Dante's Infanzia

Chapter 9
Of Anchors and Epiphanies

Chapter Description: Before Dante can survive in Limbo, he has some growing up to do.

Chapter 9: Of Anchors and Epiphanies.

After spending the better part of a day in Limbo Nursery 1017AB, Dante found the following truths to be self evident: A clean diaper felt comfy. A warm, wet diaper felt pretty good, too. A cold wet diaper felt uncomfortable. A really wet, warm diaper was practically a pocket pussy. A poopy diaper felt disgusting and was made of fail; it was just this side of water-boarding.

Speaking of torture, while the Judy’s had in fact drawn attention to Dante’s predicament over by the television, they weren‘t the one‘s who had made it worse. They had ignored his please for the potty as he made a bowel movement right in front of them, but once he had given in to their demands- like a pet chimpanzee learning a new trick- a Judy picked him up and carried him over to the changing table.

The only really big difference between a wet diaper change and a messy diaper change, Dante found, was that the wiping was much more thorough and the process took longer. Still, it had been embarrassing. Dante now sat up against the wall and sulked in his public humiliation. Experimentally, Dante poked his finger ever so slightly into the leg hole of his diaper. He pulled his finger out quickly and it came back a shade whiter. The Judy’s had really overdone it with the baby powder.

Another baby about his age, a black guy in a green romper, crawled up and tried to console Dante.

“First time pooping your pants?”, he asked. Dante nodded. “Hey don’t worry about it,” the guy said. “Everybody goes through something like that the first time.” Dante felt a little better about that. “Hey,” the guy said, “what was with you shaking your fist while they were surrounding you? You tryin’ to fight them off?” Dante shook his head and briefly explained the incident - minus a few of the more intimate details: the learning sign language, the need to go potty, the caretakers’ demands, and him having to acquiesce .

When Dante had finished, the new guy‘s eyes looked as if they were about to explode, and his lips had vanished inward from a failing attempt to stifle a laugh. “And…whuh…heh, heh. Sorry…what were the signs you had to use?”, the guy asked. Dante showed him.

The stranger’s head bobbled up and down more than nodded. “Fuckin…awesome. Thank you for the story, sir.” Then without another word, Dante’s new acquaintance crawled off towards a cloister of prisoners. Within minutes, Dante could hear laughing from across the play area. THAT ASSHOLE WAS POINTING HIS WAY AND LAUGHING AT HIM. Dante could even make out a pantomime of sorts. They were reenacting his whole horrid ordeal.

Dante’s eyes darted around the room. Several other kids were doing the same, instantly hiding their smiles as soon as they realized Dante was watching. A few were even more brazen. Making the signs for “all done” and “diaper” right in front of his face. Dante slumped down, his face growing hotter by the moment.

Before he knew it, Lysa was practically on top of him. “What were you doing talking to Jamal Adams?” she asked, indicating the black kid in the green romper- seemingly infuriated.

“He said he wanted to know why I had been so upset…when I…you know….popped my butt cherry,” he winced. There was an awkward moment of silence before Lysa palmed herself in the face.

“First of all,” she began in a tone what was quickly becoming a recognizable trademark, “don’t ever call it that again. Second of all, that’s Jamal Adams, one of the biggest assholes in this place. I think he gets off on demeaning people like it’s his anchor or something.” Dante nodded in agreement. Hindsight being 20/20, the jerk seemed the type that liked making jokes at other people’s expense. Lysa was right, that probably WAS his anchor. Wait…what?

“Anchor….?” Dante let the word fall into the air.

“Yeah, anchor,” Lysa said as if it were the most obviously apparent thing in the world…something so utterly simple and understandable that to give it a definition to it would only overly complicate its meaning. Dante might as well have said the word “Chair…?”. Dante heard her swear under her breath and saw her bite her lip when all she got was a blank stair.

“Look,” Lysa said, “It’s your first day in Limbo, and I didn’t want to overburden you with information, but I guess there’s no point in not telling you. Besides, with the Judy’s paying special attention to you, and jackasses like Jamal having put a bull’s eye on your butt, you’ll need to know sooner rather than later.

