Night was falling over the ranch like a soft embrace, painting the sky in shades of orange and pink that seemed tailor-made for the celebration. The garden was unrecognizable—long tables covered in checkered tablecloths, colorful balloons floating tied to the trees, a crackling bonfire at the center, and all around it, my family.
Not the family I was born into. The family I chose. The one that fell from the sky in a car with a flat tire and a smile that drove me crazy.
Alice was beside me, one hand resting on my back, the other holding a glass of juice. She was laughing at something Rosa was telling—probably another embarrassing story from my childhood—and that sound, that carefree, happy laugh, was all I needed to hear for the rest of my life.
"And then Marco, at eight years old, tried
