Victoria looked at her daughter, this brave young woman who had carried a stolen life with such grace, and she finished the sentence.
"You."
Chapter 14: Whose Daughter?
The word stayed with Hannah all the way back from Tacoma. You. Victoria had said it softly, like a gift, after Hannah said the only one who was not broken was the baby. Hannah had not answered.
"Are you all right?" Victoria asked.
"I am tired," Hannah said. "I need to be alone for a while."
"Of course," Victoria said. "Whenever you are ready. No pressure."
Hannah nodded and went inside. Her phone buzzed. Sarah. She let it go to voicemail. Then it buzzed again. Victoria. She let that one go too.
She stood in her kitchen, coat still on. For twenty-five years she had been Hannah Brooks, born at home in Portland. Now she was also Gwen Ashford, born at St. Mary's Hospital in Seattle. Two mothers. Two names. Two lives. And she did not know how to be either one of them.
The next days she went to work early and stayed late, wiping tables that were already clean.
"You are hiding," Molly Reyes said.
"I am working," Hannah said.
"You are hiding while working," Molly said. "Sarah called twice. Victoria texted once. Say anything. Silence is worse than the wrong words."
That evening, Nate found her in the kitchen, staring at a ticket she had already read twice.
"Walk with me?" Nate asked. "After your shift. Just a walk."
Hannah nodded. "Okay. A walk."
They walked to the waterfront as the sky turned the color of bruised peaches. The air smelled like salt and rain. Hannah walked beside Nate without speaking for a long time. He did not rush her.
"Thanks for not asking," Hannah said.
"I figured you would talk when you were ready," Nate said.
"I am not sure I will ever be ready," Hannah said. "Ruth prayed every day that the baby was safe and loved. Sarah loved me. Victoria grieved for me for twenty-five years. How do I hold all of that at once and still belong to myself?"
"But everyone is waiting," Hannah said. "Sarah thinks I am going to leave her forever. Victoria is so careful, like one wrong word will scare me off. And whatever I do, someone gets hurt."
"Who are you trying not to hurt?" Nate asked. "Them, or you?"
Hannah stopped walking. "Both," she said. "I do not want to hurt them. But I am hurting too, and nobody is asking about that. Not even me."
"What hurts?" Nate asked.
"I do not know my own story," Hannah said. "I thought I knew it. I was born at home in Portland. That was my story, and it was a lie. Then the new story is that I was born in Seattle and found in a chapel, and that is true, but it does not feel like mine either. It feels like something that happened to a baby named Gwen. Am I Gwen? Am I both? Am I neither?"
"You are Hannah," Nate said. "I have worked next to you for two years. You are the woman who remembers every regular's order and laughs too loud at Molly's jokes. That did not change because you read a diary."
"But my name," Hannah said. "My whole life, my name was the one true thing. Now I have two names. Which one is mine?"
"Maybe both are," Nate said. "You get to decide."
Hannah held out her right wrist and looked at the star. Small and pale, just below her palm. The mark that had started everything. The mark that had led to a DNA test and a chapel and a diary in Tacoma.
"Everyone keeps looking at this like it picked me," Hannah said. "Like it made me belong to someone."
"What do you think it means?" Nate asked.
Hannah was quiet. The water moved against the pier. A ferry horn sounded, low and far away.
"I think it is just a mark," she said. "It did not choose my family. It just sat there on my wrist while other people decided things for me. Ruth decided to take me. Sarah decided to keep me. Victoria decided to search for me. And I never got to decide anything."
"Until now," Nate said.
"Until now," Hannah said. "I have to choose. Not who my mother is. I cannot choose that. Biology chose that, and love chose that. But I have to choose what kind of daughter I am going to be. Nobody can do that for me."
"I pulled away from both of them," Hannah said. "Distance did not bring the answer. I need time, but I cannot keep disappearing on them. That is not choosing. That is running."
She took out her phone. "Stay," Hannah said. "Please."
She dialed Sarah first.
"Hannah?" Sarah said. "Honey, is that you?"
"Mom," Hannah said. "It is me. I am okay. I am sorry I did not call sooner."
"I thought I had lost you," Sarah said.
"You have not lost me," Hannah said. "I need time, but I still love you. Nothing I learned changes the fact that you raised me. Can you give me that?"
"Yes," Sarah said, crying now. "Take all the time you need. I will be here."