Carter gets into ready position, crouching low to the ground, his doll shoved into the back of his t-shirt with the head sticking out of the top and its eyes staring right at me.

“Son of a bitch! Where are the diapers?!” Jim shouts, tucking the doll under one arm like a football.

“This is your house, asshole! Shouldn’t you know that?” I ask him, sticking the doll’s feet down the front of my pants so its limp body falls forward and it’s head is facing my crotch.

“Molly doesn’t wear diapers anymore! We don’t have any f**king diapers!” he shouts back at me.

“This is real life, soldiers! Sometimes you don’t know where diapers and wipes are and you have to make do, especially if you’re in the middle of the desert and your baby just shit its brains out!

“When the f**k would that ever happen?” I ask in confusion.

GO!” he shouts, clicking the stop watch.

Carter takes off like a bat out of hell and runs to the front door, throwing it open and racing outside. He has the right idea - he’s getting the f**k out of dodge.

Jim and I look at each other in confusion and both take off at the same time, slamming into one another, forcing Jim’s doll out of his arms. It lands on the floor on its head and we both pause and look over at my dad.

He just stands there shaking his head in disappointment.

Jim scoops up the doll and clutches it to his chest, giving me the finger before taking off up the stairs.

My dad turns the stop watch around so I can see, and I realize I’ve wasted a shit ton of time while Jim has probably already found a diaper and Carter is most likely already three miles down the road and has chucked his doll into a ditch somewhere.

I turn and run into the kitchen, the doll’s head bobbing up and down and smacking into my dick. If this wasn’t a serious situation, I would be laughing my ass off right now.

Oh f**k it.

I stop when I reach the kitchen and lift the doll’s head up by its hair. “Was that good for you, baby? You need to work on your technique. It’s never hot to just smack your face into a guy’s junk,” I say with a laugh.

I hear a throat clear and turn around to see my dad standing in the kitchen doorway with his hands on his hips, shaking his head at me.

Twenty minutes later, Jim and I are standing in the living room in front of the couch, holding our dolls. Mine has half of its hair singed off (don’t ask), a missing arm with a screwdriver shoved into its body for a fake arm (seriously, don’t ask), and a place mat tied around its ass for a diaper.

Jim’s doll doesn’t look any better. He’s holding the body in one hand and the head in the other, with one of its legs tucked under his arm. It used to have a pink pair of footy pajamas on, but now it’s just wearing a pair of Jim’s tighty whities, held in place with a couple of Liz’s giant hair clips.

My dad notes our times on a pad of paper sitting on the coffee table and hits the stop button.

“This is just a sad, sad display of skills gentlemen,” he complains.

“Wait, where’s Carter? You can’t stop the time yet, that as**ole hasn’t even made it back from wherever the hell he went,” Jim complains.

“Carter has been back here for ten minutes. He’s in the bathroom fixing his baby’s hair that got a little windblown outside.”

At that moment, we hear the toilet flush and the bathroom door open and Carter walks out into the living room holding his baby on his hip. Her hair is in two French braids, she’s wearing a different outfit than the one she came in, and has a diaper perfectly attached to her ass.

“What. The. Fuck?” I ask him as he walks over to stand in between Jim and I, looking at each of our babies in horror.

He quickly covers his doll’s ear with one hand and presses her other ear against his chest.

“Drew! Language!” he scolds in a loud whisper.

“Oh you have got to be f**king kidding me. He totally cheated! You called your wife, didn’t you? Did Claire meet you outside or something?” I complain.

“Of course not. I am just better equipped to deal with a baby, obviously,” he replies, bouncing gently and patting the doll’s back.

“Alright, since you two obviously failed that test, you need a remedial course,” my dad says to Jim and me. “Carter, I’m going to need your help.”

~

“No, no, no. You’re doing it all wrong. You need to support his head more. My God, it’s like you’ve never had kids before,” Carter scolds as he repositions my hands and angles the bottle up higher.

“This is not the key to fixing my marriage OR my sex life. You guys all realize this, right?”

