141: Put On A Happy Face
“Excuse me,” Janet said. “Do you know where the daycare is?”
Janet was talking to a forty-something year old man with a pastel blue t-shirt and matching baseball cap. Both had “Daycare” stenciled in white block letters. He was leaning against a section of wall, staring at his phone.
Behind us, Amazons walked about the floor in their own self absorbed haze and tunnel vision ,traveling to and from shops located inside cave-like openings or to the food court where half-a-dozen fast food style eateries that couldn’t cut it on the highway grilled and fried their food into semi-palatable mediocrity.
Above us inoffensive pop songs that had been fresh and new twenty years prior played as background music to help muffle the footsteps and chatter. Kiosks were manned by bored looking employees, ever vigilant and looking to lure someone into buying a gadget advertised ‘As Seen On T.V.’ or get a new cell phone plan.
It was Wednesday afternoon and we were at the mall. It was technically branded as the Thrinacia Mall, but nobody in town called it that. Why differentiate it when there’s only one? When it opened seven years prior, it experienced a boom and it was the talk at work. Even Tracy wouldn’t shut up about how neat it was.
Lots of ads on local television about how nobody would find better deals anywhere and reminders to not to “turn a blind eye to these awesome offerings!”
Cassie and I destroyed both of our computers that summer and ordered new ones from overseas with extra virus protection and adblock software pre-installed. When a pop up ad forces its way onto your screen with a giant eyeball in the middle of it, you do not stare at it and wait for the swirling to start. You just don’t.
Now the shine had worn off the place and it was just part of the scenery. A place to go to get trendy clothes, see a movie, or otherwise just kill time when you had nothing better to do. My first impression was that it kind of reminded me of the Pretend Play Preserve if all of the energy had been sucked out of it. Or like the J-Swift plaza but no groceries.
I’d never been to the mall before. Too many Amazons and clothing stores. We were having trouble finding the daycare advertised online so I’d accidentally gotten a free tour of the place. I’d counted no less than three stores specifically dedicated to ‘baby & Little apparel’ and one for furniture.
I caught glimpses of onesies hanging from racks in non-specialty stores too. Woe be to the Little whose Mommy or Daddy is a regular at Burning Question. Then again, maybe being a ‘Goth Baby’ wouldn’t be so bad. Better than being a saintly school boy who got spanked until I lied hard enough to believe myself. As expensive and impractical as some of that stuff was, they might not be able to afford fattening my face or yanking my teeth to make me look even more babyish.
The fact that there was a vending machine right outside the public restrooms that specifically carried diapers, wipes, powder, and training pants justified my decision not to come sooner. The detail that each machine was positioned directly next to the ‘Family’ bathroom specifically was not lost on me, either.
But the worst had already happened to me. My adult things had long ago been balled up, binned, and covered in shit. So instead of paranoia or anxiety I just felt this quiet, bitter non-surprise.
It being a Wednesday afternoon, the place was relatively dead. There were no lines at any of the concession places, and one or two customers at most inside the stores. The arcade looked empty. So did what passed for a child’s play area; a ringed in space with a tiny slide, a novelty size Connect-Three game with chips so big that even an Amazon couldn’t swallow them, the world’s most shallow ball pit, and a designated area for stroller parking. If I had to guess, I’d say that the ratio of employees to shoppers was damn near one-to-one.
We should have come here on a weekend when it was busier. But Janet’s web of contacts-if they could be trusted-were opting to go the extra mile narrowing down the list with us. Helena and a few of the other Little Voices folks were also scouting daycares under the guise of relocation. Oakshire and its surrounding areas had a lot of daycares, but they were still decidedly finite.
Still no sign of Cassie or any Little girl that fit her description or temperament. If we couldn’t find her, it might mean she had a private nanny or a stay-at-home Mommy or Daddy. Or maybe her Adoptive parent worked at a place that allowed Littles.
What then? Did we start fake interviewing Nannies asking for references and then trace them back to their sources? Did we start looking on Facetome for them and see if they provided cute pictures of their Little charges? Did we go patrolling offices looking for playpens set up next to cubicles? Did I beg Janet to apply to jobs with company daycares so we could scout those out too?
What if Cassie was taken somewhere far away? What if she wasn’t ‘Cassie’ anymore? I kept asking myself ‘What if she got away?’ but that question felt hollow every time it sounded off in my brain.
