Travis looked intimidating.
But I had trusted him for most of my life.
My husband, Ryan, never had.
And as I drove toward Emma’s school with my hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly that my knuckles hurt, one thought kept circling through my head.
Please don’t let me have been wrong about him.
Part 2 — The Problem Travis Offered to Solve
The whole arrangement had begun because my work schedule changed.
Emma got out of school at three.
For years, I had been lucky enough to leave work early, pick her up, and finish whatever remained from home.
Then I transferred into another department.
Suddenly, leaving at three wasn’t an option.
Ryan worked across town and rarely made it home before six.
For two exhausting weeks, we patched together a solution with after-school care, favors from other parents, and constant schedule changes.
Every evening felt like planning a military operation.
One night, Ryan looked across the dinner table and said, “What about Melissa?”
I stared at him.
He stared back.
Then we both answered at the same time.
“No.”
Melissa was Ryan’s younger sister.
Emma adored her.
So did I.
But punctuality had never been one of Melissa’s gifts.
She could be thirty minutes late to something because she had stopped for coffee on the way to an appointment she was already late for.
There was also the infamous babysitting incident.
Melissa had once allowed Emma to watch IT because, according to her, Emma had “promised not to get scared.”
Emma spent the next four nights sleeping between Ryan and me.
Months later, she still regarded balloons with deep suspicion.
So Melissa was not our first choice for a daily school pickup.
Then one afternoon, Travis overheard me complaining about the problem.
I had just ended a phone call with my mother while standing beside my car when I noticed him leaning against the fence separating our properties.
“What time does Emma get out?” he asked.
“Three.”
He nodded.
“Our rehearsals finish around two-thirty Tuesday through Friday. The studio’s only a couple blocks from her school.”
