Denis had inspected the crèche last month and reported problems. They were supposed to have corrected the problems by now but he could see that they had done nothing. He was surprised that they didnât even seem to have made any effort.
âIâm afraid I will have to report that this crèche is not suitable for babiesâ, he told Mrs. Hargreaves. âI donât think soâ, was her reply. Denis looked up. She was pointing a gun at him. He swallowed hard. âNow donât do anything sillyâ, he warned.
She forced him to sign a favourable report and then handed him another sheet of paper. He was forced to write a letter of resignation. They took the letters from him and made him leave the room. He feared the worst when he was directed to go down the stairs to the basement. Mrs. Hargreaves kept the gun on him at all times.
He was put in a small room that had little but a doctorâs couch. She told him to strip off. He couldnât understand what was happening. He stood before her trying to cover his privates with his hands.
Mrs. Hargreaves told him to get up on the couch. Another woman came in. She proceeded to shave around his groin. Then she spread a cream all over it and made him turn over so she could put it on his bottom. He wondered what the hell was going on.
The woman took a towel and told him to lift his bottom. She slid it under him and only then did he realise that it was a cloth nappy. She pulled it up between his legs and pinned it onto him. Then she flapped out a pair of plastic pants and pulled them up his legs and over the nappy.
Next she shoved a very large dummy into his mouth. Mrs. Hargreaves continued to train the gun on him through all this so he thought it prudent to say nothing.
The woman left and returned a few moments later with some clothes. Denis studied them with interest. The clothes were primarily pink with lots of lace. The woman took a large pair of very frilly panties and pulled them up his legs over the plastic pants. Denis looked up at Mrs. Hargreaves in surprise but she just stood there smiling.
Next the woman held up a pink dress in front of Denis. It was just like a babyâs dress â flared from breast level with puffed sleeves and all trimmed with white lace around the collar, hem and sleeves â but it was very big. Big enough to fit Denis.
She pulled it over his head and made him put his arms through the sleeves. She zipped him up and tied a white sash at his back. Then she tied a pink bonnet on his head. It too was trimmed with stiff white lace. She pulled booties onto his feet, tying them in place with a thick ribbon above the ankle. He noticed that the booties were connected by a six-inch string that would stop him taking anything but little steps. Lastly she put mittens on his hands and tied them at the wrist.
Mrs. Hargreaves lowered the gun. âNice job Brigid.â She straightened his bonnet. Now that the gun was no longer pointed at him, he thought about trying to escape. He looked down at the mittens. They had no fingers or thumbs and seemed to make his hands useless.
âGet upâ, Mrs. Hargreaves instructed him. He swung his legs over the side of the couch and hopped down. The two women linked arms with him on either side. They turned him towards a mirror at the end of the room. He could see now that his dress was very short and the lower half of his frilly panties were clearly visible. He looked just like a baby girl except that he was slightly taller than the two women!
âNow come alongâ, Brigid said. They helped him towards the door as he shuffled along. He was now much more conscious of the nappy wrapped around him and how it forced his legs apart.
They brought him down the corridor to a door that had a cut-out of pink elephants pinned to it. Brigid opened the door. The room was not dissimilar to the crèche upstairs. There were toys scattered around the room, picture books on the shelves and nursery rhyme characters on the walls. But the overwhelming colour of the dÊcor was pink. He noticed a pink wooden cot, a pink wooden high-chair and, over by the window, a pink wooden play-pen.
Then he saw that there was a baby in the play-pen. This baby was wearing a similarly frilly dress that was lilac in colour. Because all the furniture was scaled up, it wasnât until the baby turned around to face them that Denis realised it was a grown man in the frilly dress and suc-king on a big dummy. Although it was clearly a man, blond sausage curls dangled from beneath his bonnet.
âDenise, this is Robertaâ, Mrs. Hargreaves introduced them. âRobertaâ rolled over onto his knees and put his hands on the side of the pen. Denis could see his hands were similarly in mittens. His dress was as short too and he wore a large pair of white bloomers. They clearly stretched over a thick nappy.
Brigid brought the high-chair over beside the play-pen. She swung the tray back and Mrs. Hargreaves helped Denis hop up onto the seat. Brigid swung the tray back in front of him and it clicked into position.
âRoberta is your predecessor, Deniseâ, Mrs. Hargreaves informed him. âShe was the last one to inspect the crèche and similarly disapproved. Still, she knows now that we treat babies very well, donât you?â Roberta nodded eagerly.
âRoberta, you have permission to speak to Denise while we prepare your bottlesâ. Denis spat out his dummy as soon as the women left the room but the dummy stayed firmly in Robertaâs mouth.