“Every person here who’s lasted more than a couple of weeks, has an anchor.” she explained. “An anchor is a hobby, or a talent- a passion really-that helps that kid hold onto their sense of self. It’s something they can do or cling onto that helps them feel more grown-up when the only options seem to be growing down. You know, something to keep them anchored to who they are instead of what this place is trying to turn them into. Yes, going with the flow and keeping your emotions in check is what‘s going to make you last in here, but that anchor is your emergency break when you find yourself careening off that cliff”

Dante took this all in. It made sense, really. If you had nothing at all to look forward to or enjoy in this place, you were better off just giving up and becoming a full baby.

“Like painting portraits or making clay dolls?” Dante asked, looking for clarification.

“Just like that,” Lysa answered.

“Or checking up on a little sister?” Dante continued.

“Mmm-hmmm,” she replied.

“Or teaching new fish the ropes around this place?” he asked, very pleased with himself

Lysa just signed sighed resignedly. “Yeah…”, she said.

“Well the thing is, Lysa,” Dante smirked, “I’m way ahead of you on that. That’s why I kept watching T.V. in the first place.”

“Oh?” Lysa asked. “Do tell.” Dante proceeded to tell her the whole story, intimate and embarrassing parts included. (It was only fair, he had already seen her vulnerable in the Newborn Room.) By the time Dante was done, Lysa was laying flat on her tummy, her chin resting in one hand, while the other one drummed the carpet floor.

“So let me get this straight,” she began, her sarcasm building with each syllable. “You’re watching Baby Signing Time. You’re thinking about how cool it is that you don’t have to stop playing to go potty anymore. Then you get the brilliant idea that you can stay comfortable in a wet diaper if you just keep wetting it again and again, so you sign to a Judy to bring you a bottle of water and you start chugging. Then you get cold feet about taking your first dump, and so you beg and plead them to take you to a potty. They refuse, so you shit yourself, and then sign for them so that they’ll go change you. That about right?”

“Uh-huh” Dante sheepishly confirmed.

“Now what about anything in that whole scenario makes you feel like something remotely resembling an adult?” Lysa scolded.

“Well,” he answered, “I was learning a new language.”

“Pfft,” she snorted, “a language designed so that babies can tell mommy when they need to be changed, or that they’d rather eat a banana than crackers.”

“Well, I was getting an erection.” Dante said a little too loudly, as the timing for Jamal Adam’s latest round of laughter was just too well timed to be anything else.

“I already told you,” Lysa hissed, “Sexual arousal is just as much a baby thing as it is an adult thing. From the moment he’s born, a man wants to get his pecker wet. It’s just that here, your only regular option is getting it wet au natural.” She sat up and crossed her arms. “Hell, if babies don’t think about sex, then where does Oedipal complex come from?”

“That’s been disproved by now,” Dante shot back, “besides, if babies have anything resembling a sex drive, then how come you don’t hear about babies having sex, or even dry humping?”

“Because they’re still just babies and they wouldn‘t know what to do anyways!”, Lysa sneered. “If they did, I’m sure you’d hear about it!”

“Oh yeah?!” Dante growled back, “Then why don‘t we put that to the test? We might as well be babies, and I’m sure you know what to do so-”

WHACK.

Dante just sat there, stunned that Lysa had just slapped him. Lysa did not. She immediately threw herself into his arms and wrapped herself around him before any Judy could turn around see what happened. She pressed her cheek against his, masking the handprint that she had just left across his face. Her mouth was positioned perfectly across his ear.

“Don’t you dare scream,” she hissed in his ear, “or I swear I’ll bite your fucking ear off and swallow it! They’ll kiss it better, but it will hurt like hell before that and you‘ll have to wait for them to sift through my shit before they can reattach it.” Dante didn’t dare move. “I like you, really I do, and you have some potential, but if you EVER talk to me like I‘m some kind of whore, I will turn this place into hell for you. Got it?!”

