Chapter 1 - The Midnight Portals and the Forged Mandate
The humid Lafayette evening had not yet cooled when the five heavy suitcases landed on my front porch like a physical eviction notice. It was a Thursday night in September, and I was still scraping blue latex paint from beneath my fingernails after spending fourteen hours lettering a community church sign. Behind the mountain of luggage stood my five nieces and nephews—Tessa, Rowan, Quinn, Wyatt, and little Vivy—looking hollowed-out and resigned, as though they were accustomed to being packed away like seasonal decorations.
My sister Celeste stood at the bottom of the steps, her posture rigid, her hand already resting on the open door of an idling SUV where her wealthy, dead-eyed boyfriend Sterling sat staring straight ahead.
"You’ll watch the kids while we’re in Europe," Celeste announced, her voice dripping with the casual entitlement of someone accustomed to rewriting everyone else’s reality. "It’s only three weeks."
I stared at her, feeling a slow, heavy pulse of anger thrumming in my temples. "You didn't ask me."
"I’m asking now."
"That’s not asking. That’s parking."
Without waiting for my permission, Celeste shoved a provisional custody mandate into my hands, demanding my signature so she could board a transatlantic flight with Sterling. When I hesitated, flipping through the pages of legal jargon, I noticed a chilling detail in the margin: Father’s whereabouts unknown. For years, our family had whispered about Reed Sunier, the children’s father, as a deadbeat who had vanished into the Texas desert. When I questioned it, Celeste brushed it off with a wave of her manicured hand.
To break my resistance, she pulled out her phone and put our father on speaker. Dad didn't bother asking about my schedule, my mural deadlines, or my life. He simply delivered the sentence I had lived under for thirty-eight years: "Don't be selfish, Naomi. You have no kids, a van, and a paintbrush. What else have you got going on?"
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The word selfish hung in the damp Louisiana air like a foul odor. It was the weapon my father used whenever he needed me to absorb the collateral damage of Celeste’s chaotic life. With five pairs of wide, anxious eyes watching my every move, I gripped the pen and signed my name. I signed away my peace, my calendar, and my quiet life, watching as Celeste's taillights dissolved into the darkness without even saying goodbye to little Wyatt.
Little did Celeste know, her rushed exit had just opened the door to a truth she had spent two years burying.
