The Baby Bet - Epilogue (Audiobook Kickstarter is live!)

[PeculiarChangeling]

15 hours ago, D503 said:

Cute! I wonder if there'll be more repercussions than just stolen fries.

Absolutely, but it's hard to negotiate those repercussions while stoned

[DAQ]

Been loving the story thus far. Definitely a crossroads. Looking forward to more!

[PeculiarChangeling]

On 10/16/2022 at 8:49 AM, Sarah Penguin said:

mooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

I once again don't understand what you mean, but I'm glad you seem to be enjoying the story!

[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 17, New Deal

Grace awoke with a yawn, rolling over in bed to feel something rustle beneath her. Not her diaper–a paper fast food bag.

Sitting up, she looked around. She hadn’t gone to her own bed, she hadn’t even changed out of her day clothes–she’d fallen asleep next to Pearce, snuggled up next to him, their bodies pressed together.

But now, she found herself alone in Pearce’s crumby, messy bed.

“Pearce?” She called, getting to her feet. Her diaper squelched when she sat up–she couldn’t remember if she’d used it while stoned, or if she’d been dry when she fell asleep. Now, she was painfully thirsty and had a headache coming on, and she’d been left alone.

Waddling out of the room, she looked around for Pearce. Maybe he’d gone to the bathroom, but no–the bathroom door was wide open and she couldn’t see him.

Uncertain where else to go, she shuffled downstairs. She didn’t even know what time it was. Checking her phone, Grace found it dead. Of course it was, she hadn’t had a chance to recharge it the night before.

She found Pearce snoring on the couch, fast asleep.

Why did he leave? Grace wondered, staring at him. And–why do I care?

Grace pushed on his shoulder, nudging him to consciousness. “Hey. Wake up.”

“Huh?” he mumbled, blinking his eyes groggily awake. “What?”

“I’m thirsty,” she said. “And we didn’t do, like, any of the bedtime stuff you were supposed to do last night.”

“You cheated,” he replied, shrugging. “I think I deserve a pass.”

She glanced away, guiltily. “Technically I didn’t cheat. But I did lie.”

“Same thing,” Pearce said, rolling up to his feet. “Ok, I’m putting on coffee.”

Before she could think better of it, Grace blurted, “Why did you come sleep downstairs?”

Pearce shrugged. “You were snoring, and I couldn’t sleep with the noise. You seemed cozy, so I let you take the bed.” His tone suggested he’d done her a favor.

Grace swallowed. She didn’t feel grateful, but she thanked him anyways. “I appreciate it.”

“Also we’re going to have to talk about the cheating thing.” Pearce rubbed his eyes, yawning again. “That wasn’t cool.”

She looked away, down at her feet. “Yeah. Sorry. Again.”

He shrugged, changing the subject. “Pancakes?”

“Sure,” Grace said. The clock on the stove showed it was past 11 AM, horrifyingly late for her to have slept until.

She sat down at the kitchen table, waiting patiently. Pearce didn’t say much, even when he gave her a bottle of coffee, mixed up how she liked.

Do I say something? She thought. I mean. One of us has to, right?

She looked at him, trying to read his thoughts. His shoulders were stiff, body language uncomfortable. She’d upset him.

Had he really left the bed because she’d been snoring?

As he finished frying up pancakes from ready-mix batter,

“So, um…” she said. “Is one of us…should we talk?”

“What about?” he asked.

“You know…” she started. “Um…”

Her train of thought was interrupted by the back door, opening up. Brains walked in, removing a pair of heavy headphones and blinking at the two of them. “Pancakes for lunch?”

“Really, really late breakfast,” Grace clarified, exhaling. Brains made this easy–as oblivious as he was to emotional tension, he could defuse the whole room. Or, at least, delay an emotionally fraught conversation.

“You’re right,” Pearce said. “We should talk.”

Grace looked between him and Brains in surprise. Surely this conversation should happen in private, not–

“Brains,” Pearce said. “The rules have some problems, and I think we need to address them.”

Oh. Okay.

“Sure,” Brains said. “Happy to help.”

And so, the Second Rules Round Table commenced, with Brains served as their sole moderator.

“Talking about game theory, we left an obvious exploit in the rules,” Brains said. He’d set up the whiteboard again, which still had the rules as written from their previous discussion listed. “It assumes a certain degree of good faith. I think we can confidently say that this was a bit naive.”

Grace squirmed. Being the bigger person sucked, and having to admit to it over and over just made her discomfort grow.

“But,” Brains continued, “On the other hand, Pearce–going by the book, you didn’t give Grace a bath before bed, didn’t change her, and didn’t actually put her to bed, let alone enforce her bedtime last night–and Grace, you didn’t stick to your bedtime either. Neither of you were up on time, either. Pretty much just a complete collapse all around. If we were to follow the rules, you’d both have, like, half a dozen penalties give or take, depending on how it all tallies up. More for Pearce than Grace, but still, a couple hours in time out at least just for all the stuff around bedtime.”

“I’ll do it if she will,” Pearce said. “I can own up to my mistakes.”

“Yeah, I’m not forfeiting either,” Grace replied. “Screw it.”

“My point being,” Brains said. “I think you’ve both proved your point. The only way this is going to dissolve is if you both stop following the rules completely–like you already did–and just call it a truce. You didn’t, like, sign a magical contract forcing you to keep playing.”

Grace looked over at Pearce, considering her options. Walk away? Just let this all end without a winner?

Eugh. No way.

He seemed to come to the same conclusion. Both of them turned to face Brains, and said in unison, “Fuck that.”

Brains shrugged. “Okay then–how do we want to handle all this?”

“I promise not to deliberately leak again,” Grace suggested. “Is that good enough?”

“If I trusted that promise,” Pearce shot back. “What if she just wasn’t allowed to hold it? No way to leak on purpose then.”

“Yeah, and how would you enforce that?” Grace asked, rolling her eyes. “You’d still have to trust me.”

“Right.” Pearce sighed. “So we take off the rule about leaking.”

“No,” Grace replied. “Absolutely not.”

“It would stop your bad behavior,” Pearce said. “You made that rule unuseable, so we shouldn’t have to use it. Right, Brains?”

“If you don’t both agree to it, I’m not sure–” Brains started.

“And then, what, you just make me ruin all the clothes you buy?” Grace asked, cutting in. “Come on, we both know the minute you lose a hard requirement making you do something, you’ll forget about it.”

He winced.

She swallowed. “Sorry.”

Pearce shook his head. “Okay, fine. I’ve got a better idea.”

Grace perked up. “Something that doesn’t involve just trusting me?”

“Yeah. You want this bet to have an end date?” he looked at Brains, who shrugged.

“You do what you want,” Brains said. “It’s a free country, and all.”

“Then we stick with the rules as written,” Pearce said.

Grace frowned. “How’s that a solution?”

Brains got it first. “You play them exactly as written. Antagonistically.”

“You want to try and make your diapers flood?” Pearce asked. “Fine. Piss away. You’re the one who set the pace, I’m just going to keep up with it–you do whatever you can to make me fail without breaking the rules, and I do the exact same thing. If you’re going to try and flood your diapers, I’ll just have to take countermeasures. If you’re going to be an annoying brat, I’ll have to find ways to shut you up.”

On the one hand, it somewhat broke the character of the bet. A real caretaker wouldn’t be antagonizing his charge, trying to infuriate them or push them into certain actions. Then again, a real baby wouldn’t have deliberately made her diaper leak to mess with the caretaker.

It signaled a shift. An acknowledgement that this had moved beyond what they’d originally said, and that the game was simpler: Outlast, out-annoy, outstubborn the other for dominance.

Grace knew she could win that.

She stuck out her hand. “You’ve got yourself a deal.”

They shook on it, again. Pearce smiled. “Alright. Well then, I’ve got some orders to make, and–”

“Ahem,” Brains said. “You owe three hundred bucks to the beer fund, if that’s how you’re playing it. And Grace… uh, you’ve racked up a lot of time out.”

Grace swallowed. “Right. Uh…right. Okay.”

Pearce staggered too, though, doing the math in his head. “Well…at least we’ll be stocked on beer for a few months.”

His own punishment made Grace feel a little better.

“Oh, and one more thing,” Grace said. “I’m not in time out yet, right?”

“That’s right,” Pearce said. “Though you’d better march your butt over and…oh, wait, don’t–”

Grace let her bladder go before his objection could finish, flooding her already-sodden diaper. It leaked almost instantly, staining her baby blue dress. “Alright, make that three hundred fifty bucks.” And, to add insult to injury, she stuck her tongue out at Pearce. It just felt right.

Instead of looking annoyed, though, he just grinned. “Oh, I’m going to love the look on your face once your new clothes arrive.”

 

...

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[Sarah Penguin]

[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 18: Skip

Skip yawned as the bus rolled to a stop, stepping off and shuffling towards home. It’d been a long night–ten hours on their feet, all go-go-go the whole time. Now, the sun had just begun to creep up over the horizon and their day had come to an end.

At least they had a three day weekend coming up.

The four-days-on three-days-off pattern worked for Skip, even if the night shift meant they started their day as everyone else was ending theirs. Long days meant fewer days, they were content with that.

On the other hand, coming home to a house divided…that was getting wearisome.

A large cardboard box sat on the porch when they arrived, Pearce’s given name printed on the label. Based on the size, it couldn’t just be a couple outfits–there had to be a lot in there. Skip pushed the box aside with a foot, opened the door, and waltzed inside.

Giggles echoed from the kitchen when they walked inside. At least Grace and Pearce had been in a good mood lately–though the tension still stood, there’d been fewer shouting matches, just bickering.

In the kitchen, Grace was in her high chair, bits of breakfast on her face. The smell of breakfast mingled with something more foul, though, somewhat muting the pleasant food smells.

“Package,” Skip said, maneuvering around them and wrinkling their nose. “Grace needs a change.”

“I know,” Pearce said. “Hasn’t been an hour yet–I decided it could wait till breakfast was over.”

“Jerk,” Grace said, but her lips were played up in a half smile.

Glancing at the stovetop, Skip saw the scattered remains of pancake preparation. “Any left?”

With a flourish, Pearce reached to a plate covered in a tea towel and yanked the cover away, revealing a stack of fluffy pancakes. “I thought you might want some.”

“I thought you might want some,” Grace corrected, rolling her eyes. “I told Pearce to make extra.”

“Thanks,” Skip said, retrieving a fork. Breakfast for dinner.

“Whipped cream if you want it,” Pearce added, sliding the can over to Skip.

Coating the pancakes with cream, Skip left the kitchen, getting away from the mild stink coming off Grace and heading to the living room.

More giggles. Even a little laughter echoed from the other room.

“Be right back,” Pearce said, walking up, past Skip, to the front door.

He towed in the box, picked at the tape with a fingernail, and ripped it open. Curiously, Skip looked over from the couch, though they didn’t ask what it was.

“Let’s see what she thinks of this,” Pearce said, pulling the first plastic-wrapped parcel from inside. Skip saw fabric, though the specifics of what they were looking at weren’t immediately obvious. It looked like clothing, maybe, or possibly a pillow–until Pearce removed it from the plastic and unfolded it, revealing a onesie that seemed to have a pillow crammed in around the bottom, comical bulk.

Raising an eye, Skip asked, “How’s she going to walk with that on?”

“That’s the secret,” Pearce snickered. “She’s not. Oh, Baby Gracie, I think it’s time for your change!” The last part of his words were projected across the house, not for Skip’s benefit but for Grace’s.

He whisked the outfit away, and the sound of amused protests and complaints echoed from the kitchen to the living room.

Setting aside the pancakes, Skip got up, looking through the other contents of the package. “Hmm.”

It was, without a doubt, not just cutesy clothing. Pearce had ordered in full-on BDSM wear, albeit BDSM wear with a juvenile coat of paint. They spotted a spreader bar, some sort of chest harness, booties–all told, probably three or four ways just to keep Grace from walking.

While they finished up breakfast-dinner, Pearce led Grace by the hand through the living room, up the stairs, his expression triumphant, hers annoyed but in a way that implied she really didn’t mind.

Skip ate the rest of their pancakes, dealt with their dishes, and went to bed.

…

“HEY!”

Skip sat up, blinking blearily. Their alarm hadn’t gone off, but Grace’s shout didn’t discriminate–even if she intended it for Pearce, it still woke Skip up, even with a fan, white noise, and blackout curtains protecting their daytime sleep.

Checking their phone, they saw it was almost five PM - just about time to wake up anyways. Getting to their feet, they yawned, sighed, pulled on a pair of baggy pants.

“Pearce!” Grace called again. “Open the door!”

Her tone wasn’t amused anymore. Great. They’re bickering again. Exiting their bedroom, they glanced down the hall.

Grace sat on the ground, legs splayed. She didn’t have on the pillow onesie thing–instead, there was a pink-painted spreader bar forcing her to crawl, and her actual clothes were a striped set of footed pajamas.

Pearce threw open his door. “I just changed you, you got a bottle–what?”

“This onesie still has a tag,” Grace said. “And you were ignoring me.”

“I’m allowed to take a twenty minute nap,” Pearce complained.

Not my problem, Skip said, walking past.

The argument continued, loud enough that the two of them could be heard throughout the house, but Skip put on headphones and shut it out, preparing their dinner-breakfast. They put on an extra helping, too, anticipating Brains’ arrival home from work a few minutes later.

“Morning,” Brains said.

“Evening,” Skip replied. “What’s up with the bet?”

“Argument a couple days ago,” Brains said, peering at the bubbling soup on the stove. “You want the short version or the long one?”

“Short one,” Skip replied, answering the unasked question as well. “There’s enough soup for two.”

Brains pumped his fist just a bit in soup celebration, then explained, “They’re escalating since neither were looking like they’re going to back down. Pearce ordered a bunch of extra crap to mess with Grace, Grace is going to be more of a brat to try and wear him down. Maybe we’ll see this thing finally come to a conclusion here soon.”

Skip shrugged. “You’ve already swept the betting pool on duration, now it’s just a matter of who wins.”

“Want to go double or nothing?” Brains suggested. “New bet on how long this’ll last, now that they’re escalating?”

“If Melody’s on board,” Skip replied.

Brains checked his phone while soup simmered. As it finished, and Skip dished out the dinner, Brains supplied, “She’s in. Her bet is five to ten days before they fall apart. She’s sticking with the same winner.”

“Under,” Skip said, sliding a bowl across to him.

“You think so?” Brains asked, blowing on his spoon. “I’m going over.”

“I figured you would,” Skip said. “Just taking the option that’s left. Plus, you didn’t see what was in that box. When are they just going to fuck already?”

Brains choked on his soup. “W-what?!”

“You don’t see it?” Skip shrugged.

“No I don’t see–they hate each other,” Brains shot. “You see how much they argue?”

“I didn’t say it was healthy,” Skip replied. “But it’s there. They don’t hate each other.”

Brains shook his head. “I don’t believe it.”

“Ask Melody,” Skip suggested.

They didn’t need Brains to believe them, but Brains was a good friend, and he deserved a solid, straightforward answer. He sent another text, and they ate together in silence until his phone dinged and–“Melody says, ‘oh yeah, they’re totally going to fuck’. Does everyone know this except me?”

“Everyone except you, and Grace, and Pearce.” Skip picked up their now-empty bowl, walking over to the sink to rinse it out.

“Hmm.” Brains rubbed at his chin. “Okay. New bet?”

Skip blinked. “No.”

“Come on,” Brains said. “If you all think it’s so inevitable, surely–”

“Crossing a line, Brains,” Skip said. “That’s too personal.”

He sighed. “Thanks.” A few moments passed, and he added, “Can I ask about it, though?”

“Sure,” Skip sighed, as they began to clean up from dinner. “What’s got you confused?”

“How can you tell?” He asked, leaning back. “Like…how is it that you all figured something out that they don’t know and I didn’t notice?”

“That’s complicated,” Skip said, avoiding the longer answer.

Brains shrank back, took a breath, and shook his head. “‘That’s complicated’ is what people say when they don’t want to explain shit to me.”

“Sorry, sorry.” Skip rubbed at their temple, considering how to answer. “You know we’re all fucked, right?”

“Right.” He tapped his chest. “Wasters for life.”

“Grace is a big ball of neuroses and she’s got a stick up her ass about everything, and Pearce–let’s just say we tried to get high on adderall once in high school and he sat down and did his homework.” Skip leaned up against the counter, resting on their hands. “And both of them are stubborn, and stupid. They can’t get over the superficial stuff. We’re all friends for a reason, but they’re both so fundamentally incapable of introspection that they can’t just sit down and figure out how they’re feeling. They have to blame someone else, and they’ve picked each other.”

“Okay, I follow all that,” Brains nodded. “But how does that lead to the two of them fucking?”

“Because you don’t get that mad at someone for being inattentive if you don’t want their attention,” Skip said. “And, well…just listen.”

They pointed up at the ceiling. Brains paused, listening, and heard another giggle echo down from the other side of the house.

“They like each other, even if both of them are too dense to realize it,” Skip said. “When they’re not both in their heads, thinking that they hate each other for reasons they haven’t really stopped to consider, they’re almost sickeningly cute. Plus, like…okay, this is crass, but Pearce just bought a bunch of fetish wear for her. Let’s not ignore that part.”

Brains sat back. “Huh. Thanks for filling me in.”

“You’re welcome,” Skip said, smirking. “And by the way–I’m not going to place a bet on it, but if I were, I’d say two weeks.”

 

...

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[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 19: New Digs

 

Grace hadn’t known what to expect, only to expect the worst. Pearce’s wicked grin as he pulled in his newest packages were enough of a sign of danger–there would be no more Mr. Nice Babysitter.

And then out came the spreader bar.

Grace stared. “Wait–”

“Bottoms up,” Pearce replied, waltzing in with a box under one arm, a spreader bar in one hand, and a full bottle of milk in the other. “Babies don’t need to walk, anyways.”

“Hold on, we said outfits,” Grace complained. Her pillow-packed onesie was one thing, she’d been forced to waddle around all morning on account of it, but a spreader bar? “That’s not an outfit, it’s a–”

“It was listed under ‘apparel’ on the website I ordered from,” Pearce replied, waving the bar in a baton-style gesture. “Apparel means outfits.”

“But–”

“You know what else technically qualifies as clothing?” Pearce asked, reaching into his pocket.

Grace hesitated. “What?”

He produced a pacifier. “If you don’t stop complaining, I might decide you need to wear this between your lips–so hush, and lay down, and let’s get you changed.”

Rolling her eyes, Grace got onto her bed. The bars of the crib frame had been set aside, so her bed could be used as a changing pad. Legs splayed from the pillow crammed into her current onesie, she rolled onto her back for Pearce to get at her, blushing at the awkwardness of it all. The onesie was annoying and made walking clumsy, but otherwise fell into the juvenile-but-comfortable she’d grown accustomed to. She’d hoped Pearce would keep the clothes choices to ‘merely annoying’. No luck there, it seemed.

Pearce unbuttoned her onesie, removed the pillow to get at her soggy diaper, and began ripping off tapes one-by-one. With the pillow gone, her legs relaxed, and she became aware of the extra effort she’d been putting in to keep her legs apart.

He had, at least, been more vigilant about changes–and he’d begun dissolving some kind of capsules into Grace’s baby bottles, which’d had the effect of making her need to pee a couple times an hour. Her attempts to hold it until she could flood and leak were thwarted by plastic pants and a constantly-running bladder.

Wadding up her old diaper, he set it aside and produced slightly-warmed baby wipes, cleaning her up. “Sog monster,” he snickered.

“Your fault,” Grace pouted, sticking out her tongue.

A gentle dusting of powder applied, Pearce wrapped her up in a new diaper. It felt even fluffier than normal, and also, just slightly warm to the touch.

“Did you heat this up?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Ran it in the dryer for a couple minutes to puff it,” Pearce replied, sticking down the tapes. “Okay, you’re all changed. Sit up, and let’s get you dressed.”

She did, raising her arms so he could pull off her onesie, so that her only remaining clothes were a bra and her diaper. Smirking, he went into his new box of tricks and produced a striped footed sleeper, one that looked…fairly normal.

“Okay, what’s the catch here?” Grace asked.

“Just that it’s tamper proof,” Pearce said. “So that fussy babies can’t wriggle out of it. The zip in the back locks.”

“I’m not allowed to take off my clothes anyways,” Grace pointed out. “Why bother?”

“Because,” Pearce gloated, setting his things down on her desk. “Now you’ll know you really are stuck.”

That logic had an unfortunate sort of solidity to it, and Grace swallowed. He was right–even if it literally had few practical results, the psychology of feeling trapped made her squirm a little as he unfolded it and pulled the legs up over hers.

“Hold still,” he said, while she stuck out her legs.

“I am,” she said. “You’re–just let me do it.”

“No,” he insisted, as the snug elastic got caught on her feet again. It took most of a minute, but he got her legs on, feet wrapped up in the bottoms–it just had a sort of grippy rubber on the bottom instead of soles.

Grace had to stand so he could pull it into place, pull her arms through the sleeves, and finally zip up the back, pulling on little parts of the sleeper to get out any pinch points or bunched-up areas. With two little ‘clicks’, he buttoned down the zipper, trapping her in the outfit.

“How’s that feel?” he asked, patting down her sides and pulling the fabric around the front of her, in a gesture that felt almost like a hug from behind.

“It’s fine,” Grace said, glad he was behind her, that he couldn’t see her blush.

“Alright, lay back down,” he instructed.

Grace didn’t know what to think of his more gentle touch. She’d grown used to the dressing ritual being a nuisance, but he was really taking his time now, making sure she was comfortable, being almost… nurturing?

(He’s probably just taking the time to gloat,) she decided, laying back down on the bed as instructed.

Pearce lifted her legs and, with a grin that did nothing to dispel Grace’s assumptions about him, clicked the collapsed bar into place, soft, plush-lined cuffs tightening around each ankle. When fully shortened, the bar was only a little over a foot long, but as he pushed her legs wider, it moved to compensate, extending to two feet, and then three, holding her ankles far enough apart that standing wouldn’t be even remotely possible.

Testing the latch to make sure the bar wouldn’t retract, Pearce let go. “Alright,” he said. “Have fun crawling, crinkles. I’ll be back to check on you in a bit.”

Grace’s heart skipped a beat, and she had to ask herself why. She came up dry of answers. “Is that it?”

“What, were you hoping for more?” Pearce asked.

She shook her head, sitting up. Legs forced apart by the bar, it made it even harder to hold her bladder, and she felt a dribble of pee escape her involuntarily as her body decided to give up on holding it. “No, I just–it’s not very creative,” she said, grasping for an excuse.

Grace didn’t know what she wanted, she just didn’t want Pearce to leave yet. Wasn’t he going to watch her crawl around a bit, maybe tease her over it? Take the time to lord over how much his new plan was annoying her?

“I’m going to go take a nap,” Pearce said. “Don’t worry, I won’t let you leak–not that you would mind that, you seem to enjoy having soggy clothes lately.”

“I don’t enjoy soggy clothes, I enjoy making you pay up,” Grace shot, in a final attempt to rile him into some banter.

“Sure thing, potty pants,” Pearce said, turning and waltzing out of her room.

(Jerk,) Grace fumed. And then, (Why am I mad?)

She stood to move to her desk, stumbled, flopped onto the floor in a pratfall. Glancing up at the door, she looked, and–

Pearce wasn’t watching. He’d genuinely left.

(Ugh.) Planting her knees on the floor, she crawled over to her door, slammed it shut, and then moved to take a seat.

Even seated, though, the spreader bar was still a nuisance–she couldn’t get her legs under her desk, the space wasn’t quite wide enough unless she turned her hips awkwardly, so she had to move her laptop off her desk and move over to bed, propping her back up on some pillows so she could work in a seated position, even if her legs were splayed out in a V.

Her focus lasted about thirty seconds before she was glancing at her door again. Waiting for Pearce to come back in and reveal he had something else up his sleeve, that he hadn’t just given up after dressing her. She wriggled, feeling uncomfortable already–between the spreader bar and the all-encompassing footed pajamas that wrapped her up, and…

(He didn’t cut off the tag,) she noted. The tag was a little offset since the zipper was in the back, but it itched at the back of her neck. She didn’t mind, much, but it was a nuisance that had nothing to do with babying her, so she set aside her laptop, dropped to the floor, and crawled on all fours out to the hall.

“Pearce,” she demanded. “Hey, Pearce!”

No answer.

“HEY!” she called, pounding on his door.

No answer.

“Pearce!” Grace called again. “Open the door!”

Grace sat on the ground, arms crossed, pouting up at the door.

Pearce threw open his door. “I just changed you, you got a bottle–what?”

“This onesie still has a tag,” Grace said. “And you were ignoring me.”

“I’m allowed to take a twenty minute nap,” Pearce complained.

“And I’m allowed to whine about it, babysitter,” Grace shot back. Pointing with a thumb at the back of her pajamas, she said, “Tag. Deal with it.”

“And then you’ll let me nap?” he asked.

She swallowed. She wanted to hang out more, to… (What do I want? For him to make fun of me? Why?)

“Yeah,” she said. “Unless you forgot something else.”

“Fine, wait here,” he grumbled, turning to march back into his bedroom to find scissors.

It was attention, but it wasn’t what she wanted. His attitude was begrudging, annoyed. Not mirthful or triumphant.

(But…I want him to be annoyed. To give up. This is good, isn’t it?)

He returned with a pair of old scissors, reached down the back of her pajamas, and snipped the tag. “Alright. Bye.” Walking away, he shut his door–he didn’t slam it in her face, exactly, but that’s what it felt like.

Pursing her lips, Grace crawled back into her room, straight into bed. Her laptop was still there, but she pushed it aside, lying back, pulling a cover over herself.

She felt tired, inexplicably tired. Pearce had made her coffee that morning, and if the bet did one thing well, it ensured she got a solid amount of sleep every night. There was no reason to be this tired, so… why?

The idea of demanding that Pearce make her another coffee crossed her mind, but that just came with a pang of guilt. He did actually deserve a nap–unlike her, his sleep had been cut short every morning, forced to wake up so he could wake her up. He was putting in the effort.

She felt mad, and ashamed of being mad, and the frustration at herself made her want to curl up in a ball.

(What the fuck is wrong with me?)

Grace couldn’t, in fact, curl up in a ball; with her legs spread apart, her only marginally-comfortable options were laying on her back or her stomach. Choosing her back, she pulled the blankets over herself.

Maybe a nap was what she needed, too. Even if she couldn’t fathom a reason for it, the fatigue and feeling of being drained had overwhelmed her.

She sniffled. Her eyes were wet. (Am I crying? Why am I crying?) She sniffled again, louder, and–

The door to Pearce’s room opened, and he stepped out, holding a plastic cup. He glanced over at her. She hadn’t shut her own door, he could see her clearly, see her red eyes, even as she tried to wipe her face and appear fine.

“What?” she asked, half glaring at him, half pleading with her eyes. Nothing made sense, her body didn’t seem under her control.

“I had to, uh, get some water,” he said, pointing to the bathroom and holding up the cup in his hand. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” she said, wiping her face with an arm. “Just…I don’t know. I think I’m sick or something, I feel really tired. I was going to sleep.”

He paused, and set down his cup.

“Hey,” Pearce said, after a moment of thought. “If you’re taking a nap, let me take off that bar. That’s got to be a pain to sleep in.”

Grace nodded. “Sure. Thank you.”

He walked over, removing the cuffs from her feet. They weren’t properly locked, just fastened in place, and he jimmied them free in a moment. “Okay,” he said, setting the bar aside. “Scoot over.”

“Why?” she asked.

“I’m gonna do the babysitter thing,” he said. “And that means you do what I say. Scoot over.”

She did, and to her surprise, Pearce sat down on the bed next to her, kicked up his feet, and lay down next to her.

Taking out his phone, he scrolled for a moment on the internet, cleared his throat, and started, “Once upon a time, there lived a very ugly duckling…”

Grace raised her eyebrows, smirking. “Wait, seriously?”

“Storytime.” He grinned over at her. “It’s what every baby needs, right? I’ll try and do voices, but my duck’s a little limp.”

Giggling, Grace said, “Say that again, I think I misheard.”

He rolled his eyes. “So there was this super ugly duckling–like, hideous. Ugliest little featherball you’ve ever seen, and…”

By the time his nursery story was done, Grace was asleep, arm stretched over his chest.

Pearce had dozed off a minute later. 

 

...

 

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[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 20: Moral Fiber

 

Contains: Teasing, messing, crawling, mild bondage clothing

...

“Yuck,” Grace said, pulling her face back from the sludge on Pearce’s spoon. “What is that?”

“Oatmeal,” he replied innocently. “Breakfast, in general. Something wrong?”

She eyed it, swallowing a little to clear her mouth. “It’s gluey. You cooked it wrong.”

“I cooked it just right,” Pearce replied. “Now. Say aaaa, you’ve got breakfast to eat.”

Grace felt a sliver of suspicion, and tried to cut through Pearce’s innocent expression with her eyes. Had he cooked it poorly on purpose, to make it gross and unpleasant? Was this another ploy? He’d made oatmeal in the past and it hadn’t been this claggy, this gelatinous. Clearly, something was up, but she couldn’t puzzle out what.

“Aaa,” she said. Another spoonful might help her discern the taste, what went wrong in cooking. It just felt…too thick. Like he hadn’t added enough water. The taste was the same–a bit of brown sugar and a little cream, pretty pleasant, the only objectionable element was the taste.

But Pearce had on a suppressed grin, an expression of amusement. He liked that she didn’t like the food.

Swallowing, Grace demanded, “What did you d–mph–”

A spoon interrupted her question, jammed between her lips, more sludgy oatmeal. A little got on her chin, and he scraped it up with the spoon, waiting for her to open and swallow.

She did, swallowing, then raising her hand to block another oatmeal assault. “What did you do to the oatmeal?”

“Nothing you need to worry about,” Pearce replied. “Do you want me to add anything?”

“It’s gross,” she said. “Maybe more milk to un-glueify it?”

He considered her request and shrugged. “I suppose that’s fair.”

While he did as she requested, she suckled on her bottle of coffee. She hadn’t even needed to ask this morning–instead just providing her with coffee just the way she liked it. Maybe a bit stronger than normal–did he want her to have a caffeine buzz?

(What the heck is he planning?)

He thinned out the oatmeal with another splash of milk, then picked up her bottle, topping off the coffee. Lifting another spoonful of less-offensively textured breakfast, he said in sing-song, “Alright then–no more fussing. Here comes the airplane…”

…

Pearce continued to behave strangely that morning. More attentive than normal–regular diaper checks, and he at least walked by her room once every ten or twenty minutes. When her coffee ran dry, he refilled it right away, ensuring she had water to drink as well.

(Is he trying to over-hydrate me?) she wondered, sipping coffee while she reviewed some code. (I don’t really mind being wet, and a change is as inconvenient for him as it is for me. Could he really just be acting nice for the sake of being nice? Does he want to ensure I can’t leak, hence all the checks?)

She couldn’t figure it out.

He had gone through the trouble of souping up her diaper situation to prevent leaks–each change now came with an additional layer of puffy padding stuck inside with an adhesive back, a ‘stuffer’, and yesterday there’d been plastic pants overtop the diaper. Today, though, there was no cover, just the stuffer.

Her outfit had included fewer inconveniences–he’d left her diaper exposed, giving her a T-shirt and stockings. When she asked why, he’d said it was for easier checks. The only issue was the booties, which had their feet lined with metal triangles. Trying to walk in them was like walking on lego–an issue that didn’t matter while she sat down, but it made walking more inconvenient than even the spreader bar.

While she worked on two projects, her programming job and the puzzle of Pearce’s behavior, she felt her stomach grumble.

The pressure came stronger and faster than usual. She’d been generally holding it until the end of the day, shortly before she expected Pearce would administer her evening bath. It made cleanup easier for the both of them, after all.

She eyed the coffee. (Maybe I’ve had enough.)

Then she eyed it again, eyes narrowing. (Is that his plan?)

Pushing up from her office chair, she dropped to her hands and knees. She needed to go see something, even if it meant crawling all the way across the house.

Maybe she’d been wrong to think this outfit was getting off light. Crawling meant sticking her butt up in the air, and her butt being up in the air meant its moderately soggy state was extremely visible. Pearce saw her through his open bedroom door and snickered, though he didn’t otherwise comment.

Stairs were harder. Crawling down seemed like a recipe for slipping and falling, so she turned around, crawling backwards, butt-first down the stairs. While she shuffled down, one step at a time, Melody met her on the way up.

“Hey,” Melody said. “That’s…a look he’s got you in.”

“These booties are a pain,” Grace agreed, blushing as she reached the base of the stairs.

The rest of the crawl saw no interruptions, and she felt glad that the window curtains were pulled, so that her crinkly, soggy bottom wouldn’t be on display to the neighbors. She got to the kitchen, pulled over a stool so she could get height without standing, and clambered up, kneeling on it to get a look in the cupboards.

She found the evidence she needed. In Pearce’s section of the cupboard, a big plastic tub of powdered fiber supplement.

“That ass–” she started to say.

“Feeling snacky?” Pearce asked from behind her.

She whirled, slipped, and nearly fell off the stool. Pearce jumped to help, but she caught herself on the counter before she could tumble down, and she snapped at him, “You’re drugging me?”

“Not even a little.” Pearce smirked triumphantly. “Just making sure you get your fill of nutrients–I don’t think anyone would say fiber is a drug.”

Her bowels gurgled again. Definitely too much coffee. “You want to make me use the diaper more so I get annoyed and quit.”

“Duh,” he replied. “I know you don’t like being Little Miss Stinkypants, so what better way to force your hand?”

She shot him a glare, but couldn’t argue against the tactic. He had a point. Only, there was a counterpoint. “I’ve never known you to like changing my…dirty diapers,” she shot back.

“I believe the rules call them your ‘Little baby poopy diapers,’” Pearce replied confidently. “But we’ll see who balks first.”

“We’ll see,” Grace said, glowering. It seemed prudent to assert her lack of caring just then, so she leaned forward on the stool.

(Fuck it. Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it–)

She would never have described the feeling as triumphant, but when Pearce’s eyebrows raised in surprise, she did at least feel a little surge of dominance. That was undercut by the swelling of mush that bulged out the back of her exposed diaper, and a blush bloomed on her puffed-up cheeks as she pushed, but she didn’t back down.

“Okay then,” she said. She almost demanded, ‘Change me’, but that’d be in violation of the rules, so she just said, “We really will see, won’t we?”

He hesitated, just for a moment, but his confidence returned and he took out his phone. Tapping a few buttons, he turned around the screen so she could see it–a timer for fifty five minutes. Just shy of an hour.

“Have fun, poopy pants,” he replied, turning to waltz away.

She grumbled, dropping to the floor, sticking her butt in the air, and scooting on hands and knees back towards her room. The crawling was easier going up the stairs than down, but every shift of her thighs back and forth made the mush in her diaper squelch.

Back in her room, sitting down in her office chair with a squelch, she realized his other trick. Without clothes, without plastic pants, there was little to contain the stink wafting off her diaper. Her bedroom was going to smell awful if she just sat around and waited almost an hour for Pearce to come around.

(I could open a window,) she considered. (Or…)

Unplugging her laptop, she rolled her office chair away from her desk, pushing against walls and furniture with her hands for locomotion. Rolling out into the hall, she scooted right on into Pearce’s room, moving a halting foot at a time.

He glanced up at her. “What’re you doing?”

“I’m feeling very mischievous,” she said, dragging herself forward until her chair was right next to his, setting her laptop on his desk. “I need supervision, I’d say, so I don’t get into trouble.”

The smell wafting off her diaper struck him, and he wrinkled his nose. “I think you’re fine in your own room.”

“Well,” she replied. “I’d rather be here.”

To Pearce’s credit, he didn’t take her gambit lying down. Standing, he grabbed the back of her office chair, dragging it towards the edge of his room, towards the exit. Grace simply flopped out of the chair, crawling back towards his desk.

“I can sandbag better than you can wrestle me,” she smirked up at him. “You know your options. For me to smell, you’ve got to smell me.”

He checked his phone, looking at the timer, then groaned and walked over to his chair. “Well, don’t let me keep you from working,” he said, sitting down.

Grace wished he’d just capitulate then and there, but he lasted an admirable fifteen minutes before pushing away from his desk and throwing up his hands.

“Fine!” he said. “Let’s get you changed.”

She smirked up at him. “If you insist!”

There was no bathtime before lunch. When he got out the wipes and a fresh diaper, Pearce realized he’d have to be thorough this time–he couldn’t just let the bath deal with getting her a hundred percent clean.

And, relishing her victory, Grace didn’t help in the slightest. She played the sandbag, laying on the ground, only following his instructions to lift her hips after coaxing and whining and complaining. It took him ten minutes to get her clean, and his face was screwed up in response to the stink the whole time.

Half a box of wipes later, though, she was clean, powdered, and freshly diapered.

“Thanks!” she said with a smirk, crawling back to her laptop. “Or, I guess, you’re welcome–this is what you wanted, right?”

He glowered, discarding all the changing supplies into a sealed trash bag. “Do you still want my ‘supervision’?”

“Hmm,” Grace said, thinking. She had another trick up her sleeve, one to really cement things.

When she’d gone in the kitchen, she hadn’t completely gone. A little pressure still remained. A little need.

She briefly pondered how long to wait. Five minutes? Ten?

(Let’s do this now. He doesn’t get a break.)

Leaning forward in her computer chair, Grace almost let out a giggle as she mucked her second diaper in as many hours. Not a lot–just enough to smell awful and be a pain to clean up, all that she had in her.

Pearce stared down at her in shock. “Seriously? I just changed you.”

Grace giggled for real this time. She didn’t care about the state of her diaper, just about the triumph. “Your face…It’s priceless.”

After that day, there were no more concerns of fiber in her food.

 

...

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[Bonsai]

One side effect of the bet that is to be expected, but so far has not been hinted, is that Grace is going to loose muscle tone and gain fat, due to lack of physical exercise. If the bet lasts long enough, she will also end up with osteoporosis and prolapse of pelvic floor…

In other words, she will be ready for the Nursing Home.

[PeculiarChangeling]

17 hours ago, Bonsai said:

One side effect of the bet that is to be expected, but so far has not been hinted, is that Grace is going to loose muscle tone and gain fat, due to lack of physical exercise. If the bet lasts long enough, she will also end up with osteoporosis and prolapse of pelvic floor…

In other words, she will be ready for the Nursing Home.

What ever gave you the impression that her physical exercise habits have changed? She was never much of one for the gym.  

[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 21: Overthinking

 

“Mhmm. Mhmm! I agree,” Grace said, nodding along as she failed to retain anything she’d heard in the last five minutes.

It was her own damned fault–her bladder was aching, but she refused to wet herself in front of a client. She doubted anyone would notice the faint pee smell–her client had far too much of a lingering B.O.-Plus-Old Spice smell to pick up anything else. But even if they’d never know, and even if her diaper would hold it all perfectly, she found it simply too undignified.

But, as a result, her aching bladder distracted her from listening to a single word that’d been said in the past five minutes. The meeting had already dragged on far longer than she expected, and her bladder didn’t seem to have as much fortitude as she’d expected–in the past twenty minutes, she’d gone from not having a need at all to bursting at the seams.

“So, I was thinking,” her client continued, oblivious to Grace’s distraction. “If you’re on board with it, we should just have the launch be a full on party.”

She blinked. “The website launch?”

“Yes, that’s the idea. Get people really excited about the Web3 integrations by throwing a rager!” he continued. “In the metaverse space, of course.”

Grace didn’t know how to respond. She’d clearly missed something.

“Can you excuse me for one moment?” she asked. “Just–one moment, I need to go use the bathroom.”

Her client nodded, a bit taken aback but understanding.

Grace stood, hurrying off to the cafe’s bathroom and locking the door behind her. Once in privacy, she muttered, “This is stupid.”

Leaning against the bathroom wall, she shut her eyes and released her bladder, soaking into her diaper. Having the modicum of privacy helped, even if she’d be waddling right back out to finish the meeting in a soggy diaper.

Sighing, she turned. This client was already a pain just from insisting on an in person meeting, and now this, just an extra nuisance. Resting her hand on the door handle, she braced herself to get back out there–

…

Grace stumbled inside, grumpy and fuming. She was glad to be busy, but a basic design meeting had no reason to last three full hours.

But for now, she needed a beer and a good, old fashioned bitching.

Walking towards the stairs, she passed Brains heading the opposite direction. He gave her a nod, sliding to the side to let her pass. “Hey, how’d your meeting go?”

“Pain,” Grace replied. “Is Melody around?”

“Off on a date, I think,” Brains replied. “I’m actually headed that way too.”

Grace perked up. “On a date?”

“Yeah, you remember that guy from before?” he grinned.

She rolled her eyes. “Oh yeah, the one you didn’t know you were dating?”

“That’s the one,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows dramatically. “I’m apparently a ‘hot ticket’ or something. Don’t wait up!” He turned to walk towards the door.

