The Traveler's Baby

[Ishigreensa]

Jim rubbed his face as she ran over, and he sighed.

He got up and looked over at her.

"Gracie," he used her name to try to calm her.  "Do you not remember anything from last night?" he asked her letting her keep her distance for now.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed.

"Your birthday was yesterday," he told her to try to help her see that he knew things that either she or someone really close to her would have had to tell him.  "You were so happy that your puppy had gotten out of the fire, but everything else is gone, sweetie.  We're going to get your puppy this morning, remember?"

He smiled for a second.

"I'm Jim.  I found you on the roadside yesterday trying to get help, honey.  We called the fire department and they tried to save your home and your family, but the only thing that survived was you and your puppy."

He pointed out where he put her clothes.

"If your towel is wet, I'll need to fix you another diaper to put on before you put your pants back on, but you wet in your sleep last night, so I had to take your underwear off you.  I couldn't leave you like that, and you were screaming in your sleep, like you had a nightmare.  That's why I fixed a place next to me in the other bed, and as you can see, I used a blanket to keep us separate enough, hoping you'd understand my intention of treating you like a child, only."

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed.

"Well, the paramedics looked at you last night.  They said you were okay, and I offered to take you with me, honey."

He started to slowly walk towards her.

"I'm the only one you have to take care of you at the moment, honey.  Can you tell me if your towel is wet or not?" he asked her.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed and walked closer to her.

"Let me check, then, okay?  I'll be gentle, sweetie."

He reached to feel if her towel was wet or not.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed and he looked into her eyes.

"Honey, the towel is soaked through.  I need to change it.  Is that okay with you, sweetie?"

He slowly slide his hands from teh back of her bottom where he felt the wet towel up to her back to rub it in a soothing way to try to keep her calm.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim took the wet diaper off of her, went and wet a towel, and used it to wash her clean, and then put another towel on her as a diaper, and slid her pants over that.

"The towel is just temporary," he told her.  "We'll get you some more panties and maybe some diapers after we get your puppy and some breakfast, baby."

He finished getting her cleaned up, and then he picked her up and put her in his lap.

"Feel better, sweetie?"

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed.

"Honey, how soon do you think we are going to be at my house?  I live in a different place, honey.  It's going to take a little time to get there.  But you want something to eat and your puppy, right?  Let's get you some breakfast first, then your puppy.  Most restaurants don't let animals in, so picking up your puppy after we eat is probably better for the pup."

He gathered what he needed for her, as much as he could find up, and the started to guide her towards his car.

"We need to get you some regular things to wear, too.  You can't be wearing towels all the time as if they are diapers.  I guess you do need diapers for bedtime though, so we'll get some regular diapers for bedtime, and try to put you in panties in the day, okay?"

[Ishigreensa]

Jim got her ready and presentable, her pants hiding the strange towel-diaper she had on, and he coaxed her to the car and let her get in.

He then made sure other things were in the car, and nothing was forgotten, and soon enough, they were on their way to IHOP, the perfect place for breakfast.

"I hope you like pancakes," he said as he pulled out of the motel parking lot.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim shook his head.

"If you don't eat, you don't get your puppy.  I told you I'd pick it up after we eat.  I want you to be taken care of, and if you let me do that, then I'll make you happy by getting your puppy and other things that you may want that would help you be happy."

[Ishigreensa]

Jim turned and looked right at her.

"You eat first, young lady.  My first duty is to your health.  We'll get your puppy after you've eaten.  I don't care what the sign says.  Besides, the restaurant is already coming up, so we'll get there first."

He turned towards the exit for IHOP.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim turned and looked her in the eye when she screamed.

"Now, that's enough of that, young lady."

He looked at her sternly for several minutes trying to be strict.  He wanted her to eat, and there was no way he was going to go back on what he told her to begin with.  He had given her his word on what would happen, and he knew that you don't easily go back on what you say, or kids will take advantage of it and think you never really mean what you say.  You have to show them that when you say something, that you intend to keep what you say.  It lets them know there is discipline in the home, and it makes them feel safe knowing what to expect.

