The next day around the apartment, he was still considering. He was torn. He had felt truly elated toward the end of the week, and last night had been spectacular. But he was still a young man. Sex was his stress relief and had always been his decision. This relationship had changed so much for him—was he ready to give up control of his sex life as well?
But there was only so far that masturbation could take him. He’d been dealing with the stress of a single man’s life. It was different now. He had someone. Someone who loved him and cared for him in ways he still couldn’t wrap his mind around. He felt nurtured and complete. He hadn’t known he’d been missing that. He loved it.
He’d always assumed he’d have to make some compromises in a relationship. But he’d thought that frequent sex had been part of the perks of the deal. Did it make sense, as Julie had said, to sacrifice quantity for quality? He considered. Any orgasm was pretty fantastic, after all. But he’d never had a night like last night….
Today he felt different. He felt irritable. That high was gone. Because he’d had sex last night? He didn’t know. Was it worth testing out again? Maybe just with Julie’s next period.
He was wiping the counter after lunch, deep in thought, when he became aware of Julie’s voice. But he’d missed what she’d said. “What?” he asked distractedly.
She regarded him grimly. “Hmmm. This is how you act after you get sex. Not even aware of me, not listening. Is THAT really the argument you want to make for yourself?”
He hurried to apologize. “I was just thinking about last week,” he explained.
She raised an eyebrow. “And? What’s your best case for free-range orgasms?”
His face fell. “I don’t know. I liked how I felt during the week. I just don’t know if I can do it all the time.”
She came close. “Sweetie, you don’t have to do it alone. I’m here. And we’ll have plenty of sex. You just won’t have as many orgasms.” Her hand caressed his face. He was suddenly aware that her touch was not quite as electric as it had been only yesterday. What the fuck?!
“Tell you what,” she was saying, studying him closely. “We both need to be on board with this for it to work. I mean, I could just decide, of course, but I want you to be supportive, too.
“Let’s try it for a month. Just let me be in charge of when you get to come. I’m not going to be mean. I think you know that. Right?”
He tried to meet her gaze. Damn, it was hard for him to have an adult conversation with a fully dressed woman when he was wearing a diaper and a onesie.
“I know. I’m just…nervous.”
She nodded, trying to divine his thoughts. “Scary to give up control, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” he confessed. “The thing is, I think you might be right about this. But I like being able to have a say in this.”
Julie took his hand and said to him, “Sweetheart, you are a spectacular doctor and a good man. But in our relationship, there are a few things that I have taken ownership of. And I haven’t been wrong yet, correct?”
He knew he couldn’t hesitate here, even if he still had reservations about never being allowed to use the potty. “No, Ma’am,” he agreed.
“Right,” she said. “This is another of those things. Remember that I get jurisdiction of—” and here she indicated his thighs—”about here”—and then moved her hand up to his waist—“to here, right?” She grinned at him. “That’s all I get. I take care of your diapers and your orgasms. You get everything else.”
He nodded slowly. It didn’t sound significant, but…it was, wasn’t it? “Wait,” he said, drawing her into an embrace. “Aren’t we partners? What part of you do I get to control?”
Julie smiled at him playfully. He thought he had her there. But she wouldn’t have brought it up if she didn’t have an answer to that question. “You control my heart, doctor. That’s the most important organ in the human body, isn’t it?”
He sighed. It was hopeless. How was it that he had gone to medical school but couldn’t win a single argument with his nurse? Maybe he should have gone to law school.
“So let’s try it for a month, okay, babe?” Julie chirped cheerfully. “I’ll make it worth your while…” Her hand tickled his belly, tracing the upper border of his diaper.
“Yes, Ma’am.”
Julie paused. “Speaking of trusting me, I’ve…got some…news. Tomorrow morning I’m covering a shift at the nursing home for my friend Hannah. She’s going away this weekend. We’d set this up months ago, before you lived here, and before–” she indicated his diapers–”all this.”
