SPOILERS: This chapter and further chapters contain spoilers for Academy A - Chapter 7.

26.)

With the laptop on Amanda's knees, and Blossom not wanting to take it from her, she did the only logical thing and spun around on the sofa so she could lay down with her legs over the arm, and she laid her head down in the other girl's very crinkly lap. And then began to read...for a very short period of time.

"Wait… wait wait, who...who's this Wendy? Where's Aya? I'm immediately suspicious!" Blossom turned her head to look up at Amanda, and then she looked back at the screen of text. "No no, don't say anything, I wanna read the rest of the chapter first. This seems like peak Academy Works, actually; changing protagonists mid-story!"

"I'm glad you think so," I said nervously. I'd never switched protagonists in an Academy Works story before, and especially not halfway through. Wendy had been mentioned in Aya's part of the story, but she was a fleeting character.

I tried to shuffle a little and get comfortable with Blossom's head on my lap, but it was a little claustrophobic. The anxiety of wearing a diaper was already a lot, and Blossom wasn't even on page two when I asked her: "Could you, uh... sit up?"

"Oh! Sure babes, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

Blossom apologized as she sat up and tousled her hair sheepishly. The truth was, she hadn't thought twice about doing that because she felt pretty at ease with Amanda. But soon after Blossom was back to reading.

A second protagonist, though… that was so interesting.

"I don't know if I trust Wendy."

"That's fair." I put my laptop between us, setting it on both her thigh and mine. She used the trackpad to scroll. I read along anxiously, wondering what words she might not like. Was this good enough? Was this a good direction to take the story? I wish I had something to keep my hands busy...

"I'm so on edge after the way that Academy K ended and I'm looking for all these clues and word choices and things I wouldn't usually pay that much attention to, but you never ever pick a word by mistake. It all means something so this isn't just 'I wanted to do two protagonists'. This definitely means something more."

For Blossom, this was a first: getting to gush about her theories to someone, to anyone, let alone Mia Moore herself.

"Yeah, well..." I wasn't sure what to say. I couldn't say too much, but Blossom knew me well enough. Or, she knew my writing. Everything had some weird meaning to it. Wendy becoming the protagonist for this chapter - maybe more chapters to follow - was not a flight of fancy. I had a story to tell.

It took Blossom a while to finish the chapter. I think she was reading slowly on purpose, trying to take in every word. The chapter ended on another Alice in Wonderland quote, just like one of Aya's chapters. It was a good literary parallel.

"I am so excited to read more! Is this the chapter you've had writer's block on? Because that was so enticing, so enrapturing, so entrancing. I want more, and I'm willing to do just about anything to get it." She paused and smirked. "I sound like a Candy."

"You really think it's okay? I know a lot didn't happen in this chapter... I wanted to actually talk about breakfast and stuff since you really only see Aya at lunch. Oh, and I wanted this Academy to have some like… schoolyard legends? I always thought those were fun when I was a kid." There was a tire swing no one would go near on the playground because it was always swinging. We thought it was haunted, but it was probably the way the wind wrapped around the building.

"Those are totes fun. In middle school, when I went to space camp, they talked about how the cornflakes were haunted and if you ate them you'd be a virgin forever, and at the time I was like 'I'm going to be a virgin forever anyway, sex sounds gross' so I ate the fuck outta those cornflakes. I guess the curse wasn't true though, because that has not been the case for me."

Blossom laughed brightly and twisted her fingers through her fakely-colored hair.

"I don't think a lot ever needs to happen, especially when you've got such a good foundation."

"So you liked it, then...?" I knew she liked it. She had been gushing about it ever since she finished the chapter! But there was an insecure part of me that needed the validation. I needed her to say it over and over until the next one came out. That was why comments on the internet meant a lot to me.

"I loved it, and I'll love it when I read it next, and then the sixteen times after that too. And if you want me to message you every time I read it and love it, I'll text you! I only need one hand for my vibrator, so texting is still totally doable!"

"...I can't tell if that's a joke." Blossom smiled slyly and I blushed. Jeeze, being an erotica writer sure was weird sometimes.

"Well, maybe the next chapter will be sexier," I offered. "This one was more about character building." Next chapter...what happened next? More classes, no doubt. The reason I hadn't set any Academy Works stories in actual schools before this was because sometimes class was just really boring to write about. It was the same reason I didn't like when characters "went to work".

