Chapter 5
### Part 5
The next morning, I took Rowan downtown in his stroller because staying inside felt like letting Vaughn win.
The city was bright after rain. Sunlight bounced off puddles. Buses hissed at curbs. A man in a Bears hoodie shouted into his phone outside a deli. I walked without a plan until I reached the convention center and saw a huge banner stretched over the entrance.
National Baby And Toddler Expo.
I almost kept walking.
Then Rowan began fussing, and I ducked inside for warmth.
The exhibition hall was enormous, full of booths, strollers, diaper bags, high chairs, bottle warmers, sleep sacks, and parents moving around with the dazed seriousness of people preparing for war. I drifted from display to display, touching fabrics, lifting handles, testing buckles.
A carrier at one booth caught my eye. It was expensive, sleek, and completely wrong. The shoulder straps pulled too high. The lumbar support was decorative. The side clip would be impossible to fasten one-handed while holding a crying infant.
I muttered, “Who designed this? Someone with four arms?”
The booth worker blinked.
“Sorry,” I said quickly.
I found a bench near the back wall, pulled out my old sketchbook, and began drawing. My hand moved before my mind could argue. I sketched a carrier with weight distributed across the hips, adjustable panels, one-handed magnetic guidance clips, breathable support, and pockets placed where an exhausted mother could actually reach them.
For twenty minutes, I forgot court. I forgot Vaughn. I forgot the hallway.
“Briar Wren?”
I looked up.
A tall man in a charcoal blazer stood in front of me, holding an exhibitor badge and two paper coffees. His hair was darker than I remembered, his face sharper, but his smile was the same.
“Callum Reed,” I said.
He laughed. “You remember me.”
“You spilled resin on my final prototype junior year.”
“And you still beat me for the design prize.”
Callum had been in my industrial design program at Northwestern. Back then, he had been brilliant, irritating, and always kind when no one was watching.
His eyes dropped to Rowan. “And this little guy?”
“My son.”
“He’s perfect.”
I smiled because he said it simply, without acting like Rowan was baggage or evidence of another man.
Callum nodded toward my sketchbook. “Are you designing again?”
“No. Just judging other people’s mistakes.”
“May I?”
I hesitated, then let him see.
His expression changed as he turned the pages. The friendly nostalgia disappeared. Something focused replaced it.
“Briar,” he said slowly, “did you draw this today?”
“Most of it.”
“This carrier solves three problems my R&D team has been fighting for a year.”
I stared at him. “Your what?”
He tapped the badge on his jacket. ReedNest. Founder and CEO.
“You own ReedNest?”
“Co-own. But yes.”
ReedNest was one of the fastest-growing baby product companies in the country. I had seen their ads while doom-scrolling during pregnancy at 3 a.m.
Callum sat beside me. “Come have coffee. I want to hear what you see that we’re missing.”
“I’m not exactly employable right now.”
“Who told you that?”
The answer rose in my throat: Vaughn, Cressida, the mirror, fear.
I said nothing.
We sat in a crowded café attached to the convention center. Rowan slept. Callum listened while I explained design flaws in carriers, nursing pillows, stroller storage, and foldable cribs. He took notes on a napkin.
Then he looked at me and asked, “Are you okay?”
The question was gentle enough to break something.
I told him the short version. Hospital. Lockout. Vacation. Sale. Court.
He did not interrupt. He did not say, “I’m sure he had his reasons.” He did not ask what I had done to make them treat me that way.
When I finished, he looked furious.
Not dramatic. Not loud. Just genuinely furious on my behalf.
“Briar,” he said, “come work for me.”
I laughed because it sounded impossible.
“I have a newborn.”
“We have remote days and flexible hours.”
“I haven’t worked in the industry for years.”
“Your brain clearly has.”
“I’m a mess.”
“You’re a mother recovering from betrayal, not a mess.”
I stared down at my coffee cup.
He leaned back. “I’m building a maternal design team. Not a marketing gimmick. Real product development led by parents who understand the problems. I need someone who can see what engineers miss.”
“I don’t know if I can do it.”
“I do.”
I hated how badly I needed someone to say that.
That night, at my parents’ kitchen table, I placed Callum’s business card beside a bowl of mashed potatoes.
“He offered me a job,” I said.
My mother looked at the card. “Do you want it?”
“Yes.”
“Then take it.”
“What about Rowan?”
My father made an offended sound from behind his newspaper. “What about him? He has grandparents.”
My mother reached over and squeezed my hand. “Go remember who you were.”
So I did.
My first month at ReedNest was brutal.
I leaked milk through two blouses. I cried in the bathroom after a senior engineer called my carrier concept “emotionally appealing but commercially soft.” I survived on four hours of sleep, cold coffee, and the stubborn refusal to be dismissed by another man in a conference room.
Then I came back with data.
I surveyed mothers in parks, daycare lines, pediatric waiting rooms, and online parenting groups. I built prototypes at my parents’ dining table after Rowan fell asleep. I tested weight loads with bags of rice. I found a supplier in Ohio who could produce the new buckle system at scale.
At the next board meeting, I placed three prototypes on the table.
“This is not a cute mother’s idea,” I said. “This is a market correction.”
No one laughed.
By the end of the meeting, I had funding for a beta launch.
Callum caught me in the hallway afterward.
“You were terrifying in there,” he said.
May you like
I smiled for real.
“Good.”
