Tale #67: A Leap Back

Tale #67: A Leap Back (Content Tags: Supernatural and surreal, messy diapers, humiliation, mental regression, altered perceptions) Leap years are a funny quirk of the way the calendar operates; February is supposed to have twenty-eight days, but every four years, it'll have twenty-nine instead. It sounds harmless enough, after all, who could it possibly affect? Leap year babies. Being born on that extra day during a leap year means that your birthday only comes around once every four years! Depending on who you are, perhaps that isn't so bad, since the logical conclusion would be to celebrate it on the day before instead. That wasn't an option for Fletcher. The curly haired boy should be turning eight this year, but as far as his family was concerned, he was turning two. It sounded patently absurd, for him to have to wait so very long between these milestones, but it was the life that he'd come into ever since he'd made the mistake of garnering the ire of his younger neighbor. How was he supposed to know that the brat was endowed with reality-altering powers? One particularly mean-spirited comment about the younger boy being a 'New Years baby' by the date of his own birthday, and suddenly that baby moniker was given to him instead. It'd been like a switch getting flipped. One day he was a big kid that would soon be moving on to third grade, and then the next, he was an oversized toddler that got put in diapers and who was enrolled in daycare. It wasn't as if his physical age had changed at all either; he was still just as big as a typical second grader, but his age was perceived as others as being only a fourth of what it truly was. He lived now in a world where he was only allowed to get older every four years, on the day of his actual birthday. So for the last month and a half, Fletcher had lived the life of an almost two year old, even with his constant complaints of it. He ate his meals in a highchair, he rode in a carseat, he slept in a crib, he watched infantile programming on the television, and worst of all was that he was given no choice but to go in his diapers. No amount of fuss would move his parents to consider that something was very wrong with what was happening; his full sentences and well-thought-out arguments were given the same respect as a baby babbling that they had just soiled themselves. He even tried to explain that he was fully capable of using the toilet, and had gone in there to demonstrate, but he'd been taken out and playfully chided for being too little to be thinking about something so advanced. Fletcher was being made to actively wet and mess his pants, because that's what a 'baby' was supposed to do. It'd be one thing if he at least was fully perceived as a tiny tot, but that wasn't even the case! People still saw that he looked seven, but in this new reality, being a leap year baby was a category all its own! Adults cooed at him and treated him like an infant, but kids were cruel and boasted how glad they were that they hadn't been born on the twenty-ninth like him. Daycare was especially awkward, since he was bigger than all the other kids, but treated as one of the babies. Preschool aged kids acted superior, and toddlers acted like he was an appropriate playmate for them. He got chastised for trying to play with 'big kid toys' and had to abide the same embarrassing schedule that the other 'under two' kids did. A particularly mortifying example had been when he'd been too proud to poop in his diaper before going into daycare; earlier on, he'd been a lot more reluctant to play by these new rules, so he was still trying to retain a semblance of his poor dignity. A mention of him being 'blocked up' to the daycare worker and his snack had become mashed prunes. He'd escaped the orbit of the drooling toddlers, and found his way to the kids that were closer to his real age. They hadn't been all that happy to play with him, and had tried to shoo him away, but Fletcher was steadfast that he belonged with the big kids. They'd been playing 'Go Fish' and he'd interjected himself into the game. They of course told him no, and snidely backed their decision by stating that he was too little to count, so he wouldn't be able to play a game that relied on identifying numbers. He argued and pestered them long enough that they finally buckled and gave him some cards to humor him. Fletcher was prepared to make them eat a big slice of humble pie, but his stomach was starting to do somersaults. This early on, he'd been more confident in himself still, so he hadn't thought too much about it. The players went clockwise and while Fletcher waited, he was beginning to fidget where he sat. The cramping was becoming more uncomfortable, and he was letting out quiet toots in his diaper to relieve the pressure. "Okay, diaper-baby! Let's see...Do you have any..." One of the boys was examining his hand, trying to decide what card he'd ask for from Fletcher. Before that card could be decided, a spasm rocked Fletcher's belly and he leaned forward where he sat. A loud longwinded fart bubbled violently in the back of his diaper and he felt a hot pouring of mush follow the powerful rumble. The little boys started to laugh at the rude noise, "Hehe...You got any number *twos*? I think you might!" That'd also been the first time that Fletcher had gone 'baby-brained'. It was a surreal experience in an already surreal world, but for a few moments, it felt as if all the wit had drained from Fletcher's head. In that moment, he had mentally matched the age that people perceived him to be. **FRRRRTBLART! BRAPAPAPA--SPLAT!** Fletcher had begun to more actively poop himself without any of the silly restraint that he'd so foolishly tried to display earlier. More muffled splattering emanated from the back of his onesie, interlaced with the noises of wet plopping and a powerful flow of hot sludge. Those prunes had done their job well. "**POOPIE!!