“No,” I answered. “I'm here for my sons.”
“Your sons?”
His eyebrows lifted.
Vanessa's gaze darted toward the boys.
Something strange crossed her face.
Not recognition exactly.
Something closer to calculation.
“Well,” she said, recovering quickly, “I suppose everyone deserves an opportunity. But Mason has been preparing with private university tutors for six months.”
Mason looked uncomfortable.
“Mom—”
“I'm simply explaining how competitive this event is.”
I tightened my grip on the folder.
Inside were the boys' registration documents, preliminary scores, and a photograph taken twelve years earlier.
In that photograph, two small children sat at our kitchen table surrounded by discarded computer parts.
Eli held a circuit board.
Owen grinned beside him.
Neither had front teeth.
That photograph had accompanied me to every important academic event since elementary school.
It reminded me where we had begun.
Owen gently touched my elbow.
“Mom, registration closes in ten minutes.”
His voice was steady.
