Chapter 3
I didn’t go downstairs immediately.
I couldn’t.
Mom and Ray hurried down to meet Lily and the woman who had brought her, but I stayed at the window.
The little girl stood beside the car clutching that purple backpack to her chest.
She looked terrified.
That made something inside me shift.
Not heal.
Not soften completely.
Just shift.
Because whatever my father had done, Lily hadn’t chosen any of it.
She hadn’t chosen to lose her mother either.
The front door opened below.
I heard voices.
A social worker, I realized.
Then Lily’s voice.
Tiny.
“Is Denise here?”
Not Mom.
Not Aunt Denise.
Just Denise.
I sat on the bare floor.
“Aunt Sarah,” I whispered into the phone. “Tell me about the letter.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Who does?”
“Lily.”
My eyes went toward the stairs.
“That paper she was holding?”
“Probably.”
“What does it say?”
“I’ve never read it.”
“But you knew about it.”
“Rebecca called me from the hospital after the accident.”
I closed my eyes.
“She was alive?”
“For two days.”
“And she talked to you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because she knew Lily would need somewhere to go.”
My anger returned.
“And she decided my mother should raise her?”
“No. She hoped Denise would.”
“That’s different?”
“Yes.”
Sarah sounded firm now.
“She knew she had no right to demand anything.”
I rested my head against the wall.
The white paint still smelled new.
“What did she say about me?”
“She said she had written you a letter years ago.”
“Years?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. She said Lily would give it to you if Denise ever agreed to take her.”
I looked down at the tracing paper in my hand.
Dad’s handwriting.
Always leave room for more color.
I suddenly hated that sentence.
I hated how beautiful it sounded.
I hated that the same man who wrote it had apparently been living another life.
“I’m coming over,” Sarah said.
“No.”
“Camille—”
“I need to do this without everyone watching me like I’m a bomb.”
Downstairs, I heard Mom say, “You can leave your coat right there.”
Then Lily asked, “Where do I sleep?”
Nobody answered immediately.
My chest tightened.
I stood.
When I reached the bottom of the stairs, everyone looked at me.
Ray.
Mom.
The social worker.
And Lily.
She stared at me.
I stared back.
It felt like looking at a childhood photo of myself mixed with someone I didn’t know.
Same eyes.
Same chin.
Same nervous habit of pressing her thumb against her index finger.
Dad used to do that too.
The social worker smiled gently.
“You must be Camille.”
I nodded.
“I’m Michelle Ortiz. I’m helping with Lily’s temporary placement while the court completes the guardianship review.”
Temporary.
Court.
Guardianship.
Words that made everything suddenly more real.
Lily kept looking at me.
Then she asked, “Are you my sister?”
Mom inhaled sharply.
I didn’t know what answer wouldn’t hurt someone.
So I told the truth.
“I think so.”
Lily nodded like that was enough.
Then she held out the blue folded paper.
“My mom said I had to give you this if I came here.”
My fingers wouldn’t move.
“Now?”
“She said before I sleep here.”
Mom stepped closer.
“What is it?”
Lily pulled it back.
“It’s for Camille.”
Ray frowned slightly.
I noticed that.
Mom did too.
“Of course,” she said.
I took the letter.
My name was written on the outside.
Camille Bennett.
Not Camille Hayes, my current last name.
My father’s last name.
I recognized Rebecca’s handwriting from old Christmas cards.
I broke the seal.
The paper inside was dated six years earlier.
The first line made my knees weak.
Camille,
If you are reading this, then something has happened to me, and Lily has been brought into your life in a way neither of us wanted.
I swallowed.
Everyone watched me.
“I’m reading this upstairs.”
Mom said, “Camille—”
“Alone.”
I went back to my room.
My room.
I wasn’t ready to call it anything else.
I closed the door and sat beside the crib box.
Then I kept reading.
Rebecca didn’t excuse what she had done.
That surprised me.
She didn’t call their affair love.
She didn’t say Dad had planned to leave Mom.
She wrote that he had been lonely, selfish, frightened, and weak.
So had she.
She wrote that he ended the affair before he died.
Then came the sentence that changed everything.
Your father never knew about Lily.
I stopped breathing.
I read it again.
He never knew.
Rebecca had discovered she was pregnant four days after Dad’s fatal car accident.
She had planned to tell him.
She never got the chance.
My hands shook.
All these years, I had imagined Dad secretly holding another baby.
Visiting another home.
Living two families.
But according to Rebecca, he had died without knowing Lily existed.
That didn’t erase what he did.
It changed it.
The next paragraph was about me.
Rebecca wrote that Dad talked about me constantly.
My drawings.
My grades.
How I once broke my arm trying to jump from the garage roof with an umbrella.
I almost laughed through my tears.
