"Inside an elegant restaurant, a little girl suddenly pointed at Clara’s necklace and whispered, “

The rain had stopped by the time they walked out of the transit terminal onto the corner of Canal and Madison. The clouds had broken toward the east, revealing a narrow strip of deep indigo sky where the first pale stars were beginning to show through the city's orange haze.

The little girl walked between them, holding Elena's hand with her right fingers, while her left hand clutched the horse book Clara had quietly purchased at the kiosk without a word of explanation. She looked up at Clara every half-block, her small brow furrowing, trying to solve the puzzle of why this tall, soaked woman with the matching gold necklace was walking beside them instead of Uncle Marcus.

"Where is Uncle Marcus going on the big train?" the girl asked, her voice piping up against the hiss of tires on wet asphalt.

Elena hesitated, looking over the child’s head at Clara.

Clara stopped on the wide sidewalk near the bridge over the river. The water below was calm now, reflecting the amber streetlamps along the promenade where Clara had run in despair barely three hours ago.

Clara knelt down on the damp concrete. She did not care that the hem of her trousers was ruined or that the cold seeped through the fabric to her knees. She brought herself level with the little girl's dark, searching eyes.

"Uncle Marcus had to go on a long journey to rest, sweetheart," Clara said, her voice trembling slightly before settling into a gentle, melodic warmth. "He went to a place where his legs won't hurt anymore."

The girl looked at Clara’s neck. "You have the same necklace."

"Yes," Clara said. She reached behind her neck, unclasped the gold teardrop she had worn for five years, and held it in her open palm. "Do you know why I have it?"

The girl shook her head slowly, her bangs swaying across her forehead, revealing the crescent-shaped mark near her hairline.

"Because a long time ago, when you were very small, someone made two of them," Clara whispered, her thumb gently brushing the smooth gold surface. "One was for a little girl named Maya. And one was for her mother, so they would always be able to find their way back to each other, no matter how dark the storm got."

The child looked from the pendant up to Clara’s face, her small lips parting slightly. "My name is Lily."

"I know," Clara said softly, a genuine, radiant smile breaking through the exhaustion on her face. "And Lily is a beautiful name. But before you were Lily, you were my little bird. And you used to sleep in a room with silver stars on the ceiling, and you had a yellow rabbit named Barnaby who had one ear missing."

The girl’s eyes widened. Her small hand let go of Elena’s fingers.

She took half a step forward, her scuffed shoes clicking against the pavement, her head tilting with the exact, piercing curiosity that had belonged to her since the day she was born.