Janet went to the kitchen, picked up her purse and keys and went into the garage, intending to take his Suburban instead of her Audi. “He’ll come home and curl up with in bed with his bottle, he won’t need it,” she reassured herself. “And Baby, am I going to need a lot of room on this shopping trip!”, she chuckled to herself as she drove away.
Timothy walked (or rather staggered) in at about noon, poured himself a drink then took it and himself to bed. He got into bed, not noticing the Janet had taken his Suburban, and fell into an ethanol anesthetized slumber that normally lasted ten hours.
Timothy woke up with a dry mouth and a slight twinge of nausea. Staring bleary eyed at the clock-radio he decided that it was about an hour and twenty minutes to midnight. He picked up the drink he had left beside the bed and downed half in one draught and lay back down on the pillow to recover and wake up, still holding the drink in his hand. His knees ached from a fall down some stairs at a bar last night. After a few minutes the door open and Janet entered carrying a bed serving tray. She placed the tray beside him on the bed, smiled sweetly, kissed him on the forehead, then sat herself down on the chair beside the bed. “I think you’ll feel better if you drink some of my herbed tomato juice instead of that,” gently taking the drink from his hand and placing it on the bedside table. “I made some breakfast for you, bacon, eggs, toast and plum jam and if you finish the juice right now, I have brandy posset for dessert with lots of brandy,” she cooed, picking up the tray and settling it over his legs.
Timothy groaned at the prospect of drinking the “herbed” tomato juice, her hangover cures always worked, but they made him feel like he had swallowed a fire hose and turned the valve on full, with water gushing from every pore. He looked at the sweetly determined expression on her face and decided that drinking the ghastly concoction took less courage than arguing with her in his condition, so he lifted the glass and drained it in a single breathless gulp. “This was the worst cure yet,” he thought, “She must have changed the recipe.”
Janet nodded and smiled at him and shook out his napkin for him. “Eat, get some more sleep and you’ll feel better tomorrow.”
He began eating the eggs with the taste of the “cure” in his mouth, praying that the food would cover its bitter tang but having little hope for that particular blessing. When he finished she handed him a very large brandy snifter with his favorite hangover remedy, a brandy posset; two raw eggs, half-and-half, salt, sugar, and vanilla mixed with a large amount of Mr. Boston Five Star Brandy. He began to get very sleepy about two thirds of the way through the posset. Timothy looked at Janet around the rim of the snifter and realized she was smiling at him. She never smiled at him when he drank. He wanted to ask her what she was so happy about, but his eyelids were drooping and he was having a hard time keeping them open. As he drifted of to sleep, she took the snifter from his hands and he heard her chuckle and say, “Sleep tight, baby.”
Babies are such a nice way to start people.–Don Herold
The next morning when he woke up he had a decidedly odd feeling. He lay on his side with his eyes closed trying to determine just exactly what felt strange. The pillow smelled like baby powder and the mattress felt wrong, it was too hard. When he shifted his back the sheet slid slightly, as if the mattress cover was plastic. His arms and legs didn’t feel right and his head felt too heavy. He lifted his right leg and bent the knee to test the joint but there was no pain. As he put his leg down he heard/felt a thin, crackling, plastic sound around his upper thigh and buttocks. He put his hand down to the area and felt plastic over some padding. He felt around his stomach and buttocks and they were covered too. His pajamas were gone and he was wearing….? Timothy’s eyes jerked open and he was fully awake. He felt again, he was wearing… DIAPERS ?!!
He looked away from the pillow and saw a line of vertical brown wooden bars rising up from the edge of the bed. He looked up over the pillow and saw that the line of wooden bars ended with a large oak headboard which had a pastel painting of diapered teddy bears. He looked at the foot of the bed and saw a similar painting on the footboard. There was something trying to grab his attention from the corner of his eye. The blanket. It had teddy bears on it too!
With a growing horror he realized where he was… in a nursery! He threw off the blanket and grabbed the bars to stand up. As he stood up the diaper pulled at his hips heavily. He put one hand tentatively down to the front of his diaper and squeezed the lowest part. It squished slowly in his fingers like a saturated sponge. He squeezed again, inadvertently pushing against the part of diaper covering his lower abdomen. The soggy diaper had cooled slightly in the few minutes away from contact with him and it felt cold against his skin. Ted screwed up his face in an expression of momentary puzzlement; the crotch of his diaper felt chilly and….damp? ……..WET??! Alarmed, he looked down and clutched the front of his diaper with both hands. Immediately, he fell backwards onto the blanket. He landed on his bottom in a sodden heap.
He sat there facing the crib side with his bare feet in front of him, knees flexed and out to the sides, the soles of his feet almost touching. He wanted to cry! He needed to cry! This was a bad dream, a nightmare, it couldn’t possibly be real! He sat motionless in the crib. He was trapped, the sides of the crib were too tall to climb over and escape. Tears of frustration welled up in his eyes unbidden and began to roll down his face.
The curtains were gaily colored and had the same teddy bear motif as the blanket and crib. Even the walls had cut-out posters of teddy bears. He saw a matching oak dresser against the wall with a changing table on top with baby powder, lotion, disposable towelettes, and a stack of clean diapers. A dirty diaper hamper stood alongside the dresser. The room smelled of clean sheets and baby powder. His eyes moved down to look at the floor and he saw a baby walker with table next to the closet. In the corner there was a large rocking chair.
He shifted his feet to get more comfortable and he looked down at his feet. HIS FEET??!! Those weren’t his feet, these feet were round and soft and chubby like a…..like the feet of a….. With a start he realized he had been looking over his hand at his feet. That was because his hand was at his mouth. Well, not at his mouth precisely, because one of his fingers was in his mouth; his thumb. His thumb was in his mouth and he was sucking it !!!
