Behind Closed Doors

CHAPTER FIFTEEN - THE ORIGINAL RECORD

I stayed outside my mother's bedroom door.

I didn't move.

I barely breathed.

Inside, silence had replaced the conversation.

For several seconds, I wondered if they had heard me.

Then I heard the scrape of a chair.

My heart lurched.

I stepped backward just as the bedroom door opened.

Mom stood there.

Her face changed the moment she saw me.

Not shock.

Not surprise.

Fear.

It lasted barely a second before she covered it.

“Amaria?”

I stared at her.

Behind her stood the man I had never seen before.

He was older, perhaps in his fifties, dressed in a dark suit. He looked completely out of place in our house.

But there was something about him.

Something familiar.

Not his face.

His expression.

The way he looked at me wasn't the way a stranger looked at someone.

It was the way someone looked at a secret that had finally become impossible to hide.

“What are you doing here?” Mom asked.

I almost laughed.

“You tell me.”

Her jaw tightened.

The man stepped forward.

Mom immediately raised a hand.

“Don't.”

He stopped.

That single word told me more than an explanation could have.

They were afraid of what he might say.

And suddenly, I knew I had the advantage.

“I heard you,” I said.

Mom's expression hardened.

“Heard what?”

“Everything.”

She stared at me.

I watched the calculation happening behind her eyes.

Then she sighed.

“You misunderstood the conversation.”

“No.”

My voice surprised even me.

“I understood it perfectly.”

The man looked at Mom.

“She knows.”

Mom ignored him.

“You shouldn't have been listening.”

“And you shouldn't have been hiding things from me.”

Silence.

I stepped into the room.

Mom moved aside reluctantly.

The bedroom looked exactly as it always had—neat, expensive, carefully arranged.

Nothing about it looked like the room where a family's biggest secret had been buried for nineteen years.

“What original record?” I asked.

Mom didn't answer.

I looked at the man.

He lowered his eyes.

That was enough.

“There is one,” I whispered.

Mom closed the door behind me.

“Yes.”

The word landed heavily.

For nineteen years, I had believed the documents in our house told me who I was.

My name.

My parents.

My birth.

My entire existence.

Now I was standing in front of my mother, realizing that everything I knew might have been built from a lie.

“Where is it?”

Mom shook her head.

“Amaria—”

“Where?”

“It's not what you think.”

“Then show me.”

She looked away.

I felt something inside me c***k.

“You told me everything about my childhood was normal.”

“It was.”

“No, it wasn't.”

My voice trembled.

“I found the envelope. I found the memory card. I spoke to Dr. Cole. Leo told me about the woman who came after I was born. And now I hear you saying there is an original birth record that could make everything fall apart.”

Mom's eyes widened slightly.

“You spoke to Leo?”

“Yes.”

The man suddenly looked concerned.

“What did he tell you?”

I turned toward him.

“You know Leo?”

He didn't answer.

“Who are you?”

Mom stepped between us.

“That's enough.”

“No.”

I shook my head.

“Not anymore.”

The man looked at Mom.

Then at me.

Finally, he said quietly,

“My name is Adrian.”

Just Adrian.

No surname.

That made my suspicion grow.

“What do you have to do with my birth?”

His face became unreadable.

“I was there.”

My stomach dropped.

“Where?”

“At the hospital.”

Mom closed her eyes.

I stared at him.

“You were there when I was born?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

He hesitated.

“Because your birth wasn't as simple as your family told you.”

I felt the room tilt.

“Then tell me.”

Adrian looked at Mom.

She gave him a warning look.

He ignored it.

“There were instructions concerning you.”

“What instructions?”

“That you were not to leave the hospital under the name you were given.”

My blood went cold.

I remembered the memory card.

IDENTITY TO REMAIN PROTECTED.

The words suddenly felt different.

“Who gave those instructions?”

Adrian didn't answer.

“Who?”

Mom finally spoke.

“Someone who believed they were protecting you.”

“From what?”

Neither of them answered.

I stepped closer.

“From whom?”

Mom's eyes filled with something I couldn't identify.

Regret.

Fear.

Maybe both.

“You were born into a situation that could have destroyed more than one family,” she said.

“That doesn't answer my question.”

“It will.”

“When?”

She looked at me.

“Not tonight.”

I stared at her.

Then I noticed something.

A small movement near the bedside table.

Mom's hand had gone behind a stack of books.

My eyes narrowed.

“What are you hiding?”

“Nothing.”

She moved too quickly.

I reached past her.

She caught my wrist.

“Amaria.”

I froze.

Not because she was holding me.

Because of the look in her eyes.

She wasn't angry.

She was terrified.

“Please,” she whispered.

I had never heard my mother say that word to me like that before.

I slowly pulled my hand away.

“Where is it?”

She said nothing.

I looked at the bedside table.

Then the wardrobe.

Then the locked drawer.

My eyes stopped on the old wooden cabinet near the window.

There was a tiny brass key sitting on top of it.

I looked at Mom.

She followed my gaze.

Her face fell.

I reached for it.

“Don't.”

I took the key.

Adrian stepped forward.

“Amaria, you don't understand what you're about to open.”

I looked at him.

“Then maybe someone should have told me the truth nineteen years ago.”

I inserted the key into the cabinet.

It clicked.

The drawer opened.

Inside was a single brown folder.

No label.

No name.

Just a date written across the front.

20 SEPTEMBER.

My hands began to shake.

I lifted it.

Mom whispered my name.

I opened the folder.

The first page was an old hospital document.

Yellowed with age.

Official stamps covered the bottom.

My eyes moved across the page.

Then stopped.

REGISTERED NAME AT BIRTH:

There was a blank space.

My breath caught.

Below it:

MOTHER: ELENA —

I swallowed.

Then I saw the next line.

FATHER:

My eyes moved across the page.

And stopped.

The name wasn't Daniel.

It wasn't anyone I recognized.

I looked at Mom.

She was crying now.

Not silently.

Not discreetly.

She looked completely broken.

“Who is that?” I whispered.

She didn't answer.

I looked back at the document.

There was another line beneath the father's name.

TRANSFERRED UNDER AUTHORITY OF:

My eyes widened.

A signature was visible beneath it.

I knew that signature.

I had seen it before.

On the transfer authorization from the memory card.

Daniel Vale.

But beneath his signature was another name.

A name that made no sense.

A name that shouldn't have been connected to me.

I stared at it.

Then Adrian spoke behind me.

“That is the name they were trying to erase.”

I slowly turned.

“What?”

He looked at Mom.

Then at me.

“The name you were born with.”

A sound came from the hallway.

Three slow knocks against the bedroom door.

Everyone froze.

Mom's face drained of color.

Adrian immediately stepped away from the cabinet.

I looked toward the door.

Another knock.

This time louder.

Then a voice came through.

Leo.

“Mom?”

My heart stopped.

He sounded calm.

Far too calm.

“Why is Amaria in your room?”

Nobody answered.

The handle began to turn.

And I looked down at the birth record still clutched in my hands.

For the first time in nineteen years, I was holding the truth about who I was.

But I had no idea whether I would still have it when Leo walked through that door.