Mother Knows Best

[Personalias]

The Bambi Motel wasn’t the ideal place for a hookup.  Across the street from an X-Mart and adjacent to an IHOP and an apartment complex filled with people too poor to afford moving out, the Bambi Motel was no Hilton.  Shit, it wasn’t even a Days Inn.  The neon fawn that resembled (but was legally distinct from) a certain animated adaptation of a public domain work did nothing to make the place feel family friendly or even safe.  The declaration that HBO was available in all rooms likely didn’t cause weary travelers on vacation to give the dump a second glance.  The Bambi Motel wasn’t the ideal place for a hookup, but it did the trick.

Cash was accepted, I.D. wasn’t checked, and no safety deposit was required.  The lady behind the service counter didn’t judge the young couple.  She didn’t condone what they were doing either.  She just didn’t give a damn.  They could have been newlyweds eloping, a John and his hooker or a kidnapper and victim.  As long as they ponied up the seventy-five dollars, Room 1017 right next to the ice machine was all theirs until noon the next morning.

Mark and Robin were none of those things.  They were two dumb kids looking for privacy.  Freshmen in college, they barely knew who Elvis was beyond a few bad impressions; and they thought Bob Seager was that tall guy from Full House.  They weren’t in love, but they were young and restless and bored. They were just working on their night moves.

Robin’s roommates had forbidden her from bringing another guy into their dorm room, effectively ‘sexiling’ her.  Mark lived at home to avoid lodging costs.  Mom stayed up late and even if Robin did the old school walk of shame, Mom would somehow know.  She always knew.

That was the problem with growing up in a college town; you never really got to grow up.  It was great for thirty and forty year olds that wanted to be hip, but for Mark it just meant a state of perpetual arrested development.

It wasn’t even nine o’clock when Mark locked the door behind him.  Good plenty of time.  The plan was they split the hotel room, go a couple rounds, Mark would get to shower, and Robin would get the room.  Mark was still grown enough to get home late as long as he was in his bed before dawn and out of it by breakfast.  That wasn’t a formal deal with his mother as much as it was an unspoken understanding between them, (or so he thought)

Robin texted her roommates saying she was staying over at a friend’s place tonight out of politeness, more than anything.  She was pretty sure that they knew what that meant.  Another silent understanding between.  They did the same thing whenever they were hooking up with someone. 

She didn’t have class tomorrow, and while the Bambi wasn’t glamorous, at least she didn’t have to hide in a closet if she found out too late that her latest conquest had a girlfriend (or a boyfriend) that he hadn’t told her about.  Plus there was an IHOP right next door if she felt like breakfast.  Bonus.

They’d met at the Theta Kappa Pi rush party.  It was boring. They’d flirted a bit. He was cute.  She was already drunk.  He’d suggested they get out of here and they’d negotiated.  Things were good.  Good enough.

Clothes weren’t completely off by the time they started kissing, her pushing him on the bed and straddling him.  Him reaching up and feeling up her breasts before sliding his hands down into her pants.  Big boy wanted to get right to it.  Based on what she felt through his pants, she didn’t object to that idea.

She stood up and unbuttoned his pants for him, ripping them off and dropping them on the bed.  He stepped out of his boxer briefs and kissed her from the nape of her neck down to her belly button, sliding her pants down to her ankles.  Robin purred as he did so.

Robin stepped out of the puddle of clothing she’d left on the floor and went for her little purse. “Hold on,” she said, digging through her bag.

“Oh it’s cool,” Mark said. He started rooting around in his pants pockets.  “I’ve got condoms…somewhere.”  He sounded a bit disappointed.  She scoffed to herself.  Boys.

Robin got to her condoms first.  “I’ve got a latex allergy,” she said.  “I don’t want to get a rash after this.”

Mark dropped his pants out of his hand.   “Oh…oh yeah,”  He said.  “Cool.”

Robin looked at his still erect member.  Not bad.  Not as big as she thought it’d be, but she could work with it.  With a gentle push she guided him back down to the bed.  He reached out for the condom.  “I’ll put it on.”

“Don’t worry,” she whispered.  “I’ll put it on for you.”  She opened the packet one handed, ripping it open with her teeth.  It was a little trick she’d learned from her older brother, but she’d keep that her secret.  She used her other hand to grab him and fluff him up a bit, eliciting low moans as she worked the shaft and he closed his eyes.  Even when drunk and horny, foreplay was important.

Quickly she unrolled the condom and climbed on top of him.   Mark started thrusting immediately as soon as he felt himself enter her.  “Ooooooh yeah,” he moaned.  “Oh yeah.” 

“You like that, baby?” she whispered, her hands on his chest as he started to work his hips.  He didn’t reply but just gave an extra little moan and a hard thrust beneath her.  Oh yeah.  “Not too fast,” she whispered.  “I wanna ride a little longer than eight seconds, cowboy.”

Mark opened his eyes and grinned a bit.  She was even hotter naked.  “You’re even hotter naked,” he said.  (Okay, so Mark wasn’t exactly a poet.  Wit was for before penetration.)

“Shhhhh,” Robin told him.   “Don’t talk unless you want me to do something.  Let’s just enjoy the feelings.”

Mark nodded and kept thrusting.  He started running his hands over her instead, enjoying the softness of her skin and the curves of her body.

BUM-BUM-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM!

The Imperial March started playing from Mark’s cell phone.  Mark’s eyes went wide.  “I gotta get that!”

Robin leaned forward and kissed him on the forehead, working down to his lips.  “Ignore it,” she told him.  “Let it go to voicemail.”  Already the boy was losing his rhythm.

BUM-BUM-BUM, BUM-buh-bum, BUM-buh-bum.

“It’s my mom,” he said.  “I gotta pick up!”

Robin gnashed her teeth.  He was losing it.  He was starting to push rope.  She leaned forward “I’m the only person you’re gonna call Mommy tonight, big boy.”  That did something.  He pulled her in close to a full open mouth kiss, his eyes closed.

Either this guy had issues, or she’d found a new secret weapon.  Either way, her win condition had been met, so Robin was satisfied (or getting there).

The ringtone stopped and fun continued….for about two minutes.

BUM-BUM-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM! BUM-BUM-BUM, BUM-buh-bum, BUM-buh-bum.

Robin groaned. “Again?!”  The cute boy she’d met looked incredibly sheepish.  That’s when Robin decided she wouldn’t be giving him her number after this.  He was a good lay so far, but not good enough to deal with Mama’s Boy Syndrome.

“Hold on, let me turn it off…”  Mark tried to get out from under her.

Robin grinned.  A new game perhaps.  “No turning off,” she coaxed.  She grinded a little harder, “Just ignore her.  Focus on me.”  She ran her fingers through his short brown hair.    “Can you do that?  Just block out the world and think about me?”

He nodded.  “Uh-huh. Yes ma’am.” 

“Good.”

BUM-BUM-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM!

His eyes darted, and she kissed him and whispered dirty things in his ear until his eyes closed.

BUM-BUM-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM, BUM-buh-BUM!

“Moan for me, baby.” 

He did.  Then she did.  They started building up a rhythm, low and slow like waves on the ocean. With each repeat of Darth Vader’s theme, the pace picked up and the groaning and moaning got a little louder.  By the seventh time, the gentle laps of waves had become choppy waters in a hurricane.

He was bucking and she was riding him out.  “That’s right!” Robin screamed.  Faster Mark!!  Faster!”

Mark was beyond talking.  He just went faster.

She was close.  So close!  Maybe he was worth dating, despite his mom.  Maybe Mama’s boys made good boyfriends (or at least fuck buddies) after you cut the apron strings.  “Say my name!” she told him.  “Say my name.”

Mark stopped pumping. “Mommy?”  

“Mommy?”  Robin frowned.  “What do you mean ‘Mommy’?”  Then she remembered the bit of dirty talk she’d said earlier.  Oh fuck.  Did this boy have iss-?

