“I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
I rubbed the corner of the dish towel between my fingers. “Did you find him?”
His voice dropped. “No, Mom.”
I nodded once, like that hadn’t hit me in the ribs.
“I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
“But I found his sister.”
I looked up. “His what?”
“His sister. Her name’s Gwen.”
I let out a short, disbelieving laugh. “Andrew didn’t have a sister, honey.”
“Mom.”
“No, I mean… okay, it’s complicated, Leo.”
My son frowned. “You knew about her?”
“But I found his sister.”
“I knew he had a sister,” I said. “But I never met her. Sometimes I wondered if she really existed. She was older and already away at college, I think. Andrew said his parents acted like she didn’t exist half the time.”
“Why?”
I gave a helpless laugh. “Because she dyed her hair black, dated some guy in a garage band, and apparently that was enough to scandalize the family for life.”
That almost got a smile out of him.
“She was the black sheep,” I said. “At least, that’s how Andrew made it sound. He never talked about her much. His mother liked things neat and tidy. Gwen didn’t sound neat.”
I gave a helpless laugh.
Leo pushed his phone toward me. “I messaged her.”
I closed my eyes for half a second, then held out my hand. “Okay, show me.”
He unlocked the screen. “I kept it simple.”
His first message was careful, polite, and almost too adult:
