Charlotte laughed and raised her milk glass. “To the mommune!” she said.

“To the mommune,” we all repeated, clinking glasses of milk.

In a few minutes, the kids would scatter to get ready for school, the sticky, syrupy dishes would need to be cleared (my week for dishes!), Elliott and I would go sign paperwork for our official offer on our new house, and we’d each have more than a few personal dramas and traumas to handle. But for now, for the moment, life was perfect.

I looked around this table at all these people I loved, and I realized that the rituals and routines of family life hadn’t saved me; the people had. With their love and support, listening ears, and guidance. They had given me that family I had always wanted most. And I would always put them first.

It might be unconventional; it might not always be easy. But nothing truly great ever is. I thought of my mother, the woman who had loved and nurtured me so fully until her life had been cut short, of Mina who had cared for me and taught me in the very best way she knew how. I hoped that the little girls around this table would look back one day and think the same of me.

I had never gotten children of my own, but it seemed that I had become a mother anyway. And if these past few years had taught me anything, it was that, when we put our heads together, when we join forces, there’s nothing that moms can’t do.

“I think we need to do our dinnertime ritual right now, at breakfast!” Emma shouted gleefully.

“Oh, yes!” Iris agreed. “Alice, you start because you’re the one who brought us all together.”

“Okay,” I said, clearing my throat. “Well, the best part of my day, obviously, is getting to have breakfast with all my favorite people in the world.”

“And what do you need?” Merit asked.

I smiled at him, at all of them. So much in life had happened to us. But this, our time together, it seemed, had happened for us. In the most roundabout way, we’d all ended up exactly where we needed to be. I didn’t have to answer Merit. He already knew; they all did. For the first time maybe ever, I was certain I had everything I could ever need.

Yes, we might be moving on physically, but we would always be connected in our hearts. Some people spent years searching for the perfect person who understood them, who made them whole. I had found nine.

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