Dante slowly nodded his head, paying very close attention to the feeling of her breath on his ear. “Good”, he heard.

Lysa detached herself, and scooted away to. Dante was left completely speechless. He made a note in his head. It read: Do. Not. Fuck. With. Her. “Okay then,” she said as she smoothed over her dress, composing herself. “I’m gonna go give Jamal Adams the business to make sure he doesn’t mess with you anymore. I’ll just pretend that he’s you and take my frustrations out on him. See you when I’m done venting. In the meantime, try and come up with an anchor that doesn’t directly involve your genitalia.”

As Lysa crawled away, her dress didn’t even pretend to cover her diaper. Dante allowed himself a look, as the clouds on her ass got farther and farther away from him. She didn’t smell bad either. The perfume and baby powder in the diapers were strangely intoxicating if you didn’t automatically associate them with babies. All of the padding made her butt look bigger too, in a good way. Maybe if -

DO. NOT. FUCK. WITH. HER. The message in his head flared. Damn! Had his mind really wandered back to sex so quickly? Was he like that before when he was alive, or was that just another affect of being in Limbo? He needed something of a turnoff; and with no Mrs. Applegate around to disgust him, his sights landed on Midori. Please Midori, do something unattractive, or at the very least something awkward and unsexy. Midori did not disappoint.

Midori was on her back, grunting with her legs curled up in the air. A nauseating wave of déjà vu hit Dante. The only difference was that Midori didn’t seem nearly as distressed as Dante had been. In fact, her hands were occupied and her grunts muffled because she was simultaneously drinking a bottle of milk. Yeah, she was drinking and pooping at the same time. Midori was nothing if not efficient in her infancy, a regular multi-tasker that one.

Midori finished her bowel movement, and her legs lowered themselves back down as Midori continued to nurse the bottle. She didn’t even seem to notice or mind. Priorities. Once she finished, she rolled over onto her stomach and propped herself up on all fours, and started crawling around; her not-so-undergarment sagging slightly from the deposit made. It wasn’t until she stopped and sat in her own mess that she seemed to notice anything amiss. When a Judy came to check on her crying, Midori immediately signed “all done,” and “diaper”. Wow. At least someone else was making use out of that baby sign language video.

Two hands lifted Dante up into the air by the armpits complete with a Judy‘s “Up we go”. Great, what now? Dante didn’t need changing again (he hoped), and it was too early for dinnertime, so what new embarrassment was he for now?

He found himself being lowered, legs first, into a bizarre contraption. It was round, like a flying saucer and made out of plastic. In the middle of the whole was a suspended seat with two leg holes, kind of like the harnesses that amateur rock climbers wore. Dante’s bare legs were threaded threw the holes, and he found himself in an odd sitting position. It was like he was trying to sit in a very small, folded up hammock. The good news was that his feet could touch the floor.

He tried to stand up, but he wouldn’t budge. He was locked in there good. More likely though, his legs were too weak. He scooted his feet along the carpet and found that the contraption moved forward a few inches. It was on wheels. He was on wheels. Shit!

A baby walker. He had been put in an over-sized baby-walker Frankly, Dante shouldn’t have been surprised, given the circumstances, but he honestly hadn’t thought to see this coming. “Time for walkies!” the Judy cooed from behind him, and gave him a little push to encourage him. The walker puttered a few feet along the floor, and Dante instinctively slammed his feet down to stop it. He stopped!

Dante grinned. Admittedly this was pretty cool. After a whole day of being carried around, or having to crawl, it felt good for Dante to be moving while in a vertical position. Plus, the feeling of the carpet brushing the soles of his feet felt so foreign after an entire day lying on the floor.

Dante tilted his head downward and noticed a yellow plastic steering wheel on the front of the walker. Walkies? Fuck that. If Dante had to pretend, he’d pretend to drive, not to walk. He grinned.

