He rubbed both hands over his face.

“A girl.”

I waited.

“Her name is Hailey.”

“Who is Hailey?”

Jason looked at me again.

“She’s ten.”

I didn’t understand why that mattered.

Then he said:

“There’s a chance she’s my daughter.”

The Girl Carol Had Known for Ten Years

I sat down because my knees suddenly felt unreliable.

“Your daughter?”

“Possibly.”

“You have a ten-year-old daughter?”

“I didn’t know.”

He said it too quickly.

I just looked at him.

Jason told me about Amanda.

They had dated briefly before he met me. It ended badly, and according to Jason, they had not spoken in years.

A few days earlier, Amanda had contacted him through Katie.

She said Hailey was his daughter.

“Why through Katie?”

Jason stared at the table.

“Because she didn’t trust Mom.”

That made no sense.

“What does your mother have to do with this?”

Another long pause.

“Apparently, everything.”

Amanda claimed she had tried to contact Jason when she learned she was pregnant.

Calls.

Emails.

Letters.

Carol intercepted them.

According to Amanda, Carol told her that Jason knew about the pregnancy and wanted nothing to do with either of them.

“Did you?”

“No.”

“Did you ever receive anything from her?”

“No.”

Then came the part that made me get up and walk away from the table.

Carol had known about Hailey for nearly ten years.

Worse, she had not simply hidden the child.

She had visited her.

Birthday gifts.

Christmas presents.

Books.

Occasional lunches.

Carol had built a relationship with Jason’s possible daughter while telling Jason nothing.

I turned around.

“And when exactly were you planning to tell me?”

“After the DNA test.”

“You knew before tonight?”

“Three days.”

“Three days.”

“Megan, I didn’t even know if it was true.”

“But you knew enough to understand why your mother didn’t want me at that library.”

He didn’t answer.

That was my answer.

Hailey had also been selected for the Young Authors Showcase.

Carol had discovered it somehow.

If I went with Sophie, there was a good chance I would meet Amanda and Hailey.

Carol wanted to control what happened before that meeting could take place.

Suddenly the family gathering made sense.

So did the urgency.

So did dinner.

Carol wasn’t offended because I had chosen Sophie over helping her move folding tables.

She was scared.

I picked up my phone.

“What are you doing?” Jason asked.

“Setting my alarm.”

“For what?”

I looked at him.

“Sophie’s reading.”

He stared at me.

“You’re still going?”

“There was never a question.”

For once, he didn’t argue.

A few seconds later, he said quietly:

“I’m going too.”

Saturday Morning

The library auditorium was already half full when we arrived.

Sophie wore the blue cardigan she’d picked out herself.

Her story was inside a yellow folder she had decorated with tiny silver stars.

She squeezed my fingers when we reached the registration table.

“Front row?”

“As close as they’ll let us.”

Jason walked beside us, unusually quiet.

Then he stopped.

I followed his eyes.

Carol had just entered through the opposite doors.

She wasn’t alone.

A woman around our age walked beside her.

And holding that woman’s hand was a girl with long brown hair and a green dress.

Hailey.

I had never seen her before.

I didn’t need anyone to point her out.

She had Jason’s eyes.

Not vaguely.

Not in the way people sometimes convince themselves children resemble relatives.

The same dark hazel color. The same slightly uneven eyebrows. Even the same habit of pressing her lips together when she was nervous.

Jason went pale.

Carol saw us.

For several seconds, nobody moved.

Then Sophie tugged my sleeve.

“Mom, they’re calling my group.”

I looked down at her.

That yellow folder was shaking slightly in her hands.

Whatever happened between the adults could wait.

“Come on.”

I took Sophie to her seat near the stage.

Jason followed.

Carol did not.

The readings began.

Three children went first.

Then the librarian announced:

“Hailey Brooks, reading ‘The Grandmother Who Came in Secret.’”

Behind me, I heard someone inhale sharply.

Hailey walked onto the stage.

She unfolded her pages.

And began.

The Story Carol Couldn’t Interrupt

Hailey’s story was about a girl whose grandmother visited in secret.

The grandmother came to birthdays with books.

She mailed Christmas presents.

She remembered the girl’s favorite color.

But whenever the girl asked about her father, the grandmother said he lived far away and things were complicated.

Hailey kept reading.

The auditorium became very still.

Then she reached a part that clearly wasn’t fiction anymore.

“When I was seven, I asked my grandmother if my father knew my name.”

Hailey looked down at the page.

“She told me yes.”

I heard a chair move behind us.

I didn’t turn around.

“Last week, my mother told me that wasn’t true.”

Jason’s hands were locked together between his knees.

Hailey continued.

“My father didn’t know my name because he didn’t know I existed.”

Someone near the aisle whispered something.

Carol stood.

Amanda looked at her.

Carol sat back down.

Hailey’s voice shook on the final paragraph.

“Adults say they keep secrets to protect children. But sometimes a secret doesn’t protect anybody. Sometimes it just steals years from people who should have had them.”