I wouldn’t admit it, but I was grasping at straws and distracting myself to stop from having a complete and total breakdown. Giving up was not an option. I couldn’t handle the idea of giving up.
As Janet wandered around, lost, I peaked into the handful of strollers, almost seeing Cassie in every single one until I blinked and recognized it as some other unfortunate Little stuck in the same position as me.
Speaking of strollers, one feature I noticed was missing was the stroller rental. Every big bouncy baby buggy I spied was a fancy store bought one. One would think they’d be promoted for the convenience of impromptu kidnapping. Snatch a Little off the street, bring them to the mall, trap them in a cheap stroller for a buck and gag them with a pacifier while you go outfit shopping for their new life. It was common sense from an Amazon point of view. It practically wrote itself.
We finally got some success when Janet noticed the guy in the ‘Daycare’ shirt. We’d passed him two to three times already. The wall he was leaning up against was painted into a mural .A grassy field with stick figure children holding hands against a blue sky with a yellow sun and rainbow colored music notes. It was all two-dimensional and very amateurish, like a kindergartener’s scribbles made large. The clothes looked blocky and layered on, and only the white semi-circle diapers gave any indication that these were supposed to be Littles.
It was yet another imitation of the Triple-P’s aesthetic done half-assed. Only the guy leaning up against the mural drew our attention and the realization that there should have been a store where he was standing.
“Excuse me,” Janet put a little more annoyance in her voice. “I’m looking for the daycare.”
“Hm?” he said, looking up from his phone. “Oh. Right here ma’am.” He thumbed to the wall he was leaning on. Then he jerked his head to the right of him.
About ten feet to the right was a rectangular metal hatch with a pull handle on it. The word “Daycare” was engraved into it, with no other indicators as to what one was supposed to do.
Experimentally, Janet stepped over and tugged on the handle. The hatch smoothly swung open top to bottom like an oven. Inside appeared to be an inclined surface and darkness. “That looks like a mail drop…!” Ever hear someone swear without actually swearing? I have, and there was at least one “fuck” somewhere in that sentance. Janet gripped me harder as if I might actually choose to leap off her hip and climb down into the unknown abyss behind it.
The guy in the baseball cap blinked. His mouth twitched, trying to suppress a smirk. “I’m sorry, ma’am. Is this your first time using our service?” he said in his best customer service voice.
“Yes,” Janet said curtly. “I’m looking for somewhere to enroll my Little boy.”
The guy bit his lip. “Oooh,” he said. “This might not be the best place for that, then.”
Fucker was hiding something. “Why not?” I piped in.
“Yeah,” Janet said. “Why not?”
The giant regarded Janet, not me, and told her, “We charge ten bucks an hour. It’s a good deal if you’re looking to do some shopping and you don’t wanna carry your baby around, but it’d get really expensive if you dropped him off for eight hours a day five to seven days a week.”
“That’s why there’s no strollers,” I whispered to myself.
Neither Amazon reacted. “Ah. Yes. That would get expensive.”
“Do you work at any of the stores?” The attendant inquired. “Most places here offer free daycare as a bonus.”
I felt a guilty tingle in the back of my neck that radiated out my shoulders and vibrated into my shoulders. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t teeing up a pitch that Janet should get a part-time job on the weekend, if only for a day or two. I quashed it down as soon as I realized exactly how stupid and selfish that sounded, but the temptation was there.
“No,” she said. “I’m just a teacher.”
“Oh yeah,” the man shook his head. “Then you don’t want him here long term. Teachers do not get paid enough!”
If we got a nickel every time someone said we would get paid enough. My lips retreated inside my mouth. I was still thinking of myself as a teacher, and it bothered me. And it bothered me that it bothered me. I looked down at my pacifier and regretted that I couldn’t insert it one-handed. Effectively not having fingers is a bitch.
Janet, of course, took it in stride. “No we do not,” she said. Every word came out in a slow tempoed staccato and she punctuated the sentence with a tired performative chuckle.She was almost required to say that by social contract. Speaking of which, “But nobody gets into teaching for the money.”
“No they do not.” The man said, copying Janet’s inflection note for note. I was just relieved that he hadn’t said ‘we’. Not that people who work with very young children aren’t teachers. Just that I wouldn’t find any very young children down that mail chute and this dude’s job was leaning up against a wall.
