Then I turned over the final letter.
On the back were five words written in my mother’s handwriting.
He isn’t like his father.
I read them again.
My mother had every reason to hate William.
Yet she had saved Caleb’s letters for years.
She had believed he was different.
Suddenly, memories from my relationship with Caleb began falling into place.
One night on his couch, long before I was pregnant, he had casually asked whether I remembered owning a red bicycle as a child.
I had laughed.
“Yes, actually.”
And Caleb had smiled in a strange, private way.
Now I understood why.
He had already known.
At the bookstore, he hadn’t discovered me by accident either.
He had recognized my name.
He had come looking for me.
And perhaps worst of all, there had been nights when I had complained about the wealthy family my mother once worked for.
I told Caleb how badly that experience had affected her.
He listened.
He knew I was talking about his own father.
And he said nothing.
At sunrise, I strapped Nora into her car seat.
Then I drove to the address written on the oldest envelope.
The house was smaller than I remembered.
Still large.
Still elegant.
But not the mansion my childhood memory had created.
The garden, however, was exactly the same.
I knocked.
An older man answered.
Gray hair.
Thinner now.
But I recognized his eyes.
William.
“You look exactly like your mother,” he said.
I tightened my hold on Nora.
“I need to see Caleb.”
“Caleb isn’t available.”
“Then tell me why he left.”
William looked at Nora.
For one brief second, recognition flashed across his face.
The curls.
The chin.
Those eyes.
Then his expression went flat.
“He knew you were pregnant.”
He paused.
“And he chose to leave.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“That isn’t my problem.”
He stepped back.
“Go home.”
As I turned away, another memory came rushing back.
My mother crying.
William shouting.
His voice following us down these same steps.
Don’t come back.
Then another memory.
A small dark-haired boy running after our car.
Crying.
Someone holding him back.
Caleb.
And suddenly I remembered the bicycle again.
His hand on the seat.
Me screaming,
“Don’t let go!”
And Caleb shouting,
“I won’t! Keep going! I’ve got you!”
I stopped halfway to my car.
William expected me to believe that boy had grown into a man who could simply abandon his daughter.
Maybe people changed.
Maybe he had.
But I was done letting other people decide what truth I was allowed to know.
I turned around.
“William.”
He looked annoyed.
“You’re becoming hysterical.”
“No.”
My voice was steady.
“I’m being very clear.”
I stepped toward the porch.
“I am not leaving until Caleb looks me in the eye and tells me himself that he doesn’t want his daughter.”
William’s hand tightened against the doorframe.
Then a voice came from somewhere deeper inside the house.
“Dad.”
Footsteps approached.
“Move.”
William stepped aside.
And Caleb walked onto the porch.
He looked exhausted.
Hollow.
Like he hadn’t slept properly in weeks.
But it was him.
The same curls.
The same chin.
The same mismatched eyes Nora had inherited.
I had rehearsed so many things I would say if I ever saw him again.
Every one disappeared.
