Squishy baby

Chapter 6

“So…I, uh, got a new job.”

Adam sat in silence, his eyes down at his plate. His knuckles were sore from the mower deck.

Do ya feel better after that little tantrum?

He didn’t. He had his hand wrapped in a washcloth after cleaning it for a second time and had to eat with his left hand because it hurt too much to hold a fork. Thankfully, a Stouffer’s lasagna didn’t require much from him other than to be vented and forgotten in the oven for a while.

“Well, a second job. I start it tomorrow. It’s at a senior citizen's place. The money is good. Better than what I make now and the hours are consistent. With any luck, I’ll be out of your hair sooner.”

The silence was deafening and the space between them gigantic. He didn’t know what to say. He had agreed to let her stay there but that was it. Conversation wasn’t part of the deal.

How broken you have become, huh? Can’t even talk to a girl? Pathetic. Truly pathetic.

His fingers tightened into a fist and pain radiated throughout his hand. He winced and relaxed. It didn’t do much but it helped to quiet the voice.

His plate was empty and after a few more bites, so was hers. She stood and took her plate to the sink, pausing long enough to reach for his. He tensed as she reached in front of him. She was close enough that he could smell her cotton candy lotion. It brought back memories. Painful ones.

Aww, does someone miss me? Or do you miss grovelling at my feet hoping that I’d give you what you want?

You’re not even pathetic anymore.

You’re less than pathetic.

You are nothing.

He stood up sharply and went to leave the room but something caught his arm. He instinctively ripped his arm away and a soft whimper made him stop in his tracks. He looked back to see her grimacing in pain as she ripped the rest of her fake nail off her finger. Her hazel eyes radiated anger but when she blinked and exhaled, the anger was gone.

He froze as she reached for him again. Fear and rejection. Pain and suffering. Emotions swelled inside him. Poisonous. Corrosive. Memories of guilt and shame flooded his mind. Faceless women taunting and mocking him. Tearing him down, bit by bit. Laughing at the very sight of him. Helpless. Vulnerable. Scared. Disgrac-

Silence. Peace and silence. Her soft touch on his trembling forearm brought soothing peace and silence to his mind. His heart was quelled. His anger, a defensive shield used to protect his inner self, faded. A sigh escaped his lips and his shoulders slumped. His mind went blank and his body relaxed.

“I just wanted to look at your hand. Can you sit for me?”

He sat. She unwrapped his hand and looked over the torn skin on his knuckles. She didn’t have any medical training but she did know some basic first aid. The skin was torn open across the knuckles of his index and middle fingers. It wasn’t deep enough for stitches, but just rinsing it in water wasn’t going to help it heal any faster. She got a bowl of warm water, some hydrogen peroxide, Q-tips, and bandages from her bathroom. He stayed in one spot and watched her. While he left his right hand limp, he repeatedly tensed his left arm at her touch as if he was preparing to lash out at the slightest provocation.

“I wanted to thank you,” she said, “for cutting my grass. You didn’t have to but I appreciate it.” She used the peroxide and Q-tips to disinfect the wound before lightly washing it away with clean water and a cloth. “This isn’t as bad as it looks. Still needs to be kept clean but I don’t think you need stitches. I’ll bandage it for you.”

“Not necessary.”

“It is if you don’t want an infection.”

“Not the first time. Won’t be the last.” He flexed his fingers. The exposed new skin was sore but life didn’t wait for him to feel better.

“Something wrong with taking care of yourself?”

“Only live once.”

“Does quality of life not matter?”

Adam abruptly stood up and muttered, “Not to me.” He retreated to his room, shutting his bedroom door with an undeserved slam. He stood in the darkness and clenched his jaw hard enough to grind his teeth.

What? No lust for life? Wonder why that is? Oh yeah, because you have no life!

A furious desperation swelled in his chest. A mixture of anger, pain, and rejection ate at him like a cancer, tearing him apart bit by bit. Depression washed over him and he lay in his bed, isolated and forgotten.

She hadn’t been wrong. He spent the majority of his work day with her words lingering in his mind. His morning had been fantastic. Really it began with the night before. She’d put him in a diaper and since he hadn’t used it before his bath, she helped him back into it when she put him to bed. Then she’d come to his room and cuddled with him while topless and convinced him to wet himself.

