CHAPTER 3 – PART 3 – THE BOY HE HAD BEEN SEARCHING FOR WAS STANDING RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM
PART 3: THE PHOTOGRAPH IN THE LOCKED BOX
Linda was standing in the living room when I got home.
She wasn’t angry that I’d been fired.
She didn’t ask why my clothes were soaked.
She didn’t ask why I had spent the grocery money.
She looked terrified.
“Where were you?”
“At work.”
Her hands were clenched together.
“Why did you talk to that man?”
I slowly closed the front door.
“What man?”
She stared at me.
“Daniel Whitmore.”
The house became very quiet.
I could hear the refrigerator humming in the kitchen.
I could hear rain tapping against the windows.
I could hear my own breathing.
“How do you know his name?”
Linda looked away.
“Everybody knows Daniel Whitmore.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“Ethan—”
“How did you know I talked to him?”
She said nothing.
I dropped my backpack near the sofa.
“He said his son was kidnapped.”
Linda closed her eyes.
“Fourteen years ago.”
Her lips trembled.
“He was one.”
“Ethan.”
“He had a birthmark behind his ear.”
Linda covered her mouth.
My stomach dropped.
I took a step backward.
“No.”
She started crying.
Until that moment, part of me had still believed there was a normal explanation.
Watching her cry destroyed it.
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
She couldn’t.
“Mom.”
The word felt different in my mouth.
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
Linda turned toward the hallway.
She walked unsteadily to an old cabinet where she kept towels and winter blankets.
From behind a stack of folded sheets, she pulled out a small metal box.
I recognized it immediately.
I’d seen it my entire life.
Whenever I asked what was inside, Linda told me it held old financial papers.
It was always locked.
Her hands shook as she removed a key from a chain around her neck.
I had never noticed the key before.
She opened the box.
My whole life changed inside that cabinet.
There were old photographs.
Newspaper clippings.
Photocopies of documents.
A yellowed motel receipt.
And beneath them, a photograph of a young couple holding a baby.
I recognized Daniel immediately.
He looked younger.
Happier.
Beside him stood a beautiful woman with dark-blond hair and gray-blue eyes.
She was holding the baby against her chest.
The baby was looking directly at the camera.
I stared at those eyes.
My eyes.
Linda whispered behind me.
“Her name was Rebecca Whitmore.”
I couldn’t turn around.
“My real mother?”
Linda began crying harder.
“Yes.”
The word almost knocked me down.
I gripped the edge of the cabinet.
“How?”
“I worked nights at a motel in Sandusky.”
“When?”
“Fourteen years ago.”
I looked at her.
“What happened?”
She sat down slowly.
“One night, a man came in carrying a baby.”
My mouth went dry.
“What man?”
“I didn’t know his real name then.”
“Why did he have me?”
“He said the child’s parents couldn’t care for him.”
I stared at her.
“He said they wanted someone else to raise him.”
“And you believed that?”
Linda’s eyes filled with shame.
“I wanted a child more than anything.”
Something inside me began to break.
“Did you adopt me?”
She didn’t answer.
“Did you adopt me?”
“Ethan—”
“Did you buy me?”
Her face collapsed.
That was my answer.
I stepped away from her.
“Oh my God.”
“I didn’t understand what I was part of.”
“You paid a man for me?”
“He said the adoption couldn’t be official.”
“That’s not an adoption.”
“I know that now.”
“You bought me.”
“I loved you.”
The words made me furious.
“That doesn’t answer me!”
“I know.”
“How much?”
“Ethan, please.”
“HOW MUCH?”
She flinched.
“I don’t remember exactly.”
I laughed once, but there was nothing funny in it.
“You don’t remember what you paid for a baby?”
“I was desperate.”
“And that made it okay?”
“No.”
She reached toward me.
I moved away.
“When did you know?”
“What?”
“When did you know I was Daniel Whitmore’s son?”
Linda stared at the floor.
“At first, I didn’t.”
“When?”
Silence.
My voice dropped.
“When did you find out?”
“Six years ago.”
For a moment I thought I’d heard incorrectly.
“Six?”
She nodded.
I was nine.
Nine years old.
I remembered that age.
I remembered sitting at the kitchen table doing multiplication worksheets.
