E


    The restaurant was cozy and warm, with soft lighting that made everything feel intimate andfortable. We got a table by the window, and I could see people walking by on the street outside,ughing and holding hands and swinging their shopping bags.


    Real families. Real couples.


    “I’m sorry,” I said to Lilith as soon as we’d ordered our food. “I didn’t mean to pry about your past. That was rude of me.”


    Lilith shook her head. “It’s not that I don’t want to talk about it. It’s just…plicated.”


    I waited, not wanting to push again but hoping she’d continue.


    “The truth is,” she said, looking down at her hands, “I do view you as a daughter. More than that, actually. You are a daughter to me, E. The daughter I never got to raise.” She sniffled and hesitated for a long moment, then whispered, “I did have a child. A little girl.”


    My eyebrows shot up. This was the first time I had ever heard of Lilith having a child. I’d always wondered, but she had never mentioned having a daughter, not even once. If anything, I’d thought that she had simply never married and had kids.


    “Did something happen to her?” I asked, dreading the answer.


    “She’s alive,” Lilith said quickly. “She’s alive and well. She just… she doesn’t know about me.’


    I frowned. “What do you mean?”


    “She hasn’t seen me since she was a baby. Less than a year old.” Lilith sighed and tucked a strand of silver hair behind her ear. “But I’ve been watching over her, unbeknownst to her, all these years. Making sure she’s safe, making sure she’s happy.” Sheughed bitterly. ” Although sometimes I don’t think I’ve done the best job of that.”


    “So you watch her, but she doesn’t know you’re there?”


    Lilith nodded sadly. “Something like that. We’ve actually interacted before, many times, but she has no idea who I really am.”


    That took me by surprise. Was she too shy to admit who she was? “Lilith, why haven’t you told her who you are?” I asked.


    “It’splicated.”


    “Everything’splicated,” I said gently. “But surely she’d want to know her mother. Surely she’d be happy to find out you’re alive and that you care about her.”


    Lilith’s eyes filled with tears again. “I don’t know What if she hates me? What if she thinks I


    abandoned her?”


    “Did you? Abandon her?”


    “No. Never. I would never have chosen to leave her.” The pain in her voice was raw enough to make me choke up. “But circumstances… sometimes circumstances make the choice for you.”


    I wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but it didn’t matter. “Then tell her that,” I said. ” Exin what happened. Lilith, take it from someone who never got to meet her mother-she would want to know you. Even if it’splicated, even if it’s hard, she would want you in her life.”


    “You think so?”


    “I know so. My mother died when I was a baby, just like your daughter was when youst saw her. And even though I don’t remember her at all, I think about her every single day. I wonder what her voice sounded like, what herugh was like, whether she would have been proud of me.”


    My own eyes were getting watery now. “If someone came to me tomorrow and told me my mother was actually alive somewhere, watching over me, caring about me… it would be the best day of my life.”


    Lilith just stared at me in shock, her face pale and her eyes filled with an emotion that I couldn’t quite read.


    “E, I-”


    “And I’ve got a club sandwich for the youngdy, and m chowder for you, ma’am…”