3 C3
created: 2023-06-04T10:39 updated: 2023-06-04T10:
"Mom, where are we going?" Hannah asked, pulling the left ear bud out of her ear. They had already traveled half way across the city.
"Well," Emily started. "I didn't think you would want to go to the store near the house. We might have run into someone that you know and then the secret would be out..." Emily glanced at her daughter who sat in the passenger seat. "You don't want that do you?"
"No," Hannah said, glancing at her mom as she drove. "If anyone finds out about this, I'll never live it down..."
"Statistically," Emily said after a brief pause. "If you were to start to get picked on and don't let it bother you, any bullies that are picking on you will stop. I know that's hard to do in practice, but it's been proven." Emily glanced over her right shoulder to make a lane change. "No one's going to find out unless you tell them. I won't say a word to anyone..."
Hannah smiled at her mother. "Thanks mom. You don't know how relieved that makes me feel." Emily slowed down and took an exit ramp making a right turn at the light. Three minutes later, Emily had parked the car and shut off the engine.
"Lets go get this part over with..." Emily said, "I know you don't want to be doing this any more than I do." Hannah nodded and opened the car door. She was met with a blast of hot, humid air. After Emily had gotten out of the car, she locked the doors and the pair headed into the store. Emily smiled at her daughter who looked apprehensive. She understood why her daughter was apprehensive, and was going to make this as painless as possible for her almost teen aged daughter. Emily grabbed a cart as they walked through the front door. After they had walked through the second set of doors and into the store proper and gotten their bearings, Hannah followed her mother, feeling like she was being sent to the gallows. A few moments later Hannah found her self in an aisle surrounded by diapers and their related paraphernalia. The aisle smelled of baby powder, and while the adolescent enjoyed the smell, now it seemed to taunt her. She watched as her mother picked up a pack of baby wipes, some baby oil, some baby powder and finally a pack of girls goodnights and placed each item in the cart. Hannah's eyes were drawn to the purple package in the cart. For some reason she suddenly felt calmer about the whole situation. Maybe it was because the weight range on the package also included Lexie and it wasn't as blatantly obvious that the contents of the purple package were for her. To the outside world, she was like every other twelve year old girl. Her mom started out of the aisle, and Hannah followed her mother. As they headed toward the front of the store, Something pink caught Hannah's eye. She turned and looked down the next aisle and noticed that it was full of bottles, sippy cups, pacifiers and all of the other stuff that a baby would have. Hannah had stopped and when her mom realized that she was no longer with her, she stopped as well and turned to look at her daughter, turned the cart around and went to see what had attracted her daughter's interest.
"What are you looking at, Hannah?" Emily asked, almost to where she could see down the aisle that had captivated her daughter. "Oh."
Hannah looked at her mom and smiled, having very faint recollections of when Lexie was a baby and drinking out of a bottle before finally graduating to sippy cups. Times were much simpler then. No school and no homework either... "It brought back memories of when Lexie was little, how she was so carefree and innocent." Not that her younger sibling wasn't still carefree and innocent now but something about aging through childhood stripped some of that away. Hannah must have looked thoughtful.
"What's on your mind?" Emily asked, before nodding. "Go on, I think I know what is going on under those pigtails of yours." A smile crossed her face as Hannah started down the aisle, examining everything before selecting a pink pacifier that proclaimed 'Mommy's Girl' and a pink sippy cup. She carried them back over to where her mother stood. After placing the two items in the cart where a child that would use them would sit, Emily looked at her daughter. "Well, this isn't what I expected..."
"I had an idea for a Halloween costume..." Hannah replied, and then lowered her voice. "If I have to wear diapers, I can just be a baby for Halloween."
"We'll see about that..." Emily said, with a chuckle. "Hopefully this whole situation is temporary, and if it is, then what are you going to do with a sippy cup and a pacifier?"
"Hmm..." Hannah said, looking at the ceiling briefly. "Good point, I'll put them back." While she was reaching for the items in the cart, her mother stopped her.
"Leave them," Emily said. "I'll put them in my room so Lexie doesn't find them." Emily smiled at her daughter, who smiled back for the first time since they left the house. "Lets head over to the office supplies, we are supposed to be getting some school supplies, remember..." The pair set off across the store in search of the office supplies. When they got there Emily selected a bunch of one subject notebooks that were standard page sizes, and then a pink covered smaller notebook. Sitting it on top of the handful of one subject notebooks she looked at Hannah, who had grabbed several three subject notebooks. "I'll explain the smaller notebook when we get out to the car... The pair headed for the check out and left the store. Emily fished the smaller pink notebook out of the bag and handed it to Hannah after they had gotten in the car. "Doctor Jones also suggested that you keep track of what you are drinking, how much, and more importantly, when. It might prove useful to know when you get in to see her. We're not going to solve this overnight, so you're gonna need to be patient..."
Hannah had already resigned herself to the possibility that this would be a long term search for the cause and eventual solution to her wetting the bed. The only thing she did not know, was how long that trip was going to take...