Chapter 1
Penny idled on the swings. The others were across the playground, being kids. Penny watched as they all played and laughed together. Especially Emma and Lilly, who were constantly whispering to each other.
Penny had her ideas as to what they might be whispering. She had ideas as to why the two were becoming so chatty lately. She had ideas of what she might do about it.
Penny hopped off the swing and walked across the playground.
Emma smiled as Penny approached. “Hey, Penny,” she said as her best friend lifted her frail, little hands and shoved her to the ground.
“How long!?” Penny asked as the others helped Emma up.
“What?” Emma asked, confused.
“Penny?” Mimi looked concerned for her sister.
“How long has this been going on?” Penny shouted.
“Penny what are you talking about?” Emma asked.
“You said you weren’t ready for me to know about it,” Penny shouted, “But I know now! I heard you!”
Emma’s eyes widened. “Oh, Penny,” she said when she realized what was happening.
Penny stormed off.
“Should we go after her?” Lilly asked.
Everyone turned to Emma, who shook her head. Despite that, Mimi ran off.
“Penny!” Mimi called as she caught up to her sister.
“What is going on?” she asked.
“Stay here,” Penny said, “Go play with your friends.”
Mimi stopped as Penny headed home. She didn’t know what to think. “They’re your friends too,” she said, but Penny was long gone.
Penny found herself staring at her feet as she stormed off toward to home.
“Penny?” someone called her name. She looked up and saw Susie through her teary eyes.
Penny looked from her feet, “Hi, Susie.”
“What’s wrong?” Susie asked, “Did something happen?”
“No,” Penny said, “Well, yes. But, not really. I mean. It doesn’t matter.”
“Okay,” Susie wasn’t sure what was going on, “Well... See you later.”
Susie started walking off, but Penny just broke down crying.
“Emma is such a jerk!” Penny shouted.
“Okay,” Susie said, embracing Penny, “You’re coming back to my place. I’ll give you a shoulder to cry on.”
* * *
Back in Susie’s room, Penny was crying on Susie’s shoulder.
“So what happened?” Susie asked.
Penny composed herself, wiped her tears, and said, “Emma.”
“Emma,” Susie asked “What exactly did Emma do?”
Penny told her everything. They pinky promised on her childhood bladder issues and then moved to Emma’s use of them to inspire her apparent hobby.
“Wow,” Susie was unsure of what to say. She reached across her bed and closed her top drawer shut. “That’s crazy,” she said.
“Wearing those things was the worst part of my life,” Penny said, “Why would someone want to wear them for fun?”
Penny looked up, but Susie was gone from the bed. She turned her head and found Susie tying up the bag in her wastebin.
“What are you doing?” Penny asked.
“Uhh...” Susie looked at the bag and then back at Penny, “It’s full.”
“I never want to see Emma’s face again!” Penny fell backwards onto the bed.
“Penny,” Susie plopped down on the bed next to Penny, “Don’t let this get between you and your best friend, okay?”
“But it’s.... wrong!” Penny said, “Right?”
Susie sighed. “Yes,” she said, “Wearing diapers for fun is wrong.”
Chapter 2
It was just after Emma’s fourth birthday. She and Lilly were playing in her backyard. It was just the two of them, which was rather boring for the two preschoolers. Lulu had moved away, Nick and the boys stopped playing with the girls, and Mimi had been sick, and no one ever wanted to play with Abigail anyway. That left just one person.
“Where’s Penny?” Lilly asked.
Emma shrugged.
“I’m bored,” Lilly whined.
Emma nodded, and then looked up. “Look!” she said.
Lilly turned, and saw Penny walking towards them, waving with glee. Emma and Lilly jumped up and ran to her.
“Where were you?” Emma squealed.
“Are you sick too?” Lilly asked.
“Are you mad at me?” Emma worried.
“Do you hate us or something?” Lilly was about to cry.
Penny giggled. And then she giggled some more. “Nope,” she said, “I started kindergarten today.”
Emma and Lilly were astonished, and then confused. “What’s kindergarten?” the asked.
Penny giggled some more. “It’s like preschool,” she said, “Only it’s more like real school. You’re there all day, and you get to have lunch and recess.”
“What’s recess?” Lilly asked.
“You get to go outside,” Penny explained, “And play games and stuff.”
Lilly was confused. “But,” she said, “What do you do the rest of the day?”
“Learn,” Penny said.
“Why?” Emma asked.
“Because that’s what school is for,” Penny said, “Learning.”
Lilly and Emma looked at eachother, then back at Penny.
“Is that it?” they asked.
Penny shook her head. “Nope,” she said, “I also get to wear these now.” Penny lowered the elastic band of her sweatpants and underwear, revealing a Pull-Up diaper underneath. “Cool, huh?” Penny asked.
Lilly was confused. She asked Penny all sorts of questions about why she was wearing them and what they were for.
But Emma knew what they were for. She had worn them herself less than a year ago, but that was because she was three and in potty training. Emma wasn’t five and in real school. Her parents had stressed to her enough that Pull-Ups were for babies and that she had to wear big girl underwear now.
Penny wearing Pull-Ups actually did make sense. Even after Emma and Lilly and Mimi had all been potty trained, Penny, who was a year older than then, was still having accidents. Practically every time they played together she would wet her pants.
But everyone has accidents, Emma knew that. But everyone didn’t wear Pull-Ups like Penny. Penny had a lot of accidents.
Emma didn’t know what to make of all of this. But in her little four year old mind, she found it all intriguing.
Chapter 3
“Wait a minute, WHAT?” Mimi’s jaw dropped, eyes wide, mind wide open.
“Ugh,” Lilly slapped her forehead, “I knew we shouldn’t have told her.”
“She’s Penny’s sister,” Emma said.
“She’s adopted,” Lilly put her fists on her hips.
“That doesn’t mean--”
“HELLO!” Mimi shouted, “Did I hear you guys right?! You wear diapers for fun!?”
Emma looked around. “Yes,” she shushed, hoping there was no one else hiding in the playground.
Mimi could not believe it. “No. Way.”
“Don’t you think that’s weird?” Lilly asked.
“Absolutely not!” Mimi said, and then had a thought, “Hang on, do you guys like ‘go’ in them?”
Emma and Lilly looked at each other and then back to Mimi. “Uh huh,” they nodded.
“Woooow,” Mimi fell back on the grass and stared up at the clouds.
“Mimi,” Lilly looked down at her friend, “You are so weird.”
“Back when we were kids,” Mimi explained, “Penny got to wear the Pull-Ups. Penny got to go to the bathroom whenever and wherever she wanted. Penny got to sit in the movie theater as long as she wanted, but me?”
“Mimi, listen,” Emma tried to comfort her.
“Not me!” Mimi interrupted. “I had to get up and go across the house, miss the movie, and wear stupid princess underwear. Meanwhile Penny just wet herself wherever she was.”
