“He doesn’t usually come on Saturdays,” I said, careful not to sound as strange as I felt. “He has his own things to do. It’s his day off.”
Winnie made a small noise in the back of her throat, like she didn’t agree with that logic. “He’s still allowed to come over, though. Right?”
I turned slowly, clutching my mug like it could anchor me, and smiled. “I mean ... I guess. But sometimes people need breaks.”
She blinked, spoon halfway to her mouth. “I don’t.”
That got a small laugh out of me. I came around the table and smoothed a hand over her head, my fingers catching in a tangle near the crown. Her hair smelled like kid shampoo and the faint scent of lavender body spray she liked to overuse.
“You definitely don’t,” I murmured. “But grown-ups get tired sometimes.”
She squinted at me, her spoon paused midair. “You look funny today.”
I blinked. “Funny how?”
She tilted her head, studying me with that tiny furrow between her brows like she was solving a puzzle. “Like ... your face is doing a secret.”
That startled a laugh out of me. “My face is doing a secret?”
Winnie nodded seriously. “Uh-huh. Like when you smile, but you’re not saying why you’re smiling.”
I pressed my fingers to the corners of my mouth, trying—and failing—to smooth it away. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Her eyes lit up. “Do you have a present for me?”
I laughed and shook my head. “Sorry, kid. No surprises today.”
Winnie pouted but went back to her cereal, completely unbothered. “Maybe you’re thinking about something that makes you happy. Your face did that when we saw Mr. O’Brien and you said his cat was cute.”
I snorted into my coffee. Mr. O’Brien was a sweet old man who walked his cat downtown on a leash. “His cat is really cute.”
She gave me a knowing look, five going on forty. “Your voice got soft like a marshmallow. I think it means we should get a cat.”
Winnie’s logic was impressive. Avoiding the topic of getting a pet cat, I retreated back to the counter, heart thudding like I’d been caught doing something criminal. I tried to examine my reflection in the toaster, but it was no use.
Winnie had always been perceptive—more than most kids her age. She saw things, felt them, and the truth was, I probably did look different.
Because Ifeltdifferent.
Austin had gotten under my skin, and I didn’t know how to dig him out.
As I reached for the coffee again, Winnie rambled on about cats and I found myself thinking about marginalia.
Those quiet notes readers left in the margins of books—half thoughts, underlines, delicate nothings that felt like secrets. I loved to collect those moments, both in a literal sense, but also in the way I’d press my thumb to the page and wonder who else had felt that line deeply enough to mark it. I’d always loved that—evidence of someone who’d come before me. A life brushing up against mine in the smallest, most intimate way.
And now I couldn’t stop wondering: What was I leaving behind? What kind of marginalia was I writing into my daughter’s life? Was it all tired routines and microwaved dinners and reminders to wear socks with her boots? Did she see me as a whole person? Or just the scaffolding that held everything up?
I glanced over at her—pink cheeks, wild brown hair, a cereal drip making its way down the front of her pajama shirt—and I felt the ache of it in my bones. I loved her more than I had ever loved anything in my life, but I was starting to wonder what else I was supposed to be.
If I was supposed to be just this.
If I was teaching her that mothers didn’t get to want anything outside of their children. That being responsible meant locking your desires in a drawer and throwing away the key.
I wanted more.
Notinsteadof being her mother, but because I was. I wanted to teach her to live fearlessly.
I wanted to show her that women could be complicated. That they could want stability and still burn with hunger. That they could make mistakes and survive them. That they could crave comfort and risk, sometimes in the same breath.