An iron grip was on her shoulder before she could finish the thought.  “Get off my baby boy you little hussy!” The voice was low and commanding.  Before she could react, Robin felt herself flying through the air, only stopping when she hit the nearest wall.  She slid to the floor with a groan. 

When the stars had cleared from Robin’s eyes she realized that they weren’t alone.  A middle aged woman about her height, wearing a dark blue dress and hot red heels stood over Mark, her posture was domineering.  Her hands on her hips and a foot tapping impatiently, she reminded Robin of old Kindergarten teacher; a woman that wore pearls like June cleaver every day, and tolerated no sass from naughty children.

Right now,  she was staring down her son.  Mark looked embarrassed and incredulous, but not for the reasons he should be.  He looked like a kid that had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar instead of a guy getting laid.

Speaking of ‘laid’, Mark laid there naked on the bed, the only thing covering him was the condom  “Mom!” he shrieked.  He took a gulp.  “How’d you get in here?”

His mother, her hair the same color as his, crossed her arms.  “I can come into your room anytime I want to.  I’m your mother, remember?”

Robin picked herself off the floor, hunching over and trying to look small even as this stranger’s back was turned to her.  Mark, she saw, was neither moving nor covering himself in front of his Mom.  He didn’t look comfortable, per say, but for a grown ass man he didn’t look nearly uncomfortable enough considering the situation.  Robin looked back at the door.  The latch was still bolted.  How the hell had his mom gotten here? 

“This is a hotel room, though.” Mark said.  He sounded like a whining toddler.  “It doesn’t count.”

“You paid for it using your money, didn’t you?” She said.  “It’s yours until checkout.”

Robin’s hookup slapped the mattress.  “Crud. You’re right.”  He sat up and bowed his head.

“Of course I’m right,” his mother said.  “What do I always say?”

Mark deflated.  Like a child reciting his lessons, he said  “Mother Always Knows Best.”

“That’s right sweetie.”

Robin had seen enough for her liking.  Quietly she picked up her pants and pulled them up her legs.  Fuck this noise.  This was not her scene.  

“Where do you think you’re going, young lady?”  The woman’s gaze was on Robin now.  Robin froze, filled with a preternatural dread.

“Out,” Robin said.  “Whatever you two have going on is none of my business.”  She’d managed to deliver the line with a fairly even tone in her voice.  She’d still frozen when directly addressed, however.  Her pants were only pulled up past her knees and could go either way at this point.

“If you’re having sex with my little boy it most certainly is your business.”

“Mom!” Mark whined.  “Stop it!  You’re embarrassing me!”

His mom looked at him.  “Hush baby.  Just suck your thumb for a bit.”  Robin watched as he opened his mouth and started doing just that.  

Oh fuck no!  This was all kinds of messed up!  What weird ass family drama had she gotten herself into?

Robin still hadn’t moved, neither had her pants.  Mark’s mother pointed to a spot on the bed next to him.  “You just waddle your sassy little butt over here, young lady.”

Robin frowned…and obeyed.  It was like her feet had a mind all their own.  The mattress creaked beneath her as she settled down on it.  Robin didn’t know what to say.  She couldn’t explain what was happening, so instead she said nothing.

The older woman regarded her for a moment.  “How long have you been seeing my son behind my back?“  Robin said nothing.  He wasn’t giving this…this…whatever she was the satisfaction.  “I’m a mother.  A grown-up.  And I just caught you on top of my baby boy.  You will answer me little lady.”

“We just met tonight!”  Robin hadn’t meant to say those words but they came out all the same.  As if in defeat, her pants finally gave up the ghost and slid back down to her ankles.  Robin finally had enough sense to cover her breasts.

The woman turned her head to Mark.  “Marcus Alexander Caldwell,” she said.  “Do you mean to tell me that this is a one night stand?”

“Mmmhmmm…” Mark nodded, thumb still in his mouth.  “I faw mehbuh beh cuh go aw eh deh if thoonuyth wenth-”

“Take your thumb out of your mouth, sweetie.”

He did. “I thought maybe we could go on a date if tonight went…”  He shrugged sheepishly and looked at Robin.  “If it went well enough.”

“I have to meet any girl or boy before you stick your penis inside them.  How many times have I told you?”  The dude’s mom sounded like she was lecturing him on playing ball in the house.

Mark bowed his head.  “A couple.”  He started sucking his thumb again.

“Well we’ve met,”  Robin sneered.  “Can you leave now? Or can I?”

She felt the full weight of the witch’s gaze fall on her.  A witch.  That’s what she was; some kind of witch.   “What’s your name?”  Robin shut her mouth.  Fuck this.  Then the witch rephrased.  “Tell me your name, little girl.”

“Robin Murphy.”  The words came out immediately.  

“Middle name, too.”

“Robin April Murphy.”

“What were your intentions with my little boy?”  Robin shut her mouth.  “You’re going to answer all of my questions.  What were your intentions with my little boy?”

Robin’s mouth went on auto pilot.  “To have sex with him…”

“Is that it?”

Robin was able to shut her mouth, this time, but only because her head nodded up and down for her.  She started to tremble.  What was this power?

The woman in control looked down at Mark.  “This is why you didn’t answer my phone calls?”
Mark mumbled something around his thumb, but he was not required to repeat himself.  The answer was obvious.

“What were you calling for anyway?” Robin asked. 

“Just checking up on him.”  She walked over and snatched Robin’s purse from off the single desk in the room.  Robin didn’t dare speak up for fear of being silenced.  “I bet you think you’re a grown-woman,”  she said.  “A big girl?”

“I am a big girl,” Robin answered.  She had to answer.  She couldn’t help it.  She grunted and forced herself to rephrase.  “I’m a grown woman.  Now get out of my purse.”  Hastily she tacked on,  “Please…”

Mark’s mom didn’t look up from the purse.  “If you’re so big, why does your diaper bag have these Pull-Ups in them?”

“Diaper bag?”  Robin’s voice caught in her throat at what she did next.  Her sheik tiny little leather purse- good for holding a wallet, a compact mirror, her phone, non-latex condoms and little else- ballooned outward.  Leather turned into glazed and coated canvas; durable and waterproof.  Simple brown turned a tacky pastel pink with smiling hippos stitched on.  “That’s’ not mine!” Inwardly, Robin felt as if she were lying, accusing the grass of being blue or the sky being green.

“Uh..uh..uh…” Mark gave out a warning mumble. 

Too late.  His mother spun the bag around.  “Then why does it have your name on it?”  Sure enough, the back of the bag had smiling hippos stitched in, but the front had her name.  

Robin started stuttering. “That…can’t…be…”  She was hypnotized.  She was hallucinating.  The ringtone on Mark’s phone had some kind of subliminal hypnotic message that made people super open to suggestion.  And it worked after only seven calls?  Over moans and grunts and other sex noises?   For whatever reason that sounded even crazier than concepts ‘magic’ and ‘witch’.

Nope.  This was magic.  Plain and simple.  No further explanation necessary.

Mark’s mother fished a condom out of what used to be Robin’s purse.  “Thought a thin little would be enough protection, did you?” Robin nodded again.  She couldn’t help it.  That’s what condoms were for.  Protection. The condom between the older lady’s fingers warped and expanded and twisted until it was a giant Pull-Up, designed for a toddler but sized for a woman.

Robin gasped.  “The fuck?”  More involuntary words, though at least this time they felt like they belonged to her.

“I don’t think so, Little Miss Robin.”  Mark’s mom said.  “You’re not ready for complicated things like love or dating or sex.  You’re not even ready for the big girl potty yet.”

The boy opened his mouth wide and screamed “Mommy! No!”

His warning came too late.  Robin felt a distinct warmth between her legs, an almost hissing sound reached her ears as her bladder let loose and sprayed out onto the bedsheets and further out onto the carpet.  “Wha?”  The girl reached back and snatched a pillow.  Still peeing she stuffed it between her legs.