“Mimi,” Emma sat down next to Mimi, “Penny didn’t ‘get’ to do those things, she had to.”
“Plus,” Lilly went on, “There are princesses on Pull-Ups too.”
“Mommy and daddy gave her all the attention,” Mimi said, “She’d wet herself and they’d change her and be all sweet and nice. But me? They’d just yell and tell me to change and say I did it on purpose!”
Lilly stared as her best friend poured her heart out. “Did you?” she asked.
“Did I what?” Mimi asked.
Lilly shrugged, “Wet yourself on purpose?”
“Oh my god,” Emma said, “What is wrong with you? She is clearly having a hard time about this.”
“Sometimes,” Mimi said, “But it didn’t work.”
Emma rolled her eyes. “Mimi, you can’t let Penny tell on us,” she said.
“Huh?” Lilly turned her head, “What do you mean?”
“Lilly, did you honestly think our parents would be okay with it?” Emma asked. “Nine year olds should not be stealing our neighbor’s baby brother’s diapers and peeing in them. We’d be in so much trouble.”
“God, you’re right!” Lilly realized, then turned to Mimi, “Don’t let her ruin this for me!”
“Penny won’t tell,” Mimi said, “But that doesn’t change anything.”
“What do you mean?” Emma asked.
“Like I said,” Mimi sat up, “I want to try one!”
“Did she say that?” Lilly whispered to Emma.
“Absolutely not!” Emma declared, “We have to stop. Now.”
“But whyyyyy?!” Lilly and Mimi both moped.
“It’s too risky,” Emma explained, “Maybe Penny won’t tell, but the more of us that keep doing it, the more likely we’d get caught. Lilly, with me and you plus Susie, that’s already three sets of parents who could catch us.”
“Susie is in on this?” Mimi was shocked, “But you just met her. We’ve been friends since we were three.”
“Mimi, if you join in that’s an extra set of parents, plus we risk hurting Penny’s feelings,” Emma said.
“I don’t care about Penny’s feelings,” Mimi said, “I just wanna have fun.”
Lilly sighed. Emma shook her head. “Sorry, Mimi,” she said.
Mimi was super bummed out. “How come I never thought to steal Pull-Ups from Penny.”
“Because,” Emma said, “You’re a good person.”
“Screw that,” Mimi pouted.
Chapter 4
“Mommy,” Emma said as she came in through the back door.
“What is it?” her mom asked as she washed the dishes.
“Penny says she has to go to the bathroom,” Emma said. She noticed that her mother instantly stopped what she was doing, and said, “Can she come in and use ours?”
“Well,” Anne said, “If Penny has to go to the bathroom, she’ll have to go back to her house to do it.”
“Okay,” Emma said and went back outside.
It was the summer just before Emma started kindergarten, a whole year since Penny revealed that she was wearing Pull-Ups and proud of it. Emma figured that if she was asking to go to the bathroom, she had either stopped wearing them or was trying to fulfill their intended purpose. As Emma had been taught, Pull-Ups were not for peeing in, they were just in case of an accident.
In any case, Emma hadn’t explicitly noticed Penny wearing them that much. The contents of one's pants rarely came up in the conversation when you were a six year old. Emma simply assumed that Penny had grown out of her little problem.
Emma took her news to Penny, who was in Emma’s backyard with Lilly and Mimi.
“She said no?” Penny had a shocked and worried look on her face.
“Just go home,” Emma said, “I can see it from here, it’ll take you two seconds.”
Penny stared at her home. It was so close, yet so far away. Emma didn’t think it was that big of a deal. She could probably walk the entire loop of the neighborhood twice before having to go to the bathroom. But she figured that perhaps Penny’s problems were simply due to not being able to hold it for that long.
“Well,” Emma said, as distress filled Penny’s face. “If you don’t do something quick you’re gonna to wet your pants.”
Everyone turned to Emma. “Don’t say that,” Lilly said.
“It’s true,” Mimi snickered.
“Mimi!” Penny cried.
“Okay, fine!” Emma said, “Then there is only one other way.”
Moments later, the four of them were standing behind a tree, one of the first at the edge of the woods behind Emma’s house.
“So how does this work?” Penny asked.
“It’s really easy,” Lilly said, “Well, Nick does it all the time. But... You know.”
“I guess you just,” Emma examined the tree, “Go?” She really had no idea. All she knew is that Penny definitely could’ve made it home by now.
“Okay,” Penny said, “I’m ready.”
Penny pulled down her sweat pants and underwear, the non-absorbent kind, and squatted behind the tree. Penny was a smart girl, albeit a bit nervous. But if there was one thing she wasn’t, it was an outdoorsy girl.
Everyone just stared, like a deer in the headlights. Penny got more on her pants than the ground.
“So,” Emma said, “What now?”
Penny’s eyes were watering, she stood up and pulled her pants back up. The damage was severe. She had a lot of juice for lunch.
“I have to go,” Penny said as she walked off.
“You want me to come?” Mimi began to follow.
“No, Mimi,” Penny said, “Stay here.”
The three watched as Penny headed off to her doom. Whenever this would happen in the past, Penny would simply return the next day and say that she got “punished” and act like that was that. Mimi was never any help, sometimes it seemed as though the two didn’t even live together.
Emma wanted to know why Penny was like this. She wanted to know what it was like to be like her. But Emma didn’t know exactly how to do that. Penny never wanted to talk about it, as it was clearly pretty traumatizing for her.
Emma simply decided to forget about it, and just be a kid.
Chapter 5
When Penny was at school, any of her problems with Emma vanished. That was one thing she really enjoyed. At Harmony Hills Middle School, there were no worries, no drama, and no Emma.
It was one of the perks of having all your best friends be younger than you. Whenever they were getting on her nerves, Penny didn’t have to see them at all. If they were in the same grade, there would be no avoiding them. When they were in elementary school together, they’d eat lunch together and play together at recess. But now that she was in a different building, she had some peace and quiet.
The downside was that Penny didn’t really have any friends that were in her own class. Sure, there were the people she talked to between classes and the people she sat with at lunch. But there was no one she wanted to hang out with outside of school.
Penny sighed.
“What’s wrong,” someone asked.
Penny turned her head. It was Nadine, one of her lunchroom buddies.
“Nothing,” Penny said and continued staring at her food.
“That’s what you always say,” Nadine went on, “In fact, it’s actually all you ever say sometimes.”
“I just,” Penny thought, “Like the quiet.”
“Liar,” Nadine said, “Everyone knows you hang out with a bunch of younger kids. It’s okay if you’d rather hang out with fourth graders than people your own age.”
“It’s not that,” Penny explained, “My sister is in fourth grade, and so is everyone in our neighborhood. It’s not that I choose to like them, I just spend more time with them. We all grew up together.”
“Do you all hang out every single day after school?” Nadine asked.
“Not really,” Penny said.
“So you spend the weekends hanging out?” Nadine asked.
