realistic Meta Moore (Ch 20, updated 7/21)

[Sophie ♥]

Meta Moore

By Sophie & Pudding

*Author's Note: About 5 years ago, a woman named Mia Moore wrote the Academy Works series here on DailyDiapers.  It is one of the worst-kept secrets that this was a pen name Pudding and I used, all so we could write THIS story! (Yeah, we really did write a seven-book series just to write a side-story.) And though you can find the whole story elsewhere on the internet, we think it's time to post it on DD as well.  I'll be posting chapters in blocks so people have time to build a relationship with the characters and the narrative.

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At the time of this story's first chapter, Mia has written Academy I [Part 1], Academy B [Part 2], Academy T[Part 3], Academy K [Part 4], and the first six chapters of Academy A [Part 5]. Throughout this story, more chapters will be released (and clearly denoted). Though it isn't necessary to know anything about Academy Works to enjoy Mia's story, it might be fun to follow along as a fan of hers. In which case, we recommend you read *all four stories above and the first six chapters of the fifth story*. 

SPOILERS: This story contains spoilers for Academy Works up to and including Academy A - Chapter 6.

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Wednesday, October 5th

1.)

I sunk down in my seat and rubbed my eyes under my glasses.  The meet-up hadn't been a total disaster, but I didn't expect to run into someone I knew.  Who drove two hours away to go to dinner, anyway?  Me, I supposed.

I took a deep breath.  It felt like the first deep breath I'd taken since bumping into Blossom Brixley.  Well, we didn't literally bump into each other; I saw her from across the room.  I ducked out before finishing my pizza and hurried back to the train station.  The truth was, she probably didn't even know who I was.

Blossom Brixley was easy to spot from across a room. She was a tall girl with bottled-blonde hair, a slim, almost lanky frame, and a figure that people either wanted or wanted to have for themselves. She was the quintessential popular girl experience; cheerleader in high school, beloved by most, and - contrary to many snap-judgements - pretty clever. Good grades, good looks, and a smile that melted hearts the way summer melted ice cream. If life dealt hands, it was easy to presume that Blossom had been dealt a good one.

Blossom Brixley was easy to spot from across a room, but the girl she followed onto the train was facing away from the door.  Just as the train lurched forward, Blossom plopped down in the seat across from the girl, so the two were facing each other.  Blossom read the name tag on the girl's shirt, only to confirm that it said what she thought it said. 

Mia Moore.  She couldn't believe it… it was actually her.  

I just about jumped out of my skin when she sat down.  It was like waking up from a nightmare just to see the thing you feared standing above you in your bed.  And the train had started to move: I couldn't run again.  My heart rate doubled.

"Blossom..." I managed to eke out.  Why was she on the train?  She had a car; she sure talked about it enough in high school.  But just because we were both on the train didn't mean she saw me at the munch.  "Nice to, uh... see you."

Had I ever said this many words to her before?  Four years at the same high school, two years at the same college, seven classes together... actually we had one together right now.  She was impossible to miss.  I, on the other hand, was impossible to notice.

"You're awfully jumpy!" Blossom laughed.  She had done enough drugs to know what euphoria felt like.  That was how she felt: euphoric, with a touch of anxiety. "I'm a girl, not a spider - nothing to be afraid of."

A girl, not a spider.  That definitely didn't align with my schema of Blossom.  In high school, she was often cruel.  She was popular, but she was also smart; that made it worse.  Then I noticed her looking down at my chest, or rather, the nametag I was still wearing from the munch.  I quickly tore it off and crumpled it into a ball.  Was my face hot?  I felt a little sick.

"Well, it was nice seeing you," I said too quickly, pulling out my phone to pretend like I was replying to a text.

For a girl who cheered in front of her whole school for years, Blossom found herself oddly awestruck. She didn't bother the girl as she played on her phone, instead choosing to gaze out the window as the city went by. Trees. Then houses. Then buildings. There was a while left on the route, and there weren't many other people in the carriage. It was now or never, wasn't it?

"I've read your stuff, you know." 

"Uh..." She read my stuff?  She meant that she read my stuff online.  She read that particular kind of stuff.  Because she saw my nametag, because she knew who I was.  But she knew who I was!  She wasn't supposed to know both of me, no one was!  And without thinking it through, without thinking about how stupid it sounded, I did the first thing that came to mind: I lied.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"I knew you were gonna say that," Blossom laughed. "I mean, that's what anyone would say, right? I think that's what I'd say too, 'cause I think we think all deniability is plausible until it isn't, and it definitely isn't right now."

Blossom was rocking gently in her seat. Mia Moore was shorter than she was, enough so that even when sitting the difference was pretty clear. But even though she was taller, Blossom felt a lot like a kid on Christmas morning. Of all the munches in all the cities in all the world… had Blossom really been going to school with Mia Moore her whole damn life?

"I'm so excited right now, I can't even. I mean, look - I'm shaking." She held up her hand to show her trembling fingers.

I sunk further into my chair and felt my face get hot.  No one was ever so excited to see me, and Blossom Brixley of all people... it was a dream.  I was dreaming.

Then a thought occurred to me, one that should have occurred to me a lot earlier.  Why was Blossom at that munch anyway?  And why did she know about my writing?  There wasn't any chance that she...

No, it was a prank.  Ugh, this was so like her.  Now what?  She tells everyone in school about me?  Her and her stupid sorority sisters laugh behind my back?  The heat on my face became that of anger rather than that of embarrassment, and I balled my hands at my sides.

"This isn't funny," I told her sharply, but tears were forming in my eyes. I always cried when I got angry. 

"Of course it's not funny, why would it be funny? I'm basically confessing a pretty personal thing about me to you, so I hope it's not funny..." 

Blossom had a legendary pout - it was a leftover from her mousey middle school days of frumpiness and unhappiness. On her current-day self, it was cute as heck and usually meant people let her have her way. Today, she pouted because meeting her literary hero was already a pretty stressful thing and... and oh no.

"Oh no no, please don't cry! No no, I've got tissues in..." Her voice trailed off as she dug through her purse looking for the little pack of tissues. "...somewhere in here... I think? I think, I mean, I should..."

"I'm not crying," I said under my breath, reaching up and rubbing my eyes with the palms of my hands.  When I was done, my glasses fell in place on my nose and I looked up at Blossom again.  She looked... worried.  Either I was barking up the wrong tree, or she was a very good actress.  The actress thing was more likely.  She passed me a tissue from her purse all the same and I took it.  I held it idly in my lap.

"Are you okay? I'm sorry I didn't mean to overwhelm you, or whatever; I was just super duper excited because I've been reading your stuff since last year, and I had no idea you were.. you know? You? I thought Mia Moore lived... well I dunno, but I didn't think I went to school with her. With you, I mean."

The fact they were in public was no deterrence to Blossom; she had a pride and confidence that was unshakable in almost all situations. But meeting Mia Moore? It was apparently her kryptonite.

"This is probably super duper weird and like... parasocial, for you, right? Sheesh, I'm sorry, I'm being a total dweeb."

"No, I..." Damnit, she seemed so genuine.  But I'd been fooled by that act before.  She was friends with my neighbor - Diana - until she found out Diana still slept with her old baby blanket.  Everyone at school teased Diana for months.  If this was real, the poetic irony was too coincidental for me.

Was all this too coincidental?  Seeing her at that munch?  Both of us taking the same train home?  Her knowing I wrote stories online?  And the content of those stories... it was a lot worse than a baby blanket.  I was alight with anxiety.  Adrenaline.  A need to run.

Or what if she was telling the truth?  What if someone actually liked what I wrote?  What if this wasn't a sick joke?  What if Blossom was opening up to me?  How naive would I have to be to believe that?  How monstrous would I have to be to believe otherwise?  I felt like I was going to pass out...

"It's just... hard to believe," I admitted, telling the truth this time. "I mean, you're... you.  I don't know why you would... I mean..."

"Oh, I know, I know. People think just because I'm this tall blonde girl who dresses nice that the idea of me reading is just so wild, but lemme tell you this much, little miss: I didn't get a four-oh in college so far by not being a reader. I read a lot of stuff, although a lot of what people say is good writing is just awful. Like why do people get so hung up on Tolkien? Or Frank Herbert? It's so... boring. It's like they're freshmen just writing for a word count, you know?"

Blossom definitely didn't expect to launch into a tangent on literature, but she was nervous.

"Uh... I guess so." I think it was more a differentiation of period norms, but sure.  I could see where she was coming from.  Though that wasn't really the point I was trying to make. 

"I meant like... that you would read... uh... niche literature." Porn.  I could just say porn.  But that felt too direct.  I still didn't trust her.  Would I ever be able to trust her? 

"I mean, a lot of it is really bad… if I read another story about 'Oh no, my Mom caught me and now yadda yadda yadda' I think I might lose enough brain cells that I won't need to bleach my hair anymore. And yes, I know that's a bad stereotype but I'm allowed to make it because I'm basic."

Blossom smiled, quite pleased with herself. If only she'd had a PSL in her hand.

"But your stories are so smart! And like, your writing is legit good. Not even, it's legit amazing."

"Uh... thank you..." How was I having this conversation with Blossom Brixley?  What parallel dimension had I fallen into?  Was a twelve-foot Amazon going to walk into our train car?  And as with any dream, once I realized it was a dream, sometimes I didn't want to wake up.  If this dream kept going like this, I didn't really want to wake up either.

"So... you've read... all of them?" Was I testing her? "Which one is your favorite?"  And why!  And what parts did she like!  And who was her favorite character!  Ugh, the neediness of a writer... or was it a praise kink?  Same thing, in my line of work. 

Oh! This was like one of those 'oh you like Star Wars? Name 9 movies then' tests! Blossom made it a point to know just a few choice pieces of obscure trivia because she liked to shut exclusionary boys down when they tried to gate-keep her friends, but this was the first time she'd actually been quizzed on something she was passionate about.

"I'm up to date! I think T is my favorite because I love that 'other side of the fall' stuff and authors don't really cover that much. But I think B is definitely the hottest. Like the stuff with Bala - is that how you pronounce it? Bala? That's how I've been saying it. But when her dreams start to change... wow..."

Blossom fanned herself with her hand and smiled, which only made her blush.

Well, she clearly knew what she was talking about.  She could have read through all my stuff just to torture me, but she would have had to know about it before the munch.  There was no way she read through four and a half stories before the train came.  I felt my muscles start to relax, in a 'less anxious' kind of way, not a 'start of a story' kind of way.

"Yeah, I think T is a lot of people's favorite.  It's very... wish fulfillment?  I dunno." 

I looked around the train car; the evening sun had fallen behind the horizon and the lights on the ceiling were working harder than before.  There were a few other groups of people nearby, but half of them were nodding off in their chairs.  One kid was playing a game on his Nintendo Switch and an old guy in the back looked at his laptop screen through half-moon eyeglasses.  For all intents and purposes, Blossom and I were alone... if we kept our voices down.

"I think it's because it's like... okay, so at first it's this whole Stepford Wives thing, like a creepypasta or something, and then it's also got hints of a Dimension story in this whole 'normalized worldspace' thing." 

Blossom even made air-quotes when she said that.

"At the start, Talita's still got this kind of resistance, but not really. And the idea of losing the ability to count or read? It's like that one post Daisy Fingers made when someone was like 'would you wanna be Bun?' and she's like 'sometimes, but then the idea of not actually being able to read or write or do basic things has a reality side that's actually pretty scary, so no'. That's basically how it is with T: it's wish fulfillment, but would I really want that?"

Blossom paused, put one finger to her perfectly glossed lips in thought, and then nodded.

"Yeah, probably," she laughed brightly.

"Huh..." Yeah, Blossom had a point.  Would I want that, if it was offered to me?  Probably not.  I sat up a little and pulled one foot up onto the chair with me, getting comfortable.

[Sophie ♥]

2.)

"So, do you do the whole 'munch' thing a lot?  I kinda freaked out when I saw you, I gotta admit..." That munch was my first.  I was hoping to run into someone who knew about my stories, but not like this.  God, not like this.

"I've been to a few! But mostly it winds up with older men wanting my phone number, or couples wanting me to go home with them - it's honestly like being in high school again."

High school was, for Blossom, a very different experience to Mia. 

"But the people are mostly nice and I usually don't end up paying for my own food. It's kinda neat to see people out in the world. Like a sanity-check, a reminder that behind that aol.com email-address-based username is a real person. How about you, Mia? I haven't seen you at one of them before." 

"Uh... no, this is kind of new territory for me." I looked down at my hands and picked at my fingernails.  The night ended a lot sooner than I expected.  I probably wouldn't go to another one. "I mostly stick to online stuff.  Forums, Twitter.  I wanna join a friend's Discord server but I feel like it will really get in the way of my schoolwork."

"You won't know until you try!" Blossom said. "That's what my Dad said whenever I was unsure about something, and for a long time I never took his advice. But then, when I finally listened, my life got a whole lot better."

Coincidentally, that was about the same time Blossom... well, bloomed. Getting stacked was definitely helpful in her finding her confidence, though no amount of body development would undo how tall she was.

"I'm proud of you for going. To the munch, I mean. If you hadn't, I wouldn't be here legit talking to my favorite author in the whole world!" 

"Internet author," I corrected, but Blossom looked at me with uncharacteristic certainty.  Confidence was one thing you could always find somewhere on Blossom's face.  She would say something wrong and say something right with about the same conviction, and she usually wouldn't change her mind one way or the other.  But this was different; this time she was sure.  I was a little taken aback. "Seriously?"

"Seriously! So liiiiike when you started posting K, I totes blew off a date with this real hottie just so I could stay home and read. And then I reread the other Academy stories to see if there was stuff I'd missed, even though you'd only posted like two chapters of K! If I had room on my wall I'd totally have a conspiracy board with red twine and stuff, and a picture of Ai in the center!"

There was this light to Blossom when she gushed, a fire in her voice, a genuine... passion.

"Ai hasn't even been in the series for two stories," I smiled dumbly.  I never got to talk about my writing! "Why would she be in the center?"

"Because! Her name is like a pun, it's like Ai, but it's also I, like 'me' like 'ego'. She's like the reader self-insert, representing our curiosity and stuff!"

This was clearly a theory she'd been percolating on for a while.

"Huh." That actually made a lot of sense.  Was that my intention?  Not really.  But it was naive to assume Ai wouldn't come back sooner or later.

