I fell in love with all of them.

***

Within months of dating, I was at Robert’s house more evenings than not.

I helped with homework, stirred soup, found socks, kissed scraped knees, and learned which child needed gentle words and which one needed the plain truth.

***

My boyfriend proposed six months later over meatloaf and mashed potatoes, with all 10 children pretending not to listen from the hallway!

“Will you marry us?” he asked.

I said “yes” through tears, and we started planning our wedding.

My mother, Helen, thought I’d lost my mind!

“Will you marry us?”

***

“Ten children, Margaret,” my mother said every Sunday. “You haven’t had your own life yet.”

“They are my life, Mama.”

“You’re being foolish.”

I let her say it because I knew she didn’t understand.

***

Two weeks before the wedding, I tried on my dress in the bedroom mirror. Amanda zipped the back while Sophie clapped, and the boys peeked around the doorframe, pretending to gag. I was so excited for that day!

Then I saw Robert in the mirror.

“You’re being foolish.”

My fiancé stood in the doorway, watching me with an expression I didn’t understand then. Not happiness exactly, but not sadness either. Like he was trying to memorize me.

“You look beautiful,” he said softly.

“You’re not supposed to see the dress.”

“I know,” he replied. “I just wanted to remember.”

Looking back, I think part of him already knew something was wrong. He’d been tired for months, losing weight, hiding headaches behind small smiles.

He was trying to memorize me.

***

The morning Robert vanished, the house was too quiet. It was a week before our wedding.

There was no sound of him moving around before the children woke. His side of the bed was cold.

“Robert?” I called.

No answer.

Amanda was standing barefoot at the top of the stairs, hugging herself, when I left our bedroom.

“Mama Margaret,” she whispered, “Daddy’s truck is gone.”

I told her he’d probably gone out to run an errand, but she looked at me with those serious eyes and knew I was lying.

There was no sound of him moving around.

***

After trying to call my fiancé and finding his phone off, I waited for an hour, tried him again, panicked, and called everyone I could think of: his brother, his foreman, his oldest friend, and my mother.

No one had seen him.

I was reaching for the phone again, ready to call the police for help, when I noticed the folded note on the kitchen table, held down by the sugar bowl.

My hands shook as I opened it.

“I’m sorry. I can’t do this anymore.”

That was all.

No one had seen him.

No explanation, no goodbyes, and no mention of the children. My heart was shattered.

I sat down hard and read it again and again, as if the words might change if I stared long enough.

Then Sophie walked into the kitchen in her pajamas, wrapped both arms around my leg, and looked up at me with Robert’s eyes.

“Mama, juice?”

That’s the moment my life split in two.

My heart was shattered.

***

My mother called back.

“Margaret, listen to me,” she said after I told her. “This is a sign. Let the system take the children. You are young and still have a life ahead of you.”

“They’re upstairs, Mama.”

“They are not your responsibility.”