Captured(82)

“Now what?” I ask.

“Wipe her ass, man!” Hunter’s advice.

“Wipe down, from the top to bottom.” This is from Rania.

“Wipe with what?”

“With the…wipes?” Hunter snickers, gesturing at the bag with the tongs. “In the diaper bag, dude. White package. Says ‘Pampers’ on it.”

I hold on to Emma’s ankles, which are kicking wildly, except the diaper bag is on the other side of me, so I have to reach over my body, grab the bag, set it on the other side. By now Emma is wriggling and twisting, and she’s got the khaki-colored poop all over her butt and it’s dripping everywhere.

Everyone is laughing hysterically.

“I don’t think I can do this.” I try to hold the squirming child in place, but it’s like trying to wrestle an alligator one-handed.

“Sure you can.” Hunter comes over, standing near me. “You’re a grown-ass man, D. She’s a four-month-old baby girl.”

I finally find the package of wipes, get it open with one hand, and manage to pull a wipe free. But six of them come out all strung together. I try snapping my wrist, and the bag of wipes goes flying.

Rania is laughing so hard she has to put her beer down, and Reagan is covering her mouth with her hand, watching me with humor shining in her eyes.

“Baby, you can do this.” She speaks from behind her hand, clearly trying not to laugh. “Just look at it as practice.”

Hunter’s head snaps up. “Wait. What do you mean, practice?”

Rania gives her husband an incredulous look. “For the baby? That they are having?” She points at Reagan, who turns sideways and pulls her T-shirt taut against her gently rounded belly. “You cannot mean you didn’t notice?”

Hunter glares at me. “How did you not tell me this, you *?”

Maida, a tall, brown-haired girl with Hunter’s eyes and the Arabic cast of Rania’s features, tugs on Hunter’s shirt. “Daddy. Daddy.”

“What, stinker?” He glances down at her.

“You can’t say ‘*.’ Mama said. ’Member? Now you gotta give me a dollar, ’cause I’ll just say ‘*’ at school and then I’ll get in trouble, and it’ll be your fault for teaching me bad words. Like ‘*.’”

Hunter stares down at his daughter, struggling between laughter and sternness. Laughter is clearly winning. “Maida. You just said ‘*,’ like, four times.”

“Three, Daddy. Three is not as many as four.”

“That’s right, baby. Good job.”

“Now gimme my dollar. And don’t say ‘*’ anymore.”

“MAIDA. Stop saying it!”

“I’m not saying it. I’m telling YOU not to say it.”

“But you’re still saying it—”

“Hunter,” Rania cuts in. “Stop arguing with your daughter. Maida—” And here, Rania spews a rapid string of Arabic.

Maida hangs her head. “Yes, Mama. Sorry, Daddy.”

Apparently their daughter is bilingual.

I’ve gotten most of the poop off Emma’s bottom during this exchange, but it’s taken a good dozen wipes. I move her legs around and lift her butt off the pad, making sure I didn’t miss any. Oops, there’s a big smear of it, halfway up her back. Once she’s finally clean, I stick a diaper under Emma. Except now I can’t figure out which way it goes. There’s the tape, so maybe….

“It’s upside down, D.” Hunter spins his finger. “Turn it around. Tape goes by her back.” I get the diaper fastened around the squirming little poo-monster, but Hunter makes a sound. “Nope. Too loose. It’ll just come off, or the sh—the poop—will leak out the sides. Tighten it up a little. There ya go. The tape usually goes right up to the pictures.”

I snap the buttons in place and hold Emma up triumphantly. “Bam. BAM. Say what now?”

“Now throw the diaper away.” Hunter tapes it closed to itself in a practiced move, hands it to me. “Good job. You changed your first diaper. Did better than I did my first time. Learned the hard way what happens when you don’t put a diaper on an infant tightly enough.”

I bring the diaper inside, toss it in the trash can. Hunter is behind me. “You probably want to wash your hands.” He’s silent for several beats. “So Reagan is pregnant?”

“Yeah.”

“Is that why you’re thinking about proposing?”

“Partly. Not entirely.” I take longer than I need to at the sink.

“I want you to be happy, man. You’ve been through some serious shit, and I know how hard it can be to assimilate. It just seems like this all happened really fast, you know? I don’t want you to rush into anything.”

“It did happen fast. My head spins sometimes, thinking about it.” I dry my hands and lean back against the sink. “I sometimes wonder if I have any clue what I’m getting myself into, you know? Like, I’m honestly worried it’s all too much, too fast. I mean, shit, you know how I used to be. A different girl every weekend. Sometimes more than one in a weekend—”

“And sometimes more than one at a time.”

“Yeah, that, too.” I laugh, then let out a sigh. “And now suddenly I’m gonna be a father, and I’m thinking about proposing? How did I get here?” I drop my voice to a whisper. “And…will I be able to handle it?”