For the past month, there was a crazy woman standing at the school gate waiting for Mad to finish school, looking at him as if she wanted to say something… until the day I met her again in my own living room… ————-

The gates of St. Jude High School, a school for the East Coast elite, were always crowded with luxury SUVs and well-dressed parents. But for the past three months, that picture-perfect scene had been marred by an ink stain.

She was always there. Beside the old oak tree across from the school gate.

Her gray trench coat was frayed, her chestnut hair was pulled back into a messy bun, and her sneakers were covered in mud. She didn’t look like the homeless people you’d see on the New York subway. She was clean, but she had the exhausted look of someone who’d walked a thousand miles.

And those eyes. Those dark, sunken eyes, always fixed on me.

“Clara, the Mad Lady is looking at you again,” Jessica whispered, nudging my arm as we walked out the school gates.

I shivered, pulling up the collar of my uniform. “Don’t call her that.”

“But she is! The security guards chased her away three times, and she still comes back. Just stands there, staring at the students. My mom says she’s a pervert, or a mother who’s lost her child and gone crazy.”

I peeked across the street. She was still standing there, as still as a wax statue. When our eyes met, she didn’t smile or wave. She just looked, a piercing, heartbroken look so terrible that it made my chest tighten. There was a strange familiarity in that look, something I didn’t dare admit to myself.

I hurried into the waiting black Mercedes. My mom, Anne, was in the driver’s seat, her hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly her knuckles were white.

“Is she still there?” Mom asked, her voice tense, her eyes glancing in the rearview mirror.

“Yes. Mom, should we…”

“No!” Mom interrupted, starting the car and pressing the accelerator a little too hard. “Don’t ever look at her, Clara. Don’t ever talk to strangers. Your dad’s called the sheriff. They’ll have her in a mental institution soon.”

I stared silently through the window. The woman’s figure gradually faded into the October drizzle. A vague unease rose in my heart. Why were my parents—always calm and authoritative—so afraid of a homeless woman?

Two weeks later, on a rainy Friday evening.

I returned home from a late musical rehearsal. My family’s villa was isolated on a hill, surrounded by dense pine forests. Normally, the living room lights would be on and the smell of food from the kitchen would be wafting in. But today, the house was dark, except for the yellow light from the living room.

The front door was unlocked.

I pushed it open and walked in. “Dad? Mom? I’m home.”

There was no answer. Only the sound of rain hitting the windows and the crackling of the fireplace.

I walked into the living room and froze.

My father, Robert – a famous lawyer at the largest law firm in the state – was leaning against the fireplace, his hand shaking so much that the wine spilled out. My mother was huddled on the sofa, her face buried in her hands, her shoulders shaking.

And sitting across from them, on the expensive velvet armchair, was her.

The woman at the school gate.

She was soaked. Rainwater dripped from her tangled hair onto the Persian rug. But she sat there with the posture of a superior, her back straight, her eyes blazing as she stared at my parents.

“Clara…” My mother raised her head, her face smeared with mascara. “Run! Go to your room! She’s crazy! She broke in here!”

I was about to back away, fumbling for my phone to call 911. But the woman’s voice rang out. Not hoarse as I’d imagined, but clear, resonant, and powerful.

“Don’t go, Emily. Come here.”

Emily?

I stopped. That name… Why did it make my heart skip a beat?

“What the hell are you talking about? I’m Clara!” I shouted, fear turning to anger. “Get out of my house now!”

The woman slowly stood up. She pulled a crumpled plastic envelope from her wet pocket and threw it on the coffee table.

“Ask them,” she pointed at my parents. Her voice shook with suppressed anger. “Ask them how much Clara is worth? Fifty thousand dollars? A hundred thousand dollars?”

“Shut up!” my father roared, lunging to grab her. “I’ll call the police! You’re trespassing!”

“Call them!” she yelled back, her eyes blazing with wildness. “Call the police, Robert! I’ll tell them about Julian Calloway!”

The name paralyzed my father like a spell. He stopped in the middle of the room, his face drained of color. My mother screamed in pain, covering her ears.

I looked at my father, then at my mother. Their panic wasn’t fear of being attacked. It was fear of being exposed.

“Who is Julian Calloway?” I asked, my voice trembling.

The woman stepped toward me. This time, I didn’t back away. I saw in her eyes not madness, but a reflection of myself. Rare amber eyes. My eyes.

“You’re not Clara,” she said, tears streaming down her cheeks. “You’re Emily. Emily Rose. Sixteen years ago, on May 12, I gave you

You went to Central Park in New York. I only turned my back for 30 seconds to throw away the ice cream wrapper… Just 30 seconds…”

She hiccupped, reaching out to touch my cheek but pulling back, afraid that I would panic.