Dante started to shuffle around the play area in the walker, slowly gaining momentum. This was so cool! Dante started to circle the play area, making sure to hug close to the walls. He even started making fake engine noises and screeched as he rounded corners. None of the other kids seemed to be in one, so this must be a special treat just for him.

He swatted the air, and turned on his imaginary radio, singing “East Bound and Down”, as he powered along the carpet. He was Bandit, and Smokey was right on his tail. Ever since he saw that movie, Dante had loved the idea of driving fast cars. As soon as he discovered the ultra-fast punk rock cover of the theme song, Dante had downloaded it to his iPod and blasted it in his car whenever he felt the need for a surge of adrenaline or had to work up the nerve to floor it. All of these memories got his blood pumping something fierce.

He felt so alive, so free! Maybe cars were his anchor, or adrenaline. Dante caught Lysa staring at him. Her face told the story of a political spin-doctor who’s job was just getting harder with everything her candidate said. Dante pulled up to Lysa in his new hot-rod, even going so far as to “screech” as he came to a stop. Lysa looked mortified. Jamal Adams, looked like he had just hit the mother load.

“So he’s not even close to the threshold yet, is he?” Jamal mocked. Lysa glared at him. “What? Did he die in a car crash and is having flashbacks? Did the brain damage carry over?” The sumbitch was mocking him to his face. Dante started getting red in the face.

“Oh wussamatter baby boy?” Jamal egged on, “You gonna cwy for Mama Judy to come and make the big bully weave you awone? Maybe when she’s done, she can sit you on the potty if you sign real nice to her like a good boy!” Who the hell did this guy. Was he actually calling him a baby for trying to use the potty?” The fuck?!

“Hey Lysa,” Jamal chortled, “After Dori fell through, I figured you wanted another friend, not another idiot.” Lysa said nothing, just growled under his throat. “What, is that maternal instinct finally kicking in, girl?!” the jackass howled. “Hey, do you think if enough of your friends crash and burn, the Judy’s will let you help change them?!” Murder was in Lysa’s eyes. Time for Dante to intervene.

Dante had actually met jackasses like this while he had been alive. No amount of logic or witty quips would shut them up. Either they were too clever and lob another insult back in your face, or too stupid and weren’t affected by your comeback.

There were only two ways to get through to these types: Either show you were more mature and walk away, clearly unaffected by their verbal barbs, or show them that you were just crazy enough to make them want to think twice. Dante was in no mood today to be mature about this.

Dante powered forward and angled the walker so that one of the wheels came directly leaned in hard. At least 180 pounds of flesh and bone plus what easily could have been another 50 given the size and materials of the walker, laid into Jamal’s left foot. Physics might take a backseat to kisses in this place, but apparently the rule of “a lot of weight, focused on one tiny spot hurts like a bitch” still applied.

Jamal’s foot immediately began to swell, his eyes watered, and his mouth opened. “Go on, and cry.” Dante spoke up, “Have the Judy’s kiss it and make it better. Bet that will make you feel like a man.” Jamal’s jaw clenched shut at that.

“If this were a movie, this would be the part where I finish you off with a witty remark, but you’re not worth the effort. Fuck you, dude. Fuck you.” Dante looked over at Lysa, just as shocked as her adversary. She opened her mouth to say something. Then closed it. Then twisted her mouth this way and that. Finally, she shrugged, and smiled.

“Thank you, Dante.” she finally said, before giving Jamal a “I told you so” look.

“ Welcome, Lysa.” Dante replied with a shit eating grin before making his walker motor off without looking back. The imaginary soundtrack in his mind started blaring “I don’t give a damn about my reputation,” as he silently pumped his fists in victory. Damn that felt good! Redemption.

Going around in his pretend car, Dante was possessed by a flash of inspiration. Knuckles white at the plastic steering wheel, Dante zoomed forward as fast as his inept legs would propel him, right toward the nearest wall. This was going to be so awesome! He’d stop just before the crash, with an inch to spare! Even if he crashed, this thing was practically a bumper car. What’s the worst that could happen.

