The Song That Didn't Fit

“Nora,” I said, trying to sound as if the question had just occurred to me. “Did you have any brothers or sisters?”

The peeler froze in her hand. A strip of apple skin slipped loose and landed in the sink. Nora’s back stiffened, then softened as she breathed out and started again, more slowly.

“I did,” she murmured. Her gaze stayed on the apple. “I had a sister. She died.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Were you close?”

She put the fruit down and braced both hands on the counter. Through the window, she stared into the yard. Her green eyes, the same color as Mom’s, shone with tears.

“We were, a long time ago,” she said. Her voice wavered. “When we were little, we were almost one person. Then we grew up and chose different paths. We had a terrible fight, and we stopped talking for years before she died.”

She turned toward me with a small, sorrowful smile. “You should be gentle with the people you love, Emma. Someday, there may not be time to make things right.”

Her answer hurt to hear. It also made no sense to me. If Nora had done something awful to Mom, why did sorrow sit so plainly on her face? The sadness in her voice didn’t sound pretend.

“I should do my homework,” I muttered, sliding down from the stool.

“All right, sweetheart. I’ll let you know when your dad’s home.”

I hurried upstairs, my heart thumping. Nora had said her sister was gone, but she still hadn’t told me that the sister was Maya Reynolds.

I wanted to know what their fight had been about. Why had they stopped speaking? And why did Dad act as if I had to be kept from learning that my aunt lived with us?

I passed my room and continued to the far end of the hallway, where Dad kept his office.

The door was shut, as it usually was during the day. I turned the brass handle. It gave way with a click, and I slipped in, pulling it closed behind me.

The room smelled like leather, old books, and Dad’s cologne. Shelves covered the walls, but I headed for his large desk instead.

Dad kept everything in order. Bills were paid, taxes went in early, and our important papers lived in a fireproof cabinet in the corner. A little silver key on his ring kept it locked.

I couldn’t open that cabinet. But I knew he sometimes left unfinished things in his desk before putting them away for good.

I went around behind the desk and searched its drawers. There were pens and markers, a jumble of spare staples, charging cords, and a tall pile of printer paper.

The bottom drawer on the right was deeper than the rest. Under a heap of old tax envelopes, I found a thick brown folder with folding sections. Its front was blank.

I pulled it free. It felt heavy in my hands. Hidden behind the desk, where the window couldn’t show me, I sat on the carpet and loosened the black cord around it.

Several piles of papers were tucked inside. The first was made up of hospital bills from the place where Mom had been taken after the crash. I turned through them, a chill tightening inside me.

The next group was older, its edges gone a little yellow. The first page looked official, with a blue crest printed at the top.

It said Family Court of the State of Ohio.

Beneath that were the words Petition for Custody.

The names below made my stomach drop: Nora Vance, petitioner; Maya Reynolds and Thomas Reynolds, respondents. The child listed was Emma Reynolds.

I went still. For a moment, I couldn’t draw a breath.

I read the page again, but the words stayed the same. My eight-year-old mind couldn’t understand all the court language. I understood the important part: Nora had asked to take me.

The page after it was a sworn statement. Most of it was crowded with long sentences, but a few parts stood out as if they had been marked for me.

It said Maya had severe postpartum depression and had developed a dependency on substances. The document claimed she couldn’t give me a steady, safe home.

Another section said Nora was my biological aunt and a licensed pediatric nurse. She was asking for temporary guardianship to protect me, the baby Emma Reynolds.

The paper slipped from my fingers and settled on the carpet.

Mom had been perfect in my memories: smiling, making apple crisp, singing the songs that belonged only to us. Yet these pages said she had been ill, and that she had used something dangerous. They said I might not have been safe with her when I was small.

I dug through the folder, searching for more papers that might explain what I’d just read.

Under the court records, I found a little white envelope. I tore it open with shaking hands.

Inside lay the three pages that had vanished from the blue photo album downstairs. Nora had once petitioned for custody of me as a baby—and she had kept the photographs that someone had removed.