“Mommy,” Mark pouted.  “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I didn’t do anything,” his mother replied.  “She’s just not potty trained.  Isn’t that right?”

“Yes ma’am.”  Both college students said in unison.  It was not voluntary in the least.  But Mark didn’t seem to mind as much; or rather, he seemed used to it.  Robin? Not so much.

Mark’s mother didn’t seem to notice their discomfort, or more than likely, didn’t care.  “In fact, I’m betting your mommy didn’t buy these for you.”   She walked over and wagged the Pull-Up in Robin’s face.

“No ma’am.”  It was such a weird, loaded question.  Why would her mother have given her condoms?  Of course, all of her condoms were now Pull-Ups…but her mother hadn’t bought her those either.

The older woman clicked her tongue.  “Pretending to be bigger than you really are.  That explains the extra diaper on the floor….”  She stepped out of Robin’s line of sight just in time for the girl to watch her discarded panties turn into a giant pair of Luvs.  Robin grimaced when she caught sight of how yellow the inside was.  She’d been drunk and wet when they’d stumbled into the hotel room, but not that kind of wet.

Mark stared down at where his boxer briefs used to be.  Robin followed his gaze and saw a discarded diaper with baby Bert and Ernie playing on it, the Pampers logo near the top.  He sulked.  “I don’t even get Pull-Ups,” he whispered.

The woman shouldered the diaper bag.  “We’re going home,” she said.  “Right now.  All of us.”

“Mommy!”  Mark stood up.  “I don’t wanna!”

“Not another word out of you until we’re home and you’re properly dressed,” the witch said.  “You’ll feel so much better when you’re in a fresh diaper and jammies.”  

Mark bowed his head.  “Yes ma’am.”

Robin rose to her feet and dropped the piss soaked pillow. “Please,” she begged.  “I’m sorry.  I didn’t know who you were or who he was.  You can leave.  You can take him.  But I don’t wanna leave!  I won’t tell anyone, I promise!  I’ll be good! I’ll be good!”  It wasn’t the most convincing argument, but it was all she had.  How does an undeclared freshman prepare herself for witchcraft?  “Please don’t make me act like a baby anymore!”

“But Robin, honey,” the wicked woman smiled.  “You are a baby.”  She held out her hand. “Now be a good one and come along.”  Robin reached out and took.  Internally she was screaming, but she was powerless to resist the witch’s suggestions and commands.

Mark couldn’t speak, but he could whine and mewl.  He started to stomp his feet, his face scrunching up in what signaled to be an epic temper tantrum.  

“Unless you want a spanking when we get home,” his mommy warned, “you should quiet down.  Hold Robin’s hand.  You wanted her more than me, anyways.”  Robin was now in the middle between either two crazy people who had infected her with madness, or a witch and her constant victim, (though the two concepts weren’t mutually exclusive).  “We’re going home right away.”

The witch opened up the door out into the Bambi Motel parking lot.  Hand in hand, the three people- two of them naked-walked out into the night.  As Robin crossed the threshold the world went black for just longer than a blink; and instead of cold concrete, bare feet found purchase on warm hardwood. 

She heard the sound of a front door clicking closed behind her.  “We’re home,” Mark’s mother announced.  Robin quietly wished she were an owl so that she could twist her head around all at once.  It was a nice enough house; not what she would think a witch’s house would look like.  Rather plain all told.  “Don’t let go,” Robin was reminded.  Her hand clutched their captor’s even more tightly.

It was nice.  That was it.  Just nice.  Not mysterious, or dingey, or creepy, or dark.  Hard wood floors changed to fluffy soft carpet after passing the initial entryway.  They passed a kitchen and into a living room with a T.V. and a fireplace.  No cauldrons.  No crystal balls.  No stairs either.  This wasn’t even a two story.  So normal as to be boring.

“Here we are,” Mark’s mother said. Crossing into the bedroom, Robin caught the briefest glimpse of a normal college kid’s bedroom: Single bed, unmade; a computer work desk; some trophies and awards from childhood; a small T.V. and PS4.  Completely typical.  

Completely typical, that is until the witch added, “Right in the nursery”.   Wooden bars sprung like a trap from the bed, and bed posts elongated and raised the mattress into the air, even as the rail dropped down to the ground.  Plain navy blue sheets got several shades lighter and happy clouds.

From underneath the bed turned crib, a bottle of lotion and a box of tissues hopped up on a perfectly normal bureau, before becoming baby powder and wipes respectively.  Like a disease, the transformation spread as the wooden furniture stretched and warped, the front of its drawers reinforcing the sides and the legs, and creating a rim around the top.  The clothes inside were visible for a second before transforming; a split-second reminder of everything that was being taken away.  T-shirts turned into onesies, buttons popped along inseams of pants and shorts, and elastic bands ruffled into waistlines.  Underwear, bulged and fluffed until only diapers were on the new changing table’s top shelf.  Socks, oddly enough, remained unmolested.

A metal wastebasket elongated and turned plastic, becoming a diaper pail while the television,  computer, and video games all melted into a pile of Tonka Trucks, building blocks and stuffed animals.  The desk hunched over and squatted down into a toy box.  ‘MARK’S TOYS’ the rainbow stenciling indicated. 

In the space of thirty seconds, Robin had watched an entire room transform into a nursery sized for a giant baby and she was the only one remotely impressed.   Mark looked like a petulant child about to be put in time out.  “Not again…” he mumbled.

“What was that?”  his mother turned to him.  Standing up, in heels, she was taller than them, but only slightly.

“Nothing Mommy.”

“Right.  Up we go.”  She scooped the grown man up in his arms.  Robin made a break for it and bolted for the hallway.  Said bolt lasted not quite two steps.  “You wait your turn, Robin.”  Her feet froze. “I’ll have you ready for bed as soon as I’m done with Marky.”

Mark sighed as he was placed on top of the changing table.  He crossed his arms and huffed as his mom rolled the condom back off his penis and threw it into the diaper pail.  He hadn’t even gotten to finish in it this time.  “Don’t fuss,” Mom said as she got out a fresh diaper for him.  “You knew this could happen the second you decided not to answer Mommy’s phone call.”  It was true.  He did.  Was it worth it?

He rolled his head and eyes back so he could so he could glimpse Robin, still frozen.  Maybe.  Maybe it was.  She was scowling at him.  She must not be used to getting caught.  Not all Mommies were as sharp as Mark’s.  

The college student lifted his head and watched as a fresh diaper was slid under him.  He might be in these for a while if he didn’t play his cards right.  He let out a giggle, not quite involuntarily, as baby powder was dusted on him.  Mommy smiled at that.  “Awww, that’s Mommy’s little boy.”  She pulled the diaper up between his legs and fastened on the velcro tapes. The diaper fit perfectly of course.  They always did.  

Mommy took out a pair of jammies.  The kind that covered his hands and feet.  The kind that made it hard (but not impossible) to so much as masturbate.  She guided him into it and snapped up the buttons and zippers in the back.  “Thank you, Mommy,” he said.

“You’re very welcome, Marky.”  She pulled the hoodie up over his head and a long ear flopped down into his vision.  “I thought bunny jammies would be appropriate, given what I caught you little rascals doing.”

The blush from Mark’s face contrasted with the powder blue of the bunny costume.  “Yes ma’am.”  She carried him over to his crib and placed him in it, clipping a pacifier to his jammies before raising the rails up for him.  

“Mark, snap out of it!” Robin called.  “She’s magicking you!  Magicking us!”

Mommy just walked over to her and scooped her up.  “Magic?  What an imagination!”  Mark knew better than to object.  He just sucked on his pacifier and watched as Mommy put another would-be girlfriend in her place.  Maybe if this one was smart, they’d get to share a crib.  That was kind of like sex.

“It is magic!” Robin yelled at the witch as she was laid on the changing table. 