“Thank you for the information,” Janet said. “I appreciate the honesty.”
“Not a problem,” the so-called Daycare Worker said back. “And thank you for everything you do in the classroom.” Janet turned just in time so that I could roll my eyes instead of masking against the empty platitudes.
“Have a nice day.”
“You too.”She started walking away.
That anxious energy hadn’t left me, though. “Mommy,” I hissed in her ear. “Janet. Stop.”
“What?” She stopped. “I’m not going to pretend to get a job at the food court for a discount.”
Just because someone changes your diapers they think they know you. “I wasn’t gonna ask that,” I said. “I just want you to put me in there for about an hour.”
“Sweetie, it’s not even a regular daycare.” Janet reminded me as if I hadn’t heard. “It’s just a drop off for parents who want to shop by themselves. Cassie probably isn’t even in there.”
“I know,” I said. “But you heard that guy. He says that there’s free daycare for employees. That means they might have regulars in there.”
“She’s probably not a regular.”
I flinched so as not to make a bigger display. “That’s not the point,” I said. “This place is a high traffic area. People coming in and out all the time. If I can talk to any of the kids that are here on the regular, I can at least ask them if anybody looking like her has ever come through.”
“That’s still a long shot.”
“I’ll at least know that I tried!”
She got a far away look and her expression softened. “You have one hour.”
“Yes, ma’am.” My heart started feeling lighter.
“I’m going shopping.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“For you.”
“Sure. Go for it.”
“Clothes.”
“Good. I won’t have to be there.”
“Cute clothes. Adorable outfits.”
“Okie dokie.”
“Things that when people see you in them, they won’t think for a second that you’re a big boy.”
I squirmed. “That’s fine.”
“I’m talking about snuggly winter rompers and sleep sacks so you’re all bundled up when it finally gets cold.”
My eye twitched a hair. “Mhm.”
“I’m talking about cute little t-shirts and matching diaper covers for when you go out in the summer with your Pop Pop.”
She was prodding me, testing my resolve. “That’s…to be expected.”
“And you won’t get to see what I bought until I put them on you.”
I huffed and failed to conceal my scowl. “Deal.”
She giggled like a school girl and planted a smooch on my cheek . She turned around and we started walking back towards the wall and the guy in the T-shirt. ”You’re too easy sometimes. You know that?”
“Does this mean you’re not going shopping?”
The smile she flashed at me was positively devilish. “You’ll find out.”
I stammered over myself. “I…but…Mommy!” Secretly (or not so secretly) I was just relieved she was teasing me again. It might mean I was close to getting the use of my hands back. That…and I genuinely wanted her to be happy with me again.
“Excuse me, sir?” Janet put on her own pleasant mask. “I was just thinking. Could I try this out anyways? It might be nice to do some shopping.”
Daycare Shirt stood up from against the wall again. “Sure thing, ma’am. Would you like me to show you how to do it?”
“Please and thank you.”
He showed Janet his phone. “First you need to go to this website, compu-creche.com, and download the app.” Janet held me with one arm and logged onto the website with the other. Meanwhile, my teeth started grinding. Compu-Creche? Never heard of it, but I had a feeling I was about to be not-surprised in the worst way. “From there you can either select the correct address- we’re the only one in Oakshire- or you can scan that QR code just above the drop off.”
Janet opted for the latter. She scanned a squiggly little box that just so happened to be located on the landing zone of a stick figure’s diaper. “Got it.”
“Now press create file.”
“Got it.”
“And it’s going to want a credit card number.”
Janet sighed. “Yup.”
Just looking at the hatch was starting to give me an awful kind of tunnel vision. This was an awful lot of automation for a simple drop off and pick up operation. I looked down at my pacifier again. Damn it would’ve been nice to gnaw on something instead of thinking about what I was getting myself into.
“The system is going to ask you for a picture of your Little. You can take it now or if you got one in your phone you can submit it.”
The phone was in my face and clicking away before I had a chance to react. “Hey!”
“Would you rather I use the one of you in the tub?” Janet asked.
I blushed. “No, ma’am.”
Our guide chuckled to himself and then said, “Then it should ask for a name, gender, potty training, discipline preferences, dietary restrictions. All that good stuff.”
Janet punched in the basic info with her thumb. She stopped and pouted her lip out in thought. “Remind me, what’s your middle name again?”
