…gave her twin brother away.”
I couldn’t breathe for a moment.
Thirty-two years ago, I gave birth to twins: my daughter, Emma, and a little boy I named Daniel. Daniel was born with a serious heart defect. He lived for two days. I held him the whole time. When he died, I was so broken that I couldn’t speak about him, not even to my husband. Then my husband left. I raised Emma alone and never told her she’d had a brother.
The nurse, Carol, had been with me during those two days.
Last month, Emma had requested her birth records to fill out medical forms for her baby. She’d found a second birth record with my name and the same date. There was a note: “Infant transferred.” The rest of the file was missing. She’d searched online and found an old message board where people discussed babies being given up for adoption at that hospital. She’d decided I’d given her brother away and kept her.
“I tracked down a nurse from that year,” Emma said later. “Carol. I didn’t know she’d be here.”
Carol opened her folder. Inside was a copy of Daniel’s death certificate and a photograph she’d taken thirty-two years ago, of me holding both babies in my hospital bed.
“I kept a copy because I never forgot you,” Carol said. “You sang to him until the end.”
Carol asked Emma to come back in. She showed her the death certificate and the photograph. Emma sat down slowly and began to cry.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?” she whispered.
“Because it hurt too much,” I said. “And I was afraid you’d feel you had to carry it too.”
Emma held out her newborn son. I took him in my arms for the first time. His middle name is Daniel.
