Junk Mail(32)

I scrunch my brow at him. “Um, further context needed, please.”

“My cousin Claire lives pretty close to here. She’s got four little ones, all under the age of six. They’re rowdy, but I love them. When I’m up here for work, I like to try to swing by for a quick visit, but I don’t want to drag you along if you don’t want. I can drop you at the—”

I cut in, interrupting perhaps a little too enthusiastically. “I’d love to meet them. I mean, it’d be a great change of pace from all the thrilling supply-chain talk we’ve had today,” I add, doing my best impersonation of a girl with any amount of chill.

“Sounds great.” Josh beams at me as he takes the next exit off the highway.

We’re both lucky I’m in the passenger’s seat. If he threw me a smile like that while I was behind the wheel, we would have majorly regretted not getting the extra insurance on the rental car.

Claire, who Josh tells me is a full-time mom with yet another baby on the way, and her husband, an eighty-hour-per-week engineer, live just a few minutes off the highway. We park in the driveway behind a big navy-blue van, and when we ring the doorbell, a series of bells chime in a light, twinkling melody. It’s a perfect portrait of suburbia.

“Uncle Josh!”

The door flings open and three tiny humans come bounding outside, wrapping their arms around Josh’s legs and tugging at his sleeves. Behind them stands a brunette with a little girl propped on her hip. I’m guessing by the baby bump that this is Claire. She has pale purple marks under her eyes, just like the ones Josh gets after a late night at the office. If he hadn’t mentioned that she was his cousin, I would have assumed Claire and Josh were siblings.

“All right, all right, one at a time. I’ve got enough hugs for everyone.” Josh laughs, hoisting up the smallest of the group, a dark-haired toddler in denim overalls. “Connor, this is Peyton. Can you say, ‘Hi, Peyton’?”

“Hiii, Peytonn,” the whole group sings in unison. Even the little one on Claire’s hip joins in with a squeal of delight.

I smile and wave—two boys and two girls. I guess the new baby will be the tiebreaker.

“I’m sorry the house is a mess,” Claire says, tucking a loose strand of hair back into her messy bun. “I mean, the house is always a mess. But it’s a bit more so than usual. Connor just had his second birthday party a few days ago, right, Connor?”

Connor nods proudly, then buries his face into Josh’s shirt.

My heart flutters a bit at the sight of Josh with a little one in his arms. For a second, I even find myself imagining what our kids would look like. My hormones really need a reality check.

“C’mon, guys. Let’s go show Peyton the cool playset I got you.” Josh sets Connor down, and all three kids immediately take off running. “Last one there is a rotten egg!”

“No running in the house!” Claire half laughs, half shouts after her kids. She attempts a disapproving look at Josh, but it quickly turns into a smile. “So, am I the rotten egg this time, or are you?”

Josh nods at the door, indicating that Claire and I should go ahead. “I volunteer as rotten egg,” he says with a laugh. “It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.”

Claire leads us down the hall, giving me an abbreviated version of a tour before we step into the backyard. The sprawling grass and big, climbable trees are like something out of a dream to me. Having a yard—front or back—was never a possibility for someone like me who was raised in the city. Swing sets and makeshift kickball fields were reserved for public parks or, more commonly, movies about kids living in the suburbs.

The acre and a half behind Claire’s house could have been pulled right from one of those movies. In the center of the yard is a play structure with four swings, one for each kid, and a giant twisty slide the color of a school bus.

“Uncle Josh is a rotten egg!” One of the girls giggles from her place on a swing, which causes an outbreak of giggling among the three of them.

Josh pretends to smell himself and pinches his nose, fanning away an imaginary rotting smell. It’s enough for Claire and me to join in on the laughter. As the kids take turns on the slide, Claire tells me the story behind the playset, how Josh bought it for the kids and took a whole weekend to come upstate and assemble it.

“My husband has been working overtime to make up for his upcoming paternity leave.” Claire pats her belly with her free hand, acknowledging the little one cooking in there. “I’m so grateful that the kids have a great male role model around like Josh during this time.”

Josh’s gaze is cast downward, a slight smile on his lips as he unbuttons and rolls up the sleeves of his shirt. “I’m just doing what I can.” This has to be the humblest I’ve seen him since we met.

When Claire ducks back inside to put the baby down for her nap, the three little ones start vying for their uncle Josh’s attention.

“You don’t have to come play. I know you’re not exactly dressed for it.” Josh nods toward my red sheath dress and black blazer.

I squint my eyes at him. Is that a challenge? After kicking off my black pumps, I take off running toward the playset. “Race ya there, rotten egg.”

The next hour and a half is spent rotating between playground games. It’s been a long time since I’ve pretended that the ground is lava, but the kids seem to like teaching a grown-up how to play. During a round of hide-and-seek where Josh is ‘it,’ I give my hiding spot away early just so we can seek together, exaggerating how stumped we are as we turn blind eyes to the kids’ blatantly obvious hiding spots.