"So what other theories do you have?" I asked.  I honestly wasn't milking her for ideas; I just wanted her to talk about it.  Anything about it.  The characters, the plot, the smutty ageplay stuff.  I wanted her to tell me every single thing she felt and thought about Academy Works.  I wanted to know I made something lovable.

"This train would need to run all night for me to have the time to talk about all my theories." Blossom beamed happily and clasped her hands together in front of her chest, a pose that really showed Blossom's years as a cheerleader.

"Okay so I'm pretty sure that Talita and her big brother were like a huge mess up, and that's the first time we've seen the Academy make such a big mistake. And then the stuff with Mrs. Hopper… I think something happened and the Academy is in decline. Maybe the leaders died, or a revolution happened, or a change in management, I don't know, but something happened! I am so sure of it!"

"What makes you think that?" I had no doubt in my mind that Blossom already put together that Mrs. Hopper from Academy T and Angela from Academy K were the same person; I wasn't very subtle about it.  Blossom's "Academy is in decline" theory wasn't so unrealistic when you thought about the way they handled Angela.

They, like it wasn't me writing it.

"They're just so in control with Ai and Bala, and even when Ai escapes it almost feels expected." It was almost surreal to hear someone so conventionally popular be so invested like this, but then again that was its own harmful little stereotype, wasn't it?

"And it feels like after what they did to Mrs. Hopper in T," Blossom went on, "that they didn't know what to do with her. She's not a Candy so they just kinda stashed her in the Kindergarten, which seems like a nightmare. She can watch everyone else live pretty fun lives full of color, and she gets none of it. I'd rather have a fate like Bala than a fate like Mrs. Hopper. Give me the Cold Room; I'll be a good girl. But don't make it so people can't see me, holy crap."

I was beaming.  I had heard theories about the Academy Works stories ever since I started posting them online, but forum posts weren't quite the same as hearing someone babble about it in person.  Then a thought occurred to me.

"Wait, do you have an account on DD?" I wanted to know if she had left me any comments, but she looked sheepish at the question. 

"Welllll, I tried to make an account on there once and then the whole site crashed and everything broke and it was a huuuge mess. So I just read quietly and enjoy it! You had this one commenter that I just wanted to reach out and slap though; he was such an entitled jerk."

I admit, I was a little crestfallen.  I looked down at my fingers and kept picking at my nails.  Maybe this was a prank after all?  If she had a post from last year, at least then I could be sure.

"You should make an account," I tried, though the prior excitement was definitely lacking. "You have a lot of good thoughts."

"I wouldn't know what to say," Blossom admitted.

"Anything," I shrugged. "Your favorite part?  Favorite line?  Just... thoughts on the story?  One person just posts an emoji, so the bar isn't super high." Even an emoji felt nice sometimes.  So much of what I got out of writing was hearing people talk about it.  Academy I had so much attention, it inspired me to start Academy B right away.  But T didn't get a whole lot.  K was a joke.  I sunk deeper into my seat.

"Or we could hang out together and I can gush and babble about it to you in person. That's gotta be worth at least two emojis on a forum!"

"I guess." Honestly, I was so wrapped up in Academy Works talk that I had kind of forgotten who Blossom was.  Of course she didn't post online.  Why would she?  She was probably just reading along to get off.

That started a whole other train of thought.  Did she get off to my stories?  Did Blossom Brixley find diapers erotic?  She had to, right?  Why else would she be on that forum?  But I couldn't put those two thoughts together, like trying to shove a square into a circular hole.

"You're totes not what I expected, by the way," Blossom said. "I mean I guess I didn't know what to expect out of the author of Academy Works; it's like finding out what Lemony Snicket looks like. 'Cause like in your head, he's always gonna be Patrick Warburton."

There was a little of that casual popular girl callousness in how she worded that, but it didn't seem malicious. Just careless.

"I would never have guessed by looking at you that you'd be sooo... perverted?"

I would have taken more offense if she wasn't so right about it.  I wasn't that sexual.  Or sexy.  I was five-foot-five, a half a foot shorter than Blossom.  I was also kind of fat.  Or chubby?  My mom would call me "healthy", but the two were synonymous to her.  I had glasses, wavy brown hair, and appeared generally unassuming.  It was like looking at Anne Hathaway at the beginning of The Princess Diaries, if Anne Hathoway were fat and her hair weren't so frizzy.  Unfortunately, taking off my glasses and straightening my hair didn't really make me look any better.  Maybe I could pull off an early America Ferrera, if she were really, really white.

"Yeah, well... I can't really say the same about you," I said sourly, picking roughly at my fingernails. "Though I guess stuff like this wasn't really what I had in mind..." 

"Just goes to show that you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, Mia Moore!"

Here was the truth about Blossom: before she started high school, she was a mousey little teenager who didn't get a lot of attention. When that changed, she found that the kind of attention she got was often the amorous type. She was hot, and… well, she wasn't a member of the Purity Club, that much was for sure. There had been a period of time when people said she was named Blossom because she spread her legs like a flower spreading its petals. So she didn't take offense to Mia implying she was a bit of a pervert, because... well, she was. 

"I've only read about it," Blossom said, about as vaguely as possible, "but it's so hot."

There were a lot of implications in that one sentence. Blossom didn't actually do any of this baby stuff.  She was interested enough to go to a munch, but not hit up a Walgreens?  But she found it hot.  Not just hot.  So hot.  What was so sexy about acting like a baby?  But I couldn't answer that question either, and we were in the same boat.  So what was this to her?  A fad?  Was she more the caregiver type?  A baby?  None of them fit.  Then again, she did tell me not to judge a book by its cover.

"You said Academy B was the sexiest?" I asked, tilting my head. "Why is that?" This time, I wasn't looking for Academy Works lore; I wanted Blossom Brixley lore.

"It's a perfect balance. The punishment of the cold room, the brainwashing with her dreams, and the almost-voluntary surrender before she even gets to leave that solitude. By the time she crawls through that tunnel, she's literally been reborn. She doesn't wanna be anyone else but who they made her. It's not identity death; it's a complete transformation, with the same parts of Bala that made her up before still being there, just... reprogrammed, and reassigned."

That was the academic answer, pardon the pun, so Blossom also added:

"And the idea of voluntarily losing control of like..."

She looked around the train car and leaned in close to whisper a little.

"To lose control and be completely dependent on diapers? Wow."

Blossom fanned herself again as she leaned back.

My cheeks were red just listening to her talk about it, and not just because I was flattered.  Though I was flattered.  So she really liked all that stuff?

"Yeah, I... I guess that makes sense." In a lot of other diaper smut stories, it was about breaking someone down so they weren't really themselves anymore.  Or it was someone willingly wanting it.  In Bala's case, it was kind of both: she was broken down enough that she wanted it.

"What about you?" Blossom asked out of the blue. "Who is your favorite?"

"I, uh..." Was she fishing for something?  Was she recording me?  Did she actually want to know?  I would just keep my answer vague enough to avoid a sound bite.

"If you're trying to get spoilers out of me, I'm not giving them," I said plainly. "But... I guess my favorite character is Ai.  Because she's... I dunno.  Broken.  Even if she wanted to give up, she can't.  She can't let herself be happy." After a pause, after too much silence, I felt anxiety creep up my spine.  I had said too much. 

"Aya is a close second right now," I added.  She was the newest protagonist, the main character in Academy A.  The stories were released in the following order: I, B, T, K, and A.  The first four were finished, but I was still writing A. 

"Aya is interesting! Academy A has this sort of... Matilda meets Pippi Longstocking, with a big Enid Blyton vibe! Like Peter Pan if Peter Pan was set in a Victorian boarding school instead of on an island full of racist stereotypes and pixies."

Blossom thought about something for a moment, before adding:

"Do you think you're like Ai? Maybe you can't let yourself be happy? I don't wanna pry but like... you saw someone you knew at a munch for people of the same interest, and you ran away."

"I... uh..." No one had ever asked me something like that before.  She kind of sounded like what I imagined a therapist would sound like.  And this was Blossom Brixley of all people!

"I dunno.  I guess my fight-or-flight response is always set to flight?  And this stuff, this part of me... no one knows about it.  So I saw you and..." I got scared.  I didn't want to say it, but that was the truth.  Even now, I was scared that this whole thing was a joke.

"Well, I know about it now, Mia. But you know it about me too. If this were a story on that forum, you'd use that to blackmail me, and all sorts of hijinks would happen."

Blossom made spirit fingers with her hands for emphasis and smiled contently before she crossed her arms about her ample chest.

"True," I laughed.  Mutual assured destruction, like the Cold War.  Not as sexy as the Cold Room, but just as effective.  Though nothing I had on her was damning enough with which to blackmail her.  Likewise, everything she had on me was just hearsay.  But the sad truth of the world is that hearsay is more powerful for the popular than it is for the invisible.

"So," Blossom urged, raising an eyebrow, "what'll it be?  Blackmail story?  Or unlikely friends?"

"Well, I do like breaking tropes," I smiled. "So I guess your secret is safe with me."

[Sophie ♥]

3.)

I felt like the train reached our station too early.  The ride was supposed to be two hours long, but it felt a lot less than one.  As I waved goodbye to Blossom, I realized I hadn't asked her for her phone number.  Would that be too forward?  Maybe it was better that our friendship ended right then.  It would simplify things.

I called an Uber.  I wondered how Blossom got home.  Was her car at the station?  Did she get an Uber too?  We could have shared... we could have kept talking.  But it was probably best that we didn't.  Right?

When I got home, the lights were off.  Mom was in bed, so I kicked off my shoes by the door and went up to my room.  I felt wired.  I didn't want to sleep.  I wanted to talk to someone.  But I knew Lin had an early morning class, and I wouldn't be able to tell her about where I was anyway.  Or about Blossom.  Secret safe with me...

I opened my laptop; maybe I could write another chapter of Academy A.  But the only story in my mind was blackmailing the high school bully.  I had turned on the voice recorder app on my phone.  I had proof that she got off to diaper stories.  She would have to do anything I said or I would humiliate her in front of all her friends.  Diapers to class.  Short skirts, pigtails.  Nothing too overt.  Eventually she'd come to love being a baby girl.  I was doing her a favor.

Alas, I didn't have the voice recorder app turned on.  I didn't have any proof.  I didn't even want to humiliate Blossom.  I wanted to ask her more about my stories... I wanted to hear all her theories about Academy Works.

I finally closed my laptop and went downstairs to make some bread.  I didn't fall asleep until six in the morning.

[Pudding]

Probably one of the best projects I ever contributed to! I hope that yall like it - Blossom was so fun to write. 

[thedman]

Ok, so I guess the worst kept secret worked on me, I was totally unaware that Mia was a pen name.  I feel like I may need to go re read the Academy series since it has definitely been a hot minute.

 

I love the premise of this story and I can't wait to see where you guys take it.

[Sophie ♥]

Thursday, October 6th

4.)

I had one class with Blossom and it met Tuesday and Thursday afternoons.  It just so happened to be Thursday.  I only got a few hours of sleep, but the thought of seeing Blossom kept churning me awake.  Excitement or fear?  Anxiety: the exact middle ground.  I could walk into class and she could have all my stories printed and taped to the walls.  Or she could bound up to me and ask me all the other questions she had about Academy Works.  I was petrified and restless at the same time.  I wanted to both go to class and disappear from the world, but only one of those was possible.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, seeing Blossom wasn't as climactic as I'd expected.  She came in late and sat in the back of the room with one of her friends, a girl in her sorority.  When I caught her eye, I waved a little, something subtle.  She smiled, but she didn't wave back.

Throughout the 90 minute class, I tried to steal an equal number of glances at Blossom.  Maybe we kept missing each other.  Eventually I put my head in my hand and tried to make sense of the notes I had written down.  They were nonsense.  I'd have to borrow someone else's.  Was that a good enough excuse to talk to Blossom?

A little about Blossom Brixley: she was a sorority girl. She was on the college board for historical preservation. She did calisthenics and yoga recreationally. She tutored Italian. She was also a total slut, and she also happened to enjoy Mia Moore's diaper stories.  And the thing that all these facets of hers had in common? She never let them overlap. Her yoga friends weren't her sorority friends. The freshman she tutored weren't into the historical preservation of the Eastman building. And Mia Moore wasn't a girl she could do calisthenics with, any more than she could invite her to a sorority party. 

To Blossom, her world was an assortment of little planets, small enough to walk around and close enough to see the others from, but never ever allowed to touch or meet.

She was going to have to explain this to Mia, and she was worried Mia - in her perpetual flight mode - wouldn't take the news well.

After class, I waited around a little.  I thought maybe she would wait too.  I thought maybe we would have a second alone, or she might try to get my attention.  She didn't.  She left with her friend and I stood there like an idiot.

Of course she didn't want to know me.  Why would she?  We promised to keep each others' secrets - that was all this was.  But she said that thing about her telling me her thoughts about Academy Works in person.  Was that just a joke?  I couldn't remember her exact words...

I didn't write any Academy Works that night.  I texted Lin that I didn't sleep well, which was true, and she left me alone after that.  I didn't have to lie - I just had to imply that I was about to lie down.  Instead, I made brownies.

[Sophie ♥]

Saturday, October 8th

5.)

On Friday, I didn't have classes.  Those were usually my writing days, when my mom was at work, but I had been feeling off ever since the munch.  Ever since bumping into Blossom.  I knew people wanted to know what was going on with Aya, but I wasn't even sure myself.  I had ideas, but all of them seemed to pale in comparison to the story about a girl who blackmailed her bully.  When did I get so cliche?

I spent my day doing homework instead.  I ate some brownies and my mom made chicken for dinner.  It wasn't until late that night that I decided to check DailyDiapers.  Would there be any new comments?  Maybe someone asking when the next chapter would be released?  But ever since Academy B - the second of five - no one seemed all that interested.  I had some good fan mail for Academy T, but K really killed the audience.  Serves me right, waiting halfway through the story to put the protagonist in a diaper.  If I was the reader, I wouldn't have made it past the first chapter.

Unexpectedly, I had two new notifications.  A comment on Academy I and a message in my inbox.  I decided to check the message first, since it was probably just some guy asking if I wore diapers.  Like, I'm on a diaper website.  Take a guess.

I didn't recognize the screen name.  Sent Thursday morning at 1am.

>>I forgot to give you my number.  Text?

Ten digits... and a local area code.

I should have downloaded an app or something with a fake number.  I should have messaged back and given my Discord username.  But I wasn't thinking; I was fervent.  It had been almost two days since that message was delivered.

>>Hey, it's Mia!

>>Sorry, I didn't see the message until just now.

