She shook her head. “It’ll be too loud in there.”
“Okay.” I tried for lightness. “We’ll keep the calm before the storm.”
Her eyes flicked toward me. “Do we have to go?”
The words hit like a tiny punch to the chest. “We don’thaveto,” I said carefully. “But remember how Belle said the Penguin Project is a place where everyone gets to be exactly who they are?”
Ava didn’t answer. She just pressed her knees together, staring out the window. “What if they don’t like me?”
I smiled, even though my throat felt tight. “Then that’s their loss. But I have a feeling they will.”
She gave me a skeptical look, pure ten-year-old disbelief with a side of existential dread.
“I already signed you up,” I said softly. “But we can go in, take a look, and if you don’t like it, we leave. No pressure.”
“Like at the dentist,” she muttered.
“Hopefully with less fluoride,” I said, and her mouth twitched just enough to count as a smile.
We pulled into the parking lot behind the community center. The banner from the derby bout was still fluttering near the entrance, faded now from rain and sun.The Grimm Reapers Support the Penguin Project!
My stomach fluttered in sympathy. This wasn’t just new for her. It was new for me too. It was a world full of loudness and color and people who didn’t make themselves smaller to fit.
Ava unbuckled her seat belt but didn’t move to open the door. “Mom?”
“Yeah?”
“Can you come in with me?”
“Of course.” I reached over and squeezed her hand. “We’ll go together.”
Outside, the rain had turned to mist, soft and silver in the afternoon light. We walked side by side toward the building, her small fingers tightening around mine.
And as the doors opened to the sound of laughter and music spilling out, I thought about Belle’s grin, about the roar of the derby, about how it had felt to step into something wild and alive.
That same feeling brushed against me now, a world shifting under my feet, daring me to believe things could be different.
The air was thick with music and chatter as we stepped in. A warm sound that can only come from too many peopletalking and laughing at once. A dozen conversations overlapped, a hundred tiny stories in motion, all of them bright.
Kids darted everywhere, some on their feet, some in wheelchairs, some moving with canes or walkers, but every one of themmoving.There was a girl twirling in sparkly sneakers, a boy flapping his hands in rhythm with the music, and another shouting “Hi!” at everyone who came through the door like it was his job to make them feel welcome.
And somehow, it worked.
Everywhere I looked, someone was smiling, whether it was teachers, volunteers, teenagers in colorful shirts that readMentor Squad, or even the parents perched along the back wall with coffee cups and soft eyes.
It wasn’t quiet, or neat, or orderly.
It wasalive.
Ava froze beside me, eyes wide. I waited for her to retreat, to tug at my sleeve and whisper that it was too loud, too bright, too much, but she didn’t.
She just stood there, taking it all in.
Across the room, Belle spotted us and waved, her smile so big it could light a stadium. She was in leggings and a Penguin Project tee, hair piled on top of her head, a glittering feather earring swinging when she moved.
“Eleanor! Ava!” she called over the music. “You made it!”
Ava blinked, startled, and looked up at me. “She’s loud,” she said softly.
