No legal poetry.
Just truth.
Ethan eventually invited me to the storage unit.
Not Daniel.
Me.
We sat on overturned plastic bins.
He opened Rachel’s letter.
The envelope said:
For Ethan when he is old enough to know I never stopped being his mother.
His hands shook.
He read silently at first.
Then aloud.
Only pieces.
Rachel wrote that she was ill after his birth.
That frightening thoughts made her afraid to hold him.
That she once believed he would be safer without her.
Later, after treatment, she understood being sick had not meant incapable forever.
She wrote:
If they tell you I gave you away because I didn’t want you, that is not true. I agreed to temporary care because I thought I was protecting you while I got well.
Ethan stopped.
His jaw tightened.
Then continued.
I am writing because everyone keeps telling me you are with a good family and I should let you settle. I want to believe them. If that is true, I hope they let you know someday that I loved you enough to get treatment and tried to come back.
