My mother vanished when I was six. Fifty years later, a hospice nurse called with my childhood nickname and a promise of answers. But when I got there, Mom wasn’t alone, and the real reason she called me had nothing to do with the truth she’d promised.
I was six on Christmas morning, and I woke before the sun.
Every year, Mom and I made a window star on Christmas morning. We folded gold paper into points and wrote a wish inside before closing the last fold.
“A wish tucked in tight can’t escape, Becca Bird,” Mom always said.
I was six.
I ran to the kitchen in my socks.
The gold paper sat on the table with a pencil beside it. Everything was ready.
But the kitchen was too quiet.
No coffee smell. No humming.
I was looking for her in the living room when Dad came in from shovelling snow.
A wish tucked in tight couldn’t escape.
“Where’s Mom?”
He rubbed his face. “Isn’t she in bed?”
“Your bed’s empty.”
He went to look.
I heard the closet door, then the bathroom, then the garage.
“Where’s Mom?”
I stood holding the pencil.
“Dad? Is she at the store?” I asked when Dad reappeared. “Maybe she went to get milk?”
“Maybe.” He stood at the window, watching the street. “Uh… should we open presents?”
“No!” It came out loud. “Not until Mom’s home. She’d be sad if she missed it.”
He knelt in front of me.
“No!”
His eyes were red.
“Becca, I… okay. We’ll wait.”
***
And we did wait.
Dad made some phone calls… I heard him speaking in the next room, but not what he said.
“We’ll wait.”
I kept watch for her out the window, trying to think where she might be and what was keeping her away so long.
What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
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