New address. New lease. Her name alone.
I filed that away and never used it.
Until now.
Her street is small and lined with houses that remind me of the one she grew up in.
I spot the number, park a little way down, and sit with the engine ticking as it cools.
I'm about to knock on the door of a woman who has every reason to tell me to go to hell. I am operating on the back of a misdirected sext and my own unresolved guilt.
This isn't rational or strategic.
All it is is instinct.
I get out of the car and squint up at a flat, pale blue sky. Her front yard has a narrow strip of grass and a couple of potted plants. The curtains are drawn.
No sign of movement. I walk up the path.
My heart thuds heavier with each step. I breathe once, twice, and raise my hand to knock.
The sound echoes for a second, then fades. I hear the faint thud of feet on the other side of the door. Small feet. Running.
The handle turns. The door opens.
A little boy stands there, looking up at me.
He wears dinosaur pajamas. His hair is a soft brown mess, his eyes are wide and a warm brown that is painfully familiar.
His nose, his mouth, the line of his jaw. Every feature hits me in a line.
My brain supplies the math on reflex.
Five years. Her silence.
The way she vanished after that night. The timing doesn't just work. It lands squarely.
My son, my mind says.
The words do not pass my lips, but they land in my chest with full weight. My knees feel loose under me. For a second, I forget how to stand.
"Hi," he says. "Are you here for Mama?"
His voice is clear. Curious. Trusting. It cuts deeper than any accusation.
I open my mouth. No sound comes out. I grip the doorframe so I do not reach for him. I want to.
God, I want to. I want to pick him up and hold on and apologize for every minute I was not here, even though he does not know me from any other stranger at his door.
Footsteps sound behind him. Adult ones. Hers.
"Jace, honey, we talked about this," she says from inside. "You don't open the door without me. You check first."
He glances back at her, then at me. "It is a big man," he reports. "He has a serious face."
Under any other circumstances, I might laugh at that.
Lena appears in the gap, hand wrapping around his shoulder to draw him back.
