap, which occurred to Emily as she sat in her bear’s. “Mmm… Mr. Bear?” she asked aloud, squeezing his soft, plump and stubby leg. “Hold my calls. I have an errand to run!” she leapt from her secretary’s cushy body and scampered off back down the hall. And right as she was about to get into the bedroom, a voice called from the nearby office, “Emily? Are we behaving?” “Yes…!” she droned back. Her hands hung on the doorframe, waiting for an answer, but nothing came. Good enough. Goodness, who’s idea was it to let a competing company stay in the same building? A very fair point that a fanatical Emily wondered as she rummaged through the closet, smuggling assets from her enemy. Joyce told her to make a big girl call about work, so obviously that meant dressing the part, didn’t it? Well, unfortunately due to recent wardrobe changes, Emily’s other set of attire didn’t exactly accommodate her newly instated bathroom needs, hence why she simply needed bigger clothes. It was always easy to run away with the fun and carefree thoughts the moment they piqued in her mind. Don’t think too hard and just go with the flow. That’s what Joyce always told her to do, right? So, it only felt right as she went back and forth from closet to dresser, grabbing what suited her fine business tastes, especially when it came to ogling Joyce’s underwear. It was really impressive, actually! “Whoa…” Emily giggled, pulling the loose panties up over her diaper. Not even the slight bulk on her front or behind could make up the difference in the width of Joyce’s hips. Her body was too good, it simply wasn’t fair. Thankfully there was the compromise though of Emily tucking the underwear partially into her diaper, just to get it to stay. What came next? Oversized pantyhose, of course. She had to roll them up a little bit and continue using her diaper like a pocket, but it worked and that’s what mattered. Next she ditched her boring shirt and went for the bright and white work blouse that’d really make her look good! Though…while it did run well down over her diaper, she really did look great from the waist up! As…long as she slightly rolled up the sleeves and held the cuffs. Joyce was pretty by default, but obviously she put work into looking good on top of that? It only made sense that Emily had to put in the same effort, too. And the perfect concealer for her slight chaos hiding underneath her shirt now was a wonderful black business skirt Emily found. The delight when it didn’t have much trouble going over her diaper was immense, though all her clothes were starting to move around a bit with all this shifting… After tucking it all back into place, the last thing she needed came from a less professional end, but it certainly could work? A wide black leather belt with some minimalistic double metal circle on it came out, and Emily made full use of it, tying all her loose clothing together. And also, need it be mentioned how comfy all her clothes were? Joyce really did never disappoint when it came to buying the nice stuff! While it was all good and fun getting ready for work, she certainly wasn’t enough of a savage to walk around barefoot. After peeking inside a few different shoe boxes with brand names she’d never heard of, Emily pulled out a pair of tall black heels. Good enough. Black was black and that meant work appropriate. With her ensemble complete and perfected, Emily stumbled and nearly tripped multiple times with pride back into the hallway, taking carefully coordinated and noisy steps all the way. “Apologies, Mr. Bear,” Emily said as she fell forward since her feet were too small in her big heels to fall back, “I needed a change of clothes,” she enunciated in an exaggerated posh form of tone. Somehow though her charade had become inspiring, enough to convince herself to finally pull the trigger and make the call on her company issued phone. Holding it up to her ear, thankfully there was enough time to sneak a swig of juice before the other end picked up. “Hello?” Yep, sounded like Amy. “Amy?” Emily asked, putting on her best big girl voice (or just being herself, really). “Sorry, is this a bad time?” “No! Now’s perfect, actually! Joyce said you were gonna be calling today, actually.” “Yeah…” Imagining scheduling an appointment when it was Mr. Bear’s job to do that… Apparently no one had job security these days. “Sorry about the delay… It’s just been sort of…busy.” A fair excuse that could only work if she actually came off as such. Spending her days doing either a brief set of chores or wearing diapers didn’t really fit as busy. The regret for saying that was hitting as fast as the smell of a messy diaper. The back of her head sunk deeper into her stuffed secretary. “Trust me, I totally get it,” Amy assured, or at least pretended like she believed her. “Joyce didn’t pressure you or anything to call me, did she?” A slight laugh came from the other end of the line, “she did, didn’t she?” “Uhm…” and just for insurance’s sake, Emily dangling her girlfriend’s heel