Penny thought about it for a second, “I guess not,” she said.
“So who do you spend more time with?” Nadine asked, “The fourth graders in your neighborhood, or the fifth graders in your class?”
Penny didn’t know what to say. Had she been going about this the wrong way? Just because she grew up with certain people didn’t mean they had to be her friends. Nadine and the other girls at school didn’t know anything about her past, while Emma and Lilly would probably remember it forever.
Penny looked around at her lunch table. Other girls had begun listening to the conversation. She figured that while eventually she would be in high school with all of her neighborhood friends, she had other friends at school now.
Friends who didn’t hurt her feelings like Emma did.
“I guess,” Penny said, “You guys are technically my friends.”
“See,” Nadine said, “Was that so hard?”
“And honestly,” Penny said, “Lately the others have been getting on my nerves.”
“Why?” Nadine asked.
Penny thought about how to answer that. Should she tell them that they’d started wearing diapers for fun? That didn’t sound like it would upset Penny, so would she have to explain to them that it was inspired by her own past diaper wearing?
And how far should she go into detail with that? Should she tell them that she wore Pull-Ups until she was six? That she still wore them to bed until after she turned seven? That she slept on plastic sheets until she was eight “just in case.”
Maybe she should just leave all that out.
“Oh, you know,” Penny said, “They’re just little kids being little kids.”
Everyone laughed, including Penny, Nadine, and the rest of Penny’s friends. Her real friends.
Chapter 6
The seats in the waiting room where cold. Penny could feel the cold metal through her sweatpants. Her head was spinning with all sorts of ideas. When she was four the doctor said that every child was different, and just needed time. When she was five he said that a phase, and that Pull-Ups were a temporary fix. Now she was almost seven, and Penny was hoping the doctor had another bright idea as to why she still had accidents all the time.
Although she hated to admit it, Penny had a problem. While she got better every now and then, she had lately been making it to the bathroom less and less. No one at kindergarten had questioned her special undergarments, but sooner or later she would unable to hide them for much longer.
"Did this ever happen to you?” Penny aske her mother, who sat next to her, filling out the paperwork.
"What do you mean?" her mother didn’t even look up.
"Have accidents like me?" Penny muttered under her breath, not wanting the others in the room to hear. “You said it happens to everyone.”
“I said that when you were five,” Nancy said sternly, “Did I have an accident here or there when I was five? Yes, probably.”
“But?” Penny knew there was more.
“But that was that,” her mom said, “It didn’t happen every other day until I was in school.”
“Why not?” Penny kept poking the sleeping bear.
“Because,” Nancy tried to put it nicely, but nice had left the building a hundred wet beds ago. “Instead of having an accident, I just went to the bathroom. Like everyone else.”
“Oh,” Penny looked down at her shoes. Her mother was initially so nice when it came to her predicament, but nowadays it seemed as though she was at her wits end with Penny.
Penny's stomach got uneasy, and luckily, the conversation ended with the nurse calling her name. They were led to a room with a large chair that had paper rolled onto it.
The nurse instructed Nancy to have Penny strip down to her underwear so the doctor could examine her easier. As soon as the nurse was gone, Penny was shaking. Her mother figured that she was either nervous, cold, or something else.
"You don't have to go to the bathroom,” Nancy asked, “Do you?"
"No," Penny said, shaking her head.
“You better not,” her mother responded as she had Penny strip down to her underwear. Unfortunately for Penny, her underwear was the kind that two year olds wear when they were potty training.
And so that was how Penny sat on the rough paper for a few minutes, in nothing but her Pull-Up, waiting for the doctor to enter. When he finally did he kept Penny's chart by his face and came in asking, "Hello there, Penny, how are you feeling today?"
He sat down in the spinning chair next to her and looked at her with a smile. "I see we haven’t moved on from those little issues we talked about last time," he turned to Nancy and asked, "So what’s been going on?”
Nancy explained how they followed his advice and put her in Pull-Ups and treat it as normal until she got over the phase. Obviously, it was more than a phase. Nancy looked at Penny, who was blushing and turned away.
“Uh huh," The doctor swiveled around to her other side and started putting the stethoscope on Penny’s chest. It was cold. After that he looked down her throat with a popsicle stick, and checked her reflexes with a small rubber hammer.
After the usual stuff, the doctor did a few more tests specific to bladder problems, the same ones that Penny had been through time and time again. When he was done, he left to process some results.
"Mommy?" Penny asked as she was getting dressed.
"What?"
"Never mind." Penny hadn't enjoyed any of their conversations that day, she didn't want to risk another.
The doctor came back a few minutes. "Once again, it looks like everything is perfectly fine," he said.
“That’s what you said the last time,” Nancy said, “And the time before that. What kind of doctor are you, honestly? We just spent a year buying her Pull-Ups so she could wet herself day and night, at home and at school. She is going to be in first grade, for Christ’s sake.”
“Well,” the doctor defended himself, “Kid’s today are changing faster than ever before. No two kids develop at the same rate. I’m not saying it’s normal, but it’s still nothing to fear.”
“No, it’s not normal,” Nancy said, “What’s normal is her sister. Adopted at eighteen months and potty trained day and night by two and a half. She can even ride a bike.”
Penny blushed.
"As I’ve said before, Mrs. Gaines,” the doctor went on, “At this age it’s probably an emotional or psychological issue and not a medical issue." he handed her a card. "Thats the name of a great child psychologist. It’s also the same one I referred you to last time you were here.”
“I believe in medicine and science,” Nancy said, “Not some nonsense made up by a professor in Switzerland.”
That was the end of the discussion. After they left, Nancy reminded Penny of the horrors of being the only kid in first grade who wasn’t potty trained. She reminded her that Mimi hasn’t had a single accident in years, and that they wouldn’t be buying Pull-Ups forever.
Penny didn’t think it was anything specific, it was probably everything that happened at the doctor’s office that day. Whatever it was, Penny suddenly got better. Not completely, and not all at once. The daytime accidents faded away first, and then only a rubber sheet stood between her and her bedwetting. After that there was only the occasional accident, which her mother was more lenient towards.
And then, by the time she was eight, it was only a memory.
Chapter 7
Susie squirmed and squeezed, but she eventually managed to get it to fit and stay on properly. It had taken a few tries, but she had managed something that she had been working at for a couple weeks. Susie never thought that, at her age, she would be this excited to be able to put a diaper on all by herself.
Her only problem now was that the size difference between her and her brother was growing. Luckily he would start potty training soon. Pull-Ups were slightly bigger, so they would certainly make things easier. Plus, she had been sneaking diapers for herself, Emma, and now Lilly without getting caught yet. All in all, Susie’s new hobby was going smoothly.
“Susie!” her mother called. Susie’s heart jumped. Even though the door was locked and she could quickly cover up her diaper, the threat of getting caught was always looming.
“What?!” she called.
“You have a visitor!”