He wondered when the whole thing would fall apart, but the thought of her having one waiting for him when he got home was too enticing to wave away as words spoken in the moment. His ten hour day went by far faster than he anticipated and as he left the shop, he couldn’t help feeling a twinge of anticipation.

That anticipation twisted into uncertainty by the time he pulled into his driveway. He chastised himself for getting even the slightest bit hopeful.

You don’t deserve it. You never did. You’ll never amount to anything. You’ll never be anything.

He walked in the door with his eyes down. There was no point in having expectations. It was just another day in his nothingburger life. He set his lunchbox down and took off his baseball cap. He hung it on the coat rack before turning and hanging his keys on the opposite wall. He stepped out of his shoes and put them on the rack.

There was a strange, delectable smell in the air and it took him a moment to realize that she was cooking. She’d been doing more around the house while he was gone. Her new job was consistent enough that she wasn’t dead ass tired at random times.

He carried his lunchbox into the kitchen and was stopped suddenly when she appeared in front of him with his pacifier in her hand.

“Open.”

His heart thudded in his chest. She took the lunchbox from his hand and pressed the rubber nipple to his lips. It slid into his mouth as his mind struggled to understand what was happening. And then he saw it. Behind her, on the counter, was a diaper. It was still neatly folded but just sitting out in the open. She clipped the pacifier to his shirt before looking down.

“That won’t do. That won’t do at all.” She reached down and undid his belt and his pants. She shimmied them a little before they fell slowly down his legs. “Let’s get you changed.”

She took his hand and led him around the counter separating the kitchen from the dining room. She grabbed the diaper on her way and led him straight into the spare bedroom. He walked in short steps as his pants bunched up around his ankles.

She knelt on the floor and motioned for him to lie down. He complied, keeping his knees bent and his feet flat on the floor.. His mind was completely blank. He lay there suckling softly on his binky as she lifted each leg and pulled off his pants and socks. His boxers were next, tossed on the pile of dirty clothes.

“Were you thinking about this all day long?” She asked, holding up the diaper. He nodded momentarily before turning his head slightly in shame. He watched her as she unfolded it and attempted to stretch it out.

“Do you think about these often?”

He was lost in the moment and vulnerable. Exposed as he was, his normal walls and bravado were suppressed and he would do anything to make sure that she moved on to the next step.

Adam nodded.

“I thought so. How often?” she paused between questions. “Monthly?”

He could feel her eyes on him as she waited for a response.

“Weekly?”

He felt like her eyes bored through him, reading him like an open child’s book.

“Daily?”

His deepest secret lay as he did, easily manipulated in her hands. She slid the diaper between his legs and his hips lifted up instinctively. He lowered himself upon it, grateful that he could have that moment one last time.

“All the time?”

His face flushed with shame and disgrace. There he was, a grown man, openly admitting yet again his deep seated desires. He covered his face with his hands and let the pacifier fall from his lips. His legs fell lips and slowly slid to the floor. He hadn’t cried since his dad passed away and he wasn’t about to now. He’d been down this road more than once. It was here where everything would take its inevitable turn for the worse. She was not long for his company, not once she knew the truth. They never were.

You just can’t help yourself can you? What’s the definition of insanity again?

He jumped as a damp, wet wipe brushed against his skin. She wiped a day’s worth of adulthood off him in slow, purposeful motions, refreshing his skin. Then came the powder, sprinkled lightly into the seat of the diaper and across his skin.

“Oops! You dropped this.” He felt her reach across him and picked up his pacifier. The clip on his shirt prevented it from hitting the floor, so it stayed clean. The corner of his eyes grew damp with tears but his conditioning prevented them from falling. Boys shouldn’t cry and men don’t feel. No one cared about how a man felt. He was expected to carry that burden alone and in absolute silence. Emotion was weakness and weakness was unforgivable.

The rubber nipple rubbed against his lips and with gentle assertion, she pressed it back into his mouth. He felt her hands slowly run down his chest, across his hips, and he felt her soft skin slide between his legs followed by the crinkle of the diaper as she pulled it up between his legs. Its soft embrace hugged his body as she secured the tapes one at a time. It was a snug fit but as she pressed the last tape down, she ran her fingers inside the leg holes to make sure the leak guards were properly placed.

