Spring came to Miami the way it always did—gradually, in ways that were easy to miss if you weren't paying attention, the specific shifts in light and air that locals noticed and visitors mostly didn't.
The garden bed, dormant through winter, began stirring again. Dante had expanded it—a second bed now, and a small section for flowers that Charlotte had specifically requested ("flowers for Mama," she'd announced, with the imperious clarity of a not-quite-two-year-old who had decided something and considered the matter settled).
Mia had not gotten pregnant yet. They'd discussed this—the specific reality that "deciding to try" didn't come with guarantees or timelines, that it might happen quickly or take time or, possibly, not happen the way they hoped at all. They'd talked about all of it
