Six months earlier, my life was busy in a normal way.
I was twenty-five and working as a structural engineer. My days were filled with site visits, deadlines, and problem-solving. My evenings were for wedding planning, budgeting, and talking about the future.
My fiancée, Jenna, loved planning. She had a talent for it, honestly. She made lists. She saved ideas. She liked to talk about the kind of home we would have and the kind of family we would build.
My mom, Naomi, texted me all the time. Small things. Grocery reminders. Questions about dinner plans. Updates on my twin sisters, Lily and Maya, who were ten and still believed birthdays were a big deal.
Life felt predictable.
Then it wasn’t.
Becoming a Guardian Overnight
After my mom was suddenly gone, the world stopped making sense.
The wedding details that once felt important became background noise. The honeymoon we had partially paid for no longer felt real. Even the apartment I thought I loved felt like it belonged to someone else.
In a single week, I became the person Lily and Maya had to rely on.
Our father had left years ago. When Mom told him she was expecting twins, he disappeared from our lives. We hadn’t heard from him since.
So when Mom was gone, there wasn’t a line of relatives stepping forward.
There was me.
Two quiet girls holding their backpacks a little too tightly, asking if I could sign their school papers now.
That night, I moved back into my mother’s house.
I left behind my apartment, my routines, and the comfortable version of adulthood I thought I had earned.
I told myself I could do it.
I had to.
