On Mother's Day, I expected roses and cake. Instead, my husband brought home a baby. A real, breathing, wide-eyed baby. A baby that wasn't ours.

"It’s not working anymore, Mark," I said, staring down at yet another pregnancy test resting coldly on the bathroom counter—negative again. "Six years of trying. Six years of heartbreak. I can’t do this anymore."

Mark came to me silently, pulling me into his arms.

As always, he held me like nothing else mattered.

A negative pregnancy test stared back at me like a cruel joke.

"Don’t give up yet, Julia," he murmured, voice low and calm like it always was when I was falling apart. "The doctor said we still have options. There’s still hope."

I pulled away, too tired to cry again. "We’ve done it all, Mark. Three rounds of IVF. Countless hormone treatments. I even let your mother take me to that weird herbalist in Chinatown who insisted on burning sage and garlic." I gave a choked laugh. "I’m 35. How much more of this can we take?"

"As long as it takes," he said, holding my face. "You are going to be an incredible mother. I believe that with every cell in my body."

I wanted to believe him. For nine years, Mark had been my anchor—after every heartbreak, every failed test, every sleepless night researching fertility clinics. While other men might have walked away, Mark had always leaned in.

He was the one holding the ice pack after my injections. The one who rubbed my back during every hormone crash. The one who always whispered, “Next time.”

He never lost hope, even when I was drowning in despair.

"Dr. Lee said stress doesn’t help," he said. "Let’s take a break. A real one. No apps. No tracking. No schedules. Just us. Just life."

I rested my forehead against his chest. "I’m just tired, Mark. Tired of waiting to live the life we’ve imagined for so long."

"Our life started the day we said ‘I do.’ The rest is just bonus," he whispered, brushing a kiss into my hair.

That was the kind of man Mark was. A believer. A romantic. The kind of person who remembered how I liked my coffee and who could quote our wedding vows word for word. Through three miscarriages and all the heartache in between, he was the one thing that never wavered.

But deep down, something in me had already begun to fracture.

"Mother’s Day is next weekend," he said suddenly, trying to lighten the mood. "Let me plan something—just for you."

I shook my head. "Not this year. I can’t pretend anymore, Mark. Not while everyone else is celebrating what I don’t have."

"But—"

"Please." I looked away. "No brunches. No family parks. No pastel cards or forced smiles. I just want Sunday to be… nothing."

He hesitated, then nodded. "Okay. I get it."

When he left that morning to “pick up something special,” I assumed it was a bouquet. Maybe pastries from the café I liked.

Instead, he walked into the house carrying a baby.

A real baby. Swaddled in a soft yellow blanket, a tiny knit cap barely hiding wisps of dark hair. Her fists curled up near her cheeks like she was hugging herself.

I froze.

"I know it’s unexpected," he said gently, stepping closer. "But this is what you wanted, right? To be a mother?"

I blinked. "Mark… whose baby is this?"

He didn’t answer right away. "Don’t ask. Just trust me. She needs a mother. And we can be that for her."

"She?"

"Her name’s Ava. Isn’t she beautiful?"

She was perfect. She looked like porcelain, so fragile I was afraid to breathe near her. But my arms reached out before my brain could stop them. I took her from him. She was warm and real, and I felt something crack open inside me.

I didn’t yet know the cost of the miracle he’d brought to our doorstep.

That night, I called my sister, Emily, while Mark gave Ava a bath.

"He what?" Emily shouted over the phone. "You’re telling me he just brought home a baby?"

"I know how it sounds," I said, pacing the kitchen. "But she’s here. She’s perfect, Em."

"I don’t care how perfect she is. You can’t just bring home someone else’s baby! Where are the papers? The birth certificate? How did he even get her?"

I swallowed hard. "He told me not to ask. That he’d handle it."

Emily groaned. "Julia, I’m a pediatric nurse. This is serious. Has she even seen a doctor? What if she has medical needs you don’t know about?"

"Mark said she’s two months old. And healthy."

"This isn’t a stray kitten, Jules."

Later that night, after I tucked Ava into the bassinet Mark had somehow acquired within hours, I turned to him in bed. "Please. Just tell me where she came from."

He stiffened. "It doesn’t matter. I’ve taken care of it."

"Mark, this isn’t a missing Amazon package. This is a child."

He turned away. "Don’t ruin this."

But I couldn’t sleep. I kept seeing Ava’s tiny face. And I kept hearing my sister’s voice echoing in my head: This isn’t how it works.

Three days passed in a blur of feedings, diaper changes, and sleepless nights. Mark spent most of his time making hushed phone calls from the other room. He said he was "arranging things."

Then, on Thursday morning, my phone rang. A number I didn’t recognize.

"Hello?" I asked, shifting Ava to my shoulder.

"Hi…" The voice was young. Nervous. "Is this Julia?"

"Yes. Who is this?"

"I… I’m Ava’s birth mother."

My stomach flipped.

"I just… I wanted to know if she’s okay," the girl said, voice cracking. "Mark told me you couldn’t have children. That you’d love her. He said he’d help me. That he had an apartment for me… the one his wife didn’t know about."

I froze. "What apartment?"

She gave an address. One I knew too well.

It was the apartment I’d inherited from my grandmother. The one Mark had promised to help me turn into a reading center for children.

"How old are you?" I asked quietly.

"Twenty. I wasn’t ready to be a mom. He said you were. And I believed him."

Tears slid down my cheeks. "I already love her."

"Then maybe this worked out for the best," she said softly.

Her name was Maya.

When Mark walked in that evening, I didn’t yell. I didn’t accuse. I sat in the nursery, rocking Ava as the sunset lit up the walls.

"You look tired," he said, stepping in. "Let me take her for a while."

"I’m fine," I replied.

He smiled. "I know I surprised you… but isn’t this amazing?"

"You cheated on me," I said.

He stopped in his tracks. "Julia—"

"She called. I know everything."

To my shock, he didn’t deny it.

"I didn’t mean to hurt you," he said. "I just… I saw a way to give you what you wanted. She didn’t want the baby. You did. It felt like fate."

"You used me. Lied to me. Traded my family’s property for a baby you had no right to take."

"But now you have her. That’s what matters, right?"

"No, Mark. What matters is that you broke the one thing I thought was unbreakable."

I filed for divorce the next day.

Mark had never legally adopted Ava. Legally, he had no right to her. No agreements, no paperwork, just reckless desperation wrapped in false hope.

But I couldn’t imagine life without her.

I called Maya again. Through tears, I asked her if she would consider signing an adoption agreement—with me alone.

She said yes.

Now, Ava is mine. Not because Mark gave her to me—but because Maya and I chose each other for her.

Mark still texts sometimes. He says I should forgive him. That he “gave me everything I ever wanted.”

But he didn’t give me Ava.

She found her way to me in the messiest way possible. And I chose her with every ounce of my heart.

And that’s what makes me her mother.