I sat down across from her and took a napkin from the stack. The kitchen rug felt cold beneath my feet. The grocery bill from the night before lay on the edge of the table, thirty-four dollars for the extra sugar and butter Piper had requested for the pre-wedding dinner.
“Dad,” Shannon said.
She did not look up from the napkin she was creasing with her thumb.
“Do you think she still knows what my voice sounds like?”
I stopped my hands, the paper napkin half-folded in my fingers. “She remembers, Shannon.”
“But I was only a baby when she left,” she whispered. “How can she remember someone she hasn’t seen since they were small?”
“Mothers don’t forget their children,” I said, though the words felt hollow in my mouth as I thought of the white box in the closet.
“Lucille says she saw a picture of her online,” Shannon said, her fingers twisting the blue beads faster now. “She had a big house in Chicago with a gated driveway.”
“That doesn’t matter,” I said.
“Is she rich now, Dad?”
“I don’t know, Shannon,” I said, though I suspected she was.
“I don’t think I want to be there when she arrives,” she whispered.
She crumpled the napkin in her hand and stood up.
She walked out of the kitchen before I could answer, the screen door clicking shut behind her.
At noon, the sun was high but pale, casting long shadows across the brick storefronts of Main Street. Jerome was waiting for me outside the bakery, his broad shoulders leaning against the brickwork, his hands tucked into the pockets of his canvas jacket. He was twenty-nine, and he worked long hours at the county road department, but he always made time for Adele’s errands.
“The cake deposit slip is ready,” Jerome said.
He placed a steadying hand on my shoulder as we walked inside the warm shop. The smell of fresh bread and vanilla frosting was thick in the air, a sweet, heavy scent that made my stomach turn. The girl behind the counter handed me a small yellow receipt, the ink faded but legible.
