Sneak peek : Bath time with Bunny...and other things.

Sneak peek for chapter 5

I rolled off the couch and narrowly avoided stepping on the small figure crouching between the coffee table and the couch. I hopped for a second on one foot trying to recover my balance, then let out a relieved breath when I was stable and upright.

I immediately glanced around the room, searching for Jason, who was never very far from Timmy’s side, but he was nowhere in sight and with narrowed eyes, I walked slowly over to the child and crouched down before him, taking in the mess he was making.

He crouched there as naked as the day he was born. In his hand, he held a tube of toothpaste and I watched with raised brows as he squirted the white stuff onto the face of his stuffed bunny, his browed drawn together in concentration as he completed his task, then as I watched, he dipped his fingers into the mess and ran it back and forth in a brushing motion.

“Are you brushing his teeth?” I asked him, and he looked up at me for the first time. I noticed the toothpaste on his face, in his hair and in his hands and if it wasn’t on the carpet I would have been pretty surprised.

“Bunny ah keen now.” He announced and I took that to mean ‘bunny is all clean now’ and wondered if I was finally getting the hang of his toddler gibberish.

“Yeah, but now you’re all dirty…where’s your daddy?”

He stood and pointed to the dining room with his free hand. “Daddy seeping.”

“Alright come on let’s go visit him.” I told him and almost immediately he stretched out his arms for me to lift him and I did so without hesitation. In one hand he still held the tube of open toothpaste, and the other was pressed gently against my bare chest.

I could feel the wet toothpaste  being smeared over my skin as I left the room and I thought of just how much of a mess toddlers made on a daily basis. They clearly needed constant supervision and I felt a deep respect for single parents who had to contend with the little beasts twenty-four seven.

When I reached to the foot of the staircase, Timmy ordered me to return to the family room for bunny, who lay alone by the couch, with a face full of toothpaste, then finally we were off and I marched the little devil up the stairs while he wrapped his arms around my neck, getting toothpaste behind my ear and, I was certain, in my hair.

The first thing I noticed when I turned down the hall, was that the door to the guest room Timmy shared with his father was wide open and when I peeked inside, it was to see Jason stretched across the bed, a hand hanging off one side of the mattress and a foot off the other, while he slept soundly. When I put a finger over my lips, Timmy mimicked the action and I turned back down the hall with him in tow.

“Let’s get you cleaned up. Are you ready for bath time?” I asked in that sing-song voice kids seemed to relate to and when he mimicked the act of a finger over his lips, I chuckled silently.

Once in my own bathroom at the opposite end of the hall, I pulled a clean towel from the cabinet and set Timmy on his feet while I filled the tub with warm water, then threw in some  body wash for men, hoping it was okay to use on kids. Timmy moved to stand by the tub and together we watched it fill. He was mesmerized when I reached in to swirl the water around, allowing the suds to form and before I knew it, he had thrown in his bunny and the tube of toothpaste soon followed.

We watched as the tube sank and bunny floated, then he too sank to the bottom of the tub, his sewed on smile still visible under water.

“Ready to go in?” I asked my little house guest and he pointed to the water and spoke some words I couldn’t decipher.

He was fascinated and when I swirled the water around some more, he watched the path my hand took, right up until the time I removed it from the water.

“Alright, that’s enough.” I said, turning off the tap and he looked up at me with a frown.

I stuck my tongue out at him and he giggled, then giggled some more when I hoisted him up and placed him into the warm water. He was in heaven, playing in the water and chasing after suds as I scrubbed the toothpaste from his hair. I decided right then to get him a rubber duck for his neck bath time.

“Wader hot.” He told me and I rolled my eyes. As long as water was involved, for him it would always be hot.

He giggled when I rolled them again and this time he hit the water a few times with his tiny arms, drenching my face with the warm liquid. I blinked it from my eyes, then pointed to the bottom of the tub.

“You wanna hand me the toothpaste?” I asked him, and after a moment’s pause he reached down and took hold of the tooth paste, but instead of handing it to me, he squeezed the end of the tube, squirting the minty flavored paste into the water, then he squirted some more until I managed to pry it from his wet fingers.

It was by this time that I’d given up all pretense of cleaning him and instead sat back and watched him play around in his soapy, toothpaste-filled bath water. It certainly wasn’t a bad way to start the day.

AUTHOR'S NOTES

SORRY ABOUT THE BLANK PAGE EARLIER GUYS..I WENT BACK TO EDIT A WORD AND THE PAGE MALFUNCTIONED.

HOPE YOU ENJOYED THIS LITTLE PEEK INTO CHAPTER 5!