My father as a boy.
My aunt at her wedding.
Then, near the bottom of the second box, I found an envelope.
No stamp.
No address.
Just three words written on the front.
For Anna someday.
Anna is my name.
The handwriting belonged to my father.
My hands began to shake.
Inside was a photograph.
At first I couldn’t understand what I was seeing.
It showed a young woman standing beneath a flowering tree.
She couldn’t have been older than twenty-five.
Dark hair.
Round cheeks.
A faint dimple beside her mouth.
And eyes I had looked into every morning for four years.
Lily’s eyes.
It wasn’t a vague resemblance.
It was astonishing.
Even the small uneven arch of the left eyebrow was the same.
I turned the photograph over.
Written on the back was a date from twenty-seven years earlier.
And beneath it:
Claire Bell.
My breath caught.
There was one more thing in the envelope.
