The peanut-butter sandwiches.
The crooked bench.
The brass ring.
The empty bridge.
The winter he waited.
Then he looked at her.
"You knew."
Nora swallowed.
"Yes."
"From the first day?"
"Yes."
His expression changed.
"You recognized me when you pushed that motorcycle into my garage."
Tears slid down her cheeks.
"Immediately."
Daniel stared.
For a long moment, he said nothing.
Then he asked the question she had dreaded more than any other.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
Nora looked at her hands.
She had prepared answers.
Explanations.
Whole speeches.
Now they seemed inadequate.
Finally, she whispered, "I was afraid."
Daniel's brow tightened.
"Of what?"
"That you wouldn't want to see me."
He stared.
She continued.
"I thought you'd received my letter. When you never answered, I believed you'd moved on."
Daniel went completely still.
"What letter?"
Nora looked up.
"The one I wrote after Daddy took me away."
He frowned.
"I never got a letter."
Her face crumpled.
"I know that now."
For a moment, the room seemed to disappear.
Daniel stared at her.
Nora wiped her cheeks.
"I wrote from a motel in Pennsylvania. I gave it to the man at the desk. I asked him to mail it."
Daniel's expression shifted.
He looked toward the window.
"I waited."
Her voice broke.
"I know."
"Almost a year."
She covered her mouth.
Daniel continued.
"I went to that bridge in the snow."
Nora began crying harder.
He looked at her.
"I went on your birthday."
She bowed her head.
"I thought you didn't want me anymore."
Daniel stared at her.
The sadness in his face seemed older than either of them.
For several moments, neither spoke.
Then he asked quietly, "Why didn't you tell me when you came back?"
Nora took a breath.
"Because I had spent forty-six years imagining that moment. And when I finally saw you, I became frightened of destroying the life you'd built."
Daniel looked toward the monitoring equipment.
"You could've asked."
"I know."
"You met Lucy."
"Yes."
"You listened to me talk about Elise."
Tears filled her eyes.
"Yes."
He looked directly at her.
"And you sat beside me at the bridge while I told you how much it hurt when you disappeared."
Nora lowered her head.
The words were not cruel.
They were simply true.
And that made them harder to bear.
"I'm sorry."
Daniel did not answer.