✅ My Cousin's Keeper [NaNoWriMo 2021]

90. My Volunteer

Tess had wet herself again, so I changed her quickly. She seemed to be embarrassed and didn't appreciate any teasing about how little she was now, so I didn't push it. My main objective here was to get her comfortable with being a baby, and make her admit to herself how much she wanted it.

I waited while they opened the last of the presents; I didn't think there was much else in their to hold the little ones' attention, but I knew they were going to get excited about every little thing they unwrapped. When they looked back on today, it would seem like a constant parade of fun and games, and I was sure they would have loved every minute. This was going to convince Tess more than anything, I thought, and I hoped that after this she would find it much harder to argue with me about how much she enjoyed feeling childish.

It wasn't long before they had them all opened, and I was already thinking about what to treat Tess to next. We'd thought about this a lot; all the different parts of Christmas that children loved so much. And the next big one was the Christmas specials on TV, things that were designed with a huge, overblown morality story about the real meaning of Christmas, or the importance of friendship, or something like that. In an era where everything was available whenever, those shows weren't limited to Christmas day anymore, but I thought that Tess would just be old enough to remember watching something seasonal on scheduled broadcast TV when she was younger, complete with commercials. So I'd recorded a cartoon about reindeers on Christmas day, complete with the continuity announcer wishing everyone season's greetings. I didn't know if she would be old enough to even notice the effort I was putting into making today perfect, but I knew that it made it seem more real to me. And even if she didn't see it, on some subconscious level it would remind her of the days when she'd really been so young and carefree. Every little detail could matter.

"Would you like to watch the Great Reindeer Dive?" I asked. Ffrances cheered, of course she did, even if I wasn't sure that she remembered our plan now. And Tess seemed optimistically curious. So I told them it was a special cartoon for Christmas, and if we missed it we wouldn't be able to watch it again until next year. I pressed play on the PVR remote, but I didn't turn the TV on yet. That particular device wasn't quite so modern, so it didn't know if we were actually watching. In a minute or two I would turn the TV power on, and we would catch the very end of the previous show, adding to the impression that this wasn't something we had complete control over. Anything to make it feel special.

I suggested that they would be little enough to be excited by it, as well. They wouldn't be able to guess the plot in advance, and they would be amazed whenever something happened in the story. They were so small that every little twist would feel like it came out of nowhere, and they would be so proud of themselves for understanding the moral of the story. Tess smiled, nodded, and agreed that they would both feel that. I felt a little bad for Ffrances, and hoped that she wasn't distressed by having her intelligence damped down like that. But this was something that I needed to do for Tess's sake, and right now I couldn't help Tess to feel those things without Ffrances experiencing it too. It would have been so much easier if I were in control, and I knew I would have to insist on that next time. And this time, I could be sure that Ffrances wouldn't stop me. This was the kind of situation nobody would allow herself to be put through more than once.

I was just about to turn the TV on when Tess interrupted. She had something she wanted to say, and she looked so very serious when she said it. I didn't want her to feel serious, and I immediately knew this was something I would need to be concerned about. But I didn't have anything I could do to help her calm down right now; she would have to consent to any triggers, and I was pretty sure she wouldn't be willing to do that. If there was any of her adulthood coming back, I had no way to stop it unless I could make her have an accident, and even if it worked I was pretty sure something like that would make her realise I'd triggered her. This was why I needed to be properly in control. Still, after today I could only hope that my girlfriend would stop deferring to the little's every whim and do what was best for her instead.