“He calls every Sunday.”
“Does he know about the foreclosure?”
“No.”
“June.”
She sat down heavily.
“He had a difficult year. His business partner left. Then there was a flood at the workshop. He has a daughter to raise.”
“So you decided to manage everything alone.”
She looked at me.
I heard my own words and sighed.
Apparently, secrecy did not require a mansion.
Sometimes it lived in a cottage with geraniums.
“Call him,” I said.
June looked toward the telephone.
This time, she did.
Noah arrived before noon.
He was tall, broad through the shoulders, and wearing a work jacket with sawdust caught along the cuffs.
The resemblance was immediate.
Not exact.
Not a copy.
But when he stopped in the doorway, I saw Adrian’s expression on a different life.
“Mom.”
June rose too quickly.
He crossed the room and hugged her.
Then he held her at arm’s length.
“A foreclosure?”
“I was going to sort it out.”
“With what?”
She looked away.
He closed his eyes.
“June.”
“I’m still your mother.”
“Then let me be your son.”
I turned toward the kettle to give them something resembling privacy.
A few minutes later, June asked the question she had been avoiding.
“Would you speak to Adrian?”
Noah sat back.
His face changed.
“He knows?”
“Yes.”
“All of it?”
“Enough.”
He looked toward the photographs.
For a moment, I thought he would refuse.
Instead, he asked, “Did he ask to see me?”
“Not yet.”
Noah nodded slowly.
“Then give him time.”
Adrian used the time badly at first.
He called June too often.
He sent an attorney before asking whether she wanted one.
