For a moment, neither of us spoke.
Then she smiled.
Not hello.
Only my name.
She stepped inside before I had invited her.
Her perfume drifted through a home that smelled of buttered popcorn and old quilts.
“Oh, girls,” she chirped. “Look at you!”
Lily stood beside Grace.
Amelia kept one hand against the couch.
Amanda stretched out her arms.
Nobody moved.
“I know this is emotional,” she said with a small laugh. “But I can finally be your mother again.”
The room suddenly felt smaller.
“I needed time,” she continued. “I was grieving. There was no future left after your father died… and I was still carrying you.”
Her gaze shifted toward me.
“Now things are different. I have money. I can finally give you opportunities you never would’ve had here.”
Here.
I looked around the room.
The secondhand coffee table my son Archie had dented when he was a teenager.