Chapter 5: The Secret Inside the Second Photograph
The second photograph was older than the first.
Its corners had yellowed, and a crease ran diagonally across the image. Jennifer held it between trembling fingers, as if the paper itself could burn her.
Emily reached for it.
“Let me see.””
Jennifer hesitated.
Then she handed it over.
My daughter stared at the photograph for several seconds before turning it toward me.
I stopped breathing.
It showed Jennifer sitting on a hospital bed, holding a newborn baby. A man stood beside her, one hand resting on the bedrail.
The man was me.
I recognized the shirt I wore, the cheap watch on my wrist, and the small scar on my chin from an accident at the warehouse.
But I had never seen that photograph before.
“Where did you get this?”” I whispered.
Jennifer's voice cracked.
“It was taken the day Emily was born.””
“I know when Emily was born. I was there.””
“Yes.””
“I held her. I drove you home from the hospital. I stayed awake for three nights because she wouldn't stop crying.””
My eyes moved to the baby in Jennifer's arms.
“Why is there another child in this picture?””
Emily stared at the photograph.
“There are two babies?””
I looked more closely.
Near the edge of the image, partly hidden beneath a folded blanket, was a second infant.
A small hand rested beside the first baby's shoulder.
The photograph had captured the corner of another hospital bassinet.
Jennifer closed her eyes.
“Emily wasn't the only baby born that night.””
Richard gripped the back of a chair so tightly his knuckles whitened.
“What are you saying?””
Jennifer looked at him.
“I'm saying there were two babies.””
Emily's voice was barely audible.
“Twins?””
Jennifer nodded.
The word seemed to suck all the air from the auditorium.
I stared at her, trying to reconcile the photograph with the memories I'd carried for eighteen years.
Emily's birth had been difficult. Jennifer had been exhausted, and the hospital staff had kept me outside the delivery room for much of the night. I remembered hearing a nurse mention an emergency in another room. I remembered a doctor asking Jennifer questions I hadn't understood.
But I'd been told Emily was our only child.
I'd signed the paperwork.
I'd carried my daughter out of the hospital.
I had never been told there was another baby.
“Jennifer,” I said, “what happened to the other child?””
She began to cry.
“I was young. I was terrified.””
“You were twenty-six.””
“I was scared of losing everything!””
“What did you do?””
She shook her head.
Richard stepped forward.
“Jennifer, answer him.””
She looked at him with desperation.
“You have no right to judge me.””
Richard's voice rose.
“You told me my son was dead!””
“And you believed what you wanted to believe!””
“Because you showed me a photograph of a grave!””
Emily dropped her gaze to the picture in her hands.
“Whose grave?””
Richard froze.
Jennifer covered her mouth.
I looked from one to the other.
“What grave?””
Richard's face crumpled.
“When Daniel disappeared, I searched for him for months. His mother told me he'd been taken to another state. Later, I received a photograph of a headstone with his name on it.””
“Who sent it?”” Emily asked.
Richard stared at Jennifer.
“She did.””
My ex-wife shook her head violently.
“I never said I sent it.””
“You mailed it to my office!””
“I mailed you a photograph someone gave me!””
“Who gave it to you?””
Jennifer didn't answer.
Emily stepped toward her.
“Mom, where is my brother?””
Jennifer sank into a chair.
“I don't know.””
The words sounded rehearsed, but the terror in her face did not.
I knelt beside Emily.
“Sweetheart, look at me.””
She turned, tears running down her cheeks.
“Dad, did you know?””
“No.””
“Did you ever know I had a twin?””
I shook my head.
“Never.””
She looked back at the photograph.
“Then why would Mom hide this from both of us?””
I wanted to answer. I wanted to offer her a reason that would make the world feel less cruel.
But I had none.
Jennifer wiped her face with a tissue.
“I was told the other baby needed special care. The doctors said there were complications. They took him away before I could hold him properly.””
“Who told you that?”” I asked.
“The hospital staff.””
“Which hospital?””
She hesitated.
“St. Mary's.””
I frowned.
Emily had been born at Nashville General.
Not St. Mary's.
I knew because I'd kept the discharge papers in the same box as the receipts.
“That's not where Emily was born,” I said.
Jennifer stared at me.
For a moment, something like panic crossed her face.
Then Richard spoke.
“You said you gave birth at St. Mary's.””
Jennifer turned toward him.
“I told you I received treatment there.””
“You said the baby was born there.””
“I was upset. I don't remember every word I said!””
Emily rose slowly.
“You told me I was an only child.””
Jennifer looked at her.
“You are.””
“No.”” Emily lifted the photograph.
“You just told us there were two babies.””
Jennifer reached for her daughter's hand.
“Emily, please. Whatever happened, it was years ago.””
Emily pulled away.
“Years ago for you. I found out five minutes ago that I might have a brother.””
She turned to Richard.
“And you knew my mother before you married her. You knew she had a child who disappeared.””
“I knew about Daniel,” Richard said.
“I didn't know about you.””
“Then why did you marry her?””
Richard looked at Jennifer.
“Because she told me she had lost a child and understood my pain.””
Emily stared at him.
“You married my mother because you thought she understood losing your son?””
He nodded slowly.
“I thought we could help each other.””
Emily let out a bitter laugh.
“Instead, you helped her erase my father.””
Richard looked as though she'd slapped him.
“I never wanted that.””
“But you let it happen.””
He had no answer.
The principal quietly asked everyone to remain seated while a staff member contacted security. Nobody moved.
I took the second photograph from Emily and examined its back.
There was a handwritten note in faded blue ink.
Two healthy boys. One mother. One father. Two different futures.
My hands began to shake.
Two boys.
Not a girl and a boy.
Not twins who looked different.
Two boys.
I turned the photograph over again.
Emily had been born a girl. There could be no doubt about that.
So whose handwriting was this?
And why did the photograph show me standing beside Jennifer while she held two newborn babies?
Then I noticed something at the bottom of the picture.
A hospital wristband lay across the edge of the blanket.
The name printed on it was partly obscured, but I could make out the first three letters.
MIC—
I stared at it.
It wasn't the baby's name.
It was mine.
My own hospital wristband.
The photograph had been taken in a room where I'd apparently been a patient, not a visitor.
I looked at Jennifer.
“Why was I wearing a hospital wristband the night Emily was born?””
May you like
She went completely silent.
Then Richard whispered, “Because Michael was the one who nearly died that night.””
