Part Two
The next afternoon, Colin texted. Landing in an hour!! Can't wait to meet my girls ❤️
I read it twice. Locked the phone.
Mom watched me. "You're not going to answer?"
"No."
"What exactly are you planning?"
I smiled toward the front door. "Something memorable."
Something memorable.
An hour later, I pulled the little chalkboard out of the hall closet — the one that usually hung by the pantry with grocery reminders scrawled across it. That day I wrote something different.
WELCOME TO COLIN'S ALL-INCLUSIVE PARENT RESORT
Underneath, in my neatest handwriting:
Sunrise Bottle Service
Bottomless Formula Refills
Daily Diaper Duty
Midnight Entertainment, Nightly
Late Checkout Not Available
Mom laughed so hard she had to wipe her eyes with a dish towel. Silas read it once, nodded, and said, "I like the last line best."
He settled into Colin's favorite recliner with one sleeping granddaughter against his chest and the other resting nearby in the bassinet.
At exactly 4:17, the front door opened.
At exactly 4:17, the front door opened.
"I'M HOME, GIRLS!"
Colin rolled his suitcase in, sunglasses pushed up into sun-bleached hair, smelling faintly of coconut sunscreen.
"I missed—" He stopped cold.
The suitcase slipped out of his hand and hit the hardwood.
His eyes had landed on the man sitting in his own recliner.
"Dad?" His voice cracked down the middle of the word. "No. No, what—"
Silas looked up slowly. "Hello, Colin."
Hello, Colin.
All the color drained straight out of Colin's face.
"What the hell is happening right now."
His knees actually buckled — I watched it happen, watched him grab the back of the couch just to keep himself upright.
"Not you," he said, voice cracking again. "Of all people, not you."
Then he noticed the chalkboard. For half a second, it looked like he might actually laugh at it.
I tried to stand up too fast. Pain shot straight through my incision, and I winced before I could stop my own face from showing it.
Colin took one step toward me.
Silas was already there first — one hand under my elbow, the other sliding a chair into place behind me before I'd even fully registered I was falling.
"Easy," he said quietly.
I sat down carefully. Colin stood frozen in the middle of the living room, watching his own father do, instinctively, the exact thing that should have been his job.
The exact thing that should have been his job.
"You don't get to judge me, Dad," Colin finally said.
Silas nodded, calm as still water. "You're right, son. I don't."
Colin blinked, thrown off balance by the agreement.
Silas adjusted the baby against his shoulder. "But I know exactly what story you've been telling yourself on that plane."
Silence.
"It was only five days," Silas said, almost gently. "I'll make it up later. The babies won't remember any of this."
Colin looked away.
Silas finally met his eyes directly. "The babies won't remember, no." A long pause. "Your wife will."
Your wife will.
Colin didn't answer, because there wasn't an answer that would have survived being said out loud.
I pointed toward the stairs. "There's a suitcase waiting for you in our room."
He climbed the steps slowly. A few seconds later, I heard him gasp.
"Nora?"
He came back down carrying it himself. Packed inside: diapers, burp cloths, bottle brushes, formula, two tiny sleepers, a digital thermometer, my post-surgery medication schedule written out hour by hour.
Sitting on top, tied to the handle, a luggage tag I'd printed that morning.