“That’s better, isn’t it?”

He barely nodded but it was indeed so much better than wearing boring adult clothes.

“Now that that’s taken care of, I need to check on dinner. When you’re ready, come out and tell me about your day.”

The mere thought of having an adult conversation with her while wearing a diaper short circuited his brain. His mind wasn’t able to handle more than what had just happened, much less his existence afterward. He uncovered his eyes as she spun around and left the room. He squeezed his thighs together and sighed in contentment at the reassuring crinkling sound of compressed bulk between his legs. The moment was perfect. She was perfect and he felt a growing sense of appreciation and gratitude for her.

He couldn’t shake the lingering sense of repulsion and disgust that he expected her to have. After all, everyone else he had opened up to had eventually had the same reaction.

Freak. Sicko. Pervert. Creep. Pedo!

He lay there and stared at the ceiling before turning his head to the side as his eyes began to burn anew.

Disgrace

The box was on the floor in the closet. From what he had kept track of and his emotion laden memories, he was nearing the end of the diapers he had. Shame and guilt had made him purge all of his stash but one already opened package in a vicious cycle of purging and collecting that had doomed him since the very beginning.

This time will be no different. You don’t change. You don’t learn. She’ll never accept you!

He was stuck. He didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t help his all or nothing nature. He couldn’t live with it being drip fed at someone else’s convenience. It was too torturous. Time and time again he endured all he could.

Chapter Five

“-and it’s because of your income, Ms. Rainier, that we cannot move forward with your application at this time.”

Tiffany wasn’t surprised. She’d applied for the loan just to see what would happen. She knew her credit wasn’t the best and her income left a lot to be desired. She’d been barely hanging on as it was but the past few months had made it that much harder. Courtney moving out to live with her boyfriend had struck a huge blow to her finances and ultimately led her to the predicament that she was in. Tiffany didn’t blame Courtney. Her and Taylor were a good couple and it made sense for them to take the next step. Retail was a fickle business at the best of times but as her hours started getting cut back for new hires, even penny pinching couldn’t help the loss of Courtney financial support.

“Worth a shot, right?”

The loan officer, a man by the name of Steven Hooper, looked at her with sympathy. Or pity. She couldn’t tell which.

“It’s not that we don’t want to help, Ms. Rainier, but your debt to income ratio makes this a risky investment for us.”

“Don’t worry about it. It was a long shot anyway. I’ll just have to pick up a second job or something. Sleep is overrated anyhow.”

She got up to leave. She wasn’t bitter. Not in the slightest. But she had memorized the bus schedule in this area and she only had a little bit of time to get to the stop.

“I know a place that’s always looking for help. I could put in a call for you.”

“Why would you do something like that for me? I’m a nobody.”

“A nobody is just a somebody you don’t know yet.”

She raised her eyebrows at him.

“Something my granny used to say.” He said, “It’s a good place full of wonderful people. And the pay is decent.”

“How decent?”

“Enough to make the numbers on this screen more enticing to the bean counters upstairs. It’s not for everyone, though, but if you are interested,” he scrawled an address on the back of his business card and slid it over to her, “tell them I sent you.”

Tiffany looked at the card incredulously. It was unusual for strangers to be this nice to her. It’s not like she was dressed to impress.

“Uhhh, thanks.”

“Watch out for Gladys though. She can be…blunt.”

Tiffany had to run to the bus stop. She barely made it in time and collapsed in an empty seat completely out of breath. The bus smelled of stale urine and dried vomit but she didn’t care. Cheap transportation was hard to come by and she couldn’t afford to be picky. She looked up the address on the back of the card as the bus rumbled along.

Meadowlands Oasis. A senior citizen housing complex. She scrolled their page. Everything always looked better than it actually was and she couldn’t help but be skeptical. Social work wasn’t exactly her dream job but she was down on her luck and couldn’t afford to pass by an opportunity.

The bus squealed to a halt and by some devious twist of fate, Meadowlands was right outside, tucked neatly away behind a line of maple trees. She didn’t think, just stood up and walked off the bus. She had no idea when or if it would be back, and she had no way of reaching Adam for a way home, but that didn’t matter. She walked up to the office, while looking over the grounds. It was a five story building with a large mostly shaded ground of well kept grass and several sidewalks that encircled the building and property. It looked like the website, quaint and quiet.

