The Diagnosis
Nora sat in the bridge keeper’s office for a long time, the letters spread across the desk, her father’s words blurring before her eyes. Eli stood by the window, watching her, giving her space. The room was cold, the air thick with dust and secrets.
“Margaret,” she said finally. “Who is she?”
Eli walked to the desk and picked up one of the letters. “There’s a Margaret in town. Margaret Ashworth. She lives in the old house on Cedar Street.”
“How do you know her?”
“She was my teacher. In high school. She taught English. She retired a few years ago.”
Nora stared at him. “She was your teacher? And you never told me?”
“I didn’t know about the letters. I didn’t know about your father. I just knew she was old and sad and lived alone.”
Nora stood up abruptly. “I need to see her.”
“Now?”
“Now.”
Margaret Ashworth’s house was a small Victorian at the end of Cedar Street, its paint peeling, its garden overgrown. Nora knocked on the door, her heart pounding. Eli stood behind her, silent.
The door opened.
The woman who answered was old — maybe eighty — with silver hair and kind eyes. She leaned on a cane, and her hands trembled slightly, but her gaze was sharp.
“Nora Hartley,” she said. “I’ve been expecting you.”
Nora’s breath caught. “You know who I am?”
“I knew your father. I’ve been waiting for you to find the letters.”
Margaret stepped aside. “Come in. We have a lot to talk about.”
The house was filled with photographs.
Nora walked through the living room, her eyes moving from frame to frame. Young Margaret, with dark hair and a bright smile. A man who looked like her father, his arm around Margaret’s waist. And in the back, a photograph of a little girl — Nora herself, at age five, standing in front of the bridge.
“You’ve been watching me,” Nora said.
“I’ve been watching over you. Your father asked me to.”
“Why?”
Margaret sat down heavily on the couch. “Because I’m your mother.”
The room went silent.
Nora felt the floor drop away. “That’s not possible. My mother is—”
“Your mother raised you. She loved you. She was your mother in every way that matters. But biologically, you are mine.”
Nora sat down, her legs weak.
“Your father and I were in love,” Margaret continued. “But he was married, and I was young, and the town was small. When I got pregnant, we decided it was best for the baby if your father’s wife raised you as her own. She couldn’t have children. She wanted you.”
“So they lied to me. My whole life.”
“They protected you.”
Nora shook her head. “He killed himself because of you.”
Margaret’s eyes filled with tears. “He killed himself because he couldn’t live with the guilt. Not because of me. Because of the lies.”
Eli sat beside Nora, his hand on her back.
“Why are you telling me this now?” Nora asked.
“Because you found the letters. Because you deserve to know the truth. Because I’m dying, and I didn’t want to take the secret with me.”
Nora looked at the photograph of herself as a child. “I don’t know how to feel.”
“You don’t have to know right now. You just have to listen.”
Margaret reached into a drawer and pulled out a box — identical to the one in the bridge keeper’s office. She opened it. Inside, more letters. Her father’s handwriting, spanning decades.
“He wrote to me every week,” Margaret said. “Even after you were born. Even after you left for college. He never stopped.”
Nora took the box. “Why did you keep them?”
“Because they were all I had left of him.”
Nora left the house an hour later, the box in her hands.
Eli walked beside her, silent.
“What do I do now?” she asked.
“You go back to New York. You process. You come back when you’re ready.”
“And the bridge?”
“The bridge will still be here. It’s been standing for fifty years. It can wait a little longer.”
Nora stopped at the end of the street, looking back at Margaret’s house.
“She’s my mother.”
“She’s one of them.”
Nora turned to Eli. “Thank you. For being here.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
She kissed his cheek. “I’ll be back.”
“I know.”