used to think the hardest part of raising twins was the exhaustion. The kind that turns time into a blur of bottles, diapers, and three-hour stretches of sleep if you’re lucky. But I was wrong.

My husband, Mark, traveled for work at least twice a month. Sometimes more. And we didn’t have a safety net.

No family. No grandparents. No aunt who could swing by with soup and tell me to go shower. My parents were gone, and I’d been their only child. Mark had grown up in foster care, bouncing between homes like a piece of luggage nobody wanted to claim. We built our life on our own—proud of it, even—but when the twins arrived, that pride started to feel like a weight.

“You shouldn’t have to do this alone,” he said. “I should’ve hired help months ago.”

So we did it the “right” way. Licensed agency. Verified references. Background checks. CPR certification. I went through the paperwork like it was a contract with the universe: if something went wrong, it wouldn’t be because I hadn’t done enough.

The agency sent Mrs. Higgins.

She looked like someone’s favorite aunt. Around sixty, maybe. Gray hair twisted into a neat bun, soft blue cardigan, sensible flats. She smelled faintly of lavender and sugar cookies, and she spoke in that warm, confident way that made you think of bedtime stories and band-aids on scraped knees.
“Oh, my little darlings,” she said the moment she saw the boys.

And my sons—who normally reacted to strangers like they were being offered to wolves—crawled straight into her lap like they’d been waiting for her.