“I feel that way too, and I live here,” Alexis said. “Sometimes it doesn’t feel close or that it matters. Other days, it’s like you and I are teens again, watching Mom and Dad fight. It’s not something I can control.” She smiled. “The only silver lining to all of this is that when Eric and I got married, we saw it as an opportunity to love each other and parent the way we wanted. And we love Juliet so much. We support and lift her up no matter what she wants to do. And we both work with kids every day and encourage their imagination. Their creativity, their wishes. And we don’t care about their mistakes.”

“The opposite of how Mom raised us,” I said grimly.

“Exactly.”

I pulled my knees into my chest and gazed at two of my most favorite people in the whole world. “Your story is the real deal. It’s a happily ever after.”

Alexis cocked her head. “Yours is too. Whether it was a story you’d written or one you’d shot on that old camera we had, Mom went out of her way to ignore it or pass judgment on it. And now look at you. All of your stories are about love.”

I hummed a little, considered that description. “I always describe them as being about the power of a community, coming together.”

“Isn’t that love too?” she said.

Juliet called down for her parents, who both rose off the couch and made their way to the stairs.

“This is random,” I said, “but do you guys want to actually stay the night? I can take Linda’s guest bedroom to sleep in, and she has so much garbage reality television to watch, I’d hate to binge Real Housewives on my own. I’d rather open a bottle of red wine and hang with the two of you.”

I couldn’t say the last time the temporary place I was staying in felt like a home. In my aunt’s house, with Juliet running around and Eric and Alexis’s laughter, there was a contentment and safety curling around my heart that I didn’t realize I was missing. I knew this attachment feeling could be dangerous but felt much too vulnerable to turn away from it.

Eric looked down at his outfit and shrugged. “I’m already in my pajamas and am seriously behind on those housewives.”

Alexis gave me a knowing look. “We’ve only got you for a little while longer anyway before you leave again. I need to soak up as much time as I can get.”

I patted the spot next to me on the couch. “All aboard the cuddle express.”

Eric laughed. “I’m going to soothe our daughter, and then someone better have opened that bottle of wine.”