Cam has been in the worst mood lately because the day before we left to go home, her Mom told her that she also has another brother.
That was six months ago and she won't talk to them.
She keeps asking me if she's being petty, but she's honestly not.
"I think breaks are good sometimes." I shrug.
Annabell is living with Matt.
Ethan got the cast off and he's walking normally now. He's at school. Max and Alex are napping.
She actually got the tattoo though, and it's my name curving under her right breast.
She's being quiet.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing, I just... just wish things were different sometimes."
"How?"
She shrugs.
"I just...my Dad, uncle Matt, I mean, he wasn't always horrible. He did actually care. I remember I had a nightmare when I was a little girl and he sang to me until I went back to sleep. I did care. My Aunt is in rehab now, and so us Uncle Matt. I just wish that My parents weren't my parents sometimes. I want a normal life, not surprise siblings and six grandparents and uncles and aunts that hate me. Why can't I be normal for once?"
I run my fingers through her hair.
"Are you unhappy?"
"I miss my life, Channing. I miss having parents to trust. I don't like living so far, but I never want to go back there permanently. All my life I wanted to be able to call my Mom with my problems, and I know I can, but I just...I don't trust them anymore. And what did my brother go through? Where is he? Is he okay?"
"I don't know."
"He's only sixteen." She whispers.
Her brother was six when she was seventeen.
She's eleven years old than him.
"What if he's in the system, or trapped in an abusive family like I was?"
"Let's find him." I shrug.
She hesitates.
"I feel like there's something you're not telling me."
"I just feel like..." I sigh. "I feel like you need to dig deeper into the family before you go trying to find your brother. I feel like there's a lot of lies and unburied secrets."
CAM'S POV
I agreed and started digging.
I couldn't find anything online, so I went to the FBI, and after a week of pestering, they let me view the family file.
Channing is taking Ethan to practice. He decided he wanted to do baseball instead of soccer. Max and Alex are with Channing.
I'm sitting at the dining room table, reading file after file.
Uncle Matt went to rehab at age twenty one?
That's how hold he was when Matt was born.
Confused, I dig deeper.
I hear Channing come home with the kids, but I don't look up, because holy shit.
I dig through the entire file.
"What?" Channing demands.
"This explains everything." I whisper. "Them moving...holy shit."
"What?" Channing demands.
