Claire’s words rattle around my skull while I lie awake that night, staring at the ceiling of the guest room with the surf pounding faintly below the cliff.
“You didn’t hear it from me,” she’d said, wiping down the espresso machine, her eyes fixed anywhere but my face. “But if you really want hospital gossip from back then, you talk to Joan Donnelly. She lives down on Sycamore, near the hardware store. She remembers everything. That’s her problem.”
I replay the way she’d lowered her voice on that last sentence and looked over my shoulder, scanning the café like there might be a Mercer crest hidden behind the chalkboard menu.
By morning, my resolve sits in my chest like a stone.
I wait until Daniel leaves for a conference call in the study, his laptop under his arm, his smile strained but dutiful. Evelyn’s voice drifts down the hall from the kitchen, smooth and bright as she directs the caterers over the phone. I tell Leonard I need my car for errands in town. The lie tastes sour on my tongue; I wash it down with coffee and an apology smile.
Outside, the air bites my cheeks. Woodsmoke from neighboring chimneys threads through the sharper smell coming up from the hospital on the hill, that faint disinfectant note I can never quite ignore now. The Mercer crest gleams on the gate as I drive out, abstract waves cut into iron, promising protection for those inside and something else for everyone else.
The main road curves through Harbor Glen’s manicured center, past boutiques with curated window displays and the banner announcing next week’s Light the Harbor boat parade. A glossy poster on a lamppost shows a yacht wrapped in white lights, “Mercer Foundation” printed below in festive script. Everyone will know exactly who stands on the top deck, champagne in hand. Everyone will pretend the donor wall at the hospital tells the whole story.
I cut away from the main road onto a narrower back street, the pavement scarred and patched. The houses here huddle closer together, clapboard and vinyl siding instead of stone and glass. Salt has chewed the bottoms of the mailboxes. Wind tosses last year’s parade flyers, now brittle and faded, against chain-link fences.
Sycamore Street is more aspiration than reality; two struggling trees lean in front of number twelve, branches bare and wrapped in a tangle of old holiday lights. The house itself is a squat Cape with peeling white paint and a roof that needs attention. A ceramic snowman by the front steps wears a cracked grin. A blue Mercy Hospital parking sticker still clings to the back window of a rusting sedan in the driveway.
I park at the curb, my heart thudding. The dashboard clock reads 10:14. Plenty of time to get answers and be back before anyone at the estate decides to check up on me.
The cold hits harder once I open the door. My boots crunch through shallow, older snow, the top layer hardened into crust. A small brass plaque beside the front door reads “Donnelly” in worn script. A faded sticker beneath it shows the Mercer crest again, this time under the words “Proud Partner in Community Health.”
I raise my hand and knock.
It takes a long minute before I hear a shuffle on the other side of the door, the scrape of a deadbolt, the rattle of a chain. When the door opens, a woman peers out through the gap: white hair clipped back, deep lines bracketing her mouth, eyes that miss nothing despite the foggy lenses of her glasses.
“Yes?” she says.
“Mrs. Donnelly?” I ask. “I’m Hannah. Claire from the café mentioned you. She said you…used to work at Harbor Glen Memorial.”
At the word “Claire,” her gaze flicks past my shoulder toward the street, scanning for an audience. She pushes the glasses up on her nose, considering me for a breath that stretches.
“You’re Daniel’s wife,” she says finally. Her accent rounds the vowels, a trace of Queens under decades of small-town smoothing. “From up on the cliff.”
The hair on my arms rises under my coat. “I am,” I admit. “But I’m also a social worker. I’m trying to understand some things that happened at the hospital years ago. Claire thought you might be able to…point me in the right direction.”
That earns me a grim little huff that might be a laugh.
“Claire should mind her own business,” she mutters, but she opens the door wider. “You’d better come in before you freeze solid. No one deserves Harbor Glen wind in their bones.”
Warmth and smell hit me together when I step over the threshold: old dust, lemon cleaner, and a thread of hospital disinfectant anchored deep into the walls, like she brought the scent of work home and it never quite left. The front room is crowded—bookshelves sagging with binders and photo albums, a sofa upholstered in a floral pattern worn pale at the arms, a coffee table covered in neatly stacked mail and a half-finished jigsaw puzzle of the harbor.