“Stop squirming, baby.”  Robin found herself paralyzed on the mat, her limbs made of lead. The woman reached under the changing table, a magician reaching for a dove.  “You’re a little littler than Mark,” she said.  “Good thing I’ve still got some diapers in your size for when Mark’s cousins visit over the summer.”  The Pampers she took out was perfect, because of course it was.  It had all the designs of the well known baby diaper brand but was easily large enough to fit an adult body with Robin’s exact specifications.  

“Magic,” Robin said.  She tried to keep the hint of awe out of her voice and turned her face into a scowl of accusation.  “You’re a witch!” If she could have spit in the woman’s face right then and there she would have.  “A witch!”

The witch waited to reply until after she’d finished diapering the girl.  If the desired effect was to make Robin feel even smaller and more helpless, it was having the desired effect.  “I’m not a witch,” she said.  “Just a mother.  You’ll understand when you’re a mother, too.”

“Mothers don’t kidnap people.”  She looked at Mark for some kind of support.  Dude had gone full baby and was just sucking on his pacifier.

Mark’s mother laughed.  “I’m not kidnapping you. It would have been terribly irresponsible to abandon a cute baby girl all alone by herself.”  She reached out and pinched Robin’s cheeks.  “Even if she was humping my son.”  Inside, fury was beginning to overtake Robin’s looming sense of panic.  She was simultaneously being infantilized and slut shamed.  “I’m just looking after you until your parents show up or until you’re ready to be a big girl.”  

“I am a big girl!”  Robin winced as soon as she’d said that.  ‘Real’ big girls didn’t say such things insisting they were such.  “Magic!  It’s magic!”  Soon another set of bunny pajamas was in the woman’s hands, this one pink.  “Just like those pajamas and this..this…”  She cocked her head towards the crinkly padding wrapped around her butt, too overwhelmed to say ‘diaper’.  “It’s magic!” 

“It’s not magic,” the witch said.  “It’s just a mommy being prepared.”

“You just transformed this room into a nursery!”

“Transformed is such a silly word for redecorating.  I suppose it must look like magic to little girls like you.”  As the woman said it, Robin could practically feel her mind reorganizing and justifying things to itself against what her own senses had logged.  Her purse had always been a diaper bag that she’d just been using as a purse to feel bigger since she could carry it all by herself.  Her own Mommy had always said she was a good little helper and let her carry the diaper bag as soon as she was old enough to walk.  Her condoms hadn’t been transformed into giant Pull-Ups, she’d just misunderstood what the grown-up commercials meant by ‘protection’ and she’d started calling her Pull-Ups ‘condoms’.  The latex thing was something she’d heard her Mommy talking about, and she’d parroted it when she found out that her training pants also lacked latex.  

These were all lies, fabrications of an overactive and influenced imagination but it was getting harder and harder to remember which was which.  Was her mind getting foggier or clearer?  Was her adult self starting to go to sleep or was it her baby self just waking up and remembering that it dreamed of growing up.

Fudge if she knew.

Arms and legs still limp, Robin had no choice but to let herself be dressed in the bunny pajamas while she weakly argued her case. “You teleported us out of the hotel and into your house!”

“Teleported?” the older woman chuckled.  “Is that what you call a car ride?  Such an imagination.”

“What would you call it?”  She tried to keep her tone fierce, or at least indignant as she was riding on the woman’s hip.  

The woman ignored her.  “Good thing I keep a spare crib in the closet.”  A pink version of  Mark’s bed came rocketing out of the closet, arranging itself catty corner to the babied boy.  She dumped Robin in the crib and attached a pacifier clip to her jammies.  “I’d call it a car ride.”

Robin gripped the bars of her new prison.  “Car ride?!  That was instantaneous!”

“Babies can’t tell time,”  Mark’s mother assured her.  “Look at that clock on the wall.  What time is it?”  

Robin squinted at the analog clock.  The numbers looked like complete squiggles.  There weren’t even hands on the face as far as she could tell.  Either she needed glasses or…”I can’t tell time.”

“So you don’t really know how long we’ve been together, do you?”  Robin slunk back down.  “Answer me.”

“No ma’am.”  

“Nuh muh,” Mark echoed from behind his pacifier.

The two big babies held captive in their own cribs, Mark’s mommy went over to the light switch.  “You two have had a big night.  You can stay up for five more minutes after I’ve turned off the light, but that’s it.”

“Yeph Mummy,” Mark said from behind his pacifier.

The lights went out, and the two were left in their cribs with only the soft glow of a night life.

“Mark!” Robin whispered.  “What the fudge?”

Mark popped his pacifier out.  This sucked.  Time to smooth things over. “Yeah…sorry about this.”  He had the good sense to sound embarrassed.  “Sometimes my mom just isn’t ready for me to grow up.  Y’know?  Mom’s right?”

“No,” Robin whispered, more afraid than annoyed.  “This is not normal, Mark.  Normal parents don’t put their grown sons and their…their…dates into diapers and lock them in cribs.”

Mark frowned.  “They don’t?”

“No!”  She rattled the bars for emphasis.  “This. Is. Not. Normal.”

“Your Mommy never turned you back into a baby?” Mark asked.  He felt his bladder burst unexpectedly and flooded the front of his nighttime diaper.  Bummer.  There was the slightest chance he might leak by the time his mom came and woke them up.

“No!”

Mark tried to figure this out:  Last year he’d spent the better part of a report card period as a baby until he brought his grades up.  Thank goodness all those shapes worksheets and alphabet puzzles his teachers kept giving him turned into calculus and biology tests when Mommy let him grow back up.  He kind of missed the toys on his desk/highchair hybrid, he had to admit to himself.  Though it was good that he didn’t have to cross the graduation stage in a walker and a onesie.

“I’m an only child,” Mark offered.  “Do you have any siblings?  Another baby of the family?”

Robin looked insulted “What?  No!  That’s not how it works!  That’s not how any of this works!”

“It’s how it works here,” Mark told her.  “Mommy knows best and whatever she says, goes.”

Robin let out a gasp and started pawing at her crotch.  “Oh my God! I’m peeing!”  She was definitely new to this.  Weird. 

 “You get used to not being potty trained,” Mark told her.  He let out a yawn.  Robin grabbed her stomach and let out a groan.  “If you’re gonna make boom booms, do your best to hold it in.  We’ve got less than five minutes.”

“Five minutes till what?” Now she was yawning.

“Till we fall asleep,” Mark told her.  “Mommy said so.”

Their eyelids were starting to droop.  Robin scrunched her face up.  “If I go to sleep, does that mean I’ll be able to…hold it in?”  She patted her bottom, holding it.

Mark shook his head.  “Nuh-uh.  But you’ll be asleep when it happens.  So there’s that.”

Robin wanted to vomit.  “Gross.”

Mark shrugged.  “It’s kinda icky.  Better than it happening while you’re awake.  Mommy won’t change us until tomorrow.”  He yawned and started grunting.  The alcohol had irritated his stomach.  Darn it.  So much for following his own advice.  “Does your Mommy still change you in the middle of the night?” 

“My Mommy doesn’t change me.  I’m in Pull-Ups.”  Robin growled at herself.  “I mean I’m potty trained.”  Another growl.  Why wouldn’t the words come?  “I mean I’m a grown-up.  An adult!”  She was starting to feel wobbly.  Time to lay down.  She rolled over onto her back and stared up the ceiling so she didn’t have to look at Mark.  “I went to college to get away from my parents and be more independent.”

“Where’d you grow up the first time?”  Mark asked.  Robin ignored it.  “Robin?  Robin?  Robin?  Robin.  You asleep?  Robin?”  This was her fault for wanting to ride strange.  She’d just never expected this kind of strange.

Robin huffed.  “California.”

“Oh,” Mark said.  “That explains it.”  Mark settled down on his tummy and put his head down.  “Makes a lot of sense.”

Robin yawned.  Almost every word coming out of either of their mouths was preceded or punctuated by a yawn.  Mommy knew.  “What does?” Robin asked.

“You’re from California.  Lotta…different lifestyles out in California.  Different values.  No offense.”

