Tweet
This isn’t a story in the classic pornographic sense of the word. It isn’t necessarily good looking, arousing or sexually desirable, but then again, neither am I. I wrote a long time ago, in boredom after reading a number of posts from ABDLs who were torn between their love of an unaccepting partner and what they are. Perhaps one of them will use it as a prism to see into their own possible future. Perhaps others will simply find it of interest.
Fortunately, it is NOT autobiographical. Not at all. More a technical exercise to see if I *could* write.
/* Like the skin on a dying man */
As water will erode rock, desire will defeat danger and when it does, crusades and ventures play chicken with fate, even in small, urban endeavours. Thus David again, found himself running the gauntlet of his spouse-patrolled kitchen at the rear of his small, red brick semi, hoping to escape unnoticed to the back garden beyond.
“HELLO!!! HELLO!!!” shrieked Percy, his wife’s green parrot as he was attempting to sidle past it’s ludicrous neo-Victorian cage beside the kitchen door.
In an instant, Helen had turned from the cooker to catching him in her gaze, like a speed camera, halfway across the kitchen floor between the sitting room and the safe haven of the laundry with its back door. Slightly flour dusted and a little greyer with faint wrinkles, she nevertheless held a trim and attractive figure that defied her 47 years and motherhood. He loved her, in spite of everything.
“Where are YOU going?” she demanded.
“I, I, was going to take a look at the mower, it wasn’t working well the other day…”
“Well you pick a funny time to do that. Don’t spend all afternoon there, you know I’ve got the Franklins over for Bridge tonight and I need you to clean up that sitting room!”
“No dear….”
Ah yes the Franklins and more specifically, their larger house, opera membership, BMW and their potential as a gateway to a higher social caste. These were all very important to Helen and Bridge was a small price to pay.
With only disapproval instead of prohibition, David, quietly went on into the laundry and out to the yard, closing the back door behind him with as silent a “click” as it permitted.. It was late afternoon and the cold, blue/grey winter light was failing as he proceeded down the short paving stone path to the battered cypress paling garden shed at its end. He entered. Closing the rickety door with its simple metal clip behind him was more about privacy than any protection from the damp cold. He turned immediately to the mountain of rubbish that lay within.
Unerringly navigating through the gloom, he moved the rusty lawn mower back to reveal a glimpse of an innocuous little crate, partially covered with a rough Hessian sack resting with studied anonymity in a rear corner. A battalion of rusted and disused garden implements stood guard before it. Reaching down and between the tools, he tugged the sack away, coincidentally showering a mixture of dusty garden waste over the crate’s contents.
“Bugger!”
Extricating from the crate a tattered unmarked plastic bag, he brushed away as much as he could of the debris that had fallen onto and into it. Within it was another opened bag, for the most part empty but at the bottom, a couple of folded adult sized disposable nappies remained; their crisp whiteness and tightly compressed folds incongruous against the dirt and fertiliser pellets that had spilled onto them. Sliding one out of the pack, he quickly stuffed the bags back into the crate, recovering them with the disguising sack.
He’d never really liked disposable nappies. He didn’t like the tapes, the feel of unpadded plastic against his skin, the thin, papery crinkling and the inevitable leaks. In his wild, days, before he had married Helen, he had cupboards of thick, terry towel nappies, plastic pants, pins, photo-copies of typed stories, obscure magazines with amateurish, hand-drawn pictures and grainy monochrome photos, whole days where he had indulged his whim and shared with a network of shadowy, like-minded contacts through letters to those magazine or even messages on the new, modem-based bulletin boards that were appearing. That was a long time ago. Unfolding a nappy now always brought these memories back, a past pleasure blended inextricably with the pain of its loss.
It had been the inevitable consequence of his lovesick desire to confess all to her that had led him to make those stumbling, awkward confessions all those years ago. She was young, she was beautiful and she was his fiancé. It seemed only fair that she should understand fully the creature that was asking her to spend the rest of her life with it. Dizzy with love for her he held hope that she could value this truth of him, live with this truth of him and even that she would in some way embrace this truth of him.
It hadn’t been like that.
