Anita woke from her sociological reverie and slowed down to let a man in a tiny red sports car pass instead of ignoring his foolish maneuvering and crushing him beneath her wheels. Anita enjoyed the feeling of control the high vantage point the Suburban gave her. Instead of being overwhelmed in the little Geo by the sixteen wheelers on the road, she was sitting at a level that was almost equal to the truckers. She felt like she was flying over the poor slobs who crept to work in their little subcompact commuter cars. No wonder Howard hadn’t wanted to give the Suburban up. She was riding at the top of the world! For the first time in her life, she felt like she was fully in control. She wouldn’t have to eat steak and potatoes five times a week. Howard had always turned his nose up at the pasta salads, shrimp gumbo, coq a vin, and spinach souffle every time she had attempted to get him to try something new. She hadn’t even been able to get him to try chocolate mousse! All he wanted to eat for dessert was chocolate cake smothered in mounds of horribly fattening, cholesterol-laden, artery-hardening frosting! The very thought of eating that much sugar made her teeth hurt.
She was free now. She could eat whatever she wanted. She could diet most of the week with bean and sunflower seed sprout salads with homemade buttermilk-feta cheese dressing topped with pignola nuts or make herself a meal consisting of only al dente steamed vegetables with a side of aromatic brown rice liberally laced with woodsy crimini mushrooms. On Saturdays she could treat herself with a fresh-baked Quiche Lorraine, Florentine or Monterey and a wineglass of decent Beaujolais while Howard had a few spoonfuls of pureed baby food and finished his meal by nursing on a bottle of formula. Who knows, she might even have a glass of plum wine for dessert while she watched little Bri-Bri suckle his bottle and drool milk down his chin!
She wouldn’t have any trouble losing the few pounds that made her figure less than perfect if she didn’t have to share in the fatty hamburger steaks that Howard used to eat. Now that she was the boss, she wouldn’t have to check with Howard to see what he wanted to eat. She’d be the one who would make the decisions in the house. Once Howard had regressed into impotent babyhood, her problems had vanished like a morning fog under the rising sun. Everything had worked out perfectly! Each time she glanced in the rear view mirror to check on her infantilized husband, she grinned in appreciation of how adorable he had become. He was such a cutiepie! Howard waved his feet helplessly in the restraining straps and watched idly as treetops sped by his window. Occasionally he would screw up his little face in the most winsome expression of intense concentration and blow little bubbles of spit to amuse himself. In general though, he had lost all unconscious control of his slack lips and drool ran down his chin both copiously and continuously. Of course, his control wasn’t helped by the fact that he always seemed to have something in his mouth. He not only sucked his thumb on a regular basis, but he frequently put three of his fingers in his mouth at a time, causing baby spit to form long strings that dripped from his chin and made large wet spots on his T-shirts. When he wasn’t in the babyseat in the car, he would lie on his back and suck his toes. It was obvious that he had regressed though the anal stage of development back to the oral stage.
Howard hadn’t tried to vocalize meaningfully for the past week. His only utterances for the past seven days had been the silly, mindless blather of early infancy. The closest he came to real communication was when he smiled and cooed as she rocked him in her arms before putting him in his crib each night. He had stopped trying to stand too. Even if he held on to the railing of his playpen, the weak muscles of his legs couldn’t hold him more than a few seconds before he fell back on his diapered bottom. If he needed to get somewhere, he crept on all fours like an infant. Anita wondered idly if he would lose the ability to creep as well. He was so young now that if he regressed much more, he’d lose control of his lower limbs and he’d be forced to crawl on his belly and squirm his way across the carpet like a legless snake. When he go to that point, she’d buy a baby carriage for him to use on their Sunday walks in the park rather than having him strapped into a stroller. He’d be more comfortable lying on his back than trying to make his immature muscles keep him upright for long periods. She’d have to remember to turn him regularly if his muscles became so weak he couldn’t turn over on his own. Anita didn’t want him to get bedsores. She remembered reading somewhere that sheepskins were often used with bedridden patients to help keep them from developing bedsores. She thought she had seen one in a Australian catalog they had that was sized to fit baby cribs. She decided she would find the catalog after work and order a couple of skins for him. It would be awhile before she would see whether he rejuvenated to the stage of early infancy though. The process of physical regression had peaked towards the end and was now grinding down to an almost imperceptible halt. It was time to visit her Chief of Research and call the President of the company.
When she arrived at work, she took him directly to the Daycare center and handed him over to one of the nursery attendants. The daycare worker held out her arms to take him from Anita and carry him back to the nursery with the other infants while Anita trailed behind. Anita followed them in the nursery and watched for a moment, then turned to leave for her office. As he was being laid down in a crib for his morning nap, Howard chanced to see Anita’s back as she began to leave the nursery. He whimpered quietly at being separated from Anita. Somehow he couldn’t bear the thought of being separated from her for a moment. Anita stopped and turned around again a fter hearing Howard’s distress. She came over to the side of the crib and attempted to comfort him by patting his head and saying that she’d be back in a little while. Then she turned and walked out of the room, swaying her hips confidently as if she owned the place. Howard pulled himself to his knees with the help of the cribs railings and watched as she disappeared from sight. He would have stood up if he could, but a few days before he had discovered that standing was nearly impossible even if he had something to hang onto. Merely pulling himself to a kneeling position was an effort. After she left, he bent over his knees while he wept silently in abandonment. Howard’s quiet sobs took a long time to slow to a stop. When he had finished, he laid his head on the crib mattress in exhaustion. His knees were still folded beneath him as he closed his eyes to shut out the world. Within minutes, he was fast asleep with his onesie-covered, thickly-diapered bottom still in the air.