Robin would have definitely taken offense, but she’d already drifted off to sleep. Mark’s eyes shut soon after.  His bunny jammies made him drowsy.  Sleep was like slipping into a warm bath.  

A warm bath.  That sounded nice.  If he was lucky, maybe Mommy would give them a bath first thing in the morning.  It’d be nice to see Robin naked in the tub.  That way he could pretend they were still hooking up in the…

Mark didn’t finish the thought.  Instead he just stumbled back into a hazy dream where such things as omnipotent mothers who could reduce their children’s status with a word was only a bit of imagination.  

Hey, he could dream, couldn’t he?

*********************************************************************************************

The door opened quietly with the rising of the sun.  “Good morning starshines!” Mark’s mother sang.  “The Earth says ‘Hello’.  You twinkle above us.  We twinkle below.”  The woman’s singing had that warbling faux operatic quality that white people who couldn’t sing adopted to compensate.  This wasn’t real singing, it was ‘mom singing’.  

Mark awoke groggily.  Mommy only sang this song on the days when he was going to be a baby.  Resignedly he braced himself, as she danced in.  He checked his bunny pajamas for stains or signs of leaks.  Nothing.  Sitting up, he wriggled his tush.  Very squishy.  Very mushy.  But everything seemed to be contained in one place.  Darn.  He’d probably have to wait till tonight to get that bath.

Robin awoke with confusion and fright.  If not for the pacifier she’d been suckling in her sleep, she might have screamed.  She looked through crib bars at the middle aged woman warbling oldie-pop that wasn’t even cool when it was first released.  That meant it wasn’t a dream, caused by something she’d ingested.  Robin sat up, and immediately regretted it.  She hadn’t experienced the feeling of a full diaper badly in need of changing in some time, but she was still bright enough to know what she was sitting in.

“Did you have pleasant dreams, my lovelies?” Mark’s mother asked.  

“Uh-huh!” Mark said enthusiastically.  If he played along with it, things would be better for him.

Poor Robin just burst into tears.  The older woman sashayed over to the crib.  “Poor Robin,” she cooed.  “She misses her mommy, doesn’t she?”

Robin sniffled.  “Yes ma’am,” she said.  It was true, but only because Robin wanted to be somewhere safe, and not in this magical madhouse. 

“Well let’s get you cleaned up and fed,” Mark’s mommy pronounced.  “We’ll spend the day getting to know each other, and before you know it, your Mommy will be here to pick you up.”

For a moment, Robin forgot to be afraid, not to mention how ridiculous she looked.  “Really?”

“Really, really.”   With nary a grunt or groan and strength that defied explanation, Mark’s mom lowered the crib rails and picked her up.  “Ladies first.”  It was a short trip over to the changing table, but even those few steps felt gigantic to Robin. The image of being carried off into the sunset by someone big and strong and loving was something that had been ingrained in Robin thanks to an endless barrage of pop culture.

What wasn’t so ingrained was being stripped, changed like an invalid or a toddler who didn’t know how to take care of herself.

The middle aged woman started to unbutton and unzip the bunny pajamas Robin had spent the night in.  “I’m not going to have to use the strap to keep you still, am I?  You’re a little girl, but are you big enough to not wriggle while I clean you up?

“Yes, ma’am,” Robin said. 

“And you’re not going to get all fussy?” 

Robin examined the pacifier still dangling from her pajama collar.  “No ma’am,” she whimpered.  “I’ll be good.”

“Good girl.”  Robin felt like a manikin as her kidnapper slipped the novelty pajamas off her body, leaving her only in a used diaper. 

And a very used diaper it was.  Looking past her breasts, Robin could see the swollen undergarment, white but discolored with her own waste.  For her, it was like a maxi-pad turned up to eleven. She felt vile as she was laid down.  The cute little cartoon character on her diaper didn’t make her feel any better.

“Mark,” she called over to the boy in the crib.  “Please don’t look!”  To his credit, Mark turned around and covered his eyes peekaboo style. 

“Awwww,” his mommy cooed at her as she ripped the first tape off.  “That’s so cute of you.  Mark knows the difference between girls and boys.  You’re not the first little friend of his to spend the night.”

“Mooooom!”

His mother turned her head as she undid the final tape. “It’s true, baby.”  That news made Robin shudder more than terrible sensations she was feeling as the diaper was opened.  What had happened to those girls?  Had they been let go, or something worse?

For the first time in forever, she was having her diaper changed, and unlike any other time before, the girl had enough awareness and shame to think this was a bad thing. Quiet little sulking noises trembled out of Robin’s throat while her tormentor opened up a pack of baby wipes.  “Suck your thumb if you’re nervous, Robin,” she said. “It’s okay.”  Without meaning to, that’s exactly what she did.  She was nervous, so in her thumb went. Her body had to obey even conditional commands, it seemed. 

Oddly enough, the thumb did help her wince and squeak less as wipe after wipe caressed her tender skin.  “Your Mommy must take very good care of your tooshie,” the woman said.  “But you’re starting to get a rash.” 

Robin’s whole body started to blush to match the color of her rump as the old diaper was slid out from under her, balled up and tossed into the economy sized diaper genie.  Just as before, fresh, somehow adult-sized Pampers was unfolded and slid under Robin; the sweet perfumes in the core of the diaper made their way to Robin’s nostrils.  Certainly better than the smells coming from what she’d been wearing last night. Oh great.  She had Elmo and Abbie on her diaper.  Her diaper…

Without warning or asking for consent, Mark’s mother dipped two fingers into a tub of diaper rash cream and started spreading it on and in between Robin’s cheeks.  Somehow this felt like more of a violation than just the wipes.  The smell was less perfume and infinitely more medical, almost like bleach…

That thought didn’t make her feel any better, nor did the cloud of baby powder to cover up that smell.

“How do you do it?” Robin asked as the Pampers was taped up.  

Mrs….damn what was Mark’s last name…?  Mark’s mother seemed mildly amused. “Do what? Change diapers?  It’s easy.”

Still laying down, Robin shook her head.  “Make things you say true,” she said.  “What magic is this?  Voodoo?”

“She’s a mommy,” Mark called from his crib.  “All mommies can do it.  Can I look now?”  He was still hiding behind his hands with his back to them.

“Yes dear, you can turn around.”

Out of habit, Robin covered her breasts with an arm, while Mark pivoted back around on all fours.  He’d already seen them, but this was a completely different kind of intimacy than she’d been thinking when they were just hooking up.  Something about being here, in this bizarre situation made her feel so…so…vulnerable.

“Because she’s a mommy?”

The woman started gently petting Robin’s hair.  “It’s true, dear.  Someday you’ll be able to do this too.”

“My mommy… I mean my mother can’t do this.”  Why was she even having this conversation?

“Of course she can,”  Mark piped up.  “All mommies can do it.”

“No she can’t,” Robin snapped back at Mark.  His mother kept a hand on her chest, while she squatted down and searched for something on the bottom row of the changing table.  Robin thought to sit up, but her spine wouldn’t even flex.  That single flat palm might as well have been Thor’s hammer.   “You’re a witch.”

Their captor sighed.  “You’re just being silly, little girl.”  She stood up and held a pink number with far too many bows.    “How do you like this dress?  It’s the perfect size for you.”  It was.  It was also gross.

“Can I just please have my pants back?” Robin pleaded.  “I’ll…I’ll still wear the diaper.”

“You will wear your diaper,” Mark’s mother replied. “You’re not potty trained.  But the kind of pants you were wearing last night will make it harder to check and change you,” she said.  “Not appropriate for a little girl at all.”  A wry wicked smile formed on the woman’s lips.  “Besides, baby girls like you love frilly pink things.” 

Robin’s mind started racing.  It was literally impossible to argue with this woman. Even as she tried to argue and rebuff, she was finding the frilly frock infinitely more appealing.  She was starting to love frilly pink things.  A deeper, darker part, worried about what that meant for her potty training.

