Done Adulting Vol. 1 Ch. 46

Jamie may as well have buried his head in her armpit for how bright the place was. Primary colors everywhere – it was like a fire truck and school bus crashed into a tanker full of blue paint. The reception area was small and had three doors inside, one that went to an office, and one to the left that went to the playground, and one to the right, a heavy, wooden door with a tall glass pane, that went into the classroom.

“Jamie, this is Denise,” Diane said, referring to the receptionist.

Jamie put his polite smile back on and said hello. She said hello back.

“You ready to go inside?”

Actually, Jamie wanted to say, is there a Starbucks I could chill at all day? “I guess so,” is what came out instead. As soon as the door cracked open, voices came out like pressurized air: talking, shouting, and a couple crying. For the first time in many years, not counting in church, Jamie made the sign of the cross.

“What’s that,” Diane asked, taking note of it.

“Just something I do when I’m nervous,” Jamie said. And when I most need to believe in a benevolent god. Once inside the room, he was at least gratified to see the room wasn’t so brightly painted. Still cheerful, but more soft pastels. It was a big space. The tables and chairs and large, tiled area didn’t help the noise, which just bounced off the hard surfaces. Diane walked straight to one of the employees.

“April, I want you to meet Jamie.” April was a young woman, a little older than Amanda.

“Hi, Jamie! I’ve been looking forward to finally meeting you.” She smiled like she meant it.

“It’s nice to meet you, April.”

“I like the puppy on your shirt.”

Jamie died a little inside. O my god, it is so early for that conversation.

“I’m going to show Jamie around. Do you mind taking his bag for me?”

“Not at all.”

Jamie saw the library corner, where a few books looked like they might be entertaining for him. The carpet there was plush, and there were bean bag chairs and one amazon-sized rocking chair.

He saw the art corner, where it looked like nothing had been paint-free for a very long time. Smocks hung on hooks on the wall, and pictures were pinned to a peg board; some of them were good as far as amateur art went, and some of it was finger-painted hand blobs.

There was a nap area, which interested Jamie most, though he had a hard time picturing it being quiet enough to sleep without a couple bottles of formula.

At the other end of the room, separated by a shoulder high crosshatch fence, was a gymnasium; there wasn’t much in it, some soft balls and hula-hoops and tumbling mats.

Finally, she led him over to the cubby area against the wall the classroom shared with the office and reception area. “And this is your cubby.” April had already unpacked his bag into the cubby. “And this is your chart.” She showed him a chart with his name at the top. Lines broke it into 30 cells. “If you have a good day, we put a yellow smiley face sticker on it. If you make bad choices, you get a red frowny face.” There were lots of yellow faces. A couple of charts, though, were more than half red.

Jamie surveyed the charts. “So, if you get a certain number of stickers, then what,” he asked.

Diane looked at him, then around to make sure no little ears could hear her, and smiled like she was getting away with something. “Nothing,” she seemed to confess.

“Then why do it?”

“Littles like stickers, and they think if they get a certain number of red stickers, they’ll get in trouble, so they behave better. But the number of stickers doesn’t mean anything.”

“Why tell me then?”

“Because you’re not regressed. Which either means you’ll be no trouble at all or a real handful, but either way stickers aren’t going to matter to you.”

“Guess not.” He looked down the row of charts and saw two nearly covered in red. “What’s their deal?”

“Billy and Bobby Barker. You just got to love them a little differently is all.”

“How very cryptic of you.”

“You like being clever with words.”

“I do.”

“You do.” Jamie thought she was scolding him, and in a mean way, too, until she started laughing and patted his butt a couple times, smiling at him as though she appreciated him as an intelligent adult, though an adult little. He remembered the first time Becky patted his butt and wondered why every adult back home and every amazon in Itali patted diapered butts as if instinctually. He very much didn’t like it at first, but he very much did now. He wasn’t sure why; it just made him feel … looked after.

“I promised your mom I’d stay with you until you were ready. What do you think?”

Jamie looked around the room. The bigs were doing their thing, but he was more interested in the littles. One looked like he was regressed to a newborn; he was swaddled in a blanket in a crib looking barely conscious; he wondered if he was a recent arrival or if he’d always be like that.

A few looked to be adult-sized infants. They crawled and mewled and played with very simple toys. The rest looked toddler-stage, but it spanned a spectrum. A few looked to be at the younger end; they weren’t as physical. A few looked to be at the older end, some running like it was new to them, feet going out a little when they went forward in the clumsy way of highly mobile toddlers. Others he could tell by the activity they were doing or the toys they played with. He didn’t count them, but he would’ve guessed twelve or fifteen.

“Which ones are Bobby and Billy?” Diane pointed to two boys who had managed to get finger paint everywhere but their smocks. Big, tall boys they were, too.

“Want to avoid them?”

“No, just wanted to know. Maybe … maybe I could even help. I used to work with kids.”

Diane repositioned Jamie so they were directly facing each other. “That’s very sweet of you. While you’re here, I want you to do whatever you want to so long as it’s safe and makes you happy. But, and I’m not saying you’re not good with human kids where you’re from, you don’t work here. So please don’t feel obligated to do anything any of the other littles wouldn’t do. Your job here is to have fun, got it?”

Jamie nodded. “Got it.” Maybe he could help anyway if he decided he wanted to.

“Who are all the bigs?” There were three others besides April. One around April’s age, one even younger than Amanda, and one around what Jamie guessed was forty in human years.

“Jordan, Jean, and Carrie.”

“Do any men work here?”

“Not many men work at daycares.” So that part’s like home, he thought.

“Jordan, Jean, and Carry. Do they, uh, know I’m not regressed,” he asked. He had made the choice not to be regressed, he didn’t like being treated like he was, and he wanted to start out his daycare experience right, with his wishes respected.

“They do. Carrie has worked with unregressed littles before, but Jordan and Jean haven’t very much.”

“Anything else I should know?”

“Hmmm, let’s see …” she thought for a second. “Ah! The rules.” Next to the chalkboard was a poster of rules:

Be nice, Be kind, Be caring, Be sharing

No name calling, No hitting, No biting, No not being nice, kind, caring, or sharing

“You don’t look happy, Jamie. How can I make that better,” Diane asked as she read his nervous, uncertain expression.

It wasn’t anything in particular, more just the fact that he had to be there at all. None of these people looked … stimulating. But Jamie knew that wasn’t fair. He had to give them a chance.

“It’s a little … loud … and busy, in here.”

“Ya think so, huh,” Diane laughed. “Tell you what. If you ever need a break, you can ask April if you can come to my office or hang out with Denise. She’ll always say yes unless there’s a reason not to.”

“Thank you.”

“You ready to join in? Or at least go hang out with April?”

Jamie took a deep breath. “I guess so.”

Diane put him down. “Off you go. Just ask to come to my office if you need to.”

“Thanks again.” He looked at April on across the room with a gaggle of free-range littles in between. He walked over, and though a few eyes turned, none really paid him any mind.

“So …” he said when he reached April.

“Finished with your tour and ready to have fun,” April asked. She turned to a little girl she was helping with her coloring and asked, “You going to be okay for a bit, honey?” The little who squeaked out an acknowledgement without looking up.