From the moment he first saw the nursery, his heart was trying dig deep into these feelings from when I was younger seeing diaper commercials on TV and blushing, seeing large packs of disposable diapers in the grocery store and walking slower to soak in the colored packaging and designs, or getting jealous when hearing other moms talking about their kids still being in diapers, kids his own age. Even through all that Ellen and her friends had put him through, it was less a struggle of him trying to escape and be free of being diapered and pampered and trying to escape from the feelings of wanting to be babied for somany years that he had hidden away in the back of my mind.

With that said, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t get away, literally and mentally. Those feelings were in full bloom now and he was Mayra’s “pequeño”, her little diapered dinosaur boy. She was taking care of him while his grandma was away, and she wanted to make sure he was happy and feeling good.

Thoughts of seeing the dusty family photo album in the basement kept coming back to him amidst this epiphany. He wanted to be that boy running on the beach his entire life; a thick diaper around him, a physical and crinkly metaphor of love, holding on to him as he ran away trying desperately not to have his diaper changed, but happy about it and happy to be accepted as a naughty little boy. These feelings were so overwhelming and his cheeks were so beet-red that he could basically see the red from under my eyes as he heard Mayra, even in his trance state.

Completely overwhelmed with a good and excited feeling, he hopped off the couch and said to Mayra, “I’m dinosaur!” before flapping my arms and waddling away into the hallway hearing her sweet laughter from behind.

Mayra gasped a little, excitedly rather than afraid, as James waved his hands and jumped from the couch, running down the hallway. He wasn’t running very fast, wanting Mayra to give chase, looking back with a gleeful smile to make sure she was following after him. Mayra turned off the TV and looked at James like a bigger dinosaur hunting him down, and when she caught him, she was going to gobble that cute little dinosaur up.

“Oh no, the dinosaur is loose!” Mayra exclaimed as she “ran” after James, dramatically picking up her feet but not walking any faster than if she was walking normally. She had her arms extended to catch him as he waddled down the hallway and around the kitchen, back into the living room and towards the basement.

“SeÃorita Mayra is going to catch you, pequeÃo,” she called after him as he fumbled with the basement door and scampered down the stairs, each footstep banging and clattering all the way up to the main floor. She made sure to turn on the light for him and followed him downstairs, worried he might cut himself or knock something over, but still playing their little game of chase.

“Come out, pequeño Come out, come out wherever you are…”

Once again, Mayra could follow his green tail dragging behind him, but she checked in places way across from him to keep the game going. She couldn’t have been happier to see such a smiling, giggling baby boy wanting to play.

Feeling a little lightheaded from the run, James began to feel his tummy start to grumble and grumble hard at that. With a sense of letting go, he felt about a billion butterflies in his tummy as though he was about to consciously use his diaper for the first time since he was a little toddler, which is exactly what he looked like right now.

He began to stare off into the distance, mesmerized as he began to slowly push, feeling his cheeks turn red from force. Kneeling down behind the first stack of boxes he could find, he began to feel naughty as he felt the back of his diaper expand dramatically, letting everything out and it being softer and messier than the previous time, and this time it wasn’t ruined by Ellen’s obviousness. But none of that mattered now; James was zoned out in his own world as he let it all out, peeing in the process. He could see Mayra through some cracks and knew she was going to change his diaper, so he yelled “I make poopie in diaper! Rawr!”