Chapter Two
I stare at my phone until the screen goes dark, then flip it face down on my nightstand.
The burger sits half-eaten on the plate beside me, cold and unappetizing.
Through my bedroom walls, I can hear my mom moving around downstairs, dishes clinking, the dishwasher humming to life, her footsteps on the hardwood.
Normal sounds of a normal evening. Except nothing about this feels normal anymore.
“We’ll figure it out.”
Her words replay in my head, but they sound less like a promise and more like another way to avoid the truth. How many times has she said that over the years? When I asked why I didn’t have grandparents on Dad’s side. I wondered why there were no photos of him anywhere in the house.
We’ll figure it out. Translation: I’ll keep making excuses until you stop asking.
I grab my laptop from my desk and settle back against my pillows. If she won’t give me answers, maybe I can find them myself.
The search bar stares at me, cursor blinking. What do I even search for? I don’t have much to go on, only “Jeremy” and “Michigan” and eighteen years of her refusing to talk about him.
I type out his name, location and job before I can second-guess myself.
The search results load, and my heart pounds as I scroll through them. LinkedIn profiles, business listings, contractor websites. Common enough name that there are dozens of Jeremys in Michigan who work in electrical.
Then I see it, halfway down the page: Kline Electric - Family Owned Since 2010 - Jeremy Kline, Owner/Operator.
Kline. My last name.
My hands shake as I click the link. The website loads slowly, revealing a professional-looking page with a photo of a man in a work shirt standing next to a utility truck. He looks older than I expected, maybe early forties, with lines around his eyes and graying hair at his temples.
However, something about his appearance takes my breath away.
I look like him. My jawline is his and we share a smile,
The About Us page describes his experience—over twenty years as an electrician and started his own company after working for larger firms. It mentions his commitment to serving the community and his expertise in residential and commercial work.
Standard business website stuff. Nothing personal.
But then I find the “Our Family” section, and the world tilts sideways.
A photo loads and it’s Jeremy with his arm around a blond woman with a bright smile. Between them stands a girl who looks about my age, maybe slightly younger, with Jeremy’s green eyes and the woman’s golden hair.
The caption reads: “Jeremy, Lilly, and Emma Kline - Committed to serving our community and each other.”
Emma.
My father has another daughter named Emma.
The laptop screen blurs as tears fill my eyes. All this time, I thought I was alone. That I was the only evidence my parents’ relationship ever existed.
But I’m not alone. Somewhere in Michigan, there’s a girl named Emma who has everything I’ve wondered about my entire life. She knows what our father’s laugh sounds like. She probably has family dinners and inside jokes and a thousand memories I’ll never have.
She has the life I was supposed to have.
I screenshot the family photo with shaking hands, needing proof this is real. Then I close the laptop and stare at the ceiling, my heart racing worse than it has all week.
My father isn’t just “dead to Mom.” He’s alive, and he has a family. A family that doesn’t include me.
The next morning, I brush my teeth and stare at my reflection. Same green eyes as my mom, same stubborn chin. Now I know I’m not the only one who has them.
I head downstairs following the scent of coffee and the sound of Robert’s morning news podcast. He’s at the kitchen island, iPad propped against his coffee mug, reading glasses perched on his nose.
Mom’s at the stove making scrambled eggs, her hair in a messy bun that somehow looks effortlessly perfect.
“Morning, sunshine,” Robert says without glancing up from his screen. “How’d you sleep?”
“Fine,” I lie, sliding onto one of the bar stools. I’d spent most of the night staring at the ceiling, thinking about Emma Kline and the family photo that proves my father moved on without me.
Mom glances over my shoulder at me. “You look tired. Are you feeling all right? Any chest pain?”
“I’m fine, Mom.”
She sets a plate of eggs and toast in front of me along with a glass of orange juice. “Don’t forget you have the permission slip for the Catalina Island trip. It’s due today.”
Right. The senior class trip. I’d completely forgotten about it with everything else going on. “Where is it?”
“Kitchen counter, by the fruit bowl.” She points with her spatula. “Needs your signature and mine.”
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.”
The name Jeremy Cole Kline echoes in my head all morning like a song I can’t get rid of. During first period chemistry, I find myself writing his name in my notebook margins, testing how it looks in my handwriting.
Maya notices I’m distracted during lunch, but she doesn’t push.
Maybe she’s finally getting the hint that I need space to figure things out.
Or maybe she’s tired of me being weird and evasive.
Either way, I’m grateful for the relative quiet as I pick at my sandwich and watch the waves crash against the shore in the distance.
“You’re doing that thing again,” Derek says, dropping onto the bench beside me.
“What thing?”
“The thing where you disappear inside your own head.” He steals one of my chips without asking. “Want to talk about whatever’s making you write mystery names in your chemistry notes?”
My cheeks burn. “You saw that?”
“Hard to miss when you’re sitting right next to me.” He bumps my shoulder with his. “So who’s Jeremy Cole Kline? New boyfriend I should be jealous of?”
The casual way he says it makes something flutter in my chest, but I push the feeling aside. “It’s…complicated.”
“Most things worth talking about are.”
I study his face. Derek’s been in my life for years, steady as the tide. He knows about my anxiety before big games, knows I eat pizza with ranch dressing, knows I’m terrible at parallel parking. But he doesn’t know this. Nobody does.
“It’s my dad’s name.”
His expression shifts immediately. “Your dad?”
I nod, pulling apart my sandwich instead of meeting his eyes. “Found it on my birth certificate this morning.”
“Wow.” He doesn’t try to fill the silence with empty words, which is one of the things I’ve always liked about Derek. He lets me process.
“The worst part is my mom acting like it’s some huge secret. Like knowing his name is going to destroy my life or something.” I finally look up. “But I have this heart thing that might be genetic, and the doctors need family medical history, and she’s still being all mysterious about it.”
“Have you tried looking him up?”
“I already did,” I admit. “Last night. I found his business website.”
He leans forward, interested. “And?”
“And he has another family. A wife and a daughter who looks about our age.” The words taste bitter. “They look really happy together.”
“Must have been hard to see.”
“I always thought maybe he didn’t know about me. Like my mom never told him she was pregnant or something. But seeing him with this other family…” I trail off. “It’s pretty clear he chose them over us.”
“Or maybe there’s more to the story than you know.”
I give him a look. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I mean, you’ve been operating on eighteen years with basically no information. Maybe your mom had reasons for keeping him away that had nothing to do with him not wanting you.”
The bell rings signaling the end of lunch. Around us, everyone starts gathering their trash and heading back to class. But I stay put, staring at Derek.
“You think I should ask her about it? Directly?”
“I think you should do whatever feels right for you,” he says, standing and shouldering his backpack. “But for what it’s worth, I think you’re stronger than whatever you might find out.”