“Who’s been handling your mom’s responsibilities for the past few days?”

“Us kids.”

“Do you have all that you need? Enough to eat?”

She nodded.

“And has your dad been managing his temper?”

“It’s been all right, Ms. Montgomery.” But the bleak light in Claire’s eyes told a different story.

“If you have any concerns, or simply want someone to talk to, I strongly encourage you to speak with me or Ms. Williams. In fact, I’ll send Ms. Williams an email right now.” She typed out a brief note, hit send, then faced Claire. “Ready to work on math?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Outstanding. We can always depend on differential calculus to lift our spirits.”

Later that evening, Leah dialed Genevieve from one of her patented out-of-Dylan’s-hearing-range spots: inside her turned-off car, inside her garage.

“Anyway,” Leah said, wrapping up a very vague description of her attempt to learn more about her genealogy, “I was told that birth certificates are only made available to the person named on the certificate or a primary family member.”

“That’s true.”

“Since I’m neither, I’m not sure what to try next.” Yet she was yearning to research Ian and Bonnie O’Reilly further.

“What about death certificates?” Genevieve suggested. “When I was looking into this same sort of thing a year ago, it was actually a death certificate that revealed far more than birth certificates ever did.”

“Oh?”

“Unlike birth certificates, death certificates are a matter of public record. They’re available to all.”

Leah’s hope rose. “How would I go about accessing a death certificate?”

“You can go to the vital records office in the county of death, or you can request a record online for a fee. I can’t remember off the top of my head the name of the website that allows you to request death records. But if you Google death certificates in Georgia, you should be able to find it.”

“I appreciate the help.”

“Sure! My sister and I also looked up old newspaper articles and old yearbook photos. I’m not sure if either of those pertain to your search, but they’re worth keeping in mind.”

Leah thanked her and, after a few minutes of chitchat during which Genevieve talked about how much she adored Ben, they disconnected.

She propped her laptop between the steering wheel and her abdomen, and located one of the record search sites Genevieve had alluded to. VitalCertificates.com.

It could be that Bonnie had died, and Leah simply hadn’t succeeded at locating her obituary online. In fact, if Bonnie had died back when Leah was young, it wasn’t surprising that Leah hadn’t been able to find her obit on the Internet. The Internet had been in its infancy then. Even after the Internet became more widespread, it may have taken many years for online obituaries to become prevalent.