Chapter 2: Her Name Was Eleanor
The closet wasn't full of paperwork.
It was full of her.
Photographs.
Hundreds of them.
A woman I had never seen before — young, dark-haired, smiling — in pictures that spanned what looked like decades.
My hands were shaking as I picked one up.
On the back, in Thomas's handwriting: *Eleanor.
1987.*
The year our daughter was born.
There were letters too.
Bundled with a rubber band, worn soft at the edges from being handled so many times.
I opened the first one.
*"Thomas, she asked about you again.
I don't know how much longer I can keep telling her you're coming back."*
I sat down on the hallway floor.
I don't remember deciding to sit.
My legs just stopped working.
Then my phone rang.
It was my daughter, calling to check on me like she did every morning.
I almost didn't answer.
But when I did, the first thing she said stopped my breath completely.
"Mom…
there's something I need to tell you.
Something Dad made me promise never to say while he was alive."
Her voice was shaking.
"I've known for a long time.
May you like
I just…
I didn't know how to tell you."
