Say Never Page 6

  Reflexively, I glance down and am horrified to see that I have unwittingly entered a wet t-shirt contest with myself. The damp white cotton of the tee is plastered to my breasts, leaving nothing to the imagination. I clasp the Hefty bag to my chest and utter a swift “Fuck!”

  “Sorry,” Matt says, his face turning red, although I’m pretty sure not as red as mine.

  “You’re sorry?” I sputter. “I’m sorry!”

  At that moment, the girls march into the kitchen in a single file line, chanting “Pizza” at the top of their lungs, followed by Tebow who is hollering something through his pacifier that doesn’t even remotely sound like the word pizza. The little procession stomps around the table like Nazis, their volume rising with every step.

  “How about another Dora?” I call out over the din. None of them pays any attention to me.

  “Pizza! Pizza! Pizza!” say the girls.

  “Mmilflew! Mmilflew! Mmilflew!” says my nephew.

  Still clutching the trash bag against me, I look at Matt imploringly.

  “Do you think you could call Domino’s while I, uh, take care of my clothes?” (Both the puke-covered clothes and the ones I’m wearing.)

  “No problem,” he replies graciously, his cheeks still slightly pink.

  “I don’t know where the number is!”

  “No problem.” He holds up his Samsung Galaxy for me to see. Ah, a man after my own technologically robotic heart. “I’ll take care of it.”

  I nod gratefully and hightail it to the back of the house. (All this rushing back and forth is almost as good as the treadmill. I can’t understand why all moms with young children aren’t absolutely skeletal.) Probably, I shouldn’t leave the girls and Tebow in the charge of a complete stranger, but Matt Ryan doesn’t strike me as a total psycho—and believe me I’ve met a few psychos in my time. Even dated a few, but that’s another story.

  In the guest bathroom, I grab the offending clothes from where I left them, on the bathmat, and shove them into the Hefty sack. I peer into the shower to see my beloved Louboutin boots right where I left them, drying by the drain. They will never be the same, but I can’t bring myself to throw them away. After a brief contemplation, I grab the bathmat and stuff it in the trash bag, disregarding the fact that Caroline will be really pissed when she finds her precious rug missing, then tie the bag shut.

  One glance in the bathroom mirror confirms my suspicions. I have been talking to a total hottie whilst looking like Who-Did-It-And-Ran. I see the reflection of the bed behind me with the detritus of my purse flung all over the comforter from Tebow’s earlier explorations. Suddenly, I remember my birth control pills and I practically leap to the bedside table where I hid them. Perched on the edge of the bed, I do a quick count and a little mental calculation and am relieved to discover that none of the pills are missing.

  I hop up, grab the trash bag, and head for the master bedroom. I drop the sack, then do another, less hurried (though still disappointing) perusal of Caroline’s closet. I opt for a pair of jeans—the only pair that has a zipper as opposed to elastic—and a dark-chocolate brown long-sleeved knit sweater. Within seconds, I’ve discarded the sweats and the lurid tee and donned the jeans and sweater, which are both surprisingly comfortable despite the fact that neither possesses a legible label.

  I take a few seconds to drag one of Caroline’s brushes through my hair (yup, my brushes are packed), knowing my reddish brown locks, which I so carefully straightened this morning before my flight, are about to curl up like Orphan-Freaking-Annie.

  If I thought my sister-in-law had any makeup that wouldn’t make me break out in a rash, I’d put some on. But I don’t trust Wet n’ Wild purchased from the Rite Aid next door to the 7-Eleven. And anyway, there’s no reason for me to put on makeup. It’s not like I’m trying to impress anyone. But damn it, why didn’t I put my makeup case in my purse instead of my luggage? (Answer: because it weighs a ton, and who knew my luggage would end up in Zaïre?)

  Trash bag in tow, I return to the kitchen. In the three minutes I was gone, Tebow has been strapped to a kitchen chair with plastic wrap. He has a pointy tinfoil hat on his head, and all six girls are dancing around him like a tribe of Pygmies, laughing and making screeching noises and poking at him with Expo markers that happen to be uncapped. Basically, he looks like the victim of an ancient Egyptian tagger.

  “What are you doing?” I cry, throwing my hands up in the air.

