Jack walked circles around the room, lightly bouncing the sleeping baby against his chest while humming Kashmir by Led Zeppelin.
"Hey Riley," Jack whispered, standing in place, still swaying with the child. She shook herself back into this weird reality and acknowledged he was about to ask a favor. "Will you get the model and serial number off that car seat and print out a manual for me?"
She balked at his request, "I can just send the pdf to your phone."
"I know, but if I pinch to make the text bigger, I have to keep sliding it back and forth because only like 4 words fit on the page."
"Oh right, using your old man glasses now."
He side eyed her with a raised eyebrow.
"Jeez, sorry. I'll send it to the printer." She rolled her eyes. A short time later, she grabbed the paper stack from the printer and handed them to Jack. "The manual was 88 pages, so I just printed out the English version of it. I was tempted to get the Dutch version to be a smart ass, but I figure you've got enough on your plate right now."
He snatched the papers from her and moved to sit next to Mac. Jack eased himself into the seat, stuffing the paper in between the couch cushion and its arm momentarily. He stopped bouncing the baby and leaned forward, supporting Clarence in the air with his forearm. "Here, Mac."
"What?" Mac's response was louder and more appalled that he wanted it to sound. "I don't know how to work those things."
"Just grab your elbows across your body and hold your arms out." Mac followed the instruction and Jack eased the infant into his awaiting arms. Mac cradled the baby, adjusting a few times until he found a suitable position for them both. "Now tilt him inward so there's a little more contact, like chest to chest." Mac tried that and went back to cradling Clarence on his back instead. "You'll get the hang of it. Just don't look...so...afraid of him. He won't hurt ya." Mac snickered at the thought. "Maybe prop your arm up on the armrest of the couch. That's it."
"Ok, that does feel more natural. Thanks, Jack."
Mac looked at the sleeping infant and finally relaxed. He couldn't help but smile at the chubby soft cheek squished against his chest.
Jack slipped on his glasses and read the carseat installation manual cover to cover fairly quickly. "I'm gonna go install this car seat base in the GTO, be right back."
Jack returned a short time later to the baby awake and laughing, playing Peek-a-boo with Riley. Mac was reading the car seat manual as Jack approached with a request, "Ah, I'm glad you're reading it. I want you to check my work."
"Come again?" Mac questioned.
"Check my work. Make sure it's installed correctly."
"Jack these are simple instructions. Well as simple as 44 pages of instruction on buckling a piece of plastic into a car can be. Besides, you can fly any machine known to man, I'd be hard pressed to think you couldn't be trusted with car seat installation."
"Always safer to have a 2nd set of eyes. Speaking of eyes, anyone see a diaper bag or anything? We might need supplies." Jack asked
Matty pulled an overflowing diaper bag from behind a chair. "You should be set for the night, the supply run can wait till tomorrow morning. There are breast milk bottles in the cooler in the diaper bag, they were recovered from the deep freezer by the fire department at the Hildebrand house. They were thawing, but should be ok to sit in the fridge until they're used."
"Ok then, we're all set. Autobots, roll out." Jack announced as he grabbed the diaper bag.
Riley placed the baby back into his car seat and buckled him in. Mac approached her to carry the baby out to the car and adjusted the straps. "This long one is the chest clip," he explained as he slid it up from Clarence's belly, "it has to be lined up with the armpits." Riley gave him a disapproving look for questioning her actions. "Sorry, it was in the manual. I didn't know until I read it either. You're way better at this baby thing than I am already, I swear I'm not questioning your abilities."
She smirked at him and picked up the car seat by the handle, walking toward the door.
Mac and Jack reached the car first, Mac checked the installation of the car seat base quickly before taking the front passenger seat. Riley clicked the carrier in place into the base and slid into the car next to the baby, behind Jack. Bozer took the seat behind Mac for their ride back to their house.
The 50 year old overhead cabinlight in Jack's car wasn't bright enough to illuminate the trio in the back seat, so Riley and Bozer used their phones to shine light on their faces to entertain the small child on the short ride home.
"Clarence?" Jack started, "That's a real badass name, but it's not a baby name. Like you don't see babies named things like Ebeneezer or Fred, just adults."
"You don't see anyone named Ebeneezer, Jack. Did you grow up during the Civil War or something?" Riley teased.
"You know what I mean. He needs a kid name." Jack explained. "Something like Bobby or Danny or Petey."