“I don’t have one.” I said.
“Really?!” Janet’s face darkened about three shades of pink. The woman had filled out my Adoption papers and replaced my last name with hers, but hadn’t noticed that I didn’t have a middle name?
It’s not terribly uncommon. Lots of Littles don’t have middle names. Middle names are often kind of like consolation prizes or formalities. Making it so every generation has an ‘Abigail’ or naming a kid after both grandfathers and such. Truth be told, with everything else going on, a lot of us find middle names kind of pointless.
Janet swallowed her pride, said nothing more on the subject, and continued making a profile for me. I nibbled on my lip anxiously watching her quantify everything she thought of me into a computer profile.
First Name: Clark Middle Name; (N/A) Last Name: Grange
Child is a(n):
Amazon (6mo-3yrs)
Little
In-Betweener
Child’s gender is:
Male
Female
Non-Binary
Child’s potty training level is:
Fully trained
Pull-ups for naps only
Diapers for naps only
Training (Occasional Accidents)
Training (Pull-ups)
Diapers full-time
If child wears diapers, what additional products should be applied during changes?
(please check all that apply):
N/A
None. (Clean diaper only)
Baby powder
Rash cream
Child’s highest level of mobility is:
Newborn (Tummy time only)
Infant (Can sit independently)
Crawler
Cruiser (Requires support to walk)
Toddler (Can walk independently)
Child’s dietary allowances (check all that apply):
Formula only
Liquid Diet
Semi-Solid Foods
Solid-Foods
Finger Foods
Spoonfed
Independent feeding
Bottles
Sippy Cups
Juice Boxes/Pouches
Containers with lids and straws
Canned beverages with straws
Canned beverages
Open containers
Does child have any food allergies? (If Yes, please check all that apply):
No
Yes
Milk
Eggs
Fish
Shellfish
Tree nuts
Wheat
Soybeans
Sesame
Other (Please list)
____________________
____________________
___________________
Acceptable terms of affection include (Check all that apply)
Baby
Baby Boy
Baby Girl
Cutie
Honey
Little Lamb
Princess
Pumpkin
Sweetie
Permitted disciplinary actions include (Check all that apply)
Gentle reminders and redirection
Speech restricting pacifier
Dexterity limiting mittens
Mobility limiting booties
Time out *
Isolation **
Spanking
Enemas ***
* Please indicate Minimum and Maximum amounts of time, in minutes, that your child may be in time out. Min (5) Max (10)
** Please indicate Minimum and Maximum amounts of time, in minutes, that your child may be in isolation. Min (3) Max (5)
*** Please indicate Minimum and Maximum amount of time, in minutes, that your child may sit in a dirty diaper after receiving an enema. Min (N/A) Max (N/A)
Do you want your child to be happy?
Yes
No
None of it was at all surprising.It still stung a bit, riding on her hip, watching it get filled out in real time. At least she said she wanted me to be happy. She was going out of her way to humor me with this. Didn’t mean I liked watching her set up a profile.
“Why are you filling it out for real?” I asked, slightly annoyed.
“Do you want them to be able to spank you while I’m gone?” Janet countered. “Maybe this won’t be so bad,” she tacked on. “It could be like a miniature Play Preserve. Something to do when we’re bored on the weekend. Doesn’t hurt.”
I was about to grumble that this place wasn’t Little Voices approved until I realized that would be actually advocating for Little Voices or valuing their recommendations. “Fine.”
Janet was about to hit ‘send’, but seemed to think better of it. “This is a lot of information to give for just an hour of daycare,” she said to what I was now thinking of as more of a sales’ rep than a daycare worker.
“Oh sure,” he nodded. “It’s a lot. But it’s necessary.”
Her thumb yet hovered over the final button, uncommitted. “Is someone really going to take the time to read all this?” she asked. “I’m not comfortable with some of these punishments, and he can be a handful sometimes. I don’t want to cost someone their job because they forgot the rules and took matters into their own hands.”
That felt like the most passive-aggressive way of saying ‘If anyone touches him I will end them’ that I’d ever heard and I loved her for it. Memories of Ambrose’s last day on the job, me punching her, and the fallout from it flooded my brain and caused my pain neurons to spark up.
Still worth it.
