One Night Stand, Eight Surprises: Pampered by My CEO Husband --- - Chapter 127: Chapter 127

The play had started at 6:00 p.m. sharp. The email from the school had said so twice. And yet, at 6:07, Arielle was still in traffic.
The baby's cries echoed through the car, her tiny fists flailing in the mirror behind Arielle’s seat. The twins were bickering in the back row, and her toddler had fallen asleep with a marker in one hand and a suspicious stain blooming on his pants.
It was already too late.
When they finally reached the school, the parking lot was nearly empty. Just one or two parents lingering by the door, chatting as they left. Damien had taken their older son earlier, promising to find a front-row seat and FaceTime her if needed.
But there had been no signal.
No FaceTime.
Just silence.
Arielle sat frozen behind the wheel as the baby calmed, her little hiccups dissolving into sleepy breaths. The school’s windows glowed with soft yellow light, and somewhere inside, the applause had already died down. The cast was probably eating cupcakes. The costumes were coming off.
And she had missed it.
That night, she tucked the younger kids in like a ghost. She kissed them, smiled on cue, listened to their retellings of the day. But inside, she was unraveling.
Her older son, Elijah, came into the kitchen in his paper crown and cardboard armor, a cookie smudge on his cheek.
“Mom?”
She turned, bracing.
“Did you see it?” he asked.
She knelt beside him slowly. “No, baby. I didn’t make it in time. I’m so sorry.”
He shrugged. “It’s okay.”
But she saw it—the brief flash of disappointment in his eyes before he hugged her. It broke something in her.
When he left the room, Arielle gripped the countertop and let the tears fall.
Damien found her half an hour later, sitting on the laundry room floor, still surrounded by unsorted socks and tiny onesies. Her phone lay on top of the dryer. A notification blinked—a video message from the school. She hadn’t opened it.
He crouched in front of her.
“Hey.”
She didn’t look up.
“I missed it,” she whispered. “I missed his first real role. His first solo line. All he wanted was to see my face in that crowd, and I wasn’t there.”
Damien reached for her hands.
“You’re a mother of five. You’re healing. You’re stretched thinner than air, Arielle. You are not a superhero.”
“Yes, I am,” she snapped, voice sharp with shame. “I’m supposed to be.”
He was quiet a long time.
Then he stood. “Come with me.”
She followed him out to the backyard, wrapped in a blanket. The night was cool, the sky scattered with stars.
A string of fairy lights flickered on around the fence. The twins’ plastic chairs had been pulled into a semicircle, and a single bedsheet had been tied between two poles like a makeshift screen.
Damien walked to the projector he’d set on the patio table. He tapped a button.
The video began to play.
Arielle gasped.
There was Elijah—confident, standing tall on stage in his glittering cardboard armor. His voice rang clear, proud, as he shouted his line into the auditorium.
Behind the camera, someone—Damien—was whispering encouragements.
“I see you, buddy. You’re doing great.”
Arielle watched, eyes blurring with tears.
The entire performance, from start to finish, had been recorded. Every bow, every misstep, every wave from the stage.
When it ended, Damien turned to her.
“You didn’t miss it,” he said softly. “You weren’t in the audience, but you were still part of it. And now? You’ll always have this.”
She collapsed into his arms, sobbing.
“I feel like I’m failing them all,” she whispered. “Like I can never be enough.”
“You are more than enough. You’re the glue. The heart. You don’t have to be everywhere. You just have to keep showing up the way you do.”
She pulled back, wiping her face. “Thank you.”
He smiled. “Besides, the toddler yelled ‘butt’ in the middle of the scene. You didn’t miss much.”
She laughed, clutching her chest. “He did not.”
“Oh, he did. And Elijah kept going. Like a champ.”
Later that night, Arielle sat with Elijah in his room. He was already half-asleep, but his voice drifted up sleepily.
“You saw it?”
“I did,” she whispered. “You were brilliant.”
He smiled without opening his eyes. “Next time, you’ll be there?”
“I’ll try. With everything I have.”
He reached for her hand. “You’re still my favorite knight.”
Her throat caught.
“And you’re mine,” she whispered back.
Mom guilt, she realized, wasn’t just about failing—it was about caring so deeply, so relentlessly, that even small lapses felt like betrayals.
But love… love had room for imperfection. For missed plays and quiet forgiveness. For cardboard crowns and backyard projectors.
She didn’t need to be a superhero.
She just had to be present, even when she arrived late.