Chapter 17

That weekend, Maya was invited to a playdate with a girl named Harper whose parents owned a three-story house with a trampoline and gluten-free everything.

I arrived with Aliya and Jaya in tow, armed with store-bought brownies I had absolutely passed off as homemade. The other moms were already in athleisure gear, doing light yoga stretches in the living room while sipping kombucha.

"Would you like to join the stretch circle?" one asked.

"I already did Pilates. With Satan. This morning," I said, which was technically true.

Aliya disappeared with the other kids, and I was left doing my best downward dog next to a woman named Skylar who had matching tattoos with her son.

"What do you do for self-care?" she asked.

"I stare at a wall and whisper obscenities until bedtime."

Skylar nodded seriously. "Grounding. I like that."

Jaya exploded a juice pouch on the ceiling right then, ending the yoga peace treaty.

That night, with all three girls asleep in a puppy pile on my bed, I sat on the floor with my new iPhone.

I typed Alec Darrow into the search bar again.

Photos. Articles. Wedding highlights.

He looked like a smug toad in his designer tux, arm-in-arm with Dorothy in her lace, diamond-studded gown. They posed like they were gods of Olympus, when all I saw was betrayal wrapped in a bow.

I didn’t love Dorothy. But she was mine. Or at least, she used to be. Alec took my company, my life, and now my woman too? It wasn't a heartbreak. It was territorial rage.

"You want war, Alec? Fine. You messed with the wrong stay-at-home-mom."

I pulled up a list and wrote:

Get fit enough to chase down a bus.

Open a secret account using hidden funds.

Rebuild my alias.

Find connections in Dublin’s underworld.

Make Alec sweat.

I added a sixth item.

Potty train Jaya.

Because the true war was still happening in my bathroom.

The next day, while sorting mismatched socks and deciphering Maya’s math homework that looked like it required a PhD, there was a knock.

It was Mylene, the angel from the children’s clothing store. We exchanged numbers and found that they were the new neighbours who live a few doors away from Jhing Jhing.

"Surprise! I brought coffee and chaos. Also, you looked like you were five seconds from crying when we last met, so I figured I’d check on you."

I blinked.

She was indeed an angel.

"You are terrifyingly good at reading people."

She grinned and stepped inside, already organizing the living room like a whirlwind.

Within ten minutes she had put Jaya down for a nap, fixed Aliya’s doll hair, and poured us both black coffee strong enough to awaken my past life.

"You seem different," she said, sitting across from me.

"Different how?"

"Like you’re in a weird in-between stage. Like you’re figuring out who you are all over again. It’s scary. But... I think you’re doing great."

I stared at her. Then I looked around. The clean house. The new car. The fridge filled with real food. The kids who hugged me without asking why.

Maybe I was doing okay.

The school festival was one of those events where you expect chaos and you still end up underestimating it.

I hadn’t even finished buttoning Jaya’s onesie before Maya screamed that the pancake stall was going to run out of Nutella. Aliya, on the other hand, insisted she was going to win the "Tumbling Twister" race even though her entire coordination system consisted of falling face-first into carpeted floors. We were late, of course, and my new yellow family van squealed like a dying cat every time I made a turn. But it was ours, and I was oddly proud of it.

Note to self. Buy a new one.

Because parking was a challenge—especially when a group of PTA moms blocked the entrance like they were the final boss in a video game. I gave my best "mom smile" and waved as if I’d been one of them forever. Thank god I had Jhing Jhing on speed dial. She appeared moments later in a floral blouse that could double as a curtain, dragging her youngest while balancing two tupperwares of filipino sweet spaghetti.

"You’re late," she whispered, handing me a paper plate.

"I live a chaotic life now," I whispered back, watching Aliya run straight into a trash can.

Maya immediately ditched me for her classmates, Aliya started a turf war over who gets the last pink balloon, and Jaya was happily chewing on a napkin. Mylene waved from across the playground. She was there too—with twins this time. We ended up sitting beside each other in the small parents’ tent, sweating under a tarp and watching our kids wreak mild destruction.

And then the Parent Shooting Booth opened.