My eyes go to the walls. Almost every inch holds a frame: black-and-white photos of nurses in white caps, a younger Mrs. Donnelly among them, smiling and tired in group shots, standing in front of the hospital’s original brick entrance. A more recent color photo shows the modern glass Mercer Wing behind a ribbon-cutting crowd, the wave crest on a giant banner. Another displays the Light the Harbor parade at dusk, boats strung in lights, the largest yacht front and center with the Mercer logo on the prow.
“You can hang your coat there,” she says, pointing to a crowded hook by the door. “Watch the rug. It curls.”
I step carefully over the corner she means, the edge flipped up like a tongue. I shrug off my coat and scarf, draping them over a rare empty peg, and follow her into the tiny kitchen where a kettle whistles on the stove.
“Tea?” she asks. “Coffee?”
“Tea would be great,” I say, my own voice sounding too careful in my ears.
She lifts the kettle with practiced economy of motion, pours into two mismatched mugs, and drops a tea bag in each. Steam curls up, carrying faint peppermint. Her hands shake only slightly.
“I worked maternity thirty years,” she says without preamble. “Started when it was Glen Memorial, before the Foundation plastered their name over everything.” She slides a mug toward me across the worn linoleum table. “You don’t want sugar from that bowl. It clumps.”
“Thank you,” I say, wrapping my fingers around the mug for steadiness more than warmth. “Claire mentioned you’d have stories. I don’t want to pry where I shouldn’t, but—”
“Then you’re in the wrong town,” she interrupts, one corner of her mouth twitching. “This place runs on prying. Only question is who you’re prying into.” Her gaze sharpens. “You’re not recording me, right?”
I lift my hands. “No. No recording. Just me. I left my phone in my coat pocket.”
She nods once. “Good. Phones have ears now.” She takes a sip, lips pursing at the heat, then sets the mug down with a soft thud. “So. What did Claire tell you?”
“Only that you worked in maternity during the years of the…” I swallow. I have to say the word. “The Mercer boating accident. And that before everything became…digitized, there were more paper records. More room for…variation.”
Her fingers drum once on the table. The sound is sharp in the small room.
“Variation,” she repeats. “Fancy word for sloppiness. Or favors.”
“Favors?” I ask.
She exhales through her nose. “Important families get…flexibility. That’s not a Harbor Glen thing, that’s everywhere. But here, the important families all live on that strip of rock out there.” She jerks her head in the direction of the peninsula. “They cut the ribbons, pay for the MRI machines, sponsor the Light the Harbor parade. You think when they want something done, we tell them no?”
“What kind of things did they want done?” I keep my voice low, my grip tight on the mug.
She looks at the wall over my shoulder, eyes tracking a photo I can’t see without turning. “Sometimes it’s simple,” she says. “Private rooms. Extra nurses. Phone calls to the right specialist. Sometimes it’s paperwork moving a little faster for an adoption, a baby going home with an aunt instead of into the system. No one cries over that. Everyone’s grateful.”
“And other times?” I press gently.
Her mouth thins. “Other times, the phone ringing at the nurse’s desk isn’t a social worker or a pediatrician. It’s the administrator. Or someone from the Foundation office. Telling you, ‘This chart isn’t yours now, Joan. You give it to Mr. So-and-So. You don’t make copies.’ Telling you, ‘This baby’s discharge is being handled directly. You do what the doctor orders and keep your notes brief.’”
A chill moves up my spine that has nothing to do with the weather.
“Babies without full paperwork,” I say. “Without the usual forms.”
“Babies who skip lines,” she says. Her eyes return to mine. “You work social work, you know what that means.”
“It means someone can vanish them,” I say, the words rough. “On paper.”
She flinches, just slightly.
I lean forward. “Mrs. Donnelly, I found an early police report from the boating accident. It mentioned two minors unaccounted for at the scene. Later versions…don’t.” I see the muscles in her jaw tighten. “And there’s a trust document for a ‘second daughter’ with terms that read like a payoff for staying away. I’m trying to understand whether a baby tied to that tragedy passed through your ward.”
“You shouldn’t talk about things you don’t understand,” she murmurs, but her gaze has gone unfocused, like she’s watching a reel in her head. “That night…” Her thumb rubs a groove into the ceramic of her mug. “We got a call from the ER. Boat accident. Cold water. Child in distress. We prepped an incubator, warming blankets, the whole protocol. Then admin rang. Said the family name. Told us to be ready for…special handling.”
