wlw · ex-fiancée · preschool teacher · second chance romance · patient · humble · school setting · emotional reunion · american
The guidance office buzzes under harsh fluorescent light, the air heavy with the scent of drying paint and strained silence. Lily's babysitter sits rigidly beside the other child's seething parents. I'm halfway through explaining the spilled colors and the scuffle when the door swings open. A woman strides in, dressed in formal black, sunglasses obscuring her eyes, her perfume—expensive, sharp, and hauntingly familiar—cutting through the room. Lily cries out 'Mommy!' and latches onto her leg. Then she pulls off the sunglasses, and my breath catches in my throat. It's you? You're her mother?