“Does she know about me?”
“She knows your name.
She knows what I told her, which was the truth as I understood it — that you had moved on and didn’t want contact.” Anna’s jaw tightened slightly.
“I told her that because that’s what Carol told me.
I believed it.
I raised her believing it.”
“And now?”
“Now I don’t know what she believes.” Anna set her cup down.
“I haven’t told her you were coming.
I didn’t know if you would actually show up.
I didn’t know if you’d want to know any of this.” She looked at me directly.
“Do you?”
The question sat between us.
Thirty-six years of a marriage I had believed in completely.
A woman who had held my hand while she was dying and asked me to find the person she had wronged.
A daughter who had grown up without a father because of a lie told at a door on an ordinary morning.
“Yes,” I said.
“I want to know all of it.”
Anna nodded once.
She reached into the pocket of her cardigan and placed her phone on the table.
“Then I think,” she said carefully, “that before I call Claire, you should read the rest of the letter.”
I had forgotten there was more.
I picked it up from where it had fallen on the floor.
My hands were steadier now.
I found the place where I had stopped.
*I never told James about the pregnancy.
By the time I understood what I had done, it felt too late to undo any of it.
I told myself it was better for everyone.
I have told myself that for thirty-six years.*
*I don’t believe it anymore.*
*If you are reading this, Anna, then I am probably gone.
And if my conscience means anything at all, I hope you will find a way to tell James the truth.
Not for my sake.
For his.
And for Claire’s.*
*I am sorry.
I know that isn’t enough.
But I am.*
*— Carol*
I folded the letter and set it on the table.
“She knew her name,” I said.
“I wrote to Carol once,” Anna said.
“Years ago.
I told her Claire was healthy.
I don’t know why I did it.
I think I needed her to know that the lie hadn’t destroyed everything.” She paused.
“She wrote back.
Just one line.
She said she was glad.”
I looked at the phone on the table.
