Chapter 16 - A New Dawn on Maple Street
Two weeks after the gavel fell, the moving truck finally pulled away from Maple Street, taking the last remnants of Sarah’s remaining personal items to a storage unit downtown. The house was quiet, peaceful, and entirely mine.
It was a Saturday morning, the kind of crisp October day where the Carolina sky was a brilliant, cloudless blue. I stood on the back patio with a mug of black coffee in one hand, watching Lily chase our new golden retriever puppy across the freshly mowed lawn. Her laughter—bright, unburdened, and joyful—bounced off the wooden fence.
Brenda had come over earlier to help us unpack the last of the kitchen boxes, but she had wisely left us to enjoy our first weekend alone as a proper family unit.
“Daddy! Look how fast Buster is running!” Lily yelled, pointing excitedly as the golden ball of fur tumbled over the grass.
I smiled, setting my coffee mug down on the patio table and walking out onto the lawn. “I see him! But I bet I can run faster than both of you!”
Lily shrieked with laughter as I sprinted across the grass, scooping her up into my arms and spinning her around in circles under the golden autumn sunlight. She wrapped her small arms tightly around my neck, burying her face against my shoulder.
“Daddy?” she whispered softly.
“Yeah, sweetheart?”
“Are we ever going to move again?”
May you like
I pressed a kiss to the top of her dark hair, tightening my embrace.
“No, baby girl,” I whispered, looking up at the American flag waving gently on our front porch. “We’re right where we belong. We’re never leaving.”