My dad walks over to check on things and smacks me upside the head.

“Wrong! A happy wife is a happy life. You learn how to do your share around the house and you will get laid regularly. Just ask your mother.”

I groan and dry heave, the bottle slipping out and milk squirting all over the front of me. “Dad, gross. Do NOT talk about you and Mom. Ever.”

Carter grabs my hands and puts the bottle back where it was.

“You need to rock and bounce a little. It helps them digest the milk easier so they don’t have as much gas. And make sure they don’t keep sucking after the milk is gone. They’ll just be getting air then, and it will cause a tummy ache,” Carter says, putting his arm around my shoulder and forcing me to sway slowly with him on the couch.

“Your mother has no complaints in the bedroom OR around the house. I keep her very sexually satisfied, and I always got up with you in the middle of the night,” my dad says while I grimace at his words.

“Wait, are you seriously trying to tell me that if I just get up with Billy in the middle of the night, everything will be restored to its rightful order?” I question.

“You stopped swaying, concentrate and keep swaying or the baby will cry. You don’t want the baby to cry if you’re doing a nighttime feeding or the whole house will wake up,” Carter reminds me, pushing against me again to get me to sway.

“I’m saying that if you put yourself in your wife’s shoes once in a while, it will be easy to see what she needs. She needs a night of sleep, she needs help around the house, she needs your love and support, and the proof that you WANT to help her with these things. A wife that isn’t getting what she needs is never going to want to give you what YOU need,” Dad tells me.

“I need kinky sex,” I tell him plainly.

“Then rock that baby like you mean it!” he yells at me.

And that’s how Liz found us fifteen minutes later when she came home early from her parent’s house. Carter and I swaying back and forth on the couch with Jim spread out on my lap, drinking out of the bottle I was feeding him.

Chapter 26 – The Newlywed Game

Drew and Jackson are up in our bedroom, and I can hear their laughter from the living room where I pace anxiously for everyone to arrive. Jackson had complimented Drew on his shirt for the night: a picture of that Monopoly guy holding a pile of money in his arms that says, “I like big bucks and I cannot lie.” Drew had taken him upstairs to show him the rest of his shirt collection.

When I had told Drew about the game night and what we were going to play, he got really excited and immediately called Jackson and asked him to be our “host” for the evening.

I want to be as thrilled as he is for tonight but my stomach is tied in knots. All I can think about is someone asking him a really important question and him getting it wrong. I had thought about canceling tonight a bunch of times, but I don’t want to ruin everyone’s night. They are all looking forward to this. I should be too, really. The kids are both spending the night with Drew’s parents, and everyone else has managed to get sitters as well. We don’t have to worry about bedtimes or cranky kids or anything being lit on fire. We are free to do whatever we want, for however long we wanted to.

The doorbell rings just as I hear Drew and Jackson coming back down the stairs. I run to the door and fling it open to see all four of our friends standing there, each with a bottle of liquor in their hands.

“We come baring gifts,” Carter says with a laugh as I hold the door open for them.

“I just want to let everyone know that Liz and I are so totally going to win this thing. We have to win this thing. It’s a matter of life and death,” Jim says seriously as he sets his bottle of whiskey down on the coffee table in the living room where I’ve set out some snacks and a bunch of glasses.

“There’s no way you’re winning this. Claire and I have been quizzing each other since this morning. We’ve got this in the bag,” Carter argues with Jim, setting his bottle of vodka next to the whiskey.

Jim turns and puts his hands on Carter’s shoulders and looks him in the eye.

“For the love of God, man, you have to let us win this,” Jim pleads.

“Why the hell is he being so dramatic,” Claire asks Liz softly.

Liz lets out a huge sigh as she hands me her bottle of wine.

“I made the mistake of telling him that if we win, I’ll give him anal. I was kind of joking at the time because he doesn’t want to play the game, and I was trying to get him in the mood for it. I may have gone a little overboard,” she explains as we watch Jim run over to Drew and get down on his knees in front of him.

