“Yup. All dry.” Pearce finished giving the front of the diaper a squeeze, leaning back.

Grace crossed her arms. “What did you expect? It’s only been an hour.”

Wagging a finger at her, Pearce said, “I half expected you to pull a fast one on me to try and get me a penalty. Y’know, wait until I leave the room, crap your pants, start a one-hour timer in hopes that I’ll stop paying attention.”

Glancing away, Grace tried to look innocent. She had considered it, but… well, that was a bit of an extreme measure, and she was hoping to avoid using her diapers for that before the bet was up. Pearce didn’t need extra encouragement from her to be hypervigilant - or, well, he did, but not for the purposes of a bet intended to prove he was lazy and inattentive.

“Well, I’ll come check on you later then,” Pearce said.

“Yeah. Sure.”

Grace turned her attention away from Pearce and went back to her computer, designing some templates for a client. She only got a few minutes of real, solid work done before another interruption came in the form of a knock on her door.

Leaning back, she tabbed Control-S to save her work before she said, “Come on in.”

It was Brains, this time, holding his phone in both hands. “Hey, Grace. Are you busy?”

“Nothing I can’t take a break from,” she said, scooting her chair back so she could turn and face him. Her bedroom/office wasn’t huge, but there was enough room for two people to have a conversation comfortably. “What do you need?”

He glanced down at his phone, then back up at her. “It’s a social thing? I don’t know if I’m reading this conversation right and I wanted your advice.”

“Sure, lemme see.” Grace held out her hand, taking his phone and scrolling through a series of chat messages. “What’s the question, exactly?”

“So it’s this guy I’ve been chatting with,” Brains explained, stepping around so he could see the screen over her shoulder. “We met online, we’ve been talking for a couple weeks, and he just asked if I want to go catch dinner and see that new Marvel movie with him tonight.”

Grace skimmed the conversation, quickly getting the gist of things. “And? Do you not know if you want to go?”

“Well…” Brains shrugged. “Is it a date?”

“Oh.” Grace smirked. “Hold on, I’m catching up on stuff.”

“Okay,” he said, looking away and giving her a moment to read. After about two seconds of impatient waiting, he started tapping his foot on the ground, not so much in a ‘You’re taking too long’ way as an ‘I’m anxious and want to be moving’ way.

“What’s this thing he’s talking about?” Grace asked, pointing to a message. “‘I had a great time last night, we should do it again.’ He sent it a few days ago.”

“Oh, we went out to a bar for karaoke,” Brains explained.

“With friends?”

“Just us.”

“Hmm.”

“What?”

Grace kept scrolling up, until she could skim some of the oldest messages. After another couple minutes, she said, “Brains, as best I can figure, he’s asking you on a third date.”

He blinked, and his foot stopped tapping. “What?”

“You asked him out for coffee, and then he took you out for karaoke. What did you think, that you were just hanging out as platonic friends, together, alone, and just happening to do date activities?” Grace raised an eyebrow up at her friend.

Brains stared back, wide-eyed.

“Oh my god,” Grace said, handing his phone back. “You tell that man that yes, you would love to, and for the love of god, be sure you dress up nice for the occasion.”

“Thanks,” Brain said, looking down at his phone. “I mean, are you sure? Because I don’t want to misread-”

“Brains, look at the selfie that you took together while you were at Karaoke night,” Grace said.

“What about it?”

“You’re holding hands.”

“Oh, well I mean. Maybe he’s just like a touchy person who likes-”

“Brains.” Grace ran a hand through her hair in exasperation. “It’s a date. He’s probably going to try and kiss you tonight. Don’t panic and ruin it, okay?”

He didn’t seem totally convinced, but he nodded. “Sure. Yeah. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” Grace replied. “Let me know how it goes, he seems like a nice guy.”

Brains nodded, gesturing to the door with his thumb. “Want me to close this?”

Grace paused, then got up from her chair. “Eh, I’m going to get something to drink.”

“Cool.” He turned his attention to his phone, typing a response to his theoretical beau and ignoring her.

Waddling out of her room, Grace couldn’t help but smile. For as smart as Brains could be about some stuff, he was an absolute dunce at others. She couldn’t fathom how he had stayed oblivious to the romantic tension going on, given everything that had happened between him and the other guy.

Some people just can’t see what’s right in front of them, she thought, as she rapped on the second door down from her own. “Hey, Pearce. I need you.”

He didn’t answer right away, so she knocked harder.

“Pearce!”

Still no response. She put her ear to the door, and could faintly hear music.

Goddammit. Opening the door, she loudly called, “Pearce!”

