She walked in and I knew before she said one word. Same nose. The exact nose I’d hated in every school picture. And then her hands. When she pulled out the chair, her hands looked just like mine, down to the same crooked little pinky. I actually felt dizzy for a second.

“You look just like her,” she said as she sat down. I didn’t ask who “her” was. I wasn’t ready for that yet.

She’d brought a folder. A worn manila one, soft and fuzzy at the corners like she’d opened it a thousand times. “I brought everything,” she said. “I didn’t want you thinking I made any of this up.” Birth records. Court papers from 1983. And then a photo. She held onto it for a second before she handed it over, like it hurt to let go.

Two little girls. One a chubby toddler with my nose, one a tiny baby wrapped tight in a hospital blanket. Both of them had those plastic hospital bracelets on their little wrists.

“That’s you,” she said, pointing at the baby. “And that’s me. I remember holding you.” Her voice cracked right in half. “I was two. Everybody tells me there’s no way I remember. But I do.”

I sat there holding a picture of myself from before I had a single memory of my own. I didn’t know what to say, so I said something dumb about how blurry the photo was. She just smiled and let me have the moment. To be fair, she’d had twenty years to get ready for this. I’d had three weeks.

Then she said it quiet. “Turn it over.”

I flipped it. There was handwriting on the back in faded blue pen. Two names with our birthdates under them.

And below that, a third name with three little words written next to it. “Temporary caregiver.”