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“I’m thinking you were very…wanted.”
“I guess so. I mean, why else would you adopt unless you wanted a child?”
“Well, Jeff wanted to legally adopt me when I was around twelve, so not all adoptions are the same.”
“I’m guessing he didn’t because your name is Murphy.”
“I don’t have my biological father’s either name,” I fix her with a look, “which is fine by me. When Jeff came up with his asinine idea, I begged my mom not to do it. I threatened to run away. He’s so lazy, I doubt he ever would have mustered up the effort to get it done anyway.”
“Your uncle was probably more of a father figure to you than either one of them, so it’s fitting that you’re a Murphy.”
“Exactly.”
There is no other name I’d accept as my own. I don’t tell Sarah how often I’ve wished that Dan and Maeve were my real parents and that I grew up in their house. I love my mother and I love Lorraine, but my life would have been so different.
“Now that I know her name, I can’t help but imagine what my life would have been like if…”
I fill in the void. “The great what if…You’ll never know. And speaking of knowing her name, what else did you dig up?”
She opens her phone’s picture app. “Not much else. Only her name is listed on the birth certificate with her date of birth. She was twenty years old.”
“She didn’t name the father?”
Sarah looks straight ahead and shakes her head.
“All right. Grace Dawson, twenty years old when the lovely Sarah was born, last known address in Durham, North Carolina. So what does that tell us?”
“Maybe she went to Duke?”
“A definite possibility.”
“But NC State, UNC and Wake Forest are all nearby, too. And there’s a good chance she wasn’t in school.”
“True. And if she wasn’t in school, there’s a decent chance she’ll still be in the area.”
“Ugh,” she groans, “I’m probably taking you on a wild goose chase, aren’t I?”
“A fact-finding mission. Even if she’s not there, we’ll get a lead.”
“Maybe this is a mistake.”
“What?”
“I’m just saying that when I turn eighteen in August I’ll have legal access to the adoption records. Maybe I should just wait.”
“Hold up. You’re not eighteen yet?” She starts to giggle. “I believe Iworkedyour eighteenth birthday party.”
“Audrey thought it would be best to surprise me a few months early because I never would have been on board with a party, and she also figured most of my friends would have left for college by the time my actual birthday rolled around in August.”
“That’s weird. You do realize that, don’t you?”
“Yes, but she definitely achieved the element of surprise.”
“It’s like throwing a graduation party at the end of junior year.”
“Or an anniversary party before you get married.”
“Or a funeral before you croak.”
