Chapter 8
The envelope was open and the kitchen didn't feel like our kitchen anymore.
Mom's hands were shaking so bad the paper rattled against the granite. She'd pulled the letter out halfway and stopped, like she couldn't decide whether to push it back in or pull it the rest of the way. The string hung loose off the island. The wax seal was cracked into two dark pieces.
Daniel hadn't moved since he set it down. His hands were at his sides now, palms open a little, like he wanted us to see he wasn't going to touch anything else.
Mom finally unfolded it. One page, handwritten, the ink a faded blue. She stared at the top and her breath caught.
I stepped closer. I could see the first line even before she read it.
She read it out loud, and her voice was barely there. "From Michael Reyes."
She stopped.
Daniel nodded once. Slow.
Mom looked up at him. "Michael," she repeated. It wasn't a question. It was like she was checking if saying it made it real.
I didn't know that name. I'd never heard it in our house. Not once. "Who's Michael Reyes?" I said.
Mom didn't answer me. She looked at Daniel. Her eyes were wet but she wasn't crying. She was holding it in, her mouth tight.
Daniel looked at me first, then at her. "My brother," he said. "Older brother."
Something about his face suddenly made sense. The way Mom had said he looked like someone she knew. The same jaw. The same way their eyes sat. Not identical, but close enough that if you knew one you'd see the other.
"He was twenty-four when he knew your mom," Daniel said to me. His voice was low and careful. "Just out of the service. She was nineteen."
Mom's hand tightened on the letter. I saw her knuckles go white.
"We were together before you were born, Ethan," she said. Her voice shook on the before. She didn't look at me when she said it. She looked at the cabinets, at the floor, anywhere but my face. "Michael was... he was my first everything. Before this house. Before we moved here."
I felt cold run through my chest. "You never told me about him."
"I know," she whispered. "I know I didn't."
Daniel took a small step closer to the island but not to us. "He kept up with you," he said to Mom. "Not in a weird way. He just... he asked about you. For years. He knew when you got married. When Ethan was born. He had a picture someone sent him. From your sister."
Mom's eyes jerked up. "You talked to Lisa?"
"Michael did. A few months ago," Daniel said. "He asked me to do this. He said — he said I should only come if you'd built a new family. If you were okay. And only if he couldn't come himself."
The kitchen was quiet except for the fridge humming. I could hear the clock over the stove ticking.
"Why couldn't he come himself?" I asked.
Daniel looked down for a second. He swallowed. "He wanted to. He planned to. This was his letter. His words. He asked me to bring it and to make sure you got it in person."
He didn't say why. He left it hanging there, and I saw Mom understand more than I did. Her face did something complicated — relief and dread at the same time.
She looked back down at the letter but didn't read the rest. Her thumb was right under the signature. Michael Reyes, in a looping, hurried hand.
I couldn't stand the quiet anymore. My heart was beating so loud I thought they could hear it. The question had been sitting in my throat since he said older brother. Since he said before you were born.
I looked at Mom. "Is Michael my father?"
She didn't answer.
Not right away.
Her mouth opened a little and then closed. She stared at me, and her eyes filled. Daniel went completely still. He didn't jump in to rescue her. He let the silence sit there.
That silence was the answer before any words. It was heavy. It filled the whole kitchen and made the granite and the cabinets feel like they were pressing in.
Mom's hand was still holding Michael's letter. The other hand was gripping the edge of the island like she needed to hold herself up. I waited. I didn't breathe.
After three or four seconds — it felt like a minute — she whispered, "Ethan..."
And stopped. She didn't finish. She couldn't.
May you like
Daniel's eyes moved to me, soft and sorry, and he didn't say yes or no either. He just stood there and let me hear what Mom wasn't saying.
On the island, under the letter, the corner of the second folded paper was still sticking out of the envelope, untouched.