Susie sighed. She didn’t have to worry about her diaper around Emma or Lilly, assuming one of them was the visitor. As long as it wasn’t Abigail, she’d be fine.
Susie straightened her dress, ensuring that her diaper was concealed, and opened the door.
“Hi,” Penny waved.
Susie’ wasn’t expecting that. “ What’s up?” she asked.
Penny walked right past her and plopped down on Susie’s bed. “I was just thinking,” she said, “Maybe it was time I finally gave up Emma and the others. And got friends my own age.”
Susie was confused, “You don’t want to be friends with Emma, who is nine, because you’re ten?”
“That,” Penny said, “and because of the you-know-what that we talked about.”
“Penny, I think you need to just take some space,” Susie said, “And then just get past it.”
“What happened to ‘wearing diapers for fun is wrong?’” Penny quoted Susie’s own words.
“I don’t think you should throw away years of friendship with people you have to see every day,” Susie explained.
Penny took a look at Susie, who was suddenly going back on what she had said before, not to mention she was standing kind of funny. Then, Penny put it all together.
“Susie,” she said, “How old is your brother?”
Susie didn’t know where that was coming from. “Two? Why?”
“You’re in on it!” Penny said, with her jaw dropped.
“What?” Susie couldn’t believe what she was getting at.
“You are!” Penny realized, “You take your brother’s diapers and give them to Emma and Lilly. I bet you’re wearing one now!”
“I’m not!” Susie said, “Please, just calm down.
Penny didn’t calm down. She just stormed out and left.
Susie sighed. “What just happened?” she asked herself.
* * *
“That’s it!” Emma declared, “We’re all giving up diapers, once and for all.”
“Good idea,” Susie said.
“Uh-huh,” Lilly nodded.
“NOOOOO!” Mimi whined.
“Mimi!” Emma put her foot down, “Weren’t you listening to Susie? The jig is up.”
“But I never even got to jig,” Mimi said.
“She was really upset,” Susie said, “She really might never talk to any of us again.”
“But, we’re her only friends, right?” Lilly asked. “I mean she doesn’t know anyone in her class. At least I don’t think so. Does she Mimi?”
Mimi looked away and ignored them all.
“We should get rid of any extra diapers we have,” Emma said, “I only have one, how about you Lilly?”
“None,” Lilly said.
“Okay,” Emma turned to Susie, “You can just sneak any ones you took back into your brother’s room.
“Right,” Susie nodded. Then, she remembered something and said, “Except for the one I got on now.”
Mimi’s jaw dropped, “What!?”
“I put it on before Penny showed up,” Susie explained, “And I left in a hurry to come find you guys.”
“Can I see?” Mimi asked.
“It’s the last one, okay,” Emma said, ignoring Mimi. “We can’t do this anymore, not as long as Penny feels this way.”
“When do you think she’ll come around?” Lilly asked.
Emma shrugged. “Who knows?” She then turned to Mimi and said, “She’s your sister. This was a hard part of her life until she was like seven. She’s not just gonna get over this like that.”
“Fine,” Mimi finally gave up, “But from now on, you guys call me next time you do something fun.”
“Remember when we used to come to the playground to play?” Lilly asked, “Instead of secretly meet to discuss diaper drama?”
“Fourth grade is tough,” Emma said.
“Wait until you get to state capitals,” Susie warned them.
Chapter 8
Penny turned off the TV and headed upstairs. It wasn’t even dark out, and yet she already felt like she could roll into bed and fall asleep forever. However, when she walked into her room, she found a surprise visitor.
“Emma,” she said, “What are you doing here?”
“I came back with Mimi,” she explained, “I can’t stay.”
“I don’t want you to stay,” Penny declared.
“Okay,” Emma took that one to heart, “I just wanted you to know that if I knew this would upset you so much than I would never have started.”
“You didn’t know?” Penny couldn’t believe that that was the best Emma could come up with. “You didn’t think I’d be upset about you doing that in memory of the worst part of my life?”
“I don’t know,” Emma shrugged.
“What made you start it in the first place?” Penny asked, “Hey, Penny used to do this, why don’t I give it a shot?”
“It wasn’t like that,” Emma said, “I just... Always thought it was interesting. It’s hard to explain.”
“Emma, there was nothing fun or interesting about constantly wetting myself and having to wear Pull-Ups to school,” Penny informed her, “In fact, I wouldn’t want anyone to go through what I did.”
“It wasn’t horrible, at least not for me,” Emma defended herself, “I liked it. The way the padding felt, how it got all puffy when it was wet. I liked not having to wake up in the middle of the night.”
“I would’ve given anything in the world to be able to wake up at night,” Penny said, “I wished I never had to feel the puffiness, or the padding. All I wanted to do was to wear regular underwear like everyone else in school. And to not pee in them before lunch.”
“It’s not just the feeling,” Emma said, “I mean, not that kind of feeling at least. Yes it feels nice when it’s warm, but it also makes me feel warm inside. Like I’m a little kid again. Right now we’re growing up so fast. We’re not in the same school anymore and sooner or later we’ll all be old and move away.”
“That’s life, Emma,” Penny said.
“Don’t you want to stay friends forever?” Emma asked. “Don’t you just want to be a kid for as long as possible? Yeah I’m only nine, but soon I’ll be ten and then eleven and then all of a sudden we’re adults.” Emma’s eyes filled with tears as she said, “Penny, don’t you understand that when we grow up we won’t be friends anymore?”
There were no tears in Penny’s eyes. She had heard everything Emma had said, about how she wanted to be a kid again and stay that way forever. When Emma was a kid, things were simple. When Penny was a kid, she was weird, everyone made fun of her, and she was afraid to even talk to people. Now, things were starting to look up.
“I want to grow up,” Penny said.
Emma was heartbroken. She knew what that meant. There was no need to say more.
* * *
Emma held on tightly to her mother’s hand. The two stood at the entrance to a room full of all sorts of loud and scary kids, all running around screaming. Some of them were even crying.
“Okay, Emma,” her mother said, after introducing her to the preschool teacher. “Have fun.” And soon, Emma was alone.
She simply looked around, unsure of what to make of this new experience. There were girls being rough, girls playing pretend and even one girl with skin that looked like chocolate. Emma had never seen anything like it. She eventually saw one shy looking girl playing by herself in the corner.
Emma felt comfortable enough to walk up to her and waved.
But there was no response, the girl simply whispered to a stuffed bear. Emma took a better look at her. She was pale, with long blond hair, and big round glasses. She was tiny, and Emma could clearly see Pull-Ups sticking out of her pants. Since Emma herself had already stopped wearing those long ago, she figured this girl must be younger than her.
Assuming that maybe she didn’t see her wave, Emma crouched down next to her and said, “Hi, I’m Emma.”
The girl looked up, “I’m Penny,” she said.
Emma smiled. “You want to be friends?” she asked.
Penny smiled back and said, “Okay.”
