I don’t reply. Just stand there. She was the one who knocked.

“Miss—it’s like this.”

A mix of English and Albanian.

“I’ve heard you’re searching.”

Now she even throws some German into the mix of languages she’s using to try to make herself understood.

“That you . . . yes, ask questions.”

It’s not an accusation. More a statement. With a note of seriousness. Worry.

I neither answer nor close the door.

I have a hard time making sense of what she’s saying, even though now she’s settled on English.

“Can I come in?”

She nods to my messy room—I was late, ran to the shower, and left my clothes spread all over the floor, and then I couldn’t find my brush and . . . well, I wasn’t expecting visitors.

I open the door a little more, and she steps inside. But she doesn’t sit down on the bed I point to, the only seat I have.

“It’s not good that you’re asking questions.”

She stands in the middle of the room, and glances now and then through the window. As if she were looking for someone out on the street.

“People get worried about the kind of questions you’re asking. And when they get worried, they start asking questions, too. That was how I found out. And how I knew.”

I speak to her for the first time.

“Knew what?”

“Who you are.”

Now she moves a pillow and sits down. Next to me. Takes my hand, and it surprises me, but I let her hold it.

“Zana. Your name. Zana Lilaj.”

“Ah, now I understand—you know Lorik.”

“No.”

“Okay—you work at one of the bureaucracies I visited?”

“No.”

“But those are the only people I’ve told, except for a woman on the train, when I just wanted to try out how it sounded. There’s nowhere else I’ve even used it.”

Then she lets go of my hand, and caresses my cheek instead.

“It’s you. Even after all this time.”

“I don’t understand at all.”

She runs her hand over my face. It’s not unpleasant, I don’t draw back, it’s just unexpected and therefore a bit strange.

“I recognize you. Your mouth, your cheekbones. You’re bigger now, little darling, but it’s you.”

“Who are you?”

“Your aunt. Your father’s sister. He was my big brother.”

“Excuse me?”

“I used to hold you in my arms. You used to lean your head against my shoulder and rest it just there, so calm. You were a newborn the first time we met, and especially the year you were two and three, I saw you often—I pushed you around in your stroller, over the streets of Shkodër, when you had a hard time going to sleep. You were three the last time I saw you. Or, since we’re sitting here now, second to last time.”