Dad set Hunter down in a standing position on the other side of the coffee table and placed a Montana Outdoors magazine in front of him. “Distraction.”

Hunter stopped crying and hit the magazine with his palm. Slap, slap. Then got ahold of the cover and started jerking it back and forth.

Bea inched closer. “He’s going to rip it.”

Dad waved her away. “He’s fine.”

Part of her was thankful she didn’t have to face Hunter alone. Another part wished she hadn’t gotten Dad involved. “You keep saying that.”

Dad chuckled as Hunter succeeded in tearing off the magazine cover and crumpling it up. “That’s because it’s true.”

But how did he know? Bea remained on edge as Hunter proceeded to rip more pages out, one by one. How was she supposed to know if he was fine? If he was doing what he was supposed to be doing? If she should let him do what he wanted or intervene?

Dad must’ve read the anxiety on her face. “Don’t worry. You’ve got lots of time to figure it out.”

“Seven months is not ‘lots of time.’” Bea gasped as Hunter lost his balance and fell backward onto his bottom. He made a little burbling sound but otherwise seemed unfazed, his diaper having cushioned his fall. “What if I don’t know what to do?”

Oops. She hadn’t meant to ask that question out loud. Dad already thought having a baby was a bad idea. The last thing she needed was for him to find out how unprepared and ill-equipped she really was.

Dad helped Hunter to his feet, then pressed his own back into the couch and put his hands on his knees. “One time, when you were a little younger than this guy, we went to Ponderosa for something—I don’t remember what—and totally forgot to bring your diaper bag. We had no spare diapers, no wipes, no nothing, and you had this huge blowout in the middle of a Wendy’s restaurant. It was so bad, we ended up throwing away everything you were wearing and wrapping you in my favorite T-shirt. Which was soaked in pee by the time we got home.”

Bea’s eyes widened. “Why would you tell me that?”

An old, familiar light sparked in his eyes. “Because we lived through it. We learned. Your mother and I never forgot the diaper bag again, and it wasn’t nearly as big a deal as we thought it was at the time.”

Emotion flooded her as she pictured herself as a baby in her mother’s arms. “What about your T-shirt?”

“I threw it in the wash and kept wearing it. And told your mother that next time she had to sacrifice her own shirt.”