"Now, it is breakfast time, and we are going to have breakfast," he told her.  Maybe for lunch, we can go somewhere where they serve chicken strips or something like that."

He pulled into IHOP.

"Now, please get out of the car and come in the restaurant  like a good little girl," he told her.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed and looked at the little girl for a moment trying to decide if she was just saying that to make him change his mind, or if she really got sick when she ate pancakes.  She had certainly not said anything about that when he first talked about having breakfast.

"Tell you what," he gave in a little.  "You are not getting your puppy until we get some breakfast, but how about we go to Denny's instead, and then you can order what you want as long as it has something to do with breakfast."

He smiled at her.

"If you remember that pancakes make you sick, then do you remember your name yet?"

[Ishigreensa]

Eggs were in most foods for breakfast he could think of, so he had to think a bit.

When they pulled up to Denny's, he smiled over at her.

"That allergy really limits what I can get you, doesn't it?" he said with a small smile.

He led her into Denny's by the hand, and asked her to sit down in front of a menu.

He looked it over for a while, and then decided the breakfast menu was safe.  He would eat the pancakes from it and let her have the rest, and he would order her a side bowl of cereal to replace the pancakes that she couldn't eat, and asked them to put the pancakes on a separate plate for himself explaining that she couldn't eat the pancakes herself, but he wanted her to have everything else on it, the toast, the sausage, and the hashbrown potatoes.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed.

He wasn't sure what was going on, but he pushed some food at her.

"Grace, I'd like you to have some breakfast," he told her.  "I'll explain things in while, but you need to eat first, okay?"

He was now worried about her, and would not let her go anywhere by herself for a while.  If she was having fits of amnesia off and on, then she could really get lost in a fit, if he wasn't carefully watching her.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim smiled glad she was willing to eat.

He gave her half of his food, the parts that didn't have egg in it, and then continued to eat.

"After you eat, can I take you to the bathroom just in case?" he asked her.  "I'd let you just go, but right now is not a good time for you to be alone.  You're going through some difficult times and having a major case of amnesia spells, honey."

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed and pointed at her food.

"Your puppy is safe," he told her.  "Just do as you are told, and we'll get your puppy in a minute.  Now, if you are done eating, let's take you to the bathroom so you can try to go, okay?"

He started to stand up as by then, they had finished eating.

[Ishigreensa]

He ran after her, and stopped her at the door.

"Honey, what's wrong?" he asked and then saw her pants.

"It's okay.  Let me pay first, and then we can leave, sweetie.  We'll go get your puppy, and then go get you some clothes."

He took her by the hand and led her back to pay for the meal.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim sighed and while watching her, he paid for the meal before coming back to her to figure out why she moved away from him.

"Gracie, I don't know exactly what is going on with you, but you better start obeying me.  It's dangerous right now for you to be pulling away from me and trying to be completely by yourself.  You are having trouble remembering where you are, what you are doing, and even your name at times, and that's not a good condition to find yourself lost in, baby."

He held out his hand towards her.

"Will you please hold my hand and walk to the car so we can talk about what is going on, sweetie?  You don't want me talking to you like a little girl in front of all these people, but I feel I might have to in order for you to understand how serious this situation is."

[Ishigreensa]

As they walked towards the car, he noticed her footsteps slowing down and heard water hitting the ground.  He stopped and looked and saw her peeing her pants again.  He sighed and bent down to her.

"Are you okay, baby?" he asked her.  "Don't worry about peeing, sweetie.  I told you I'd get you some new clothes.  You need some anyway even if you hadn't wet your pants just now, honey."

He reached under her arms, and picked her up and patted her skirt against her bottom so her diaper didn't show.  It was bad enough she was peeing her pants right in public.  She didn't need to show everyone she's also wearing a diaper like this happens all the time to her.  However, he was now thinking maybe diapers would be a good thing for her, at least for the short term until he figured out if this was related to her trauma of losing her parents or if it was related to something medical that the doctor might be able to fix later on.