from her outstretched foot finally let it drop to the floor. “No?” Another laugh from Amy, but she said, “Okay, well good. I don’t want you to feel like you have to do any of this! So, it’s a couple things I could actually use a hand with. Oh, and there’s no need for experience with sewing or anything like that! I have a client that’s looking to get a few outfits done, but they’re mainly out of state, so all I have are her sizes on paper. Usually I don’t take on work like this if they aren’t available, but since she’s longstanding, I took her up on it. So here’s where you come in: having a model would help me a little bit? She’s a little bit bigger than you, but you’d make a great stand-in reference and all I’d need to do is upscale from there.” “So you want me to be like your mannequin?” “When you put it like that you make it sound like I just want your body…” Amy groaned back playfully, “Well, guess I do, actually. It’s not a deal-breaker for whether I can get it done for her or not, but having a live reference could speed things up. And of course, I’ll pay you! I’m only asking because I had to check your numbers for a different project and happened to notice the sizes were sorta close.” “A different project?” A project for her? “A-anyway!” Amy rushed her voice and implied a certain matter wasn’t to be explored, “I can keep you busy with helping organize some fabrics, too. Buttons, zippers, and stuff, but to be honest I don’t think I can fit out a whole work week for you… I’m balancing a couple different commissions right now, so it’d be a sort of on and off thing. When I’m ready and you’re ready, you know?” Far from fully employed and official work. It sounded like she would be paid under the table, too. It wasn’t an actual job, but it was gonna give her something… “That works…but, I guess I don’t really have any experience with that sort of stuff…” “That’s fine, don’t worry about it! It’s just standing in front of the mirror, really. It’s super relaxed, promise. We can chat, have lunch, all that fun stuff. You can play with Ashes too, if you want?” Bribing her with a pet? This was sounding more like a favor than a regular job… “I mean…yeah, I guess I can do that then,” Emily agreed, albeit meekly. “I guess we just need to coordinate when I come?” “And we’ll do that well in advance, promise. No day-of kinda stuff. Promise! Ugh, you’re a lifesaver! I don’t really doubt my skills, but if I don’t get an actual body to play with, it kinda throws me off a little, you know?” No, actually. Not at all. “Yeah…” “Awesome! Give me a couple days and we’ll set something up, okay? I’ll keep it at a reasonable time, and just let me know if we need to reschedule. Thanks so much, Em, and if ya have any questions, just shoot me a text or give me a call, okay?” “Mm. Okay, will do.” “Take care! Ciao!” And like that the bandage had been ripped and Emily was employed. Sort of. Not really. Not at all? Kind of employed. But she sighed nonetheless when she could drop the phone. Good thing she was wearing all that big girl armor. The baseless worry of making that call had been eating away at her for some stupid reason, but it was done now. Reality sunk far lower than her excited expectations, which in this case was a good thing. Could she count that as an “interview,” even? Was this going to be something that she could put on a resume? Seamstress Assistant - Stood in front of mirror and looked pretty Skills - Patience Something like that. But since the office was busy being used right now, Emily didn’t have to entertain the thought of doing any computer work. Instead she rolled onto her side against Mr. Bear, suckling down a stream of juice, watching the sky and city beyond the heavy wood and glass doors past the terrace. It was such a small thing to have done in retrospect, but now with her one big thing she’d been trying to avoid out of the way, all that was left was to enjoy the rest of her day. A weight was off her shoulders and she had nothing else to worry about. Everything was quiet again and her cheek rested against her giant stuffed bear, listening to the faint typing from down the hall in Joyce’s office. A calm, quiet lull filled the home and before Emily knew it her eyes were getting heavy. Naps were dumb, stupid and the worst thing ever imagined by anyone. The kinds that were enforced, at least. Emily was much more of a “natural” napper, which was something Joyce unfortunately could never seem to understand. She slept when she wanted to, not when she was told. Joyce was much more of a schedule-based sort of folk. If only Emily got to waddle to the beat of her own drum. Without an oppressive system to keep her down, or crib bars to keep her confined, it was much easier to follow the whims of her sleepy self as she laid there with half a sippy cup spout in her mouth. Constantly reminding herself to suck, her eyelids kept on drooping until they finally stopped rising, closing completely for a good stretch of uninterrupted time. Meanwhile, sometime