  “He likes it,” says McKenna, crossing her hands over her chest defensively. “Don’t you, TeeTee?”

  “Don’t call him that!” I say, remembering my childhood name for urine. Buddy, I have to make teetee! But when I look closely at my nephew, I see that he is giggling madly, despite the fact that his face is a rainbow of dry erase ink. Jesus, I hope that comes off.

  I realize that cardigan man and the dog are conspicuously absent. I’d be conspicuously absent too, if it were up to me.

  I cross to the back door, yank it open, and toss the trash bag out onto the concrete patio. Then I turn to face the mayhem and clear my throat in preparation for some serious stern voice.

  “Just stop it, okay? STOP!” The girls freeze in their tracks, six markers suspended in mid-air. “McKenna,” I say, taking the pen from her clammy grasp. “Where is Mr. Ryan and Godiva?”

  “Pizza!” she hollers, and the girls echo her. “Pizza! Pizza! Pizza!”

  It takes all of my restraint to keep from throttling her. “Yes. Pizza. It will be here soon.”

  “Yup. That’s what Mister Ryan said,” McKenna agrees. “He left you a note.”

  A note? She nods toward the counter next to the fridge where a small square piece of paper is tucked against the phone. I head for it, and the girls assume this is an invitation to continue with their satanic ritual.

  “No!” I grab the note, then return to the table and swoop Tebow into my arms and away from the rabid beasts. He hollers in protest, his pacifier shooting from his mouth and smacking me in the eye.

  “Youch!” Tears stream from my right eye as I try to read the note with the one good eye I have left.

  Delivery was an hour behind, so I went to pick up the pizzas. Took Godiva with me—thought there was enough commotion going on without her.

  Just then, the phone rings. I cross back to the counter to answer it, still carrying Tebow. As I lift the receiver, I sniff the air and realize that something is rotten in the state of Denmark. If the state of Denmark were my nephew’s diaper.

  “Hel—”

  Before I can complete the single-word greeting, my sister-in-law starts yelling at me through the phone line.

  “What’s wrong? Is everything okay? What’s going on? Are the kids all right? Let me talk to McKenna!”

  Bitch. “Hi, Caroline. I’m fine, thanks, how are you doing?”

  “With you looking after Tebow and McKenna? How do you think I am?”

  I hate her.

  “You’re welcome, sister dear. It’s my pleasure to come all this way to take care of your kids.”

  “Give me a break, Meg. You don’t want to be there any more than I want to be stuck in here.”

  “And yet, here I am. The least you can do is say ‘thank you.’”

  There is a pause on the line. “Thank you,” Caroline says finally, her voice tight, and I can only imagine how hard that was for her to say.

  I glance over at the table and see that in the absence of my nephew, the girls are all drawing on each other. If my arms weren’t full of toddler, I’d slap my forehead. At least they’re so focused on decorating themselves in kindergarten hieroglyphics that they’re barely making noise. And by ‘barely,’ I mean the kitchen no longer sounds like a football stadium during the Super Bowl.

  “What’s going on there? Why didn’t you answer the phone? I called about a half an hour ago.”

  In my mind, I rewind the last thirty minutes of my life (and what a banner thirty minutes they have been!). Likely, Caroline called during the air raid siren. Can�
�t really explain to my sister-in-law that I almost burned the house down, now can I?

  “I was in the shower,” I lie.

  “What?!? How did you manage to take a shower with seven children in the house? I can barely shower with just my two.”

  “Sounds like a personal problem to me,” I say drily.

  “Very funny. I’m serious!”

  “The kids were fine, Caroline. They were watching Dora.”

  “You put on the TV? Oh, God. I knew it.”

  What the hell’s wrong with the TV? “It’s a very entertaining show. And educational, too.” How many piña coladas can you drink tonight? Uno, dos, tres, quatro! I hear her sigh over the phone line. “Look, Caroline, it was for exactly twenty-two minutes. Twenty-two minutes of television is not going to rot their brains.” Of course, they’ll be watching a lot more than twenty-two minutes when Auntie Meg is on duty. But I needn’t share that at the moment.

  “I want to talk to McKenna,” she demands. “I want to hear my daughter’s voice.”

