Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 80562 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80562 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
I give her a long look. “Alright. Yeah. I guess you’re right. But I don’t like lying to my teammates.”
“They’ll understand once we can explain our reasoning. And if anybody gets too close or sniffs us out, we’ll just bring them into the fold. Only on an absolutely-need-to-know basis.”
“If you say so,” I say. I pause, sniffing the air. Something foul hits my nostrils. “I think Walker may have… taken a shit.”
She laughs. “Babies do that. Do you want the honors?”
I can’t help flinching a little. “You want me to change his diaper?” I ask.
“If we’re going to fool anybody, you probably should look like you know how to care for a baby. It’s going to be suspicious if you can’t.”
I steel my nerves. I can do this. I’ve played in the Stanley Cup finals. I’ve faced off against some of the most badass athletes on the planet and come out on top. I can handle a poopy fucking diaper. “Alright. Let’s do it,” I say firmly.
She gives me an amused look and unclips Walker from the carrier, lifting him up, kissing him, and rubbing her nose against his. He giggles at the attention as she carefully lays him on his back on the bed.
“The diapers are in that bag,” she says, pointing. “Side pouch.”
The hotel staff already brought our stuff up to the room, so I find the diaper bag in the closest and bring out a diaper. “Do I need baby powder, or something?”
“Walker doesn’t seem to need it. Just get that package of wipes.”
“How many do I get?”
“The whole package,” she says with a little humor twinkling in her eyes.
I push down a slight jab of fear at the certainty that I’ll need so many wipes. How much poop does this baby produce, anyway?
“Oh, and grab that,” she says, pointing. I pick up what seems like a washable little baby-changing blanket. It’s slick and covered in dinosaur print. “Put him on top of it so we don’t get poop on the bed.”
I narrow my eyes. “Why would poop get on the bed? Isn’t it just going to stay in the diaper?”
I don’t like how she’s grinning, but I do as I’m told and put him on the little mat.
Walker is looking up at me with a similar expression to his mom. It’s like they’re both in on it and enjoying this.
“Now what?” I ask.
“You take off the diaper and figure out what you’re working with.”
I brace myself, then unstrap the little side straps on his diaper. When I pull it down, I reel back and grimace. “Holy Hell,” I exclaim. “What are you feeding him?”
Walker seems to think I’m playing around because he starts bulging his eyes and kicking his chubby legs like crazy.
“Hey!” I say. “Quit playing around, kid. You’re going to get poop everywhere.”
Walker doesn’t care. He’s trying to flip over now. I’m pretty sure he’s not supposed to even be able to do that, but he’s certainly trying.
“What is he doing?” I ask.
“He loves getting his diaper changed. It gets him a little hyper. You should probably start using those wipes. Oh, and I usually–”
Warm liquid hits me in the face. It happens so fast and unexpectedly that I don’t move for a solid two seconds. Caroline is laughing her ass off because I’m getting peed on.
The little bastard is peeing on my face.
I fall backward, nearly knocking over the nightstand as I wipe at my face. “Oh God,” I gasp. “He pissed on me. He pissed on me.”
Caroline moves in, expertly wiping away all the poop, removing the diaper, and putting on a fresh one while I’m still on the ground in a state of shock.
She looks back at me and tosses a clean wipe my way. “Can you handle cleaning yourself up, or do you need my help for that, too?” There’s an edge of satisfaction in her voice like she knew I was going to show my ass when I tried to do this.
I take the wipe and smear it across my face, shaking my head. “I… did not expect to fail so badly at that. But you didn’t warn me he would fight back.”
She laughs. “Honestly, it’s kind of refreshing to see you do something badly. You’re always so good at everything. But everybody sucks at being a parent on their first try. It’s a learn-on-the-job kind of thing.”
Being a parent. I don’t know why, but that phrase hits me in a strange way. It makes my stomach flutter a little, even though I know she meant to say “pretending” to be a parent. “Yeah,” I say. “Well, thanks for not rubbing it in. Too much,” I add with a grin.
“You may want to change,” she says, looking at my shirt.
I look down and see I’ve been splattered from the stomach to the face with piss. I can’t believe such a small human can produce so much piss and shit, but I guess that’s all he can really do at this stage in his life. And if you’re only able to do one thing, you’re probably going to do a pretty damn good job at it. Good for you, kid.