He nodded. He knew she had worked at the home before his office. He’d never met Hannah, though.
Julie was looking at him, like he was supposed to be understanding something important. “It’s a shift that starts at 6 tomorrow morning, until 2:30 in the afternoon. It’s a Saturday. You won’t be up yet.”
His eyes widened. His morning routine. First thing in the morning–he’d have a very wet diaper, and then…he’d have a messy diaper. “Oh…”
She nodded grimly. “I tried to get out of it, but I can’t find anyone else to cover. I have to do it. So…I asked my mom to come over to help out with the boys…and everything.”
He paled. “Julie, I can’t–”
She clasped his face in between her warm palms. “Of course you can, baby. My mom knows all about you and your schedule, and she’ll be expecting to change a dirty diaper. It’s fine. She’ll be professional and efficient, just like I was at the beginning. After you get that out of the way, you’ll be old friends, I’m sure,” she said, smiling at him. “This is just like everything else. You’ll need to trust me. There is no need to be overly embarrassed about your poops. Get over it.”
She turned to leave the room, then turned back. He was still frozen to the spot, unable to move. “And by the way, this is obviously a fairly big favor she is doing us both, so I expect you to be as polite and helpful to her as you are for me. Be a VERY good boy tomorrow. I don’t want to get a bad report from her about your behavior.”
He stood there for several minutes after she left the room. His girlfriend had arranged for her mother to change his messy diaper tomorrow–had essentially decided he needed a babysitter, that he couldn’t be trusted to take care of the boys, or himself, for a few hours on a weekend. He had been fully demoted to being a toddler in Julie’s house, without any autonomy or decision-making ability.
He didn’t know whether to be more embarrassed or offended by the situation.
They went to a park during the afternoon, then he had some clinical work to do online. By bedtime, he hadn’t figured out how to change his fate the next day. Not surprisingly, Julie was not in the mood for sex. She’d hinted as much earlier when she’d noticed his inattentiveness. After changing him, she was instead buzzing around the bedroom picking out the things she needed to wear in the morning.
He watched her nervously from the bed, freshly taped into a clean, thick nighttime diaper. “What if we use the morning as an audition for me to show you how self-sufficient I can be? I’m sure I can change myself. And it’s low stakes. I’m not going anywhere during the day, so if I leak, big deal–”
Julie had taken her clothes into her bathroom so she could get dressed in the morning without bothering him.
“I think that if we decide to try that, I want to be home for it. Tomorrow is not the day for experiments.” She turned out the bathroom light and climbed into bed with him.
“But if–”
“Baby, that’s enough. I told you, Mom knows all about your diapers, and is expecting to change you after breakfast.”
He reddened all over again, thinking about how that conversation must have gone. “But–”
“I know you are stressed about it, baby, but she has changed poopy diapers before. It’s already been decided. Please remember your manners, okay?” She waited for him to answer.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “But Julie, I–”
“Please no more. I need you to be a big helper tomorrow. Andrew and Thomas can be a handful at times, and it would be nice if you are around to lend a hand. I need to get some rest now. I do love you!” she yawned, and turned over before he could respond.
He wasn’t surprised that she had shut him down. This was the kind of discussion that wasn’t really a discussion. But he was dreading the morning. Sleep did not come easily to him. He tossed and turned for more than an hour, imagining having to go to Mrs. Davis with a loaded diaper and ask her to change him. He imagined her face as she smelled his mess. He imagined their new relationship as babysitter and toddler.
Suddenly he thought of an idea. If he could wake up super early and have his breakfast and coffee before Julie had left, maybe she could change him. What time would that be? She had to be at the home by six, so 4:30 should do it, right? That was early, but it reminded him of residency days. He could do it, and catch up on his sleep tomorrow night.
He set his alarm, an old digital clock on his side of the bed. He relaxed a bit, happy that he had come up with the workaround he needed, and was finally able to fall asleep.