“What’s wrong with you?” he asks, looking at me like I’m a puzzle he’s trying to solve.
“What do you mean?” I ask coyly. Easton has always been the intuitive one. We can’t ever get anything past him. The kid stopped believing in Santa at four years old. After immense questioning on his part, Emma and I tried explaining the logistics of Santa’s delivery methods with as much Christmas zeal one could conjure in the situation. He looked at us with the same look he’s giving me now, said, and I quote, “Sounds fake, and I’m ashamed you would lie about something like that.”
“Something’s wrong.” He sighs, turning over and looking up at the glow-in-the-dark stars speckled on the ceiling. “You didn’t do any voices. You always do voices.”
I see his mouth tick in frustration as he pulls the blanket up to his neck. He stays fixated on the stars, not looking at me. A part of me is glad; I hate disappointing them. And Easton looks exactly like his mother when he’s disappointed. Something about the way his eyebrows pinch and arch in one fluid motion is uncanny to Emma, and they have the same personality too. They’re helpers, givers, sacrificing so much to please the people around them that when something doesn’t go the way they hope, it’s almost too much to handle, and they get anxious.
Luckily, Easton hasn’t shown any signs of generalized anxiety, but still, I can’t help but hover when stress arises.
“I did voices,” I finally say.
“Dad,” Easton chides me, still glaring, eyebrows still mirroring my wife’s.
I blink at him. He’s right. I’m letting the weight of everything else crowd out this time with him, letting grown-up problems seep into something that should be simple and sweet. Oh how I wish I could be a boy again, not worrying about my marriage, or work, or bills. Just focus on getting the story right, making sure the dragons gettheir tacos.
“You’re right. I’m sorry.”
I snatch the book from the bedside table and climb into his bed, letting him and his panda from Build-A-Bear squish into the crook of my arm, then start the story from the beginning. Accents, sound effects, and dramatic pauses commence before he’s finally snoring.
After ninja-crawling to the door, I take in the sight of them. Their sleepy smiles and tender breaths are something I never want to get tired of. I don’t ever want to forget this season, no matter how worn down I might be.
When I make it downstairs, Emma hasn’t made it out of Josie’s room yet, so I take the opportunity to clean up the kitchen, make tomorrow’s lunches, and throw a load of laundry in the dryer.
“See, this isn’t that hard,” I tell myself as I wipe the counter down. “Your wife shouldn’t be doing all of this on her own.”
Nearly twenty minutes go by, and after a minor crisis with Josie’s bottles, there isn’t much left to do. But Emma still hasn’t come downstairs.
Josie’s bedroom door is cracked open, and a small sliver of gold light illuminates the opposite wall. With the sound machine whirring, I’m not as quiet as I should be when I walk in, but it doesn’t matter. Emma and Josie are fast asleep in the glider.
The sight stops me. It’s beautiful and devastating all at once. Emma’s head is cocked to the side, hair tangled and draped over half her face. The shadows beneath her eyes make her look depleted and kind of dehydrated. Josie, on the other hand, is nestled peacefully against Emma’s chest, looking full and well rested. She’s perfectly content. They’re polar opposites holding onto each other.
It’s the clearest picture of motherhood I’ve ever seen. Emma giving so completely of herself so Josie never has to go without. I can’t describe the feeling that happens in my chest. I just know it hurts, and it takes extra effort to move across the room to them.
I ease the baby into her crib, careful not to wake her. Then I lift Emma into my arms, cradling her the way she held our daughter. Holding her against me seems to be all I need for everything bad and angry that was stirring inside me to fade.
As I ease her onto our bed, I press a kiss to her forehead. Then another to her lips. Her skin is warm beneath my hands as my thumbs brush her cheeks, and for a moment, she leans into the touch like she’s not tired down to the bone.
I settle beside her, letting the weight of the day fall away as she curls into me. Her head finds the space beneath my chin, her hand slipping over my chest, fingers curling lightly into my shirt like she’s afraid I’ll vanish if she lets go. It’s moments like these that solidify the persistent gnawing in my chest, the one that says I have to make this work. I can’t lose her.
She sighs so quietly it’s almost fragile. And she feels so small. I know I’m the reason. I’ve brought us to this place. I’ve made her feel small and fragile.
I run my hand slowly up her side, a quiet, careful reassurance that I’m here. She melts into the touch, pressing closer, her breath mingling with my own.
“I love you,” I whisper into her hair. It comes out rough and heavier than I intended.
“I love you,” she murmurs around a yawn.
We need to talk.The words I need to say are right there, but they get lodged in the back of my throat. We need to hash this out, hash everything out. Everything that’s sitting between us and stealing pieces of our life.
But I’m tired and terrified. I’m also angry. Angry with myself…with her a little, too. If I say the wrong thing, it could make everything worse. I could lose the tiny bit of closeness we have right now. So instead, I just hold her, my hand at the small of her back and lips brushing the top of her head.
Her chest rises and falls against mine, her breathing slowly evening out until she’s fully asleep. I feel the tension in her body unwind against me. It’s absurd to think, but this simple thing is a reminder that she does still trust me enough to relax. It’s so trusting it hurts.
I close my eyes, letting myself feel it. The ache of everything. The relief, the anger, thefear, all of it tangling together so tightly I don’t know how to separate them. I don’t know how to fix this, but I know I need to.
I can feel myself itching to figure it out. Assess, evaluate, make a plan. That part of me never really shuts off. But I’m tired, and moments like this with her are rare. So instead, I just hold her and remember how lucky I am to have something so precious.
My luck runs out when two feet find their way to my abdomen. All the air leaves my body when Sawyer lands on top of me.
