Even after twenty-six years.
I went back to the photographs.
I understood. That didn’t make hanging up any less frustrating.
So I went back to the photographs.
This time, I noticed something I had missed before.
Rachel was sitting at a kitchen table in one candid shot, laughing while Daniel apparently took the picture without warning.
Behind her were several envelopes.
I wrote both down.
I enlarged the image.
One address was mostly hidden. Another was turned sideways. But on the third, I could make out part of a street name and an apartment number.
I wrote both down.
That afternoon, I went to the public library. I searched old city directories first, then archived newspapers and community notices.
Nothing.
I went to the public library.
Then I found an old church bulletin scanned into the local archive. There, buried beneath announcements about bake sales and choir practice, was a birth notice.