Her first reactions had been incredulity, quickly turning to concern. What of children (for there had to be children, this was important to her)? Would he molest them? Would he be somehow jealous of them? Hours upon hours of assurances and explanation from him had followed. Then the tears started. He didn’t love her; he only loved his “things”. Constant assurances could not quell the fires of her mounting upset. He tried telling her that the only reason he had shared this with her was because his love couldn’t bear the thought of anything less than total transparency. Next came the practicalities: the smell, the washing, the “what-if-the-neighbours-found-out? David talked with her up hill and down dale well into the early hours of the next morning until there was nothing more either of them could think of to say. As Helen left his place for her home in the cool grey dawn light, tired and spent, David hoped that she may choose to accept him as he was, even share this part of him.
Days went by. He did not hear from her. A cold lump in his stomach quivered and grew with each unreturned phone message he left with her parents. He began to consider the doomsday scenario of losing her.
One week to the day she called. She wanted to meet, she wanted to talk. Yes, anywhere, anytime! Frantically, he listened intensely to each of the brief syllables she uttered over the phone, desperate for a clue as to her intentions.
And so they met for lunch the next day. The venue: a dingy café just off High St. Worn laminate surfaces in washed-out 1960s pastels adorned spindly, chrome-legged tables dull with age. Across the grime-stained linoleum floor, a grey net curtain afforded some privacy from shoppers walking by like penguins in heavy, black winter overcoats. A booth at the rear of the premises afforded obscurity and some degree of privacy.
As Helen surveyed the anaemic ham and cheese toasted sandwich placed in front of her, she began to speak. The opacity of her weeks silence was stark contrast to the transparent clarity of her speech to him now. David was a good man and her affection for him was abiding. David was flushed by a warm wave of relief. He was not about to be discarded.
Helen continued: her affection was even deep enough for her to withstand his revelation of such a horrendous character flaw. She would stand by him but “that” must be excised from him, removed, and neither mentioned nor manifested to her or in her house. Any “things” he had were to be destroyed immediately and she was never to sight them lest her revulsion defeat her affection. Even the discussion itself was to be buried. It was the only hope. Her resolve was immovable and implacable. .
Within days, bin liners of nappies, plastic pants and all his other accoutrement of his banished practice were anonymously dumped.- a bitter reverse-dowry that he had reluctantly paid as the price of his love; a love that had survived somehow in this form to this day.
Helen was a choosy woman and had remained consistently so across the years. She selected and rejected desired traits in her friends, partners and possessions as though selecting fruit at a stall. For most of his adulthood, David had found himself living a life choreographed tightly to what Helen did, and did not want. His predilection for nappies was, in her view, an emphatically rotten fruit.
Still, a fetish was a fetish and must be accommodated somehow. He could no more renounce this sexual need than he could carve out his memories to throw away with his “things”. So had ensued 25 years of sporadic, brief and furtive fumbling in an uncomfortable disposable nappy hidden in a series of “safe” locations outside the house, the latest of which (now that their only child had left home) was the garden shed..
Turning again to the matter at hand he unfolded the nappy. A little dirt had fallen on it which he shook off as best as he could. The damp of the shed had also permeated its absorbent gel. A slightly swollen appearance and a musty smell warned him that the absorbency of this garment was in all likelihood quite limited.
Looking out the shed window back up the path, he checked and saw her through the window and that she was still in the kitchen, pre-occupied with hors d’ouvres. Quickly, he slid down his trousers and underwear. It was quite cold in the shed but he was adept with practice and in 15 seconds or so, he’d quickly taped on the nappy and was pulling his underwear and trousers back up over it. A little grit must have remained in them however and his spent more seconds adjusting himself to remove the itch thus caused.
Thus attired, he immediately turned and stood against the shed bench, his hands resting on its rough-hewn wood surface, briefly savouring the comforting bulk between his legs. Time, however was the finite resource that and conserving it demanded rapid progression of the exercise. Whilst gazing out the window back towards the kitchen wall, he released his bladder. A hot, salt coin at the tip of his penis rapidly spread into a glowing bread-plate sized heat across the front of his nappy as hot trickles escaped immediate absorption and ran back down his penis, tickling his scrotum. Although his eyes gazed outside, they were blank as he concentrated on the warm, heavy sensations spreading through his crotch.
In seconds it was over. He couldn’t pee much into those disposables anyhow as they’d only leak and he’d certainly struggle to explain his wet clothing to Helen. He savoured the dissipating warmth from his unconventional underwear and the half erection he had down in the damp confines of his nappy grew more insistent.
