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The fabric floats around him in soft translucent layers, barely there, cut loose from beneath the chest and ending high on his thighs.

There is a matching little piece of something—maybe ribbon, maybe lace—near the neckline.

I don’t know fashion. I have lost all capacity for textile analysis.

Because under that ethereal pink cloud are not the matching panties I expected. No. Kammie has on a thick white diaper that is painfully, blatantly obvious through the sheer fabric.

Our eyes meet in the mirror. His face goes scarlet. Mine probably does something considerably less innocent.

Neither of us speaks.

He grips the hem of that sheer slip of cloth with both hands while I grip the door frame.

He looks away, not at the floor, but at the reflected edge of his own jaw. His mouth works, then stops. Even his knuckles have gone pink, where they clutch at the hem.

I have waited through firefights, surgeries, and one particularly slow DMV queue, but none of that prepared me for this standoff. My heart is an artillery round.

“Kammie,” I manage.

He flinches, then launches into a hurried explanation. “I tried on the babydoll first,” he says, voice thin and wild. “Just to see. Because the color was pretty and the fabric was soft, and—and then I remembered the bag in the closet, and I thought—I thought—”

He stops, takes a shuddering breath, and fists the skirt tighter. His legs are trembling, which makes the whole confection of lace and plastic shift in the light.

“I saw the diapers, and I wanted to try one. I just did. And now it probably looks weird, and I know that’s not—”

I step into the room before he can finish.

Kamden’s eyes dart from my face to the mirror and back again. His throat works as he swallows, and he stands up even straighter, like the only path is through the storm.

I can’t decide whether to drag him into my arms or get on my knees and worship whatever secret part of him decided this risk was worth taking.

“Why didn’t you—” My voice cracks, and I have to try again, softer. “Why didn’t you let me help?”

Kammie blinks at me, then at himself, then at me again. His lip curls, not in disgust but confusion. “I just wanted to see,” he says finally. “It was right there. I didn’t think.”

I cross the last step between us and gently put my hands on his arms. The fabric is so thin it barely counts as a barrier, and his skin is shaking underneath it.

“Do you—” I start, then abort. Ask the question, Adrien. It’s not a bomb. “Do you like it?”

He nods, a tiny, desperate gesture. “Maybe? I don’t know. I just—sometimes I want to, and sometimes I don’t. Isn’t that stupid?”

I shake my head. “No,” I say, and it comes out like a verdict. “It’s not stupid at all. I thought you didn’t really like them, since you never… You’ve got all your pretty panties, and—”

He chews the inside of his cheek, and when he looks up, there’s a kind of raw, pleading honesty in his eyes. “I do love the panties,” he says. “But… maybe sometimes…”

I pull him in, just close enough for my voice to be an echo against his hair. “Sometimes, you want this instead.”

He closes his eyes, and the smallest sigh escapes him. “Yeah.”

“Okay,” I say, and this time it is a promise.

I move slowly, so slowly he could stop me with half a motion, but he doesn’t. I run my hand down his arm, to his wrist, then guide his fingers to loosen their death grip on the hem.

I take his hands in mine, one in each, and hold them gently out to the sides so the babydoll’s skirt flutters down to cover him. He keeps his eyes fixed just past my shoulder, as if afraid to look directly at me—at himself.

I could play this cool. I could say something affirming, or just nod like this is perfectly routine. But I don’t want to. There is nothing routine about how hard my pulse hammers, nor the way my stomach flips over itself, nor the absolute, all-consuming urge to take this boy apart and put him back together, softer and safer every time.

“Kammie,” I say, voice barely above a whisper. “If you want to take it off, you can. If you want to just wear it around the house, you can. If you want me to hold you, or rock you, or just leave you alone, you tell me, and I’ll listen.”