He patted her wet bottom as he carried her.  She was surprisingly light for a fourteen year old kid, or maybe he was just really strong or something.  Anyway, to him, she didn't seem to weight much more than a ten year old.  HE didn't think she looked like a teenager either, and at the moment, he wasn't sure she was behaving like one, but that part was either trauma or something else not to mention he had a fantasy of being trusted to raise a little girl from around nine or ten years of age to adulthood....

[Ishigreensa]

Jim shook his head.

"No one is going to hurt you, baby," he said softly.  "It's okay, honey.  It's okay."

He helped her into the car and then closed the door.

He walked around and got in himself and then he looked over at her.

"Honey, no one in my house ever gets punished or yelled at for a little thing like peeing your pants.  A girl you age, well, you already know better than to do that, and you definitely wouldn't do something like this because you wanted to, honey.  I get that.  This is something you can't help for some reason.  I'm not sure what is wrong, but we'll figure it out, sweetie."

He smiled.

"How about we get you some new clothes before we get your puppy?" he asked her.  "It'll feel a lot better going in to pick up your puppy in dry clothes, won't it, honey?"

[Ishigreensa]

He smiled and nodded.

"Alright, we'll check on getting the puppy first, but I still need you to come and get some clean clothes with me when it's time," he told her.  "You can't go around in those wet things much longer, sweetie."

[Ishigreensa]

Jim didn't realize she had agreed to get the new clothes first, and was really trying to be patient and understanding of what she wanted.  STill, he promised to check on the puppy first, so he started the car and drove towards the first shelter he could find to ask them about the puppy.

In time, they reached the animal adoption pound, and he walked her in and looked around until he could find someone to talk to about the house fire and a rescued puppy that had come out of the fire without much of a scratch.  Eventually, they brought her little puppy out to her.

Jim smiled when they handed her the puppy.

"Do I owe you anything for the night it stayed?" he asked the rescuers.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim let her have her minute with her puppy, and then after a bit, he helped her to her feet to carry the pup out to the car.  The kennel gave him a carrier to put it in so it wouldn't get sick all over his car.  

He took the carrier and let Gracie carry her puppy to the car.  When they got there, he put Gracie and the pup in the back seat so she could be with her while he drove towards TArget.

"You can't bring her into Target," he told her.  "But here is what we can do.  You can either put her in the carrier and come in with me, or if you want to stay with her, tell me your sizes and I'll go in and get you some clothes that will be enough until we get where we are going.  Which way do you want to do it, honey?"

He pulled into Target and waited for her to tell him what she wanted.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim had never heard of a service dog for anxiety and panic attacks.  He thought to himself that they'll medicaid anything these days for a penny or to give in to our younger generation's whims.  He wasn't really sure what a dog, trained, would necessarily do for a person that suffers from panic or anxiety that a regular pet wouldn't do.  Do dogs really need to be trained for that kind of thing?

He decided he wouldn't say anything about that.  Instead, he tried to refocus her towards the idea she had her puppy anyway, and that he was going to go get her stuff so that she wouldn't have to leave her puppy by itself in the car.  It wasn't trained yet, so even if they said it was a service animal, it really wasn't given that it had not completed the training yet.

"You play with your puppy and I'll be right back," he told her.  "Keep the doors locked until I get back.  I have my own key, so you don't have to worry about that."

Then he went in to get her some clothes.

[Ishigreensa]

Jim eventally came back to the car with a cart full of bags, and he started to unload them into the very back of his Car.  He had gotten the little one lots of different clothes, some diapers, a few toys, and the dog some toys and treats as well.

Once he had unloaded the bags into the car, he put the trolley up, and then came back and pulled out a diaper from the package of diapers, and then a pair of panties and a skirt along with a white t-shirt with Minnie Mouse.

He got into the side door of the car and then gently patted her shoulder.

"Baby," he said softly.  "Let daddy change you, okay?"

He waited to see if she would wake up and respond to him.