I debate calling her at work, but at this point, it might be faster to just do it myself. At least the parts I know.
I start to fill in the sections as best I can:
Name: Melinda Smith
Marital Status: Single
Occupation: Artist
(Because there’s no way I’m putting “Aura Healer and Crystal Specialist” on a college application)
Education Level:
The question stops me cold.
I have no idea.
Did she go back to school after dropping out whenshe got pregnant with me? Did she ever finish her degree?
I should be able to answer this. It’s the kind of basic information someone should know about their own mother, but I don’t.
Does that make me a shitty, self-centered daughter?
Possibly.
Unsure what to do next, I try calling. It goes straight to voicemail.
She must have a client. Even though there’s zero scientific proof, my mom is fully convinced that radio frequencies from cell phones interfere with her “psychic energy” during readings, so she always turns hers off.
With no other options left, I shut the laptop and head for her bedroom closet, going straight to the purple, cosmic-swirl storage bin where she keeps all her important papers. Inside it, everything is filed into manila folders with tabbed labels scrawled in her messy cursive. There’s one for each of us:
Melinda.
Alysander.
Ambrosia.
I flip through the “Melinda” folder, quickly scanning the contents: bills, lease papers, credit card statements, something titled “Empath Degree.”
I bite back a laugh. God only knows what kind of shady online program handed that one out.
I’m almost to the end of the folder when something tucked way in the back catches my eye. Asealed, legal-size envelope. It’s soft at the corners, slightly crumpled, and marked with a single letter:
“S.”
I pause, fingers hovering. Then I slide it out.
I know I’m crossing a line. If the situation were reversed, I’d lose it if she went through my private things. But this is different. Because I know who “S” is.
“S” means Sonar.
My father.
I was barely a year old when he left, too young to remember him. No matter how many times I’ve asked, Mom never told me much about him, either. I know she gave up everything to raise us on her own and carried more than I probably realize, but none of that makes the questions go away.
He’s still my dad.
I have the right to know who he was. To know where I come from.
