After Maggie came Diane. Then Susan. Then the others—twelve women in total, each one with her own version of the story I was learning to tell.
They weren't copies of each other, but they shared something true: they all knew that life was longer than they'd expected, and they were going to have to figure out how to live it. They knew that their best chapters weren't behind them. They were happening right now. In the messy, complicated, beautiful now.
Creating these women was like creating permission for myself. Each one of them was a different version of what if I'm not done? What if I'm not too old, too broken, too late? What if this is exactly when my life is supposed to begin?
I wrote in the pockets of time life gave me: during lunch breaks, beside appointments, and late at night when the house had finally gone quiet and I could pretend, for a little while, that I knew exactly what I was doing.
Cairo would rest his broad head across my feet while I typed. Odin and Frey curled into the couch cushions nearby, two small shadows keeping watch. And I wrote about women finding their way home.
The heroines started teaching me things. They showed me that resilience isn't about not breaking—it's about what you do after you're broken. They showed me that chosen family matters. They showed me that a woman can be fierce and gentle at the same time. That she can be strong and still need help. That showing up for someone else and showing up for herself aren't opposite things.
By book three, I stopped asking if I could do this. I was too busy listening to what these women wanted to say.