"I...I..."
*PLOP!*
I let out a tiny chirp of a gasp. My round, dimpled chin quivered. Though I knew all too well what had happened, my eyes still - as though needing to confirm my sheer humiliation for themselves - drifted downwards, drifted past my smooth chest and chubby tummy to where my shame had been put on full and sudden display. The soaked diaper that had clung so tenaciously to my pudgy hips had finally given up the ghost; and now that it lay around my bare little feet in a squishy, sodden, yellowed pile, it seemed almost ridiculous to think that it had once been a crisp, white pair of Huggies that had so tenderly cuddled my tiny weenie and bouncy baby bottom. Indeed, I could feel my wet, immature nub shrink even further now that it had been exposed to the cool air, now that it was no longer shielded by layer upon layer of thick, cushy padding. My eyes burned with Seryth's cruel snickering as I sniffled and whimpered, as I felt tears come to my eyes. In staring at my infantile acorn - in being unable to tear my eyes away - it felt as though a day's worth of retroactive humiliation had come crashing down on me at once, as though this was the price an adult had to pay for thinking he was allowed to be silly and playful and free, as though -
*PLOP!*
My head snapped in the direction of the squishy sound that echoed the harbinger of my own humiliation; and standing there, defiant and diaperless, was Dylan. He had ripped the tapes of his own Huggies and let them fall to the floor, leaving him every bit as wet and nude as I was. Though I saw his dinky similarly shrink to near-microscopic proportions, Dylan did not - save for perhaps a bit of a blush in his cherubic cheeks - seem at all embarrassed. His eyes never broke with Seryth's as he stepped to my side and threw a pudgy arm around my shoulders, looking away from the fairy just long enough to shoot me a quick, bolstering grin. I hesitated for only moment before putting my arm around Dylan's shoulders, suddenly feeling confident enough to put on a defiant smile and turn it on the displeased fairy who floated above and scowled down on us. In any context, the scene was ridiculous - two naked babies smelling of baby powder and pee standing together against a mystical being of unknown power and origin. But, despite that - or perhaps because of it - Seryth finally backed down. He scoffed, broke his stare, and shrugged.
"Fine," he spat. "If that's your choice, then I'm not gonna waste any more time here. Just don't come crying to me when this impostor eventually stabs you in the back."
With that, he snapped his fingers and disappeared in a puff of fairy dust. For a moment Dylan and I simply stood there in silence - and then he squealed in joy and took me up in the biggest, tightest hug his little toddler arms could muster.
"We did it!" He cried, wobbling back and forth on his pudgy legs as he held me in his embrace, as our warm, chubby tummies were pressed together. "You were tho bwave, Mah-co! I'm weawwy pwoud of you."
I found myself giggling in pure joy as I gleefully returned the hug with just as much strength and vigor, the embarrassment and shame I had felt a moment prior disappearing as though they had been nothing but a bad dream. As I squeezed Dylan tightly against me, I beamed at how wonderful it felt to rub my smooth cheek against his, to know that each of us were in the arms of a true friend. Though we may not have been related by blood, we may as well have been brothers for how close I felt to him in that moment - and even greater and more exciting than that was the realization that we were now free to make this world whatever we pleased.