Leaning forward slightly further, his crotch touched the edge of the bench and he began to rub himself gently against it feeling the damp, warm gel pleasantly embracing him. As he did so, he fantasised. He fantasised about his bachelor days when he was free to spend entire days and nights in nappies. He fantasised about Helen, about her embracing and kissing while knowing he was wet. He fantasised about lying in bed next to her at night, under the covers snug in his old terry nappies and plastic pants. He fantasised of other things that had never been and never would..
His rocking against the edge of the bench increased in pace.
With arousal heightened, his fantasies focussed on the more visceral. He fantasised about easing down a heavy wet nappy and plastic pants from Helen’s waist, exposing her pee-wet sex. He fantasied about stroking her hair and nuzzling her breasts gently while she filled her nappy for him. He fantasised about turning her over in bed, pulling his own wet nappy down slightly and her wet nappy to one side then fucking her like an animal from behind with the faint smell of urine, the swishing of their plastic pants rubbing and her moans of desire as props on his mental stage. His knees weakened, his vision darkened and with a faint groan befitting a modest climax, his penis twitched spasmodically, his seed joining his urine within the waiting nappy.
The cleanup had to be quick - as quick as the fading of his excitement after climax. He always lost track of time doing this. Sliding his pants back down, he ripped off the disposable and wrapped it into a small ball, a heavy, warm thing, like a freshly killed bird. The cold air chilled his damp flesh and he quickly yanked his underwear and trousers back up. He would shower later. A quick double-check to make sure that his clothing was back in order and he stooped to exit the shed.
It was nearly dark now. The path was wet and a light rain was falling. With the balled up nappy tucked under his cardigan, he scuttled up the path, briefly looking up towards the yellow light spilled from the kitchen window above him. As quietly as possible, he lifted the lid of the dustbin that stood sentinel at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the back door and carefully submerged the used nappy under some existing rubbish. With a last check of his clothing for signs of dampness or disarray, he ascended the stairs, opened the dark green back door and unobtrusively as possible, made a beeline across from the laundry across the kitchen to the sitting room and safety.
“HELLO!!” trumpeted Percy shrilly, vaporising any chance of a camouflaged return.
Helen turned from the dishes she was drying to face him.
“Well you certainly took your time! I don’t know WHAT you do out there, LOOK at the state of you!. I hope you’ll go and see to sitting room as it isn’t fit to be sat in!”.
An almost imperceptible tightening of the crows feet beside her eyes and her extra-vigorous tea towelling of the cup she held gave faint betrayal to her disgust. She knew exactly “what you do out there”.. Of course she knew. She had always known. He knew she knew; but it could not be discussed. Her inexhaustible cold charity was yet again bestowed by her grim preparedness to yet again, pretend it hadn’t happened.
Like all rooms of their small house, the sitting room was furnished strictly in accordance with Helen’s tastes. Crowded with over-stuffed cushions and chintz sofas too big for them room were draped with crocheted quilts, for the most part covered in dog hair from the horrid little Shitzhu that had taken pride of place in Helen’s heart since their daughter had left for a flat of her own. Too many lamps provided too much illumination.
David began to tidy.
Numbly he stuffed used newspapers under the coffee table, tidied the television remote controls (why were there always at least three of them?), and put away her magazines in the ritualised prelude to an evening of Bridge. The television was switched on as it usually was drenching the small room with a blanket of ceaseless chatter as it usually was, insulating all occupants from any chance of discourse.. Tonight on ITV, a nubile young girl twittered on about the fabulous climate and beaches of an Indonesian island resort as David pondered the more pressing matter of where to stash the dog-saliva-soaked ball he’d found abandoned under an armchair. God knows where the dog was, probably asleep on his pillow. His crotch was damp and itchy as though irritable at being plucked from its warm confines so soon.
An abrasive, yellow note from the television momentarily penetrated the mental fog his mundane tasks had brought down. -
“A PRIVATE PARADISE WHERE YOU CAN TRULY BE YOURSELF!!” shrieked a televised nymphette.
Dried dishes were being clattered angrily from the kitchen.
