Chapter 4: The Sealed Envelope
Sophie woke before I did.
I opened my eyes to find her sitting cross-legged at the foot of the bed, the box from yesterday open in her lap, the small sealed envelope in her hands.
"Sophie—"
"I didn't open it." She held it up carefully.
"It has my name on it."
It did.
In the same handwriting.
*Sophie.* Just that.
I sat up.
"I know."
"Can I open it?"
I looked at her holding it.
The morning light was coming through the curtains.
She was still wearing the seashell necklace — she must have put it back on before she fell asleep, or maybe she had never taken it off.
"Not yet," I said.
"Let me make a call first."
She looked at me steadily.
"The number on the card?"
"Yes."
She nodded, as if this were a perfectly reasonable sequence of events, and set the envelope down carefully on the pillow beside her.
I took the card into the bathroom and closed the door.
I stood at the sink for a moment, looking at myself in the mirror.
I didn't look the way I felt.
I looked ordinary.
Tired, but ordinary.
The kind of tired that had become so constant I'd stopped noticing it.
I dialed the number.
It rang twice.
"Anna."
His voice was the same.
Lower, maybe.
Quieter.
But the same.
"How did you know about this trip?" I said.
"Before I even booked it."
A pause.
"Your father called me."
"He called you."
"Eight months ago.
He told me Sophie had asked to see the ocean." Another pause.
"He said he didn't know how much time there was."
I pressed my hand flat against the cold tile of the bathroom wall.
"He had no right to do that," I said.
"No," Daniel said.
"He didn't.
He did it anyway."
"Why?"
"Because he's her grandfather." A beat.
"And because I think he knew I needed someone to make me move."
"Move." The word came out harder than I intended.
"You've had four years to move, Daniel."
"I know."
"She's six years old.
She has never once asked me where her father is.
Do you understand what that means?
A six-year-old who doesn't ask."
He was quiet for a long moment.
"I know what it means," he said.
"I think about it every day."
I turned away from the mirror.
I couldn't look at my own face while I was saying these things.
"There's a letter in the box," I said.
"Sealed.
With her name on it."
"Yes."
"What does it say?"
"Things she should know." His voice was careful.
"Things I should have said a long time ago.
I didn't want to write them to you.
They're for her."
"She's six."
"I know.
Some of it she won't understand until she's older." He stopped.
"Anna.
I need to tell you something.
Something I should have told you before any of this."
I waited.
"I'm sick," he said.
The bathroom went very quiet.
"What kind of sick?"
May you like
"The same kind of sick," he said.
"As Sophie."