Penny idled on the swings. The others were across the playground, being kids. Penny watched as they all played and laughed together. Especially Emma and Lilly, who were constantly whispering to each other.
Penny had her ideas as to what they might be whispering. She had ideas as to why the two were becoming so chatty lately. She had ideas of what she might do about it.
Penny hopped off the swing and walked across the playground.
Emma smiled as Penny approached. “Hey, Penny,” she said as her best friend lifted her frail, little hands and shoved her to the ground.
“How long!?” Penny asked as the others helped Emma up.
“What?” Emma asked, confused.
“Penny?” Mimi looked concerned for her sister.
“How long has this been going on?” Penny shouted.
“Penny what are you talking about?” Emma asked.
“You said you weren’t ready for me to know about it,” Penny shouted, “But I know now! I heard you!”
Emma’s eyes widened. “Oh, Penny,” she said when she realized what was happening.
Penny stormed off.
“Should we go after her?” Lilly asked.
Everyone turned to Emma, who shook her head. Despite that, Mimi ran off.
“Penny!” Mimi called as she caught up to her sister.
“What is going on?” she asked.
“Stay here,” Penny said, “Go play with your friends.”
Mimi stopped as Penny headed home. She didn’t know what to think. “They’re your friends too,” she said, but Penny was long gone.
Penny found herself staring at her feet as she stormed off toward to home.
“Penny?” someone called her name. She looked up and saw Susie through her teary eyes.
Penny looked from her feet, “Hi, Susie.”
“What’s wrong?” Susie asked, “Did something happen?”
“No,” Penny said, “Well, yes. But, not really. I mean. It doesn’t matter.”
“Okay,” Susie wasn’t sure what was going on, “Well... See you later.”
Susie started walking off, but Penny just broke down crying.
“Emma is such a jerk!” Penny shouted.
“Okay,” Susie said, embracing Penny, “You’re coming back to my place. I’ll give you a shoulder to cry on.”
* * *
Back in Susie’s room, Penny was crying on Susie’s shoulder.
“So what happened?” Susie asked.
Penny composed herself, wiped her tears, and said, “Emma.”
“Emma,” Susie asked “What exactly did Emma do?”
Penny told her everything. They pinky promised on her childhood bladder issues and then moved to Emma’s use of them to inspire her apparent hobby.
“Wow,” Susie was unsure of what to say. She reached across her bed and closed her top drawer shut. “That’s crazy,” she said.
“Wearing those things was the worst part of my life,” Penny said, “Why would someone want to wear them for fun?”
Penny looked up, but Susie was gone from the bed. She turned her head and found Susie tying up the bag in her wastebin.
“What are you doing?” Penny asked.
“Uhh...” Susie looked at the bag and then back at Penny, “It’s full.”
“I never want to see Emma’s face again!” Penny fell backwards onto the bed.
“Penny,” Susie plopped down on the bed next to Penny, “Don’t let this get between you and your best friend, okay?”
“But it’s.... wrong!” Penny said, “Right?”
Susie sighed. “Yes,” she said, “Wearing diapers for fun is wrong.”
Chapter 2
It was just after Emma’s fourth birthday. She and Lilly were playing in her backyard. It was just the two of them, which was rather boring for the two preschoolers. Lulu had moved away, Nick and the boys stopped playing with the girls, and Mimi had been sick, and no one ever wanted to play with Abigail anyway. That left just one person.
“Where’s Penny?” Lilly asked.
Emma shrugged.
“I’m bored,” Lilly whined.
Emma nodded, and then looked up. “Look!” she said.
Lilly turned, and saw Penny walking towards them, waving with glee. Emma and Lilly jumped up and ran to her.
“Where were you?” Emma squealed.
“Are you sick too?” Lilly asked.
“Are you mad at me?” Emma worried.
“Do you hate us or something?” Lilly was about to cry.
Penny giggled. And then she giggled some more. “Nope,” she said, “I started kindergarten today.”
Emma and Lilly were astonished, and then confused. “What’s kindergarten?” the asked.
Penny giggled some more. “It’s like preschool,” she said, “Only it’s more like real school. You’re there all day, and you get to have lunch and recess.”
“What’s recess?” Lilly asked.
“You get to go outside,” Penny explained, “And play games and stuff.”
Lilly was confused. “But,” she said, “What do you do the rest of the day?”
“Learn,” Penny said.
“Why?” Emma asked.
“Because that’s what school is for,” Penny said, “Learning.”
Lilly and Emma looked at eachother, then back at Penny.
“Is that it?” they asked.
Penny shook her head. “Nope,” she said, “I also get to wear these now.” Penny lowered the elastic band of her sweatpants and underwear, revealing a Pull-Up diaper underneath. “Cool, huh?” Penny asked.
Lilly was confused. She asked Penny all sorts of questions about why she was wearing them and what they were for.
But Emma knew what they were for. She had worn them herself less than a year ago, but that was because she was three and in potty training. Emma wasn’t five and in real school. Her parents had stressed to her enough that Pull-Ups were for babies and that she had to wear big girl underwear now.
Penny wearing Pull-Ups actually did make sense. Even after Emma and Lilly and Mimi had all been potty trained, Penny, who was a year older than then, was still having accidents. Practically every time they played together she would wet her pants.
But everyone has accidents, Emma knew that. But everyone didn’t wear Pull-Ups like Penny. Penny had a lot of accidents.
Emma didn’t know what to make of all of this. But in her little four year old mind, she found it all intriguing.
Chapter 3
“Wait a minute, WHAT?” Mimi’s jaw dropped, eyes wide, mind wide open.
“Ugh,” Lilly slapped her forehead, “I knew we shouldn’t have told her.”
“She’s Penny’s sister,” Emma said.
“She’s adopted,” Lilly put her fists on her hips.
“That doesn’t mean--”
“HELLO!” Mimi shouted, “Did I hear you guys right?! You wear diapers for fun!?”
Emma looked around. “Yes,” she shushed, hoping there was no one else hiding in the playground.
Mimi could not believe it. “No. Way.”
“Don’t you think that’s weird?” Lilly asked.
“Absolutely not!” Mimi said, and then had a thought, “Hang on, do you guys like ‘go’ in them?”
Emma and Lilly looked at each other and then back to Mimi. “Uh huh,” they nodded.
“Woooow,” Mimi fell back on the grass and stared up at the clouds.
“Mimi,” Lilly looked down at her friend, “You are so weird.”
“Back when we were kids,” Mimi explained, “Penny got to wear the Pull-Ups. Penny got to go to the bathroom whenever and wherever she wanted. Penny got to sit in the movie theater as long as she wanted, but me?”
“Mimi, listen,” Emma tried to comfort her.
“Not me!” Mimi interrupted. “I had to get up and go across the house, miss the movie, and wear stupid princess underwear. Meanwhile Penny just wet herself wherever she was.”