I blinked at the clock in the corner of my phone screen.  12:25am.  She would be asleep.  Or at one of those fun late-Friday college parties.  I should have waited until morning, but the reply came back within a minute.

>>Hi Mia!!!!

>>It is peachy! I was not sure how long it would take you to check the message neways!

I looked at her messages for a few minutes, trying to think of what to say.  She was so quick to text me back, but she didn't say anything to me at school.  Maybe she was busy?  She didn't look busy...

>>So what's up?

Great texting skills, I scolded myself.  I fell back on my bed with a groan.

>>I am doing this essay and it is about the importance of the spice trade

>>I promise I would rather be reading than writing

>>Reading your stories if that was not clear! 🤤

>>Yeah I usually write on Fridays when my mom's at work.  But I wasn't feeling it today.

>>So everyone will have to endure another week without Academy Works.

>>Not that they seem to mind. 😔

>>I mind!!!!

>>I am sorry you are not feeling it tho 

>>Do you want me to come hang out with you?

>>Uh...

>>No that's probably not a good idea.

>>My mom's asleep.

>>Also like?? There's nothing to do in this house.

>>Why do you think I write stories?? 😅

>>Well do you want to go out somewhere

>>I would love love love any excuse to not be writing this essay

>>It's kinda late??  I also don't have a car.

>>Which reminds me

>>Why did you take a train to that dinner??

>>I did not 😅

>>But I saw you were taking the train

>>So like a weird creepy stalker girl

>>I followed you to the station

>>I had to go back and get my car the next day 😤

>>Seriously??

Yeah, that was kind of weird.  But maybe if I ran into Carl Jung at a meeting for diaper lovers I would have followed him onto a train too.  It was weird to think that I was Blossom's Carl Jung.

>>You coulda just talked to me the next day??

>>Actually no I would of freaked out

>>You did the most normal thing

>>Babes I know I did

>>I leave my car all sorts of places tho

>>I once left it in Chicago by accident because I thought I took the greyhound there. 

>>So it is fine!

>>I can't imagine misplacing a car

>>But I am glad you got on the train

I paused and bit my lip, looking at that last message.  I was glad she followed me.  I was glad I had someone to share this with.  But then yesterday at school...

>>So I tried to get your attention Thursday in class??

>>I didn't wanna bug you tho

>>I was worried that might happen

>>It is hard to explain and sometimes people get hurt when I try but hear me out

There was a fairly long pause.

>>I do not really mix parts of my life because it is easier to just know who is who and who knows what about me if that makes sense? When I was in middle school there was an incident where I told secrets to a friend and that secret got around to everybody so now I keep my pockets of friends separate like potato and gravy.

>>Oh

>>Yeah I guess that makes sense

I didn't know why, but her explanation didn't really make me feel any better.  I knew what she was saying was reasonable, but my heart didn't really care.

>>I don't tell my best friend about the Mia stuff either

>>So I get where you're coming from

>>You would not like my friends anyway they are pretty shallow people

>>Really nice and loyal and sweet!!

>>But shallow

>>Your characters have more depth.

>>And I love my friends but they have the emotional maturity of Talita. 

>>Did you fall asleep?

>>No, sorry.

>>I was just thinking, like...

Did she still want to hang out?  Probably not.  I closed my eyes tight, until I saw stars when I opened them, and went back to my phone.

>>We can just text about Academy Works if you want??

>>I don't wanna make things hard on you

>>You are not making things hard for me you silly gosling

>>And do not think I do not notice what "we can just" means in this context!!

>>I am your friend. I want to hang out with you!!!

Friend?  She didn't really act like my friend.  We had known each other for six years, and she had never once acted like my friend.  And now, because I wrote some stories on the internet, she wanted to know me?  But not enough to make room for me.

No, she just wanted more stuff about Academy Works.  I was a middleman.  But... well, I would rather be that than be nothing.

>>How are we supposed to hang out??

>>I mean I can't talk about AW at home when my mom's here, which is like.  Always??

>>And you live in a sorority house right??

Ah, the age old problem of discussing diaper smut without a place to discuss diaper smut.  Texting was just easier. 

>>I have a beach house.

>>My dad's brother does I mean

>>But he only uses it for one week in July

>>And it sits there all year without being used

>>It is about a two hour drive away

>>I could pick you up!

Of course her family had a summer home.  On the beach no less.  The ocean was at least an hour away, maybe two.  From there, a myriad of beaches and beach-front properties.  They were popular for summer vacations, and too damn cold the rest of the year.

>>I dunno...

>>That's kind of far??

Blossom's speedy reply was really a testament to her thoughtlessness.

>>Stay the weekend then!!

A weekend at a beach house.  Mom wouldn't believe me if I told her.  But I was an adult, despite my proclivities, and she never stood in my way when I wanted to do something.

>>You sure it's not an imposition??

>>It is not at all!

>>We will have to bring our own food and I do not know how to cook so it will be junk food mostly

>>But it is really lovely!

>>And it is not too cold yet so we might be able to tan even!

>>I can bake??

>>I'll bring some dough with me??

Finally, something I could bring to the table.  Literally.

>>Wait, when are we doing this??  Next weekend???

>>If you want to!

>>But if I see a beach house in a future Academy Story it better be my one so I can be like "Oh look that is my beach house!"

>>🥺

>>I've never been to a beach house, so I promise to use yours as the template 🤣 

>>Though I really have no intention of making an Academy Beach House

>>We already had Academy B

>>It could be Academy V!

>>The Illusive Academy Vacation House

>>That is right I pay attention! 🤔

That actually made me laugh.  The mention of Academy V was a throwaway line from my first Academy story, and it was actually a little flattering that she remembered.  Back then, I was still using Roman numerals instead of letters.

>>Friday after school??

>>Wait do you have classes??

>>Fridays are my day off

>>Yeah 😭 

>>I am done at five

>>That's okay, maybe I'll get some writing done

>>My mom works until 6 so those are my writing days

>>That sounds great!

>>Thank you for understanding

>>About my circles

>>Of people

>>Some people get very bent out of shape and I do not know how to tell them like

>>This is how I do not be anxious please be chill

>>Mia, some people are just not chill OTL

>>That's me

>>So chill

I sighed and put down my phone.  I was not chill.  I didn't like this at all, honestly.  But it was her life.  If she was making room for me, I should take what I could get.  What I could get was a beach house.  That was kind of cool, right?

>>I should finish this essay

>>I had friends in high school who had simps to do their essays

>>But because I was Miss Ugly Duckling through middle school I learned how to do my own school work

>>It is such a curse

>>I hope you get good sleep tonight, Mia Moore!

>>Goodnight

>>Good luck

I put my phone on my nightstand and looked up at the ceiling.  For better or for worse, I had a weekend away with Blossom Brixley at a summer home on the beach.  Despite the sickness and anxiety swirling around in my chest, I was actually kind of excited.  But all that excitement was crushed when I went back to my computer and checked that comment.

[Sophie ♥]

6.)

I knew the internet was full of thoughtless people.  I was just a name on a website.  They had expectations of me that I never knew, that I couldn't possibly meet.  Hell, I finished Academy I almost a year before that comment came through!  And still…

I didn't get out of bed on Saturday.  Well, I did.  I used the bathroom.  I made an appearance with my mom, so she thought I was just doing homework upstairs.  I ate lunch and dinner with her.  Sometimes that's what it means to not get out of bed: to get out of bed only the bare minimum so other people don't worry about you.

I read through the comment a dozen times, until I felt so sick that I couldn't read it anymore.  "Disappointed."  Didn't this guy know what Littles were like?  Didn't he know that there was probably no word in the English language that hurt quite like that one?  I just wanted to sleep until my skin flaked into paper and my bones dissolved into dust.

"It felt like a giant prologue." I guess it was, in a way.  It was just an introduction of concepts.  I thought it came across well as a standalone story, like a fun little vignette or something in a weird world where you don't fully understand the rules.  Like, kids growing up.  It was literally supposed to be a metaphor for infancy, for learning about the environment.  Or maybe I was just too vague about that.  Or maybe it wasn't that good a story.  

I mean, Uncle Andrew just handed some kids magic rings that threw them into different worlds, but I always thought The Magician's Nephew was a pretty good book.  It set up the villain for The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  I set up Nana a little bit… then again…

That commenter aptly pointed out that Nana didn't have much backstory.  Or any, I guess.  Maybe that was my flaw.  But if I told the reader about Nana, they would learn too much about the Academy.  They could start inferring things that I didn't want them to infer.  I just wanted to start with some ideas and some sexy baby smut.  I mean, it was my first real story!

And who is this guy anyway?  Where are his stories?  Why do people always criticize artists and writers and people that make things when they don't make anything themselves?  Are they so entitled to think their opinions matter this much?  Or do they know how much validation means to us?  Are they trying to hurt us?

The worst part was that final comment. "Curious to see how the second one is." So he was going to keep reading it.  So there was enough incentive for him to keep going.  Why?  He didn't say a single nice thing in the whole paragraph!  He didn't give one compliment, one thing he enjoyed, one acknowledgement of the twenty-eight thousand words that made it worth reading.  Why didn't he share any of that?

So what's really the point of leaving a comment then?  Especially on a story from a year ago?  I'm five stories in!  I can't just rewrite it.  I can't fix it.  I can't make it more interesting or more standalone or more engaging.  What were the words he used? "Something to latch onto." I thought I was doing that with the whole file at the end!  And…

I was crying again.

It wasn't good enough.  I should start over.  I could do better.  I could give this random stranger on the internet a reason to be proud of me.  I could change everything about myself, all for some guy I would never meet.  I'd do it.  Honestly, from the bottom of my heart, I'd do it.

If I had the fucking energy.

[Parkin]

22 hours ago, thedman said:

Ok, so I guess the worst kept secret worked on me, I was totally unaware that Mia was a pen name.

I didnt even get it until I was a few chapters into Meta Moore. I thought it was like a fanfic of Mia writing the story, I think the pdf I read didnt had the explaination. I was a bit mind blown when it suddenly clicked

[Parkin]

@Sophie ♥ Will the story get an epilogue? 🤗

[TBCuri]

Mia Moore's Stories inspired part of my story. 💎

[Sophie ♥]

45 minutes ago, Parkin said:

@Sophie ♥ Will the story get an epilogue? 🤗

If this drums up enough interest, I MIGHT be able to convince Pudding to write an epilogue with me!  So make sure to share with your friends.  

6 minutes ago, TBCuri said:

Mia Moore's Stories inspired part of my story. 💎

Awww!!! ❤️❤️ We are so flattered!!

[Parkin]

30 minutes ago, Sophie ♥ said:

If this drums up enough interest, I MIGHT be able to convince Pudding to write an epilogue with me!  So make sure to share with your friends.  

 

Then I hope it does  

[Pudding]

Oh totes! If this gets enough attention and feedback I could be convinced to do an epilogue~

[Sophie ♥]

Friday, October 14th

7.)

Blossom and I texted all week, and almost none of it was about Academy Works.  Actually, any time we got on the topic of baby stuff, she kept saying "I'll talk to you about it this weekend".  At first I wondered if she was just shy, but that didn't sound like Blossom.  It was more likely that she didn't want to say anything I could screenshot.  She didn't trust me.  But I guess I didn't trust her either.

I re-read that comment on DailyDiapers at least a dozen times.  I knew it was going to hurt me, but I couldn't help myself.  Maybe I felt like I was missing the lesson, that if I kept going over it again and again I'd figure out what I could have done differently.  But the truth is, I think I just wanted to punish myself.  I felt like I deserved it.

Friday morning, I tried to write.  I kept reading and re-reading the last few chapters of Aya's story, but it felt so claustrophobic.  I had something else I wanted to say, another piece of the puzzle I needed to get out, but every time I tried it felt awkward and forced.  How many people would I be disappointing with this chapter?

Instead, I packed my bag.

What was I supposed to bring with me?  Diapers?  A pacifier?  I had a sippy cup, but even that felt too incriminating.  What if I got into her car and she opened my bag?  What if her friends were waiting in the backseat to laugh at me?  We never even talked about this stuff, and Blossom had made it clear on the train that she hadn't really done any of it anyway.  Munches and online stories were the extent of her experimenting, which was all she could get away with in her sorority house.

In the end, I decided to just pack a few sets of clothes.  Pajamas, layers, stuff like that.  A toothbrush, a phone charger, and of course my laptop.  It was only 10:30am when I texted Blossom.

>>5pm can't come soon enough @_@

>>I can't focus on writing 

>>It is very exciting!

>>I used to say 'berry' because I could not make V sounds as a little girl

>>And then I got braces and everybody made even more fun of how I talked ☹️

>>So I learned how to Very instead of Berry

>>That's some pivotal Blossom Lore for you right there!

>>Are you packed for the weekend? We have a long drive!

>>But you should always over-prepare because it is best to have something you want and not need it

>>Than to need it and not have it!

>>Yeah I'm low maintenance

>>I have some dough in the fridge too that I'm gonna bring

>>I just feel guilty when I can't write

>>Not that it really matters??

>>Just that one guy is commenting on A:A

>>And I never know how to respond to him

Usually I stayed a few chapters ahead of my posting schedule, that way when I got writer's block I had something to show until I got back in the groove.  But since A:K finished, I felt like I'd had nothing but writer's block.  I was all caught up: posting and writing were in parity.  And it had been more than two weeks... 

>>I am reading it!

>>And you know I have been reading since the beginning and I just do not comment

>>So I bet there are a hundred others like me!

>>Maybe more.

>>Imagine!

>>But

>>You should not feel guilty because you do not owe anybody anything

>>We are very lucky to have you and your art!

>>A lot of people say that

>>But it doesn't really help

I looked at the clock again.  Six more hours.  Maybe if I got dressed up, I could find some motivation to write.  I could get in Aya's head.  I could feel what she felt.  But the anxiety of this trip with Blossom kept pulling me away from that headspace.  Maybe I could make her a cake... was that weird? 

>>I am not very good with helping when people are sad

>>But

>>I am very determined at most things I do

>>So get ready for a weekend of mishandled and poorly implemented attempts of helping with your sad!

>>Looking forward to it XD

Sad wasn't the right word.  I was discouraged.  I was a lot like Aya from the new Academy Works story: I wanted to do my best.  I wanted to impress people.  I wanted to do something extraordinary.  Where did I choose to put all that passion?  Into writing diaper smut.

In the end, I didn't write any of Academy A.  Instead, I made Blossom a cake.  Actually, I made her five, but I only had one cake container.

[Sophie ♥]

8.)

