And my mother was gone.
No note.
No explanation.
Nothing.
Back then, my mom, Lorraine, had always been unpredictable. Some days she acted loving and warm, like the kind of mother who’d fight the world for you. Other days she treated life like an inconvenience she never agreed to.
When she got pregnant with twins, I honestly thought maybe it would change her.
Maybe motherhood would ground her.
Instead, she grew angrier.
At the world.
At men.
At bills.
At herself.
She never even told me who the twins’ father was.
Every time I asked, she exploded.
Then Ava and Ellen were born.
For two weeks, Lorraine pretended to try.
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She’d warm bottles sometimes or change a diaper before disappearing into her bedroom for hours while the babies cried. I was still finishing high school, trying to study between feedings and panic attacks, wondering if every exhausted teenager secretly felt like they were drowning.
Then one night I woke up to crying and silence at the same time.
Lorraine’s coat was gone.
So was she.
That moment changed everything.
I remember standing in the kitchen with Ellen against my chest while Ava screamed nearby, realizing something terrifying:
If I fail them, nobody catches them.
I gave up college applications that same week.
I’d dreamed about becoming a surgeon since I was eleven years old after watching a documentary with my grandfather about heart transplants. I used to picture white coats, operating rooms, years of study.
Instead, I became a parent overnight.
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I worked everywhere that would hire me.
Warehouse shifts.
Food delivery.
Stock rooms.
Late-night loading docks.
I learned how to stretch groceries across entire weeks and how to calculate formula costs faster than math homework.
I learned how to fall asleep sitting upright with a baby on each shoulder.
People constantly told me to let the system take them.
“You’re too young.”
“You deserve your own life.”
“You can’t raise twins alone.”
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But every time someone suggested foster care, all I could picture were two little girls growing up wondering why nobody stayed.
So I stayed.
The twins started calling me “Bubba” before they ever learned to say “brother.” The name stuck so completely that teachers and neighbors started using it too.
We became our own strange little family.
Movie nights on the couch.
Pancakes on Saturdays.
Homework at the kitchen table.
Tiny stick-figure drawings taped to the refrigerator with captions like:
“Me, Ellen, Ava, and Bubba.”
Not brother.
Not guardian.
Bubba.
For years, that was enough.
Then Lorraine came back.
Seven years after disappearing.
I still remember opening the apartment door and barely recognizing her.
Gone were the thrift-store jackets and exhausted eyes.
Now she looked polished.
Expensive coat.
Perfect makeup.
Designer purse.
Jewelry that probably cost more than our rent.
But the second she heard the girls laughing in the hallway, her entire personality shifted.
Suddenly her voice became syrupy sweet.
“Girls!” she exclaimed. “It’s Mommy!”
She carried shopping bags from luxury stores I’d only seen online.
Inside were things I could never afford:
A tablet.
Designer clothes.
Expensive toys.
Jewelry.
The girls stared at her like they were watching a dream unfold.
Because children always want to believe their parents will come back better.
At first, I tried to convince myself maybe Lorraine regretted leaving.
Maybe she really wanted to reconnect.
But every visit felt rehearsed.
Too bright.
Too polished.
Too perfect.
Then the letter arrived.
A thick envelope from a law office.
Inside were custody papers.
Guardianship petitions.
Legal requests.