“Mimi,” Emma sat down next to Mimi, “Penny didn’t ‘get’ to do those things, she had to.”
“Plus,” Lilly went on, “There are princesses on Pull-Ups too.”
“Mommy and daddy gave her all the attention,” Mimi said, “She’d wet herself and they’d change her and be all sweet and nice. But me? They’d just yell and tell me to change and say I did it on purpose!”
Lilly stared as her best friend poured her heart out. “Did you?” she asked.
“Did I what?” Mimi asked.
Lilly shrugged, “Wet yourself on purpose?”
“Oh my god,” Emma said, “What is wrong with you? She is clearly having a hard time about this.”
“Sometimes,” Mimi said, “But it didn’t work.”
Emma rolled her eyes. “Mimi, you can’t let Penny tell on us,” she said.
“Huh?” Lilly turned her head, “What do you mean?”
“Lilly, did you honestly think our parents would be okay with it?” Emma asked. “Nine year olds should not be stealing our neighbor’s baby brother’s diapers and peeing in them. We’d be in so much trouble.”
“God, you’re right!” Lilly realized, then turned to Mimi, “Don’t let her ruin this for me!”
“Penny won’t tell,” Mimi said, “But that doesn’t change anything.”
“What do you mean?” Emma asked.
“Like I said,” Mimi sat up, “I want to try one!”
“Did she say that?” Lilly whispered to Emma.
“Absolutely not!” Emma declared, “We have to stop. Now.”
“But whyyyyy?!” Lilly and Mimi both moped.
“It’s too risky,” Emma explained, “Maybe Penny won’t tell, but the more of us that keep doing it, the more likely we’d get caught. Lilly, with me and you plus Susie, that’s already three sets of parents who could catch us.”
“Susie is in on this?” Mimi was shocked, “But you just met her. We’ve been friends since we were three.”
“Mimi, if you join in that’s an extra set of parents, plus we risk hurting Penny’s feelings,” Emma said.
“I don’t care about Penny’s feelings,” Mimi said, “I just wanna have fun.”
Lilly sighed. Emma shook her head. “Sorry, Mimi,” she said.
Mimi was super bummed out. “How come I never thought to steal Pull-Ups from Penny.”
“Because,” Emma said, “You’re a good person.”
“Screw that,” Mimi pouted.
Chapter 4
“Mommy,” Emma said as she came in through the back door.
“What is it?” her mom asked as she washed the dishes.
“Penny says she has to go to the bathroom,” Emma said. She noticed that her mother instantly stopped what she was doing, and said, “Can she come in and use ours?”
“Well,” Anne said, “If Penny has to go to the bathroom, she’ll have to go back to her house to do it.”
“Okay,” Emma said and went back outside.
It was the summer just before Emma started kindergarten, a whole year since Penny revealed that she was wearing Pull-Ups and proud of it. Emma figured that if she was asking to go to the bathroom, she had either stopped wearing them or was trying to fulfill their intended purpose. As Emma had been taught, Pull-Ups were not for peeing in, they were just in case of an accident.
In any case, Emma hadn’t explicitly noticed Penny wearing them that much. The contents of one's pants rarely came up in the conversation when you were a six year old. Emma simply assumed that Penny had grown out of her little problem.
Emma took her news to Penny, who was in Emma’s backyard with Lilly and Mimi.
“She said no?” Penny had a shocked and worried look on her face.
“Just go home,” Emma said, “I can see it from here, it’ll take you two seconds.”
Penny stared at her home. It was so close, yet so far away. Emma didn’t think it was that big of a deal. She could probably walk the entire loop of the neighborhood twice before having to go to the bathroom. But she figured that perhaps Penny’s problems were simply due to not being able to hold it for that long.
“Well,” Emma said, as distress filled Penny’s face. “If you don’t do something quick you’re gonna to wet your pants.”
Everyone turned to Emma. “Don’t say that,” Lilly said.
“It’s true,” Mimi snickered.
“Mimi!” Penny cried.
“Okay, fine!” Emma said, “Then there is only one other way.”
Moments later, the four of them were standing behind a tree, one of the first at the edge of the woods behind Emma’s house.
“So how does this work?” Penny asked.
“It’s really easy,” Lilly said, “Well, Nick does it all the time. But... You know.”
“I guess you just,” Emma examined the tree, “Go?” She really had no idea. All she knew is that Penny definitely could’ve made it home by now.
“Okay,” Penny said, “I’m ready.”
Penny pulled down her sweat pants and underwear, the non-absorbent kind, and squatted behind the tree. Penny was a smart girl, albeit a bit nervous. But if there was one thing she wasn’t, it was an outdoorsy girl.
Everyone just stared, like a deer in the headlights. Penny got more on her pants than the ground.
“So,” Emma said, “What now?”
Penny’s eyes were watering, she stood up and pulled her pants back up. The damage was severe. She had a lot of juice for lunch.
“I have to go,” Penny said as she walked off.
“You want me to come?” Mimi began to follow.
“No, Mimi,” Penny said, “Stay here.”
The three watched as Penny headed off to her doom. Whenever this would happen in the past, Penny would simply return the next day and say that she got “punished” and act like that was that. Mimi was never any help, sometimes it seemed as though the two didn’t even live together.
Emma wanted to know why Penny was like this. She wanted to know what it was like to be like her. But Emma didn’t know exactly how to do that. Penny never wanted to talk about it, as it was clearly pretty traumatizing for her.
Emma simply decided to forget about it, and just be a kid.
Chapter 5
When Penny was at school, any of her problems with Emma vanished. That was one thing she really enjoyed. At Harmony Hills Middle School, there were no worries, no drama, and no Emma.
It was one of the perks of having all your best friends be younger than you. Whenever they were getting on her nerves, Penny didn’t have to see them at all. If they were in the same grade, there would be no avoiding them. When they were in elementary school together, they’d eat lunch together and play together at recess. But now that she was in a different building, she had some peace and quiet.
The downside was that Penny didn’t really have any friends that were in her own class. Sure, there were the people she talked to between classes and the people she sat with at lunch. But there was no one she wanted to hang out with outside of school.
Penny sighed.
“What’s wrong,” someone asked.
Penny turned her head. It was Nadine, one of her lunchroom buddies.
“Nothing,” Penny said and continued staring at her food.
“That’s what you always say,” Nadine went on, “In fact, it’s actually all you ever say sometimes.”
“I just,” Penny thought, “Like the quiet.”
“Liar,” Nadine said, “Everyone knows you hang out with a bunch of younger kids. It’s okay if you’d rather hang out with fourth graders than people your own age.”
“It’s not that,” Penny explained, “My sister is in fourth grade, and so is everyone in our neighborhood. It’s not that I choose to like them, I just spend more time with them. We all grew up together.”
“Do you all hang out every single day after school?” Nadine asked.
“Not really,” Penny said.
“So you spend the weekends hanging out?” Nadine asked.