It was almost five thirty when Blossom's ritzy sedan pulled into my driveway.  I already talked to my mom about going away for the weekend, but I left a note on the counter all the same.  I had my phone, in case she needed to call me.  Blossom said they had service up there. 

"Have you ever thought about car seats?" Blossom asked.

Yes, that was the perfect greeting for the author you idolize and adore when she sits down in your passenger seat. Blossom was often like that though, very stream of consciousness. That was why a lot of people thought she was a ditzy bimbo, that and her big rack and blonde bleached hair. She would just blurt things out because she'd been thinking about them.

Mia closed the passenger door and reached for her seatbelt. Blossom was wearing very very short denim shorts that looked even shorter because she had legs that refused to quit. She paired that with a white tank top straining over her large chest and a flowy red cardigan that she had pulled down off one shoulder. Topped with her large round sunglasses and straw hat, she looked ready to hit the beach despite the fact summer was long since over. Even if Blossom didn't know how to dress for the occasion, she sure knew how to dress.

"Car seats?" I asked.

"Like little kid ones, but in adult sizes," Blossom explained. "I bet they'd sell on Etsy or something."

"Uhh... I mean, I guess so."

I was always a passenger.  I mean, I had a driver's license, but my mom and I shared a car.  Sometimes I could borrow it in the evenings, but riding shotgun was kind of the norm.  A carseat would probably make the otherwise boring experience a lot less boring.

"You don't have car seats in Academy Works," Blossom mentioned offhandedly.

"There aren't any cars in Academy Works," I countered.  It looked like all her pent up question-asking was about to come out in full force.  I checked the back seat: no one was hiding to jump out and laugh at me.

"What's that?" Blossom asked.

"Uhh..." I looked down at the tray in my hands, with the plastic dome over the top. "Cake?  I was bored, so I made it.  I hope that's okay?" Maybe Blossom didn't eat cake.  She sure looked like the kind of girl that would scoff at carbs or something.

"I love cake soooo stinking much!" Blossom said unexpectedly. "That's so awesome. I'm going to spend a weekend with Mia Moore and the cake she made; that's so hot."

Now, admittedly, Blossom meant 'hot' here as a term to mean 'really good' or 'pretty great', but also she did find it a pretty attractive quality in a person for them to make cake for a road trip. She was positively glowing, and her sunglasses only served to accentuate the definition of her cheekbones. And her lipstick - a bright red - only served to make her smile all the more apparent.

"Thank you?" Well, that was a lot more enthusiasm than I expected, but it was appreciated all the same.  I set the cake tray on the floor of the car and put my feet on either side to keep it steady.  Blossom pulled out onto my street and started toward the freeway.  Two hours in a car with Blossom Brixley: what could go wrong? 

"I'm surprised that there aren't any cars in Academy Works," Blossom said. "I guess it makes sense that there aren't any in I or B, but in T there's a whole town. There's a lot of potential there. Like in this one other story I read, the girl had an accident in the car on the way to visit her friend, so her friend obviously had to put her in a diaper and baby her."

Blossom was as exuberant as usual, and thankfully that didn't distract her from driving. Her stereo showed the name of a song playing from her phone, but she had deliberately turned the volume down so she could talk with Mia. 

"Do you ever read stories by other people?" Blossom asked.

"Yeah," I shrugged. "I mean, not so much anymore.  I think I get discouraged, seeing how good other people are at writing.  Like, you know Personalias?  I feel like he writes an entire story before I can finish a single chapter.  That guy is non-stop."

That was the first time I said Personalias's name out loud.  I said it like two different words - Person Alias - but maybe it was supposed to be Personal-eeus?  Person-el-eeus?  It was strange, introducing my baby brain to the world of sound and speech.  They felt incompatible.

"What, uh... about you?  I guess you must have other favorite authors?"

"I've read a lot! There's that one Baby Dolls story by Fifers, but it hasn't had an update in ages. AB Alex has really nice short stories."

"Agreed," I said.

"And there's Sophie and Pudding," Blossom went on, "but their style takes some getting used to because it goes back and forth. But the colors help! I used to like Princess Pottypants too, but I don't think I've read anything by her in a long time."

Talking about this stuff out in the open was a little bit surreal, because until very recently this circle of Blossom's life was a pretty solitary one. It wasn't uncomfortable though, and saying the words out loud didn't feel that weird. It was just a new thing, and that newness was also exciting in its own way.

"Ha, yeah.  Everyone writes in the Diaper Dimension.  I'm not a huge fan." Did I sound jealous?  I was jealous, but I didn't want to sound like it.  I mean, who didn't want every ABDL author writing in the universe they made up?  No one else wrote in the Academy Works world.  Though I guess I didn't leave a lot of room for it...

"I don't mind it," Blossom said. "I think a shared universe is pretty heckin' cool, but a lot of those stories make the world their whole gimmick, so they feel pretty samey. I love your stuff because it's all so different. None of the Academy stories feel alike!" 

"Thanks..." I sighed. Blossom had to hit the brakes kind of hard to avoid an annoying driver who tried to cut her off. I was glad I had been holding the cake tray between my feet, or it would have gone flying off my lap. "But I mean, all the Academies are in the same world.  They are the same... uh... organization?" Was that the best word?

"So are there twenty-six?" she asked. "One for each letter?"

"I think so." That was a tidbit that probably would never appear in the written work.  Maybe I was starting to trust Blossom after all. "There are what, 1500 Candies?" 

"1508," Blossom corrected. "Nine if you count Angela."

"You shouldn't count Angela," I smirked.  I felt like a cat with a secret. "And there are sixty-ish Candies in K and A."

"Which is..."

Blossom did the math faster in her head than I could have done on paper.  It was kind of impressive. 

"A little over 25 Academies."

"So the math checks out," I shrugged.

"But you're not writing 26 stories," Blossom said, almost like a question, but it had the wrong inflection at the end of the sentence.

"Nope. It won't take that many to tell the story I want to tell." 

"So did you plan out the entire roadmap from the start?" Blossom asked. "Or have you been winging it as you go?"

"We're just going to shotgun Academy Works questions for two hours?" I asked, breaking her train of thought.  I was just joking, but Blossom got a little flustered.  Her cheeks took on a splash of color and she tightened her hands on the wheel of the car.

"I'm sorry. I must sound like such a little simp, huh?"

Blossom actually wasn't too used to being called out, joking or otherwise, and it took her a few moments to figure out how to stick the landing on this one. In the end, she settled on adjacency.

"Well, what other stuff have you done? What else are you into? Tell me about the real Mia Moore!"

"Uh..."

On the list of things I wanted to talk about, Academy Works was at the top.  Me?  I was at the bottom.  So I decided to deflect back to her original question.

"I had a plan when I started writing, but I think a lot has changed since then.  Maybe the core story is still the same?  But all the pieces are different." It was kind of weird how things evolved over time.

"Oh hey now," Blossom said, "I was a cheerleader and I don't even think I'm flexible enough to have dodged like that!"

Which really only made Blossom more interested in knowing the answer! Something she'd learned on the train that first evening had been that brute-forcing things with Mia wasn't the cleverest idea, though, so she decided to do some give and take.

"Okay I'll go first! I love mind control and hypnosis stories, especially when the person is fully aware of what's happening to them. Certain words, like 'conditioned' or 'trained' are super mega ultra hot by association."

No wonder she liked Academy Works...

"Can't we just go back to talking about my stories?" I whined. Those were more interesting anyway!

"One thing about you first," Blossom countered.

"Ugh... I dunno..." Mind control was definitely up there on my list of kinks.  I played with my fingers in my lap and tried to answer her question. "I don't really read a lot of stories anymore?  I usually make up my own?"

She looked over at me out of the corner of her eye, raising an eyebrow.  I sighed.  Gosh, this sucked.

"I see a photo or a piece of art or something and I make up my own story to go along with it.  Like, how did they get to that point?  What happens after the picture?" And now it was my turn to blush.

"See!" Blossom said gleefully. "That wasn't so hard, now, was it? And that's super interesting and totally charming. You undersell yourself so much, Mia Moore; you're such a curiosity." Boldly, Blossom put her hand on Mia's knee in encouragement and winked at her.

"Uh... thanks..." I shrugged her hand off me and sunk further into the chair. "Can we go back to talking about Academy Works now?"

"Totes!" 

"Actually, I had a question for you." It was the first bit of initiative I took since getting in the car.

"Shoot," Blossom said. 

"Did you like the first one?  Academy I?  I try to write the stories as their own little standalone vignettes, since like… I know a lot of people just want to get off to this stuff and writing long-form stories can get in the way of that.  I just want everyone to have fun reading them, even if they don't get the whole plot, ya know?  But I dunno.  Maybe they aren't good on their own?" After that comment, I was actually thinking about going back and editing all my posts to specify that the stories must be read together.

If Blossom had needed to think about the answer, it must have happened quickly because her answer came at the speed of a gameshow contestant hitting a buzzer.

"Mia Moore, if Academy I hadn't been so amazingly good, I wouldn't have read it. The whole thing is a masterclass in both meeting and subverting expectations, like the cupboard thing and the Flopsity thing. And it's like how movies become a series after the first one, like Star Wars? Star Wars had to be really good, because it might have been the only one. But it also had to be a good first entry to a series if it did well, and that's what Academy I is. It's a collection of extremely hot scenarios with a fun, curious protagonist. The undercurrent of mystery is just icing on the cake."

After gushing about it, Blossom summarized:

"It definitely stands alone."

"Even though it doesn't answer any questions?" I asked.

"The fact that it asks them at all makes it better than most diaper stories. Plot isn't exactly the metric by which you judge a diaper story."

I nodded. Maybe Blossom was right. If kink stories were about plot, we wouldn't have so many 'my wife wants a baby' stories. We wouldn't have so many people who liked reading about it. Maybe I was being too hard on myself; I wasn't trying to win a Pulitzer. I just wanted ABDL stories to be more than fap rags. In a vaulting contest of expectations, the bar was so low that an actual baby could crawl over it.  At least I was trying, right? So why couldn't I shake the suspicion that I was digging under that bar?

I didn't want to talk about it anymore.

"Did you have any other questions?" I asked, which was a stupid thing to say.  Blossom's questions had no end. I kept thinking she would get sick of asking about my stories, but she didn't.  I had doubted her motives before getting in the car, but by the time we arrived at the beach house I was well and truly convinced: Blossom Brixley was a fangirl of my diaper smut.

"Wait, how many more stories is "a few"?  Two more?  Three more?" 

Blossom put the car in park and turned to me with undivided attention for the first time in two hours.

"I dunno?" I shrugged. "Something like that?" 

On the drive, we talked about my inspiration for writing Academy Works in the first place: a video game called Xenosaga.  My mom got me a PlayStation 2 when I was in middle school and I fell in love with the game.  There was one character - MOMO - who was a little girl with a magical girl battle mode.  I think she contributed a lot to my liking of Little stuff.

More importantly, Xenosaga was a wild narrative and psychological roller coaster.  It was based on some stuff by Carl Jung and Friedrich Nietzsche, the fathers of pretentious college kids everywhere.  It also had a lot of biblical inspiration.

Xenosaga - which was actually three games - also had a prequel game called Xenogears, but the game was so complicated that they had to make a guide book in Japan called Perfect Works.  I thought that title was elegant, so I named my series Academy Works in reverence.

Perfect Works had six parts, but I wasn't confident that I could wrap up Academy Works in only six stories.  I was already halfway through the fifth one and there was a lot left to say. 

Blossom didn't know anything about Xenosaga or Carl Jung or Friedrich Nietzsche, which was probably a good thing.  I didn't want her to get her expectations too high; I wasn't as pedantic or as visionary as my source material.  I was, however, more comprehensible.

"So if you aren't going to use all the Academies... how do you feel about someone else doing it?  Writing stories in those places?"

"Uhh..." Like how people write in the Diaper Dimension? "I'd be flattered."

"But Academy Works is kind of intricate, right?" Blossom asked. "Would they be non-canon?"

"Hm." I had never thought about that. "No, I think they could still be canon.  The Academies are there to make obedient Candies, but not all of them are important to the main plot.  So if someone wanted to make like... an Academy J story or something, they could design the Academy and fill it with whatever characters they wanted.  And that could be like... a side-story?" I kind of liked the idea, to be honest!

"Like Paradox Space." Blossom nodded in understanding, and Mia looked at her blankly. She shook her head dismissively and smiled with her painted lips. "Come on, let's head inside."

[Sophie ♥]

9.)

The beach house was "Brixley Family" incarnate; it sat half on the sand, on top of short stubby stilted legs a few feet high, with a railed deck that looked out onto the water at the rear of the house and stairs that led down onto the beach. The outer walls had the appearance of a log cabin painted white from the outside, but it was only a facade. The interior was pretty standard. A living room, a few bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom; all very open plan and airy with pastel painted walls that evoked the sky and the sunset.

Blossom led Mia to the door, unlocked it with a code, and then turned to leave again.

"You can go inside," she said. "Check out the deck at the back too! I've gotta turn on the propane tank and power meter, so I'll be right back."

"Uh, okay..."

I had my backpack slung over my shoulders and the cake in my hands.  I looked out at the beach; the sand was white and flat, leading up to gentle waves and a whole lot of water.  The coastline was empty with the exception of a couple holding hands and walking along the water's edge.  I wasn't that surprised; the sun was almost down and the weather app on my phone said it was 55 degrees.

I stepped into the foyer and kicked off my shoes.  The kitchen was easy to find.  Actually, the whole floor plan was pretty open, with a huge glass door wall facing out onto a deck, overlooking the water.  But the most interesting part about the beach house wasn't outside: it was the accent wall.

It was only a few minutes before Blossom followed Mia into the beach house and she flicked a light switch on and then off to make sure it was working right, then did a discrete little fist pump that she'd gotten it right. 

"There's a part of me that says 'Blossom, get your things out of the car now', but a much louder part of me says, 'you're not the boss of me Blossom's internal monologue, you don't tell me what to do'."

Although she wasn't sure exactly how much of that Mia had paid attention to, because she seemed totally enraptured by the Wave Wall. The Wave Wall was a large, tacky mural that took an entire wall of the living room from floor to ceiling, painted to look like a crashing wave. Blossom had loved it as a little girl, but the design goal hadn't really stood the test of time.

"This is... big." The whole wall was a painting, and it was also incredibly detailed.  If I hadn't been able to step up close and touch it, I might have thought it was a billboard or something.  I'd obviously underestimated the wealth of Blossom's family.  Though this was her uncle's place or something, right?

