Chapter Text
Asimov Bay was something else. Just when she thought she'd seen it all, there was always another hideaway to be discovered.
Adea stared skywards, tilting her cap back just-so to block out the sunlight coming through the tree tops.
Behind her, Adam rummaged in the boot of his car.
“Adam?” Adea said, still in awe. “How do you find places like this?”
“You can find a lot of things when you don’t sit around all day indoors.” She saw him take their art supplies out, balancing the art bag over a shoulder before he retrieved the other items.
They didn’t need a tent or a blanket or pillows for plein air painting, but he wanted his little girl to be comfortable.
“Har har har,” said Adea. “Downright hilarious. But I’m serious.”
Adam shut the boot with a slam. “As am I.” He offered Adea his hand.
She accepted it and the pair began to walk the trail, leaving the car park behind.
It was a nice walk, a bit damp in some places from summer rains, but otherwise walkable. Adea’s head swivelled while they continued their journey. She had been to trails before, for Adam was rather fond of them, but her attention was more consciously given this time.
She wanted to be in the moment. She had this nagging worry that if she didn’t look at the blades of grass before she stepped on them, that if she didn’t crane her neck to follow the quaint birdsong, that she would forget it all.
Eventually she stopped walking.
Adam slowed to a stop, too. “Sweeting?”
“Just stopping to smell the flowers.” She beamed at him, crouching to get closer to some pretty-coloured ones on a bush.
He smiled. “Ah.” And he crouched low to be next to her, hands resting on his knees. “They are rather nice, aren’t they?”
“Mhm.”
Such pretty little things they were. They were white, with perhaps five petals and a warm, yellow interior. Plumerias. Frangipani flowers. However you called them, Adea thought they were lovely.
They weren’t the most eye-catching, but they didn’t need to be. Adea appreciated just seeing them. The petals were fixed together almost as if they were unswirled from something else, a slight twisty-look that added a beautiful coyness to the plant.
“Adam?”
“I’m right here, Adea.”
“I know you haven’t been painting for very long,” she started, “but it feels like just yesterday you were calling me ‘Miss Adea’ and I was calling you an ‘it’.”
“Oh yes,” he said, rising to his full height. There was a nostalgic smile on his face. Adea didn’t understand what he had to be nostalgic about. “When you were ever so insistent that you’re running an experiment–”
Adea’s face warmed. “A-Adam!”
She remembered full well what he spoke of, but she’d allowed herself to think that maybe Adam wouldn’t have. She threw her hands up over her face as she slowly rose from the grassy ground.
If the ground opened up to swallow her whole just then and there, she wouldn’t have minded.
Adea uncovered her eyes, hesitant. When she saw that Adam was still smiling at her, she felt another wave of embarrassment wash over her.
“Was I that obvious?” murmured Adea, when the warmth in her cheeks and in her ears became more manageable and she could start waling again.
Adam didn’t answer her immediately. “Well,” said he, clicking his tongue, “I’m sure there may have been someone who didn’t catch on.”
“Oh thank God–”
“That someone being deaf and blind, naturally.”
Adea wheezed. “A-Adam!” Alex was ruhbing off on him too much, she decided. “Come on, knock it off.”
And he relented, but only because they had reached their destination.
It was a small clearing. Adea looked behind, to see from where they’d arrived and saw that the clearing was a good ways off the natural trail.
“You come here to paint all the time?” she said, helping Adam take the load off his shoulders.
“Not all the time,” he said. “I’m fond of the boardwalk, too. Problem is” — he said it with a sort of half-sneer, an awkward expression — “other people are so nosy. I don’t enjoy having people stare over my shoulders while I work.”
“Is it because you’re rubbish at painting?”
He gave her a look, and Adea grinned.
“What? I’m just teasing.”
He’d teased her plenty earlier. So, he supposed it was only fair for her to get him back like this.
Adea settled onto a nearby stump, waiting for Adam to set up his other things: the easel, his palette, and the tent. It was only a small one, but it was more than enough for an adult of Adea’s size.
She watched him work, and when that grew boring, she tilted her head straight upwards.
It was a nice day out.
Nice and quiet. No one around except for she and Adam. No one and nothing except for green, damp earth and vast blue skies.
