A doctor’s waiting room is no place to have fun. Ever. I’ve never been to a “grown-up” doctor, but I feel that’s true, regardless. Patients aren’t meant to enjoy themselves in a waiting room; they’re meant to suffer quietly and bide their time until called upon.
A lot of that is reflected in a pediatrician’s waiting room. None of the toys light up or make noise. They don’t go boom and bam and ring out. They clink and click quietly unless they’re soft and plushy, and if they’re big enough to fall or tip over they’re bolted down. Neither children nor Littles are expected (or allowed) to just sit with their own thoughts, and so they’re given things to distract and fidget, but not entertain or stimulate.
That’s why doctor’s offices are never fun. Fun is too loud and noisy. Oh, and then there’s the whole “sick” thing, too, I guess.
Not that I wanted to play with the toys. It’s why I sipped so softly on the bottle. The moment I’d guzzled it down, Janet would want me to play with something. She’d want her new pet to perform for her. I wouldn’t be allowed to sulk and be in my thoughts.
We weren’t left alone for long. Other Amazons and their charges trickled in as the water trickled down my mouth. An Amazon man came and plopped two Littles in pink and blue footed sleepers down into a sturdy wooden playpen bolted to the floor. He gave them each a kiss on the forehead and then left them alone to sit in a nearby seat and read a magazine that was six months out of date.
The pair sat on padded rears and began occupying themselves with a game of Connect Four. No pacifier gags to silence them or stupid grins and giggling drooling lips with blank eyes to show that they had no real consciousness left to them. Their careful moves signaled that they weren’t mind fucked; not completely. They were just old hat at this “baby” thing. They’d reached a level of calm acceptance of their situation; if not enjoyment.
Oh, the level of pity, jealousy, and dread that flooded my mind in that tiny moment.
The Little boy who was brought in next was screaming his head off. I don’t know if his mind was gone or if he was just in so much mental, physical and emotional pain. No words came out of him, just throaty bellowing screams.
His screaming hurt even my ears and his whole body was flushed bright red. Fever? Screaming? Both? His screaming only stopped when his Amazon whipped her boob out and brushed a dripping nipple against his cheek. The screaming stopped as soon as he latched on. His body slowed and his “Mommy” petted his hair and whispered quiet, shushing words.
I put my tongue in the whole of the nipple to slow the drip. Janet was staring at them. I thought she’d looked crazy yesterday when she ran into the I.E.P. meeting. That was nothing, comparatively. There were worse things, I remembered, than just bottle feeding.
The door into the examination area opened, and a nurse poked her head out. “Clark?” she called. I bit down and made a bit of water squirt down my throat. I suppressed the urge to gag and just drank a little more.
Janet stood up with me and carried me over yet another threshold. I gripped the bottle a little harder.
“How are we doing today?” The nurse asked not me.
“Just fine, thank you.” Janet replied. “Kind of excited actually. This is our first doctor’s visit!”
“It is exciting, isn’t it?”
“Very!”
Exciting. That was a word for it. I had no chance of being bored, that was for sure.
The next seven minutes were a special kind of hell for me.
I was laid down on a metal slab, and my weight was taken. I was shivering. The metal sides rose up, so that the “baby” didn’t “accidentally” roll off. To me though, they were too similar to the confines of a certain bug zapper.
Giant hands stretched me out on an examination holding me down so I didn’t squirm or struggle too much while another pair played with measuring tape. They were measuring my length. Length. I guess height was for “grown-ups” too. The way Janet and the nurse did it sent me back a little over twenty-four hours to when I was being stretched out and splayed out to be coated with skin repairing cream.
I didn’t breathe the entire time.
A monstrous cuff engulfed my bicep and squeezed hard enough to almost make me lose feeling in my arm. I couldn’t help but think about what happened to the uncle I’d never met. All the while Janet shushed me and told me how it was going to be okay. Nothing was okay though.
“You’re gonna need to get him down to just his diaper,” the nurse said before leaving.
I planted my palms down on the exam table and leaned back. “No.” It came out stronger than I would have expected.
“But Clark,” Janet said. “The doctor needs to take a look at your body to make sure that everything is working right.”
“No.” I was sitting down, but standing my ground.
“Clark-”
“Janet,” my voice cracked. “I have been stripped and zapped and carted around and and and…everyone has seen me naked or in a diaper and I am already SICK of it.”
She didn’t laugh. If she had I would’ve hated her utterly. “Clark. This is just the doctor. He sees people in just their underwear and diapers and naked all the time. It’s part of his job.”
