52.)

I expected Blossom to play some indie-alternative music with a female singer; that was what she had playing in her car a lot of the time. Instead, the music that came on had no words. It was quiet background music, full of acoustic chords and heavy piano keys. It was light... relaxing.

I didn't move toward Blossom as she wet her hands in the tub and grabbed for the shampoo. I didn't intend on moving at all, but she tapped the side of the tub the way someone might beckon a cat. I bit my lip without thinking.

"C'mon, cupcake."

Don't move, Amanda, I told myself. Don't let her treat you like that. You aren't a pet or a child. You're barely even her friend. You're her classmate.

But the voice that had been berating me for the past ten minutes was louder. It rang like bells, chanting "wrong" over and over in my head. And if everything I did was wrong, then why not listen to Blossom?

After a moment of hesitation, I slid through the water on my butt until I was on her side of the tub. I turned around before we could make eye contact and played with my fingers under the bubbles.

"You know, my Dad used to wash my hair for me until I was like…ten, I think?" Blossom said. "And it's not as though I hit puberty early or anything, so it wasn't weird - it was just a shared moment between two people who loved each other. And he'd blow dry my long chestnut hair, and he'd put it up in plaits for the night."

While Blossom recounted the story from her childhood, she gently began to massage the shampoo into Amanda's hair. She wondered quietly and to herself if this was what her Dad felt like when he'd wash hers.

It sounded like the kind of thing a mom would do, but she didn't have a mom. Then again, I didn't do this kind of thing with my mom after I started elementary school. Lin mentioned that her mom used to give her baths when she was sick.

Blossom took a cup from the sink and filled it with soapy water. I couldn't see it, but I could feel the water as it poured down the back of my head, through my wavy hair. She tilted my head back a little and did it again. Soon, all the shampoo was gone.

The voice in my head was still loud, but my attention was pulled away by Blossom's actions. The splash of water. The heat through my hair. The hum of the background music. Every time her fingers touched me, which was mostly just my scalp. The loud voice sounded miles away.

"You have really pretty hair, you know that?"

It was a simple compliment, but she meant it. Blossom began to meter out some of her fancy conditioner into the palm of her hand, ready to move to the next step.

"You're a good girl, cupcake."

A good girl... a part of me didn't believe her, that loud part that thought I couldn't do anything right. But even if it was just a platitude, something to make me feel better... well, it kind of did. I sunk a little lower into the water and played with my fingers. A good girl...

Blossom touched me again, this time along my shoulders. She scrubbed the conditioner into my hair and rinsed it again with water from the tub. The hot water was starting to make me sleepy. It was relaxing, almost magical. Like a drug. Maybe there was something there I could use in Academy Works.

"You know," and Blossom was tempting fate with this one, because she didn't know the nature of Amy's thoughts, "a lot of girls your age fuss a lot in the bath. But not you, cupcake; you're quiet as a mouse and sweet as a cookie."

I was glad Blossom couldn't see my face, because I was sure I was blushing. The 'girls your age' comment was so cliche, and yet so effective. There was a reason tropes were a thing: they worked.

"It's new," I answered. It was the first thing I'd said since moving over to Blossom. "I haven't had one since I was a kid."

It was an answer Blossom hadn't expected, although to be fair she hadn't expected an answer at all; Amy had been quiet for so long. Maternal wasn't a term that Blossom might have used to describe herself…well… ever. But she could see why people were able to feel it now.

"We should make it a regular occasion then," Blossom said. "That's what I think. A way to wash away the stressors of the outside world."

"No, I... I couldn't..." Already, Blossom offered me a whole house, a sanctuary to write. She bought me diapers. She would tease and baby me. And now, she was giving me a bath. I couldn't do anything in return, other than write her chapters of Academy Works. I should have been writing. I shouldn't have been soaking in a tub, taking up Blossom's valuable weekend.

"And why couldn't you, cupcake? Why couldn't you give me this pleasure and enjoyment of getting to give you a bath?"

Blossom was experimenting; trying out framing this from a 'what does Blossom get out of this' perspective.

"I just... can't..." I shook my head, but the heat of the tub made me lazy. I felt slow, and the voices in my head were quieter. I bit my lip again and inched away from Blossom. When I was in the center of the tub, I turned to face her, but I didn't look her in the eye.

Blossom leaned back in on her hands, propped on her knees. The wetness of her palms left her chin and cheeks damp, but not much could dull the radiance of her pretty face. Or her smile.