“Hey Adam,” she called sharply, “Do you have any extra paper?”
*
Adea was getting frustrated.
“The colours are all brown.” She scooted off of ‘her’ stump to show Adam her latest creation. He always walked with extra watercolour paper, and extra brushes and pencils.
He was set up at his travel easel, painting the trees directly ahead of them both. Adea didn’t see the appeal in staring at tree bark for three hours, so she’d taken to just painting from her memories.
Her painted plumerias, though, were a poor imitation of the real thing.
“Normally we work from light to dark, little one.” Adam saw her discouraged face, and ruffled her hair. “Watercolour is different from other paints in that regard.”
It was a grave understatement.
“I don’t want to waste your expensive art supplies.” She didn’t know what a ‘Schminke’ was, or a ‘Daniel Smith’, but they were labelled on the tubes and they sounded expensive. Much too expensive for her to be playing around with.
“As long as they’re being used, it’s no waste.”
Adea didn’t agree, but she bobbed her head along anyways. It would take some time before Adam was finished.
But that was okay, she had her books to read. (And Alex to thank for insisting she bring more than just one along.)
The tent was already set up for her, with were more than enough pillows to keep her comfortable, and a thin sheet if she wanted one.
“Hm.” Adam looked skywards when she saw Adea begin to inch towards the tent. “I suppose it is about time for your nap.”
“I’m not going to fall asleep.”
But she fell asleep anyways.
There was never any hope for her: inside the tent was just the right temperature, and snug and cosy. The pillows moved with her body. She’d stuck a pacifier in between her lips, too.
It was so peaceful and relaxing. The suckle of her paci. The wind rustling through the tree leaves. The heavy smell of forest. Hearing Adam move around outside …
Adea fell into a sound sleep, laying flat on her tummy with her diapered tush in the air.
Had she stayed awake for a little while longer, she’d have caught the warning drips of the pitter-patter of falling rain.
* * *
It was the thunder which woke her up.
Adea jolted awake, sitting up — they had to pack up the tent! — and then she realised that they were not in the forest anymore.
Yes, she thought, looking around, This is the nursery in Adam’s house.
To be precise, she had woken up in her crib, a downy blanket pulled up to her chest. And Adam must have changed her out of her clothes; she was only in a shirt and diaper.
Adea had barely taken in the textures and the sensations before she felt that urge — the little nudge from her body that said she needed to go to the bathroom and that she needed to get there soon.
She stood up in her crib with a needy whimper, the urge heavier now that she’d risen to her feet. She knew that there was a latch somewhere to lower the crib bars from the inside, but she couldn’t think when she had to pee.
Her standing became more frantic. She churned and rocked her hips, and shifted the weight from right foot to left foot and then back again.
Her gaze rested on the bars. Maybe she could swing a leg over?
Adea tried it, and promptly decided that it wasn’t worth it. It seemed a long way down, far too daunting without the guarantee of a soft landing. What if she fell wrong and broke something? What would she do then?
She sucked in her tummy, trying to steel herself.
She knew that she had to do something, but the only option which came to mind was —
Adea whined, this time a bit louder. She didn’t particularly love using her diapers, but, well, wasn’t that what they were made for?
It started as a warm burst from her crotch. It was sudden, and Adea crossed her legs, and held onto the crib bars for support. She was letting it all out, and there seemed to be quite a lot to let go.
The warmth spread just as quickly as that initial burst — Adea hiccuped when the sensation spread to just under her bottom and settled there.
And then she was done.
She lifted her shirt nervously, hesitantly, already feeling a pit in her stomach from the embarrassment. There were no visible dark spots, thank God, but Adea could very clearly feel the wetness between her legs, and which had travelled up to her bottom, as well.
Her little ‘accident’ added a small, but noticeable drag to her diaper. Adea sat back down, thinking that would help.
It didn’t.
She felt even worse now.
Whining and murmuring to herself, Adea tried different positions. Laying on her back didn’t work. Neither didn’t lying on her side.
She had just settled onto her stomach when she heard Adam.
He flicked on the light, and then made a beeline for her crib. “I didn’t know you were up. Why didn’t you say something, mhm?”
The girl gave an awkward shrug, trying to scoot away from Adam but also trying to do it in a way he wouldn’t notice.
