In the bathroom Ben locked the door, once he’d used the toilet he took the nappy out of his wash bag. He unfolded it, and pulled down his boxers. He lowered himself down to the floor, and slid the nappy underneath his bottom. He pulled the front between his legs, and realised he’d put the nappy on backwards, with the tapes at the front. He turned the nappy around, this time with the tapes at the back, and fastened the nappy into place. It wasn’t perfect, but it was pretty snug. Ben stood from the floor, pulling his boxers back up.
There was a floor-length mirror next to the sink, and when Ben went to look in it he felt panic start to rise inside him. His T-shirt would have had to be a dress in order to conceal the large bulge of his nappy. Anybody who saw him would know what he was wearing; the outline of his nappy was not at all hidden by the boxers, which were no longer very loose at all. How could his Mum do this to him? She’d said no one would notice, but his schoolmates would have had to be blind in order to miss this.
Ben lowered the seat of the toilet and sat on it, placing his head in his hands he just burst into tears. He hated himself, he really did. Why did he have to be like this? Why couldn’t he wake up dry like everybody else his age? He shouldn’t have to be wearing nappies on a school trip, a sixth-form trip at that. What was wrong with him?
“Oi, who’s in there? Hurry up.” A knocking on the door interrupted Ben’s sobbing, “There’s a queue out here, quit hogging the bathroom.”
Ben began to feel even more nervous. A queue? He was going to have to walk past people like this? His only alternative was to take the nappy off, but he knew that wasn’t really an option. If he slept without the nappy on he would soak the bed. It was that simple. He could count the number of dry nights he’d had on one hand, and he’d had a couple of beers with his dinner, there was no way he’d be dry after drinking.
“Sorry, I’m nearly done,” Ben shouted out, pulling his T-shirt down so it covered as much of his butt as possible. He would just have to hope no one looked at it, or heard it, the plastic noisy as he moved.
Luckily for Ben the queue only turned out to be two people, a girl called Marie and her friend Hannah. Neither paid much attention to him, both going into the bathroom together as soon as he vacated it.