Grace smiled. She couldn’t help but be happy at her friend’s happiness, though the overall ‘Grump’ of her afternoon still wore down on her; By the time she reached the top of the stairs, the burst of cheer had largely deflated.

Melody was gone on a one night stand, Brains was gone on a date, and Skip would be at work. If she wanted someone to complain to, only one real choice remained.

Rapping on Pearce’s door, she said, “You there?”

He answered a moment later, opening it to reply rather than just calling from across his room. “Yup. How’d the meeting go, soggypants?”

“Awful,” she replied. “How many times can you tell a client, ‘Using copyrighted characters in your banner is going to get you sued’ before you’re legally allowed to slap someone? I don’t think he understands trademarks, or web design, or, like…basic hygiene, for that matter.”

“Ugh, the worst,” he said, rolling his eyes in response. Leaning over, he gave the front of her jeans a squeeze, testing her diaper through the denim. “Well, I think you could wait a little bit before your change. Let me slip you into something less comfortable, and then I’ll get you a bottle of beer if you promise not to brat and leak on purpose?”

She smirked. “Sure, that sounds nice.”

The ‘something less comfortable’ ended up being a onesie with a whole entire pillow shoved down between the legs, which made her bottom puff out like a comic exaggeration of a diaper bulge. It did the least to hinder her walking of the various waddle-inducing garments Pearce had recently picked, but perhaps the most blush-inducing. She had to toddle down the stairs, with Pearce snickering at her all the while.

Splaying out on the couch, she stretched her arms, waiting for Pearce to return with her beer. He waltzed in with two bottles a minute later–one glass with a long neck, the other plastic, wide, and with a rubber nipple on the top, but both full of fresh, frosty beer.

“So tell me about the awful scrooge of web design,” he said, passing her beer down. “And scoot, I want to sit.”

She accepted the bottle, and shimmied butt-first towards the edge of the couch, throwing her legs over the armrest. That placed Pearce on the other end of the couch, sitting right by her head. “Ugh, it’s just–a garbage client, you know?” she said, taking a long suckle of her beer.

“Yeah, I’ve had a few like that,” he said. “Getting paid well, at least?”

“I’m getting paid,” she said, stopping to get another sip. The nipple only allowed a slow trickle of beer, adding long pauses to her speech, but Pearce waited for her to finish. “I’m actually giving him a discount, though.”

“Why?” Pearce asked. “He caught you on a sale?”

“No, I just wanted the job,” she admitted. “I knew they were talking to a couple other clients, and I thought it wouldn’t be this much of a pain. It’s going to be like, a full week of work, and I am not looking forward to the client back-and-forth.”

“Have you done any of the work yet?” he asked.

She raised an eyebrow at him. “No, we just did the initial design meeting–which absolutely could have been a phone call, let me tell you. But when I couldn’t meet him in his ‘Web Three Metaspace Zone’ bullshit whatever, he insisted we talk in person.”

“So…why not just drop the client?” Pearce asked.

Grace stared up at him, almost choking on her sip of beer. “What?”

“Are you super pressed for work?” he asked. “Struggling to pay your bills?”

“No, I–I mean, I’ve got other projects with looser deadlines I could be working on,” Grace started, shaking her head. “But–”

“And are you worried that dropping him might tank your career or something?” He tilted his head. “Does he have lots of connections in the industry that could cause you trouble?”

“Not connections I care about, just crypto bros,” she replied. “But–”

“I’m not hearing any good arguments to keep him around,” Pearce shrugged.

“I can’t do that!” Grace cut in, finally, sitting up and spinning around to face Pearce. “Are you serious right now? Just toss out work like it’s yesterday’s jam?”

Pearce snorted. “Yesterday’s–never mind. Yeah, just drop the client.”

“I already sat through that whole meeting with him,” Grace said, feeling her heart rate rise just at the thought of it–(Drop a client? Just because he’s annoying?)

“Sunk cost fallacy,” he replied. “Would you rather suffer for another week or two to justify a couple bad hours? You’re overthinking.”

“I’m not overthinking,” Grace shot back.

“You’re always overthinking, crinkles,” Pearce said with a smirk.

“Okay, but…you don’t turn down work just because it’s kinda shitty,” Grace said. “I’ve got to do it. I promised.”

“Sure,” Pearce said. “Or, well. You don’t.”

“You do?” she asked. (I knew you were lazy, but–seriously?)

“Not just because it’s hard,” Pearce said. “I like a hard job, if anything. The challenge is fun. But if the client’s an asshole with unreasonable expectations? Nah, screw ‘em. I know what my time’s worth, and it’s not worth being shit on.”

“Don’t you worry about…like…money?” Grace asked.

“I mean, yeah, but I get my bills paid,” he replied, stretching an arm over the side of the couch and sipping his beer. “We’re splitting a mortgage and utilities five ways and I don’t have any dependents. I’m okay on money. I’ve got a little savings, enough for an accident at least.”

Grace almost couldn’t wrap her head around it. “But…”

“Hey,” he said. “If you want to keep working with this dick, you do you. I’m not going to tell you how you live your life, it just seems like you’d be happier without it.”

She took a breath, cautiously reclining a little next to Pearce, putting up her feet on the coffee table. “I just don’t get you, sometimes.” Putting the bottle back into her mouth, she took a long, thoughtful suckle.

“Yeah?” he asked, looking down at her, taking another pull of his drink. “What’s not to get?”

“You just–you never care about anything,” Grace said. “You don’t get stressed. You don’t worry.”

“I don’t think that’s quite true,” he said, frowning and furrowing his brow as he thought about his answer. “I care, I’m just pragmatic. When I get stressed, I know how to talk to myself, how to walk my anxiety down to reasonable levels.”

“That’s called ‘rationalizing’.” Grace rolled her eyes. “It doesn’t make the problems go away.”

“What problems?” Pearce asked. “Seriously. If I’m keeping myself taken care of, what’s there to worry about?”

“But it only gets taken care of because someone else is doing it,” Grace said. “Like–let’s say I got in a car wreck and got hurt really bad, insurance didn’t cover it, and I couldn’t pay my bills because I didn’t have enough saved up.”

“We’d take care of you,” Pearce said, tapping his chest with a bird-flipping fist. The club salute they’d had since Junior High. “Wasters for life.”

“Right.” Grace nodded. “You’d have to take care of me. I’d be dropping a burden on you because I didn’t save enough.”

Pearce’s face softened, eyes widening. “Grace–that’s what having friends is for. We support each other. Nobody’s mad at you because you aren’t entirely independent all the time.”

“You don’t complain about it, but you still notice,” Grace corrected. “Nobody likes cleaning up someone else’s mess. But nobody likes doing someone else’s dishes, or gathering up their garbage, or picking their hair out of the shower trap. And if I don’t do it, I’m forcing someone else to take that on for me. There’s a reason why acts of service is a love language–it’s because you wouldn’t do that shit for someone if you didn’t care about them.”

“Grace, you’re overthinking it again.” Pearce shook his head slowly. “You’ve got it all wrong. You’re not an obligation that we’ve taken on begrudgingly. Picking up after each other isn’t a responsibility, it’s just…it’s just kind of part of life. We’re here, right now, together, and it’s nicer to be doing life stuff with friends and to have each other’s back than to do it all alone.”

Grace didn’t respond right away, covering her silence with another suckle of her beer. She looked up at Pearce, at his face, not so much reading his expression as just looking at him. “You seriously think that?”

“I mean, yeah,” Pearce said. “You want proof?”

“Duh,” Grace snorted. “It’s a big claim.”

“I’ve been taking care of you for, what, a few weeks now?” Pearce asked.

She nodded, supplying, “Three weeks and four days. So?”

“I have to make all your food, run your baths, deal with your clothes, wipe your butt,” he said. “And yeah, it’s work. It takes time. Sometimes it stinks. Sometimes, you’re an enormous brat, and you make the work harder than it needs to be.”

“You’re not making your case,” Grace said, curiosity building, along with a certain tension in her chest. “What’re you getting at?”

Pearce glanced down at his beer, and took another swig, draining the rest of the bottle. He set it aside on the coffee table, and turned his head to look at her. “At any point has it seemed like I’ve stopped caring about you just because I’m caring for you?”

(Oh.)

(Oh.)

“Mmm,” Grace said, looking down and away from him.

“Does that make sense?” Pearce asked, sitting forward a little.

“Yeah, it…I guess.” She started drumming her fingers on her leg, then stilled, then started drumming again.

“Grace?” Pearce’s tone rose just a touch, with concern. “What’re you doing?”

She took a breath. “Overthinking.”

Before he could ask what she meant, she turned her head to face him, eyes huge. Then, before he could respond to that, she leaned in and kissed him.

 

...

 

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[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 22: The Kiss

 

Their lips met, and a thousand anxieties exploded in Grace’s head.

(This is stupid. Oh god what is he going to say? What if he reacts badly? What if he laughs? What if he tells everyone? What if–)

Pearce returned the kiss, leaning into it, reaching up to cup the back of Grace’s head with his hand. They embraced on the couch, bodies pressed against one another, making the kiss last. Once they pulled apart, once they broke the spell, they’d have to talk about this, but for as long as their lips touched–

Click.

The front door lock turned, and the two of them broke apart like a pair of magnets with opposed fields. With a whole pillow’s worth of spare bulk crammed between her legs, Grace nearly toppled off the couch, while Pearce sat up so straight he looked like he belonged in a prep school.

The door opened, and Melody waltzed in, some girl on her arm. “Hiii,” she said, drawing out the greeting. “This is Nina.”

Nina put a hand to her mouth, tittering. “You must be Grace! Why’re you wearing that?”

Grace’s eyes widened, but before she could explain, Nina’s titters broke into giggles.

“I’m just joking,” she explained. “Melody told me about the bet.”

Grace was so flustered she didn’t even remember to blush, she just nodded, trying to explain what they were doing that didn’t involve lip contact. “Yeah, I–this is Pearce. We were just sitting here–um, we were going to watch TV, that is.”

“We were going to watch a movie,” Melody said. “Were you turned on?”

“Wh-what?” Grace asked, her eyes widening.

“What were you going to turn on?” Melody repeated. “Or were you just planning on watching ‘something’?”

“Oh, whatever,” Pearce said, underlining Grace’s comments with his own defense. “We weren’t doing anything in particular. Just sitting here. Thinking about TV.”

“We’ll give you two privacy,” Grace added. “So you can watch the movie together.”

“It’s okay,” Nina added in a soft voice. “There’s room on the couch, we can share. Have you watched Redline?”

Grace shook her head. And, stupidly, said, “I’ve been meaning to check it out.”

“Then scoot over!”

And that’s how she ended up pressed right up against Pearce, the two of them so close she could feel his pulse, utterly unable to talk about what had just happened.

Grace should’ve just excused herself. Said, ‘I have work to go do’, or invented some other excuse, but paranoia told her that if she said that, Melody would know what was up. Maybe Pearce could come up with something better–but as every moment passed, the awkwardness of coming up with a reason to leave grew, and by the time Nina had queued up the movie on their TV, Grace felt utterly trapped.

She tried to communicate with Pearce via anxious glances, but if he got her messages, his replies didn’t translate.

(Is he–does he like me?) she thought. (Why did I do that? What does this mean for us?)

Pearce sat stiffly next to her, trying to keep to himself, but as Nina and Melody spread out on the couch, that became increasingly difficult. Grace couldn’t close her legs on account of the waddle-inducing onesie she’d been zipped into, and she couldn’t help but be acutely aware of every point where she found herself touching Pearce, her leg against his, their arms touching, their fingers brushing against each other…

An eternity passed. Every second, a thousand questions rolled through her mind. Every second, she feared Pearce might say something stupid and reveal what they’d done. Moments stretched on into an endless stream where time had no hold or meaning.

The opening credits finished playing.

The lovebirds, Melody and Nina were only half watching the film, as interested in each other as in the narrative and animation playing out, but now anxiety had paralyzed Grace to the point that she couldn’t even take care of their distraction. They were trapped, caught–

“Grace and I need to go,” Pearce said, cutting in.

Melody barely spared them a glance and a shrug. “Sure.”

“It’s just, I just realized it’s been a while since she’s eaten because of her meeting, and I don’t want to get in trouble–plus if she…” Pearce started, before realizing that not a soul in the room actually cared about his excuse. He cleared his throat, got to his feet, and helped Grace up.

Gratefully, she waddled after him, out of the living room and upstairs.

Once they’d evacuated to his room, Grace whispered, “Thank you.”

“So…” Pearce said, looking at her. “Do we want to talk?”

She rubbed at the back of her neck. “That was stupid, I–I don’t know.”

He looked away, and both of them avoided eye contact for a long moment.

“I just–you were saying you cared about me,” Grace said. “And I think…I don’t know. I liked that.”

Glancing back at the door, Pearce searched for his own words. “I liked it too, I guess.”

They both stood there a while longer.

Finally, Grace said, “I…I have work to do. And I need to think about this.”

“Do you want to change first?” Pearce asked, uncertainly.

The farthest thing from Grace’s mind was the bet; rigging the moment to her advantage didn’t even occur to her. “I…yeah. Probably, I’m going to leak if I don’t.”

He nodded, gesturing to the changing mat in his room, laid out on the floor by his bed. “Okay…um. I guess go lie down.”

She waddled over, obeying, holding her arms over her chest while Pearce retrieved the changing supplies. He knelt by her side a moment later, with a diaper, powder, and cream in hand, setting them all aside.

“Oh,” he said, looking down at her. “I–my bad. I need you to sit up, this onesie doesn’t have snaps.”

She obeyed, blushing. He’d done this dozens of times now, but this felt different, more personal, as he unzipped her onesie. Nudity no longer felt perfunctory–as he pulled the sleeves away from her body and down her chest, she felt acutely exposed and moved to cover her breasts. She had to lie back as he pulled the onesie off completely, freeing her of the pillowy, waddle-inducing bulk, but leaving her naked save for the sagging diaper she’d saturated to fullness.