"Malcolm." Riley couldn't hold back her laugh at her own very-not-a-baby-name idea.
"Craig." Bozer added.
Mac felt compelled to join in with his own bad suggestion, "Glenn."
"Alright, Angus, I see y'all aren't going to be any help." Jack took his eyes off the road to stare down his partner, "I guess he'll just be Jack Junior then." Jack's eyes lit up, "or Luke like Luke Skywalker since Han Solo isn't a very kid friendly name. There was a freshman on the football team when I was a senior whose name was Han and he was teased mercilessly. Back then only the huge nerds liked Star Wars, so it was definitely not cool to be named after Han Solo. I guess now it's cool, but in the early 90s it was definitely not." Jack pondered the names for a moment, "So if he's Luke, I'm Uncle Owen." Jack pointed a thumb toward Mac, "and you're Aunt Beru."
Mac countered, "if you call him Luke, you're equating his dad, who died tragically and a hero, to an evil Sith Lord."
"I guess you're right." Jack sounded defeated.
Bozer threw out his own pop culture suggestion, "Or what about Harry Potter, with that kind of tragic backstory, Harry is appropriate."
"No, Harry is a terrible name." Riley objected. "He needs some generic white boy name, like Chris or John?"
"Like my man McClane. Yeah, I like that, Ri. Johnny Boy it is." Jack's excitement was apparent in his voice.
"Look what you've done," Bozer whispered loudly at Riley, "this poor kid's gonna be dressed in white tank tops now."
They pulled into the driveway, and the three younger agents exited the car. "Mac," Riley asked, "you mind if I crash on your couch? We can pick up our cars from the restaurant in the morning."
"Yeah, that works." MacGyver agreed. "Jack, why don't you stay here too? In case the baby doesn't sleep well. It'll be easier to take turns so you can get some sleep."
Jack stuck his head out the window with a stern reply, "I can handle a child, Angus."
"Damn," Bozer elbowed Mac in the ribs, "you got first named twice in like 10 minutes. That's a new record for Jack. He's a once a month kind of user."
"I'm not doubting you, Jack. This kid's been through a lot. New surroundings, missing his parents...we don't even know if he sleeps with a night light, with lullabies or a white noise maker, or even when his bedtime even is."
"I guess you're right."
Bozer clapped with enthusiasm, "a good old fashioned sleepover. We'll see what Johnny thinks of my chicken and waffles in the morning."
When they detached his car seat from its base, Claren...Johnny was sleeping lightly despite the excited chatter in the car. Once they entered the house and placed his car seat on the ground, he began to wail.
"He's probably hungry." Bozer suggested. "Don't babies eat for like 18 hours a day?"
Mac shot him a puzzled look, "I think that's cats, and it's not eating, it's sleeping."
"But you still understood my reasoning, so mission accomplished." Bozer shot him finger guns.
Riley unbuckled the baby and lifted him gently, wrapping her arms around his back and resting him on her hip. She popped his pacifier into his mouth and started to walk the room. He was placated for about 90 seconds before he spit it onto the floor and started screaming again.
Jack was digging through the cooler in the kitchen, examining the breast milk bag. "It doesn't say how long to microwave this to heat it up. I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be warm, not like a milkshake like this."
Bozer whipped out his phone to research. Mac was sifting through the other contents of the diaper bag and found an applesauce pouch.
"Riley, I found a snack...I think." He cracked the seal on the screw cap on the pouch, eliciting a Pavlovian response from the angry child. He seemed intrigued and stopped screaming for a moment.
Riley hiked him up a little higher in her arms so he could see Mac from over her shoulder. He squeezed her arm with excitement and tugged on her hair with his other hand. Mac approached him and raised the applesauce pouch tentatively toward the baby as if he were trying to entice a wild animal to eat from his hand.
Johnny eagerly sucked a mouth full of the fruit puree from the pouch and just as enthusiastically, spit the whole amount out onto Riley's shoulder. Mac froze in place as if he'd just stepped on a pressure plate and whispered, "Oh God, Riley, don't move."
"What?" She whispered loudly back to him, unable to hide the fear in her voice.
"If you turn your head, you'll get applesauce all in your hair. Now don't move."
"Ugh." Her disgust was apparent as was her relief that it was just some rogue food on her clothes.
To fetch some paper towels, Mac bolted into the kitchen where Jack and Bozer were dealing with their own problems.
