Ashley slammed the flour bag on the counter, sending a puff of white into the air.
“Bless you, Chef,” I said as she sneezed.
“Dad, can you hand me the sugar? Not that one, the big bag. Mom always used the big bag for Easter cookies.”
I slid it over. “You sure you don’t want a break?”
She shook her head. “No breaks. We promised the shelter.”
She held up Hannah’s heart-shaped cookie cutter. “Remember this?”
“Like it was yesterday, baby,” I said quietly. “Your mom always let you do the first batch.”
Ashley pressed the cutter into the dough. “She said if you press hard and twist, they don’t crack.”
After a while, she asked softly, “Why did Mom start going to the shelter for holidays?”
I hesitated, then answered, “Your grandparents didn’t accept her. She was only nineteen when she had you. They kicked her out.”
Ashley froze. “That’s why she had nothing when you met her?”
I nodded. “She stayed at the shelter for a while. The people there became her first family.”
Ashley frowned. “I don’t get it. I would never turn away my family. I just want people at the shelter to feel like they belong.”
“You’ve got your mom’s heart,” I told her.
For three nights, we baked.
Flour covered everything. Dough stuck to the floor. Icing dried on the sink. But Ashley never slowed down.
On Easter morning, we packed the cookies into little pink boxes.
At the shelter, Ashley handed them out one by one.
“Happy Easter! These are from me and my family.”
Some people smiled. Some cried.
Ashley hugged a woman who broke down, whispering, “It’s okay. You aren’t alone. We are all here.”
I stood in the doorway, watching her. For a moment, it felt like Hannah was still with us.
It was the proudest moment of my life.
I thought that was the end of the story.
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