Chương 10
You don't get to be angry at him for leaving when you left first.
At the time, Daniel had told himself she was being cruel.
Sitting alone in his father's house, he was less certain.
He opened the envelope.
Inside was one folded piece of paper.
Only one.
No explanation.
No apology at the top.
Just his father's handwriting.
Daniel,
If you are reading this, I am gone, and you are probably standing somewhere you promised yourself you would never stand again.
The house.
The workshop.
Maybe the kitchen where you used to steal pieces of pie before dinner and blame the dog.
Daniel stopped.
A quiet laugh escaped before he could stop it.
There had not been a dog.
His father knew that.
The joke was so painfully familiar that Daniel had to put the letter down.
For a moment, the room felt less empty.
Then the feeling disappeared.
He picked the paper back up.
I know you think I kept secrets from you.
You are right.
I did.
But I need you to understand something.
Not every secret is a lie.
Some are just things people are too ashamed to say while they still have the chance.
Daniel leaned forward.
His father's words blurred for a second.
He rubbed his eyes and kept reading.
There is a box under the workbench.
The key is taped beneath the third drawer.
Before you decide whether you hate me, look inside.
Daniel lowered the letter.
He stared toward the hallway leading to the workshop.
The place he had avoided for five years.
The place where his father spent most of his final months.
The place where Daniel refused to visit because every memory there felt like an accusation.
He almost left.
That would have been easier.
He could take the letter, put it somewhere safe, and return to his apartment where nothing smelled like his childhood.
But his feet moved anyway.
The workshop was colder than the rest of the house.
The old fluorescent light flickered twice before turning on.
His father's tools were arranged exactly how they had always been.
Thomas Mercer believed every object had a proper place.
Daniel had spent his teenage years moving things just to bother him.
A screwdriver.
A wrench.
A small metal ruler.
His father always noticed.
He never understood how.
Until now.
The drawer was stuck.
Daniel pulled harder.
It opened suddenly, sending him backward into the workbench.
He looked beneath it.
The key was still there.
A piece of yellow tape held it in place.
For some reason, that detail hurt more than the letter.
His father had prepared this moment.
He had imagined Daniel standing there.
He had known there was a chance Daniel would never come.
The box was small and made from unfinished wood.
Inside were documents, photographs, and a recording device.
Daniel picked up the first photograph.
It showed his mother.
She was younger than he remembered.
She was sitting beside Thomas in a hospital room.
Daniel had never seen the picture before.
His mother died when he was ten.
His father almost never spoke about those years.
The next photograph showed a woman Daniel did not recognize.
On the back, his father's handwriting said:
Margaret Ellis.
Daniel frowned.
He looked through the documents.
There were medical records.
Letters.
A copy of a legal agreement.
The name appeared again and again.
Margaret Ellis.
His stomach tightened.
The sound of the workshop door opening made him turn.
Emily stood there.
She looked exhausted.
Her black coat was still on.
Her hair was pulled back like she had not bothered fixing it after the funeral.
"You ignored twelve calls," she said.
Daniel put the documents down.
"You counted?"
"I was angry."
"You are always angry."
The words came out sharper than he intended.
Emily looked away.
That hurt more than if she had yelled.
"I came because I knew you would do this."
"Do what?"
"Find something complicated and decide it proves everyone was against you."
Daniel stared at her.
"You knew about this?"
A pause.
Small.
But enough.
"About what?"
"Don't."
Her expression changed.
Not dramatically.
Just enough.
Daniel saw it.
"You knew."
Emily walked into the room slowly.
"I knew Dad kept something."
"That is not an answer."
"It is the only one I have."
"You always do that."
"Do what?"
"Talk around things until nobody knows what you're actually saying."
Emily crossed her arms.
"And you always think being hurt means you are the only person allowed to ask questions."
The silence between them felt older than the house.
Daniel looked back at the box.
"Who is Margaret Ellis?"
Emily did not answer.
That was the moment he understood the truth was not hidden because it was impossible.
It was hidden because everyone had been afraid of what would happen after it came out.
"Emily."
She sat down.
The anger left her face.
What remained looked closer to grief.
"She was Dad's sister."
Daniel blinked.
"What?"
"Our aunt."
"I didn't have an aunt."
"We didn't know."
"How do you not know something like that?"
Emily gave a tired laugh.
"Because Dad spent thirty years making sure we didn't."
Daniel looked at the papers again.
The story came out slowly.
Not like a confession.
Like something dragged from a locked room.
Thomas Mercer had grown up with a family he barely spoke to after a fight with his father.
Margaret had tried to reconnect years later.
Thomas refused.
Then Daniel's mother became sick.
Margaret helped quietly.
Paid medical bills.
Sent letters.
Never received answers.
Daniel felt anger rise.
Then disappear.
Then return in a different shape.
His father had not just hidden a person.
He had hidden the evidence that someone had cared.
"Why didn't he tell us?"
Emily looked at the floor.
"Because he thought he had no right."
Daniel wanted to reject that answer.
He wanted a cleaner villain.
May you like
Someone easier to blame.
But the box was full of proof that people could damage lives without wanting to.