Penny thought about it for a second, “I guess not,” she said.
“So who do you spend more time with?” Nadine asked, “The fourth graders in your neighborhood, or the fifth graders in your class?”
Penny didn’t know what to say. Had she been going about this the wrong way? Just because she grew up with certain people didn’t mean they had to be her friends. Nadine and the other girls at school didn’t know anything about her past, while Emma and Lilly would probably remember it forever.
Penny looked around at her lunch table. Other girls had begun listening to the conversation. She figured that while eventually she would be in high school with all of her neighborhood friends, she had other friends at school now.
Friends who didn’t hurt her feelings like Emma did.
“I guess,” Penny said, “You guys are technically my friends.”
“See,” Nadine said, “Was that so hard?”
“And honestly,” Penny said, “Lately the others have been getting on my nerves.”
“Why?” Nadine asked.
Penny thought about how to answer that. Should she tell them that they’d started wearing diapers for fun? That didn’t sound like it would upset Penny, so would she have to explain to them that it was inspired by her own past diaper wearing?
And how far should she go into detail with that? Should she tell them that she wore Pull-Ups until she was six? That she still wore them to bed until after she turned seven? That she slept on plastic sheets until she was eight “just in case.”
Maybe she should just leave all that out.
“Oh, you know,” Penny said, “They’re just little kids being little kids.”
Everyone laughed, including Penny, Nadine, and the rest of Penny’s friends. Her real friends.
Chapter 6
The seats in the waiting room where cold. Penny could feel the cold metal through her sweatpants. Her head was spinning with all sorts of ideas. When she was four the doctor said that every child was different, and just needed time. When she was five he said that a phase, and that Pull-Ups were a temporary fix. Now she was almost seven, and Penny was hoping the doctor had another bright idea as to why she still had accidents all the time.
Although she hated to admit it, Penny had a problem. While she got better every now and then, she had lately been making it to the bathroom less and less. No one at kindergarten had questioned her special undergarments, but sooner or later she would unable to hide them for much longer.
"Did this ever happen to you?” Penny aske her mother, who sat next to her, filling out the paperwork.
"What do you mean?" her mother didn’t even look up.
"Have accidents like me?" Penny muttered under her breath, not wanting the others in the room to hear. “You said it happens to everyone.”
“I said that when you were five,” Nancy said sternly, “Did I have an accident here or there when I was five? Yes, probably.”
“But?” Penny knew there was more.
“But that was that,” her mom said, “It didn’t happen every other day until I was in school.”
“Why not?” Penny kept poking the sleeping bear.
“Because,” Nancy tried to put it nicely, but nice had left the building a hundred wet beds ago. “Instead of having an accident, I just went to the bathroom. Like everyone else.”
“Oh,” Penny looked down at her shoes. Her mother was initially so nice when it came to her predicament, but nowadays it seemed as though she was at her wits end with Penny.
Penny's stomach got uneasy, and luckily, the conversation ended with the nurse calling her name. They were led to a room with a large chair that had paper rolled onto it.
The nurse instructed Nancy to have Penny strip down to her underwear so the doctor could examine her easier. As soon as the nurse was gone, Penny was shaking. Her mother figured that she was either nervous, cold, or something else.
"You don't have to go to the bathroom,” Nancy asked, “Do you?"
"No," Penny said, shaking her head.
“You better not,” her mother responded as she had Penny strip down to her underwear. Unfortunately for Penny, her underwear was the kind that two year olds wear when they were potty training.
And so that was how Penny sat on the rough paper for a few minutes, in nothing but her Pull-Up, waiting for the doctor to enter. When he finally did he kept Penny's chart by his face and came in asking, "Hello there, Penny, how are you feeling today?"
He sat down in the spinning chair next to her and looked at her with a smile. "I see we haven’t moved on from those little issues we talked about last time," he turned to Nancy and asked, "So what’s been going on?”
Nancy explained how they followed his advice and put her in Pull-Ups and treat it as normal until she got over the phase. Obviously, it was more than a phase. Nancy looked at Penny, who was blushing and turned away.
“Uh huh," The doctor swiveled around to her other side and started putting the stethoscope on Penny’s chest. It was cold. After that he looked down her throat with a popsicle stick, and checked her reflexes with a small rubber hammer.
After the usual stuff, the doctor did a few more tests specific to bladder problems, the same ones that Penny had been through time and time again. When he was done, he left to process some results.
"Mommy?" Penny asked as she was getting dressed.
"What?"
"Never mind." Penny hadn't enjoyed any of their conversations that day, she didn't want to risk another.
The doctor came back a few minutes. "Once again, it looks like everything is perfectly fine," he said.
“That’s what you said the last time,” Nancy said, “And the time before that. What kind of doctor are you, honestly? We just spent a year buying her Pull-Ups so she could wet herself day and night, at home and at school. She is going to be in first grade, for Christ’s sake.”
“Well,” the doctor defended himself, “Kid’s today are changing faster than ever before. No two kids develop at the same rate. I’m not saying it’s normal, but it’s still nothing to fear.”
“No, it’s not normal,” Nancy said, “What’s normal is her sister. Adopted at eighteen months and potty trained day and night by two and a half. She can even ride a bike.”
Penny blushed.
"As I’ve said before, Mrs. Gaines,” the doctor went on, “At this age it’s probably an emotional or psychological issue and not a medical issue." he handed her a card. "Thats the name of a great child psychologist. It’s also the same one I referred you to last time you were here.”
“I believe in medicine and science,” Nancy said, “Not some nonsense made up by a professor in Switzerland.”
That was the end of the discussion. After they left, Nancy reminded Penny of the horrors of being the only kid in first grade who wasn’t potty trained. She reminded her that Mimi hasn’t had a single accident in years, and that they wouldn’t be buying Pull-Ups forever.
Penny didn’t think it was anything specific, it was probably everything that happened at the doctor’s office that day. Whatever it was, Penny suddenly got better. Not completely, and not all at once. The daytime accidents faded away first, and then only a rubber sheet stood between her and her bedwetting. After that there was only the occasional accident, which her mother was more lenient towards.
And then, by the time she was eight, it was only a memory.
Chapter 7
Susie squirmed and squeezed, but she eventually managed to get it to fit and stay on properly. It had taken a few tries, but she had managed something that she had been working at for a couple weeks. Susie never thought that, at her age, she would be this excited to be able to put a diaper on all by herself.
Her only problem now was that the size difference between her and her brother was growing. Luckily he would start potty training soon. Pull-Ups were slightly bigger, so they would certainly make things easier. Plus, she had been sneaking diapers for herself, Emma, and now Lilly without getting caught yet. All in all, Susie’s new hobby was going smoothly.
“Susie!” her mother called. Susie’s heart jumped. Even though the door was locked and she could quickly cover up her diaper, the threat of getting caught was always looming.
“What?!” she called.
“You have a visitor!”
