Chapter 2 - WHAT EMMA WAS AFRAID TO SAY
Richard did not board the plane.
Within minutes, he canceled the flight and moved Emma into a private office near the terminal lounge while one security employee remained outside the door.
Victoria demanded that Richard stop “turning a tantrum into a crisis.”
He refused to argue with her.
He asked terminal management to arrange a separate room for her.
Then he turned his attention entirely to Emma.
The little girl sat curled into the corner of a leather chair with the orange box on her lap.
Richard pulled another chair close.
“Are you hurt?”
Emma shook her head.
“Did Victoria touch you?”
“Just took the box.”
“Has she ever hurt you before?”
Another small shake of the head.
Richard was relieved by the answer, but only partly.
“Has she thrown your things away before?”
Emma looked down.
That hesitation told him more than the answer.
“Sweetheart?”
“Sometimes.”
Richard felt something tighten in his chest.
“What things?”
“Drawings.”
“What else?”
“A bracelet.”
“What bracelet?”
“The one with the airplane.”
Richard recognized it immediately.
Olivia’s bracelet.
His daughter had worn a tiny silver airplane charm when she earned her private pilot certificate at twenty-two. After Olivia died, Richard had given it to Emma because she always reached for it when she was little.
He had assumed Emma lost it.
“When did Victoria throw it away?”
“She said it was broken.”
“Was it?”
Emma shrugged.
“I don’t know.”
“Did you tell me?”
Emma shook her head.
“Why?”
The answer came almost too quietly to hear.
“She said you were tired of hearing about Mom.”
Richard went completely still.
Emma looked up quickly.
“I don’t talk about her too much, do I?”
The question broke something in him.
“No.”
He leaned closer.
“Emma, you can talk about your mother every day for the rest of your life if you want.”
Emma’s eyes filled.
“Victoria says it makes you sad.”
“It does make me sad sometimes.”
Emma immediately looked guilty.
Richard corrected himself.
“But being sad because I miss someone is not the same thing as wanting you to stop talking about them.”
Emma slowly nodded.
Richard glanced at the keepsake box.
“Can I ask what’s inside?”
Emma hesitated.
Then she placed it carefully between them.
The box itself had little monetary value. Orange cardboard covered in worn fabric. One corner was crushed. The brass latch was scratched.
To Emma, it was priceless.
She opened it.
Inside were pieces of Olivia Hayes’s life that would have looked meaningless to anyone else.
An old photograph of Olivia sitting on the wing of Richard’s first training plane.
A pair of childhood friendship bracelets.
Her silver pilot wings.
A pressed yellow flower.
Three handwritten birthday cards she had written for Emma before she died.
A small white hospital bracelet.
Several Polaroids.
And a faded velvet pouch.
Emma reached for the pouch.
Victoria had apparently been trying to make her throw it away for weeks.
“She said this stuff is junk.”
Richard looked at the photograph of his daughter laughing into the sun.
He swallowed.
“None of it is junk.”
Emma touched the velvet pouch.
“Mom said this one was important.”
Richard looked at her.
“When?”
“Before she got really sick.”
Emma had been only five when Olivia died. Richard knew memories from that age could blur easily.
“What did she say?”
Emma squeezed her eyes shut, trying to remember.
“She said, ‘If Grandpa forgets, show him.’”
Richard frowned.
“Forgets what?”
“I don’t know.”
Emma opened the pouch.
Inside was not money.
Not jewelry.
Not a secret key.
It was a folded sheet of paper.
Richard unfolded it carefully.
At the top, in Olivia’s handwriting, were two ordinary words:
“Emma’s Things.”
Underneath was a handwritten list.
Sapphire earrings.
Grandmother Ruth’s watch.
Pilot bracelet.
Three sketchbooks.
Brown leather flight log.
Yellow watercolor.
Silver compact.
Pearl hair comb.
Letters for Emma.
Richard read the list twice.
Most of the items meant something to him.
Several had been accounted for after Olivia died.
But not all of them.
He looked at the line marked “Grandmother Ruth’s watch.”
He had not seen that watch in three years.
The same was true of the sapphire earrings.
And the yellow watercolor.
Richard slowly looked toward the office door.
Victoria had helped him sort Olivia’s possessions after her death.
At the time, Richard had been too devastated to question much of anything.
Now his granddaughter was holding a list Richard had never seen.
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And the woman who had just thrown it into a trash can had spent weeks trying to convince Emma that everything inside was worthless.
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