"It sure is!" Blossom laughed. "And you can't escape it. You'll be in the bathroom trying to wash sand out from between your toes and you'll look out into the living room and wow there it is. The Wave Wall." 

The way that Blossom talked about the Wave Wall did make clear that she had some degree of disdain for it.

"Well, uh... cake?" I held out the tray.

"Right!" 

Blossom took it from me and set it down on the kitchen counter.  I followed her, because... well, what else was I going to do?  I wasn't even sure why we were here.  To hang out?  To be friends?  Probably just to talk more about Academy Works or diapers or whatever it was two kinky college girls did.  The sun was setting, but the bay faced south; it wasn't that impressive.

"I should probably cut you a slice because you're clearly too baby to be allowed to use a knife, right?" 

Blossom winked with a friendly smile. But it was more than just a casual comment of teasing, or a gentle ribbing; it was a proper test of the waters. She didn't really know what Mia liked in person. Yes, Blossom's teasing had painted her as 'the big' but maybe Mia didn't want that. Maybe Blossom didn't want that. Maybe this would all be nothing in the end. Blossom made sure to keep her expectations open and tempered.

"Oh, uh..." I felt my face get a little hot.  I'd written that line like a dozen times, and I'd probably read it a dozen more, but no one had ever said it in the real world.  Wait, did people actually say that in the real world?  Ugh, I needed to go to more of those munch things...

"I'm, um..." Not that hungry? "Sure..."

Blossom grinned happily, clearly pleased with herself, and the gentle heels on her boots clicked on the tile floor of the kitchen. She leaned over to get plates from a lower cabinet and then stood up to get cutlery from the drawer. She opened the cake carrier up and tilted her head left and right as she lined up the knife, as though getting it dead center was the most important thing in the whole world. And then with a smooth elegant motion, she sliced the cake down the middle. With two more deft cleaves, she cut and served two slices of cake, then gently sucked the frosting off her thumb with a coy smile.

This was so surreal.

She was here with Mia Moore!

I took my plate and sat down at the kitchen bar, on a little stool.  It creaked a little and I suddenly felt a little self-conscious about my weight.  I knew it would probably creak for Blossom too, but... well, maybe not.  Blossom reached over and gave me a fork and I took a bite of the cake I'd made.  A little dry; slightly overbaked.  At least the frosting turned out okay.

Blossom took a bite of her slice and rolled her eyes back in delight, licking the fork as she pulled it out of her lips.

"Oh this is so good! I love cake so much! You should totes have an Academy story where they like kidnap the Candy with drugged cake. Or or! Where the cake just makes you baby? Or it's addictive? I'm just saying, even if I knew all that, I'd probably still eat it because I'm such a slut for cake. Of course if this were an Academy story, the cake would have to be pink." 

"Pink cake... yeah, I haven't done that one yet." Pink food was a recurring theme in Academy Works, and it always made the eater into a dumb, giggly baby. It was inspired a little bit by milk from another diaper story I'd read. I took another bite of cake and smiled up at Blossom. This was actually kind of nice.

"I think it would probably taste like pink milk. Like that not-really-any-natural-flavor-but-we-tell-our-kids-its-strawberry kind of flavor? Like Red Velvet Cake but it's Pink Baby Cake. You can use that one, uncredited, don't worry!"

Blossom had the goofiest, happiest smile on her face while she ate. She was genuine.

"I know the whole 'drug that makes you act like a baby' thing is a trope, but what can I say?  Gotta write what you love."

Blossom finished her piece before me; if she ate cake like that, how did she stay so thin?  When I was done, she took the plate from me and rinsed it in the sink along with her own.  I kicked my feet.

Friends with Blossom Brixley.  I sure didn't see this coming.

"I always love when the pink stuff comes out," Blossom said. "I totes didn't see the berries coming in K; those were awesome. Kione would have just been so much happier if she stayed blissed out on baby berries, I'm jus' sayin'."

Blossom was a tall girl; it wasn't so obvious on the train or in the car, but at the college among others it was pretty clear. Here, in the beach house, it was also pretty clear. But the fact she wore boots with a small heel today - and actually really liked heels in general - was her way of owning what a lot of girls would see as a negative characteristic. She leaned over the counter and put her weight on her elbows, smiling at Mia.

"So tell me what else you love about writing, Mia Moore~"

"Uh..." I looked up at her and then down at the countertop.  I didn't know why, but it was hard to meet her gaze when I was talking.  When she talked, I could look at her just fine. "I dunno... I like the psychology of it, I guess?  How do you make an adult do what you want?  Obviously treat them like a baby..." That was sarcasm, but my tone didn't land that well.

"So if I wanted you to tell me more about what you like, I'd have to treat you like a baby then?" Blossom put her finger and thumb on her chin like the thinking emoji and paused for dramatic effect in that pose.

I blinked.  Was that a joke?  Obviously it didn't land either... maybe we were both off our game.

"Anyway..." I brushed my hair away from my cheeks, still avoiding eye contact with Blossom. "What about you?  Didn't you say you... like... haven't done the whole... baby thing before?"

It wasn't common for Blossom to cause an awkward social situation, so maybe that hit her a little harder than it would most people. She pouted about it too, pursing her lips and standing back up. Maybe she was just trying too hard here. What was she expecting of all this, anyway? This was her literary idol; she had to do better if she wanted to make a good impression.

What was the question?

Oh.

"Oh! Yeah. I've only read the stories online and gone to a few munches. It does make me feel like I'm not like a true fan sometimes."

"When did you... know?" 

I didn't know what kind of answer I was expecting.  Something recent?  Maybe then I could chalk all this up to a stupid fad.  Maybe some dude called her princess one too many times in the bedroom and she wound up on DailyDiapers after a night of boring internet searches and a half-bottle of wine.  Or maybe she would say forever.  Maybe she snuck into her little sister's crib when she was five years old, or she would steal pullups when babysitting her neighbor.  The truth was, I still couldn't put Blossom Brixley in the same camp as me.  We weren't anything alike; why would we share this?

"That's a big question!" Blossom said.

There was a lot of vulnerability tied up in that question too. Blossom knew full well that she had to be willing to give some of that up if she was going to earn the trust of her new friend. 

"I was in middle school, and I didn't have any friends, so I spent a lot of time online. I was always too shy to enter chat rooms or whatever because what if people asked how old I was? Or what I looked like? Or wanted me to call them, or tried to trace my computer or something; my Dad would have kicked my butt!" 

Blossom laughed, but it was clear that this was some pretty deep stuff for her; that this was personal. 

"I read a lot of forums and stuff, and sites with stories. It was usually romance stories, not even kink stuff, but I never really liked the ones where there was this traditionally pretty girl or whatever because that so wasn't me. And one day I saw this story about a girl who just never grew up. Like, she got older, but she didn't grow up, and people loved her for it. She had binkies, and wore and used diapers, and she had a biiiig crib and a Nanny and it was just... I wanted that! And the girl in the story wasn't the prettiest girl in the world, and I thought hey Blossom maybe that could be you. Maybe you're more of a Bubbles, did you think of that? Then it kind of spiraled from there."

The Powerpuff Girls reference wasn't lost on me, and... weirdly enough, it was kind of poignant.  Blossom was the leader, the one who always had to keep cool and make everything okay.  Literally, since she got ice powers or something.  Bubbles was the baby of the group.  Everyone always treated her like a kid, and... well, she kind of acted like one too.  I mean, there was that one episode where she threw a tantrum about being too cute, but even that was kind of cute.

"You didn't have a lot of friends in middle school?" I asked. She sure had a lot of friends in high school, but I didn't know Blossom before then.  We went to different middle schools.

"Not at all! I was a kind of shy, awkward, tall girl that nobody really wanted to be friends with. Everyone else got hit with the puberty stick and I was just this flat chested muppet with braces whose Dad would plait her hair every morning, because bless his soul he sure did his best. I had these glasses too, and I really liked them because they were pink but they did not look good. Back then I didn't really care though."

Oddly enough, Blossom seemed more comfortable talking about that part of her life than the fact that she had looked up pervy stories at the same time.

"Ah, so I'm basically middle school you, minus the dad." I mean, I didn't have braces and my glasses weren't pink, but enough of the parallel lined up. I laughed at my own joke, but Blossom didn't. 

"Middle School Blossom would have given anything to be you, Mia. You're curvy, you're talented, you have people who want to see your creations, and you're so much prettier than I think you think."

A girl like Blossom, tempered in the fires of high school drama and shallow expectations of image-is-everything, didn't need to lie about that. Heck, she probably didn't even know how to lie about that. And in high school, she'd been the kind of girl who'd been a bitch to people who were less pretty than she was. She wasn't proud of it, but it had been known to happen. 

"Uh... thanks..." Blossom's earnest tone was really not what I expected.  I looked down at my lap and played with my fingers.  My face felt hot.  I didn't understand how someone like her could find someone like me pretty... 

Blossom smiled and bit the corner of her lip as she winked - Blossom was a winker - and then got back on track with the important stuff.

"So, Mia Moore, I've told you my Baby Girl Origin Story, so now it's your turn to spill! Do you wanna go sit on the deck with me? Watch the water while we talk?"

"Uh... alright." 

[Sophie ♥]

10.)

I got up from the stool - which really didn't do anything for my height - and followed Blossom to the huge doorwall.  The sun was down and the water in the distance was barely distinguishable from the inky blue sky.  The deck was wooden, with a little set of stairs leading off to the beach.  Blossom had to go down the stairs and around the house to get the lounge chairs out of the shed.  I offered to help, but she told me I didn't have my shoes on.  She wasn't wrong.

I waited, leaning on the edge of the banister, looking out at the water.  It was quiet.  Peaceful.  I bet I could get some good writing done in a place like this... 

With some pride in her posture, Blossom unfolded the wooden lounge chairs, checked them for cobwebs, and set them in place. She then went inside, opened a closet door just inside the kitchen, and came back with a couple of wave-printed cushions for the lounge chairs.

"It looks prettier during the day, I promise."

Oh, that reminded her! She looked up under the porch ceiling and reached up, turning on a purple bug zapping lantern; it was probably high enough that most girls would have needed to stand on a chair, but not Blossom. It made her a tad bit self conscious. Nonetheless, she sat down on the lounge chair and put her feet up.

"Come on, sit! You're so stuffy, Mia; relaaaaax, get comfortable. I wanna hear your story!"

I sat on the chair next to Blossom, crossing my legs and looking out at the water.  The purple hue of the lamp above us washed out the horizon and it was hard to see the water.

"I was talking to a guy online," I started. "We used to roleplay together.  I was like, thirteen?  He said he was sixteen, but I said I was sixteen too, so who knows.  It wasn't sexual or anything, not at first.  We were both into Harry Potter, so we made up our own school where we were both mages.  Then one time there was a spell that turned me into a kid or something for the day, and all the teachers were treating me like a kid.  By the next year I was reading stories on sites I shouldn't have been on." It was kind of a dull story. 

"I've never read Harry Potter ~ I wanted to, but it turns out the author is a bit of an awful witch and not like the 'cast a spell and turn you into a baby' kind of way, but the really bad way, so I never got the chance."

Blossom looked up at the bug light and then out at the ocean and then at Mia Moore, sitting an arm's length away. Was this a dream? This had to be a dream, right?

"I totally lied about my age when I was that age too, because obviously.  And I used to think people would take me more seriously if I capitalized the first letter of every single word; my heavens I must have been obnoxious. Do you still talk to the boy?"

"Nah, we lost touch after a few years... I think our interests kind of took different routes.  I was on more of the ABDL stuff, and he was kind of..." I didn't know how to phrase it; I'd never talked about that guy out loud before.  Back then, I had such a limited vocabulary. "Kind of submissive?  And it's hard to be submissive with someone who wants to act like a child."

"Ah, I totes understand. It's hard when dynamics don't line up right, because you can kind of force it for a while but eventually you both notice how uncomfortable you are and you're left wondering if it's even worth it, am I right?"

Blossom did have a tone hinting that she'd had at least one awkward dynamic mismatch in her life, and rather than let it hang out open in the air she elaborated a little bit further.

"Ya girl Blossom here is a Switch, and I still sometimes end up in relationships where things don't work out dynamics-wise. Like, he'll want someone who's only submissive or she'll want someone who's only dominant, or it'll be some edgelord who thinks that safewords are the devil or they mean you're not committed or whatever the fuck."

"Ew."

"Very ew," Blossom echoed.

"I guess I didn't really get into the whole sex thing until later," I said, playing with my fingers in my lap. "I think most of my teens was just playing baby.  It started as a kid, then a toddler, and eventually diapers got introduced.  Lots of roleplays; that was how I learned to write.  Roleplaying and reading.  I sure didn't learn it from school."

"What about now?"

"Now what?" I asked.

"You said you didn't get into the sex thing 'until later'."

"Oh." I guess I did say that. "Yeah, probably around fifteen or sixteen.  I still don't think baby stuff is all that sexy, not objectively.  But it's sexy if you're forced into it.  Hypnosis, conditioning... like you were talking about in the car.  Or just someone strong, who knows what they're doing.  That's why there aren't any ABDL characters in Academy Works, I guess.  It's not hot if someone already wants it.  I mean, not to me.  To other people, probably."

"Obviously I can only speak hypothetically based on the stories I like, but I probably agree with you. There's a big yes to the idea of forcing, or coercing, or conditioning or training - have I mentioned how much I love that word? It's so fucking hot.  Training someone to wear diapers, or act like a baby."

Blossom fanned herself a second before continuing.

"Obviously there's lots of value in pretending or roleplaying too; there kinda has to be. Once a person likes it, they like it, and they'll probably only want to be forced to like it if they like it. The game itself is really fun; you just have to suspend disbelief and play along. Buuuuut... also? There's some appeal to me in the idea of training someone like Talita who accepts it, who likes it, but who also remembers when she didn't and that's pretty hot too. Bala was kind of the opposite because she's trained to like it, and also made to remember liking it so it's a really hot reversal."

It was hard to tell under the purple light, but Blossom was blushing.

"Also, being made to wear diapers in everyday situations, even if it's just under clothes and people can't really tell but maybe they can? Wow."

I had to laugh a little.  Gosh, she sounded like such a fangirl, talking about my stories like that!  She was just so excitable.

"What?" Blossom pouted, looking over at me.

"Nothing," I smiled. "I just haven't talked about this stuff in person before.  It's different than talking online.  More personable.  And with Blossom Brixley, no less."

