You, Me, and Riley

chapter 11

"Do you think she is going to be big or little today?" Dana asked standing up after zipping up the final bag. We are doing last minute bag checks Wednesday morning before we wake up Riley to get her ready for the airport. "She was still little when we put her to bed last night."

"Big would be ideal." I said, "But she said this was her first time flying and after last night I think she might regress when she is stressed."

"So little it is." She said with a laugh. "I'm going to start loading bags and you should start getting the little one ready. This is our first morning so who knows how long it will take."

I make my way upstairs super excited to wake Riley up and see how this morning is going to begin. "Hey baby." I said running my fingers through her hair. "It's time to wake up."

"I too seepy to et up." She mumbled "Eo says it not mornin et."

"Well Mr. Leo you are being very silly." I said picking him up and poking him on the nose. I heard a soft giggle and looked down to see a pair of brown eyes peering up at me from under the covers. She quickly threw the blanket over her head when she saw me looking. "Well I guess the plane is just going to leave without a certain bunny and his sidekick." I said with sigh as I tucked Leo back in and got off the bed.

"I no want da pane to eave witout me." She said sitting up in bed. "Neiter does Eo."

"Then I guess we should get you ready to go shouldn't we." I said with a smile as I picked her up out of bed and carried her to my bedroom. I paused before I asked her the next question "I have a very important question to ask you and I want you to think very hard before you answer ok?" I said as I sat her down on my bed. "How big do you think you are going to be today. Because Hawaii is a long flight and if you are going to be little I want to put you in a pull-up." She sat on the bed looking between the pull-up and me for a few minutes before she leaned into me and rested her head on my shoulder.

"I want to say that I will be big" She said with a sigh as she sat up. "But I'm super nervous and I don't think I can make it through the whole trip being big." She said sounding disappointed.

"That's ok sweat pea. That's what Dana and I are here for, to take care of you when you're little. You don't have to be disappointed." I said kissing her on the forehead and getting her little stuff ready.

"The problem is that as soon as you get that stuff ready I'm going to regress I can tell already." She said starting to fidget.

"Come here sweat pea." I said pulling her into my lap putting my hand on her cheek and brushing my thumb against her face. "You keep forgetting that Dana and I want to do this. If you remember correctly we asked you."

"Yeah but I don't think you were expecting to carry a 2-year-old adult through the airport." She said starting to chew on her thumb as I rocked her back and forth.

"You call her a two-year-old adult I call her my baby." I said as I finally watched her slip into her headspace. "You are so silly little one you know that." I said poking her nose and making her giggle.

"Eo the siddy one not me." She said holding the rabbit up by his foot.

"Oh my mistake." I said tickling her. "How could I forget something like that!" I sat her up and helped her into her pullup and adorable yellow romper. I brushed out her curls and put her hair into a high ponytail. And lead her downstairs. Through trial and error last night we discovered that the best way to give her, her medications was to crush them and mix them with applesauce. After her bowl of applesauce a piece of toast and a cup of orange juice we buckled a talkative Riley into her car seat and we were on the road to the airport.

Getting through baggage check and TSA with Riley wasn't easy especially when we had to explain to them that her 3D cast could not be removed to go through the x-ray machine. Once we were able to convince Riley that Leo would be okay going through the conveyor belt and she walked through the metal detector we were finally on our way to our gate!

Dana pulled a fidgeting Riley in her lap as I pulled out my ipad and let Riley watch one of the movies we had downloaded as we waited to board. Thankfully we can afford 1st class tickets allowing us to both board first and giving us a little more space and privacy. Thankfully Riley wasn't able to get to absorbed in her movie before we boarded the plane and I had to take away the movie. Once we got seated I took her backpack out and showed her everything inside of it.

"Ok sweetheart since this is such a long flight I have stuff in here for little Riley and big Riley. I have a book for big you to read and a few for little you to look at." I said taking them out.

"ooks?" She asked as she reached for Leo when she saw his ear poke out of the backpack.

"Mmhmm. And I got you this Nintendo qs, fs, df thing." I said trying to remember the name. "In the pink case are games for little Riley when she's feeling on the older side and in the blue case are games for big Riley."

Dana snorted looking over at me. "It's a DS and I'm pretty sure she is not interested in anything you are saying right now. Riley how old are you?" She asked reaching into the front pocket and grabbing the pacifier.

"Mmmm I two!" She said clapping her hands.

"Yeah, give her the coloring books." Dana said as she clipped the pacifier to the front of her shirt and sat back.

"I cuwer!" She said smiling through the pacifier in her mouth.

I rolled my eyes at Dana and helped Riley set up her coloring book around the ipad so she could watch the movie as she colored and smiled to her as I sat back in my seat. With Riley completely distracted between Dana and I, I pulled out a book and prepared for the next several hours. These flights suck when it was just Dana and me, and now we have a two year old I thought to myself with a sigh as I turned to my page and enjoyed the calm while it lasted.