Susie sighed. She didn’t have to worry about her diaper around Emma or Lilly, assuming one of them was the visitor. As long as it wasn’t Abigail, she’d be fine.
Susie straightened her dress, ensuring that her diaper was concealed, and opened the door.
“Hi,” Penny waved.
Susie’ wasn’t expecting that. “ What’s up?” she asked.
Penny walked right past her and plopped down on Susie’s bed. “I was just thinking,” she said, “Maybe it was time I finally gave up Emma and the others. And got friends my own age.”
Susie was confused, “You don’t want to be friends with Emma, who is nine, because you’re ten?”
“That,” Penny said, “and because of the you-know-what that we talked about.”
“Penny, I think you need to just take some space,” Susie said, “And then just get past it.”
“What happened to ‘wearing diapers for fun is wrong?’” Penny quoted Susie’s own words.
“I don’t think you should throw away years of friendship with people you have to see every day,” Susie explained.
Penny took a look at Susie, who was suddenly going back on what she had said before, not to mention she was standing kind of funny. Then, Penny put it all together.
“Susie,” she said, “How old is your brother?”
Susie didn’t know where that was coming from. “Two? Why?”
“You’re in on it!” Penny said, with her jaw dropped.
“What?” Susie couldn’t believe what she was getting at.
“You are!” Penny realized, “You take your brother’s diapers and give them to Emma and Lilly. I bet you’re wearing one now!”
“I’m not!” Susie said, “Please, just calm down.
Penny didn’t calm down. She just stormed out and left.
Susie sighed. “What just happened?” she asked herself.
* * *
“That’s it!” Emma declared, “We’re all giving up diapers, once and for all.”
“Good idea,” Susie said.
“Uh-huh,” Lilly nodded.
“NOOOOO!” Mimi whined.
“Mimi!” Emma put her foot down, “Weren’t you listening to Susie? The jig is up.”
“But I never even got to jig,” Mimi said.
“She was really upset,” Susie said, “She really might never talk to any of us again.”
“But, we’re her only friends, right?” Lilly asked. “I mean she doesn’t know anyone in her class. At least I don’t think so. Does she Mimi?”
Mimi looked away and ignored them all.
“We should get rid of any extra diapers we have,” Emma said, “I only have one, how about you Lilly?”
“None,” Lilly said.
“Okay,” Emma turned to Susie, “You can just sneak any ones you took back into your brother’s room.
“Right,” Susie nodded. Then, she remembered something and said, “Except for the one I got on now.”
Mimi’s jaw dropped, “What!?”
“I put it on before Penny showed up,” Susie explained, “And I left in a hurry to come find you guys.”
“Can I see?” Mimi asked.
“It’s the last one, okay,” Emma said, ignoring Mimi. “We can’t do this anymore, not as long as Penny feels this way.”
“When do you think she’ll come around?” Lilly asked.
Emma shrugged. “Who knows?” She then turned to Mimi and said, “She’s your sister. This was a hard part of her life until she was like seven. She’s not just gonna get over this like that.”
“Fine,” Mimi finally gave up, “But from now on, you guys call me next time you do something fun.”
“Remember when we used to come to the playground to play?” Lilly asked, “Instead of secretly meet to discuss diaper drama?”
“Fourth grade is tough,” Emma said.
“Wait until you get to state capitals,” Susie warned them.
Chapter 8
Penny turned off the TV and headed upstairs. It wasn’t even dark out, and yet she already felt like she could roll into bed and fall asleep forever. However, when she walked into her room, she found a surprise visitor.
“Emma,” she said, “What are you doing here?”
“I came back with Mimi,” she explained, “I can’t stay.”
“I don’t want you to stay,” Penny declared.
“Okay,” Emma took that one to heart, “I just wanted you to know that if I knew this would upset you so much than I would never have started.”
“You didn’t know?” Penny couldn’t believe that that was the best Emma could come up with. “You didn’t think I’d be upset about you doing that in memory of the worst part of my life?”
“I don’t know,” Emma shrugged.
“What made you start it in the first place?” Penny asked, “Hey, Penny used to do this, why don’t I give it a shot?”
“It wasn’t like that,” Emma said, “I just... Always thought it was interesting. It’s hard to explain.”
“Emma, there was nothing fun or interesting about constantly wetting myself and having to wear Pull-Ups to school,” Penny informed her, “In fact, I wouldn’t want anyone to go through what I did.”
“It wasn’t horrible, at least not for me,” Emma defended herself, “I liked it. The way the padding felt, how it got all puffy when it was wet. I liked not having to wake up in the middle of the night.”
“I would’ve given anything in the world to be able to wake up at night,” Penny said, “I wished I never had to feel the puffiness, or the padding. All I wanted to do was to wear regular underwear like everyone else in school. And to not pee in them before lunch.”
“It’s not just the feeling,” Emma said, “I mean, not that kind of feeling at least. Yes it feels nice when it’s warm, but it also makes me feel warm inside. Like I’m a little kid again. Right now we’re growing up so fast. We’re not in the same school anymore and sooner or later we’ll all be old and move away.”
“That’s life, Emma,” Penny said.
“Don’t you want to stay friends forever?” Emma asked. “Don’t you just want to be a kid for as long as possible? Yeah I’m only nine, but soon I’ll be ten and then eleven and then all of a sudden we’re adults.” Emma’s eyes filled with tears as she said, “Penny, don’t you understand that when we grow up we won’t be friends anymore?”
There were no tears in Penny’s eyes. She had heard everything Emma had said, about how she wanted to be a kid again and stay that way forever. When Emma was a kid, things were simple. When Penny was a kid, she was weird, everyone made fun of her, and she was afraid to even talk to people. Now, things were starting to look up.
“I want to grow up,” Penny said.
Emma was heartbroken. She knew what that meant. There was no need to say more.
* * *
Emma held on tightly to her mother’s hand. The two stood at the entrance to a room full of all sorts of loud and scary kids, all running around screaming. Some of them were even crying.
“Okay, Emma,” her mother said, after introducing her to the preschool teacher. “Have fun.” And soon, Emma was alone.
She simply looked around, unsure of what to make of this new experience. There were girls being rough, girls playing pretend and even one girl with skin that looked like chocolate. Emma had never seen anything like it. She eventually saw one shy looking girl playing by herself in the corner.
Emma felt comfortable enough to walk up to her and waved.
But there was no response, the girl simply whispered to a stuffed bear. Emma took a better look at her. She was pale, with long blond hair, and big round glasses. She was tiny, and Emma could clearly see Pull-Ups sticking out of her pants. Since Emma herself had already stopped wearing those long ago, she figured this girl must be younger than her.
Assuming that maybe she didn’t see her wave, Emma crouched down next to her and said, “Hi, I’m Emma.”
The girl looked up, “I’m Penny,” she said.
Emma smiled. “You want to be friends?” she asked.
Penny smiled back and said, “Okay.”