“When I turned back, the cart was empty.”

“You’re lying!” My mother—the mother who raised me—rushed forward, hugging me tightly. “Don’t listen to her, Clara! She’s crazy! We legally adopted you! We have papers! You’re an orphan, and your biological mother is a young teenage girl who signed the papers voluntarily!”

“Papers?” The woman laughed bitterly. She pointed to the envelope on the table. “Open it, my daughter. It has a picture of you at 1 year old. And more importantly, a red maple leaf birthmark just below your left rib. A birthmark that my ‘parents’ have never been able to explain its origin.”

I was stunned. My hand unconsciously touched my left hip through my sweater. That birthmark… I always thought it was congenital. My parents said it was an angel’s mark.

I gently pushed my mother away, stepped forward to pick up the envelope. My father tried to snatch it, but I glared at him. A cold look I had never had before.

Inside the envelope were old yellowed newspapers.
14-MONTH-OLD GIRL MISSING IN CENTRAL PARK.
SINGLE MOTHER DESPERATELY LOOKING FOR HER.

And the photo. A little girl was grinning, with unmistakable amber eyes. The baby was wearing a camisole embroidered with the word “Emily”.

I turned to look at my parents. They no longer had their usual dignity. They were withdrawn again, small and guilty.

“Dad… Mom…” I whispered. “Tell me the truth.”

My father collapsed into his chair, burying his head in his hands.

“We… we didn’t know you were kidnapped,” he said, his voice breaking. “We swear, Clara. We’ve been barren for 10 years. We went to Julian Calloway. He’s the most famous adoption attorney on the East Coast. He said… he said he had a ‘secret’ case. A young mother who wanted to remain anonymous. He wanted $200,000 in cash to speed up the process.”

“And you believed him?” I asked, tears welling up.

“We wanted to believe him!” My mother sobbed. “When we saw you… you were so beautiful, so perfect. When he gave us the fake papers, we… we ignored the absurdities. We ignored the lack of an original birth certificate right away. We just wanted you!”

“Your selfishness has taken my life!” the woman—my biological mother—shouted. “Sixteen years! I lost my job, my house, my husband because I spent every penny, every minute, looking for her! While you lived in luxury on my pain!”

“Julian Calloway was arrested two months ago for child trafficking,” she turned to me, her voice softening. “When the police searched his office, they found a black book. It had your name in it. And the address of this house.”

The room fell into a deadly silence. Only the sound of the rain outside could be heard.

I looked at the strange woman in front of me. The one who had stood in the rain for the past three months just to see me leave school. The one who had lost everything because of me.

Then I looked at my adoptive parents. The people who had loved me, given me piano lessons, sent me on trips to Europe, but that love was built on a cruel lie. They hadn’t kidnapped me, but they had bought me. They had chosen to be blind to crime to satisfy their desire.

The sound of police sirens echoed in the distance, echoing through the pine forest.

“Who called?” my mother asked in panic.

“Me,” my biological mother said. “I didn’t come here to kidnap her back. I’ve come to get justice.”

The door swung open. The red and blue lights of the police car swept through the living room, illuminating the pale faces.

The sheriff entered, followed by two officers. He looked at my father with concern but determination.

“Mr. Robert, Mrs. Anne. We have an arrest warrant for Julian Calloway’s child trafficking ring and federal forgery.”

My mother collapsed to the floor, screaming my name. My father stood up, holding out his hands for the officer to put cold handcuffs on his wrists.

I stood alone in the middle of the living room. On one side was my strange biological mother in tattered clothes. On the other were my adoptive parents in designer clothes being led away.

“Clara…” my adoptive mother called back as she was dragged to the door.

I didn’t answer. I turned to the woman standing shivering by the fireplace. She looked at me, her eyes both hopeful and scared. She didn’t dare come closer, afraid I would push her away.

I took a step toward her. Then another.

“Your name is Emily?” I asked softly.

She nodded, tears falling like rain. “Yes, Emily. I’m sorry I lost you.”

I didn’t hug her right away. Sixteen years couldn’t be covered in a hug. But I reached out and took her calloused, rough hand.

“I don’t know what to do,” I confessed.

“Neither do I,” she squeezed my hand. “But we have time. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll never take my eyes off you again.”

The door closed behind my foster parents. In the flickering light of the fireplace, the luxurious mansion suddenly felt cold and unfamiliar. But the warmth of the woman’s hand beside me—a warmth I had never known was mine—was warm.

longing – began to creep into my frozen heart.

I looked out the window, where darkness fell. Clara had died tonight. And from the ashes of lies, Emily began to take her first painful breaths.

THE END