"If you don't build the characters, it's not gonna be as fun to break them! So that's pretty important. And you know different people can find different things sexier, too; some people love the struggle and the humiliation and the build-up to the fall, but then lose interest after that. And other people like the aftermath of the fall more. So you never know who you might be turning on even if you're not aiming for it to be strictly sexy."

Blossom nodded, as though she were an expert here. She was feeling more comfortable around Amanda, and she got the vibe that the same was true in reverse.

"That's true..." I mean, we found diapers sexy. That was kind of out there, wasn't it? "Sometimes I just write about what I wish would happen to me. But if it actually happened to me, I'd hate it."

"Sometimes I read about what I wish would happen to me, but I'd probably hate it too. Buuuuut… also sometimes I think I'd like it a lot, and that's the stuff I fantasize over most. It's frustrating never really having gotten to explore any of it in real life. And believe me, it's not that I'm not kinky, I just… never felt I could trust someone with this."

There was a confession from Blossom right there.

"Well..." I knew I'd regret it, but maybe it was better for the both of us to get this out of the way. "I have an extra... you know. If you want it?" She had mentioned before that she had never worn them. It probably had something to do with her spheres, keeping things separate in her life. But hey, I was in one!

"I have no idea how to wear a diaper." Blossom's cheeks were very very red, but her eyes sparkled because this had crossed over with the confidence she often had when it came to sex. "But if you wanted to put me in one… I could be open to that~"

"Uh... I don't think I could do that..." Not only because the thought of undressing another woman and putting her in a diaper was awkwardly intimate, but also because... well, I really had never diapered anyone before. Not even a real baby. It took me ages to learn how to do it myself, and I wasn't sure it translated well. "You've read enough stories," I told her. "You can figure it out."

"Alright, I'll give it a shot! As long as you promise to tell me if it doesn't look right, and do your best to help me fix it if I fuck it up, okay? I'm serious!"

While Blossom did have some confidence - to this feeling like much any other sexual encounter - and while this did share most of the things in common with wearing any other lingerie for someone, Blossom had a bit of a starstruck situation when it came to Mia Moore.

She wanted to impress her.

Maybe I should have just diapered her myself. That's what would happen in a good story. The cute cheerleader-turned-friend says she wants to try on a diaper, maybe because she's flirting with some Daddy type. She blushes and pouts and bites her lip. She says she's never done it before, and four tapes? Oh, that's so complicated! What side is the front? Which side is the back? The caregiver smiles warmly and offers to help. A sensual scene follows of powdering, depicted stylistically as foreplay. Nervousness, excitement, a heat between her thighs. The soft touch of his hands on her hips. The security of the padding as he tapes it in place, sealing her into his fantasy. She's embarrassed by how much she loves it.

But the truth is, if you read enough diaper stories, you know which side is the front. Tapes these days aren't like the ones ten years ago: you can redo them a few times without losing any stickiness. It's not that hard to diaper yourself, not really. It takes a while to be perfect at it, but adequacy is a low bar.

I only brought two diapers with me for the whole weekend; I didn't think I would need more than that. But when Blossom followed me up to the guest bedroom and I handed her my last one, I felt a pang of anxiety. Getting adult diapers was a bit of a chore. I couldn't ship them to my house, and I sure as hell wasn't shopping in the daytime. I went to a 24-hour Walmart in the middle of the night to get them, and I could really only hide one pack at a time in my bedroom.

"People online say bottom tapes first?" I shrugged, trying not to blush. I couldn't look her in the eye. "I usually do the top ones first, but I think that's because I'm bigger?"

"We'll see how it goes!"

Blossom smiled, feigning all the confidence she could: truthfully, this was equal parts exciting and nerve-inducing. But Blossom was pretty good at the things she put her mind to, and her mind had been put to diapers for years, right?

"Do you wanna come in and watch? Or do you wanna wait outside the room? What's good, babes?"

Nudity, at least, was something Blossom had no issues with.

"I'll... wait in the hall..."

Blossom shrugged her shoulders. I didn't understand how she could be so cool with being naked around people who were practically strangers, but it was more of a jealousy than a judgment. I wished I had her confidence.

I left her alone in the guest room. I didn't give her baby powder or anything, though I did bring a small travel bottle with me. Even if I wasn't wearing a diaper, baby powder had a lot of use for chubby girls to prevent chafing. It was a good item to have on-hand.