Looking up, the telly showed only blurry hints of azure and beige tropical beach hues. He blinked. Now the whole television set was blurred, the room was blurred, even the miniature china penguin figurine he’d been tidying away to nowhere in particular was blurred.. Blinking his eyes together harder in a moment of confusion, he realised that it was because he was crying. He didn’t know for how long he’d been doing so.
Fortunately, it is NOT autobiographical. Not at all. More a technical exercise to see if I *could* write.
/* Like the skin on a dying man */
As water will erode rock, desire will defeat danger and when it does, crusades and ventures play chicken with fate, even in small, urban endeavours. Thus David again, found himself running the gauntlet of his spouse-patrolled kitchen at the rear of his small, red brick semi, hoping to escape unnoticed to the back garden beyond.
“HELLO!!! HELLO!!!” shrieked Percy, his wife’s green parrot as he was attempting to sidle past it’s ludicrous neo-Victorian cage beside the kitchen door.
In an instant, Helen had turned from the cooker to catching him in her gaze, like a speed camera, halfway across the kitchen floor between the sitting room and the safe haven of the laundry with its back door. Slightly flour dusted and a little greyer with faint wrinkles, she nevertheless held a trim and attractive figure that defied her 47 years and motherhood. He loved her, in spite of everything.
“Where are YOU going?” she demanded.
“I, I, was going to take a look at the mower, it wasn’t working well the other day…”
“Well you pick a funny time to do that. Don’t spend all afternoon there, you know I’ve got the Franklins over for Bridge tonight and I need you to clean up that sitting room!”
“No dear….”
Ah yes the Franklins and more specifically, their larger house, opera membership, BMW and their potential as a gateway to a higher social caste. These were all very important to Helen and Bridge was a small price to pay.
With only disapproval instead of prohibition, David, quietly went on into the laundry and out to the yard, closing the back door behind him with as silent a “click” as it permitted.. It was late afternoon and the cold, blue/grey winter light was failing as he proceeded down the short paving stone path to the battered cypress paling garden shed at its end. He entered. Closing the rickety door with its simple metal clip behind him was more about privacy than any protection from the damp cold. He turned immediately to the mountain of rubbish that lay within.
Unerringly navigating through the gloom, he moved the rusty lawn mower back to reveal a glimpse of an innocuous little crate, partially covered with a rough Hessian sack resting with studied anonymity in a rear corner. A battalion of rusted and disused garden implements stood guard before it. Reaching down and between the tools, he tugged the sack away, coincidentally showering a mixture of dusty garden waste over the crate’s contents.
“Bugger!”
Extricating from the crate a tattered unmarked plastic bag, he brushed away as much as he could of the debris that had fallen onto and into it. Within it was another opened bag, for the most part empty but at the bottom, a couple of folded adult sized disposable nappies remained; their crisp whiteness and tightly compressed folds incongruous against the dirt and fertiliser pellets that had spilled onto them. Sliding one out of the pack, he quickly stuffed the bags back into the crate, recovering them with the disguising sack.
He’d never really liked disposable nappies. He didn’t like the tapes, the feel of unpadded plastic against his skin, the thin, papery crinkling and the inevitable leaks. In his wild, days, before he had married Helen, he had cupboards of thick, terry towel nappies, plastic pants, pins, photo-copies of typed stories, obscure magazines with amateurish, hand-drawn pictures and grainy monochrome photos, whole days where he had indulged his whim and shared with a network of shadowy, like-minded contacts through letters to those magazine or even messages on the new, modem-based bulletin boards that were appearing. That was a long time ago. Unfolding a nappy now always brought these memories back, a past pleasure blended inextricably with the pain of its loss.
It had been the inevitable consequence of his lovesick desire to confess all to her that had led him to make those stumbling, awkward confessions all those years ago. She was young, she was beautiful and she was his fiancé. It seemed only fair that she should understand fully the creature that was asking her to spend the rest of her life with it. Dizzy with love for her he held hope that she could value this truth of him, live with this truth of him and even that she would in some way embrace this truth of him.
It hadn’t been like that.
Her first reactions had been incredulity, quickly turning to concern. What of children (for there had to be children, this was important to her)? Would he molest them? Would he be somehow jealous of them? Hours upon hours of assurances and explanation from him had followed. Then the tears started. He didn’t love her; he only loved his “things”. Constant assurances could not quell the fires of her mounting upset. He tried telling her that the only reason he had shared this with her was because his love couldn’t bear the thought of anything less than total transparency. Next came the practicalities: the smell, the washing, the “what-if-the-neighbours-found-out? David talked with her up hill and down dale well into the early hours of the next morning until there was nothing more either of them could think of to say. As Helen left his place for her home in the cool grey dawn light, tired and spent, David hoped that she may choose to accept him as he was, even share this part of him.
