Joan had not seen Alex for three days by then. She felt as if she were slipping onto reality. He had stopped replying her text and avoided her calls. Joan agonized over the possible consequences of their last heated, insightful argument. Still, she could not help but think that something more profound was falling apart. Something he hadn't yet let her know.
Alone in her room, she sat wrapped in her cream knit blanket and stared into the aged photo frame resting on her desk. Rising, grinning, Mr. Harris with a very familiar boy by his side was shown in a dusty photograph of her father. Joan used to never pay attention to it, but she now saw the boy was nearly exactly like Alex when she looked very closely.
She starts pointing with a knock on the door.
"Come in," she murmured.
Albert was her senior brother. He started with a somber look. "Mom wants to see you," he said, pausing.
Joan's heart sank. "Exactly what is it?"
Albert moved, his long shadow falling across the doorway from his great height. She wouldn't offer every word. "But it has to do with Alex."
With bare feet, Joan stood up right off, her heart beat into her ribs. Apart from passing references to "poor circumstances" and "forbidden knowledge," Mrs. Harris seldom mentioned Alex.
Mrs. Harris was standing by the fireplace clutching a folded letter in her hand when Joan walked into the sitting room. Her face had no emotions.
"You have got to sit," she said softly.
Joan complied. The fire boomed and cracked behind her, but the room was still cold.
"Earlier should have I told you," her mother started, her voice small. "But I was trying to shield you from humiliation, from pain."
Joan leaned forward and said, "What on earth are you on about, Mom?"
The letter was in Mrs. Harris' hand. It was aged, the pages yellowed, the handwriting weak but beautiful. Joan carefully opened it down. She felt the air expelled from her lungs as her eyes moved across the words.
Most Honorable Miriam, I never wanted to cause you pain. Still, you should be aware that my little girl from Eleanor was more than a fling. It was reality. And that son of mine is mine. Just as Joan is yours, so is yours. I beg you to keep them separated should they ever meet. Their bond will be too close, and it will ruin the two of them.
Joan's hands shook. "This implies..."
Mrs. Harris nodded slowly, eyes glassy. "Alex is your half-brother, Joan."
Joan got up fast, her vision spinning, as no. We have no idea—he cannot be—
Mrs. Harris remarked, "We didn't know you'd meet; we thought Eleanor's husband would bring him far off and destiny wouldn't cross your ways."
Joan retreated from her mother. "You had to have said that to me. Before I came to love him. Before it descended this direction.
Mrs . Harris sighed "sorry."
Joan ran from the room.
Though she ended up at the Swan house, she did not know where her legs were taking her. The estate was quiet, nearly too still. Ruth greeted the door with an eyebrow lifting.
Joan murmured, voice exhausted, "I have to find Alex."
Ruth said that he left two days ago and he is not here." Not disclose the location."
Joan stepped back. The door closed, and with it, a part of her heart.
Restless, she dialed Davis late that evening. He was her only sibling who had from the start opposed her love for Alex. Perhaps he knew more.
After a couple of rings, he picked. "Joan."
She said, "Have you seen Alex?'
Davis paused before: "Why should I?"
Knowing you spoke to him helps me. Weeks ago, I know you advised him away from me."
The line was silent.
"Hollow Creek," Davis eventually said. "At the cabin of Grandfather."
Joan did not wait. Having prepared her belongings, she drove through the dark night by herself after leaving a message for her mother. About an hour distant, Hollow Creek was a sequestered, wooded location. Her grandfather's cabin had long been vacant, a family heirloom full of secrets and dust.
Just as day broke, she painted the sky in shades of grey and lavender.
Crookedly against the forest backdrop, the cabin was camouflaged in ivy. Joan banged a single. Not any answer. She swung the door open.
Inside, everything was faint; the air smelled of old wood and dust lay thick.
She called, "Alex?"
Quiet.
Then backroom footfalls.
With a hollow and red-rimmed stare, Alex turned up shirtless. Seeing her made him paralyzed.
He said,"You should not be there."
Joan replied: "I had to come; I know the truth."
Alex started. "Then why exactly are you here?"
She said, "I love you because I don't care."
He shook his head nervously. "Joan, we're brothers."
"Isn't love stronger than blood?" she sobbed. "Don't you feel it too?
Alex turned away, fists clenched. "That love could ruin us both."
She said defiantly, "Then let it."
Something smoldering in his eyes, he turned back to her. "Do you know what else I discovered when I was here?"
Joan blinked and asked, "What?"
He went to the mantlet and retrieved a larger envelope than Joan had seen from it.
"It's a will from our father," he said. Dated after the first, your mother let you use.
With trembling hands, Joan opened it.
Within, the will would say:
Should my two kids—Joan and Alex—ever learn the truth about their blood, they should also discover the truth of the lie I spun. For one of them..is absolutely not my baby.
Joan's pulse raced. What is this symbol?
Alex said, "I'm not sure." There's more. The title is. A position. Someone we should search for."
"Who?" she replied, with wide eyes, glancing up at Alex.
"She's still living. The nurse brought us both in."
The front door creaked sharply from behind.
They turned but noticed nobody.
Then a shadow passed across the window. Followed by a knocking.
Three bangs.
Gradual. Purposeful.
Another person knew the truth.
Moreover, they were not alone.