And we finally had.
When the tears slowed and we started to pull away from each other, I had the chance to speak to her as my mother.
“They call me Robin now,” I said with a tearful smile.
Juno nodded, her face still beaming with joy. “Robin,” she repeated. “Then that’s what I’ll call you, too. Even if in my heart you’ll always be Elyse.”
Elyse. So Juno and Culver had named me after all, even if it didn’t show up in the redistribution records. I wondered why it wasn’t on the paperwork. But there would be time for that later.
“How did you know it was me?” I asked in a soft voice. Juno made room for me to sit beside her on her hospital bed, and we sat together and held hands as we spoke.
“You never forget your child, Robin. I would know you even if you were a hundred years old,” she replied, squeezing my hand.
I thought about Hope. Would I know her immediately, as Juno had known me? And Juno had been so willing to call me by the name my adoptive parents had given me, but the name Genevieve, given to Hope by her new parents, filled me with woe and anger. Would I need to call my own daughter by her new name to make her happy?
“Before we fill each other in about our life stories, would you mind telling me where I am?” Juno asked, her smile widening. We laughed together at the ridiculousness of it all.
“It’s called Brightbirch. I’m new here, too,” I replied. “But we’re all a community of like-minded people.”
Juno stared at me quietly, patiently waiting for me to continue. I thought about what Nathan would want me to tell her, and what would be too sensitive to share. Obviously, Juno knew that we were anti-regime and that we had airships and advanced tech at our disposal, since she had seen all of that firsthand.
“We’re just trying to fight for what we believe in,” I finished.
Juno smiled knowingly at me. “Well, I’m sure it’s a pretty secretive organization,” she said. “But thank you for sharing what you could with me. I had a feeling you’d be a fiery personality from the moment I laid eyes on you. So this doesn’t really come as any surprise.”
I smiled. I had gotten the same impression from Hope even when she was just minutes old. It must run in the family.
“It was actually your father’s observation,” Juno said, her smile fading slightly and belying a deep undercurrent of sadness for the first time.
“Culver,” I said without thinking.
Juno’s eyes widened. “That’s right,” she replied in surprise. “How did you know that?”
I thought about Nathan again. I was sure he expected a high degree of information lockdown, particularly now that we were already weakened by betrayal. But I had gotten this information through Nelson and her investigation to begin with. And this wasn’t some stranger we were talking about. It was my mother.
Then again, a close relationship with me hadn’t helped things when it came to Nathan’s trust in Henry.
“I did a little digging on my own,” I replied.
“So that must’ve been how you found me,” Juno said.
I nodded, but Juno’s eyes suddenly looked downcast.
“I hope you don’t think I wasn’t looking for you, too,” she continued. “I had been saving money since they took you away. I squirreled away every cent I could spare trying to get enough money to get out of Millville and start looking high and low for you. I didn’t have much of a plan, but I knew I had to start somewhere, or I’d never find you.”
My heart hurt for her as she spoke. How could I have doubted that she would want to see me or look for me? She had been hurting all of these years in the same way that I hurt for Hope. And I felt guilty for not trusting that she would’ve felt that way about her child.
“But money was so tight after your father died. It was all I could do to keep a roof over my head and food on the table. And then Helping Hands came and took us all away, to a place that was somehow even worse than Millville had been,” she said. “But it was a blessing in disguise, since that’s where you found me.”
Tears started to run freely over her thin, high cheeks again as she placed a hand lovingly on my face. I placed my hand over hers and relished the feeling of being so close to her after so long.
“I knew enough to start looking for you in Millville,” I replied. “But it still doesn’t feel real that I’ve actually found you.”
“I know the feeling,” Juno said with a smile. “I just wish your father could’ve been here for this.”
“What happened to him?” I asked.
Juno’s smile melted away again, and I could see her eyes glazing over like she was being sucked back into a memory that was just as vivid as real life. I prepared myself for the worst. Did I really want to know what had happened to Culver?
“Agents,” Juno said softly. “The day they came to take you away. A man from the Ministry came with half a dozen armed Authority agents with him. But Culver didn’t want to give you up.”
She looked down at her hands in her lap. I reached over and grabbed one, trying to provide her some level of support. But Juno didn’t elaborate further, and I knew not to press her. Perhaps there were some details that I was better off not knowing.
But if agents had killed Culver then that meant . . .
“You fought back?” I asked dumbly. I couldn’t imagine that they would’ve risked their lives for me. I knew how dangerous that was firsthand, and even as much as I loved and wanted Hope, I hadn’t fought back for that very reason. I didn’t want to lose my life then, because it meant I’d lose my chance to get her back at any point in the future.
“We could’ve made it, too. We had you for almost two whole months when they finally found us,” she said.
Two months. The amount of time before I’d been adopted. So I hadn’t been in a holding center that whole time, like I was afraid of. I had been with my parents.
“What happened?” I asked.