Days went by. He did not hear from her. A cold lump in his stomach quivered and grew with each unreturned phone message he left with her parents. He began to consider the doomsday scenario of losing her.
One week to the day she called. She wanted to meet, she wanted to talk. Yes, anywhere, anytime! Frantically, he listened intensely to each of the brief syllables she uttered over the phone, desperate for a clue as to her intentions.
And so they met for lunch the next day. The venue: a dingy café just off High St. Worn laminate surfaces in washed-out 1960s pastels adorned spindly, chrome-legged tables dull with age. Across the grime-stained linoleum floor, a grey net curtain afforded some privacy from shoppers walking by like penguins in heavy, black winter overcoats. A booth at the rear of the premises afforded obscurity and some degree of privacy.
As Helen surveyed the anaemic ham and cheese toasted sandwich placed in front of her, she began to speak. The opacity of her weeks silence was stark contrast to the transparent clarity of her speech to him now. David was a good man and her affection for him was abiding. David was flushed by a warm wave of relief. He was not about to be discarded.
Helen continued: her affection was even deep enough for her to withstand his revelation of such a horrendous character flaw. She would stand by him but “that” must be excised from him, removed, and neither mentioned nor manifested to her or in her house. Any “things” he had were to be destroyed immediately and she was never to sight them lest her revulsion defeat her affection. Even the discussion itself was to be buried. It was the only hope. Her resolve was immovable and implacable. .
Within days, bin liners of nappies, plastic pants and all his other accoutrement of his banished practice were anonymously dumped.- a bitter reverse-dowry that he had reluctantly paid as the price of his love; a love that had survived somehow in this form to this day.
Helen was a choosy woman and had remained consistently so across the years. She selected and rejected desired traits in her friends, partners and possessions as though selecting fruit at a stall. For most of his adulthood, David had found himself living a life choreographed tightly to what Helen did, and did not want. His predilection for nappies was, in her view, an emphatically rotten fruit.
Still, a fetish was a fetish and must be accommodated somehow. He could no more renounce this sexual need than he could carve out his memories to throw away with his “things”. So had ensued 25 years of sporadic, brief and furtive fumbling in an uncomfortable disposable nappy hidden in a series of “safe” locations outside the house, the latest of which (now that their only child had left home) was the garden shed..
Turning again to the matter at hand he unfolded the nappy. A little dirt had fallen on it which he shook off as best as he could. The damp of the shed had also permeated its absorbent gel. A slightly swollen appearance and a musty smell warned him that the absorbency of this garment was in all likelihood quite limited.
Looking out the shed window back up the path, he checked and saw her through the window and that she was still in the kitchen, pre-occupied with hors d’ouvres. Quickly, he slid down his trousers and underwear. It was quite cold in the shed but he was adept with practice and in 15 seconds or so, he’d quickly taped on the nappy and was pulling his underwear and trousers back up over it. A little grit must have remained in them however and his spent more seconds adjusting himself to remove the itch thus caused.
Thus attired, he immediately turned and stood against the shed bench, his hands resting on its rough-hewn wood surface, briefly savouring the comforting bulk between his legs. Time, however was the finite resource that and conserving it demanded rapid progression of the exercise. Whilst gazing out the window back towards the kitchen wall, he released his bladder. A hot, salt coin at the tip of his penis rapidly spread into a glowing bread-plate sized heat across the front of his nappy as hot trickles escaped immediate absorption and ran back down his penis, tickling his scrotum. Although his eyes gazed outside, they were blank as he concentrated on the warm, heavy sensations spreading through his crotch.
In seconds it was over. He couldn’t pee much into those disposables anyhow as they’d only leak and he’d certainly struggle to explain his wet clothing to Helen. He savoured the dissipating warmth from his unconventional underwear and the half erection he had down in the damp confines of his nappy grew more insistent.
