“Hello?” I answered, my voice barely steady.
“Meryl, I’m so sorry to call you like this,” she said, sounding unsettled. “I found something in my desk today. I think you need to come to the school right away.”
“What is it?”
“It’s an envelope… with your name on it. It’s from Owen.”
I tightened my grip on the shirt.
“From Owen?”
“Yes. I don’t know how it ended up there, but it’s definitely his handwriting.”
I don’t remember ending the call. I only remember standing up too quickly, my heart racing.
I found my mother in the kitchen. She had been staying with us since the funeral because I wasn’t eating and often woke in the night calling Owen’s name.
“His teacher found something,” I told her. “Owen left something for me.”
Her expression shifted in a way only another mother could understand.
Charlie was at work. Since the funeral, work had become his refuge. He left early, came home late, and barely spoke. He wouldn’t even let me hold him anymore. The space between us no longer felt like shared grief—it felt like a barrier I couldn’t break through.
At a red light, my eyes fell on the small wooden bird hanging from my rearview mirror—Owen’s Mother’s Day gift. Its wings were uneven, its beak slightly crooked.