The sales rep nodded, flashed a not quite sleazy smile and explained, “No one’s going to read it ma’am because they won’t have to. Our system is a hundred percent automated.” He kept talking even as I clung to Janet tighter. The mail chute was looking less and less attractive. “Computer loads up the file, the parameters you’ve set on the app, and takes things over from there. If you want to know how your Little guy is doing while you’re shopping, you just gotta open the app.”
Janet pouted her lip and squeezed me tighter. “Are there hidden cameras or something?”
“Nope. Privacy. But the computer keeps track of everything else.” He turned his phone around to show her. His screen looked like a split screen layout of multiple different profiles. Like some kind of incomprehensible stock market ticker every picture had a series of bar graphs, numbers and readouts that updated constantly.
“Right now there are five different kids, all Littles, in there. Their heart rates and body temperature indicate that they’re stimulated but not distressed. One is taking a nap. One just got done being fed a bottle of apple juice. They’re all wet, but none of them are in a bad enough way to be changed. Oops! Check that, one of them just flooded and is getting changed right now.” I watched as a bar on one of the profile shrank down to nothing.
“This one pooped,” he tapped at a picture, “but they’re the one taking a nap. No signs of rash or distress so the nursery is letting them sleep.”
“There isn’t any hypnosis in there, right?”
The guy blew air past his lips. “Pfft. No ma’am. We’re not allowed to touch that stuff. My job wouldn’t be necessary if we were.”
“And I’ll be able to see all of this?” Janet asked.
“Not for everybody,” the man said. “Just your Little guy. But you’ll get a full report when you pick him up.”
“Where?” Janet looked around for some kind of reverse mail slot. “Where do I pick him up?”
The guy slapped the wall he’d been leaning against. “Hidden compartment. Harder to see, harder to breach. Helps make sure everybody goes home with the right person.” Harder to escape too.
“What if there’s an accident?”
The male giant smirked. “There won’t be. But if there is, that’s what I’m here for. I can override everything and take care of it from here.” He gently slapped the wall again. “And we got a hidey hole big enough for me if I need to get physical.”
“I see,” My Mommy did not approve. Good. Neither did I.
She looked at me. “What do you think, Clark? Do you want to give it a shot? See if you can make some new friends? Maybe see if you recognize some old ones?”
“Yes, Mommy,” I said. “Go shopping. I’ll be good.”
“Promises, promises,” she clucked, and tapped the final button on her screen.
“Okay,” the engineer said. “You’ve got a profile in the app. Now hit ‘Check-In’.”
She did.
PING!
“In just a second, if you listen closely, you’ll hear a humming sound.” Right on cue a low vibrating mechanical hum came out from the drop off shaft. Machinery coming to life. “And you’re good to go.”
Janet stepped closer to the hatch. “You’re sure about this?” she asked me.
I looked her directly in the eye. “Yes, Mommy.”
“He’ll be fine,” the service tech said. “It’s like a slide.”
Janet pulled open the hatch, threaded me in, and down I went!
It wasn’t a long trip. The world went pitch black and my ears heard the clang of the hatch closing behind me. I skidded down an impossibly slippery slope at an easy thirty-five degree angle for two or three seconds and landed softly onto a padded surface; closer in texture and dimensions to a gym mat than a changing mat. A full second hadn’t passed when I felt something strong wrap around each arm and leg, leaving me spread eagle on the floor.
My eyes had yet to adjust to the darkness so I had no idea where these tendrils were coming from. I’d been given no chance to dodge or react and lay helpless, immobile and helpless while not in any pain. Amazon technology at its finest.
“Scanning,” a voice said. It was feminine sounding but neutral in tone. A sharp beam of red light passed over me from above from top to bottom. Great. Now I officially had an idea of what an item getting scanned at the grocery store felt like.
“File found,” the voice said again. “Clark…Grange. Initiating care in three…two…one…”
Lights flashed on with such intensity that I let out an involuntary scream; scrunching up my face and thrashing my head from side to side. “NOOOO!” Flashbacks of being shoved into an electrolysis tube leapt behind my eyelids, but no pain followed.
A new voice came into my ears. “Well hello there…Clark. How’s Nanny’s favorite favorite baby boy?” It was still feminine sounding but it was close to an octave higher and talked in the same condescending cooing sing song talk that a baby would enjoy. “Is he good? Is he? I bet he is!”
