We built something.
The kids met me at the door when I got home from the store. Rosie grabbed for the chips first. June wanted to know if I remembered the chocolates. Maya took the box of pads quietly, the way she always handled her sisters' private embarrassments.
That was our life. Simple, crowded, and loud in a good way.
At dinner that Saturday night, Owen asked if we were still going to the cemetery on Sunday morning to visit Grandma's grave before lunch.
"We'll go after church," I said.
Rosie made a face at the meatloaf, then ate two slices. June announced that periods were a scam. Ellie told her to stop being dramatic until June pointed out that Ellie's own first one had involved crying over a potato. Maya laughed so hard milk came out of her nose, which made everybody lose it.
That was our life. Simple, crowded, and loud in a good way.
I sat there looking around the table and had one of those quiet father moments no one prepares you for, the kind where your chest hurts a little because the people in front of you are your entire life and you are so tired and so lucky you almost cannot hold both truths at once.
On Sunday, we went to the cemetery, came home, warmed the leftovers, said grace, and sat down for a Mother's Day lunch that was more about remembering my mother than the woman who had left my children.
Then the doorbell rang.
I got up to answer it. The second I opened the door, all the breath left my body.
Natalie stood on my porch dressed as if she had been invited somewhere better first.
Polished shoes. Good coat. Hair done carefully to look effortless. For one stunned second, my brain refused to connect the woman at the door with the one who had left five children and never once called to ask if any of them still had night terrors.
