Chapter 6 - Saint Mercy
Saint Mercy Home for Children had been abandoned for nearly a decade.
The building stood behind an iron gate covered in vines.
Mave entered first.
The hallway smelled of dust and old paper.
Augustine followed with a small team.
Wendell remained outside.
Azie stayed in the car.
He had not spoken to Mave since the night of the party.
Inside the building, Mave found dozens of empty rooms.
Small beds.
Metal cabinets.
Broken toys.
She touched one wooden horse.
Juny had loved wooden toys.
Then she noticed a mural on the wall.
Sunflowers.
Three children.
And a small girl holding a red toy car.
Mave's legs nearly gave out.
“Mommy.”
The word came from memory, not from the room.
She closed her eyes.
When she opened them, Augustine was beside her.
“There.”
He pointed to a door.
Scratched into the wood were three letters.
J.C.
Mave touched them.
Azi entered.
He saw the marks.
“She was here.”
“How do you know?”
“Because the children used initials when they weren't allowed to use names.”
Mave looked at him.
“You knew.”
“I suspected.”
“Stop saying that.”
He nodded.
They searched the building.
In a basement office, they found records.
The children had been assigned new names.
Juny had been listed as June Mercer.
Age six.
Transferred from Rhode Island.
Medical condition stabilized.
Placement pending.
There was no adoption record.
No death record.
No final disposition.
Mave stared at the page.
“Where did they send her?”
Wendell found a second file.
“There's a foster family.”
Connecticut.
The surname Mercer.
Mave looked up.
“Mercer.”
Augustine checked the address.
The family still existed.
Mave's hands shook.
They drove there.
An older woman answered the door.
Her face changed when she saw the photograph Mave held.
“You're her mother.”
Mave could barely speak.
“You know her?”
The woman looked toward the street.
“You shouldn't be here.”
Augustine stepped forward.
“Where is she?”
The woman began to cry.
“She was with us for two years.”
“Where is she now?”
“She ran away.”
“When?”
“Sixteen.”
Mave stared.
“How old is she now?”
“Seventeen.”
Mave's heart stopped.
“She's alive.”
The woman nodded.
“Her name isn't June anymore.”
“What does she call herself?”
The woman whispered:
“Juni.”
Mave closed her eyes.
Juny.
Even after everything, the name had remained.
The woman handed Mave a photograph.
A teenage girl.
Ash-brown hair.
Green eyes.
A familiar smile.
Mave sank onto the porch step.
“She has my smile.”
Augustine sat beside her.
The woman explained everything.
Juny had been transferred into foster care under a fabricated identity.
She remembered almost nothing before age eight.
But she always carried a red toy car.
She had nightmares about a woman in uniform.
Every time somebody asked who the woman was, Juny answered the same thing.
“My mommy.”
Mave pressed the photograph to her chest.
“Where is she?”
The woman pointed toward Providence.
“She left three months ago.”
“Why?”
“She said she had found a place where people wouldn't ask her who she was.”
Mave looked at Augustine.
Ashgrove.
Her daughter's hiding place was close to the one place Mave had chosen for herself.
They returned to Providence.
That evening, Mave sat in the kitchen.
The 2:00 a.m. lamp was on.
Augustine placed two cups of coffee on the table.
“You don't have to sleep.”
“I know.”
“You don't have to talk.”
“I know.”
She opened the drawer beside the stove.
Inside was something she had hidden fourteen months ago.
A little folded paper.
She unfolded it.
A child's handwriting.
Mommy, don't forget me.
Mave had found it in the last apartment she shared with Juny.
She thought she had lost it.
“I never showed this to anyone.”
Augustine sat across from her.
“Why now?”
“Because I think she wrote it before she disappeared.”
“She was six.”
“Yes.”
“What does it mean?”
Mave looked at the page.
“I promised I wouldn't forget her.”
“And you didn't.”
She looked at him.
“Did you ever lose someone?”
He did not answer immediately.
“My father.”
“I know.”
“My mother.”
Mave waited.
“She was alive when she left.”
“Left?”
“Someone took her.”
Mave's eyes softened.
“What happened?”
“I found out years later she had been hiding from people who wanted leverage over my family.”
“Did you find her?”
“No.”
Mave looked at him.
“Then maybe that's why you understand.”
“Maybe.”
For the first time, Augustine touched her face.
He did not kiss her.
He simply brushed a tear from her cheek.
Mave closed her eyes.
Then a noise came from the hallway.
A child’s voice.
“Mommy?”
Mave jumped up.
The voice came again.
“Mommy?”
She ran into the foyer.
The front door opened.
A teenage girl stood there.
She held a red toy car.
Mave stopped.
The girl stared back.
Neither moved.
Then the girl whispered:
“Mave?”
Not Mommy.
Not yet.
Mave's breath broke.
“Juny?”
The girl cried.
And then they ran into each other.
Mave fell to her knees.
Juny wrapped her arms around her.
“I thought you were dead.”
Mave sobbed into her hair.
“I thought you were dead.”
“I looked for you.”
“So did I.”
“I remember the beach.”
Mave froze.
“What?”
“The ice cream.”
She laughed through tears.
“You hated socks.”
Juny pulled back.
“I still do.”
For fourteen years, Mave had preserved memories of a child frozen in time.
But the child in her arms was no longer six.
She was seventeen.
She was alive.
And she had found her way home.
Augustine stood several feet away.
He looked down.
He gave them their moment.
Juny eventually looked toward him.
“Who is he?”
Mave wiped her tears.
“Augustine.”
Juny studied him.
“He looks scary.”
Augustine nodded.
“I have been told that.”
Juny smiled.
That night was the first time Ashgrove had ever felt like a home.
But in the morning, a problem remained.
Cordelia had disappeared.
And she had taken something with her.
Wendell brought Augustine the message.
“She left a note.”
“What does it say?”
Wendell handed it over.
FOR EVERY SECRET YOU FOUND, I HAVE ONE YOU DIDN'T.
At the bottom was an address.
And beneath it were five words.
May you like
COME ALONE, AUGUSTINE.
THE GIRL IS THE PRICE.