I opened my eyes, and was immediately drowning in pastel colors. Yellow above and the three walls I could see were pink, green, and blue going from left to right. The tendrils cuffing me to the floor came up from the floor itself and were coated in a fuzzy white surface that clashed against the black padded floor. The ceiling looked low enough that I might have bonked myself on the head had I tried to sit straight up.
“Who’s a happy boy?” the recording went on. “Who’s a happy boy?”
Out of pure habit, I grit my teeth and set my face to a defiant neutral and thought of every single angry swear word in my vocabulary.
A panel in the ceiling opened up and a cylinder slowly descended down towards my stomach. I don’t want to say what it reminded me of but let me just admit that for a moment I thought.the machine had meant to aim lower. “I know how to make you happy.”
A mechanized hand popped out on either side of me, grabbed the bottom of my toddler shirt and yanked it up past my nipples.
PBLTHPBLTHPBLTHPBLTH!
“Oooo!” I shrieked in surprise, feeling compressed air and synthetic flaps replicated the feeling of Janet blowing a raspberry on my tummy. I shook and giggled out of surprise and shock. My titters more terrified than delighted.
The cylinder withdrew. “There’s Nanny’s happy boy! Much better! Are you ready to play?”
There was a delay. Was I supposed to respond?
“Y-?”
“Let’s check your diaper first!”
The mechanical hands- pale, fuzzy, super articulated versions of a mannequin’s- released my shirt and grabbed the elastic waistband of my pants. The tendrils gripping me by my ankles forced my legs and hips up enough for my pants to be pulled down to my ankles. Another hatch opened and long, bony rod with a bulb at the end made a bee line for my crotch. I winced uncomfortably as it poked and prodded at the front of my diaper.
“Hmm…you’re a little wet, but you don’t need a change yet….”
I felt a gust of air pull at me, like a vacuum. “And you’re not stinky…”
The red light scanned me again. “But I see someone has their naughty mittens on? Have you been playin’ Grown-Up games with yourself, honey? That’s perfectly natural, but it’s a no-no at Nanny’s. Okay?”
Why did everybody think that I was a chronic masturbator?! Is that what the mittens were normally used for?! I was normally too busy ruining shit to do that!
“Awww, no need to be such a sour puss. Nanny can still help you have fun.”
“PBLTHPBLTHPBLTHPBLTH!”
The laughter leapt out of me like a scream. The way that the corners of my mouth ached and how dizzy I suddenly felt told me that there was more than just a raspberry blower in the box with me. Some kind of frequency akin to a rattle had just assaulted my senses.
“That’s better! Nanny loves a happy baby! Now gooooo play!”
The box tilted forward, the green wall nearest my feet opened up, and the coils released me. I slid and then tumbled out and onto the carpet of a nursery. My pants were still around my ankles, and my shirt was still slid up past my chest.
I heard a gasp when I stopped rolling and I struggled to climb to my feet. The rattle effect combined with the tumble I’d taken had left me disoriented.
“New kid!” someone called. “Hurry! Pull your pants up! Pull your pants up before it’s too-!”
More mechanical appendages shot out of the ceiling. “Uh oh. We’ve got a droopy drawers on our hands! Nanny will fix!” I was shoved off balance and caught underneath my armpits. Robotic hands took pants, socks, and shoes off in just a second. My bare feet were now on the carpet, and my t-shirt was in no way up to the task of covering my diaper up.
“Don’t worry!” the same person called. “Your Mommy will get your clothes when she comes to check you out! It happens to all of us who still wear pants!” He sounded oddly chipper about the whole thing.
I followed the voice to a Little boy in a walker. He was already scooting my way, the wheels squeaking with every dragging labored step.
“Hey,” I said, “I’m-”
“Smile, my friend! Smile!” He himself wore a grin so exaggerated as to be grotesque. All gritted teeth, lips peeled back, and fearful eyes that were begging me to play along. “The only time we’re not smiling is when we’re sleeping or when there’s something in our mouth!” Just as before, his tone was happy to the point of desperation.
I looked this way and that. A Little girl and boy were pushing trains around a wooden track wearing the same rictus grins. They stopped, looked at me, and pointed to their mouths with both hands. Another Little was lying on his back, wearing a t-shirt and diaper like me. The expression he wore as he lazily flipped at the pages of a board book could best be described as horrifyingly delighted. His gaze went way past the readable chew toy and landed on me, pleadingly.