later, Joyce was wandering out of her office. “Emily?” she called, “I wanna check your diaper?” The first place she went was their bedroom where the light was still on and she noticed her closet door half ajar… And her dresser drawers open…with undergarments, pants and such hanging out and askew. Going just a step further, Joyce stepped inside her closet, first making note of the small pile of hangers laying on the floor; a couple shirts and skirts included. Wait, were her shoe boxes moved too? Either they had been robbed or some form of mischief was afoot. Hardly believing in the former, Joyce sighed as she tried to figure out what the angle of the mess in their room was while she tidied it up. “What did that little munchkin do…?” she muttered, flicking off the last light as she came into the hall. “Emily? Did you–” she started to say, then she saw her sleeping. Sleeping in Joyce’s clothes, wearing them like oversized bags snuggled with her feet together with small dollops of pantyhose fabric hanging off her toes. She noticed the large stuffed bear that lived in the nursery had decided to move, and she then went on to recognize her four-figure belt imported from Italy with half its leather material hanging out and sitting so loosely on her little girl’s frame from riding up to her waist. The clasp didn’t even look to be sitting right…! Her poor heels from last year’s trip to France were lazily sitting on their sides on the floor, far from any feet, much less ones that could actually fit them. Joyce’s business skirt was half on Emily’s hips, half beneath the panties she recognized as her own, which also fell beneath the plastic siding of her diaper… And the cherry on top? Joyce quietly came closer, carefully removing the sippy cup that had fallen from the sleepy girl’s hand and onto her bear. Not that it mattered much, but she pinched the loose collar around Emily’s neck, fingering the wet apple juice stain now on one of her best shirts. And Joyce sighed, right before her phone buzzed in her pocket. Slipping it out she read a message to herself. AMY: Just heard from Emily! All set. I’ll b in touch with her! She put the phone away, giving her little girl a dumb smile. “So we’re playing dress-up now, are we?” she whispered with a grin. Apparently a toddler that went unchecked would become a tyrant. Clothes had been wrinkled, a shirt had been ruined, but as the saying went, t’was the cost of doing business. The cost of caring for someone you love. “Though…” Joyce kept to a whisper, so as not to awaken the tot she was playfully chewing out, “The nerve you’ve got to play with Mommy’s expensive clothes…” At least in her state of disarray, play and slumber, a cute bum showing itself made it easy to check a diaper. “Dry…” she muttered while she angled her phone, recording such a sweet memory. Standing back up, one quick trip to the nursery and back around the couch and she was holding two trinkets worth adding to the scene. With her mouth still partly open from enjoying her juice, Joyce swabbed a tiny bit of drool collecting on her bear and clogged the leaky pipe with a silicone bulb and plastic shield. Carefully lifting Emily’s arm, she slipped Pip underneath and set it back down. And lastly, Joyce draped a nearby blanket over her sleeping beauty, far more satisfied with a few more pictures to go with it. “I’ll be taking these back, though…” Joyce glared for just a second, trying not to laugh as she hooked her discarded heels by the fingers and walked them back to the bedroom. “One broken pair is enough, I’d say…” With her brief duties being finished, Joyce slipped back into her office, feeling awfully good now with finishing the final stretch of her day. After all, how could Joyce not be leading the pack if she’d just seen her littlest employee so hard at work…! “I don’t wanna wear this one…!” Emily moaned as the zipper traveled up her back. “But you were so excited trying on different clothes earlier?” Joyce teased from behind, snapping a flap of fabric over the zipper, hiding it completely. “Where did you even get an idea like that?” she laughed so pleasantly, “What made you wanna play dress-up?” “I was dressing for work,” Emily stressed for the umpteenth time. “You wouldn’t get it.” Really, she wouldn’t! Joyce didn’t have to keep swapping from panties to diapers! “No, I probably wouldn’t,” Joyce giggled. “Not that I need to. I like it when you do cute stuff like that.” Though it’s a little less cute when costly damages are incurred… No need to mention that part, though. “I was a little sad though when my busy little office girl was dry, though.” “Sorry,” Emily smugly shrugged, “it’s a skill I’m working on.” “Yeah? You and what references?” Joyce squeezed her waist, watching them both in the mirror. “Cuz if anyone calls me, they’re definitely gonna know that you can’t be trusted out of your diapers.” “Yes I can!” Emily shot her a rude look. “Sorry, sweetie, but I can only speak from experience? Though, I think Amy already knows, so you