The first thing I saw inside the box was a yellow baby sweater.
I knew it at once. Hannah had knitted it during the last weeks of her pregnancy, sitting beside me on the sofa with her feet propped up and a ball of yarn rolling across the floor.
“She’ll wear it home,” she’d said, holding the tiny sleeves against her stomach.
Audrey never wore it. After Hannah died, I couldn’t bear to look at anything she’d made.
I lifted the sweater from the box. Beneath it were fifteen envelopes tied together with blue ribbon. Each had a number on the front, written in Hannah’s careful handwriting.
One. Two. Three.
All the way to fifteen.
I pressed a hand to my mouth. Hannah had written to her daughter for birthdays she expected to celebrate with her. She had planned so far ahead while I’d been worrying about whether we had enough diapers.
At the bottom of the box lay a photograph. Hannah stood in the sunlight outside a diner, one hand resting on her pregnant belly. A young man stood beside her, smiling directly at the camera.
It wasn’t Mark.
Mark was the boyfriend who had come to the hospital, held Audrey for a few minutes, and left a week later. I’d believed him when he said he was Audrey’s father. Hannah had never given me a reason to doubt it.
I turned the photograph over.
The day we told Daniel about Audrey.
For a long moment, I could only stare at the name.
I’d heard Hannah mention Daniel once or twice before she was pregnant. Then she stopped. Whenever I asked about him, she changed the subject, and I assumed they’d broken up. Now I was looking at him with his arm around her and joy written all over his face.
Under the photograph was a smaller envelope addressed to me.
Mom, please read this before you give Audrey her letters.
I broke the seal with my thumb.
Mom, I should have told you sooner. Mark isn’t Audrey’s father. Daniel is.
I read the sentence again, hoping I had misunderstood it.
Daniel knew about the baby. He was thrilled when we found out she was a girl. But a few weeks later, something happened between us, and I told him to stay away. I told you Mark was the father because I couldn’t bear to explain what I’d done.
My chest tightened.
I’m going to tell you everything when we come home from the hospital. I promise. If I don’t get that chance, please give Audrey these letters when she’s old enough. And please find Daniel. He needs to know she was born.
The letter ended there. No explanation of what had happened. No address for Daniel. Just Hannah’s name at the bottom, followed by a small, crooked heart.
I sat on the closet floor with the paper trembling in my hands.
For fifteen years, I had told Audrey that her father left because he couldn’t face raising her. I’d tried to make sure she knew his choice said nothing about her. But I’d been talking about the wrong man.
And Daniel, wherever he was, might have spent all those years believing Hannah had taken their child out of his life.
“Grandma?”
I looked up. Audrey stood in the doorway, still wearing the blue sweatshirt she’d pulled on after school. Her gaze went straight to the box.
“Is that Mom’s?”
I wanted another minute. I wanted enough time to understand what I’d read before I changed what Audrey knew about her own life.
But she was already looking at the envelopes, and I wouldn’t hide them from her.
“Yes,” I said. “I found it behind the closet shelf.”
Audrey knelt beside me. She picked up the yellow sweater by one sleeve and gave a small, startled laugh.
“It’s so tiny.”
“She made it for you. She wanted you to wear it home.”
Audrey held it against her chest. Then she noticed the envelopes.
“Are those for me?”
“One for each birthday.”
Her eyes filled. “She wrote all of them before I was born?”
I nodded.
Audrey touched the envelope marked 15. “Can I open this one?”
“Of course.”
She untied the ribbon and drew out the letter. I watched her read the first few lines, her expression softening.
“What does it say?” I asked.
“She says she hopes I had cake today.” Audrey gave a watery smile. “She says when she was fifteen, she was sure she already knew everything.”
“That sounds like her.”
Audrey kept reading. Halfway down the page, her smile disappeared.
“Grandma.” She looked up at me. “Who is Daniel?”
I glanced at the letter in my hand. “I think he’s your father.”
Her eyes widened. “You think?”
“I only found out a few minutes ago. Hannah wrote to me, too.”
I passed her my letter. She read it without speaking, while I sat beside her and wished I had an answer ready for every question she was about to ask.
When she finished, she lowered the page to her lap.
“So Mark wasn’t my dad.”
“No.”
“And Daniel wanted me?”
“From what Hannah wrote, yes. He knew she was expecting you. She said he was happy.”
Audrey looked back at the photograph. She studied his face for so long that I wondered what she saw there. An unfamiliar man, or some part of herself she had never been able to place.
“Did he know Mom died?”
“I don’t know, sweetheart.”
“Why didn’t she tell him I was born?”
“I don’t know that either. She planned to explain it when she came home.”
Audrey swallowed and unfolded her birthday letter again. “There’s more.”
She handed it to me, pointing near the bottom.
Audrey, if there ever comes a day when you want to find Daniel, you can. You don’t have to decide how you feel about him before you meet him. Ask Grandma to look in the pocket of the yellow sweater. I put something there to help.
I turned the sweater over and slipped two fingers into a pocket so small I’d mistaken it for a fold.
Inside was a piece of paper, worn soft from being tucked away for years. It held a street address and a telephone number. Beneath them, Hannah had written Daniel’s full name.
Audrey leaned close enough to read it with me.
“We could look for him,” she said.
“Yes.”
She glanced toward the window. “What if he has another family now?”
“He might.”
“What if he doesn’t want to meet me?”
I set the sweater down and took her hand. “Then I’ll be here with you. But we haven’t asked him yet. Hannah wanted him to know about you.”
Audrey nodded, though she kept her eyes on the photograph.
I was about to suggest we sit at the kitchen table and talk when my phone rang in my pocket. The screen showed an unfamiliar number.
I nearly let it go to voicemail. Then Audrey squeezed my hand, and I answered.
“Hello?”
There was a pause. A man cleared his throat.
“Mrs. Bennett? My name is Daniel Mercer. I know this call must be unexpected.”
I looked at Audrey. She watched my face, waiting.
Daniel spoke again, his voice strained. “I found out this morning that Hannah died. I was trying to reach her, and someone gave me your number.”
My grip tightened around the phone.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “She died fifteen years ago.”
The silence on the other end lasted so long that I thought the call had dropped.
Then he whispered, “And the baby?”
Audrey could hear him. I saw it in the way she sat up straighter.
I took a breath. “Her name is Audrey. She’s here with me.”
Daniel made a sound I couldn’t quite understand. When he spoke again, every word came slowly.
“Could you tell her,” he said, “that I kept the last picture Hannah sent me? I still have it.”
Audrey held out her hand for the phone…………………..