"Kink doesn't care how stacked you are, or how popular," Blossom said wisely. "It just gets inside your head like a sexy lil' brain parasite and that's that."

Blossom leaned back in her chair.

"Is it good different?"

"Hmm?"

"You said talking in person is different from talking online?" Blossom reminded. "Is it good different?"

"I think so?" I looked over at Blossom, then looked down at my hands and smiled. Even if we couldn't be friends in the real world, this beach house was real enough.

I could have stayed on that porch all night, but the sun had gone down a while ago and it was getting cold.  I checked my phone: 45 degrees.  I pulled my arms into my hoodie - out of the sleeves - and wrapped them around myself to prolong the moment.

"I'm cold, too," Blossom smiled, without looking over, "I'm scared if we get up and go inside, suddenly you'll be gone, and that'll be that."

The two of them were quiet for a few more moments, and the gentle waves lapped at the sand melodiously. Eventually, the cold would win. Maybe it would be now. Maybe Blossom should get up, and lead the way inside; she wasn't dressed for the chill of the breeze off the water, that was for sure.

"We've got all weekend?" I offered, still looking out at the horizonless void. "The weather is supposed to be nice tomorrow."

"If it's nice tomorrow, I'm totally going to get you out on the beach to tan," Blossom said with a smile. "Come on, let's go inside and I'll order some delivery - cake only works for dinner if it's pink, so let's get some real food."

Blossom stood up and stretched her arms above her head before turning to slide open the door wall.

I didn't want to leave that moment, I really didn't.  But if I stayed there, then I would miss out on all the other moments waiting for us.  I couldn't risk that, so I got up and followed Blossom inside.

[Sophie ♥]

Saturday, October 15th

11.)

Saturday morning, I played idly with the keys on my laptop.  I had slept in one of the spare rooms upstairs.  It was quiet, with nothing but the faraway lapping of waves to lull me to sleep.  If I were writing this story, maybe I would have wet the bed or something.  Sounds of water as you're drifting off to dreamland?  There was something there.  But truthfully, I had never wet the bed before, not even on purpose.

Chapter Seven.

Aya woke up wet, as she always did.  The sounds of faraway waves had maybe too much of an effect on her, and after so long at the Academy she never stood a chance.

Backspace.

Aya woke up wet, as she always did.  The lantern above her was still flickering in the bright sunlight.  She rolled over and checked her alarm clock, round with a little bell on the top.  She wasn't late to class this time.

Backspace.

Aya woke up wet, as she always did.  The lantern above her was still...

Still.  Always.  Repetition.  This was always my problem when I was writing: the second things started getting monotonous, I got bored.  So many other writers could just repeat the same scene over and over about a little boy filling his pants or a little girl getting fed in a high chair.  But me?  Once I wrote it one time, I felt like I had nothing more to say.  Maybe that was why all the Academy stories were so short.

Backspace.

Aya didn't wake up wet.  For the first time in months, her diaper was dry as a bone.

A bone?  Aren't bones technically wet?  I mean, they're surrounded by blood and muscle and stuff.  What a stupid simile.

Backspace.

I fell back against the pillows and looked out the bedroom window.  It faced the driveway, and I could see Blossom's car in the distance.  I wondered if she was awake.

Mia woke up dry, as she always did.  The laptop screen in front of her was still glowing in the bright sunlit beach house bedroom.  She pushed it aside and rolled out of bed.  She wasn't late for anything.  Maybe there was pastry flour in the house and she could make some scones for breakfast.

Blossom hadn't had the best night of sleep in her life. Maybe it was the fact it wasn't her own bed, and she always slept the best in her own bed with her own sheets and her own three pillows (soft, soft, firm). Maybe it was because the ocean had its way of always being present in the way that trains running in the city weren't. Maybe it was because she wasn't cuddled up in someone's arms, although with Blossom's patterns on dating and one-night-stands, that was more the exception than the rule. 

Probably, it was because her literary hero was asleep in the next room. 

If this were an Academy story, maybe Blossom would have gotten up and snuck into the room with Mia, rubbing her eyes sleepily and saying she had bad dreams. Or maybe she would have cuddled up with Mia and Mia would have wet the bed and blamed Blossom for it, just so she'd be punished. All those thoughts made her loins warm beneath the sheets, and it was only after she'd taken care of that train of thought that Blossom had finally gotten some rest.

When the sun came up, it felt like she'd time traveled and no time had passed at all. But at least she was rested. She looked at her phone and at the weather forecast. Hot and sunny. Maybe she'd get some tanning done today.

Maybe she'd see what Mia wanted to do.

Something smelled good; was Mia cooking?

Blossom finally stopped putting off the inevitable and got up out of bed to investigate.

The kitchen was stocked with a lot of staples, and thankfully that was all scones really needed.  Eggs were the only things lacking, and one of the neighbors next door let me borrow a few.  We didn't have any fresh fruit, so I settled for cinnamon.

When Blossom finally came out of her room, I was on my third tray.  I had to throw a couple of them away, but I still had twenty or so left.  I slid one of the fresh ones onto a plate and pushed it across the island counter toward Blossom.

"You should keep frozen blueberries," I told her before saying 'good morning'. At least she had frozen butter.

"Blueberries?" 

Blossom tilted her head, curious about the context, but the sweet baked good on the plate pushed in front of her helped her still-sleepy brain to fill in the blanks. She slid up onto the stool, still dressed in her pajamas - a cute white top with a big flower printed across her boobs that didn't go quite down past her belly button and revealed a lot of her taut tummy, and a pair of pink powerpuff girl pajama pants - and smiled gratefully. 

"You made breakfast? You are so fucking sweet, Mia. Do you want me to get a pot of coffee on?" 

"Oh... I guess so." I wasn't exactly a coffee drinker, but with enough sugar and cream anything could be good.  I usually got those super sugary drinks at Starbucks, and Lin always made fun of me for ordering 100% sweetness when we got boba.

So Blossom - her plate and scone in her hand - went to obtain the coffee pot from one of the cupboards and I started kneading the dough for another batch of scones.

"Did you sleep okay?" Blossom asked. Without waiting for an answer, she said, "I never sleep the best in a bed that's not my own. I know, I know, Blossom Brixley who's slept in half the beds on campus, you'd think would be better at it by now. But unless I'm cuddled up to someone, my brain and body both whiiiiine about the bed no matter what."

She plugged the coffee maker in and filled up the reservoir with water. It was actually a little surreal because she felt like she was going through the motions of the morning after having fucked someone, but her and Mia Moore hadn't even shared the same bed.

"I wasn't thinking that," I said absentmindedly, folding the dough over and trying to ball it into the right shape. I cut it into triangles like a pie.  Scones were one of the easier things to bake, and one of the first things I learned how to make.  Baby's First Baked Good.  Was there a story idea there?

While last night's conversations had eventually gotten to the point of feeling free and easy and open, Blossom was beginning to realize that Mia had clammed up a little since then. That was fine; everyone has their own comfort levels with conversation. Blossom would just have to work a little harder.

"We should take our coffee and cake out onto the beach and eat breakfast together."

"Alright," I agreed. "Let me set a timer." 

I put the scones in the oven and set a timer on my phone.  It worked out, since Blossom was just finishing pouring the coffee.  I used some of the heavy cream that I had put in the scones in my coffee and dumped more-than-acceptable amounts of sugar.  It wasn't good, but the bitterness went nicely with the sweet scone.

The beach was a lot busier.  It was late morning and people were trying to hold onto the last bits of summer.  The sun was bright and hot and the sand glistened as vapidly as the ocean in the distance.  Sounds of children filled the air.

I sat on the same chair I sat on the night before and balanced my coffee up on my plate.

"I should get the end tables," Blossom thought aloud to herself, looking for a place to put her own coffee.

"You can probably reach the banister from there," I offered.  Her chair was closer to the stairs.

"You're so clever, Mia Moore."

Blossom reached up and set her coffee down on the banister and then addressed her scone.

"You have got to hand it to the English, making a cake you can eat for breakfast."

She happily took a bite and made an even happier noise as she indulged herself. Blossom did express her love for cake already, so she didn't feel the need to be too overly gushy about it this morning. Regardless, she couldn't help but layer on a little praise.

"This is so good! I oughta marry you, because whoever does is gonna be one lucky person."

"Ha..." She was flattering me.  I took a bite of mine and chewed it for a little too long.  Not a lot of flavor.  The cinnamon wasn't coming through the way I wanted it to.  Better than the first batch, though.  I washed it down with coffee and leaned back in my chair.  Someone was flying a kite in the distance.

"So you like baking?" Blossom asked.  She was chewing, and it came out a lot more like 'though yew lie bathing'.

Note to self: dry scones elicit babytalk.  Pink berry scones, perhaps?

"Not really," I shrugged. "But it keeps my hands busy.  And if I'm doing something, why not try to do it well?"

"That's a pretty good perspective to have on life, I think. Mia Moore: Philosopher."

But there was something beneath the surface that Blossom couldn't ignore any longer, so she came out and said it rather than beat around the bush.

"You seem pretty down this morning. Do you wanna talk about it?"

"Down?" I had to parse that for a second. Like, depressed? Did I seem that way? I didn't feel depressed. Maybe a little anxious... but that was because of–

Oh!  I could actually talk about that with Blossom!  I was so used to skirting the topic.

"I was trying to write some Academy Works this morning, but I'm not getting anywhere," I admitted, taking another sip of my coffee. "Nothing I write feels good enough."

Blossom's eyes lit right up at that revelation, because the idea that she might get to be privy to the writing process - or even help it along - made her entire face tingle in delight. She managed to keep a cap on her excitement though.

"Well, what's the problem," Blossom asked. "What feels not-good-enough about it? Maybe talking with me can help?"

"Uhh... I'm not sure?" I sunk further into my chair.  Talking out loud about this kind of stuff had never happened before.  Everything about my process was internal.  I never even spoke out loud to myself. "You're caught up, right?"

Caught up in this case was six chapters into Academy A, the fifth story.  How could I be bored just six chapters in?  Regardless, Blossom nodded.

"Well, I feel like Aya's conflict is kind of over with," I explained. "Obviously there's a lot more I want to say about her, but... well,  you know what Owen Dennis said about Infinity Train?"

Blossom shook her head.

"Have you seen Infinity Train?" I asked.

She shook her head again.

"You should watch it," I encouraged. "Anyway.  Owen Dennis is one of the creators and he said something like... when you write a story, you're writing about a hole in the protagonist's soul.  And for the ending to be good, you have to fill that hole.  So sequels are kind of stupid because you have to make a new hole that's more important, which trivializes the first story.  Also, it's boring.  That's why all the Academy Works stories use different protagonists, so I'm not dealing with the same thing over and over.  That's what Infinity Train does each season." 

Listening intently to every word, Blossom nodded her head and listened and soaked it all up. She didn't know anything about this show Mia was talking about, but the logic presented seemed pretty solid.

"I never really thought about that, but that's kinda why most sequels suck, huh?"

Most. Not all. Blossom did have her favorites. Knowing why each Academy story was about a different protagonist though, that gave her the kind of insight that she'd never really considered. She twirled the ends of her blonde hair and pursed her lips in thought.

"So...the setting for Academy A is so fricking cool, and also creepy. But it's creepy in that 'I don't know why this is creepy' kinda way, liiiike... oh! It's unsettling! That's a better term. But the cast is pretty strong so far. You did a diaper pooping scene in like the first chapter, so it's already an avant garde narrative, right? You don't have to fit a mold here." 

The casual commentary on a grown woman pooping her diapers was really awkward, and it brought a bit of heat to my cheeks.  I took another bite of my scone and slipped further into the chair.

"I think the messing scene in chapter one was probably rushing it," I admitted, "but after Academy K, I felt kind of guilty." I made the readers wait thirty-thousand words before Kione messed herself, and a lot of people only read diaper smut for that kind of thing.  Academy K had less engagement than the other three stories, and that didn't strike me as coincidence.  I didn't want to bore my readers again. 

"I don't think it felt rushed at all," Blossom argued. "And I also don't think you waited too long for it to happen in Academy K either. Because I'll be the first to admit that it definitely gets my thighs warm to read stuff like that, but without the context of the character it doesn't have any meaning. Like, it meant different things for Ai, Bala, Talita, Kione, and Ayoka. I love that you approached them all so differently, and at the same time, they all got me all hot and bothered. That's something to be proud of, right?"

There were people further down on the beach, but the thing about having a beach house was that people who didn't kind of ignored you. Blossom also didn't think anyone wanted to eavesdrop on this conversation anyway.

"I guess..." Despite Blossom's reassurance, I was still doubtful.  The longer something goes on, the less likely people are to read all of it.  I felt like Academy K was a bit of a bottleneck.  Maybe I should just stop writing... but I hated when ABDL stories went unfinished.

"Anyway," I deflected, "I'm not sure what to do.  I know what needs to happen in this story; I just have to get there."

"Do you ever write out of order?" Blossom asked. "Work your way backwards?"

"I know a lot of writers do that, but I'm very linear when I write.  But it's worth a shot, I guess."

"I bet it could be helpful to try."

Blossom nodded in agreement, although there was definitely something else bothering her a little. Something that wasn't sitting quite right. She pursed her lips and thought about it, thought about how to approach it, how to be tactful and careful, but in the end she just decided to ask her question rather bluntly.

"How come you don't like your own writing, Mia? You always seem skeptical when I gush about it, and your own assessments of it are always pretty negative."

"Isn't it like that for all writers?" I shrugged. "We are our own worst critics.  Aren't you critical of stuff you do?  Like cheerleading or something?" I didn't know a whole lot about Blossom's hobbies. "Partly because you know what is good cheerleading and I don't, so when I compliment you, is it really that validating?  It's like a kindergartener complimenting a rocket scientist on getting to the moon."

"That's fair, I suppose - but cheerleading is a bad example because we don't need to be self critical when all our friends and teammates are so critical of us already!"

Blossom laughed, but Mia didn't. 

"I'm not a writer, but I do read a lot of smutty stories so I think that's gotta count for something, right?"

At the end of the day, though Blossom knew Mia was right, she was just a kindergartener when it came to writing. That thought was kinda hot though.

When the timer on my phone went off, I got the scones out of the oven and let them cool.  We had thirty or so scones laying about the kitchen and I really didn't have anything to do with them, so I started sealing them on trays with plastic wrap.  There was no way Blossom would finish thirty scones, but they would make good snacks throughout the day.

[Sophie ♥]

12.)

