Jacob and Rick knew what had to be done. They nodded at each other with gravest determination their cherubic toddler faces could convey.
"Dis is gonna be messy," Rick murmured as he awkwardly hunched over to slide his arm under the near-catatonic James's left armpit. Jacob did the same on his side. Rick reached out with his pudgy free hand to try his luck at the crib's padlock.
"I dun think it'll work," Jacob said morosely. "Baby-proof."
"We'll see," said Rick. What ensued was one of the most frustrating, tense episodes of Rick's rapidly-unraveling life. He jiggled the lock. Wiggled it. Banged it against the crib. He pleaded. He cried. And all the while, the ungodly stink of James's overloaded diaper grew worse and worse.
"Told ya," Jacob sighed.
As if the universe had decided that it had gone just a little bit too overboard in causing the three new toddlers misfortune, the lock sprang open. It was the sound of freedom; for a moment, even James was smiling.
"Awright! Wet's get you changed," said Rick. The three plucky tots climbed down from the crib and onto the floor of the nursery. James landed yet again on his extraordinarily messy diaper, making him feel like he'd jumped bare-bottomed into a pit of warm mud. Not even his most heroic efforts could fight back the tears.
"How're we gonna get up?" Jacob asked, pointing at the changing table. From their shrunken perspective, the table seemed two stories tall.
"Dun need to," Rick replied, spotting a changing mat propped up against the wall. There were some spare diapers and wipes too; a small bit of luck, but a welcome one.
James, not sure whether not feel eager to be free of the dirty diaper or be reluctant to be changed by his friends, slowly laid himself down on the changing pad. He sucked his thumb at a feverish pace, trying to focus all his attention on the ceiling light above. It will all be over soon, he said to himself.
Feeling like scientists about to enter a room filled with used nuclear fuel rods,
Rick and Jacob got down on their knees and prepared to change James's diaper.
Rip. Rick slowly peeled off the first tape.
Riiip. Jacob gingerly tore off the second one.
They both sucked in as much air as their little lungs could take, and pulled the diaper open. Their senses were immediately greeted with a two-pronged assault. They
James's diaper area--and inner thighs--were utterly covered in filth. The smell was like a campground vault toilet in the middle of a hot summer. It was enough to make them wheeze.
"Sowwy," James said weakly. The
"Don't be," Jacob said, trying to avoid going into a crying fit himself. Rather than pulling the heavy diaper away, they simply stood James up and went to work on his messy lower half with as many baby wipes as they needed.
Which turned out to be almost half a tub. Whatever hope James had of keeping his dignity intact in front of his friends was wiped away just as surely as his mess.
James cried even more. For their part, his friends tried to help him, whispering reassurances as they finished their dirty job. It helped...though not much.
After several near-comical minutes of trying to tape James into a new diaper, Jacob and Rick discovered that the pack of diapers on a floor were a different size than the others. They were much smaller, presumably from earlier in their babyhoods.
They only marginally fit James, leaving him not much better than nude. The cleft of his innocent baby bottom poked out a half-inch from the top of the diaper, a sight that mothers would no doubt find adorable but he found utterly humiliating. The diapers tapes were stretched to the max, extending tenuously along his hips to just barely connect to the front panel. But worst of all, the front of his diaper didn't sit flush with his crotch. Sucking in his pudgy belly, he realized that anyone standing directly above him could easily get a peek at his exposed privates.
He looked at his tiny penis resting against the inner lining of the diaper. It was still wet with the cold alcohol of the baby wipes. Combined with its exposure to the room's chilly air, it had shrunk it from its already comically tiny size into an acorn-like nub.
Jacob and Rick didn't know what caused James to resume his crying with a renewed passion, but they knew they were running out of time. They needed to act fast, and before their tormentors came back.