“It is most unusual to have a walk-in applicant, even with such a distinguished referral.”

Tiffany shifted nervously, unsure of what to say.

“No resume. No background in social work. No medical training. I have no credible evidence to support offering you a position beyond the fact that you sought us out.”

“I under-”

“Are you a social person? Like to talk? Able to listen?”

“I-”

“Ever changed a diaper before? Given someone a bath? Cared for a sibling or relative?”

“Yes. My-”

“How are you at navigating conflict? Do you get your feelings hurt quickly if you are insulted or denigrated?”

“Not normally.”

“So if I hypothetically said you are a brain dead cunt faced waste of an orgasm that your mother should have just swallowed because the world would be better off if she had, how would you respond?”

Tiffany sat there in silence, anger brewing through her chest. She didn’t know this woman, nor had she done anything to deserve such vile comments. She forced a smile to keep from replying with vitriolic remarks of her own.

“You're hired.”

She blinked repeatedly in disbelief. “What?”

“You’ve got the job. When can you start?”

“I, uh, today. Tonight?”

“Tomorrow. 8 A.M..”

“Yeah! I’ll be here!”

“Good. But some scrubs. Wear comfortable shoes. Pin your hair up. You’re a pretty girl. The boys will love you. But the gals? They will rip you apart like a pack of ravenous wolves if you show them any weakness. That’s why I had to test you.”

“That was a test?”

The woman nodded and stood up, “Walk with me.”

She led Tiffany outside and around the back of the building. “We call that the Tower. 2 floors of hospice care, 3 of assisted living. You’ll be assigned to one of the upper floors. You’ll cook, you’ll clean, you’ll sit and listen, help them bathe, be their friend, their nanny, their daughter who never sees them anymore, and anything else they need. They are old. They are bitter. And many of them hate everyone and everything but they are no less deserving of our care. They will lash out and say anything they can to get a rise out of you because they can’t direct their anger where it would do them the most good. Only advice I can give: Don’t take it personal. I’ve been called the worst things you can imagine and also the kindest. It really depends on the day. If you can keep that in mind and do your best, you’ll do fine.”

“Umm, thanks for the advice. I, uh, you kind of caught me off guard.”

“It happens. Just when you think everything is going good things will spiral out of control. Just keep your cool and your voice level. Yelling back at them only makes you look like the monster. I always like to hit them with, “Are you sure that’s a good choice?” Gets them every time.”

Tiffany was confused. “How so?”

“It’s like a threat. We know it’s empty but they don’t. They want to treat me like garbage, I don't want to make their dinner. It comes down to how close to that line they want to get. We would never deprive our residents of their needs and I’d fire anyone on the spot who did, but we also can’t let them push us around.”

It was sound advice and something that she thought about the entire way home. She was able to pick up a few sets of scrubs from a store down the road and it left her with plenty of time to get back to the bus stop. If it wasn’t for her phone, she’d be totally lost. She thought about how she’d gotten to this point and while the advice of a stranger wasn’t going to revolutionize her life, it was direct enough to make her reevaluate herself.

She heard it first, the sharp ting of metal bouncing of concrete followed by a loud “Fuck!” The wrench bounced into the road and clanged to a stop a few feet past where the driveway met the asphalt. She heard the sound of lawn mowers and smelled fresh cut grass as the wind blew softly from the west. She rounded the corner of the yard where his property butted up to hers and sighed. Her grass needed to be cut too and if it wasn’t, they would tack on an extra $75 to her back due lot rent.

Stepping around his porch, she saw his Jeep backed into the driveway and two makeshift ramps made of oak propped up his riding lawnmower. His feet stuck out from under it and flailed pointlessly as he strained to do something under the deck.

“Goddamn sonofabitching anyways! Fucking metric ass bullshit reverse threads. What ever happened to Made in America? Oh yeah, we sold out to fucking China for cheap wages and piss poor quality.”