Leaning forward slightly further, his crotch touched the edge of the bench and he began to rub himself gently against it feeling the damp, warm gel pleasantly embracing him. As he did so, he fantasised. He fantasised about his bachelor days when he was free to spend entire days and nights in nappies. He fantasised about Helen, about her embracing and kissing while knowing he was wet. He fantasised about lying in bed next to her at night, under the covers snug in his old terry nappies and plastic pants. He fantasised of other things that had never been and never would..
His rocking against the edge of the bench increased in pace.
With arousal heightened, his fantasies focussed on the more visceral. He fantasised about easing down a heavy wet nappy and plastic pants from Helen’s waist, exposing her pee-wet sex. He fantasied about stroking her hair and nuzzling her breasts gently while she filled her nappy for him. He fantasised about turning her over in bed, pulling his own wet nappy down slightly and her wet nappy to one side then fucking her like an animal from behind with the faint smell of urine, the swishing of their plastic pants rubbing and her moans of desire as props on his mental stage. His knees weakened, his vision darkened and with a faint groan befitting a modest climax, his penis twitched spasmodically, his seed joining his urine within the waiting nappy.
The cleanup had to be quick - as quick as the fading of his excitement after climax. He always lost track of time doing this. Sliding his pants back down, he ripped off the disposable and wrapped it into a small ball, a heavy, warm thing, like a freshly killed bird. The cold air chilled his damp flesh and he quickly yanked his underwear and trousers back up. He would shower later. A quick double-check to make sure that his clothing was back in order and he stooped to exit the shed.
It was nearly dark now. The path was wet and a light rain was falling. With the balled up nappy tucked under his cardigan, he scuttled up the path, briefly looking up towards the yellow light spilled from the kitchen window above him. As quietly as possible, he lifted the lid of the dustbin that stood sentinel at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the back door and carefully submerged the used nappy under some existing rubbish. With a last check of his clothing for signs of dampness or disarray, he ascended the stairs, opened the dark green back door and unobtrusively as possible, made a beeline across from the laundry across the kitchen to the sitting room and safety.
“HELLO!!” trumpeted Percy shrilly, vaporising any chance of a camouflaged return.
Helen turned from the dishes she was drying to face him.
“Well you certainly took your time! I don’t know WHAT you do out there, LOOK at the state of you!. I hope you’ll go and see to sitting room as it isn’t fit to be sat in!”.
An almost imperceptible tightening of the crows feet beside her eyes and her extra-vigorous tea towelling of the cup she held gave faint betrayal to her disgust. She knew exactly “what you do out there”.. Of course she knew. She had always known. He knew she knew; but it could not be discussed. Her inexhaustible cold charity was yet again bestowed by her grim preparedness to yet again, pretend it hadn’t happened.
Like all rooms of their small house, the sitting room was furnished strictly in accordance with Helen’s tastes. Crowded with over-stuffed cushions and chintz sofas too big for them room were draped with crocheted quilts, for the most part covered in dog hair from the horrid little Shitzhu that had taken pride of place in Helen’s heart since their daughter had left for a flat of her own. Too many lamps provided too much illumination.
David began to tidy.
Numbly he stuffed used newspapers under the coffee table, tidied the television remote controls (why were there always at least three of them?), and put away her magazines in the ritualised prelude to an evening of Bridge. The television was switched on as it usually was drenching the small room with a blanket of ceaseless chatter as it usually was, insulating all occupants from any chance of discourse.. Tonight on ITV, a nubile young girl twittered on about the fabulous climate and beaches of an Indonesian island resort as David pondered the more pressing matter of where to stash the dog-saliva-soaked ball he’d found abandoned under an armchair. God knows where the dog was, probably asleep on his pillow. His crotch was damp and itchy as though irritable at being plucked from its warm confines so soon.
An abrasive, yellow note from the television momentarily penetrated the mental fog his mundane tasks had brought down. -
“A PRIVATE PARADISE WHERE YOU CAN TRULY BE YOURSELF!!” shrieked a televised nymphette.
Dried dishes were being clattered angrily from the kitchen.
Looking up, the telly showed only blurry hints of azure and beige tropical beach hues. He blinked. Now the whole television set was blurred, the room was blurred, even the miniature china penguin figurine he’d been tidying away to nowhere in particular was blurred.. Blinking his eyes together harder in a moment of confusion, he realised that it was because he was crying. He didn’t know for how long he’d been doing so.