PART 5 – The Third Page Held Information Nobody Had Shared With Me, and Suddenly Those Five Rejected Adoptions Meant Something Different

I couldn't take my eyes off the paper.

The lawyer sat quietly across from me.

I looked at the same lines again, hoping I had misunderstood something.

But the words didn't change.

My fingers were trembling.

I placed the document on the desk and tried to steady my breathing.

"How long have these papers been missing?"

The lawyer looked uncomfortable.

He explained that the documents had only recently been discovered among additional records connected to Lily's case.

I wanted to understand how something so important could have been absent from the information originally provided.

I had trusted the adoption process.

I had answered every question put before me.

I had completed the paperwork.

I had waited through months of uncertainty.

And now I was sitting in an office learning that there was information about my own daughter that I had never been shown.

I looked down again.

The first few pages contained information connected to the earlier adoption attempts.

I remembered the five families.

I remembered how the caseworker had told me that each had considered taking Lily home.

Then each had withdrawn.

At the time, I had thought perhaps they had changed their circumstances.

Perhaps they had decided they weren't ready.

Perhaps something unrelated had happened.

I had never imagined that there might be more to the story.

"Why wasn't this included when I adopted her?"

The lawyer didn't give me an immediate answer.

He appeared just as troubled as I felt.

He explained that he was trying to understand how the additional documents had become separated from the records we originally received.

I wasn't satisfied.

I didn't want an explanation about paperwork.

I wanted to know what the documents meant for Lily.

I wanted to know whether there was something I should have been told before I became responsible for her.

Most of all, I wanted to know whether anyone had deliberately kept information from me.

I picked up the page again.

My eyes moved slowly across it.

I couldn't stop thinking about Lily waiting at home.

She was probably playing with her toys.

Perhaps she was looking through one of her books.

She had no idea I was sitting in an office, holding documents that had turned my ordinary afternoon upside down.

I felt guilty for even thinking about her in connection with those papers.

She was three years old.

Whatever the documents contained, none of it was her fault.

I wanted to protect her.

That feeling was stronger than my fear.

"Please tell me everything you know."

The lawyer looked at me and nodded.

He said he would explain what he could establish from the records.

But he also made it clear that he didn't want to guess about anything that wasn't confirmed.

I appreciated that.

I was already frightened enough.

I didn't need assumptions added to the facts.

I placed the papers carefully on the desk.

The folder looked ordinary.

Just paper held together in a file.

Yet it suddenly felt heavier than anything I had carried into that office.

I thought about the five families again.

Why had all of them withdrawn?

Had they each received the same information?

Had they been told something about Lily that I hadn't been told?

I couldn't answer those questions.

And I hated that I couldn't.

The lawyer turned another page toward me.

I tried to concentrate.

I read the information slowly.

Then I stopped.

There were details I didn't understand.

I asked him to explain them.

He took his time.

I could tell he understood that I was struggling to take everything in.

For a moment, I wished I had never received that telephone call.

I wished I were back home.

I wished I were listening to Lily laugh.

But wishing didn't change what was sitting in front of me.

I had asked to become her mother.

And now I needed to understand everything that concerned her.

I wasn't going to put the folder away simply because the truth frightened me.

Not when Lily was the person at the center of it.

Click here to continue reading: PART 6: I Had Chosen Lily Without Knowing Everything, but Nothing in That Office Changed the Promise I Had Made to Her