  “She’s a little busy right now.” God, the stink in Tebow’s pants is starting to make me dizzy. “And I have to go.”

  “What’s that noise in the background?”

  “The girls. They’re getting ready for dinner. Here. Talk to Tebow.”

  I hand my nephew the phone and he immediately starts to gnaw on the receiver. I pull it away from him, then hold it properly against his ear.

  “Say hi to Mama,” I tell him while Caroline starts babbling to him in a sickly sweet voice.

  “Hi, TeeTee! It’s Mommy! How’s my big boy?”

  Tebow’s eyes light up. “Mommy!” he shrieks with delight. “Mommy, mommy, mommy! Fuck me!”

  “WHAT???” Caroline cries.

  My finger accidentally presses the ‘off’ button, disconnecting the call. Ooops.

  “TeeTee poopoo,” my nephew says, smiling happily as though his taking a shit is the most exciting thing on earth.

  “McKenna!” I yelp. “Do you know how to change your brother’s diaper?”

  “No-way, olay! I’m not ‘llowed.”

  Terrific!

  Holding my nephew at arm’s length, so I won’t have to change my clothes again—and trash another ensemble, no matter how much it deserves to be trashed based on what it is—I carry Tebow into his room and set him gingerly upon his changing table. I stand there for a moment, regarding his lower half as though it’s a time bomb about to explode.

  I count to ten. Then to twenty. Then to thirty.

  Very gently, I tug at the waistband of his jammie bottoms, so as not to disturb the diaper. As soon as I get them to his knees, an unbelievably toxic stink assaults my nasal passages.

  I stop what I’m doing and start counting again.

  * * *

  This has officially become the single worst day of my life, the day of my mother’s funeral included. When I die, if I get into Heaven and there actually is a God, I’m going to have a long conversation with Him about the nature of baby poo. I mean, seriously. Why, in His infinite wisdom, could He not have made humans poop like rabbits—little dry, easy to clean up, pellets. But no. He made this. How could a benevolent God create this? I have opened the diaper and the sight and smell on the changing table before me is like something out of a horror flick. The movie’s tagline rolls in my head: Toddler! The Smell Alone Will Kill You!

  I’m desperately trying to breathe through my mouth, but every few seconds I get a whiff and gag violently. Tebow seems inured to my distress and is entertaining himself with the tinfoil hat.

  Sweet Mother of God! I cannot do this.

  The diaper is a living thing, full of brown gooey, nasty muck, some of which is still clinging to my nephew’s butt. I look around for some sterile gloves, but none are in view.

  People actually do this with their bare hands? Revolting!

  A few years ago, one of the assistant producers at the station, a lovely and utterly bland young married woman whose name I can no longer recall, invited me to her baby shower. I am not in favor of baby showers or bridal showers or any other kind of ‘shower’ unless it falls from the sky or my bathroom showerhead. And I’d rather stick my head in an oven than play the dreaded baby shower games. At this party, they had a game I found particularly foul and tasteless, but which all of the other women in attendance found hilariously entertaining.

  The hostess had taken a bunch of disposable diapers, put a different type of chocolate bar in each—Baby Ruth, Hundred Thousand Dollar Bar, Hershey’s with Almonds, etc.—then stuck the diapers in the microwave to melt the chocolate. Then the guests had to identify the kind of candy bar, the winner being the one who correctly identified the most.

  I remember watching with disgust all of the women burying their noses in the diapers and touching the ‘poop’ and even going so far as to take little tastes of the diapers’ bounties. Just to win a box of freaking dime-store bath beads.

  This memory is currently making me want to heave.

  “Hi.”

  I jerk with surprise and my hand brushes against the warm, moist goo. Aaak!

  Matt Ryan stands in the doorway—again—biting his lip to keep from smirking.

  “Hi. Pizza’s here. The girls are eating.”

  I cannot reply, cannot utter a single syllable because there is TEBOW POO ON MY SKIN! All I can manage is a low mewling sound like that of a sick kitty.

  “Are you okay?”

  I hold up my hand in lieu of a response. When he realizes what I’m showing him, he springs into action, crossing to me in two long strides. I watch, paralyzed, as he opens the top drawer of the changing table and withdraws a plastic box of baby wipes. He pops the top and pulls one through the rubber teeth.