“I’m a Little.” I was on the verge of losing it. “Everyone in my life is going to see me naked or in diapers.”
“Then what’s one more person? Especially if it’s their job?”
Fuck. I walked into that one. “At least let me do it myself…?”
Again, she didn’t laugh. I could tell from her expression that she thought it was one of the cutest things she’d ever heard. I hated her less for that… Without pushing me down, and with impossibly strong yet nimble fingers, Janet popped open the snaps on my plain white onesie. “Okay.”
I stood up on shaky legs. The padding beneath my feet combined with the stuffing between my thighs wasn’t doing my balance any favors. Now that it was effectively just a shirt, it was easy enough to yank it back over my head.
Except it wasn’t.
I got my arms through the sleeves and was pulling-yanking even- it off my shoulders, but all I managed to do was make my neck hurt. “I’m….stuck!” I gasped.
“Hmmm?” I heard her say. Followed by, “Oh! Yeah!” The shirt was yanked back down and I was staring into Janet’s eyes. I felt one final pop at the back base of the collar. “Sorry,” she said, “I forgot that there was one in the back too. Silly Mommy.”
Heavy footsteps blocked out any reply I might’ve come up with. Janet finished yanking the diaper shirt over my head right as the door opened again.
The man who walked in was big, even for an Amazon. Broad shoulders, a chiseled jaw, and a full head of silver hair, he was a head taller than Janet. He had wrinkles but they were the kind that came from smiling. He was smiling even then, and in a deep but jolly voice, he said. “Good morning! I’m Dr. Milton.” He reached and shook Janet’s hand and then did a double take at his watch. “Yup. Still Morning.” He laughed at his own non-joke. I knew this patter. I knew this tone.
“Janet Grange.”
“Pleasure to meet you, Janet Grange.” All smiles. His wrinkles creased up around his eyes everytime he did. The laugh lines vanished with his grin. I’d made that face so many times when I was trying to be sociable with parents.
What happened next caught me completely off guard. He strode up to the examination table, looked me in the eye. “Hello. I’m Dr. Jonathan Milton. And you are?”
He asked me. Me! I was in a pediatrician’s office, wearing nothing but a Monkeez, and he was shaking my hand and greeting me. Like an adult. It hadn’t been two days since someone had done that, and yet it was something that I deeply expected to never happen again.
“C-Clark.” I stuttered.
“Pleasure to meet you, Clark. And how old are you, sir?”
Sir….
SIR!
I was a sir, again!
I blinked. “Thirty-two.” My voice sounded far off. Just that little bit of courtesy, that little bit of dignity completely threw me off my game.
Dr. Milton whistled. “Thirty-two. Not bad, young fella, not bad at all.” I was shaking with something besides anger. I didn’t even mind being called “young fella”. It was a damn site better than “baby” or “sweetie” or “Little boy”.
“Thank you…?”
“So here’s what I’m going to do, Clark. I’m going to listen to your heartbeat, your lungs, and your guts using my ol’ stethoscope here.” He held up the instrument in front of his face to show me. “Then I’m going to look in your eyes and ears and throat with my otoscope,” he paused to show me the instrument. “That’s what I call this doohickey right here. Then I’m going to test your reflexes right quick with my tiny knee hammer. And then I’ll ask you some questions about your health. Do you understand?”
In awe, I nodded. It was refreshing actually. Relaxing even.
“Breathe in. Deep Breath. Breath out. Sorry about it being cold by the way.”
I was entranced. He was so respectful. So gentle, always warning me when I was going to be touched.
“MMhmm… Open your mouth please. Say ah!”
He narrated everything he did, but not in the same patronizing way that Typical Amazons did when talking to Littles.
“Excuse me, just checking for bruises, sprains and breaks. That hurt? No? That? No? Good.”
Even the “good” was good. Because it wasn’t “good boy,” or “good baby.” No stupid kid jokes like I’d get a giggle out of a pun or a knock-knock joke. Nothing about a light coming through the other side of my head.
“Oh wow. It’s light’s never come out the other end before.” I stood corrected… “Ah, you know I’m just jokin’. I just can’t resist making a dumb joke everynow and then. That one was just for me, sir. Just for me.” AND THE RECOVERY!
Damnit! I wanted to hate him, and I still did…but it was SO HARD!
Then it hit me. This was me. This guy was with me how I treated my own students. Respectful, playful, professional, but caring. And that hair, that glorious mature silver hair, and those stress free laugh lines. He was who I wanted to be when I grew up…
Even though I’d already grown up…
Even though I’d never grow up again.