Part 4
Nora stopped with another story about her mother ready to tell. She set Daniel’s wallet on the blanket within reach of his hand.
“Okay. I’ll get the letters.”
“Could you bring them here? I’ve got someone coming to pick me up.”
She nodded and stood. At the door, he asked her to leave the envelopes sealed, and she said she would.
Cal was still beside Owen when she went to tell him where she was going. Their son had fallen asleep holding one corner of his father’s shirt. Cal had moved his chair closer rather than pull the fabric free.
“Do you need anything from home?” Nora asked.
“His toothbrush. Pajamas that don’t have tight cuffs.”
She wrote both things in her phone. Then she stayed by the bed, waiting for Cal to say something that would make leaving easier.
“I don’t know what to say to you yet,” he told her.
“I know.”
“Just bring his things.”
Owen stirred, and Cal put a hand on his back. Nora left without asking her husband to look up again.
At home, the half-cut flyer still lay beside the scissors. Beyond the glass, rain had washed away most of the bobcat’s prints, leaving a faint muddy crescent where its paw had touched the pane. Nora put Owen’s cap on the drying rack and went upstairs.
The desk key was in the back of her jewelry drawer. She had moved it there after finding the letters, away from the loose keys Cal sometimes sorted when he could not sleep.
The blue recipe box was heavier than she remembered. Beneath the cards for pies and cookies lay three envelopes of different sizes, held together by Vivian’s note. Nora lifted the top one and rubbed a thumb over Daniel’s name.
The flap had loosened at one corner. She could slip a finger under it without tearing the paper; she could know what he would know before she put it in his hands.
For a moment she stood holding it that way, her thumbnail just beneath the edge.
Then she put it back with the others. She carried the whole box downstairs, packed Owen’s things in a separate bag, and returned to the hospital.
Daniel had changed into dry clothes, though he had not managed to button his shirt around the sling. Nora set the box on the rolling table and moved it close enough that he could reach it without leaning.
“Those are yours,” she said, indicating the envelopes. “There’s nothing else locked away.”
He looked at the note around them. She watched him read my son twice, his eyes returning to the same short line.
“I’ll leave you alone,” she said.
“Just a second.”
He worked a finger beneath the oldest envelope’s flap. Nora put her hands in her coat pockets so she would not help him before he asked. After a little struggle, he opened it and eased out a folded sheet with a newspaper clipping tucked inside.
The clipping showed a high school cross-country team. Someone had circled a boy standing at the end of the back row, half his face hidden behind the runner in front.
“That’s me,” Daniel said.
He touched the boy with the tip of one finger. Then he turned the clipping over and studied the scraps of print on its other side.
“I was seventeen.”
Nora could imagine her mother at the kitchen table with scissors, cutting carefully around that small, obstructed face. She could not tell him how Vivian had found the photograph, or what had stopped her from doing anything more. The urge to offer a kind explanation was almost physical.
Daniel looked at her. Nora kept her hands in her pockets.
“I didn’t know she had this,” she said.
He laid the clipping on his lap and unfolded the letter.
Nora stepped into the hall and let the door close behind her.
He sent the recipe box back with a nurse before he left. The envelopes and clipping were gone, and so was the tomato soup card. On a hospital notepad sheet, Daniel had left his phone number and asked whether he could borrow that recipe. Beneath the request he had written: Does this really say rice?
Nora sat beside Owen’s bed to answer. She told him to keep the card for now and explained that her mother cooked the rice separately so it would not soak up all the broth. She erased a sentence about how much Owen had loved helping Grandma make it and sent the message without it.
Six weeks later, Daniel stood at their kitchen counter measuring rice with a chipped green cup. His shoulder still troubled him, and Cal lifted the heavy pot from the stove while Daniel steadied the lid with his good hand. It was his second visit since the hospital; on the first, he had stayed twenty minutes and brought back the soup card.
Owen sat at the table with a photograph Daniel had brought from one of the survey cameras. It showed the notched-ear bobcat on a log above the creek, followed by two nearly grown kittens. The family had given a full account of the feeding to the wildlife officer and stopped leaving food outside.
“She came looking for me,” Owen said.
Nora put a spoon beside his bowl. “She probably came looking for the chicken. We followed where she went.”
He looked down at the photograph. “She still helped.”
“She did.”
He pushed the picture toward Daniel, who bent over it without trying to settle anything further. Nora began copying a rice measurement onto a fresh card; the old one was stained where Vivian had once set down a can of tomatoes.
Before Daniel put the photograph away, Nora said, “Owen asked about going with you to check a camera.” She turned to Cal. “I told him we’d talk about it together.”
Cal set down his glass. “Which one?”
“The meadow,” Daniel said. “Away from the creek. We can stay on the level path.”
Cal looked at Nora. “I’m not ready for him to go without one of us.”
“I could come,” she said. “Or we could both go.”
“Both,” Cal said.
Nora waited while he considered it. He asked Owen about his ankle, then said they could try the short walk Sunday if it wasn’t hurting. Nora wrote the plan on the calendar beside the refrigerator, where Cal would see it when he left for work.
After dinner, Owen asked Cal to come outside and look at a loose strap on his pack. His ankle was much better, but he still took the porch steps one at a time. Cal carried the pack for him and left the outdoor light on.
Daniel stayed at the table. He had not told Nora what was in the other letters, and she had stopped checking her phone each evening to see whether he had decided to tell her.
Three quick taps sounded at the glass.
Nora’s pen stopped against the card, leaving a dot of ink beside the word rice.
Owen was outside with his father, holding up the repaired strap. Cal reached past him and opened the door, already reminding him about his muddy boots.
Nora turned the card over and wrote down how long the soup should simmer.