Dante never got to find that answer. He had made it within a foot of the wall before something dragged him to a stop. A Judy, his Judy, had grabbed the backside of the walker and pulled him to a stop with ease. Her look said it all.

“Oh no you don’t, little man.” she scolded as she wrapped an arm around his chest and lifted him out of the contraption. Before he could protest, he felt a hand pop across his behind and he went limp like a puppet with its strings cut. The Judy with blonde hair in the nursery scrubs, carried his mobile form across the room, and strapped him into a giant baby swing.

“Mama Judy knows what you were doing, and you should be ashamed of yourself. What if you had hurt someone running around so fast. What if you had hurt yourself, crashing into that wall? Mama Judy would have felt terrible knowing you were hurt. If you can‘t be safe, you‘re going to have to sit in time out. Now you just sit here and think about what you‘ve done.” Then she turned on her heel and walked back to check on the rest of the baby prisoners.

Where did that monster get off on calling herself his “Mama?” His real mother never talked to him like that. In fact, he was pretty sure his parents were anti-spanking. They had never treated him half as inferior as these things did. He was practically their equal. They cared about him too, they had bought him things.

They had bought him his car, all his clothes, not to mention the awesome party…granted, that part didn‘t end well, but it was the thought that counted. He was practically the center of his parents life, and they showered him with affection and gifts to prove it.

Hell, he was pretty sure his dad had been grooming him to work in the restaurants and one day take over the family business. His old man never told him such out loud, but he had seemed happiest that summer when Dante was bussing tables and spending more time in the restaurant. His dad even had showed him how to balance the books, check the inventory, and even cook a little too.

“Your mother fell in love with me because I could cook,” his dad had told him that hot summer night. “Learning this stuff was the best decision I ever made.”

His mother had always been the steady one, the one to bail him out when he got in over his head, not just with money either. She had spent countless nights staying up and studying with him till he was ready to drop. First it was spelling tests in elementary school, then it was algebra in middle school, and helping him edit term papers and book reports in high school. He never would have gotten into his AP classes junior and senior year if she hadn’t pushed him.

Dante even remembered an argument one summer where she had put her foot down and insisted he take the honors courses, instead of the easy ones. “You won’t be challenged there.” she insisted. “You need a challenge if you’re ever going to develop into a worthwhile human being and not some lazy lay about.” In hindsight, he had been grateful for it, but he hadn’t ever told her as much. Right now, he wished he had.

With them out of the picture, he wouldn’t get anything except stuffed animals and stupid baby toys.

That’s when it hit him: An epiphany. Holy shit! He had been dead for the better part of the day, and hadn’t even once been worried about his parents. Did they know yet? Had news of his death reached their ears? How would they handle it? He was their only child, and the one time they had left him alone so they could enjoy themselves, he had fucked it up and died on them. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!

Now their anniversary would forever be associated in their minds with his death. He hadn’t even considered their anniversary as anything other than a ploy to get him that party, and now he had ruined it for the rest of their lives. How long would that be?

What about the neighbors? What would the community think? Once the story got out, and oh it would get out, how would his parents be looked upon? Would they get labeled as “abusive” or “neglectful” parents? Would they be taken to court, or scandalized in the news, or sent to prison? It was all over, once an autopsy showed how much drugs were in his system and the cops found all of the pill bottles and the note. His selfishness and lack of forethought had ended his own life, and ruined theirs.

Dante was a selfish, self-serving prick: He had no doubt about that right now. His very first coherent thought in Limbo was that he had hoped he wouldn’t have to clean up his own vomit after he puked all over the floor. As soon as he had laid eyes on Lysa and Midori, he immediately was sizing them up for conquest.

What a mistake that had been. Midori, who was the poster child for what Limbo was all about, and Lysa who was so much more than she had seemed. That girl was like Rosie the riveter crossed with Laura croft. Man, that was what was so awesome about her, the way she- DO. NOT. FUCK. WITH. HER. Oh yeah. Almost forgot.

