Orphan Petal

June 2023 - Part 3

Shirley now is at an orphanage where Aunty works. He now will start a new journey. What path will he take?

This is a spin-off to the story "The Teenage Years of Alexander Horten"

Victoria Temple:
We are now in the third week of June and let's see what Shirley is up to. One reader told me that the diaper girl in his dreams is interesting. Can the diaper girl be Shirley's conscience on how he treated others who are different or is it a cry for help that he needs a friend? Another reader wrote to me that when she started reading the story she disliked Shirley. Now she feels sorry for him and thinks he must be a very confused boy. Does Shirley even know who he is? Doctor Mary thinks a lot of his bad attitude is a reflection of how his parents raised him to be and how to act. Now that his parents are dead, can Shirley find his identity?

Susan:
Shirley does not get upset anymore when people call him Shirley and not Shirl. Aunty told us all that we are to call him Shirley, so maybe this is why he has accepted it. I think that Shirley is obsessed with Aunty. He asks me a lot such as do I know where she is. Then he goes and finds her. Today when he came into my room, he did not ask about her. I was doing my homework and nearly pulling my hair out because I did not understand a word. Shirley asked me did I wanted any help. This surprised me a bit as he never helps anyone. It's good that he helped me, as he is very intelligent. He also made doing homework funny and to be honest, I never laughed so much! It was also nice seeing Shirley smile and laugh. I wish others could know him like I do.

Aunty:
Why does Shirley want to find me all the time and just look at me working? I do not say anything to him and when I do, I just snap at him. I do not understand why he even looks up to me. None of the other boys here like me. I think the only boy that I ever liked was my nephew and I manipulated him into being transgender years ago. I also admit that Shirley could make a lovely girl. He was small and looked so slender and he had an angelic face. He just needed his hair to grow. I could convince him that he was a girl, but I decided long ago to mend my ways and not manipulate boys. It would be fun to make Shirley love to wear dresses, but I think of how tough it was for Allie and did not want another boy to experience the same that he has.

Austin:
I tried to have a serious talk with Shirley as he sat on his bed. I told him that I knew that he had a rough time, but he had to remember that everyone experienced bad things. We all lost our parents or our parents take care of us. Shirley looked at me when I said this with a confused face. Then I reminded him that he had no friends here as no one liked him. Some were afraid of him. He just mumbled that he knew this and did not need a friend. I told him that he would need social skills to have a friend. I do not think he knows how to be with others and this is not because his parents died. I bet he was always a grumpy and judgemental twat. Despite I do not know if I liked Shirley or not, I reminded him not to get attached to Aunty as she did not like boys. I think it's too late for this. He seems to be hanging around her all the time. I wonder if Shirley is this way because he has a secret he is not telling us.

Susan:
Shirley asked me today did I have a lot of friends. I answered that I did have friends but no close friends. This was probably because I talked too much. Once again, I asked if Shirley considered me a friend. He said in a low voice that he did not have friends. He does not even think that Aunty likes him. I had to ask why on earth he wanted her to like him. That woman could not ever replace his mother. She has no clue how to work with children. Then he told me that he wanted to tell me a secret. He has an invisible friend and she is in his dreams. When I asked more about her, he did not tell me. For a minute, he was almost more human with me. Then his usual stern and serious face came back and warned me not to tell anyone. This made me laugh and I asked him does he think that he could beat me up. I would hit back and I am much stronger. Shirley stormed out of the room. This made me feel sad. I would never tell anyone. It proves that I talk too much and say things before I think.

Shirley:
The last week I have been looking at other children here. They played with each other and were always smiling and having fun. When I looked in the mirror, I did not like myself. Aunty was right. I was slender and very short. A fly could beat me up. I thought of all the children that I pushed or hit. They never hit back. If they did, I would be constantly in the hospital. Were they afraid of me or why did they not stand up for themselves? The thing is that I never had a friend. I remember when I told my parents about this, they would say things like no one was good enough for me. The world is full of liberal fanatics who think that everything is allowed, no matter how wrong it is. Aunty is right. Austin is right. Susan is right. I am just a sad and mean boy who can not accept others. I feel bad about how I treated others. I remembered what I did to Logan. I remembered how I treated Austin and Susan. I do want to be liked. I want Aunty to like me. I don’t know why, I just want this so much.

