“Do you remember Mommy?”
“Every day.”
“I remember her too. Not lots, but some. She smelled like flowers. She sang before bed. She made pancakes on Sundays.”
Declan’s throat tightened.
“She loved you very much.”
“I know.” Ember placed one hand over her heart. “June helps me not miss Mommy so much.”
Declan looked down at her.
“How?”
“When I get sad, she’s sad too, because she misses her parents. So we get sad together, and then it doesn’t hurt as much.”
The wisdom of it broke him.
Ember continued, “She filled the empty space. Not all of it. Mommy is still here.” She tapped her chest. “But June is here too.”
Declan cried then.
Quietly.
Ember noticed.
“Are you crying?”
“Yes.”
“Because you’re sad?”
“Because you just told me something beautiful.”
“Do you feel it too?”
Declan looked toward the hallway where June slept.
“Yes,” he said. “June filled a space in me too.”
By the time Sandra called about Margaret Collins, Declan had almost forgotten to fear the future.
He should not have.
“A woman came to our office,” Sandra said. “She claims to be June’s aunt. She has documentation.”
Declan sat down.
“What does she want?”
“To meet June. For now.”
For now.
The phrase echoed.
Margaret had hired a private investigator after learning June had vanished from the system. She had searched for months. She was June’s biological relative. She had rights Declan did not yet fully have.
When Declan told the girls, June went pale.
“I don’t want to see her.”
“You remember her?”
“A little.” June hugged the doll. “She wasn’t there when I needed her.”
Ember sat beside her.
“You don’t have to go with her.”
“What if I have to?”
“Then I’ll stop it.”
Declan wished legal protection could be as simple as Ember’s certainty.
Saturday came too fast.
Margaret Collins arrived at two o’clock carrying sunflowers.
She was a woman in her forties with tired eyes, simple clothes, and hands that trembled around the bouquet. She stepped into the house and looked around at the drawings on the fridge, the little shoes by the door, the baskets of toys, the photos where June had slowly appeared beside Ember in frames.
“This feels like a home,” she said quietly.
June stood behind Ember.
“Hi, Aunt Maggie,” she whispered.
Margaret’s eyes filled instantly.
“You remember me.”
June nodded but did not move closer.
Margaret knelt.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to come to me.”
She explained the sunflowers.