✅1️⃣ | Hypnosis Doesn't Work Like That!

170: A Decision I Made a Long Time Ago

"Adelaide!" A man's voice jolted Adi out of her fascination with all the bright, flashing lights. "How's my little girl?"

Adi turned and stared, while desperately trying to stop the flow of hot pee into her diaper. She hadn't spoken to her Daddy in years, and that was a choice she'd put a lot of thought into after she saw how upset he made Mom. But right now she couldn't quite remember why she'd thought all those things, and she found herself so excited to see him. It had been so long, she barely even recognised him. She was angry that he'd made her have an accident when she was trying her best to be a big girl, sure, but he was still her Daddy and she needed to show him just how grown up she could be. Dressing up might not be a competitive game for most babies, but just this once Adelaide promised herself that she was going to win.

She turned to Daddy and pouted theatrically, trying to show that she didn't want to be called by her full name. But the effect was somewhat spoiled because she couldn't stop her mouth turning up at the corners when she thought about how well she was pretending to be a big girl, and a tide of giggles was rising up in her throat, trying to escape.

"Mr Boone, I presume?" Toni spoke over Adi's head, taking a step forward and offering a hand to shake. "A pleasure to meet you."

"You'd be Toni, then? I'd say I heard a lot about you, but I've barely had a dozen words from Garfield and Nyx."

"Nice of them to mention me," Toni gave a half-hearted, one-shoulder shrug. "Any juicy details that I should be worrying about?"

"Just that Adelaide might be dating now. Mostly 'maybe's until more recently, when anything they might want to tell me about you was buried in a whole bunch of detail about this... baby thing. They didn't even say..."

Toni raised an eyebrow, waiting for a question that didn't seem to be coming.

"Anyhow, I guess I shouldn't be surprised these days. I've got a booth, so we're a little cut off from the rest of the room. Would you two like to join me?"

The booth was just like the rest of the bar, an aggressively retro styling. There was a pale light overhead, surrounded by a much brighter square of blue neon that seemed to flicker just enough to remind you that you were living in an '80s futuristic fantasy without quite becoming annoying. Adelaide didn't even notice any of that, immediately losing herself in the mirrored strip along the edge of the table. Every time she shifted her head, the shape of her reflection in the curved surface changed. She couldn't quite pull herself away from experimenting with all the different-shaped faces she could see. She knew that she was behaving like a little kid, and she was supposed to pretend to be a big girl for this meeting, but when Daddy kept saying her baby name she found it even harder to avoid doing little things like this.

"She's enjoying herself, anyhow," she heard Daddy saying, and an irresistible blush flowed up from her chest to set her whole face on fire. But she still kept on thinking that she'd pull just one more face at the weird table before she turned back to look at them.

"She's adorable," Mommy fuzzled her hair, and all Adi could think of was the weird waves that she seemed to be making in the mirror. One more thing to look at, making her look so cute for a couple of minutes. "I'll bet you weren't expecting to see her behaving like this again. But as long as she's happy, I hope you don't mind too much."

"Just like the last time I spent time with her," there was a little laugh bolted onto the end of that comment, but Adi was feeling too giggly to work out if it was at her, or at himself. Daddy sounded just a little bit bitter for a moment, but it was hard to keep one thought on her mind even for a moment. She hoped that he wouldn't say her name again, because she really wanted to show Daddy what a big girl she could be, and he wasn't making it easy. She looked like a big girl in the mirror, at least, with her eyes stretching out and the bunches in her hair turning into some fancy style that she didn't know the name of as Mommy swept them down to a part of the reflection where they turned super thick. "I don't know how much Nyx told you, but I haven't spent any quality time with Adelaide in years. This brings back memories, you know? She's just the same, only taller."

"She's changed more than that," Toni smirked, at least pretending that she didn't notice Adelaide's squirming as she tried so hard not to wet any more. "I'm sure even you can see. But it looks like she'd love to try a hall of mirrors for a date. I've never seen anyone so caught up in their own reflection before, and that certainly isn't the Adi I'm used to."

"She's never been vain," Daddy agreed, and Adelaide hoped that might be a compliment. "But I remember once she got lost in a fairground fun house. We thought she might have been trapped, or terrified, when we lost sight of her for more than a minute, and we were so worried. But she was just bobbing up and down in front of a twisted mirror. I guess she's really taking a trip back to her childhood, and not just the obvious things. Somehow I imagined that the next time I saw her, she'd be introducing me to a boyfriend or even a husband, if Nyx could keep us apart long enough, and she'd be trying her best to act so serious. I never thought I'd see the Adelaide I remembered again, and I never even imagined..."

"That there's be a girlfriend in the picture?" There was just a hint of harshness in Mommy's voice, but Adelaide hardly realised as she bobbed up and down to watch her face and hair change shape.

"Yeah. And you are...?"

"Still a girl, no matter how butch I might seem. And I won't usually object to being called butch, if you're not trying to make it an insult. I'm a pretty good judge of people's intentions, rather than the words. But if you're hoping to get a single clear answer out of your daughter, it might be a good idea to say 'Adelaide' a little less often."

"I'm sorry," Daddy said as Adelaide squirmed and giggled again. "Nyx did mention that, but it comes out so naturally every time. It's the only name I've ever known. Would it be better to stick to Juniper maybe, or just Adi for now? She doesn't seem to have any objections, but it really shouldn't... Well..."

"I've been calling her 'Babe' until I got used to it. I take it you don't object to that, or think it's denigrating. Somehow I feel like I should be asking your permission more than the other way around, but there's nothing right now that would make it any different. I guess she's still your little girl."

"Big girl," Adelaide pouted furiously, and then degenerated into laughter again at her twisted reflection. She couldn't take anything seriously, as much as she wanted to. But with Mommy and Daddy both here to watch out for her, she knew that she didn't need to worry about all the grown-up stuff. She could enjoy herself for now, a child playing dress-up, and go back to being all serious afterwards.