Chương 6
Their father had spent those same years blaming everyone except himself.
And Daniel had eventually learned that grief could become a routine.
You could go to work.
You could pay bills.
You could laugh at a joke.
You could stand in a grocery store deciding between two brands of coffee while carrying an unbearable weight that nobody else could see.
"You should read it," Maya said.
"I already did."
"All of it?"
Daniel looked at the folder.
"No."
"Then you didn't."
He hated when she was right because she never seemed pleased about it.
She simply waited.
That was worse.
"I have to finish the audit," he said.
Maya stared at him.
"The audit can survive ten minutes."
"You don't know that."
"I absolutely know that. I am the person who fixes your mistakes after you pretend you don't make them."
A small laugh escaped him before he could stop it.
Maya smiled.
"There. Still alive."
The moment passed quickly.
That was how normal life worked.
It interrupted pain without asking permission.
Daniel went back into the records room.
He closed the door.
Then he opened the letter again.
The first page contained only a few paragraphs.
Mara explained that she had avoided contacting him because she believed someone was watching her.
Daniel stopped reading there.
He almost threw the letter away.
Not because he didn't believe her.
Because some part of him wanted to believe her too easily.
He had spent years wondering whether Thomas had chosen to leave.
Whether his brother had become tired of their family.
Whether he had found another life somewhere and simply decided the old one was not worth returning to.
Mara's letter offered something more dangerous than hope.
It offered a reason.
The second page contained details only someone close to Thomas would know.
A scar on his left hand from a childhood accident.
The cheap blue jacket he refused to throw away.
The fact that he always tapped his thumb against his fingers when he was lying.
Daniel remembered that.
He remembered because he did the same thing.
The third page was different.
There was a location.
A storage facility outside town.
A locker number.
And one sentence that made his stomach tighten.
Do not open it unless you are ready to know why he left.
Daniel read the sentence three times.
Then he checked the date.
The letter had been mailed two weeks earlier.
Mara had written it before she died.
He knew because her obituary had appeared online six days ago.
He had seen it.
He had done what he always did when confronted with something painful.
He closed the page.
He told himself he would look later.
Later was where difficult things went to disappear.
His phone rang.
The name on the screen made him stop breathing for a second.
Unknown number.
He answered anyway.
"Hello?"
There was silence.
Not accidental silence.
The kind where someone on the other end was deciding whether speaking was worth the risk.
"Daniel Mercer?"
His grip tightened around the phone.
"Who is this?"
"You received something today."
Daniel stood.
"Who is this?"
Another pause.
"Someone who thinks you should leave it alone."
The call ended.
He stared at the screen.
Then he looked at the letter.
For years, he had wanted answers.
Now that they were finally reaching him, the first thing they brought was fear.
He put the letter back into the folder and walked out of the records room.
Maya looked up immediately.
"You finished already?"
"No."
"Then why do you look like you just saw a ghost?"
Daniel grabbed his coat.
"I need to go somewhere."
"Where?"
He stopped.
That was the question.
Not where.
Why.
Maya saw the answer forming before he spoke.
"Daniel."
"I don't have time."
"That is usually what people say before making a terrible decision."
He reached the door.
"You think this is a terrible decision?"
"I think you haven't told me enough for me to know."
That stopped him.
Because it was exactly what he had been doing for fifteen years.
Keeping everyone outside the room where the truth lived.
"I found out who sent the letter," he said quietly.
Maya's expression changed.
"Who?"
Daniel looked at the folder.
"Mara Ellis."
The office became strangely quiet.
Even though nothing had actually changed.
Computers still hummed.
People still talked.
Printers still produced documents nobody wanted.
But for Daniel, the past had moved into the present, and he was no longer sure which one he was standing in.
Maya lowered her voice.
"Daniel, Mara died last week."
"I know."
"Then who sent it?"
He had no answer.
That was the part he couldn't admit.
The letter had been impossible.
And impossible things were usually where people got hurt.
"I need to find out," he said.
Maya watched him for several seconds.
Then she picked up her keys.
"No."
Daniel frowned.
"No?"
"You are not walking into whatever this is alone."
"I didn't ask you to come."
"I know."
"Then why?"
She looked annoyed.
That was easier for her than looking worried.
"Because you are the kind of person who says he is fine while making decisions that could ruin his life."
Daniel wanted to argue.
He couldn't.
They walked toward the elevator together.
Neither of them spoke.
The doors opened.
Inside the elevator, an older man held a grocery bag and complained about the building's broken air conditioning.
Daniel listened.
For a moment, the world returned to normal.
A stranger complained.
A light flickered.
Someone somewhere dropped something heavy.
Life continued with no understanding that one person inside a small elevator had just stepped toward a truth he had spent years avoiding.
When the doors opened on the ground floor, Daniel followed Maya outside.
The rain had started.
Not heavy.
Just enough to make the pavement shine.
He looked toward the parking lot.
For years, he had imagined finding Thomas.
He had imagined anger.
He had imagined relief.
May you like
He had imagined questions.
He had never imagined standing beside someone he trusted while carrying a letter from a dead woman telling him that the brother he lost had not disappeared.