“Drew, please, listen to reason. I’m begging you, don’t let us lose. Oh God, I can’t lose!” he wails.

“Hey, asshole, while you’re down there…” Drew says with a laugh.

Jim clenches his fist and punches him right in the nuts and Drew goes down on his knees, holding his crotch.

“Alright, ladies and gentlemen, my name is Jackson and I will be your host for this evening,” Jackson says with a grin while I grab Drew’s arm and help him stand up.

“Um, Jackson, everyone already knows who you are. Remember?” I whisper to him.

“Pay no attention to the woman behind the curtain,” Claire says with a laugh as she takes a sip of the wine she's poured for herself.

“I’m not behind a curtain. Is this part of the game?” I ask in confusion.

“Anyway, I’m going to start by taking the ladies into another room and asking them a series of questions. They will write their answers on these pieces of poster board,” Jackson explains, holding up a stack of white, heavy duty cardboard and a couple of black markers. “Then I’ll do the same with the guys. Everyone will keep their answers in a stack, face down on their laps. We’ll do ladies first, so the women will be answering the questions for the first round. Each couple will get five points for each correct answer. The couple with the most points at the end of the game will be crowned The Best Couple in all the Land.”

This seems complicated and Jim is so excited he’s bouncing up and down in his chair. He wants to win this as bad as I do. I can’t even bribe Drew with anal like Liz did. That ship sailed a long time ago.

“Okay, ladies. Grab your glasses and follow me. Boys, start getting liquored up so you have a fighting chance,” Jackson says as he turns and heads into the kitchen.

“Hey, sweetie, do you want a nipple for that drink?” Liz asks Jim with a secret smile.

“You were never to speak of that again!” he complains, throwing his hands up in the air.

“What is he talking about?” Claire asks Liz as they make their way to the kitchen.

“If he pisses me off tonight, I’ll let you know,” she tells Liz, throwing Jim a warning look over his shoulder.

“Fuck, even if we win I’m not getting anal. This sucks,” Jim complains, pouring himself a healthy glass of whiskey.

I let go of Drew’s arm and start to follow when he suddenly wraps his arm around my waist and pulls me back against his chest. He leans his head over my shoulder from behind, and with his free hand, swipes my hair off of my shoulder.

“Let’s kick some ass, baby,” he whispers against the side of my neck before pressing his lips to my collarbone. He holds them there for several seconds, letting his tongue snake out to taste my skin before pulling his mouth away from me.

My whole body tingles from head to toe and a smile lights up my face as I pat the top of his hand that's resting on my stomach before he lets go and smacks my ass as I walk away.

Drew has been different this week. He pissed me off a few times making a big deal about putting the toilet seat down after he used it. I mean, give me a break! You don’t need a present and a pat on the back for doing crap like that! But he does deserve a present for everything else. Ever since he helped his dad build that bookcase, he’s been super helpful with everything. The past four nights, he’s got up each time Billy cried and gave him his bottle, telling me to go back to sleep. Last night Billy had slept through the night for the first time. Drew has even used the sex swing that is still in the corner of our room and agrees that it makes a great baby swing, especially when I show him where he could store extra bottles.

On Wednesday of this week, he had shocked me again after work. I was late getting home from running a few errands so I could relieve Drew from kid duty and he could head to work, so we barely had time to even say, “Hi” to each other as we passed in the doorway. As soon as I set my bags down inside the door, the first thing I noticed was how absolutely spotless the house was. Not one toy or dirty dish in sight and there was a basket of folded laundry on the couch. Before I could say anything, he grabbed my hand and placed a small, white box in it before kissing the tip of my nose and then racing to his car to make it to work on time.

When we first started dating, we went to the movies one night and he bought me a giant bag of Skittles. I sat there for fifteen minutes before the movie started and picked out all of the red and purples ones, putting them in a napkin in my cup holder before handing him the bag. From that point on, every once in a while for no reason at all he would give me a little white box that was filled with just purple and red Skittles. I couldn’t even tell you the last time he did that for me.