Page 7 of Broken Secrets
I grab the permission slip and start filling it out while eating. Name, address, grade… Then I get to the emergency contact section. There are spaces for two contacts besides parents. I write Maya’s name and number first, then pause at the second line.
“Robert,” I say, glancing up at him. “What’s your relationship to me? Like, legally?”
He looks up from his iPad, eyebrows raised. “What do you mean?”
“I mean…” I tap the pen against the form. “Like, are you my legal guardian? Did you adopt me?”
Mom freezes at the stove. Robert sets down his coffee mug slowly.
“Why are you asking?” Mom’s voice is carefully controlled.
“Because I need an emergency contact, and I don’t know what to write. Like, if something happened to me at school, would they legally be allowed to call Robert?”
“We’ve been together for twelve years, Liv,” Robert says gently. “I’ve been in your life since you were six. Of course they’d call me.”
“But legally?”
“We are married, so I am your stepdad, so legally they can contact me.”
“Okay,” I say.
Robert reaches over and squeezes my shoulder. “You know I love you like you’re my daughter, right? Paperwork doesn’t change that.”
“I know.” And I do know. Robert’s been to every soccer game, helped with homework, taught me to drive, scared away boys who weren’t good enough. He’s been more of a father to me than most of my friends’ actual fathers. But why isn’t it official? Why isn’t there paperwork?
More questions without answers. The theme of my life, apparently.
I finish the permission slip and hand it to her to sign. She scribbles her signature without really looking at it.
“I need to grab a stapler from your office,” I tell her. “The pages are separating.”
“Go ahead. It’s in the top drawer.”
Mom’s home office is really just the formal dining room we never use, converted with a desk and filing cabinets. The stapler is exactly where she said it would be, but as I’m reaching for it, I notice other papers in the drawer. Legal-looking documents with official letterheads.
I know I shouldn’t look.
But my name catches my eye on one document. Olivia Anne Kline. And another name I recognize now, Jeremy Cole Kline.
My father’s full name is right there on my birth certificate.
My hands shake as I pull the document out. It’s definitely my birth certificate.
I’m so focused on the birth certificate that I almost miss the folder underneath it. The tab reads “Legal - DO NOT OPEN” in my mom’s careful handwriting.
My heart pounds. What’s in there that’s so secret it needs a warning label?
I want to look, but footsteps in the hallway make me quickly put the birth certificate back and grab the stapler.
When I get back to the kitchen, Mom and Robert are cleaning up breakfast.
“Got it,” I say, holding up the stapled permission slip, trying to keep my voice normal.
I grab my backpack, but my mind is spinning. Everything I found online last night is confirmed by the birth certificate. Jeremy Cole Kline isn’t just a possibility, he’s my father. And he was living in Grand Rapids eighteen years ago, the same city where his electrical business is now.
“Liv?” Robert’s voice breaks through my thoughts. “You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Tired,” I manage. “I should get to school.”