“Are you cold?” Pearce asked, scooting down so that he knelt by her waist. “Do you…want a blanket or something?”

Grace shook her head. “No, just…um. Don’t take your time?”

He nodded, popping the tapes on her diaper and peeling it away, leaving her utterly naked and exposed. Again, something she’d experienced many times, but now his touch and her completely exposed state made her shudder and flush.

Pearce did as she asked and didn’t waste any time, wiping her down thoroughly and efficiently, cleaning away any stale pee residue from her thighs and between her legs. He dusted powder in a thin, pale sheet, and finally slid the fresh diaper underneath her, taping it up.

“Do you want just a normal onesie?” he asked.

She nodded, struggling to find precise words, and he got up to get her different clothes from his closet. He brought back a baby blue onesie with white frills around the leg holes and sleeves, one of the more mundane options from his suite of clothes intended to humiliate her.

Grace lifted her arms so he could pull the garment over her, then lifted her freshly pampered butt off the ground so he could reach down and do the snaps. She felt his touch through the thick padding, and her anxiety spiked again.

Fully dressed, she sat back. Her heart pounded far more than felt reasonable given the circumstances, and she mentally scolded her body for having such a reaction.

“Are you okay?” Pearce asked.

She nodded. “Are you?”

He shrugged. “I guess.”

“I’m…look, I’m sorry,” Grace said. “I wasn’t thinking, it was just impulsive, and now we’re both stressed and it’s a whole thing, and I shouldn’t have put you in this situation but I did, and–”

Pearce kissed her.

Her eyes widened in surprise, but that moment of shock vanished in an instant, replaced with the warmth of his lips, the satisfaction melting out into her. When they met, her stress vanished with her fear, and it was just the two of them.

She wrapped her arms around his back, pulling herself close, feeling her way through the kiss. It was less anxious than the first, more explorative, curious, learning how he tasted when they were together.

After an infinite heartbeat, they separated just far enough to breathe, and she saw his smile by how his cheeks lifted. “There,” he whispered. “Now we’re even, and you can stop apologizing.”

“Pearce, I…” she started. Words failed.

She kissed him again, relishing the fireworks.

When they separated once more, she began, “Did this surprise you as much as it did me?”

“I didn’t…” he said, leaning back against his bed. “Well…”

He kissed her again, another lingering moment of passion where thoughts and fears needed not apply.

“We’re going to have to have a real conversation eventually,” she said as they pulled apart.

“Maybe,” he said, exhaling in a not-quite laugh. “Only if we stop.”

Moving up onto him, sitting on his legs, Grace took his face in her hands. “Then let’s not stop. I don’t want to deal with this, I just want this.”

No more separation, no more breaks. Their bodies pressed close, she kissed him, and he kissed her, and at least in that moment, they were happy together.

...

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[derj]

?

[PeculiarChangeling]

On 3/29/2023 at 2:21 PM, derj said:

?

I'm not sure what your question is, so I can't really answer it! 

Chapter 23: Logistics

 

Grace lay next to Pearce on his bed, staring at the ceiling. They’d exhausted their collective energy on making out, and now, even as she knew they should have a conversation about what’d just happened, she couldn’t bring herself to it. She just wanted to sleep, savoring the lingering buzz of sensation that Pearce’s lips had left on her own.

Pearce shifted his body, and for a moment, Grace thought he might start snoring. She expected herself to get annoyed with that, but when she sought out the familiar emotion, she found nothing. It was charming, from the right viewpoint–he was so comfortable next to her that he didn’t mind dozing off.

But, instead of a snore, she heard his voice. “Do we want to call off the bet?”

And there it was–logistics. Something to break the spell.

She saw the logic in it–calling off the bet would simplify things. They wouldn’t be in contest with each other, constantly bucking for advantage, trying to trick the other or push them into frustration and humiliation. Trying to compete and kiss in the same breath could lead to deeply regrettable choices from everyone involved.

“How would we explain that to everyone?” Grace asked. “That we just decided to give up?”

“I don’t know, we could say that,” Pearce replied, moving his arm so that his fingers brushed against her skin. “We realized we were too stubborn to lose, so we compromised.”

“I’m not sure anyone will believe that. We’re too committed.” Grace pursed her lips.

“What about…the truth?” Pearce floated.

They both lay in silence for a moment, thinking about how that conversation would go. After a lengthy pause, Grace said, “I like this being our secret.”

More candid, Pearce said, “I don’t even want to imagine the giggling.”

Exhaling sharply through her nose, Grace nodded. “I don’t think we’re ever going to live this down, are we?”

“Only if they find out.” Pearce shrugged. “Still, we could come up with an excuse.”

Another bit of niggling doubt ate at the back of Grace’s thoughts, something she deflected with a more tangible objection. “I don’t think we could.”

“You’re smart, you could come up with something,” Pearce said.

“I’m smart, but Brains is a logic machine and Melody’s uncannily observant. I don’t know if I could invent an excuse that can slip past both of them.” She shook her head. “I want to keep the bet going for now.”

Pearce leaned up a little bit, turning to look at her face.

(He noticed,) Grace realized, her heart skipping a beat.

He said, “You still want to win, don’t you?”

Face twisting into a crooked smile, Grace nodded–she’d only halfway been caught, but it was better to admit a partial truth than the whole thing. “I don’t like losing, and I do like making you do my chores.”

“You mean, you like doing my chores,” Pearce retorted. “Since that’s what you’ll be doing once you lose, baby butt.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re lucky you can pull off the ‘charmingly cocky’ thing, because otherwise you’d be insufferably wrong right now. As it is, you're just wrong.”

He laughed. “Of course, maybe I am wrong…”

“Oh yeah?” Grace admitted. “Ready to quit?”

“No, that’s not it,” Pearce snickered. “Maybe you just like having poopy pants and you came up with this whole bet as a cover story.”

Grace forced out a laugh–she had to force it, because he’d come disturbingly close with his guess. She hadn’t invented the bet as some deliberate ruse, and she still didn’t have any love for dirty diapers; those parts were completely off base. However, she wasn’t ready to give things up just yet, and she didn’t want Pearce to walk out either.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” she said, forcing a smirk. “It’d give you an excuse to quit without admitting defeat.”

“Stinker,” he replied.

“We still need to figure out what we’re going to do about…this, though,” Grace said, pulling his blankets up a little more over her body. “What do we want to do?”

“I’m not sure what ‘this’ is.” Pearce raised his hands, making air quotes. “What are we? Friends that like to kiss?”

“I think the term is ‘friends with benefits’, usually,” Grace said. “Though…usually that comes with different benefits.”

“I see you naked a couple times a day,” Pearce pointed out. “A lot of guys would count that as a ‘benefit’.”

Grace turned so that Pearce could clearly see her raise an eyebrow at him. “And you don’t?”

“‘Seeing you naked’ hits different in the context of ‘cleaning up your potty pants’.” He shrugged.

(He didn’t say ‘no’,) Grace thought. (Is he being coy, or am I reading too much into that?)

Aloud, she said simply, “Okay, fair enough.”

“So, friends with smooching benefits.” Pearce moved on in the conversation, rolling around the words to see how they felt. “Sure. I think I like that.”

“And otherwise, nothing’s changed,” Grace said. “The bet’s still on. You’re still going to lose.”

“Sure, uh-huh.” Pearce rolled his eyes, sitting up. “It’s getting to be about dinner time. Do you want anything special?”

“Just whatever you were already making,” Grace said, “I’m not feeling picky.”

“Strained peas and mush it is.” Pearce winked and got to his feet, straightening his collar. “Shouldn’t take long.”

Grace shook her head and smirked, sitting up. “Hold on–you’re so rumpled you look like you just got run over.” Reaching out to him, she straightened his shirt, smoothing out the aftereffects of their makeout marathon. Running her fingers through his hair, she got rid of the worst of the birds' nests that’d formed. “There, that looks better.”

“Thanks,” he said, leaning in to give her a surprise kiss. Though they’d been doing roughly the same for the past hour, the gesture still sent a blush running to Grace’s cheeks, flushing bright pink while her heart fluttered. “I’ll be back.”

“Uh…” Grace said, smiling stupidly. “Uh huh. See you soon…”

He left her there, sitting on his bed, and she wasn’t sure if or when her heart would ever stop racing.

…

A warm buzz had settled over Pearce, a feeling reminiscent of being high without any of the impairment.

He didn’t know how to name this feeling, but a weight had been lifted as so many details came into focus. Emotions and reactions he hadn’t known how to parse had been clarified, uncertainty had crystallized into meaning, confusion was meaning.

He liked Grace. He like liked her. When they met, when they kissed, he didn’t feel anxious or unfocused, he didn’t feel like he was forgetting things and worrying about what he had to do. He found calm, and that calm came from someone he cared for on a deep level.

All but floating past Melody and her date, he waltzed to the kitchen, preheating the oven to cook a frozen pizza.

Friends with Smooching Benefits.

Beaming, he leaned against the counter, mostly on autopilot. His thoughts kept returning to Grace, and the perfect calm he found with her.

There was just…

(Screw it,) he thought. (Worst thing she can say is no.)

Emboldened by his good mood, he left to go back upstairs–he didn’t want to wait any longer for answers.

Grace was still in his room, on his bed, snuggled underneath his blankets. She looked up when he came in though, smiling at him. “That was fast.”

“Food’s not ready yet,” Pearce replied. “But…I wanted to ask you something.”

“What’s that?” she asked, tilting her head. She seemed uncertain, as though worried, and that made Pearce worry in turn.

(Should I drop it?)

“You’re fine saying no,” Pearce said. “But…would you… Eh, do you want to be friends with more benefits?”

Her mouth opened in a little surprised ‘Oh’, like she’d been expecting a different question entirely. It took her a moment to process, and when she responded with words, she just said, “Pearce…I don’t know.”

“That’s fine,” he said. “Don’t worry about it then, I just…wanted to ask, I guess.”

She glanced down, then back up, nodding. “That wasn’t a ‘no’, I genuinely don’t know.”

He nodded again, spirits lifting a little. “So…okay. Let me know once you’ve thought about it?”

“I’m not sure if I can think my way into an answer,” Grace admitted, sitting up. “It might require…a test.”

His eyebrows shot up another half inch, surprised yet again. “Oh! Well–Yeah, that’d be cool. I just don’t want to push you.”

“After dinner?” Grace asked. “We can…run some tests.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Pearce agreed. “After dinner.”

He shuffled his feet, and Grace fidgeted with her hands.

“Maybe–” Grace started. “Maybe before?”

He nodded, more excitedly. “Before is good.”

Blushing, Grace said, “So–how do we do this?”

A smile broke across Pearce’s face. “Well, when two grown ups love each other very much–”

She rolled her eyes. “Just get over here, smartass.”

He crossed the room, sitting down on the bed next to her. He’d done this before–plenty of times, even–but with Grace, he felt like he was back at prom night, fidgeting and nervous about whether he could perform–this was a step beyond what they’d been doing, and even as smoothly as things had gone so far, the escalation worried him.

(What if I screw something up?)

“So…” he said. “I guess…”

“First,” Grace said, wrapping a hand around his chest and leaning in to kiss him.

Bliss.

Calm.

Uncertainty washed away, he pulled back and whispered, “Do you want me to finger you?”

She bit her lip and nodded. “Mhmm.”

Reaching down, he had to undo the snaps on her onesie and pull it up, granting access to the top waistband of her diaper. Unsure if he should take it off or not, he went with his instincts, sliding his hand down the top of the diaper.

Grace was already wet–in both ways that mattered. She bit down harder on her lip in response to his touch, muting a moan so it wouldn’t carry out of the room, and then leaned forward to kiss him, hiding her moans in his mouth.

He felt her fingers against the front of his jeans, fumbling with the zipper–he was already hard, and just a little touch was enough to steal his attention.

“Good?” he asked in a breathy whisper, lips an inch from hers.

“Good,” she replied. “Very good.”

“Want to keep going?” he asked. She nodded emphatically, pulling him back onto the bed before locking their lips.

Together, the two of them experimented, explored, and learned about each other by their touch.

...

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[aldl4811]

Love the sexual chemistry growing 

[D503]

🔥

[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 24: Coming Down

“Fuck, yes–yes–”

“Don’t stop–”

“Oh god–”

…

“I…”

“What was that?”

“Hmm?”

“I couldn’t hear you. You were mumbling.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Okay.”

…

“Scoot closer.”

“Can’t get enough of me, hmm?”

“I’m cold and you’re sharing the blankets, casanova.”

“If it gets any cozier, I’m going to fall asleep.”

“As long as we don’t doze for too long…”

…

Grace dreamed of a warm embrace, sunshine wrapped around her body, comfort and care.

She awoke to an empty bed.

She’d fallen asleep with Pearce, that much she’d remembered–after a long night together, breaking occasionally to eat, to bathe, to change, they’d dozed in her bed, nestled against each other. That feeling of being wanted had carried her off to sleep, wishing her earthly needs away.

Now a laser beam of sunlight was blasting her in the eyes, forcing her to wince awake, an indication that the morning was growing long. She’d overslept, and she had work to do.

“Pearce?”

Rolling upright, she looked around. Pearce hadn’t put up the crib bars, so no awkward climbing was required to stand up. She felt emotionally hungover; there was no blinding headache or physical pain, but she felt fatigued, drained. Abandoned?

Her phone was on the ground by the crib, and she knelt to grab it, pressing the on button to check the time. It didn’t take long to recognize that the phone was dead, or that it wasn’t hers, but Pearce’s. Hers was on the nightstand a few feet away, and she’d remembered to plug it in even through the haze of cuddling.

Past ten in the morning. (Goddamnit,) she thought. (Pearce was supposed to wake me up.)

