For a moment, Sarah stood still, watching her children—a beautiful, chaotic constellation of personalities. She’d worried so much about the lines between past and present, between "his and mine," but here, those lines blurred into something she hadn’t anticipated: a family. Her family.
She deserves better than me, Emma thought, a familiar ache blooming in her chest. The tears came, unbidden and relentless, dampening the sleeve of her jumper as she buried her face in it.
Time blurred, and she lost herself in the spiral of thoughts, until the gentle creak of the front door broke the spell. Her mum, Mary, stepped in hesitantly, holding a thermos of soup in one hand and an expression of concern in the other.
