PART 9 – The Longer We Waited for Confirmation, the More I Realized That Knowing Ellie Was Mine Would Not Explain Where My Baby Had Gone

The call came while I was folding laundry.

I almost let it ring because my hands were full.

Then I saw Nora's name on the screen and dropped the towel onto the bed.

"Have you heard anything?" I asked.

"Not yet," she said. "I was calling to see if you'd heard."

I sat down.

"No."

We had reached the point where every ordinary phone call seemed like it might contain the answer.

It was exhausting.

I tried to remind myself that the test needed to be completed properly and that waiting was better than receiving an answer nobody could trust.

Still, I wanted it over.

I wanted someone to tell me whether Ellie was Lucy.

And if she was, I wanted someone to explain how my daughter had ended up in the adoption system.

Nora said the agency was continuing to review the records.

There were inconsistencies in the earlier paperwork, and the preliminary comparison had raised a serious question.

But the information we had so far couldn't explain the whole story.

I understood that.

I didn't like it.

After we hung up, I finished folding the laundry.

I put the towels away.

I made myself a cup of coffee.

Then I stood at the kitchen counter and stared out the window, thinking about the first time I had held the hospital bracelet.

I had kept it because I needed something that belonged to Lucy.

Now I wondered whether the bracelet was connected to a child who had survived, grown older, and somehow become Ellie.

The possibility still seemed impossible.

But I could no longer dismiss it as easily as I had when Nora first sat at my table.

The cheek swab had been mine.

The report carried my name and Ellie's.

The hospital and dates had raised questions that needed answers.

I couldn't make those facts disappear simply because they frightened me.

That afternoon, I took the bracelet out again.

I laid it beside the report Nora had given me.

The bracelet was small and ordinary.

The report was only paper.

Neither object could tell me what had happened.

I put them away separately.

Then I called Nora and asked whether I could visit.

She said yes.

When I arrived, Ellie was sitting on the floor with a few toys spread around her.

Tom was nearby.

She looked up when I came in.

"Auntie Claire!"

I smiled and sat beside her.

She began telling me about what she was doing, and I let her explain it in her own way.

For a while, I managed to forget the test.

Then she leaned against my arm.

It was such a small gesture that I might once have barely noticed it.

That day, it nearly undid me.

I wondered how many times Lucy might have leaned against me if she had grown up in my home.

I wondered whether she would have come to me when she was tired, or whether she would have preferred sitting beside someone else.

I would never know those things if the records turned out to mean nothing.

And if they meant everything I feared and hoped they meant, I still wouldn't know them.

Ellie had already lived five years.

Those years had happened without me.

The thought hurt in a way I couldn't explain to anyone who hadn't lost time with someone they loved.

When Ellie went to find Tom, Nora sat beside me.

"She really likes you," she said.

"I like her, too."

Nora looked at me.

"I hope you know that I can see how much this is hurting you."

I took a breath.

"I'm trying not to make everything about me."

"You don't have to pretend you're not hurting."

I looked toward the doorway Ellie had just disappeared through.

"I don't want her to feel that she has to choose between us."

Nora shook her head.

"She's a little girl. She shouldn't have to choose anything."

We agreed on that without hesitation.

Whatever the test revealed, Ellie would not be asked to settle an argument between adults.

There wasn't an argument yet.

There was only uncertainty.

But I knew how quickly uncertainty could turn into blame when people were frightened.

I didn't want that to happen to us.

Before I left, Nora asked whether I thought the result would change the way I felt about her.

I was surprised by the question.

"Why would it?"

She looked down at her hands.

"Because I adopted her."

I understood what she was asking.

If Ellie was Lucy, would I blame Nora for bringing my daughter into her home without knowing who she was?

Would I look at the last two weeks as something that had been taken from me?

Would I think Nora had somehow stepped into a place that belonged to me?

I considered the questions honestly.

There was no point pretending that the situation wasn't painful.

But Nora had adopted Ellie believing the information she had been given.

She hadn't known about the possible connection.

She hadn't taken Ellie away from me.

She had given a child a home.

I looked at my sister.

"I don't blame you for loving her."

Nora's eyes filled.

"I don't blame you for adopting her, either."

She reached for my hand.

I let her take it.

That didn't mean I had no fear or anger.

It meant I knew where those feelings belonged.

I was angry that I had spent five years believing Lucy was dead while a child who might be mine had grown up somewhere else.

I was frightened that the truth might be worse than anything I could imagine.

But I wasn't going to turn against my sister because she had finally become the mother she had wanted to be.

I left her house with that decision settled in my mind.

I still needed answers.

I still needed the independent test.

But I no longer felt that finding the truth required me to prepare for a fight with Nora.

If Ellie was Lucy, we would have to face what that meant together.

If she wasn't, we would still have to understand why the records had raised the question.

Either way, we needed facts.

Not guesses.

Not accusations.

Facts.

Click here to continue reading: PART 10: I Had Spent Five Years Learning to Accept a Doctor’s Words, and Now I Needed to Know Why Those Words Might Have Been Wrong