Always Pink & Always Right ♡

The first few questions aren’t too bad, although you spend an embarrassing amount of time on eight times seven. By the time you realize you’ve reached a calculus problem your mind is starting to become a swirling mess.

Your entire body vibrates as you struggle to get through a word puzzle which secretly has no answer. You spend thirty minutes with your mind looping in circles on a famous unsolved math problem and by the time you’re on the second paragraph of your first fifty page essay the timer rings.

Supervisors begin gathering answer sheets. From the corner of your eye you see a girl your age trying desperately to finish her essay before it’s snatched cruelly by an attendant. They whisper something into a walky talky before producing a small oblong metallic object and pointing it towards her eyes.

Before she can even manage to protest the object pulses with a blinding white light. You witness the girl go limp in her seat for a moment, her body motionless before she slowly comes back to life. She stares around blankly for a moment before erupting into a wail, tears and snot dripping from her face and onto her pants.

She jams her thumb into her mouth greedily as, her face relaxing a bit, a pool of urine begins forming under her bottom and overflowing onto the tile floor below. The supervisor looks on coldly and lets out a small “Tsk,” before radioing another vague instruction.

In a flash, another attendant jogs onto the scene carrying a patchwork duffel with Winnie the Pooh on it. Before you can continue looking on in horror, you’re called to attention by an imposing figure in front of you.

They look down at their clipboard, then at you, then at their clipboard again before a muted chuckle passes through their lips. “What? W-what I…? You trail off just as they speak, mind still groggy.

“Three.”

“T-three? Out of five? That’s not so—“

“Nonono hun. Three years. Our results indicate you have the effective intelligence of a three year old. Do you have any questions before we proceed?

They don’t give you a chance to respond before the metallic object is placed squarely in front of your eyes. “Alrighty then! Ready to kiss those adult worries bye-bye?” They click a button on the side and a quiet whirr shoots from the device. “Say cheese!”

The device pulses a bright white flash in your field of vision. For a fleeting instant, you feel fine, like it might not have worked, that your fate isn’t sealed. Until, click!

Your body and mind go limp as your subconscious awakens, going to work diligently on making the changes necessary to transform you into the ideal toddler. Your academic experience is scrubbed clean first, all that advanced coursework turns to mush and flows right out of you, never to be seen again. You can hardly manage the potty now, much less addition and subtraction.

Imagery of your favorite films are substituted for a collage of Princesses and Bluey, your refined humor replaced almost entirely with an affinity for crude fart jokes and funny noises. Your once adept social skills revert back to such strategies as asking strangers if they can share toys and throwing tantrums to guarantee your way. All of it gone, turned to that same mush and flushed out of your mind for good. Forever.

Your clothing taste goes from chic and classy to humiliating and childish. Opting for Sesame Street T-shirts over a cute sweater. For skirts and overalls over proper formal wear. Any concern for sexy, form fitting underwear is replaced with a concern for wether or not you’re making it into pull-ups this week, and any long term life goals are replaced with the simple task of trying to make it to the bathroom on time. Everything. Your entire adult self. Gone in a fleeting instant, all scrubbed clean and washed down the drain.

You yawn deeply as you rouse from a very brief yet productive rest. Your supervisor, who’d been patiently waiting now for all of five seconds, speaks up first. “How do you feel sweetheart?”

You look up at them confusedly, your subconscious still making the finishing touches. Before you can snap back to reality you’re made aware of a sharp pain in your pelvic region. You cross your legs quickly and furrow your brow before looking up to your new caregiver. “I- uhm… potty?”