Chapter 20
The venue buzzed with kids’ laughter, and the sound of space-themed music playing overhead.
The ceiling was strung with silver streamers and model planets.
Blue lights danced across the floor like stars, and a full-size inflatable rocket ship sat beside the massive mobile dome that Adair had booked—the planetarium that took up half the room.
The glow from it made everything feel enchanted. Unreal.
Sabine blinked, trying not to get emotional before the party even started.
There were kids everywhere—some in space helmets, some already tearing into astronaut freeze-dried snacks, some chasing each other under a floating banner that read:
“BLAST OFF INTO SIX!”
Ade was in the center of it all, pure joy in motion. He was everywhere at once—bouncing from one table to the next in his custom silver sneakers and glow-in-the-dark astronaut tee that read: “I’m the Birthday Boy, Blast Off!”
Sabine’s shirt read: “Mom of the Birthday Boy.”
Adair’s: “Dad of the Birthday Boy.”
They hadn't coordinated intentionally but when the vendor asked for shirt orders and Adair sent the idea late at night with, “Just pick your size. I already ordered Ade’s,”—she didn’t argue.
It felt easier to lean into it than explain it away.
The three of them together looked like a unit again, and everyone noticed.
Now, standing here beside him, being hosts and pointing parents to the bathroom line while answering questions about the space dome, Sabine realized they looked like a couple again.
Aunt Terri was the first to say it out loud. “Mmhmm,” she hummed, adjusting her wig and sipping “punch.” “Y’all look real reconciled to me.”
Sabine choked on her laugh. Adair blinked like he hadn’t heard her, but the redness in his ears said otherwise.
“Terri,” Pam warned with a smirk, “go eat your little sandwich before you get kicked out chile.”
“Please!” Terri flagged her sister, stepping closer to Sabine, wrapped in leopard print and armed with a flask. She grabbed her by the wrist, and whispered loudly, “if y’all don’t get back together after this party, I swear to God I’m writing y’all into my will just so I can cut you out of it.”
Narri was next in line with something to say. She came strolling up, her hair in two high ponytails, and TJ hanging onto her leg. “She not wrong. Y’all are cute though,” she said, chewing gum and giving them a once-over. “Like old-married-couple cute. Y’all look good. Real good. Real…familiar.”
Sabine rolled her eyes but didn’t deny it. Tate was there too, unusually quiet, sipping soda and watching Narri from a distance like he hadn’t fully made peace with his own decisions.
Pam floated through like the mayor of the party, snapping pictures and fixing things up when they shifted. Reeka helped kids make their own mini moon jars, side-eyeing Geechie the whole time who of course eyed Sabine too long without hiding it.
Adair caught him, squared his shoulders, and stood a little closer to her. “You good?” he had murmured to her once, noticing Geechie’s stare.
“I’m fine.”
“You sure? ‘Cause if he tries to slide you even a fuckin’ wink—”
“Adair.” She touched his arm briefly. “We are not doing this today, you are not doing this at our son’s party. I am not worried about Geechie’s ass.”
“Say less.” He raised both hands in surrender.
Parthenia came, too. She stood near the drinks with a tight smile, her husband notably absent. She was awkward—still polished, still beautiful, but clearly out of sync. She hugged Sabine with cool arms and said the venue was “charming,” like they weren’t in a perfectly curated space galaxy.
Sabine didn’t have the energy to decode that, so she let it go. Ade didn’t notice any of it. He was glowing. Happy and that was all she cared about.
The astronaut arrived at one o’clock sharp, dressed in a full NASA-style suit, and the kids lost their minds. He gathered them around and called them cadets, leading them into the dome one by one.
Once everyone was seated inside, the projection lit up and Adair’s pre-recorded voice came on: “Hey, buddy. Happy birthday. I hope this trip to the stars is everything you imagined. Just know—no matter how far you fly, how big stars get or how wide the sky—you’re always the center of mine.”
Sabine blinked fast, still caught off guard even though Adair had already told her about the message. It was just so sweet. She had to bite the inside of her cheek not to cry when their son lit up like he was the first boy ever sent to space by their father.
Ade turned around inside the dome, eyes wide, and whispered, “That’s Daddy!”
Loved.
Known.
And Sabine...she felt something sharp and soft twist in her chest.
After the planetarium show, there were cupcakes shaped like rockets, cake pops that looked like craters, a “zero gravity” bounce pit, and a photo booth that spit out polaroids with the caption Mission Complete: Ade’s 6th Orbit.
There was one photo of the three of them—Sabine, Adair, and Ade—with silver crowns on their heads.
Ade had his arms around both their necks, mouth wide in a laugh. Adair and Sabine weren’t looking at the camera. They were looking at each other.
It would become Sabine’s favorite photo. She slipped outside for a little air while they wrapped up their last hour. Adair was already there. He handed her a Capri Sun.
“Seriously?”
“They were out of juice boxes.”
She took it with a smirk; straw already poked through. They stood in the late afternoon haze, side by side, leaning on the banister, watching the kids inside run wild through the “zero gravity” bubble pit.
“He’s really happy,” Adair said.
“He is.” Sabine nodded.
“You did good.”
“We did,” she corrected.
Adair looked at her then. Fully. Not with guilt or nostalgia but with a kind of recognition. Like he could see her clearly again. Like he had finally stopped squinting through the past long enough to see who she was now.
“We really did,” he said.
They didn’t kiss.
Didn’t touch.
But something softened in the space between them.
Sabine realized in that moment—maybe healing didn’t look like declarations or grand gestures.
Maybe it looked like this.
One beautiful day at a time.