Then she wrote:
He kept a photograph of your mural on his desk. He said you were braver with color than he had ever been with anything.
I looked at the white wall.
My vision blurred.
Rebecca continued.
I am sorry that my choices became part of the grief you inherited.
Lily is innocent.
So are you.
You do not owe her love.
You do not owe me forgiveness.
But if you ever meet her, please do not make her pay for the things adults did before she was born.
I covered my mouth.
Then I heard a soft knock.
“Camille?”
Lily.
I wiped my face.
“Yeah?”
The door opened two inches.
She peeked through.
“Can I come in?”
I almost said no.
Then I saw her bare feet.
Her socks didn’t match.
One had stars.
The other had yellow ducks.
Dad used to wear different socks on purpose and claim matching socks were “an attack on creativity.”
My throat tightened.
“Okay.”
She entered slowly.
Her eyes went around the empty room.
“Is this where I’m sleeping?”
I looked at the crib box.
“I guess.”
“You don’t want me here.”
It wasn’t a question.
I folded the letter carefully.
“This used to be my room.”
Her face fell.
“Oh.”
“They didn’t tell me they were changing it.”
“Oh.”
She looked at the floor.
Then she suddenly began unzipping her backpack.
“I can sleep somewhere else.”
I watched her pull out a stuffed rabbit.
A toothbrush.
Two shirts.
A small framed photo.
“That’s not what I said.”
“I sleep on couches good.”
The sentence hit me.
“How many couches have you slept on?”
She shrugged.
“Three.”
“Since your mom died?”
She nodded.
Something in my anger broke.
Not because I forgave anyone.
Because I finally understood who had the least power in this house.
I looked at the photo she had removed from her bag.
Rebecca was holding Lily when she was maybe four.
They were smiling beside a lake.
Lily saw me looking.
“That’s my mom.”
“She was pretty.”
“She said you’re pretty too.”
I looked up sharply.
“You knew about me?”
“Yeah.”
“For how long?”
“My whole life.”
I stared at her.
“She told you I existed?”
“She said I had a sister named Camille who draws buildings and people.”
My heart stopped.
“How did she know what I draw?”
Lily pointed at the letter.
“She knew things.”
I opened the folded pages again.
At the bottom was another message.
P.S. If you want answers about your father, ask Denise about the storage unit on Marshall Street.
I read it twice.
Then three times.
Mom had never mentioned a storage unit.
I stood so quickly Lily stepped back.
“Stay here.”
“Did I do something?”
“No.”
I stopped.
Then forced myself to kneel so we were eye level.
“You didn’t do anything.”
She studied me like she wasn’t sure she believed adults when they said that.
I walked downstairs with the letter.
Mom was signing paperwork at the dining table.
I placed the page in front of her.
“What is on Marshall Street?”
Her pen stopped.
Ray looked up.
Michelle, the social worker, glanced between us.
Mom slowly lifted her eyes.
“Where did you hear that?”
“Rebecca.”
Her face lost color.
I tapped the letter.
“She told me to ask you about Dad’s storage unit.”
Ray looked at Mom.
“What storage unit?”
Interesting.
He didn’t know either.
Mom stood.
“This is not the time.”
“It became the time when you painted over my room.”
“Camille.”
“What is in it?”
She rubbed her forehead.
“Things I couldn’t keep in the house.”
“Dad’s things?”
“Yes.”
“You told me you donated everything.”
“I donated his clothes.”
“What did you keep?”
She didn’t answer.
Ray’s voice hardened.
“Denise, what did you keep?”
Mom looked trapped.
Then Lily appeared at the bottom of the stairs holding her rabbit.
She had heard everything.
Mom saw her and lowered her voice.
“Not now.”
Lily whispered, “My mom went there once.”
Every adult turned toward her.
I felt chills crawl up my arms.
“What?”
Lily hugged the rabbit.
“She took me there.”
“When?”
“Before the accident.”
Mom looked stunned.
“How did she get in?”
Lily reached into the front pocket of her backpack.
Then she pulled out a small brass key.
A white plastic tag hung from it.
Unit 214.
She held it toward me.
“My mom said this belonged to your dad.”
Ray stared at my mother.
Mom stared at the key.
And I realized something worse than the secret itself.
Mom had known about Dad’s storage unit.
Rebecca had known.
Now Lily had the key.
But judging by my mother’s face, Rebecca had gone there without permission.
I took the key.
“What’s in Unit 214?”
Mom whispered, “I don’t know anymore.”
“What does that mean?”
Her eyes filled with fear.
“It means someone has been paying for that unit for seven years.”
I gripped the key.
“You?”
She shook her head.
“No.”
Ray stepped forward.
“Then who?”
May you like
Mom looked at me.
“I always thought it was Sarah.”
