Skip to content 
I never thought that a brief meeting of my teenage years would matter decades later. Then, one morning, my past appeared unannounced, in a way I never would have imagined.
I was 17 when I welcomed my twins.
At that age, I was without a hard, exhausted, I could barely pass each day, and I still held on to school like a student of honor as if it was all I could save myself.
My parents didn’t see it that way.
They said I’d ruined everything. They told me I was alone. Within a few days, I had no help or a place to stay.
My parents didn’t see it that way.
In November 1998, he was combining classes, two newborns and all the work he found. The father of my children had asked me to have an abortion, so he was not in the equation. Most nights, I worked at night in the university library.
The girls, Lily and Mae, were still wrapped up in my chest in a worn-out scarf I had bought second-hand.
I lived on instant noodles and campus coffee.
It was not a plan, just a matter of survival.
I was juggling my studies.
***
That fateful night, it rained on you singing in Seattle when I left work.
I only had 10 dollars. I was catching up for the bus and bread, to survive about three days if I managed a little.
I left the library with a cheap umbrella, adjusting the scarf so that the girls would not get wet. That’s when I saw him.