Your father’s gone, your mother’s gone, and after five hours in the rain you still haven’t figured out that nobody wants you here.” / Chapter 10 / 15

Chapter 10 - THE LETTERS IN THE DRAWERThe school counselor, the pediatric dentist’s receptionist, and Sarah’s third-grade teacher all had versions of the same story.

Grandma says Mom’s away for a while.

Grandma says calls upset Sarah.

Grandma says family is working on it.

No one person had enough to intervene aggressively.

Together, the pattern was grim.

Mia’s lawyer moved quickly. Because the temporary caregiving authorization had expired long before, Norma had no automatic right to keep Sarah. There was no filed guardianship order. No court had ever approved long-term placement with Grandma. Most of what held the situation together had been intimidation, confusion, and the ordinary way people assume whoever has the child must also have the authority.

For two days Sarah stayed with Christopher in a furnished apartment above his buddy Ray’s garage because Mia’s one-bedroom place in Green Bay was too far for immediate school continuity and everyone agreed not to uproot Sarah all at once.

Mia spent every hour she wasn’t working in Appleton.

Christopher kept waiting for a formal explosion—police at the door, emergency hearings, dramatic accusations.

What came instead was something subtler and uglier.

Documentation.

Statements.

Timelines.

Notes from Mia’s treatment center confirming completion.

A letter from her therapist supporting reunification.

And from Christopher’s side, the most damning evidence of all: the unopened stack of letters Norma had kept hidden.

They gave Sarah the first one on a Thursday evening.

Christopher sat beside her on Ray’s old plaid couch. Mia sat on the other side holding Sarah’s socked foot in both hands like she still needed proof the child was really there.

The envelope was dated September 3.

Sarah opened it carefully.

Inside was a card with sunflowers on the front and Mia’s handwriting inside.

My sweetest girl,

I miss your sleepy hair and your frog pajamas and the way you always steal the red jellybeans first. I am getting stronger. I think about you every single day. Grandma says you get sad when we talk too long, so I’m sending this instead. Please remember: none of this is because of you. I love you bigger than the sky over Highway 41.

Sarah started crying before she reached the end.

Mia cried too.

Christopher stared at the wall because if he looked at either of them too long, he wasn’t sure he’d keep it together.

There were ten letters.

One birthday card.

Two little drawings Mia had made of a cat named Pickles because Sarah once said every good story needed a useless cat.

Every letter said some version of the same thing:

I love you.

I’m trying.

I’m coming back.

Sarah read all of them over two nights.

By the fifth letter she stopped asking if Mia had really wanted her.