That’s another thing that Dante figured he shouldn’t be too proud of, how easily he allowed himself to be led around by his penis. Yeah, it was funny when it happened in comedies (really funny), but it wasn’t how a decent person should treat or think about another. Okay, maybe think, he compromised, but definitely not act on…at least not as much.

Come to think of it, in life, did he even have any friends who were girls that he wasn’t explicitly interested in for romance (read: getting laid)? Did he even know Melissa’s last name or anything she had been interested in outside of cheerleading ( which she totally advertised by wearing that kinky outfit?) He did not.

SHHHIIIIIIIIT!

Not only was he an ungrateful and selfish prick to his parents, he had been an asshole to women too.

Then Dante remembered lunchtime: Just before naps, Dante had hoped he would pee himself and get changed on the floor with that half naked-girl so he could cop a feel. That was just the milk talking-the milk that takes away ambitions and inhibitions so you’re very, very, very, honest with yourself and who you are.

Dante found that he could move again, his body rebooting from the spanking. He shuddered in the baby swing. He had basically wanted to molest that girl. That poor girl who had been completely broken down and desperate and worn out. The poor girl who probably had no idea where she was or why they were doing this to her. He didn’t think about that all, he had just wanted some tits. Maybe he had had more in common with Lysa’s baby sister than he realized.

Maybe Dante hadn’t been such a good person. Maybe he was really just someone who never took the opportunity to be bad. Maybe he belonged here, in Limbo…or worse.

When he was finally out of the baby swing, Dante was in a somber mood, not quite hysterical. He sat wherever the Judy plopped him down, looking inward more than outward and thus not even really aware of his own surroundings. By the time Lysa had found him and crawled up to him, Dante had been muttering “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry” for roughly 25 minutes straight.

“If this is about earlier,” Lysa told him, “it’s ok. I’ve already forgiven you. That thing you did with Jamal was pretty smooth. I’m glad you can take care of yourself.”

“It’s not that,” Dante shook his head. “I just realized what kind of person I was…” he hesitated, “am.” Lysa looked confused. “I just now realized how my death probably ruined my parents’ lives. I belong here.” Dante felt her arm around his shoulders.

“It’s not your fault,” Lysa consoled him, “it’s nothing you did. It’s what your parents didn’t do to you. If they had even gone to church once and dunked you, you’d be hanging with the halos right about now.”

“I’m not so sure,” Dante remarked. “Even if I’d gone to church, that in of itself wouldn’t have made me a good person. My parents’ only mistake was trusting me to make good decisions.” Dante felt cold inside. Numb. He didn’t even notice the uncomfortable and scared look in Lysa’s eyes before she withdrew and crawled away.

The rest of the afternoon was uneventful. Dante idly played with some toys, did some minor socializing, (The girl who did the amazing finger paintings was named Vivian.), and wet himself just before dinner. The Judy in the nursery scrubs proclaimed that bath time was right after dinner, so Dante could wait a bit and eat dinner in a wet diaper. Therefore, Dante squished instead of crinkled when he was buckled into his highchair.

Dinner was served via spoon in a highchair, just as lunch was. This time, the mouth exploding mush was warm and tasted of mashed potatoes with melted butter. The Judy in the green dress returned with her three charges, still dressed in nothing but their diapers. The girl that Dante had eyed earlier, was much calmer than before, and ate every bite without complaint.

One of the boys, the one that Dante had heard refer to him as “freak” loudly pooped while in the highchair, his whole body turning red. Lysa and Midori both giggled at his expense, Midori was just amused by the sound and laughed because Lysa did. He started swearing, and got his bottle of milk early.

Dante felt a wave of relief wash over him as he accepted his own milky ba-ba. The milk of human kindness was good cure for feeling guilty too as it turned out. Oddly enough, he didn’t fantasize about grabbing anyone’s tits, but just let himself float through space. He wondered if there were different formulas that had different effects, or if this was really just how he felt and thought at the moment.

