**Diary Entry**
*What is a child without roots? Nothing. A ghost who happened to stumble upon a body.*
“You always felt like a ghost, didn’t you?” Michael asked, stirring his tea quietly in my spacious kitchen.
I looked at him—the only person who knew the whole truth. The one who helped me find *her*, the woman who carried me under her skin and then cast me aside like a discarded draft.
My first cry hadn’t melted her heart. The only thing she left behind was a note on a cheap blanket: *”Forgive me.”* One word. All the love I was never meant to know.
Margaret and Henry, an elderly, childless couple, found me on an early October morning. They opened their door and saw a crying bundle. They had enough humanity not to take me to an orphanage, but not enough to love me.
“You live under our roof, Emily, but remember—you’re not ours, and we’re not yours,” Margaret reminded me every year on the day they found me.
Their flat became my cage. I slept on a fold-out bed in the hallway. I ate their leftovers. My clothes came from charity shops, always two sizes too big. “You’ll grow into them,” she’d say. Except by the time I did, the fabric was already falling apart.
At school, I was an outcast. “Foundling,” they whispered behind my back.
I didn’t cry. What was the point? I stored it all inside—rage, determination, fuel for the fire.
At thirteen, I started working—handing out flyers, walking dogs. I hid the cash in a gap under the floorboards. One day, Margaret found it.
“Did you steal this?” She clutched the crumpled notes. “Knew it. Blood always tells…”
“It’s mine. I earned it,” I said.
She threw the money onto the table. “Then pay up. For food. For rent. It’s time.”
By fifteen, I worked every spare hour. At seventeen, I left for university in another city with a backpack and a shoebox—my only treasure: a snapshot of me as a newborn, taken by a nurse before my “mother” took me from the hospital.
“She never loved you, Emily,” Margaret said as I walked out. “Neither did we. At least we were honest.”
In halls, I shared a room with three girls. Lived on instant noodles. Studied until my eyes burned—only top marks, only scholarships. Nights were spent stacking shelves in a 24-hour shop. The other students laughed at my worn-out clothes. I didn’t hear them. I only heard one voice: *I’ll find her. I’ll show her who she abandoned.*
Nothing cuts deeper than knowing no one wants you. The shards stay lodged in your skin forever.
Michael knew my story. Knew how I clawed my way up, gasping for air.
“You know this won’t bring you peace,” he said once.
“I don’t want peace,” I answered. “I want to close the chapter.”
Life has a cruel sense of irony. Sometimes, it hands you the chance you never expected. In my third year, my professor assigned a marketing strategy for an organic skincare brand.
I didn’t sleep for three days. Every hurt, every hunger poured into that project. When I presented it, the room went silent.
A week later, my professor burst into my dorm. “Emily! Investors from London saw your pitch. They want a meeting.”
They offered me equity, not a wage. I signed, hands shaking—what did I have to lose?
A year later, the startup took off. My shares turned into money I’d never dreamed of. Enough for a flat in central London, investments, a new life.
By twenty-three, I had it all—a bright, spacious home. I carried in only two things: that backpack and the shoebox. The past stayed at the door.
But happiness didn’t. Just emptiness.
“You’ve got a ghost sitting on your shoulder,” Michael said.
I agreed. That’s when he helped. Michael wasn’t just a friend—he was a private investigator. Two years of searching. Dead ends. Then, he found *her*.
Helen Matthews, 47. Divorced. Living in a dingy council flat. Drifting between odd jobs. *No children.* Those two words burned worst of all.
He showed me her photo—a face worn down by life, eyes stripped of light.
“She’s looking for work,” Michael said. “Cleaning homes. Are you sure?”
“Absolutely,” I said.
We posted the ad. Michael conducted the interview at my desk while I watched through a hidden camera.
“Any experience, Helen?” he asked, formal.
“Yes,” she fidgeted. “Hotels, offices… I’ll work hard.”
“The employer expects perfection. Punctuality. Flawless work.”
“I understand. I need this job…”
Her voice was broken, shoulders hunched. Not a trace of pride left.
“You’re hired on probation,” Michael said.
When she left, I walked to the desk. Her ID sat there. The document of the woman who gave me life and took love with her.
“You still want to do this?” Michael asked.
“Now more than ever,” I said.
A week later, she arrived at my home—rags, lemon-scented cleaner, a shadow from the past.
The first meeting was brief. A nod, pretending to be busy.
She didn’t recognise me. Only desperation to keep the job flickered in her eyes.
I watched her scrub my floors, iron my shirts, wipe my mirrors. I left tips—not out of pity, but to make her return.
Two months. Eight cleanings. Helen became a ghost in my house, nearly invisible.
Sometimes, I’d catch her staring at my photos—Paris, conferences, smiling with colleagues. She’d study my face. Did she know?
“You’re torturing her,” Michael said. “And yourself.”
Maybe. But I couldn’t stop.
Then, it changed.
One day, she lingered by the bookshelf, holding my graduation photo. I stood in the doorway, watching her trembling fingers trace the glass.
I stepped forward.
“Recognise me?” I asked, cold.
The frame shook in her grip. She turned, guilty as a thief.
“Sorry… The dust—”
“Sit,” I said, my pulse hammering.
She perched on the edge of the chair, knuckles white.
“You look so familiar,” she whispered. “Like a girl… long ago.”
I snapped.
“Helen, twenty-five years ago, you left a baby on a stranger’s doorstep. A girl. Emily. Look at me.”
Her eyes lifted. Then she *knew*.
I pulled out that single photo—the newborn shot.
“This is me. You left me. Why?”
Her face crumpled. She dropped to her knees.
“I was young. The father left. My parents threw me out. I didn’t know what to do—”
“So you threw *me* away?” My voice cracked.
“I wanted better for you! Wanted you to be loved…”
I laughed bitterly. *”Loved?* They tolerated me.”
She sobbed. “I thought of you every day—”
“But you never looked,” I cut in.
She stammered—she’d gone back after a year, they’d told her no child was found. She gave up.
I watched her. And suddenly, the storm inside went still.
“No,” I said calmly. “I don’t want revenge. But I won’t forgive either. We’re free of each other now.”
I asked Michael to see her out.
When she was gone, I blocked her number.
I lifted the baby photo to my face.
“You made it,” I whispered. “You survived.”
A few days later, I unblocked her number.
I gave us a chance. To try again. To understand.
And maybe—just maybe—to forgive.
**Lesson:** The past is a shadow, not a chain. Sometimes, the only way to bury a ghost is to let it speak.