He had on headphones and was sitting at his desk, surrounded by a hoard of empty cans and mugs. The music was blasting in his ears so loudly that Grace could hear it from across the room, and if he wasn’t totally nose-blind to the smell of stale drinks and dirty dishes, he didn’t seem to care.

Finally noticing Grace, he sat back and pulled off his headphones. “Hey, what’s-” He smirked, looking her up and down.

“What?” Grace demanded.

“You just look really cute,” Pearce said, adding quickly, “Like a baby dolly. Just ridiculous.”

Grace rolled her eyes. “Yeah, sure, whatever. I’m thirsty. Can I have some coffee?”

“Coffee’s not going to make you less thirsty,” he pointed out.

“Coffee and water, then,” she said.

“Sure. Let me get to a stopping point here, then I’ll go get it,” Pearce said, gesturing to his screen.

“Sure. Don’t forget,” Grace said, closing the door and returning to work. A twinge of suspicion convinced her to keep her own door open, though, watching the hallway.

Almost an hour later, she was still thirsty, and Pearce’s door hadn’t moved.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she grumbled. Getting up, she stormed back down the hallway - or, at least, she tried to. It was hard to work up a storm when her bottom was puffy and crinkled with every step.

Pounding on Pearce’s door, she waited only a second before throwing it open again. “PEARCE!”

He was exactly where she’d left him, sitting at his own desk, music blasting away, utterly oblivious to the passage of time.

(What a fucking asshole.)

Waddling over, she ripped the headphones off his head, and he started backward. “What the hell?”

“You said you’d get me something to drink!” Grace exclaimed, throwing up her hands. “That’s literally one of, like, four things that you have to do, and you already forgot.”

He frowned. “Yeah, I was going to do that once I got to a stopping point. It’s only been, like, fifteen-”

“An hour. Pearce, it’s been an hour.”

Eyes widening, he glanced back at his computer. “Shit. I’m sorry, I didn’t-”

“Bullshit,” she fumed. “Trying to make me quit because I’m dying of thirst is low, Pearce. Do we need to break out the rule book and add a line specifying that you can’t just deny me water?”

He got to his feet, quickly, shaking his head. “No, I- No. I’m sorry. I’ll go get that right now.”

“Uh-huh.” Grace crossed her arms. “I’ll wait.”

Pearce hurried out of the room, and true to her word, Grace waited stubbornly for him to return. She was half tempted to follow him down and make sure he didn’t get distracted by something else, but even Pearce couldn’t screw this up.

(Could he?)

After that thought crossed her mind, Grace walked downstairs anyways, glowering at the whole debacle. If Pearce wasn’t actually getting her water, she was going to kill-

She blinked. Someone was on the couch who she hadn’t expected. Specifically, a stranger.

“Um…” she said, looking down at herself for a moment and back up at the stranger, who was chatting with Melody.

Melody looked over, and the stranger finally took notice, staring in surprise.

“Uh, hi, Grace,” Melody said. “I didn’t think you’d be done working for a while or I’d have said something. Er... this is BB, the girl I’ve been talking to.”

“Which-” Grace shut her mouth before she could say, ‘Which one?’. “Which… um… which way did you see Pearce go?”

“He’s in the kitchen,” Melody said.

“Thanks. Um, nice to meet you, BB?”

BB looked at her. “You, uh. Nice outfit?”

She turned pink. “It’s… a long story. There’s a whole bet, and-”

Winking, BB said, “I get it, you don’t need to make excuses.”

“... sure,” Grace said, unconvinced, as she waddled out of the living room over to the kitchen.

Pearce, at least, had stayed on task and had two baby bottles for her, one with water, one with coffee the way she liked it. She took them both.

“You’re welcome,” Pearce said. Grace ignored him, her face red, storming back up to her room.

She ended up draining the water bottle in a few minutes. The rubber nipple made it slower to drink from than just a regular cup, but she was thirsty, and consistent suckling got the liquid out as fast as she could have expected.

The coffee she took her time on, taking occasional sips as she focused on work, blocking out her other grievances with the day. If Pearce forgot about her again, she was going to make damned sure that they added a rule about that. Or maybe she’d just kill him.

Grace ignored the other reason why she was grumpy. It was more pressing, but there was less for her to worry about.

While, logically, she had known this moment might come eventually, she’d really been hoping that Pearce would chicken out and concede before it came up. That wasn’t going to happen, though. All he had to do until dinner time was check her diaper and forget to bring her water, both things that didn’t take much effort.

And she wasn’t going to last until dinner time.

Grace really, really needed to pee.