Done Adulting Vol. 1 Ch. 120 (Patreon)

“Am I missing anything at daycare?”

“No,” Ella told Jamie, “other than me missing you being there. I wish Stacy was off work for the holidays.”

“Sorry. But at least we got to have a playdate.”

“You sure your mom won’t come in?”

“Unlikely. I usually go down for at least an hour and a half in the afternoons.” Ella’s response was to take her shirt off, leaving her in just her diaper, same as Jamie.

“So, what’s been going on with you,” she asked.

“O, that big merger we talked about got approved by the regulators, so ... wadduya think? My days don’t change much.”

“Like things aren’t happening in your head all the time. Seriously, what’s up lately? I haven’t seen you in a week.”

Jamie shrugged. “Got my hand slapped by some bitch at a party.”

“And?”

“And Amanda and Mom took care of it.” There really wasn’t much of a story to tell there. “Got my picture taken with Santa again.”

“Why?”

“Mom said it would be a nice surprise for Amanda.”

“Ha! That’s too funny. Did he recognize you?”

“He played along. What’s been up with you?”

It was Ella’s turn to shrug. “Same routine.”

“How’s therapy going?”

“I did a pull up without any help. Well, most of a pull up.”

“Really? That’s awesome!”

“Not a big deal.”

“Of course it is.”

Ella frowned and looked away. She wasn’t sure how she felt about receiving praise for her recovery. She was silent for a moment, thinking about it. Her eye caught the red line of the scar at her elbow. “They don’t gross you out,” she asked after a few seconds.

“What?”

“My scars?”

“No,” Jamie said, his eyes softening so she could see he was, like always, honest with her. “Not at all.”

Ella shook her head. “I wish I didn’t have them.”

“I wish a lot of things for you,” Jamie said, bringing his hand up and caressing her arm. Ella sighed and moved closer to him.

“I can’t believe I went so long without this,” she said, taking his hand and intertwining his fingers with her own, “Human hands.”

“It is different,” he said, “Just different from a big’s. Better.”

“What about you? How’s your therapy going?”

“We’re gonna do just once a week starting after the new year. Mary thinks I’m doing real well.” Ella caught the hesitation in his body language.

“What do you think?”

“I think she’s right, mostly. Still, seeing her helps.”

“For what it’s worth, I think she’s right, too. You’ve seemed a lot calmer and happier lately for the most part.”

“Thanks.”

“Ya know, I went through a lot of therapy too, when I first got here.”

“You never told me that.”

“O yeah,” she said, rolling her eyes at the memory, “I was talking to a therapist before I could even walk again.”

“Did that help?”

“Big time. I had such terrible nightmares. Flashbacks. A big could hardly come near me without me having a fit. Every time one came in the room with me I’d just scream and panic.”

“How did you get over that?”

“Drugs, to start.”

“That seems wrong, considering everything.”

“Necessary,” she said as she grimaced, remembering how hard it had all been, the way she’d lose her ability to reason and self-soothe as the fear overtook her. “I still had to be fed, still had to be changed, bathed, everything. It became a kind of exposure therapy, bigs coming near me.”

“How so?”

“I started with Dawn and Michael. They were the only people who took care of me at first. Always one or the other. It got to be so I was okay with them, and only them, for long time. Then we gradually added other bigs until I could be around them without having a panic attack.”

“When did you meet Stacy?”

“A few months after getting here. She moved into the hospital. In the room next to mine. She very gradually took over.”

“Did you get a say in that? In having Stacy?”

“Yes. Dawn and Michael explained it to me and told me the choices I had.”

“What did you think of Stacy at first?”

“What do you think of her?”

“I like her.”

“Why?”

“Because ... because she’s good to you.”

Ella smiled. “I couldn’t stand her.”

“Why not?”

“Because she was new. I had my routine, and I didn’t like it changing.”

“What changed your mind?”

“The four of us had a long conversation, and Stacy explained to me it wouldn’t be a normal big-little relationship. And Michael pointed out that if it wasn’t her, it could end up being some big who did want a little, and then who knew how I would have been treated.”

“So you accepted it.”

“Grudgingly. Like I said, she took over things in the hospital, and then she took me home. Dawn and Michael would come take care of me there when she went to work. It was a slow transition. I think almost two years total.”

“So how did ... Sorry, never mind.”

“What?”

“Well, how did it come to be that ... you have a nursery, and pacifiers, and bottles.”

“How did all that happen since I didn’t want a big and Stacy didn’t want a little?”

“Yeah.”