I remembered Linda taking me to the lake.
I remembered losing my first big tooth.
I remembered believing the woman beside me knew everything there was to know about me.
“You knew when I was nine?”
“I saw a television report.”
Linda’s voice cracked.
“They showed a computer reconstruction of what Christopher Whitmore might look like as a child.”
I stared at her.
“You recognized me.”
She nodded.
“And you said nothing.”
“I was afraid.”
“Of what?”
“Of losing you.”
I felt tears burning my eyes.
“What about them?”
“Ethan—”
“What about Daniel?”
She cried.
“What about my mother?”
“I was scared.”
“You let them keep looking.”
“I know.”
“You let them think I was dead.”
“I know.”
I grabbed the edge of the metal box.
“YOU KNEW.”
My hand knocked it from the cabinet.
Photographs and clippings scattered across the floor.
One newspaper article landed faceup near my shoe.
I almost didn’t look down.
Then I saw the photograph.
Rebecca.
Older.
Thinner.
Still beautiful.
The headline above it said:
REBECCA WHITMORE DIES AFTER LONG ILLNESS — FAMILY SAYS SHE NEVER STOPPED SEARCHING FOR MISSING SON
I stopped breathing.
I bent down and picked it up.
“My mother died?”
Linda covered her face.
“Three years ago.”
I read the headline again.
Then again.
The words didn’t change.
My mother had died.
Not Linda.
Rebecca.
A woman whose face I had never seen until that night.
A woman who had spent eleven years looking for me.
I turned the article over as if there might be some answer on the back.
“There was still time.”
Linda sobbed.
“I know.”
“When you found out, she was alive.”
“Yes.”
“You could’ve told her.”
“I know.”
“She could’ve met me.”
“Ethan—”
“She could’ve known I was okay.”
Linda had no defense left.
Neither did I.
My knees hit the floor.
I stared at the photograph of Rebecca holding me as a baby.
Her cheek was pressed against my head.
She looked happy.
I had spent my entire childhood wondering why I sometimes felt like there was a missing room inside me.
Now I knew.
Someone had stolen my name.
Someone had stolen my family.
Someone had stolen fourteen years.
And Linda had stolen six more after learning the truth.
Then headlights swept across the living room wall.
Linda looked toward the window.
Every bit of color disappeared from her face.
“Turn off the lights.”
I looked up.
“What?”
“Turn them off.”
“Why?”
She grabbed my arm.
“Ethan, now.”
I stood.
A car door slammed outside.
Then another.
Linda rushed toward the curtains and pulled them shut.
“Who is that?”
She turned to me.
“You need to leave.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Use the back door.”
I stared at her.
“Who is outside?”
Her voice dropped.
“The man who brought you to me.”
The anger inside me vanished.
It was replaced by cold fear.
“He’s alive?”
Linda nodded.
“He called tonight.”
“What did he say?”
“He knows Daniel saw you.”
A knock sounded at the front door.
Three slow knocks.
Linda flinched.
Then came a man’s voice.
“Linda?”
I felt the hair rise on my arms.
“Who is he?”
She pushed my coat at me.
“Go.”
“Tell me his name.”
“Ethan.”
“Tell me.”
The doorknob moved.
Linda looked at me.
“His name is Raymond Cole.”
Everything inside me stopped.
Cole.
I stared toward the front door.
“Travis?”
Linda nodded.
“Raymond is Travis Cole’s father.”
Suddenly the way Travis had acted at Mason’s looked different.
His anger when Daniel came in.
His panic when I tried to help.
His insistence that Daniel leave.
His fear after Daniel recognized me.
The voice came again.
“Linda.”
The knob turned harder.
“I’m coming in.”
Linda grabbed my shoulders.
“Go.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll handle him.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“I can’t leave you.”
“Yes, you can.”
Her eyes met mine.
Whatever else Linda had done, whatever lies she had told, the terror on her face was real.
“Please.”
The front lock snapped.
I ran.
I slipped out through the back door and into the rain as the front door opened behind me.
For the second time that night, I was running away from a place I thought I belonged.
This time, I had no idea whether the people behind me wanted to keep my secret hidden.
Or keep me alive.
Leave a Reply