Destination: Daughter

Your destination, the GPS repeats, is on the right in 600 feet.

I am in Cary, North Carolina.

Only 600 feet from reuniting with the daughter to whom I gave birth 18 years ago today.

I find my destination.

My phone.

My voice.

Are you here? she exclaims.

Yes…are you here?

Oh my God! Yes!

Come outside?

Yes!

We’re still holding phones to our ears when she emerges.

Our eyes meet and our phones drop.

Before I remember to breathe, she’s already burrowed in my arms.

Her shoulder fuses to my chin like a long-lost limb.

Our arms grip each other’s rib cages.

Feet meet and rock in place.

We are a single silhouette of fabric and skin.

A single silhouette from which sobs and squeals and sighs are escaping.

A single silhouette being filmed by several lenses.

I shift away from the cameras, find her ear.

Darling girl, I whisper.

She squeezes tighter.

Oh, darling girl, happy birthday.

She sobs harder.

I find her shoulder again.

Breathe in the apple scent of her long brown hair.

Exhale a few sobs of my own.

We sway in the December air—five minutes? fifty-five minutes?—until our senses start to recover.

She lifts her head toward my ear.

I’ve been dreaming about this moment, she confesses.

Me too, I admit. How’s it going so far?

It’s perfect, she sighs.

You’re perfect, I whisper.

We squeeze each other until we’re both cry-laughing.

We do not let go until our tears have officially dissolved into giggles.