“O…ooo…okay,” Robin squeaked.  “Can it be purple, instead?”

The woman raised her brow. “Are we bargaining?”

“No ma’am…just asking.”

This seemed to please her. “Such manners!”  She turned around and looked at her son. “Mark, you might be able to learn something from this little girl.”

“Yes, Mommy.”  The reply was automatic and submissive.

His mommy dropped the pink and frilly thing and searched the bottom shelf again.  “I just happen to have something in that color that would look adorable on you.  I know you’ll absolutely love it.”  When she popped up, Robin saw her chosen alternative.  It was practically a smock.  It was a t-shirt pretending to be a dress and it still had a bow on the back.

And Robin loved it…

She was pulled into a sitting position, and this time of her own semi-free will, lifted her arms up and allowed them to be fed into the dress and have it tugged down over her head.

Two matching ribbons were used to tie her hair up into matching pigtails.  She loved that, too.

It was only when she was set down on the nursery floor and felt the muffled puff of her fresh diaper underneath her that Robin snapped back to her senses.  This thing was ghastly.  Sitting down, the hem of this thing didn’t even reach her knees.  The moment she stood up her padded ass would be able to be seen from space! 

She did NOT love this.

While Robin was having a quiet existential crisis, Mark was busy getting his own diaper changed. Such a weird turn of phrase, really.  Mark wasn’t particularly busy.  All he had to do was lay there while Mommy wiped him.   “Did you sleep well, last night, baby boy?”  His mother’s words were high pitched and syrupy, even if he was on punishment. 

“Yes, Mommy.”  Mark let out a breath as the previous night’s diaper was thrown away and a new Pampers was slid under him.  Every diaper was a kind of new start.  That’s how he chose to see it. 

“Mommy loves you.  You know that, right sweetie?” 

Mark managed to smile.  “Yes, Mommy.”  It was hard to be fussy when she was like this. He didn’t have a rash, so he didn’t need any of the butt cream and the powder felt dry and cool; a pleasant contrast after waking up warm and very very moist. 

Once his diaper was on,  Mommy pulled him up just long enough to shimmy the red onesie over his head.  Mommy loved putting onesies on him when he was a baby. With other outfits, he might be able to pretend that he was grown-up, or at least a big boy.  It was impossible with a onesie, however.

No choices for Mark.  He’d made his choice when he chose to let Mommy worry.  For the foreseeable future, there was only going to be one way he’d be getting his dick wet.  On the bright side, he got Bert and Ernie for a decoration, so that was nice. 

 He didn’t have to lay down long for Mommy, with the crotch snaps being buttoned quickly and efficiently.  She was good at this. Always had been; never having been long out of practice.

Out of habit, his legs wrapped around her waist as he rested on her hip.  “Let’s go get some breakfast,” she said to the both of them.   At least he wasn’t having to breastfeed…for now.

From her spot on the carpet, Robin looked up.  “Can I walk?”  She sounded silly.

“I don’t know,” Mommy responded.  “Can you?”

Robin went pale and stood up as quickly as she could.  “Yes ma’am!”  Mark didn’t want to be rude, but he almost giggled. 

He looked back at Robin while Mommy carried him into the kitchen.  She was walking funny.  The fact that she was walking with an awkward baby gait didn’t surprise him, but she seemed very uncomfortable about it.  Every few steps she kept tugging at her dress, trying to hide the bit of diaper that was peeking out. 

Wow.  

Robin’s mommy really had never put her back in diapers or made her a baby again.  Talk about privileged. 

As he expected, Mommy had redecorated the kitchen last night.  His highchair was out, as was the spare for Robin.  Mark let himself be buckled in and the tray slid into place.  Mommy gave him a pat in on the head and turned to face his would-be girlfriend.

Robin, looked at hers as if it were the electric chair.  “Do I have to?” she whined.

“You’re certainly not going to eat your breakfast on the floor, if that’s what you think.”  Mommy grabbed Robin by the hips and boosted her into the highchair, securing her as she started to sniffle. 

As Mommy started tying their bibs around her neck, Mark couldn’t figure out why Robin was crying.  Was she wet again, or something?  Not being potty trained sucked, but it wasn’t anything to cry about; not unless you were leaking, but a quick change fixed that.

While Mommy went to the cupboard to get out some baby food, he looked over to Robin and felt a pang of sympathy.  Looking back on it, he’d cried the first time when Mommy took away his big boy privileges, too.  He’d been a lot younger, but that didn’t mean Robin didn’t have a right to be scared.  “Hey,” he whispered to her.  “It’s gonna be okay.”

Robin didn’t say anything back, but she seemed to take some comfort in it.  Mommy went to the microwave and took out two bowls of oatmeal.  “Oatmeal is good for little minds, and little stomachs,” she told them, setting each bowl on a corresponding tray.

Mark watched as Robin went for her spoon, before Mommy cut her off. “Little girls like you can’t feed themselves with a spoon.”  Robin’s hand dropped to the tray like a lead balloon.  “You can use your hands if you want,” Mommy offered.

Robin sank down in her chair.  “No, thank you.” 

Mommy positively beamed.  “You’re learning so fast!” she praised Robin.  “Such a good little girl.  Maybe I misjudged you and you were just having a case of the naughties.”  A small bubble of hope formed inside Mark.  If Mommy liked her, maybe he could get to date her again.

“Can I have the airplane, Mommy?”  Mark asked.

His mother regarded him.  “Do you think you’ve been good enough to have the airplane?”

Now it was Mark’s turn to shrink down.  “No, ma’am.”  Sufficiently cowed, the two were spoonfed their oatmeal in relative silence, with only the occasional “Good boy” or “Good girl” when they swallowed without letting any of the bland mushy stuff dribble out of their mouths. 

From out of the refrigerator came two bottles of frosty cold milk to wash it down.  Mark drank with gusto, while Mommy rinsed out and washed the bowls over at the kitchen sink.  Robin?  Less so.

“Are you lactose intolerant or something?”  Mark asked, Robin.  Not that it mattered.  Stomach cramps had a way of quickly working themselves out when you were a baby. 

Robin seemed actually offended. “No,” she said. “I just don’t want to drink milk out of a baby bottle.”

“But you’re a baby,” Mark told her.

“No I’m not.”

“Mommy says you are.”

“You’re Mommy’s wr-wr-wr-wr-…”  Robin couldn’t finish the sentence.  Mommy was never wrong and always right.  She knew best.

“You slept in a crib and got changed and dressed by a grown-up,” Mark told her.  “You just got breakfast spoonfed to you in a highchair. Now it’s time to finish our bottles.  Sorry.  You’re a baby.”

“Drink up,” Mommy said, still at the sink.  “Then it will be time for school.”  Both bottles practically leaped into the couple’s mouths and lips and throats started automatically suckling.

Mark saw the panicked look in Robin’s eyes as she drank, and he knew exactly why.  He started actively guzzling down the milk, full tummy be darned. He huffed and belched as he was able to pull his bottle out.  “Don’t worry,” he told Robin.  “It’s easy stuff.  Shapes and colors and stuff.”

Robin couldn’t believe what she was hearing.  THAT’s what he thought she was stressing about?  How warped did a guy have to be to realize that pooping your pants and getting spoonfed was not normal just because Mommy said so?

The witch who did this to them let Mark out of his ridiculously sized highchair and set him on his feet.  Okay.  So he could walk, too.  Good.  Escape might be possible.  “Maaaaaaahm!” he whined while she slipped two fingers into the leg holes of his onesie and diaper and patting his butt.  She was checking him like he was a toddler, and he acted like she was just straightening his tie or something.

“Just checking, honey.”  She gave him another quick pat on the behind.  “Go get the matching game.  I’m homeschooling today.”

Mark nodded. “Yes, Mommy.”  Robin felt the relief drain out of her as he literally toddled off.  Homeschooling.  Homeschooling.  That meant she wouldn’t be going out in public.  Not like this.  Robin didn’t know if she could handle going out like this.

