Chapter 2 - No Room for a Father
The mall was too bright, full of families who looked complete in a way mine wasn't anymore. I kept my eyes down until I reached the baby store, a place called Little Sprout near the food court.
The yellow sleepers were right up front.
"Your mom was right," I told Ellie, holding one up. "Snaps are a trap."
I dropped two sets in the basket.
Then Grace started screaming.
Ellie joined in half a beat later, like she'd been waiting for permission.
"I hear you," I said, already moving. "Daddy's got you."
I rolled the stroller against the nearest wall and checked Grace first. Soaked straight through the sleeper.
"Oh, buddy," I breathed. "That's a big one."
Ellie kicked and wailed, her face going red and blotchy.
"I know. You too. We're going right now."
I grabbed the diaper bag and followed the restroom signs down a side hall.
The men's room was nearly empty. I walked the whole length of it twice.
No changing table. Not even a fold-down shelf.
A guy drying his hands caught my face in the mirror. "There's no table in here. Happened to me last month. They took it out."
My stomach sank. "Do you know where the family restroom is?"
"Other end of the mall, I think. By the shoe place."
Both girls were screaming now, the kind of screaming that makes strangers turn around.
I backed into the hallway and found a security guard standing near the mall directory.
"Excuse me. I need some help here."
He glanced at the stroller. "What's going on, sir?"
"Where's the closest family restroom? My daughters need to be changed now. Both of them."
His face went tight. "I'm sorry. The one in this wing's been closed for renovation about two weeks now."
"What about the men's room?"
"They pulled the changing table last week. Some maintenance thing."
"So the family room's closed, and the men's room has nothing." I wasn't really asking.
"I don't make those calls, sir."
"I know. Sorry." I dragged in a breath. "Where's the next one?"
"North concourse, past the Skechers store. Fifteen minutes. Twenty if the crowd's bad."
They were three weeks old. They couldn't wait twenty minutes because a mall couldn't keep a bathroom open.
A woman walking past slowed down. "The women's room has a changing table, you know." Then she saw me look toward the door and her whole face changed. "You can't go in there. You're a man."
"I know. But the men's room is empty, and the family room's locked."
"That's not my problem," she said, and kept walking.
So I stood there with two screaming newborns and a diaper bag cutting into my shoulder, and I heard Rachel in my head, the thing she said the week we brought them home.
"Talk to them, Adam. Even when you feel dumb doing it. They know your voice."
I crouched down by the stroller.
"Girls. We're going to be fast, and we're going to be polite about it. Daddy's got you."
I lifted Grace into the wrap against my chest and left Ellie in the stroller. At the women's room door, I stopped and made myself breathe.
I hated it. But I loved them more than I cared about somebody looking at me sideways.
I pushed the door open with my shoulder.
May you like
"I'm sorry," I said loudly before I stepped in. "I've got newborn twins. There's no changing table in the men's room and the family restroom is closed. I'll be two minutes, I promise."
Nobody answered. The room looked empty.