“Uh oh…” the same high pitched voice from the box chimed in.
The man in the walker gripped at the sides. “Hurry! Please!”
I smiled. It was a thin, fake thing, like posing for a school picture. “How’s this?” I asked.
The robotic Nanny answered for me. “Thaaaat’s better!”
“Good enough!” The Little in the walker’s shoulders sagged with relief. What might have been laughter or a muffled sob escaped him. “That was too close!” He cry-laughed again. “Yessir it sure was!”
“Hey, I-”
“What time was it when you came in?” my new friend asked me. “We’re much too babyish to tell time in here! It feels like we’ve been in here forever!” He chuckled and a hint of tears formed at the corner of his eyes. “Been having fun! So much fun! Every…single…day…”
I let my smile drop into a thoughtful frown.
“Uh oh…”
The smile went back up.
“Thaaaat’s better!”
I kept the fake grin going. “After three thirty, I think.” I said. “Probably closer to four.”
There was a resounding cheer. “YAAAAAAAY!”
“Only one more hour to go!” the guy in the walker said. “One…more…hour…”
“What’s your-?”
“No names, my single serving friend! What would be the point?! Let’s just be good babies and have fun!”
I kept my grin going. “Alright, but I was actually wondering if you’ve seen-”
“May I suggest we convene by the floor gym? It’s wonderfully relaxing and nothing jingles!” Arms wide “Gotta keep busy or Nanny might think we’re tired!” He batted at a spinning wheel gadget stuck onto the walker’s tray. “So tired…”
I walked with him over to a baby gym. ‘Isn’t there somebody taking a nap?” I asked.
“Yessir! Yessir!” He stopped at the mat of the floor gym. “Another first timer like yourself. Guy didn’t have the stamina.” His sigh turned ragged. “So Nanny put him down.” He pointed. On the far end of where we were, A row of cribs waited. A single lump dozed in one, breath rising and falling in slow even rhythms. “Hate it when that happens. The sleepers are never much for conversation.”
“Soooo…why are we smiling?” I asked, my face starting to ache.
“Our Mommies and Daddies who work here, filled out the profiles, don’t you know? They said they wanted us to be happy! Who doesn’t want their babies to be happy? And when they pick us up at the end of the day, the app tells them we’ve been happy! All day!” He let out a cackle that verged on maddening.
My face was really starting to hurt. “What happens when you tell them you’re not happy?”
“My friend,” his voice cracked. “When have you ever known an Amazon to listen to somebody like us?”
“Uh-oh…”
Extra pep suddenly popped out of him. “We’re just babies after all!”
“Thaaaat’s better!”
“Happy! Active! Smiling! Babies!” He was anything but. I guess the computer didn’t have the capacity to tell the difference between Happiness and woe. A smile was a smile, no matter how fearful or forced.
“What happens if we’re not?” I asked. “Purely as a thought experiment of course!”
“If you’re not happy, Nanny helps you be happy! That’s why I’m in this walker! Too many single serving friends getting rattled! I caught some of it too!”
I laid down on the gym mat. I went to bat at a stuffed mobile toy. Then my eyes rolled back into my head and the smile became more genuine if only for a moment. This was the exact same heavenly material as my play mat in front of the T.V. at home. Every muscle in my body was being massaged at once. “Oh shit…” I whispered.
“Uh oh…”
I sat up like a bolt, confused. I hadn’t stopped smiling had I? “What?!”
“Now you’ve done it,” the LIttle in the walker said. “Gotta watch those words, buddy.”
“Is baby boy having trouble making poopies?”
From out of nowhere a thin plastic hose was jammed into my mouth. A balloon inflated almost as soon as it was between my lips and a red viscous fluid was shot into my mouth. I swallowed on instinct.
“Here, honey. This will help.”
HOT! HOT! HOT! The fire of a thousand bottles of tequila scorched my mouth.
I started screaming as soon as the nipple deflated. The hose retracted. I pawed and clawed at my mouth. I waved my hands in front of it. My face was hot pink. My ears were on fire. I was sweating and crying at the same time.
““My friend, in about five minutes you’re going to have a very neat experience! That stuff is more potent than an entire box of training chocolate and not nearly as gentle. Shouldn’t have said the S-word. Nanny thought you were constipated!”
“Does baby want a drink?” the robo-nursery’s voice said. My throat was instantly raw and shouting incoherent nonsense from pain that sounded more like gargling than anything else.
