Chapter 20
Me passing him the wrong screws.
His laughter.
I pressed my lips together.
“That counts,” Alexander said.
“What?”
“Remembering his hands.”
Something inside me cracked.
Not painfully.
Softly.
I had spent so many years believing that incomplete memories were somehow lesser.
Alexander had just treated one like a treasure.
I sat down again.
“If Daniel wasn’t my biological father, he knew, didn’t he?”
“I don’t know.”
“My mother wrote that he raised me, loved me, and gave me his name. That sounds like he knew.”
“It does.”
I looked toward the computer.
“Then I want to know.”
Dana stepped forward.
“Before we open the files, I want to say something.”
I nodded.
“There may be documents on that drive that contain accusations. Financial records can be misunderstood. Personal letters can describe beliefs rather than facts.”
“I understand.”
“And if it identifies someone as your biological father, that isn’t the same as scientific proof.”
I understood why she was saying it.
Once, I might have resented the caution.
Now I appreciated it.
“I want the truth,” I said. “Not a dramatic version of it.”
Dana nodded.
“Then we take it slowly.”
The clerk returned.
He entered a security password, inserted the court’s copy of the drive, and opened the directory.
Seven folders appeared.
VANGUARD.
MARGARET.
DANIEL.
CHARLES.
TRUST.
CLARA.
And one folder labeled:
IF I AM WRONG.
My skin prickled.
“Start with Clara,” I said.
The clerk clicked.
Inside were three documents and one video file.
The video was dated March 2004.
Three months before my mother’s death.
I stared at the thumbnail.
My mother sat at a kitchen table.
The yellow kitchen.
My yellow kitchen.
The one I sometimes dreamed about.
My hand flew to my mouth.
“Play it.”
The clerk did.
The image flickered.
Then my mother moved.
Alive.
For one impossible second, I forgot how to breathe.
She looked younger than my memories and older than the photographs.
Her hair was pulled into a loose knot.
There were tired shadows beneath her eyes.
She adjusted the camera.
Then smiled.
“Hello, sweetheart.”
My fingers gripped the edge of the table.
She was speaking to me.
“If you’re seeing this, then you’re older than the little girl who is currently asleep upstairs with three stuffed rabbits and one sock.”
A laugh escaped me.
I remembered those rabbits.
One had been named Captain.
My mother continued.
“I don’t know when you’ll watch this, Clara. Maybe when you’re eighteen. Maybe thirty. Maybe never. I hope never.”