In 2017, this then-17-year-old teen had been entrusted with the task of looking after her then-3-year-old brother, as her parents had to attend to a family emergency. But, she “didn’t want to miss any work” from school, and so took her little brother to her high school.
What happened next in class, however, was “the sweetest” moment, according to her mother, who later saw the endearing picture her daughter uploaded to Instagram.
Stiles Parish, then aged 17, was asked by her parents to pick up her then-3-year-old brother, James, from daycare and take him back home.
Mom Candice Curry said that it just so happened that on this day, she and her husband, Brandon, couldn’t make it to pick up little James due to unforeseen circumstances.
This last-minute request required Stiles to pick James up, take him home, and stay with him. But Stiles also had school that day.
“I figured she had gone to get him and taken him home. Later that day I saw the picture on her Instagram and realized that she had taken him back to school,” Candice told ABC News. “She told me that she didn’t want to be counted absent and that she didn’t want to miss any work.”
The endearing thing was that James was so tired that he quickly fell asleep in her arms during class. Stiles was studying to be a nurse, and that’s maybe why this situation didn’t bother anyone in her class, including the teacher.
“Her teacher was very supportive and didn’t mind him being in the class at all. He slept most of the time and if he had become a problem my daughter would have taken him out so that she didn’t disrupt the other students. She attends an amazing school that clearly sees the value in family and education,” Curry said.
It really hit a soft spot when Curry saw her daughter’s loving care toward her baby brother. “When I saw the Instagram post it made my heart want to explode. The tenderness in it is just the sweetest,” she said. “The fact that he is sleeping so comfortably on her in the middle of a class full of teenagers tells me how much he trusts her. As a mom, it makes me so thankful that they have this kind of relationship, and I pray it will always stay this way.”
She also wrote on Facebook: “Life is short. These are the moments that make it so incredibly sweet.”
