The bell rings somewhere down the corridor, shrill and bright, and kids spill out of classrooms in a rush of backpacks and sneakers and half-finished thoughts. I pause to the side, letting them rush past me, feeling oddly outside of time.
Safe. Loved. Thriving.
I repeat the words in my head as a checklist. Perhaps if I say them enough, they’ll stop feeling borrowed and start feeling earned.
Outside, the morning air hits my face. It’s the kind of weather that makes you stand a second longer than necessary just breathing. I do.
No rush. No emergency.
That’s new.
I walk instead of driving, hands shoved into my jacket pockets, boots scuffing the sidewalk as I head toward Main Street.
Colter Creek is waking up the way it always does. Shop doors opening. A truck rumbling past with hay bales stacked too high. Someone arguing good-naturedly about parking.
I pass the hardware store and catch my reflection in the window. Same guy. Same flannel. Same permanent squint from years of sun and worry.
But I feel steadier.
I think about the nights I lay awake listening to the twins breathe, counting seconds between inhales as if that could keep the world from taking anything else from us. The mornings I triple-checked lunchboxes, permission slips, and shoes on the right feet.
The way I learned to braid hair from a shaky YouTube video at midnight.
The way I still panic every time Eliza gets quiet.
The way Caleb’s laugh can undo a whole bad day in half a second.
I’ve always been afraid that one day they’ll look back and see the gaps. The places where a mom should’ve been. The times I didn’t know what to say.
But maybe they’re not keeping score the way I am.
The Buckhorn Diner comes into view, squat and stubborn as ever, and my stomach finally reminds me that pride and relief don’t count as breakfast.
I push the door open, bell jingling, and the smell of coffee and bacon wraps around me deliciously. Everything inside looks the same.
Vinyl booths, chipped mugs, the same crooked photo of a prize-winning pie from a decade ago. Comfort disguised as grease.
“Well, look at you,” Betty Lou calls from behind the counter before I’ve even made it two steps in. “Someone looks downright cheerful.”
“That obvious?” I ask, sliding into my usual booth.
“Like a kid who just found an extra fry at the bottom of the bag,” she says, already grabbing a plate.
“Kids are thriving,” I say, unable to keep it out of my voice. “I’m riding that high.”
Carrie Jo appears with a coffee pot. She summoned herself with gossip radar alone. “We love thriving kids.”
She pours, then pauses. Tilts her head. Squints at me, trying to read fine print.
Uh-oh.
“And?” she prompts.
“And… what?” I say, because apparently today I’m choosing bedlam.
Betty sets the plate down with just enough emphasis to make a point. “Don’t play dumb, Jesse Murphy. You’ve gotthatlook.”
I lift a brow. “Which one?”
