The boy stared at her, confused by the tears in her eyes.

“My mom gave it to me,” he said softly. “Before she got sick.”

The woman gripped the photo tighter.

Her hands were shaking now, the gold bracelets on her wrist making a small, broken sound.

“What was her name?”

The boy swallowed.

“Mara.”

The woman covered her mouth.

For years, she had hated that name.

For years, she had been told Mara betrayed her, took the baby, and disappeared.

The boy looked scared.

“Did I do something wrong?”

The woman dropped to her knees in front of him, not caring that her expensive dress touched the dirty ground.

“No,” she whispered. “No, sweetheart.”

Behind them, wedding guests began to gather.

Her husband stepped out of the hall, angry and embarrassed.

“What are you doing?” he hissed. “People are watching.”

The woman didn’t look at him.

She held up the photo.

“Why does this child have a picture of me holding him as a baby?”

Her husband’s face turned pale.

The boy looked between them, clutching his empty stomach.

The woman’s voice broke.

“Answer me.”

Her husband whispered, “You were never supposed to find him.”

The woman stopped breathing.

The boy’s eyes filled with tears.

“What does that mean?”

She looked at the little boy’s face, at his trembling lips, at the tiny scar near his eyebrow.

The same scar her baby had the day he was born.

She pulled him into her arms and cried into his dirty hair.

“It means you found the right place,” she whispered. “You found your mother.”