**" The temporarily babified boy had exclaimed with red cheeks and a trickle of drool running from his slackened lips. Not a single mature thought looked to be behind his amethyst eyes, and he had a big dopey smile on his face. It's been just funny at first to the little boys, but as the back of Fletcher's onesie had continued to sloppily swell outward with the smelly contents of his Huggies, they'd grown less amused. Potty humor was good and all, but this baby was stinking up the joint! "Mrs. Tiffany! One of the babies has a poopy diaper and he won't leave us alone!" A swift standing up and popping of the buttons on his onesie was all it took to fully confirm the veracity of that. By the time that Fletcher was having his mushy bottom inspected, he had come back into his own headspace, and was humiliated by the display of infancy. Those baby-brained moments had only gotten more frequent since then, and they'd bled into his life more and more. He'd have those moments of mental regression, but he had also begun to see his 'big kid' skills deteriorate at an alarming rate. Reading, math, vocabulary, coordination...They were all of the chopping block! Even reciting the alphabet and counting to ten were becoming out of reach, and his toilet skills were ironically now totally in the toilet. Two weeks in and he had genuine accidents on a daily basis; a month in and accidents were the norm instead of the exception. Verbal skills weren't doing so hot either, though considering how little anyone had respected what he had to say, it wasn't ultimately making much of a difference. If anything, it was a blow to his already fractured pride. As February was coming to an end, his family began to excitedly mention his birthday was almost here; not his eighth, but his 'second'. It felt so peculiar to have his little brother, who only a few months ago had annoyingly been looking up to him, but who was now acting as if he was the big sibling. Fletcher literally stood at least four or five inches taller than the Kindergarten brat, but that mattered not. When the day came, the house filled with family and neighbors to celebrate the occasion. Former friends no longer had any connection with him, beyond pinching his cheeks, and his new daycare 'friends' were waddling around in Pampers just like him. One of the party guests was the little kid that had started all of this; the first grader was a friend to his brother, but his real reason for coming was to see his handiwork up close and to decide whether or not Fletcher had learned his lesson about teasing. Fletcher, the lucky birthday boy, was clad in little more than a fresh diaper and a frown. He'd been in a cute little birthday outfit earlier in the party, but he'd sprung a leak and ended up with the dreaded 'half-moons' on the back of his shorts. With birthday cake close on the horizon, his parents hadn't seen much reason to dress him back up again after his change. Opening presents hadn't been the fun experience that it usually was; there were no action figures or video games in any of these packages, just baby toys and clothes tailored for a giant two year old. The party 'games' weren't very stimulating either, since they couldn't require much physical or mental rigor. He got put into his highchair after most of the festivities had commenced and a bib got buttoned around his neck. The colorful cake made its way out, and on top were two candles instead of the eight that he knew he deserved. Fletcher had to endure the internal shame of hearing the birthday song from his guests, with the knowledge that they thought so little of him. Blowing out the candles didn't feel like the triumph that it should. He couldn't even enjoy his cake with dignity; no fork was provided and he had to sloppily shovel the desert into his mouth with the infantile coordination that he'd degraded to. The bib got good use, and so did the baby bottle of milk that was right next to his plate. While he ate, he could feel the front of his diaper growing warm, but that had become normalized to him by this point. His mother wiped his face clean when he was done and let him out of his highchair. She stuck a finger in the legband of his diaper and commented quietly about him being wet, but that a change could wait for a while. Earlier on he probably would have been more embarrassed by that, or he would have maybe insisted that he be changed now, but it didn't even register by this point. She allowed him to toddle off with a pat to his diapered rump and asked his 'older' brother to keep an eye on him while the grownups took this time to chat. His Kindergarten brother gave an emphatic nod and trailed behind the larger boy, as if he was the only thing standing between Fletcher and trouble. In the playroom, there were still some other kids, but the party was beginning to wind down and people were starting to leave. Fletcher's brother got distracted by one of his friends and so Fletcher at least wasn't being so strictly supervised, though while he sat and tried to entertain himself with blocks, a shadow loomed over him. "Bet you're happy to be two now, huh? And you only hafta wait another four years to be three! Maybe by then they'll let you start pottytraining, if you can handle it." It was the kid that did this to him, coming to mock and boast! Fletcher furrowed his brow at the first grader, "Dis' isn't otay! Fix it, or else!" "Or else what? You gonna cry and poop your pants?" The boy teased with a huge grin of self-satisfied superiority. Fletcher blushed at the snarky comment; it wasn't really that far off-base. Worse, it highlighted the truth that he really didn't have any leverage here; Fletcher was technically bigger, but he was horribly uncoordinated and this other kid had crazy magical powers. If anything, Fletcher should be groveling at the feet of the first grader, in order to gain his favour. Fletcher was just too proud for that, and he wasn't clever enough to realize his failures anymore either. He stood up and put his hands on his hips, in an attempt to intimidate the younger boy, while standing there in a yellow tinted diaper. "M'supposta be a big boy and you--" Before his angry tirade could continue any further, a pacifier suddenly got popped in his mouth and he couldn't resist but to soothe himself with it. "Best thing for a cranky baby is their binky." The other kid grinned. Fletcher was losing himself in the infantile suckling of the pacifier's bulb; his eyes lost their glow of intellect and drool began to accumulate around the pacifier's guard. Short yet powerful toots started to pepper his diaper and he began to grunt quietly behind the paci. "Mmph...Nghhh...Nnnfff!" As his face got red, the flatulence got wetter, until there was a nasty sounding explosion in his seat. The scrawny boy tilted forward, his hands balling up and his eyes rolling back in the infantile pleasure of filling his diaper. The crinkly garment puffed out and sagged behind him with the eminence of his immense load. With the worst of it quite literally behind him, the baby-brained boy slumped his shoulders and allowed the last remaining steamers to simply plop on out to join atop the fuming mound. The other boy gave the drooly 'baby' a condescending pat on the bottom, which resulted in a squish. "Maybe if you're a little nicer, I'll think about changing you back on your next birthday. For now though, I think you need a different kind of change.."