Adam noticed immediately.
He lifted her up, and right as he went to voice his question, he recognised exactly what had happened.
“You didn’t make it to the washroom in time,” he said.
“Sorry…” Adea looked to the ground. Adam moved away from her crib, and bent to get something. “Uhm, I can get myself cleaned up if you put me down?”
“Nonsense.” Adam kissed her on the forehead, pushing a pacifier into her mouth at the same time. “This is what I’m here for, sweeting. Come. I’ll get you cleaned up.”
Adam knew how to make her feel so small. In a good way.
Adea sucked on her pacifier, watching the bathroom ceiling while Adam dealt with her. Diaper changes remained a humbling affair, albeit, affairs which were very good at pushing her into the Right Headspace.
Her arms lay spread at either side of her, and her legs were both held up by a careful, metal hand. Adam pulled a wet wipe out. The cold wetness ran all over her dirtied lower half, and Adea wiggled, rocking from side to side to make the bad chill go away.
“I’m almost done, little one,” assured Adam. And then he reached for the powder. “See? We’re nearly done. And when do we finish, you can have a bottle and we can watch that cartoon you’re ever so fond of.”
It sounded good to Adea.
Goodness, wasn’t she a loved little thing?
She reached up for Adam as soon as he was done diapering her, forcibly pushing her face into his chassis and grinning. She felt the laugh in Adam’s chest, and next, his little kiss to her cheek and then, the hand that soothingly pat her on her bottom.
His affection and care was like a drug, and even when he settled her down in the living room, she kept scrambling back over to him.
“Yes, sweetheart, I’m here. I’m not going anywhere,” he reassured her. And he gave her even more kisses, holding her up and blowing raspberries into her neck, making her shoulders bunch up and his little girl squeal with delight.
This was the Adea he was used to.
And when he finally stopped, and Adea’s laughter died down, she laid back against him, thoroughly satisfied.
It was such a small thing, kisses and tickling, and being there to clean her up and reassure her.
“I’m guessing we got rained out?” she said, cuddling against Adam. There were times when she just wanted to meld into him, have his strong arms cradle her to sleep. Now was one of those times.
Adam said, “Flooded out is more like it. When the rain cleared, you were still fast asleep and …” — his features scrunched into a kind smile — “I hadn’t the heart to rouse you.”
Adea was grateful. While her sleep schedule was a lot better these days, the Kennedy shit had ruined it again.
She blinked.
Oh.
Oh yes. There was that problem with Kennedy. She had almost forgotten. Almost nearly.
She frowned. “Adam?”
“Yes, Adea, darling?”
“I… Do you think things will be okay?” With her business, she clarified.
“Perhaps things will be and perhaps things won’t.” He wasn’t a psychic, but, he mused, he didn’t have to be. “Things will run their course. You made a mistake, Adea, but you’ve done all you can to fix it at this point.”
It didn’t feel that way at all. Adea exhaled, breath shaky.
“I know that,” she admitted. She knew she had done everything she could have, but it felt as if she could have done more. Always that something more; some miracle she should have performed just at the right moment.
Adea’s shoulders slumped. “To be honest,” she said, a nervous laugh coming through, “I’m thinking that maybe … that maybe I’m just not cut out for this sort of thing. N-not to be a quitter or anything, but I don’t know if I want to keep doing this.”
She might make more mistakes in the future.
Adam hugged her close, and Adea broke in his embrace. It started as a sniffle, and then came the trouble with swallowing, and the burny-eyes.
He rubbed her back, letting her cry out the frustration.
“I can’t tell you what to do,” he told her kindly. “But however you decide to go forward, both Alex and I will support you.”
Adea squeezed him tighter. “A-and what if I don’t want to do anything at all?”
“Then you can stay with us here for as long as you want to. Our stance hasn’t changed, nor will it ever.”
She would always have somewhere to return to, he promised. Always.
Always.
Adea laid her head on his shoulder, closing her eyes to feel the hum of Adam’s inner workings. She thought back to their brief talk on the trail — about how, so long as the paint was used, it was never wasted.
Maybe, thought Adea, maybe she could apply that to her own life?
Or maybe she just needed a good cry.