✅🎊✂️ Hypnosis Won't Take Me There!! [alternative cut]

Chapter 533: The Last Person I Expected

It was late in the day by the time the car pulled up outside Mom's house. Adi glanced up at the window, where the kitchen light was already on, and automatically lowered one hand to check her diaper. She was dry now, of course. She wasn't young enough to wet herself without realising, and in any case she had made sure to use the bathroom before leaving the Walker house. She didn't want to be blushing like a child when she first stepped back into the place she'd lived for most of her life. She didn't want to face Mom like that, and she was sure that Garfield would never stop poking fun at her anyway, so she didn't want to give him any ammunition.

The door opened when she was only part way there. Mom was standing in the doorway, offering her usual poker face. Toni waved from the car – she had volunteered to give Adi a lift the rest of the way so that Dean wouldn't be too late driving back. They had both realised that the day's heavy traffic could only get worse once the nine-to-five crowd finished work and had to transport their offspring to colleges that could easily be several hours drive away.

"Hi. How was the trip?"

"Sorry I'm late. We had to–"

"It's fine, honey. Dean already called ahead to let us know you'd be delayed. Now, you should get inside, it must be cold out there. Does Toni want to come in? I just made coffee."

"No thanks, Miss Spenser," Toni called back. "I need to get Sherwood's car back, and we've had some time to catch up today. It's your turn now." She'd had time to walk around the car and open the back door while she was talking, and handed over a guitar case and a bag of oddments to Adi and her mother.

"It's good that you two are still getting on well," Mom said with a smile, shepherding Adi back into the house as soon as the car pulled away. Adi realised that she'd hesitated in the doorway to wave Toni off, which she wouldn't have done for any of her other friends. Maybe they belonged together after all, but she still couldn't be sure.

The coffee was as good as ever. That was something Adi had really missed. For all the talk about fancy machines, and the perfect roasted beans, it seemed there was something about Mom's coffee that nobody else could replicate even in perfect conditions. Adi sat down at the kitchen table, drinking from a tall glass with a pink plastic lid. After the summer she'd had, it didn't even seem strange now to have a lid with a built-in straw to make it harder for her drink to spill. It was childish, perhaps, but only in the eyes of people who'd never tried it. If Adi had had the courage to ignore the imagined derision months before, she might never have ended up turning into a baby.

She didn't say anything while she enjoyed her beverage, but there was no pressure to speak. Just the quiet ticking of the clock, the gentle susurrus of the coffee machine keeping its water reservoir warm in order to dispense a prompt refill, and the whisper of television from the next room.

There was another knock at the door, and Mom muttered something about how her house was the centre of the world today. Adi chuckled along with her even though she didn't hear all the words, because the sentiment was one that she could understand. This time, the figure outside the door was one of Garfield's school friends, a tall boy with sandy hair. He was dressed a little more smartly than usual, and there was a girl looking in over his shoulder. Adi wasn't sure if she should have recognised either of them. She might have seen them before, but she didn't pay too much attention to her brother's friends.

"Garfield?" a yell from Mom cummoned a cacophony of rushed footsteps from above. Garfield must be late for something, or he hadn't heard the door to be charging about with so much energy as soon as his friends were here.

Seconds later there was a clatter like a buffalo rolling down the stairs, and the kitchen door flew open to disgorge Garfield. He'd grown over the summer, she thought, and she might not have recognised him if she'd seen him in town. He'd smartened up as well, wearing a casual shirt with a button-down collar and jeans that might have been new. Like he really cared about his appearance now. It must be some kind of special event, but she couldn't think what would drag him away from his computer.

"Hey!" he waved to his friends with a grin that tried so hard to seem casual, and then turned around on the spot just before reaching the door. "Thanks, Mom. We don't need to be here for babysitting this week, do we?"

Adi could have slapped him, and she was halfway to her feet before she heard Mom respond: "I don't think so. We'll be busy tonight while your sister's back, and I think Belle said something about a new job that might be starting soon." When she heard that, Adi's brain went into overdrive and she realised that Belle had mentioned using the nursery here when she was playing as Lily. Did that mean that Garfield had been babysitting for a girl older than himself? It seemed so strange, but once she thought about it her whole life this year had been crazy. Nothing should surprise her now, and if it wasn't her they were calling a baby then she had no reason to be angry.

"Thanks, just checking."

"Belle got the internship," Adi felt she needed to add something. "She's working for a big law firm in town."

"Oh, hi sis," Garfield raised a hand in half-hearted greeting. "Didn't see you there."

"Doofus," his friend shook his head, and then raised a hand to ruffle Garfield's hair. "She's right next to you, how can you be so oblivious?" Garfield, of course, responded with a half-hearted punch to his friend's arm, which quickly attracted retaliation, and in seconds the two boys were locked in an energetic tussle on the doorstep. Their wrestling could easily have wound up spoiling their nice clothes, or with someone suffering real pain. But it seemed to end in a kiss, before the girl who was with them closed the door behind them and hid the rest of the action.

Adi blinked a couple of times and stared at the door. She was aware her mouth was open, but she couldn't even think of the words you wanted to say.

"You remember Jack Dibble, right?" Mom said without any surprise, taking Adi's almost-empty coffee and unscrewing the lid so she could fill it up again. "Your brother's boyfriend, they're officially dating now. Except Jack's father can't know, a little stuck in the past that one, so don't mention anything to him. They've been babysitting Lily when she comes to visit. Make the experience a little more real if there's someone she doesn't know that well looking after her. It's interesting just how different you..."

"Hmm?"

"Sorry, I'mm still not sure if that's a sensitive subject for you. I did say I wasn't going to talk about the regression thing."

"It's fine. But I think I should take a look at my room if I'm going to be staying here. I hope I can remember how it used to look."