THE GIRL ETHAN COLE COULDN’T LEAVE BEHIND
CHAPTER 7
The adoption process took months.
There were setbacks.
Paperwork was delayed.
One meeting had to be rescheduled.
Another required documents Ethan didn’t know existed.
There were nights when he wondered whether the process would ever end.
Lily noticed.
One evening, she asked,
“Are you still doing it?”
Ethan looked up from the kitchen table.
“Doing what?”
“Trying to adopt me.”
He put the papers down.
“Yes.”
“Even though it’s taking so long?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because important things usually take time.”
She thought about that.
“Do you want to give up?”
“No.”
“Even if you could?”
“No.”
That answer seemed to settle something inside her.
Meanwhile, Greyhaven slowly became part of Lily’s world.
June taught her how to bake.
Ben taught her how to fish, although Ethan later complained that Ben’s lessons consisted mostly of untangling fishing line.
Martha insisted Lily had a permanent seat at the diner.
The children at the harbor began calling her “Ethan’s kid.”
The first time Lily heard it, she became embarrassed.
The second time, she smiled.
One afternoon, Ethan found her sitting beside the harbor with June.
“What are you doing?”
“Thinking.”
“Dangerous.”
Lily smiled.
Then she asked,
“Do you think my mom would be happy?”
Ethan sat beside her.
“I don’t know.”
Lily looked disappointed.
He continued.
“But I think she’d want you to be loved.”
Lily looked at the water.
“I remember her voice.”
Ethan waited.
“She used to sing when she cooked.”
“What did she sing?”
“I don’t remember the words.”
“That’s okay.”
“She smelled like soap.”
Ethan smiled faintly.
“That sounds like a good memory.”
“It is.”
They sat quietly.
Then Lily asked,
“Did you remember your parents?”
Ethan stared at the harbor.
“Some things.”
“Like what?”
“My mother used to brush my hair.”
“You had hair?”
Ethan laughed.
“Very funny.”
“Did she love you?”
“Yes.”
Lily waited.
“And your father?”
Ethan took a breath.
“He tried.”
Lily nodded.
It was enough.
Neither of them needed to explain further.
That evening, Ethan returned home alone.
He stood in his kitchen.
He looked around the small house that had once felt perfectly adequate.
Now he imagined a child’s shoes near the door.
A backpack on the chair.
Drawings on the refrigerator.
A voice asking where he had been.
He had spent most of his life believing that peace meant having no one who could leave him.
Now he was beginning to understand that peace could also mean having someone worth staying for.
