Sometimes there was five dollars.
Sometimes ten.
When he turned eleven, there was a twenty, and Adrian reacted as though royalty had contacted us.
“Oh, this is serious now,” he said, staring at the bill. “My secret person is moving up in the world.”
I laughed, but by then, the mystery had started bothering me too.
I checked postmarks.
Studied the handwriting.
Held envelopes against the light like someone in a cheap detective show.
I asked my mother.
My sister.
I even called an old friend and joked, “If you’re the weirdo mailing my kid birthday money, just tell me so I can stop wondering.”
Nobody knew anything.
Or nobody admitted it.
***Adrian loved the mystery. I hated it.***
Not because it seemed dangerous.
It never did.
It felt intentional.
Almost thoughtful.
That was what unsettled me.
Someone remembered my son every year with this strange little ritual while staying just far enough away to remain anonymous.
It felt like a hand resting at the edge of our lives.
When Adrian turned thirteen, he opened that year’s envelope at the kitchen table while I made pancakes.
He pulled out the card, looked inside, then narrowed his eyes at me.
“What?” I said.
He tilted his head.
“Are you doing this?”
***I laughed. “Doing what?”***
He held up the card.
“These. Every year. Is this one of your weird mom things?”
“I am offended you think I have this level of consistency.”
He did not laugh immediately.
He looked back at the card.
Then quietly asked, “Could it be my dad?”
That hit harder.
Adrian’s father was not some tragic lost love.
He was not a man separated from us by circumstances.
He was someone who disappeared the moment responsibility stopped being convenient.
He never met Adrian.
Never sent a present.
Never asked for a photograph.
Some years, I was not even sure he remembered I existed, much less that he had a son.
***So I answered the way I always did when that subject came too close.***
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