Worse–she had a phone meeting she was supposed to take half an hour ago. She’d missed it completely.

Heart rate spiking, Grace quickly texted the client apologizing for her tardiness and asking if they could reschedule. She told herself not to catastrophize–it was just a phone call, it probably didn’t matter too much, she wouldn’t lose work over this–but in the space between reaching out and getting a response, it was hard to feel anything except anxiety.

By the rules of the bet, she was probably supposed to crawl back into her crib and wait–maybe she could shout from the other room until he woke up, but Skip would be home by then, and asleep, and she didn’t want to wake them up after a long shift.

Besides–she had more important things to be doing.

So, dropping Pearce’s phone back onto her bed, she waddled out of her room. Her diaper squished slightly–she was fairly sure she could remember wetting it in the night, waking up for a moment to relieve the pressure on her bladder before dozing off again. Since Pearce hadn’t properly put her in pajamas, she just had on a T-shirt over it.

Opening her door, she looked at the entrance to Pearce’s room. His door was shut, and she could hear gentle snores from the other side.

(I should wake him up,) she thought.

Then she considered why he was snoring in his room–he’d left her side at some point in the night to go back to his bed, without a thought in the world for her. No alarm, no text, he’d just left.

Her phone buzzed–a response from the client she’d accidentally blown off. ‘I’ll see if there’s a time I can reschedule to, we’re on a pretty tight deadline but I might be able to shift things around.’

(Translation: They already hired someone else. Stupid. I should have set my own alarm.)

She looked back at Pearce’s door again.

(He can sleep.)

Mentally, she racked up the rules he’d broken–no bathtime, no bedtime, no waking up on time, no breakfast. She could probably get away with making her diaper leak before he woke up too. He was in for a hefty bill. It might be enough to finally make him balk, to give up, and then she wouldn’t even have to worry about her punishments for getting out of the crib.

And, besides–she had other reasons to believe that she was safe from punishment.

Toddling downstairs, she made a beeline to the coffee pot–still half full, Brains or someone must have left it percolating before leaving for work. The house was still and empty, she was the only one there, the only one awake.

Smirking to herself, Grace poured a cup of coffee into a mug. If Pearce wasn’t going to enforce the rules, why should she obey them? That was just another tally against him, more proof he was going to lose the bet.

He’d just left her, anyways. She wasn’t going to keep the song and dance going, drinking from a bottle when she had to fix the drink herself.

Sipping it, the coffee tasted cold and bitter. Even a run through the microwave and a healthy helping of cream and sugar didn’t fix it, the drink offered her no satisfaction. It just felt…off.

(Brains probably used the wrong setting,) she told herself, setting aside the mug and pouring herself a glass of water instead. That, at least, just tasted like water.

From there, she got to work. Real, on her own time, work. Sitting at the desk in her room, she buckled down, focusing on the project she most wanted to get out of the way. Since there was no call that morning, no chance to set client expectations, her intended work for the day wasn’t available. She didn’t like switching on the fly, but the poorly conceived blockchain metaverse nightmare wouldn’t take care of itself, and it was something to do.

Pearce’s advice to ditch the project completely echoed in the back of her head, but then his snores drifted in through the wall they shared and chased away all her other thoughts of him.

Eventually, she checked the time.

(It’s past noon. Is he seriously still asleep?)

Her diaper had filled to the point of full saturation, and if she wanted to avoid leaking she’d have to start doing some sort of yoga poses to ensure things trickled into the few dry bits of fluff. Rather than do that, she squelched to the bathroom, squatted in the tub, and let her diaper leak onto the porcelain.

(And that’s another penalty for Pearce,) she thought, grabbing a towel off the rack. She thought about stripping out of the diaper, but changed her mind.

It was better proof of Pearce’s failings if she kept it on. When he woke up and saw the state he was in, it’d be clear: (Look how badly you failed.)

She could have woken him up then–it’s not like there was a penalty for double leaking. He probably had work of his own he could be doing, things he was missing.

Grace waddled precariously past his door and into her room. Throwing the towel over her chair she sat back down and got to work. Loading up her work, she stared at the screen, eyes glazing over.

(What am I doing?)

She remembered Pearce’s arms around her. Even calling it just ‘friends with benefits’, they’d shared something last night. She probably owed him the courtesy of a wake-up knock, if not because they were friends, then at least because she no longer stood to gain–she was out of penalties to amass for him, unless he slept so late that he missed her bathtime as well.

She checked her phone. Nothing from the client she’d burned, no indication that they were going to reschedule.

(He couldn’t even set a stupid alarm,) she told herself. (He thinks he can be responsible, and he can’t even set an alarm. I can’t afford to lose this client–) she had to cut herself off, because it wasn’t true. She wanted the money, but she could muddle through without, she’d just be thin on cash for a while. (I wanted this client a lot. He could have just set an alarm.)

Something deeper niggled at her. A little cold, bitter feeling in the pit of her stomach, like she’d swallowed an ice cube made of vinegar. That wasn’t true either.

Grace remembered falling asleep with warmth and comfort next to her, with… There was only one word she could think of. She’d fallen asleep with her caregiver next to her, and woken up alone, and neglected.

She didn’t care about the client, not really. She didn’t care about an hour of extra sleep. She just wanted to know that Pearce would be there for her when she needed him, but she’d woken up alone.

Putting him out of her thoughts, Grace dove furiously into her work, blocking out everything else. She could code in her sleep, she could do design with her eyes closed, it just had to occupy her thoughts.

Work. Problem solve. As long as she had something she could fix, something to create, she didn’t have to think about her feelings.

A couple hours later, she had to drag herself away to the bathroom again, to repeat her stunt of leaking into the tub. Sighing, she got to her feet, waddling out, stretching out her hands as she bumped right into Skip.

They came out of their bedroom with headphones on, and she was so preoccupied with her thoughts that she only stepped out of the way at the last second. “Woah,” she said, stumbling and grabbing the wall for support.

“Morning,” Skip said, pulling an ear bud out to say hi. “How are…is that what you were wearing last night?”

“It is,” Grace said.

Skip looked her up and down, eyes lingering on her particularly heavy diaper. “Did Pearce put you in the same clothes? Or–where is Pearce?”

“He’s still asleep,” Grace said, in a tone meant to convey, ‘Can you believe this guy?’

Skip blinked. “It’s four in the afternoon.”

Grace nodded. “Yeah.”

“You didn’t wake him up?” Skip asked, looking at her like she had two heads.

“Not my job,” Grace replied. “He wanted to be the babysitter so much, I’m not going to do that work for him.”

Pushing past her, Skip pounded on Pearce’s door. “Hey! Wake up!”

The snoring stopped. Pearce’s footsteps approached the door, and he opened it, bleary-eyed and confused.

“Skip?” he said, blinking at them. “You’re home early. Or…”

He looked around. Even sleep-drunk, he recognized something was wrong pretty quickly. Maybe what tipped him off was that she'd gotten out of her crib, or the light filtering in through the hallway window, but his eyes widened.

“You slept all afternoon,” Grace said.

“No,” he said, though it was hard to deny. “I–my alarm never went off.”

“Your phone was in my room,” Grace said.

He stared, uncomprehending. She recognized the panic, the ‘oh shit I missed so much’ look that she’d felt earlier that same day.

He summarized the feeling shortly.

“Fuck.”

 

...

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Chapter 25: Conflict

Pearce spun in place, head spinning with everything he had to do.

He’d fucked up.

He’d fucked up big time.

It was four in the afternoon, on a work day–and sure, he freelanced from home, but that didn’t mean he could just ignore his job all day without consequence. Waiting anxiously for his phone to charge, he booted up his desktop, wondering if he had time to go make a pot of coffee and take an aspirin for the headache that was starting to pound a hole in his–

“Pearce,” Grace demanded, standing by his door. “I need a change.”

And she did–her diaper had been utterly decimated; flooded so thoroughly that the tapes were struggling to hang on and all the padding had clumped and fallen to the bottom of the diaper. It was a miracle she hadn’t–

“I’ve already leaked twice,” she added, emphasizing the depth of his failure.

(Oh.)

“I’ll get to that soon,” Pearce said. If she leaked again, it’d cost him fifty bucks–a price worth paying to get his day back on track, to recover from the death spiral he’d flown into by losing eight hours. It was one thing to talk to Grace about being chill, about skipping jobs if they didn’t spark joy, but he’d screwed up badly with a client he actually liked, and he had to do damage control before they decided not to renew his contracts.

He hated doing the mental math on what took priority. He’d already screwed up enough as the babysitter, already let Grace down hard, and he was actively choosing to let her down more. That made him sick, but Grace’s petulance was making it easier to stomach–the more she irritated him, the less he cared.

“Did you eat?” he asked, as his phone chirped to life.

“I made myself food, yes,” she said. “But that was around lunchtime–I still need dinner.”

(Okay. I need to–fuck. Eight missed calls. I need to listen to these messages, return the calls, reply to the texts, check my email, see if that build got uploaded–dammit, I said I’d give feedback today. So feedback. And Grace needs a change, and dinner, and I need to figure out when I’m going to redo the meeting from today, and–shit, she probably needs a drink, too, and she’s not dressed, and…I need to listen to these messages.)

“Pearce–” Grace snapped. “Look at me.”

He looked at her, frowned, and looked away.

“Pearce,” Grace insisted, demanding his attention.

“What?” he snapped, wheeling on her. “Grace, I have five thousand things to do, no time to do it, and none of our shit takes priority right now. You need to leak? Go leak.”

“Are you giving up?” she demanded.

He ran his hands through his hair, exasperation growing by the second. “No, I’m not–Grace, are you fucking kidding me?”

Grace’s face registered shock, and he hesitated. He hadn’t meant to be that harsh, but it wasn’t half so harsh as the crueler thoughts rolling around in the back of his head.

He simply could not believe that Grace had left him out to dry, and though he buried his worst impulses, he couldn’t contain his rant completely.

“You seriously fucked over my entire day so you could get leverage for the bet?” he continued. “You’re that petty? It’s a game. I haven’t tried to screw any of your work stuff up or mess with your jobs, I’ve made sure you have space and time to work, and, what? You were just waiting to get the right leverage on me so you could fuck me over?”

He knew he was yelling, he knew Skip could probably hear him if they hadn’t left for work already, but he didn’t care.

“You did screw my work.” Grace didn’t need volume to convey her anger, every word had an icy edge. “You were supposed to be the one to wake us up. You had one job.”

“I have like fifty jobs! I’m doing everything!” Pearce shot back. “So I screwed up one thing. Sure. Whatever.”

“Whatever? No.” Grace glowered, refusing to give him an inch of empathy. “You don’t get to be in charge and then ‘Whatever’ everything away when you screw up. You either need to own up and take care of your responsibilities, or admit that you can’t actually do this and tell me you’re done. Only two options.”

Her words hit him like a warning shot, an indicator that if he didn’t back down immediately, she’d go for his throat.

He didn’t care about what she wanted him to do. “Grace,” Pearce shot back at her. “I know you want to be the center of attention, but I have so much work to do, and you cannot be up my ass about this right now!”

“No, we’re going to talk.” Her gaze was steel as she attacked him again, more insistent. “Are you going to give up?”

(Shut the fuck up and leave me–) “How many things did I miss?” Pearce demanded.

“Eight.” Grace began counting on her fingers, loading up her verbal cannons for the finishing strike. “Two leaks, bedtime, wake up, bathtime, breakfast, lunch, and I haven’t had a single thing to drink today I didn’t get myself. Four hundred dollars. Pay up, or give up.”

There it was. Her ultimatum–he could take the verbal torpedo head on, or he could sink.

Preparing to take it on the chin, he readied his return salvo. “You got out of your crib on your own, made yourself two meals, got yourself drinks, and you just told me you needed a diaper change.”

Her eyes narrowed. “So?”

“So,” he attacked, ready to blast her confidence out of the water. “You want me to play the game, respect the bet? Fine.”

Swiping his wallet off the desk, he fished in it for cash–of course he didn’t have enough. Instead, he scooped up his phone, sending a digital payment to Grace–four hundred dollars. Twenty hours of his life, labeled ‘Penalty Beer Money’.

“I’m paid up,” he announced, dropping his bomb. “You broke five rules, that’s five hours in time out. Go away, sit down, shut up, and leave me alone.”

Grace’s eyes widened, her face drawing tight as she balled her hands. “You aren’t serious–”

“Completely.” He felt a sting of satisfaction, and couldn’t help but add, “Are you going to give up?”

When her face fell from shock to sadness and she backed away, all that vindication washed away, and he felt only shame.

…

Grace genuinely could not believe him.

Pearce.

Fucking Pearce.

He’d left her alone, skipped out on his responsibilities, and he apparently had the gall to throw it right back in her face that she didn’t waste her entire day sitting in her crib, waiting for him to demonstrate basic life skills.

She stared at the corner of the wall, wriggling uncomfortably. Her leaky, swollen diaper wasn’t getting any more comfortable, and she couldn’t even get Pearce in further trouble by going again–she’d just be making puddles on the floor. Her stomach cramps hadn’t gone away, either, and sitting in a low stool that effectively left her in a constant crouch didn’t do much for her control.

(Five hours. It’ll be bedtime by then.)

Grace wouldn’t have any trouble holding it for five hours, but she’d already been holding it all day. She couldn’t remember going yesterday, either–after she and Pearce had started talking, she didn’t want to kill the mood by stinking up the room and forcing him to change her; she doubted either of them could rebound back to sexy from ‘cleaning up her poopy bottom.’

Now she was stuck fighting cramps.

For five hours.

She blamed Pearce for this, but she blamed herself, too. This could all have been avoided if she’d just…

(Woken Pearce up?)

(No.)

(I should have set an alarm on my own phone.)