Juno straightened up in her hospital bed as she prepared to tell me the story of my birth, and I held my breath in anticipation. After all these years, I’d finally know what had happened when I was taken from my parents by the regime.
“Culver and I met in school in Millville,” Juno began. “Back when it still had a school, that is. Your father was always a dreamer, but especially when he was a kid. He used to say that Millville was too small for him and that he was going to explore the world. He asked me to come with him.”
Juno smiled as she remembered my father. I tried to picture them together, young and full of optimism, but I had no idea what my father even looked like.
“We fell in love. And even though we never did get out of Millville, I like to think that he was still happy. We worked in the factory together and had a small apartment. Everything was as perfect as we could’ve expected it to be, under the circumstances. But I wanted more . . . One day I finally asked your father why he had never asked me to marry him. We had been together for years at that point. And I knew he loved me and wanted to be with me forever. So why no marriage? Of course, I didn’t expect a ring or a ceremony. I just wanted to be Mrs. Juno Wright. But when I asked him, I was surprised at his answer.”
I breathed in, realizing that I had been involuntarily holding my breath in excitement. I sat enraptured, waiting for her to go on.
“He said that marrying would make us more conspicuous to the government, that they would be keeping closer tabs on us. And he didn’t want that. Because he wanted to have a child. And we were going to keep that baby.”
Juno closed her eyes while I tried to process what she was saying. They had me on purpose? I knew that back then the CRAS wasn’t as widespread as it would eventually become, since Henry had been allowed to stay with his poor parents shortly before I was born, but Juno had to have known that they were at least at risk of losing me.
“I knew the government was ramping up their”—Juno sneered and placed a mocking emphasis on the next word—“redistributions.” She looked down aga
in before continuing. “But we were so naïve and impetuous. We thought maybe we wouldn’t be chosen by the CRAS, or that we could hide the pregnancy. So when I knew why Culver had been putting off asking me to marry him, I fell in love even harder. And soon we got our wish. We got you.”
She smiled and placed a hand on my shoulder. I smiled back, but inside I couldn’t help but wonder: Was it worth it to her? To get me if it meant losing the love of her life?
“When we found out you were coming, we still had hope that you wouldn’t be taken from us. But all of the pregnant women we knew were having their babies taken at that point. Wage decreases had sunk the entire town even further into poverty than it had already been, so we knew our town was marked—and that the CRAS might come for you. So I wore bulkier clothing and didn’t tell anyone, not even my closest friends. When it was no longer a possibility to hide my growing bump, I left the factory altogether. When we knew you were coming soon, Culver and I just picked up and left, pretending that we had gotten jobs in another factory town. Culver had been building a small cabin deep in the woods outside of Millville for months in preparation for your arrival. It was small and kind of drafty, but your father had spent a lot of hours late at night building it. He was quite the handyman. We had a garden and a fireplace and even a little crib that your father made.”
Culver, my father, had made me a crib with his own hands. It was a far cry from my worst fears of having not even been wanted.
“And then one day you came. I labored for hours, and your father was there beside me the entire time. When I thought I couldn’t do it any longer, he was still there, telling me how close we were to finally completing our family. I’ll never forget the love in his eyes when he looked at you for the first time. And I’ll never forget the love I felt for you myself. But I should’ve known that it would never last.”
The faint beeping sound coming from Juno’s monitors started to pick up, and I looked over to see that her pulse was quickening as she spoke.
“Because that was the first time that I had ever felt complete. It was the first time that I ever saw a future for myself and felt a purpose and a meaning in life outside of manual labor. And this regime couldn’t handle that. I should’ve known that they would never let someone of our status and background be happy and in love together as a family. And one day, sure enough, they came. I don’t know how they found us. Maybe it was the smoke. Maybe it was the rumors from Millville. But they came and they took you. And Culver tried to stop them, so they took him away from me too. I thought I’d be arrested, but I think the agents took pity on me. Or maybe they figured that keeping me alive and forcing me to return to my old life would be the worst punishment of all. And they were right.”
And then the tears that came from Juno weren’t tears of happiness or nostalgia. They were tears of raw pain. Her shoulders slumped forward in her sudden grief.
“I buried your father after they left. But then I didn’t know what to do. I thought about staying out there and just freezing to death in the cold or letting myself starve. I couldn’t imagine going on without you or Culver. But after several days alone out in the cold, I realized that if I let myself roll over and die, then I definitely wouldn’t ever see you again.”
Of everything that Juno had described, that was the emotion that I could relate to the most. I too had wondered what to do with myself after they ripped Hope away. How do you keep going when everything you love is suddenly lost?
“But there was a chance, if I could keep going, that maybe one day I would find you. So I went back to Millville. I went back to work in the factory as if nothing ever happened. And for almost twenty years I carried around a hole in my heart.”
Juno leaned forward and wrapped both of her arms around me again. And then she whispered one last thing into my ear.
“Today, it was finally filled again.”
I could no longer hold it back. With the end of Juno’s story, my tears flowed over, and the outpouring of grief and disbelief and love and joy overwhelmed both of us all over again.
