I loved my mornings, like something out of a movie. The sun barely touched the rooftops, soft jazz playing in my headphones, and everything felt perfect.
Every day followed the same routine: a morning run, a warm shower, my “orange coffee,” and a walk to work through the lively city streets filled with pre-holiday chaos.
That day, I stopped at my usual coffee shop, where the owner greeted me with, “The usual?” I handed him my card with a smile. As I continued walking, I passed a wood vendor’s stall and noticed a beautiful wooden pepper mill. I bought it for my mom for Thanksgiving.
At work, I got promoted, but not everyone was happy. Martha, a colleague, was upset. “This position was supposed to be mine,” she said bitterly. I shrugged it off.
Later, I found a strange note at my apartment door: “You stole my life.” It made me uneasy, but I tried to shake it off, focusing on Thanksgiving with my family.
At dinner, everything felt normal—until a delivery came. Inside was a small wooden toy car. The moment I touched it, memories rushed back: dreams, a hallway, a boy’s voice, and the words, “You stole my life.”
My parents revealed the truth: I was adopted. They had taken me from foster care when I was little, but I had no memory of it. Inside a box, they showed me fragments of my past—a photo of a boy named Samuel, someone I had promised to be adopted with, but never was.
After Thanksgiving, I drove to where the wood vendor usually set up. Samuel was there, carving wood. He remembered me and explained that I had forgotten him when I got a family. He sent me the toy car to remind me of him.
We talked, and over time, reconnected. Samuel opened a woodworking shop, and we started anew. A few weeks later, he gave me a set of pepper and salt shakers with our initials carved on them. “So you don’t forget me again,” he joked.
I never did.
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