The afternoon brought with it a deep malaise.  I didn't know what people usually did at beach houses.  Swim?  The water must be freezing in mid-October, and I didn't bring a swimsuit anyway.  I sent my mom a text to let her know I didn't die, but that was about all I had planned.  Luckily for me, Blossom was a bit more prompting.

"It's not that warm today, but the sun is high and the sky is clear and I wanna work on my tan. And you're going to work on yours too."

It was pretty on-brand for Blossom to be assertive like that, so it sounded natural. But tanning was definitely a part of her world and not Mia's. To say Mia was pale was to say that milk was pale; it was an absolute understatement. But Blossom thought she would look hot with a tan, and it might help her confidence a little as well. More than that, so far this trip had been all about Blossom stepping her toes into Mia's world, and it seemed fair to turn that around a little..

"I don't tan," I said. "I think I just burn?" My mom took me down to Florida once and that was a bad time.  Well, the theme parks were great: it was the next two days that sucked.  "And isn't tanning bad for your skin?" I should look it up...

Blossom shook her head. Mia might have known a lot about writing, but this was something from Blossom's life.

"Rocket Scientists and Kindergarteners, remember? This is something I'm really good at. It doesn't matter how pale you are, or how easily you burn, anyone can tan. I'm going to be in charge, so you can get some color on that skin."

This was a lesson that mousy little chestnut-haired middle school Blossom had to learn without a mentor to help. Mia was lucky!

"The FDA says tanning has no health benefits whatsoever and greatly increases the risk of skin cancer." I was reading off my phone. "It also ages you faster.  So like, the opposite of our kink."

Honestly, I didn't know people actually did tanning in the real world.  I thought it was just one of those things from TV shows that didn't translate well into modern life.  But when I looked up from my phone, Blossom was pouting.

"It's not about health," she said. "It's about looking hot. Everyone is going to age anyway, so you might as well do the things that make you look hot while you're young."

And, Blossom kept this part to herself, tanning couldn't be any worse than sitting in front of a computer screen all day.

"Pleeeeeeeaaaaase? I wanna share a part of my world with you, Mia~"

She was really good at pouting.

I was already the charity case here; could I really afford to be a stick in the mud too?  So I sighed and relented.

"If I get skin cancer, I'm blaming you."

"Deal!" Blossom said, and hurried off to the downstairs bathroom.  

I looked up a few more facts about tanning on my phone, but none of them were making me feel any better, so I put my phone away.  Then I remembered the reason I wasn't going swimming.

"I don't have a swimsuit," I called after Blossom. "Don't you need a swimsuit to tan?"

"You can tan in anything," Blossom called out from the other room, "but whatever's covered won't tan. So that's how you get sexy tan lines."

"I don't know what makes a sexy tanline..." Or who would even see them.  Honestly, they sounded like a nuisance, and I'd managed to go the whole summer without getting burned.  I really was a kindergartener and she was the rocket scientist in this matter.  Why did that thought give me butterflies?

Blossom was much taller than Mia, and much more endowed in many of her areas, so her swimsuits weren't likely to fit her new friend and that was a major conundrum. 

"A lot of my family members leave swimsuits here for when they come up, so give me a little bit and I'll see if any of them will fit you."

Eventually Blossom came back with some tanning oil and a set of swimsuits.  They were mostly straps and bits of cloth, but there were a few pairs of swim trunks too.  I took one of them - a boy's set of blue trunks - and held them up to my hips.  They would probably fit.

"Usually you want skimpier to get really nice tan lines, but this is your first time and you'll probably get some color in like half an hour or an hour or so because you're pretty pale. So we can work with the trunks this time. and get you something sexier for next time."

Blossom was pretty giddy about this. She was getting to share some of her expertise with someone she looked up to; it felt like a privilege.

"Whatever you tan in is going to be pretty obvious," Blossom continued. "We used to make boys from the associate frat house tan in bikinis as part of their pledge hazing stuff, and they'd have these dainty little tanlines for weeks. It was super hot."

"So it's like a brand or something?  A, uh... temporary tattoo.  I guess I can see the appeal." That wasn't really in my strike zone, but a blushy baby tattoo could be sexy.  Like a "change me" tramp stamp?  Though I supposed tans didn't quite have the same finesse as a tattoo.

"Wear this for your top," Blossom said, tossing me a bikini. "T-shirt tans make you look like a farmer or something."

"Gotcha." I was more of a one-piece swimsuit kind of girl, but maybe a bikini top and trunks would be okay.  That was a look, right?  Not that anyone would see these tan lines anyway.

I left Blossom alone to change in the downstairs bathroom.  The straps on the bikini took me a while to understand, but I figured out that if I tied them first and slipped it on afterward it was a lot easier.  Finally I was dressed and standing in front of the bathroom mirror.  My stomach hung out a few inches.  I tried to suck it in, but I wasn't sure I could hold it like that all day.  Ugh, I was so disgusting...

I grabbed a towel off the bathroom hook and wrapped it around myself, just over my boobs.  It hid the top half of the swim trunks and a lot of my skin.  I could take it off after I laid down outside, when gravity would pull my stomach in for me.

When Blossom returned from the downstairs bedroom, she was dressed in what might only be describable as an array of string and very little fabric. Her bikini top did its best to provide some coverage for her ample chest, but she wasn't far from a public indecency charge. Her bottoms did provide coverage in the front but disappeared in a string up between her butt cheeks. This was a woman who had every bit of confidence in her body. She had a few tubes of liquids in her hands and she set them down and began to explain.

"This is sunscreen, it's going to stop you burning. This is tanning oil, it's going to help keep you moisturized. And this is tanning accelerant; it helps filter the UV so your skin gets what it needs to tan at a higher rate."

She looked Mia up and down and smiled.

"Oh I can't wait to see you with a tan."

"Uh... sure..." I'd seen Blossom mostly naked before.  Who hadn't, am I right?  But she was the kind of girl who would suntan at the football field after school.  I remember a lot of guys going there just to watch.  At the time I thought it was just to get attention from boys, but I didn't think we would get much attention if we stayed on the deck.

That being said, though I had seen it before, Blossom's body was certainly something to be admired.  Her skin was already lightly tanned and smooth as silk by the look of it.  Her legs went on for days and her breasts were the kinds of things I would write about in stories.  She couldn't quite challenge Mommy Moo from Academy A, but she was getting there.  I didn't realize I wasn't listening until Blossom was done with her speech.

"Sound good?" she asked.

"Uh... alright...?" I had no idea what sounded good.  Maybe I had agreed to let her diaper me and feed me on the deck.  She'd untie the Gordian knot of her swimsuit and put her nipple to my lips.  My face felt hot.  Why did I let my mind run away with stuff like that?!

"Fantastic. Drop your towel so I can do you, okay?"

Mia stared at Blossom. Blossom tilted her head in curious expectation.

"I can't put your lotions on if you have that towel wrapped around you, and you don't wanna be in the sand when I rub stuff all over you cause that's no good for anyone. Once I've done you, you can do me, okay?"

Without waiting for an answer, Blossom set the other two bottles down and held the sunscreen in her hand, ready to rub her fingers all over Mia's body.

"Right..." I sucked in my stomach and unwrapped my towel.  I must have looked like Picasso's Weeping Woman beside Canova's Psyche.  It was one of those liminal moments where, if someone was looking in on the both of us, they might assume we weren't real.  How could she and I be in the same space?  What god would allow that?

Blossom rubbed her hands together and rested them on my shoulders.  I looked down at my feet and held my breath, trying to think about something other than her oily fingers sliding down my bare arms.  Sports.  Red Sox.  Red Wings.  Red cheeks.  Spankings.  Stern words.  Loving words.  "I know what's best for you".  Lathering me up.  Tanning oil on my skin.  Branding me, coloring in my cells.  Darker, artificially.  Sexiness in artificiality, a double standard.  Sexy on a white woman, but what about a Black woman or a Latina?  Isn't tanning just racial tourism?  Isn't this kind of insensitive?

My moral compass spun so fast that the centripetal force knocked me square out of erotic fantasy.  I was suddenly very thankful for my near-debilitating progressivism, because I really didn't want Blossom to know that she was turning me on. 

Mia was predictably quiet as Blossom rubbed the sunscreen into her skin, and she stayed quiet as the much taller girl moved on to the tanning oil, and then to the accelerant. Despite her silence, Mia was trembling a little bit the entire time. Did Blossom scare her? No, that probably wasn't it. She probably just wasn't used to the feeling of the lotions on her skin.

"Mia? Mia Moore?" Blossom snapped her fingers to get her friend's attention. "I said it's your turn to do me now."

"R-right... sorry..." I was covered in oil from my face all the way down to my feet.  I felt slimy, like Pad Thai noodles.  My glasses kept sliding down my nose, and when I tried to push them back up I left a little smudge on the lens.

Blossom showed me what oils to use and how to use them.  Then I lathered my hands in them and started on Blossom's shoulders.  She was taller than me by a good degree, and I had to raise my hands a little higher than I expected to get the sides of her neck.  When I got to her chest, I hesitated.  There were straps going every which way, and I didn't really know how to get oil between all of them.  Thankfully, Blossom seemed to notice.

"Just put your hands under them," she said. "The straps will stop me from tanning in those spots, so you want to put the oil everywhere."

"Right..." That made sense.  But as I put my fingers under the straps, I realized it was a lot like groping under someone's shirt.  Or, in this case, under their bra.  I avoided her boobs the best I could, but the sides of her breasts and her cleavage still showed.

I'd never touched another girl's boobs before.  I had touched my own, which was how I got a lot of the descriptions for my stories.  Hers didn't really feel any different, not on a physical level, but they also felt very different at the same time.  It was intimate.  It was the kind of precursor to a kiss or something in a story.  It was the kind of thing a boy did to a girl to make her lose her breath.  But Blossom didn't lose her breath; I lost my breath.  I pulled my hands out from under her bikini top and took two steps back, almost tripping over my own feet.  I had stopped focusing on holding in my stomach.  My cheeks were burning red.

Blossom seemed to notice how flustered the entire experience had made Mia, and she mercifully finished up around her breasts as she turned to look at the blushing girl. 

"You're so fucking cute, Mia, my goodness. Don't feel bad, my body tends to have that effect on everybody - boy or girl or otherwise. You're only human, after all, right?"

She winked and made a kissy gesture with her lips. It might have seemed self-aggrandizing or arrogant, but Blossom was playing it up to try and minimize Mia's discomfort. Clearly some part of Mia was into her, and that made Blossom's head spin with all sorts of fun thoughts and ideas.

"I'm just not used to like... touching people like that... it's not you..." I was lying.  I mean, I was telling the truth, but that last part - the part about it not being her - that was a lie.  It was definitely her.

[Sophie ♥]

13.)

I couldn't believe I was lathering Blossom Brixley in tanning oil.  The only world where I thought that would happen was if cheerleaders became the dominant caste and nobodies like me were their slaves.  Before I could become enraptured in a new fantasy, I shook my head and grabbed my towel.  I wrapped it around my stomach and stood awkwardly in the corner while Blossom finished up.  I still had to help with her back, but that was a lot easier than her front. 

There was a lot more that Blossom wanted to do and say, there was a lot more she could have leveraged from that moment, but she didn't want to make a mistake. So Blossom did the uncharacteristic thing of restraining herself. Once the two were both lathered up, Blossom took Mia by the hand and led her down onto the beach to find a spot to lay down. 

Blossom made a note to make sure Mia had a proper swimsuit next time, because she couldn't wait to see her with tanlines. 

"Alright, lay down here on this towel."

"This is kind of public..." I lamented. "We couldn't do this on the deck?"

"Probably," Blossom shrugged. "But it would take longer."

"I'm okay with that," I said, but she gave me a look.  One of those "you're being difficult" looks.  I had gotten enough of those in my life to recognize them right away.  So, with a sigh, I laid out the towel and sat down on it.  I unfolded the towel around my stomach and laid on my back.

"So I just lay here?" I asked.

"Yup. Close your eyes. Sometimes we wear sunglasses but that has its own risks, so we're just going to do closed eyes today."

Blossom was already pretty tan. Mia wasn't at all. 30 minutes today, tops, and then she'd take her new friend inside and rub her down with moisturizer to keep her skin happy. 

"Once you get your own swimsuit," Blossom said, "the tanlines on your bottom half will look better. Right now it'll just look like shorts, which is fine, but there are sexier underwear lines to have tanned into you. Trust me."

"I don't see why it matters," I said passively, laying there with my eyes closed. "No one is going to see my legs." Under the heat of the sun, it was actually a rather warm October day.  I thought I would get cold closer to the water, but so far that wasn't the case.

"Oh I don't know about that," Blossom teased. "If you wear a diaper when you're here next week, I might see them."

Blossom wore a cheeky smile, even though both of them had their eyes closed and neither could see it. She liked to imagine Mia was blushing when she said that, and she also hoped that nobody else had been close enough to hear.

I didn't know what to say.  We'd talked about the whole diaper thing in theory.  We talked about my stories, and the kind of things we liked about them.  I knew she had never worn one before.  She knew I had.  But the implication of us doing so together - of me doing it?  I froze up.  A part of me continued to wonder if maybe it was all a trick.  She puts me in a diaper, snaps a picture, and then blackmails me.  But maybe I had just read one too many stories...

"Mia?" Blossom asked, after a long silence.  

I nodded, but I didn't say anything.  Both our eyes were closed, and I knew she couldn't see, but I felt too queasy to talk.  Thankfully, Blossom had no such issues. 

"It's okay if you don't want to," she said. "I was just teasing."

Wasn't the whole point of going to that munch to make friends like Blossom?  I wanted to play with someone local, didn't I?  I thought I did.  But now that it was here in front of me - now that it was Blossom Brixley of all people... 

"Roll over," Blossom said quietly after what must have been forever.  

I did so.  On my stomach, I could open my eyes.  My skin felt a little tingly, but not in a bad way.  Actually, the heat and the light of the sun was starting to feel relaxing.

I turned my head to look at Blossom.  Her eyes were still closed.  Her bare ass was mooning the ocean.  Her top was tied in impossible knots. Her face was soft and quiet.  She looked like she was asleep.  She looked so... unthreatening. 

"I'm nervous," I admitted. "I know it's stupid and mean, but I just keep thinking... this is a joke.  That you want to hurt me..."

"I know, and I deserve that opinion of me," Blossom muttered. "I was a pretty awful girl in high school, and I'm really not much better now. I got my status by stepping on people lower on the social hierarchy - of course you're going to be afraid."

