After Jake’s wife decided to travel the world and leave her family behind, he was left to take care of his two little girls, Emma, 4, and Lily, 5, all by herself.
Navigating through life hasn’t been easy for this single dad, who struggled to balance work, his children, and housework, but he knew he needed to be strong for his girls and did everything in his power to take great care of them.
“Emma, Lily, time to get up!” he would wake his girls up softly every morning.
That particular morning didn’t start any differently, except for the huge surprise that awaited them in the kitchen.
Both Emma and Lily were unwilling to get up, but once they did, they chose their favorite dresses which Jake helped them put on and the three headed downstairs to have breakfast before going to daycare. Jake planned on preparing the usual, oatmeal with milk, but the moment he stepped inside the kitchen, he lost his tracks. There on the table were three plates of freshly made pancakes with jam and fruit.
“Girls, did you see this?” he asked, puzzled.
Lily’s eyes widened. “Wow, pancakes! Did you make them, Daddy?”
“No, I didn’t. Maybe Aunt Sarah stopped by early,” he said and took his phone in order to call his sister and ask her if she was the one who prepared the breakfast.
To his surprise, Sarah said she didn’t stopped by that morning and wanted to know why he was asking, but Jake said it was nothing and went to check on the front door and the windows but there was no sign of anyone entering the place forcefully.
“Is it safe to eat, Daddy?” Emma asked, and Jake said yet, although hesitantly.
Confused, he couldn’t stop wondering who the person who treated them with pancakes could be, but since they were late already, he took the girls to the daycare and went for work.
When he and the girls returned home that evening, there was another surprise awaiting them. The lawn, which Jake hadn’t had time to mow, was neatly cut. “This is getting weird,” Jake muttered to himself and went on to check the house again, but nothing was out of the ordinary.
The following morning, he decided to find the answer to the question that bothered him all night, so he woke up at around 6 am and hid in the kitchen. To his surprise, he saw a woman climbing through the window.
She was wearing some worn out clothes and started doing the dishes right away. At one moment, she took a piece of cheese from her bag and started preparing pancakes again.
As he stepped out of his hiding place, Jake yelled, “Wait, please, I won’t harm you. You made those pancakes, right? Please, tell me why you’re doing this? Don’t be afraid of me, I’m the father of the girls and would never harm a woman, especially when you’ve helped me so much.”
The mysterious woman then stopped and turned her face towards Jake. She did look familiar, but he couldn’t recall where he had seen her before.
“We’ve met before, haven’t we?” he asked in confusion.
She nodded, but before she could say anything, the girls started shouting, “Daddy, daddy.” Jake then asked from the woman to take a seat at the dinner table and meet Emma and Lily, and she agreed.