He wasn’t sure where he was in relationship to the rest of the nursery he was when his Judy carried him from the kitchen area to the bathroom. For all he knew, this place only existed when it needed to. The bathroom looked to be roughly a quarter of the size of the main nursery, with much less cavernous ceilings. It had all white tile, with orderly rows of large bathtubs, more like modified Jacuzzi hot tubs, actually. What was more noticeable was what was missing, ie: anything that wasn’t a bath. No mirrors, no sinks, no potties, nothing.

Each tub had large shower curtain that hung from the ceiling in a greater circumference than the tub. The curtains made a kind of privacy shield, all the better for the Judy’s to bathe their children with some sense of privacy, though why start now, Dante didn’t know.

His Judy had donned rubber gloves and an apron- as if the angel needed them. She could have wiped his ass with her hand, and his excrement would disappear from existence rather than stain her. Why use baby wipes? Likely, Dante thought, to keep up the illusion that they were the babies they were treated as.

His onesie was undone and yanked over his head, and his wet diaper was removed and balled up. It seemed more swollen than it should have been. Had Dante unknowingly wet himself a second time during dinner?

His naked and hairless body was placed into an empty tub, while the Judy went to go get Lysa and Midori. He heard other children, both young, old, and young of mind, being carried in, cooed over and babbling. No chance of getting out here, and the milk of human kindness was still affecting his fight or flight impulses.

He looked down at his hairless crotch. How strange, not only was this the first time he had gotten to see his private parts in private, but this was the first time he had seen his genitals from some position other than his back today. He tentatively touched his knees together like two old friends who hadn’t seen each other in a long time.

The sound of Midori’s babbling, and two more sets of diapers being untaped alerted Dante of Midori and Lysa’s impending arrival. The pending embarrassment immediately shocked Dante out of his angel milk haze. As soon as they were placed in the tub, the Judy turned the water on- perfect temperature- and Dante averted his eyes. “What’s with you?” Lysa asked, a dopey smile on her face from the milk.

“You guys are naked.” Dante blushed.

“So? We‘re all naked” Lysa pointed out as the water quickly rose in the tub. “Modesty goes out the window in this place, I told you. Dori’s too out of it to care, and you must’ve seen my box at least twice today.”

“That’s not the point.” he told her.

“What is the point?” She drunkenly asked, her naked breasts bobbing slightly as she did. Those perky, wonderful, glorious bre- DO. NOT. FUCK. WITH. HER. Damn this situation was getting hard…er…difficult. The Judy poured in some lavender scented bubble bath, creating a screen that blocked certain parts. Thank you bubble bath.

“The point is, I don’t want to think of you as…as…as…”

“Girls?”

“Yes!” Dante yiped, “I mean no.”

“Then what do you mean?” she asked, giving him a surly look. Crap. He was in it now. Just say it just say it just say it.

“I mean I want to think of you as a person, and not just another way to get my dick wet.

Lysa’s eyes glazed over, and then she shook her head, as if waking up from a dream or coming out of a buzz.

“Wow“, she said, covering her breasts. “That has got to be one of the crudest…and nicest things a boy has ever said to me.” The three of them sat there for the rest of the bath, letting the Judy do her work.

After the bath, Dante was quickly toweled off, re-diapered, and dressed in footie pajamas. It was by far the warmest and least revealing thing he had worn since he got to this place. The Judy in the nursery scrubs carried him out into the main nursery. While he had been bathing, the whole layout had been replaced. Other than the occasional changing table and trashcan, most everything else was gone. All of the cubicle walls had vanished, and in their places were rows upon rows of cribs, not unlike a scaled up version of the newborn room. The lights were low, and a soft tinkling music flooded the air. Time for sleep.

Dante was lowered into a crib, and a bottle of milk was handed to him, though not forced upon him. “To help you get to sleep,” the Judy said as she passed him the drink. Dante opted to place the bottle by his feet.

Dante laid down in his crib, perhaps being a little more grown-up than he had been when he had awakened this morning, despite his change in attire. The last sounds he heard before he drifted off came from Lysa, one crib over.

“Good night Dante. Happy Birthday.”

Next Chapter: Second Chances.