There was something in her voice, a sort of tone of... well, remorse, mostly. Maybe something else.

"I promise I'm not out to hurt you."

Was there a way she could prove that, though? Was there a way that Blossom could prove to Mia that she wasn't just looking to humiliate her, or embarrass her, or black–

Hah. There sure was.

"I'll wear one if you do, and I'll let you take pictures. So you'll have something on me. And then you can feel less at a disadvantage."

"No, that's..." I put my head down on the towel and sighed.  The truth was, even if I had pictures of her in diapers, she could probably play it off like a prank or a joke or something.  Blossom just had that kind of magnetic energy.  It was hard to oppose her.  There was no security in blackmailing her.  And besides... "I don't want to feel this way.  I don't want to distrust you.  And I don't want you to be afraid of me just because I'm afraid of you."

"I wanna improve your life, Mia Moore. I wanna be your friend, I wanna show you my world in little pieces, I wanna know more about yours. I wanna help you work out your writer's block, or whatever it is. I just wanna know you. You've been a pretty big part of my life, in this weird parasocial way. And I'd like it to be less weird, and more real. Does that make sense?"

Blossom knew the timer would go off soon and it would divert the conversation, so she was eager to make at least some inroads.

"I know..." I sighed. "I'm trying..."

Maybe trying wasn't good enough.  Maybe I wasn't capable of being her friend, or maybe I wasn't capable of being really honest with anyone.  I couldn't even tell my best friend.  How was I supposed to share this stuff with someone like Blossom?

"We can take it slow," Blossom offered.

"If you're sure," I sighed, but I didn't feel much better.  I felt like it was inevitable that I would sabotage this friendship.  Even if she didn't want to humiliate me or use me to get more Academy Works stuff, she wanted someone to play with.  I couldn't give her everything she wanted.  Maybe I couldn't even give her anything she wanted.

[Sophie ♥]

14.)

Eventually the timer went off and Blossom and I returned to the beach house.  I didn't really see a difference in my skin, but Blossom assured me it took a few hours.  I changed back into some real clothes and Blossom did the same.  The mood had certainly deteriorated, and I felt at fault for that as well.  I wondered how far it was to the grocery store: I could get some blueberries.

"Wanna go out for dinner?" Blossom asked. "There's a town up the road.  They have some good seafood stuff.  Do you like seafood?"

"Shellfish," I said. "Not fish fish."

"Well you're in luck, they have fantastic shrimp, and lobster, and oysters and other stuff."

Boys had this notion that oysters were an aphrodisiac, and the amount of times Blossom had been taken out to get oysters for dinner in the hopes that it would make her put out was beyond the number of fingers she had to count on. Stupid boys, anyway – if she was going on a date, she was planning to have sex, come on now.

So it was a little amusing that she was the one suggesting this place to Mia Moore - not because she wouldn't sleep with Mia, because given the chance she absolutely would, but because it was such an innocent suggestion this time.

"You've baked me cake and scones and fed me for the past two days so this one is on me."

"If you're sure..." I didn't like someone else paying for my meals, but I knew how expensive seafood could be.  Maybe it was best if I just let her do it, just this once.  And if we went into town... "Could we stop at a grocery store?  I can pick up some blueberries and eggs and stuff." She was almost out of yeast, too.

"We sure can stop at the grocery store, as long as you're a good girl and don't try to sneak things into the cart when I'm not looking~"

This was an experimental response. Not about diapers, not even strictly about the whole kink thing; it was just some playful teasing to see how much Mia could handle before she got in her own way. Blossom was nothing if not persistent.

I gave Blossom a bit of a look.  Classic teasing.  But... well, it was kind of nice.  I didn't want to discourage her, so I stuck out my tongue.  Playful, right?  I hope she saw it as playful... but I wasn't a little kid, even if I liked pretending sometimes.  All those mannerisms?  They probably looked stupid on me.

"Let's just get going," I muttered, trying not to think about it.

"You're so stinking cute." 

Blossom screwed up her nose into a crinkly faced smile, but she let things go from there and began to systematically close windows and lock up the beach house. She held the front door open as she slipped into some chunky heeled sandals and waited for Mia to step outside.

The town was only a ten minute's drive away.  If I had the energy, I could probably walk there and back in just a few hours.  That was good to know.  It wasn't a huge town, but it had a handful of restaurants and a shopping center.  A big looming grocery store was the biggest building in the square.

Blossom pulled into the unpaved parking lot of a large shack.  It had signs in the windows advertising different fish things, and a big wooden display near the front door.  No neon lights, nothing flashy.  If it wasn't for the handful of cars, I would have assumed it was closed.

"So one thing to know - this is the best seafood place I've ever been to. They only take cash, they only do seafood, fries, and coleslaw, and they don't accept tips. But their stuff is always super fresh and yummy and high quality. I'll order for you - no fish, but everything else okay?"

Blossom had a system; she was pansexual and high-femme, so both the boys that wanted to date her, and the kinds of girls that wanted to date her usually wanted to be in control. Ergo, she would usually let them order, and that meant having a stable of venues under her belt where she liked most of the menu. Ordering for herself, let alone for someone else? That was a rare delight for Blossom.

I didn't expect anything fancy, and the place sure lived up to that expectation.  The tables were wooden and old, and most of the seats were either benches or hard wood chairs.  There was no sense of decorum and it was weirdly loud for such a small restaurant.  Blossom and I sat by a window that looked out at the beach, though it was far enough in the distance that it wouldn't really be called a "view".

"Thanks for this," I smiled. I couldn't say I honestly trusted Blossom in entirety, but she was sure working her way there.

"Thanks for hanging out with me," Blossom said. "I know a big part of you probably wants to run far away from my tall and leggy ass, so I appreciate you giving me a chance even if I come across like a hopeless fangirl half the time."

As she talked, Blossom filled out a paper order form from a pad attached to the menu and checked several boxes before tearing it off and taking it up to the counter. She was back a few moments later and sat back down. In her summer dress, with her fancy heels and designer purse, the bottle-blonde cheerleader stood out like a sore thumb in this place, but nobody said anything about it. Honestly, it seemed like people were content to mind their own business.

"No, I uh... I don't really get to talk about my story stuff.  Or uh... any of that stuff. So it's nice to talk to you about it." We had a lot of Academy Works discussions already and it felt a lot like the weekend had tilted us into private talks.  Maybe that was why I asked: "So you've never told anyone?  Like, friends or...?"

"Never once. And I mean, I have other kinks, and a lot of the people I date or sleep with have their own things. But this one... has always felt pretty private to me. Like I couldn't trust anyone with it, which I'm sure is a feeling you know. The munches have been nice, but you know the way I compartmentalize the circles of my life, so the people I know from them would never know where I went to school or anything."

"I never thought about that..." She kept everything in her life separate.  I was probably the first thing that intersected two different spheres.  Of course, when she had to choose, she would put me in the same camp as those people at the munch.  That way, she could still talk to me about Academy Works.  But I already knew too much.  I knew where she went to school.  I knew about her family.  I almost felt guilty for ruining her system, and guiltier still for complaining about her ignoring me.  Of course she ignored me.  I'd ignore me too, if I was in her shoes.

"Other kinks, hm?" I asked, tilting my head with a smile. "Do tell." I knew about her mind control thing; we talked about that in the car.  But I didn't see how she would be able to do that in real life, and she was talking about people she actually slept with.

"Oh, there's a bunch. I had a thing for girls worshiping my feet for a while, but then guys got all mixed up in it and it got weird and I kinda drifted from that. But a lot of stuff like... dehumanizing stuff, petplay, dollplay, that kinda thing. I love latex, too, but I don't really get to indulge that – again, guys tend to make it weird. Oh, I've done a lot of impact play, floggers, whips..."

As she recounted, Blossom marked them off on her fingers, like she was going down a numbered list. It was a kinda endearing mannerism for the rather sophisticated girl.

"And then there's the basics: restraints, wax, power exchange, pegging... just the usual suspects."

"Right, the usual suspects." I rolled my eyes.  She was such a slut.  For a brief moment, I wanted to make fun of her.  I wanted to tie her actions in with a lack of self-respect or immorality.  I wanted to blame her for the kind of disrespect women get from men in this country.  But I didn't, because there was nothing wrong with being a slut.  My instinct to hurt her was paradoxical and innately human, because – to be honest – I kind of wished I was more like her.

"I think kinks are an inevitable part of exposure to many partners and experiences; everyone has their kinks, and it's becoming more and more socially acceptable to share them. So people do. When I first got to high school and I was popular for the first time, I was so shook by the stuff people talked about. Like the first time a boy talked about anal, I was so squeamish about the whole thing. But it's all just another way to feel good. That's all this is, it's all any of this is. It's a way to feel good, to feel complete, to feel seen, or whatever else."

Blossom smiled and looked over at the counter to see if she could see their food order coming yet or not. Nothing yet.

"So then why not tell people about this kink?" I asked, motioning to the both of us, to our table, to the abstract concept that brought us together. "It's just another way to feel good, right?" I wasn't trying to trap her in a corner, but I was curious what her answer would be.

"Because I don't tell people about my other kinks unless they've already told me. You're an exception, honestly, because if Miss Wax-my-Tits and Mister Peg-my-Ass told me about their kinks, I'd tell them I was into that, but I wouldn't tell them the other stuff. It's all about circles, Mia. The fact I've told you like half of my kinks is pretty rare."

And why be so secretive at all when she'd been so positive about it? Well, though Blossom was sex positive and kink positive, not everybody else was. Until society caught up, she'd have to have limits.

"Good point..." I tapped my cheek in thought. I never really thought about other "kinks" I had, but I suppose a lot of what I wrote about in Academy Works transcended the basic ageplay thing.  Mind control, hypnosis, spanking.  Even just dominance and submission.  I mean, the whole point of the Academies was obedience, not "make adults into babies". 

"To be honest though, I think I'd be too scared to do any of my kinks with someone else." Just then, a waiter came by and dropped off a few rolls of bread at our table.  I quieted down until he left. "I'd probably just do whatever they liked."

"And what if that person's desire was to do what you liked? Would you indulge them?"

Blossom picked up a bread roll, still warm and steaming, and moved it to a plate in front of her along with a pat of butter.

"Or what if that person was some hot cheerleader type who's touched herself to stuff you've written about, and would probably be down to reenact pretty much anything you've written? Not naming any names, of course."

Grinning, Blossom took a bite of the bread.

The first question was compelling, but ultimately pointless.  Doing what I liked was just a cop out.  After all, that's what I was doing, wasn't it?  I would do what someone else wanted to avoid doing what I wanted.

The second question though pushed her hypothetical too far.  I rolled my eyes and gave Blossom that look she gave me earlier: you're being difficult.

"I don't care if you get off to my writing; I figure most people have.  That's kind of the point of smut, right?  But that's not the same as actually doing it in real life.  Actually, most of what I write about isn't even possible." Sorry Blossom, pink hypno milk and magic markers that make you dumber aren't real.

"It depends on the kind of play, doesn't it?" Blossom asked. "If we're talking purely physical play without emotion or scene-setting or role-play, then yeah a lot of it just comes down to the basics. And I know some stuff isn't going to translate well to real life, but given I don't have any experience with any of it, all I can really do is speculate, right? I'm just saying, I'm open to the idea of a lot of things. A lot."

A staff member approached and Blossom hushed as a large basket of shrimp and lobster and crawfish, peppered with oysters and scallops, sitting on a far too large bed of thick cut french fries, was slid into the middle of the table. As quickly as he appeared, the man left, and Blossom beamed at the food. She hoped Mia liked this.

I couldn't tell if she was being serious.  She wasn't, obviously.  I mean, of course she wasn't!  But her insistence... the barrage of jokes... but that's what they were.  Jokes.

I started with the scallops, which were incredible.  The shrimp was great too, but Blossom had to open up the lobster for me.  Honestly, I had never had lobster before, and it seemed like too much work for how it tasted, but it was still really good.

All the while, while we ate, I thought about what she said.  Roleplaying could supplement some of the less plausible things, right?  Was that how that worked?  But even so, I wouldn't actually want to do any of it.  I was thinking about Nana giving Ai an enema in Academy I, and a shiver ran up my spine.  Things in stories weren't the same as things in real life.  Things we found hot in fiction weren't exactly the same when they became reality.

While eating, Blossom took some time to admire Mia. The way she ate, the way her eyes went wide when she liked something, the self-conscious way she'd turn in on herself when she thought someone was looking over their way, and the shy way she would steal glances up at Blossom in return. She was so curious what the other girl was thinking, but Mia was a steel trap. Blossom didn't let it get to her.

"You're starting to tan, you know; it looks amazing already. It won't last more than a week or so, but next weekend we'll do it again, and we'll build it up. You're gonna look so hot, Mia Moore."

Although she'd let the topic shift, Blossom was still thinking about the stories, about kinks, about fucking around with Mia... 

Mia was having trouble writing, right? 

Maybe Blossom could help inspire her.

[WBDaddy]

11 minutes ago, Sophie ♥ said:

Blossom pulled into the unpaved parking lot of a large shack.  It had signs in the windows advertising different fish things, and a big wooden display near the front door.  No neon lights, nothing flashy.  If it wasn't for the handful of cars, I would have assumed it was closed.

"So one thing to know - this is the best seafood place I've ever been to. They only take cash, they only do seafood, fries, and coleslaw, and they don't accept tips. But their stuff is always super fresh and yummy and high quality. I'll order for you - no fish, but everything else okay?"

Oh my, you've been to Brown's Lobster Pound in Seabrook, NH, have you? 

Well, even if you haven't, that's exactly where my thoughts went. 

[Sophie ♥]

16 hours ago, WBDaddy said:

Oh my, you've been to Brown's Lobster Pound in Seabrook, NH, have you? 

Well, even if you haven't, that's exactly where my thoughts went. 

This is so funny because unofficially Mia and Blossom live in New Hampshire!  The beach house is in Maine.  We actually found real houses in the area to use as templates for the houses in the story.

[WBDaddy]

47 minutes ago, Sophie ♥ said:

This is so funny because unofficially Mia and Blossom live in New Hampshire!  The beach house is in Maine.  We actually found real houses in the area to use as templates for the houses in the story.

Well, FWIW, Brown's is right on the beach, in an old shack, noisy as hell, seating is all benches and old wooden chairs, and all they do is seafood and coleslaw and fries.  They ask you what you want at the counter, and ask how you want it cooked.  When I get up there, I usually just grab a pint of steamed clams with a bunch of drawn butter and go at it.