The stupid thing had been to let her guard down, to assume that just because Pearce was fun to hang out with, and fun in bed, that she could rely on him. She’d lowered her guard, fully relaxed, and been punished in response.

And maybe–maybe–she could admit that refusing to step in and wake him up had been an overreaction, but she wasn’t in charge of him. They were just…she wasn’t sure. Friends with benefits sounded wrong.

She squirmed again. Her bottom was starting to itch from the prolonged time in a saturated diaper. If she’d been a real baby, she would have probably just bawled her head off when she woke up stuck in her crib, not snuck around and stayed quiet.

(Now I’m making excuses for him.)

She couldn’t check the time. She couldn’t do anything, except squirm, pout, and reflect.

(Is this why time out’s are a popular punishment? So kids will think about what they did wrong?)

(Not that it works when I didn’t do anything wrong.)

(Goddammit, how long has it been?)

(Brains gets home at around six, usually. Seven at the latest. It was like five PM when I got stuck here, so...it hasn’t even been an hour.)

(Should I just pee? I feel like I should just pee. I can’t hold it for five hours.)

(Oh god I hope time is passing faster than it feels like. It feels like it’s only been a few minutes.)

(How the hell could he do this to me when he’s the one at fault?)

More than the boredom itself, or the discomfort, it was the injustice that ate at her. He’d failed her, and then when she confronted him about it he found an excuse to abandon her again. Paying lip service to the rules of the bet didn’t justify this, he just wanted to eliminate an inconvenience by any means necessary.

Her stomach gurgled and cramped again, painful fullness rearing its head. A reminder that she’d been holding it for almost two days, and that she wouldn’t be able to keep it held much longer–certainly not while she had to sit in a near crouch.

She had to choose between physical discomfort or humiliation, and even if she chose the former, she didn’t know if her body would comply.

(Fuck.)

…

Brains returned home late, only to find himself confronted by a smell, like someone had just squatted down and gone right onto the floor in the living room.

He saw Grace on her time out chair, in a flooded diaper, sitting over a puddle of urine. That explained the smell, then. If Melody was there, she could’ve probably gleaned a lot more from Grace’s body language, Brains could largely only intuit the fact that she was upset from the facts–if he were in a wet diaper stuck in time out, he’d be upset too.

“Time out?” he asked, before quickly catching himself. “Sorry–don’t answer that.” He didn’t want to get her in trouble. “I’ll go ask Pearce what happened.”

He took his phone out while navigating upstairs, taking the time to text Melody, ‘You on a date tonight?’

‘Yeah, what’s up?’

‘Grace is in time out. Peed on the floor. Might be awkward to bring someone home to.’

‘Noted, thanks.’

Heading upstairs, he briefly considered Not Getting Involved. Instead, he knocked on Pearce’s door.

“Grace?” Pearce called through the door. “If you got out of time out–”

“Brains,” he corrected.

Pearce opened up. “What’s up?”

“Grace leaked onto the floor,” Brains said. “What did she do?”

“What didn’t she do?” Pearce replied.

“I…don’t know,” Brains said. “I’ve been gone all day.”

“Sorry.” Stepping back, Pearce let Brains into his bedroom. It looked more chaotic than usual. “She broke like five rules today.”

“Oh, damn,” Brains said. “Why?”

Pearce seemed to be thinking about his words for a long moment. “I broke eight.”

“Oh, damn.” Doing the math, he said, “Four hundred bucks. Can you afford that?”

“Sorta. If I don’t lose this client that I ghosted for like eight hours.”

“Hold up.” Brains shook his head. “I need you to explain what happened.”

Pearce explained, starting with the morning–he’d forgotten his phone, missed his alarm, and Grace had woken up sometime that morning well after their day was supposed to begin…then she’d refused to wake him up in turn.

“Five hours, though,” Brains said, finally. “That’s…Pearce, that’s a lot.”

“I know,” Pearce shrugged. “But, like…if she’s going to insist I do the whole thing, I can’t really back out, can I?”

“Honestly?” Brains said. “You shouldn’t. She deserves it.”

Pearce stopped to look flatly at Brains. “That’s unusually harsh.”

“You messed up by accident,” he replied. “She let you sleep on purpose. Intention matters. If anything, she should be apologizing to you.”

Sighing, Pearce looked back at his computer, then at Brains. “She’s still mad.”

“That doesn’t mean she didn’t purposefully hurt you.”

Pearce shrugged. “You’re right.”

“I am?” Brains said, almost surprised at saying something insightful.

“You are, but I’m going to ignore you anyways,” Pearce said. “It all comes back to the bet–I’d been thinking of it as rules, but it’s more than that. Grace really has the emotional regulation skills of a toddler, and I shouldn’t have been expecting her to handle an adult relationship.”

That surprised Brains less–he was used to that. “Then what are you going to do? Let her out of time out?”

“No,” Pearce said. “She made her diaper, she can sit in it. But I’m the adult here, the one in charge. I just need to start following the rules.”

...

The good times couldn't last forever, could they?

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[D503]

Thanks for the update - such tension! They both make good points - hopefully they can compromise but it's reallt fun to see the sabotaging going on.

[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 26: Sort-Of Forgiveness

Grace whimpered–she couldn’t deal with the cramps anymore. Bad timing and Pearce’s betrayal had worked against her, and with hours yet to go in her absurd, unfair time out, she gave up control.

She told herself that’s what she was doing–giving up, not losing. Despite her attire of late, she was no baby, she could control herself, these were simply exceptional circumstances and the smart, correct decision was to not fight it.

Still, going right there, she felt pretty stupid–she really, truly couldn’t do a thing to hold it, and anyone who walked by would know it. There were no universes in which Grace would deliberately fill up her diaper, not when she wouldn’t be changed out of it for hours.

The muck spilled out into waiting, utterly sodden padding, a diaper so abused that it didn’t so much as absorb anything as it just held the mess in place, spreading out over the time out stool.

At least Melody was out for the night and Brains had gone upstairs. If Pearce stayed in his room, maybe nobody would notice, at least not until her time out was over. She’d be able to avoid the humiliation until the very end, and then get it over with in one quick burst. Unless…

Footsteps tapped down the staircase.

(I had to think it,) she realized, annoyed by her own self-dooming mental prophecy. (Just please be Brains, I don’t want to hear from him right now.)

Fighting the temptation to look away from the corner, Grace instead cast her gaze up, a slight grunt escaping through her lips as she tried to at least finish. Getting caught in a messy diaper would be bad enough, getting caught actively packing it full filled her with a sense of heady humiliation that made her want to scream and surrender.

“Hey, Grace.”

(Of course. It’s him.)

She wasn’t sure if Pearce recognized she was still in the midst of blowing out her diaper’s seat, but she refused to acknowledge his presence. Not a nod, not a shake, not a sound.

“I need to apologize.” A slight creak of the floorboards and light thump told Grace that he’d sat down behind her. “I…oh, geez. You’d been holding it a while, huh?”

She caught the slight nasal quality of his words, and then heard a little shhh-shhh-shhh as he scooted a couple feet back over the hardwood floors. She didn’t respond. She couldn’t, she’d…

(Is this a trick? He’s baiting me into more punishment?) That didn’t seem like something Pearce would do, but she didn’t think he’d give her five hours of time out, either.

Just in case, she pressed her lips together tightly and resolved not to even think about responding.

Of course, that meant she had to breathe through her nose. She wriggled uncomfortably, noting that–at least–the pressure on her bowels had abated now that she’d cleared them out.

“I broke several rules, and left you in an uncomfortable position,” he said. “For that, I’m sorry.”

Grace shut her eyes. (He seems sincere enough.)

“I’m not letting you out of time out.” He said that flatly–nipping any hope in the bud, before she could start to wonder. “If I let you skip punishment, that sets a bad precedent.”

(So why even tell me this?) Grace fumed. (It just seems like you wanted to stop feeling guilty, without doing anything to fix it.)

“But I promise I’m going to try and honor the rules better. I won’t screw up again.” He paused, then added, “There’s no rule saying you can’t have dinner while in time out. Do you want food?”

After a stunned pause, Grace nodded.

“Ok. I’m going to go make you some dinner. I’ll be right back.”

Her silent contemplation had a new character to it. Her physical condition had grown markedly more uncomfortable, but mentally, she felt a lot better. Pearce’s apology rang true, if a bit too little and far too late to save her day.

He came back around a few minutes later, and she saw the edges of his hands and a towel as he wiped up the puddle she’d made. She’d no doubt make another one before her timeout was over, but the gesture made her feel a little better. When he returned with a bottle to drink from, her mood elevated a little more.

At least she wouldn’t be in time out on an empty stomach.

She now had a better way of telling time, too–she knew how long chicken nuggets took to cook, give or take, and she could hear the oven beep when it got up to temperature. That helped her get a sense of how long she waited, before he brought over a plate of nuggets with a side cup of honey mustard.

It wasn’t the most appetizing; having to eat while getting the occasional whiff from the seat of her diaper, but she managed, opening wide for him to put each nugget in her mouth. He didn’t say much, just dipping each nugget, plopping it between her lips, and waiting for her to chew and swallow before repeating the process. Once she’d eaten, he wiped off her face, took the plate, and went to go do the dishes.

As an additional concession to the sheer length of time she’d be stuck there, Pearce put the TV on too–nothing special, just Netflix autoplaying some cooking show or another, but the sounds of gentle British concern and string instruments helped mark the passage of time.

(It’s about fifty minutes per episode, and I’ve already been here over an hour, so…just four episodes. That’s not bad.)

It beat having to sit with her thoughts.

Every hour or so–that is, roughly around when the credits music rolled on the TV–Pearce refreshed her bottle, as well as replacing the towel under her time out stool so that her inevitable and regular leaks wouldn’t soak into the hardwood. Her bottom seriously began to itch by the time the second episode ended, but she knew it wouldn’t be much longer, she could handle the waiting.

Brains occasionally walked past, but didn’t engage. Melody, luckily, steered clear and didn’t come home at all.

Finally, long after all sunlight had stopped filtering through the windows and she found herself seriously chafing between her cheeks, Pearce tapped on her shoulder. “Time out’s over. It’s bedtime.”

“Oh, thank fuck,” she said, leaning back. She immediately fell, not having realized her feet were asleep, and it took a steadying hand from Pearce to pull her upright. “Thanks.”

“Diaper change, then bath, then bed,” Pearce continued. “We’re not counting this as going past bedtime, since it was a time out situation.”

“...right,” Grace said. “Okay.” She hadn’t expected him to go straight into rules clarification, but it was nice to have it confirmed that she wouldn’t be in more trouble.

“Long day,” he said. “I’ve got more work to do once you’re asleep.”

She felt a tiny twinge of guilt. Maybe she should have woken him up after all…but then again, he seemed to have learned his lesson. If he stuck to his promise and followed the rules going forward, then it’d be worth it: He’d have, finally, learned. Meanwhile, if he didn’t learn, he was hopeless, and she had nothing to feel guilty over anyways. Either way, she dismissed the concern.

Pearce changed her in the bathroom, where a pre-drawn bath waited for her. Her utterly demolished diaper got discarded, he wiped up the worst of the muck, and transferred her into the tub, mostly focused on getting his work done as quickly as possible.

Her thighs felt hot where the diaper rash had set in, particularly vulnerable to the temperature of the water, but it felt good to get clean, to wash the thin residue of pee and muck off her skin that baby wipes alone hadn’t removed.

“Did you get your thing with your client worked out?” Grace asked, while he rubbed shampoo into her hair. He didn’t take as long as she’d liked, the duration of his hands working on her scalp couldn’t have been more than ten seconds before he started rinsing it out, but she still leaned into the moment of contact.

“They haven’t fired me,” he responded. “Arms up.”

She raised her arms so he could get suds and a washcloth under them, scrubbing her down efficiently. The cloth on her skin felt nice–just abrasive enough to make her feel clean. Half to his comment, half to the contact, she said, “That’s good.”

If he understood her double meaning, he didn’t acknowledge it, moving efficiently on without looking her in the eyes. “Mhmm. Well, you’re all clean.” Reaching over, he pulled the plug. “Up, and we’ll get you in your PJs.”

Grace idly wondered what was coming for her, as he ran the towel over her body and got her dried off. Would he get back at her, slightly, with something particularly embarrassing or uncomfortable? He’d made her sleep in that waddle onesie before, and she’d fussed plenty about it. Or he might go easy and just dress her up all cutesy.

She didn’t ask, not wanting to tempt him one way or the other while he got her in her nighttime diaper. Pearce rubbed in cream on her rash that felt pasty and chalky but eased the discomfort, and powder over it made her skin feel cool and nice.

He sat her up, left for a moment, and returned with a T-shirt. No bottoms, no frills, just a T-shirt.

“Arms,” he said, guiding her into the shirt.

She obeyed, looking down, expecting something humiliating to be printed on the front. ‘Princess Potty Pants’, maybe, or maybe something more on the nose, like just, ‘Diaper Baby’.

It was just a plain blue T-shirt, one that came down a little past her waist.

“Is this it?” Grace asked.

“I thought it would be warm enough tonight, but if you think your legs will get cold I can find some bottoms for you,” Pearce suggested.

“No, that’s fine,” she conceded. “It’s just, plain, is all.”

“I thought you’d be happy about that.” Pearce helped her to stand. “Alright, though, seriously. Bedtime.”

She nodded. “Sure.”

Turning, she started walking to her room, waiting for Pearce to follow. He did, checking his phone on the way, only giving Grace a fraction of his attention. She got under her covers, and he looked her over briefly.

“Alright,” he said. “You’re set. Good–”

“Wait,” Grace said.

He stopped. “What?”

“I…” she hesitated. She wanted to ask him something. Anything. Keep his attention for a while. He’d, strictly speaking, done everything necessary to put her to bed, but she wanted something else. “Can I get a bottle of water?”

Pearce nodded. “Sure. I’ll go get that.”

