The Bachelor and the Babies

However... Rolling out of bed, Harrison followed Nathan.

The little boy was squatting by the playpen poking his finger through the net at Matthew’s head.

If Harrison had arrived three seconds earlier, Matthew might have remained asleep. That’ll teach you.

They all ate cereal for breakfast. Matthew’s was a bit of unappetizing reconstituted white flakes, but he seemed to like it well enough.

Four hours later, Harrison was desperate for both sleep and adult company. It wouldn’t be cheating to call one of the sitters on the list, would it? After all, if he had a wife, he’d be able to take a break. Harrison only needed a couple of hours. He’d go for coffee and read the paper. Shower and shave, even. So far, he hadn’t because he wasn’t comfortable leaving Nathan unsupervised.

Harrison called all three sitters. All three sitters were busy.

Even worse, they were busy tomorrow.

What kind of sitters were these? Harrison hadn’t considered the possibility that at least one of the three wouldn’t be available.

Who could he get to watch the boys? He didn’t know any baby-sitters. Yes, he was sure there were professional agencies he could call, but Jon and Stephanie didn’t want that and Harrison had agreed to play by their rules.

Okay, who owed him a favor? As he cut up chunks of banana for Nathan’s lunch and watched Matthew’s attempts to crawl, Harrison uncomfortably remembered the times he’d criticized employees for not having adequate backup child care plans in place.

That prompted an idea. Abandoning Nathan to his banana, Harrison recorded a memo to himself about establishing an emergency day care center for his employees. He wasn’t about to get into the child care business, but if he stressed emergency, meaning short-term, and kept things simple, but licensed, he could see how employee efficiency and productivity would be increased.

As plans raced through his mind, Harrison became more enthusiastic about the entire child care issue. He should kiss his brother’s feet for pointing out a weakness in the Rothwell time-management system.

Harrison became oblivious to his two charges, remembering them only when socially unacceptable smells from Matthew’s diaper registered.

Resigned, Harrison checked on Nathan before cleaning up Matthew.

Nathan had squashed banana in his hair.

He’d also dumped it over the side of the tray and smeared it along the doorjamb. Harrison stared at him, then handed him more chunks. “Have fun.” At least it would keep the little boy occupied.

He slipped on banana on his way out of the kitchen.

Nap time, blessed nap time arrived. Harrison took his long-awaited shower, then intended to try. to find a baby-sitter for tomorrow, but it was so quiet and he was so tired...

Something woke him up. For once, it wasn’t Matthew crying, though he was making noises. There was another noise that Harrison couldn’t identify.

Nathan wasn’t in his room. Fully awakened by the shot of adrenaline to his system, Harrison ran down the hall where he found Nathan. Matthew wasn’t visible.

What was visible was a mountain of diapers, big, little and overnight-size, all mixed together inside the playpen.

“Matthew?”

“Matt in dare.” Nathan giggled and pointed, but Harrison was already digging out his younger nephew. Fortunately the baby didn’t seem upset at being buried.

Exhaling, Harrison sat on the couch and stared at the playpen, then at Nathan.

“Uh-oh,” said the little boy.

“Uh-oh is right, buddy.”

He couldn’t get angry. Nathan had been bored, no real harm had been done and this was one of those situations Harrison might find funny in the extremely distant future.

“Go get the diaper box, Nathan,” he said, not knowing if Nathan would or not.

“Game!” shouted Nathan and ran off.

“What have you got to say for yourself, Matthew? Did you feel like you were in an igloo?”

A drooling Matthew looked as though he couldn’t decide whether he was unhappy or not. Harrison definitely wanted him happy.

“Hungry, sport?” Harrison spread out a blanket and set Matthew on it, dumped some toys around him, then retreated to the kitchen to make a bottle.

Nathan dragged a diaper box into the room. “Hawee?”

“In here, Nathan. Put the diaper box by the playpen.” As he poured formula into a bottle, Harrison watched Nathan from the bar. The little boy stood without moving, then picked up the cardboard box and walked over to the blanket where Matthew was chewing on some rubber thing. Without warning, Nathan threw the box on top of the baby, who promptly started crying.

“Nathan! No! You hurt Matthew!”

The sound of Harrison’s raised voice startled Nathan and he, too, began to howl.

But Matthew was Harrison’s immediate concern. After checking and finding nothing more than a red mark on his head, Harrison tried to comfort him. “You’re okay, Matthew. Come on, buddy, shake it off.”

Nobody was shaking off anything.

Harrison wasn’t at all surprised when he heard the knock at the door. He opened it without checking to see who was there. He just knew.

Carrie, or a version of Carrie, stood at the door. She wore a long, light-colored dress with a ribbon tied at the waist. Her hair was held back from her face with a band.

“I thought I’d come check on you on my way out.”

“You mean you could hear us from the parking lot.”

“Yeah.” She grinned and walked past him.

Harrison eyed her getup. “You look like Little Bo Peep.”

“And you look like, uh, heck. Real bad heck.” She sat on the couch and patted the cushion next to her. “Hey, Nathan, what’s the matter?”

As Nathan sobbed out his grievances against his uncle Hawee, Harrison checked his appearance in the foyer mirror. Yeah, he had a bad case of bed head caused by falling asleep when his hair was wet.