“I never gave up the pacifier. They kept using one in the hospital to help me calm down. I couldn’t sleep without one for a long time. The feedings were necessary for a while because I hadn’t had solid food in years, and I guess we both just grew to like that time together.”

“So she does like parts of you being a little.”

“O, definitely. It’s like with you and Amanda. She wasn’t really sure, but once we got used to one another she kinda got sucked into the role. I had to pump the brakes a bit.”

“Like what?”

“Baby outfits ... Do you know what a nose pump is?”

“Ew.”

“Yeah. First time I got a cold she ran out and got one of those. Had to convince her I could handle blowing my own nose.”

“Geez.”

“I know. But my room is less of a nursery than yours is. At least I have my own bathroom.” Jamie blushed and giggled.

“What?”

“Maybe we can convince Mom to let us take a bath together.”

“Yeah? Is that what you have on your mind?”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

“So you’re okay with it? Stacy, I mean, and the whole being a little thing.”

“I wouldn’t trade Stacy for anyone. Far as things go, I couldn’t have gotten luckier.”

“And being a little?”

“What about you? Wasn’t exactly the reason you came here. At least, not all of this,” she said, picking up his binky and tauntingly waving it at him.

“It’s not so bad.”

Ella scoffed, “You are such a bad liar.”

“What? I mean it. It’s not.”

“I meant you like it. ‘Not so bad’ are things we tolerate. You like this now.”

Jamie turned his eyes toward the sheet and played with it, twirling it in his fingers. “Does that change how you think of me?”

“Yes, it makes me like you more.”

“Why,” he asked, surprised.

“How about for one you were quite the sourpuss when we first met.”

“I wasn’t that bad.”

“Not bad. Just unpredictable,” she said, taking his hand again. “I never knew if you were gonna sit and draw with me all day or sit in the corner with your headphones on and block out the world and get angry if someone interrupted you.”

“It takes getting used to.”

“I know. So yeah, I like you happy and mellow and affectionate and cute. I don’t care how you got here. I’m just glad you did.”

“It’s not a turn off?”

“What?”

“The baby stuff?”

“It’s not baby stuff. It’s little stuff. And no, it doesn’t. It’s something we have in common, for one thing. Does this turn you off,” she asked, looking at her own diaper.

“No. But, you need those.”

“So do you, now. Sort of.”

“But I had some choice in it.”

“Not really, ya didn’t. Your big put you back in diapers, like me. But in any case, no, it doesn’t bother me. I like seeing you finally being little. Especially with others. It’s cute, and I like the Jamie who cuddles with me way more than the Jamie who sits with the receptionist all afternoon.”

“That was only a few times.”

“Still. And Joey and Jenny and the other littles like you, too.”

“It’s easier to play with them now.”

“See? All good things.”

“I think I have you to thank for that.”

“Not just me. You got a whole village of people who helped you along.”

“It takes a village to raise a little, I guess,” Jamie joked.

“Hehe ... so you’re really okay with all of it?”

“Yeah,” Jamie said, still blushing. “I don’t think I could go back to the way things were.”

“What would you miss most?”

“Touch. I don’t know why no one ever talks about it, but adults need it, too. I guess I’m addicted to it now, being held. I can imagine not getting hugged, like back there. I never got hugged; for, like, fifteen years before I met Cheryl, I got maybe five hugs.”

“You sweet boy,” Ella said, moving her hand up and playing with his hair. “I know what you mean. Once I got over my fear of them, I was unhappy whenever Michael or Dawn or Stacy weren’t holding me.”

“They were your protectors.”

“And the people who loved me. And do love me.”

“I love you,” Jamie said. It just came out. He didn’t mean it in a romantic way, or at least he didn’t think he did, but in the same way Stacy loved her, and the way he loved Becky and Amanda. He thought.

“O, Jamie, I love you, too.” With her hand on the back of his head, Ella pulled him in for a kiss. Jamie responded by reaching down and running his hand across her thigh, gently lifting it over his.

“Do we have time,” she asked.

“So what if we don’t?”

_________________

Becky may not have been as blinded as she used to be to the ways Jamie wasn’t the traditional, regressed little, but she was still sufficiently obtuse to think nothing of Jamie and his playmate (and his bedding) being so sweaty after a nap that they both needed a bath and saw no reason why they couldn’t take one together. She left them alone and came back just a minute later to find Jamie laying against the back of the tub with Ella reclined against him, enjoying the feel of him hot and stiff against her.

“You two are so cute together,” she said.

“Thank you, Miss Webb,” Ella said self-consciously, feeling Jamie getting softer against her thigh. You’re killing the mood, she wanted to say.