12
Juno and I spent some time together in silence, just appreciating being reunited, and then continued telling each other about ourselves and our lives. I learned that Juno was an only child who had always wanted to have a big family. I told her about the Sylvones, my adoptive parents, and all of my adoptive siblings. She was pained and angry when I told her how I had been kicked out of the lap of luxury and sent packing to a hard life of Nurmeal and factory work.
“They kicked me out after I got pregnant with my daughter,” I had told her of my adoptive parents. I hadn’t wanted to tell her too much about them, since it might be painful for her to hear. I, for one, didn’t want to know too much about Hope’s adoptive parents, Mavis and Michael Preston. I preferred to think of them as villains and not real, feeling people. It made it easier to imagine taking Hope back from them.
“I can’t believe our government allows things like that to happen. Why rip you away from people who love you just to place you with people who would cast you aside like that?” Juno asked furiously.
I thought of Hope and nodded. Money was important, sure. We had to be able to afford to feed and clothe and house our children. But why take those children away from their poor parents and place them with the rich as opposed to helping the parents? What was the point? Was it just to save money? And if so, was money more important than the love a parent could provide?
What incentives were the government offering the rich? Why were they so willing to take children that weren’t even theirs? Could Hope’s adoptive mother love her as much as I did? Even so, why take her away from me if I could provide her the basics and love and protection?
“Is your daughter here?” Juno asked timidly.
I could tell by the reticence in her voice that she already knew the answer.
“Not yet,” I replied hopefully. She probably wouldn’t ever be in Brightbirch with me, but I had to believe that she’d be back with me someday. And then it wouldn’t matter where we were. “I lost her to the CRAS. I’ve pretty much been looking for her ever since.”
“I never thought I’d see you again, but here you are. So I know we’ll find her, too,” Juno said with a smile. “I can’t believe that I’m a grandmother! I can’t wait to meet her.”
I smiled back. It was a beautiful thing to hear. I tried to think about a life with so much of my family back together again. I thought of Juno holding Hope up in the air, cooing over her granddaughter. I thought of Jace looking lovingly on. I thought of Hope running over to me, giggling, and jumping into her mother’s arms. My heart expanded ten times over.
We weren’t there yet, but I had never been more resolved. We would get there eventually. No matter what it took.
Juno looked at me intently, as if she was trying to determine something.
“What is it?” I asked.
“You look so much like your father,” she said, reaching toward me to tuck a strand of dark blonde hair behind my ear. “Your hair color, your eyes. I can see so much of him in you.”
It shouldn’t have come as a surprise to me, since I obviously didn’t get my hair or eye color from Juno, but I hadn’t considered it previously. It made me feel closer to Culver in a way. And it also made me wonder what Hope looked like now. Had her dark hair lightened since I last held her? Did she have my straight hair or Henry’s curls?
I couldn’t wait to find out.
At some point when we were sitting quietly together, I noticed Juno grimacing in between breaths and had to remind myself that she had just been seriously injured only a couple of days prior. We had been so excited and happy to be in each other’s presence that I had forgotten all about the fact that we were sitting in a hospital room.
“Are you all right?” I asked with a renewed sense of concern. I had cared deeply about her even when she was just the woman from Millville who had stood up for me in the face of serious pressure. Now that I knew she was my mother, my concern for
her ran even deeper.
Juno exhaled painfully but managed a smile. “I’ll live,” she replied. “And frankly, I feel better today than I have in almost two decades.”
I narrowed my eyes. “But you’re hurting,” I said. “Do you need me to call a nurse?”
As if on cue, a kindly older woman walked in wearing nursing scrubs.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said upon entering. “I didn’t know you had a visitor.”
“It’s quite all right,” Juno said warmly.
I smiled at her kindness and hospitality. They were a sure sign of a good person. My adoptive parents had always treated servants and assistants like sub-humans, rarely bothering to address them unless it was to bark orders. But Juno spoke to the nurse kindly, like she was her equal and not a servant. Most of the poor people I had met were that way. I guessed it was an unexpected perk of growing up in poverty: You valued all human life, since no one had ever made you feel like you were worth more than anyone else.
“I’m here to give you your pain medicine. You need more rest,” the nurse explained, obviously giving me a hint that it was time to leave.
“No, I’m fine—”
“You need your medicine,” I said, unwilling to let her suffer for my sake. “Don’t worry. I’ll be back before you know it.”
Juno looked slightly defeated, but her physical discomfort was obvious. So I stood and allowed the nurse to approach with a syringe, and there was no more arguing from Juno.
When I leaned down to hug my mother, she spoke softly into my ear.
“Promise you’ll be back.”
I pulled away and looked into her eyes. There was a fear there that I hadn’t expected but which suddenly made a lot of sense. Juno had just found her daughter after nearly twenty years and was terrified of losing me again. I could empathize. If I ever brought Hope home, I knew I’d probably feel the same way.
The Child Thief 6: Zero Hour Page 9
