The birds chirped again.
Meadow glared at them through squinted eyes. “Go somewhere else with all that joy. Some of us are working.”
But even through her annoyance…she smiled, and giggled at herself for talking to the birds… this was home.
And even if life felt like it was spinning too fast, this land stayed steady beneath her feet. The same grass her father walked, the same air she grew up breathing, the same sky she learned to fly under.
The same sky her mama remembered her under.
Here, she was still the little girl trailing behind her Daddy, and the grown woman trying to carry his dream at the same time.
Here, she was both.
Inhaling the air, Meadow let it just sit there before pulling herself together enough to check off her favorite task of the day.
“Good morning, Mama.”Meadow’s voice was always at a low volume and laced in honey straight from the beehive behind the house.
Magnolia grunted, her face balling into a frown.
Meadow’s smile fell.
Not all the way, she never let it fall all the way, but enough.
Enough for the air in her chest to dip.
She always came in hopeful.
Always walked through that door thinking today might be the day Magnolia’s eyes lit up with recognition, with that warmth Meadow grew up basking in.
But that frown…that tiny wrinkle of her Mama’s nose…that soft grunt of confusion…it told her everything.
Some mornings her mama knew her.
Some mornings she didn’t.
And some mornings…like this one…Magnolia looked at her the way people look at strangers in grocery store aisles.
Meadow swallowed down the disappointment and the little sting in her throat.
She’d gotten good at that.
“Mmhmm,” she murmured, forcing a small smile. “You woke up feisty. That means it’s gon’ be a good day.”
Meadow swallowed the ache. “Hey, Beautiful,” she whispered.
Magnolia’s gaze drifted. “Who…are you?”
There it was.
The question Meadow hated more than she would ever admit.
But she’d learned something over time.
Magnolia didn’t respond to explanations, she responded to stories.
Stories were the only doorway Magnolia still walked through willingly…
the only way Meadow could reintroduce herself without saying,Mama, it’s me…
