My stomach dropped, veins running icy cold as I stared at the word Mom and felt the phone vibrating in my hand. It was selfish, how I didn’t want to answer because I didn’t want to face her misery, her pain, her tears.

And the fact that once again, I’d have to find a way to help her.

I was running out of ideas.

My heart was heavy, a sandpaper knot in my throat as I slid my thumb across the bottom of the screen and plugged my headphones in, setting my pace toward my dorm room.

“Hey, Mom,” I answered. “You okay?”

“Oh, sweetie,” she answered on a sniff, the words garbled by crying.

I braced myself.

“I’m more than okay.”

Something more like confusion, rather than relief, found my next exhale, especially as Mom continued to cry as I waited for her to explain.

“We’ve been blessed with a miracle,” she said. “The Lord has shined his almighty light upon us.”

I stopped walking. “Holy shit, did you win the lottery?”

“Language!” She chastised with a laugh. “And I guess you could say I did.”

“Mom, what’s going on?”

I continued walking, hiking my bag up over my shoulder.

“It’s Cory.”

I frowned, and though I had no reason to be anxious, something inside me was on high alert. “Cory? As in Maliyah’s dad?”

“The very one,” she confirmed. “I don’t know what happened. I mean, Maliyah called me last night to catch up — which was so nice, by the way. I haven’t really talked to her since you two split up, and it was just so lovely to hear from her.”

My lips flattened. “Mm-hmm.”

“Anyway, so we were talking, and you know how close we are. She’s always given me such great advice when it comes to men.” She paused. “Should be the other way around, ages considered.”

“Mom,” I said, dragging her back to the point.

“Well, I was telling her about the restaurant, and about… about Brandon.” Her voice cracked a little with his name. “And she was just so sweet, listening to me being all heartbroken.” She sniffed. “And I guess she must have told her dad about the whole thing, because he called me earlier today.”

I waited, heart picking up pace in my chest like it knew well before I did that something was wrong.

“He’s going to help us, baby,” she said, all joy through her tears. “He came by this afternoon with a check for ten-thousand dollars.”

“He what?!”

“I know! I know,” she said, like I was excited when the truth was I was fucking appalled. “He wanted us to have enough to get through the holidays, so I could focus on getting better instead of getting a job. Oh, I can’t tell you the relief it brought me. I feel… I feel… loved.”