Aunty:
Shirley has been here for three weeks now. He needs new clothes and he could use a haircut. He asked me today if I thought he needed a haircut. I do not like boys with short hair. I told him that we could wait until next month to decide if we should cut his hair. Shirley has nice hair and it seems to be a shame to cut it. I know what you are thinking. I want him to have hair that makes him look more feminine. This is not true. Boys sometimes look good with long hair. There was no rush. I know that Shirley is the focus of his documentary, but I do have other children to think about!

Susan:
Today was a day that will go down in history. Shirley told me that he wanted to have a serious talk with me. I told him that was fine and then there was silence. I asked him what the problem was. Silence. I thought he wanted to warn me once again about not telling anyone about his invisible friend. He did not speak. It was like making a stone wall talk. Maybe I would have better luck there. I looked at Shirley for some time as he looked like a nervous lamb about to be slaughtered. He finally asked in a low voice if we could be friends. I did not get a chance to answer as he was giving a hundred reasons why we should be friends. I started laughing which made him look like he was going to cry. Since Shirley came here, I have considered him as a friend and told him this. I do not think that he understood this as he asked if this meant we were friends. When I told him of course it meant we were friends, he had the largest smile on his face.

Shirley:
I now have a friend. This was the hardest thing to do in my life. If I had so much trouble asking a girl to be my friend, how would I survive when I needed to ask a girl to marry me? Still, I was happy that I now had a friend. People no longer could bug me that I did not have a friend. Wait... I have two friends. I also have an invisible friend in my dreams. I do not even know her name except she wears diapers, and is short. She had nice hair and a nice personality and people liked her, except the bullies. I am a bit crazy that I think so much about a girl in my dreams. This afternoon, I sketched her. I am not a bad drawer and used most of the afternoon making the drawing perfect as it could be. In the end, I was happy about the result. The diaper girl was no longer just in my dreams, she was also on a piece of paper!

Austin:
When Shirley told me that he was officially friends with Susan, I went quiet for a while. I wanted to laugh but did not want to hurt his feelings. I thought it was strange that he used the word “official”. I never heard someone saying that a friendship was now official. I did tell him that I found it hard to believe that he had a new friend. The response was that he did not care what I thought. Later, I found out that it was Susan. She does not have that many friends, so the two losers are good for each other. No one else wants to be friends with them, so at least they have each other.

Susan:
Shirley is my friend, but today he embarrassed me. We were having fun and then he suddenly asked me what it was like wetting the bed and wearing diapers. He wanted to know if I was teased. If I wanted to wear them all the time. There was a barrage of questions from him. He wanted to know what it was like being a girl, He wanted to know if I wanted to be a baby girl. I snapped at him and told him to stop. Did he expect me to all these questions? It was something that I did not want to talk about. I told Shirley that as a friend, I would answer him, but I did not want him to tell others. I already told him that I wet the bed and had to wear diapers. My roommate told everyone that I wore them. Some teased me a lot like calling me names and saying I was a baby. I had no friends and some thought I wet the bed on purpose to get attention. I did not mind wearing diapers. I felt safe when I did, but I did not consider myself a baby. I stopped wetting the bed 4 months ago. It was about time I got rid of the bag of diapers. The fact is that I was afraid that I would start wetting again.

Aunty:
I was walking down the hallway when I heard Shirley ask what it was like to wear a diaper. Do not worry, I was not spying on them. The door was slightly opened. It was interesting that Shirley asked so many questions about diapers. Interesting indeed.

Shirley:
Today I found a stuffed unicorn on my bed. I hugged it and wondered who kept giving me these strange gifts. A week ago it was a pink pacifier and now a unicorn. It must be Susan because I asked her a few days ago if she wanted to be a baby. These gifts are embarrassing. A girl's pacifier? A girl's stuffed animal? I suppose that I should not get mad at Susan. It's not as if she had boy things to give to me as a present. Besides, I had worse things to worry about. Austin found the sketch of my invisible friend and asked why I had drawn a picture of a girl in a diaper.

Victoria Temple:
Thanks for reading this part. I hope you will comment. Why do you think Shirley is dreaming of a girl his age wearing a diaper? I hope to see you in the next part of “Orphan Petal"