The last thing I expected to hear on our family vacation was my son shouting, “Mommy’s here!”
But there she was—Stacey, alive and standing on the same beach where we’d once built sandcastles as a family.
Luke didn’t hesitate. He ran to her with outstretched arms, but she recoiled like he was a stranger. The man beside her pulled her away, and just like that, she was gone again.
Back in our hotel room, I scrolled through old photos on my phone, comparing them to the woman I’d just seen. Same smile. Same scar above her eyebrow from a childhood fall. There was no doubt—it was her.
When I finally confronted Stacey’s parents, the truth spilled out in tearful fragments. The “accident” had been a lie. The funeral, a charade. She had wanted a clean break, and they had helped her fake her death rather than face the messiness of divorce.
The hardest part? Explaining to Luke that the mother he’d been grieving wasn’t gone—she had chosen to leave us.
“Doesn’t she love me anymore?” he asked that night, his stuffed dinosaur clutched tight.
I pulled him close. “Love doesn’t just disappear, buddy. Sometimes people get lost, but that doesn’t mean you weren’t worth staying for.”
Now, when Luke draws pictures of our family, he includes a woman with yellow hair—his way of remembering the mom who walked away. And when he asks if she’ll ever come back, I tell him the truth:
“We don’t need her to.”
