For two days after the flight, I almost convinced myself that the strange moment with Luke had been just that—a strange moment.
A small pocket of kindness in the middle of a life that had turned sharp at every edge.
My cousin Jenna lived in a narrow townhouse in Annapolis with blue shutters, a crooked mailbox, and a kitchen that always smelled faintly of cinnamon tea. She had cleared out her home office for me and Poppy, setting an air mattress beneath the window and stacking folded towels on an old rocking chair like she was preparing a guest room in a real hotel.
“It’s temporary,” she told me, as if she could hear the apology forming before I said it. “Temporary is allowed.”
I nodded, but the word sat heavily in my chest.
Temporary.
That was what my entire life had become.
A temporary bed. A temporary address. A temporary plan for what came next.
Poppy adjusted faster than I did. Children have a way of accepting the world by the hour. If there was milk, her lamb, a place to nap, and someone to clap when she stacked blocks crookedly, she could make a home anywhere.
I envied her for that.
On the third morning, I woke to the sound of Jenna’s coffee machine hissing downstairs and Poppy babbling softly from her travel crib. Gray morning light spread across the walls. For a few seconds, I forgot where I was.
Then I remembered.
The divorce.
The bank account.
The locked house.
The flight.
Luke.
I sat up slowly, stretching one aching shoulder. Poppy stood gripping the rail of her crib, cheeks flushed from sleep, her curls sticking out in every direction.
What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
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