She returns minutes later with a brown-haired girl in tow behind her. Amaryllis’s heart-shaped face and dark hair are her own, but her eyes—locked on me—are Truman’s eyes, large and luminous.
Mrs. Sommers walks back into the room briskly, but Amaryllis hovers at the doorway, peering at me. She is wearing a plain blue dress that looks like a school uniform and scuffed patent leather Mary Janes.
“Come inside, Amaryllis,” Mrs. Sommers says, beckoning the child forward.
Amaryllis doesn’t budge.
Mrs. Sommers repeats her words in a louder, slightly more authoritative tone. “Come inside, Amaryllis.”
When the child again makes no move, Mrs. Sommers opens her mouth to no doubt repeat the request and maybe add a warning, but I speak before she does.
“Hello, Amaryllis. My name is Helen. I’d like to talk with you if that’s okay.”
“I don’t know you,” the child says in a voice void of emotion. She is making an observation and nothing else.
“I know. I would like for you to know me, though.”
“Why?” The child narrows her eyes slightly, as though she’d been studied by prospective parents in the past and then ultimately not been chosen. The look in those Truman-like eyes speaks of far more heartache than eight years on the planet should. It is as if Amaryllis is already done with pretense and half-truths. The answer I give must be as truthful a one as I can give.
“Because,” I say, and I can only hope my next words are the right ones, “we are family, you and me. You are my niece.”
Amaryllis stares at me for a long moment before saying, “I don’t have a family.”
“It may not be a big family, that’s true. But I am your aunt, and that makes us family.”
“How are you my aunt?” the child says, her brows slightly furrowed.
“Well, my brother was your father.”
Amaryllis stares at me in obvious disbelief. “I don’t have a father.”
“Everybody who is born has a father,” I say. “I know you never knew yours, and I wish my brother were still alive so that you could meet him. He died during the war. I’m sorry to have to tell you that.”
Amaryllis does not react to this news, either, at least not that I can see.
“Was he nice?” she asks seconds later.
“He was a good brother to me.” I hope that is answer enough. “I’m a little older than he was. We lost our mother when we were young, and so we sort of looked out for each other when we were children.”
“What was his name?”
“Truman.”
Still Amaryllis does not move.
“I knew your mother, too,” I say.
At this, Amaryllis’s face seems to crumple the tiniest bit. “Is she dead, too?”
The child’s words pierce me, but I keep my voice light. “I don’t think so. I’ve been looking for her, and I haven’t found her yet. But I did talk to someone who said she was well when he last saw her.”
Still Amaryllis does not move.
“And there’s something else. I think I know why your mother gave you your name.”
Amaryllis holds my gaze as her cocoa brown eyes suddenly begin to shimmer.
“Won’t you come sit with me so we can talk?” I ask.