What little relief she felt was short-lived as she was unbuckled from the highchair and shifted up over the witch’s shoulder, and her back was patted.  A mighty belch quickly rumbled it’s way out of her. 

“Good girl.”  Robin felt the hem of her dress being lifted and the waistband of her diaper being pulled back.  “Still clean.”  There was an underlying implication of “for now”, in the other woman’s tone.

“Kill me,” Robin whispered to herself.  “Just kill me.”  She’d had guys try to cop a feel before.  But never had she felt so utterly helpless and unable to retaliate or strike back. That this in no way felt sexual somehow made it worse.  This kind of treatment was just something that she couldn’t wrap her grown-up brain around.  (Grown-up?  Grown-up? Isn’t that what grown-ups called themselves?)  She felt so violated. So small. So little.

She bobbed up and down as she was carried into the living room. Like the rest of the house, it was decorated for a small child, but size and proportion were completely wrong.  A playmat was off in the corner, with tiny little stuffies dangling down for an infant to bat at.  One of those weird little bead toys with the colorful bent wire tracks laid on the floor next to a jack in the box.  Sitting at the foot of the couch was what appeared to be a well used teething ring.

 That was another unnerving thing that bothered Robin:  None of this stuff seemed completely appropriate.  Spoon feeding solid food, but burping.  Being able to walk, but the type of play at that was clearly meant for kids who might be crawlers at best. Nothing was “age appropriate” for any particular age.  

But Mark’s mommy (shit…now she was starting to think those terms), hadn’t given Robin an age; just that she was a baby and was too little for her big girl panties.  

Mark was already on his hands and knees, spreading out little cardboard tiles. “I’m setting up the memory match game, Mommy.”   Before she knew it, Robin was back down on the floor, her padded underwear cushioning her seat.

Mark’s mother leaned over them, her hands on her knees.  “Do you know how to play ‘memory’?”  

“Yeah,” Robin said.  “You just match the pictures together.”  She caught a disapproving look from the witch.  “I mean…yes ma’am. I do.”

The smile, returned.  “Good girl.” She stood up.  “I know babies like you two have trouble remembering things, but I want you to try your best.”  She turned around. “I’ll be on the couch reading a book.  You two play nice,  and don’t stop until you get all the matches.”

True to her word, she went over to the couch, crossed her legs and cracked open a paperback novel.  For reasons that should have disturbed her, but didn’t, Robin couldn’t make out the writing on the cover; just that there was a picture of an impossibly ripped man and a ridiculously thin woman in beach gear walking by the ocean.

Robin turned back to the square tiles.  Mark flipped over the first tile.  A cow was on the tile.  “Mooooo…” he intoned.  “The cow goes moooooo…right?” 

The young woman had shaken her head plenty of times, in her life.  On Twitter, she’d written ‘smh’, too, plenty of times.  Never before had she actually thought it, before. Such was her bafflement and disbelief at Mark that coherent thought switched to text shorthand.  “What’s wrong with you?” She hissed.

“Don’t bother trying to trick me,” Mark said.  “I’ve played this game plenty of times.  I know that the cow goes moo.”

“I mean why are you okay with this?”

“It’s an okay game…”  Mark flipped over another tile.  “Dog goes meow.  No match.”  He flipped the two tiles back over.

Her lips curled back in disgust.  “Why are you okay with being treated like this?”

“Oh, that,” Mark said.  “Sorry.  I know she’s kinda strict, but she’s just looking out for us.  But eventually she’ll stop being mad and I’ll get my big boy pants back.  Your turn.”  

She still couldn’t believe what she was hearing.  “You’re what?  Eighteen?  Nineteen?  You’re an adult.”

“Not without Mommy’s permission, I’m not,” Mark replied.  “It was the same with my dad.  I think that’s why they divorced.”  There was an awkward pause.  “Your turn,” he pointed to the scattered tiles.

Robin let out a disgusted scoff and flipped over two tiles.  “Raccoon and raccoon.  There’s a match.”  She scooped the tiles up.  “Beginner’s luck.”

“What does the raccoon say?”

“I don’t know!”  

“Me neither.”  Mark giggled a bit.  “Seriously, though, it’s gonna be okay.  You’ll probably be back to being a big girl in no time.”  He flipped over two more tiles.  “Panda and Pig. No match.  Your turn.”

Robotically her hand flipped over one tile after another.  “Dog goes woof.  Chicken goes cluck.  Your…” and then her stomach turned.  

Mark, being a gentleman, flipped the tiles back over for her.  “What’s wrong?”

“I gotta go…”  Without meaning to, Robin was shifting to all fours. Her pride wanted her to sit down but her body was clearing a path so to speak. “…again.”   In a minute or two, sitting down wouldn’t be an option for her, not if she wanted to keep her sanity.

Mark took his turn.  “No match.  And no you don’t gotta go.  You’re not potty trained.  You’ll just go.” There was an uncomfortable pause.  “You get used to it.”

“I don’t want to get uuuuuuuused to it!”  Robin grunted.  She grunted!  She didn’t want to grunt!  Grunting meant…?  What did grunting mean?  She wasn’t potty trained anymore!  That meant that she was losing her sense of cause and effect about certain things!    Her tummy was hurting.  Grunting would take care of the tummy ache.  She’d grunt and then she’d…she’d…her tummy would stop hurting but…but…but…”I need to get out of here…!”

“But Mommy said we have to keep going until, we have all the matches.”  Mark leaned back on the floor.  The front of his onesie between his legs grown somehow.  It wasn’t so much like he was pitching a tent, as much as filling up a water balloon. “Don’t feel too bad,” he whispered  “Mommy checked me too early, too.”

“Don’t say going!” She groaned.  “I’m gonna…I’m gonna..”

“I know.  But Mommy said…”

Straining and despairing, Robin lowered her voice.  “Just…just…give me a minute.”  She put her head to the floor and closed her eyes.

“Everything okay?”  Mark’s mommy asked.  

“Yes, Mommy.”

“Okay…”. She didn’t sound completely convinced.

“Kill me,” Robin whispered again.  “Just kill me.” It took less than thirty seconds for Robin to die.  It was just a little bit and only on the inside, but it still counted.” 

“Ready to keep playing?”  Mark asked.

Robin wanted to cry. She wanted to ugly cry and let snot drip out her nose and just scream her lungs out.  In a weird way, it’d have made her feel more adult.  Babies didn’t cry when this sort of thing happened to them.  Not right away, anyways.  That’s why they needed to be checked.  “I can’t keep playing.”  Her voice was still soft and shaken.  “I gotta…I gotta…I gotta get chaaaanged.”  The last syllable came out as a low, sorrowful wail. 

She wanted to crawl away.  Forget that!  She wanted to run away; to spring.  But her body wouldn’t let her do anything unless it was directly related to playing a dumb preschool game.  Mark’s mother knew best.

Mrs. Mark’s Mommy looked up from her book.  ‘Everything alright, kids?”

“I neeeeeed aaaaaa chaaaaaaange!”  Now Robin’s wail wasn’t low.

“After you’re done.”  The witch went back to her book.

“But-!”

“That’s what diapers are for, sweetie.”  She wasn’t even look up.  “So that babies like you can keep playing and learning your lessons and you don’t have to stop to use the potty.” Robin’s diaper was sagging even more as her body completely emptied itself.  “Keep playing.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Mark answered for them both.  “Until we have all the matches.  Mommy knows best.”

Perhaps it was the rock bottom state that she found herself in, but in her despair, something sunk in besides the contents of her Pampers.  Whatever the witch said was true, even if it didn’t make sense.  It didn’t have to be accurate to be true.  “All…the…matches!”

Both arms reached out and swept up all the tiles in one fluid motion. The witch hadn’t said anything about having to play the game.  She only had to have all the matches.  If she had all the tiles ….“Gottem!”

