CHAPTER 2: THE WOMAN WITH THE YELLOW BLANKET
CHAPTER 2: THE WOMAN WITH THE YELLOW BLANKET
That evening, Catherine and several police officers followed Lily to an abandoned apartment building on the edge of the city.
The place looked ready to collapse.
Broken windows.
Peeling walls.
Dark hallways.
Lily led them to a small room on the third floor.
Inside sat an elderly woman.
She looked exhausted.
But when she saw the police, she didn't run.
Instead, she quietly closed her eyes.
"I knew this day would come."
Catherine's heart pounded.
"Where did you get her?"
The old woman looked at Lily.
Then tears rolled down her face.
"I didn't steal her."
The room went silent.
The woman explained everything.
Ten years earlier, she had found a crying toddler alone near the river after the festival.
The child had been injured and unable to speak.
Police searches had focused on another area of the city.
Nobody connected the missing child report to the little girl she found.
At first she planned to turn her in.
Then weeks passed.
Then months.
And eventually fear took over.
Fear that authorities would think she was guilty.
Fear that she would lose the only family she had ever known.
So she raised Lily herself.
In poverty.
But with love.
The yellow blanket was still there.
So was the hospital bracelet.
And dozens of newspaper clippings about Catherine's missing daughter.
The old woman had kept every one.
She never stopped wondering whether she had made the wrong decision.
Catherine looked around the tiny room.
There were no luxuries.
No signs of abuse.
Only evidence of sacrifice.
The old woman had worked multiple jobs to feed Lily.
She had sold nearly everything she owned.
And now she sat waiting for judgment.
Catherine's anger slowly gave way to something else.
Understanding.
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Because despite the mistake, one truth was impossible to ignore.
The woman had loved her daughter.