That was good enough. Two tendrils grabbed me from the ceiling. A dressmaker’s dummy with the same kind of arms as the ones that had undressed me grabbed me and cradled me. Another hose came down. The dummy inserted the nipple, identical to a baby bottle’s. Correction: There was one key difference. This one inflated like a pacifier gag too. White milk streamed down into my mouth and I had no choice but to swallow.
“Drink up, sweetie! Make it all gone for Nanny!”
I gulped and gulped and gulped, trying as hard as I could not to choke on the stuff. At first it was soothing, then it was annoying. Then it was revolting. Then it was sickening.
When I felt like I was about to throw up, the flow of milk stopped. “All done!” I was repositioned over the dummy’s shoulder. I felt a large hand methodically pound my back. One time. Two times. Three times.”
“URP!”
Something worse started to rumble in my gut.
“Good job! Now make Nanny proud!”
I felt the same hand travel and pat me on my backside.
One time. Two times. Three times.
A much ruder sound came out the other end, and hot near liquid mess forced itself into the seat of my diaper. My clenched my jaw and pushed it out faster to get it over with. Powerful expulsions fizzled out into muffled burbling farts. I wanted to throw up when I felt the hand pat the back of my Monkeez again.
“Good job! Your Mommy will be so proud of you when I tell her you made poopies like a good baby!”
“Fuck my life,” I moaned.
“Uh oh…”
I smiled immediately, but that wasn’t the problem.
“Someone needs to think about what kind of words he’s using. Nanny’s going to have to put you in time out and tell your Mommy on you.”
My legs were threaded through a bucket seat. The hot, nearly acidic mess inside my diaper was pressed up against me when my weight came down on the hard plastic seat that had been produced.. I used both hands to grab at my pacifier and shove it into my mouth so i didn’t accidentally curse again while I felt my balls become coated with my sloshing filth.
I was stuck suspended in the air, marinating my own feces
“Rookie mistake my friend,” the boy in the chair called out. “Should’ve waited till after the change!”
“Since this is your first time in the naughty stool,” the nursery announced, “Nanny will only make you sit in time out for five minutes as long as you’re good.”
The locals all pointed to their faces and toothy grins. I had to sit in my own shit and smile about it? What the actual fuck?! “Really???”
“Careful friend. Is this the worst punishment your Mommy selected for you?”
“Not quite,’ I called back. “She also said isolation!” Now my tone was taking on the air of fake cheer. “She’s the best, isn’t she!”
“I’m sure she is to you!” he pretended to agree. “Just make sure to keep that attitude, mister. You don’t want to smell like that and be in a box! That’d be most unpleasant!”
“Uh oh…”
“I mean a very interesting experience!”
“Thaaaat’s better!”
My feet were suspended well above the air. I remained at the same level of the dummy that had fed and burped me. “Hey!” I called down. “Can I ask you a question? Any of you?”
The Littles waited for the nursery to trigger. Evidently time-out didn’t have to be silent. “Has a Little girl named Cassie, or maybe Cassandra, been here? Short brown hair? Kind of skinny? Even for us? Big brown eyes? A chip on her shoulder? In a good way, I mean.”
I tried to describe how my wife usually dressed, but what would be the point?
Doesn’t ring a bell, friend! But a lot of people come through here! Kind of hard to keep track!”
That was true. Still…
“Can you do me a favor?” I asked. Four sets of eyes turned and watched me. “If you see anybody like that. Tell her her husband Clark misses her and is looking for her!”
Four sets of jaws unhinged. “You lasted long enough to get married?” One of the Littles had been playing with trains stopped. “How long?”
“We’re on year eleven.”
“Holy shit…” the Little in the walker said. “You made it that long? That’s almost as long as I’ve been Adopted.”
“Uh oh…”
He smacked his forehead. “Why can’t I ever learn?”
His tears were streaming out his face before the red laxative was piped in. He refused the milk and shit his pants anyways. He made sure to keep crying and screaming even up until the moment that the last tape on his fresh diaper was applied. It looked cathartic when he did it. Like not being forced to smile all the time was a relief. Like he was finally allowed to be himself: Someone so full of sadness and anger kept bottled up that it had broken him.
If nothing else, I was realizing just how fortunate I’d been in where I’d ended up.