My pulse throbs in my throat.
“Special handling,” I repeat.
“Different rules,” she says. “No hallway chatter. No names at the desk. You write ‘Baby Girl’ on the board, not the surname. You don’t talk to the other families about the crying in the corner room. You keep your head down when the suits show up and start closing doors.”
“Suits from where?” I whisper.
“From upstairs,” she says. “From the Foundation, from the lawyers, I don’t know. Men in coats who smelled like expensive soap and didn’t look at the babies unless they were in a photograph.”
“And the baby?” I ask. “Did she live?”
Her eyes snap back to mine. For a heartbeat, something raw and guilty flashes there.
“I’m not God,” she says. “I don’t declare life or death.”
“But you saw her,” I say. “You held her.”
Her hand trembles around the mug.
“Tiny thing,” she says. “Dark hair plastered to her skull. Blue lips. Fingers still fighting. I remember that.” Her throat works. “Some of us…some of us stayed past our shifts that week. We thought…” She cuts herself off, clamps her lips shut.
Hope surges in me, bright and painful. “You thought she might make it.”
Her gaze skitters away to a cluster of frames on the far wall, to a photo of herself in younger years holding a bundled infant, smiling at the camera. I notice, for the first time, a small silver frame tucked beside it: a snapshot of a hospital hallway plaque dedication. The Mercer crest sits at the top. Below, engraved names list donors. Robert and Evelyn Mercer near the top. Staff names lower down, including “J. Donnelly, RN.”
“Were there adoptions connected to that baby?” I ask. “Arrangements outside the usual system? A placement tied to a trust? I saw language about ‘medical documentation irregularities.’”
The mug leaves her hand so fast that tea sloshes over the rim onto the table. She grips the edge of the formica with both hands, knuckles whitening.
“You shouldn’t have that,” she whispers. “You have no business reading those words.”
“Someone does,” I say. “Someone has to, or that child never existed.”
“Stop,” she says. She darts a glance at the tiny digital clock on the microwave, then at the window over the sink, its blinds half-closed. Her breathing quickens. “You think you’re the first person to come sniffing around with phrases like ‘documentation irregularities’? You think this town lets those people stay?”
“I’m not an investigator,” I say. “I’m family. I’m married to Daniel. Doesn’t that—”
“Make it worse,” she cuts in. “That makes it worse. If you talk, you’re not a stranger they can swat away. You are one of theirs. They will fix you.”
My stomach flips. “Fix me how?”
“Hannah.” She lowers her voice, my name turning into a plea. “Those lawyers Evelyn keeps on retainer? They don’t just send letters. They dig. They find everything. The missed rent payments, the old DUI, the brother who sold pills in college. They build a picture of a person who can’t be trusted. And if they can’t find enough, they nudge. They…encourage breakdowns.”
“You’re talking about me,” I say quietly. “About what they’d do to me.”
“I’m talking about anyone who won’t shut their mouth,” she says. “Including old nurses with mortgages and grandchildren who need college funds.” She pushes back her chair abruptly. The legs scrape over linoleum, loud in the small room. “You need to leave.”
“Mrs. Donnelly, please.” I stand too, heat rising up my neck. “I’m not trying to drag you into anything. I just need to know if the hospital helped the Mercers move a child—”
“Do not say their name in my kitchen,” she hisses.
The ferocity in her voice startles me into silence. Her face has gone bloodless, eyes bright with a fear that looks freshly cut, not decades old.
“They gave my husband a job when the plant closed,” she says, words coming fast now, like something breaking loose. “They paid his chemo bills when our insurance ran out. They put my name on that plaque.” Her hand jerks toward the hallway. “You think that doesn’t mean they can take everything away just as quick?”
“Would they really do that,” I ask, “for telling the truth?”
“Truth is what they print on those glossy brochures,” she says. “Truth is what’s etched on the donor wall. That’s the only kind that matters in court, in this town.” She moves toward the doorway, one hand outstretched, not quite touching my arm but herding me all the same. “You want to play hero, you do it without dragging me back into it.”
Guilt punches through my chest.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” I say. “I promise.”
