He’d been carrying this for twelve years. Alone. To protect me.
The same way, I was starting to realize, someone else in my family had carried something alone, to protect me.
“Daniel,” I said. “Did you read the folder? The one with my name on it?”
He shook his head.
“I saw the name. Project Margaret. And I closed the safe. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t read about my mother in somebody else’s handwriting.”
He reached into the box and took out a thick brown accordion folder, held shut with an elastic band.
Across the front, in black marker, in handwriting that was not Robert’s:
PROJECT MARGARET — CONFIDENTIAL
I took a breath.
“First the letter,” I said. “Your father’s letter. Then the folder.”
I picked up the envelope.
I slid my thumb under the flap.
After twelve years, it opened easily. The glue had given up long ago.
