"I love you too," Hannah said. "I will call again soon."
She hung up and dialed Victoria.
"Hannah," Victoria said. "I am so glad to hear your voice."
"Hi," Hannah said. "I wanted you to hear it from me. I am okay. I have been thinking about everything."
"Take your time," Victoria said.
"I need time too," Hannah said. "I need time to figure out who I am with all of this. But I am not running away. I just need room to breathe, and then I will come back and talk. Really talk."
"I understand," Victoria said. "Thank you for calling."
Hannah hung up and slipped the phone into her pocket. The star on her wrist caught the last light. For the first time, it did not feel like a question someone else had to answer. It felt like hers.
Chapter 15: The Distance
Three weeks passed, and Hannah filled every one of them with work. She took double shifts at The Copper Lantern until her feet ached. She volunteered to close. She volunteered to open. She filled every empty hour before the silence could find her.
"You are going to burn out," Molly Reyes said one afternoon, cornering her by the bar. "Hannah, talk to me."
"I am talking to you," Hannah said, stacking clean glasses.
"That is not talking," Molly said. "That is deflecting. Sarah called me twice. Victoria called once."
"I asked them for time," Hannah said. "Time means time. If I talk to them, I will have to feel all of it, and I am not ready."
"And working yourself to death is better?" Molly asked.
"It is quieter," Hannah said.
Nate came out of the kitchen with a plate. "Eat something," he said. "You skipped lunch again."
"I am fine," Hannah said.
"You are not fine," Nate said. "You are running."
The first letter from Victoria arrived that week, in a cream envelope. Hannah held it a long time, then put it in her drawer unopened. The next week, another came. Then another. One a week, gentle and steady. She did not open any of them.
"They are just sitting there," Molly said when she came over one evening and saw the stack of unopened envelopes. "One letter a week is not pressure."
"I know," Hannah said. "That is what makes it worse. If she were pushy, I could be angry. She is being kind, and I do not know what to do with kind."
"Open one," Molly said. "Just one."
"Not tonight," Hannah said, and Molly let it go.
The package from Sarah arrived on a rainy Thursday. It was a plain brown box with Hannah's name written in her mother's careful hand. Hannah set it on the table and stared at it for an hour before she opened it.
Inside, folded neatly, was her baby blanket, soft and worn, pale yellow. On top of it lay the tiny knitted cap, the one from the box in the attic, small enough to fit in her palm. Underneath was a two-page letter in Sarah's shaky handwriting.
Hannah sat down and read it.
"My dearest Hannah," it began. "I was wrong. It is a small sentence for such a big wrong, but it is the truest one I have. I was wrong to take you. I was wrong to keep the secret. I love you. I have loved you every day since the night I found you, and I will love you every day for the rest of my life. Whenever you are ready. If that day never comes, I will understand. I will be here. Love, Mom."
Hannah folded the letter and pressed it against her chest. She picked up the blanket and held it to her face, and it still smelled faintly of cedar and home. She held the tiny cap and thought about how small she had been.
That night, she did the thing she had been avoiding. She took out all of Victoria's letters and spread them across her kitchen table. Four envelopes. Four weeks. She opened the first one with shaking fingers.
"Dear Hannah," Victoria had written. "A letter is quieter than a knock on the door. You do not need to reply. I only want you to know that I am thinking of you. Take all the time you need. I waited twenty-five years. I can wait a little longer. With love, Victoria."
The rest were shorter. Victoria had planted roses. She had told Clara about Hannah, and Clara had cried. The last one said only, "Dear Hannah. I miss you. That is all. No pressure. Just that. I miss you."
Hannah cried then, for the first time since Tacoma. She cried for Sarah, who had held a stranger's baby and could not let go. She cried for Victoria, who had waited twenty-five years and was still waiting, patiently, one letter a week. She cried for Ruth, broken by grief, who had left a baby in a chapel with a note. She cried for the baby herself, for Gwen, for Hannah.
Her phone buzzed. It was Molly.
"Are you okay?" Molly asked. "You went quiet."
"I read them," Hannah said, her voice thick. "All of them. Victoria's letters, and Sarah's letter. I am still angry, but I am so tired of being angry. I miss them. Both of them. Is that allowed?"
"Of course it is allowed," Molly said softly. "You have two mothers, Hannah. That is just your life."
"I do not know how to do this," Hannah said. "I do not know how to be the daughter of two mothers."
"You do it one step at a time," Molly said. "What is the first step?"
Hannah looked at the letters, at the blanket and the tiny cap. She thought about Portland, about the woman who had raised her and the woman who had given her life, and how they had never once been in the same room.
"I think," Hannah said slowly, "the first step is getting them in the same room."
After she hung up, hands still shaking, she booked a train ticket to Portland for Saturday morning. Then she picked up her phone and called Victoria.
"Hello?" Victoria said, her voice full of hope.