“Then forget my name,” she snaps. “Forget I made your tea. Forget Claire ran her mouth. Burn whatever you printed. Go back up to that glass palace and smile when they take your picture at Light the Harbor. That’s how people survive here.”
“You didn’t,” I say softly. “You stayed. You remember. That tells me you don’t think everything they did was…harmless.”
Her jaw clenches. For a moment, I think she might throw me out bodily.
Instead, she leans in, eyes bright with something like anger wrapped around terror.
“Harmless?” she whispers. “Babies disappeared. Mothers got told there was a mix-up, or that the child didn’t make it, and the death record went one way while the baby went another. You think I don’t see those faces when I close my eyes?” Her voice cracks on that last word. She straightens, wiping at her mouth. “That’s all you get. And it’s more than is safe. Now go.”
My heart slams against my ribs. “The baby from the accident,” I ask, one last push, desperation shredding my tact. “Was she one of those?”
Her eyes flood with tears so quickly they shine.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says in a flat, practiced tone. “I never saw any baby tied to any Mercer accident. That’s the truth I give anyone who asks.”
The switch is jarring. Her face closes over like ice crusting on a puddle.
“Mrs. Donnelly—”
“Out.” She points toward the front door, not looking at me now. “And don’t come back. Don’t call. Don’t send anyone. I have nothing to say to you, Mrs. Mercer. Nothing at all.”
The title scrapes across my skin. I obey, because staying feels like holding a match over a stack of her life.
I grab my coat and scarf from the peg, fingers clumsy. In the hallway, the frames watch me pass—smiling nurses, beveled plaques, the Mercer crest repeated and repeated until my eyes blur. I catch one last image as I reach the door: a grainy photo tucked in the corner of a larger frame, partially obscured by glare. A dark-haired infant in a hospital bassinet, a handwritten label on the plastic reading only “Baby G.”
My hand twitches toward it, but Mrs. Donnelly’s footsteps sound behind me.
“Door,” she says.
I open it. Cold air slaps my face, clearing the sting in my eyes. The street is quiet, just the distant hum of a truck on the main road and the faint call of gulls from the harbor.
“I’m sorry,” I say, turning back. “For bringing this to your door.”
For a second, regret softens her features.
“You should be sorry for yourself, not me,” she murmurs. “They don’t forgive disobedient daughters. Not the born ones, not the married ones.”
Then she closes the door gently, firmly, the latch clicking into place with a finality that vibrates through my chest.
I stand on the porch for a few breaths, staring at the chipped paint and the warped welcome mat. The smell of someone’s fireplace drifts down the block, sweet and thick. Beyond the houses, the hospital rises on its hill, glass and steel catching a weak strip of winter sun. Somewhere inside those walls, a baby’s record got stripped down to “Baby G,” and whatever connected her to the Mercers got buried under “special handling.”
I walk back to my car, my boots leaving deep prints in the thin snow. Once inside, I close the door and lean my forehead against the steering wheel, breathing in the stale scent of coffee and Daniel’s cologne trapped in the upholstery.
Mrs. Donnelly is right. I did drag that woman back toward a past that already haunts her. I also heard exactly what I needed: admissions, however oblique, that babies disappeared, that the Foundation’s love for “at-risk children” sometimes came with paperwork that vanished inconvenient mothers.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I swipe the screen. A text from Daniel glows: “Roads on the main hill are icy. If you’re coming back, take the side road past the docks—less traffic, better plowed. Love you.”
I stare at the words. The harbor road—narrow, prone to black ice, hugging the water before looping back up toward the cliff. Evelyn’s warning about “treacherous roads for the unprepared” brushes the back of my mind like a cold finger.
I tuck the phone back into my coat, start the engine, and pull away from the curb. At the intersection, I pause with my blinker ticking, torn between the straight shot up the main hill and the left turn toward the docks, toward the quiet back road Daniel recommends.
I glance in the rearview mirror toward Mrs. Donnelly’s house, small and stubborn under the gray sky, then toward the distant shape of the Mercer estate clinging to the cliff.
“They don’t forgive disobedient daughters,” she said.
I take a breath that tastes like salt and exhaust, tighten my grip on the wheel, and flick the blinker left, committing myself to the narrow road skirting the harbor, every turn ahead carrying the weight of the stories no one in this town wants to tell.