Returning home was always such a big production. It was exhausting. Particularly at holidays. Elizabeth’s parents had never gone all out for Christmas when she was growing up. Now, she wouldn’t be surprised if her parents went out to buy a giant inflatable snowman and more lights for the front yard while everyone else was at the pancake breakfast. Actually, she wouldn’t be surprised if her parents decided to go all in and buy an animatronic snowman instead of a regular inflatable one because Connor was also coming home and bringing someone.

From the driver’s seat, Malik knocked a knuckle into her knee. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Elizabeth replied, frowning out the window. Her parents weren’t solely to blame for how hectic trips home were. It was just...when she was back in Kansas City, she wanted to get to do all the things. She wanted to take her daughter to Union Station because she’d grown up going to Union Station. She wanted to go with Malik to the coffee shops they used to love when they were in college. She wanted to get cute, artisan cupcakes on the plaza with her sister.

Malik knocked on her knee a couple more times, and she looked back at him with a sigh. “I said I’m fine.”

“Yeah, but that was a lie,” he told her. Mercifully, he kept his voice pretty quiet, and Katelyn and Dylan were both pretty preoccupied with talking to Sapphire in the backseat to overhear.

“No, it wasn’t,” Elizabeth said.

“Another lie,” Malik argued. He had one eyebrow raised and a half-smile playing at the corner of his mouth. His whole face was asymmetrical. When Elizabeth neglected to respond, he let out a short, frustrated breath, and Katelyn shot a concerned look her way.

“Stay in your lane, little sister,” Elizabeth said.

Katelyn rolled her eyes and grumbled, “And you wonder why Connor and I never tell you anything.”

When Katelyn had her attention turned back to Sapphire, Malik told Elizabeth, “You’ve been moody and distant for weeks. You should tell me what’s been going on. That is the whole point of having a me.”

“I have not been moody and distant for weeks,” Elizabeth argued, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Yes,” Malik said. “You have. Except for when you were tormenting Katelyn. That seemed to delight you.”

Elizabeth rolled her eyes and looked back out the window. Malik had always had an issue with her picking on her siblings. In fact, he seemed to have more of an issue with it than they did. After a moment, she said, “I was having fun before then, too.”

Malik found a place to park in a parking garage and then they had to walk a little ways to get to the event. The breakfast with Santa was being held in an old theater that looked a bit like a nostalgia trip. Admission was significantly more expensive than Elizabeth anticipated. She had to pay $60.00 for her family, and she felt a little bad when she glanced over her shoulder to see her little sister passing a credit card to an elf. She ought to have looked up the price beforehand. Katelyn and Dylan both worked in the food service industry. They probably wouldn’t have ever suggested wasting their money on hot chocolate and pancakes with Santa Claus. It had been Martha’s idea. She’d mentioned it to Malik the night before and then, instead of doing any sort of research about it, both he and Elizabeth just shrugged and said, “Yeah, sounds good.” As Malik was paying one elf and Katelyn was shaking her head at another, Elizabeth silently cursed her mother. Immediately, she felt bad about it. Martha probably hadn’t been concerned about the cost because Jason was an investment banker. It wouldn’t have been a problem for him to throw away $50 on a kitschy Christmas outing.

Inside the theater, a room was set up with several long tables covered in red and green plastic tablecloths. They had half an hour before the meal actually started, so, Malik and Elizabeth took their daughter off to play reindeer toss and elf bowl as Dylan, whose eyes lit up as soon as he saw the words hot chocolate, dragged Katelyn off towards the hot chocolate bar.

Elizabeth squatted down to watch her daughter toss a ring at a poster of a reindeer with protruding antlers. One of the rings caught, dangled off the antler for a moment, and then slid off, clattering on the floor. As a toddler, Sapphire didn’t understand that in order to win the ring would need to stay, so when the ring crashed on the ground, she giggled and clapped. Elizabeth couldn’t help but grin. If it were possible, she would bottle up the moment, and all the similar moments that came before and after it, the ones that felt like...a love of being.

Growing up, Elizabeth had never really wanted kids. She had been pretty disinterested in baby dolls and strollers. One year, her aunt gave her a doll with a magnetic pregnant stomach that had a baby in it. Naturally, Elizabeth found the doll utterly disturbing, so she tossed the baby and the belly and just kept the doll. Elizabeth’s mother was disturbed by her eight year old throwing an out an infant, so she fished the baby out of the kitchen trash. Years later, when Elizabeth was in high school and had started dating a boy with a car, Martha had the baby made into a keychain that she forced Elizabeth to carry so she’d always remember what could happen. Up until she met Malik, it was a pretty effective deterrent.

So, anyway, Elizabeth had never really wanted kids. She never dreamed about them or made up names for them. She only babysat her own siblings because the one time she tried to babysit somebody who didn’t share at least seven chromosomes with her, she was totally miserable. She never volunteered for VBS or helped with kids church. She got her community service hours for high school graduation through tutoring, but she always refused to tutor in the elementary schools. Whenever kids came up in conversations, she would shrug and say, “I just don’t really see myself having kids, y’know?”

She had friends who had dreamed of being mothers, who picked out names and cooed over newborns. But she had never been able to relate. Then, she got a husband and that husband wanted a kid. They had talked about it off and on for the first two years of their marriage. He’d wanted children, multiple, and the thought made her want to vomit. Malik had grown up with two brothers and three sisters. He had a whole slew of cousins, too. And he loved all of it. He had delighted in the noise and the joy and the chaos. If his stories were to be believed, Malik had spent his entire childhood playing tag in the street, playing video games in the basement, sneaking into theaters, and jumping through sprinklers, all right next to his siblings. So, Malik had wanted a child, and then he wanted siblings for that child.

“Siblings,” Malik would say, “Are like built in friends.”

Elizabeth had a different experience.She loved Katelyn and Connor, but she was six when Katy was born and seven when Connor was. They’d always been closer to each other than to her. They were all friends in adulthood, sure, but that genuine friendship hadn’t really developed until they were in college.

At any rate, Malik had wanted a child and Elizabeth was unconvinced. They never really made a decision one way or the other, they just stopped preventing it. Shortly after, she was pregnant. Then, there was Sapphire.

Sapphire had picked up her ring and was running around the reindeer ring toss area, squealing. Malik scooped her up into his arms, spinning in the process. They were both laughing. His skin was a deep, rich brown and hers was just a shade lighter. He was wearing a dark red v-neck sweater and she was wearing a bright red dress with candy cane striped leggings. Her hair was pulled into two little puffs of curls. She let out a giggle. Elizabeth watched all of this with an ache in her chest.

It was true: Elizabeth had never really wanted kids before. But then she had Sapphire. Before Sapphire, Elizabeth never imagined her heart could hold so much love. And worry and joy and delight and fear and hope, but mostly love. So Elizabeth had never really wanted kids before, but then she had Sapphire and, then, she wanted more.

Now, she was afraid she couldn’t have them.