Ava didn’t take the elegant gift boxes Vanessa held out. Instead, she gently adjusted the microphone stand, stepping slightly in front of her twin sister so they stood shoulder-to-shoulder before the crowded room.
“You called us up here to accept a surprise,” Ava said into the microphone, her voice carrying clearly across the silent auditorium. “So we have a surprise for you, too.”
Vanessa’s polished smile flickered for a fraction of a second, her hands hovering awkwardly with the unopened designer boxes.
Emma stepped up to the microphone beside her sister, pointing directly down into the fifth row where I was sitting in my worn suit jacket.
“The man sitting right there spent eighteen years waking up at 5:00 AM to braid our hair, cook our meals, pay our tuition, and hold us through every night we cried because we thought we weren’t good enough,” Emma spoke clearly into the microphone.
“He didn’t turn us against you, Vanessa,” Ava added, using her mother’s first name without a trace of affection. “You turned us away the day you decided your freedom mattered more than six-hour-old babies.”
A collective murmur rippled across the three hundred guests in the auditorium as school administrators and teachers sat completely frozen on stage.
What did the girls do with Vanessa’s expensive gifts? Continue reading Part 3 below to find out.
