I flex my jawline, steeling myself before opening the wound. ‘There’s no record of her existence.’ My voice is quieter this time, not quite so forceful, my resolve worn away. I can see, from the corner of my eye, that Mum’s mouth is open, eyes wide. Confusion etched across her face.‘No record? How do you know?’ She stares at me as if I’m a stranger, someone with a story she knows nothing about. ‘I thought we talked about everything, Rhys, I didn’t think we had secrets. How can you know this and not have told me?’ But then she drops her eyes, realising that perhaps this isn’t about a truth I haven’t shared, but a reality I’ve buried. And perhaps also that she has kept truths from me too. Perhaps we’re more alike than we realise. ‘How do you know?’ she asks. I lean forward, burying my head in my hands. I want to run away. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to talk about this – about anything.‘Can you tell me about it?’ she asks, gently. I shift uncomfortably beside her this time. My turn to feel awkward in my skin. Everything itches; bile rises from the pit of my belly. ‘I can think of better things to talk about,’ I say, staring at my feet. Flippancy kicks in to replace hurt. ‘Global warming? Donald Trump? Chips served in tiny buckets on a piece of lake-stone slate, I mean whose idea was that? I blame Jamie Oliver,’ I finish, running out of momentum. ‘Rhys.’The shoelace on my trainer is coming undone. I bend down to tie it then rest my elbows on my knees. I search for the best version of this story for her. The least painful. The one where I don’t tell her that if she’d bothered to find out about my past, she could have protected me in my future. Because that’s how the small boy inside me feels: like this is her fault. It was a feeling I could forget when we were distracted with our David. A feeling that now I can’t push away. I know it’s unfair and yet… Mum’s looking at me. Waiting for more.

‘When David contacted the agency, he had an appointment, didn’t he?’

‘Yes, you took him. He didn’t want me to go.’

‘Right.’ I bite the inside of my cheek and Mum reaches a hand out, placing it on my back. The warmth from her hand reaches through to my heart. ‘When he went in for his appointment, I don’t know, something just… I thought maybe I’d like to know too. Maybe it would help him if we both went on this journey together.’

‘You’d never been interested before.’

I shake my head. ‘I know.’ I take a minute to think about that. About why I’d never wanted to know. Cowardice on my part, this time. ‘So I went in too. I asked for my file. It was all very straightforward, easier than I’d expected. I don’t know, maybe part of me only asked because I didn’t anticipate it being that easy. Perhaps I thought they’d ask me to come back and I could pretend I didn’t have time or something. I forget now what was really going through my mind because there it was. Within seconds. My life in paperwork, easily picked out of a metal filing cabinet marked 1976.’ I feel as hollow as the day I read my papers. I feel that sense of expectation, immediately crushed by devastation. It’s deep in my gut. That it returns with such clarity all but knocks me over.‘My file. My name. My date of birth.’ I take a deep breath. ‘The word “abandoned” beside it in capital letters, red pen. Pretty perfunctory really, considering.’ Mum lets a breath, a small cry, escape. It’s that sound I’ve wanted to avoid. A sound that links to sadness. To guilt. To responsibility. And yet it’s a sound that I’m relieved she makes, because in some way it makes her feel a tiny part of the pain I felt when I read those papers.