🌿 Mori-Winslow Journal Entry — Day Four
“Standing Strong”
Morning Encounter: “Oh… you.” / “Yeah, me.” (Everette & Sebastian’s first meeting — because of course it happened at sunrise.)
The morning started like a calm hum. Ocean mist hung low over the reeds with the kind of quiet that makes the world feel smaller. Everette, ever the early riser, was halfway through his jog when he crossed paths with someone heading the same way.
Sebastian.
A small pause. A grin. “...Oh,” Sebastian said, catching his breath, the faintest laugh behind it. “Yeah,” Everette replied, still jogging in place. “Me.”
They stood there for a second — one grounding himself, the other pretending not to. Something about the moment lingered, though neither of them knew why yet. Before heading off, they exchanged a few jokes and even took a quick selfie (Everette’s idea, obviously). Just two men, meeting by the sea. It would mean more later.
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Later that day...
The Mori-Winslow household was alive with small sounds. The faucet dripping, Ami typing softly on her laptop, and Everette under the sink with a wrench, muttering, “It’s time for me to shine!”
He fixed the leak while humming a tune he’d made up on the spot — something about standing strong, which fit a little too perfectly. Ami laughed from the next room, shaking her head like that’s my husband.
Once the sink stopped its stubborn dripping, Ami wiped her hands, plated the meal she’d made for dinner, and called out to him:
“We’re going to the Swift-Davenport’s tonight. Don’t forget to change your shirt!”
Willow had already gone to daycare. The house, for once, was quiet — the kind of quiet that felt earned. Ami slipped into a soft dress; Everette, freshly showered, threw on something casual but neat. Rowan, of course, followed suit. (“If Dad’s dressing up, I’m dressing up.”)
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Dinner at the Swift-Davenports’
Amara greeted them first. running on wobbly toddler legs and babbling words that half-made sense but all made joy. Everette knelt to her level immediately, listening like it was a grand speech. When Rowan entered the room, Amara’s eyes lit up. The way children recognize warmth before words.
Rowan spent most of the evening showing off his silly side. Hide-and-seek with Grandma Eveline, goofy faces across the dinner table, the occasional dramatic fall for laughs. Amara couldn’t get enough of it.
Meanwhile, Ami and Marisol swapped stories, mothers connecting with that unspoken understanding that comes from balancing too much and still managing grace. Sebastian and Everette reconnected - that same calm, teasing rhythm from the morning, only now with the laughter of their families around them.
There was a moment, brief but telling, when Sebastian looked over and grinned like, You again. And Everette, of course, grinned back. “Yeah, me.”
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Rowan & Adrien
By the time the sun dipped behind the windows, Adrien finally came downstairs. Rowan froze for a moment — “Wait, you’re his kid?!” — and then laughed.
Turns out, both had just lost a tooth. A shared rite of passage that somehow sealed an instant friendship. They took selfies. So many selfies. And somewhere between laughter and a goofy face, you could tell: this was the start of something.
On the way home, Rowan told Ami, half-asleep in the backseat,
“I think I found my best friend.”
And Ami, smiling at the rearview mirror, said softly,
“I think so, too.”