should be in the clear for that,” she couldn’t hide her teasing smile. “So I take it you called her?” “Yes… She wants me to be a model, sort of.” “A model?” Joyce raised her brows. “That could be kinda fun?” “Uh-huh,” she nodded, tugging a little at the collar on her sleeper. It was on there real good. Not uncomfortable, but it sure didn’t stretch. She couldn’t even find the zipper on her back… “She asked because her client is a little bit bigger than me, I guess, but she’s out of state. Amy sort of said it was gonna be an irregular thing, though.” “Well that’s okay; we’ll get you there when you need to be. Don’t worry about wondering if anyone’ll be available. I’ll make it work.” “Thanks…” with all the effort that went into getting Emily around, sometimes she wondered if anything that she did make was enough to offset the expenses Joyce dropped on her. At this point, was she dropping a profit in financials or just emotion and entertainment? “So work was good?” “Yes, it very much was,” Joyce concluded with a kiss. “You made my day getting to see you each time I stepped out of my office!” There were definitely going to be more work-from-home days in the future… “G-good…” Emily exhaled through her nose, feeling the warmth spread through her diaper. No comments were made, but she got another affectionate rub. “Yes, very good. But what isn’t so much is that I have to make a call too.” Joyce’s happy face started to droop. “Oh! Is it with that kinky person? I…Isabelle?” “Yes, Isabelle.” The one and only who had shell-shocked her so greatly. “Mm. Well, don’t have too much fun with her.” And just like that Emily won a light swat on her padded rump. “Hey!” “Silly comments get silly prizes,” Joyce spoke with finality. “Can we snuggle while you call her?” “We will do that very thing after I talk to her. Tell you this: how about I get you a nice bottle of milk,” no sippy cups, not after that little spill… “and you get comfy on the couch while I go make a grownup call in my office? Then we could watch a movie…?” Her eyes lit up like the sun. “A scary one?!” “No,” oh, buzz killed. Joyce gave her a helpless look, “Not a scary one.” “But I’m wearing one…!” “And what made you think that makes it a done deal?” Joyce’s eyes did circles on themselves. “Weekdays are definitely not scary movie nights.” What if Emily had a nightmare and she was already gone for work? “We will be watching something age appropriate, got it?” “Fine…” “No grumpy attitudes, either,” Joyce pinched her lips, making her cute girl look like a cute duckling. “Now can I get an ‘I love you?’” “I love you, Mommy,” Emily put on her best ‘totally not grumping’ voice. Joyce wow’ed with pride. “Ou, and I didn’t even need to ask for the last part!” Ignoring the tone, she kissed Emily again. “Go get cozy on the couch for me.” They made way for the living room and after dropping Emily off Joyce took a detour to the kitchen. “Don’t fall asleep on me~!” she warned as she left Emily with her bottle. “I won’t! I slept like twice already!” And since when did that stop you from doing it a third? Joyce held her breath just long enough to shut her door, too overjoyed to feel anything but. Only for a second though, as the dread ate away at all of it the moment she looked down at her phone. Now the not so fun part… First Sheila, and now this? Hell, her business with Sheila wasn’t even done yet. Why couldn’t she just get the easy call with Amy like Emily did? With one can of worms already open and spewing, with great reluctance she started to dial what was scribbled on a sticky note. And maybe in some form of retrospect that was too far in the future to consider, if only this second discussion was going to be just another can of worms. Much more aptly, it would be reminisced on as Pandora’s Box. 17 2 Link to comment
YourFNF Posted December 8, 2022 Share Posted December 8, 2022 2 hours ago, Mee said: And thankfully, before Joyce could respond, her office door was shut and she was all alone again. Whether she believed it or not, objectively, Sheila had been disciplined. Yet with a whole can of worms opened because of it. …Beets… Okay can I just say the emotional realism and dialogue on this is amazing! 1 Link to comment
YourFNF Posted December 8, 2022 Share Posted December 8, 2022 2 hours ago, Mee said: With her brief duties being finished, Joyce slipped back into her office, feeling awfully good now with finishing the final stretch of her day. After all, how could Joyce not be leading the pack if she’d just seen her littlest employee so hard at work…! I do have some concerns though about how controlling Joyce is being with limiting the amount and type of work she's doing though... Link to comment
WBDaddy Posted December 9, 2022 Share Posted December 9, 2022 10 hours ago, YourFNF said: I do have some concerns though about how controlling Joyce is being with limiting the amount and type of work she's doing though... I don't know that's a thing. Emily had plenty of opportunities to find and accept other work. She just didn't find a job. Link to comment
