Part 3
Ms. Alvarez entered first.
Her hair had come loose from its clip, and mud covered the cuffs of her pants. A sheriff’s deputy followed her, but she raised one hand before he could speak.
“Are either of you hurt?”
Emma shook her head.
Eli held Ruth’s paper against his chest.
Ms. Alvarez looked from him to the woman in the hospital bed, then to Hannah. “Who lives here?”
“I do,” Hannah said. “With my grandmother. I’m Hannah Mercer.”
“Relationship to Eli?”
“His half sister.”
Ms. Alvarez’s expression changed, though only slightly. “Do you have identification?”
Hannah retrieved her wallet. While the deputy checked it, Ms. Alvarez crouched in front of the children.
“You left Bridgeway without permission. You crossed county lines, and no adult knew where you were for almost seven hours.”
“We left a note,” Emma said.
“A note is not an adult.”
Eli expected anger. What he saw instead was exhaustion and fear, which made it harder to look at her.
“I asked you to call,” he said.
“I did call. The archival office was closed until Monday.”
“That could mean months.”
“It could have. It also could have meant two days.” She glanced at Ruth. “I understand why you wanted answers. I do not understand why you risked Emma’s safety and your own to get them.”
Emma folded her arms. “I risked my own safety.”
“You’re eleven.”
“I’m aware.”
The deputy cleared his throat to hide what might have been a laugh.
Hannah handed Ms. Alvarez an envelope filled with copies of birth certificates, old county forms, and returned letters. “Please take these. We’ve tried before.”
“How recently?”
“Every year until Grandma’s second stroke. Then I started again when I turned eighteen. The state said there was no child named Eli Mercer matching our information.”
“He entered care as Eli Carter,” Ms. Alvarez said.
“I know that now.”
Ruth shifted against the pillows. “Don’t take him before I tell him.”
Eli looked at her, but Ms. Alvarez stood.
“He has to return to Bridgeway tonight. That doesn’t mean this conversation is over.”
Hannah knelt in front of Eli. She did not reach for him.
“I won’t ask you to trust me,” she said. “I haven’t earned that. But give Ms. Alvarez the papers. There are letters in my closet, photographs, hospital records—everything we kept.”
“Did you know she signed me away?”
Hannah looked at Ruth.
“I knew she signed something while she was in the hospital. I didn’t understand what it meant. I was a kid too.”
Eli glanced at the groceries scattered across the floor, the wheelchair ramp, and Boone lying beneath Ruth’s bed with his cloudy eye fixed on him.
He had found the house.
He still did not know whether it was a home.
The drive to Riverbend took less than an hour in Ms. Alvarez’s county car. Eli sat in the back beside Emma. Neither spoke.
At Bridgeway, staff members checked them for injuries, made them drink water, and took away their outdoor privileges for two weeks. The other children crowded the recreation-room doorway until a counselor sent them upstairs.
That night, Emma sat cross-legged on Eli’s floor.
“You found them,” she said.
“They lost me.”
“They said they searched.”
“They also said they signed papers.”
Emma picked at a loose thread on her sleeve. “Both things can be true.”
Eli turned his face toward the wall. “You wouldn’t understand.”
The silence behind him changed.
Emma stood.
“You’re right,” she said. “Nobody has ever found me.”
The door closed before he could apologize.
For the next four days, Eli refused Hannah’s calls. On Friday, Ms. Alvarez came to Bridgeway carrying a cardboard box sealed with tape.
“Hannah brought this to the county office,” she said.
“I don’t want it.”
“That’s fine. It can stay here.”
She placed the box on the table and sat across from him. She did not try to open it or explain what was inside.
After several minutes, Eli pulled it closer.
The top layer contained envelopes. Some had been opened and resealed. Others bore stamps reading RETURN TO SENDER, NO RECORD FOUND, or FORWARDING ADDRESS EXPIRED.
Every one was addressed to Eli Mercer.
Beneath the letters lay a red toddler’s shoe, a knitted blanket, and a photograph of a much younger Boone curled on a hospital floor. Between his front legs slept a baby with dark curls.
Eli turned over the picture.
On the back, someone had written:
He wouldn’t let the nurse move him until Ruth came back.
There was one more envelope at the bottom.
It was newer than the others, but the paper had softened at the corners. Across the front, in uneven handwriting, were the words:
For Eli, if Hannah ever finds him.
“Who wrote this?” Eli asked.
Ms. Alvarez looked at the return address.
“Your mother.”
Eli tore open the envelope. The first sentence was written alone at the top of the page. There was no good reason for what I did to you…
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