He left her there, alone with her thoughts for a fleeting moment.

Even though he’d taken care of her, given her comforts he hadn’t needed to, this felt…wrong. He hadn’t teased, or put her through the ringer. It had to be his way of apologizing–he’d messed up, now he was giving her an easy time to compensate.

Maybe she had been too hard on him. Maybe she hadn’t. Either way, he definitely felt guilty enough.

Too guilty, even.

When he returned with her bottle, she accepted it, then caught his attention one more time. “Hey, Pearce,” she said, before he could leave the room.

“What?” he asked, looking back at her with an expression that seemed…flat. Not quite bored, but like he wasn’t totally in the room with her either.

“I’m sorry I didn’t wake you up.” She felt insincere saying it–she was liking the results, after all–but walking things back a step seemed like the high road to take. “I didn’t mean to ruin your work or make things this stressful for you.”

He looked at her for a moment, gaze distant.

(Why does he need to think about his reply this much?) Grace wondered. (He has to believe me. I’m really apologizing, mostly.)

After an eternity that lasted a good ten seconds, he said, “It’s okay, Grace.”

She exhaled, relieved. He wasn’t mad.

“I know you weren’t trying to be cruel.” He shrugged, turning to leave, flicking off her lights as he went. “You just wanted to win.”

Shutting the door, he left Grace alone without room to respond.

She didn’t get much sleep that night.

...

We're starting to get into the home stretch, so for the foreseeable future - until it's done - I'm going to be posting at least two chapters of this story a month, sometimes three.

We're up to Chapter 29 over in early access! So if you can't help yourself and want to jump ahead (or if you just want to help support the creation of this story and others like it) you can find me over here:

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[DannyAndBarb]

On 6/23/2023 at 10:59 PM, PeculiarChangeling said:

“I know you weren’t trying to be cruel.” He shrugged, turning to leave, flicking off her lights as he went. “You just wanted to win.”

HOLY! That is one gut wrenching line, very powerful. 

[PeculiarChangeling]

Chapter 27: A Realization in Three Courses

Breakfast time.

Grace sat on a kitchen stool, waiting patiently for Pearce to finish serving her breakfast, waiting to see if his lesson had sunk in.

He’d dressed her plainly enough–onesie, pants, diaper. Practical and straightforward, to the point that the onesie didn’t even have any screen printed slogans or childish designs. Grace didn’t know how to take that. The bet was still on, clearly, but he hadn’t tried to tease or push any humiliating buttons, he’d just followed the rules.

On the one hand, the straightforward outfit and prompt meal was a good sign–it meant he’d at least learned a bit about responsibility.

On the other, she struggled to interpret his tactics. This was too weak and easy to make her quit, not after she’d proven she could stick it out for weeks. This couldn’t be an attempt to win the bet.

That left one possibility–he thought she was still mad, and this was his way of apologizing. Let her have it easy for a couple days, let the bet lie low so she could calm down.

His interpretation was wrong, she didn’t need kid gloves, but it was reassuring that he’d chosen to be kind.

“What’s on the menu?” she asked, as he passed her a bottle of fresh coffee.

“Toaster waffles,” he replied, leaning back against the counter and waiting for the toaster to get finished.

“Nice,” she said, unsure what else to add to the brief conversation. The air between them felt awkward and she wanted to chat to fill the space, but couldn’t think of what to say.

The toaster did its typical jumpscare, popping loudly and without warning to indicate its contents were cooked, and Pearce slid the waffles out onto a plate. Butter and maple syrup got slathered on the breakfast, and he set it all down in front of Grace.

Dividing everything up with a fork, he scooped up a bite, raising it for Grace without a word.

She hesitated. Normally, he’d have something to say here–maybe a classic, ‘Here comes the airplane/train/automobile’, or something teasy, ‘This will help you grow up to be a big, strong adult!’, or a joke, ‘Open wide for Daddy Bezos!’. Now, he just held out the fork.

“Uh,” she said, before just opening her mouth and taking the bite.

While she chewed, Pearce prepared the next bite, moving efficiently to get the meal over with.

Grace got it. He was task oriented. “Have a lot of work on your plate today?” she asked between bites.

“Playing catch-up,” he confirmed.

Well, he was staying on task and handling his duties. She couldn’t complain about that. Taking the next bite, she worked her way through breakfast, stopping for the occasional sip of coffee.

He responded to questions and occasionally spoke, but otherwise stayed quiet and got the job done. Grace didn’t try to prod too much for conversation, though–if he had things to do, she didn’t want to slow him down.

When she finished up the syrupy meal, he put the dishes away, refilled another bottle with plain water, and set it on the kitchen table in front of her. That done, he popped two more waffles into the toaster.

Finally, he gave the front of her jeans a tentative squeeze to determine how wet she was, and shrugged. “You’re all good,” he said. “Fed, don’t need a change, you’ve got something to drink.”

“Thanks,” she said, caught off guard by how quick and non-invasive the check had been. “You’re sure I don’t need a change?”

He stopped, eyeing her. “That’s awfully close to asking for one, Grace. Please don’t do anything that’ll get you a time out.”

(Right.)

He was watching out for her, trying to straddle the line between obeying the rules and protecting her from unfair consequences. He didn’t want her to get in trouble for something that wasn’t her fault, not for a second time in as many days.

She half-smiled, but couldn’t quite bring herself to fully appreciate his gesture. “Thanks for the warning.”

“No problem.” Leaning against the counter, Pearce checked his phone, waiting on the toaster.

Grace still didn’t get up, at least not right away. The meal felt incomplete, somehow.

Noticing her continued presence, Pearce directed a look up at her. “You want some coffee?”

“Oh…yeah, sure,” she said, glancing at her water. Maybe that’s what was missing–coffee–but she somehow doubted it. Draining the rest of the pot into a new mug, he gave it to her.

The lack of attention couldn’t be blamed totally on how busy he was, not if he was scrolling through apps while waiting on his own breakfast. So, it was down to her first guess–that he just didn’t want to try and push her or be condescending if she still held on to any residual anger over his mistakes the day before.

A twang of guilt hit her. If he thought she was still mad, she had probably been a little too harsh on him, pushed too hard for the ‘obey the rules’ mindset.

With time, though, things would settle back into the way they had been. She just needed to make it clear that she’d gotten over it, that an occasional quip would be fine, she wouldn’t take it the wrong way–as long as he kept on top of his responsibilities and didn’t abandon her again. Improving and showing that he’d listened would be a better apology than any words could be.

(It’s not that I miss being teased,) she told herself. (It’s just that I don’t want him to feel like he shouldn’t talk to me. That’s all.)

For the time being, she had her own work to do, but she’d try and get him to ease up soon.

…

Lunch time.

Same clothes, same stool, fresh diaper. Macaroni bubbled on the stovetop, powdered cheese sauce at the ready. All of Grace’s physical needs were either taken care of, or would be tended too imminently.

Pearce was on his phone.

“Anything important going on?” she asked, trying to get him to engage.

“Not really,” he said. “Just taking a break to check some stuff.”

“Gotcha.” Grace drummed her fingers on the table, thinking what to say, trying not to be too overt.

Ultimately, she decided not to say anything. If she wanted to get Pearce to lighten up, she didn’t need words, just a few well placed actions.

The timer for the macaroni beeped, and with a little bit of work–draining, mixing, stirring, and dumping into two bowls–Pearce had it ready to eat.

Pearce set aside his own food for a moment, raised the mac n cheese spoon, and held it there. Again no quip, no commentary, just a spoonful of food hovering in front of her lips.

Grace didn’t open up. (Let’s see what he thinks of this.)

After a few seconds, Pearce lowered the spoon. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s too hot,” she said, feigning protest. “It’s going to burn my mouth.” She almost added, ‘Can you blow on it for me?’, but decided that’d be too on the nose. He’d get the idea, he wasn’t stupid.

“Okay,” Pearce said, setting the spoon down in the bowl.

Sliding it off to the side, he walked around the table, sat down, and started working on his own food. His first bite had him puffing a bit, and after that he blew on his own spoon, cooling off the fresh pasta just a bit, but Grace didn’t get that treatment.

“Hey,” she said. “What happened to my lunch?”

He looked up at her flatly, speaking in an, ‘isn’t-it-obvious?’ deadpan. “It’s cooling down. I’ll feed it to you in a minute.”

She frowned to one side. “You always feed me first.”

“Mhmm,” he said. “Well. Not today, yours is too hot.”

He blew on another spoonful, chewing slowly.

(Yours is just as hot as mine,) she fumed, (But when you eat it, you do something about it.)

Still, this offered an opportunity. Crossing her arms in front of her chest, Grace stuck out her lower lip a little, framing her face in a very clear pout. A childish response to being told her lunch would come five minutes later. She just hoped it was childish enough that Pearce would take the bait and engage a little.

He had eyes only for his macaroni. He didn’t even look at her.

“Pearce,” she said. “I’m–I’m hungie.”

The affectation she threw on was a last minute addition. Maybe it was too much, but he wasn’t acknowledging her, she needed to do something.

He sighed, setting down his spoon. “Okay, fine. You can eat first”

Standing up, he walked around to her bowl, scooping it up. She expected a loaded spoon, a long puff of air from Pearce’s mouth to cool it off, and maybe, if she was lucky, the extra step would get him back to his usual self and he’d even throw in a joke before helping her eat it.

Instead, he opened the fridge door and searched around until he found a tub of sour cream. Tossing a dollop onto the noodles, he stirred it in and gave a tentative taste.

“There,” he said. “That’s cool enough.” Raising the spoon, he held it in front of her mouth.

Grace paused, going slightly cross-eyed as she looked at the food. She couldn’t really complain again, not without coming up with something new, and that would give her game away.

“I don’t like sour cream,” she said.

Pearce shrugged. “It’s food. You said you were ‘hungie’. Do you want this, or do you want to wait for something else to cook?”

Grace slumped back a little, though the stool didn’t leave much room for a dramatic recline. This was a fight she wouldn’t be winning with her current tactics. She opened her mouth, sullenly accepting the mac n cheese without another word.

She’d try again later.

…

Dinner time.

Same Grace. Same Pearce. New plan.

Being coy wasn’t working, and she wasn’t about to try patience. If Grace wanted the old Pearce back–or, at least, some of the old Pearce, with more of his new discipline–she needed to be direct.

So, while her babysitter took a formerly-frozen pizza out of the oven and slid it onto a cutting board, she said, “Can we talk about yesterday?”

He looked back at her, nodding. “Sure. What about it?”

“I just…” she paused, trying to decide which direction to take the conversation. “I appreciate that you’re doing a lot to follow the rules and take care of me today,” she said, “but I feel like you’re trying so hard to be perfect that it’s making you stressed.”

“It’s not,” he said, returning his attention to the pizza. “I made a checklist on my phone, there’s an app with reminders. I’m not stressed about it at all, I’m getting everything done.”

“Oh,” Grace re-evaluated the time he’d spent on his phone. He hadn’t been ignoring her, he’d been thorough. “Okay. That’s good.”

Rolling a pizza cutter across their dinner, he divided it up into eight even pieces and moved half onto a plate, then cut the remaining half into much smaller squares.

Grace tried again. “You just seem really reserved today, and I’d hate for you to be so worried about all your responsibilities that you can’t relax at all.”

He paused for a moment, then finished his last cut and set aside the pizza cutter. “That’s the point, isn’t it?”

She frowned. “What?”

Turning to look at her, Pearce said, “I’m not supposed to relax. I’m babysitting. I can’t let my guard down, or I’ll miss something, and the baby will get hurt. You wanted to prove that I relax too much, that I’m not responsible enough to handle anything important, and now you’re asking me to be careless.”

“Pearce, that’s not what I’m saying.” She stared at him, trying to communicate what she wanted without finding the words she needed.

He looked her squarely in the eyes. “Then what are you saying?”

(I want you to smile, and laugh, and tell me I’m being a good baby again,) she thought.

There were things she couldn’t be direct about, not even to herself. She shoved that thought away and shook her head. “Never mind. Do you want to watch a movie or something tonight?”

“No thanks,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ve been working all day, I want to do something fun.”

(Oh.)

(He–)

(Oh.)

Grace blinked, trying not to let the hurt register.

Pearce no longer categorized ‘Spending time with Grace’ as ‘Something fun.’

That’s why he’d been distant. Not because he was stressed, not because he was busy, not because he was placating her mood. Because, however much he’d deserved a bit of education, Grace’s lesson the day before had changed his outlook on her completely.

Pearce misread her face. “Don’t worry, I’ll still be checking on you every hour or so. You’re not going to be totally ignored and left to fend for yourself.”

“Right.” Grace fumbled for words, speaking almost as an afterthought as she processed what Pearce was communicating. “Not ignored. That’s good.”

He kept his promise.

After dinner was over, he checked on her. Poking his head in her door, squeezing her diaper just enough to determine she didn’t yet need a change, refilling her bottle as needed.

And not a single thing above and beyond that. He barely spoke to her, moving quickly and efficiently to get back to…whatever else it was he was doing on his own.

Grace didn’t feel ignored that night.

She felt alone.

...

For the remainder of The Baby Bet, I'll be posting three chapters a month - Of course, you can still jump ahead if you go read on Patreon instead! All my early access subscribers are on Chapter 30, plus my full access subscribers get to read, 'The Baby Book,' a bit of mean, unfair-ending magical transformation fiction I posted recently just for them! 

Financial support is never demanded, (in fact, you're welcome to skip these post-chapter blurbs too, nobody's making you read this ) but it's always appreciated and helps enable me to write as much as I do, as well as I do! 

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[Bluebird67]

I wish I could give two reactions: I really like this story, but I feel Grace deserves some sympathy here, so I’m giving a sad face, not because I’m sad, but because she is.

[randominterestedperson]

Damn son, that's one hell of a good story. I hope Grace eventually learns her lesson.