Smiling was contentious for Blossom. She had braces when she was younger, so she never smiled. And then when she blossomed, she learned to smile for cheer; but it was always the same picture-perfect-fake-smile that she'd spend hours a night practicing in the mirror. It was only when she was freed of the shackles of high-school drama that she found her true smile.

"You're doing great, cupcake."

I wanted to argue with her. I'm not doing great. I'm not doing anything! But arguing with her felt worse than agreeing. Disappointment was the worst kind of punishment. If Blossom had been the kind of woman to lead me down the same paths as the loud voices in my brain, I would have broken. I would have broken willingly.

Story idea?

"I don't know what I'm doing," I admitted. It was as close as I could get to agreeing with her.

"Well the first step in knowing your first step is to know where you're going; that's my Dad's thoughts on the matter. Do you wanna learn Italian? Your first step is to know that your first step should be to start learning Italian. It's silly, but it works. So where are you going, Amy? I'll help you find your first step to your first step."

"I don't know," I admitted. In order to have a first step, I had to want something. I didn't feel like any of my wants were good enough. I didn't feel like any of my wants would lead me down the right path. Wanting things was so dangerous...

"You don't know what you're doing, but you also don't know what you want to be doing?" Blossom had her snarkiness turned off, and used only enquiring tones for clarity.

I shrugged, a substituted "yes". Blossom gave me a quizzical look, like she had never in her life not known what she wanted. In retrospect, maybe she hadn't. Blossom never seemed to let anything stall her. Obstacles were cracks in the sidewalk for Blossom.

"Well, let's start with what you want. You know in Disney films, the princess always has an I Want song, where she declares the thing she wants? What does your I Want song sound like, cupcake?"

"I... don't know..." I wasn't being difficult; I really didn't know. True love? Not really. To save the world, or whatever? That song might make it into the sequel. Even the idea of becoming some hot guy's full-time baby... I didn't want that either. All I really wanted was... "I wanna write?"

"Oh." Blossom tilted her head. She hadn't expected that. Like, of course she wanted to write, but that was her truest want? It sounded easy enough... but Blossom had to ask: "Why?"

Why did I want to write more than anything else? Why did I want to finish Academy Works? Fame, maybe? I wanted everyone to read it and tell their friends. I wanted it to be the pinnacle of what ABDL fiction could be. I wanted everyone to know the name Mia Moore.

But I wasn't Mia Moore. I was Amanda Pearson. If I wanted to be famous, why wasn't I writing a real book? Maybe I wanted to be a big fish, and that was easier done in a small pond. Ageplay fiction was such a small pond, and with podcasts and Discord and Twitter, it was a dying industry. Even if every ABDL read Academy Works, in ten years it would probably vanish into the bowels of the internet. It would be forgotten like a used diaper at the end of a changing scene.

So why did it matter? Why did any of it matter? Why did I want everyone to read it, and why did I want everyone to like it? Why did I want to be the greatest ABDL storyteller of all time?

"Because I want to be good at something," I told Blossom. "I just... want people to know that I can be good at something."

Blossom was silent for a moment, clearly at a loss for words, or maybe trying to find the right words. Finally, she broke into her signature smile and nodded her head in understanding.

"That is an amazing goal to have, cupcake. And hey - if you weren't good at this, you wouldn't have had that brat you went to high-school with falling head over heels to get to know you. And while our friendship has now bloomed into something independent of your writing, it's your writing that was our seed, and it'll always be a part of us. And I love that."

I don't know what it was in particular about Blossom's little speech that surprised me. Maybe it was because she didn't think my wants were stupid. Or maybe it was because she called us friends. But I think maybe it was because everything that ever happened with Blossom moving forward was not founded on our relationship in high school or our relationship in college, but on my writing. And if writing was the only thing I could do well, then... well, maybe the things that came of it could be good too.

"Can I get out of here?" I asked. "The water is getting cold." I wasn't looking for permission; I was looking for privacy.

"Sure thing, cupcake. Thanks for talking with me."

Blossom got to her feet and stepped out of the bathroom to the adjacent closet, fished out a towel to hang on the rack inside the room, and then with a playful wave she stepped out of the bathroom to leave Amy to her business. She wasn't sure just how well that had all gone, but for the first time in her life Blossom Brixley was chasing someone. And she felt… perhaps pleased with herself.

Maybe even proud.