Anita couldn’t resist joining the fun and said, “Little Howie looks sooo cute sitting there with his thumb in his mouth. Aunt Fran hasn’t seen how cute you look sucking on your binkie. Would you like Mommy to get your binkie for you so Aunt Fran can see what an adorable baby you are? Aunt Fran says that Mommy should put you in dydees! Would you like Mommy to do that, Baby? Just think of how nice and secure Howie would feel if he had a thick dydee between his legs. If Mommy put baby Howie in dydees, hims wouldn’t have to worry about making poopies in his panties! Howie could pee and poop in his dydees all day long, just like all the other babies in the nursery! Hims would look so cute in dydees! All little Howie has to do is ask and Mommy will get her baby the biggest, softest, fluffiest flannel dydees money can buy! Wouldn’t that be nice, Baby?”

Howard did his best to ignore their jibes and concentrate on the cartoon. It wasn’t enough that she made him wear training pants, but did she have to parade his personal problems in front of strangers?

Anita shook her head at his attitude and said, “It looks like little Howie is cranky this morning. Why don’t we leave him in here to watch cartoons so we can have a talk. I’d like to tell you more about how he’s been acting and I don’t want any comments from the peanut gallery.”

Fran smirked and said, “All his babytalk is getting to you, isn’t it? It’s tough being a mother for the first time. Especially if you haven’t raised him from infancy!”

“Well,ÖThe two of us are managing to get along,” Anita replied a little defensively.

Fran grinned and said, “But you’d rather not have him at the table listening to our conversation. Is that it?”

Anita smiled broadly in return and replied, “As you can see, he’s a little young to be sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee and taking part in adult talk. He’ll be happier watching cartoons on TV.”

The women repaired to the kitchen to gossip in his absence while he was left to be babysat by the TV like a small child. Howard was mortified by Anita’s treatment of him in front a stranger, but there was nothing he could do about it. It galled him to think of what Anita must be saying about him in his absence, but there was no way he could think of to spy upon her and listen in on their talk.

After a while, Howard became extremely thirsty. He got up from his pad on the carpet and went to the kitchen for a drink. The skin on the heels of his bare feet stuck to the floor slightly as he walked. He wondered why his skin felt sticky and stopped to touch the bottoms of his feet. There was nothing foreign on his feet, it was just that his callus had vanished along with his age and his feet had the soft moistness of early childhood. There was something disconcerting about looking down at his foot and seeing that his toes had become so tiny and pink. His toenails had changed too; instead of the twisted and lined toenails of an adult male, his little toes were graced by perfectly-formed petite miniature toenails that one would expect to see on an infant. Although the sight of his babified foot made the adult male in him slightly nauseated, he couldn’t help but be captivated by the innocent beauty of his tiny appendages. He hadn’t really paid any attention to his feet in years, other than the simple maintenance of washing them and clipping his toenails. Now they had a strange allure that he found fascinating and wanted to explore further. Howard wondered idly if his joints were limber enough for him to hold his feet close to his face so he could get a really good look. He decided that he might be able to do it if he laid on his back. The thought struck him that if he could bend his legs that far back, he’d probably be able to suck on his toes. Howard shook the errant thought off as an absurd fancy, why would he ever want to do anything as silly as sucking his toes? Just because they were so soft and pink andÖwell, attractive, that was no reason to want to stick them in his mouth, was it? Nevertheless, he made a mental note to himself to examine his feet closer later that day.

Anita and her friend were sitting at the kitchen table talking as he walked into the room. Anita was just finishing her sentence when he toddled up to the table, “Öeverything’s going according to plan, both at home and at work. Howie’s been less trouble than I expected, even when you consider his incontinence. Of course his pants-wetting was no surprise to me. Children his age can be expected to have problems keeping themselves dry. It was his thumb sucking that was the real surprise to me, most children his age have given up sucking their thumb.”

“I don’t know about that,” Anita’s friend said, “My brother Frank didn’t stop sucking his thumb until he was five. Maybe he’s just anxious about all the changes that have been happening to him. His subconscious is probably consoling itself by engaging in a little regressive behavior. It sounds to me that he’s reacting to having to adjust to his new life with you.” The woman made a depreciating gesture with her hand and continued, “It doesn’t matter if he sucks his thumb, the problem will resolve itself soon enough anyway. If it’s more convenient for you to have him in diapers now, then I’d do it. It’s not important how HE feels about it, Anita. You’ve got to realize he’s only a little boy. His opinion doesn’t matter to anyone but himself.”

Fran reached across the table and covered Anita’s hand with her own comfortingly, saying, “This isn’t like managing some test animal at work, Anita. There aren’t any protocols for how you take care of him. Do whatever you have to do to make your life easier. He’ll adjust to whatever you decide is best. I know he tends to make a fuss if he doesn’t get his way, but that’s part of being a child. You’ve got to understand how he feels, Anita. This is all a new environment for him. He feels lost and has no control over his surroundings. He can’t understand what’s caused all the changes in his life. Suddenly the ties with his old life have been severed and he’s been forced to accept you as his surrogate mother. He’s completely dependent on you. He may throw a temper tantrum from time to time, but that’s to be expected at his age. You have to be firm with him and make the decisions that he’s too young to handle now. Don’t worry if he gets upset when your decisions conflict with his desires. His negative emotions aren’t motivated by rational thought, they’re governed by his neural development. A three-year-old is too young to control his feelings and think clearly. He’s not angry with you and he’s not trying to alienate you. He can’t take care of himself alone and he knows it. He’s only a little boy! He can’t afford to make an enemy of his mommy. If you decide to make him wear diapers tomorrow, he may not like it but he’ll accept your decision.”

Fran stopped talking when she saw that Howard was standing at the foot of the kitchen table listening to the advice she was giving Anita. Howard grasped the table leg to steady himself as he swayed in horrified fascination of the woman’s admonishments. He had thought that they were just tormenting him earlier with all the talk of diapering him. Fran seriously wanted Anita to diaper him like an infant and Anita was nodding her head in agreement! If that wasn’t enough, they had stopped talking the moment they saw him standing there! What were they up to? Fran’s talk appeared perfectly innocent on the surface, but there was something in the woman’s tone that gave him the feeling that the two of them were plotting against him. He had the strangest feeling there was more to what Anita’s friend was saying than the innocuous sounding words he had heard.

The two women turned to him and waited in silence for him to speak. “Mama?”, Howard began tentatively, “Me thirsty!”

“What would you like, Honeybunch? Would you like some milk?”, Anita asked solicitously.

“Yes, Mama!”, Howard replied, “Me thirsty!”