He put his hand on her arm. “Remember, as nervous as we are, he is too. He’s been through a lot.”
Snapping the car doors shut, they crossed into the lush grass. Claire scrutinized the people around the playground. No kids old enough to be him. Then she saw him near the seawall.
Finding it suddenly hard to breathe, she pointed and muttered, “I think that’s him.” Actually, she knew it was him.
Whitaker followed her gaze toward the sheltered picnic tables on the southern end of the park.
A woman and a boy were standing up from one of the picnic tables. Claire knew the woman was Kari, Oliver’s case manager. She was dressed like a teacher in blue pants and a blue-and-white striped shirt. Oliver wore a baseball shirt, mesh shorts, and bright running shoes.
Claire’s throat closed for a second, and her heart scraped at her rib cage. Amid the nervous jitters pecking at every part of her, the fear of potentially learning things she’d rather not know, she also felt a good deal of excitement, like this adventure she’d been on since finding the composition books had led her to this exact moment.
They walked in silence toward Oliver and his case manager. Though the boy in the photograph was eleven, the young man standing before them was one and the same. He was taller than in the photo, maybe three inches shorter than Whitaker. He had brilliantly blue eyes that looked both curious and skeptical. His hair was the same as it was in the photo, straight and long, long enough to cover his eyes if he didn’t push it to the right. He was a good-looking boy, still so young. Too cute to be called a man, still a few months from sprouting. Awkward he was, but only because everyone was awkward at fourteen.
Claire said the first words. “You must be Oliver.” She reached for his hand, and he shook weakly, averting his eyes. She instantly thought of the pictures she’d scanned through back at the hotel in Sarasota. Why wasn’t he among them? Did he not want to be adopted?
After introductions, Kari gestured toward the picnic table. “Why don’t we sit down?”
“That’s a great idea,” Claire said, trying to sound upbeat and positive.
Claire and Whitaker sat opposite Oliver and his case manager. Two men were playing a game of chess at one of the tables under a gazebo.
“They told you about David?” Whitaker asked.
A nod, Oliver’s sadness coming through.
Claire and Whitaker had already put together that no one had told Oliver about David, and they could only assume he had been left wondering for three long years.
“I’m so sorry you had to find out this way,” Claire said, a foreign feeling rising up inside of her, something so distant she couldn’t place it at first, but it was powerful and thrilling.
“That’s okay.”
Whitaker took over. “We’re still trying to put the pieces together, but you knew him for a while, it sounds like.”
“A year or so.”
These short answers were breaking her heart. Claire had forgotten what it was like to be fourteen, but hearing the boy’s high-pitched yet changing voice reminded her. Fourteen was when you were finally finding yourself, growing into your body, discovering your identity.
“Did you have any idea what happened to him?” Claire asked, already knowing the sad answer.
Oliver shrugged. “I don’t know.” He looked to the parking lot and back again. “I thought he was mad at me.”
“Didn’t you have a way to get in touch with him?”
“Yeah, my case manager—the one back then—had his number. But I didn’t want to call him and bother him.”
“He didn’t run off on you,” Claire assured him. “Is that what you thought?”
Oliver nodded, and the foreign feeling, still unidentifiable, rose up her spine.
Everyone took a long breath, barely hearing the noises from the playground.
“Let’s back up,” Whitaker said. “Do you know who we are?”
“Kari told me. You’re a writer.” Oliver glanced at Claire, his eyes still darting and insecure. “You’re Claire. I recognize you from the photos on David’s desk.”
Her heart suddenly burned, the other feeling going away. “I don’t know where to start, Oliver. He never told me about you.”
“I know.”
“What do you mean, you know?”
Oliver looked at the table. “He wanted to tell you for a long time. Couldn’t figure out how.”
“What was the big deal?” Claire heard anger in her voice and reminded herself to calm down.
He shook his head, eyes still down. “He just said you were sad about never being a mom.”