We adopted a girl no one wanted because of a birthmark. Twenty-five years later, a letter from her biological mother showed up in our mailbox and changed what we thought we knew.
I’m 75. I’m Margaret.
My husband, Thomas, and I have been married for over 50 years.
For most of that time, it was just us. We wanted children. We tried for years.
I did tests, hormones, appointments. One day a doctor folded his hands and said, “Your chances are extremely low. I’m so sorry.”
That was it.
No miracle. No follow-up plan. Just an ending.
We grieved, then adjusted.
By 50, we told ourselves we’d made peace with it.
Then a neighbor, Mrs. Collins, mentioned a little girl at the children’s home who’d been there since birth.
“Five years,” Mrs. Collins said.
“No one comes back. Folks call, ask for a photo, then disappear.”
“She has a large birthmark on her face,” she said. “Covers most of one side.
People see it and decide it’s too hard.”
That night I brought it up to Thomas. I expected him to say we were too old, too settled, too late.
He listened, then said, “You can’t stop thinking about her.”
“I can’t,” I admitted. “She’s been waiting her whole life.”
“We’re not young,” he said.
“If we do this, we’ll be in our 70s by the time she’s grown.”
“And there’s money, energy, school, college,” he added.
“I know,” I said again.
After a long silence he said, “Do you want to meet her? Just meet her. No promises.”
Two days later we walked into the children’s home.
A social worker led us to a playroom.
“She knows she’s meeting visitors,” the social worker said. “We didn’t tell her more. We try not to build expectations we can’t meet.”
In the playroom, Lily sat at a small table, coloring carefully inside the lines.
Her dress was a little too big, like it had been passed down too many times.
The birthmark covered most of the left side of her face, dark and obvious, but her eyes were serious and watchful, like she’d learned to read adults before trusting them.
I knelt beside her. “Hi, Lily. I’m Margaret.”
She glanced at the social worker, then back at me.
“Hi,” she whispered.
Thomas squeezed into a tiny chair across from her. “I’m Thomas.”
She studied him and asked, “Are you old?”
He smiled. “Older than you.”
“Will you die soon?” she asked, completely serious.
My stomach dropped.
Thomas didn’t flinch. “Not if I can help it,” he said. “I plan to be a problem for a long time.”
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