The wrench slipped and she heard a bang and sharp inhale as his knuckles slammed into the mower deck. A low growl emanated from under the mower and he slid out from it, wrench in hand, blind rage in his eyes. He cocked his arm back to throw the wrench and paused, mid throw, as his eyes fell on her. His lip curled in disgust and he dropped the wrench. Blood ran down his fingers and dripped onto the concrete. If he was in pain, he didn’t show it as he got to his feet and went into the house. She tightened her grip on her shopping bag of scrubs and followed him. He banged around in his bathroom to the sound of running water.

Tiffany went to her room and dropped off her scrubs. She wanted to wash them as she didn’t trust second hand clothing, but she didn’t want to be in his way. She heard him stomping through the house, and jumped slightly as the spare bedroom door slammed open. She heard the clanging of metal hitting metal and the shuffling of tools before his heavy footfalls retreated back outside. The house fell quiet and she took the moment to exhale in relief. She didn’t know how to react to someone with explosive anger issues.

Something in the other room fell over and the clatter sounded off, like it was too high and didn’t hold anything of weight. She heard the mower start and from the window, she saw him back it down the ramp. He let it idle as he checked the tension on the belt before driving it into the yard. He started the deck, drove it a few feet, before letting it run while he checked the cut of the grass. He reminded her of her late grandfather, a man who was obsessively particular and detail oriented almost to a fault. He got back on the mower and drove off. She saw him trace the outside of his property and then heard him fade away as he made his way over to her lawn, tying all of it into one task.

Curiosity was a terrible thing. She told herself that she was just checking on her stuff in that room and nothing more, but in reality, she wanted to know what had fallen. His stack of boxes were different. They had been reorganized and one was missing. Her stuff was fine and she knew somewhere in her gut that she should have left it alone, but the closet door in the back of the room was slightly ajar and something white and oddly shaped was stuck under the door. She crouched down and touched it. It was plastic and smooth, with an unusual softness to it. She applied a little bit of pressure and it slid back behind the door. She couldn’t determine its size or function by what little she could see. The closet was dark and her body cast a shadow over the door. She pushed the door open a little, pausing to listen to the sound of the mower, before she stood and reached for the light. She couldn’t find the string and when she took a step into the closet, her bare toes landed on something half soft and half rigid. The deck of the mower shut off and panic washed over her. She knelt down and grabbed whatever it was, tucking it under her sweater, and hurried back to her room. She closed the door behind her and leaned against it. Her heart pounded and her rapid breathing shook her chest. Adrenaline coursed through her veins.

She stood there for a few moments to let herself calm down. The mower deck started its one note roar again and she realized that she had panicked for no reason. She sat on her bed and pulled out the item she snuck out of his personal things. It was in an opaque Ziploc bag. She opened it and dumped the bag out into her lap. Out tumbled something she immediately recognized but didn’t understand. Its proportions were too big. Its function, while familiar, made no sense to her. It had a plastic curved shield with a slight rounded dip at the top. In the middle of the shield was a plastic circle with a hoop attached to it. All of the plastic was soft baby blue. She turned it over and gasped slightly. Attached to the inside of the shield was a bulbous rubber nipple. It was wider than anything she had seen before and upon closer inspection, had pointed indentations in the rubber. Indentations that looked suspiciously like teeth marks.

She held it in her hand and felt a cool understanding wash over her. It was disproportionate to her understanding of it, but she knew what it was. A pacifier. Something that parents gave babies to soothe them. Her cousin normally had one pinned to his shirt when he was little. Any time he’d get fussy, his mom would slip it into his mouth to keep him quiet. But this was much larger than something meant for a child. This looked like it would fit comfortably in an adult’s mouth.

She had no idea what to do with it. She knew she should put it back into the closet and forget she ever saw it. She dropped it back in the bag and sealed it. She went to her door but just as her hand hit the smooth metal, the mower sputtered to a stop and she heard him curse just outside of her window. There was a sense of frustration and pent up emotion layered in his voice, like he was fighting against his nature to keep him composure. It sounded like he was holding onto a great pain, one that threatened to burst forth whenever he got too stressed or things didn’t work exactly as he wanted them to. She looked at the bag and her hand slid off the door knob. She took a guess at what box was now missing.

Disgrace

The pacifier and the strange plastic covered thing had to have come from that box. He intentionally moved it to hide it from her or himself, that part wasn’t clear, but in his impatience to stow it away from prying eyes, he must not have made sure it was securely placed.