Like a bolt, Robin was on her feet and sprinting for the front door.  Her bare feet flapped against the floor.  Her legs pounded pushing her forward, even as her diaper sagged and washed between her legs. Go!  Run!  Get to the cops!  Forget pride!  Forget disgust!  JUST! GET! FREE!

“ROBIN!” The harpie’s voice called out after her. “STOP!”

The young woman’s feet stopped so quickly that she tripped over them, tumbling face first to the floor.  Still better than the other end.

Stinging pain in her face, a shadow fell over Robin.  “That was a very naughty thing you just tried, little girl.”  The witch was wagging her finger at her.  

The college co-ed rolled over (and immediately regretted it), to look her tormentor in the eye.  “But you said I had to find all the matches and I could…”

“That’s not what I meant, baby girl!”  The madwoman was fuming.  “If you can’t understand even that you’re farther away from being a big girl than I thought.  Maybe you’re littler than I thought.  Maybe you can’t walk yet. Maybe you can’t crawl.  Maybe you can’t talk.  Maybe you need to be breastfed and put down for naps every few hours like a newborn.  Maybe you have no hair or breasts or teeth and can’t understand English and just need to lay in a cot all day. Is that what you want?  Is it?”

“But you said…-!“

Robin was cut off.  “Never mind what I said! Clearly, you need another lesson!  Do you want a spanking before or after I change your diaper?”

DING-DONG!

Mark’s mother frowned. “I’ll get it.”  She took a step and doubled back before saying,  “You wait right here, little missy.  I’m not done with you yet.”

 
Robin was frozen in place, forced to race as her captor went to answer the front door.  Maybe she could scream.  Maybe she could call out for help.  But what good would that do against someone who could warp reality with a word. 

Mark’s approach was signaled with the slight crinkling as he crawled up to her.  “You did it now,” he whispered.  “Mommy’s really mad.  The last time something like this happened, my cousin Felicia ended up in diapers for three years. Three years!”

“Your mom’s a witch!”

“You should see my auntie.”

A new voice interrupted them.  “Robin?”

The young lady whipped her head.  “Mom?”  What was her mother doing here?!  Her parents lived out of state! 

“Hi sweetie!  It’s good to see you again!”  Robin’s mother spoke in the same sing-song mother ESE reserved for a toddler.  Did you have a nice time with your little friend?”  Beside her mother was Mark’s mom; the two women looked like bosom buddies.  ‘Thanks for watching her,” she said.  

“She was a bit of a handful,” Mark’s mother said.  “But I think everyone had a good time.  Would you like to stay for lunch.”

Robin’s Mommy politely declined. “Thank you,” “but I really ought to be getting her home.  It’s a long drive from here to California.”

“I’ll bet,” the witch agreed.  “Perhaps we can arrange another playdate sometime next week.”  

“Mom, get away from her!”  Robin screamed.  “She’s a witch!”

“Robin!”  Her mother scolded.  “That’s not very nice.  Say you’re sorry.”

Even if she didn’t know what it meant, Robin had the impulse to tell everyone in the room to “get bent”.   But her mouth didn’t listen.  “I’m sorry Mrs. Mark’s Mommy…” she said, sounding every bit the chastised toddler.  Once she said it she looked down past her nose to the lips that had disobeyed her.  Betrayed by her own body again!  Only this time, the order came from her own mother…

Robin’s mother’s nose wrinkled and she sniffed.  “I think your little boy needs a change,” she said.

“Actually, I think that’s Robin,” the other adult replied.  “I was just about to change her when you rang.”

Her mother furrowed her brow, and Robin felt a bit of hope.  “Change her?  What do you mean change her.  She’s potty…” Robin’s mom stopped and stared at her exposed ass, the diaper not peaking out from the dress as much as the dress barely framing the diaper.  “Why is my daughter in a diaper?”  The voice was defensive. And suspicious.  And just a bit angry.

YES!

“I found them in her diaper bag last night.” Mark’s mother said.  “I just assumed…” she let the thought trail off.

“Of course she’s potty training! That’s why she was wearing a Pull-Up!”  Mommy sounded exasperated but the only thing  Robin felt was schadenfreude.  Mark’s witch of a mother  Then the weight of her mother’s words landed on her.

“Potty training…?”  she echoed, computed.

Mommy came and helped her to her feet.  “Yes dear.”  Just like Mark’s mother, her own lifted the dress and pulled back the Pampers to take a look in side.  “Oh look at you.  I hope you don’t start up bad habits, again.  You were doing so well.”

“Then why were there…?”  Mark’s mother seemed confused and off balance.

“They were for nap time, and overnights, obviously!  She’s in Pull-Ups during the day!”

“I am SO sorry!”

“You better be!”

While the two adults bickered, Robin looked to Mark.  He seemed distressed, but it had nothing to do with subject matter and everything to do with volume and tone.  He looked like a baby upset that two adults were yelling.

“Come on, Robin,” Mommy said, taking Robin by the hand and leading her out the door.   I’ll change you in the car.”

She was silent, stunned really, when Mom’s Mint Green mini-van was parked in the driveway and she found herself laying down in the back to have her privates wiped for what had to be the third time in twenty four hours.

Mommy took the balled up Pampers and tossed it onto the driveway.  “Let them clean it up,” she muttered before taking out an adult sized pink Pull-Up and sliding it up her daughter’s legs.

“Mommy?” Robin asked.  “What’s going on?”

Mommy took a breath and helped Robin into a standing position.  “I’m sorry, sweetie.  Sometimes grown-ups lose their temper, even though we shouldn’t.  But that lady shouldn’t have put you in a diaper.  You’re not a baby.”

“Why am I in Pull-Ups?”

“Because you’re potty-training, honey.  You’re learning how to be a big girl.”  The hatchback was closed and the side door was slid open.  Inside the car was a toddler’s car seat, sized perfectly for a certain college girl. 

“But I’m going to college…”   Going to college didn’t stop Robin from being buckled into a carseat.

“That’s right,” Mommy said.  “And you’re learning to be a big girl at college, aren’t you?  Don’t worry, I’ll take you back tomorrow for class.  I’ll make sure to put plenty of Pull-Ups in your backpack for your cubby.  No diapers this time.  Don’t want anyone getting confused.”

Confused?  Confused?!  She had no idea!!!

“I was having sex last night!” How silly she felt saying it.

“That’s right,” her mother told her. “And you can have sex again as soon as you’re a big girl again.”

Robin started thrashing and kicking her feet, but all she ended up doing was stubbing her toe on the front passenger seat. “But I wanna have sex nooooooow!  I’m a big girl!”

Mommy ignored her and closed the door.  “Big girls don’t wear Pull-Ups,” she said once she was in the driver’s seat and backing out.

“But I wasn’t weeeearing Pull-Ups last night!”

Mommy shifted the car in gear and started driving.  “Last night you were a big girl.  Now you’re back to learning how to be one.”

“It doesn’t work that waaaaaay!”

“Yes it does.”

“WHYYYYY?!”

“Because I say it does.”

Robin was past the point of breaking.  “WHYYYYYYYY?!”

“You’ll understand when you’re a Mommy.”

(The End…?)
 

[Jayme]

You may want to check this story, it appears a formatting gremlin has gotten ahold of the blender and hit frapé..

[Personalias]

6 minutes ago, Jayme said:

You may want to check this story, it appears a formatting gremlin has gotten ahold of the blender and hit frapé..

Thank you.  Does it look better on your end now?

[Jayme]

3 minutes ago, Personalias said:

Thank you.  Does it look better on your end now?

Looks awesome now, I loved the story once I figured out where the frapé copied and pasted it in weird patterns. Glad to see you were able to fix that.

I wonder what will Robin remember from this meeting....

[Personalias]

46 minutes ago, Jayme said:

Looks awesome now, I loved the story once I figured out where the frapé copied and pasted it in weird patterns. Glad to see you were able to fix that.

I wonder what will Robin remember from this meeting....

It's a good question.  And an intentionally vague ending.