"Well this mommy board person says to heat the milk in the bag, but this user says to heat it in the bottle." Bozer continued to read helpful information off his phone, "but they seem to universally agree that you head the breast milk in a water bath."
Jack turned up the corners of his mouth in confusion with a squint. "Like thawing a turkey?"
"Well no. More like...heating it indirectly I guess?" Bozer voice went up an octave with uncertainty.
Jack mumbled out of the side of his mouth to Bozer, "ixnay on the ermodynamicsthay with him in the room or you might end up getting a lecture explaining how exactly the molecules in the liquid blahbidy blah to make it do whatever."
Mac grabbed the towels and corrected Jack as he hurried back to the living room, "Milk is a colloidal suspension, and the best way to heat that quantity up to body temperature in water from it's currently partially thawed state is to put the baggie in a giant coffee mug and push the middle sized coffee cup button on the Keurig."
They did exactly as they were told as Mac tried to wipe the applesauce from Riley's shoulder without smooshing it into her shirt. "I'm sorry, Ri, he looked so excited about it. I really didn't imagine this would happen."
"I'm just glad it was applesauce and not...milk." she shuddered at the thought. "At least spitting food on me amused him. Try it again. I'm already sticky, maybe he'll take it this time." She suggested as she bounced him lightly.
"Ok." Mac wasn't convinced. He showed the baby the applesauce pouch again, and again his face lit up and the prospect of having the snack. Tiny John McClane nee Hilderbrand took another mouthful of fruit puree from the spout of the pouch and spit it out with a disgruntled look on his face. "The hell, man?"
"Maybe he likes it warm." Bozer suggested. "From what I'm seeing on this mommy board, when kids are fairly new to solid foods, a lot of them are fed purees that are warmed up, like you know, they used to do with baby food jars with us. I'll get you a coffee cup of hot water too."
The kid got fussy again as Mac waited impatiently for the applesauce to warm up inside the mug of hot water. When he felt like ample time had passed, he screwed the cap back onto the pouch and shook it up. Afraid he'd lost what little trust the kid had in him, Mac showed him the pouch again from his position behind Riley. Johnny's face lit up again, but with slightly less vigor as Mac twisted the lid off of it. He took a mouthful and swallowed, anticipating another mouthful immediately.
He emptied the pouch in seconds and Riley felt it was time to pass him along to his new BFF, Mac. She placed the happy tot onto Mac's hip like she'd been holding him, letting Mac get his arm situated under the baby's butt. He wasn't sure what to do with the empty food pouch and handed it to Johnny, just in case he liked having something to occupy his hands as well. This pleased the child, and he smashed the shiny pouch repeatedly against Mac's chest with delight, making excited squawks with each strike. The bottom corner of the pouch managed to leave a papercut like scratch across Mac's cheek before he pried it from the baby's hand. "Hey, I just don't want you to get hurt." He tried to reason with the little blonde, but it was no use; he started to scream again.
Riley washed the pacifier as the other two in the kitchen tried to figure out the bottle situation. She returned the pacifier, and Johnny closed his eyes slowly before snapping them back open, agitated. "Aaaaw, you look just like Mac when he's sleepy and grumpy." She rubbed each one of them on the head, tousling their hair "Maybe he needs a bottle and bed." She grabbed the diaper bag searching for pajamas and a fresh diaper.
Mac laid the baby on his back on the couch and unsnapped the onesie. "Um, this looks like a cloth diaper. Riley, please tell me they have disposables in that bag. I don't even know what to do with a cloth diaper."
Riley continued to dig through the bag as Jack came from the kitchen with bottle in hand. Mac joined Riley at the bag and dragged it back to the couch.
Jack rushed to the couch taking a seat by the baby's feet, "Mac! You can't just leave a baby on the couch, it'll roll over and splat on the floor like a potato."
"Potatoes don't splat."
Jack played at being annoyed, "Neither do babies from this height, but you get my drift. Don't leave 'em unattended...like ever."
Bozer grinned from ear to ear "Spoken like a true helicopter parent."
Changing the subject, Jack drew attention to the streak on Mac's cheek that was pink and puffy. "Damn, son. The kid get you with his sharp paper thin talons?"
"No." He sighed, "applesauce pouch."
"Baby-2, adults-0," Jack lamented. "Who's the next victim?"