This could not be happening to him! He wanted to scream in rage at his helplessness. He couldn’t be a baby, wearing a very wet diaper, sitting in a crib and sucking his thumb!
He felt a vague apprehension that he had missed something important. He turned his head and saw only the open curtains with the morning sun beaming through and he realized what he had subconsciously feared. It was morning and whoever took care of the baby….. took care of him… would be in the nursery any minute to change him.
The fear of discovery and the threat of extreme humiliation rolled over him like a thick blanket blotting out any rational thought. He closed his eyes and darkness immediately enveloped him, shutting out the shameful world he had found himself inhabiting. He rocked back and forth at the waist, savoring the pleasant sensations the constant motion gave him. The comforting blackness was only marred by the thin wails of a crying baby. The sound seemed far away at first; a barely perceptible intrusion in the background. He struggled to focus his disordered mind on the sound of the baby. As he concentrated the wail became nearer and clearer to him. They sounded like they were in the same room with him. He wanted to open his eyes and look around for the baby, but the thought of seeing himself in an infant’s nursery filled him with a nameless dread. He kept his eyes closed and tried to locate the source of the sound by concentration alone. The screams became louder until they filled his head. Then the realization of what was happening hit him. He was crying! He was wailing and bawling at the top of his lungs. Screaming out against a world he no longer understood and could not change! He opened his eyes and squalled as tears ran down his face. He had lost control of his emotions and they were running away with him, regressing him to a time when his emotions controlled him utterly.
He was wet, cold, humiliated, and terrified. He was scared someone he didn’t know would hear him and come to see what was the matter. He was even more afraid someone he did know would come through the door. He was alone and helpless and panicky! Knowing this only made it worse and frightened him even more. He tried to stop crying, to grab a breath, but he couldn’t, and now he could hear foot steps in the hall. They were coming closer, time slowed down to a crawl, the door opened and standing there was….was… Janet ?!!
She had an apron on, and she was smiling, coming toward him with her arms outstretched, and cooing, “There, there, baby, its alright, Mommy’s here, everything is alright.”
She picked him up and held him to her chest, with one hand supporting his bottom and the other on his back. He lay against her sobbing, while she comforted him with her hand patting him on the back saying “Mommy’s here, baby, mommy’s here.”
He felt his bottom held securely against her, completely cradled by her hand and fingers. She sat down in the rocking chair with him in her arms rocking slowly, gently until his sobs died away.
When he had quieted down, she turned him so that he was sitting on her lap, his back leaning against her left arm, legs across her lap, facing up at her looking down at him with a smile of motherly concern and love.
She patted the front of his diaper and said, “Did baby pee in his diaper? Does baby need his diaper changed ?”
He started to cry again but she held his head to her shoulder with her right hand and said “It’s okay baby, mommy will take care of everything. Mommy will change you. Don’t worry, baby boy. Mommy’s right here.”
She rocked again until he was quiet, the got up carrying him to the changing table on dresser, and laid him on his back. He got wide-eyed as she undid the tape on the diaper, first the far side and then on the side nearest her, smiling down at him and prattling baby talk to him non-stop, while pulling the diaper up away from his stomach and down between his legs in front, revealing him completely to her thoughtful gaze. He lay and he blushed in deep embarrassment. He was shamed and humiliated by his wet diaper.
Then, with her left hand she picked up both of his feet and lifted him easily until his bottom was free of the table, and with her right hand she removed the soggy diaper and tossed it into the dirty diaper pail. She took a moist towelette and washed his front, then turned him over on his stomach and washed his bottom. Then she rubbed his bottom all over with baby lotion, turning him over on his back so she could finish his front. ” Does baby like that when I do this? Does baby like his wee-wee rubbed with baby lotion?”
He wriggled vigorously and was dismayed that he could not tell whether he squirmed in pleasure or mortification. She sprinkled his pubic area generously with baby powder and lifted his feet again with her left hand while putting a clean diaper beneath him. She laid him down, and grasped the far front side of the diaper with her right hand, simultaneously smoothing the rear piece over it with the left hand and taping it down. She did the same to the other side and picked him up and carried him back to the crib and placed him in it saying, “It’s too early for you to be up, baby.” and she laid him down on his back, pulled the blanket up around him and tucked him in.
She reached into her apron and pulled out a full baby bottle, removed the cap and pushed the nipple into his mouth. He almost started crying again, but to his horror, his mouth betrayed him and he started nursing and sucking the nipple voraciously, the warm formula filling his mouth and rolling down his throat. He could taste it not only on top and sides of his tongue, but on the sides of his mouth. He was very hungry and thirsty and the formula fulfilled both needs. He distantly heard her say, “That’s a go-od Baby! Drink your formula all down.”
He was embarrassed, humiliated and helpless, but he kept nursing the formula, his lips tingled with every movement of the nipple. He could not control himself. The sweet aroma and taste of the warm formula permeated his mouth. He had become chilled after sitting up bare and uncovered while wearing a cold, wet diaper. Now, as his stomach distended with milk, his abdomen warmed. He drank nearly all of the formula and began to feel sated.
He felt warm all over and he was getting very, very, sleepy. Janet stood at the side of the crib and watched him affectionately as his eyes closed and the bottle began to slip from his hands. Taking the bottle from him tenderly, she pulled the nipple from his lips. She reached into her apron pocket and retrieved a pacifier and placed its nipple in his mouth as he fell into a deep sleep. With both hands, she carefully lifted him slightly from the crib and turned him on his side, gently and quietly tucking in the blanket around his small slumbering body. Smiling broadly now, she put the cover back on the bottle and returned it to her apron pocket. “Sweet dreams, baby.”, she said as she turned and left the room, closing the door behind her. “Sweet dreams.”