Quite-Tiff Posted December 9, 2022 Share Posted December 9, 2022 Thank you for the early Christmas gift. 1 Link to comment
BabySerenity Posted December 10, 2022 Share Posted December 10, 2022 On 12/8/2022 at 6:57 PM, WBDaddy said: I don't know that's a thing. Emily had plenty of opportunities to find and accept other work. She just didn't find a job. I think they were talking about Sheila the secretary especially after what happened!! Link to comment
BabySerenity Posted December 10, 2022 Share Posted December 10, 2022 I do hope Sheila becomes more of a fixture in their lives as a babysitter??!! And I do hope that her ideas as an AB get shared and picked up by Isabelle from the fetish party maybe they collaborate on their next project so Emily can be more of the baby she deserves to be and should be??!!! Perhaps Isabelle is also a Mommy type?? Link to comment
kerry Posted December 11, 2022 Share Posted December 11, 2022 On 12/8/2022 at 8:20 AM, Mee said: litoney Just so you know: this word is spelled "litany." It is misspelled (in different ways) in each of your stories... Link to comment
Mee Posted December 11, 2022 Author Share Posted December 11, 2022 On 12/8/2022 at 11:30 AM, YourFNF said: Okay can I just say the emotional realism and dialogue on this is amazing! Thank you so much! I think there's always a thousand different ways I can improve in delivery and dialogue, but I'm glad to know it's being enjoyed. On 12/8/2022 at 11:54 AM, YourFNF said: I do have some concerns though about how controlling Joyce is being with limiting the amount and type of work she's doing though... I can definitely see how that might be a concern, though as an advocate for Joyce I wouldn't say she's trying to totally force Emily into this thing with Amy. Deciding for her that she was going to make the call in the first place was really just to get something going for her, I'd say. They both know Emily's upset about the current status quo, being she's hanging around at the house most of the time. Emily wants work, and I'd say Joyce is somewhere in a space that's indifferent to what she does, as long as Emily's happy. What they both agree on is having some kind of change and Joyce is at least trying to force Emily's foot in the door so she can have the opportunity to consider it. On 12/8/2022 at 9:57 PM, WBDaddy said: I don't know that's a thing. Emily had plenty of opportunities to find and accept other work. She just didn't find a job. Along those lines, I'd say. With her job hunt in flux, this is just Joyce putting another opportunity on her plate. On 12/9/2022 at 1:24 AM, Quite-Tiff said: Thank you for the early Christmas gift. Thank you for enjoying it! 15 hours ago, BabySerenity said: I do hope Sheila becomes more of a fixture in their lives as a babysitter??!! And I do hope that her ideas as an AB get shared and picked up by Isabelle from the fetish party maybe they collaborate on their next project so Emily can be more of the baby she deserves to be and should be??!!! Perhaps Isabelle is also a Mommy type?? Hmm, that is a good question. What is in the cards for Sheila? Isabelle is a very much wait and see at the moment, but I'm sure there has been hints for possibly just how she leans on things. Either or, there should be a little more insight into her soon enough. Thank you! 41 minutes ago, kerry said: Just so you know: this word is spelled "litany." It is misspelled (in different ways) in each of your stories... Thank you for catching that! My spellcheck won't always immediately catch everything I throw at it, so if it's not immediately noticed/updated with a fancy red underline, it's something that can sometimes propagate. Didn't necessarily know I was misspelling in different ways across my stories, but thanks for the fun fact! Link to comment
YourFNF Posted December 11, 2022 Share Posted December 11, 2022 8 hours ago, Mee said: hat they both agree on is having some kind of change and Joyce is at least trying to force Emily's foot in the door so she can have the opportunity to consider it. Okay that makes sense! I might have misremembered some things... Link to comment
kerry Posted December 12, 2022 Share Posted December 12, 2022 Wow... What a wonderful early Christmas present! Two-chapter updates on both of your stories! I promise to be super good so that I deserve all of this! Fank you! Link to comment
Little_Mouse Posted December 22, 2022 Share Posted December 22, 2022 Thanks for two new amazing chapters ?? 1 Link to comment
BabySerenity Posted January 31, 2023 Share Posted January 31, 2023 Are there going to be anymore updates soon?? Link to comment
Disk Posted February 1, 2023 Share Posted February 1, 2023 There are quite a number of chapters up on Patreon. Link to comment
D503 Posted April 7, 2023 Share Posted April 7, 2023 Every now and again, I'm like - I hope there's a new "Sheltered" Chapter coming soon! Happy Easter 🐰 Link to comment
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