“Run, man, run!”
With that, he turns and takes off, his little legs pumping as fast as they can, all the way to first base. Our friends holler from the stands like they’re witnessing history in the making. Hell, it’s the best any of these little goons have done all day.
The kid knows how to make his old man proud, that’s for sure.
• • •
The game ends up a well-earned tie.
While parents retrieve their kids, I exchange a firm handshake and a tired look of relief with the other team’s coach. There were no meltdowns today, so that’s a win in any Little League coach’s book.
While Becca and I are packing up our kids in the car, Jordie slaps me on the shoulder. “You seen Harper anywhere? I can’t find her.”
Becca frowns slightly, which would be invisible to anyone who hasn’t memorized her facial expressions like I have. “She said she was going to wait in the car. Headache, I think.”
Jordie exhales out of his nose sharply and shakes his head. “Right . . . thanks. See you guys.”
“Thanks for your help today, Jordie,” I call to his retreating back.
What the fuck is going on with him? Whatever it is, there’s nothing I can do about it now, so I shake it off and focus on my family.
After stealing first base like he did, Becca and I agree that Bishop deserves an extra-special treat. There’s an ice cream parlor a short drive from the field that we’re known to hit up after our games, and this time, Bishop can have all the sprinkles he wants.
As we get situated with our variety of cones and cups of multicolored ice cream on the patio, Becca seems to read my mind.
“What was up with Jordie today?” she asks, pulling the sun guard down over the double stroller where the twins are napping peacefully.
“I was about to ask you the same thing about Harper.”
Becca nods in agreement. “Right? They’re both acting off. There’s some kind of tension between them.”
Jordie and Harper met a few years back and got hitched pretty much out of the gate. It was messy, involving a bet made in poor taste, a fake book club, and all the fuckery that comes with dating the coach’s daughter.
You heard that right. The rookie and the coach’s daughter. But those crazy kids fell in love—the kind meant to last forever. Or so we thought.
“I was hoping I was imagining it.”
Becca scrunches her nose, playing with the loose ends of her scarf. “You definitely weren’t. I mean, you’d have to be blind to think that nothing’s wrong.”
There’s a harsh edge to her voice that I recognize from the early days of rearing our first kid. Becca was a bundle of stress back then, and I’m sure she’s struggling now that her workload has tripled.
Just as I’m reaching out to take her hand, Charli squeals in the front seat of the stroller.
Bishop gulps down the rest of his ice cream in a hurry. He may only be six, but even he knows that life with twins is unpredictable. Sometimes we have to pack up and take off in a hurry, and there was no way he was missing out on the rest of his ice cream.
Becca lets out a little groan as Bella joins in the noise, waking from her slumber with stuttering cries.
Our quiet moment is gone before it really began. Charli is babbling loudly and unhappily, and Bella is growing red in the face with her sympathetic tears.
Becca moves into action, packing everything up. She’s a pro by now. We once had to leave a restaurant in the middle of dinner because Charli had blown out her diaper, and Bishop had downed all his chocolate milk in a rush and then thrown up under the table. I swear, you can’t make this stuff up. In my defense, I left a really nice tip.
Once Becca and I have all the kids calmed down and packed into the car, we settle in the front seats with heavy sighs. She looks wrecked, resting her head in her hand, propped on an elbow against the window.
I reach across the console and squeeze her knee. “It’s not always going to be like this, you know. It’s gonna get easier.”
She scoffs a little, but her hand finds mine. “I really don’t know if that’s true.”
“I mean it, angel. I know it’s a lot, and you handle it all so well. I love you.”
Becca cocks her head toward me and smiles, her usual bright blue eyes a muted gray. It’s about fifty percent of her smile’s usual radiance.
My stomach sinks. What’s happening here?
That weird tingling feeling inside me is back. I need to get to the bottom of whatever it is that’s going on with her.
3
* * *
BECCA
“What are you drawing?” Owen asks our son, pulling up a chair to sit next to him at the kitchen table. A table that will need clearing of all the art supplies scattered over it in less than ten minutes if these goons want any dinner.
Bishop mumbles something unintelligible, concentrating too hard to speak up.
“Belushi? Like the comedian?” Owen chuckles, a little bewildered.
“A beluga,” I call out from across the room where I’m stirring a pot of homemade pasta sauce. “He’s been into whales lately.”
“Ah. Looks good, buddy.” Owen rubs our son’s hair.
I glance over at the twins, immediately wishing I hadn’t. Bella is rubbing a yellow crayon against her cheeks, getting dangerously close to shoving it in her mouth entirely.
“Owen, she’s got the crayon in her mouth again.”
He leans over and carefully confiscates it. “Hey, hungry, hungry caterpillar. Crayons aren’t food.”
Bella whines in protest.
“I’m hungry,” Bishop says, only contributing to the chaos.
“Your mama’s almost done with dinner, bud. You can wait five minutes.”
“Ten, at least,” I grumble, jogging over to prevent Charli from knocking the whole container of art supplies onto the floor with her surprisingly strong hands.
Bella has managed to get her grubby little fingers on a marker this time, trying to bite off the cap. Owen snags it just in time and shoots me a look that says, What have we gotten ourselves into?
Parenthood and all its wonders.
On nights like these, I’m so grateful to have Owen around to help. He’s great with the kids, an honest-to-God fantastic father. But now that we’ve got three, it takes at minimum two sets of hands to keep them from certain death at all times. Thank goodness the twins aren’t walking yet, or else I wouldn’t put it past them to toddle into incoming traffic.
Somehow, as if things aren’t crazy enough, the fire alarm goes off. I spin around, covering my ears against the noise, which is made louder by the kids screaming along like it’s the world’s worst song. Smoke is billowing from the oven.
Crap! I left the garlic bread in the oven too long. The slices are as black and hard as hockey pucks.
Owen doesn’t need a ladder to turn off the alarm—skyscraper height is a wonderful trait to have in a husband—but unfortunately there’s no off switch on a trio of wailing children. And now my sauce is burning. The edges are blackened and the smell is atrocious.
Sighing deeply, I try to shush the twins.
Owen and I decide to nix pasta plans in favor of some simple cheese sandwiches. Neither of us even have the energy to grill them. But there’s nothing that Bishop loves more than cheese, and there’s nothing his little sisters love more than matching their brother.