Grandma's Attic

Chapter Eighteen

Bored, Thredwyl paced. Three days, three chuffing days now, held in this high-security unit. Days broken only by Dr Ireson's visits – the Iron Man, Thredwyl had decided to call him – and the attentions of Bessy and Night-Shift Louisa, her oppo.

Bessy was day shift, Bessy explained. Very chatty was Blessed Bessy. Blessed because Grandma had blessed her with ample curves, blessed because with her chattiness she divulged more than she ought. That first day in this high-security unit, Blessed Bessy had let slip that she was having what she called a 'thing' with Dwayne, over at Anthropology. Iron Man Ireson might want to keep secret the location of this facility for holding illegal aliens and questionable little fellows, but thanks to Blessed Bessy's voluble mouth, it didn't take much for Thredwyl to work out its location. Cambridge.

Blessed Bessy was a goodun. He'd heard that said of things and people several times since his miss-worded spell had landed him here in the Land of Giants, or rather, the Land of Man and His Unkind Kind. Goodun, aye, that's a goodun, said with affection. Still, he'd had to train Bessy in the basics.

"Seeds, I only eat cold chuffing seeds," he had shouted at her the second time she brought him a dish of steaming hot food. He didn't know what the food was. Not seeds. Who'd ever heard of serving hot seeds? Not even the Fernamon did that.

But she'd taken it well. Nodded, put dish and tray down by the door, and scribbled a while on her clipboard.

With careful observation, Thredwyl had discovered a discernible pattern to her use of that board. When she came on duty, and again when she left for the night, she jotted on the first page. She jotted on the last page when, at two hourly intervals, she checked on his padded pants. Oh yea, that was a delightful humiliation.

"What's this?" he'd asked the first day, pulling at the teddy-patterned padded pants that hugged his hips and padded his crotch as if he was hung like a Giant.

"That's so you don't mess – catches your doings." Not a blush to Blessed Bessy's fair freckled cheeks.

"My...?" Thredwyl had gulped and told her sternly. "I would prefer that you provided a pot, like Daisy did."

"A pot is easily overturned. Or thrown."

He stared at her, his cheeks burning like they were chasing embers through the spectrum. "Do I look the sort to play with my poop? Well, do I?"

She stuttered what might have become an explanation – had he allowed it.

"Just because I'm small, doesn't mean I'm a baby. Would you wrap these things around a—" But he didn't know what word to use. Aliens and little fellows, that's what Iron Man Ireson had said. "An adult-sized person?"

Blessed Bessy had opened her mouth. But closed it again and nodded.

"What, you do make them wear these?" He pulled at the offending plastic. "By the cringe!"

"We have to collect it," she said, very apologetic though not abashed. "It's for the lab. It has to be analysed."

He scrunched up his mouth and clenched his fists. He had to get out of this place.

She jotted what she explained were her observations of what he ate, how much, and if he asked for more.

She jotted again when he banged his head against the door. No handle, no visible lock, just an unmarked block of high-sheen metal.

She jotted when he pushed his bed closer to the window. But that bed was way below its level, and he still couldn't see out. It didn't take him long to solve that. He bounced on the bed till, woo-hey, with enough momentum gained he jumped and landed on the window-ledge. That panicked her.