  “More,” I manage to choke out.

  He pulls out another.

  “MORE!”

  Nodding, he yanks out a wad and passes it to me.

  “Glrobzee!” Tebow exclaims, pumping his legs like he’s riding a bicycle.

  I scrub the offending fecal matter—seriously?—from my hand with such force I probably remove the top layer of my skin. When I’ve cleaned it as sufficiently as possible without a brillo pad and rubbing alcohol, I pull another wad of wipes from the box and begin to ineffectually slap them against Tebow’s hind quarters. Unfortunately, his legs keep getting in the way.

  Matt is standing so close to me that I can smell his musk-scented soap, which is a hell of a lot better than soiled diaper. I have the crazy urge to bury my nose in his cardigan.

  “Is this your first diaper?” he asks.

  “No,” I snap. “Not my first. I changed my brother’s diaper when I was four.”

  “So, that was a long time ago, huh?”

  I turn and glare at him. “Are you trying to be funny?”

  “No, I’m not. Honestly. It’s just…you kind of have to…” He reaches for Tebow’s ankles, clutches them in a firm grasp and lifts the toddler’s legs. In one swift motion, he folds the diaper over itself and scoops it away, then deposits it into a strange, thigh-high contraption next to the changing table.

  “Now you wipe,” he declares, still holding Tebow’s ankles.

  Cringing with my entire body, I swipe at my nephew’s butt, quickly discarding each wipe the instant it becomes stained. By the time his butt is clean, I’ve gone through the entire box. I look around for a fresh diaper. Without a word, Matt reaches into the top drawer and produces a beautiful, brand-spanking-new Huggies, and the only reason I know the brand is because the word Huggies is written on the side of it.

  “Thanks,” I say, more tersely than I’d intended. His acumen in the diaper-changing department has magnified my shame. I suddenly feel the need to prove I’m capable, despite my own diaper-changing deficiency. “I have a talk radio show, you know.”

  “Really?” he says, but he doesn’t sound impressed.

  “In New York City,” I clarify.

  “That’s great. Um, you’ve got this, right?”

  I’m n
ot sure I’ve put the diaper on correctly—I’ve had to reattach the adhesive tab twice—but what the hell? “Sure. Yeah. I’ve got this.”

  “Because I’ve kind of got to get home.”

  “Of course you do.” I heave a sigh. Probably the ‘little woman’ and his own precious offspring are wondering where the hell Daddy went. “Thanks for all your help.”

  He moves to the door. “No problem. It was really, um, nice meeting you.”

  I glance over at him. “Yeah, you too.” I grab Tebow’s pajama bottoms and begin the task of easing them up his legs. It’s a slow and arduous process, especially since my nephew is taking this opportunity to rehearse for a stint with the Rockettes, alternately kicking his legs out with enthusiasm. By the time I finish and look up, Matt Ryan is gone.

  I grasp my nephew under his armpits and set him back on the floor.

  “Milflew!” he announces around his pacifier.

  “Pizza. Yes. Let’s go.”

  He trots out of the room. I follow him down the hall, eyeing his butt, which looks rather saggy, and realize that his diaper has already come undone and has slipped down to his thighs.

  Fuck it!

  The girls are seated at the dining room table, taking part in a feeding frenzy, and when I look around, all I can think is CSI: Kindergarten. Pizza sauce (blood splatter) and melted cheese (bits of brain matter) decorate every available surface, from the table top to the chairs to the beige carpet, as well as every mouth and shirt in sight. I feel my shoulders shoot to my ears as the realization hits that I will be the one to clean up this mess.

  Tebow, finding no empty seat, marches over to his sister and starts climbing into her lap to get at the remaining slices. As he reaches towards the middle of the table, McKenna lets out a cry of pain and shifts position, causing Tebow to lose his balance and go flying. His face lands in the middle of a pizza box, and when he pushes himself up, a piece of cheese pizza is stuck to his cheek. He immediately starts to shriek as though an alien has attached itself to his face and is sucking the life out of him. His shrieks are contagious. Within seconds, all the girls are shrieking with him.

  Oh my God. How did I think I could handle this? And for ten days? I can’t handle this for two hours!